#but maybe one day I will write a book about all this... The Sorrows of Young Finnish Musical Fan or something like that

[starlene]

My top 3 most insane interactions with the Finnish professional theatre community:

1) When a representative of [redacted] told me to take down my post with a cookie I had decorated to resemble a character in their musical, for I had edited a photo of said character next to the cookie, and that was unauthorized use of their promotional photography

2) The whole blackface debacle of 2016

3) When [redacted] from [redacted] accused me of making a two-part podcast episode (about a very wide-spread issue) just to accuse/insult them

Fun times!! Never forget, forgiveness handled on a case-by-case basis.

[n0thingbutlov3]

need you now

in which an impulsive voicemail leads to some secrets being spilled.

pairing: spencer reid x fem!reader. warnings/tags: angst (sorry i’m incapable of being nice lol) hurt/comfort tho!! lil bit of fluff too because i AM capable of being nice, alcohol consumption as a coping mechanism (i’m literally just a girl…) spencer and reader are broken up :( but they’re still sooo in love and it’s soo obvious so it’s fine!! (also it kind of gets fixed at the end-ish. you’ll see *evil smirk*) reader cries a lot (real) spencer is a cutie (as always) spencer and reader sleep together…no like literally, not in a funny business way, some swearing, no use of y/n!!! wc: 3k a/n: hihihi!! so this is my first fan fiction i’ve wrote and completed ever (gulp) it’s also my first time publishing one (gulp) my writing could definitely be better and so could my grammar tbh but i HOPE if you choose to read you’ll enjoy…feedback is always appreciated (plsplspls) also like requests?? if anyone’s into that—id love to write more but inspo is difficult sometimes. if there’s any spelling mistakes im sorry, eye am very tired!! it’s 5am *eye twitching* okay i’m going to sleep, gootbye IF U SAW ME EDITING THIS 5 TIMES NO U DIDNT (i’m bad at tumblr ok..)

“Hi. This is Doctor Spencer Reid. I’m not available right now, but leave a message and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can…”

His tinny voice cut off to make way for the signature beep of the beginning of a voicemail recording.

You could hang up now—you should hang up now, save yourself some dignity and go drown your sorrows in alcohol like a normal person instead of calling your ex-boyfriend.

You should, but your mouth was opening before your finger could reach the hang-up button, and…and it was a losing battle from the moment you clicked on Spencer’s icon.

“Uh—hi, it’s…it’s me.” You huffed out a sad laugh.

“So, um, I…I tried calling, but you didn’t answer so…” The static buzz of silence hummed through your ear, just inches from where you held your phone with a shaky grip. “maybe you’re on a case or out with friends, or someone else—“ You let the implication hang in the air—the thought of Spencer potentially being in a relationship bringing a lump to your throat.

You swallowed it down.

“I just…I just had an unbelievably shitty day, Spence.” You sniffed, wiping the moisture that had escaped from your eye with your sweater sleeve. “I know you’ve never read A Series of Unfortunate Events but I think I’d give those kids a run for their money.” You tried to laugh but it came out as more of a sob.

You inhaled shakily, trying to collect yourself and remember why on earth you thought it would be a good idea to call Spencer when you’d been broken up for months. Hell, you hadn’t heard from him at all since you had parted ways—except from the odd text about returning each others’ things. It was obvious he had moved on, and here you were, filling up his voicemail with blubbering messages and making references to adolescent books.

“God, sorry about this.” You breathed out a watery chuckle. “I just…didn’t want to be alone, I guess. But that’s-um-not your problem anymore, so I’m—I’m sorry. Have a nice night.” Your voice cracked and you hung up before you could start weeping down the line. You didn’t need to look even more pathetic.

You pulled your phone away from your ear, looking down at his contact photo through blurred vision. He was smiling—not the tight, closed lip smile he gave other people, but a full, bright smile that had his dimples showing. One of your hands was wrapped loosely around his neck and the other was holding your phone just far enough away to capture both of your smiles. Your head was rested on top of his shoulder, tilted just slightly to the left so your temple was brushing against his.

It felt like looking at a vintage photograph—you knew those people and their happiness existed at some point in time, but it wasn’t tangible; you couldn’t verify it was real.

When you were with Spencer, you never doubted how real it was. All you had to was look at him across the room and he’d flash you a smile identical to the one in that photo and you’d just…know.

It felt like forever ago now that you’d been on the receiving end of that grin and it killed you. So much so that before you could consider the repercussions, you were trudging through to your kitchen and grabbing the bottle of whiskey that sat unopened in your cabinet. It had been a present—from Rossi, actually. When Spencer had first introduced you to the team, the older man had given it to you as something of a welcome gift. Of course, he couldn’t have known you weren’t much of a drinker, and since you wanted to make a good impression (and because you were sure it had cost more than all the alcohol you had consumed in your life combined) you accepted it—deciding to save it for a rainy day.

You think this qualified.

You grabbed the bottle, a glass, and padded back through to your living room, slumping onto your couch. You filled your glass up a little less than halfway before gulping it down, enjoying the burn in your throat—it was better than the constant thickness.

You poured yourself another glass before turning on the TV. You weren’t sure what was playing—it didn’t really matter anyway, your vision was already being obscured by tears again.

You thought the pounding was in your head at first—serves you right for drinking half a bottle of whiskey. Only, it wasn’t, because moments later the pounding subsided and instead, your apartment door was opening, casting your pitch-black living room in a yellow glow which temporarily blinded you.

You squeezed your eyes shut, your mind hazy—again, serves you right for drinking half a bottle of whiskey. Someone was calling your name, but there was too much sensory input for you to make out who.

You certainly hoped it wasn’t a paramedic—maybe your neighbour had heard you sobbing for the last four hours and decided you needed a wellness check. Then there were hands on your face, and that had you flicking your eyes open, because you recognised those hands—impossibly soft, with a callus on his trigger finger being the only thing to mar them. Spencer.

“Spencer?” You slurred.

He sighed in exasperation (or relief) and tucked a stray strand of hair behind your ear.

“Are you alright? You weren’t answering your phone, I thought…” He trailed off, worry evident in his voice.

You sat up then, trying to compose yourself even though the room was spinning. Fucking whiskey. You rubbed your eyes haphazardly, blinking until you could finally see.

You should’ve stayed bleary-eyed. Because nothing could prepare you for the way your breath hitched when you finally saw him. After months of not seeing each other, Spencer was here, sitting on your couch, and he was looking at you like you were something fragile, and—God, you needed another drink. You turned away from him, reaching for the neck of the bottle as you spoke.

“I’m fine.”

Before you could lift it up, Spencer gently pried your hand away from the bottle with his own, and then slid it across the coffee table with his other.

“You’re drunk. No more of that, please.” His tone wasn’t unkind, but he left no room to argue. You probably would’ve objected anyway, if it weren’t for the way he kept his hand clasped around yours, rubbing soothing circles into your pulse point almost absentmindedly.

You glanced up to him—to stop yourself from staring at your hand in his and how natural it felt, more than anything—but that proved to be a mistake too, because he looked just as beautiful as thirty seconds prior and it felt just as natural for him to be sitting next to you on your sofa, but it wasn’t natural anymore.

“How did you get in?”

“My key.”

“Oh.”

Right. The key that he still had because you refused to meet up with him to let him return it. He tried for weeks to contact you, but you ignored him, because getting the key back meant things were finally over. You supposed he could return it now—maybe that’s why he came in the first place.

“Why did you come?” You asked, your voice impossibly small.

“You called.” He replied—as though he was talking about something as simple as the weather. You call and I come.

You searched in his eyes for any sign of a lie, but of course, there was none. He was being completely genuine—as always. You were the awful ex-girlfriend who left concerning voicemails on his phone and had him travelling to your apartment in the middle of the night only for him to look completely okay with the situation—like there was nothing he’d rather be doing than making sure you were safe.

You couldn’t help the way tears sprung to your eyes or your lip began to tremble as you lolled your head back onto the couch, pulling your gaze away from his.

“Angel, what’s wrong?”

You liked to consider yourself to be a strong person. You had been through things in your life that were objectively worse than your breakup with Spencer, but something about the gentleness of his tone and the way he had let one of his many (past) petnames for you slip had your throat tightening and you ducked your head into your one hand—the other still seized by Spencer’s—to try and muffle a sob.

“Hey,” He trailed his hand that was wrapped around yours up your arm, all the way to your shoulder blade before lightly guiding you towards him. You don’t have enough energy in you to fight his magnetic pull, so you shuffle over until you can bury your head into his shirt. You inhale his scent; vanilla, neroli, and so him it makes you ache.

Stopping your tears is futile—you’d know, they’d barely ceased all night—so you just let them fall, seeping into Spencer’s tie as he rubs one hand softly up and down your back, the other cradling the crown of your head.

His breathing is quiet and slow—the exact opposite of yours—and you try to imitate it—forcing air into your lungs. When your sobbing has turned to shaky breathing and the occasional sniffle, he speaks up.

“Do you want to talk?”

Talk about what? About what had happened today—what had led you to calling him? Talk about how for the last few months, he had been the only person you had wanted to call?

“No.” You hated how pitiful you sounded.

“Okay.”

Spencer didn’t say anything else for a minute—your synchronised breathing being the only thing to stop the room from falling into dead silence.

“You need to rehydrate.” He murmured, smoothing down your hair.

You hummed into him, in no hurry to unwrap yourself from his body. You probably wouldn’t get to be this close to him again, after all.

He moved both of his hands to your biceps, pulling you back slightly so you could look at him. He knitted his brows together in a silent plea which had you rolling your eyes petulantly, your lashes still damp from tears.

“Fine.” You peeled yourself off of him, pushing yourself into a standing position. Horrible mistake. You were still incredibly drunk, turns out, and everything was spinning a little bit and come to think of it, you were also nauseous and—

“Careful, lovely.” Spencer placed his hand firmly on the small of your back, keeping you upright.

and—actually, you were fine now.

He stood too, moving his hand just slightly over to your waist so he could guide you to the kitchen. When he knew you could stand upright—even if you were relying mostly on the counter behind you—he grabbed a glass from your cabinet, moving around effortlessly to pour you some water. The sight was so domestic you almost wanted to cry again. Maybe in some alternate timeline, where you and him could’ve worked, this would be an every day thing—minus the drunk sobbing part, of course.

He handed you the glass of water, watching as you took a few sips. He raised an eyebrow, nodding his head slowly.

“Whole thing, please.”

You let out an exasperated (affectionate) sigh and gulped the rest of it down, setting it on the counter behind you.

“Happy?”

“Very.”

You smirked, trailing your gaze down his body. He was still in his work clothes which, at the very least, meant he wasn’t on a date before he came here. He always changed before dates—well, for you, anyway. You wondered if he had been on any dates since the breakup—you certainly hadn’t. It had been long enough now that it wouldn’t be weird for you to start seeing other people—but you didn’t want to. You weren’t sure you’d ever want to, to be completely honest.

The more you thought about it, the more the whole thing seemed stupid. You didn’t want anyone else, you wanted Spencer. You had tried to get over him but if tonight was any indication—it clearly wasn’t working. You can’t even remember why you broke up in the first place—it all seemed so insignificant now. No amount of pain you had ever experienced in your relationship had come close to that of living without him.

You met his eyes once more and it was like he could see the question brewing. He tried to stop you, calling your name in a quiet warning, but you ignored him.

“Why did we break up?”

He frowned, pulling his bottom lip between his teeth with his tongue in that maddening way he did.

“I—you know why—“

“No, but I don’t! I know things were difficult sometimes but that doesn’t mean it didn’t work. It worked—we worked.” Your eyes were stinging again.

Spencer pressed his index and middle finger into his eye, furrowing his brows.

“I know, I know we worked, angel—but you were sad all the time, remember? I was gone so often and it wasn’t good for you.” His true emotions were indecipherable but his tone was soft, and you wished you could be as calm about this as him. Did he just not care as much as you did?

“But It’s—It’s worse now—“ You choked out, tears falling freely now. “I was sad when you were gone, but you always came back—you don’t come back anymore.”

Spencer removed his hand from his face, flexing it at his side like he was uncertain what to do with himself before taking a stride towards you. He brought a hand to your face, wiping the tears from under your eyes delicately—like you were made of porcelain.

“Listen, sweetheart—alcohol affects your ability to regulate your emotions and I know right now it might feel worse but that doesn’t mean it always—“

“Spencer, stop! It’s not the fucking alcohol, I miss you! I miss you all of the time! Even—even when I’m having a good day—I still want you—and especially when I—when I have a bad day—“ You choked out through heaving breaths.

“Breathe.” He urges, cupping your cheek. And you’re so, so angry, and sad, and tired that you have no choice but to shut up and listen to him. When you’ve adequately calmed down, he moves his hand to your jaw, tilting your head up to look at him.

“I don’t think we should talk about this tonight but I—“ You open your mouth to protest.

“I promise we can talk about it tomorrow when you’re sober—if you still want to.”

Your lip trembles of its own volition and you frown.

“Of course I want to.”

“Okay,”

“Okay.”

He gives your eyes a final wipe before he’s—rather unexpectedly—pulling you into a hug. You all but melt into him, your head finding its home in his sternum and your arms wrapping around his middle. He tilts his head down, kissing the top of your head—and you’re certain you can’t let this go again. You will chain him down before Spencer leaves this apartment again.

Everything is wordless from there—mostly because you’re so, so exhausted that even talking seems like too difficult a task. Spencer helps you find something more comfortable to change into and you pull out an old t-shirt of his and a pair of plaid pyjama pants you had kept here for him. I guess your keeping them ‘just in case you needed them in the future’ had come in handy, after all.

As you washed your face, Spencer snuck through to the kitchen, refilling your water and grabbing two aspirin in a not-so-subtle attempt to help the inevitable hangover you were going to have in the morning.

You caught him placing them on your bedside table and mock gasped.

“Trying to drug me in my sleep so you can make a run for it in the night?”

He grinned lazily—exhaustion creeping up on him as well.

“I wouldn’t dream of it.”

You smiled, flopping yourself onto your bed rather ungraciously. Spencer looked at you like you were something fascinating before biting his lip, clearly deep in thought.

“What?” You let out a self-effacing little chuckle.

“I was just…wondering…if you’d like me to sleep on the couch?”

You probably should’ve been more careful in your facial expressions considering you were still broken up but your thoughts about that offer were obvious.

“No, stay.” Stay in your bed, in your apartment—stay anywhere that was close to you.

Maybe you were coming on a little too strong.

“Unless you want to, I mean—“

“No, no—I’ll stay.” Forever, preferably.

He walked around to the other side of your bed—as he had done so many times before—and sat down, pulling the covers over his legs. You mirrored his movements before flicking your bedside lamp out, turning to face him.

You were a little thankful you were so out of it, because this had the potential to be very awkward otherwise. Spencer shuffled down so that he was at eye level with you, turning to face you as well.

You just stared for a moment, committing him to memory. The moonlight had a way of highlighting all the high points of his face, and the twinkle in his eyes, and—God, you were so glad the moon existed and that Spencer was in your bed that you couldn’t help but giggle.

“What?” Spencer laughed along with you, even though he had no idea what was so funny.

“Nothing. You’re pretty.”

“You’re drunk. Go to sleep.”

“Don’t wanna.”

“Why?”

“Scared you’ll be gone when I wake up—like I made it all up.”

Spencer’s smile faded then, and he looked at you with something that seemed so much like the one thing you had been willing yourself to stop doing the whole time that you’d been broken up, that it almost took your breath away.

“I won’t. I promised, didn’t I?”

You nodded.

“So there’s nothing to worry about. Now get some sleep, lovely.”

You smiled, feeling Spencer’s hand inching towards yours. He intertwined them and gave yours a squeeze.

“Just in case you make a run for it in the night.”

You chuckled, your eyelids fluttering shut. Yeah, you could make it work.

part two!

[eldrith]

i literally just thought abt this ajehbsha but like what if the reader was jace's bethrothed that was "killed" by the greens during the dance, but was actually captured and brainwashed her to be an assasin ksjwbsna

think of it somewhat like bucky barnes

safe flight on ur trip!:)

BABE YOUR MIND…. also i haven't seen the marvel movies in ages so im kinda going off what i can recall . and i took this in a bit of a diff direction i hope thats ok but i love this i could write a whole fucking book about this omfg. your mind is beautiful id love to keep it in a jar warnings: mentions of torture, death, assassinations, angst, allusions to smut if you squint, targcest bc its implied you are aegon's sister/of valyrian blood, brief allusion to suicidal thoughts, fluff mostly at the end and is a bit canon divergent. and yes i know this is 3.1k words but it's still a headcanon ok. its just a great concept

you and jacaerys are betrothed when you are young.

despite this, you remain close; shy smiles, kind whispers and youthful awkwardness that blossoms into a strong, devoted friendship. you're to be queen - and he, king. indeed you study for your future duties side by side, with prideful grins - and along the way, you find time for yourselves.

in youth, it is in teaching jacaerys to sew and read tarot, painting, or maybe even showing him the game you used to play with your brothers; it is in him teaching you to wield a sword, studying high valyrian together, him showing you how to climb the castle's ramparts, and inviting you along with he and luke to throw stones at the sea.

as you grow old, it is in jacaerys giving you rides on vermax, dancing with him any chance you can, exploring nature - mountains with caves and tall waterfalls that he pulls you under with feverish kisses, finding ways to sneak to each other's chambers; it is in you kissing his cheek and teasing him when his face grows pink, bringing lucerys along with the two of you when you begin to sneak out of the castle, in sharing too many cups of wine and stumbling to your quarters, in hands weaving through each other's hair.

it is nice.

but then, the war.

things are as okay as they can be for a while- duty is a blessing and a curse for you both. tensions mount. jacaerys feels like everything is falling apart, but he has you; his best friend, his lover, his favorite person in the entirety of the seven kingdoms. you cry with each other, train with each other, sneak off when things become too intense in court. you begin to whisper about a secret wedding, a traditional valyrian one; intimate, quiet.

he just wants to call you his wife, and you just want to call him your husband. but duty has a way of interfering with even the sweetest plans.

the evening jace leaves to treat at winterfell, you clasp a chain round his neck, one you strung your favorite ring through; a keepsake, perhaps. or as he likes to think, a reminder of you during the cold nights in the north.

despite it all, things are okay.

until he loses you.

you are killed with your dragon, defending a crucial line of passage for their men; vhagar and aemond are the last ones to see you as your dragon spirals beyond a hill, wings singed and aflame. you vanish.

jace is overwhelmed with grief.

the news comes just as he's beginning to find himself in a new world - a world without his younger brother - and he, an empty pit of grief and despair, isolates himself from others. consumed by sorrow and rage, his emotions spiral out of control - snapping, yelling, unable to contain his emotions even at council.

his days are marked by a deep mourning that he's unsure will ever be mended. life continues in its droll capacity - the war rages on, and jace becomes more bitter, and more like his great uncle daemon. bloodthirsty, demanding revenge.

and then, you return from the dead.

the day you come back to him is rainy and drowsy. he had foolishly, or in a bout of grief, not noticed the sounds of dragon overhead the caste; a dragon whose screech he had not heard in many moons.

