#he was woodcutter before he was cursed i think

[sunburstsandmoonshadows]

From earlier, if dipper and Mabel got turned, do you think the other 3 got changed as well?

Like maybe Soos becomes clay and can change into different tools? And maybe Wendy becomes an action figure with gimmicks and accessories? While Stan becomes a teddy bear (since he’s the twins papa bear for the summer?)

I've been debating this with myself tbh!! Originally I was thinking maybe Stan also got cursed, with everyone else being fine, but I've realized I find it very fun to have just Dipper and Mabel be cursed while everyone else are as normal as ever. (So not normal at all, lol.) I just enjoy drawing kid-sized bobble-headed dolls next to regular humans. So Dipper and Mabel are the only cursed ones.

If the other Shack residents were turned as well, I think Soos could be a wind-up tin toy since he's always willing to work when prompted, just like the toy starts walking if you turn the key. As for Wendy, while being an action figure does maybe go against my name of 'handcrafted pines' for the au...well, she's technically not a Pines either! And I do love her being an action figure. Ax and ushanka sold separately!

[hatchetmanofficial]

(I love this question and I love your username!!!)

Thanks!

I like to think that Alan still has a part of him, that wants to weasel his way back into society, especially after meeting his Doe-eyes. But he can never have it. It's selfish of him to want.

Or Alan doesn’t believe that even if he can get away he can be redeemed/deserves it. Or could cope with being part of society.

Boss is unpredictable and very much so picks those who believe they are someone without a cause. I'd like to think that The Beast's song "Come Wayward Souls" applies to him.

I really enjoyed Over The Garden Wall, and especially Come Wayward Souls/Potatus Et Molasses. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=hWgVdUv9UHo

It’s a shame the show got pulled from streaming services in a lot of locations.

TW suicide, death, religion feel free to ignore and delete this ask if it’s too heavy or triggering.

I watched Over The Garden Wall years ago and while I haven’t actually read The Divine Comedy/Dante’s Inferno directly… I need to as I’ve found a great VN that also derives from it called 10:16 …I seem to remember some analyses that describe the sin of despair.

(Makes sense. Catholics believe suicide is a sin.)

That is why blithe Greg was aided unlike Wirt. He is a child, innocent of the sin of despair, and in turn his seemingly random foolish actions stave off disaster, ie. dumping the coins from the ghosts creates a bonding experience while getting to Adelaide’s house so Beatrice can change her mind about betraying them.

(Also - that means they didn’t pay the coins to the ferryman to cross Acheron/the Styx! Charon’s Obol. Put into the mouth or on the eyes of the dead for that purpose. They also played a song for clemency like Orpheus.

Technically they haven’t paid for passage or received rites so cannot cross over into death and are trapped on the Earth side of the bank! Forced to wander/given more time before crossing. This may have been key to finally getting out of there. Though a villager in Harveston did say it wasn’t their time.)

And Greg is only ever in real danger when he loses hope, gives up and chooses to sacrifice himself for Wirt.

Wirt only breaks the curse when he has a realisation and dares to hope. To act. Otherwise he would have been trapped as the new employee, the new woodcutter/soul reaper/perpetuator of the cycle.

So… The Beast, and perhaps the Boss, do prey on despair and the lost. And potentially suicides but I’m not sure.

The Edelwood trees also recall The Wood Of The Suicides, which is yet another reference to Dante’s Inferno that I first encountered in The Sandman series. (Though those were in hell.)

So. With Over The Garden Wall being a child friendly allegory for purgatory or hell… I’m actually wondering if Carver, Alan, and Stitches may be dead without being aware of it? Or at least no longer strictly living, caught halfway in the liminal space of the uncanny town.

Stitches was constructed from the remains of three people. Carver doesn’t resemble his past self, retain much of his humanity or remember much about his life. 

Alan… was an unprepared 14 (?) year old runaway who was homeless for at least a year in Canada (?), which means he very likely experienced at least one bitterly cold winter without adequate shelter or clothing. Due to his genetic condition he may not have even been able to feel cold or pain to know how much peril he was in and find shelter, or he was lost.

I don’t know whether he was ‘rescued’ while still alive as an alternative to dying or whether he could have actually succumbed to exposure (or to despair in a tragic literal sense) and been found then.

I wonder if this is a Charon situation, if Alan replaced a disobedient employee and a future victim may replace him. (Perhaps Stitches is being lined up, or was created to watch Alan.)

Are the employees psychopomps? 

Or cultists enacting sacrifice?

Both?

In a way Alan cutting down people with his hatchet recalls the cutting down of the Edelwood Trees, that being a metaphor for death.

(I wonder if the choosing is similar to that of the employees - if he takes the despairing, those lost in life, or those who get lost in the forest. The victims are cut down with a hatchet, reaped to feed/fuel the Boss/the Beast.)

Which is more traditionally represented with a field of wheat being reaped by Death’s scythe.

A cornfield, another scary liminal space where people get lost, with similar reaping imagery, has also been associated with evil supernatural entities. 

A good example is He Who Walks Behind The Rows, implying an ancient evil god/cult worship and human sacrifice. Giving a hint of why the Boss might be making them do this.

Much in the way the Ancient Greeks believed they needed to placate gods and ghosts with blood.

Doe Eyes is a pull to humanity and life. Orpheus trying to lead Eurydice out of Hades. 

Or maybe the coworkers are just metaphorically ‘dead to the world’ through being taken in by the cult and largely isolated from society. (Stitches though is absolutely on some level dead or was never alive.)

I’m also seeing some Twin Peaks/Deadly Premonition parallels with forests/trees, weird towns, and another entity like BOB feeding on suffering.

I remember reading that the Boss may have been partially inspired by Bill Cipher too, so I’m wondering if the town is a little pocket of supernatural chaos. 

Bill (a yellow pyramid) was in turn inspired by Nyarlathotep, who liked to start cults and spread chaos and discord amongst mortals - and where Nyarlathotep is associated with pyramids The Boss is embodied in a similarly angular form of a diamond shaped sign. A yellow sign! 

The Yellow Sign is a symbol that is usually used by the Brotherhood of the Yellow Sign, a cult that worships the Great Old One Hastur. It is said that the symbol can bestow supernatural powers such as mind-control and possession, and is used to get people under the control of the King in Yellow.

Actually… Past traumatic event in Doe Eye’s life and (spoiler) aside, that may also explain Doe Eye’s nightmares and inability to sleep. As well as their pull to the forest.

So while I’m half recalling all of this or extrapolating from googled snippets maybe all of these things together are hints to the Boss’s eldritch nature.

However, he can still influence his employers. If he sees someone get out of line, he would simply have to put them back in place. Alan, however, never gave Boss any hassle, not even when he first found him. You could say he has a clean track record when it comes to his job. Until doe-eyes that is. When I say that Boss kinda has favorites. He truly does.

I think Alan was too young, beaten down and scared to rebel and so obeyed without question. I think the Boss liked that. Alan is wolf coded but was as obedient as a lamb. Or the Boss’s loyal dog, used to guard and attack.

I had a blast reading through all of this

thank you tumblr user krowspiracyanon!

[dvarapala]

udyati smiles at pudding. for a moment, she falls silent. takes her time to think. then she's got one. "well, this one didn't happen to me personally but i could tell you about this one lady, see? she was a princess. very beautiful, very gracious. kinda like you, actually." the compliments fall freely from her lips and udyati smiles once more.

"anywhoozies, lots of people came and asked for her hand. but she rejected all of them. none fit her standards. so the king said: 'fine! you can go and find your own husband, then!' and the princess was like: 'i will!' and off she went, taking only some food, weaponry, and the clothes on her back. in the end, she stumbled upon a forest. and in that forest lived a woodcutter. at once, the princess fell in love. and he loved her too. they got married and the princess was content to live out the rest of her days in the woods - even though she didn't know half as much as she ought to, being a woodcutter's wife. but her husband - once a prince, now cursed to be a woodcutter forevermore - was marked for death. marked by the gods. he only had one year left. the princess could not - would not - let that stand. so when the woodcutter died, she clung to his body, howling fiercely, threatening to tear the reapers limb from limb."

udyati runs a hand through her hair. "it became so bad that the god of death himself had to step in. he took the woodcutter's limp body and set out, readying himself for the long walk back to his kingdom. but the princess wouldn't give up. she got up, dusted herself off, wiped her tears and followed the god of death. he warned her that the journey would mark her; she did not heed his words. she kept following him until her feed bled and then, she kept going. eventually, they arrived at the gates to the kingdom of the dead. the god of death was so impressed by her tenacity that he allowed her to ask one favor, except restoring the woodcutter's life. that, he could not do."

but the princess was smart, udyati said, and had a way with words. she twisted and turned them such that the god of death had no choice but to restore the woodcutter's kingdom and bring him back to life. in the end, the princess and the woodcutter-prince lived happily ever after.

that is how the tale ends and, not even ten minutes later, udyati gets distracted by pudding's kitchen creation.

"oh! can i help? or, wait. maybe that's not a good idea. i don't know how souffles work. but i can be your taste tester, maybe? i've never had a one before. a souffle. not a taste tester. though i haven't had one of those, either. it looks good, though. you're a real kitchen whiz!"

either way pudding wouldn't mind, curiosity killed the cat and she's all too aware of that... but satisfaction brought it back, and if anything there isn't really anyone else she could tell such secrets to anyway. so eyes perk up at the mention of many more stories, regardless of their endings.

"an happy one would be nice." and a positive change from the reality she lives daily, in all truth. question is met with a soft hum, gaze darting on the oven glass and its dim light. "uh, soufflé." sheepish smile forms on lips as oven gets opened to reveal a few plates. "i usually only make chocolate ones, but i wanted to try something new."

a moment of silence follows her words as gaze gets lost for a second, thoughts quickly pushed aside out of fear to bore udyati with her silly nonsense. "cheese should be good too, i got it this morning from mont d'or."

[spice-chan]

Cure Me

King!singledad! Bakugo Katsuki x fem!reader

Prince Matsuki makes an interesting friend. he could have never foretold who she is to his father...

TW: curses, sickness

Thank you so much to @stargazingaloneatnight for sending this lovely request ! I totally got carried away though, so it’s going to have a second part. 

Thanks a lot to @patt-writes-stuff and @reddriot for being amazing beta readers !!

Wordcount: 4.4 K

..........................................

At the ripe age of 18, you were married off to the woodcutter in your village. 

You weren’t enthusiastic about it, but you didn’t dissent. After all, in a small village, all the people of close age were expected to marry eventually. It was either him, the farmer or the butcher. A prince isn’t going to come and sweep you off your feet.

You moved to the isolated cabin near the woods where your husband resided, and you lived there with him for a year. You wouldn’t exactly describe it as harmony, but it was peaceful enough for you to be content. He respected you and you respected him, but you yearned for something more.You yearned for love, for the overwhelming feeling that would envelope you whole, that would elicit shivers from your spine, and down to your very toes. 

But you had to get those foolish fantasies out of your head; after all, your husband was now all you had. Until you didn’t have him anymore. 

His body was found, squashed underneath a large tree that fell the wrong way. 

Guilt and loss reigned in your mind and heart. You wondered, should you have appreciated him more ? Should you have cherished the little moments instead of wishing for something better? 

It was a lonely existence for a while after that, until a red eyed, spikey haired little boy ventured to your isolated abode. 

………

Loneliness was a disease that feasted on your open wounds until they were gaping holes, bleeding and gushing, but you were unable to stitch them back together. Who wants to be lonely, truly? So all Bakugo did was cover the open wounds with his hand, growling protectively as he shielded himself. And he couldn’t stitch together the hole in his chest, even when his hand was stained red as evidence of his pain. 

He thought he loved her. He convinced himself he loved her. The only woman and person who seemingly managed to stand him and understand him. He tried so hard to be good to her. Tried to act better when he saw the gleam of judgement in her eyes. Only to wake up one day with a letter telling him “don’t look for me” and “I’ll be somewhere better. Away from you and that spawn. Good luck with him, though you’ll probably have enough soon and throw him somewhere far, the sound of his cries is annoying.” 

Him. 

She couldn’t bring herself to say her son’s name. 

It’s like he was a disposable piece of trash to her. Katsuki’s teeth gnashed whenever he remembered the way she spoke of her own son, his son. 

“DAD!” screamed a little boy, the carbon copy of his dad, running to his father's lap where he ducked down and hid between them. 

Bakugo growled playfully, bending his back to look at the excitable little boy, who held his finger to his lips. 

“What do you think you’re doing, squirt?” 

“I’m hiding from Shitty Maid.” 

Katsuki quirked his eyebrows at the foul language that came out of his son’s mouth, but his response never made the light of day as a flustered and heaving maid entered the dining chamber, her eyes frantically searching. 

“My king, I’m so sorry ! Have you seen Prince Matsuki come here ?” she questioned breathlessly, the prince having evidently tired her out. 

Bakugo clicked his teeth rather impertinently. “No, you shitty maid, I didn’t see him come here,” he replied and resumed eating, seemingly unperturbed by his son being ‘missing’. 

“Sorry, Your Majesty, I’ll resume my search for him. Sorry to have disturbed you!” she exclaimed before picking her gown and scrambling out. 

Bakugo stared beneath his chair pointedly, his carbon copy only giving doe eyes as a reply. 

“Why are you hiding anyway?!”

Matsuki crawled out from underneath the chair and stood up, dusting his knees. 

“She wants to teach me eti-etiquette or whatever,” Matsuki grumbled. “I’m going out to play with my friends.” 

Etiquette? How useless. Is that what they are teaching his son? 

Bakugo clapped his back, glad to see his son not be a pushover. “Don’t be late, squirt.”

“Ok, dad!” Matsuki jumped and enveloped Katsuki’s muscular frame in a hug with his tiny arms, warming Katsuki’s heart as he ruffled his son’s spiky hair. 

……..

Matsuki couldn’t find his friends. 

He ventured into the woods in search of them, sporting a scowl everyone should be familiar with. His tiny, handsome face scrunched slightly as he looked around the place curiously. His feet padded on, scrunching on crispy fallen leaves in their wake. 

He walked for a while, marking trees as he went along to ensure he didn’t get lost, but eventually, a sugary sweet scent had his tiny legs move faster on their own accord in search of it. The closer he seemingly got, the more powerfully the mouth watering scent assaulted his nose. It smelled cozy on this chilly day, like a warm cup of milk by a warm fire as snow fell outside.

He reached a clearing. The thick, intimidating trees that loomed over him shrunk away until there was none left. 

No trees, but he found a small cabin with a window cracked open. 

He boldly marched up to it, his mouth set in a straight, determined line. A fisted palm knocked once, twice, and thrice on the worn out wood, to ensure that it was heard. 

His nervousness set in when the handle turned and a lady emerged at the threshold. He steeled himself. His daddy told him that if he wanted something, he should work to get it. 

You smiled at him warmly when you spotted him: a young, unfamiliar boy. He looked out of his element, but his strange red eyes stared at you despite how he seemed to be unused to such situations. His eyes reflected the embers of a brave soul. 

“There was a nice smell coming from here,” he admitted, his tiny face scrunching into a scowl that seemed more adorable than anything.

“Well, yes, I baked cookies,” you responded mildly, your voice never too high but quite clear. The boy’s eyes widened, his red hues glistening in child-like excitement.

“Cookies?!”  He jumped, and clutched your gown. 

“Can I have some ?” Puppy dog eyes stared up at you, pleading and cute. You haven’t encountered a child in a long time. You stopped going to the village as often, and eventually, they stopped visiting too. Your mother died after she contracted something, her old body unable to fight it off, and your dad ran off somewhere to ‘adventure’. 

“Sure.” You moved from the threshold. “Come in.” You gestured with your head to your small cottage, a humble place, but a reminder of your lonesome existence. 

He brightened up considerably, his mouth twisting into a sweet smile. He would become such a handsome young man once he grew up. It made you wonder how beautiful his parents must be. 

You pulled a chair for him at the table, and went to put some cookies on a plate for him. 

“YUM. That’s so delicious!” He spoke between mouthfuls, some tiny crumbs flying out of his mouth in his excitement. 

“Thank you, but be careful. You might choke if you speak while chewing sweetie,” you chided him lightly. Matsuki didn’t recognize this tone, it sounded equal parts stern and caring. He nodded and continued munching down. 

“Would you like to drink something? I have some orange juice, and uh, water. I could make tea, but I don’t think kids your age fancy that you rambled, suddenly excited about having someone keep you company for the first time in a while. 

He opened his mouth to answer, but upon remembering your words, he opted to chew for a few more seconds then swallowing his cookies before bellowing out,“Yes! Orange juice.” 

