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shibaraki · 2 years ago

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IF TIDES COULD SPEAK (THEY’D CALL YOU HOME) ┊ BAKUGO KATSUKI

synopsis: an unlikely hero comes in the form of a barbarian. your stolen pelt is returned by his hand— but for a selkie that is more than simple kindness. it is a proposal.

tags: AFAB reader (referred to as a 'wife' once + 'baby' a few times), fantasy au, barbarian bakugo (+ the squad), selkie reader, brief non graphic suicide attempt, minor injuries, previous forced marriage + captivity, strangers to friends to lovers, accidental marriage + bond, magic elements, bathing together, sharing a bed, miscommunication, love as a choice, getting together, shapeshifters, angst + fluff, eventual smut, bakugo carries reader (he’s strong!!), oral + fingering (reader receiving), unprotected vaginal sex

wc: 25K+

↳ for the mermay collab hosted by the teahouse server ↰

The battle rages on behind as your bare feet carry you frantically toward the cliff side, incognisant to the uneven earth and jagged rocks cutting under your heels.

A magnificent orange glow is cast across the land. Blistering heat radiates at your back and seeps through the thin robes pulled across your shoulders. Fire eats away at the canopy above, at the dry grass in the gardens, at the place you deign to call home.

It is a sight you wish you had more time to savour. A draconic clan hailing from the north had descended upon the land and sought to reap the riches for themselves. The anguished screams of your once wretched husband still echo in your heart, dancing through its chambers like wind through chimes.

You fled with only one destination in mind.

Many, many moons ago, you had been stolen away by greed. A man that called himself king yet acted anything but kingly. Lord only in name. He speared your pod mate and took you, dirty calloused fingers sinking into your flesh, violently tearing the pelt from your back. Nausea churns in your stomach as you recall his grin, eyeing you greedily, desiring servitude that was not his to have.

“You are to be my wife,” he said, drunk on tales of rare creatures who would keep a hearth burning and bear his children if only he stole their hide. “Now you belong to me”.

Your pelt remained locked away in an armoured vault along with his other opulent treasures— goods that would now be burning, turned to ash. He had finally taken from the wrong people and must reap the consequences.

You are so relieved to be free of his clutches that there is no time to grieve the loss. This is your chance. With or without your pelt you are a selkie, and the ocean always welcomes her children home.

Guided by the tides' tumultuous song you sprint through the woods, treeline funnelling out on a plateau to reveal the edge of the cliff. You take a staggered breath, wincing at the pain in your chest. Now your momentum has slowed to a stop, the fatigue catches up with you. An ache seeps through your legs and your knees threaten to buckle as you shiver.

This is it, you think. You watch the waves below roll like dark ribbon. Steeling your resolve you spread your arms as far as they go, until the sinew holding your back pulls taut. Something acrid sinks in your gut and you feel distinctly ill. It takes all of your willpower to deny the fear pounding in your body as you step forward.

The wind billowed around you, swaying your human form towards the edge. Faux wings spread and a roar pushed to the limits of your small voice, sound whipped from your mouth and cast far asea. Eyes squeezed shut, you tip into the oncoming depths trusting your mother will catch you.

The sound is cacophonous. Not even your pulse can be heard over the waves; elemental fingers apply sharp pressure to the north and south of your body, shaping flesh until you're nothing but a pebble caught in gravity's path.

If you should concentrate you’d hear a frantic shout through the white noise. And between the milliseconds left before bone collides with the tide, a large clawed foot encircles your forearm. A rush of air swells in your lungs as you try to scream, the abrupt disruption of your freefall forcing your shoulder from its socket, talons tearing through capillaries as if your skin were wet paper.

Suddenly, you’re a sail without a mast, rippling over the open ocean. Dark and cloudless, not a speck on the surface. The spray is icy against your ankles, a million papercut kisses. In the mirage, you can see fleeting reflections. The silhouette of a dragon mid-flight.

You’ve no memory of hitting the sand or being carried along the shoreline. Your consciousness dips and peaks. The few times you come to are when your body is being jostled, a blurred figure looming above and unrecognisable. In one breath they are washing your wounds with water poured from a wineskin, the next you are flinching away from salve covered fingers as they poke and prod to stem the bleeding.

Warmth is the first thing on your mind as you wake. With a sudden gasp for air, all the exhilaration and adrenaline hits you as if your soul had been caught, suspended in that moment. Phantom touches skim the length of your spine and all at once you are overwhelmingly aware of your body.

The sharp noise startles a figure in your periphery.

“Back in the land of the living, huh?”

A broad, bare chested man sits at your bedside with his arms crossed tight and pillowed in his lap. There’s a single delicate braid by his ear, longer than his short-spiked hair and dangled loosely beneath his jaw. You’d find him beautiful if not for the searing glare.

“That was a fucking stupid thing you did back there,” he snarls. Brusque and overfamiliar. When you don’t respond he continues, “What’ve you got to say for yourself?”

You shrink back.

There’s an awful pinch in his brow. Concern seems to be superseding what was a show of honest anger. Dimly lit by a few oil lamps, from what you can ascertain there is no one else in the room but you two. Inhaling the residuals of healing magic you find that your throat is unbearably dry, tongue stuck to the back of your teeth. How long have you been asleep?

You couldn’t find a voice to ask, exhaling a pathetic whine. The silence provides a window of opportunity for him to further scold you yet he doesn’t take it, fuming as he recedes into his chair. “Don’t need to act so fucking skittish. M’not here to hurt you,” he exhales hard through his nose, reaches out and leaves his hand upturned on the edge of the bed. “Alright?”

Something draws you to this stranger. Inexorable, like the pull of the tide. You accept his proffered palm and it feels unsettlingly familiar. The skin is rough, battle worn and hot. Slowly, your fingers intertwine, and you see fair hair on the back of his knuckles.

Disorientation, loss and anxiety err on the edge of your consciousness. The lamp above his head gives him a warm hued crown, highlighting strands of gold. You can feel sleep weighing on your eyelids but you don’t yet want to look away. “Whatever,” his mouth sets into a frown. “Get some more rest or I’ll knock you out myself”.

When you come to the sun has risen and filters into the room in thin streams of light. Dust fairies dance around the bed. You squint as your vision sharpens, a dull throb reverberating through your skull.

You look at your body first, arm well bandaged and the rest of you bruised tender like an old peach. The wounds throb in time with your pulse when you shift, reminding you that they’re there as your thin clothing brushes against them with little movement. All you can remember is falling. How the waves had careened up the cliff side to catch you, only to have you snatched out of reach once again.

Wherever you are now it is obviously far from your Lord’s grasp. He has never bothered to take you to a healer. You are in a private office, tucked into a bed with soft blue sheets. The shelves are stocked with various medicines, salves, and analgesics. Herbs and chopped petals are stuffed in glass jars labelled with messy penmanship you can’t decipher. A metronome sits on the nearby wooden desk, ticking back and forth, filling the silence until the door is pushed open.

Whoever enters is trying to be careful. You can tell by how slowly they turn the handle and pause at every little complaint the hinges give. Their hair is green, richer than the later weeks in spring, with loose waves that bounce as they move. You watch wearily while they move through the space, humming under their breath and picking up a notebook from one of the desk drawers.

The healer, you presume, pinches the end ball on the metronome and brings it to a stand still. He hushes it as though it were an unruly child before turning on his heels toward you—

And immediately screeching as your eyes meet.

Loud enough for the entire country to hear, his abrupt shout seems to alert others in the building, causing a gaggle of people to burst their way into the room. A metallic tang fills your senses; magic ready, the man that sat brutish yet kind at your bedside wields explosive sparks in the palm of his hands, adorning chains with carved talons and beads and asymmetrical armour strapped to his left bicep beneath a red fur lined cloak.

“What is it, Deku?!”

You offer wordless gratitude to the final dregs of sedatives in your system. You barely flinch at the hostility in his voice, time seemingly slowed as your gaze drags to the companions at his back. First a woman doused in pink. And like the sun, her face glows the rich ochre of dawn, framed by silky salmon toned curls. There are horns protruding from the top of her head, bending like the junction of a tree branch.

Beside her is a large man. Red, red, red. Bright eyes split with a reptilian slitted pupil. Crimson hair styled into sharp spikes. He’s built like a warrior, tall enough to swallow most of the doorway, yet you feel no true fear when you look at him. Something innate in your gut tells you this is a kindred spirit. Energies aligned, you think he must be a shifter of some kind too. He locks onto you first, his alarmed expression smoothing into a wide toothed grin.

Last are two men who have managed to tumble to the floor amidst their rush to get into the room. Distinct gold bangs with a symbol of lightning, pale faced, an undercurrent of electricity thrumming below his skin. Dark shoulder length hair, white spools of rope wrapped around the crook of his elbow, grappling hook in hand and ready to strike.

“Sorry, Kacchan!” the healer, Deku, spluttered. He holds his hands up in surrender, shaking them in a placating motion. “Nothing, it’s nothing! All of you please calm down!”

Deku is quite the unfortunate name, you think. At his insistence the group lower their defenses and slump forward, relieved. All but ‘Kacchan’, who only raises his hackles further.

“Don’t fuckin’ scream like that if it’s nothing,” his upper lip curls to bear his teeth, moving fluidly as his group slinks past him to stand by your bed. “I damn near blew up the building”.

Distantly, “I couldn’t help it…!”

The frame jostles, mattress dipping as it takes on the weight of another. Head turned into the pillow you blink dazedly at the sharp toothed shifter. Propping his chin in his hand, his elbows are braced next to your thigh. “Hi. I’m Kirishima,” he chirped, unmoving as his friends wrapped themselves around him to get a look at you, all repeating his jovial greeting with introductions of their own.

“…Hello,” you rasp. The word grates the inside of your throat and tears well in your eyes as you fight the urge to cough. “Where am…?”

“Back up, losers,” ‘Kacchan’ forces his way to your bedside, shoving the group aside. There’s that odd sensation again as you stare up at him. Strong jaw clenched with eyes narrowed and blazing; sliding to where you lay, waning briefly. “Have some manners”.

“Since when have you cared about manners,” the pink woman, Mina, bemoans.

“Shut it!”

Deku’s nervous disposition dissipates quickly and he ambles to the opposite side of your bed, his notebook flipped open to a page covered in incomprehensible scrawl. While the others squabble he leans forward and flashes a trembly smile.

“Hi! I’m Midoriya Izuku, the one that fixed you up,” Midoriya—not Deku—lowers his voice into a more soothing tone. “It’s good to see you awake. Do you think you could tell me your name?”

You remember your name. Yours. The one given to you before human hands stole your hide. Midroiya’s pen scratches at the parchment as you recite it, his lips silently repeating it. “Great! Thank you. Now can I ask, how are you feeling?” he asks, eyes darting across your face, your body, scanning the bandages wrapped around your arm. “Any pain? Nausea? Loss of vision? Numbness in your limbs? Hallucinations?”

“Slow down, nerd,” Bakugo grunts.

Midoriya immediately appears sheepish, “I’m sorry”.

“It’s okay,” you say. “My mouth is dry and my arm hurts but I’m— okay, I think”.

“That’s my bad,” Kirishima speaks up from his place next to Bakugo, lifting a hand. Despite their difference in stature it was clear who led the charge and who fell in line. “I was rushing so I wasn’t very careful when I caught you”.

Your first thought is that he must have been the dragon. Your second thought is, ah, right. You had tried to fling yourself off the cliff.

As though he’d read your mind, Bakugo scoffs. “Not much choice when you’re saving someone that’s trying to kill themselves”.

Overlapping objections ring loud in your ears. “Bro, not cool,” Kirishima groans, similar sentiments sent loud and fast from the rest of his group.

“I wasn’t trying to—” your half lie is halted by the seething look Bakugo turns to you. Same as before, beneath it all is worry and confusion, unblinking as though you might disappear between the seconds. “I just wanted to go home,” you confess weakly, tethered by the restless twisting of your fingers into the linen.

“Home?” the electric blonde, Kaminari, murmurs.

Tension returns to your limbs, instinctively bracing for the greed you have learned to expect. You may get away with evading questions now, but the healer—if he’s worth his salt—would already know what you are.

“I’m a selkie,” hesitance bleeds into your tone, the confession coming quiet and small. Your chin dips as you swallow, canines sinking into your inner cheek. “The Lord whose castle you raided stole my pelt and kept me hostage for months. I figured it was long gone, so as soon as the attack gave me an opening I ran”.

The atmosphere is stifling. Silence befalls the group, equally stunned. Midoriya is the only one that does not react, kind eyes closely observing you.

A litany of emotions weave through Bakugo’s face as you speak. Disbelief, anger, regret. “Sick bastards,” he mutters heatedly from behind gritted teeth.

A head of pink hair rests by your knee. You’re taken aback by how informally they all behave towards you. “You still would have died though,” she says, bottom lip jutted, sadness colouring her features.

“I would have become seafoam,” you rectify passively. “It doesn’t mean death, not to my kind. It’s a sort of rebirth. My pelt is with the ashes now. I thought… it was my only option”.

“Wait. It got burned up in the fire?!” Kirishima straightens worriedly, eyes wide and apologetic. His fingers twitch as though he wanted to reach for you but thinks the better of it.

“Surely. I mean, I assume it was,” your mouth thins into a strained, rueful smile. “He kept it in the vault with all his other treasures. I watched his quarters go up in flames”.

Recognition passes over Bakugo’s expression but Midoriya is already stepping forward with his outstretched hands waving dismissively. “Okay, guys! No more stressing my, uh… patient,” he says, allowing some strength into his instruction. “Give us some space. You can ask more questions later. Please?”

Your new guests surrender with a chorus of groans. Bakugo squints pointedly at you over his shoulder as Sero ushers him out into the hallway. You feel rooted by its significance somehow. An unspoken instruction that you can’t decipher.

“Are you really feeling okay? No wooziness?”

Drawn to the gentle cadence your gaze meets Midoriya’s. He has set the notebook back onto his desk and rolled up his cuffs. “I’m okay,” you reply after a moment of consideration. “Thank you. You fixed me up, right?”

Rubbing at his nape, Midoriya shoots you a sheepish grin. “To the best of my ability, yeah,” he says. “I’m just a researcher and I don’t have an affinity for healing magic, but Kacchan insisted that I help”.

“You’re not a healer?” it’s then that you notice how untraditional his dress is for a doctor. A bishop sleeved shirt, six buttoned green waistcoat and dark pants. There’s a belt strapped tight around his hips, small satchels hooked into the leather, and an empty waist sheath clearly meant for a sword. “Ah. You really aren’t a healer,” you repeat blithely.

Midoriya giggles, nervous. “No— I mean, this is my office! And I guess I am an apothecary of sorts, but that’s only a small part of what I do,” he explains, gesturing to his various shelves and cabinets. “Kacchan could’ve taken you to the next town over on Kirishima’s back but I think he was panicking— oh, please don’t tell him I said that. He just doesn’t trust other people much. So you got shafted with me”.

When he leans down to untuck your bedsheets you bend your unharmed arm, propping your upper body onto your elbow and working in sync with him as he fluffs the pillows behind your back. Sat upright you hold your bandages out to him. “Thank you,” he mumbles, delicate as he slides his hand around your forearm, patting around his belt and satchels with the other.

Finding a small pair of scissors he tucks it beneath the top of the bandage and carefully cuts down the length of your arm. Your chest constricts as the inflamed skin is slowly revealed to the tepid air. There are ribbons of sutures running from your inner elbow to your wrist, puckered but thin and largely healed, sinew clumsily fused together.

“Sorry about my poor suturing,” Midoriya says as he overturns your arm in his palm, checking from root to stem. “Everything looks good, though. No infection or fever,” he continues muttering, thumb pressed to the shadow beneath his lip. “Your immune response was pretty quick. I wonder if it has something to do with your selkie blood…”

You barely register his apology, stuck on the jagged scar tissue decorating his own hand. The cautious call of your name breaks your reverie. Midoriya’s brow is furrowed, eyes wide in genuine concern that wanes when you try to smile at him. “Got lost in my head there, sorry”.

“I get it,” he breathes, glancing over to the largest cabinet in the room. Reaching the ceiling, stained dark wood, and looks slightly out of place alongside his other furniture. Misaligned, you realise. It is on four small wheels and placed an inch away from the wall. Odd.

You watch Midoriya stroll over with a bounce in his step. His biceps strain under the pale sleeve fabric as he grabs either side of his cabinet and pulls. The wheels squeak and it rolls away with some exertion to uncover a hidden door. Dust cascades through the air; he coughs into his shoulder, shaking out his hair.

“I’ve got a private washroom through here if you’d like to use it,” he explains after catching your questioning frown. The room is barely bigger than a closet. There’s a toilet, a tiny sink, and a tub that, given the width and depth, would require you to sit with your knees beneath your chin. A mere speck compared to home. If you closed your eyes and concentrated, maybe you could pretend you were resting in a tide pool along the shallows of a beach.

You stand for the first time in who knows how long. An uncomfortable prickling sensation crawls the length of your legs as the phantom turns solid and blood rushes to your toes. You grip at your bare thighs where the hem of your robe falls, flesh bursting through the gaps between your fingers, and you gasp through the pain. It’s as if you’re growing a new limb all together.

“Careful,” Midoriya murmurs kindly, hovering at your side in case you need assistance. You hobble over to the washroom, each step like treading on seaglass. He moves away once he is happy with your progress.

“It’ll take a while to warm up,” he warns. “But there are various medicinal soaps and salts under the sink that I’ve made, so you’re free to use them”.

The door is closed behind you.

Left to your own devices the first thing you do is fill the tub with water. You find that the bathroom has no lamp, illuminated only by the cool light flooding in from the main room. His warning had not been exaggeration — fingertips touching the bottom of the basin, the water comes slowly and remains cold up until your second knuckle. Then it warms, warmer than the sea, and with no salt at all.

Bare knees against the floor and skin pimpling under the thin robes, your breaths come quick, stumbling over the erratic jumping of your diaphragm. Indentations between each tile press uncomfortably into your skin, the initial pain dulling into numbness as you sit back on your heels. Beneath the sink behind you are the medicinal soaps and salts. You delicately take a small pot, squinting to decipher the handwritten labels in the dark.

Pulling back one of the lids you’re overwhelmed by an unfamiliar floral aroma. Inside are rocks— tiny, tiny pink rocks, with dried white petals. You pinch some with your already damp fingers, feeling as they immediately dissolve in the moisture, and sprinkle them into your bathwater.

Once full enough, you strip yourself of the robe and fold it neatly, left by the closed doorway. The cold air prickles, your nipples pebbling and the soft hair across your body standing on end, but the water is hot.

You dip your foot in and breathe a sigh of relief as the temperature suffused through your skin, swaddling you in warmth. You submerge yourself completely. As suspected the space is remarkably cramped. Your legs are bent, tucked against your chest with knees below your chin, arms folded around your shins to keep yourself together.

Enclosed in four walls again, shrouded in little to no light, you feel lonely. The type of quiet that makes you whisper. Your mind drifts to the stranger that had saved you, wondering where you might’ve met him before. You smile ruefully, cupping the scented water between your hands. He’s strong for a human. Imposing, you muse, staring back at the reflection held in your palms. Not only in his stature, but even his presence is difficult to ignore.

You bathe, scrub away the blood and grime until you’re a flesh wound. The temperature is cold by the time you’ve turned focus to your fingernails, neurotically picking away the flecks of blood dried beneath them. Drain the murky water, refill, repeat. No matter how harshly you pinch and pull, the feeling of being dirty does not go away, but you stay in the water at least until you feel like yourself again.

The towel you find is coarse to the touch. Sitting in the heated water has tended well to the knots in your muscles. Ungainly as you re-enter Midoriya’s empty office, you flop back onto the freshly made sheets with little guilt. You sit there for a while and let the air dry your body.

There is a pile of spare clothes on the end of the bed; neatly folded shirts, tunics, skirts and pants. You throw on a sleeved shirt and come across a simple beige kirtle as you parse through, the skirt falling just above the ankle, delicately sewn buttons lining the back. The fabric is very soft, though fitting and naturally cutting at the waist.

After putting on some thick knitted socks and a pair of hardy brown boots left by the desk you run both hands down your sides and spin on your heel, causing the free flowing skirt to plume. Satisfied, you slip out the door and creep toward the gathering voices at the far end of the hall. Phantom fingertips walk the length of your spine. Odd, but you put it down to the apprehension churning in your stomach. Gradually you are able to make out what they’re saying.

“Get your filthy hands off it,” Bakugo growls venomously.

“I just wanna feel,” another whines. You recognise it to be Kaminari. “Why is Kacchan the only one allowed to touch it?”

“Stop calling me that, fucker!”

You round the corner and the bickering halts with a harsh shushing sound. They’re all in the centre of a cramped lobby, few chairs lining the walls, woven tapestry hung from the ceilings. Kirishima stands in front of you wearing a pleased grin, comically large. The armoured plates on his naked shoulders clink as he moves. “Hey! You clean up nice,” he tells you. “Feeling better?”

“Much better,” you affirm, perking up at his sincerity. “I’m grateful to you all for watching over me”.

“Our Bakugo did most of the work, really. Got a little protective,” Mina, the one kissed by dusk, leans into your space with her plump mouth curled into a smile. The thin gold jewellery hung from her lobe to ear cuff glints in the late afternoon light. “Barely let us in the room”.

“Cause you idiots are too loud,” Bakugo grumbles, stepping forward holding a shiny garb. The fond undertones belied his annoyance, and everyone heard it loud and clear. Your skin prickled as he drags his eyes over your clothed body, evoking a sense of insecurity that is foreign to you. You aren’t sure what, but you wanted him to see something in you worth coveting.

Then your gaze falls to the fabrics folded over his forearm. Your heartbeat ricochets through your ribcage. A tide of emotion wells at the base of your throat. He handles the pelt with purposeful care. Shivers break out across your skin as he smooths a hand over it. Holding it out, he says your name as if it was the simplest thing in the world.

“Here,” he thrusts the pelt into your arms. You scramble and clutch it to your front. Something deep inside you shifts. “This is yours, right? We took it during the raid”.

You’re frozen to the spot, mouth gaping around words that won’t come. Bakugo frowns, the group members behind him glancing at each other and shrugging when they find no answer to your silence.

“Well?” he demands, embarrassment staining his ears pink.

“Yes,” you choke, bringing the hide up to your face and rubbing your cheek against it. So warm and alive. Brine fills your senses, overwhelmed by the smell of home. The relief is short lived. “Thank you for returning it, but…”

Losing strength, you try to convince yourself that he needn’t know— that the old ritual would not be binding if done with a human. If the Gods were merciful there would be no condition that tied you together for the rest of your lives. Yet you felt it the moment your pelt was handed back to you. You’ve been feeling his touch all this time, even before the bond had solidified. Heat rose to your cheeks at the realisation; such an intimate act, and it had been accidental.

From one prison to another. Maybe things wouldn’t be so bad. Bakugo seemed good, in his own rugged way, and he was handsome even by faerie standards.

You wet your lips, breath shaken. “Bakugo. Do you understand the significance of what you just did?”

Bakugo’s expression darkens and he becomes rigid. You get the impression he hates being left in the dark. “What is it?”

“To…” your nails sink into the short velvety fur. “To a selkie their pelt is like an extension of their soul. In our culture, to find and return it is viewed as a…marriage proposal”.

Sero catches Kaminari and Mina as they grapple one another in a dramatic fashion, swaying on their feet. Kirishima puts a hesitant hand on his friend’s shoulder, eyes flickering between the barbarian and your slouched form. “Bro… don’t do anything hasty,” he faltered.

“Bakugo is married now?” Mina shrilled, promptly shut up by the hand covering her mouth. Sero sends you an apologetic grimace.

“Like hell I am”.

Hackles raised, voice sharp and commanding, Bakugo is staring you down like an enemy. Your knees threaten to buckle but you stand your ground, shielding your body with your thick hide. His hands remain by his hips, sparking as the tang of magic bleeds into the air. Despite making no move to attack you still feel his rejection strike you.

“Break whatever vow I just made,” he demanded. “Now”.

“I can’t,” you admit helplessly. “It’s more than a legal contract or a declaration of love. We’ve— it binds us together”.

The barbarian starts forward, upper lip curled into a beastly snarl, held back by the dragon shifter’s grip. Stumbling as you dodge, two familiar scarred arms catch you before your fall. “Kacchan, what are you—?!” Bakugo darts out to grab you and Midoriya immediately pushes you behind his back, shielding you with his body. “Stop it!”

“Midoriya,” Kaminari wheezes, tears beading along his lash line. “Kacchan accidentally got married. Can you believe it?”

Midoriya observes their exchange with a look of confusion. In the seconds that follow you see his eyes fall to the pelt folded against your chest, eyes brightening in understanding. Incognisant to this, Bakugo continues his verbal barrage. “Oi, Deku. You’ve got brain cells. Figure out a way to fix this”.

Mouth gaping like a fish out of water, Midoriya pins Bakugo with a pleading look. “Kacchan. Please tell me you didn’t personally give back the selkie pelt”.

“You knew and didn’t think to say anything?!”

“Why would I?” Midoriya returns, equally irritated. You press your face into the space between his shoulder blades, feeling the vibrations of his voice as they argue. “It’s common folklore!”

“You know I don’t listen to fucking fairytales, Izuku”.

Midoriya reaches back to brush your wrist and offer a comforting touch. You knock your knuckles to his own, grateful for his consideration but unneeding of it. While Bakugo’s furious refusal hurts, and his volume is harsh on the ears, you aren’t truly scared of him. More than anything your body remembers those warm palms— how he had held your hand, even as a stranger, and how he meticulously groomed your hide only knowing that it was of importance to you.

“There’s nothing I can do to fix this,” lowering his tone into something more apologetic, Midoriya’s shoulders slump in defeat. You step to the side, coming into view. Head bowed, weight shifting between each foot. You refuse to be subservient any longer but cannot ignore the guilt that churns in your stomach.

Bakugo sees you. Something flickers in his features; a brief glance, a rough exhale, it flies across his face like the shadow of an albatross and disappears, equally fleeting. Never taking his vermilion eyes off you he argued, “What about cheeks?”

The golden hour spreads her hands all over the room, air cooling when his spitting frustration dwindles to uncertainty.

“Uraraka?” Midoriya mused aloud. His softer countenance tempers your anxiety. “It’s possible she could do something… Let me go see if I have her recent coordinates written somewhere…”

Midoriya scurries back down the hallway, leaving you defenseless. Without thinking you ask the group, “Uh. Who’s Uraraka?”

Everyone’s attention falls to you and you resist the reflexive urge to cower. “She’s a witch,” Kaminari supplies happily, arms wrapped around Sero’s neck like a scarf. “An old friend of ours, but she’s pretty hard to find now. I heard her place is always moving”.

A building that could move with magic. The human world never ceased to be fascinating.

Mina nudges her elbow into his side and a shock of electricity sparks from his crown. “That’s outdated, dummy! You’re supposed to say occultist”.

Kaminari whines, rubbing at his ribs. “To-may-toe, to-mah-toe,” he enunciated, pouting. “Same thing”.

Bakugo growls, ignoring their exchange in favour of pacing the room. Your pelt is a comforting weight as you follow the back and forth motions, taking the chance to really look at him. The fur lined cloak across his shoulders billows obnoxiously as he turns, jewels and talons strung around his neck knocking against his clavicle. Doused in sunlight, the markings painted across his bare chest are highlighted, and you notice the uneven skin beneath them— more scars.

He combs his fingers aggressively through his hair and his arm bulges beneath the armour strapped to his bicep. Kirishima tires of watching and cuts into his path, hands open in surrender.

“Stressing won’t do you any good, man,” the shifter reasoned. “We’ve all got your back. I’m sure Uraraka will know what to do”.

Bakugo huffs. You think there should be steam coming out of his nose. “I know, shithead. I just,” he takes a quick look at where you are awkwardly standing. “I don’t like this”.

There’s an abrupt yelp in the distance. Midoriya’s cry is followed by a crash, the sound of books tumbling from shelves onto the wooden floor. He stumbles out into the hallway slightly dishevelled, patting off the dust on his waistcoat and proffering a sheet of paper. Tucked under his arm is a rolled up map.

“Kacchan,” comes his breathless chime. “Here’s where she was last. But I remembered that she was planning on taking a short trip to the valleys near the coast to find more idiran leaves since they’re in season now. I mapped out all the areas where they usually grow, in case you—”

Bakugo snatches the coordinates and the map without ceremony. “Thanks,” he grunts, turning on his heel and making for the exit. “Come on, losers. We only got a few hours until it’s too dark to fly”.

The group works in perfect synchrony. Sero reaches under one of the nearby chairs and drags out a large bag, hoisting it over his shoulder. Mina does the same, pulling back the draping tapestry by the doorway and taking back a concealed sack. You watch as they walk leisurely behind Bakugo, in no real rush despite his demands, Kaminari lamenting how little they trusted him with their cargo.

Kirishima lingers behind, clapping Midoriya soundly on the back. “Thanks for everything as usual, man. We appreciate it,” he emphasised his gratitude with a strong squeeze.

“I’m always happy to see you,” you’re impressed by Midoriya’s reaction; a smile from ear to ear, sturdy and unaffected by Kirishima’s obvious force, his smaller frame belying his strength. “Just promise not to shift too close to the building. I don’t have time to re-thatch my roof”.

“I promise!” Kirishima traces a cross over his heart with his fingers. Their focus turns to you. You tense, feeling entirely out of place. “Sure you’re feeling alright? Have you ever flown before?”

“No,” you admit, needlessly smoothing the fabric of your kirtle down. “I’ve probably never been this far inland, nevermind flying”.

Midoriya’s eyes widened, though not unkindly. They’re sparkling, as if he were excited on your behalf. “Then you’re in for a real treat,” he beams, the intensity dimming within the next breath, sadness hemming his smile. “Just know you’re in good hands. Kacchan is a little abrasive but he means well”.

“And I swear I’ll fly carefully,” Kirishima interjects. It’s funny, a man so large exuding such gentility. “I’m a dragon shifter, if you hadn’t already guessed”.

You had sensed it immediately. Shifter energies were palpable and animated things. They hung in the air like a humid fog. Despite your similarities you are still so uniquely different. While you were tied to the pelt in your arms, Kirishima had no such restriction. You envied his freedom.

“You caught me…?” you say. He nods at your words. “Thank you, then. Again”.

“That was all Bakubro. He saw you before anyone else did,” as though on cue, Bakugo’s voice penetrated impatiently through the walls, demanding that you both get outside. Kirishima’s lips uptick affectionately.

“If I don’t get to see you again, well…” Midoriya begins to corral the pair of you to the door as he speaks. “I hope you make it home. And I’m really happy I could meet you”.

Surrounding Midoriya’s residence is a dense forest. The trees are tall, older than any you’ve seen, their branches reaching out and intertwining with one another to conceal your group under a canopy shrouded in gold. Further ahead it thins out onto a winding road. Built on a steep hill it dips in the distance, opening up to the many plots of land below.

The earth is soft under your boots. There are wildflowers at your feet. You try to step around each one carefully while Kirishima advances forward to the group with vigour.

Bakugo is saying something but you barely hear it, lost in your thoughts, besotted by the vast canvas around you; a sense of harmony as the pigments blend together. It is like a dream in which you can’t tell one side of the veil from the other, and nothing like the dreary castle you were once stowed away in.

Your moment in lucidity is soon interrupted. You instinctively pull the pelt closer to your chest before realising who had approached. “You listening or what?” Bakugo calls quietly, an attempt at being reposeful. Amidst your daydreaming Kirishima has disappeared into the overgrowth and the others are watching your interaction with poorly veiled interest.