his mother is the one to find him - alone, staring at the hearth in his quarters, eyes filmed with the glossy haze of sorrow.

rhaenyra's face is ghostly, sickly - and he grows immediately concerned as he sees her expression, rising to grasp her arms. "mother, are you well?"

he is shocked when he hears her whisper out: "she's alive."

his worry for his mother vanishes, blinded by her words. you. you're...

and despite being ordered to remain, his legs carry him out - to you. his mother's own footfalls follow behind him, her voice begging. he does not listen, even when she warns him - there is something that isn't right.

when he finally finds you he's elated, heart nearly stopping when your eyes meet.

but there's something missing.

when he takes you into his arms, you're cold; barely blinking, you are not who you used to be.

his own tears distort his vision as he cups your face, pressing a kiss to your full lips - and perhaps that is why he does not notice the sullen, empty look on your face. but he feels it in the way your lips do not kiss back.

jace tries to ignore it, at first.

as you are nursed back to physical health, you avoid telling the court of the truth. all that is revealed is the harrowing tale of your mangled body, put back together by the maester in the red keep; your mutilated dragon, whose health was dangled over your head by your own brother, the one whose head bears a crown that is not his.

you do not speak of your time, but the nightmares you wake from, screaming your throat raw, speak for themselves.

you heal.

you begin to show some signs of humanity after the initial shock subsides; and when you begin to seek his touch, he is glad for that semblance of what you used to have.

but it isn't the same.

you flinch at the slightest movements; your face, once expressive and joyful, is rarely lax of the straight, icy stare you send mostly towards walls. he knows he must be patient; you've endured something he could not imagine - but he cannot help his unease.

you do not speak as you used to - lapse in memory, seemingly unfamiliar with jacaerys; as if you did not grow up together, running down halls, whispering secrets, notching each other’s heights in the frame of your chamber’s threshold.

he can't help when he begins to turn away from your lips, avoiding the mechanical feeling of your mouth upon his, the coldness of your eyes when you attempt to unlace his tunic.

he feels as though it is a different person that tries to kiss him each time. he grows incredibly lonely.

in time, he is suspicious of you. you're... different. during conversations, you forget important details, you cannot recall milestones or memories you used to cherish.

the way your palm fits oddly into his, the way you no longer brush his hair back when it falls into his eyes. you call him jacaerys, or your grace - that, indeed, is the first seed planted in the suspicion of his mind. always jacaerys, never jace - and when he asks you what you do with all the time you spend alone in your chambers, you lock up as if mute.

when performing certain duties around the queen, your eyes would slide to odd objects, or pay close attention to cupbearers and how the queen enjoys her wine.

and he begins tracking your walks when you think you're alone: he discovers you sending ravens with a cloak pulled low over your head, visiting odd alleys in town and disappearing into the lower bowels of peculiar shoppes.

jace goes to daemon, of all people - daemon, first. he knows his stepfather's reputation—ruthless, cunning, and fiercely protective; if anyone can help him discern the truth, it's him. "something is not right," he tells him, worried daemon would somehow turn it into something it's not.

even worse, though, is that daemon is quick to agree. and when jace tells his mother, she confesses her own concern.

"that isn't her," his voice warbled when he tells his mother - lip, trembling, tears tracking down his cheeks as she pulls him into her embrace, her own fear poorly concealed.

when it finally happens, it is a shock to his entire body.

a mere word; murmured, off-hand at a council you happened to be attending - of which you often no longer attended, your trauma and recovery from the kidnapping having sequestered you to your quarters most days.

"Usurper," he'd said.

and then your head had snapped up.

a change in your face - as if no longer human, you’d leapt, ripping out a dagger that had been concealed in your bodice.

and then you'd lunged at him; slicing like a hound rabid for a piece of meat.

he does not remember much besides his reaction: striking you across the cheek and disarming you- kicking hard, your body being thrown to the stone. four swords at your throat. daemon holding you down with a look of disbelief at your heaving frame.

you were relentless, ready to kill - but you are too small, and the rest too many.

a stinging pain, throbbing at his neck as he watches you in shock.

but that was not you - a statue, some sleeping beast that'd been awoken in your tortured brain at the trigger of such a word. it had nearly been worse than when you'd died.

brainwashed, maester gerardys tells them.

it is not until after you have been thrown into the cells below and a bandage sealed around jace's neck.

the blade was one of green and black hilt; intended, likely, for the queen herself - in hopes that she'd have been the first one to utter the word.

likely, maester gerardys says, you were led to believe you'd been abandoned by them, and subsequently tortured for all the time you'd been held at the red keep.

and of course, there was the threat of further maiming your dragon, perhaps, or other similar threats - and physical torture, if the scars on your body are anything to go by; this twists a raw agony in jace's gut and he has to shut his eyes to ward off the thought of you, in pain.

it is a miracle you did not lose your head for nearly slitting the throat of the crown prince; he contests while still lying abed with the open slice of red across his throat, relieved when his mother informs him you are still among the living. she is a merciful queen.

he does not weep until he is alone that night.

breaking the brainwashing is the hardest part.

nights, falling asleep in his brothers or his mother's quarters where your screams of anguish or anger could not be heard - days walking past your heavily guarded chamber to reach his own, swallowing thick as he imagines you on the other side.

isolation is key, he's been told, but it makes it so much worse.

it takes so long that jacaerys nearly forgets what your voice sounds like, how your eyes shine in the sun. he forgets how your smile, beautiful and uneven, makes his heart flip; the taste of your lips, the cadence of your voice.

he even finds himself praying to the seven for the first time since he was just a babe.

slowly, as you begin to heal, you are permitted to see others. he is not allowed, nor is his mother - daemon first, then baela and rhaena with their grandmother. servants and maids.

he begins to hear you again. walking past the chambers which lie near his own, he'd hear your voice, conversing quietly with maester gerardys. when he dozes off over a strategy tome at his desk, he is jolted awake by your gentle, haunting humming; a tune he used to love.

his mother tells him it is not healthy to keep it in.

but he cannot bring himself to speak of it.

shame, pain, anguish, embarrassment - heartbreak. he has grieved you twice over, seen you become a ghost. he has lost you and lost you again.

herbs, potions, guided discussions and meditations. solitary confinement, exposure to the word - all of this, and you begin to shed the skin of whatever person they had made you into.

he pretends that he does not endure nightmares of that day every time his eyes close - of the glint of your knife, the soulless stare of your eyes. the swelling bruise on your cheek - in the shape of his own fist.

there is a thin scar, a puckered pink line of fresh skin across the apple of his throat the next time he sees you.

it's an accident; he walks past just as a maid leaves your chambers, and he naturally glances over. your eyes meet him, hair wet and fresh from bathing; wide as a sweet doe, pain and regret laced through your gaze. "jace."

his throat is tight when he hears your voice - gentle, laced with remorse. jace, you'd called him. he hides the tears in his eyes when he continues briskly past your chambers. he thinks about you ceaselessly the rest of the day.

he's told you do not sleep. you eat only when it becomes impossible not to, you cannot make meaningful eye contact nor hold steady conversations without breaking down in guilt. it eats away at him.

but as you begin to show signs of improvement, jacaerys is finally allowed to visit.

they're brief, supervised; he brings paintings, books, and anything they believe could help stimulate your memory of life before your change. he tries to ignore the sting of pain when you barely meet his gaze, voice stuttering, hands shaking.

you’re still not you; flickering eyes, quiet voice. but soon, after moons of quiet conversation, stunted by the armored guards standing between you and observing your every move, it changes.

little by little, he sees glimpses of you again. you laugh like you used to. you recount stories of your shared youth - with a grin, you remember the day he'd fallen from an apple tree trying to pick you a fruit, and you'd had to snap his arm into correct place.

you brush flecks of dust and lint from his shoulder with shy looks, you share the books you’ve been reading; one day, you ask him to braid your hair - a task you'd taught him in youth. you fall asleep when he's halfway through.

and yes, there are bad days - days where your grief and guilt eat your stomach and you refuse to even look him in the eye; when you sob into your hands and curl yourself on the chaise longue and jace is stuck, heartbroken, watching you push him away.

you do not forgive yourself, you will not let him forgive you - but you soon let him hold you, and you soon begin to hold him back with a desperate grip.

it takes a while for jace to accept help.

but soon, he undergoes his own healing process; he knows he must reconcile the grief of losing you with the joy of having you back, albeit changed.

eventually, he speaks openly with you about the death of lucerys and about your own assumed death as well. you stroke his hair when he cries into your chest, you kiss his nose and cheeks to rid the tracks of tears.

during quieter moments, you find solace in each other's presence. you walk together in the gardens, hand in hand, your steps in sync as you talk about the future; you sit by the hearth in the evenings, your heads close as you share whispered conversations and stolen glances.

you broach the subject one stormy day, your beautiful hair loose and whipping around your head.

he watches your mind churn behind those eyes, the ones that have regained their expressive nature - the eyes he's loved since before he knew such a word.

"i would have killed you." it's a whisper into the wind. "and yet, you saved my life."

your voice is not grateful - to his horror, it is pained - as if you believe such repentance could only be achieved through greeting the stranger.

he shakes his head, "it was not you who did it." but you've heard it countless times, and you still find it hard to accept - guilt swims in your beautiful eyes.

"i love you." he whispers it.

tears drop from your eyes as you look at him. "why?"

eventually, the fog clears fully.

you remember the details of your manipulation, the torture, the indoctrinating, the conditioning. you confess it all to queen rhaenyra and the dragonstone court - voice shaking and body bent with shame, you apologize for your weakness. jace has to look away when you begin to cry, when you beg for forgiveness, for another chance.

it is given without hesitance.

one evening, you sit by the fire with him.

something upon him catches your eye; with a tentative reach, your fingers brush his chest. jace looks down, breath catching as he realizes what you've found; gently, you pull the necklace from his tunic - a ring upon it, untarnished. your smile is sad, sorrowful - "you kept it," you whisper.

he can only nod, eyes never leaving yours. "i never took it off."

it is that night you tell him about a dream you had; you were both young again, carefree and in love. his eyes glisten with unshed tears just as yours do, and he takes your hand, pressing a kiss to your knuckles. "we'll get there," he promises, his voice unwavering. you both believe it.

you come back to him in ways he doesn't expect.

longing glances, eyes holding on his lips when he speaks to you - short teases that release your sharp tongue and quick wit. you are given some old duties back. kept to the castle, you mostly held draw efforts from within, but he can see the fire in your eyes return as the guilt subsides.

when the word usurper is accidentally used in conversation, eyes still flicker to you. there will remain wariness - conscious or not - for the rest of your days. but you prove yourself loyal and trustworthy, and you soon begin to forgive yourself.

nights you spend in jace's arms, fingers brushing against the scar you'd given him. tears are replaced with soft kisses upon lips, and eventually upon flushed, sweat-laced skin.

he is terrified each time you ride into battle - even when he and vermax are alongside you.

perhaps it is a weakness - to worry so, during a war; he cannot help it. but to his relief, you always come out unscathed, as does he - and you always slide off the wing of your dragon and pull him to you, murmuring into his neck, soothing over his back with your palm once you return.

you love him, and you tell him as much any chance you get. you begin to stop wincing when he tells you he loves you, too.

you still wake sometimes with a hoarse throat, but now you are soothed back to sleep when jace, bleary eyed and heart pounding, crawls into your bed alongside you. your cries turn into soft puffs of breath as he braids your hair until you fall asleep.

you still sometimes flinch when someone raises a hand, jace sometimes watches with wariness when he sees you wielding a knife.

but eventually the war ends.

you and jace marry.

a traditional, valyrian one; dragonglass sliced into lips, palms. a kiss that tastes of metal, of loyalty, of love. you whisper the words to each other, no echo of ghosts nor fear in your minds.

one flesh, one heart, one soul. now and forever.

you become prince and princess of dragonstone, first in line for the succession to the iron throne.

you show to be just rulers; fair and kind, strong willed and bright. ceaselessly, fiercely in love.

your firstborn son is named lucerys.

he has jace's eyes and your hair. you sing him the song jace remembers you humming those days after you came back to them - and when the queen visits to give her congratulations and to meet her grandbabe, the heir to the heir, she calls you daughter.

the scar upon his neck fades away, until you can scarcely trace it with your finger as he pulls you to him in the late hours of eve, wrapped in furs and the soft flicker of candlelight.

you do not hear the word usurper again.

requests open, or talk to me <3 taglist/mutuals; @bitchydragonparadisee @lukehughes43 @rhea-ripley @jottositto @chloe-petrichors @softspiderling @dipperscavern

[inkskinned]

i know some of the poets outside of their books, like cameron awkward-rich; who was my seminar teacher for a semester in grad school. you know him, he wrote about keeping his hand on the walls of his stupid heart. he gave us a journal without lines in it, so the pages were all blank and naked. we had to write down 3 words every day, ruminations on our own lives.

in pink glitter pen, i watched my handwriting cramp and spill from pristine and well-meaning to the slant of someone deeply suffering. the words stopped being lyrical over the course of february. bad, it said. bad and bad and bad. each day carving out a little bit of marrow, the sparrow of my heart acting as roadkill. that winter i was only allowed to eat apples, like a horse. my ocd had decided i could only touch food if it was red. i was sleeping on the floor and a spider bit me.

i wanted him to be my thesis advisor, but it was covid the next year, and we never spoke again, and i'm worried that i embarrassed myself by asking him repeatedly. for my final project in his class, i wrote about my disability. i called myself a rat, fondly.

his most famous poem is titled Meditations in an Emergency. i didn't know it until three weeks after i had graduated from that university.

at one point, he sat me down after class just to discuss some of my work. it was a night class, and we were all a little drowsy. he blinked up at me. i think sometimes the way you see the world is a little bit alarming. i wonder about that, in hindsight. i wonder if all of us who are walking on thumbtacks always recognize when someone else's spine is the undulating form of a siren. i could see it in him and you can see it in me, if you're looking.

yesterday nat said some of this is worrying.

i told cameron i was fine and i told nat i was fine, but i think maybe all of us had learned a long time ago how to be fine the way a poem is fine - because it happens outside of you. it can be honest, the confession, but it cannot be spelled out across your ribs. we make our art so that the sorrow can hang, limbless, trembling on the fetid walls beside us.

you learn to turn the ugliness into some kind of work, because you must smash the entire human experience of your stupid bones and teeth and tongue into something, so that you have anything to show for it. otherwise, what is the fucking point. why were you suffering, if not to polish the runoff and say - the melancholy is the signature of my art. i took the splinters out of my gums and filed them down into a thesis. the thesis has been turned into a book which is getting published.

cameron, to my knowledge, still has not read it.

i hope he has found his way out of the maze. i hope you and i one day write our own lanterns. i hope we are able to find some kind of peace without viscera. without having to fight for it. i hope we are able to stumble without falling. i hope one day the sky is empty of vultures and we can cross the desert of our memories without starving.

in the meantime we get up and leave the circled shadow in the writing.

[cardinal-crossing]

Another edition to the flower series!! I had a lot of fun once again, and I think this one took even longer, at just shy of 7 hours. I am so happy that I'm graduating in a few days so I can do more stuff like this. It really does make me very happy to just sit down and paint for a few hours. This piece is a companion piece to the Emmet One, I did a few days ago.

Again, the flower meanings will be under the cut, but read at your discretion because it makes the piece sad.

Alright so flower meanings! Again most of the flowers mean grief in some aspect, but it's also related to memory (or the loss of) Rosemary Flowers (top left in the hat): Rosemary flowers usually represent love and remembrance. In this case, they represent Ingo's love for his missing person but the pain that comes with not being able to remember.

Asphodel Flowers (On the left near Ingo's face): The Asphodel flowers mean, "My regrets follow you to the grave," but it can also mean, "I will remember you beyond the tomb." The second meaning is the one that I am referencing, as Ingo will likely never see Emmet again, but he remembers that he misses someone, and regrets that he never got to meet them again.

White Camellia (over the eye): This flower means a few different things, but the one that I am referencing is the meaning "longing for you." I believe the camellia is akin to the rose, where its more familiar meaning is romance or heartbreak. Still, the meaning I am deriving from is one of the Victorian languages of flowers (there is a fantastic book I will reference at the very end of it is incredible and I love it dearly) Anyway, this flower is self-explanatory in the way that Ingo longs for the person he never remembers and likely will never see again, but he wishes he could. Forget-Me-Nots (on the right by Ingo's face): I reused this flower from the other piece to connect the two pieces, but I'll reuse the meaning here, as I am using it in the same context. Forget-me-nots represent true love; this flower means love and respect towards the person it is gifted to, and the person will never be forgotten in your thoughts. I am slightly alluding to maybe Ingo being gifted this flower by Emmet before he departed, as a reminder that someone respects and loves him very much, but Ingo cannot remember who. However, I haven't decided yet. Lily of the Valley (Very bottom in the bouquet): The lily of the valley's lesser-known meaning, the pain, and loss that comes with death, is the one I'm using. Representing Ingo's minimal memory of Emmet and Emmet essentially dying within Ingo's mind as Ingo makes a new home for himself in Hisui. However, despite all the sadness and loss, Ingo hasn't forgotten entirely. Willow Tree Leaves (on the right side in the hat band): I reused these as well, as I really like the shape of the leaves and how I worked it into the piece, I'll also reuse the same explanation of the meaning. While not technically a flower, the willow tree has its own meaning. A willow tree often represents sorrow and loss, as well as mourning. OKAY! Here is my rant about flowers. Also, the book I referenced is Florigrophy by Jessica Roux. I love all the illustrations, and the writing and explanations are wonderful. I am working on getting a copy of my own, as I have been borrowing the one from my school library, but it is wonderful. I would recommend it. Thank you so much for reading this! I love flowers, and painting them is one of my favorite things.

[cbrownjc]

Thoughts and Speculation after 2x07 (Spoilers):

A lot of people have said that this moment from the Season 2 trailers might actually be caused by a fight between Louis and Armand in the penthouse:

gif credit: @hermit-frog

And I have to say, after watching episode 2x07? I think they might be right.

Because if you know the book, you know that it is at the very end of it, like literally the last few pages, where it's revealed that Louis knew the whole time about Armand's role in what happened to Claudia. And they break up.

And so I think the same thing is coming next week on the show. Only in the show's regard, Louis knew of Armand's role, as we saw here -- but then was made to forget the actual full context of just how involved Armand was.

Because, as I pointed out on Twitter, this image from the trial --

-- is quite something. You have both the writer and director for the Théâtre des Vampires not on stage for this whole thing. Very much underlying the fact that this is a theatrical play that is being put on. As we saw, there was even a real, actual SCRIPT for this whole thing!

Like, how much more could the show have been pointing to what was really going on here? Trust a writing staff of playwrights to be meta about all of this. 🙃

Because the ending of this trial was written and locked in long ago. And who is the one that usually says when a play or film is locked in and finished?

The Director. (And yes I know producers and studios do too, but Armand is very much all of that wrt his role for their little theater as well).

BTW, Santiago and the coven did NOT expect Armand to do that to the audience. Saving Louis was very much off-script. And if Armand really had no power here, the coven could have just taken Louis off stage and killed him another way. The only reason they didn't was because Armand was very much not powerless in all of this.