How adorable. 

You poured two glasses of orange juice and joined your little companion, munching on some cookies of your own. Before long, he finished all of them and leaned back on the chair, mouth letting out a sigh and hand patting his stomach as a show of overindulgence. 

“Good?” 

“Yup! You’re a very nice lady. Way nicer than my dummy maid,” he grumbled, you weren’t sure whether to be flattered or concerned, but one thing did grab your attention. 

“Maid ?” 

He nodded, slightly confused at your question. 

“Don’t you have one ?” You quirked an eyebrow and looked around your tiny cottage. Did it look like you have one? 

Oh God, you hoped this boy wasn’t mistaking his mother for a maid. With that in mind, you asked him, however, his face fell in sadness and the fire in his eyes dulled a little. 

“I don’t have a mother. The maids always talk about how sorry they are for me. I hate it. None of them even care about me,” he spoke in a quiet voice, tearing at your heart with his down turned face. 

“But at least I have my daddy,” he spoke up, brightening a little. You smiled at that, reaching towards him and ruffling his fluffy yet spikey blond hair. 

“That’s good. Keep cherishing your father, at least the two of you have each other.” You wiped some crumbs from around his mouth with a napkin, speaking to the boy in a lonesome voice; unintentionally mothering him. 

He smiled and nodded;unintentionally accepting. 

The boy was either mistaking some people in his household for maids, or he was some rich merchant’s son. On that note—

“Did you tell anyone you’re coming here? They might be worried about you,” you asked cautiously, but then your eyes widened as a new wave of worry hit you. 

“Oh my God, what if you got lost? Do you know your way back?” 

You sighed in relief when he nodded, flashing you a smile with his teeth on display, one of them missing from the front, making it all the more endearing. You narrowed your eyes at him, prompting him to elaborate. 

“I always come to play around here with my friends. It’s really close to home!” You oo’d. However, it was now his turn to panic. “Oh no, I forgot all about them !” He looked outside, seeing the sun shining proudly in the centre of the sky. 

“I think I can still catch them,” he declared determinedly, and hopped off his seat. His tiny legs carried him to the door, his pale hand grasping the worn down doorknob, but before twisting it, he turned to you, his smile of youth gracing his face again. 

“See you later, nice lad !”

.……..……

“No way! You wanted to be a pirate? But they’re so nasty!” he exclaimed, scrunching his nose at you in disgust. You shrugged, shoulders slumped. 

“I thought it’d be a fun time. I found it in a book and dreamed that one day, I too can embark on an adventure and find hidden treasures,”you explained with a dreamy, yet nostalgic look in your eyes, akin to one looking back fondly at a long gone memory. It’s been nearly a year since you met the mystery child. You’ve been...noticeably happier. 

His cherry red orbs made your day, along with an innocence that was very hard to maintain in these tough times, although that's probably because his toughness differs from yours. 

He pouted, running a hand through his tamed locks. “Well, why can’t you?” 

He stared up at you expectantly, oblivious to what he was expecting. His red orbs burwith ith the flame of innocenand and didnuldn’t dare blow it out. 

“I don’t know.” 

Even for his young age, he was perceptive. Bbut before he could question your downtrodden face, you stood up, coughing loudly. It went on for a few seconds, and Matsuki watched worriedly as you cupped your hand over your mouth, shoulders shaking from the force. 

After you stopped, you breathed for a few seconds, face flushed and stamina depleted. But again, before he could question anything, you stood up, stretching. The sun hit your face, which looked noticeably paler, but you forced a smile anyway, and held your hand out for Matsuki to grab and follow suit. 

“Let’s go inside, you wanted me to redo your hair, right ?” He grabbed your hand with renewed vigor, hopping off the wood and trekking with you back inside the cottage. 

He said his maid had to slick his hair back because they had guests over and he ‘had to look more presentable’, which you internally scoffed at. His hair was amazing as it was. 

You’d never seen a texture so amazing. It was soft as silk, but it appeared spikey. Like a porcupine or something, looked thorny but had a soft side? 

You brought some water and wet his hair, before drying it with a towel. You could already see some results. You brought a hairbrush and began to hum softly while brushing his semi dry blond locks. 

You towelled it once again, before patting him across the back. Your head felt light, and a light pain began to creep in. You probably need some water. 

“THANK YOU! It was so ugly before.” He pranced about, happy that his hair no longer looked like some ‘sappy extra’. You wonder where the child got those interesting phrases. You stood up to get a glass of water, but the moment you stood up, the world swirled, spinned, and blurred. And then it all faded to black. 

You hit the floor with a loud thump, and Matsuki sprung to his feet and frantically ran to your side. 

His small hands grabbed your arm and shook you, his face growing warm and throat getting clogged up, before tears burst forth. They dampened your sleeves, continuously flowing like a waterfall, but you still remained almost lifeless on the floor. Matsuki was young, helpless, and alone. 

And he did what any young, helpless and crying child would do. 

He ran to the person he loves —his father. 

……………

Bakugou heard the sound of Matsuki running before h, felt the wind, tornado like, as the doors of his room were pushed open in a manner so excitable he’d consider it rather insolent had it not been his own son. 

 His reprimands were stuck in his throat when he saw the flushed face and bloodshot eyes of his shis heart aching at the sight. 

“What’s wongh” he asked softly, the tone rather unusual coming from him. Then again, his son coming to him crying was something very rare.oo., Matsuki took after his  and and he was a very brave and strong boy. Something that Bakugou lamented about, at times. Being his carbon copy wasn’t that much of a blessing when it came to the matters of the heart. 

Matsuki found his dad sitting at his desk, he ran to him and clung to his legs, crying uncontrollably. 

It took Bakugou a second to overcome his awkwardness and emotional constipation. He scooped his son up and sat him on his lap, wiping his tears away. 

“Hey squirt, calm down and tell me what’s wrong. If it’s someone that upset you, God help them-” 

Matsuki tried to halt his hiccups, failing for a few seconds while he hugged his dad, he patted his back comfortingly. 

“Dad, my friend…” he began, but his eyes watered as a fresh batch of tears threatened to burst. 

“What happened to your friend, Matsuki?” 

Matsuki sniffled, wiping his eyes before continuing. 

“So, she’d been sick for a few weeks, but today when I visited her, she fell and wouldn’t wake up,” Matsuk explainedd, clutching into Bakugou tightly. 

Bakugou hummed, nodding solemnly. 

“Can you take me where your friend is?” 

Matsuki nodded, but Katsuki was dubious about the nature of this pursuit. His distrustful nature was shining through.If this ‘friend’ was outside the protective barrier, then Katsuki didn’t know what to really expect. So before leaving his room, he donned his protective amber around his neck, a magical jewel chosen by his dragon when he was younger. All shifters choose an enchanted jewel to guard their existence and warn them of dangers. He made sure to pick up his son’s, looping the necklace around his neck, the jewel dangling and shining. 

He needed to give his son a talk about this. 

…………

They walked in the forest for a while before reaching a small, worn out looking cottage. Bakugou arched a blond eyebrow, more curious than ever. He’d think it was a ploy with more sinister intentions, luring both prince and king but… he’d never seen his son more shook up over someone, they must mean a lot to him. He couldn’t bear to delay this. 

They reached the door, the wood creaking as Bakugo opened it. His ruby eyes started searching for you, and when they caught your figure on the floor, they began gleaming. 

He felt the breath knocked out of him when he saw you, asleep (he hoped) like an angel with your hair looking wild but still adding to your charm like a halo. You looked so soft, so precious, and it felt like his life only began this moment when he caught sight of you. 

His heartbeat was so strong, he could feel it in his very eyes, who were overwhelmed with the most beautiful person he’d ever seen. He had seen plenty of beautiful women, ones he didn’t spare a second glance at, extras, unworthy of his time. But for some reason, the beauty of you rooted him in his spot and halted all rational thoughts. He was only broken out of his reverie when Matsuki shook him. He felt a rush of love, devotion, and ease like he’d never felt before. It all made sense, the sense of loneliness, of being lost when his path is clear in front of him. Of finding every potential romantic partner lukewarm at best. 

“Dad. Can you help her ? I don’t want her to be sick anymore.”

And in that moment, it dawned on him. 

Katsuki found his soulmate, but there’s a chance he might have already lost her. 

He ran to you checking your vitals, and thankfully, everything seemed fine. He put his forehead against yours, cursing when he felt a scalding fever. 

“What happened ?” He picked one of the numerous questions buzzing in his head. 

“Well, she did my hair like I’d asked her, but the moment she stood up, she fell down! I tried waking her up, but she wouldn’t. She’d been coughing a lot the past few weeks too and looking tired,” Matsuki explained clearly, now comforted by having his father share the weight with him. 

Katsuki looked around at the rather shabby place. Fit for a commoner. Not you. 

He was baffled at having a mate. Only the most legendary, wise and favoured dragons did, the dragons that made it to history scriptures. Things no one considered him to be. Things he was succumbing to not being. Things she convinced him he wasn’t. Sure, he could fight deadly wars, bring nations down to their knees, but violence did not warrant a soulmate. 

He scoop you up, closer to his chest. Heyouyou tightly, heart physically hurting at the thought of you being in pain. He just met you, what’s with him ? 

He stood up, nudging his son to leave. 

What a coincidence. An insane, crazy coincidence. 

His son, his only blessing in this shrouded world, was what led him to the one thing nobody thought he’d have. 

“Tell me more on the way.

Matsuki nodded. 

……………

Bakugou laid you on his bed, surrounding you with the softest materials one could ever touch. He pulled a chair besides you, lounging on it as he waited for a healer to arrive. 

You remained unconscious, but it seems like your temperature increased even more. He was so lost in his own thoughts, that he didn’t register that Matsuki walked inside the room until he was addressing him. 

“Is she going to be alright ?” Bakugou didn’t have the heart to tell him the truth, then again, he didn’t have the heart to lie to him either. 

“I don’t know.” Somehow saying it out loud hurts even more. 

A knock on the door broke the gloominess. 

“Come in.” 

Hope walked in, in the shape of a short, old lady with medical equipment. 

Recovery Girl inspected you, from temperature to heartbeat. And when done, she sighed. 

“Everything boils down to it being a simple fever, but in that case, she wouldn’t be unconscious,” she explained ambiguously. She took one of your hands, and andr fingertips were icy cold. 

She hummed contemplatively. She brought out a healing crystal, squeezing it in one fist, while she held your hand in the other. The idea was to transfer the healing energy from the crystal to you, only possible through a healing mage. 

However, when nothing seemed to happen, Recovery Girl opened her fist. She found a shattered crystal. 

“Oh my…” 

Bakugou growled, frustration willing up and tipping over. “The fuck!” 

Recovery Girl glared at him. Such language shouldn’t be used in front of a child. 

“Typical healing methods aren’t going to work.” 

Silence reigned over this time, willing the old lady to continue on, both his and his son’s hearts on the edge. 

“I believe she’d been cursed.” 

Bakugou scrunched up his eyebrows at the absurd explanation. Who’d curse you of all people ? He only just discovered your existence!

Yet for some reason, he felt like he’d rather die than let you, the one who could love him for all his flaws, the one who always brought a smile on his son’s face, suffer. 

“How?” The deity up there must be very cruel, to take you away when he just met you. 

“I don’t know, son. There’s a very strong, malevolent energy, enough to break a healing crystal. It’s going to make her body reject anything that could heal it,” she explained solemnly. 

“If you want this young lady healthy and well, we need to take different measures to heal her. Also, do you know who cursed, or where she could have incurred it? That will be very helpful.” 

Bakugou looked at Matsuki, knowing that he himself is clueless. 

“This is the first time I met her. Matsuki seems to have met her a while ago in her tiny ass cottage outside the protective barrier.” She looked like she had some questions, but instead directed her attention to the little Bakugou and asked him what matters most right now. 

“Do you know anyone that might’ve done this? Have you seen her interact with anyone that could possibly be capable of it?” She knew asking a child would likely be more fruitless then not, but she still wished to help you in any way she could. 

Matsuki shook his head. 

“I’ve never even seen her talk with anyone.” This only served to increase Bakugou’s suspensions. Could it be something to do with your affiliation with Matsuki ? And if that was the case, then there’s so many other things he must take into account too, because that would mean that there’s a traitor in their midst, or at least someone that had been tracking Matsuki for… what fucking ever reason. 

He sighed, feeling an ache beginning to form in his head. He touched your arm, wanting to reassure himself that you are alive. 

A gasp rang out from the occupants of the room when you opened your eyes, making them seem glowy when the sunlight reflected off them, giving you an ethereal, angelic radiance. 

The air left his lungs, while blood rushed to his cheeks, making them seem ripe as apples. 

“How is this possible?” 

This shocked him awake, out of his reverie and into reality. 

Recovery Girl glanced at the arm Bakugo was touching, humming to herself with a knowing glint in her old, wise eyes. 

“Well, my king, did you forget? The oldest, most powerful magic that dragons have been gifted::soulmates.” 

Bakugo blushed again, kissing his teeth and glaring at Recovery Girl. 

“What are you babbling on about, old hag?” 

“I believe you know.” 

He glared at the ground, childishly not answering. 

“Um...what’s going on?” A small, feminine voice asked. Bakugou turned to you, melting at the majestic sound of your voice. 

“That’s a good question.” That brat. 

Bakugou tried to stay in contact with you, afraid of making the burst of magic triggered by your bond slipping away. 

“Uh, you lost unconsciousness and Matsuki asked me to help you. Oh, and apparently you were cursed.” Bakugou bluntly spits the facts at you, not thinking ahead for your reaction. 

“A CURSE?” you shouted, coughing after due to hoarseness. The old hag shot Bakugou another glare, before sweetening up and looking at you. 

“We’ll explain after you rest a bit and freshen up, you’d been through quite a bit.” she said, deliberately not divulging any information yet. She didn’t need to be there for the grand explanation. She’d rather not be, actually. 

She stood on her weary legs, leaving the room unnoticed as you admired your surroundings, and as Bakugou admired you. Matsuki’s stare lacked the burn of fascination as he stared at his father grumpily. 

“The fuck you looking at her so weird for?” Matsuki seethed. You gasped and turned to him. 

“Matsuki!” He bristled in frustration, having forgotten how much you hated it when he cursed. 

“Sorry. He was though!” 

Bakugou, throughout the whole thing, glared at his son with blushing cheeks. He wanted to spank some respect into him so bad right now. 

You turned to Bakugo, gaze weighty in the seriousness it’s burdened with. 

“Thanks for helping me, I appreciate it. You’re Matsuki’s father, right? The resemblance is hard to miss. Well, I have a lot of questions, but firstly, what do you mean by cursed?” 

You felt as if a rock was pressed against your chest, gloom overtaking your features as you awaited his answer. Still hopeful that it was a joke, but the ancient dark magic was not to be joked with. 

“Someone cursed you. It’s the cause for your sickness, and it’s slowly sapping the life out of you. You’re only awake because uh...the magic of our bond is more powerful.” Bakugou rushed the last part, his heart beating, squeezing painfully when silence hung in the air after his not so confession. 

You purse your lips, the movement catching Bakugo’s attention, drawing him to your lips. Supple, kissable lips. 

“Our bond?” 

Bakugo nodded. 

“You’re my soulmate, it’s why—probably why Matsuki was so drawn to you.” Bakugo was looking forward to explaining more, before his door was busted open (a common occurrence these days it seems) by a panting soldier, who summoned the strength to salute stiffly. 

“Your majesty, we have received a letter from Celeane Siloh.” 

Well, what a great introduction to the family. 

...............

Kofi

Don’t forget to like and reblog if you enjoyed this !

[konako]

It might just be me but there is not nearly enough conversation about that werewolf hunter guy that kidnapped Snow in the episode "Heartless" in season 6. "Must be the Woodcutter. A bounty hunter who usually specializes in hunting down werewolves," says Snow.

It's not just you, my dude. It's.... It's true. We are overlooking this. Because... Look. I recognize canon has made a decision, but given that it's a stupid-ass decision, I've elected to ignore it.

It’s too much to even attempt to—

There’s so much wrong with that.

To have— To have Blue— BLUE— OF ALL PEOPLE—

Deep breath in, now...

THE FUCKING BLUE FAIRY?!!! REALLY? Really? Oh really?!!!

Hmmmmmm!!!!

Look. Full transparency: I haven’t watched a single episode of season 6 or season 7 (though I’m told the last one is not as bad). I was barely conscious during season 5, only holding on to the promise of seeing Ruby again. I was entirely checked out after 5x18. 

I’ve just watched that episode. Just the scene with the Woodcutter. Just so I can understand what’s going on and, seriously?