“Uh, sure,” you blurt uselessly. He raises a brow and you feel ridiculous.

“Kirishima said it’s your first time,” he pauses and you nod in affirmation. A hand comes to rest on your back, breath caught in your throat, pressure pulling you close to his side. “Then you’ll sit up front with me”.

Your head bobs again, unrolling the pelt and knotting it tight to your waist, skin prickling under his close scrutiny. Bakugo brings his fingers to his lips and whistles, “Red!”

‘Red’ answered the call with a low room and a rustle of wings. The dragon’s head lifts, towering above the treeline, his body following as he steps out into the open. Amber eyes gleamed in the early evening light as he bobbed his head on a serpentine neck. His deep red scales shimmered with a faint golden sheen as he flashed his teeth in greeting.

You err on the side of reticence while Mina and Kaminari sprint toward the dragon whooping excitedly. Various lines of thick rope trails behind them and Sero picks up the slack, looping it thrice through their bags. He spins the cut end, undulating as the momentum builds, and throws it over Kirishima’s back to be caught by Kaminari and pulled taut.

“C’mon,” Bakugo leads you forward. He is surprisingly patient with you now. You’ve faced young whales and sharks yet still you feel dwarfed by the sheer size of the dragon, heart all pitter patter behind your ribs. It is the prey animal in you.

Kirishima snorts, lowering to the ground. The earth trembles, a gust of wind dancing through the grass. Another rope is flung around his neck, threaded through the horns protruding from his skull like a set of reins, dropping in front of you.

The hand by your hip slides further at your abrupt flinch, arm securing around your waist. “On three I want you to climb,” he commands, giving you no time to think. “One… two…”

Bakugo takes the weight like it’s nothing, lifting you higher so you can grab the rope. Molten heat. You pull yourself up, scrambling to straddle Kirishima’s upper back. The others are further down his spine, playing around at the base of his tail without a care in the world, as though they were not about to be thousands of feet in the air. Kirishima’s lungs expand for breath and you cling to a spike protruding from the dragon’s nape, grip flexing at the warmth that settles behind you.

Bakugo frames your body with his thighs, thick by the skirt bunching above your knees, and pulls the rest of the rope up to wrap it around your pelt. In an instant you are all too conscious of him as a man, the proximity plucking at your centre of gravity, a cold sensation spreading throughout your chest. “Sorry,” he mutters unprompted, so quiet you aren’t sure you were meant to hear it. You get the impression he doesn’t say it often. “For dragging you into more shit”.

You mull the words over as you relax into his hold. With that one sentence you think you understand him a little more than before.

Sero’s voice travels through the silence, “Good to go!”

Fastening his arm across your middle, solid and steady, Bakugo brings his boot hard down onto Kirishima’s shoulder. “Get moving, Red!” he roars.

The dragon’s movements are heavy, slow. Aligned with the winding road, he builds up speed. As though he’d shaken off his own mass Kirishima is suddenly quick on his feet and breaking into a run; forced back in the momentum your stomach swoops, upheld by inertia as your body follows the broad bounding movements.

Leathery wings snap open into the clearing. Your hands clutch at Bakugo’s forearm and he digs his fingers in harder, his lips warm against your temple. “I’ve got you,” he whispered, but all you can hear is the thundering wind and the blood rushing in your ears. You watch the steep edge approach and take a reflexive breath as it abruptly disappears.

Air pours into your lungs and then out again in a ragged, exhilarated gasp. The ground falls—and then you are gliding.

The cool air whips against your cheeks. Smooth and steady as a horse’s canter, Kirishima soars through the open skies, his magnificent wingspan bearing the weight of five riders. Below, the fields coalesce into one land. Towns and villages become an inscrutable speck. Incredulous laughter bursts from your throat, nerves evolving into excitement in the climb towards the clouds.

Bakugo mellows by the second, tension ironed down by gravity. There’s a particular satisfaction to his expression, contentment you’ve only ever experienced in the ocean’s depths, and yet, as he squeezes around you intermittently to remind you he is there, you can feel it too.

“You with me?” he shouts. “Not scared?”

You lock eyes and try to show him a tremulous smile, answering at the top of your lungs, “I’m good”.

Then he bares his teeth, grinning proudly. Over you comes the sense of being praised. Your smile widens.

Time moves differently in the skies. Closer to the sun, you thought perhaps things naturally moved slower. Change is always less apparent when you are walking alongside it. Instead, you measure the hour by the shadows cast chasing Kirishima’s tail, and eventually the skies darken.

Lowering his head, tilting a wing to swing out in a broad arc, Kirishima angles toward the earth. Bakugo raises up a battle worn hand, the lineaments of his face irradiated by streams of dim light threading through his fingers. He makes a specific gesture, signalling to the others of the incoming descent. Like the sun, you can’t look away from his raw brilliance.

Kirishima lands at the base of a mountain valley. It sends a gust of wind across the clearing. Through the dark you make out a familiar reflection of light in the distance. The lake is hardly an ocean, but you’re extremely comforted to be by a body of water.

Chest pressed flat to your back Bakugo’s natural heat spreads through your shirt. Helped down much in the same way you were boosted up, he seems determined to keep you near. You can’t say you mind it— a quiet attraction comes and goes as he steadies you on your feet. He clicks his tongue, muttering clipped insults that he doesn’t mean.

It’s decided you’ll remain there for the night. “You can bet your ass we’re having an early start,” Bakugo says, pointing at each of you with stubborn intent, squinted glare lingering on the less than enthusiastic members. Kaminari slumps forward dramatically and you worry his knees might buckle.

Kirishima leaves again, briefly, to circle the area in his full form while Bakugo starts on the pit. It’s lit by a whisper of fire from the returning dragon’s mouth, setting the tinder ablaze over the nest of branches; the dry, withered pine slowly releases years of energy soaked up from the sun, the air, and the ground, keeping the camp brightly lit.

Smoke swirls above and dissipates into the atmosphere. You are far enough from any large human settlement that you see the night sky in all its clarity. Around you now are the soft voices of acquaintances filtered between conversations; none you could hear properly, but the sounds were still soothing, coming in hushed tones that add to the intimate atmosphere.

Flames dance on their cheeks, illuminating the prominent parts of their faces. You’re sitting beside the water’s edge with your pelt strewn across your lap, close enough to feel the warmth as it crackles and spits, watching the way they love each other.

Kaminari has fished out a big bottle from his bag, dramatically popping the cork, and is steadily passing it around. Alcohol, you guessed. Sero took a heavy swig without flinching. Mina had tried to do the same and now has her head pillowed by Kirishima’s thigh, thick and sturdy as a human, and his fingers stroked through the curly by her temple aimlessly as he lost himself in discussion. Sensing your gaze, she meets your eyes and smiles dazedly, lids fluttering.

You look away, take a breath and notice the air tastes like sake and smoke. Darkness covers the lake. Under the waxing moon your face stares back at you, swimming among minnows and echoes of stars. It ripples where you dip your fingertips, mind empty, anaesthetised by the chill.

“You idiots never pace yourselves,” Bakugo’s voice rumbled over the flames and rolled over your skin. He is sitting closest to you, legs loosely crossed in the dirt . “If you throw up on Red tomorrow I’m not cleaning it up”.

Kaminari shakes the bottle in his direction. The bubbles fizz upward, some spilling out. “Such a stick in the mud, Kacchan. We gotta celebrate your marriage somehow!”

Sero cackles as the other two chime in agreement. You stroke your pelt, restless at the mention of your union, and it soaks up the water from your fingers. Surprisingly, Bakugo lets it slide, though not before scooping the loose earth into his hand and throwing it at an oncoming Kaminari.

Eyes of amber briefly flicker over your form in his approach. Kaminari drops into the empty space beside you and pulls the bottle from his mouth with a resounding pop, leaving behind a wet sheen, and tilts it forward. “You too,” he grinned. “Congrats. Our boy is quite the catch, y’know”.

“So I can see,” you smile, letting the gloom be pulled right out of you, your fingers wrapping around the bottle's neck. They grazing his own and spark static. Neither of you comment on it, his squinted stare fixed curiously on your expression as you bring the finish to your lips.

The aroma is rich, sweet like overly ripe bananas. You tip back, feeling it dry and bitter on your tongue. There are hints of vanilla and brown sugar, a sting to your throat that begs you to cough. You hear a quiet laugh.

“Too strong?” Sero teases lightheartedly from across the campfire.

Your expression twists, “It’s good. But it burns. Is that normal?”

“That’s why it’s good,” Kaminari snickers. You clear your throat, handing the bottle back, attention drawn back to the lake in a beat of comfortable silence. “Oh, hey. I did want to say— you can swim if you need to, y’know”.

“Hm?”

“Kiri has all sorts of weird urges if he doesn’t shift for a while. Gets all restless and snappy,” Kaminari gives a knowing look to the man in question. Kirishima nods at you, his features taut with sincerity. “So if you want to swim for a while or something we totally get it”.

You’re flustered by their earnestness, gripping at your pelt, all too aware of it. Slipping into your other form feels far too personal; well meaning as they are, they’re still strangers to you. “That’s— I’m alright,” you politely decline, “my needs as a seal aren’t really felt while I’m like this”.

A surprised noise resonates from Kirishima, Mina unmoving from her place in his lap but watching with rapt curiosity. “You’re practically human right now, then?” he asks.

“Practically,” you give a self conscious shrug. Somehow admitting it felt like stripping yourself. Confessing to a weakness. Unsettled, you deflect the subject back. “Do you keep your dragon traits as a human?”

“Nah, not while I’m in this form. I don’t even have my hydrogen glands— look,” Kirishima hooks his fingers into his cheeks to spread them wider. You lean in for a closer look. The glow from the campfire illuminates the back of his throat— barely, and ironically. His tongue wiggles as he tries to lay it flat. You’re not sure what he’s trying to show you. You’ve never seen a dragon’s maw before, but aside from the shark-like teeth his mouth really does seem the same as any other man’s.

“Pretty boring, right?” his words come garbled around his fingers and so he pulls them out, wiping the spit on his pants. “But even though I can’t breathe fire right now, I can do this!”

You stare in surprise as the skin along his forearm hardens into tough scales. He holds it out to you in permission to touch; they feel jagged under your fingertips, tough like the bark of an ancient tree. “That’s amazing. You have your own shield,” you breathe, awed.

“Damn right,” Bakugo interjects. There’s that unfettered pride again. Kirishima’s cheeks redden and you sympathise with him. In your short time with them you knew receiving praise from Bakugo felt like standing under the sun. “Should‘ve seen him as a kid,” he continues, eyes alight and mirthful. “Had scales like wet paper. Even cried when he first shifted”.

“D’you have to bring that up,” Kirishima groans, though not upset by it. He shares in the amusement, uplifted by the sound of his friends' laughter, and pouts playfully in your direction. “It was scary!”

Mina giggles. Her movements are sluggish and dopey as she waves her arm in Kaminari’s direction, who then stretches around the pit to Sero, who then passes it off to her. She takes a quick sip, free hand pinching Kirishima’s cheek. “Wasn't your first time an accident, too? That’s so cute”.

“He sneezed actually,” Sero supplies, smirk crooked, foot tapping Kirishima’s ankle in a preemptive apology. “Destroyed half his house”.

Kaminari slaps his knee, “Man, you were stumbling around like a newborn foal. It was hilarious”.

Bakugo grinned as the others bickered, a fond, radiant thing that lit up his whole face. He’s softer like this, drenched in warmth. Cloak tucked behind his shoulders you are given the view of his broad chest. And when he finally looks at you, his half lidded gaze has been softened by his third swig; though he remained considerably sober compared to his companions.

“What’re you starin’ at?” he mutters.

“Nothing,” you answer quickly, then, quieter, “It’s just nice that you’ve all been together for so long”.

“Since we were snot-nosed brats. We hail from the same clan. Deku too,” he replies, elbow propped on his knee, chin cupped in his palm. “Getting sick of seeing their faces at every turn”.

“Liar,” you hum amusedly. “What do humans call it…? Emotionally constipated”.

His eyes slide over you, brow quirked. With his friends distracted he is more emboldened giving you attention. “Got some liquor down your neck and suddenly you’re givin’ me cheek?”

“Guess so,” you feel yourself endeared by your not-husband. The pleasant honeyed sensation shrouding your body must’ve loosened your tongue. “Anyone can see they’re like family to you”.

The barbarian kisses his teeth and shifts himself toward you, an ugly look on his face. You catch his peek at your pelt. “What about you?”

“Me?”

Bakugo grunts. “Yeah. You got family?”

If not for the alcohol that question might’ve sucked all the joy from the air. You settle on a sad smile, dragging your fingertip through the dirt to draw a vague seal shape. “That’s hard to answer,” you intoned gently, barely audible over the crackling fire. “My memories of them are vague. The longer I stay human the more I forget”. He frowns, but you continue, unperturbed, “Usually it would be the same thing in reverse, if we weren’t bonded I would likely forget all of this”.

“And you’re okay with that?” he says, some edge to his tone. “You’re okay with being stuck here?”

The ‘with me’ goes unspoken but you hear it, and you fall silent. Because you have no answer. You’d had months to reconcile a pallid future— at one point you thought you would never again see the ocean, least of all your family. It was probable that they’d already moved on without you.

“I don’t feel stuck,” you admit. His actions and his words, albeit harsh, proved that to be true. Aside from the obvious differences from your previous capture, the biggest is that you are equally in possession of Bakugo’s individual liberty— you’re married, you mentally amend, not in possession. While it is true you wouldn’t be able to stray far from him with the bond established, you held your pelt, independence, control.

A near imperceptible tension seeps from him at your answer. “What about you?”

He scoffs, stretching out his legs. The soles of his boots drag in the dirt. “Do I look fuckin’ stuck?”

“No,” you murmur with amusement, turning to gaze at the flickering pyre. “A man that can fly hundreds of miles on dragonback in a single day certainly isn’t stuck”.

“Now you’re getting it”.

The other conversation has worn into soft murmurings. Kirishima drunkenly hands off the last of the alcohol to Bakugo, gesturing to the three who’ve surrounded him and fallen asleep. As the dragon shifter repositions himself to join them, curled together like a pack of seal pups, Bakugo takes a sip.

There’s probably only a mouthful left and you accept it when he offers. “You should sleep, too”.

You heed his instruction and lie down on your side, your pelt pillowed under your head. The smell of home swaddles you. “Early rise, right?” he nods, leaning back onto his arms. “How long do you think it’ll take to find the—uh, occultist?”

“A week if she’s where she’s supposed to be,” he scowls. You’re not sure what draws the heat to your face; the drink or his voice, now gravelly with fatigue. “Three at most”.

“Okay,” you exhale, eyes fluttering closed. “Thank you, Bakugo”.

A soft breeze dances through the brush. Your skin pebbles, shivers slipping down your spine. Something heavy drapes over you and encases you in a warm cocoon. Fluff tickles at your nose. Your fingers curl into the familiar red fabric of Bakugo’s cloak. He has pointedly angled away from you, ready to ignore any attempt at interrogation. The gruff act of kindness makes your heartbeat faster. Fondness settles in your chest, so big that it aches. His natural scent mixes with yours and it’s like being laid on the shoreline, stitching sea and land together.

“Don’t fuckin’ thank me yet,” the muscles in his back ripple as he tends to the dwindling fire, declaring with conviction, “Just follow me. I’ll fix this and get you home”.

You lick your lips, mouth dry from the alcohol. In that very moment you want to tell him that the ocean and the sky are like a two way mirror; that when you were up there with him, strangely, your body thought it was at home.

Instead, you close your eyes and watch the embers paint yellow and orange kaleidoscopes behind your eyelids.

Instead, you sleep.

The weeks that follow are arduous. Uraraka is nowhere to be found, and your group resorted to searching the areas of iridian growth Midoriya circled.

You weren’t used to hiking up mountainous lands, navigating forests or scaling dragons, not in the beginning. Rising with the sun, enduring unpredictable changes in weather, wincing through the ache that grew in your weaker human muscles, Bakugo found your crankiness amusing and irritating all at once; never missing an opportunity to comment on your lack of stamina, then using it as an excuse to assist where assistance is not truly needed.

But you saw through him, and let him. You did not need help climbing, yet your hands weaved together so he could pull you up. You’re soon practiced in saddling Kirishima, yet you always wait for Bakugo to put his arm around your lower back every ride. Your inner voice sings whenever he brings you food— begrudgingly, he throws it into your lap and grunts like the barbarian he is— or hangs his cloak over your head without a word as though you were a rack. It’s a little more charged every time you interact, and you found you liked being taken care of in those subtle ways that did not undermine your independence.

The others noticed and teased accordingly. They call him a dutiful husband and his aggravated explosions saw you driven out of two small settlements for startling livestock. You become closer to each of them. Their patchwork family makes room for you quicker than you know what to do with. And you enjoy it; learning about the people around you, peeling back the rind of their lives piece by piece with mundane questions, seeing what they’re made up of.

You learn Kaminari enjoys literature, dramatically reciting love tales in the night, referencing poems you’ve never heard. He’s charming but never with actual intention. It is somehow more endearing that he doesn’t know his own allure, finding comfort in the role of a jester. Mina is pure joy wrapped in flesh. Apologetically overbearing and well meaning. Like an older sister she showed you how to securely fashion your pelt—over one shoulder, a belt fastened around the waist, keeping it in place— and let you use her combs. She speaks fast when she’s happy, hits hard when she laughs and gossips avidly, picking up new information wherever she goes.

Kirishima looked at you with kindness and iron surety in his eyes from the start. Good natured and feeling— he has a heart so big that he apologises to a flower bed after he steps on it. There’s a natural fraternal air about him that sets you at ease and the group’s clear affection and appreciation for him diminished any worry about your own treatment as a shifter.

But of everyone else in the group you found Sero the most easygoing. Conversation came fluidly and your initial diffidence was thrown by how naturally you were able to fall into place with him. He lends an ear to any questions you have, practised in the art of human interaction; a man capable of adapting to any one person he comes into contact with. As such, he is the member sent to negotiate, collect information, and make arrangements.

When you make it to the last destination on the map you are drenched in a time-steeped sunset. Sero trudges back through the brush, returning from the nearby port town. Landing at such a late hour Sero had been tasked with finding the local tavern to buy a few rooms for the night, and the lazy thumbs up he waves from a distance is proof he accomplished his goal.

“They don’t get too many travellers passing through here so I swiped up three rooms,” he huffs, coming to a stop and brushing the dirt off his pants. “They’ve got a bathhouse, too”.

Bakugo makes a noise of approval, lifting a bag over his shoulder while Kirishima carries the rest under his arms and flashes a toothy smile. “Glad it went smoothly, man”.

“Thank the Gods,” Kaminari cheers, clapping his friend on the back. “You’re a lifesaver. I can’t wait to sleep on an actual bed again”.

“Uh huh. Two twin rooms for us lowly minions,” Sero continues, his grin curling into something more sly. You get a sense of foreboding. “And of course, a double room for the newlyweds”.

Mina whistles, slipping her hand into yours and tugging. You freeze, heart in your throat, and force yourself to relax, not yet used to how tactile they can be. She’s too invested in Bakugo’s response to notice. Your eyes flicker over to find him red faced and incensed, knuckles white with the pressure he has around the drawstrings of his bag.

Sharing a room with Bakugo. Alone. Thus far you’d all been together. Either under the stars or in caves, or packed into cramped quarters stuffed with wattle and daub if a villager felt kind enough.

“You've got exactly five seconds to explain why you thought that was a good idea”.

Sero quickly put his palms up in surrender. “You gave me a budget, Bakugo. They offered to lower the price as a wedding gift. I figured it would be okay for one night”.

Bakugo jerks his head in your direction, his steely glare unmoving. The tips of his ears are pink, too, frustration unfolding across his skin. “You don’t get to decide that,” he chided, tone harsh like a hiss.

Suddenly, Sero looks rather ashamed of himself. “Shit, I’m sorry. Should’ve asked,” he says to you, rubbing at his neck as his head lowers. It’s unlike him to be so wilted— and all because of your potential discomfort.

You meet Bakugo’s eyes, gleaming intensely, already trying to scrutinise your reaction. Mina hums quietly. She tightens grip on your hand again in reassurance, the other running along your bicep. “If you want I can swap with you”.

Bakugo snorts at that, as if the idea was ridiculous, but he doesn’t shoot it down despite his clear aversion to sharing with Mina. You understood his disbelief. They behaved much like siblings, squabbling and poking at one another. It’d rouse suspicion and you didn’t fancy being chased out of town for swindling the keepers for a discount.

“Thank you guys. But it’s alright,” you reassured, mouth lifting into a small smile and reciprocating Mina‘s gentle squeeze. “I don’t mind sleeping with Bakugo”.

A few beats of silence. You see Bakugo’s expression slip, jaw loose and eyes wide for a brief moment before it twists. He turns away from the group as a chorus of suggestive crowing erupts.

Understanding your mistake almost immediately hot mortification comes over you, stifling beneath the pelt on your shoulder. “Shut up, you useless fuckin’ perverts,” Bakugo snaps, flustered and wild, swatting at the nearest victim. Kirishima feigns a wounded noise.

“Hey, I didn’t do anything!”

“Just get moving,” the barbarian marches onward, tearing his way through the overgrowth and heading for the tavern. “And walk behind me!”

His choleric mutters continue, heard even at a distance. Tucking your chin to your chest, you hide your laughter in your silken pelt as you follow after him, mouth filling with a comforting briney scent. You think Bakugo undeniably cute when he’s embarrassed; a sight you’ve had the pleasure of seeing more than once on account of his pod. That feeling from the campfire returns, fills your chest, pulsing through to your fingertips, tempting you to reach out, to touch him.

More and more you’re inundated with the need to be close. You quell the urge and tighten your grip on Mina, her cheek squished to your shoulder, loose curls the colour of blossom tickling your throat. “Don’t worry. He’s not really mad,” she tells you furtively, as if it were a big secret.

“I know,” gaze lingering on Bakugo’s back, covered by that thick red cloak, you wonder if your scent still clings to it. Contentedly, “I’m getting used to it”.

The town is beautiful. Bursting with flora and fauna, accentuated by the dusk, ocean curling around the village in a way that reminds you of mother. Nature's cradle. You cling protectively to your pelt, scenting the salt in the air and hovering closer to Bakugo. If anybody could identify a selkie skin it would be fishermen. Stray drunken locals stumble by, arm in arm with boisterous cheer. You’re greeted like a long lost friend, neither person recognising your true identity. Humans really can be hearty and genuine at their core. Life before had been so desolate in comparison, so lacking in love and colour.

“Oi,” Bakugo beckons you to his side. When you don’t fall in line he grabs your wrist, pulling you close. His natural body heat lingers like a brand. “Make sure you call me Katsuki from now on,” he instructs under his breath.

You blink at the unexpected request. The muscles in his face are tight, twitching, and his nose flares the longer you stare. Given names are important to humans in this region. Sharing them is an intimate thing, a sign of your close relationship. “Are you sure?”

“Wouldn’t say it if I wasn’t sure,” he punishes your questioning with the fleeting tightening of his grip. You can’t help it. He’s pink again and you like it. “I’m your husband, yeah? So call me by my fuckin’ name”.

The keeper waits surreptitiously by a sheltered stairwell leading to the inn above her tavern. A small Elven woman, uncloaked, the lantern overhead creating a halo of light to circle her ginger crown. She perks up when Sero hands over a small velvet sack, the drawstrings pulled tight. “For the rooms,” he emphasises, coins chiming dully against one another as he shakes it. The woman takes it and cradles the payment to her breast, exchanging the gold for three keys.

You’re guided up the stairwell and into the building, presented with a narrow corridor. There are numerous doors, decorative runes carved into the frames, a coloured piece of string hung from each handle corresponding to the colour of the keys. “It’s good to see some youngins pass through. We only ever get the same old geezers around here,” she says, “Makes for a mundane life”.

The crows' feet wrinkle by her eyes when she smiles, laughter lines framing her mouth. She hands out the keys to your pod who all rush in childish excitement to see their rooms. At last she turns to where you stand stiffly beside Katsuki.

You’re handed a key. The stem is long and thin and made with copper, the key wards in the bit uniquely shaped to your door. Threaded through the bow is a lavender string. “It isn’t much but I hope you will be comfortable for the night,” with a wink, she adds, “Congratulations to you both”.

“Thank you. We will be in your care,” your reply is tremulous, undecided whether to be pleased with the sincere acknowledgement of your marriage or nervous to be seen through. At your side, the large barbarian grunts.

It is uncharacteristic of him; always very respectful of his elders. You lean against him, just a nudge. His attention snaps to you and you smile innocently. “Be polite, Katsuki”.

Like it was meant to be spoken only by you, Katsuki’s name sits right in your mouth, lips shaping around the characters softened by warm intonation. The reaction is instantaneous. His jaw ticks. His faint blush returns. His stoic expression wanes as he looks to the keeper, who is observing the interaction with mirthful eyes. Lowering his head he mutters, “We appreciate your hospitality, ma’am”.

“You’re quite darlin’ together, aren’t you,” she comments heartily, mostly to herself, as if airing her thoughts. “We got good food and drinks downstairs, do come if you’re hungry! Blessings be upon you”.

On her departure you enter the room. Spangles of light dusted the air. While it clearly isn’t lived in, it is homely. You canvas the space. Two square-headed windows facing the street are covered by thin cloth. There is an old, tattered tapestry strung across the wall to cover up a fist sized hole, a patterned glass vase and various other unique tchotchke adorning the shelves. You drag your fingers across the brick fireplace opposite a wide double bed, mattress made of wool but compensated by the many feather pillows and blankets.

“This is good,” you say, “homely”. Though there is an animal hide on the floor, which you find rather… untoward. A soothing musky smell with overtones of caramel and vanilla rising through the cracks in the floorboards from the tavern below. You breathe it in deeply.

“It’ll do,” Katsuki voices his agreement and drops his bag with a conclusive thud. “Let me hide our stuff and we can meet with the others for food downstairs. You haven’t eaten in hours”.

The small consideration makes your heart flutter. “Ah. I’ll be there soon,” you tell him. He squints at you, attempting to mentally pry the answers out of you. “I’m okay, Katsuki. I just need a minute”.

Pausing in the centre of the room, Katsuki scrutinises you. You fidget under his intense appraisal, undecided whether it pleases you or not. It is strange to want something that often leaves you feeling excruciatingly… exposed.

You wait apprehensively and wonder if he’ll comment on your use of his name— needless, this time. After all there are no ears or eyes in these walls. You’re not sure what you’ll do if he asks you to stop.

“Are you sure?” you nod, mouth strained in a thin smile. Bakugo frowns but ultimately gives you your space. “Make sure you catch up. If you’re not down in ten minutes I’m coming back”.

“I will,” you land heavily on the edge of the bed, wrinkling the sheets as you unclip your pelt. The collar of your ill-fitted shirt slips forward with the motion to reveal cleavage, and Bakugo immediately averts his gaze.

“Whatever,” he rasps, unexpectedly shy. The door slams as he leaves. You right the collar, tugging it back up, lips pressed thin to repress the laughter that bubbles in your chest. Aimless and left to your own devices you take a solitary moment to groom the pelt in your lap, marbled and downy-soft. Brushing through the coat, fingertips trace the rings of black and brown.

Things are so different. Being a person is more overwhelming than you imagined. Being locked away had kept you in a state of inertia, suffocating in numb misery, but now you were left to grapple with the immense spectrum of human emotion. Urges and wants that you had never experienced before meeting Katsuki.

You swallow, staring at the spaces between your fingers. Spaces filled with short tan fur. Selkie marriages were simultaneously complicated and simple. Rather, they were so simple that they bore unnecessary complications.

A stolen pelt creates a one sided bond but upon return it is consummated. Between two selkies in courting pelts were exchanged, solidifying their promise to one another, deeply unified by their magic. Elder podmates said that it meant they belonged to only one another. Abandoning the tides, in a way.

Since being a pup the voice of the sea was a ceaseless whisper you were always aware of. Yet since Katsuki held your seal skin, unknowingly cradled your very being and returned it to you with only sincere intention, that voice had gradually been ebbing away.

Would there come a day that you no longer recalled your identity as a selkie—? No. You quickly smother the thought. The immaterial, chimerical magic that made up your very being could never be forgotten. And deep down, you knew Katsuki would not let you. Indeed, you can only picture his surly retaliation if you ever woke up and could not recall your lineage.

With that you get to your feet. Ten minutes would soon pass and his probable wrath was enough motivation. You consider the pelt in your grasp and give a surreptitious glance around the room for somewhere to hide it. Taking it into a tavern full of drunken strangers and mariners seemed like a much worse idea.

After rolling it up tight you stuff it behind the pillows at the head of the bed, further pulling over the coverlets. The hallway is quiet when you step out. You lock the door, tensing at the loud click. You can hear muffled laughter rising through the floors.

It grows in volume when you step out into the evening air. Slurred conversation and bickering pour through the tavern windows. At front is a large, arched door, overshadowed by a dark blue awning. The wood panels are weatherworn and rustic, covered in rivets. You reach for the brass handle. It’s heavy in your palm as you turn it, using your full strength to push forward.

First, you are met with a crescendo of boisterous cheers. Stepping inside, your eyes are drawn to the green dyed sailcloths hung from the rafters above the bar. The establishment is modestly sized, enough that there is a longtable set up in the centre of the room and a fair few smaller roundtables dotted with stools.

Across the far end of the tavern is a line of small booths, separated by wooden screens decorated with mosaic carvings. Oil lamps are hooked on the walls, casting a warm sepia hue that seems to cohesively bring everything together. It felt welcoming, and intimate, like approaching a friend by the fire.

You try to seek out a familiar head of blonde hair. The place is busy but nobody bats an eyelid at your entrance, lively enough that you cannot hear clearly above the overlapping voices around you, intermingling with the low playing of music.

“Lost, stranger?”

You startle.

She finds you easily, like she’d been waiting. Mina curls an arm around your back, pressure light as if she was suddenly worried about being too familiar. It tightens when you lean into her and she smiles with more vigour.

“C’mon. Let’s get you something to eat”.

The distance between you and them is barely that of a crevice, but it is daunting, yawning like a trench. Over in the far left booth, both secluded and closest to the bar, is a group of friends. Directly beneath a lantern strung onto a hook, Katsuki is bathed in orange and nursing a drink. The others are tucked away in the booth, cups and plates lining the table top. Their laughter slows as you approach and you battle the urge to recoil from everyone’s eye. Mina, sensing the discomfort, begins to rub her hand along your back.

“All of you scoot up,” she asserted, wiggling her pointer finger. “Make some space for us!”

They move around on the long, curved seat to make space. You end up on Katsuki’s right, sandwiched in by Sero who smiles, though awkward, earlier remorse persisting as you take your place beside him. “What’s the verdict, are you happy with your room? Best I got from Bakugo is a grunt”.

“Yeah, I like it. You did good picking this place. It’s cosy,” you glance over toward Katsuki. “Beats a cave. The fireplace is nice. I wonder if it works…”

Mina tucks into Kirishima’s side where he sits across from you. Most of the plates are piled up in front of him, food aplenty to sate his dragon-sized appetite. His chin dimples as his bottom lip juts forward, “You guys get a fireplace? That’s so unfair”.

“C’mon, Kiri. The fireplace is there for…”—Kaminari leans in, suggestively lowering his voice and nudging Katsuki’s left arm—“…ambiance”.