Like, I love Armand's character, I really do -- now. But that is something that only came about after I read the books from Queen of the Damned forward. For the first two books, I very much did not like him. And, particularly when it comes to the Paris part of this story, that is where we are with his character right now. I know why he's doing what he's doing, I understand it. But I can't defend it.

Louis probably figured things out before San Francisco in 1973. He probably knew Armand's full role in what went down, same as in the book, after it all happened. But it was his suicide attempt that had Armand redact that knowledge from Louis' mind. The clues for that being the case are all there after episode 2x05.

Because, at the end of the day, even knowing Armand's full role in Claudia's death, Louis still mostly blamed himself for it all.

As we see, things are slowly starting to come back to Louis, but he's not fully there yet. And I think this whole memory thing is a more literal interpretation of the veil that descended over Louis' mind after Paris in the books.

A veil that only began to lift once Armand revealed to Louis that Lestat was alive. As we've seen, Louis knew Lestat was alive back in 1973. I'm not sure if he does so now. But maybe this isn't about knowing if Lestat is alive or not. Maybe it's just Louis thinking he needed to be punished because of his own role in failing Claudia -- and staying away from Lestat was part of that self-punishment. Because that view is a feeling I got when watching episode 2x05 and Louis not wanting to speak to Lestat. His refusal to speak wasn't out of anger IMO, but more fear and even sorrow.

The show is very much sticking to the beats of the book with all of this, and not revealing things about what happened that were revealed in later books. So I don't think Louis fully knows what was going on with Lestat during that trial. I wouldn't be surprised if we learn he still doesn't, since he never learned it in the first book.

But as I said here, it was clear as day that Lestat wasn't himself during that trial. Physically and especially mentally. I didn't even guess that the show would be that obvious about it, but they were. All very much hinting about what was really going on with his appearance here.

And Louis himself might, just might figure that out for himself. Especially if Dreamstat might appear to be back in his mind again. Because Dreamstat is very much Louis' subconscious. And I think Louis' subconscious knows something important is missing wrt all of this.

It was nice that, at least in the end, someone chose Claudia. Madeleine could have escaped this but chose to die with Claudia instead when she didn't have to. Her little middle finger to the crowd gave me a smile.

They did not do the full reveal of Claudia's diaries and what was in them on stage, which I seriously thought they would. They gave a hint about it, but more so in episode 2x05 than in here. Which means that, in a later season, we're still looking at that reveal from Merrick happening it seems. But then again . . . there were some things I suspect got left out on purpose because the actual (attempted) murder of Lestat was very much glossed over for us, the audience, during that trial sequence. We are very much set to revisit that whole thing during The Vampire Lestat adaptation in Season 3, of course. But I think even more will be revealed about that there then I originally thought.

And finally, Claudia. They said in the Inside The Episode they wanted her to go out with as much strength and defiance as she could and yeah, she did. But in the end, I still think she was angry, sad, and hurt by it all, which she had every right to be. Because at the end of the day, she never should have been made and was made for all the wrong reasons. But being turned so young made her a fierce and pure vampire though and though because she never had enough time to have lived a human life to have those types of morals and outlooks fully imprinted on her. That was always one of Claudia's core traits wrt her being turned so young, and she still had it here. And yes girl, you will haunt things after this -- particularly your parents.

In fact, it probably very much was your voice Louis heard calling him back in 2x05, wasn't it?

So, for a penultimate episode, this was very, very good. And things are very much going to explode next week. I knew Louis going Carrie/Firestarter on the coven would happen in 2x08. That moment always screamed "season finale" to me. Santiago picking up Claudia's yellow dress is also significant, as I think we'll see Louis' POV of that moment with Lestat about it.

And the break up between Louis and Armand might just be much more violent than it was in the book as well.

[unpickled-olive]

Realizing that, while I like Destiny lore, what I love is Seth Dickinson's writing.

The Final Shape was a lovely story and the characters' archs were all emotional and satisfying. Maybe a nostalgic tear was shed for Cayde bonding with his reformed, resurrected killer.

But the things that have kept me coming back for 9 years were missing. I thought there'd be concrete answers about the Traveler, or some more thorough insights into the Witness, or even good lore on the Dread. I was hoping for another great lore book to join the ranks of Books of Sorrow, Unveiling, Mysterious Logbook, Marasenna, Last Days of Kraken Mare, etc. Some philosophy and horror, a genesis or exegesis or thorough backstory on a yet unexamined character/species.

Sadly, I didn't find those. The Dread's origin is that the Witness made them. Do they think and feel? TBD. The Traveler's conclusion was something like "you just have to have faith <3." Fine for the characters, but not for the readers/players of a 10-year-old mystery.

There's some nice things. The Micah-10 Traveler interpretations are cool, as is her origin story. And the foreshadowing still has me excited for the Dreadnaught, a yet unseen Disciple, etc. But I think key parts of what made Destiny lore so alluring for me are diminished.

Maybe it's the layoffs at Bungie. Maybe it's new writers going in a different direction. Either way, the aspects of sci-fi/space fantasy—ancient mysteries, metaphysical warfare, _____—have taken the back seat to personal drama that frankly isn't that interesting or fleshed out.

Maya could be an interesting antagonist, but she needed more backstory than "this simulation was evil or something" and more nuance than "the Vanguard are coercive, so I will coerce all of humanity." Why not explore what her presence means for the Vex, or the other simulations helping Praedyth escape the Vault?

The Witness trying to sway various characters was fine, but that has been covered so many times, especially in Beyond Light.

All that said, back to Seth: their absence in TFS made me realize how huge their presence in the lore was for my love of Destiny. I finally went and read their original works. What an incredible writer.

First, I read Exordia, the first/only entry into a dark mindfuck of a space opera. Its horrific in abstract ways: mysterious alien monoliths that poison reality around them. It's horrific in grounded ways, too: the alien invasion plays off of parallels with the Anfal campaign and the US involvement in Iraq. It's campy at times (with a villain who shouts "I love genocide!") but also profound. There's souls and date, but also math. There's also my favorite trope: mysterious, ancient architects.

After that, I read Baru Cormorant—all three books in a month. It's tragic and inspiring and genius. Originally I couldn't get through the first chapter because of the "fantasy" label. I've already read Earthsea and wasn't in the mood for wizards on boats. But I had the wrong impression. Understandable, because there is just no succinct way to label it.

Is it even fantasy? Honestly, I still don't know.

What it is is its own world. One that the inhabitants haven't fully mapped. One whose past is a must and whose future is uncertain. It's about hegemony. It's about purpose, obsession, and revenge. It's about revolution and community.

The colonizer culture is a kaleidoscope of different influences. Seafaring. Peri-industrial. Eugenic. It strikes me as something like 17th century Britain with a 20th century grasp of science. They don't have guns, but they do have both Greek fire and lobotomies. The story plays with different cultural views on indigenous rights, race, sexuality, and gender in ways that commentary real life while serving as interesting world building.

This story also weaves an insane amount of intellectual concepts into it. But rather than bog it down, they lift it up. The fate of the republic hinges on a myriad of different questions: is evolution Lamarckian or Darwinian? Can mathematical proofs usurp cultural hegemony? How do economics influence history? Most importantly, can you destroy the enemy from within before it destroys you?

It is not just cerebral, but tragic and heartbreaking. I saw the end of the first book coming, and yet I was devastated by the last chapter. Crushed like no ending has ever really crushed me. I didn't want it to happen.

There will likely be some time before the final book comes out, which is understandable. So much research goes into these. So many plot threads need to be woven together. So many mysteries not yet confronted.

This is all to say: if you like what I like about Destiny–thorough examinations of ancient mysteries, sci-fi takes on souls and magic, fantasy takes on science and technology, obsessive characters and vividly fucked up monsters, cancer and math as motifs, metaphors manifesting, and genius characters written by genius authors–give Seth Dickinson a chance.

[heathermason6060]

Daryl Dixon x f!Reader: Together Apart Ch. 6

(Hes sitting next to you in this pic :D)

Warnings/Mentions: History of abuse, neglect, strong language, mentions of character death, alcohol and drug abuse, ptsd, shared trauma, reader is cold, angst, fluff, eventual smut, slowburn, angst, SMUT Summary: You search for Daryl after Negan's lineup. You didn't understand the trauma he went through, and eventually you decide enough is enough, and you leave. Notes: The last chapter! Somewhat proofread. Filled with tensions overflowing and then some sex. I had a lot of fun writing this and want to thank @louifaith again for allowing me to write out her idea. It's also pretty long because I didn't want to break it into two chapters, it didn't really make sense that way. Longish read, but longish smut at the end if you're just here for sex and want to skip ahead.

When you found out he left on some halfcocked revenge mission, you were pissed. And then you learned nearly everyone else had gone too, you were pissed and confused. 

The rare presence of the others had become more common than the familiar presence of Daryl. He was gone more often than not now, either out with Aaron or off with Rick. Even when he was home, he was never really there. He didn't laugh at your crude insults about others anymore, he didn't want to spend all day with you out hunting in the woods. It looked like was also making an effort to smoke less, often declining your outstretched cigarette. He was the one who got you to smoke once. You used to hate it, but eventually associated the smell of tobacco with him, and you grew to love it.

You couldn't read him like a book like you once did. He'd become overly serious, distant, and uncharacteristically concerned with the well-being of others. 

You had half a mind to just leave. The only reason you hadn't left months ago was Daryl, but the way he was treating you felt like a slap in the face. It hurt. For the first time in so long you hurt. You felt utterly and completely alone, leading you to once again close yourself off from the others, spending all your time hunting or scavenging for substances in the city that could make you feel better. You scored an unopened bottle of painkillers, something you once hated, and drowned your sorrows with a stuffed nose and a foul post nasal drip. 

The savior issue never really seemed like a big deal to you when it first arose. Some asshole raiders trying to make a point, you didn't give a shit. Rick and Daryl would handle it like they always did. 

You took a deep drag from your cigarette as you watched the front gates being opened, two heavy duffle bags over each of your shoulders. You’d come to terms with it, you were leaving, and that was it. You weren't some obedient housewife that didn’t mind the absence of Daryl, you were his best friend and you couldn’t put up with the dramatic emotions anymore. You were fully prepared for the conversations that would ensue, a list of reasons you should stay, maybe some light pleading, so when you saw what came from those gates you froze. 

The muscles in your jaw throbbed as you listened to Rick's pitiful attempt at retelling you what happened, his eyes red and puffy, his hair wet and matted to his forehead. He couldn't, so he gave up, and drug his feet into the house, moving in a way that closely resembled the dead. Carl followed, and you realized Maggie was missing too. Your heart dropped. 

“What the fuck is wrong with him? What happened?” You gaped, looking from face to face, searching desperately for an answer, only to be met with the ghosts of their former selves. You spotted Aaron and realized he was almost never out without Daryl, and your confusion snapped violently to panic. Michonne was really the only one who wasn't too shocked to speak. She told you everything in great detail, her words cold and harsh as she made her anger towards your insensitive behavior well known. Each word she spoke felt like a curse, spitting at you with such venom you'd never had directed towards you before. You deserved it. 

You weren't a good person like them. The deaths of Glenn and Abraham didn't make you cry, go through all the stages of grief and have a mental crisis, in the moment she told you they just felt like problems you’d deal with later, you didn’t have the time. Not when you still had no idea where Daryl was. 

Despite not being a good person, you reacted to the news in a way that was very impressive by your standards. You didn't scream at anyone, or punch Gabriel in the face, you just threw your already packed bags in the car and set off. 

You chain-smoked an entire pack of cigarettes the first hour of searching. You never did find the saviors home, even though you didn't stop searching to sleep the first few days. You found the location of the massacre, a few shredded pieces of clothing and blood stained dirt. You were brought to furious tears at the thought of the scenario where you were in Daryl's position, and him yours. Your first assumption was that he would've already tracked you down by then, him and his one man army breaking you out and taking you far away from the entire state. Then the second, and more daunting assumption, would he even look? Would he be too busy taking care of Rick and the others, the task of rescuing you put on a back burner? 

You told yourself maybe you were just impulsive and stupid, maybe Daryl in that scenario was just being smart and careful, you were just a guns blazing idiot who didn't think far into the future. 

It felt like you'd been out there for weeks, living off a diet of cigarettes and various illegal substances. You nearly stuck a knife in the face of  a woman who was unlucky enough to walk into the same store you were in. 

“No, please, don't.” She sniveled pathetically, her hands raised to the sides of her head in surrender. “I don't have anything. Please. I can take you to my camp, we've got food and water and medicine-”

“Dude, shut up. Just thought you were a walker. Goddamn.” You sheathed your knife and stood back, the tip of your tongue held between your teeth in thought. “But I'm hungry as fuck!”

She took you back to her camp, which was extremely impressive. And just in time, too, your stomach growled noisily and you felt the small waves of hunger nausea begin. 

“Put your gun away, please.” She pleaded in a hush whisper as you stood in front of the wooden gates. 

You looked to her with furrowed eyebrows, your cheeks hollowed out as you pulled on your twentieth cigarette that day. You really needed to cut back. “No.” You muttered around the cigarette, eventually sighing and slinging your rifle over your shoulder with a dramatic eye roll. 

The sight of Rick and Maggie chatting outside with a small group of others felt like you'd been slapped in the face. They looked just as stunned as you were, pausing their conversation. You stood there for about ten solid seconds before the silence finally broke. 

Rick opened his mouth to speak but you raised your hand, stopping him. “Don't have time. Just gonna eat and leave.” 

“Daryl's here.” The sound of Maggie's harsh voice halted your route to the front of the mansion. You couldn't hide the look on your face, an intense ‘this better not be a lie’ mix of anger and disbelief. She pointed up to your previous destination with raised eyebrows and you took off. 

He almost punched you in the face when you jumped him. He was still wet from a shower, littered in various sized bandages and bruises, wearing a fresh set of clothes. He smelled like laundry detergent and cheap flowery shampoos. 

“Holy shit I thought they killed you. Holy shit. Mother fucker.” You babbled into his chest as he squeezed you so hard your back cracked. 

It felt indescribable being in his arms again. It also felt incredibly different. You'd hugged him hundreds of times but something about this particular hug stood out. It was desperate and deep, you didn’t worry about coming off as soft or being too much. Your fingers dug into the sleeves of his shirt around his biceps, your face buried into his chest, and his hands were all over you. He couldn't decide where to touch you, your arms, your face, your hair, your back, they would move from place to place as he cemented into his mind that you were really there, there in his arms, holding and petting him like you'd always done before. His mind flashed with images of him back in that cell and his throat tightened, the slightest whisper of a whimper sounding in the back of his mouth. He held you tighter and kissed the top of your head, rocking you in his arms for a few silent moments as you pulled yourself together. 

“Where the hell you been? Rick said ya left with all your shit.” His voice was tight, the way it would get when he would try not to cry, along with raising in pitch a little. 

You looked up and smiled softly, seeing him through a sheen of wet tears. “Doesn't matter.” You hummed as you stroked his cheek. “Really. It doesn’t. I've been looking for you, only reason I'm here is because some bitch thought I was robbing her and told me about this place. Couldn't keep looking if I was starving.” You buried your face back in the fabric of his shirt and sighed deeply. 

“Told ya, I ain't leavin'. I ain't dyin’ neither.” His warm words in that deep rumble resulted in your racing heart finally slowing its pace. 

“What happened? Are you okay?” You pulled back from his chest to look up at his face. He looked miserable, it broke your heart. He looked away from your gaze, unable to keep eye contact, which was something he never struggled with before when it came to you. “Daryl?”

His head immediately dropped and his forehead collided with your shoulder. Your heart banged against your ribcage and you wrapped your arms around his shoulders, stroking the back of his neck and kissing the side of his head while he stifled his soft sobs.

“Let's leave. C'mon.” You parted from him, only to be pulled back by his grip on your wrist. 

“Y’jus’ got here.” Daryl furrowed his brows, his eyes wet with tears that he quickly blinked away.

“Yeah, to eat so I could keep looking for you. I've found you, so let's go.”

“Go where?” 

You gritted your teeth as his grip on you loosened. “Anywhere else, I don't care.” You said through clenched teeth, your gaze intensifying. “We're done with this shit. Not our problem anymore. Let's go. I'm not letting these people get you hurt again. Never, Daryl.”

Daryl had never been the reason you cried, at least, that's what he thought. So when you started cracking at his rejection, his heart shattered. Every bone in his body yearned for him to hold you, bring you back into his arms and make the pain stop. It hurt even more to see that you weren't just upset, you were pissed, disgusted at the fact that you were showing such weakness in front of the same person who made you cry. 

“I gotta. ‘Jus need to do this.” He attempted to comfort you after your rage at your perceived betrayal faded into tears of defeat. “M’doin’ it for us. Ya gotta trust me on this.” 

There was a small glimmer of hope then, and you allowed yourself to feel it. You were desperate to believe him, and desperate to believe everything would turn out alright. Rick and everyone else would deal with Negan, you'd scratch that burning itch for revenge, and everything would be okay. 

Rick did deal with it, that much came true. At the cost of his son's life, he defeated the saviors.

You were more than willing to fight. You’d been dying for a purpose, and being a soldier in the war against Negan was exactly what you needed. You looked like a cheesy action movie protagonist with two long arm guns on your back and two pistols in each hand. You used more ammo that day than you had in your entire life. God. You wished Merle had been there to see you and Daryl. 

You didn't get the revenge you so desperately craved. You absolutely lost it when Negan was defeated. After Daryl decided against killing Dwight, you lunged at the man like a rabid fox, fully prepared to end his life with just your teeth and hands, only to end up clawing and wriggling in Daryl's grasp. You could've gotten over that eventually, it would take a really long time, sure, Dwight was a brainwashed cult member and did what he did because he was told to. And he'd get his, even if you had to restrain yourself. Fine. It’s fine.

But Rick sparing Negan? 

No. Your reaction to that earned you the reputation of the group's feral animal. You shared the same reaction as Maggie, but unlike her giving up after a while of being held back, you ended up earning a matching set of rope bracelets and anklets.

“You'll have to kill me.” Your throat burned as Daryl tossed you in the back of a blue Toyota camry. He nearly had to force Dwight into the passenger seat at gunpoint, the terror in the backseat scaring him more than the thought of death. 

Your spit was red and thick as it smacked onto Dwight's battered face, blending with the blood that made him unrecognizable. He was barely able to get to his feet after Daryl's threat of death if he was to return, blindly picking up the car keys in the mess of blood spattered leaves. 

The relationship between you and Maggie quickly became a deep friendship as you plotted to kill Negan. Neither of you were allowed to see him in his cell without someone to stand guard, but Maggie even moreso. With enough time you were able to get down there alone, gun in hand, only to be stopped by Michonne, who had apparently come for the same reason. 

“I haven't seen you much before. What's your name.” Negan's eyes followed you as you paced back and forth in front of his cell, seething from the fact that Michonne wouldn't let you kill him yet. She had her own unknown motives, which didn't really matter to you, but all this talking was driving you insane. 

“You don't need to know my name.” You muttered, cutting your eyes at the man. “You look so much smaller than I remembered you looking in that field.”