Taking a step back out of the universe and looking at the writing objectively, as a consumer?

You can tell it was not supposed to be Blue there. She’s painfully out of place (and time) there. She’s not Snow White’s fighting buddy. She’s never been. She’s the shady one. Blue was not the one for that place by Snow’s side. It was the other color.

But Meghan wasn’t available to bring in Red for this storyline — Which is a shame, because that would have been a juicy storyline for her. But I get it, she was done with the show, the show was done with her. It actually pains me, that it was the case.

It’s a tragedy for the story.

It truly is a great loss. We missed out on having Red Snow (first of all, an excellent dynamic that could have made for thousand more fascinating storylines!) facing, for a brief moment, A Werewolf Hunter. 

Sit on that for a second. Red Snow vs. A Werewolf Hunter.

Think of the potential there!! The expansion of the world! The depth of that story, the many possibilities to be explored for Red Snow pre-curse, pre-Charming. The weight it would have added to Ruby’s past, present and future and for Snow’s character by association! What a great way to evolve her angst into something even bigger!! Wow. 

(But this is OUAT and, by season 6, we had learned that having potential is not a guarantee for a good thing. Sometimes, it’s quite the opposite).

It is truly sad. My grumpy entitled little inner child feels cheated, robbed of a great thing. 

But my adult brains knows better. OUAT has always had great pieces, but often couldn’t put them together (or keep them together for long).

That’s a deception I have to live with, thoughts and prayers for me please.

What I don’t understand is: (two things, real quick, as brief as I can be)

1) Why make it explicitly a Werewolf Hunter, if the implications of that wouldn’t be explored further?

I mean, before I get into why I’m bitter about it, let me be clear: thank you! Honestly, thank you for that! I’m grateful. I’m not even kidding! That’s precious and I appreciate it, thank you for that addition! My headcanon was starved and I needed that!

Because now I know that hunters specialized in werewolves are a thing in the Enchanted Forest (and maybe beyond) and that’s another rant on its own (you can hold me to that). File that in the special folder in my headcanon drawer, Jessica.

That’s an excellent detail to introduce, so the story has yet another layer and can (could 💔) later branch out into interesting confrontations, character relations and dynamics. That’s good!

But... it went nowhere. Not only it wouldn’t be explored further and the one werewolf we know and care about wasn’t there to react to it, but the next best thing: The Werewolf’s BFF had no particular reaction to this.

This is a man that specializes in HUNTING WEREWOLVES FOR A LIVING. He has a nickname, he’s known for it, so we’re to assume he’s good at it, has been doing this a while, has a decent reputation and people call him when needed.

The existence of this character implies that there are people weaponizing silver, studying werewolves and their patterns, learning to recognize them in human form to better kill them, finding ways to imprison them and/or selling them off to buyers with nefarious intentions. Does that mean there is a market for werewolves? For silver weapons? Are there people teaching others in the art of killing a werewolf? (I COULD GO ON!!!) 

Not only that, but SNOW WHITE acknowledging The Woodcutter and taking the time to explain it to Blue means that at least she’s (THEY, and by THEY, I mean RED SNOW OF COURSE!!!) ran into him (or hunters like him) before.

What does that mean for Red Snow as a friendship, as An Outcast Partnering With A Fugitive? How does Snow feel about it? Surely she would outlaw that practice, once she’s Queen. And, most importantly, what about Red? What kind of impact does it have on her life, her self-image and self-esteem? On the way she interacts with people, with the world, on the people she decides to trust with her secret or not. (FOLKS WEREN’T EXACLTY UNDERSTANDING) How does she cope with that? (I COULD GO ON!!! 2)

ALSO (AND THIS IS ME BEING BRIEF, MIND YOU!!) 

2) WHERE THE FUCK IS RED!?!!

“There’s nothing holding me here”, said Snow. 

BUT EXCUSE ME? What the fuck. Where is Red. Where is RED?? (I know where Meghan is, but here is RED?) That’s the question that OUAT has never attempted to answer: Where is Red, while this is happening? 

It’s one thing for them (RED SNOW!!!) to part ways after Snow meets Charming and gets into fighting Regina and all that. But here?! She knows Blue already, she’s not yet met Charming, I’m guessing. So, in this moment in the timeline, WHERE IS RED?!??? What the hell is she doing? Is she in hiding because of the werewolf hunters? Could be! I don’t know!! 

Snow could throw an axe like that, so I’m guessing she’s had some fighting training (first with Red, then with the dwarves I guess), she’s selling stuff, she’s thinking ahead, still in hiding, she’s smart and she’s fast making decisions, so she’s been at it for a while, she’s not the young naive Snow we met during Red Handed. She’s a bit hardened already: SHE’S MAKING PLANS TO LEAVE. ALONE. 

What about the cabin in the woods? WHAT CHANGED? WHY IS SNOW PLANNING ON LIVING THE KINGDOM? ALONE? WHERE IS HER GODDAMN FRIEND?

Deep breath out....

[mugiwara-rosewolf]

A Bundle of Straw & Roses

Fairy Tale AU -- Sanji x F!Reader

(Content: Angst, Fluff, Queer Themes & a little bit of *Spice*)

(Once Upon a Time)

In the land of Germa, where things such as cat carriages and giant sea-faring snails really exist, it is quite a misfortune to be born an only child. Everyone knows that if you fail, then your family's fortune ends with you. Whether you are the child of a poor woodcutter or a prosperous merchant, the luck of your family solely depends on you, if or when you seek your fortune.

(Y/N) was the eldest and only child of a lovely florist in the prosperous town of Iwatobi, named after one of the land's previous rulers before his mysterious, unfortunate demise some years ago. Around the same time (Y/N)'s mother died, come to think of it. Her father had remarried since then, a lovely amber-haired man named Markl. It was quite a drastic change from (Y/N)'s childhood, to be sure. But Markl did his best to honour her mother's memory, treating (Y/N) and her father with every possible kindness.

(Y/N)'s father and his new husband were very proud parents, sending her to the best school in town. (Y/N) read a great deal there, and very soon realized how little chance she had of an interesting future. Many girls her age were the eldest of three; hoping to marry rich and settle down with a family of their own. Others were the youngest of five, insisting they wouldn't bother to marry and instead strike out across the continent on their own.

For her part, (Y/N) wasn't strongly entrenched in either camp. She enjoyed daydreaming about marriage, or about setting out to sea. Though she soon realized that neither future was all that likely. After all, only children were often haunted by rumours of infertility. She was therefore unlikely to land any sort of marriage, whether for money or for love. As for the latter path...leaving your home village for another is one thing. But leaving the kingdom entirely? Much less the greater empire? Preposterous! No one leaves the Germa Empire.

--Only The Lost Ones.

At the start of (Y/N)'s 19th year, everyone began talking about the Lost Queen again. It was said the Queen had threatened the life of her husband decades ago. Upon unveiling Her Majesty's betrayal, the Emporer sentenced her to death on behalf of the gods. A godly sentence is neither quick nor painless. Legend has it the treacherous Queen was gripped with a wretched illness, one that would not release her until she lost what was most precious to her--the equally infamous Lost Prince.

So when, a few months after that, the Royal Palace declared the wonderous return of their 'Lost Prince'--half the country immediately assumed the end was nigh. That the Prince had miraculously returned from the dead to fulfil what his traitorous mother promised--the destruction of their Emporer and his remaining legacy. Even into the swell of spring, the rumours persisted:

'The Queen may've been horrid, but what if the Prince is worse?'

'I heard He survived the curse by collecting young girls' souls.'

'Sucking souls? I thought He ate their hearts!'

'Whichever it is, that Prince is utterly cold-blooded.'

'Right! The undead can only ever be heartless monsters.'

'No one is safe, especially not those poor young girls.'

Hearing these whispers, both Markl and (Y/N)'s father became quite worried, indeed. Warning her to never go out alone, especially in darkness or bad weather--which was a great annoyance at the time. She wondered what use the Prince would have for all those young girls and the hearts he stole.

She soon had other things on her mind, however. For (Y/N)'s father swiftly fell ill and died, just as his daughter finished schooling. As it turned out, her family had been altogether too invested in her future--the school fees her father had amassed left their little flower shop with horrifying debts. The severity of their misfortune was so all-consuming Markl and (Y/N) couldn't even gather sufficient funds for a funeral.

"I'm sorry, (Y/N)," Markl lamented, eyes shimmering with the quiver of his voice. "I've been doing sums back and front and sideways, and the only way I can see to keep the business going and take care of the two of us is..."

"To bury my father...in the woods, unmarked." The realization was slow, sinking like a ball and chain into the sea.

"Y-yes, I'm afraid so."

"So...what now?"

"Now," Markl took a deep breath. "We're too deep in debt to pay our old staff. Everyone's found work elsewhere. ...I'm afraid it's down to us to keep the doors open."

"Just the two of us? -Alone?"

Markl nodded. A small, tired motion, highlighting the shadows grief had painted under his eyes and cheeks. (Y/N) swallowed.

"Alright then," She decided. "We can't very well let Father's dream slip so easily, now can we?"

Her stepfather's glimmering eyes overflowed. His smile was soft, and oh-so relieved. (Y/N) returned the gesture in kind. "--Let's do this."

***

(Y/N) could hardly say she felt resigned to the provincial life. In fact, she always revelled in the joy flowers brought to the community. Since she was a tiny child, she had run in and out of the big work shed across the yard her father used as a greenhouse. Bundles of flowers and flowering fruit trees are all ready to be bundled in wax paper in a ribbon.

Growing up, her father did most of the tedious work; cleaning the dry leaves, changing the soil of the pots and taking care of the orders. Her mother focused more on the flower arrangement. Somehow she made the language of flowers feel like its own art form. Making the flowers shine with life as if they were immortal all along. But with her passing, it seemed some of the magic of flowers died with her.

Now...it was just her and her stepfather, Markl. Sure, both (Y/N), Markl and her father had been perfectly capable of making beautiful arrangements of vibrant colours. But there was always something missing. (Y/N) could feel it in her very bones. Perhaps their customers could feel it too. Maybe that's why business had been trickling in slower and slower in the years since her family's passing. (Y/N) wasn't sure.

All she remembered was her mother's magic.

(Y/N) was sure, if she could somehow bring that magic back, she could revive her family's business. So she could carry on her mother's legacy. She could make her father proud, and make sure Markl never had to worry about putting food on the table again.

The idea became so deeply entrenched in her mind that, after a time, she started talking to the flowers about it.

"Mother used to always make you look so pretty," she'd say to the potted hydrangea.

"I wonder how she did it...you think she learned from an actual wizard or something?" She asked the vines of ivy.

"No, that can't be right. But she must have learned it from somewhere..." (Y/N) muttered to her lily trimmings.

Of course, the flowers never replied to her questions. But who else could she ask? Both her and Markl were up to their ears in requests, all in preparation for the summer festival. With so many orders coming in, (Y/N) had little time to talk to anyone else, really. Spending so much time in her father's greenhouse...(Y/N) liked doing it. She was quite good at making the bouquets, despite missing her mother's gifts. She wondered if her mother ever felt this lonely. The sole heir to a beautiful trade she still felt inadequate in, even after a lifetime of observation and practice.

(Y/N) remembered the whispers that had been swirling back in early spring. How one of her old school friends, Viola, youngest of two, had suddenly become a prodigy in her family's bakery. All season, the Riku family's business had been packed with gentlemen from morning to night, each one buying quantities of cakes and demanding to be served by Viola. She had had ten proposals of marriage, ranging in quality from the mayor's son to the lad who swept the streets. And Viola refused them all!

"I dare say that's quite sensible of her," (Y/N) muttered to the petunias. Wrapping the last bunch in paper with ribbon and a wax seal. "Though I could've sworn when we were younger she wanted to be a princess or a dancer. Funny how it all works out, isn't it?"

No reply.

"How she awakened such skill so spontaneously is beyond me," (Y/N) marvelled, eyeing the pile of receipts beside her. Orders that had yet to be filled. An uncomfortable prickle curdled in her stomach. "Bet she would make even these mundane tasks look glamorous. No wonder all the other ladies look to Viola and despair."

(Y/N) talked to the flowers more and more as weeks went by. There was no one else much to talk to. Markl was out, managing the shop front, trying to whip up more customers. With every bouquet completed, she set them each in a woven basket. One that would likely end up hanging from the elbow of some lovely young lad or lady awaiting a dance from their partner at the festival. Twas the season of engagements, after all. Bouquets like these were often presented between romantic partners; whether already engaged, courting, or yet to be either.

As she finished each bouquet, (Y/N) liked to imagine the person who may gift it to another or the lucky someone who may receive it during the festivities.

"You have mysterious allure," she told one twined with crimson polyanthus.

To a lush, creamy array of Skumpiya, she said, "Your intelligence is only matched by your gentle kindness."

And to the caterpillar green arum blooms with the curly fern fronds she said "Your passion is its own kind of charm."

She told the french willow blossoms tied with velvet that they were "braver and brighter than any other."

(Y/N) told the bonnets of burgundy allspice and indigo monkshood that they would soon belong to a chivalrous soul filled with compassion beyond compare. "You have a heart of gold and someone just as golden will see it and fall in love with you."

This was because she felt sorrow for that particular bouquet. No one understood allspice. Others thought monkshood was only poisonous. Markl would later report that her dear friend Viola had bought that same bouquet on behalf of her sister, Scarlett. This piqued (Y/N)'s interest. For Scarlett was widely considered as little more than a dormouse when compared to her sister. She was so meek, always keeping her hair and face bundled away in the back of the bakery. A few of the ruder old crones around town complained that not even the Lost Prince would steal her heart, let alone a respectable partner.

(Y/N) generally frowned at the sound of such disparaging talk. From what she remembered of the girl during their school days, the young woman was practically sugar incarnate. Just the kind of gentle soul who'd thrive in her family's business. If anything, she probably preferred her younger sister holding the spotlight at the front of the store.

The night before the festival, closing up the greenhouse, (Y/N) admitted to herself the similarities between herself and Scarlet. She picked up a stray bouquet from her work table, cradling it like a child in her arms. Catching her reflection in the glass, plain grey dress and all, Y/N could only imagine how Scarlet would look at the festival. Likely blushing and stammering as she presented her dusky arrangement of flowers to whichever golden soul had captured her heart. Again that strange sensation curdled in (Y/N)'s stomach; a slow, sinking feeling like water circling the drain.

This was a mistake. She thought. The pallid grey dress did not suit (Y/N), particularly when her eyes were red-rimmed from pollen and her hair had frayed from its pleats like over-dried straw. "Like one of those bitter old crones..." she grumbled to herself.

It wasn't that she wanted half the town to offer her marriage, like Viola, or that she wished to tread the familiar footsteps of festival tradition like Scarlett. But she wanted to do something--she was not sure what--that had a bit more interest to it than simply whittling away her youth in an alcove away from the world.

What if I went to the festival? (Y/N) thought suddenly.

The idea was so startlingly simple, she couldn't believe she hadn't thought of it sooner. Tomorrow she could go to the forest, gather some flowers, and when the time comes for the festival just--put herself out there. See what happens. Resolve cemented its roots inside her chest. (Y/N) smiled at her reflection.

I wanted to make my own path--this is the first step.

***

Author's Note: Hello! Welcome to my impulsive outpouring of fantasy exposition! If you stuck it out this far--thank you so much! This short slice of life fairy tale is based purely on Howl's Moving Castle, Wizard of Oz and Whole Cake Island. If you like this little teaser and would like to read more--let me know! All likes, reblogs and comments are more than welcome. Thank you so much for reading, I hope you enjoyed. :)

[lunabonita]

My Webtoon Recommendations

These are webtoons that are all 10/10 for me. Of course it doesn’t have to be a 10/10 for you, so just a reminder, do not attack me for liking a webtoon that you do not. These are my opinions and we are not going to have the exact same taste. Please be respectful.

Your Throne

Genre: Fantasy

Chapters: 75

Status: Ongoing

-

“Tensions are brewing under the seemingly calm surface of the Vasilios Empire, a kingdom ruled by the Imperial Family and the Temple. Lady Medea Solon has lost her place next to Crown Prince Eros, but resolves to win back whats rightfully hers. Will she reclaim her throne?”

You know whats amazing about this webtoon? The summary leads you to think that what shes winning back is the prince. Wrong. Shes trying to win back the throne. I love how this webtoon doesn’t try to make it a girl focusing her goals on a man, but on power. Medea is such a strong and well written character that you can’t help but love her.

The second protagonist Pschye, who of which is the person who took Medeas place as Crown Princess, is the complete opposite of Medea. At the beginning you hate her, but as the webtoon goes on and Medea and her get a better understanding of eachother due to them switching bodies as a wish from God, you begin to root for them as they team up to take over the throne from the Crown Prince.