You feel a gentle nudge. Katsuki, ignoring his friend's harmless influx of innuendos, slides a glass across the table toward you. “What is it?” you ask, bringing it to your lips. The liquid is dark, red like fresh blood, but it smells fruity. Before he can tell you, you’ve taken a sip.

It is weighty on your tongue, unlike anything you’ve tasted before. Cherries and jam and oddly well paired notes of spicy tobacco. The corner of his mouth curls into a barely there smile, pleased at the immediate delighted sound. He brings forward a large opened bottle and presents it to you.

“Barmaid gave us this to share,” Katsuki taps at the calligraphy on the label. “It’s wine. Expensive too, usually”.

“Guess marriage does have benefits,” Sero gibed, raising a glass of amber liquid you assume to be beer. Expression open in sincere merriment, he declares, “To the happy couple!”

Six glasses come together, toasting to your accidental bond, alcohol spilling over your hands. Katsuki’s cup is there too, his monotonous voice blending into their hurrahs. A hand slides from the back of the booth to rest upon your shoulders and you lean into it, heat prickling over your skull at the feel of his bare skin. Blood thinning, belly full, inhibitions lost to bliss.

Mina brings her hands together in a succinct clap, weaving her fingers. “Another round!” she beams, and the enthusiasm stirs once more.

The evening crawls on. Your modest group barely puts a dent into the chaotic din but it sure can eat. You’re made to swallow your fill under Katsuki’s direction—watching you closer than he did anyone else—and savour the dishes, heady and complimented by your flavoursome wine.

Stories pass through loosened lips, new and old. You don’t mention it when Kaminari repeats himself twice over— nobody else does, either. You all sink into the balmy atmosphere, sharing food and conversation, relaxing entirely for what felt like the first time in months.

Sero chokes on his drink as Kirishima recounts the story of when he and Katsuki first became friends. How the tiny blonde barbarian would sneak up on him through the bushes, throw rocks at his tender head, and challenge him to battle all in pursuit of friendship.

Your shoulders shake, burrowing into Katsuki’s side to sap his warmth. Bare skin pebbles as your fingertips skim his ribs, poking near his armpit. “Would it kill you to communicate like a normal person?”

Trembling mouth pressed firmly together, Katsuki refuses to give anyone the satisfaction of making him laugh. You see through it plain as day. “Shut up,” he grumbles.

“Didn’t even flinch when ma threatened to eat him if I came home with any more teeth missing,” Kirishima continued, sighing happily. “My bro is so manly”.

Steadily the energy begins to dwindle into a pleasant hum. You’re together, drunk on wine and laughter and a sense of harmony. Being with them is startlingly effortless. It feels like family.

In the recesses of your mind you think, I don’t want to let go.

“Hey,” Katsuki says, sharper when nobody hears him. “Hey, shitheads”. You lift your head from where it had come to rest on his shoulder, cheek slightly numb. “Think I’m going to head up”.

You hear a chorus of sluggish objections with no real heat behind them. While he’s fighting off their interrogation you simply watch him, awkwardly angled and ignoring the twinge in your neck. The bead in his braid glints in the low light.

Sensing your stare, Katsuki looks down at you, dappled by lamp light. The flames dance in his irises, gaze unbearably soft, as it had been that first night by the campfire. You hold your breath when he sets his thumb with his tongue and uses it to wipe a crumb from your cheek. The touch is like a spark to flint. A fleeting sort of hope stirs in your chest, like this is all you’d been waiting for, that the universe was finally making things right for you.

Then he snatches his hand back, as though waking up to what he was doing.

“I’m going to bed. You idiots better behave,” he groused, returning his focus to the group. You mourn his attention. “If we get kicked out early I’ll kill you”.

“You love us too much,” Mina tucks her drunken smirk into the cradle of her palm, arm almost slipping with the weight. Cloudy eyes follow Katsuki as he forces his way out of the booth like a bull. “Admit it!”

Bending at the waist he meets her stare head on and deadpans, “Die”. Mina merely laughs and plants a kiss on his forehead that he aggressively rubs away as he leaves.

You stay a little longer but find your mood dampening. Katsuki’s absence makes known an ache usually quelled by the weight of your pelt, almost as though his presence had placated that innate yearning for home. The thought leaves you dizzy.

“I think I’m going to go, too,” you announce out of the blue.

Expressions fall, concerned. Kaminari tilts into your space. You barely even blink at the proximity now. “Everything alright? Y’dont feel sick or anything, do you?”

“No, not at all—“ he frowns at you, unconvinced, “—I just feel like going for a soak before bed. Sero, you said there was a bathhouse?”

Sero perks up at his name and nods loosely, head barely held by his neck. “Yeah! They’re around the back, apparently. Just walk beyond the stairwell,” he shoots you a thumbs up. “They’re mixed but only guests can use ‘em, so don’t worry about it being crowded”.

That’s comforting to know. If luck was on your side it would be empty. You duck out of the tavern with a final wave and a promise to see them in the morning. Thankfully the boisterous chatter grows dull as you step into the night air, stopping to look up the stairwell. You hope Katsuki can sleep through it.

Heeding Sero’s instructions you follow the beaten path around the back of the tavern. There you discover another building, smaller, but with a steeped tile roof and shuttered windows. Curious, you gently lift the green dyed curtain hung in the doorway and enter the earthen-floored threshold.

You are led to what you guess is a small changing area. Cabinets left open, again each handle corresponding the key colours. You find a lavender ribbon and peer around the empty space, contemplating getting undressed.

Gathering courage you pull the strings in your shirt slack, slipping your arms from the sleeves and pulling it over your head. Tepid air breathes over your skin as you push down your pants, stepping out of them where they pool at your feet. Your clothes are folded and left on the shelf, boots lined neatly by the doorway.

Further in is an open space covered in tiles of smooth green. There are low stools and basins with natural running water, washcloths and soaps. While unpracticed you are at least somewhat familiar with bathhouse etiquette. Sitting hesitantly, hissing as your bare thighs meet the cool wood, you dip one of the cloths to soak and begin to scrub at your body.

The knots in your muscles become undone with the repetitive motions, again and again until you’re lathered in bubbles. You breathe in, feeling the humidity cling to your lungs, and rinse away the soaps.

Eventually you dub yourself clean enough to enter the baths. The seafoam tiles soon taper to stone that borders the baths. You take in the tall ceiling with beautiful carvings along the walls and high placed glass windows allowing the moon to shine in easily. The patterns are comfortingly familiar. Shells, waves, gulls, rock formations and arches. Though the bathhouse is much warmer, hot tendrils of steam rising from the bubbling water.

Penumbral light glinted on the water's surface. It held a distinct earthy scent, rolling in from the nearby springs. Again, you are reminded of a tide pool, but deeper. Clear and clean and natural. What immediately seizes your attention is the familiar man sitting close by, a head of wet golden hair still somehow holding its shape, the loose strands that typically make up his braid now tucked behind his ear.

Katsuki tips back to rest on the bath's edge. A thin white towel is laid across his face. Your gaze follows the slope of his shoulders, roving over his defined chest, skin pink with the heat. Rivulets run between his pecs to his sternum, lower body distorted below the water but patently bare, same as you. You exhale a breath you hadn’t known you were holding and quickly look away from his lap.

Time spent with Katsuki taught you that he hated being treated delicately. Tip toeing around this was not an option. You would join him in the baths and behave as normal. But—

Humans were fickle about nakedness. Where should you sit? What is an appropriate distance? Straying too far could make him defensive, yet getting too close might—

“Are you going to stand there all night?”

Startled, the soles of your feet almost slip on the smoothed stone. “You knew it was me?”

Katsuki scoffs. The towel remains over his eyes, obstructing his view, that which you were grateful for. Your previous indifference had so abruptly burgeoned into apprehension. Just the thought that he might see you this glaringly bare and skinless, a body without boundaries, made your stomach swoop. It is a peculiar sensation; you wanted him to look and you didn’t.

“Nobody else thinks that loud. Unless you’re Deku,” you can imagine his eyes rolling, the exasperation clear in his voice, though not unkind. The corded muscles in his shoulders shift beautifully as his arm stretches across the bath’s edge, wrist limp to allow his fingertips to breach the surface. He flicks the water in your direction, creating capillary waves. “Just— fuckin’ get in already”.

“Right,” you laugh quietly under your breath, descending the steps into the baths. The heated water is soothing, climbing the length of your lengths, eventually coming to rest above your hips.

You sink near to him and pointedly keep your eyes above his collar. Katsuki neither twitches nor acknowledges your approach. In fact, you aren’t sure he is even breathing. It occurs to you that he too could be nervous, tempted to look but refraining. The possibility of being wanted by him brings a sudden sharp sort of awareness that slides through you and heightens your senses.

Outstretched fingertips brush featherlight between your shoulder blades where you lean back against the wall. You sit with your knees close to your breast, relieved to be covered. “I thought you were heading to bed,” you comment quietly.

“Saw the path and followed it,” he replies, stiff shoulder jerking as he shrugs. “Wanted some quiet”.

A deep pink flush is spreading across his collarbones, clawing up the column of his throat. Your rational mind knows it is caused by the steam, yet the greedy part of you, the part so distinctly human, wants to know if you affect him as much as he affects you.

These feelings had gradually been accumulating since the very beginning. You’ve no idea where to put them. The voice in your hindbrain all but panics at the idea of leaving. You’ve spent a lifetime listening to your instincts and they’re telling you to keep your place at his side.

You inhale until the pressure in your chest is smothered by your lungs and your heart beat slows. Exhale. The water shifts in sync with your subtle movement. Emboldened by the wine in your veins you slide closer. The soft hair on your legs prickles, everything in you gravitating toward him. Katsuki doesn’t acknowledge it.

“Always staring,” a flustered growl snaps you back to reality. “You got something to say to me?”

“No,” you answer too quickly.

“Good,” his upper body sinking lower. After a length of silence it must get to him. Voice pitched low, as though afraid to disturb the atmosphere, he mutters, “Ever had a bath this big, back at that shitty castle?”

You snort. He turns at the sound and the surface ripples as you quickly smother it with your wet palm. It’s easy to picture the searing glare beneath the face towel. “Sorry. It’s just,” your mouth pulls into a tipsy grin. “All things considered, this place is pretty small to me”.

“Dumbass. You know what I meant,” he huffs, not bothering to hide his fond exasperation. “The sea doesn’t count”.

Humans are cute, you concluded. Trying to emulate the ocean in their warm wooden structures. “It counts,” you insist, moving closer still. You’re giddy in the water, with him. Like you’re sharing some special part of yourself in a strange way. “Have you been?”

A rough hum, “Where?”

“The sea”.

“Which one?”

The steam must be making you light headed. You’re tucked to his side again. Thigh to thigh. Skin against skin. You are acutely aware of your shared nakedness. His arm has slipped over the bath's edge to drape around your shoulders. “The closest, obviously. Or any of them,” you knock your knees together. “It’s not like you to be purposefully obtuse”.

“Big attitude for a little fish,” he mutters, free hand reaching for the towel, sliding it up to his hairline and revealing a crooked grin. Your heart squeezes. “Course I’ve been in the ocean. Flown over it on Red a few times too”.

You want to do that, too. To bear witness to the wind driving the currents from above, feel the sea salt spray sharp on your cheeks, touch the unreachable seam where your two worlds become indistinguishable.

“Never bathed in it, though?”

“No,” he drawled, an impatient edge to his tone. “I don’t plan on giving the finfolk an eyeful of my dick anytime soon”.

You laugh, “Like you are now, you mean?”

Katsuki tears off the face towel before you’ve any time to process it. The water thrashes. You daren’t look away. His stare has a certain ferality, pupils dilated, fair lashes damp from the steam and clumped into little spikes; it pins you in place like prey.

The blush across his chest is matched in his cheeks. A droplet slides down the delicate slope of his nose. You feel the surface of the water calm and settle just above your breast. You watch his gaze flicker reflexively to them, then to the ceiling, then clamping shut with a growl. Apprehension pulses through you and your thighs clench.

“You—” he inhales sharply, gathering his thoughts. You track the movement of his tongue as it swipes across his lips. Thickly, Katsuki asks, “What are you trying to do here, exactly?”

A sense of dejection comes over you and your immediate response is to feign innocence. “Soak with you,” which is no more than a half truth. You attempt to create some distance and his arm coils around your waist. Any effort to twist away from him proves futile; a snake that constricts the more you struggle. He doesn’t allow you to slip away, hand hot at your hip.

“Yeah?” but there’s no real bite, no vitriol as he drags you closer. “Soaking, s’that what you call this? Rubbing up against me, practically climbing into my lap?”

You might feel demeaned if not for the lust hemming his words. His grip is bruising, fingers kneading soft flesh. You can see this for what it is— a choice, a question. He’s confused, and wanting. Presenting an opportunity for you to change your mind in the face of his callousness. Katsuki is kind, in his own way.

Your palms come to rest over his sternum, pushing with no real effort, an accomplice in whatever cat and mouse game he was trying to play. His breathing picks up, abdomen clenching. You stare where bodies meet, low light reflecting off the wet sheen. Beneath your touch his heartbeat ricochets around his ribs.

Katsuki calls you. Your name is barely above a whisper. Peering up through your lashes as his hand comes to cup your nape, the other massages simple shapes into your hip, his fingers splayed across your navel. You exhale shakily as his pinky fits into the crease of your thigh.

He cradles your nape, guides you into his magnetism, and then you’re tilting— your world with it— into a careful kiss. Static blankets your thoughts. Katsuki’s lips slot over your own, a gentle press that quickly grows feverish as your tongue traces the seam of his mouth.

Exhaling harshly through his nose he drags you over his lap, the bath water splashing onto the stone tiles, holding you to his front in a way that makes it difficult to discern where you end and he begins. You have all of him now. Half hard under you and tense like he was exerting effort not to do anything about it. Hands wandering, mapping out the topography of your body, clutching greedily at your thighs. Smoke fills your throat, a tang of explosive magic lingering in the grooves of your teeth.

Minutes passed imperceptibly. You leave it feeling as though all the sinew in your body had unravelled, undone in his embrace like loose skeins of yarn. Katsuki doesn’t appear any more composed than you are; staring at you, slack with hunger, jaw relaxed the way a beast would do to taste the air. Palms cupping his cheeks, thumbs moving in idle back and forth motions under his eyes, you smile—

“Katsuki,” you murmur reverently. For reasons you can’t understand, it wakes him up. Snaps him out of his stupor. Panic flits over his features and you’re being pushed away, deposited back into the water. It rocks with the abrupt movement, waves breaking against your chest as he brusquely wades toward the steps with the small towel barely covering his modesty.

Echoing louder now, “Katsuki?”

And he was gone.

You stare at the entrance to the baths for a long time, willing him to return. You stare until your eyes sting and you’re forced to blink. All that’s left is the soft sound of the running springs, your shallow breath, and the muffled chanting of a few drunken men.

An emptiness makes home in your chest. Bereft, you follow in his steps, exiting the baths and heading to the changing room. You pat yourself down, rough towel absorbing the moisture, and pull on your clothes.

A hopeful spark catches when a figure ducks in under the curtain. Snuffed out, then, when Mina greets you cheerily. She seems to have sobered up for the most part, more coherent than you’d last seen her.

“You took a dip too?” she bounces on the balls of her feet as she undoes her shirt buttons, oblivious to your somber disposition. “I saw Bakugo come from this way too. Looked a little constipated if you ask me. I thought hot baths were supposed to relax you, not—”

Finally, she looks at you. Her voice stops as her brows pinch into a frown. You offer a brittle smile and endure the scrutiny. “Did something happen?” she asks worriedly.

Your throat closes up. Your teeth sink into your cheek and lower your gaze to the tiled floor, cracks overlapping as your vision blurs. Mina reaches for you. She halts in your periphery, thoughts and actions misaligned. A flash of hesitance, and then determination. She strides across the threshold to pull you into an embrace. Her arms slip around your shoulders, crossing over one another at your nape, tightening.

The tension begins to soften. Your body slumps, sinking into her kindhearted warmth as the rigidity weakens with your resolve. Bowing into the crook of her neck, you inhale her gentle scent. A soliflore smell, a flower you don’t know the name of, earthy undertones and hints of saké.

Your eyes are wet. Tears cling to your lashes as you blink. The moths dancing in the lamp light blurs, small specks of white stretching and flickering like pallid butterflies. Breathing shuttered, there’s a thickness in your throat that squeezes your voice into a frail whisper.

“Thank you”.

She hums, rubbing a comforting hand along the top of your spine. Her natural heat seeps through the thin fabric of your shirt. Though her arms are muscled they are also supple, like her chest, like her waist. You haven’t been held like this since you last saw your podmates.

After a few beats she asks, “Do you want to talk about it?”

You shake your head, grasping your bearings, “No”. It’s best left between you and Katsuki.

“If you’re sure,” Mina gives a final crushing hug before releasing you. “I’m bunking with Sero tonight. Knock if you need anything”.

“I will,” you say on the end of a shuddering exhale. “I’ll see you in the morning”.

She hums, watching apprehensively as you make your way through the changing rooms. The retention of her heat clings to your clothing when you step into the cold night air. Your boots rub at the sore skin around your ankles, fitting loose, having foregone tying the laces. They encumber your steps, obtrusively loud and ungainly on your journey up the stairwell.

A closed door should not be so daunting. Your hand hovers over the handle, steadily turning it, flinching as the locks click open. Low light floods in from the hallway and your eyes adjust to the darkness between blinks, the shape of a figure under the covers sharpening into view. Katsuki is laid on his back, hand disappearing under the pillow beneath his head where your bunched up pelt resides.

Hesitant, you shut the door and kick off your dirty shoes. You tiptoe around the frame and climb into bed. You try to alleviate your weight, balanced between your hands and knees so the mattress won’t dip, yet it is futile. “I’m sorry, Katsuki,” you whisper, feeling fragile as you lower into the linens. He’s awake, you can tell despite his efforts to appear otherwise, because you feel him stroking your sealskin between his thumb and forefinger.

“…Shouldn’t have done that,” his cadence is unsettlingly calm; gently sheathing the sharp words. “We’ve been getting too comfortable, letting shit influence us. It was just the magic talking”.

What?

“It’s not—”

“Go to sleep,” the volume raises in momentary frustration, but as quick as it came, anger dissipating. Dropping his head into the pillows he looks as defeated as you feel. He closes his eyes. “I won’t fuckin’ do anything to you so just. Sleep”.

You try, fitfully. The atmosphere is unbearable, keeping you glued to the far side of the bed lest you accidentally touch one another. Pressing your fingertips to your lips, you remember. You ache. You stare into the shadows and wonder at what point did the intentions become so crossed.

Katsuki valued the right to choose above all else. You liked that about him. He respected and surrounded himself with people who steered their own destiny, marching to the beat of his own drum; a rhythm you had fortuitously interrupted. In his mind he’d given into a temptation, and that act of indulgence was somehow the same as losing in battle.

Katsuki viewed your relationship as an infliction he needed to fight against.

That knowledge hurts you in ways you hadn’t expected. The words “we’re getting too comfortable” reverberated around your skull. Perhaps he was right. Somewhere along the lines you forgot that these truly were temporary circumstances, childishly wishing that maybe he’d come to love you, that you could simply accept this reality and grow into each other like a child into new shoes.

You blink. Linens rise and fall with his shallow breath. Katsuki’s mouth is open, the corner of his mouth wet with drool. His lips smack together as he bundles you closer. Unconscious, yet still seeking you out. He’s devastating even when he’s not trying to be.

Sleep feels impossible.

Then you wake.

Morning spills her dewy light throughout the room. Katsuki’s side of the bed is empty— made up and tucked at the corners. Cold. You are suddenly a distance apart and scrambling to make it all better again.

You push up into a sitting position. The bedsheets shift and pool around your hips, creasing the perfect slate Katsuki left. You rummage for the pelt hidden behind the pillows, dragging it out and around your shoulders, ducking your nose into the dark fur for comfort before tying it to your midriff.

Judging by the sun’s position you would guess it is still quite early. Sluggish movement can be heard through the thin walls, indicating that others are awake. Knowing Katsuki he would want to set off early to find Uraraka, especially after last night.

Another figure joins you in the hallway. Kaminari remains unaware of your presence as he fiddles clumsily with the key, squawking when it almost slips between his fingers. He’s dishevelled, shirt half tucked into his belt, cuffs undone and hung off his wrists; there’s still an impression of his pillow printed on his left cheek.

Having finally turned the lock, Kaminari spins on his heel with a happy hum. The tune escalates into a shriek as he notices you standing a few feet away. “Holy—! Warn a guy, would ya?” he clutches at his chest, exhaling harshly. “I think my heart just stopped”.

“Sorry Kaminari,” amused by his shrill intonation and melodramatics, you smile for the first time that morning. It exaggerates the bags under your eyes. “Did you sleep well?”

“Like a baby,” he falls into step with you, knocking your elbows together on your way out into the stairwell. “I don’t think you can say the same, though,” his mouth twists into a smirk, “did Kacchan keep you up all night?”

Normally the teasing wouldn’t bother you. In many ways you saw it as a sign of acceptance into the group. Now you wince like somebody had carelessly pressed a bruise on your body. Kaminari, for all his obliviousness, knows when to drop the masquerade.

Your smile tightens uncomfortably as his fingers circle your wrist. In daylight you are left feeling exposed, unable to temper the regret written so plainly across your face. His mouth opens and shuts, searching fruitlessly for the right words, only to be interrupted by a callous shout from below.

Katsuki’s voice is incredibly distinct. He’s yelling, which is nothing new, but now it is with genuine frustration. Kirishima, Mina and Sero are there alongside him, speaking in low tones as you would to an untamed animal.

Kaminari tugs at your sleeve and gives you a meaningful glance, gently coaxing you to the bottom of the stairs. He must’ve at least connected Katsuki’s poor mood with your own. “Kacchan, my man. It is too early for all this shouting,” he implored, settling back into his jovial self.

You collect yourself, trying to retain shape and rationality as Kaminari draws Katsuki’s ire. Those vermillion eyes rove over you, head to toe, before flickering to the man on your right. Fast, like he’s afraid to look too long. Nostrils flare. The warm puff of air from his nose is visible in the cool air.

“It’s late enough. What took you so long?” Katsuki snarled, poking a finger harshly between Kaminari’s eyebrows. “The keep told me cheeks is planning on leaving today, so all of you get moving”.

Kaminari pouts, rubbing at the spot. The pale skin turns slightly pink. Unheeding of the wary scrutiny he is receiving, Katsuki charges onwards in expectation that everyone will follow. Kirishima raises a brow at his shape verbiage but doesn’t comment. He takes you under his arm in a half hug, sharing a look of understanding with Mina and the others.

Sero recounts their findings. According to the townspeople, Uraraka, the occultist, landed her abode miles outside of their bounds and set up wards in the valley to confuse strangers. It steered them in opposing directions and sent them in circles, practically making her impossible to find. You’re worried clear up until your group crests the precipice of a steep hill several hours later.

You take in the gentle undulations of earth and fauna. Grass tall enough to brush your shoulders, wildflowers and weeds hugging the barely worn path, sparingly tended nature left to flourish. The magic becomes apparent with proximity. It hangs in the air like humidity, an unnatural sheen muddying your vision. Katsuki continued with brass-bound determination; weaving skilfully through the runes, barrier fracturing under the pressure of his explosive palms.

There’s a quaint cottage in the middle of the glen, done up with a sweet ivy on the walls, latticed strips of wood around the windows, and a cobbled chimney towering from the pink tiled roof. Each windowsill appeared to have a different unidentifiable herb growing on it. A small, circular stained glass window in the door refracted the afternoon light, a knocker below it. Hanging by the door frame is a wind chime, shells tied to strings producing delicate crisp sounds in the breeze; in the effort to knock, Katsuki shoulders it carelessly, and the tune turns sour.

His fist comes down with hard momentum, stopped midway by another. “Be careful,” Kirishima gently chides. Katsuki shoves his hand off, sparing him an incredulous glare, which the shifter subjugates with a pointed reminder: “She won't help you if you bust her door down, bro. Play nice”.

Katsuki grunted his understanding, jaw clenched. He raps his knuckles on the wood. The sound is dull, and you stare down at your scuffed boots as an unpleasant pang of anxiety knocks around your chest. A voice shouts from inside, somebody scurrying around, then the door is pulled open.

“Can I—Bakugo?!”

“Uraraka,” Katsuki greets bluntly, giving a short nod. It is the first time you’ve ever heard him say her name. His hands flex at his sides, restless. Through gritted teeth he adds, “Deku sent me. I need your help with something”.

“Oh,” Uraraka exhales in disbelief. She steps back, pink slippered feet in your periphery. “Come in, then. I haven’t seen you guys in forever…”

Their voices fade into the background. All at once subconscious acts like breathing and blinking become tiresome. Hearing him let go of his pride felt so final. You fall away, stuck in a cold fog. Your gait is uneven as you remind yourself to put one foot in front of the other, incognisant to the worried looks thrown your way.

You remember being seated on a plush feather-pillowed sofa. Hands running over your shoulders, grounding you. You reach for your pelt, sinking fingers into the downy fur, and find no comfort in it. Now you’re here it feels more like a husk, leaden and hollow, ready for you to be stuffed into.

“You married a selkie by accident?” Uraraka blanched, her volume rousing you from your haze. “You know, Bakugo, for someone so smart your ignorance is truly astounding”.

“Can you fucking reverse it or not?”

“Reverse it. Are you kidding? You’re not. Gods, Bakugo—breaking a soul bond isn’t common,” Uraraka snaps, rubbing roughly at her eyelids as she loses patience. You feel a pang of guilt, that which worsens as it unearths the hope that perhaps she wouldn’t be able to separate you from him. “Most of the methods are based on myth. You realise it will be incredibly painful, and possibly for nothing?”

You take in the surroundings while they continue to bicker. The cottage is modest. A small foyer leads to the living space, rugs of various shapes and colours laid to insulate a path through the house, runes and scrawls carved into the hardwood walls. Logs presumably for fuelling the hearth monopolise much of the space, spilling out from the nook in which they’re stacked. There is nothing particularly otherworldly, at least not where you can see it. Uraraka obviously lives within her means, a humble and frugal person despite wielding magic of her calibre.

“I do have something I can try, ” she sighs with a sidelong glance. The skin on her lip breaks between her teeth. Your prolonged silence has likely done nothing to reassure her. You try to feign interest, to smile and express gratitude, but she grimaces.

“What do we have to do?”

“Essentially I can sever the bond at the stem but not the root,” the group is quiet, tense as they listen. Mina’s grip is bruising, as though making sure you were still there. “The dissolution of your marriage will only be complete when the selkie returns to the sea. Within a day or two they’ll… forget you”.

You sense the atmosphere darken. Katsuki shifts his weight in your periphery. Neither one of you can look at the other. Whether he’s threatened by your feelings or ashamed of them you can’t be sure, but what you know is that they are real, sown and tended in the weeks you spent together.

Kirishima exhales a shuddered breath. His big body crouches before you, warm hand resting on your knee. Kaminari and Sero linger on either side, watching over the scene, wearing grief plainly on their faces. A broken part of you wants to laugh. They are acting as if this is your wake.

“Are you sure about this?” he implores, discreet and unintentionally cruel. If you were to say no, what of you then? Nothing to do but follow them on their journey, dragging along like the hide of some shorn animal. Stuck waiting for Katsuki to resent you over an incredibly frustrating and misplaced presumption that he played a part in fabricating your thoughts and feelings.

Uraraka’s method may well cleave the ties created in your accidental matrimony. You trust in her capabilities because Katsuki clearly respects them. You’ll say yes. And after it all, when your soul has been excavated, when you’ve gone home crying to your mother, rocked to sleep in her gentle undertow, you will still stubbornly want him.

The thought comes unbidden, a sudden clarity that overcomes you. At that point he would have no room to question your will. “I’m sure,” you say, still breathless with the realisation. “You can go ahead with it, Uraraka”.

Hesitating in her movement, Uraraka considers you for a moment longer before disappearing down the hall. When she returns she pulls seven tear shaped crystals from a velvet satchel. Dread churns in your stomach, sensing the energy emanating from them.

She begins to recite machinations beyond your comprehension. Opalescent rays of light burst from within her enclosed fist where it pressed against her mouth, dappling sentient shadows across her face, now taut with concentration. Her features ripple and distort, not unlike a reflection on the ocean's surface, then fades into obscurity as the spell settles into its conduit.

Uraraka hands the lustre of the stone to you, knuckles pale as she squeezes the magic out into your cupped palms. As a pup you would try to drink sunlight, specks chased across the seabed as the clouds shifted, caught like a cat to a mouse only to remain empty handed. Light was not made up of solid matter— it was intangible. To be felt, seen, but not touched.

Yet it is swirling in your hands like that lovely warm wine from the night before, slipping through the thin cracks in your fingers. “Drink it,” she coaxes gently.

You look at Katsuki. His eyes flicker up to meet your own. There’s an awful urgency coursing through your body, frozen like a fawn, something inside willing you to stop. Begging him to speak up. He lowers his gaze, expression pinched and inwardly furious.

Heel to chin, you tip your head back as if drinking from a cup. Her magic is entirely flavourless, waning with your own imagination as if it were allowing you to choose the taste yourself. The consistency is like steam; inhaled rather than swallowed, and hot on the roof of your mouth.

Elemental magic was external in the way it bursts forth from the user, often causing flesh wounds or dramatic change in the terrain. You think of Katsuki, the calamity at his fingertips, juxtaposed by the tender manner in which he would always touch you, cauterising your fear. Uraraka’s magic is unforgiving and uniquely invasive. It is so much worse than being burned.

It spreads through your sinuses like searing wildfire, pressure balloons behind your eye sockets, undoing the seams that make up the very fabric of your being. Waves of nausea engulf you, throat tight and constricted. Breathing laboured and irregular, you fight against the urge to retch it all up.

It’s too much. The incorporeal spell pierces through your mind, tearing at the bond, more overwhelming than anything you’ve ever been dealt. Knife-like pain persists after her chanting stops. You wince and cradle your head, weeping as it passes. Left in its wake is a muted soreness throbbing across your brain.

“Hi,” Uraraka is before you, ducking to examine for any injury. Careful, her fingers encircle your wrists and pry your hands away. “You’re okay. Can you look at me?”

You squint, reluctant to blink and irritate the soreness around your eyes. “How’s your vision?” she asked, sotto voce. Her touch is deliberate and gentle, slightly pulling down your bottom eyelids, petting over your jaw and down the nape of your neck, feeling for something. “Does anything feel wrong, or out of place?”

Wrong? your mind echoes. Out of place? Cold is creeping into your muscles, gritty and dense like wet sand. You’re unnerved by the veil of apathy that settles around you. “I don’t think I’m injured. The light is more intense. Hurts,” you admit, voice breaking.

Everything that remains the same yet is somehow more drab, lacking colour and difficult to look at. Your friends, clinging to each other. Your Katsuki, staring back at you. “But I can still see everything”.

“Good,” she breathes, relief entirely palpable. If this is success then you wonder what the worst outcome might’ve been. “That’s good. If you reach for the bond, is it there?”

You’re not sure what she means. Seeking connection you clutch your sealskin to your front, kneading at the familiar fur. It’s minor but it’s back— the voice belonging to the tide, beckoning you to shift again. “I don’t think so,” you reply.

“Then there’s only one thing left to do,” Uraraka smiles and covers your hands with her own. You sense the tips of her fingers ever so slightly across your collar where they brush the pelt bunched in your fists. “You’re free now. You can go back home”.