He winced at your words, placing a hand over his heart in mock offense. “Oh, sweetheart. That hurts. Actually, I've been told I'm pretty impressive.”

He watched you as you continued pacing, your hands sweaty and your eyes wild with rage, confusion, and confliction. A smirk spread on his face. “Look at you. Like a lion in a cage. Well, I’m the one in the cage, but. Coulda used a psycho bitch like you. If you were on my side that day, phew!”

You pulled your gun from your waistband and pulled the trigger. Negan raised hands and jumped. Your heart dropped when you were met with an empty click. You inhaled sharply through your nose and pulled out the clip, which was completely empty. 

Daryl. He dragged you out of the basement, thankful he’d unloaded your guns the night before. He wasn’t stupid, he knew what you were planning. He didn't care that you were pissed, Rick wanted Negan alive, so that's what he was going to stay, even if he did want the prick dead.

It didn't take long for you to pick up on Daryl's trauma. He was good at hiding it from others, nothing much had changed aside from him being quieter. But once your selfish rage had settled you noticed small differences. He slept closer to you at night, no longer on the other side of the mattress, and his nightmares became more violent. He'd thrash in his sleep, tossing and turning and sweating, you found yourself waking him up more times than you could count. Each time he'd get real quiet, maybe from shame, and walk outside to smoke a cigarette. You'd follow him each time and sit quietly on the porch steps, not caring that he didn't offer you a hit. He looked like he needed all he could get. 

You saw him crying with Carol once. His head dipped down and his forehead pressed against her shoulder. If it had been long ago you would've felt hot at the sight, assuming he obviously must've felt closer to her since he hadn't cried like that with you since his capture, but you weren't as shallow and selfish as you once were. Your heart ached for him, wishing he would open up and tell you what happened, you could comfort him too, you wished you could tell him that. 

“Wanna go hunting?” You asked one day, picking up your new hunting rifle, a Savage model 99 that you'd replaced your broken bow with. Daryl shrugged from his spot on the chair beside your bedroom table, not looking up from his work. He was almost always making new bolts in his free time then. He had a pile of twenty-two sitting next to him. 

“Come on, I'm craving venison.” 

He inhaled deeply, his shoulders sagging. 

“Seriously, we haven't hung out in forever man.”

“Hang out?” He said it like you asked him for a ‘playdate’. “What're ya, twelve?”

“No, I'm an adult who misses you, jackass.” You muttered, kicking one of his boots across the floor closer to him. “You've made two hundred arrows in the past week man. I think you can take a break. Yeah, don't look at me like that. I've counted.”

It was when you were alone in the woods that he broke down. You hadn't even asked, he just told you after you took down a buck. He didn't cry at first, he gave a vague retelling, it was only when he felt your arms wrap around his shoulders from behind that he cried. His head hung low as his chest shook with quiet sobs, his hands laying idle and nervous in his lap, his eyes looking down at the stump he sat on. You rested your head in the crook of his neck and held him for a while, your fingers occasionally giving his biceps a reassuring squeeze if his breathing grew too ragged. 

“I'll kill him. I promise. I'll find a way.”

When you were fifteen you skipped school for the first time. Your freshman year, Daryl's too. It was one of the only times you hung out that wasn't just the right time, right place. He was the one who talked you into it, since the two of you shared a history class. He brought cigarettes and a wild assortment of drugs, no doubt nabbed from Merle. 

“We should do this more.” Daryl had said as you walked the power line trails in the woods behind the school. He shrugged when you looked at him, his gaze falling to the grass in front of him. “Hang out, I mean.” 

“Yeah, we should.” You flashed a rare smile, earning one from him as well, the purple skin around his eye wrinkling. 

You never did. You were too busy with school work and getting beat on by your withdrawing mother. Daryl wasn't really busy, in fact, he was alone most of his teenage years. Always alone out in the woods. Sometimes he'd miss school for a week, living in his father's tent deep in the forest, spending his time learning to live on his own. His father never noticed, not until the school called and he got one of the worst beatings he'd ever gotten. You saw him at school a few days after that, one of his last days before he dropped out. 

He looked awful. Busted lips, bruises all over his arms, light purple handprints on his neck, and deep purple blotches around his eyes and jaw. The school called the police, but nothing ever happened. Daryl told them it was from a fight with some kid, and they happily accepted that answer, eager to miss out on the paperwork. 

“We should just leave.” You said after he pulled the cigarette back away from your lips to take a drag of his own. 

“I would.” He muttered as he held the smoke in his lungs, watching the kids in the far off soccer field chasing the ball. His legs dangled off the edge of the school roof, occasionally swinging a bit. 

“I would too.” You wouldn't. Not until you got your brother back. You looked at him, feeling an unfamiliar twist in your heart when you saw the way he flinched under your sudden gaze. “I'd kill him if I could.” 

You truly meant it. Even though Daryl was barely an acquaintance at that point, you would have killed his father if you got the chance. Daryl didn't mean much to you to be brutally honest, you didn't care to form a deep friendship with anyone, but you shared the bond of trauma from parental abuse and that was deeper than any normal friendship. He could leave, never see you again, and you wouldn't be upset, but if you ever had to witness his father touch him it would shatter your soul. 

You promised yourself you'd kill anyone who ever hurt him after that. You almost murdered Andrea when you found out she shot him. You risked being eaten alive by walkers just to make sure the Governor was really dead. You beat Dwight until Daryl dragged you off, if he hadn't done that you would've killed him. 

Things got a lot worse after the day of your failed assassination attempt. Daryl was never home anymore, either at Hilltop or Ezekiel's kingdom. You had reached the point of considering leaving again. The emotional rollercoaster you were going through was taking a heavy toll on your already fucked mental health.

He could see the effect his absence had on you, and it made him feel like shit. There wasn’t much he could do, he had so many responsibilities and he would never ask you to come with him and Rick every time they packed up and went on long trips every five seconds. It felt selfish to him, he didn’t know that you’d be more than happy to accompany him. 

His hands on your tense shoulders as you sat on the edge of your bed did wonders to loosen you up. You set your gun down beside you and looked up to him, forcing a smile. 

“C'mon sweetheart. Wanna show you somethin’.”

He took you on a long walk in the woods to a secluded pond that once belonged to a fisherman, obvious by the raggedy dock and small wooden shack filled with all sorts of fishing tools. There was still homemade canned fish in his cupboards. 

“Gonna stay here for a few days. Jus’ you an’ me.” 

You watched him over your can of trout, chewing slowly. “Really?”

Daryl shrugged and stabbed his fork into his own can. “Yeah. Ya need it.” He cleared his throat awkwardly. “We need it.”

Your heart swelled with warm joy, a smile spread on your face and you tried your best to contain the satisfaction his gift had given you. You missed your best friend more than anyone you’d ever missed before after your baby brother. You’d come to terms with the more than likely possibility that he was dead, and so were your parents. It took a long time and many different weeks spent searching when you were back in Georgia. 

You had a fantastic time with him. You fished all morning, talked all afternoon, and ate your fill of fresh and canned fish. It wasn't long before you set up your bedrolls in the middle of the shack and blew out your candles. It felt amazing to sleep next to him again, you couldn't properly put into words how much you missed him. The feeling of his large warm body next to yours as you fell asleep had you thinking that it was all worth it. He was making an effort to spend time with you again, and with that effort came the sparks of hope, hope that you were getting your best friend back.

You woke up the first night spent with him in the fishing shack to see moonlight seeping through the holes in the tin roof. You rubbed your blurry eyes and sat up, propping yourself up with an elbow on the floor. 

“Daryl?” You murmured sleepily as your eyes came to focus in the dim light. His bedroll was still beside yours, albeit empty. You waited a few minutes before walking outside, assuming he just had to go piss or something. 

Ten minutes passed before you walked back into the shack, now carrying a small candle to light the room, cursing when the wax dripped down your knuckles. The amber glow illuminated his bedroll, bringing attention to a small white square. You leaned down and picked up the piece of paper, squinting in effort to read his handwriting. 

The pain in your chest was deep and dark. Growing up you had grown used to being disappointed by your parents and people around you. It never surprised you. Even now you didn’t expect much from people, but Daryl was that exception. So when you read his little apology, claiming Rick called on him through his walkie to request his help in the Kingdom, you decided you’d had enough.

He had been in the Kingdom for about two weeks until you heard from Rick that they were back.

“We're leaving.” You seethed the moment you stepped into your new shared bedroom with Daryl. It was upstairs in one of the apartments in Alexandria, no longer the basement in Rick's house. You had a nice king sized bed, lots of dressers and shelves, a big ass tv, and even a gaming console that once belonged to Carl. Daryl had only slept in that bed three times since you moved in months ago.

He sighed your name and stood from his seat at the table, setting down the disassembled gun he'd been cleaning. “No we ain't. Cut that shit out.” 

“I can't be here anymore. I can't. I can't.” You began hyperventilating as you ripped the dresser drawer fully out, falling to your knees and quickly grabbing the clothes that spilled out. 

“Stop.” When you didn't comply he made you stop, grabbing your wrists and forcing you to look at him. He spoke in that serious tone that felt like a stab to the chest, his eyes burning holes into yours. “I'm not leavin'.” 

You froze at his words. Your mouth opened and your lips trembled, your breath catching in your throat. The words never came to you. You just stared at him with wide eyes and a horrified look of disbelief.

Daryl didn't speak either. He stood his ground, maintaining a firm gaze, his grip on your wrists slowly loosening. 

It hurt. And that made you angry. 

“Who even are you anymore?” You hissed, tearing your hands away from him and shooting up on your feet. “I never see you anymore, you're cold, distant.” He got to his feet, accepting each blow of your words with this calm face that turned your anger into lividness. 

“You promised me you'd never leave me. You promised you'd always be the one thing Daryl, the one thing that wouldn't change, wouldn't leave, wouldn't hurt me, I kept my promise!” Your finger hammered against your own chest in reference. “You say you're never leaving but you already left! I can see it in your eyes, don't look at me like you have no idea what I'm talking about.” Your face burned. “I can see it. The pity, the disdain. The only reason you haven't just kicked me out is cause you feel like you're obligated to me now, or maybe you're scared I'm some loose canon and I'll burn this fucking house down-”

Daryl had heard enough, he lurched forward until he was inches away from you, his nostrils flared due to his increasingly heavy breathing. “You're fuckin’ delusional!” He spat. “You don't think this is hard on me too? Don't think I'd rather be out there livin’ in some cabin with you? That shit ain't happenin’, these people are family. I ain't leavin' ‘em neither. Shit don't mean I don't care ‘bout ya anymore. We ain't in Atlanta, ‘ts not like that anymore. Ain't just me you ‘n Merle.”

“We should've just left. We should've just left.” You repeated in a breathy whisper, your glazed over eyes locked on his chest. 

“Yeah? Well, we didn't, now we can't. Now I won't.” The purposeful enunciation of the last word was the straw that broke the camel's back, and he immediately regretted it as soon as your eyes squeezed shut. “G’damnit.” 

“Fine.” Your breath was shaky, and you resumed packing. 

He found it impossible to stop you, impossible to move. In reality all it would take from him was a simple request for you to stay, but he couldn't even manage that. It felt like watching a fire you started get out of control, he knew he still had the power to stop it, but he was too stunned to move. 

You zipped up the same second duffle bag you'd packed with the same intention on leaving, just as you'd done before. This time though, it wasn't the same. It felt too final. You knew it would be the last time. Daryl did too, and he still didn’t stop you.

You’d set up camp deep in the woods down a dirt road that led to a pond. You slept in your car with your campfire a few feet away, a pot of wild carrots and rabbit simmering over the coals. It smelt amazing due to your stolen beef bouillon cubes, but you didn’t really have the motivation to eat. You flicked away the first cigarette of your last pack and stared into the red hot coals, watching them ebb and glow until the flash of something large and dark caught your eye. 

You stared in disbelief as you watched his figure move through the thick trees, making his way over to your little camp beside the car you'd stolen from Alexandria. He had a heavy bag with him. 

He plopped his bag down next to your fire and sat down, helping himself to a bowl of your stew. He said nothing, not even looking up at you as he finished your supper.

“The hell are you doing here?” 

He looked up at you and sucked the grease from his fingertips, the empty bowl now discarded at his side. You had no idea how he’d managed to get his fingers coated in rabbit fat, it was fucking soup and he used a spoon. “Ts’it look like?”

You couldn't move, your feet glued to the debris of the forest floor. Your mind spun with questions. If he was actually willing to leave with you, leave all those people behind, why had he shut you out? Why had he changed? What changed? 

“I don't want you here. It's an obvious act of charity.” You finally spoke, watching as he lit a wrinkled cigarette. “You told me yourself-”

“Will ya shut up?” He squinted up at you through the burn of smoke. “Jus’ walked six  damn days to find ya. M’not leavin'.” 

You sat on the opposite side of the fire in silence. He scooted around to sit next to you, and held his cigarette up to your lips. You took a weak pull and sighed. After a while of not speaking, you broke the silence. 

“You're so different. Changed so much”

He nodded at your words, his head tilted down to stare at the leaves between his legs. “Had to.”

“Why?” The question burst from your lips so quickly that it surprised you. 

“You.” He took a deep pull off his cigarette and blew it out the opposite side of his mouth to avoid blowing it directly in your face. “This ain't the kind of life you deserve. Tryin’ to get that for ya. That little house ya dreamed of living in, one with a screened in porch for plants ‘n shit. Life that ya ain't spendin’ hungry, cold, scared.”

He paused for a moment, taking another long drag. “Wanted me to be better too. The kinda man to pick ya flowers, take ya on dates, all that stupid shit.” He flicked the spent cigarette into the fire and leaned back against your car door. 

If it was possible, you were feeling every emotion all at once, in such a rapid and disorienting fashion that it looped back around and made you too shocked to feel. 

He delved deeper, explaining that he felt you deserved better than who he once was, Merle’s echo, a loud and angry asshole, then turned into a cold and traumatized shell, never allowing himself to feel vulnerable with you again. When he finally broke out of it and realized exactly what he wanted, he worked on himself in a determined attempt to be the man you dreamed of marrying as a kid.He worked on your surroundings as well, making sure to eliminate any possible threat in every colony that had even the slightest chance of risking your livelihood. But more importantly, he wanted to be yours. The type of husband you described when you were thirteen years old, cleaning the blood from his swollen ear one of the nights he slept on your back porch. 

“I'm not gonna be like my mom.” You had said firmly, tossing away the bloody tissue paper. “I'm gonna get a good husband and I'm not gonna mess it all up like she did.”

“A good husband?” He questioned curiously, wincing as you dabbed his ear with rubbing alcohol. 

“Yeah, like…. He'll take me on dates, open doors for me, buy me cool stuff, uh….” You trailed off in thought. “He's gonna build me a house too. With a screen porch that I can put a hundred plants in, and he won't be allowed to smoke in it. Oh, he won't smoke, actually. Or drink, or do drugs. He'll never hit me or yell at me like my mom did to my dad, and to me. He'll be handsome too. And smart.”

You were brought to the present with a jolt as Daryl’s hand touched your knee, making you jump. You didn't notice your eyes had started watering and you quickly went to discreetly dab them dry. 

“Guess I fucked up. M’sorry. Was a real piece of shit.”

“No,” your voice broke as you stopped him, grabbing his hand on your knee and giving it a squeeze. “Complete opposite of a piece of shit. I had the wrong idea, I should be the one apologizing.”

“Tsh. Nah.” Daryl waved you off and shook his head. “Should’a told ya. Wasn't thinkin' right.” 

The two of you sat in thoughtful silence until the embers began to grow dim. The forest was thick, so even though the sun was visible as it sank lower and lower, it soon became too dark to see properly. 

“My…” you broke the silence, searching for the right word. “Aspirations have changed since then.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

Several seconds of silence.

“How'so?”

“Well, I don't care if he smokes, or does drugs, or curses or can't take me out on a date. He doesn't have to build me a house, but that's still an option.” Daryl snorted, and you went on. “But he does have to own a crossbow, ride a motorcycle without a helmet even though I tell him to, and he definitely needs this,” your finger tapped on the skull tattoo on the back of his hand before sliding up his arm to stroke a line down his back, “and these tattoos. And this.” You touched the mole over his upper lip. “And he definitely has to slur all his words together because of his accent.” 

“That's all, huh?” He joked softly, watching you draw your hand away from his face. “Y’got some low standards for a husband.”

“Oh, right, I forgot. He also has to go back to his family, because that's where he belongs.” There was a quick flash of hurt on his face, his lips parting and his eyes narrowing, so you continued. “And because that's where my dream house is going to be built.” 

In all your years knowing Daryl Dixon, you'd never been sexually intimate. You'd never had sex, flirtation only being reserved for playful teasing banter, you'd never really kissed, aside from that one night at the Greene farm. You'd laid with each other multiple times, more often than not sleeping curled up together in the woods or on the floor of some house. Despite never being sexually intimate there was an unspoken mutual understanding of your relationship, you were together, but not in the traditional standard sense. Neither of you ever had interest in a relationship with anyone, that was simply out of the question. Why have a partner when your best friend is everything you need? 

He became your partner at some point, maybe that's why it caused so much anguish to the both of you when you left. But it was only that night that you solidified it. And the next morning, and in the back of the car on your way back, and on the hood of the car, and after your shower back home, and after dinner, on your bed, on the floor, a second time after that, right before bed, and again the moment you woke up. 

It started with a kiss, which just so happened to be his second ever kiss, the first being you in the back of Dale’s RV. You wouldn't have ever guessed, the way he kissed with so much passion and vigor felt akin to a man kissing the same pair of lips he'd kissed his entire life. And you would have never guessed he was a virgin. 

Each touch was as if he was handling precious glassware. He never took off any of your clothes, he'd just gently tug at your shirt until you got the hint and undressed yourself. 

At some point you moved to the back of the car, he laid you down and closed the door behind him. Your soft pants and gasps quickly led to the windows fogging over, and by the end of it there were beads of precipitation dribbling down the glass. 

He led graciously. His fingers were gentle but firm against your clit through your panties, working hard and with determination to give you the orgasm you deserved. He obeyed your requests for ‘circles, ah, softer, to the left, more’, and before long he was a master in the art of making you come. 

Daryl wanted to give you oral, but you quickly pulled him back up, shaking your head as you gasped for air. “N-no, please. You. Need you.” 

It was shocking that he didn't feel embarrassed when he came early. You'd reached down to stroke his cock, only getting in a few strokes before he pulled away with a strangled gasp, spilling his hot cum on your bare stomach. He didn't have time to feel embarrassed because only seconds later you were taking him in your desperate mouth, giving it your all to make him hard again. 

He didn't take long. After stiffening in your mouth he eased your head away, maneuvering you on your back in such an effortless way that it made you look like you weighed nothing. Due to your wetness and unimaginable arousal it didn't hurt at all when he finally pushed in after rubbing his cock all over your desperate slick flesh. 

You cried out anyway. Your jaw dropped and your eyes rolled back, clutching at his bare shoulders when you felt his pelvis fully connect with you. 

“F-fuck.” You groaned as your eyes rolled back, digging your fingers deeper into his skin.