The art is so beautiful and I constantly found myself at awe from the amount of detail put into it.

-

The Makeup Remover

Genre: Romace

Chapters: 78

Status: Ongoing

-

“After years of being told to focus on studying, Yeseul feels lost when she starts college and is suddenly expected to pay attention to makeup. When a chance encounter with brilliant makeup artist Yuseong leads to her taking part in a televised makeup competition, Yeseul begins to question the role that makeup and appearance play in society.”

This was created by one of my favorite webtoon creators Lee Yone. Their art is just so amazing and their stories always include such good topics.

For instance, The Makeup Remover’s theme is loving yourself for who you are. It shows how people treat you based on your looks and as someone whos struggled with that kind of thing for a while, this webtoon really touched me. The main character Yeseul is such a relatable character, even when trying to reject beauty standards, she still came subject to the pressures of living up to the people around her. She struggles with trying to love her own appearance and I really like that this webtoon didn’t try to be like, ‘fuck the beauty standard im better than that screw pretty people!!!’ it actually showed realistically how people struggle with self-image. I also love the main love interest because oh my god, we need more men like him please. He doesn’t care about Yeseul’s appearance and genuinely loves her for her personality.

Also, art is amazing. The author is so talented and you should support them by reading and liking the chapters.

-

Surviving Romance

Genre: Horror

Chapters: 14

Status: Ongoing

-

“When Chaerin Eun becomes the protagonist of the romance novel she is reading, she expects a fairytale ending with the novel’s love interest, Jeha. But when a bizarre twist makes her realize the story is not playing out as it does in the book, she’ll need the help of an unlikely character from her class to defy the new storyline and find her happy ending - if only she can figure out who this ‘Unknown Extra’ is first!”

Hands down one of my favorite webtoons by a long shot. You ever see a webtoon and think, ‘oh yeah, thats going to be a good webtoon’? Thats how this webtoon was for me. It was so good that I spent hours searching for other chapters that hadn’t been uploaded to webtoon yet on other manhua websites. I discovered it because it was also by the author of ‘The Makeup Remover’.

If there is one thing you need to know about me, its that I am a huge horror fan. So when I saw that my favorite author on webtoon had a horror themed webtoon out? You bet your behind that I binged it. Let me tell you, best choice ever.

Think of it as if ‘Ino’s Law’ and ‘Quarantine’ were combined with amazing art and a badass MC.

The Remarried Empress

I love how it is set up to the point where she cannot ‘quit’ until she completes the novel. Creating scenarios where she must survive while meeting the standards in the book. It is such an amazingly written webtoon and I cannot wait for more chapters to be released.

-

Genre: Fantasy

Chapters: 82

Status: Ongoing

-

“Navier Ellie Trovi was an empress perfect in every way - intelligent, courageous, and socially adept. She was kind to her subjects and devoted to her husband. Navier was perfectly content to live the rest of her days as the wise empress of the Eastern Empire. That is, until her husband brought hone a mistress and demanded a divorce. ‘I accept this divorce… And i request an approval of my remarriage.’ In a shoking twist Navier remaarries another emperor and retains her title and childhood dream as empress. But just how did everything unfold? “

Am I in love with Navier? Yes.

I absolutely adore how this story was set up. The first chapter begins with the big divorce scene, followed by Navier saying that she was going to be remarrying someone else since he wants to divorce her. This sets up a picture that gets completely shattered as you read the chapters. How everything falls into place with the reason behind the divorce and the remarriage is just so well written. The art is so good and and everything is just so insanely well done.

I absolutely love Naviers character, from her regalness and devoted loyalty to her role as empress, all the way to her petty moments and times of sadness. She is truly a character that you want the best for, and I cannot image anyone not liking her. Also the story is just so capable of making you feel emotions. I’ve laughed, cried, and got angry during the course of reading this webtoon. I love how betrayed I felt when the emperor brought home his mistress. It felt like I was in Navier’s shoes!

This is such a well done webtoon and I'm so excited for Navier to get all of the good things she deserves in her new Kingdom and with her new husband.

-

Witch Creek Road

Genre: Horror

Chapters: 74

Status: Ongoing

-

“A survival horror about love, acceptance, death, and revenge. And sexy flesh-eating demons. Yeah, it has those, too.”

This series seriously mind fucked me. The way that this story is set up, you don’t see the full picture until the later chapters. Season two literally blew my mind. It is also very gorey so keep that in mind if you don’t like that kind of stuff, but for me that makes it all the better. It is just so wild and crass that you can feel your heart pumping in anticipation.

They even have their own website that goes further into the lore because it’s just so wild. Also the art style is just so amazing, because it complements the story and horror theme so much. You hate most of the characters because they suck, and it is so satisfying when they are killed. Also it has it’s sad moments but I think it is a nice break from the horror so it isn’t so overwhelmingly scary.

I binged this series and I recommend reading only a few chapters a day so you don’t overload your brain.

Other then that, an amazing webtoon. Seriously, go read it, support the author, so much work goes into the story and art that it’s insane.

-

Dating With A Tail

Genre: Romance

Chapters: 36

Status: Ongoing

-

“On the dawn of her 29th birthday, unlucky-in-love Yunha discovers a shocking family secret: she’s started growing a fox tail, the mark of an ancestral curse. She must find her fated love before her 30th birthday or she is destined to become a fox forever! Even with her new-found enchanting power to attract men using her scent, will one year be enough to break the curse before it’s too late?”

Oh my gosh this is just such a good webtoon. It has amazing art, story telling, and characters. The true love interest was there the whole time, the villain isn’t who you’d expect it to be, and the spirit who cursed her is just! Im not going to spoil it but go read this webtoon!! It is so good and deserves more love.

Also Yunha is just so relatable?? Like she put off finding the woodcutter (her fated love) for 29 years and waited last minute to find him. Homegirl is me trying to do a project for school. Also to get rid of the scent that makes men attracted to her, she just starts eating a ton of garlic and that is just so funny to me.

Also I would go to church for the priest anytime if you know what i mean ;)

-

Omniscient Reader

Genre: Action

Chapters: 53

Status: Ongoing

-

“Dokja was an average office worker whose sole interest was reading his favorite web novel ‘Three Ways to Survive the Apocalypse.’ But when the novel suddenly becomes reality, he is the only person who knows how the world will end. Armed with this realization, Dokja uses his understanding to change the course of the story, and the world, as he knows it.”

I cannot get over how high quality this story is. The world building is phenomenal, the art is fantastic, and the characters are very fleshed out. This deserved all the hype it has gotten so far and more.

I love the ‘mc thrown into a different reality’ trope so much. Just like with surviving romance, Dokja’s world became the story he was reading. Also a very cool aspect of the story is the level up and the fact that its like a game. Earth has turned into this show for god like creatures to watch and it follows Dokja trying to survive. I also really like that TWSA has a protagonist, but Omniscient Reader’s protagonist is not the protagonist that was in TWSA. There is just so much lore and I’ll say it again, the world building is just phenomenal.

The Ddokkaebi’s and Dokja’s interactions are also just some of my favorite moments from the story so far. And oh my goodness I would die for Lee Gilyoung. Thats it, thats the tweet. That little boy could probably kill me with his giant praying mantis and I would let him if it would make him happy.

-

Not So Shoujo Love Story

Genre: Comedy

Chapters: 45

Status: Ongoing

-

“Romance super-fan Rei Chan is ready for her first boyfriend and she knows just who it’ll be: the most handsome boy in school, Hansum Ochinchin. But her plans for the perfect story are derailed when the most popular girl in class declares herself a rival… for Rei’s heart?! This is the year her not so shoujo love story begins!”

This is just such a cute webtoon. The style is very appealing and while the humor can be childish and weird sometimes, it still has made me laugh a lot. I know the humors not for everyone but just keep in mind that it does get better as the story progresses and gets more serious.

Also its a gl! I’m really unable to find good gls these days that don’t fetishize wlw relationships. Rei being painted as a mean trouble maker whos just misunderstood and Hana being the ‘perfect girl’ who only wants Rei’s attention is such a cute dynamic. They balance each other out and better each other. Also stan Rei for constantly sticking up for Hana even if she doesn’t necessarily like her in the beginning, she has very good morals and sticks to them.

Also the defying stereotypes in this webtoon? Just god-tier. Really makes you think twice when you judge someone just on first impressions alone.

-

Odd Girl Out

Genre: Drama

Chapters: 264

Status: Ongoing

-

“After a successful winter break makeover, Nari is finally ready for her high school debut. But somehow, she ends up friends with the three prettiest girls in school! Follow Nari as she tries to navigate her brand new high school life surrounded by beauties.”

This story has made me cry multiple times. A lot, even. It is just such a beautiful tale of friendship and finding support in people who are unlike those around theme. It also tells a great story about how anybody can be the ‘odd girl out’. Be it the fat girl, the beautiful girl, the rich girl, or the laid back girl.

It goes so deep into its characters that you even feel bad for the minor antagonists. It really makes you feel for the characters and the reasons behind their actions. Also I know its long, believe me I binged all 260 chapters in the span of three days, but oh my god it is worth it. Also I know the art is kind of off-putting, in fact that’s kind of why I put off reading the story, but I’ve honestly grown to love it and the writing is so good that the art could be literal stick figures and it wouldn’t matter.

The story is amazing and also I just love Nari. She’s just the best.

-

Gremoryland

Genre: Horror

Chapters: 67

Status: Completed

-

“Six old school friends are invited to be the first visitors of GremoryLand, a new horror theme park that promises an experience as unique as it is spooky. But once this experience starts there is no turning back, and they find themselves tested beyond what they imagines, facing their most desperate fears in order to survive.”

This is definitely one of those stories were you kind of need to turn of your brain and choose to ignore ‘plot holes’ while reading the early chapters because this story definitely gets crazy if you don’t know the ending. Believe me if you stick with it it will all make sense and the satisfaction you get from finding the ending is just so worth it.

The story is so good, and who Gremory is you would literally never suspect. When it was revealed who Gremory was and how he was able to create Gremoryland is so fucking mind boggling that you would never guess. I had to do a double take. It wasn’t like one of those random characters with a vendetta type of twists, but like one you can pick out from clues throughout the story.

Its so good and twisted and just so worth at least giving it a chance.

-

These were some of my favorite webtoons on the app! Of course it’s not all of them because unfortunately there is a 10 image limit. I also made this because I’ve run out of new webtoons to read and would love if you guys commented some of your own recs. I can also do a part two with other ones I liked if y’all want more recommendations. You guys can even request specific categories like Drama or Sci-Fi and I can tell you my favorite ones from that genre.

Also a reminder - if you disagree with any of my praise of these webtoons be respectful about it. At the end of the day it’s my opinion and you don’t need to be rude when disagreeing with that opinion.

[mrs-hyperfixed-writes]

Are You Single? - Part 1

Was originally gonna release it all at once but it was taking way too long and what I had so far was already kinda long. This sort of sets the scene.

Written for: @becomeunsolved

After getting lost in the woods and ending up in a mysterious isolated village, you get captured by Heisenberg and develop a crush, stopping at nothing to get to him.

You imagined that going through the village had been the closest to hell on earth you would ever get. It had been an honest mistake ending up here. Just a simple case of following the wrong fork in the trail. And then night had fallen, the light filtering through the canopy of leaves becoming scarcer and scarcer as the sun slowly dipped below the horizon, abandoning you in a dark forest devoid of noise, the only company being the sound of the snow crunching underneath your hiking boots and the weight of your backpack. You had kept a level head, trying to backtrack but being unable to find the original path you had been set on, and at this point you were sure that you had accidentally brought yourself deeper into the forest. You had decided that the next time you wanted to get away from your shitty job, your shitty flat, and the shitty people you surrounded yourself with you were going to go to Disneyland or something, not go on a soul searching hiking trip in Romania in the middle of winter.

Things began to make noises in the woods, but you refused to stop. Refused to acknowledge them. You wouldn’t be able to see through the dense darkness between the trees with your measly flashlight anyway. And if you stopped, then whatever was prowling the forest might know you were aware of it and take the opportunity to jump at you. So you kept going, hoping that whatever was breaking twigs and making those quiet panting noises didn’t decide that you looked too delicious to ignore any longer. You weren’t afraid of them, not really. It was something else that spurred you on.

Then you had found the village, the enormous castle that overlooked it taking your breath away. For a moment, relief had flooded your system.

It didn’t last long.

***

You fell to your knees in front of the gate to Castle Dimitrescu, exhaustion cutting through to your very bones. In your left hand you held a woodcutter’s axe in a deathgrip. It had been the only thing you had to defend yourself with up until that old man had given you a handgun before he had been dragged away. His blood had spilled from the hole he had created, landing in your hair and drying into a crust. Luckily for you, you had found an old shotgun discarded on a kitchen table in your attempts to escape the horde that had threatened to overwhelm you. It sat in your backpack, the end of it sticking out. You thanked god for deep pockets on hiking trousers. Convenient ammo pouches.

Your jacket was long gone, the monsters that had prowled the village ripping it to shreds in their efforts to get to you. The rest of your clothes were saturated with black blood, your hoodie had become uncomfortably heavy with it, forcing you to take it off and shove it at the bottom of your backpack - which itself was sporting a broken strap. You cleared your throat, spitting a wad of your own blood onto the floor.

A monster had dragged you down below the house, had thrown you out through the wall. You had dropped your axe but had managed to maintain a grip on your gun, and when it had charged at you, you had unloaded four badly aimed shots into its chest and scrambled for your weapon. And when it had charged again you had swung, pouring all your frustration and rage into that swing. You had been through hell already, and for what? Was this punishment for getting lost? Was this punishment for trying to get some peace away from your shitty life? Was this a punishment for those desires that you had buried, that need to be violent and terrifying that you had repressed? You’d spent your entire life shoving that shit down and trying to be a good person. You valued human life, but sometimes you couldn’t help but think some people would look better if they were missing some teeth. Maybe an eye for good measure.

You had turned its head into a pulpy mess even when it had been long dead. Then you had told it to get fucked. And when another one had emerged from the hole you had left in the house, you had bared your teeth at it in a sort of feral smile and waited for it to come. It had circled around you, feeling you out. It looked like it was unused to the resistance. It was unused to a lack of fear.

You had prepared to swing your axe, and addressed it directly, “Dance with me then.”

It had lunged.

And then there had been Luiza’s house. That hadn’t gone very well, the screams of all the people inside still bouncing around your head as Elena’s father had changed. You had understood at that moment that the monsters roaming around had once been people. It had made your skin crawl, and had forced you to fight with even more ferocity when the knowledge that if they got too close to you then they could turn you into one of those horrible beasts with just a scratch. Your jacket had acted as an extra layer of protection, but now it was gone.

You took a deep breath from your position on your knees, hand tightening around the axe. Part of you was horrified with yourself. Horrified that you had given into that need for violence that you had shoved down for most of your life, that you could laugh and smile and indulge in the cruelty of cackling and cursing at the carnage you could wreak on something, even if the victim was a flesh eating werewolf. The rest of you just wanted to survive, knowing that that feral glee that you were trying to keep shoved deep down was probably keeping you alive.

You had no idea what was waiting for you in this castle, but everyone in the village was dead, you had witnessed the last surviving members go up in flames. You couldn’t go back into the forest either, not with all the monsters prowling about. And even if there weren’t any, you might just die of exposure anyway.

So you took a deep breath, reaching for the lever that would bring the gate up.

A steel rod shot in front of your face, embedding itself in the wall to your right. You curled your hand into a tight fist as you stared at that rod. Apparently there really was no rest for the wicked.

“Well, well, well. I didn’t think anyone was left.” A man’s voice.

“Oh for- just give me a break already,” you muttered under your breath.

You turned to look at him, part of you worried that he would be some sort of horrible monster, ready to claw at your skin and chew on your bones as he spoke to you in that accent that you couldn’t quite place. But as you set your eyes on him, your breath caught in your throat.

“Oh. Fuck me,” you whispered under your breath,not caring if he heard or not.

Apparently Red Dead Redemption had completely fucked you up, since now your type was middle aged cowboys that looked like they smelled of cigars and oil. Bits of scrap metal floated all around him. Six hours ago if someone had told you that a man dressed as a cowboy holding a giant hammer had a form of telekinesis that could apparently only affect metal you would have laughed at them and asked them if you could have some of whatever they were drinking. But you had seen plenty of strange things already, and the rod embedded in the wall behind you was giving you a warning that whatever the nature of his powers were, they were nothing to scoff at. They were dangerous. He was dangerous. The thought made something coil in your gut. But not in fear.