Her soothing countenance might as well be dry grass to your precipitous anger. “Right,” you deadpan, voice entirely devoid of emotion. Best kept that way, lest you release all your bubbling frustrations onto a woman that only wanted to help you; in her eyes—and the rest—you were just another trapped, useless selkie.

That anger carries you to your feet. You want to cry but the tears don’t come. When you exit the cottage with a curt bow and a ‘thank you’ you find yourself in the lead for once, marching ahead of the group. They remain a few feet behind, muttering amongst each other. Without the view of Katsuki’s back you feel lonely. Even so you keep your hurried pace, too afraid to turn around and be inundated with questions.

The journey back passes in a blur. Hours, surely, because you’re ready to pass out from the exertion. Loose dirt and geosmin clings to your clothes. Shadows stretch across the emptying streets as dark cloud cover canopies the town, sparse instances of light rainfall that stick to your skin. There's a chill in the air now, a bite to it that rattles your bones and quickens your breath. It’s damp, imbued with the scent of sea salt.

You don’t stop, not when the desperate calls of your name begin. Further up the dock is lit golden, lanterns lining cobbled roads and emitting a warm orange glow. You trudge through the quieting bustle, workers scurrying to shelter, while enduring a pervasive sense of wrongness.

You don’t know what to do with this freedom, this precipice, so joyless and empty. Slowing to descend weather-worn steps onto the beach there’s a presence at your heel. “Shit. Would you slow—!” Katsuki moves to stop you. His fingers flex, start to close around your wrist. Then they hesitate and fall away, clenching at his side until all the blood recedes from his knuckles. “You don’t need to immediately run off into the damn water”.

“It’s easier this way,” and quicker, you think.

“What?”

Listening to the sea sings an ancient litany, you let your anger wash away with the oncoming tide. The whiplash is intense. Your lips tremble, pulling into a tearful smile, laughter bubbling up through your chest, choked by the swell in your throat. “I think I understand why you’re always yelling now,” cumulus clouds pass overhead and bring with them a curtain of rain. “Being human is very melodramatic”.

Katsuki clearly hadn’t expected that, of all things. His expression softens in his surprise. The short hairs by his temples are laid flat, braid swinging in the breeze, the fur around his cloak dark and saturated. “That’s what this is? Baby’s first tantrum?” his tone is mean, and your hackles would rise if he were not visibly deflating. Katsuki reacts to vulnerability like a wounded dog. He laughs despite himself and scratches at his neck, “Fuck. I thought you’d be happy, or something close to it”.

Standing a few feet behind him, Kirishima, Sero, Mina and Kaminari are linked together, waiting to approach. They remain in your line of sight as you consider the barbarian in front of you. A cold shock billows through his cloak, a wave crashing onto the shore. He shivers, but remains stubbornly rooted to the steps.

“I’m not happy,” you lamented. “I’m going to miss you. You are an impossible man, Katsuki. Impossible to forget. I wish you’d believe that”.

Katsuki’s mouth opens and shuts. Silence falls once again, and he can’t find the words to fill it. Your fingers work at the belt keeping your hide secure, tugging it loose and letting the sealskin unfurl, blanketing the length of your body.

Mina takes this as an indication that you are leaving. She rushes ahead, stumbling past a stunned Katsuki, gathering you into her arms. The pelt is trapped between your bodies as you curl into the embrace. You feel yourself warm up, the wet winds rolling off the sea obstructed by three larger figures trailing right behind her, encasing you in a group hug.

Constricted from all sides, the arms around your waist tighten. Mina’s nails dig in, and she shakes you gently in an attempt to scold you, “Don’t go leaving us without a proper goodbye”.

Kirishima is at your back. He must be. The height, the rough skin, the hard spikes in his hair poking at your nape where he inhales deeply, memorising your scent. Sero flanks your left, resting his head on the shifter's shoulder as dark eyes watch you. Kaminari bears down his weight, slumping against your right, a sour metallic taste at the back of your throat as the grip on his magic loosens with emotion.

It feels wrong without Katsuki. You crane your neck and look for him. The sight of him dithering off to the side, alone and wearing a visage of muted guilt, makes your insides twist. Your hand bursts through a crevice in the huddle, coaxing him over.

He comes. Mina drags him into the middle without fanfare, and enclose around you in a last ditch effort to keep you together. “This is the worst,” Kaminari snivelled. “It’s like my parents are divorcing all over again”.

Katsuki weakens to it. Gives a quiet, choked laugh and it blows warm across your temple. You’d know his hands anywhere. Hesitant, they rest on your hips. You close your eyes and centre yourself in the present, tilting your head to rest on his collar. The motion drags your lips up to his jugular and you kiss the words against the damp skin, thicker than intended, “I’m—really, so happy I met you all”.

The briny air greets you when they finally step away. Mina rubs harshly at her eyes as your feet sink into the sand. There are stragglers by the port but nobody along the beach, so they trail after you to the shore, equal parts unwilling to leave and curious about your selkie form.

You’re pointedly aware of their presence as you shake out your fur. You hold it to your face for a moment, blocking out the wind, the light and the rain with how insulated it is, before setting it on the sand. Kaminari coughs, the group spinning on their heels when you begin to undress. Katsuki does not.

Kicking off your boots as you fiddle with your shirt strings, you consider the barbarian, impressing his appearance behind your eyes for a final time. “What will you do after this?”

Broad shoulders rise and fall as he sighs. Looks up to the sky, frowning, a blush on his cheeks. “Go further inland to one of the bigger cities to find something to pay back Deku, I guess. Circle around, head back, and then home”.

Shirt discarded, you unbutton your pants, letting them fall down your thighs, and step out of them. “How long will you be in the city?”

Shrugging, he grunts, “A week at most”.

That’s good. Long enough to wait out the final stages and prove his place in your memory. You nod, spine straightening with determination. “When you circle back I want you to stop here again. Just for a day”.

That half lidded gaze slides over to you, squinting. Pointedly kept above the shoulders. Searching. “Why?”

The tide crawls further ashore. A wave breaks around your ankles. Your toes wiggle in the sand, sinking as it is displaced, a small smile curling at your lips. You bend to grab the pelt and slide it around your shoulders like a coat. It’s comforting, familiar. Energy thrums at the surface of your skin, ready to pull. But you wait.

“In a week. Promise me?” you say without explanation.

Katsuki swallows. Eyes boring into yours. His jaw shifts. Then he nods, tersely. Reassured by this you hold the coat tighter, chin tucked as you steady your breathing. Consciously, you reach inward, drawing upon the pelt.

And you change. Falling to your knees, cold water biting at your thighs, you crumple in the sand, body shrinking as flesh and fur meld together. It’s painful after so long, unsettling to be snapped back abruptly into your hindbrain, but the discomfort eases quickly, like stretching a muscle.

You lift your upper body, nose flat and wide and twitching, scenting the air. The sand sifts under bootstrapped feet. A human approaches, beautiful and familiar, lowering into a crouch as you freeze. Forearms resting on his knees, he holds out his fingers. Faintly smoky, a mix of spice and earth.

The way in which this man appraises your form is uncomfortably solemn. Vacuous expression betrayed by the gentle light in his eyes. He smiles ruefully and readies himself to speak. Alight with a bitterness that is vaguely accusatory in the oncoming darkness he says, “Already forgot us, didn’t you?”

It steals the breath right from your lungs. Recognition strikes through you. Bakugo Katsuki. The thought is alarmingly fleeting, almost evading your grasp. Nostrils flaring, you drag your body forward to wipe the look of self-deprecation from his face. You nudge your snout into his hand, not shying away from the fierce elemental energy radiating from his palms. You unhinge your jaw, canines gently indenting the heel, as if to scold him.

He laughs, disbelief bleeding into the sound. It beckons his pod, more humans— one not so human. “Don’t fuckin’ scare them,” Katsuki calls over his shoulder. Not once do his eyes stray from you.

A thick tang of draconic magic overwhelms your senses as the largest in the group mirrors Katsuki, making himself impossibly small, aware of his magnitude and the imbalance between your species. “Wow…” the shifter, Kirishima, breathes in awe, genuine rather than tainted with greed. “So cute”.

More people come closer. Their faces filter through your memories in bits and pieces, stitching together into a patchwork timeline. “Yeah…” Mina echoes the sentiment. She gets on her knees, doesn’t care when the waves drench her skirt. “You’re beautiful like this too,” holding her hand an inch away from your skin, she asks, “Can we pet you?”

Five fingers to your scruff, one hard pull and you could be torn from your rudimentary shell. Human hands are dangerous but not these ones. You give a short tonal whine and hope she interprets it as permission. They do, taking turns tracing the marbled fur and clawed flippers, murmuring awe filled words.

The tides are high, wrapping around and coaxing you into their arms. You look toward the horizon and the itch grows. A seamless vista of clouded sky. Warm mouths litter the top of your head with kisses, their blunt human teeth behind soft lips, juxtaposed by rough, barely decipherable mutterings of something that sounds mournful.

Mina sniffles as Kirishima helps her to her feet and they wade backwards toward the port. Katsuki cups your muzzle in his palms, searing where his thumbs swoop beneath your cheekbones, brushing over the whiskers by your nose. “Stay safe out there, yeah? Don’t get eaten by a shark or whatever,” he bends, bringing your foreheads together as if to impress his thoughts onto you. “I won't wait around for a weakling”.

You can only hope he saw the promise held in your eyes as you stare at his retreating back. The swelling waves pull you into the current, submerged until only your head is above the surface. In the distance your pod breaks into cheers. They line up on the beach, jumping high as their legs will allow, waving their long arms in the air.

A descending chorus of trills build in your own throat, mellifluous and loud enough to cut through the wind and the waves. Noise becomes muffled as you’re submerged into the dense water. Wrapped up in brine the ambience fills your head. It pushes out rational thought, drawing only instinct to the forefront.

Your vision adjusts quickly to the dark the further you swim. Stretch your flippers and sweep them down like a dragon's wing, flying through the depths until you tire. Coming to an ocean shelf, there you rest. Cradled by a moving, ever evolving element. Creatures big and small pass by. Fish with vermillion scales haloing wide faces dart in and out of your dreams, shimmering under weak streams of sunlight.

The shifting tide keeps you cognisant. You linger close to the surface to monitor the sun. Days pass and you are unbearably alone. It is harrowing; this unending, sombre ache. You think of Katsuki. Repeat his name until it sounds foreign. You recall his handsome face, the way his eyes always seemed brighter in the early dawn, how his nose would wrinkle if you stared too long, like he’d tasted something bitter. You miss him.

Come the week’s end you’ve become something else, something new. Irrevocably changed by love’s hand. You recognise that you exist in two worlds: as a selkie, tethered to the seabed and embraced by buoyancy, and as a human, struggling against the currents, compelled back to land—

To Katsuki.

You glide through the waves, riding them as they swell and break onto the shore. Undulating your body, the hitching motion pulls you forward, wriggling up into a cluster of rock pools, safe from any onlookers. You wait there, chin propped on the shoulder of a jagged stone to observe the beach.

He finds you there beneath an almost oppressive dusk. The approaching footfalls command attention, announcing his arrival. You slink into the shadows for a moment, detailing the subtleties in Katsuki’s expression on his march along the sand, pinching more and more as he casts he searches the beach. The breeze ripples through the notorious red cloak, fur collar tickling his cheeks. Shirtless, wearing his scars proudly. His pants sit low on his hips, adorning various belts and jewels. Warmth curls up in your chest at the sight of him. Giddy. You remember him.

You lift your head. His focus immediately latches onto the movement. A croon rumbles in your throat as he approaches. He climbs up onto the rock, towering over you, his body obstructing the evening sun. It halos around his golden hair. The braid by his ear falls forward as his head tilts, squinting to get a good look at you.

The laughter lines by his eyes deepen, brow creasing. Almost slipping as he climbs down, Katsuki frowns at the lack of traction on the surface. You laugh and it comes out like a rough snort. The shallow pools splash loudly under his boots upon landing. He curls his upper lip at you, “Laugh at me and I’ll kill you”.

You do so again, more deliberate this time. He senses your sarcasm and flicks water at you. Your whiskers twitch, subtly tasting the air. He slumps hard on one of the flatter ridges and clicks his tongue. “This better be you and not some random fuckin’ seal I’m talking to,” he mutters, embarrassed.

Unwilling to prolong your reunion any longer, you shed your pelt. Joints slot into place, the sealskin receding, your human form unearthing as it loosens and pools around your naked lap. Katsuki watches the air bite at your skin, nipples pebbling as you shiver.

“Katsuki,” you rest your cheek on his thigh, knelt between his legs. You let him take it all in. Satisfied with his assessment of you his fiery eyes meet yours.

“Almost didn’t come. Figured you wouldn’t be here,” he intoned gruffly, chin dimpling as he juts his bottom lip. “You were supposed to forget about everything”.

You nod, mouth curling into a helpless smile. Your fingers flex and you feel the muscles jump underneath, “I know”.

Katsuki exhales a long breath, fists clenched tight in his lap with obvious restraint. “Why didn’t you?” his eyes track the movements of your hands. “It worked, I know it did. Cheeks doesn’t do shit halfway. I felt when… So what the hell are you doing back here?”

You pause when his words register, suddenly off kilter. There it is again, the displeased wrinkle on the bridge of his nose. You had never considered that he, too, would’ve experienced the connection. Admittedly a naive oversight on your part—but he never mentioned it. You figured it was just a selkie thing. Perhaps, all that time, he had been contending with his own feelings as well as yours. Wondering if he could trust himself, if they were true.

Vows dissolved, he still chose to come back for you. To bet on that slim chance. Just as you did.

The knowledge compels you to touch him more, to reassure, to lean further into the clutch of his thighs. The intrusion forces his legs wider and when you reach to cradle either side of his taut jaw he lowers to close the distance.

“I felt it, you know. Before you offered me my pelt I felt you touching it,” you begin, watching how his expression splits open as your eyes meet. “I knew it was safe with you”.

“That’s stupid,” he utters, though you can hear that he doesn’t mean it. Embarrassment slowly stains his cheeks pink. You can feel him twitch, smothering the instinctive urge to snap at whatever made him feel so intensely.

“Maybe,” you pull back a hair's breadth to lightly knock your heads together. “My point is, I was drawn to you before all that, in such a short window. I think… I didn’t forget you because those feelings grew naturally”.

The more you speak he progressively gets pinker, flustered and mad about it. It births an odd, primal urge to sink your teeth into something. To bite his cheek white, watch the blood retreat under the skin. Instead, you slide your hand lower to rest on his neck and his own cuff your wrists.

“That first day, you apologised to me because I never had a choice,” there’s a soft grunt in acknowledgment. His pulse dances under your palm. “I’m making one now of my free will. And you—can say no, if you want,” you stutter, then, suddenly realising the real possibility of him rejecting your request altogether. “But I want to be here with you”.

The last rays of sun stretch across the land, cosseted behind soft clouds as it sheaths. Katsuki considers you quietly. There’s a soft sort of intent in his eyes, wearing the revelry of dusk. You kneel in the rock pool, literally and figuratively bare, heart pounding in your throat as he readies himself to respond.

“Back at the bathhouse…” he hesitates, promptly clears his throat and struggles to look at you.

“Nothing was influencing me that night. Except maybe the wine,” you admit timidly, abashed at his sudden demurity. “I’m sorry”.

That garners a reaction from him. In true Katsuki fashion his tongue clicks behind gritted teeth and applies pressure to your wrists, pulling you up. “Come here,” he tells you. You uncurl your legs and begin to stand moving with all the grace of a newborn fawn. “Oi, don’t—!” jerking his head to the side, he averts his gaze from your naked lower half, glaring at the shoreline. The sea-scented air prickles your skin, heat gathering where he has you held. “Expose yourself to everyone in the fuckin’ country, won’t you? Come here,” and then he’s hooking behind your knees, making them bend, gathering you into his lap in bridal fashion.

“What’s the problem?” you mutter. Heat creeps up your neck, feeling defensive and distinctly embarrassed by his behaviour. “I don’t see how my nakedness is any different here than it is in the public bathhouse”.

He holds you closer, voice vibrating through his chest as he roughly insists, “It’s different”.

Your pout softens into a small pleased smile, letting him manhandle you until he’s satisfied with his grip. He bends, incidentally baring his throat stretching for the pelt discarded by the rocks. Tucking your nose to the underside of his jaw you revel in how his arm tightens around your lower back.

Katsuki draws the pelt into your lap, covering your modesty. You laugh at how sweet and boyish it seems. “Laughin’ at me again, huh?” two fingers pinch at your cheek, pulling until you whine. “Got a death wish?”

Kneading at the sealskin coat your affections roar into existence once more with an intensity. “You wouldn’t hurt me,” you grin, and he abandons the pinch to stretch his big hand across your face. Thumb on your left cheek, fingers on your right, he squeezes together until your mouth is misshapen and pursed.

“Sure about that?” he warns, tone steeped in fondness. It is exhilarating to have him touch you again, more freely than he ever had before; it is as close to ‘I believe you’ as you think you’ll get.

You smile with your eyes, locked with his. Close enough to count every fine eyelash. Your words come garbled as you say, “You still haven’t given me an answer”.

Katsuki exhales shallowly through his nose. His throat contracts as he swallows. The pressure releases. His hand cups your face, flexing with uncertainty. You shudder when he dips to press your lips together. You’re kissed without hurry, besotted by his firm but cautious movements. He relaxes as you lean into the rhythm, humming proudly. The soft, wet sounds of your mouths meeting again and again echo over the crawling waves.

Katsuki pulls away first, eyes still closed but smiling to himself. He licks his lips and rasps, “I guess you can come along with us,” as though that was all the answer he needed to give.

Alight with excitement you squirm in his lap, earning a quick slap to your hip. Katsuki ignored your grumbling and set to covering your body entirely. “Hold onto the corners,” he says, draping the hide over your shoulders, comforting warmth enveloping you as you obediently take the corners. “Put your arms around my neck. Do not drop it”.

You do, curtaining both of your bodies with the pelt in the process, fingers interlocking at Katsuki’s nape. Your faces remain a whisper away. It feeds a skin hunger that plagued you for days. Satisfied, he then unties his cloak to slide it over-top, layering the two to keep you covered.

Your stomach swoops as Katsuki pushes to his feet, carrying you in his arms with no sign of exertion and much better balance than before. His bicep bulges, fingers flexing under your thighs. “Where are we going?”

Sand and broken shells crunch under his boots, gait leaden like wading through mud. Mariners whistle suggestively in your direction as he climbs the steps to the dock, making his teeth grind. “Taking you back to our room,” he grunts.

You flush with heat at the implication. “You still have the key…?”

Without disrupting his pace, Katsuki’s nose nudges along your temple to press a kiss there. “Said my shitty wife left something behind,” you feel his mouth pull into a smirk, “so they gave me it to go take a look”.

A pleasant sensation erupts in your stomach. Fluttering like butterflies. “And the others?”

Darkness covers you when he ducks into a narrow alley. Katsuki meanders along the winding path with unfettered confidence. “I sent them on ahead. Said I’d catch up on foot,” he explains, eyes darting over the surroundings, striding back out into a familiar road leading to the tavern. “Wanted to be alone”.

You’re carried up the stairwell despite the stern assertion that you would be just fine on your feet. In that same vein, Katsuki is clearly just fine taking all of your weight— proud of it, you think. Unwilling to put you down.

He shoulders into the room and kicks the door shut. It is as you remember. Dim and homely, accented by a lamp that casts a soft yellow glow over the bed. Heavy footsteps take you forward, and you are swiftly deposited on the mattress. You bounce a fraction, losing purchase on the pelt and cloak. Both layers peel away, rumpled under your back, leaving you splayed out and bare.

Katsuki stands next to the bed, watching the rise and fall of your chest. His features are tender in the light, smoothing his hard edges. It flickers in his irises. Gaze hungry, restless.

Your body can’t help but react to Katsuki’s silent observation. The ardent stroke of his eyes across every part of you like it were his hands themselves. Heat races through you and coils between your legs. Feeling exposed, you try to close your thighs.

There’s a hand on your knee, stopping the movement, firm but gentle as he pries them back open. Katsuki moves closer and kicks off his boots. The mattress dips under his weight. One knee on the bed, your legs part further to make space for the intrusion, wrapping around his waist without second thought.

“This okay?” he murmurs, barely above a whisper. You exhale shakily, hands roving along the thick of his arms to clutch at his shoulders. The buckles on his pants bite into the back of your thighs. You can feel his arousal swelling through the fabric.

Rocking your hips, your feet cross at his lower back. “Yeah. I want…” his eyes flutter, almost rolling up into his skull, pupils dilated. You chase the phantom feeling of his lips with your tongue and he tracks the movement. “Kiss me again”.

“Thank fuck,” Katsuki groaned, the sound dwindling into a low chuckle. His forearms settle either side of your head, pressing all his weight down, pinning you to the bed. Taking up your vision until only he is in your orbit. The braid by his ear hangs loosely, the bead cold where it brushes your jaw. You tremble, fingers threading into his hair to scratch gently at his scalp.

Your mouths slot together and he kisses you full, nibbling your lips until they part. Pushing deeper, tongues sliding over teeth, stealing the breath from your lungs. He handles you with indecision. Careful kisses followed by rough ones; grabbing at the soft parts of your body a little too hard, smoothing the flesh with his thumb in apology.

It’s overwhelming how much he wants you. And you try to return the fervour, arms sliding around his back to keep him close, undulating your hips to feel the tremors wrack through him.

The talons strung around his neck graze over your chest as he descends. Kisses left on the corner of your mouth, cheek, jugular. He takes your pulse between his jaws and you whine, clenching at his waist. Katsuki moves away, laving his tongue along your throat.

“Wanna touch you,” he says. Goosebumps break out across your skin as he blows cool air over the wet stripe left behind. “S’all I could think about. You’re fucking distracting”.

“Yes. Please,” your eyelids flutter, leaning back to hear your throat. “Please”.

“Needy,” he mumbles, a satisfied lilt to his tone. His hand slides down to your ass, grabbing one cheek and filling his palm with it as he spreads you open. “Bein’ too quiet. I like it when you say my name,” he rasps. “Gonna let me hear it?”

Fingertips brush against your sex. Heat flushes under your skin, anticipation and understanding unfurled within you. “Katsuki,” you sigh into his mouth.

Katsuki flashes a predatory grin. Pleased, and pink all the way to his ears. Breath puffing over your lips he says, “Again”.

“Katsuk—ah,” his thumb circles over your swollen clit, sparks zipping up your spine. Your breath hitches. You chase the touch, his four fingers splayed low on your navel; the other cups the back of your knee to keep you spread as he descends from throat to chest, forging a path of wet kisses, stopping intermittently to softly suck at the flesh and coax blood to the surface.

You’re wet. Wet enough, warm enough, that the still air feels cold on your skin. His lips wrap around your nipple and you arch up into the sensation as he slowly sinks a finger inside of you. You take him to the knuckle, and he waits, gradually pulling out until you’re clenching around a fingertip.

Again and again he fucks you on his fingers, adding another, curling them up mid stroke to brush the most sensitive part of you, spreading them to work you open. You mewl, steeped in pleasure as it diffuses through your belly, pooling between your thighs.

Katsuki watches you, peering up through heavy eyes, mouth full of your breast. He flicks his tongue over the pert nipple, coming up and switching to the other, lavishing you in attention. You exhale, tremors wracking your body. Cradle the back of his head, grip tightening reflexively when he hits that sweet spot, and the groan rumbling in his throat prickles under your skin.

Satisfied, he continues lower. Throws your legs over his broad shoulders, laid flat along the bed. The mattress jerks when he ruts into the sheets, still confined in his pants. You hold his gaze as his cheeks hollow. Saliva pools into his mouth and he tucks his chin, spitting it on your clit, massaging it over with his thumb.

You shudder, hips canting. “Shit, look at you,” he pants, voice so thick and supple you want to wrap yourself in it. “Keep your eyes on me, yeah?” he litters kisses across your inner thigh, pressing praise into the sensitive skin there. Your heels dig into the thick muscle at his back when he dips to kiss your clit, licking in and around his fingers. “I wanna see your face when you cum”.

You’re pulsing around him, frantically chasing the feeling. It’s— overwhelming, like you can’t breathe through it, and every string in your body has been pulled taut, wavering on the precipice. You reach to grasp his forearm. The muscles flex under your palms, pave unrelenting, and tears begin to sting behind your eyes.

“Fuck, Katsuki,” you gasp, breathlessness abated by the sudden rush of air to your lungs. “Feels so good, I can’t… Katsuki I can’t—”

A broken sound reverberates throughout the room the moment he stops, pulling back and leaving you empty. You can barely believe that it came from you, squeezing your eyes shut in shame. But then he’s right there, crowding into your space, caging your body with his own. “Oi,” he softly takes your jaw, “What did I say? Look at me”.

You squint up at him. You take in his swollen lips, lidded stare, the sheen of sweat on his brow, hair matted to his forehead, arousal and spit coating his chin. For the first time you think you might understand, just a fraction, the greed of those who kept you. Because now you desire to be the one to take. To keep. To stow away his shamelessness and be the only one to see it.

“You hurt?”

“No,” you whisper, blinking away the haze. Katsuki tucks his knees up higher against your middle, tops of his thighs shelving your splayed legs. You feel yourself clenching around nothing, empty. “I’m sorry”.

“Don’t fuckin’ apologise,” he tucks his nose against your temple, indifferent to the sheen of sweat. You inhale his musky scent and slide your arms around his shoulders. “Got too in your head, huh?”

His cock twitches in his pants, still hard and pressed to your thigh. Gathering your bearings you subtly rock your hips into his lap. You shiver at the sharp hiss by your ear, the drag of his soft lips over the shell. He nips at it in warning.

“You want to keep going?”

You nod, playing with the thin hair at his nape. He rumbles and it feels like a purr, pushing up only to pull at the belt buckles around his waist. Impatient, you reach to help, pulling the leather out from the loops, fingers trembling.

Katsuki frees his hands and lets you work at the buttons. He wears a small, crooked smile on his face as he watches, chest rising and falling with every anticipatory breath. You pull them down his hips, a trail of light hair leading from his bellybutton to his cock. He shifts, hooking into the waistband and pushing them down his legs, kicking them off the bed.

In your impatience your fingers wrap around his length, playing with the soft skin. You circle the blushing tip, smearing pre with your thumb. He throbs, abdomen clenching with a guttural moan that shoots straight to your own.

“So impatient,” he cups your jaw and forcing you to meet his eyes. “Get me nice and wet?”

“Yeah,” you rasp, detailing how his pupils expand as you slide his cock through your folds. The corner of his mouth twitches. He grins as he dips to kiss you. It is more chaste than the last, a kiss for the sake of kissing.

Then the grip on your jaw tightens. Firm and unyielding. Katsuki’s big hand engulfs yours, squeezing his dick, teasing the tip at your entrance. “Gonna make you cum on my cock. But you’ve got to listen to me and relax. Okay?”

You desperately want to dig your heels into his lower back, to drag him inside and fill up that awful emptiness, to take him to the hilt and keep him there. Instead you acquiesce, forcing yourself pliant; rewarded with a soft kiss, he presses his forehead to yours.

“Take a deep breath for me,” he tells you. You inhale, ribs expanding as your lungs bloat. Slowly, Katsuki pushes his tip past your entrance, and begins to sink his cock into you. His expression shutters, eyes rolling shut as his face scrunches up. Strained, he says, “Breathe out, baby. Slow”.

You exhale, ending on a long moan as skin meets skin. He settles in the cradle of your hips. “Good,” his voice is gravelly, strained. His nails bite at your waist, “And in”.

Repeating the motions your muscles clench around him as he pulls out, as though your body couldn’t be without him. He huffs through his nose and you feel it hot on your cheek. It continues like that. He fucks you slow and deliberate, pinned to the bed like a butterfly, guiding your breathing. You cannot look away from him. He’s devastating. He’s yours. Wild spikes are tousled around a flushed face, mouth kiss-bitten and slack with awe. “Katsuki,” you whisper, each more frantic than the last.

The earlier intensity does not return, rather, it accumulates inside of you with every inhale, suffusing through you like a warm, pleasant fog. The pressure has you bursting at the seams, undone by the indelible drag of his cock, how his pelvis pressed so perfectly against your clit, little incantations of your name murmured into your hair.

“Ah, fuck. Katsuki, I’m—” your thighs seize either side of his waist, toes curling as the words catch in your throat. “M’gonna…”

“I’ve got you,” he fucks you a little deeper, gritting his teeth. The muscles in his neck flex with exertion. “In and out, baby. I’ve got you”.

Those practised breaths quickly stagger into uneven whines as you’re tipped over the edge. Ley lines erupt behind your eyelids. You arch back into the sheets—pelt and cloak rumpled beneath—as the pleasure quakes through you.

Katsuki fucks you into your orgasm and then beyond it. You cradle him to your chest when his rhythm stutters, releasing a long groan as he spills into you.

Together you collapse back on the mattress, rolling onto your sides. He slides his arm beneath your head and hooks your knee over his hip, keeping himself nestled inside you for a while longer. You lie there until the fog recedes, leaving a sated contentment in its wake.

In that instance you can no longer tell where the line of your own body ends and where Katsuki’s begins. You feel warm, comfortable against him. All the fears and hypotheticals that sought to fill the hole in your chest have faded. You realise in those intimate few minutes that home is what you choose it to be. A place, a concept, a person. Home is the ocean, said to cover more than half of the earth, fissuring inland and stretching further than the eye can see; it is a current that will always run in your veins. But humans, too, are made of the sea. Water, minerals and tissue. Home is in the blood that rushes to Katsuki’s cheeks when you kiss him.

This is where you belong.

Eventually Katsuki decides he needs to get up. Your objections go ignored, silenced when he returns dressed with a damp cloth to wipe you down. Once he's done he pulls up the bed covers and manhandles you under them, declaring that he needs to go downstairs and pay ‘that woman’ for the room.

“Won’t be long. Don’t even think about getting up. I’ll need to buy you some clothes tomorrow…”

Grin hidden under the blankets, you call out to him before he goes. He stops in the doorway, softened by the lamp light. Feigning innocence, you jokingly ask, “Before you go, could you pass me my pelt?”

Your heart races when he reflexively goes to do so, only for him to halt halfway. His eyes narrow, lips thinning into a smirk:

“Real fuckin’ funny”.

#bnha x reader #mha x reader #bakugo x reader #bakugo katsuki x reader #bakugou x reader #bakugou katsuki x reader

3K notes · View notes

lovelyhan · 1 year ago

Note

Okay, you still have a spot. Great. I thought they'd be filled so, I didn't send anything lmao. Insomnia has its perks.

This is deeply self-indulgent and I'd love more Hao from you. So, hear me out, Minghao with a breeding kink. I feel like it doesn't get enough attention especially given how much that man gravitates towards babies lol. Like he and Reader visit Cheol's and see him with his new baby and, Hao's like oh, wait a minute. I think this is making me feel some type of way.

— terrified ⟢

minghao has a knack for keeping the things you tell him in mind. from your favorite brand of wine to how the idea of bearing children terrifies you—he remembers all of it. so your husband is in a bit of a crisis when he realizes that this newfound desire to start a family kind of clashes with something you trusted him to respect.

★ FEATURING; minghao x f!reader

★ WORD COUNT; 4.4k words

★ TAGS; idolverse, established relationship, hao trying (and failing) to play it cool about the wanting-to-be-a-father thing, brief discussion abt family planning, this is only a little sad bc hao has overthinkeritis, smut (MINORS DNI!)