He let out a moan then, a light and vulnerable sound. You could feel him shaking on top of you as he fought not to finish again. It broke your heart, knowing he wanted to have sex with you so badly, to please you like you had him. 

You stayed as still as humanly possible while you waited for him to move. 

Daryl’s breath slowed and he moved, finally. He fucked you slow at first, slow and deep thrusts that managed to bury his dick further and further inside you each time. With each thrust he let out either a shaky whimper or a deep grunt, and soon he was picking up the pace, fucking a moan out of you each time he drove his throbbing cock back inside. 

When his hand connected with the warm skin of your torso you whimpered, tossing your head back against the car seat. His hands stroked your sides, rough and dirty fingers scraping against your nipples and breasts. He gave one a firm squeeze, eliciting a sharp moan from you, one that he eagerly swallowed down with his hungry mouth, kissing you deeply and feverishly. He was breathing heavy through his nose, hot puffs of air sending waves of heat across your upper lip and cheeks.

A rough slam of his pelvis against yours sent the tip of his cock so deep it was almost painful, your gasp choked in your tight throat, your thighs squeezing the life out of his torso. He groaned at how responsive you were, his hot wet lips sliding down your face to start kissing your neck. 

Daryl was quiet in the sense that he didn't say much. He groaned and whimpered, sure, but he hadn’t said a word since entering you. Which was totally fine by you, but you were a sucker for dirty talk. It was one of your favorite parts of sex.

“Fuck, you feel so good.” You whined, hoping to get a response. He just grunted, a possible returned compliment, his head not moving from the crook of your neck. 

A noticeable increase in his pacing had all thoughts vanishing from your mind in a puff of smoke. You could feel the side of his jaw clenching against your neck, the skin hot and prickly with stubble, the friction eventually becoming uncomfortable. As if he could read your mind he raised his head and looked down at you, the tip of his tongue peeking between his teeth, looking like a man in deep, oh, deep, concentration. 

“Fu-uh-uck-” You babbled, your heavy eyelids shutting against the brutal force of his thrusts. You grabbed onto his biceps again and held on for dear life, giving them a squeeze each time he gave a really deep thrust. 

“That’s it.” Your heart jumped in your chest at the sound of his voice, it was gravely and sounded from the base of his throat. You felt your lower stomach do that delicious flip sensation, your clit throbbing in response to his voice. 

“Mmm’god.”

“I know. I know.” He breathed, taking a second to readjust himself between your legs before going back to his artistic thrusting. He was grinding against you then, barely pulling out, using the full weight of his hips to force himself as deep as possible while he ground into you. You couldn’t speak, could barely breathe, it was a miracle that a virgin could fuck like that. He was a savant at something he’d never done before. You came hard around his throbbing dick, your walls clenching down so hard that it ripped his orgasm straight out of his body. 

You gasped, your fingers tightening around his flexed biceps as your orgasm shook through you in violent waves. You moved your hips on your own, grinding up and against his pelvis to draw your pleasure  out for  as long as possible. 

Daryl wasn't expecting it, he just came. His jaw dropped and he held onto the nearest body part, which just so happened to be your neck. He didn’t choke you, which came as a slight dismissible disappointment, he just held onto you with his large hands as he finished. It was so sudden and unexpected that he couldn’t control the sounds he made, better for you, he let out this beautiful high moan that sent flashes of Daryl in Atlanta behind your closed eyes. His body shuttered and jerked as every single rope of his cum flooded your insides, coating your vice like walls like spilled paint. 

You didn’t give him time to recuperate. You squirmed under him, swapping your positions, and took his softening cock in your mouth. He groaned under you, grabbing you by your hair to pull you away, only to shudder when he felt his cock growing hard again. You smirked against the tip as he gently pulled you back down.

Halfway through he tugged you off of him, the two of you switching spots once again. You whined when you felt his lips connect with your puffy clit, your mind swirling as he used the flexed tip of his tongue to drift between your slick folds. 

“Oh god, daryl.” You panted and ran your fingers through your sweaty hair to push it back over your head. You were either extremely sensitive due to the two orgasms, or he was an extremely skilled pussy eater. Either way you came fast, clenching your thighs around his head to clamp his mouth tight against you. He didn’t ease up as you came, his tongue and lips pulling tricks you didn’t think possible, drawing out your orgasm longer than any time previously. 

He slid up between your legs, planting kisses from your wet mess up your stomach to your chest. He suddenly bit down on one of your nipples, gentle at first, but the moan that came from your lips had him tightening his teeth.

You were under the impression that he would ease you down from your high with light kisses and soft touches, but apparently, he had other plans. His cock plunged back into you before you had any idea what was happening, and he quickly set a fast and intense pace. His hands slipped around both of your wrists and pulled, using the leverage to both fuck you deeper and keep you firmly in place.

If you could’ve seen the state you were in, you’d be a red hot embarrassed bitch. Your mouth was hanging open, your eyes fluttering between open and closed, sounds coming from your throat that envied any moan and whine to ever come out of a woman's mouth. Your hair kept falling back in your face each time his hips slammed into yours, no matter how many times you hastily pushed it away or tucked it behind your ears. You looked at him for as long as you could, but you were too stimulated, it was too hot, he was too beautiful, you had to let them fall shut as you came again.

As cliche as it sounds, your final orgasm, for that night at least, was world shattering. You didn’t care how loud you were or what types of faces you were making. Your body was completely out of your control, your brain on pause as it struggled to deal with the flood of dopamine and oxytocin. 

Daryl wasn’t looking any better, he’d ran miles before and came out looking more put together. He huffed as he came inside you yet again, his dick twitching with each spurt of cum. He braced himself on his elbows on either side of your body, his head drooping down as he managed a few sloppy thrusts. He muttered something then, something you were too fucked up to make out through his thick and slurred accent.

When he finally drew his red and tender dick out of you his heart seemed to skip a beat. The two loads spilled out the second he withdrew, trickling down your folds and over the swollen head of his dick. That was a sight he’d remember till the day he died.  

You fought to catch your breath after he all but collapsed on top of you. It was pure bliss for a few moments, and then it was too hot and too close. Before you could say anything he lifted himself off of you, still waging his own war against his lungs. 

“Getting old there, huh?” You teased, sliding up into a sitting position after grabbing your panties. Yeah, he's old, it's not the fact you just did the same amount of exercise as swimming across the atlantic ocean.

“Shut up.” He breathed as he wiped his damp hair from his face. 

After a few moments of silence, apart from the sounds of your breathing, you dressed yourselves and began loading all your shit into your car. 

“You really walked six days? No bike, no car?” You questioned as he plopped down into the driver's seat, the flame of his lighter illuminating his face. The smell of cigarette smoke had you leaning over and he pressed the filter against your lips. 

“No bike.”

“That’s kind of stupid.”

“Huh. Rich.” He smirked around the cigarette at you before glancing over his shoulder to watch the dirt road as he reversed.

“Yeah, true.”

Your life wasn’t magically fixed after that night, and neither was Daryls, but it did get a lot easier. You zipped up your coat but your shoes were still full of snow, that kind of better. A lot of shit happened, you had your arguments, but no fights. After RIck died you ran off together looking for his body, for Daryl’s closure, living off in the woods somewhere with a dog that liked to growl at you. He was over possessive of Daryl, and so were you, so the two of you were butting heads often.

He never did build you that house, but you moved into one of the newly built homes in Alexandria. He did build you a back porch, which looked great for someone who’d never built an entire screened in porch before, even if it did look a little raggedy in some spots. He even brought home pots for you to plant ‘shit’ in, as he said. 

Daryl wasn’t home often, which didn't bother you anymore, because you were out there with him. 

@ophelialaufey @carlgrimesgfofficial @theskinniestjackson-denny @dilfish-daydreams @louifaith @my1fx @jinx-nanami

[remembrancer-of-heresy]

Replica (Part 4)

Summary: The iron cage has slammed shut and you will never leave it.

Perturabo/fem!Reader

Warnings: incest (kinda), possessive behavior, manipulation, humiliation, smut (finally :D), dubious consent

Word count: 2601

Finally, after a while, I was able to finish part 4. Perhaps I will write part 5 with the daemon prince, but I need some time for it. Updated the images (what I love about Tumblr is that you reblog the old version of the post, but by going to the original you can see the new version, it's very convenient). Specifically re-read The Hammer of Olympia for this one. I hope you enjoy it, it was a lot of fun to write.

Song: Mitski - Washing Machine Heart

You still remember the first time Perturabo kicked you out because you mentioned Dorn. For two weeks he did not meet with you and did not have a heart-to-heart talk, moving away as far as possible. You thought that the primarch would do the same now, but the very next day he summoned you to his chambers.

You felt awkward for the first hour, but gradually relaxed. But still wondered why the Iron Lord behaved so strangely in the baths. Of course Perturabo was hard pressed by his responsibilities, but his sudden rage was unusual. You haven't done or said anything wrong.

Maybe he changed his mind about you? He realized that he became attached to you when a primarch should not have weaknesses. Does he see you as more than a mortal friend? Does he think of you as a sister or... something more?

These thoughts made you blush, and you hid your face in the book while Perturabo worked on the drawings. No, this is unthinkable. Of course, you knew that the primarchs had families on their planets. Parents, adoptive siblings and friends. But could they have romantic feelings for mortals?

And did you want to become his lover?

You could barely restrain yourself from jumping out of your chair and rushing around the room due to the abundance of thoughts. Feeling a strange sensation, you raised your head and with a gasp saw the attentive gaze of the primarch. You swore he could hear your heartbeat.

“Very exciting poems” - you tried to justify yourself by telling half-truths. You really liked these verses and it would be better if the lord did not know your thoughts. - “I never thought that I would love Olympic poetry about love so much.”

The primarch continued to glare at you and you shifted nervously in your chair. Did you say something bad? Since Perturabo called you, it means he is not offended or angry. But why does every minute with him last like an hour? Why is the room so hot, and the mere sight of a man makes you tremble?

“You can call me Bo.” - the primarch said quietly before turning to the table. - “During this time, I became attached to you almost like a sister. So why not make our communication even more... close.”

You smiled softly, accepting such a wonderful offer with all your gratitude. Your heart was happy. Enough time had passed to experience grief and yet you missed your parents and brothers. It was nice to feel part of the family again. Even if it is so unusual.

You involuntarily rolled your shoulders, throwing off the recent strange hot sensations. It’s as if you felt someone else’s emotions and desires that are unusual for you. But as always, you tried to brush aside the annoying thoughts and continue living in your “dome.”

***

You continued to live carefree, not knowing the sorrows of mere mortals, from time to time forgetting about the monstrous actions of the primarch. He was terrible in anger and did not value people, regarding them only as a piece of meat. He despised the weakest sons, “covered with rust” and unworthy to bear the title of Iron Warriors. He pumped out all the resources from the planets that came his way.

He had told you about his deeds before, but only the tiniest bits. Enough to frighten you and force you to obey him in everything. But you spent much more time talking about more abstract topics. Beautiful and creative. But Fulgrim's betrayal and journey into the Eye of Terror took their toll.

Now the primarch began to pour out his soul to you more and more often, sharing the terrifying methods of the art of war and enslavement. He spoke about the crimes of other legions and the warp space that you recently visited. Perturabo didn't seem to care what you thought about what was happening in the galaxies. You are just an ordinary mortal girl who will not survive in this world without him.

But you were truly frightened when the iron lord told you about the betrayal of Horus, the demons of the warp, the World Eaters and the daemon prince Angron, with whom Inron Warriors would go to their greatest battle. Siege of Terra. The man saw the horror you were in, watched as tears flowed down your cheeks and how awareness gradually came.

“I understand how difficult it is to find out all this. But nothing can be done. The False Emperor must be overthrown, and we will rule the Imperium as we deserve.” - the primarch, grinning darkly, stroked your head. - “I promised to take care of you. And I will continue to cherish you. Nobody cares about you except me. You would have become a slave or fodder for fuel in the hands of my brothers or continuing to live under my father's rule. Without me, you are a mere mortal girl, one of trillions. You are nobody. Nothing."

The man’s words hurt painfully, and yet you pressed closer to him. Thoughts swirled in my head. Your home world was far from the Solar System and yet your life was quite acceptable. You had a loving family, you did not live in poverty, and working as a chronicler was your long-time dream. Rogal Dorn brought your world into harmony, improving life on the planet and you were glad to become part of the Imperium.

But now it was just a dream. A deception. No, the primarch could not lie to you. The Imperium is rotten and sooner or later an unenviable fate would await you. The world was full of dangers and you could not resist these horrors. You would have been torn to pieces, gutted and eaten alive long ago if it weren't for Perturabo. He saved you. If he didn’t need new personal slaves, if you weren’t noticed, then you would... you would...

“Bo,” you whispered chokedly, swallowing tears and trying to calm your breathing. Fragile fingers squeezed the iron lord's tunic with force. - "I'm scared."

The man stopped stroking and you held your breath until you felt the touch of fingers on your chin. The primarch gently lifted your head, forcing you to look straight into your eyes. You could only gasp in horror and the feeling of safety next to Perturabo.

“You mortals do not obey me. You don't know what's good for you. There is no peace and kindness in this world. Only violence.” - your lips trembled and you let out a strangled squeak, feeling the grip on your face intensify. Almost possessively, the man held you close to him, never breaking eye contact. - “You promised that you wouldn’t leave me. So continue to listen to me. Love me and I will build a perfect world for you.”

You cannot stand the excess of emotions and, sobbing, bury your face in the primarch’s chest. Some part of you knew he was fooling himself. He wants to destroy and recreate everything anew just for himself. And you were part of this vast plan, a chaotic and terrifying dream, recreated from the darkest feelings of a primarch.

But the world around you was disgustingly cruel and merciless. You won’t be able to take a single step, the monsters will immediately destroy your body and mind. You didn't have anyone. No family, no friends. There are no enemies left, and the strangers have disappeared. There was no human warmth around you and you didn’t notice how you were left alone in an iron cage. Only Bo was with you. You only had him.

And if Terra must fall for the Iron Lord to be happy, then so be it.

***

He lost. The opportunity to rise was taken away from him. He was deprived of his greatest triumph. The Solar War ended in victory only thanks to Perturabo. He alone bore on his shoulders the responsibility for the entire success of the traitors while the rest of the legions indulged in senseless violence and debauchery.

But the worst thing was that Horus did not allow him to storm the Imperial Palace. He was not allowed Dorn's creation to be destroyed. He was not allowed his once beloved father to laugh in the face, who preferred another son to him. The warrior turned out to be a slave of the Chaos Gods, having lost his power and strength. And his brothers would not have been able to contribute to the war if not for the Iron Lord.

He's so tired of it. Complete disappointment. Retreating to Mars, Perturabo continued to oversee the ongoing Siege of Terra. Rage and resentment overwhelmed him and he destroyed everything that came in his way. He did not spare his creations, nor his slaves, nor his sons. He was humiliated. Again.

He hated them all. And the Emperor, and the loyalist brothers and traitors. They all mocked him. No, that will not do. The Warmaster may win this war, but he won't be celebrating for long. Perturabo will not let them rest on his laurels, oh no. He will rise above them all. The Primarch was humanity's greatest creation, but that was not enough. He needed more strength, more power. He will become a deadly deity who will crush everything in his path. All galaxies will obey him. Everyone will fear and respect him.

He will rule over everyone. And with him his Legion. And with him...

The man stopped abruptly, sucking in a breath and slowly lowering the hammer. Containing his emotions, he slowly walked towards her chambers. How long had he been trying to drown out his feelings, to deceive himself? How long and unsuccessfully have he tried to suppress this desire?

She was a fragile mortal, unworthy of his attention. But she had been a part of his life since his childhood. Crafty and smart, so kind and beautiful. She was weak, but so pleasant and sweet to the taste. Only she was allowed to see his soul hidden behind the iron. He told himself that he almost loved her like the Emperor... No, he loved her much more than his father. And the whole world.

The primarch slowly opens the door and sees you cowering next to the bed, trembling in horror. Of course, you now know about what is happening in the world and what sacrifices Perturabo makes to make your life enjoyable. Besides, you probably heard him raging with anger. Well, now you just have to calm him down.

“Bo?” - your voice trembles with surprise and you almost sigh with relief. You rise to your feet, but you can’t even take a step from the tension. - “Is it over? I-I heard how angry you were. Are you-”

“Take off.”

It's that simple. No confessions of feelings, no long conversations. The primarch did not want to wait any longer. He let you close enough to him. Why use unnecessary words when you can strengthen your connection in such a primitive but intriguing way? You freeze and open your mouth in surprise. Hands tug at the dress, unable to remove the fabric stuck to the body.

The primarch notices a blush on your cheeks. Embarrassment is an unnecessary quality, but he likes to see you in this state. It's quite charming. But he doesn't want to waste another minute. With sharp steps, the man approaches you and with one hand, forcefully tears your dress, exposing your body. You scream and try to cover yourself, but Perturabo grabs your hands, not letting you.

The man swallows, looking at your perfect forms. On your femininity. This is an ordinary human body, nothing special. He had seen naked people more than once, and females too. But you aroused him. The Emperor removed such base desires from the Astartes, but the Primarchs were a different matter. They experienced a greater range of emotions than mere mortals. They knew and saw more. But the war for humanity and service for the Emperor did not give them the opportunity to experience carnal pleasures. To become attached to mortals in a different way.

But now Perturabo no longer serves anyone but himself. And he could do whatever he wanted. With these thoughts, the man begins to touch you, no, caress you. That's what it's called. His hands on your shoulders and waist. Touching your lips, kissing your breasts and stomach. Listening to your breathing. Lower and lower until it reaches your thighs. Primarchs grew up in flasks; they were not born naturally between their mother's legs. And you... you would have been a wonderful mother to his real sons.

The man throws you on the bed and takes off his clothes. It’s good that he took off his armor first. He couldn't stand waiting that long. The primarch climbs on top of you and is displeased to see the fear in your eyes. Because of the difference in height? Women can endure even more than that, and sharing the bed with a primarch should be the greatest honor. Especially with him.

Or is it because of the blood of slaves and sons that got on his face? Still fresh, it dripped onto your body and you shuddered every time. In truth, he doesn't care. Now you are afraid, but soon you will dissolve in him and thank him for this.

Perturabo abruptly enters you, tearing you apart and looking with ecstasy at how your face stretches out in pain. He feels your blood and cannot wonder if he is your first or if your tender body is simply not intended for a primarch. Even if it's not meant to be, you have to accept it.

“Be quiet. Control yourself. I don't want to hear your screams. I don’t want to see you hurt.” - He wants it in some way. Make you suffer for what you did with him. The man moves his hips and you bite your lip. - “I just want to hear your moans. You have to beg me for it.”

The Iron Lord continues to slowly fill you, peering into your face until he notices dramatic changes. How your mouth opens slightly and your eyes close from the rush of feelings.

“Bo, I”

"You were right. I crave love. I want love. And you have to give it to me, you have to.” - the primarch accelerates, not allowing you to get a word in. “They underestimate me, but it only makes things worse for them. I am the grandest, sister. I am superior to everyone in this world. I'm not a boy, I'm a man. And now you see it. You see it.”