You wanted to smack yourself. Now was not the time for an infatuation.

But looking at him, you just couldn’t seem to help yourself. He was tall, and carried himself with a confidence that must have taken a lifetime to master. He carried a giant metal hammer on his shoulder that you knew weighed at least a ton. And the way he carried it so effortlessly made the coiled heat in your stomach spread out across your body.

Why couldn’t you have just been attracted to normal men? Why couldn’t you have been attracted to traits that wouldn’t have put you in an early grave?

You took your backpack off and shoved it blade down next to your shotgun, zipping the bag shut as far as it would go. If it came to a fight, there was no way a weapon with a metal blade would help you. You almost laughed aloud. If it came to a fight between the two of you, only god himself intervening would help you.

“Who the fuck are you?” You weren’t subtle in the way your eyes roved up and down his body.

He raised an eyebrow.

“Oh. You’re not local? Even better.”

He grinned, and flicked his hand.

The rod that he had thrown came out of the wall and wrapped itself around your neck. Your hands instinctively came up, trying to pry it off. He laughed at your attempts, and another flick of his hand had you being dragged down to the floor neck first before he sent the rest of the scrap metal that had been floating idly to cocoon you.

“Mother Miranda’s gonna love you.”

He laughed, and you cursed at yourself for finding that laugh so attractive as he towered over you. As that last sheet covered your face, you let yourself go, slipping into a deep sleep.

***

Your back hurt. Your wrists hurt. Your head hurt. Everything hurt. But the silver lining on the situation was that you weren’t trapped in a metal cocoon any longer. Instead you were lying on a stone floor, wrists handcuffed together. A discreet tug while you pretended to still be asleep revealed that they were attached to a short chain that was connected to a loop on the floor. Regardless of how strong you were, in your current condition there was no way you could even make an attempt to get yourself free. Even if there weren’t people in the room.

You could hear their voices in the background, and it was a struggle to sort your thoughts so that you could tune into their voices. It had to be about you, and you needed to know what they planned to do with you.

There was no fear, it would only make you panic. Instead there was just determination, a need to survive even if there wasn’t much in your life worth it. Spite maybe? You weren’t going to give anyone the satisfaction of dying alone in a village full of corpses.

“The mortal is of no real use to anyone else. And my daughters do so love. . . entertaining foreigners.”

Red flag. Hearing that in any other scenario would have been a pleasant thing, but given the context of the situation and everything you had been through so far, you were sure that whatever the woman meant by that could not be a good thing. And if those daughters were still alive when the rest of the village had been subjected to either vicious deaths or being slowly and painfully turned into a creature that you were very sure could be considered werewolves.

“Furthermore, I can assure you if you entrust the mortal to House Dimitrescu, my daughters and I shall deliver to you the finest cups of their slaughtered blood.”

Yup, entertaining those daughters was definitely not a good thing.

You pried your eyes open, almost wishing you hadn’t when you saw the creepiest doll in the world standing in front of you. She was about three feet tall and wearing a wedding dress that was admittedly well-crafted. You almost twisted to kick it out of reflex, especially as it started moving like it was alive. A hunchback came in from the side to crowd your personal space, and you gagged against the strong smell of fish. You had smelled actual dead fish that were not as fishy. What did this man do all day?

The doll roughly pushed him out of the way, complaining in a high pitched voice, “Out of the way ugly! I wanna see- oh!”

“You mean-” The man who had captured you started, being interrupted by the doll’s excited dancing and announcement that you had woken as well as the hunchback’s general groaning.

To your left you spied your backpack, just out of reach. “Y-you mean,” he tried again. “Both of you shut the fuck up!”

Well that did it. The doll went to sit in the lap of what could only be her puppeteer, a woman in funeral garb, the only skin exposed being her pale hands. The hunchback shambled off to the side, standing behind the pew where the only human passing man in the entire village sat.

“You mean you’ll screw around with them in private, and where’s the fun in that?”

You looked around, taking note of the woman who had been speaking. Dimitrescu. You could practically feel your nosebleed coming on. She was the tallest woman you had ever seen, and the most beautiful too. Her skin was so pale, her lips a deep red. She looked like a vampire, but given what you had seen so far and her talk of delivering your blood to the other woman in cups was making you think that maybe she didn’t just look like one.

Her name was ringing bells in your head. Dimitrescu. Where had you heard that before?

“Give them to me,“ the man started again, “and I’ll put on a show everyone can enjoy.”

Why me? This was definitely punishment for something.

“So gauche-”

“Hey I know you!” you interjected, addressing the tall woman and interrupting her as the realisation hit you.

They all stopped, turning to face you properly for the first time. Dimitrescu looked you up and down, seemingly regarding you as something beneath her. You quickly came to the conclusion that maybe interrupting her was a mistake, but you didn’t care. There was still no fear, even in the face of a giantess.

“Dimitrescu. That’s the name on that super rare wine in the really pretty bottle. They don’t distribute it anymore.”

She continued to look down at you, which admittedly was easy for her to do given height. “And how would the likes of you have tasted the Sanguinis Virginis?”

“Some rich guy I met at a bar gave it to me in exchange for. . . It doesn’t matter. But. . . it stands for Maiden’s Blood right?” You froze, the dots practically connecting themselves. “Oh my god. I think I’m gonna be sick.”

You leaned over to the side, ready to vomit. You knew there was something wrong with that wine. Your mood was not helped by the shrieking laughter that the doll was emitting at your expense. The man, to his credit, had the decency to wrinkle his nose in disgust at the prospect of blood filled wine. You had drank someones blood. Who had she been? Had they tortured her? Had she died in agony? You didn’t know. You didn’t really want to know.

You looked back up towards the altar. The woman standing at it had looked as familiar as Dimitrescu’s name had sounded. You had seen her portrait in many of the homes. And thinking back, it had definitely been her that had killed that villager when Luiza’s house had burned down. Your heart tugged painfully at the thought of Elena, at how you had come so close to saving her before the floor had collapsed under her and she had told you to escape this village and run.

This woman was Mother Miranda, and somehow she was the cause of all of this. Still no fear, but hatred bubbled up in your heart.

“I’ve heard all of your arguments. Some of you were less persuasive than others, but. . .” She looked at the man, who had now put his hammer on the ground, leaning forward as he waited for her answer, “Heisenberg, the mortal’s fate is in your hands.”

He tipped his hat towards her, grinning.

Dimitrescu got to her feet.

“Mother Miranda I must protest! Heisenberg is but a child, and his devotion to you is questionable.” She started walking towards you. “Give the mortal to me, and I will ensure that they are ready.”

Heisenberg angrily got to his feet, stalking towards her. You had to hand it to him, even with his telekinesis, he must have been fearless to confront Dimitrescu when he was half her size.

He held out his hand as he approached her, summoning the hammer to him. You were beginning to think that something was wrong with you, given that the action had your gut coiling again.

“Shut your damn hole and don’t be a sore loser! Go find your food somewhere else.”

“Quiet now child-”

“Well if it were up to me-” you started.

“It isn’t!” Both of them shouted down at you in unison, though Dimitrescu put significantly more venom into it.

“Well please spare me the family drama when I get enough of that at home.”

Heisenberg actually laughed at that, some of the tension leaving him. Dimitrescu however, looked incensed.

“How dare you! Do you have any idea-”

“If you’re going to ask me if I know who you are, we already established that I did. I just don’t care. And I’m not afraid of a single one of you!”

Heisenberg let out a full belly laugh at that. At which part of the statement he found to be hilarious, you weren’t sure. At least someone had found you funny, and you never wanted that laugh of his to stop. You could listen to it all day.

“SILENCE!” Mother Miranda shouted over them, intervening before someone - probably you - got hurt. “My decision is final, there will be no argument. Remember from whence you came!”

“A megabitch apparently,” you muttered under your breath.

One look at Heisenberg told you that he definitely heard that too. And as he smiled at the statement, you knew in your bones that Dimitrescu was right. His loyalty to Mother Miranda wasn’t just questionable, he hated her. You could feel it. Why though, was anyone’s guess. Though to be fair, she didn’t exactly scream motherly love.

Briefly, you wondered why someone with his abilities didn’t just finish her off and get it over with. But her words, reminding them to remember where they came from. . . she must have been very powerful if she could scold a nine foot tall vampire queen and a cowboy with the powers of Magneto into submission.

Dimitrescu moved back, but Heisenberg moved forward to take up all your attention. Those horrible monsters swarmed in as he did so, clinging to the walls, the scaffolding and leaning over the balconies, snarling and howling as he did so.

“Lycans and Gentleman, we thank you for waiting.”

I fucking knew they were werewolves.

“And now let the games begin!” He leaned down towards you, coming in at eye level. “Lets see what you’re really made of.”

You just smiled at him, deciding to let that beast under your skin that was making heat coil in your gut out to play. “I don’t suppose you’re single.”

His grin dropped off his face, and something like genuine surprise flitted across it. But instead of answering he raised his hammer above his head.

“Oh shit-”

He swung it down, cracking the loop that was keeping you chained to the floor. Lycans were beginning to crowd in. And Heisenberg, he was beginning to countdown from ten. You looked to your left again, spotting the hole in the floor just beyond your bag. You darted towards it, picking up your bag as you did so and turning to the lords one last time. You brought your hands to your face and kissed your palm, blowing it towards Heisenberg. He stuttered in his countdown, just enough to be barely noticeable. You wondered if it was in confusion or if it was because maybe, just maybe, you had flustered him ever so slightly. You vowed that you would make it out alive and find out.

Then you stuck up your two middle fingers, and jumped down the hole.

[dddainuhsoar]

long nights

historical and vampire au, guanshan x hetian, pg, unbeta-ed

trigger warning gore, trigger warning blood

word count: 1199

an ear-splitting crash lands somewhere in the north of the woodcutter’s hut, followed by a smaller clatter from inside. everything shook, including the young woodcutter’s son. entire body still buzzing with shock, the boy picks up the bowl he dropped and places it onto the table before going outside to check.

an ear-splitting crash lands somewhere in the north of the woodcutter’s hut, followed by a smaller clatter from inside. everything shook, including the young woodcutter’s son. entire body still buzzing with shock, the boy picks up the bowl he dropped and places it onto the table before going outside to check.

a crash that loud must have attracted others, but it will take some time before anyone else comes. the woodcutter’s hut is deep in the forest, after all, away from civilisation. no particular reason besides the woodcutter enjoying privacy for him and his son. unfortunately, he has to walk a long trek to reach town to sell his wares. he has to leave his son alone in the forest for long periods of time, but the apprentice can take good care of himself. the crash, however, has shaken him to his core.

on trembling legs, the woodcutter’s son stands on the edge of the front yard and peers between the maze of trees before him. someone is screaming for help, and the person is coming towards him. the boy takes a step forward with some hesitance.

“wh-what h-happened?” he whispers hoarsely. he didn’t mean to whisper. his throat has closed up from fear. he feels like a coward. the woodcutter’s son frowns at himself. with a new conviction, he clears his throat. “i’m here!” he calls over the screaming.

another young boy emerges from the darkness of the forest. his white robes are stained crimson. his eyes are frantic, tears streaming from them. he stops where he is, hands on his knees as his body forces him to catch his breath.

“please help me!” he cries. “my mother, she’s hurt!”

“i-” the sight of blood has quashed what little courage he summoned before. “m-my father, he’ll be back soon.”

“please,” the boy begs. “she doesn’t have much time.”

even if he wanted to help, the woodcutter’s son doesn’t know how to. he barely has control over it. his father has always been there to help anchor him when he uses it.

“please.”

hetian is begging with his entire being. his hands are clasped together, he is on his knees in front of the boy with the fire-red hair. desperate and helpless, he has never felt more fear in his life. he doesn’t know what he’ll do if the boy refuses to help. his mind is so clouded with panic that he doesn’t even wonder how the other boy, who looks no older than he is, can help in the first place. how many thirteen-year-olds are knowledgeable about life-saving first aid? it doesn’t cross hetian’s mind. he only knows to find help and nothing else.

“i-i’ll get the medicine we have,” the boy finally says.

“please, hurry,” hetian beseeches as the other boy scrambles to get back inside his hut. every passing moment is torture for hetian. he was ready to continue screaming when the boy finally returns with a large wooden box hanging on his shoulder by a cloth strap.

“take me to her,” the boy says, voice laced with promise.

hetian wastes no more time. he turns on his heel and dashes back towards where he came from. he hears the boy following close behind him, footsteps heavy in the bed of leaves that litter the ground.

images of his mother bleeding to death on the dark cavern floor flash in hetian’s mind, bringing him to tears over and over again. it’s blurring up his vision. he continuously swipes at his eyes, cursing under his breath. he has found help, the only objective on his mind since they crashed, but the closer he gets to his mother, the stronger the chokehold terror has on him. he feels like his legs are about to give out.

a gasp rips through hetian when they reach the mouth of the cavern. he turns to the boy, who rushes past him. coughing his lungs out, hetian hurries after him. the redheaded boy kneels by his mother’s side. hetian goes to her other side and kneels as well. he sobs as he wipes the strands of hair sticking to her wet face.

“mother,” hetian whispers, trying to clean the blood off her lips but only causing it to smudge across her grey cheeks. “i found help. we’re going to be okay.”

hetian’s mother cannot respond. her eyes are squeezed shut with suffering, and her breaths are shallow. her robes have been dyed red with blood, such that the original white looks like specks on scarlet clothes. the boy rips her dress with a dagger to reveal a hole the size of his fist in her stomach. his face drains of colour, and hetian feels a stab of hopelessness.

the boy’s arms are shaking as he rifles through his box of medical supplies. it strikes hetian that he doesn’t know what he’s doing either. hetian has made a grave mistake. a distressed bawl tears itself from his lips. he weeps over his mother’s body.

“no… no, i can still-” the boy puts his small hands over the wound, as if he were trying to plug the blood from spilling further. his skin is quickly painted with red and his sleeves are getting soaked.

out of the desperation of something to do, hetian puts his hands over the boy’s. a pulse of energy whips through him so violently, his mind was taken off his mother for a split second. he stares in shock at the young boy, who is suddenly vibrating with pure magical energy. hetian gulps. could there be hope? he grips the boy’s hands and channels every ounce of energy he has left in him through the contact.

the boy is huffing and groaning under his breath. sweat is pouring down his forehead. the teeth digging into his bottom lip have broken skin and hetian swears he doesn’t pay attention to the bead of blood swelling from the tear.

hetian’s head is spinning. he knows they’re close to saving his mother’s life. her breaths are getting quicker. her wound is closing up. the hole grows smaller and smaller until it’s gone. a relieved grin breaks across hetian’s face. he looks up to thank his saviour, but the boy isn’t done.

“she has lost too much blood,” he mutters, searching her face for a sign of life. “i have to replenish it.”

hetian feels another rush of energy, and a second later, his mother is gasping back to life the exact same time the red-headed boy lets out a vicious cough that sprays blood over hetian’s face. the boy collapses next to his mother’s healing body. hetian is stock-still.

some of the blood has gotten on his tongue.

hetian can no longer think. his mind spins. he is no longer in control as his body thrums with renewed power. he leaps over his mother to pin the other boy to the floor. he crushes the blood-stained lips against his own and licks into the boy’s mouth. he drinks it all, even laps up the blood streaming down his chin. he takes and takes, and takes; lost in the taste, lost in the power, lost in his hunger for the boy with fire-red hair.

[writer1]

A regretful Wolf and his Beauty.

Chapter Three

Beast!Rex x Fem!reader

Summary: As punishment for his actions, young prince Rex was cursed to become a monster by a witch. The only thing that saved him from his fate was an enchantress, who gave him a condition. He has to find true love in order to redeem himself and he only has until the last petal of the enchanted rose falls. Rex's family helps you by guiding your way into his heart. Rex's fate now lies in your hands.

A\N: This is a collaborative fic with @ahsokatano-thetogruta. Just a warning, the transformations get kind of gory and disturbing, if you want to skip that part you may, it starts right after Rex transforms. We have marked where the gore and disturbing parts are, so you can skip that part if you'd like because the last part of the chapter leads into the next one. As always, we hope you enjoy this fic. credit too @suddenly-clones for Cody’s nickname Bubby.

Warnings: mention of past abuse, horrific description (we have marked this for you so you don't have to read it)

Rex walks down the stairs behind Cody, feeling nervous. Once at the bottom, Cody places a hand on his shoulder, giving Rex a comforting smile. They both walk to the ballroom, opening the door and walking in to see 99 reading all the little kids a story.