★ WARNINGS; mentions of pregnancy and childbirth but nothing too graphic

★ NOTES; i scheduled to post this when it hit exactly 12 midnight in rj's timezone just in time for her birthday :> (pls look away if i got the schedule wrong,,,) i'm not really back yet bcs this is a queued post, but happy birthday, beloved. i love you more than i can say directly, so i decided to just write a fic for you instead! hopefully, i can come back and torment you with every other seventeen member BUT cheol soon :3c

★ SMUT TAGS; unprotected sex, breeding kink, creampie, multiple rounds, mating press, hao is just really feral in this yk

★ PERMANENT TAGLIST; @cheolhub - @pretty-trustme - @just-here-to-read-01 - @idkmelkro - @dejavernon - @venusrae - @jyiiscool - @jiniesclub - @junhui-recs - @bldelaine - @featmia - @fruitzcup - @hoeforhao - @candidupped - @billboard-singer - @caratochan - @novalpha - @dahliatopia - @0717luv - @shiveringgaze - @toruro - @mixling-blog - @minnie-mouser22 - @homerunhansol - @mirtaspace - @ti--red - @zzucculent - @woozarts - @rubyreduji - @mozellerra - @lllucere - @cheolzip - @jjjzzzz - @lissiesykes - @dearjeonwonwoo - @meowmeowminnie - @colored-confetti - @partiallyinfluencial - @speaknowlwt - @flwrshwa - @lilylikesthat - @aurorahongg - @whippedforjihoon - @todorokiskitten - @immabecreepin - @98-0603 - @peachhiz

★ MINGHAO TAGLIST; @haoxiaoba - @jeonride - @coffeestay - @hyvnae

In the height of his career as an idol, Xu Minghao filmed a certain piece of content where he was asked a normal question to which he responded with a slightly controversial answer.

"How many kids do you want in the future?"

"Oh, It's not me who'll give birth, so I can't be the one to decide."

It's a response that made waves on the Internet during the week the video was first posted—a reaction from both fans and casual netizens alike that Minghao definitely did not anticipate that he would receive when they packed up the set several months prior.

It's pretty much the logical answer, isn't it? Sure, he'd love to have kids someday, but the quantity isn't something he should decide on without his non-existent partner's input.

Minghao learns further down the road, when he finally meets and eventually gets together with you, that the number of children isn't the only thing that a couple should mutually agree on.

"I don't really want to have kids..."

You tell him this during a spontaneous date he deigned to take you out on. He just came back from a tour packed with a long list of stops and even if he should probably catch up on some sleep, he opted to have a picnic with you at the park because of how much he missed you.

Your cheeks are stuffed with a few bites of pie, thoughtfully chewing as you wait for Minghao's response to your sudden confession. If he didn't know you as well as he does, he wouldn't have sensed the waves of anxiety rolling off of you in waves—as if you're waiting for him to get mad at you for simply being honest.

Mingao heaves a quiet sigh before he pulls you into his chest—a tiny squeak caught in your throat after swallowing your food.

"Hey, that doesn't make me love you any less," he murmurs, pressing his lips on top of your head. "I know bearing children can be terrifying and painful, so I completely understand."

For a moment, your brow dips, a soft frown tugging at your lips. "I-It's not that I'm terrified... Okay, maybe a little. But—"

Minghao promptly silences your protests with a firm kiss on your lips—one that you find yourself easily melting into given the time and distance that's separated you until this moment. He smiles against your mouth, glad that you can be honest with him about things like this.

"No buts, if you don't want to have kids, that's alright," he murmurs before pulling away. "Maybe we can just get a dog. You're already close with Mingyu, aren't you?"

That makes you snicker. "You're so mean."

It's a brief exchange that Minghao doesn't really think about again for several years. After all, his career as an idol was at an all-time high. As much as he wants to settle down with you and start the next phase of his life, he's certain that he shouldn't step out of the limelight just yet.

But it doesn't take long for time to catch up with him.

One by one, his brothers are off to fulfill their mandatory service and the group's activities are at a momentary standstill. Those who were left behind go their separate ways for a while—Joshua expanding his solo promotions in the US and Jun taking up more brand sponsorships in China.

Minghao chose to stay in Seoul mostly for your sake, and the fact that this city is the only common ground between him and the rest of the boys. When Vernon and Seungkwan enlisted together, it was around the time that Seungcheol and Jeonghan came back with overgrown buzzcuts, while Joshua landed in Incheon for the first time in two years.

It was also the time when you and Minghao got married.

The event was celebrated among close friends and family with only a brief news article about the marriage of SEVENTEEN's The8 allowed by the company to circulate for a while. They did a good job at keeping things hush hush, and Minghao thinks it's only because it's been more than a decade since his debut that they're being so lenient.

But even if they weren't, nothing would stop Xu Minghao from making you his wife either way.

It takes a few more years for all thirteen of them to get back together again, but when they do, the first thing that Seungcheol does is invite everybody to his daughter's first birthday.

Minghao has met baby Suri a handful of times in the past. Seungcheol's wife visits them at the company from time to time, wheeling Suri's stroller into the practice room as her uncles all fawn over her until she's crying. For some reason, the only people the infant seems to tolerate are Jun and Seokmin.

It's pretty much the same scene during the party. Seokmin and Jun are the only ones allowed within a one-meter radius from Seungcheol's baby girl to prevent an incurable crying episode in the middle of the celebration. Soonyoung was not happy with the fact that he can't personally give Suri the little tiger plush he got for her, but Minghao thinks it's for the best.

But then, as everyone was finishing up with dinner, he saw you walk up to Seungcheol's wife with a familiar sparkle in your eyes. You're staring at Suri who's all dressed up for her party with a look of endearment—nearly gushing with how animatedly you're speaking with her mother.

Minghao doesn't think much of it. You and her have always gotten along for as long as he can remember.

What does catch him completely off-guard, however, is the fact that Suri is being handed into your arms and you let it all happen without much of a fuss.

Chan was in the middle of telling him about this martial arts move that he'd wanted to choreograph into a dance but as much as he wants to give the younger man advice, his gaze is completely glued to the sight of you with Suri in cradled against your chest.

It's one thing to see a woman holding a baby. It's another to see his wife do the same thing.

"Hao, look!" You quickly call him over when you catch his eyes in the crowd. "Suri thinks I'm worthy! It's been five minutes since her mom handed her over and she's still not crying."

The sight is so adorable that Minghao abruptly excuses himself from his conversation with Chan to rush towards you with clipped strides. His heart thunders inside his chest as you visibly dote on Seungcheol's daughter, and he isn't sure if he wants to give the feeling a name.

It eventually fades into a barely there throb in his chest when he drives back home for the evening. You quickly fill the silence with your attempts at looking at some properties in this newly opened residential area near the freeway and as always, your husband lends a willing ear.

"It's a little far from your company building, but it's much more spacious than our apartment right now," you chuckle, face alight with the glow of your screen as you scroll through the property's details on your phone.

Minghao hums before pulling over at a red light. "Hm? Isn't our place alright as it is? Why would we need the extra space?"

He half-expected you to answer with something along the lines of, so I can have more space to keep my book collection in or so you can have enough room to practice at home if you want to.

But all you do is let out an uneasy laugh, locking your phone before depositing it in the cupholder on the middle console.

"Y-Yeah, you're right. That was a bit silly of me."

The next time Minghao unwittingly makes the connection with you and the prospect of having kids is when Seungkwan's nephews are in Seoul for a couple of weeks.

While he and his sister are off to run errands every now and again, they typically ask Jun to watch over the kids because out of all the members, he's definitely the only one who can be trusted around children. Even more than those who are actual fathers.

But it just so happens that Jun is all the way in Shanghai to shoot for a historical drama, and for some reason, Seungkwan thought it would be a good idea to drop his nephews off at Minghao's doorstep.

"You're pretty decent with kids and your wife can take care of anything," Seungkwan praises while he ushers four year-old Hanjun into the room and eight month-old Jiren into your arms. "We'll be back for them after lunch!"

It's just as Seungkwan said though: Minghao is pretty decent with kids and you can take care of anything.

While waiting for lunch to cook in the kitchen, you both do your part in entertaining the children—Minghao pointing out different shapes and animals in the picture book from Hanjun's backpack while you quietly feed Jiren the baby formula that Seungkwan's sister prepared in advance.

So distracted with the sight of your soft gaze transfixed on the baby in your arms, Minghao barely notices it when the soup he's prepared starts to overflow from the pot. You scold him for being so distracted before he shuffles into the kitchen with his tail between his legs.

As he salvages what's left of the soup, Minghao tries to pull himself together. Sure, it's been a few years since you two tied the knot, but you made it clear years ago that children wasn't on the table when it comes to the two of you.

It's something that you both agreed on even before marriage, and Minghao isn't about to break your trust by saying he suddenly wants kids all because seeing them in your arms makes his brain short-circuit. He has more tact than that.

"Is it just me or are you acting a little weird?"

For some reason, you choose later that evening to corner him in the quiet of your bedroom. Minghao was just getting ready to sleep when you turned to face him with a frown.

"Weird how?" he wonders, praying that you wouldn't single him out like you probably will.

"I don't know, you were looking at me funny when I was giving Jiren his formula," you point out. "You only do that when you want something from me."

Your words make him sigh. Of course his wife would catch onto every nuance of his actions—even from his stare alone.

"And what do you think it is that I want?"

"Xu Minghao, we're already married. Cut the games and just tell me what's on your mind."

God, he really couldn't love you any more than he does now.

It takes several minutes, but you and your husband eventually migrate to the living room—cups of hot chocolate in hand as you patiently wait for Minghao to open up about something he's been keeping to himself for a while now.

He's rightfully nervous—hands clammy around the ceramic of the mug that matches yours. It's Game of Thrones-themed with a dragon's neck acting as a handle. You kept insisting at the souvenir shop that its selling point was the unique design, but Minghao was pretty sure you were excited by the fact that the printed text changes color depending on the drink's temperature.

With that memory suddenly drifting into his mind, the tension ebbs from his shoulders. Though he tends to forget, you're the last person who'll condemn him for what he's about to say to you.

"I've been thinking of starting a family with you," he admits—hitting his point straight to the roots. "But... I always brushed it aside because I know how you feel about kids. I don't want to force you into something you don't want."

It's in times like this where silence is more deafening than actual noise. It rings in Minghao's ears as you watch the steam rise from your mug and your husband lets himself stew in his anticipation, wondering how you'll choose to respond to his honesty.

Will you laugh at him? Will you be angry with him? It's a subject that the two of you rarely broach with each other, so he isn't quite sure how to handle whatever reaction you'll grace him with.

What Minghao never would've expected, however, is for you to crack him a relieved smile.

"Me? I thought you didn't want kids because having one would be detrimental to your career," you chuckle, taking the first few sips from your hot chocolate. "And you always kinda shrugged it off whenever I tried to ease the topic into the conversation."

"I did?" Your husband scowls. "When did I do that?"

"After Suri's birthday party? When I was showing you a couple of new houses?"

Oh. Oh.

"Shit," Minghao mutters, embarrassed. "I almost forgot about that. I'm sorry, love. It didn't occur to me because you said that you didn't want to have kids—"

"One time," you interject with a groan. "That was one time, Hao. God, can't a woman change her mind about wanting kids with her husband?"

He blinks. "But you said you'd be terrified."

"No, you said I'd be terrified. As an educated guess and to some extent, you're right. But it's not the having-a-kid part or the childbirth part that terrifies me, Hao." You let yourself breathe for a couple of seconds and it comes out shaky. Minghao has to resist the urge to reach out to embrace you.

"What terrifies me is becoming a mother."

The silence of the living room thickens when you say the words and Minghao feels his chest flutter with that same feeling from the first time he saw you cradling Seungcheol's daughter in your arms. Despite the questions swimming inside his head, your husband keeps his silence and lets you continue.

"Like, yeah, the pregnancy is going to be hell and god knows whether I'll even be alive after giving birth, but..." You hesitate, refusing to meet Minghao's eyes for reasons that elude him.

"Raising a child so they would grow up to become a good person is even more daunting to me... What if I accidentally teach them something wrong? What if they end up hating me because I can't keep up with whatever trends kids would come up with in a few years? What if they love you more than they love me?"

Minghao laughs airily. "Is that last part really a necessary measure?"

"It is," you insist before breathing out a laugh of your own. "Urgh, you get the point! It's just that... I'm not against having kids, but the responsibility that comes with raising one overwhelms me whenever I think about it."

"You know you're not in it alone, right? I'm your husband. Of course I'll be here to support you however I can," Minghao sighs before finishing the rest of his drink. "Whether you want kids or not, I'll go with either choice because I want what you want, yeah?"

"Yeah. I do know that. I think I've always known, but at the same time, I didn't want to tie you down," you murmur, tracing the handle of your mug with a small pout. "If we have a kid together, they might take up the time meant for your schedules. I never want to burden you like that..."

Your husband sets down his mug on the coffee table, carding his fingers through his hair with a disbelieving sigh. You were starting to fear that you might've annoyed him by accident, but when Minghao leans closer so that your eyes are leveled, you realize that is far from the case.

"Baby, our wedding rings are literally tattoos," he reminds you while reaching for your hand—pressing the inked fingers together. "I'm as tied down as I can be and you've never heard a peep out of me after all this time, yeah? So don't you ever think you or our future kids would be burdens to me."

Playfully, you raise an eyebrow at him. "Kids? Plural?"

"Hey, like I said—"

"Yeah, yeah, you want what I want," you interrupt with a roll of your eyes. "I get it Hao, you're a gentleman. But what if I told you I want you to fuck me on this couch right now and give me your kids?"

The wording is so crass that it could only be seen as a joke, except the reaction it incites from Minghao is leagues more intense than a mere joke would. The mental image injects a rush of corrosive want straight into his bloodstream and Minghao swears it makes him a little lightheaded.

Your husband lets out a shuddering sigh. quickly lunging after you to pluck the mug out of your grasp and safely place it on top of the coffee table. When you look up at him so prettily as he cages you on the couch, the sight makes his cock twitch with anticipation.

"Then I want that, too."

Logically speaking, you and Minghao can't just flip the switch and go into full babymaking mode after a heartfelt conversation and a bunch of impulsive decisions.

For one, you were still on birth control. It would take some time to wean yourself off it and you'd have to ask your doctor if it was safe to stop taking the pills at this point in your life.

Next was that Minghao and the rest of the guys are going to be preoccupied with their latest album—one where all thirteen men are back together after years of being separated. It'll go on for a couple of months and maybe a year if he's going to take their tour schedules into account.

And because he doesn't want to be absent in any milestone during your hypothesized child's life, you and your husband mutually decided not to actively try for a kid just yet.

But that doesn't mean you can't pretend.

"Fuck, baby, your cunt's gripping me so tight," Minghao groans, nearly hissing as he slides his cock against the velvety heat of your walls. "You want my load in you, pretty? You want to me to pump you full until it's dripping out of your pretty pussy?"

With coherence having long left your mind, you arch your back even higher as your husband continues to plough you into the mattress. "Y-Yes, yes yes! Hao, feels s-so fucking good!"

He chortles quietly and even with your cheek pressed against the sheets, you can still picture the smirk plastered on his face. "Pretty baby's in love with my cock. You just can't get enough of me, can you?"

"More," you whimper, the muscles of your pussy tightening around his length as he plunges in and out of your sopping entrance. "W-Want more, Hao. Need you to fuck me harder..."

Your husband is quick to comply with your wishes, gathering your hair with one hand while keeping your hips in place with the other. Minghao slams his hips brutally against yours, making stars dance in the seams of your vision as the head of his fat cock bullies its way into your leaking hole.

He's so deep, you can feel him prying your cervix open with a promise that you'll be filled to the brim if you behave tonight. And with all those years of being a professional dancer under his belt, it's no surprise that he's got enough stamina to wreck you more times than you can handle.

The first orgasm blindsides you completely. He'd just been whispering both sweet and filthy nothings into your ear when it washes over you like a tidal wave—inevitable, inescapable.

(Doing so fucking good for me, love. Taking my cock like a good, good wife. You'll take my cum just as well, won't you? Keep it inside so it'll take and you'll be swollen with my child. Then everybody will know you're mine.)

The second time it happens is mere seconds after Minghao's own orgasm. His thrusts have started to lose their practiced cadence and even if you've been in this situation countless times before, the euphoria that sings in your veins makes it feel like the first time all over again.

Minghao's cock twitches before his cum spurts in thick ropes inside your tight cunt—filling you with a warm sensation that has you biting down his neck to stifle your moans. The motion of his hips slows to a crawl as Minghao feels you clamp down on his length. Your pussy gushes around him with a delicious grip that brings him dangerously close to another orgasm with how good you feel around him.

"Fuck, baby," he swears, voice still hoarse with need despite the fact that he's fucking you into overflowing. "I love you. There's no one else I'd want to have a family with."

"T-There better not be," you say cheekily before Minghao is flipping you around so that you're lying on your back. The sensation of his cum dripping out of your ruined pussy makes your skin tingle with excitement, and the fact that his ravenous gaze is trained on your body isn't lost on you.

"Be a good wife for me and hold your thighs up," he whispers lowly and it takes you mere seconds to comply. "That's my girl."

You preen at his praise—no matter how pathetic it would make you seem. After all, if there's anyone who get reduced you into a cockdrunk mess, it's most certainly your husband.

Minghao doesn't waste any more time, he pumps his cock into full hardness for a few moments—refractory period be damned—before gliding the head of his cock against your slit. Your thighs twitch every time be brushes against your clit, making you cry out with desperation as he gloats at your misery.

"Minghao," you beg, trying your best to hold your thighs up just like he asked all while he's taking his sweet time admiring your pussy. "Fuck me more. Want you to fill me up even more."

"Needy little thing," he chuckles. "You want my kids that badly? If I fuck you too much, you might actually get pregnant, love."

"Don't care," you practically sob. "I want it. I want you. All of you—even your kids."

Fuck. He really, really fucking loves you.

Minghao needs little encouragement after that, gripping his cock tightly as he guides himself back inside you.

The new position makes it easier for your husband to pound into you—the weight of his thrusts pressing you into the bed with enough intensity to make the wooden enforcements of your bed groan from the effort he's exerting. He splits you open on his cock, spreading your folded thighs as far as he can as he drills inside of you with the promise of another load.

"So pretty and pliant for me," he whispers, pressing a soft kiss on your nose all while the squelch of your cunt with each pass of his cock echoes in the bedroom. "My perfect wife. You'll let me breed this pussy once all's said and done, won't you?"

You nod all too eagerly. "Yes, Hao! I'll let you use my pussy however you want. Just please make me come again!"

"So demanding," your husband sighs with a wicked smile as one of his hands trails between your legs. "Hold those thighs nice and open for me, love. You'll feel even better soon."

"W-Wait, I—"

Your protests quickly melt into a hiss of pleasure when Minghao applies ample pressure on your clit—lathering his fingers with your slick before tracing tight circles around the sensitive nub.

He knows you so well, been with you for so long, that Minghao already knows the ins and outs of your body. Your husband claims that making you come undone with his own fingers is a practiced art and that he'll never forget about it until the day he does.

So it's no surprise how quickly Minghao manages to make you unravel at the seams when he couples his intense thrusts with the added stimulus to your clit. You're creaming around his cock in no time—muffling your cries in the crook of your lover's neck as he fucks into you with the intention of filling you up even more.

"I love you," Minghao rasps as he tucks your head beneath his chin, pinpointing the height of his own pleasure. "I'll want no one else but you, baby. No one."

Shakily, through a haze of delirium, you manage to say, "I-I love you too, Hao. I'll always be yours as long as—f-fuck—you'll always be mine."

You twitch violently beneath the weight of Minghao's body and the sight of you so fucked dumb on his cock eventually pushes him over the edge. Your husband comes with a sharp breath, his white hot cum gushing into your pussy until it drips onto the sheets.

It's only when you've come down from that post-coital high that you realize Minghao is looking at you as if you hung up all the stars in the sky. You respond with a weak smack against his chest.

"Don't look at me like that," you grumble weakly. "I might think you're in love with me."

"Y/N, we're already married."

"I don't see how that's a problem."

As Minghao does the honors of cleaning you up after roughing you up all evening, you quickly realize that, really, there's no reason to be terrified at all.

Not when your husband will be by your side every step of the way.

⟢ end notes: i wrote this in a haze so if there are any technical writing errors, i implore you to just ignore them for my sake <3 happy birthday again to my soulmate, rj! i hope you enjoy your day to the fullest and i also hope you like this gift i wrote for you hehe ^\\\^ like hao to the reader, i'll always be w you every step of the way (i'm just a lil busy rn, so i hope you forgive me !!)

#seventeen smut #the8 smut #minghao smut #svthub #minghao x reader #seventeen fanfic #the8 x reader #full length fic 📚#lovelyhan #💭 request #💘 mutuals #rj 🍷#q: i always need queue 🐇

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amandacanwrite · 9 months ago

Text

Halsin Headcanons For When He's In Love With You/Tav (Ungendered)

I ACCIDENTALLY POSTED TOO SOON

Generously Requested by @cryingoverpixelsetc I can't tell you how much it means to me when people actually WANT to hear about my bg3 brainrot because this game has been my escape lately and also, just a nice little break from the freelance work I have to cram to get done.

(PS if you like these, I am also a writer of my own original stories and I have some WIP's you may like.)

Quick CW|| Some graphic depictions of violence, particularly puncture wounds and viscera, intentions of heavy violence also referenced. In Battle

He trusts you, perhaps more than anyone else, to handle yourself. He doesn't hover, but he always has an eye on you as you tear into the fray.

He always seems so gentle to you that you sometimes worry about your own brutality in a fight. Especially when it leaves you covered in blood.

Because of this, you tend to keep your distance after a fight, too frightened to look into his pretty hazel eyes and see any measure of hesitance or disgust with you. Not that you've gotten used to it, you cant bear the thought of him not calling you 'my heart.'

This is only a fear for you until you got pinned down with a particularly nasty bhaalan cultist. Astarion had already been taken down in the surprise attack, then you were toppled by one of the many in the ambush.

The scream you let out as they sadistically drove their daggers through the palms of your hands was shocking even to you. You felt like a moth pinned to a board--it was too painful to try to break yourself free, even as the assailant wielded his next blade like he was about to field dress an elk.

You'd never felt fear like that.

But it didn't last long. A great cave bear launched through the air and into your attacker, wasting no time before ripping into the soft flesh of his throat and tore it out.

The smell of fear on you was strong, he knew you couldn't fight like that, so he simply stood guard over you, tearing to shreds anyone who got close from what small parts of it you can remember through the utter fear.

It was the after math of that fight when you knew you could never let him go.

He cups your face in his large, warm hands.

"Look at me, dear heart. Look upon me and remember that you're alive. There is no more threat. There is no one to hurt you. I would never let someone take you away from me before nature deigns it so."

The blades, you wept, the blades would hurt to remove.

"They will, but only for a moment, my love. Just a moment of pain before I heal you myself and carry you back to camp."

It's Astarion who removes the blades from your palms and frees you; he has the steadiest hands. But Halsin wastes no time in cradling you close to him, holding both of your hands in his own as he quietly whispers the healing word. You watch as your flesh and tendons weave themselves together. Then he envelops you and comforts you as you cry. Just cry.

How lucky it is that he is so at peace with every expression of you. He takes you as you are at all moments; whether you're bloodthirsty, joyful, or terrified. He basks in it all.

At Camp

Always touching you. Always. To him this isn't a public display of affection. It's not awkward. He loves you, why should he not touch you at every moment he can?

Sometimes it's a small thing, a broad hand on the small of your back as you discuss travel plans with Wyll. A little touch to remind you that he is there, like a tether to safety.

Other times your bodies are a tangle of comfort. Like he's looked for every way he can weave his body with yours. His fingers in your hair, your arm over his shoulder, your leg betwixt his, his wide chest lifting and falling with his sleepy breaths. This is often how you wake in the mornings with him.

Perhaps your favorite, though, is the nights by the fire. He doesn't even ask most days, just places himself behind you and offers himself as your seating arrangements for the night. His arms up behind him as he reclines against a rock or a felled tree, you sitting on his lap or between his lazily bent legs. His husky laughter tickles against your ear, the little hairs on the back of your neck. His rough voice rumbled against you as he regales the camp with yet another story of his youth.

He's a bit of a night owl. You fall asleep long before him most days.

He's also a bit disheartened by how difficult it is to find clothes that fit him in your travels together. Karlach as generously offered to share her clothes with him of course, but...something about her taste doesn't really seem to quite suit him.

(A disappointment to you, considering how nice those legs looked in infernal leather.)

He's the one who does much of the hunting for the party, along with Astarion. Halsin's a shockingly gifted fisher, though most of the fish he brings back to camp have bites in the flesh.

It was unnerving to gale at first, but he learned to live with it when he once brought back a salmon the size of a deep gnome.

When You're Alone

Rarely fully clothed. Not shocking, of course and certainly not something you would ever complain about. He usually just takes his tunic off, he says it feels restrained by it. He feels like he can breathe a bit better when his chest is bare.

No pun intended, of course.

Funny thing though, you always feel its much harder to breathe when he's shirtless.

There are no chaste kisses with this large elf. He seems to not have the restraint.

"I love the taste of you, my heart. It's the finest ambrosia. How blessed I am to have free reign to sate my appetites with you."

He likes to braid your hair and you're not sure why you're surprised at how good he is at it. Braids are a common hairstyle for elves, after all, and the man is a few centuries old. It soon becomes your favorite part of any day.

"I love how long your hair is getting, love. These times with you, my focus lost in your tresses...they have become some of my most treasured memories."

He compliments you often and freely.

One day you tell him about how you worry that you're too brutal to be with him, that you're concerned you'll scare him off one day for good.

"My heart, I spend more than half of my life in the form of a cavebear. I know I have told you how I received this scar. I may treasure the thriving, living of nature but that is only one side of the coin. Nature can be as brutal as it can be miraculous. In you, I see the beauty of brutality. I do not fear it, I admire it."

In Intimate Moments

Potential NSFW below, proceed with caution.

TW|| Mentions of consensual rough housing before...well, you know.

He is...proportionately sized...if you like.

(You do. You like very much.)

You sometimes have to remind him to get his pleasure with you. He is so pleased to be with you in this way that he forgets to indulge himself, even when it would be a moment of shared pleasure.

He loves every iteration of making love with you. He loves to take you fresh after a battle, covered in blood, to remember what it is to live and be alive.

He loves to take advantage of the vulnerability of a bath in the rivers and lakes of Faerun. Seems to particularly enjoy the sounds that come out of you as he thrusts up and into you, the sounds of your bodies muted by the water so he can hear every whimper and hitch of your breath.

He loves to hunt you. More than once you've stolen away into the forests and he gives you a head start. It's some of the most thrilling experiences you've had being intimate with someone.

This is no simple game of hide and seek, it is a true pursuit.

He always finds you quickly and he is fast, but you are faster. It's always a struggle for him to catch you. When he finally does succeed in his quest, you are so lost in the thrill and challenge of the pursuit that it becomes a struggle.

This part he always wins though. Sometimes because your desire for his body takes over your desire for besting him.

Sometimes you are still fighting when he gathers both of your wrists in a single one of his hands and carefully locks your legs beneath his.

He is careful though. He would never do anything without your express consent, without your enjoyment. He may be lost in the moment but he is old enough and wise enough to keep his head.

"Do you still want this, my love? Does your body still burn with need? Or has the pursuit run away with you?"

When you tell him you want this; you want him. That brief tarry into gentleness vanishes. He smiles sharply and turns you over, taking you as an animal in the wild might. Rough and unrelenting.

His hands dig into your thighs, your hips. His fingers tangle and pull your hair.

But when all is said and done, the kisses are soft and sweet. Peppered over your shoulders, down the path of your spine.

He collects you in his arms and soothes you.

"Have you pain anywhere? Is there anything I can get for you my love? You have been so generous with your body this night, it is only right that I take care of you for the remainder of it."

He likes to discuss your intimacy at length. He wants to know what you liked, what you didn't like, what he should change. At first you didn't like to critique, but he pressed you about it once he started to notice changes in your demeanor or reactions in the act. It's gotten much easier for you to discuss these things with him over time.

He simply loves discussing the potential of a family with you. Sometimes enough to be ready for a second round. But that second round is much gentler and more loving than the first. Like he's dreaming of a future with you.

#writing community #writers on tumblr #writing #bg3 headcanons #halsin headcanons #halsin x tav headcanons #Halsin x reader #my writing #romantasy #writeblr #authors #historical fantasy #halsin x tav #halsin smut #baldurs gate halsin #bg3 x tav #bg3 halsin

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txttletale · 11 months ago

Note

your points on AI are really good, i don’t want to use use you as a rambling device, but i kinda keep thinking about “just buy a commission”.

because like. to me it’s same thing as pirating, just presupposes that if i didn’t pirate, i’d watch a thing legally. i can’t afford commissions, personally, so if i ever decided to, i’d probably consider looking in platforms like fiverr or whatever, or artists who obv undervalue themselves. which leads me to: 1) i shouldn’t have art bc i’m too poor; 2) i should exploit poor artists (in the south) bc it’s better then using famous artists (from the north) to teach AI; 3) i only deserve art if i suffered through the years (which i’m doing rn) and if i can’t create it physically, i don’t deserve it.

idk. i hope this makes sense. this is obv ignoring how AI works and how AI art is used by companies, not by people

yeah i mean it is ultimately the exact same logic about piracy. like there are labour concerns re: ai art that i am fundamentally sympathetic to (people in graphic deign and stock photography and game art who are worried that their employer will fire them and rehire them to touch up AI-generated versions of the images they were previously employed to create for less money) but a lot of the time when people talk about their 'labour concerns' it is clear that they are in the petty-bourgeoisie mindset of being really upset about losing some purely hyopthetical profit, that using midjourney to generate a picture of lightning mcqueen being boiled in a pot of spaghetti is snatching money out ofg the mouth of an artist who you ovbiously 100% would have paid to make that image otherwise

#ask

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lovelyhan · 2 years ago

Note

enemies to lovers prompt #10 "I'm not driving home with you..." with mingyu, thx <3

— vices & virtues ⟢

being from one of the most opulent families in the city, you're used to getting everything you want. but when you realize that your hot bodyguard is strictly off-limits, you treat him like anything else you can't have: with unbridled hostility.

★ FEATURING; bodyguard!mingyu x reader

★ WORD COUNT; 5.4k words

★ TAGS; enemies to lovers, unresolved sexual tension, smut

★ WARNINGS; alcohol consumption, cigarettes, implied/referenced drug use, self-destructive behavior in general, (probably inaccurate) discussions about drug poisoning, graphic sexual content (MINORS DNI)

★ NOTES; when i tell you i speedwrote this just in time for mingyu day,,, eugh i love you so much gyugyu and thank you to the anon who sent this in a while back!! this prompt was so tasty to work with!

★ SMUT TAGS; unprotected sex, couch sex, oral (f receiving), dirty talk, dacryphilia, size kink, mating press, overstimulation, creampie

★ SVT TAGLIST; @wonderfulshinee - @misssugarlips - @yourfavoritefreakyhan - @jeanjacketjesus - @just-here-to-read-01 - @hanihans - @venusrae - @taestrwbrry - @minnie-mouser22 - @dreamhannies - @thvhannie - @kkooongie - @gae-uls - @lenireads - @gaebestie - @ryusha-rose - @enhacolor - @ilyvern - @woo8hao - @spk93 - @tommolex - @stariightjoyy - @asjkdk - @horny4hoshi

★ MINGYU TAGLIST; @ @renjunphile - @acgyu - @potatofrieswithketchup - @pluviophile-xxx - @pretty-trustme - @zeenanigans - @noveniadelia

When the tiniest sliver of consciousness slips into your inebriated brain, you feel the cold tile of the bathroom floor being pried off your face. Well, more like you're being gently lifted off it, and into the arms of someone warm.