Perturabo leans down with difficulty and begins to kiss your neck, leaving hickeys. He remembers the sound of crunching, he remembers blood and dead eyes. It wasn't you. It was a decrepit old woman who called herself you and dared to condemn him. Daring to mock him. And you, crying with pleasure, know your place. So continue to remain at his feet and he will show you a perfect world.

The man groans and pronounces your names, continuing to whisper about his grievances and shout about imminent divinity. Until he finally fills you and sinks onto the bed with a sigh. Burying your small figure with his massive body. Completely unaware of your tears and misunderstanding in your eyes. How a drop of love mixes with true horror.

But if he saw it, it wouldn't change anything. You belonged to him. You were his and only his. The iron cage was finally closed. And now the bird will sing only to him.

[gretavanmoon]

an omnipresent force•

hey friends, so in recent days I've realized that Tumblr is nothing but an open place to dump our wild, running thoughts, right? a place to express our art and let creativity flow in its rawest form, whether or not the work is unfinished or tied up with a big red bow. my docs is littered with unfinished ideas and half-written junk, and they're just sitting there. why? they're collecting dust, and I don't like dust.

ive consulted with my nearest and dearests on if this thought process is wack or not, and they don't think it's TOO wack, I hope. but anyways, here's a little preview of something I started a long time ago. It's got a couple chapters complete, a couple outlined, but it has no end in sight. and I don't really care. I wanna share it, because I love it, and completing multi-book works is a feat I'm familiar with from writing the Vigilance & Valor worlds, and without @gretavangroupie encouraging me to write like the wind, those things would STILL be sitting in our docs COLLECTING DUST (with absolutely no fault to her stamina, but by fault of mine lol)

so I'm gonna post this, it's messy and unfinished and kind of unedited, because who cares? we read for indulgence and escapism, and we write for the same reasons.

maybe I'll finish this one day, maybe I won't. nevertheless, enjoy it my loves ;)

also ily so much @builtbybrokenbells & @farfromthehomelands for the encouragements

Warnings: Mentions of Death & Dying, Pain, Loss, Crying

•

“Do you remember it, Y/N? Do you? Are all of your memories still alive? Do not ever let your mind be one to settle, my love. You know that. That is essential.”

His voice is strangled and pained as he tries to speak quietly in the shadows that have fallen across the large room, pushing his words out with haste as his eyes scan behind me. Waiting, anticipating someone to come unnoticed into the room with us. I take sight of his rigid and shaking body laid out across the cot, the white sheet wrapped around his freezing self.

"What did they give you, Paps? What did they drop into your eyes?" I beg. His pupils are dilated and the whites of them are now a deep red, swollen and blotchy as he struggles to focus in on me.

"My memories, my love... they've tried to take them. But the rash, it's taking me faster..." he moans.

His calloused hands desperately grab at mine, the beds of his fingernails torn and caked with dirt. “Promise me you’ll never forget… the things we thought we’d have forever are long gone, now, and we’re never getting them back. Keep your memories, Y/N, think about everything that you can, often. Speak them, share them- but only when you know you’re surrounded by those you can trust. Otherwise, keep them within yourself, and use them to keep going. Keep pushing through to the next sunrise…” His wrinkled and bruised palm then rests gently across my chest as it heaves with sorrow and exhaustion. I can’t stop this… There’s nothing more I can do for him…

“I won’t, I won’t ever forget…” My promise feels futile in the moment as I croak the words out, but I know that I will take charge of myself and bring it to fruition when the time is right. When I don’t feel as though I’m going to drown in my own tears as they feel like puddles around me. When my chest isn’t weighed down with the guilt of leaving him behind without a proper burial. When my body isn’t begging me to run as fast as I can. 

I squeeze his hand. 

“We’ve never seen times this dark, my love, and I fear that you will be the one to see them even darker. But don’t fret, darkness is only the absence of light. And where there is light, there is love. Never let yourself forget.” A quick and tight smile ghosts my lips as I remember his favorite song. “The photos, the books, the songs… sing them all the time. Keep the melodies alive, and don’t ever let yourself forget the words.”

His fingers drift down the line of ink that paints my forearm, each tattoo a memory of times that we will never get back, sounds that we will never hear again unless we sing them out loud, hoping that our memories serve us right. His sullen eyes snap to me again as we both hear a crash in the room behind us. I rip my sleeve back down to cover my arm. Nothing to show my identity.

My body urges itself to prepare to run, and though he knows that I must, he pulls me back down to speak to me again, his voice still hushed and dry as his body wracks with pain.

“Remember when you were a child, no bigger than a grasshopper, and I’d sit you on my knee, teaching you how to put the needle on the record so you’d always have the ability? And how we’d sing the songs together, and I’d play the melodies on the piano… you’d dance, oh my love, you’d dance!”

“I remember, of course I do!” I cry through a weakened smile, the memory of standing on his feet as he twirled me across the firelit living room now feeling like it was a thousand years ago. 

“Never cease your movements, my sweet.” His eyes scan behind us again, his weak hands squeezing mine in return. “Move until your muscles are sore, move until your feet are tough and hardened. Keep your body in good health, because in turn your mind will act along with it. Remember the trees, remember the clouds. The grass, the streams, the way the air smells before a rain, keep it all…memorize it. Categorize, record, and repeat. Your grandmother’s recipes, they’re still in the book. Her plant descriptions, her foraging tools, her gardening plans… study them, Y/N. Memorize. I’ve taught you well, we all have, you must seek and find what’s on the other side of this, my love. You’re prepared, it’s up to you. Find your clan, sweetheart. This isn’t the end. Many have forgotten what the emotion feels like, by now. But you know what love is. Track it down, and hold onto it with everything you’ve got left. Do you hear me? Love, honey. There are more of us. The good ones, they're still left. Find them. Find them!”

I nod harshly as the noise behind us crashes again, likely pulling down my makeshift barrier of tables and chairs. His breathing is weakened, and his chest rattles with a sound no man should ever make.

“They can take our things, but they can’t take our memories. Ever.” He taps the side of his temple with one finger. He knows just as well as I do that they can take our memories, and they have. They've already begun to take his. But his immunity to their drugs and schemes still proves itself strong, just like mine does.

“Share them, please… pass them along, and remember the memories that others share with you, too. You’ve always had the biggest heart of all of us, don’t try and argue with me. You’ve got more wit in your little finger than we all had from our heads to our toes. And any of us would have willingly admitted that, my sweet. Go- get out of here, while you still can. Remember my words, my love. Our history can’t be unwritten if you keep it here, in your heart.” His frail, bruised fingers tap my chest again as if to remind me where my heart sits, still beating with strength as his struggles to pump his blood supply. “Run, love, go! And don’t even think about turning back for me. I’ll have taken my last breath before you even cross the threshold. 

I love you, you love me.”

As I bring his hands up to my trembling lips, I feel the coldness of them like I’ve never felt before, as if they had been sitting in a bowl of ice water. The sound behind me crashes again, this time louder, and I know they are getting closer to us, now. I kiss his digits and smooth his silver hair back, whispering out a choked ‘I love you back’ before I turn and let my feet carry me toward the light peeking from under the towering double metal doors.

I hear his voice in the distance, crackled but still just as powerful as the man that made it.

“Remember, your memories are your own. Go and find the good ones, Y/N! Find them!"

•

Taglist:

@gretavangroupie @britney-gvf @sacredstarcatcher @wetkleenex-gvf @farfromthehomelands @takenbythemadness @writingcold @builtbybrokenbells @ohgodthefeeling-gvf @fleet-of-fiction @milkgemini @gvfpal @ageofcj@dancingcarbon @highway-tuna @stardustjake @jakekiszkapunchmeintheface @gvfmarge @gracev0609 @myleftsock @literal-dead-leaf @peaceloveunitygvf @ageofbajabule @slut4lando @jordie-gvf @sadiechar @tinydancer40 @rosabellagvf @capnjaket @lyndz2names @thetroublegetssoloud71 @gretavanomens @spark-my-nature @josh-iamyour-mama @anythingforjtk @alwaysonthemend @danieljlmwagner @klarxtr @fortunatelytinybasement @demonrat444 @gretavansara @watchingover-hypegirl @hippievanfleet @digitalnomadz @raviolilegs @lipstickitty @hippievanfleet @klarxtr @strange-whorizons @do-it-jakey-baby @myownparadise96 @gvf-luna @starshine-wagner @cassiesgreta @joopsandjangs @whimsiliz @kiszkas-canvas @whimsiliz @joopsandjangs @broken0mens @scoreofinfantryvines @whereiskeara @do-it-jakey-baby @miravanfleet @heckingfrick @kiszka-canvas @whimsiliz @joopsandjangs @broken0mens @scoreofinfantryvines @whereiskeara @do-it-jakey-baby @miravanfleet @heckingfrick @jenniferkiszka

[peachyforthis]

Eternal Duty, Mortal Love

Pairing: Neuvillette x reader (angst no comfort)

Disclaimer: tw: reader’s passing away with time in the end, very slight Neuvillette story quest spoilers idk why i was in the mood for angsty stuff lmao so sorry if this feels rushed as this is my first try in writing, lovers to strangers, reader is human, established relationship to not, I loveee Neuvillette but I feel having a relationship with him would be a lot challenging.

The rain starting to pound against the window barely drowns out Neuvillette’s sorrows as he holds you and lays his head on your shoulder, his tears slowly staining your cloth. Yet you couldn’t move an inch as you stand there, seemingly ignoring his pleas for you to stay, to give him another chance to show his love to you.

As he couldn’t believe that you were over that feeling a long time ago.

“Please stay…” his mouth quivers, and you couldn’t help but remember yourself saying those same words to him. When he would visit you only for a few hours in a week and leave as soon as even a menial work came in his schedule. You couldn’t blame him for this, he was the Chief Justice of Fontaine. The renowned, impartial judge every citizen respected. Your sweet, loving dragon who successfully worked out with humans who admired and respected him back.

But perhaps it was your mistake to think dragons and humans could ever really work out in love.

You had loved and admired him so much, even after knowing he was the Hydro dragon, your feelings for him had never wavered, you read up any book you could find about Dragons to understand him better, tended to him whenever he felt exhausted, while Neuvillette loved you too. Whatever time he could make, he’d be all attentive to you and your needs.

“Please… stay.”, he says again. It was rare to see him in this state.

“It’s over Neuvillette…” You didn’t have enough strength to argue anymore. “We’ve discussed this before…”

His grip on your arm loosened a little as he heard that. He couldn't believe how calm you were. How nonchalant you sounded while saying it..

".. How can you say that so easily? So nonchalantly?.."

His voice faltered a little. You could tell he was trying to hold back tears. He couldn't believe it. He didn't want to believe it..

There was one thing Neuvillette didn’t realise though, your mortality.

He was basically immortal, while you were on limited time. As months went by with his role and workload, Neuvillette thought he would have all the time in the world for you eventually… some day. He didn’t get it that for you it was basically being fed on crumbs. Time held different perspective to you and him. He gave you the best he could but honestly? it couldn’t be enough…

“Neuvillette… I loved you so much.. but i just can’t bear it anymore! I didn’t ask you to stay with me forever and I want great things for Fontaine too… but you chose the nation over me Every. Single. Time… Maybe if you were in my position, you would understand!” Those long nights without him were too much for you to bear.

The second thing was that Neuvillette wasn’t able to choose you enough either…

He had worked so hard to become and uphold the title of the Iudex of Fontaine, honouring the sacrifices his two first companions made and ensuring a better future for the Melusines. So it was inevitable that his duty clashed with his plans for you often. A pang in his heart whenever he saw you choosing him over your work everytime, but could he really choose you over his duty too if the choice came down to it?

Neuvillette honestly couldn’t tell you… or maybe he knew deep down but didn’t want to tell you… as you would feel the same pang in your heart when he had to cancel most of the multiple dates you both planned together.

“I… I had to… it is my duty.”

“Then my dear Iudex…” you sniff as you feel tears forming, “…I wish you well.”

You pick up your bags and start to leave when his hand grips you softly again, as if he knows it’s his last chance to make up your mind.

“Please, love…”

The storm raged on.

He wanted to say so much. He wanted to speak and beg for you to stay, to not leave him..

But his voice failed him. He couldn't form a single word. He just stared at you silently. The expression on his face said everything he wanted to say..

But… maybe it was for the better after all. You deserved so so much more in his eyes. Someone similar to you who would be able to choose you over anything, and give you more and better memories in life.

Meanwhile you look into your lover’s eyes, those purple irises swimming in tears, so tired. Even if you never saw him again, you could never forget him. The ethereal, majestic hydro dragon who once loved you, a mere human. You softly cup his cheek, trying to etch his memory in you forever.

“Goodbye, Neuvillette.”

He reluctantly let go of your arm. He just stood there, silently. He watched you turn away from him..

Centuries have passed by since then, with you long gone. Some sources say you became a wandering traveller , while others say you got married and settled down. Neuvillette doesn’t know, since he never heard from you again. Nevertheless, he had wished the best for you, even after he was left alone to pick up the broken pieces of his heart… even till now.

Something which he didn’t know he had the power to feel until he knew you.

Fate was cruel to you both. He wonders if you would come in another form too some day. Perhaps now that Fontaine has prospered and stable enough to not need him anymore.

After so long his memories of you have been starting to become slightly blurred, but there are some things Neuvillette can never forget.

Like how those centuries ago, in this similar light rain that starts to fall, two rapidly beating hearts had confessed to be each other’s forever…

[spencereid-reads]

the language of you | s. reid

wc: 2.1k // warnings: english isn't my first language! an extreme amount of italics, meet-cute, love at first poem sight kinda thing. poems that i found on either google or pinterest. a few swear words, maybe? // a/n: my first time writing for reid and cm in general. i'm in the middle of season 9 and idk where this idea came from. also i don't know anything about poetry, the last quote is as far as my knowledge goes. if you think you know me from my other writing blog no you don't<3but ily also idk if i'll keep writing, i just wanted to post it bc of world poetry day, i think it's a nice coincidence.

i use she/her pronouns//fem!reader in almost all of my fics!

the cold hallways of the university building aren't as big and intimidating as he remembered. and this time, they welcomed him with open arms. he was just a kid when he first set foot here, and now here he was, being invited by a member of his team to teach the young minds of college kids.

spencer reid had never been a great public speaker, sure, he had the qualities of one, but he was also known to ramble on and on about a specific subject if he was interested enough in it, most likely overwhelming and quite often scaring the class attendees.

he followed dr. blake through the crowded halls, she'd invited him along to one of her lectures, she needed someone with vast knowledge about, -well, everything-, and a quick mind, and he was the perfect addition to her classes.

it was weird, being on the other side of the lecture hall, with dozens of eyes set on him as he spoke, he wasn't nervous per se, more... aware of the situation. but luckily the students were focused, paid attention and asked good questions. he considered that a win in his book. without noticing, the 90 minute class was over, and he approached blake after gathering his things and crossing his signature leather bag over his shoulder.

"ready to head back?" he asked.

"not quite, there's a friend of mine giving a lecture next door, it's her first class, actually. thought we'd stop by for a bit, wish her good luck." she said, sliding her black blazer back on.

"sure, what's it about?"

"you'll see. i think you'll enjoy it." she gave him a sly smile, making her way up the steps, he stood there for a second, wondering what the subject might be. there were a lot of things that he enjoyed, physics, math, science.

spencer caught up to her just as she opened the door to the other lecture hall, sliding in behind alex as his eyes adjusted to the change of lighting. compared to the room they'd just left, this felt nothing like a classroom. it felt more like a theater.

the lights were off, the room being lit up by fake candles lining both sets of steps on each side of the room, and he noticed real candles on the front stage, the flames dancing with the subtle change of pressure as a girl, maybe as young as he was, walked on stage. a book in her hand, but she didn't need it, whatever she was saying was from memory, the worlds flowing effortlessly out her mouth.

he stood frozen in his spot, it took him two seconds to recognize and figure out what was going on.

"lines fall on the soul like dew on the grass. what does it matter that i couldn’t keep her. the night is fractured and she is not with me." she recited, eyes closed as she stopped walking, even from his spot at the top of the steps he could see her facial expression, a frown on her face as her eyebrows furrowed, lips pursed as if she was the one feeling the pain the author was describing.

neruda. poetry.

spencer had never been the biggest fan of poetry, but maybe he just hadn't found the right person to teach him about it.

what an incredulous thought, someone teaching a subject to genius spencer reid? but he couldn't help but be drawn to the soft voice that spoke with love, sorrow and rhythm.

"my voice tried to find the breeze to reach her. another’s kisses on her, like my kisses. her voice, her bright body, infinite eyes."

she was savoring each word in her tongue, and spencer's ears perked up at every sound that left her mouth.

"wonder boy, come on," alex's whisper brought him out of his thoughts, as he followed her down the candlelit steps to one of the first rows.

how he wished he could've stayed up there, hidden within the shadows, since he couldn't take two steps without his eyes having to find the young lecturer again, slowing down his legs.

but from down there he noticed the way the candles lit her face, casting a soft golden glow, and now he found himself thanking the small flames scattered around the stage.

she threw the two fbi agents a look, a knowing gleam in her eye as she recognized the female doctor. it was fleeting, she didn’t let the interaction distract her from the verses and the words slipping from her lips.

“loving is so short, forgetting is so long,” she breathed the words, barely audible as she felt every syllable in every bone of her body.

as she finished the poem, deafening silence fell upon the room, and spencer realized how quiet the room had been since he arrived, yet her soft voice seemed to fill it effortlessly.

“has anyone here ever felt emotions as strong as the ones depicted in the poem? joy, sadness, anger?” she asked, somehow leaving aside the ‘character’ she’d slipped into as she recited the words written by neruda. “love? has anyone ever experienced this… deep, unshakeable need to absolutely possess someone? to keep them all for your own, locked in a room to look, touch, admire as much as you wish?” she continued, eyes scanning the room, and spencer’s breathing hitched when she placed her eyes on him. “i know how it sounds like, but- poetry and language, is quite possibly the best way to express those intense feelings.”

“what about sex?” a voice from the crowd asked.

“that’s a great way too,” she nodded, laughing along with the class, “but have you ever stood in front of a girl, a boy, a person you truly feel like you’d die for, and told them exactly that? how just the touch of their hand holding someone else’s would rip your soul out of your body, or how you’d swim oceans just to get to hear their laugh one last time? i don’t know about you, but i feel like that’s a hundred times better than sex.” she continued, walking from one side of the stage to the other, using her hands and changing the tone in her voice to emphasize what she wanted to say. “i promise you that by the end of this semester you’ll be able to put all of that into your own words. read, everyone. please, read and do your research, and i promise you that you’ll get your chance to be neruda, dickinson. anybody can be a poet. poetry is about feelings, thoughts, the things that keep you up at night, and being able to put all of that into words. read, even if you don’t understand what they’re saying, but think about what they want to say. i know it’s our first class but i’ll leave you some work for friday. just pick a poem, learn it and present it here, i want to see what we’re working with. that’s it for today, thank you.” she vowed her head like an actor who’d just finished a play, walking around the stage as she blew the candles off.