“And little red riding hood asked ‘What big teeth you have grandma’ the wolf in disguise smiled at her. ‘All the better to EAT you with’ the wolf then lunges at little red riding hood, but just before he eats her, the friendly wood cutter bursts in. He scares the wolf, who runs away. And both him and red find her grandmother locked in the closet. And everyone lives happily ever after.” the kids cheer, with the bad batch closest to 99. 

There's fourteen year old Hunter sitting right beside him, with twelve year old Crosshair on the other side and eleven year old Wrecker in behind Hunter since he's the tallest. The youngest, Tech, who's only six years old is sitting on 99’s lap. Stutter is in the middle of the group of kids with Ahsoka and his friend Sabine who’s the same age. Rex thinks about the real ending of the story, where the grandma was eaten and the woodcutter kills the wolf. 

He’s glad that 99 waits until you turn twelve to tell you the real story, it's way too dark for little kids. Rex is glad the bad batch is happy here, they, like Stutter, were taken in because of abusive parents. His aunt hated the boys for being different. Hunter was born with enhanced senses, which gives him headaches and can make him pass out, Crosshair is the weakest of the kids, having deficiencies that make him skinny and sick, they also made his hair grey. Wrecker is the biggest and strongest of them. But his eyesight is amazing, you have to watch out for the grumpy kid, he has a habit of whipping things at people when angry, and he has Never missed. Tech is tiny too, but he’s also super smart, but his eyesight is horrible, so he wears glasses that Anakin had made for him. 99 adopted them as his son’s as soon as he found out about the abuse and trauma his sister had caused.

All of that is gone now and it is all in the past. The bad batch and Stutter are living such happier lives now with their new, loving family.

xxx

Fives is aimlessly wandering around the castle, trying to take his mind off of what had happened earlier. Echo is with Waxer and Boil, playing with Numa. Fives kindly declined when his twin asked if he wanted to play too, but he said that he just needs some alone time. 

He still feels a little bit hurt inside, but the feeling is slowly passing and fading the more he keeps on wandering, turning from one corridor to the next. He stops when he hears a soft humming of a melody coming from a room that he passes by. Listening intently as he looks around the corner, he sees an eight year old girl cleaning around the room with her feather duster. Her hair is brown and short, her skin is a pale blue like a blue lagoon.

The young girl turns around to see Fives peeking around the doorway. Before she could say anything, he tried to hide as quickly as he could, but she already saw him. She giggles a little, walking towards the doorway and standing there, brushing off any dust from her uniform and smiles at Fives. "Hello Prince Fives." The girl has a small, cute smile gracing her face now.

"Hey." Fives says nervously, not really sure of what to do. He thinks that she is really cute, so he decides to push his nerves aside and talk to her some more. "What's your name?"

"My apologies Prince, my name is Kiara Zelenca." She does a little curtsy in front of him. "It's nice to meet you."

"It's nice to meet you too, though you don't have to call me Prince. You can just call me Fives." He smiles kindly as he admires the  white patterns on her face. Her turquoise eyes compliments her skin perfectly. "If you don't mind me asking, what species are you?" He tries to sound as politely as he possibly can.

"I don't mind at all! I'm both Human and Togruta. My Mother was a Togruta and my Father was Human. I have hair instead of montrals and my ears are a little bit longer because I don't have lekku like other Togruta." She explains a little nervously. He probably thinks that I'm weird now. She thinks to herself. "I use my hair to cover them as much as I can, because the others will say that my ears look weird and ugly. They call me a freak too..." She tries her best to keep her sadness back. She hates how she looks already, so it doesn't help that she gets bullied by others.

Fives frowns, hearing that this has happened to Kiara. The slight tremble in her voice is apparent to him, so he walks a little closer to her, looking Kiara directly into her ocean blue eyes and slowly raises his right hand towards the left side of her hair. He freezes just before he reaches her face. "Can I...can I see them?" 

Kiara is speechless, thinking that just explaining them to him would make him feel the same way that the others do. After a moment, she nods and Fives strokes back her hair. Kiara looks away embarrassed. He sees that they are longer, but he just smiles. "I think they are really pretty." He says stroking the side of her face lightly. She looks into his honey coloured eyes. "You are perfect just the way you are, so don't let anyone else tell you otherwise. If they do give you any more trouble ever again, you tell them that they will be speaking to Prince Fives personally." Fives smiles reassuringly.

This is the first time that someone has told her that she is perfect and that she doesn't look like a freak. Her heart flutters as she leans into Fives' touch. He feels his cheeks heat up a little bit, she looks so adorable like this. Kiara opens her eyes and looks up towards the ceiling, to see mistletoe hanging down from the doorframe. She giggles.

Fives raises an eyebrow sweetly. "What is it?" He asks her as she motions for him to look up. He does so and sees what she wanted him to see. His cheeks turn red when he turns his head to look back down at Kiara. Her cheeks have turned to a darker shade of blue. She's obviously blushing. 

Fives swallows harshly, trying to gather all of the confidence he can find within himself. "W-would you like to kiss me?"

Without a moment of hesitation, Kiara wraps her arms around Fives' neck as she softly presses her lips to his. Fives instantly starts kissing her back, wrapping his arms around her lovingly. They both pull away, and Fives sees the bottom of Kiara's ears move a little as the tops turn the same shade of blue that is on her cheeks. Kiara giggles at the goofy smile on Fives' face. “Wait till I tell Echo that I kissed a girl.” 

Kiara laughs at Fives’ remark, kissing his cheek softly. They are both blushing a lot, this having been the first time either had ever kissed someone. “I… I think that i might love you already?”

Kiara’s eyes go wide when she realizes what he just said, then she realizes that she feels the exact same way. “I think that i might love you too, Fives.”  

“Kiara!!” Kiara turns at the voice of her mom. She turns back to Fives, an apologetic look on her face. “I’m sorry. Thats my mom, I have to go” Fives nods, watching her leave. He sighs. I’m gonna marry her. He thinks to himself.

xxx 

A little while after 99 finishes the story, Fives and Echo walk into the room, Rex notices that Fives is blushing as he tells Echo something. He can’t hear what is said. Both boys freeze when they see Rex walking over to them. “Hey Echo. Fives.” he says nervously, the twins just frown at him, he sighs.

“Look, I'm sorry for what happened, I shouldn't have snapped at you. I know you were just having fun. I understand if you don’t want to talk to me for a while after how I reacted earlier.” Rex wrings his hand together, staring at the floor. He hopes that his brothers can forgive him, but he also understands if it takes a while.

Fives slams into him with a hug, and Echo follows after him. “We’re sorry too, we shouldn’t have pulled the prank in the first place.” Echo nods in agreement with Fives.

“Yeah, we shouldn’t have played a prank when we knew that you were stressed, we’re sorry.” Both boys nuzzle into their brother, as Rex wraps his arms tightly around them.

"It's okay. Now, shall we go and play a board game?" Rex offers and the twins nod their heads in sync, making Rex chuckle. "Alright, you two can pick what we play.

xxx

Further somewhere in the castle in one of the bedrooms, Kanan and Hera are getting ready for the evening activities that were planned to take place in the ballroom. They are both nineteen years old and Kanan is a knight, though he was not needed to go out on patrol today.

Kanan had rescued Hera five years ago when she was being chased by some smugglers who were after her. He fortunately got there in time to save Hera and she is still very grateful for it. Kanan asked if she had anywhere to go, but she just shook her head. He decided that he would take her to the castle with him. He asked his friend, Rex, if it was okay if she could stay for a while, so the eight year old Prince asked his parents if it was okay and they both were happy to let her stay for as long as she needed to.

They were quick friends in the beginning and soon enough, they became lovers after they confessed to one another a few years ago. After another year had passed, Kanan decided to finally propose to Hera, so when he was out on patrol in the village, he bought her a beautiful ring. He was delighted when she said yes and they got married soon after. It's been two years and they are so happy together.

Hera finishes putting on her long, dark green dress that she wears on special occasions. It compliments her lime green skin perfectly. Kanan exits the ensuite to see his wife standing in front of a standing mirror as she tugs the long sleeves of her dress down. Hera sees in the mirror that Kanan is admiring her from behind. 

"You look stunning in this dress, darling." He walks closer and wraps his arms around her waist, kissing her lek from behind.

Hera relaxes into his embrace. "Thank you, love. You look very smart in your suit too." 

Kanan hums in response, enjoying every passing moment they spend like this.

"Shall we go and join everyone downstairs in the ballroom?" Hera asks as she cups Kanan's face.

"Yeah, let's go."

xxx

A few hours later the sun has fully set, allowing the warm lights strung up against the walls to glow brightly, creating a warm, atmospheric feeling in the ballroom as everyone is gathered around, speaking to friends and family. The knights haven’t returned from patrol yet when there's a knock at the door, Rex being closest, answers it. Outside is a woman, she has a bald head, white skin and tattoos on her face. “Hello, can i please come in? Its bitterly cold out here and i have nowhere to go, all I have to offer is this rose as payment.” 

Rex feels pity for the woman. “Cody!!” He calls his older brother, he knows that he has to ask permission before he can allow a stranger in. The woman watches, Rex doesn’t see the malicious glint in her eyes.

“What is it Rex? Who is this?” Cody asks as soon as he sees the woman. “She has nowhere to go, can we allow her to stay with us? She says that she can only pay us with a rose, but i don’t think that’s a problem. Do you?"

Cody smiles at his brother’s kindness, turning to the woman. "I don’t think that will be a problem either, of course you may come in Miss…?”

“Ventress, just call me Ventress. Thank you for your hospitality.” Ventress walks in, handing Cody the rose.”There are drinks and food over there  if you’re hungry Miss Ventress.” Rex tells her as she walks in, he doesn’t see the evil smirk as she eyes the bowl of red punch. She walks over grabbing a drink.

xxx

An hour passes, everyone is having fun. Fives is with Kiara, introducing Echo to her. Jesse and his twin brother Kix are playing doctor with the young knights in training. Kix had just become a doctor a year ago, so he’s writing fake doctor notes of crazy, fake diseases for a few knights while Jesse is entertaining the kids with paper shapes and animals that he folds.

Boil is making his niece pancakes and Waxer is sitting nearby, playing with the little girl. All the cousins, knights and staff are talking, joking and having a great time like they do every year. Ventress walks near to Rex, who’s talking to Cody and Bly. Ventress has a wicked smile on her face as she pretends to trip, spilling red punch on Rex’s favorite white shirt. “I am so sorry young man.” Ventress says sarcastically, making Rex lose his cool for the second time that day.

“Can’t you be more careful! And watch where you’re going!” He tells her angrily, freezing when he realizes how rude he was.”I'm sorry, I should-!”

“ENOUGH!!! You have been rude to the wrong person, little prince!” She snarls. Her hands have a dark green aura, everyone now realizes that the woman they had kindly invited into their home, was actually an evil witch. Her eyes glow green, and a circle of magic surrounds young Rex, cutting him off from his family. All the child can feel is fear as tears stream down his face. "I’m so sorry.” He whimpers out, begging and pleading for forgiveness. 

The magic surrounding Rex and the witch is too strong, stopping anyone from getting close to them. Despite this, Obi-Wan tries to go and protect Rex, fighting his way through the sheer force of the wind being created. He only gets so far until he is blasted back into Cody's arms who catches him. Obi Wan gets to his feet and holds onto Cody.

Through all of the madness surrounding everyone, Obi Wan hears someone yelling behind him and then sees Anakin run past him with his wooden sword held high above his head, charging directly towards the witch. Obi Wan manages to grab Anakin and pull him in close to himself and Cody, all huddling together during the complete chaos. Both Obi Wan and Cody wrap their arms protectively around Anakin, using their own bodies to protect the child from the chaos and anything else that may happen. Cody prays for his brother, feeling like a failure for being unable to get to Rex. Not even all the Knights using the force would be able to get to him.

Suddenly there is a cry of pain. fearing the worst for his Rex'ika, Cody looks towards Rex who has his hands in his face and drops to the floor on his knees, writhing in pain. Cody looks around the room to see that everyone can see it too. Rex is...growing.

Plo, Wolffe, Sinker, Boosts and Comet all tried to get too Rex… that is until he started to change, they froze as soon as their older cousin started to grow. Plo has never heard of this happening before, he knows that witches are powerful, whatever she is doing to the young prince won’t be fixed so easily… If ever. Wolffe goes to run up to them, he doesn’t care about what’s happening to his older cousin. He leaves his brothers, running to Rex when a shard of glass hits him, cutting a slice through his right eye. Ventress laughs, knowing that her shard glass had hit her target.

Boil jumped in front of Waxer and little Numa as soon as the witch yelled, leaving the pancake he had cooked thrown on the floor. Numa screams and cries as the chaos ensues, both Boil and Waxer hear the cry of pain, they turn to see Rex fall to the ground in the middle of everything. They watch in horror as he starts to grow. Something that should not be happening to his body.

The Bad Batch all grab onto 99, standing in front of him. They close their eyes in fear, but 99 sees what happens to Rex, feeling fear for the young boy whose body is unnaturally growing bigger. And is also screaming in both pain and terror.

Fives jumps in front of Kiara, Echo following behind him. They watch their Ori’Vod fall to the ground, crying out in pain, they watch as his body starts to grow. They don’t know what’s going to happen to their brother, but they swear that they will love him no matter how much that monster changes him.

Stutter's eyes widen as he sees his Ori'Vod growing and writhing in pain on the floor, so he screams and tries to run over to help him. He feels someone grab his small hand and gets pulled towards them. He looks up to see Sabine using her whole body to protect him. Stutter sees a Lasat run up behind her and crouches down, wrapping his arms around the both of them to keep them safe from the chaos.

Fox and Thorne hear the cries from Rex, panic coursing through their bodies, flooding their minds with fear. Fox looks around quickly to see that Ahsoka isn't with them anymore. He scans the room to see that she is staring at her Ori'Vod through the green forcefield of magic. Fox grabs her arm to pull her back towards him and Thorn to protect her, though in the process, she loses her grip on her music box, dropping it to the floor. Everything seemed to play in slow motion as she watched it break to pieces that scatter across the floor. Fox realises what happens when Ahsoka starts to scream and cry as he sees the broken music box on the floor, so he comforts her the best that he can. Thorne joins Fox to help protect Ahsoka.

All Rex feels is pain, discomfort and fear. He regrets everything. He groans as his smart clothes begin to grow tighter on him, ripping open at the seams, revealing blonde fur. His arms start to grow longer and so does his legs, bending and rearranging themselves into haunches as a tail also starts to grow. He feels his face elongating into a snout, baring his sharp teeth to attempt to block out as much pain as he can. His cries of pain turn to whimpers as the transformation finishes. His clothes have ripped to shreds, blonde fur now completely covers the entirety of his body. The only article of clothing left are his shredded pants. Rex just lies on the floor, whining as he feels everyone staring at him.

Cody watches as his little brother turns into a creature of legends… A werewolf. Everyone in the room is shocked, the kids that had heard the story from 99 earlier cower in fear, afraid that Rex might eat them. Cody doesn’t care about that… This is still his Rex’ika, his baby brother. And nothing will ever change that. 

The witch looks around the room as Rex lays on the floor, breathing heavily. The force field goes away and she smiles wickedly. “Don’t worry, young prince. You won’t be alone with this curse.” Rex looks up at her, eyes wide. Tears are still falling down his face, wetting his fur. ”What!?”

“Yes! I have a perfect plan for everyone in this castle! I want to have some more fun” she lifts her hands up. "You all stand there like objects, so I’ll turn you into objects!” She sneers.The green aura engulfs the room, and everyone groans, Rex watches in horror as his friends and family start to morph and change in front of his very eyes. Rex feels absolute fear, he wants his bubby. 

(Warning! Slightly gory and disturbing description of the transformations from this point. Note where it ends.)

But Cody is groaning in pain as well, and morphing, getting wider and less human. Cody’s arms and legs burn as they grow slimmer, wood growing all over his body. He forces his eyes open to check on Obi Wan, staring in horror as his beloved scratches at his skin as it becomes metal. He sees young Anakin doing the same. They both form into a suit of armour that covers their whole body from head to toe. The same is happening to Kanan and Plo too. 

Fox and Thorn struggle to hold onto Ahsoka, not just because they are changing, but also because she is getting smaller. The once shattered music box starts piecing itself together, but leaves the ballerina there on the floor. Ahsoka cries and screams as she becomes unable to move her legs anymore and she starts to become older in appearance. Her clothes change too, into more of a ballerina's outfit like the one that the little figure was wearing before.

Echo and Fives scream in pain as they transform, Both of them shrink as Fives' hair starts to become waxy, turning white in color. It's not just his hair, his whole head from top to his top jaw turns into wax, so does his hands, and the rest of him, including his bottom jaw, turns to a gold metal. Echo starts to grow a mix of metal and wood all over his body, the twins cry in pain as they shrink. 