You nearly lean into their embrace until you catch a whiff of that familiar, musky cologne with hint of something like pine. It takes you some effort to keep yourself from bolting out of his grasp and retching your guts out in the toilet again.

You deign to squint your eyes despite the harsh fluorescent light razing your vision. Looking down on you is none other than Kim Mingyu, gaze as indifferent as ever. Unfortunately, you're too drunk or high to figure out how he even found you here, but you know there's no weaseling your way out when your father's little lapdog has tracked you down.

"What're you doing here?" you still ask even if you knew the answer.

It's my job to take care of you.

"It's my job to take care of you," he says the words in the same way you imagined him to—apathetic. Indecipherable.

"Fuck you. I don't need you to take care of me," you scoff. "My friends'll drop me off at my apartment like they always do."

Mingyu rolls his eyes. "You mean the same friends who called me because they're tired of having to clean up after your shit? I don't want to be here either, princess, but I'm actually getting paid to keep you in line, if you hadn't known that yet."

There's something so unfairly attractive in the snark in his tone, and you fucking hate him for it. Mostly, you hate yourself for even thinking that anything about Mingyu is remotely alluring.

In the end, you just tell yourself that you're an objective person. You have eyes, and it won't cost anything to admit that Mingyu is conventionally attractive. Even if you did hate his guts.

Not that he'll ever hear you admit that aloud, though.

You're vaguely aware of how the hem of your too-short dress rides up your thighs as Mingyu rises back to his full height—having no problems carrying you out of the bathroom bridal-style.

Under normal circumstances, you would've struggled. Proved that you could very much handle yourself despite being obviously hammered. But your head is spinning, and your limbs feel like they'll disintegrate any second.

Eyes closed, you press your face into the fine fabric of Mingyu's suit—breathing in the same scent that repulsed you not five minutes earlier in an attempt at anchoring your consciousness.

As Mingyu maneuvers you out of the bathroom, the loud bass blaring from the speakers at the frat party you've decided to attend last minute rings in your eardrums. You don't have to see your surroundings to know you've got onlookers. Those unsubtle comments are clue enough to know you're being watched.

Who is that? Her boyfriend?

No, idiot, that's probably her bodyguard or some shit. Her family's loaded as fuck.

So lucky. If I had a bodyguard like that, I'd totally let him smash.

The real question is: would he let you smash?

Fuck you.

You want to flash them the most disgusted look you could muster. As if you'd stoop low enough to fuck Mingyu, of all people. Don't they know who you are? You could easily let any man or woman you wanted on their knees for you.

You were supposed to stick to your regular routine of getting railed into the next day after a few drinks and sticks, but you obviously got a little too excited about the new strains your friends snuck into the party. Now you're being princess carried by a man you absolutely despise, too shit-faced to even be remotely desired by anyone else at the moment.

Still, never in a million years would you consider having this guy as a bodyguard lucky.

You can tell you're outside when the music starts to fade in the distance and the cold starts to prickle your legs and arms. A somewhat coherent part of you recalls leaving your designer jacket in the coatrack of the frat house, and if you weren't so fucking shit-faced, you would've yelled at Mingyu to go back and get it.

But just before you can consider asking him somewhat nicely, you hear him unlock a car that definitely doesn't sound like yours—making your ears perk up, and your consciousness flood back in much faster.

"What are you—?"

You thrash in Mingyu's arms until he lets you down on the ground—throwing him a stone-cold glare right after. The fact that your pedicured feet are in direct contact with the asphalt makes your rage spike further. How dare this asshole leave your Valentinos behind? He might as well have just left you at the party altogether!

"I'm not driving home with you," you growl.

Mingyu's expression doesn't even budge. "You're not driving. I am."

"Don't try to be fucking smart with me. I'm high, not stupid."

Folding your arms across your chest, you try to pretend that you're not in the middle of the street, arguing with Mingyu as your blood pressure rises to unimaginable heights.

Unfortunately for you, this isn't the first time your friends have left you in the quote-unquote capable hands of your bodyguard. But every time he did, he would always drive whatever car you chose to bring for the occasion and drop you off at your place.

When he brings a car of his own, however...

"You're bringing me straight to the old man," you grumble. "You think he'll appreciate seeing his daughter all wasted at three in the morning? You think he'll be happy with you when he finds out you let me sneak out like this? Are you stupid or do you actually want to get fired?"

"And who told you I was going to bring you to him?" Mingyu shakes his head, letting out a long-winded sigh. "Like I said, I don't want to be here either. The last thing I need is even more overtime after your father sets you straight."

That makes you pause, eyes widening with a hint of mistrust. Mingyu listens to every word his employer says. He's the perfect little lapdog. So perfect that sneaking out for these nightly escapades of yours have grown increasingly difficult with how good he is at finding you and bringing you home.

So hearing him practically say that he won't tattle on you...

"How can I be sure you're not fucking with me? That if I fall asleep in the car, I won't wake up in the courtyard of the old man's stupid mansion?"

"Do I look like I have the energy to deal with both of you at the same time?" he replies sharply, opening the door to the passenger seat with a hint of finality in his actions. "Just get in the fucking car so we can all head to bed before sunrise."

The sound of the house party still in full swing echoes in your ears from the distance. Your skin tingles a little beneath the heat of Mingyu's mildly pissed off gaze, and you let out a shuddering breath to keep yourself from giving the feeling a name.

"Fine."

...

Good news: you made it safely back to your apartment without anyone alerting your father about your true whereabouts.

Bad news: Mingyu just won't fucking leave.

He insisted that you get yourself refreshed with a shower first before he talks to you in the living room. The same guy that right-out said that you should hop in the passenger seat of his car so you'd both be asleep before the sun rises. The clock is already pushing past four in the morning, and Mingyu still insists on lecturing you before he leaves?

You of all people know how obstinate he can be. He's even more stubborn than you are, if you're being completely honest. So even if it wounds your pride to play along with what he has planned, you head back to your living room right after slipping on your usual nightgown—flashing Mingyu a look to remind him you're not at all pleased with whatever bullshit he wants to talk about.

However, your irritation ebbs a little when you see a plate of your favorite cookies sitting on the coffee table, along with a glass of water and a sheet of Advil.

Your gaze drifts from the snacks to your bodyguard, who looks more dressed down than usual. His coat is folded neatly, hanging off one side of your couch, and the first three buttons of his dress shirt are undone.

You gulp, prying your eyes off the sliver of chest he's willingly exposed before seating a respectable distance away.

"What did you want to talk about?" You try to sound casual as you leaned forward, reaching for a cookie and the glass of water without as much initiating eye contact.

"You smoked a few joints at the party, didn't you?"

You take a bite, washing it down with your drink before replying with, "So what if I did? A little kush isn't going to kill anybody, Mingyu."

"We both know 'a little' doesn't exist in your vocabulary, princess," he points out, crossing his arms with an unimpressed look. "Anyway, I'm not your father, so I typically don't care about what drugs you're taste testing every night—"

"Are you implying that you suddenly care now?"

"With a new poisonous marijuana strain circulating in the underground market? Of course I do."

You do a double take on that, staring at him hard as you begrudgingly swallow your cookie, "What? Underground market? And what do you mean poisonous?"

Mingyu lets out another sigh when he leans forward to reach for the box of cigarettes and a lighter you left strewn across your coffee table. You're even more surprised to see him lighting himself a stick and taking a drag than you were when he prepared some snacks and water for you.

"Some Columbian drug cartels thought it would be funny to infiltrate surface-level drug transactions. Long story short, they invented some fucked up strain laced with belladonna and smuggled it into the market under the impression that it's a new sativa strain."

You absolutely have no idea how Mingyu even got ahold of this information, but realizing the implication of his words has your stomach sinking with dread. If what he's saying is true, it's no wonder you were out so fucking quick tonight.

"I'm not gonna die within twenty four hours, right?" you half-joke because, Jesus, you're adventurous with your drugs, but you wouldn't willingly take something that can actually kill you.

To your relief, Mingyu shakes his head. "I don't know the science behind it either, but I was told sativa tones down the poisonous effect of belladonna by a huge margin. The worst you'll experience is a fever and a nasty cough if you don't do anything about it."

"Gee, way to be reassuring."

Mingyu scoffs before taking another drag of his cigarette. Your gaze is riveted on the cut of his jaw as he inhales the smoke with eyes closed. It's only when he flicks the ashes in a small ashtray you left by the small table beside the couch that you realize he's pushed the sleeves of his dress shirt to his elbows—exposing a good deal of his toned arms.

You immediately take a huge gulp of water, not wanting such unsavory thoughts about an unsavory person to surface now, of all times.

You might be more refreshed after your shower, but if you're starting to ogle Kim Mingyu, the strange joints you've been hitting all night might've messed with your head more than you thought.

"That's why we're going to the doctor tomorrow—"

You scowl. "Like hell I'm going to pay Doctor Yoon a visit. That guy's the biggest tattletale in the world. He'll definitely tell the old man. Oh, and I actually have classes tomorrow if you're forgetting, Mingyu."

"You're pretending to attend those now that it's convenient for you?" He smirks as he breathes out another puff of smoke. "Nice try, princess. But don't worry your pretty little head about it. I'll take you to another doctor I know—someone who won't get us both in trouble by telling your father that you've been smoking bad weed."

"Again, way to be fucking reassuring."

The silence finally settles as you nibble contemplatively on the snacks he brought for you. You're can say for sure that you're most certainly sober now, so Mingyu's words have got you thinking.

But it's a little difficult to think about the state of your health when you've got a sort-of uninvited guest manspreading right next to you on the couch.

"Aren't you going to leave?" you ask. "Just text me what time we're going to visit that doctor friend of yours."

"How would you feel if you got told to scram while you're in the middle of a smoke?" Mingyu flashes you an annoyed look. "For the third time, I don't even want to be here, princess. At least let me have this as compensation for saving your sorry ass."

He's so fucking infuriating.

The rough undercurrent in his voice. The perpetual upward curve of his lips as if he always has the upper hand. His beefy arms. His built chest.

...Not to mention his unexpected thoughtfulness when he decided to stick around and inform you about what you might've gotten yourself into instead of leaving you to fend for yourself. He even brought out your favorite cookies for good measure.

You never really know what to do with Kim fucking Mingyu. He stirs up all sorts of confusing feelings inside your chest at any given time, and frankly, you've had enough of it.

You allow yourself to relish in the pride that swells in your chest when he nearly drops his half-smoked cigarette in the ashtray the moment you crawl on top of his lap.

Mingyu's mouth quivers with some sensible words his job description probably requires him to say, but you rob him of his ability to speak when you steal the cancer stick from his fingers. In one long breath, you smoke the cigarette down to the filter—killing it on your ashtray before leaning down to press your lips to his.

With how stunned he is, it doesn't take a lot of effort to pry Mingyu's mouth open, breathing the smoke into his mouth. Once you're satisfied, you pull away with a triumphant smirk.

"Now you're done," you say, making the motions to get off his lap. "I'm heading to bed. Don't wake me up before noon for that doctor's appointment or else I'm going to slash your ti—"

You don't even get to finish that sentence. Mingyu suddenly flips you over so that your back is pressed against the couch and he's lying on top of you—both knees planted on either side of your hips as he gazes at you with an ireful glare.

"W-What are you doing?" you whisper, but in spite of the protesting nature of your words, you can't help but feel a pang of white hot desire shoot straight through you when you feel just how big he is now that his body is pressed against yours.

"Teaching a bad girl a lesson," he whispers, grabbing your face roughly. "You can't just pull off shit like that and expect to walk away from it unscathed, princess."

Fuck. That nickname he always uses never fails to get on your nerves on any other day. But when he sounds like that and has you under him like this...

"What are you gonna do about it then?" you ask.

Mingyu chuckles darkly, as he squishes your face with his big, long fingers. You nearly shudder at the thought of what those digits could do to you if you just pushed the right buttons.

"You'll just have to fuck around and find out."

When the pressure of his strong grip leaves your cheeks, confusion paints your features. Mingyu's weight eases off your pliant body almost immediately as well, leaving you to scowl at him incredulously. He doesn't even look at you as he collects his coat from where it hangs off your couch.

But before he can even think about putting it back on, something not so different from a growl resonates deep in your chest as you sit back up—tugging on the collar of his shirt to smash your lips together.

Mingyu all but groans into the kiss, but you're not sure if you can even call it that. There's nothing but hunger fueling the both of you as your tongue slides alongside his, mapping out each other's mouths like your lives depended on it.

You vaguely hear his coat fall to the floor as Mingyu goes back to crowding you against the couch—one of his strong arms circling your waist as he grinds his hips against your middle. It's nearly embarrassing how willing you are to receive his advances.

You, the same person who told your bodyguard you refused to drive home with him, are now making out with said bodyguard at four in the morning.

But then again, who fucking cares?

"You have no idea," he whispers hoarsely against your lips and you let out a stifled moan when you feel the outline of his erection rut against your clothed pussy, "how much you drive me insane. You're such a fucking handful, you know that?"

"I'm glad to know I make your life miserable," you bite back despite the fact that, when Mingyu brings down the straps of your nightgown to expose your breasts to the cool air, you do nothing about it.

Mingyu lets out a harsh laugh. "You're probably into this, aren't you, princess? You like riling me up so much so that I'd snap and teach you a lesson?"

You want to tell him that he's being fucking full of himself if he thinks you've planned this that far back. But with how massive he feels through his trousers alone, you can't say that you don't want him inside you right this second.

It doesn't help that he's giving your chest a generous amount of attention—suckling at your nipples in a way that has you twitching beneath him with sensitivity.

"So what if I am?" you say, testing the limits of what he'll let you get away with. "You talk big about teaching me a lesson but you're being awfully careful with me. Aren't you going to shove your cock down my throat to get me to shut up?"

Mingyu chuckles with a quick shake of his head, like he isn't even taking your words seriously. You let out a sharp yelp when he bites down on one of your breasts—leaving a distinct imprint of his canines on your skin before staring into your eyes.

"I can choke you with my cock next time, princess. For now, I just want to make you come until you're crying for me."

Fuck.

Mingyu wastes no time. He immediately sinks to his knees on the floor, hauling your hips closer to the edge of the couch so that he can hook your thighs over his shoulders. When he realizes that you're not wearing any underwear underneath your flimsy satin nightgown, you swear the noise he makes is near animalistic.

"Don't get f-fucking cocky," you stammer, nerves alight everywhere his lips graze your inner thighs. "I don't usually wear underwear before going to sleep! This wasn't for you."

"It is now," Mingyu says before licking a long stripe from your leaking hole to your aching clit. He holds your thighs far apart as his lips latch onto that little bundle of nerves, alternating with delicious licks at your sensitive folds.

He practically smothers his face into your cunt as he continues his relentless assault on your clit. By the time Mingyu starts to tease his tongue along your entrance, your fingers have found their way into his unruly hair—moans falling from your lips with little concern about appearances.

Mingyu pulls away for a moment, and you nearly snap at him from that alone until he eases one of those thick fingers into your wet channel—dark eyes trained on you as he stretches you out with a hungry gaze.

You don't even feel any semblance of shame when you start to ride that single digit, wanting to feel him go deeper and spread you wider. Fortunately, your bodyguard is more attentive than you think, and it doesn't take long for him to ease another finger into your needy pussy, curling them just so once he's sure he's found that spot that'll render you an incoherent mess.

The sound he rips out of you is unholy and Mingyu growls again before his mouth finds its way back onto your cunt—getting lost in the taste of you on his tongue.

"Where's the fight you've been putting up against me all this time, princess?" he taunts just before those stupidly thick fingers graze that sensitive patch of flesh inside you again. "Are you that desperate? You've fucked yourself up so much tonight that you couldn't bring anyone back home. Your bodyguard's gonna have to do, huh?"

You know you should be affronted by how offensive his words are. Mingyu might be an expert at getting on your nerves, but with how good his fucking mouth feels as he laves at your cunt like a man starved, you can't even let yourself feel any modicum of annoyance.

"M-Mingyu," you gasp as he suckles on your clit again—steadily building your orgasm from the ground-up. "I'm gonna come, f-fuck!"

Three. Mingyu slides in three fingers at your admission, and you nearly cry with how wide he's stretching you out. This time, he switches from sucking at your clit to rapidly flicking his tongue against the sensitive pearl.

Your toes curl with oversensitivity, thighs nearly crushing his head as you frame the syllables of his name in another wanton moan. When Mingyu curls his fingers inside you one more time, the tension that's been building in your stomach snaps like a rubber band.

Once you teeter off the precarious edge of release, you feel a gush of slick surge out of your cunt and into his awaiting mouth. Mingyu laps it all up—his sinful tongue catching every drop of your tangy essence. If you didn't know better, you would think he's desperate for you as much as you are for him.

It takes a while for your mind to fully come back online after that first orgasm, chest heaving almost painfully with how Mingyu took your breath away with oral alone. When you finally have your wits about you, your bodyguard surges forward so that your faces are levelled, and you nearly groan when you see the way his mouth and chin glisten with your juices.

"So fucking delicious for me," he rasps. "Gonna let me have a taste of this pussy every time now, princess? Want my mouth on you before you sleep?

"Do whatever you want, Gyu," you mewl, tugging him closer as you position yourself horizontally on the couch. "N-Need you so bad."

He sighs, unbuttoning the rest of his dress shirt as he drinks in the sight of you all fucked out and compliant because of his mouth and fingers alone. Your lips are parted, eyes glistening with tears or desire—Mingyu can't say for sure just yet.

But if he can get you this wrecked from oral, he can't fucking wait to see what you'll look like after he gets you to cream on his cock.

His shirt falls to the floor and you can't contained the awed gasp that leaves you at the sight of him. He's built like a fucking sculpture—all lean muscle and hard toned abs. It would make sense for Mingyu to be this well-built, being your bodyguard and all, but the thought of having his body pressed against yours as he fucks you into the couch is sending your mind into overdrive.

"You're so adorable," he chuckles, but you know the words are anything but a compliment. "A moment ago you were challenging everything I said and did. Now you're suddenly an agreeable little thing. Are you that cock-hungry, princess? Want something to fill that pretty pussy?"

"Yes." You don't even hesitate. "Yes, yes, yes. Want your cock in me. Want you to fill me up, Gyu. Please..."

Fortunately for you, Mingyu isn't one to tease. The moment you've given him the green light to rearrange your insides, he steps out of his tight trousers and boxers at the same time, pumping his thick cock in one hand as he nudges your thighs apart once again.

You practically salivate at the thought that you're about to take all those delicious inches inside you. Mingyu doesn't miss the starry look on your face, but doesn't take the time to gloat about it. Instead, he leans all the way forward so that your thighs are squished against your chest—easing your legs across his shoulders in a position that's not so different from when he ate you out earlier.

"Gonna fuck the attitude out of you, princess," he promises before pressing a kiss on the corner of your mouth. "You ready for me?"

You nod a little too eagerly, forcing his face into the crook of your neck as you wrap your arms around his head. "Gyu, please..."

"Alright. Since you asked so nicely."

He doesn't even give any forewarning when he bottoms out inside you in one languid stroke. A choked up noise gets caught in your chest with how sudden he was, how full you feel in such a short amount of time, but Mingyu doesn't give you any time to think, or even to breathe.

Before you can even get a single word out, he's pulling his hips back—making you feel every inch of his thick cock before slamming his hips forward with a powerful thrust that drives you further into the sofa. You let out a long-winded moan, unable to do anything about it as he pounds into you with the vigor of someone who's been putting up with your shit for a better part of the year.

"Pussy's so fucking tight for me," he growls. "You're squeezing my cock so good, princess. Is this all I had to do so you'd stop driving me crazy? Eat you out a little and dick you down 'til you forget your name?"

You can't even process what he's saying right now—too lost in the sensation of his cockhead grazing your cervix with each forward stroke. He's reaching into you so deep that you might really just forget everything but the letters of Mingyu's name by the time he's done with you.

"M-Mingyu," you drawl dumbly as he peppers your neck with bites and bruises—unrelenting with his deep strokes as your cunt flutters around his length. "Fuck. L-Love your cock so much—oh!"

You let out a gasp that Mingyu quickly muffles with his own mouth as he adjusts your positions on the sofa—easing your legs off of his shoulders in exchange for spreading them wider on the cushions. How he manages to do that without his cock slipping out of you is a testament to your flexibility, and he's already cooking up what he'll do about that information for next time.

Mingyu continues kissing you all while he plants one foot on the couch and the other on the floor. When he tugs your hips even closer it's only then that you realize that the lunatic has you in a mating press.

"How long have you been thinking about me fucking you like this?" he whispers, deciding to drag it out with slow, deep thrusts that only serve to frustrate you. "You wouldn't have let me go this far if you hadn't thought about it at least once, princess."

I've wanted to fuck you since the old man introduced us, is the correct answer but you've still got some shred of dignity. If Mingyu wants the truth, he's going to have to work for it.

"Fuck me again after this, and I might give you an answer," you rasp, meeting his lazy thrusts with some of your own to get the point that you want him to ram into you across.

"There she is," Mingyu laughs. "My nasty, sharp-tongued princess. Thought I lost you for a sec."

"You will if you don't fuck me until I black out."

"Oh? All you had to do was ask, you know."

Then and there, Mingyu makes good of that interesting position he'd unknowingly lured you into—plunging that fat cock even deeper into your pussy if that's even possible. It felt heavenly, taking all of him while your legs dangled off his shoulders, but there's just something about having your legs spread impossibly wide as he drills into you with the full intention of making you come until you're crying that does it for you.

As each second passes, Mingyu's thrusts become more erratic—hips snapping with hard, calculated strokes so fucking good that tears are starting to glisten along the lines of your lashes like he promised.

You mewl his name like a string of prayers as the sound of your cunt squelching with every thrust rings in your ears. It's insane how close he's driven you to the edge in the span of thirty minutes, and you're starting to grow fearful of how addicting it feels to have him inside you like this.

At this point, you'd rather get off on Mingyu's cock than get high from some shady sativa joint. Something tells you he'd rather have that, too.

"Where do you want me, princess?" he whispers into your ear, reaching between your legs to give you just the right pressure you've been missing on your clit. You have to bite back a sob when he presses his thumb against it.

"Inside," you whimper as he continues plunging his engorged length into you. "Fill me with your cum, please, Gyu. I want it—want it so bad."

Mingyu hisses when you clench around his cock, large hands undoubtedly about to leave bruises on your thighs come morning. When you hear that deep, sexy laugh in your ear, you know it's all over for you.

"Come on my cock first, princess. Then I'll give you what you want."

He punctuates the words by drawing quick, tight circles on your clit all while keeping up the cadence of his thrusts. With the steady stream of stimulation he's so willing to give, it's a no-brainer for another orgasm to blindside you yet again.

You cry out with bliss as you screw your eyes shut—tears running down your cheeks in cascades as you fall apart on Mingyu's cock. He fucks into you despite the overstimulation, his own high not far behind because of the expression you're showing him.

"That's it," he rasps, leaning down to kiss the tears away. "Fucking cry for me, princess."

You're not sure if you're just too blissed out to comprehend it properly, but you're pretty sure that Mingyu just triggered another orgasm from you when you feel him twitch inside—your tight channel being covered in his white hot emission.

It doesn't help that your insatiable lover continues to fuck his cum deeper into your abused cunt, taking full advantage of this position while he can.

"M-Mingyu," you beg, fingers raking across his back as he punches the breath out of your lungs. "Too much. T-Too much."

You thought he wouldn't heed your words, but surprisingly, Mingyu halts every movement to gaze at you with a hint of concern lining his gaze. Wordlessly, he eases himself out of your sore cunt, wiping the tears off your eyes before pressing a kiss on your lips.

"Sorry," he murmurs before gently fixing the straps of your nightgown. He even tugs the hem down despite the fact that his cum is currently leaking out of you. "You want me to tuck you in?"

You nod, lacing your fingers around his neck, the overstimulated mess you are. Mingyu breathes out a quiet laugh before carrying you into his arms again.

"Alright, princess. Let's get you to bed."

You don't have the heart nor the energy to protest. Besides, it's his job to take care of you, after all.

⟢ end notes: reminder to not take any of the medical indications abt drugs that i included in this fic seriously. i made all of those up. oh and this should go w/o saying but don't fuck anyone while under the influence of anything AT ALL !!!

that aside, happy birthday to everyone's favorite puppy boy mingyu! i ended up loving him a lot more as i stanned svt, and i hope everyone else gives him the same love as well! god knows he has lots to give to both his members and his fans ueueue

++ if you spotted a few errors here and there, please don't tell me or i'll die of embarrassment ^_^ this wasn't proofread bcs i wanted to drop this exactly on his bday (i am 1 hour and 34 mins late!) HEHEHE i was sposed to write an ending scene in the morning where gyu wakes up and sees her wearing his shirt while making breakfast but that'll make this too long :| i'll just leave that to ur imagination!

#seventeen smut #seventeen fanfic #mingyu smut #mingyu x reader #seventeen x reader #kim mingyu #svt smut #svt fanfic #lovelyhan #🎲 ask games #full length fic 📚#💭 request

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tamapalace · 13 days ago

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Bandai Japan Details 2024 Tamagotchi Ichiban Kuji

Back for a second year, and better than ever!

We already knew the lottery, known as the Ichiban Kuji was coming back for 2024 from the announcement back in July, 2024, and we’ve been drooling over the recent pictures of the prizes at the 2024 Tokyo Toy Show.

Now, Bandai Japan has detailed all of the prizes officially on the Tamagotchi Ichiban Kuji website!

Prize A is that beautiful Tamagotchi Connection limited edition Ichiban Kuji shell.

Prize B is a large Tamagotchi Mametchi clear case, which is perfect for storing things, with a large capacity so you can see what is inside.

Prize C are Tamagotchi pouches, which feature characters on top of them and a clear circular case with a keychain.

Prize D are Tamagotchi Connection card holders a total of six designs from the Entomb and Uratama era!

Prize E are Tamagotchi acrylic keychains, a total of six designs ranging from Tamagotchi Connection themed, to a Tamagotchi iD themed one too!

Prize F are die-cut towels with Tamagotchi Ichiban Kuji graphics on them! Featuring the Tamagotchi Connection 20th Anniversary graphic, Keitai Tamagotchi, and even some vintage screen sprites too.

Prize G consists of Tamagotchi zipper bags, in various deigns, perfect for storing small items, and phone tab and decorative stickers.

Last prize is the large 60cm Kuchipatchi Hug Plush! Super cute, super soft, and features a Tamagotchi Connection 20th Anniversary logo on him too!

You know the routine, the Ichiban Kuji starts in Japan on November 22nd, 2024 at various retail locations (Lawson, Ichiban Kuji Official Shop, Ichiban Kuji Online). Simply locate a store display, purchase a ticket and see which prize you earn! Tickets are ¥700 including tax. The Ichiban Kuji will run until February, 2025! Good luck!

#tamapalace #tamagotchi #tmgc #tamatag #virtualpet #bandai #ichibankuji #ichiban kuji #lottery #jp #japan

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yiga-hellhole · 4 months ago

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TFTK: CHAPTERS 21&22

Ghirahim copes with the aftermath of his conspiracy. What is a blade to do, without a hand to wield it?

I'VE kept you all waiting for quite a bit haven't i. well i'm making it up to you! 2 chapters in one go! one VERY big thank you to @bulgariansumo and @orfeoarte for betareading these. quite a bit happens in the aftermath of zant's betrayal... i'll let it speak for itself.

the promo art for these chapters was heavily inspired by, and is basically an homage, to Houseki no Kuni's volume 7 cover! HnK influences a lot of my writing tone and symbolism. i really recommend it!!

this chapter has a bonus of another new language... protogermanic! it's written in elder futhark. you'll have to wiktionary the rest! teehee! (it's not plot-relevant, just a little easter egg for you all!)

ao3 mirror

CW for: graphic violence, toxic relationship, suicidal ideation (brief mention)

From the shadow of one colossal threat, into the other. This one weighed on him far heavier. Ghirahim stood in the cold dark of Zant’s chambers, for a moment, taking refuge in the first second before his eyes could adjust. Ever-so-indulgently, he blinked just a little longer than he had to, shrouding himself in the comfort of that shadowy blanket and shielding himself from what he would now have to undertake. When he opened his eyes again, he glared at the shape lying on the bed. When he strained his ears, he could hear a squeaky wheeze, little grunts of pain spotting through his breath.

Perhaps he had been a little too optimistic, hoping for Zant to have succumbed in his absence. Ghirahim approached the bed, the injured Twili upon it heaving his blankets with his arduous breathing. Neither of them had noticed he was still holding the Demon Scimitar. What good would it have done, to be any more aware of that frivolous thing? Ghirahim could forget about any urge, any fantasy, of using it to pounce upon him and flay him where he lied. With every step closer, that little dagger all but shook in his hands, cheering to see its beloved alive, though not well. It exploded into a cloud of diamonds, each shred and particle snaking back into Ghirahim's core by a trail. Such bothersome affection was best left where he could keep watch of it, and lock it away, deep where he could no longer feel it. All until this rotten fool would recover, rip it from him, and drag him about by the strings of his weakness all over again, no doubt.

Six seconds. That was how long he spent in that chamber, up until that point, when a flash of light broke through the gaps in the curtains, and briefly cast the room in dim light. Another second and the thunderous roar of a massive impact followed. The whole castle shook, dust raining down from the ceiling, the contents of shelves jolting in place and tumbling to the floor, glass and ceramics shattering on the spot, and wooden furniture rattling on their legs. The screws from Zant’s canopy bed gave way. A curtain rod, drapes and all, dislodged from its place and bared the fallen Twilight King to the little light that made it through the windows.

The tremors subsided at last. All of the palace – no, the world, was eerily silent. Sand, carried across the desert by the shockwave, pelted against the outside walls and spewed through the curtains. Ghirahim approached the bed, grains crunching beneath his feet.

Peering at him through swollen eyelids, Zant turned his head ever so slightly. “Your last gambit, I take it?”

Ghirahim deigned to answer. A last gambit, indeed, but one he never wanted to play. Majora’s words rang in his head, clear as day.

“... use it wisely, for when the tides of war turn irreversibly against your favor.”

Oh, and how the tides had turned. In one fell swoop, Ghirahim had lost both the battle and his Master, both of these promises doomed for failure from the very start. By accepting Majora’s allegiance, all in the name of the pitiful man now lying wheezing before him, those very tides crashed into him again, only from a different angle. Now that he stood there, wave-beaten as he was, the water cleared from his eyes. He could see just how laughable of a trap he’d fallen for. In calling Majora to his aid, Ghirahim silently wondered whose hands he had played into.

Zant stammered through this silence. It seemed he could not go a single minute without ushering his little plans along. “We cannot stay here. In the next few hours, those taking refuge in the dungeons will free themselves from their barricades and swarm through the Palace. If they find us–”

“Our lives will not remain secret” Ghirahim interrupted. “I get it. You want me to find some alternate place, yes? Or, even more probable, you already know exactly where you want to go?”