“come on, let’s go say hi,” alex stood up, prompting spencer to do the same, and he had to swallow the feelings inside of him. his mind repeating every word the girl onstage had just said. he knew the importance of poetry, he had a few favorite poets, and he knew about all the hard technical work that was behind writing a good poem, but he’d never taken the time to think about the personal aspect of the work.

“dr. blake, great to see you here,” she greeted the older woman, who embraced her in a hug.

“you too. you were great there, no one would’ve thought it was your first time teaching,”

“well, what can i say, i learned everything from you.”

“please, our fields are as far apart as they could be. it’s all thanks to that big brain of yours. which, speaking of, meet dr. spencer reid, we work together.” alex stepped aside, revealing a tall man, hands fidgeting with his leather bag and long strands of hair covering his forehead. alex always had a soft spot for spencer, the young genius reminded her of herself, once upon a time.

“pleasure to meet you, dr. reid,” the young girl smiled at him, offering her hand.

“likewise,” he said, taking her hand in his. alex’s eyebrows raised, she’d been expecting a speech about germs and pathogens but got none.

“so, what’d you think? was it too much? think i scared the kids?”

“today’s youth doesn’t take things too seriously, they prefer one night stands and lack of commitment.” spencer explained.

“think i’m reaching for the stars for trying to get them to channel their emotions and actually feel them?” the young professor asked him, a smile on her face told him that she’d already thought about that.

“not necessarily, studies have proven that people who can feel and acknowledge their emotions are happier, live longer and have better relationships with themselves and others. also, they have more confidence in themselves and can make lasting relationships, but physical and emotional.” he continued, and this time dr. blake spoke.

“so if you do your job right you’ll get lots of people laid,”

“ah, if only i could make that work for me,” she replied, heat creeping onto her cheeks as she looked down. her words made spencer stop breathing.

“i’m sure someone with your wits and… well, you could get anyone you want,” the words slipped out before he could control them.

“sounds easier said than done, but i’ve decided to devote my life to my work and books, and there doesn’t seem to be anyone coming anytime soon to change that. i’m alright with that, life is more than that.” she shrugged her shoulder.

“not enjoyment, and not sorrow, is our destined end or way; but to act, that each tomorrow find us farther than today.” spencer recalled from memory.

“you speak my language, doctor,” the young professor breathed. and the older woman took the opportunity to interfere.

“like i said, genius. you two should talk, he’s got a very interesting brain that i’m sure you’d love to pick,” she reached toward her friend, wrapping her in a quick hug, “i’ll meet you out there, reid, i have a few things to do.” with that she walked out of the lecture hall, leaving the two young brilliant minds together.

“sorry about her, she’s been trying to set me up with someone since we met. i was her t.a back when i was a grad student.”

“you worked with her?” spencer asked, internally rolling his eyes at himself, she’d obviously just stated that.

“yup. i know, how could someone go from linguistics applied in criminology to poetry? it’s a big leap, but… she’s helped me more than anyone in my entire career.” she spoke with fondness in her voice. “anyway, she was right. i would love to pick that brain of yours.” she said, “sorry, that sounded weird, but-”

“no, no, it’s- fine. i- i’d like to talk to you, more, as well.”

“it’s a date, then.” she smiled, even wider when she noticed the slight blush creeping on his cheeks,

“if only i could recollect it, such a day of days. i let it come and go as traceless as a thaw of bygone snow; it seemed to mean so little, meant so much-” spencer started, the words taking over his mind and mouth before he could even think about it.

“if only now i could recall that touch, first touch of a hand in hand- did one but know,” she finished for him.

“i-i,” he started, surprising himself by the way he stuttered. “i don't speak your language, not like you do, not yet. i'm not a poet. but… i want to learn… i want to.”

she breathed out, all the air leaving her lungs, his wild eyes scanned all over her face, not profiling. but learning, taking in her cues, and a pressure left his shoulders when she saw her lips twitching, breaking for a smile.

“i may be the writer, but you'll always be the words.” she took a step toward him, his eyes settling for her own, it helped him calm down. “it's like i said, anybody can be a poet.”

“i-i’ll see you friday?” he said.

“friday?” she raised her eyebrows.

“yeah, you-you said you had to see what you're working with?”

“i do.” she nodded, a playful gleam in her eyes, “i guess i’ll see you friday. we can get coffee, before coming here.” she suggested.

“is that special treatment, professor?” one more time, he surprised himself by the way he spoke to her, like it was the most natural thing to do. we wished it never stopped, he wanted to hear her amused laugh again.

“maybe.” she bit her lip as she laughed.

****

“this could be the start of something new, and it feels so right to be here with you.”

-high school musical

[whynotjohnlock]

Hello! If it’s no trouble to ask could you write a platonic fic or headcanons for good omens?

Like where it’s Aziraphale x Crowley x teen!reader

Maybe something like how would it be to have them as parental figures/parents?

Anyways I hope you have a good rest of your evening!!

(and if you don’t mind could you add something in there about how they’d react if the reader ever came out to them? If not I totally understand!!)

A/N: I love the idea of Aziraphale and Crowley as parents! You didn't really specify what the reader was coming out as, so I made them non-binary, as that's what is most relatable to me!

In the beginning of the story the child is a girl, and they eventually figure out that they aren't a girl at all and tells our favorite angel and demon couple.

P.S (O/N) means old name and (Y/N) means Your current name

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

Crowely had never been more angry in his entire life as when he first met (Y/N). Rage burned in his demonic blood and his mellow yellow eyes flickerd into a poisonous red. The only thing stopping him from calling thunder from the sky and creating mass destruction was those little innocent eyes he had met on that sorrowful day.

-Flashback-

Aziraphale had just started to reorganize the book shop, as he did every decade when the papers and memoirs and novels got mixed up beyond the ability to find them. Crowley knew Aziraphale. Without words, without any indication, he knew that the angel would get tired and would want some pastries to snack on before noon. They had been friends for eons together and words were not necessary to convey thought between the pair. Crowley went out to get some pastries because he liked to see the angel's face become soft and happy. The demon loved the way his angel's eyes seemed to cut through any darkness or pain he held.

Just the thought of Aziraphale seemed to brighten his day and a small unnoticeable smile formed on Crowley's face. Mentally he had scolded himself for being a lovesick aardvark and finally got the strength to leave the couch and swagger walk™ out of his flat's door.

A happy juant to his other beloved parked right next to the bookshop and a nice drive latter he arrived to a newly opened bakery.

The bakery itself was rather dull, and he hadn't even cared enough to remember it's name. The whole experience was rather annoying as the shopkeeper kept talking to him when he wanted to order. He stood there for what felt like ages- which considering his age was 6000+ was quite the achievement- bored and annoyed. Couldn't the shopkeeper see he was completely uninterested in conversation? While the shopkeeper was busy ranting on about the economy, the window clicked open on noticed by everyone but him.

From his periphery and under his designer black shades, a small girl that caught his attention as he watched them sneak in through the window soundlessly.

The child silently went up to one of the display racks with croissants and started stuffing them into a little brown worn out backpack to eat later. Whoever this child was, it was clear to Crowley that they would have to be very brave or very desperate or possibly both the rob a bakery in broad daylight.

Still, the shopkeepers were not the wiser as the little gremlin continued to steal their day supply bread and it appeared they would be able to escape unnoticed.

Then the floor creaked, and all eyes turn to the little girl furious and angry. "Thief! Thief! Somebody get her!" The man running the register shouted. In surprise the girl dropped her bag of food and make a run for it.

Crowley always had a soft spot for kids and it was no surprise really to anyone who had actually known him like Aziraphale, that he miracled a chair in the way of the shopkeeper so he 'accidentally' tripped and little girl could getaway.

Falling down in pain the angry man shouts "Ugh, I hate that girl! it's the third time this week! If she does that again I'll call the police to take her away!"

All respect gone for the man working the desk, Crowley decides to order three sandwiches instead of the usual two. Once the food is in his hands, he sets off to find the crafty little thief.

It only really takes 5 minutes for Crowley to find thief girl walking streets alone. "Hey kiddo, you lost?"

The girl looks up at him and surprise and then fear like a broken animal, and from her lips tumble a simple "No mister."

His heart aches, and to appear less threatening he gets down on one knee. "Hey it's all right kiddo I'm not going to hurt you. I even brought you some food."

Crowley gives the tiny human one of the sandwiches to prove he's not a threat. The girl blinks at him and then blinks again and then devours the sandwich like it's the first food she's had in weeks.

Actually, looking at her now it might be. This is the first time Crowley's been able to really observe her and from what he can see it's almost certain she's in a rough situation- which reminds him he hasn't even asked her name yet. "What's your name kiddo?"

The girl blinks once more. "(O/N)"

He hesitates. He doesn't want hell to find out he helped a small defenseless child and certainly doesn't want hastor to use the girl to get him. He looks down at the poor innocent girl who has already finished the sandwich and is eating crumbs off the floor. "I'll walk you home, just show me where you live."

(O/N) nods simply, before taking his hand and walking Eastward for a couple of blocks. She stops at the intersection between two houses. 'Maybe she needs to go in the back door?' Crowley thinks to himself. Alas, despite working for hell, his gut wasn't quite prepared for the twisting sensation when he sees (O/N) gesture to a pile of cardboard boxes.

"This is my super cool box fort!" She says truly proud of her creation and happy, as if this was an okay way of living. "Let me give you the tour!" All Crowley can do is nod dumbly as she excitedly explains her home.

"This is where I sleep! Oh, and this is where I look at the stars through my telescope." Her 'telescope' is a clear glass bottle attached to a thrown out tripod stand. "And this is where-"

Crowley is heartbroken and can't take anymore. He cuts the girl off in a gentle sad tone, "where are your parents kiddo?"

"My parents? Umm, mummy and daddy dropped me off and said they'd be back in an soon."

"When was that kiddo?" Crowley's voice breaks into fragments.

"Um, when they were painting that house red I think. Don't worry though! I'm sure they'll be back soon Mister, just like they promised!"

Crowley knew this side of town well because it was on the way to Aziraphale's house, and recalled they had painted that particular house red a year ago.

A year ago.

What in God's name had this child been through? From the size of a little girl she couldn't have been more than five or six years old.

The little girls face made him hurt so so much because she truly believed that her parents would come back to her even after a year of not being there for her. 365 days of fighting for herself alone just for the basic necessities to grow up; and some how she still had hope they were good people. It hurt that much more in that she reminded him of himself as an angel, naive and hopeful of God and the great plan she had for the universe. Her face held the same smile that Aziraphale had when he believed that Angels were good people. And by Satan and God did it hurt.

His pain fueled his rage and bitterness. Anger at the people who it forsaken the child. Bitterness for the world. Hatred for God and her holier than thou standard. His jaw clenched and fingers turned white from clenching so hard into his fist. Why had she forsaken him? Was he not good enough? Was it because he asked too many questions? God's prophet, Jesus had said time and time again that questioning was part of faith, so that really didn't make sense. The more he thought, the more none of the answers made any sense at all.

The only thing that seemed to make sense was the fact and desire and need to take (O/N) home and keep her safe. He decided he would do what no one else had done for him; he would be there, and he would protect her. He would take her home and answer all the questions she had without ever getting annoyed or angry.

No one deserves to be in trouble just for asking questions. 'It won't happen, not on my watch' he vowed.

He did not swear to God. He did not swear to Satan. Crowley sweard to the only thing that mattered to him, Aziraphale, that he would find a way to convince this little girl to go to his angel's bookshop with him and protect them from all harm.

And he did.

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

*Flash forward*

His little girl grew up so fast. She wasn't little anymore. Heck, (Y/N) even a girl anymore.

It god was amazing when they came out. He was so fucking proud that his little thief was brave enough to question there own identity and gender through an incredible mental journey to find the words to represent who they where and had always been. He definitely was not crying when (Y/N) came out, even though Aziraphale had hallucinated and kept insisting that that's what happened.

They had grown into a fiercely independent young adult who had just finished education was pursuing the career of their dreams.

"Are you alright, dear?" An angel snapped him out of his thoughts, and he could have sworn his demonic heart stopped for a second.

"I'm alright, angel. I was just thinking about our little thief."

Aziraphale becomes a mother hen™ "Crowley! How meany times have I told you that they are so much more than a scoundrel who steals money in the night!"

"Angel, (Y/N) likes the nickname, and told me they like it several times!"

"Our starlight deserves a better name!"

Aziraphale had grown to love his starlight as much as he loved his wiley old serpent, with all of himself, truly, madly, and deeply. He read to (Y/N) every night, creating worlds and universes of words for his starlight to laugh and enjoy.

He took them to all his favorite restaurants, for sushi for brioche for crepes and even oysters to taste and try. Only the best for his starlight!

Both angel and demon become extremely serious and angry with one another for a few heartbeats.

Then, they burst out laughing together, unable to continue this silly argument any longer. Crowley falls over on the couch tackling his angel down with him.

They just lie there together completely unable to do anything but keep laughing together in pure unchecked joy.

Aziraphale and Crowley eventually get there giggles out, and hold one another in silence.

Aziraphale whispers softly into Crowley's ear: "I love you, my dear."

Crowley gives a half smirk half smile, "i fORgIvE yOu!"

"You're never going to let that go, are you?"

"Nope!"

"Well, I suppose it's well deserved, but I want you to know that I really do love you more than books and oysters and crepes. I love you more than I can say with words."

"I know, angel. And I really do forgive you for whatever that word mess was. Can we go back to cuddleing?"

"Of course dear."

Crowley and Aziraphale had never felt more at peace with the world than they did with you since you entered their life. They where truly free from hell and heaven to be with one another happy.

They were truely free to be as they always wanted to be;

An Ineffable family.

[hooked-on-elvis]

THANK YOU FOR BEING STRONG, LISA MARIE PRESLEY ♥ (1968 — 2023)

I'd like to address a few words on Lisa Marie Presley today, on [sadly] the 1st anniversary of her passing.

BRAVERY. That's the biggest virtue I see in Lisa.

At 5 years old she saw her life drastically changing for the first time, and it was the first moment she had no other choice but to be brave, even not knowing about it, consciously. Her parents, Elvis and Priscilla, divorced in 1973. Imagine how this feels to a child. Imagine now how this feels to a famous child, since gossip is all around and there's nothing anyone could do to prevent her from being exposed to it (even if Priscilla and Elvis tried the hardest to protect young Lisa, the best they could).

Although she couldn't possibly understand what was going on, a child is still very perceptive and sensitive to the world around. At 5 years old is the age we all begin to keep the first memories of being alive, so Lisa must have kept to her adult years, vivid, possibly painful, memories way back from 1973, even if just a few blurred images and soft whispers echoing through her mind.

Then, at 9 years old she was forced to be brave for the second time, but it was harder. Unfortunately, Lisa lost her loving father in 1977 and grief stroke her for the first time, ravaging her fairy tale castle at once, without any warning, and, on top of that, she spent her whole life from then on, having those painful memories being brought up to mind when people, naturally, asked about her phenomenal father, all the time they addressed to her. She could never, and she did never, managed to escape this, to keep herself from thinking about her father's death and avoid suffering.

But the worst about having to heal and "get over" her father's loss, certainly was witnessing people, many, many people, badmouthing him. The man this young girl knew, the one she looked up to, the loving parent that took good care of her, that spoiled her to a fault, the first man that protected her and the first man she ever loved, the one man that treated her as a little princess and made her feel the most special little angel on earth, was gone forever... and the people, instead of being compassionate and protective about her, were all around spewing venom over her father's grave, shouting how bad of a man Elvis Presley supposedly was. And it all started since the day Elvis passed away, from the gossip in the book "Elvis: What Happened".

To little "Yisa" Marie, Elvis was a hero, just a hero... nothing more, nothing less.

But she didn't have him around anymore, to hug her and tell everything would be alright, or to put her at ease and say those things they said about him, those things that were hurting her so much, were all lies — even tho much wasn't, she didn't understand and it would've been good having her father there to make her feel safe.

All she had available now, to help her feeling closer to her daddy, to get to know him a little better for herself and maybe getting a good and sound advice from him, were books. Books with the family and friends own personal accounts on who Elvis was and what he did throughout his life. But those books... the same books that contained the good side of Elvis, contained many things a daughter doesn't want and doesn't need to know about her parent.

To who Lisa could run to, when needing a little support, a little help soothing her sorrow, her grief? Her mother. Now, the worst must have been having her own mother writing a memoir book where she accused Elvis of many shameful, monstrous even, actions and behavior (one of the vital books that tainted Elvis' image forever). Now, Lisa didn't have her father anymore, and her mother kinda looked like an enemy at times. She felt lost, alone, and didn't know why those people kept on talking so badly about someone she utterly loved so much and that gave her nothing but the deepest love she ever felt.

Reading gossip all the time, being asked about things written in book she couldn't possibly tell rather they were truthful or not; things written in books she probably didn't ever read to keep herself from getting even more hurt. Still, Lisa had to sit and hear all those hurtful things about her own father and she couldn't do much to defend him. She just sat there and probably feeling the words cutting her guts like knives being twisted nonstop. This little girl was deeply hurt many times in her life, and nothing could mend this part of her broken heart.

It made her angry the way she was forced to hear some people mocking her father. It maddened her how the press kept questioning her about rather Elvis was or wasn't a bad man. But she had to live with this and keep a straight face. She had to grow up faster than most children/teenagers do while the press - and a good part of the society - kept on trying to make Lisa hate a part of herself, her origin, her own family name. She saw her castle being crushed many times during her life, with only a few quick breaks, here and there, so she could take a deep breath and get herself together again, only so she could prepare herself to the next dark moment she sorely felt would come to find her, sooner or later.

On top of Elvis, Lisa had to deal with many more damaging situations throughout her life, AND I AM ONLY TALKING ABOUT HER FORMATIVE YEARS UNTIL NOW.

Because of her status in society, her name, her fame, her wealthy, she never knew if the ones around her were genuinely loving and caring for her or not (something her father also experienced as an adult, something that Elvis confessed to friends it made him hopeless since he would never know for sure if he had true love in his life or if the people around him were there to get something only he could offer, and something that wasn't his pure love at all. Imagine living a life where you never know if you are loved because of who you are or for what you have to offer. It must make one feels like they worth nothing, like they didn't deserve being loved.

Yes, Lisa was poured with Elvis' fans adoration and love, but its a different love, it's distant. It's a love not even Elvis himself could feel in his soul, even tho he loved his fans so much. He said to friends our, his fans love, was an impersonal kind of love because we didn't know him as a person, just as an image. He was right, back in his time people only knew Elvis' image. As much we adore them, Elvis and little Lisa couldn't possibly feel loved only from the fans adoration.

Not knowing if her friends really cared for her must have been lonely. Like she had nobody she could trust. We know Elvis felt like this.

Living this kind of life isn't easy, it would quickly take its toll on any of us. Lisa must have felt browsing in the ocean, all alone. She needed to escape from those uneasy feelings. So, she had some drug issues during her growing up period in life. I don't blame her, neither should you. Like Elvis sang, "Walk a mile in my shoes". You and I have no idea how it must be unbearable listening to people mocking at your family publicly; saying the meanest things about your father, some mean gossip about her mother too, here and there, and even mean rumors about herself, when people begun judging her body, her relationships, and so on.