Kiara is the same, yelling out for her mother as the top half of her body becomes wood and the bottom half morphs painfully into feathers. All three of them have tears running down their faces, as they scream from the worst pain they’ve ever felt in their young lives.

Stutter screams loudly in pain, this is somehow worse than anything his brothers and father had ever done to him. “R-R-Rex!!!! C-C-C-Cody!!!” Young Stutter screams for his brothers, he's so scared. His body is becoming wood, his arms are sucked into him, morphing to his sides as his legs morph together and become the familiar bristles of a paint brush. He screams, looking over and seeing Sabine in the same predicament. He cries as he starts to shrink. “F-F-Fives!!! E-Echo!!!!! B-B-Bly!!!” He tries one last time to get one of his brothers, to no avail, he’s all alone once again.

Kix, Jesse and Hardcase all fall to the ground, screaming out in agony as they feel their bodies beginning to change. Kix wraps his arms around himself, squeezing his eyes shut to try and block out the pain coursing through his body. He becomes rigid, unable to bend any of his limbs as they straighten out. His legs morph together and his arms sink down into his body. His blood becomes colder as it starts to turn to ink. 

Jesse starts to get wider and thinner. He starts feeling lighter and when he looks at his hands, they flop backwards as they become paper thin. It doesn't take him long to figure out that he's actually becoming paper, because his skin turns dramatically pale. As his body becomes thinner, he starts getting smaller too. Hardcase's body from his neck to his feet starts to turn to wood as his body becomes narrow.  He screams at the searing pain rushing throughout his head as it becomes metal, his facing becoming longer and sharper with each passing second.

Hera feels her body start to morph into light, it burns as she is transported to the mirror she was looking into only hours before, she looks around at the room around her, she bangs on the glass, unable to get out. The room is only grey, the only thing in it being her. “Kanan!!!” She screams for her husband, the last she saw of him he had fallen to the ground in pain, she has no idea what he might have become.

Bly falls to the ground in pain, his whole body starts to burn as it turns to metal, he screams in agony  as his head splits into three. He shrinks, turning into a fork. Ten year old Wolffe doubles over in absolute agony, along with the 9 year old twins, Sinker and Boost. And the youngest, seven year old Comet. They all grow smaller as they turn to ceramic, Wolffe screams as his body widens, going hollow once it turns completely too glass, lessening the pain some thankfully. Plo tries to fight through the pain of his own transformation to get to his boys, he hates that they have to go through this pain.

(Gore ends here!)

Rex can't believe his eyes. Everyone has completely changed. They aren't even...alive anymore? Though he can still hear the groans from everyone as their transformations finish. He looks towards Ventress with piercing anger in his eyes, but she just laughs at everyone. She feels content now that she has had her fun. 

"I don't know what you are looking at me like that for. You are the one who has caused this! Now your friends and family will share your punishment." She cackles as she surrounds herself in a cloud of green smoke, creating a whirlwind. Once it clears, Ventress is nowhere to be seen.

No...what have I done? Rex thinks to himself as he sees everyone start to move again without being in complete pain and agony. He presses his ears back against his head, feeling consumed in guilt and regret. The room is almost silent, the only sounds being slight shuffles around the room as people adjust to their new forms. 

Cody had heard every word that Ventress had said to Rex, about her saying that this is his Rex'ika's fault. He tries to shuffle to Rex, calling out to him to comfort his little brother "Rex'ika." Rex hears the familiar nickname, looking towards the direction that his Ori'Vod's voice came from.

"Bubby…" a second later, Rex bolts out of the room and runs as fast as he can. Away from everyone. Cody calls out to him and tries to follow, but he can't move very well at all. Everyone else doesn't know what to say. Their expressions are a mix of fear and confusion, not understanding what has just happened to them. All anyone can really think about is Rex's safety. They need to know that he's alright...

taglist: @captainrexisboo @pro-fangirls-unsocial-life

[redstainedsocks]

Plant Day!

Whumpblr, forgive me for this... xD this is either the best or silliest idea I've ever had and honestly? I think it might be both at once. Heed the tags but also just know nothing is as serious as it seems by the time you reach the end...

for @brutal-nemesis' whump of the month prompt: plant day.

Thank you @muddy-swamp-bitch for helping me work out how to tag this thing

Warnings: cutting, knives, scarification, body horror (???), corpse mutilation [!?], environmental whump, [mass] killing (???), multiple whumpers (but not at the same time), survivors guilt, curses, magical whump, whumpee with she/her pronouns, captured whumpee. Mentions of: eye whump, bugs/insects, slavery whump

The knife wasn’t sharp enough, not for this. It was a hack job, and it wasn’t going to heal pretty. It carved into her slowly, inch by torturous inch, scraping away the surface of her skin. She screamed, but no one seemed to care, it wasn’t like they spoke the same language.

The two people leaning over, peering at her, paused in their work.

I hope crows peck out your eyes

They talked and brushed away the carnage their knife wrought, tittered, went back to their work.

I hope your children never know love, or freedom

It hurt, digging deep into the fibres of her skin. Changing the surface of it forever. It was going to scar, these strange, crude letters forever marring her perfect form.

It was no worse than anything else she had suffered but she resented it all the same.

May bear excrement ruin your water source and wasps sting you to death

Her cries went unheard. And curses didn’t mean a wad of shit if no one observed them. She liked that word shit, she’d learned it from the humans long ago. Shit shit shit, it was all shit.

Long ago, in the days before, she had watched her people be slaughtered. Hacked down one by one, cut to pieces and their bodies heaved off by horses. Horses bound to do the humans bidding, such a wretched life, she thought, but they seemed happy, they hadn’t come to her aid when she called.

She had mourned and grieved her fallen brethren, watched their lifeless forms be stacked and chained together to be burned or put to some other nefarious use, and only hoped that her own pain would end so swiftly. But it was not to be. She had been left to witness, the pain hers alone to bear.

Long, long years passed, held captive in this barren, dying place. The colonies that tried to take up life in her people’s old home were uprooted, shunned. Nothing and no one could prosper here.

She waited a long time; long after the woodcutter, and the woodcutter's son, and the woodcutter’s son’s son…. and, well, she lost track of the generations a bit after that but it had been a while.

The sun was older, the earth quieter. She was cold, her joints creaked and ached and everything was heavy. She had been abandoned by her own people and the humans who had caused their destruction. She alone, left to weather the harsh… weather. Lashed with rain and beaten by the hot sun, no friends left to help give shelter. No happy little breeze now, just the violent waves of wind, unhindered.

Her eyes were cast ever skyward, and it hurt to look at the sky, but it was better than the memories that clung to the earth. She would weep, but it only made her feel sticky and sickly.

One day a mere mortal, not more than three score years and probably not even that—she noted his features were smooth and bare, no whiskers on this one— wandered by. He was dressed strangely but everything they did was strange so she didn’t pay it much attention. He laid a hand on her and she tried to shake it loose.

Stupid humans, no touching, dirty hands, ruinous hands

“What was that?” He murmured.

She thought he was a he, he had that air about him. Entitled. An extra trunk between his legs too, if her eyes weren’t mistaken.

Go back to your cities, cretin

His hand slid around her, feeling for… something. It brushed over the scar of the initials carved into her, that claiming mark.

“Tsk, this won’t do.”

He brought out a knife. Of course he did. Just like all the rest.

He cut into her and she wailed, throwing herself around and trying to get away but it was no use. He just kept on cutting, and though his work seemed like it had a purpose she couldn’t tell what it was. Her life force oozed out around the hole he was making as he cut chunks, stole away parts of her, until a hollow hole was left where part of her should be.

It felt… if not better, certainly different. They were good at change, these humans. She looked skyward again, only feeling a little better when she noticed the scarring marks were gone. He’d cut it away?

Well, more power to him, if he wanted a piece of ruined flesh so be it. She thought no more of it until he came back three moons later and talked to her again.

“I know what you are.”

Oh goodie, someone with some brains for once. Very pleased to meet you I’m sure

“I can hear you, you know.”

I doubt it

“I wouldn’t, if I were you. I know your secret, hiding in plain sight. But you can’t hide from me.”

She stayed silent, thinking, considering. If he was telling the truth…

“You’re no tree,” he murmured, stroking at her with his silly little furless paws. “You’re a wood nymph.”

Hmmph

“No, I said nymph.”

And you are a wizard, what do you want a pat on the back?

“No, just a conversation.”

She was taken aback, she hadn’t talked to anyone for years.

“You must be lonely.”

Obviously

“You’re very grumpy.”

I’ve been stuck in a tree for near three hundred years, you would be too

“There’s not enough magic left for you to get out.”

Congratulations on stating the obvious but there is nowhere I could go anyway

“I have somewhere.” He produced a small box from his pack and her heart—woody though it was—faltered. That was—

“Yes I made this from you.”

Thief!!

“Come now, it won’t be so bad. I have a wonderful collection of items, and creatures, you won’t be lonely.”

I won’t be free

“You’re not free now.”

I won’t go

“Oh yes you will.” He opened the lid of the box, ornately carved and beautifully made but still the desecrated corpse of part of her flesh. Disgusting, sickening. Very pretty but so macabre.

It was powerful magic, runes and other things that should be of no consequence but she was too weak to resist and had been for too long. She screamed, waved her branches, reached for the sky but no great eagle or eager buzzard came to her rescue as she was pulled down, down down into the tiny wooden prison made from her own bones.

“That wasn’t so bad was it?” He asked as he snapped the lid tightly shut.

The box rattled with the force of her rage but he wrapped it in cloth and she felt the slide of ropes twinning tightly about her. It was strange, feeling part of herself outside of herself, when it shouldn’t have been part of herself any longer. I was dark and cool inside the box, but that was about the only good thing she could say about it.

Let me out

“No.”

He slipped her into his satchel, and she bounced and shook as he walked further and further away from her home.

Curse you

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you. But no, you will be a blessing. A boon to long life, nymphs, if the books are correct. We’ll be happy together.”

I doubt it. Ridiculous boy with your toys and tools, I could never be happy with you

“Hush now, tree, or I’ll leave you in that box forever.”

Shoddy craftsmanship, you should be ashamed

He laughed. “At least I know you’re not going to sulk silently like some of my prizes. No, you’ll be more entertaining.”

She went silent, just to make a point.

“If you’re very good, maybe one day I’ll work out how to re-plant you and you can feel the mud between your toes again. Wouldn’t that be nice? A little glade, lots of life around you, plenty of growing things to watch over.”

She perked up at that, suddenly feeling… was that what hope had felt like? It had been a few decades since she’d last let herself feel it.

“See, I told you. Your old tree may wither and die without you, but you can be new and fresh as a spring bud. As long as you do what you can for me.”

So that was that, she was to be a slave? No worse than she deserved, after watching her people be killed and not able to do anything to stop it. Finally her long awaited fate had caught up to her, it was about time.

Do you have what the humans call television?

“Yes, why?”

I’ve wanted to see what it is, can’t I be curious?

“Well you won’t have eyes for a good long while until I know you can behave, but we could start with some music.”

Nature makes the best music

“You haven’t heard rock’n’roll, just wait.”

[My thought process for writing this was: hmm, plant day. Plant whump... what if... the plant was the thing that was whumped. Hahah, nah... unless 👀?

And I thought about that for like three weeks before finally churning out 1k the night before the event. Sexily unedited, just the raw chaos]

[oceanspray5]

Gwen and Arthur

We first meet Red Riding Gwen in the middle of the forest when Jack stumbles upon her. How did she get there and why is she a wolfette? Her face is covered and although that is expected because she's wearing a cloak and everything, she seems to almost be cowering into herself and hiding. But hiding from what. Those eyes in the forest too, what are they? Are they what Gwen is hiding from?

For her back story, I'm borrowing certain aspects and changing them from Arthurian Legends. @hanadoesstuffbadly came up with the name Gwen since it's a nickname for Queen Guinevere (wife of King Arthur) from the old English stories and so I decided to run with it and borrow some aspects for Gwen's back story. (Mainly the interpretation from the 60s Broadway production of Camelot or... rather from what I could find from Wikipedia about it but even so I didn't use a lot of references so you don't need to read up on that or anything. It's very very loosely related because I just needed a general idea of the Queen Guinevere from the famous legends).

Also special thanks to @ai-katsuu​ who really helped me with the ending of the story and made it better by adding an epic boss battle.

 So far my idea is: Gwen grows up a common girl living on the outskirts of the woods. She's known as Red Riding Hood because of her bright red cloak that her grandmother makes for her obviously. Her grandmother lives in the safe part of the woods that are not to far from Gwen's home. She likes to be closer to nature so Gwen's parents regularly send Gwen to check up on her grandmother.

Gwen adores her grandmother and always enjoys the trip but she's always been a sensitive and sheltered child. She's grown up a little further away from any large villages so she's relatively strong and good at doing things like gardening and stuff one needs to manage around the house, she's very shy and somewhat afraid of her surroundings due to her limited world view.

It's on one of Gwen's regular trips that an evil sorceress, Morgana le Fay, curses Gwen. The curse is sadly through no fault of her own. I think the reason why Morgana would curse Gwen is because she mistakes her for someone else. Morgana is in a relationship with a famed knight named Lancelot who leaves her for another maiden and Morgana mistakes Gwen to be that maiden even though she's not. Morgana is well-known in the land for her harsh fury and she isn’t a good witch or a bad witch, she’s just neutral although she can be very unpleasant when she wants to be.

On her way to deliver bread to her grandmother in the woods, Morgana finds and curses Gwen who is confused but moves along, unaware something drastic happened to her. When she reaches her grandmother’s house she has the appearance of a wolf. Her grandmother obviously doesn't recognize her and sounds the alarm. A nearby woodcutter comes and chases poor Gwen.

She's utterly terrified and runs off deeper in the woods where she's never gone before. She strays off of the path she knows and gets lost.

That's where we see her first.

Gwen is lost and nervous because she's never been in these parts of the woods before. She knows there are monsters in these woods as she's always been warned of them and told to remain on the path. Unfortunately she lost it and can't find her way back so she wanders around for some time, trying to stay as inconspicuous as possible. She has enough food to last her a while since she never ended up delivering to her grandmother. She manages to avoid any monsters. Naturally, when she sees Jack tangled up in his invisibility cloak, she thinks he's a monster and runs off screaming.

She's afraid to go back home in case she appears as a wolf again and she doesn't know what to do to get rid of the curse.

It takes her some time (although she has survival skills so luckily nothing happens to her) Gwen finally escapes the woods through an alternative route to the one she takes in. The months she spent lost she spent running from monsters and strange sounds so she stops to take a breath outside when she escapes and there's when she meets Arthur.

Arthur sees Gwen and of course decides to try his luck.

Gwen is pretty and she looks scared and as a knight, Arthur also wants to check up on her and make sure she's OK. He offers her the flower and Gwen feels flattered because she's never had someone do this for her before but also she's still scared the curse had given her some lasting affects that would make her unapproachable to others even as a human.

But then the full moon comes up and Gwen becomes a wolf again and starts crying thinking she can never go back home or be normal or have someone love her again. She can only be hunted like her grandmother tried to get the woodcutter to do. 

She's afraid she'll have to go back and live in the monstrous part of the woods again because nowhere else will accept her.

Arthur comforts her and promises her that she won’t be alone. He gives her the flower as well to promise her he doesn't see her as a monster and that she's still beautiful and gentle, not at all a ferocious beast in his eyes.

Arthur then goes with Gwen back in the woods to find Morgana and challenge her into breaking the curse but Morgana only laughs in his face and says Prince Arthur alone is hardly enough to defeat her. Arthur still attempts to duel Morgana though but she escapes using a spell but not before telling Arthur there's no real way to break the curse. Arthur doesn't believe this though and promises not to give up.

Naturally, Gwen is distraught by this news but Arthur comforts her because he would "never abandon a lady in distress" (read it in his accent xD). It's his duty to protect any fair maiden who requires his help.

Arthur then invites Gwen back to the White Palace and tells her she's welcome even if she's afraid she's a monster. Gwen agrees because she's still not sure how to go home and face her family yet. The Fearless Seven and their partners are welcoming and kind as well although Gwen still keeps to herself in the beginning.

As Arthur promises, he researches Morgana and a way to break Gwen's curse. Merlin is a great help there since he's a sorcerer as well and has heard of Morgana le Fay. The F7 (F14 now I guess?) are willing to help Gwen whatever it takes and she is grateful.