Zant averted his gaze. If Ghirahim didn’t know any better, he’d think it was an expression of guilt. Though, a playful one, like that of a prankster caught in the middle of their schemes. It may as well have been, to a man like him.

“Do you remember… That ruined little village in the woods?” Zant asked, finally.

“I do.”

Questions he once would have freely blurted out with a wry smile now refused to move, lodged somewhere in his throat by their barbs. They buzzed in place, instead, like cicadas stuck in their husks. Was there even a single house intact? Would such shabby lodging truly be up to his standards? But to return to such banter, nothing would feel more unnatural. In choosing to remain with this man, his capricious yet determined self was cut off from whatever steered him now.

So Ghirahim stood and said nothing further; simply stared.

Zant took his silence as a prompt to continue. “I spied one house on the outskirts, I believe, that could at least shelter us until I recover. I was considering our base at Eldin, first, but I do not trust it to be properly deserted. For the time being, if you could take us there…”

“Yes. Fine.” Zant’s words were full of implicit little meanings as usual. Teleport us there. Clear the coast. Bring bandages. Bring bedding. Steal whatever food you think we can use. Take every God-damned thing that you value because we are not coming back. And don’t get caught.

Once, he thought reading into his every word was a skill, a convenience that made the two of them more efficient than any other pair. How awfully intrusive it felt now! As if Zant, instead, wormed his way into his mind, and commandeered him as he pleased!

Ghirahim’s arms hooked under the fold of Zant’s knees and around his shoulders all the same, cradling the injured man to his chest. To let that line of thought go any further was to suspect a past weakness where he had once seen strength. He thoroughly had enough of those today. To dig any deeper, to realize –

Zant’s head slumped to the side, burying his face in the nape of Ghirahim’s neck. He was burning up. Of all the wounds he’d sustained that day, one of them was bound to fester. Ghirahim supposed he would have to snatch some coriander along the way for a tincture or two, and –

Oh, Hell.

—

Their arrival at the abandoned town had been uneventful. War was raging on beyond the treeline, miles and miles away, but in this forest, the simple cycle of life and death turned and turned along as though the world had been quiet. Birds rooted around in piles of fallen leaves for their morsels, bucks bellowed for their harems further out in the woods, and rodents hurried for cover, away from these strange new arrivals, as though they’d been the only disturbance for years. It felt thoroughly undeserved. Ghirahim’s life was on fire. It would only have been fair for this place to feel its cinders, too.

But if everything was judged by his standard of fairness, he never would have left Ganondorf’s side. Zant would have been wearing his usual stupid, blindly loyal smile beside them both, and they would have Hyrule’s ashes stomped to coals beneath their feet. Instead, Ghirahim stood inside the last standing house of this village, surrounded by bare necessities. Zant lay in a makeshift cot, sweating a fever away tucked in the shadows of the room. Finding a spot for him had been a bit of a challenge. The place was littered with uncovered windows and a hole in the roof let in a persistent beam of sunlight even if he managed to fashion some curtains. Ghirahim sat against the wall across the Twili, face buried in the comfort of his favorite cloak. Termites and lichen made their home in the logs pressed against his back – how this place hadn’t collapsed along with the rest of the village, Ghirahim couldn’t say. Zant would probably have some long-winded theory about it all, but if he heard even another squeak out of that man before sundown, he wouldn’t hold himself responsible for whatever happened next.

And night did fall, after hours spent in nothing but solitude. Ghirahim sporadically flitted about the house, passing through like a ghost. Through the windows, the forest’s naked branches clacked in the wind like the dead waving their skeletal arms. One way or the other, he supposed the memory of those he wiped from the face of the earth in Gerudo Desert, sent its regards. But the Desert was far behind them now, their belongings scattered across the floor or bundled up in chests throughout the little house. They would not return.

Ghirahim sat outside as the sun sank below the treeline, poking at the cinders of a fire pit he’d set up a little ways from their shelter. The night air was a little easier out in the open, without the soft sounds of suffering keeping him so dreadfully on edge. To sit by Zant, with so many accusations to sling at him but no motivation to do so, filled him with such a terrible thunder. He couldn’t stand another minute in there with him.

Of course, he was enraged at Zant. Somehow, that maniac had managed to deceive a Demon, and, with how Ghirahim so piteously carried him to safety, had gotten away with it, too. It was infuriating, as much as it tore his heart to pieces. They had loved each other then, and though Ghirahim had let it shatter, the shards of this love still remained within him.

Zant meant no harm to him, this he knew. But what the Twili did not seem to get through his thick skull was that in threatening his Master, that threat extended to his most loyal blade.

What other choice did Ghirahim have, though? He didn’t have the authority to be selfish, but deep inside himself, he cherished that wish, still, to have his true purpose fulfilled in the hands of his Master. Removed so far from Him now, for the first time, Ghirahim confronted his wish head-on. He could not bear dying a second time, without his true purpose fulfilled. So, even if this incarnation of Demise would not wield him, he could at least try to live on, and wait for the next. The only way to safeguard that childish desire now, was to remain hidden away, by Zant’s side.

Plop. Plop. Plop. Something was close to burning in the pot he was tending to. Bubbles rose through the thick liquid and popped into tufts of steam at its tawny surface. He took the pot, but a little rattle behind him urged him to turn before he could return to the cabin. Yet the ruined village around them was quiet, his idle scrying sensing nothing out of place. Dismissing the disturbance as another quirk of his agitation, he kicked a serving of sand over the smoldering ashes of the fire pit and headed back inside.

Zant sat propped up in his bed. His hand was raised to his face in a puckish, half-hearted attempt to conceal that he had been poking at his stitches mere seconds earlier. Ghirahim ignored those silly traits and handed him a bowl.

Raising shaky hands, his scarred ear straining to twitch, Zant took the bowl with surprise. Wide eyes peered inside. “I… Did not know you could cook.”

Ghirahim curled his lip, offended both by his carefree attempt at small-talk and at the underestimation of his abilities. “I am Demon Lord. I hold encyclopedic knowledge spanning thousands of years, and you think I wouldn’t know how to prepare a simple gruel?”

“... Forgive me for inquiring,” Zant mumbled, bringing the bowl to his parched lips.

A moment of silence passed between them, with Ghirahim again hunched down against the far wall. Sitting there, staring at Zant somewhat struggling to feed himself through tremoring hands and an injured throat, became quickly unbearable.

Ghirahim was tending to one of his daggers, a leather case full of them beside him, when Zant interrupted their silence again. “I must say, Ghirahim… I did not expect you to want to care for me, as grateful as I am for it. I remain a little jarred.”

Ghirahim furrowed his brows. Rose from his seat, made his way over to the cot and loom over the wicked thing nesting there. “Simple. It would be inconvenient if you died now. I have put everything on the line for you, Zant, and to let you perish from something as simple as a fever would mean I’ve wasted valuable time. I’m a deserter now, thanks to you,” Ghirahim hissed, looking down on him from beside his bed. “Do you understand? You owe me everything.”

Zant for a moment seemed intimidated. A long, spindly form, normally so towering, sat folded in on himself more fragile than a newborn bird. He blinked up at him with his big eyes, before resigning himself to nursing his bowl of food. “I know, Ghirahim. I know. And you shall get it. All in due time…”

That was how Ghirahim spent hours. Days. Cleaning bandages and watching a traitor eat porridge. Oh, Demise Mercy. He must have been defective. The both of them, fools locked in a little hut, each robbed of their sound minds. Back in the Palace, Ghirahim must have knocked the last sense out of Zant when pummeling him for his transgressions, or he would have realized the idiocy of his plans by now. In that same vein, he himself must have had his reasoning beaten out from him with the hammering of steel. Otherwise, he never would have tagged along. The Demon King was not an enemy one could meet in any way other than prostrated, begging for a quick end. Yet here he was, persuaded to betray him, head-on.

This exact line of thought repeated ad nauseum in his mind nigh every hour of every day. Either Ghirahim would hush it with some excuse, or let its flame run its course, quietly, yet viciously, behind dark eyes aimed straight at his conspirator. Today was one such day of well-contained rage, tempered as he tended to the last of Zant’s injuries. Despite the many ills he would wish upon the man in his darkest hours, Zant’s health was indeed improving, leaving only lethargy and persistent pains, both of which motivated his loud complaints.

And how he cursed this recovery. Every bit of care sparked an affectionate streak in the Twili. Zant spent what little energy he could spare on conveying his gratitude, carefully at first, but growing ever more bold. Ghirahim flinched from his touch in these early hours, until it angered him, swatting his hands away at the slightest provocation. But at the first solid contact, the laying of those pallid fingers on his false skin, he realized he was powerless.

He had missed it. Ghirahim craved to be touched by him. It was the closest thing to a disease he had ever felt.

There could have been many things that made him stay. It could have been Zant’s bizarre kindness, his devotion, and all their fond memories. But above all, Ghirahim was a Blade. He followed power. Even when laying there, too ill to move, there was a spark of determination in Zant’s eyes. A deep grudge that had rested in smoldering tar until finally ignited, burst into flame deep within the Twili, and would not cease burning until he got what he wanted. Zant had died not once, but twice, and came clawing out his grave with the same deathly resolve each time. Narrowly escaping death a third time, the fire still lit in his soul proved it. There would be nothing stopping that man from taking Hyrule, promised by his expression alone. How horrifyingly familiar it was.

So Ghirahim allowed it. All of it, his affection, his schemes, and his weakness, as Zant lay there shallowly breathing. Even in the chance his comparison was false. His captor, his usurper, had trapped Ghirahim so thoroughly by his side that there was no choice but to remain. And through his efforts, past something so cruel, Ghirahim loved him still. Zant would take everything the Demon King ever had, starting with His blade.

As Ghirahim lamented this, he loomed over him, tugging the stitches out of a freshly sealed scar. Out of all moments, Zant thusly decided to be possessed by another one of his honey-eyed fits. He reached his hand – a little steadier this time, but hesitant, still – to Ghirahim’s face, to trace a thumb along the blemished skin of his cheek.

Only to recoil. Zant tested again, running his thumb along the little dimples left by Darunia’s hammer. “Did I do this, Ghirahim? In convincing you to betray your Master, did I damage you?”

Before Ghirahim could get past his perturbation and respond, Zant looked at him intently. His hand flat on his jaw, Zant spoke gravely. “If I cannot do this without hurting you, I have already failed. You are a collateral I cannot accept. I wouldn’t forgive myself, and, by the Sols, would not expect you to either.”

Pallid hands found his own. Zant stroked past his fingernails, talons that they were, beneath his gloves. He guided this hand, and pointed its nails at his heart. “Tell me, then, if I am to blame, and, should you wish it, to repay my crime against you… Kill me.”

Ghirahim paused. For a moment, he indulged the thought. He imagined rooting past his ribcage and ripping out whatever strange, beating organ lay beneath. Only to find the appeal fall flat. If he had any cheer in him, he would have had to stifle a laugh at this bizarre request. He must think I’m stupid, he thought. It’s a bluff. He knows I’m in too deep to conspire against him.

Pathetic, wretched man. Is this the only way he knows how to express love? Empty threats on his own life, gored upon my blade?

“Don’t go on such ridiculous tangents,” Ghirahim said, wrenching his hand free. “It was Darunia.” He turned his back on him, then said no more.

Silence fell, one of the many unbearable ones they kept on having inside this house. Without looking back once, Ghirahim made for the door.

Zant interrupted him, right as he placed his hand on the door handle. “... Ghirahim, please-”

“Please, what?” Ghirahim snapped, glaring at him over his shoulder. “After everything you’ve already taken from me, you have the nerve to ask any more from me? What could you possibly want?”

Zant startled. “This is what I mean! Do you intend to sit and simmer in silence for the entirety of our cooperation? You are bursting at the seams with unsaid frustrations, and yet, you remain with me. So do us both this favor and hurl whatever you have bottled up in there my way. Clearly, this tension benefits neither of us!”

Ghirahim froze. Did it truly take this many days for Zant to wonder? Was it so inconceivable to him, up until this point, that anger would remain? The urge to snap at him was irresistible. He pushed the small crack in the door he’d pulled open back shut with far more vigor than necessary, and whipped himself around.

“You wish to hear it? Fine. I’m astounded I even have to spell it out for you. Aren’t you so smart? So cunning? You’ve ruined my life!” Ghirahim shouted, stomping his way to the center to the room. “Every chance I’ve had in this war, to build my reputation, to bond myself to my Master, you’ve sabotaged. With your ridiculous plots, your manipulative little distractions. And then, oh so merrily, you lay there on your deathbed and say, you intended to have the one man that matters to me, killed!? What a terrible fate you’ve strung me up with!”

In all technicalities, it was impossible for Ghirahim to run his voice ragged. In his frustration, it still had. His words tumbled out of him moreso than he spoke them, tripping over hitches and bumps on their way out. “By all means, ‘sitting and simmering’ is the most charitable thing I could do to you. I ought to tear you limb from limb and feed you to the pigs!”

Ghirahim heaved breaths through clenched teeth, fast-paced in his rage, but gradually slowing. Before him, Zant looked petrified. How cathartic! To cause him even the slightest fraction of pain, after he himself was hurt so deeply!

But as much as it soothed him, the sight also fizzled out his drive. Ghirahim knew he couldn’t tear into him forever. So, his hackles going slack, he resigned himself to solemn reasoning. He looked at him bitterly as he spoke. “But I won’t. Because what good would it do me? You’ve made sure every home I ever had in this wretched time is burned to the ground, and every ally, gone with it. You give me no choice but to go along with your schemes. I’m trapped in here with you, so I will act as damned frustrated with the part as I please.”

Throughout his outburst, Zant had cowered, his eyes wide and on the verge of tears. He’d looked hurt, like for once his plans weren’t packing out the way he expected. This changed when Ghirahim’s temper grew calmer – where Ghirahim’s resolve faded, Zant’s grew. His eyes narrowed, his lips drew to a tight line, and his back straightened. Zant looked thoughtfully down at his hands in his lap. “I see. So you think you are blameless in all this?”

“Don’t you dare –”

Zant’s face snapped up towards him, once again freezing him inside that all-consuming gaze. “No, no. Ghirahim, you act as though I’ve forced your hand at every turn through this. I must make one thing crystal clear to you, it seems.”

Zant took a deep breath, his eyes closed, and sighed it back out. His patience gathered, he spoke. “When Ganondorf first summoned me, Ghirahim, I was ready to die. I had been since Cia resurrected me, too. And though I indeed intended to stray from Ganondorf, it was only ever a wishful thought.” His tone grave at first, he soon grew wistful. “Had you not accompanied me, my Blade, and showed me the vastness of this world, I would not have wanted to remain in it. I would have lost myself to a drone-like state and fought to the death without aim, as I had before.”

“And,” Zant said, eyes aimed straight at his core. “Had you not taught me swordsmanship, had you not given me our scimitar, I would not have become as strong as I am now.”

Ghirahim could see it now. The full extent of the trap he’d fallen into. Strings intertwined. Each bound by their wrists, twisted and tangled. Forcing each other closer, and closer, until their laced fingers tied together and soaked red with the blood on their hands.

Zant saw the moment the dots connected behind his eyes. Despicably so, he almost looked smug. “So face it. We have sculpted each other like this, for better or for worse. You chose to return to me. On Death Mountain, in the Temple of Souls, and even after I revealed my deceit to you, you came to me of your own accord. Do not dare blame me for the impulses of your own heart.”

All throughout Zant’s words, Ghirahim felt a storm brewing inside his chest. Thunder threatened, rolled, deep within, until at long last, it snapped free at such simple words.

“My heart?” Ghirahim scoffed, grit his teeth. The elation of his next words nearly sent him into delirium. He glared at him madly, wearing an incredulous smile. “I do not have one!”

Somehow, a statement of truth evoked instant distress in Zant. His eyes went wide along with the cracking of his temper. Biting his lip, huffing almost childishly through his nostrils, Zant reverted to his old ways with tears beading in his eyes.

“Why must you always quarrel with me?” Zant whimpered, composure finally gone. “I saw you exploited, in danger, and I took you with me. I cannot deny you your nature as a blade, this I know. B-but even then, all I wanted was to place you in safer hands!”

Ghirahim’s expression, on the other hand, did not change. He folded his arms, his nails digging into his skin even through the cover of his gloves. Fabric nearly creaked beneath his grip, straining at the seams. The stupidity of it all was almost enough to pacify him. Keep him safe? A living weapon, in time of war? Zant was a little boy living in his own reverie.

Ghirahim was at once disappointed with this spineless response. He sighed. Narrowed his eyes, then growled his next words. “Then you failed.”

Zant bared his teeth, similarly balling his fists. “Perhaps I may have. But in banishing us, Ganondorf, too, forced us into this fate. If it had otherwise meant dooming you to scrap, then my conscience is spotless.”

He felt the corner of his lip twitch with involuntary rage at this. Such a presumptuous face was just begging for a fist to be planted square in the middle of it. Ghirahim wanted to step forward, to grab him by the collar of his nightgown and rattle the mess of his brain some more, but a different part of him begged for him to be reasonable.

Ghirahim would never get the chance to wrestle past whatever held him back. Before he could set another step, a tremor shook him to a standstill. At once, the gentle, golden rays seeping in through the ceiling cracks turned red. Not the warm vermillion of sundown, but rather, a sickly crimson, stifling every other bit of light like a bloody fog. At once, the woods around them turned dead quiet. Not a leaf dared to rustle. Then, another tremor, rattling the rusty nails in the floorboards and shaking dust loose from the ceiling. At once, Ghirahim felt it. Deep in his soul, a roar and a magnetic pull, urging him to flee the house. Yet, he remained frozen in place.

Zant looked up, peering intently out what little window he could see. He whispered.

“Ganon.”

Ghirahim did not notice when he stepped into Zant’s range, but he must have, because a hand suddenly clasped around his wrist. Zant stared at him intently.

“It’s time. Take us there,” he insisted, clamping on with a tightness a man this frail shouldn’t be able to manage. “Somewhere safe. A vantage point. I must see him perish with my own eyes – I’ll trust no one’s account on it.”

Ghirahim furrowed his brows, revolted, but soon stopped struggling against him. Either way, there was a deep instinctual need that drew him to the battle Ganon now was entangled in. If he dragged Zant along, the man could do very little harm to begin with. But what allured him most, was the thought of leaving him there to be discovered. Zant’s naive drivel had, once again, drawn his ire. The effort Ghirahim had spent in keeping him alive may very well have been a fallacy, should he change his mind now… But to bring him directly before his old Master may very well reinstate his position by Ganondorf’s side.

And, if he was lucky, in his hands. This was his very last chance.

—

As they arrived, within a second, Ghirahim saw his last chance slip from him, vanishing into thin air. He had taken Zant with almost suspicious eagerness, situating the both of them atop the cliffs that surrounded Hyrule Field. Stroking a hand through his hair, he propped the man in the shadow of a great tree. Leaning on makeshift crutches as he was, lacking his helmet, he would need to be a semblance of safe. Or at least feel the part.

But when Ghirahim turned to face the battlefield, to where his Master was bringing chaos to the lands of Hyrule, he lost any hope he had. The source of the ground-shaking pounding of hooves, of the malice-filled roars, was unmistakable. There rampaged Ganon, Demon King, reducing the once-green fields to a barren wasteland under the deep-red skies. He was colossal, resembling the man he knew only by his fiery red mane. Now, he tore through barricades in the form of a boar, with tusks like battering rams and clawed fists decimating men by the dozens just by galloping past. In his wake, keeps had crumbled, monsters had feasted, and a gigantic sword had lodged itself in the most suitable pedestal of all: Hyrule Castle.

Zant limped to the edge of the shadow to stand behind Ghirahim, close enough for him to hear the manic giggle under his breath over the carnage.

“Magnificent, isn’t it? All that power. That is what the Triforce contains.”

It was. He was dazzling, awe-inspiring, enough to bring the demon to his knees, eyes and mouth agape. The world trembled before the Great King of Evil, who had brought ruin to the once-so-grand Hyrule Castle, and swept any resistance aside with a single swing of his hand. But it was also terribly, terribly, wrong.

“... He’s lost his mind. I have seen this before. Ganondorf, as we have known him, is gone. There will be no more negotiations, no more allegiances, and no Kingdom to rule. The Princess must have pushed him over the edge –”

“And he’s taking everything down with him,” Ghirahim finished, the words leaving him in a quiver, like it was the last breath he would ever take. He fell to his knees.

Zant had the gall to snicker. “Oh, but he will not win. He cannot, not if – Ah, there you have it.”

As if struck by some unseen force, Bestial Ganon recoiled. Attacks once focused on the Demon himself now veered to the Colossus Blade lodged in Hyrule Castle, instead. Ghirahim remembered this sword – forged for the hands of Giants, only to be seized by the clutches of Hell, and made into a conduit for the Demon King. If it functioned anything like the one kept in Demise’s palace, it would have served as an amulet, to cast a protective spell over its Master.

And now, it was being bombarded by a deluge of shimmering arrows, and wicked little birds carrying explosives in their talons. It all pitter-pattered on the midnight steel like prismatic rain, but the shriek of cracking metal was no less foreboding. Though Ganon chased them down, with the arrival of the Rito, all troops were heading for the Castle to reclaim it. Ganon tore through brick and mortar with enough force to crack one of his horns clean off, but it was too late. Launching the demon boar back, the Colossus Sword shattered. Though no less dangerous, Ganon was now vulnerable.

Ghirahim whipped around to glare at the man behind him. Those eyes looked on the ensuing chaos like nothing was out of place. “You know more than you let on. Spit it out.”

Zant squinted his eyes nearly shut with a wide grin. “Ah, well… It was a gamble on my part, but I confess. Do you remember Chancellor Meherat?”

Ghirahim grimaced at him fiercely enough that no words were necessary to get him to continue.

“I intercepted her in the desert, buried her in a shallow grave. But not before planting a letter on her body, detailing some… Educated guesses, on how he might attempt to conquer the Castle. I’d hoped her traitor-sisters might find the body and give her a proper burial, and I was correct. I’m almost a little taken aback by how well something so brash seems to have worked.”

Ghirahim at once flew back to his feet and lunged at the Twili. He grabbed him fiercely by the tabbard, tugging him down to eye-level with his fangs bared… But past his enraged panting, found he couldn’t force a single word to form. With every anguished bellow behind him, his grip on Zant slackened. He couldn’t bring himself to turn around and look. So he buried his face in the fabric of Zant’s cloak, and let it soak up every tear he spilled. When Zant brought his hand to his back and stroked it softly, he wanted to recoil. He wanted to shake off his wretched affection, sprint down to the battlefield and come to his Master’s aid, but all was hopeless. In this state, Ganon would not even recognize him. Not as his ally, not as his blade. He would shatter him to splinters on the spot.

Ganondorf had broken his promise. Ghirahim would never return to his hand.

So, defeated and ensnared in the Twilight King’s web, Ghirahim gave up. He hid himself from the sight of his dying Master, as the monomaniac he clung to looked on in fiendish delight, nearly drooling at the power he coveted.

Until, as the clamor continued, Zant prodded at him to catch his attention. “Ghirahim,” he hissed. “We have been spotted.”

Mind gone muggy from his despair, Ghirahim sluggishly turned to where Zant urged him. Surely, at a distance, there stood a trio of blue-clad Hyrulean soldiers – two Hylians and a Rito. They were almost mere specks in the yards between them, but certainly eye-locked, nonetheless.

Zant leaned in, whispering as though they might hear from such a distance. “It is in our best interest that Hyrule believes we are dead. We cannot afford witnesses.”

Ghirahim stared a little longer, but soon the Rito braced himself, flapping his wings to take off in flight.

“So, what are you waiting for?” Zant chimed, extending his bony hand in the direction of the now-fleeing group. “Go, Yima Gradiegra. Kill.”

Ghirahim hadn’t realized how he’d hungered for such words until the command alone blazed fire within him. Before he’d even registered it in his mind, his feet took off in a sprint. All his fatigue, his listlessness, had disappeared, peopling his mind instead with this newly-acquired purpose. With bloodlust.

Kill.

The first head rolled. The next drew a sword on him, only to find his blade flying into the dirt and himself skewered in a flash. Downy feathers fluttering down from above reminded Ghirahim of the Rito, who had taken off beyond his reach. With a snap of his fingers, Ghirahim sent a cloud of daggers whistling through the skies and plunging themselves into the plumed flesh of his target. With a squawking scream and a few futile wingbeats, the Rito sank in the air, and plummeted down to the ground.

Only when he pounced on the already corpse-bound soldier to carve his throat for good measure, did a call of his name snap him out of this droning state. Without even looking back at the carnage he’d left, he winked himself back to Zant, and hid himself in his arms.

“Excellent work, my Blade… You and I, we shall have Hyrule at our feet.”

Those words, those hands stroking his back, encouragingly… Something burned within him and it sickened him. Enough to burrow further in those wretched arms. It was not just the sights of war Ghirahim hid from. Not just the unbearable reality of watching his Master die before him a second – no, third time. Most of all, he hid from the off chance he would meet Ganon’s eye from afar and have him see the spark of delight that lingered there. The shame it would bring to admit he had followed another man’s commands – a mortal, – and found joy in it… It would be far easier, were He to die without knowing of it.

So Ghirahim let Him. In the shadows of the Twili’s cloak, he could see nothing, but the deafening sounds of the clash behind him spoke volumes. An army of demons, falling to the hands of flesh-born men. The mightiest of them all, slain by the powers of light. As he had time, and time, and time again. For once, Ghirahim had the privilege to avert his gaze from his Master’s fall. Though he took it, he regretted it in an instant.

But this regret did not last long. His eyes snapped wide open when he heard a low rumble, followed by a horridly familiar giggle. A shockwave soon launched the both of them back. Ghirahim, still hidden in Zant’s arms, landed on top of the injured man completely unceremoniously. When he raised himself to see what pushed them back, he came upon clear amber skies of dusk, and Hyrule Field green and spry as if nothing had ever touched it. A crumbled land, bathed in golden light, stretched out before him.

“Ghirahim, my ribs,” groaned the man below him. Though addressed, Ghirahim lingered just a few seconds longer than necessary, before turning to sit beside him. Listlessly, he pulled his knees to his chest.

“Now, I truly cannot go back.”

“No,” said Zant. “But we can start anew, once more.”

Ghirahim deigned to respond. He supposed they would have to.

So, they returned to that little forest town, as bit by bit, the World returned to normal for the victors. The two of them noticed nothing of these efforts, other than their bond slowly returning, as much as Ghirahim wished to struggle against it. With his last tethers to his True Master now gone, there was little, so, so very little, tying him to the wishes of his past life. Day, after day, Ghirahim’s walls chipped away, allowing that old fondness to peer cheekily at him through the cracks in the mortar. Captive and Keeper, Victim and Tormentor, Blade and Master. Conniver, and Target. Such words he would once have used for their dynamic, but he had no word for what it was melting into. The life they led, sheltered in these woods, defied everything he knew.

It was bare, it was calm, it was quiet, this one-man sick bay. These days, the most excitement Ghirahim got was the occasional target practice on a woodland bird, that he could then feed to his patient. If they’d wanted, they could have fled, then, a pair of deserters never to be heard from again. But, deceptively, in these moments of peace, Zant was letting his plot simmer. A man like him would never have been content with a simple life.

Neither was Ghirahim. Not for one minute did he consider this drag of an affair his possible future life. If he could not have Demise, then he would at the very least have vengeance. Now that Ganondorf could not give that to him, he would take it himself. Hyrule would burn for what it did.

Ghirahim dapped a wet rag on the gash by Zant’s forehead. Arterial scabs were stubborn to heal, and on Twili, this seemed to be no different. By all means, there was no reason for him to keep doing this. Zant was able to sit up by himself just fine and had long abandoned his fever. Yet, with so little to do but wait, not even an army below him to amuse himself with, he’d rather care for this fool and feel useful than sit around. When he finished reapplying the bandages, Zant thanked him with a coo and a stroke of his thumb across his cheek. Then, he requested from him his field guide, that strange hobby of his. Though he’d traded calligraphy ink for graphite, Zant was no less eager in his scholarly pursuits and would sit, hunched, working on sketches and descriptions of creatures whose appearances he’d long committed to memory. Ghirahim was thankful for these moments. There were only a few forces in this world that could rip Zant from his concentration now, and he wasn’t up to such nonsense that day.

So, he did what he would every time the house got quiet. He went for a walk. At first, he would just explore the ruined town at his leisure, perhaps turn over a stone they had missed when they first came here and find anything of intrigue whatsoever. On the third evening, though, far into the woods, he began to hear voices. Whether it was the fairies, or huntsmen, or soldiers looking for the last monstrous hideouts, he was not keen on finding out. What if, upon the sight of him, they would scatter, and spread word of his survival to Hyrule? No, he would much rather ambush them than seek them out. Since then, he’d taken to calling his habit of wandering a patrol.

On the eighth day of his roaming, an unfamiliar sound sent his hair standing on end, and his fingers braced to summon his weapon. It was a rattle; not like the clacking of branches, as he was used to, but like the shaking of an instrument. Hollow… As his eyes scanned his surroundings, he remembered something Zant said, so long ago now. He, too, complained of hearing such a sound at the edge of the woods when Ghirahim himself could perceive no such thing. Did he, somehow, transfer this madness to him?

But madness it was not. For soon, the rattling returned, this time accompanied by a troubled little whine. Then, out from the bushes, a strange creature barely the height of his knees came toddling towards him. It seemed to be entirely made out of wood, with stumpy limbs, antlers like branches, and a painted leaf stuck to it, serving as its face. Once it had confirmed Ghirahim could see it (doubtlessly through his bewildered, and somewhat disgusted look), it spoke.

“ᚺᛁᛏ:ᚾᛖ:ᛊᛁ:ᛊᛈᚱᛖᚲᚨᚾᚨ:ᚹᛁᚦᚱᚨ:ᛃᚢᛉ:ᛁᛏ:ᚷᚱᚨᚢᛏᚨᛉ:ᛒᚱᛖᛊᛏᚨᚾᚨ:ᚾᛖ:ᛚᚨᛁᛒᛁᛃᚨᚾᚨ! ᚠᚢᛚᚷᚨᚾᚨ:ᛗᛖᚲ!”

Of course, Ghirahim understood not a word of what it had just said, but had an idea of what it wanted. It waddled away from him with great urgency, only to turn and jump up and down a few paces later. Ghirahim looked behind him, thinking what would become of Zant, were he too stray too far… Well, if he was spirited away, that wouldn’t matter to him anymore, would it? With his true purpose gone, his sense of caution had also gone almost entirely slack. He decided he didn’t much care for the consequences of following woodland creatures into the thicket. So he just did that, and set off after the panickedly bouncing creature. Every once a while, it hopped high enough to see past the tall grass. Which was a thoughtful, but unnecessary gesture. He had long since set his dowsing to the odd little thing, and could follow it to the ends of the continent if he had to.

It had already been later in the day when Ghirahim departed their shelter, but the light in the forest grew ever more ochre as he chased after his odd chaperone. They passed through wisps of fog, which were familiar in their chill… For a moment, Ghirahim thought the moment of his disappearance must have arrived, and the soaring sound of wind seemed to agree. Until, with just a few steps, the clouds pulled away at once, and his sight could not have been more clear. The wooden creature guiding him then came to a sudden halt, refusing to go any further. When Ghirahim stopped behind it, it quickly grew anxiously irritated. Squeaking some unintelligible request, it got up behind him and started pushing him in the calves, urging him to go on. Generously, he complied. Less generously, he took offense to this undignified interaction, and promptly kicked the creature off of him. It led out some little cry of pain, tumbled backwards into the brush, and, alive nonetheless, scurried out of sight.