Yet, Lisa continued being brave. She lived her life, her own way. Never caring what outsides may think of her. She got married some times, she had children and for a moment things seemed to be doing okay. But the worst thing could ever had happened to sweet Lisa, happened. Suddenly she was losing her only son, her loving beautiful boy, her Ben. All of those things that happened in that little girl's life until now, and then this, the most horrendous nightmare strikes her, breaking not only her heart but her soul, in a way she would never recover from.

Still, Lisa Marie continued being the bravest she could, for herself but mostly for the 3 beautiful daughters she had to be there for, but from now on things were never the same.

I still don't know about Lisa Marie's life in a deep. There's many more things, I'm sure, she had endure, she had to face in her lifetime [the broken relationships, not to mention the inner monsters she had to fight against every single day], but those things everybody knows are enough to make me feel empathetic towards her.

Of course, there's poverty in the world, there's people literally dying from starvation or from guns/knives and bombs - and we all feel deeply for them too, but that doesn't mean the famous and rich people don't suffer as well. Everybody has their own mountains to climb. And yes, I feel very empathetic for the emotional issues Lisa Marie Presley had to face after losing her father as a child, all the press abuse she experienced since a young age and then the tragic lost of her only son.

I'm not trying to make Lisa a saint, much less someone you should pity. Not in a million years. I know, we know, Lisa Marie was happy too. Not everything was darkness in her life. ✨ She managed to find happiness and bliss in the little things. She wrote beautiful, meaningful and deep songs; she performed live onstage graciously, even if it must have felt terrifying singing in front of an audience when people had unreal expectations on her because of her father. Lisa lived life her way. She gave her father's fans her love and affection the best way she could, all her life. She grew a loving family. She had 4 beautiful children. CONTINUOUSLY, SHE LIVED BOLDLY, DOING HER OWN THING, TAKING CARE OF BUSINESS, SEARCHING FOR HAPPINESS WHILE BEING THE STRONG, BRAVE WOMAN SHE WAS BORN BEING.

Lisa Marie Presley is an inspiring woman. She was humble, she was fearless, she was a rock star. ⚡

Unfortunately, Lisa was taken away from her family, from us, fans, too soon, exactly one year ago. But we will never forget her, not because of her father but because of her own soul, the life she created by herself.

Now, something to celebrate is that we, gladly, will read Lisa's own words about her life. About her father, certainly, but most importantly about herself and this is something to celebrate indeed. Elvis didn't had the same good fortune of having the time to collect his memories and writing a book that could speak up for him when he was no longer here. Thanks to Riley Keough, Lisa's beautiful daughter, Elvis' grandchild, Lisa will have this triumph, this final time to set the record straight.

I'm SO, SO, SO happy Lisa's memoir book will be released! She deserves having her story told by herself. Once again, Riley is being the real Presley she is. God bless her.

I love that GIF so much! It's clear to see how Lisa is emotional seeing her father's history being told in such a fair, not full of bullshit way. If we think about other Elvis biopics released previously, where in some Elvis is shown ridiculously talking to his shadow, even tho Baz Luhrmann's 2022 "Elvis" movie isn't 100% accurate, it was the closest we ever got to his real, full lifestory being portrayed. I feel happy the last her father's history portrayed onscreen she got to see was one that made her feel happy, proud and honored. That's all Lisa wanted all her life in what concerns to her daddy memory and legacy. I'm in peace knowing that, even tho she died so young, she was honored and witnessed at last her beloved father being honored and praised for the good, unique Rock and Roll hero, the pioneer, the legend he was.

I'm happy it made her happy. ♥

We miss you so much, EP and dear Lisa. Hope you're both happy reunited. Look down for us, sweet angels. We'll keep your memories alive. May God keep Lisa's angel soul in Heaven, peaceful and together with her beloved father and son.

We love you, Yisa. Thank you for living your life in such inspirational way.

Rest in peace, sweet princess. ♥

[ohblackdiamond]

the story of mandate (conclusion)

Part I is here. Here is the completely signed magazine.

I went to a Paul event thanks to my dear friend @elrohare and I was a woman on a mission. This was my holy grail, my twelve labors of Hercules, my ultimate sacrifice of good sense, my Mandate, if you will. Paul is a man of constant sorrow who's seen trouble all his days. Paul had not known trouble until he saw my face again a mere two months after his last time.

Unlike Gene, who will randomly set a date to hand out his crap for hilarious prices, Ace, who will appear at any 500-1000 seater across the country and balefully advertise his meet and greets onstage, and Peter, who will roll out of bed every six months for a horror convention, Paul does his events at Wentworth galleries across the country. Paul is basically like Pokemon Red's Porygon. You can get him, but he'll take everything you have.

I was prepared. I had done the legwork and the paperwork. Part of my purchase included an autographed item. (Please note that this is not nearly the entirety of the, uh, Paul Stanley Experience, if you will-- this is only the Mandate aspect of it. There was more!)

Paul remembered both of us. "It's been awhile."

"Yeah, couple months, since February, yeah." I'm actually sort of not shocked he remembered us since neither of us look like typical KISS fans. There is also a very large height difference between us, so we are distinctive. We talk. I manage some conversation, some of which is sort of funny. But I'm not here to provide Paul with wit and candor. I'm here for Mandate, which he has already by that point seen the back of even with me trying to cover the naked men in the tub with my phone. He has already also seen the front of it, with its doodled-on-by-Gene cover. He has seen it open, because I had to set it down in order for us to take our picture together. He has probably spent the whole rest of our conversation leading up to this determining what to say to the lone weirdo that has not given him RARO, his solo album, his other solo album, the KISS comic book (mint condition), or various and sundry other KISS collectibles.

He has hit on it. He gestures to the president of Wentworth who is, incidentally, the one that's borrowing my phone to take our pictures. He comes closer as Paul shows him the magazine, along with me.

"Gene drew on it [the front cover of my copy]," I say.

"Mandate... this is the very first magazine we were ever in." (Peter said the same thing in his first book. They are both technically incorrect, but far be it from me to correct Paul Stanley on things that happened before I was born-- and to be honest, knowing what I know about how slow it could end up being to go from writing a feature for a monthly magazine to it actually being published, it wouldn't surprise me at all if they'd done the magazine some months prior to it being on the shelves).

"Our manager at the time said he could get us into a magazine. We didn't know it was a gay magazine. I mean, whatever you're into, but... ["I wasn't," basically, though I don't know if he said those two words specifically]....." as he flips, completely needlessly, through the pictures, sort of slowly, until he gets to page eight and page nine, where all three of his bandmates have signed in black Sharpie. "Of course, they blew me [the photo] up. ... And Gene drew on it."

I finally manage to pipe up.

"Yeah, Gene texted you about it, purportedly, anyway...."

"Yeah, he did."

"He did? Really?"

He looked like he was weirdly thoughtful. Well, sounded like he was. Maybe even a little bit amused. I had a hard time looking too hard at him while this was going on, and I found myself looking more at the naked men he was flipping through. But I had my plan and I would not be too distracted. I had brought my own black Sharpie, since I knew he had a penchant for signing in silver (this is because his Wentworth artwork always comes with an inscription on black paper that he writes on in silver). The Sharpie was right there and, possibly because he was keenly aware of my level of distress at the thought of Mandate being signed in a different color, he obediently took it and signed it and shut it, and handed it back to me. My smile could've broken through my dimples.

Triumph complete. Thank you, @elrohare for again allowing me the pleasure of coming with, and I was glad to plus-one and for once, return the favor.

Thank you, Mr. Paul Stanley of KISS. And thank you to Peter, Gene (especially Gene!), and Ace. I hope Mandate gave you all an unexpected blast from the past, and I really wish I'd told Paul that Peter quite appreciated the ass on the guy on the front cover. Maybe next time.

[clazberryk]

Tav's Nightmare.

Well i did it chapter one is up. I hope you enjoy it.

Warnings: Depression, suicidal tendencies.

Please look after yourself and read only if you are comfortable. There is nothing graphic.

Well this kinda took on a work all its own. My work is not ususally this angsty. Maybe i should not write when i am struggling but also, i know the importance of sheddign light on topics like this. I will say there is a hapyp endign to this. Promise.

So without further ado: I give you: Tav's nightmare. Pairing: AstarionX Tav (Female)

Chapter one: Darkness

He felt her twitch and tense in her sleep, the telltale sign that not everything was copacetic in her mind as she slumbered. Sighing he pulled her tighter against his chest, she was nestled on his left side, arm lazily thrown over his waist, no cloth barrier just the two of them, skin to skin, it was a novelty for him, for his skin not to crawl, for him not to recoil in terror or disgust, he loved it.  He loved the feel of her breath against his solar plexus, tickling him, he loved the weight of her pressing down on him in her sleep, their legs entangled together. It was perfect. His mind was at peace for the first time in two hundred years his mind and he was at peace. It was laughable that he was so at peace and yet she was not, and the world was close to ending.

Ever since the fight with Cazador she was having worst nights, the nightmares did not scare him, and witnessing what she witnessed in the fight, the lead up to the fight would impact anyone, regardless the strength of their character. What he did not like, what did scare him was how cut off she had become the following days. How withdrawn into herself she had become, even their companions were starting to notice. Constantly asking him if there was anything that they could do to help, the worrying glances when her back was turned or when she was occupying herself with a task in their shared room at The Elfsong. Often him, Karlach and Gale had shared knowing looks however he was unsure of what he, himself could do. Astarion was out of his depth with this, with supporting his partner, his equal, but he did certainly know that he would do anything he could to help her through this.

Astarion had no illusions of being her knight in shining armour because he was not one, he was no hero, no ethereal prince from a fairytale that would fix everything with a kiss and whisk her away to a fairytale land, as much as he wanted to. He was just him the person she had chose to spend the rest of her life with, which if he thought too much about still overwhelmed him but he found with each waking day he was becoming more comfortable with the idea, even starting to think on their future and what to do after the battle with the elder brain. Astarion was not stupid or oblivious he knew she had her struggles had even opened about some of them in their many nights of just talking in the Shadow-cursed lands. He knew she was a closed book, that he was slowly getting too open and read page by page, chapter by chapter. She was not quick to trust, but once you had her trust, she was quick to defend. She wore her emotions in her eyes, and even on that first night in camp he saw the depth of the pain in those brown orbs, she hid it well in her demeanour and everything else, but her eyes were so expressive. Did she know how expressive her eyes were?

Those brown depths held so much pain, sorrow, lose but there was a slowly growing fire every time she looked at him, every time she smiled at him, or he smiled at her, every interaction between the two of them he saw that fire get stoked just a little brighter. A shine, an ember, a fire just for him, he knew what that shine was, what that fire was, he at first felt guilt for it, which led to that fateful night after she defended him against that awful Drow, when she supported his decision without questioning, even feeling her magic grow hotter in her blood as the Drow kept pushing and she shut her up with a simple remark.

“He gave you his answer” and walked away even dropping and smashing the potion the Drow had given them from her blood. It was then he knew that his simple plan had fallen apart and the warring in him calmed and the side he never would have betted on, the underdog, the side that he had been supressing and pushing further down since The Underdark had won, he no longer wanted her to be a conquest, he no longer wanted her to be a mark, he wanted her. Not her protection. That is when he realised, he wanted ALL OF HER! This was further cemented when he watched her die at Moonrise and resurrected by Withers, he knew when she stood tall with him against Cazador, and they nearly lost but she let everything loose in her magic, even to the weakening of her and when she threw herself in front of Cazador’s necrotic claws and he saw her fall. He knew with every fibre of his being. He wanted all of her. He wanted to be better for her, yes, he still had craved the power of The Vampire Ascendent, but he wanted that power not for him anymore but for her, to protect her any way he could. However the look of pure pride she gave him, her eyes shining bright when he turned away from it was worth a life in the shadows.

So, if it meant that he be there for her however he could during her difficulties it would be no difficulty for him, he would learn how to support her and be a solid constant like she had been these several months of travelling. He pulled her in tighter, kissing the crown of her head, and closed his eyes, she had been quiet for a while, usually that meant her mind had quietened as well.

“Run Tavi, run” She looked around the horizon blurring as her tears gathered in her eyes, her mothers frantic voice screaming at her to run, the fires around her growing brighter and closer.

“Tavi!” Her mother’s profile was then right in front of her, pushing her away from the burning village, her home burning. Tavi turned and ran as far and as fast as she could, she could feel the fire burning in her blood, her breath burning in her lungs, she felt every contract and snap of muscle propelling her forward, away from danger out and away, just like her mother always told her to do. See danger. Run from it. Do not approach, do not engage run. It is how is you survive Tavi. She kept running until she could no longer see the orange glow in the horizon, she was surrounded by darkness, the middle of a forest, she slowed and turned for her mother, and gasped. Where was she?

“Mum?” She looked around maybe she had fallen back a little, she was not a spry has the elf was, not as young as Tavi, her mum was only a half elf whereas she was a full elf, regardless how mixed her blood was, she was still leaner, faster, eye sight more prominent “Mum?” Tavi called, fear constricting her words, she started back the way she came but saw nothing “Mum? Mum? MUM!” She screamed, her body folding over on itself has her fear took over, she could not be alone, no not alone, please no. She could not do this. It was too much. Please? Oh gods, please? However she knew, she knew in her heart of hearts her mother had pushed her away and saved her life.

The scenery merged and she was stood on the porch of her small home with her partner, she was crying, arms folded tightly against her midsection, watching as her partner, no ex-partner was leaving, never to return because of her.

“Mum?” She called out, crying, wishing she could be held by those comforting arms, anything to be loved again, unconditionally “Mummy” She fell to her knees her emotions crushing her, in the space of Tenday she had lost her unborn child and her partner. “Mummy” She fell sideways in a foetal position and just cried, her mind broken, her body exhausted, her heart shredded out in front of her. Even her magic did not answer to her call.

She was walking down a road, she could see the cityscape in the distance, she was unsure of the day, week, month, or the year. She just had a purpose, albeit a small one but a purpose, nonetheless. Tonight was the night. Tonight, she would have her answers. She was dressed in simple travelling clothes, her hair left down, what was the point of putting it up anyway, nobody was waiting for her at home. She had no one, no one to answer to, no one to come home to. It was her, alone in this never-ending world that was too bright and too dark at the same time. Just get to the top of the tower, all you need to do is get to the top of the tower.

To the top of the tower.

Fear, did someone scream? Was that her screaming?

Restricted, she could not move, a strange reptilian woman flooded her vision, she was restricted as well, she watched as a tadpole was inserted into her eye. She passed out again. She did not want to see those endless rows of teeth.

It was too bright, she rubbed her head, trying to shield her eyes and her headache from the too bright sun, her senses smelt the burning debris, no, no, no, no not again. Mum. Mum. Mummy! Tavi forced herself to her feet and saw that she was not in her village that had just been raided and pillaged by bandits, she was on a beach, it was a crash site, there was a dark-haired woman on the ground near her. She walked towards her.

Flash of silver, the cool feel of a blade at her throat, she fell backwards and landed with a thump, her breath forced out of her lungs, a silver curly haired elf had a blade to her neck, of course this would happen. She was denied death, so the universe deemed her its plaything.

“I saw you on that ship” The elf snapped, tightening his grip on her, the blade cutting closer into her skin, she did not feel it though, she felt the pressure dagger, but the pain did not come, she was numb. “Nod” The elf snapped, and she mechanically nodded. “Good now what the hells did you do to me?”

The Emerald Grove, the Tieflings, the goblins, the night out in the clearing, the Underdark, The shadow cursed lands. Moonrise, The Absolute, Ketheric, The Chosen Three, Murkyl, the guardian, CAZADOR!!!

Tavi gasped, her eyes taking in the room, and where she was, her heart and mind racing, it took her a few minutes to get her bearings, for her to realise where she was. The Elfsong, in their bed. Her head against Astarion’s chest. He was trancing, and she smiled softly.

He will leave to eventually. You know this.

The voice was back, did it really leave? She knew it was getting less the more that her and Astarion talked, but still it was back. Her malicious self. Her true self.

You bring nothing but death. Making decisions for everyone else.

No! he loves me. Tavi clasped her hands over here ears trying to block out the words.

But has he said it? Tavi could not refute that, because he had not said it, she loved him by all the pantheons she loved him with every fibre of her being. She would sacrifice herself to save him. She had done against Cazador. You destroy everything you touch. Your father left disgusted by your mixed blood, your mother left, dying because she could not spend another second of your whining weak self.

No stop it, she died to save me. She told me to run!

And run you did, the one thing at which you are good. Tavi stood grabbing a shirt, she was unsure if it was his or hers, pulling it over her head she smelt the Rosemary and the Bergamot and knew it was Astarion’s she sighed, looked down at the pale elf, ensuring he did not rouse from his trance, and headed towards the ladder that took her to the roof of the Elfsong.

Running again. No surprise there. Tavi blocked out the voice as she lifted the latch to the roof of the tavern, and looked up int the night sky, stars for as far as she could see. It was warm, but there was a cool breeze blowing in from the docks. Tavi shivered and wrapped her arms around herself, for warmth but also to just hold herself together.

Stupid worthless girl! You should have perished with your mother, then all this would not be happening. Shadowheart would be a Justiciar, Wyll would not be a devil, Karlach would not have a life sentence. Lae’zel would not be running from her Queen, and your beloved Astarion would be ascended.

NO, no stop it. Stop it. Stop it. Tavi turned away from the voice, it was starting to take form, and once it took form there was no escaping it, she slammed her hands over her ears and snapped her eyes closed. If she could not see and she could not even hear then it was not there. The monster that stayed in her, watching, waiting, lying in wait. The beast continued the diatribe.

Kept him weak, so he would not leave you, so he would not realise how worthless you are. Just a silly worthless lost little elf girl. Too weak for him, to weak for anyone. Kept him weak so he was your equal, so that there was never the risk of him leaving. Gone, gone, gone. You only have until the end of the world, tick tock, fast approaching. There have been no talks of after has there. He is not going to bring it up, denying him his freedom, denying him his life I the sun so he can hide in the shadows with the lost little elf girl. Selfish bitch!

Tavi stood up straight then, tears streaming down her cheeks, pleasantly numb again. Numb she could do; numb she could deal with. She walked to the edge of the roof, looked down into the square, she could just make out the fountain was just outside Sorcerers Sundries, they were going with Gale today to help him with his research. They could do that without her. They did not need him. What point was a sorcerer in the group when they had a wizard, a well renowned wizard at that Gale of Waterdeep. They did not need Taveleigha of who-knows-where. Lost little elf girl. No mother, no father, no child to call her own.

I mean, it would not take much. Headfirst, nobody could stop you. Smash the brain, smash the tadpole. It would be over. Would be quiet. Isn’t that what you wanted when you first came here? Before you were taken. Tavi knew the beast was taunting her, and she could not deny it. She had originally come to Baldur’s gate to kill herself, before she was snatched up in a whirl of purple smoke. She moved closer to the edge her toes hanging over the edge, the beast whirling around her, leaning over her suffocating her, pressing down.