The last stretch the pixie expected him to walk was short, as soon he waded past a juvenile treeline to find a clearing. In the middle of it, hovering above the gnarled stump of a felled tree, was Majora. And, the poor sod it inhabited, slumped over in the air like a marionette at rest. The second Ghirahim stepped closer, though, the puppet came to life. Glowing a deep purple, it shrieked a little, before rapidly jerking its arms to and fro. Having sufficiently awakened, its mask leered down at him.

“Ahh, how nice of you to join meee, Ghi-ra-hi mmm,” spoke the mask, hitching on each vowel like a rusty hinge. Majora’s host convulsed, creaked, its master forcing its head into jittering angles.

Somewhat unnerved, but unwilling to show it, Ghirahim crossed his arms and managed a pleasant greeting. “Good evening, Great Gluttony. Your vessel is looking a little worse for wear.”

“Yesss-s-s-ss, it is becoming… Too small for me ee e. Crampedddd d. T t t. But it matters not. Not for me, and not for it. W itness me.”

The puppet stopped shivering. Its arms fell limply by its side. Hand by hand, it then began to grasp at its face, feeling around for the edge of the mask. Gloved hands, their talons poking through the fabric, found the opening of the puppet’s jaw and yanked.

From its open mouth, a claw surfaced. More curled around the rim, one by one, until an entire draconic hand forced itself through the far-too-small opening, and slammed itself into the ground. From this anchoring point, Majora pulled itself out. Wild, iridiscent manes pooled from the defenseless Skull Kid in an avalanche, until from this mass of fur, an armored dragon burst outward. The mask, once stuck to the vessel, now rooted itself to the dragon’s face, leeching into its flesh by pulsing, pink veins.

It bristled and shook. The last of its body wormed itself unnaturally from the beak of its vessel, like a snake shedding its skin. With a single flick of its furred tail, it had completed this metamorphosis, and discarded the Skull Kid against a nearby tree with a thwack.

Now before Ghirahim, the towering mountain of armor and mane that it was, stood Majora, the spitting image of its former self. Once, it was more massive than this, yet Ghirahim was dwarfed before it. The tips of its horns almost grazed the lower canopy of these infant woods as it sat. Where its colors were muted and meager millennia past, the bright colors of its sealing curse had turned it into a veritable prism. Through the trees, the light of the setting sun enshrined its wispy fur in an infernal halo, leaving Ghirahim imprisoned in its shadow. The Great Gluttony, Arch-Demon of the Timeless Lands, had returned to this realm.

Well, for as long as that mask could keep this form up, at least. It rumbled with satisfaction, shaking out its head to dislodge its fur from its triple set of horns. As it moved, the plates of its armor clanked together like cymbals. Ch-Ch-Chsss!

“Charmed. Anyhow,” said Ghirahim, thoroughly unamused and checking his manicure. “A little woodland sprite hassled me to come pay you a visit.”

Majora grimaced, for as far as a reptilian face could do so. It dropped itself to the ground, folding its claws comfortably. “Messing around with fairies? Have you learned nothing from our last encounter?”

Stepping back slightly from the gnarled purple face leering closely at him, Ghirahim kept his countenance cold. “I’ve learned to spot a trail when I see it. Now, what do you want from me? I’m a very busy man.”

Majora wagged its head side to side almost cheerfully. “Oh, I wanted nothing more than to say my thanks for the little nudge you’ve given me. And, of course, to have you witness my return to glory,” it said and raised its behind. Curving into an arc, Majora stretched out its long-dormant body. “It’s been soooo long since I could properly stretch my legs!”

“I don’t recall doing a single thing for you. But, if it gets you out of my hair, then I most gratefully accept.”

Sitting back down with a gasp, Majora had its eyes wide and grin wry. “You truly must give yourself more credit, your lordship! Had it not been for your oh-so punctual summoning, I wouldn’t have had enough power to feed!”

Majora sat up on its haunches, coloring its words with gestures of its claws. “With the lives you sacrificed in the Desert, I could finally clamp my jaws into a long-desired target. All of Ganondorf’s misery, mine, all mine!”

Standing in the dragon’s shadow, Ghirahim widened his eyes and covered his mouth in shock. But before he could sink into guilt over complicity in his Master’s death, Majora took his expression alone as a cue to keep babbling. “Oh, don’t look so surprised. How else do you think Hyrule returned to peace so quickly? This place would have been a wasteland, had even a drop of his rage been left to simmer. By all means, I’m such a nice little demon! The Hylians should love me.”

Amidst that self-satisfied prattling, Ghirahim could have been gnawing his nails clean off. Had he not accepted Majora’s offer, then it wouldn’t have been able to, ‘eat Ganondorf’s misery,’ as it said. But then, did this contribute to Ganon’s defeat? Had he, by purging Gerudo Valley, ensured that untimely demise? Or was Majora merely a scavenger, picking the scraps off the Demon King’s carcass?

Could he be certain Zant hadn’t known all this, the second they left those woods, mere months ago?

Nail polish sticking to his teeth, he was quickly snapped out of his thoughts by large, shimmering talons pawing at him. “Ghirahim!! Lookie-look! My little vessel seems to have survived. How quaint!”

Just by the tree where Majora left the little creature, small squeaks and groans emitted from a beaten form. It sat up shakily, patting at itself. Said vessel’s true face was now revealed. It was a featureless, shadowy thing, with two glowing beady eyes and a sparrow’s beak. Soon, that beak burst open, freeing an anguished wail. Unintelligible babbles poured from it, prompting the two distraught fairies beside it to start dragging it to the shrubbery, doubtlessly perturbed by the pair of demons glaring down at them. But being parted from what was once its mask only made the childish thing shriek harder. Nevertheless, the fairies prevailed in their escort, as more and more of them poured from the woods to help pull it away.

“Poor thing,” tutted Majora, watching along. “It must have gotten attached to me. And who can blame it? Power is alluring, even as it devours you.”

Ghirahim turned, feeling thoroughly addressed, to indeed find Majora looking at him closely. When their eyes met, it flashed its teeth with a grin and got back to its feet, prowling circles around him. Ghirahim felt his hand itching for his blade. Why did he come here unarmed?

“Either way, once more,” Majora purred, teeth still bared past its lips. The marks on its mask coiling, coiling, coiling, in the illusion of its shimmering scales. “I thank you two for your generous assistance. Consider your debt from the Lost Woods… Thoroughly repaid.”

Yet the intimidation display shook Ghirahim none. It could prowl around him all it wanted, he would not be prey.

“Us two?” Hook, line, and sinker. “So, you were aware of Zant’s intentions, all along? Have you both wound me up in your cahoots behind my back?”

Majora stopped in its tracks, but Ghirahim would be hard-pressed to find even a split second of insecurity in that wicked face. “Cahoots? Oh, I didn’t have to get involved with him whatsoever to know his intentions,” it said. “They were clear as day! But, even though I poked around him a bit… He most likely does not even know I exist.”

So, his two tormentors just so happened to get viciously lucky. Ghirahim didn’t believe a lick of it. Though, the idea of the Arch-Demon breaking past Zant’s mental wards unnoticed… It was as unlikely as it was intriguing.

Guilt turned to contempt in a flash. He now saw Majora as responsible for the death of his beloved Master, rather than a tool that ran haywire under his watch. His apprehension, as such, disappeared just as quickly. Anger scrubbed every courtier’s discretion from him, and returned to him his true foul temper of a Demon. Ghirahim crossed his arms and faced Majora.

“If you supposedly know everything, surely you can tell me if Zant is hiding anything else from me.”

He very quickly saw that boldness cost him. Majora approached him, placing each claw carefully before the last in an elegant prowl, and burst into laughter once it was right before him. Just then, it braced itself, bristled its fur to become a mountain of shimmering fleece, and hurled itself at him.

Ghirahim yelled out as he was pounced. Had he thought quick enough, he could have summoned his sabre and buried its tip in the pink flesh of its throat, bared as it was when it guffawed at him. But he hadn’t, so pinned between its claws, he stumbled to the floor, and let it loom over him.

“You are getting greedy, imp,” hissed Majora, inches away from his face. The colors in its eyes pulsed with warning. “By all means, I have been generous with my information… Yet you demand more? Knew I not steel to taste terribly…”

“You cannot blame me for trying –”

“I can,” it growled.

Yet in its rage, Ghirahim found his escape. His one hand concealed under the bulk of the dragon’s scaled claw, he snapped his fingers, and promptly disappeared from under its grip. Instantly annoyed, Majora hobbled in a circle, only to find Ghirahim sitting on a branch above just out of its reach.

“Right, then, I suppose I will have to find out some other way,” said Ghirahim, idly swaying his leg over the edge of the branch. “If neither of us have anything else to tell each other, I assume our little parley ends here.”

Majora flexed its talons, for a moment looking as if it would jump up and scuff him. But it narrowed its eyes in a relinquished temper.

It sat back down. “If that’s how you want to part, fine by me. You’re dismissed, ‘Demon Lord’.”

“Wonderful. I hope to be seeing very little of you, Great Gluttony Majora. Enjoy the new skin. I found mine suited me quite well.”

With another snap of his fingers, he was out of sight of the clearing. He felt like a buzzing in his head finally faded, while he hadn’t even noticed it come on as he spoke with Majora. With a few more paces, it had gone completely. Just as he, Majora had departed. As it did, the forest took just a moment of quiet; held its breath. Then, it sighed collectively, a knee-height plume of fog pouring in through every crack. Above him, at his feet, and every which way, chittering and chirping filled his empty head in gratitude. He supposed, for now, the annoyance of fairies was preferable to the hatred and regret he’d left simmering on the backburner after the encounter of mere moments ago.

It was time to head back.

Ghirahim shambled back through the treeline. Gossamer fog pulled away from him like a sigh the further he departed from that clearing, the fairies’ cries faded with every step. As luck would have it, he’d let himself be lured into the woods by the Fair Folk, and they hadn’t even had the decency to spirit him away.

Back he went to his house of conspiracy. With that excuse for escape now locked behind him, Ghirahim felt an odd sense of peace. A resigned one, but peace nonetheless.

Ghirahim neared the edge of the forest, but did not yet surface from it. Through the leaves, the last light of dusk colored his surroundings golden, tree trunks carving big black pillars of shadows all throughout this dying light. These shadows made for a fine hiding spot, but not at all from the man looking for him. It then struck him just how long he must have spent with Majora, even if at the time, it seemed like minutes.

Which meant all the more that he should quit dawdling. Ghirahim stepped through the mouth of the little elephant path he’d followed before and entered the town.

His King was waiting for him there. Zant sat on a stack of firewood outside the house, staring at the first stars speckling the skies. On his hands, he was idly letting some kind of beetle tromp along his wheeling fingers. He perked up from his thoughts when Ghirahim’s arrival rustled the thicket. The two met eyes.

“Gone for a bit of an evening walk?”

“Indeed. You don’t mind, do you?” Ghirahim scoffed. “Surely, you can manage an hour or two without me?”

Zant smiled, turquoise flashing through the marks of his forehead. “Yes, I can, but I would prefer not to,” he responded, beckoning him over to sit with him. Ghirahim only half-refused, opting to lean against the shack wall behind him, instead.

With a brief pause, Zant looked over his shoulder to address him. “Right, ah… Listen, Ghirahim. I wish to divulge the next step of my plans with you.”

Ghirahim hummed, cocking his head. “Just about time, I’d say.”

While Zant should have expected snark, he clearly didn’t. A little caught off guard and flustered, he continued. “... Yes, my apologies. I –”

“Oh, please,” interrupted Ghirahim. “I don’t want any excuses. Just tell me.”

Zant nodded sheepishly, then scraped together what little dignity he could. “I will allow myself a few more days of rest, six at the latest. We will reclaim the Triforce of Power first, but we cannot take the Valley with just the two of us. We will need troops.”

So, that’s what he wanted all along. Ghirahim couldn’t even find it in him to be surprised. Perhaps somewhere, he’d hoped that Zant was content with Ganon’s death alone. But, always there was more. His Master and Zant, both, thirsted for Hyrule’s throne. It was to be expected that he would follow through, and, with enemies like theirs… They’d need some seriously hefty tools for the job. Taking the Triforce was the next logical step.

‘We can start anew,’ indeed… They were back at square one.

The lack of response made his companion nervous. Somewhat anxiously tapping his foot in the dirt by his seat, Zant continued. “The Bulblin Clans have been loyal to me before, and they are easier to persuade than most. When I have recovered, we will recruit them first thing.”

Eyes cast to the ground, Ghirahim hummed, crossed his arms. So, their little getaway was to end so soon.

Zant shifted in his seat. He looked up at him. “But, in the meantime, Ghirahim, I want to ask you a favor.”

“And what would that be?” Ghirahim asked, tipping his head. Might as well humor him.

“I have been resigned to bedrest for too long, and I fear I have grown sluggish. For both our sakes, Ghirahim, teach me how to wield you again.”

Ah, this was it. Just as he’d predicted, Zant was to break through his walls, and free what part of himself he had so thoroughly kept locked away. Smothered no more, the little dagger that loved him so pressed itself to the gate of its prison, and awaited its opening with bated breath. They would give it what it wanted. The Demon Scimitar was made to be wielded, just as he was. At least a part of him should feel that satisfaction.

So, saying nothing, Ghirahim pulled the Twili to his feet. In doing so, the wobbly creature stumbled into him, squeaking in surprise. That saved him the trouble of pulling him close, he supposed. Hands at his sides, Ghirahim craned his head up to look at him, daring him to act. Zant had wronged him, worse than he thought he ever could. Yet, Ghirahim saved his life, twice over. The least he could do now was show him that he at least had the guts to assert himself. Ghirahim would not lead this dance.

After some deliberation, the wide-eyed gawking of his amber eyes and wiggling fingers on reserved hands, Zant made his move at last. One lanky arm curled around his waist, as it would always do, while the other hovered above his chest. For once, it was Zant avoiding his gaze, not the other way around. All this effort, all this plotting, all these meticulous efforts to secure his usurpation… And now he could not even touch the one he called his lover. He was a fool. A coward. And Ghirahim would not stand for it. So he tested what Majora claimed it had done.

He pierced through that frail, mortal mind at once. Of course, against his Gradiegra, he’d built no wards. Ghirahim seized him firmly by what tethers he could grab, and commanded him.

Look at me.

With a yelp, Zant obeyed at once. And when those glowing eyes found the deep, void pupils of his own, Zant faltered. His hand fell on his chest and the Scimitar was beckoned. Their souls latched together, just like that. Crack, crack, Twilit magic slowly peeling away the skin to his core to lay bare that precious gem. Where he was once apprehensive, Zant quickly became eager. For a powerful blade was just that, and he would chase after such an allure without cease. Even if it meant toying with the heart of the one who mattered most to him. Especially then. But it was not just Ghirahim’s deepest self brought to light – he still had Zant ensnared, like fingers wrapping around his throat. As his questing magic lapped at the edges between them, Ghirahim saw every inch of him. Through his mind, through his hands, and through his eyes, so close to him now.

So was the truth to be revealed. Zant had not changed. After parting his veil of lies, Ghirahim expected to find a completely different man hiding behind. But he did not. All that had changed was the light he saw him in. And how dazzling it was, pointing at his every nook and cranny, bright as day! He’d torn him open, baring every ugly rotten part of him, that stabbed and plotted and hated, so, so deeply, sticking out from his flesh like hooks to gutted fish. And yet, amidst all now in plain sight, Zant’s eyes looked at him that very same way. A laughably simple plea for affection glinted in the wetness of his eyes. Somehow, even when orchestrating a grander scheme than Ghirahim could even dream of doing, a deathly weapon within reach, Zant could think to wish for his companionship – No, to strive for it, to hold it tight and make it his own. As if it could be of any importance, as if Ghirahim cared, as if he expected him to simply forgive him overnight. All just because he loved him.

They were the same, in this way. They’d ripped each other apart and sat panting across each other, hands drenched in each others’ deepest parts. In this idiotic, violent act, the borders between them had blurred and slurried together.

Oh, how they were the same. And how gently Zant traced his fingers along the measly wall that kept them separate. Hoping, perhaps, that a tender touch now might ease the violence that would come later. It would not, but the sentimentality of it all would bring mirth to even this demon. Nevertheless, Ghirahim groped his wrist, dragging him along to place his hand square on his chest. Ghirahim then wished nothing more than to be breached. To return the favor, to mend what was broken. The gentle flutter of eyelashes and Zant’s shaky breath tickling his skin made the wait unbearable. All at once, the heat in his body gathered in his chest, and its surface cracked. His core was within view, within touch. Enter me. Let us blur together some more.

So, Zant’s fingers slipped past him. Dodging his sharpest facets, and plunging directly into the molten heat of his core, Zant made his way to that promised hilt. And as his hand drew closer to its goal, so too did their bodies draw together. They hid in each other, their faces buried into the napes of each others’ necks. Like this, Ghirahim could feel every wince, every drop of sweat from that awful Twili, who struggled through his endurance to keep his hand in the blazing heat of his chest. Ghirahim smiled a wicked smile, and at last, embraced the man who tried so hard for him.

“By the eighteen Hells, I hate you,” Ghirahim hissed. But how I missed this love.

“Then, forged by the fires of those Hells, and your burning hatred, Yima Oibede, let me draw our blade.”

Ghirahim laughed in mockery. Yet, all the same, he jut his chest forward, and in doing so, pushed the pommel of the blade he’d hidden into Zant’s hand. Such tenderness had earned him this gift; embraced as he was, with each engrossed in nothing but the other. For a sword was equally made to be held, as it was made to kill.

Spindly fingers finally dared to curl around the grip of him. But when Zant tugged, he found it stuck. Once again, the blade was incomplete – after such a betrayal, the image of their bond had irrevocably changed. So, the little dagger that embodied it had to change, too. This time, when the blade sapped Zant of his strength, he did not yelp, he did not even flinch. Readily, he poured his magic into it, and let its threads be woven into a truly wicked sword.

Ghirahim hated it. He wanted that composure shattered and he wanted it fast. So he sunk his teeth into the tender flesh of Zant’s neck and let him squirm. And, though indeed, his reaction was as delicious as the taste of his blood, it only lasted so long. Zant, driven by what could only be instinct, snarled with bared teeth and bit him back. Like two wild dogs entangled in strife, they took from each other, one pulling at shards of the soul, and the other savoring drops of blood. Ghirahim let ichor leave him past the holes left in him by needle teeth, and Zant lapped it up, even if by all means, it could poison him.

Zant whined at him through black-stained lips. “Ghirahim-ili… How I’ve longed to rule with you by my side.”

With that promise, Zant freed the blade with one last tug. It burst from him, spurting an arc of white-hot liquid metal in its trail as Zant held it by their side. The Demon Scimitar has returned to his hand, once wicked but now gnarled, black and red in hatred and the love of a bleeding heart. Even with this blade in his hand, as instrumental a key it was in his plans, Zant never took his eyes off the scabbard in his arms.

When they kissed, it was like lightning. Fierce, shocking, and above all, bold, serving to release their bottled-up affections and frustrations both. With the taste of iron on their lips, they sealed their blood pact in this way. A promise of carnal pleasure, turbulent love, and of course, with blade in hand… The violent glory of battle.

When they parted, neither of them could say how long they’d stood there in lip-lock, though the smearing of blood and cosmetics gave them an idea.

Now, Zant stepped back, his arm still loosely resting on Ghirahim’s waist. He finally took the time to survey the changes to their blade. A grin stretched across his face… He likely didn’t even notice it did.

“Beautiful, Ghirahim-ili,” he said, turning it in his hand to drink in every angle. “I would go to war with no other blade.”

Ghirahim slipped from his embrace and laughed. “Then prove it. Let’s fight.”

Ghirahim drew his own blade, one simple and heavy. He did not have the concentration to summon anything more thoughtful, for his core hummed and buzzed far too erratically to let him even think of a careful choice. The man whose hands just plunged into his soul and pulled out his own piece stood before him… With his stance too wide and his arms wobbling. Where Ghirahim wanted to again spiral into conflict and despair, he now puffed out a laugh.

“Last time I struck you in the chin for such sloppy stancework, Zant, but I’m a little hesitant to do so, without your helmet to guard you.”

Zant grinned. “I don’t think you’re hesitant at all.”

“You’re right,” Ghirahim chimed. At once, he launched for him. Zant flinched, but did not falter, swinging upwards to catch the offending blade on his fingerguard. Of course, Ghirahim didn’t fight him with all his vigor… They were only practicing, after all, and Zant was recovering from the brink of death, still. But every few swings, he found he could hit harder than he anticipated. Only once did Zant’s hands shake enough for their clings to slip, and land him a painful jab to the wards in his armpit. He was still just as careful, as analytical, and as fierce as he was before his bed-ridding… Taking advantage of the new, thorny shapes jutting from the Demon Scimitar, he flicked Ghirahim’s swing off course.

When Ghirahim was then struck, he stumbled, and realized how he’d been tricked.

“ ‘Teach me how to wield you again’ ? What an awful excuse! You remember what I’ve taught you just fine,” Ghirahim grimaced, poorly masking a grin with fake rage as he brought the flat of his blade down on Zant’s shoulder. “Deceitful fiend! You baited me.”

“Indeed, I teased you,” Zant whistled through gritted teeth, prying the both of them apart through the locking of their swords. “But I could use the refresher.”

They trained for what felt like hours – not from dull exhaustion, but because the minutes melted away as they clashed their blades under the setting sun. Zant’s joy was infectious – or was it he who had started laughing? – and soon, they chased each other in a true mockery of swordsmanship. They then cared not what bruised or what tore. All that mattered was this dance.

Inbetween manic giggles, Zant reeled him in with glee. “Don’t you feel it, Ghirahim-hasir? The thrill of sparring again? Day, after day, how I’ve longed for this!”

Ghirahim could have berated him then, for having dared dream of such childish things while bringing him such suffering. But to reject this shared joy now, nothing could feel more unnatural. So, he went for the next best thing: a swordmaster’s scolding. He had been merciful with Zant’s sloppy mistakes up until then, but no longer. Whacking right into the Scimitar’s sharp edge, he trapped Zant’s blade in his and wrenched it from his hands with one sweep of his arms. With nothing left to protect him, Zant flinched, staying perfectly in place to then be kicked square in the chest and knocked to the ground.

Sword planted firmly in the soil right beside Zant’s face, Ghirahim stepped over him, one foot at each side of his chest, and leered down. “Then, you ought to long for tomorrow, too, Twilight King. You’re getting rusty.”

Blinking up at him and panting, Zant was frozen in place from his startle and exhaustion. A drop of ichor falling on his cheek thawed him out quickly enough. His fingers curling around his victor’s blade, he smiled.

–

And so, six days went by, with Zant retiring from his bedrest and taking up their blade once more. Before the sun rose, Ghirahim was shaken from a daze to find the bed next to him empty. Stood waiting at the window, eyes wide and staring miles ahead of himself, was Zant. The day to recruit their soldiers had arrived.

They joined hands. Zant knew just where the Bulblins would be that season, and could warp the both of them there, without Ghirahim’s assistance. Since the event of Ganon’s death, Zant had recovered almost to the point of being his old self, if one ignored the gray hairs, the scars, and the dent along his jaw. Magic flowed through his veins once again – if Ghirahim had to hazard a guess, he must have been conservative with it before, not wanting to draw the attention of their Master. He wondered, idly, if sharing a piece of the same Triforce came with a bond he could not have had. Ghirahim shut this line of thought, very quickly, before he could vie for the attention of a dead man all too severely.

They arrived at the outskirts of the Bulblin settlement shortly, just as the sun began to set behind the dry grass. The expanse colored ochre in the light of dusk, almost bloodstained, to cast the camp in a similar light. It was a tall-fenced enclosure, with only some shacks on the outside for the occasional pastoralists… Who were now glaring at them with great scrutiny. Upon wandering a smidge too close to the gate, a small troupe of guards marched up to halt them. Only to then, where they’d been blinded by the sun before, realize who stood before them, and sent one of their numbers to inform the Earl post-haste.

Led through the sea of tents and cabins, they arrived at a large, black, goat-hair tent at the nexus of the settlement. Inside, they found – eyes led to the center by racks upon racks of ornamental weaponry and tapestries – the Bulblin Earl, Lord Hallra, seated upon a wooden throne, and surrounded by smaller blins.

Upon their entry, Lord Hallra laughed, his arms spread and clutching a massive axe in his right hand. “Shadow Lord Zant,” he shouted, beckoning them to approach. “What a surprise. Word had it you’re dead. Or has your Master resurrected you once more?”

Zant bowed his head, just to be polite. Ghirahim did no such thing. “No, Lord Hallra. I am alive and well. And, here today, of my own accord.”

The Earl leaned forward, his elbow resting on his knee. He wore a cheeky grin. “Then, I take it that you need something from me.”

“Indeed I do,” said Zant, prompted to continue by a gesture of Lord Hallra’s meaty hand. “Your hospitality is much appreciated, Your Excellency, and assures me that our favor with you has not yet faded. I will keep it short. As soon as our forces are ready, I will march for the Valley of Seers. To do this, I need soldiers. Your clans happen to be the finest that I know.”

Flattery. How bold. Ghirahim decided to sit this one out – he had very little to do with the brutes around them, as interested as they seemed to be in him. Doubtlessly, the smaller Bulblins peeking at him through the spear racks were making plans to make some room for him in the armory.

Lord Hallra, meanwhile, rumbled thoughtfully and sank back into his chair. He ruminated on the offer for a frustratingly long time. Finally, he shook his head, rattling the decorations on his horned helmet.

“My people have sworn ourselves to you before, Shadow Lord. You are strong, I know this, but we have already pledged our allegiance to Ganondorf before. By all means, he was your superior, and still he failed. I see no reason to join forces with you again.”

Such words were poison to Zant, made vile by the mentioning of his former Master. Zant recoiled accordingly but did not back down. “Ganondorf was a fool, and so was I, when I followed him the first time. He was under the impression that he could rule alone, abandoning those who served him to keep his throne of ashes to himself. He did so in the Age of Twilight, and he would have done so again. My usurpation of Hyrule now will be very different from back then. I will not settle for a mere piece of the Triforce. This time, we will claim all of its power in full, for our own.”

Though he seemed ready to have the two dismissed just seconds before, Lord Hallra sat back in his throne, scratching at his beard with intrigue. “Curious, then, how you didn’t attempt taking it before.”

“Back then I did not know I could. The Triforce will only settle in the palms of those with its birthright. Unless you know how to tear it from them.”

“Hah! I don’t suppose you can simply tell me?”

Just then, Zant exchanged a glance with Ghirahim. They at once spotted a weakness in Lord Hallra’s otherwise powerful stature. An obvious fracture to Ghirahim, but seemingly, just as clear to his companion. Zant was a demon in this way. A desire – and if the Earl had something to wish for, so did the Twilight King have a bargaining chip.

Naturally, Zant sunk his teeth into the opportunity with a smile and amicably raised hands. “You spoke of our allegiance before. Centuries past for you, and mere months ago for me. I remember it clearly. Particularly, how you abandoned your bond to me when Hyrule’s Hero bested you in battle.”

At the first sign of a frown from Lord Hallra, Zant stepped closer. Sand puffed up from the tapestry below his brass slipper. “The Bulblins are an honorable people. You follow the strongest. With Hyrule’s victory over Ganondorf, I do suppose that would make Queen Zelda your superior, but I know neither of you would fancy such an alliance. Instead, I propose the following.”

Reaching behind him, Zant took the hand of his Sword without having to look for him. He held him as if escorting him to a dance, feather-light. “Lord Hallra, I challenge you to a duel. If I am the victor, the Bulblins will serve me with their numbers in overtaking the Valley of Seers once more. Should you win, I will surrender, and with it, bestow the knowledge upon you that shall lead you to the Triforce. It will be yours to command, and yours alone.”

As Zant spoke, the pudge of Lord Hallra’s cheeks dented more and more under the force of his knuckles as he leaned his face upon them. With that last sentence, a spark of greed lit in his eyes and raised his brows – the bane of all Men. “... Hah! You pillock. Ganondorf would never have proposed such a promising offer.”

Zant’s smile did not even twitch. Slowly raising his hand, he led Ghirahim closer. “Did I not tell you my rule would be very different?”

With a chuckle, the Earl lowered his eyes, hiding his gaze behind wrinkled lids and plucky lashes, like straw stuck into his skin. He leaned into the whispers of a Blin beside him, nodding all the while, until so boldly, he grinned widely, and defiantly shook his head. His hand firmly clutched his armrest. He sat up and boomed his answer. “Aye, that you did. Very well. I accept your terms!”

As the sun set, torches lit around the camp. Zant fitted himself in his form-fitting armor and plates beneath his robes, though his helmet remained as absent as it had been. The Earl’s squires, in the meantime, clad him in chainmail, helmet, and banners, every splinter of metal glittering in the flickering light.

In this almost companionable silence, Zant drew the ire of every bulblin in the room, and lightly addressed his fellow duelist. “I must ask for reassurance, Lord Hallra. For the sake of your people, I hope you have procured some heirs.”

Lord Hallra’s eyes remained ever hostile, until the weight of Zant’s words hit him. Jagged teeth bared, he erupted into gut-shaking laughter, pounding the staff of his axe on the ground beside his throne. His underlings burst out in a heckling chortle beside him.

“Shadow Lord. I have lived to see fifty-three monsoons, and in this time, taken four wives. You tell me if you think I have heirs.” Creaking his chair, he leaned forward with a mocking grimace. “Do you?”

“Oh, I do not expect to need them,” Zant waved him off. With a single tug, he pulled his Demon into his arms, one hand bracing on his shoulder. “Ghirahim, our blade, if you will.”

So was the Demon Scimitar drawn. Their entourage was led behind the Earl’s throne room to an open-air battlefield. At the sight of their leader, clad in steel and axe in hand, clamor burst out throughout the camp. Every blin and mount, be they green, red, or magenta, just about plastered themselves to the fence to watch the battle unfold. All were eager to witness their leader off another poser. His people were confident in him and cheered thrice as loud, wishing him his fortunes in defeating their former lieutenant.

And, truth to be told, Lord Hallra was formidable. Decades of pure, honed strength jettisoned his every swing. The massive axe flew through the air, never losing its edge no matter how hard he cleaved it into the dirt. More and more of their arena was destroyed, both men leaving decimation in their wake. The Earl pushed Zant off of him with shoves of his axe handle, or kicks of his feet, or swings of his horns. Against anyone, man or beast, Lord Hallra would fall to no weapon.

Had his opponent not been Zant. Ghirahim could see it in his floaty gait – he was simply stretching time, perhaps to allow this washed-up senior his last moments of glory in front of his people. But when Zant drew his blade; truly drew it, with killing intent palpable enough for Ghirahim to feel it in his soul, it was over in seconds. Shadows trailed Zant as he burst forward, then assailed the Bulblin General from all angles in wicked tendrils. One slice of the Demon Scimitar, and the first of Lord Hallra’s armor was torn through like paper. A second swing, and yellowed fat tissue pooled free from a blood-drenched wound. Before the third could land, the hammer-end of the axe crunched into Zant’s upper arm, but it wasn’t enough to save Hallra’s life.

A flash of darkness. A splatter, a deafening silence from the crowd. Zant limped to the severed head now on the floor and raised it before his army. Their contract was sealed.

#ghirazant #ghirahim #zant #ganon #tftk #beararts #bearwrites #majora #skull kid

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