Although she stays at the White Palace, on the full moons, Arthur accompanies her to the woods so she's not alone. She doesn't have to leave. She's never really harmed someone during a full moon and Snow even offers her a separate guarded off chamber if she'd prefer to spend the night there on full moon nights and feel safer but poor Gwen is afraid she'll hurt someone and overstay her hospitality if she accepts and politely declines.

Arthur and Gwen have a good time on their little getaways though. He, of course, is very courtly and chivalrous. Gwen was brought up in a very ladylike manner. Her mother was a lady of the court who ran away to get married to a common man so Gwen grows up knowing most courtly etiquette including how ladies behave around chivalrous gentlemen. Her personality also plays into the fact that she's very reserved around Arthur but they become good friends and obviously have feelings for each other. Arthur is very gentle with Gwen so as not to overwhelm her and Gwen finds herself revealing her more playful side around him so they easily get along. They're opposites in many ways but also manage to find interest in each other's interests and that's why they fit so well.

The F7 have a bet going on how long it will take them to admit their feelings though since Gwen's upbringing and Arthur's chivalrous nature don't allow them to take more then baby steps in their relationship. It's always adorable to see Arthur tripping over his feet to do something for Gwen whenever she asks though.

It's on one of these monthly trips on the full moon when Arthur almost gets his curse broken. They're on their way to the woods, a little before sunset, and Gwen tries to kiss Arthur as a thanks and a favor for being so kind to her all this time and giving her a home since she lost her own. She says he has been her knight all this time and a fair maiden always owes her knight a reward. She's very shy as she says this and kisses him on the cheek and Arthur isn't expecting it at all. They’re about to kiss for real though but Gwen turns into a wolf since the sun officially sets (yes I had to use the almost kiss trope).

Luckily, Gwen and Arthur manage to find a trail lead to Morgana's castle during their evening in the forest. They immediately call for backup from the rest of the F7 and Co. (should it just be F14 at this point? XD) who arrive.

(Merlin, crashing in through the trees with everyone else: We're here Bitch xD)

The group makes their way through the forest and reaches Morgana's ruined castle overgrown with bramble and magical plants. It's absolutely teeming with magical energy but the group remains Fearless (pun not intended). This is their boss battle and a test of their teamwork as a whole.

They make their way through various rooms and challenges, the couples fighting in perfectly matched pairs for the most part. Morgana has sent a variety of monsters, both magical and ones she's tamed from the forest, to stop the group in their tracks. The group's goal is to get Merlin face to face with Morgana so they can battle sorcerer to sorcerer.

On the way Gwen almost gets killed and one of the other F7 members nearly sacrifices themselves for her. She's shocked because she never expected these people to care for her so much they'd risk her life for her. Sure they'd become tentative friends but Gwen hadn't opened up fully and she just thought she was a temporary guest at most.

But when Gwen points this out, the teammate who saves her says "Of course I risked my life for you. We're all family!". (For some reason I imagine Briar being the one to save her but it could be anyone from the group really).

When they reach the final room, Merlin battles Morgana alongside Arthur while the rest take care of the other monsters and magic. In the end, Morgana lays defeated and reveals that she already told Arthur the curse is irreversible. What she can do is modify it and she does so.

Gwen learns that her transformation is now something she can control at will. If she wants, she can choose to remain human even during full moons and she can transform whenever she actually wants to. This is very useful because she uses this power when fighting with the Fearless Seven in battles in the future. She's not exactly as she used to be but a part of her is relieved because she had learnt to live with the wolf inside her and wasn't quite sure if she wanted it gone after so many months with it.

Arthur and Gwen kiss and his curse is broken. Arthur, being the dramatic over the top knight that he is obviously says gets down on his knee and says "My lady, I would be honored if you would be my Queen." 

Arthur gets a lot of teasing about that from the others cuz "Arthur you JUST transformed back! We know you're thrilled but give it some time buddy."

They do give it some time albeit not as long as the others but eventually Arthur proposes for real very soon after. He knows he loves Gwen and she loves him and they get happily married.

Bonus Headcanons:

Gwen goes back to her parents and grandmother who were worried sick about her. They scold her for running off and thinking they'd turn her away for getting cursed but they readily accept her back, relieved that she is safe. They are thrilled to hear she found Arthur and a lot of other friends although they are sad to hear her go and prefer to stay at Palace White with them instead. She visits a lot though.

Gwen was strong to begin with since she worked in the gardens and around her house but her curse and the wolfette inside her gives her an extra strength. Gwen isn't always aware of it though and she has a tendency to crush things unknowingly especially if she's angry or anxious and there's something in her hand at the moment. (Think spiderman when he's not yet sure about the extent of his powers). Because of this, her and Briar (and sometimes Goldie) make quite the pair, one having super strength and the other being extremely clumsy. She eventually learns how to be gentle again although it takes some practice. Arthur helps her and they both become a little more gentle in that way.

She is the quietest member of the Fearless Seven + Partners (Fearless Fourteen?) squad. She's introverted and shy as mentioned earlier but she does fit quite well in the group dynamic even if she isn't quite as dramatic as the rest. Her and Snow sometimes sit and have tea together alone just for a quiet relaxed evening away from the chaos.

She takes to the Dog Food quite quickly. The Fearless Seven find their match in her. Gwen never would have expected to try these snacks before her wolfette transformation but afterwards her taste buds can't get enough and she out-eats most of the F7 combined.

She is well versed in herbs and potions so this is a useful trick on top of her wolf strength when the F7 and Co. go on missions and need to camp out and either get injured or need something to season food with.

Gwen calms Arthur's boisterous personality a lot. He's very gentle with her because he knows she prefers soft voices and movements. In turn, he also brings out her playful wild side from when she was a child and climbed trees and ran around. She's still remarkably composed of course, but when it's just the F7 her hidden nature comes out to play.

She keeps her grandmother's cloak for a long time and ends up passing it on to her own daughter as well.

Jack recognizes the cloak and after A LOT of painful whining about having seen Gwen somewhere but not knowing WHERE, eventually he and Gwen connect the dots that he landed in the forest near her long ago (I imagine Gwen was on her own in the woods for quite a while before getting out and Arthur finding her) and she scared him for which he apologizes although it's not entirely necessary and it becomes a funny memory they laugh over.

I'm sure to have more headcanons soon and when I do I'll definitely make a seperate post but this is all I have related to Red Riding Gwen and Arthur for now. Feel free to interpret this as you will and share your own headcanons if you have any!

[advisortotheadvisor]

Matters of Lupine Nomenclature

The name Tobias Clay still felt heavy and uneven on his tongue, but that didn't make it any less his. Or, at least, something that used to be his.

(Or, Canis ponders names, and all the baggage that comes with them)

(Ao3 link)

--

Tobias Clay

The name still felt uncomfortable and foreign on his tongue no matter how many times he silently repeated it to himself, turning the syllables over and over like that would make it take on a more recognizable shape. It wasn't familiar, but it was his, supposedly. It was his in the way that Tobias Clay's life was supposedly his. He'd been told it was his, and he had no reason to believe otherwise, but it wasn't something that felt like his, something he remembered being his.

“So which is it?” Charming had asked the day after they fled into the woods. Their group had already started their preliminary plans for a war camp but most retired to bed once the sun set, with the exception of himself, Charming, and Snow White and a few Merry Men keeping a look out for the Scarlet Hand. He was used to late nights and wanted to take the opportunity to meditate, but he couldn't fathom why Charming was still awake.

“What are you talking about?” he growled without opening his eyes. He'd agreed to a truce because preparing for the upcoming war was more important than a petty grudge, but it was easier to keep said truce if the other man didn't speak to him, walk next to him, or generally exist within his line of sight more than strictly necessary.

“Your name, mon-" Charming cut himself off, apparently struggling with their recent alliance as well. “I heard from the short child with the braids that it used to be Tobias Clay. So which is it, Clay or Canis?”

“I don't know.”

(It reminded him of all those years ago, when that was the only answer he could give.

Where did you come from? I don't know.

What's your name? I don't know.

Who are you? I don't know.)

“Helpful,” Charming sneered. “If you want my advice–"

“I don't.”

“–I'd switch to Tobias. Canis is a little too on the nose.” With that, the other man sauntered off. Good riddance.

He didn't think about that conversation much (particularly because the day he took advice from William Charming on anything besides war plans was the day he died) but he did think about Tobias Clay.

Tobias Clay had been a human woodcutter with a questionable choice in apprentices. That was all he knew. It was all anyone knew.

Now, after being abruptly thrown into a town where nearly everyone hated him and he didn't know why, he was used to working with minimal information. But at least then there had been something to work backwards from, people to gather information from. The only person who could tell him about he had been before the Wolf was Howard Hatchett. Howard Hatchett, who had manipulated a mentally ill, traumatized child. Howard Hatchett, who had rewritten history just to inflate his own ego. He wasn't going to ask that man for anything and even if he did, Hatchett wasn't exactly a reliable source of information.

So, as he did with most issues, he turned to meditation.

(Relda said meditation couldn't solve every problem, and he agreed; occasionally you needed to apply brute force. But he couldn't physically fight his lack of memories any more than he had been able to physically fight the Wolf.)

But the magic from the horn of the north wind had been shaky at best (he knew a rushed spell when he saw one) so the memories of Tobias and the memories of the Wolf tended to blend together. Blurred faces, snatches of conversation, a landscape he could vaguely recall, a splatter of red, blood under his claws as they tore into sinew, fangs ripping into flesh and muscle–

It isn't real he reminded himself. But he had to check. He always had to check. He slowly opened his eyes – normal dull human teeth, normal dull human fingernails. No sign of the Wolf, because it was trapped in the jar in his bag. It was actually rather ironic – something that had tormented him for years contained by something as fragile as glass. He had never cared for irony.

The memory of fur and blood still clung to him relentlessly, despite his attempts to bury the sensation. His meditation sessions tended to end like this lately, with the Wolf hanging over him like a ghost, infecting his thoughts even though they were finally separated once and for all.

He stood up, his joints aching with protest- that, too, had been happening more often as of late. The floorboards creaked beneath him- his cabin, as well as the rest of the camp, had been built rather hastily by the Merry Men with the help of magic. And while they had done that, he'd been here. Meditating. Waiting. Being useless.

His eyes lingered on the singular bag he'd taken with him and somehow, in an action driven more by instinct than logic, the jar containing the Wolf found its way into his hands.

The power of the Wolf thrummed under his fingertips like lightning. It swirled and snapped, always moving, always fighting. He knew that feeling well. Up until him and the Wolf had been separated, he hadn't realized how much of his time he had dedicated to battling the Wolf. To protecting everyone from himself. And now he felt…restless without something to fight.

His fingers itched to unscrew the lid.

Instead, he hurriedly rewrapped it in one of Relda's dish towels to ensure it wouldn't break and tucked it back into his bag.

(He was free from the damn monster after centuries of torment and the cursed thing still had a hold over him.)

--

He was able to not think about names or Tobias Clay for a while because there were larger things at stake and more important things to think about then who he used to be.

Meditation, his own private weapon against the Wolf, became something he taught one of his most hurt victims. It seemed irony was as pervasive in his life as the Wolf.

Guilt had always been one of his strongest weapons against the Wolf. He created chains from the faces of his victims and shackled the Wolf with them, forcing the beast further and further back with every reminder that he couldn't allow something like that happen again. Restraint and keeping himself centered were invaluable as well, but guilt was what he found himself relying on the most.

I concentrate on all the people I hurt when I was unable to control myself he had told Daphne when she had asked. He'd kept the details to himself of course – he had no intention of traumatizing yet another child – but it still rang true. His own regrets had always been what was keeping the Wolf at bay.

But that didn't apply here with Red. She was trying to recover her memories, to piece together what her old life had been just like he was. Guilt was useless, and he couldn't imagine asking a child to put herself through that kind of turmoil. So he found himself directing their meditation sessions in other ways.

He wasn't certain, but he imagined that Red's memories came to her the same way his came to him; in disconnected piecemeal, snapshots of scenes that meant nothing without context. Snippets of a life that neither of them could return to.

“What did you see?” he asked after her face scrunched up in concentration. The question was rote by now, something repeated in every one of their sessions. He occasionally shared his memories to make her more comfortable telling him her own. His (when not bloodstained from the Wolf) tended to be rather benign; sparse glimpses of a forest or a brief conversation with a stranger (or a friend; it was difficult to tell the difference.)

“I remembered something from before,” she started. “B-before the cabin, a-and the Wolf. I was talking to my grandmother and…and she called me by a different name.” Her brow furrowed, as though the memory was already slipping through her grasp. “I can't remember what it was, though.”

“That's alright,” he said absently. Red had already agreed that if she remembered anything about the Master or the Scarlet Hand, then he was free to relay it to the others in the camp. Any personal memories, though, he kept to himself until she felt like sharing them with anyone else. But that also meant Charming would be breathing down his neck about this as though recovering memories taken by powerful magic was a feat no more difficult than checking the weather. He would, however, have to deal with that later. “I'm sure you'll remember in time.”

Red nodded. Picked at a thread on the pants she had borrowed from Daphne. “You had another name too, didn't you? Tobias Clay? That's what they said at the trial.”

His eyebrows furrowed at the shift in conversation. “That's correct.”

“But everyone still calls you Mr. Canis.” It wasn't phrased like a question, but the uncertainty in her voice made it seem like one.

“It's the name I went by for twenty years. I suppose it's easier to remember,” he said. Red moved her fingers to a different thread. “And believe me, child, there are far more important things to worry about than my name.”

She was quiet for a moment before speaking, her voice still soft. “I don't think that means it's not important at all. My memories are important to me, even if they don't help us find the Master. Your name is allowed to be important to you.”

Though it was wavering, it was the most conviction he'd ever seen her display. It was also the first time she'd ever openly disagreed with him. He was, oddly enough, a little proud of her, of her small act of bravery despite how meek it was.

He sent her away after that, telling her that they're done for the day and could resume tomorrow if she wanted to. The door closed behind her, as quiet as she was, and he was left alone with his thoughts.

Tobias Clay.

The name still didn't feel right. He thought of it every once in a while, when one of his memories was particularly clear or unusual, but it still held no real familiarity to him. It still felt empty, like something that belonged to a stranger and not himself.

But wasn't that the point of names? To be given meaning, rather than have meaning inherently buried within them? Could he arbitrarily decide that this name meant nothing, considering that Canis had meant nothing to him as well at some point?

The shadows on the floor grew longer as he found himself with no answers.

--

(Wolf was the only name he would never have any doubts about. It had been a monster, a being capable only of bloodlust and destruction. He couldn't erase what he'd done, but he'd be damned if he let that monster dig its claws any deeper into his life.

Hamstead had been the single exception, in that the name had been used with a kind of respect. He'd done the same with ‘Pig.’ It was a reciprocal acknowledgment of their shared past.

Coming from Hamstead, it was the only time he didn't hate the name.)

--

It wasn't until after the war that somebody brought up the topic of his name again. Because, while Canis was familiar and it was something he remembered, he wasn't sure if it qualified as his any more than Tobias Clay.

Canis had been, as Relda phrased it, a “place-holder name" that was only supposed to last until they found who he really was. And he wasn't a fool – he knew exactly where she'd gotten it from and what it meant. For all of Relda Grimm's strengths, subtlety wasn't one of them. It had been a temporary name at best. And now, nearly two decades later, he finally had the answer to the question he hadn't even been sure could be answered.

In theory, Tobias was better. Canis may have been familiar, but it was also irrevocably linked to the Wolf. Everyone (himself included) had believed that Canis and the Wolf were interchangeable beings, but Tobias Clay proved the opposite, that he had been someone before the Wolf and could be someone after. It was a name unconnected to the Wolf, unsullied by its crimes.

It was a name unconnected to anything. It was both a benefit and a detriment. Canis had been linked with the Wolf, but that wasn't the only connection that name bore.

The name Tobias Clay may have meant something to him in the past, but it didn't mean much now. Any connection to the name was burned away by magic, torn away and discarded centuries ago. Tobias Clay was, by all means and purposes, a ghost, someone who might as well been killed by the Wolf even if he was still physically alive. Tobias’s memories haunted him in fragments; events he couldn't remember, people he didn't know. They were foggy reflections of a life he had already lived.

The day he'd been sentenced to hang, the day he'd found out about Tobias Clay, he had asked if he had a family. It was one of many questions he had about his old life, one morsel of information he craved to know about who he had been. Nobody had answered because the concept of Tobias Clay existing was as novel as the idea of Canis existing had been all those years ago.

It was a question only he was capable of answering, though he wasn't sure if either possible answer could be considered good. Was it better to know that he'd lived alone, that no one had mourned him when the Wolf came to be? Or was it better to know that he'd had a family, one that was forever lost, only alive in his memories?

He may never know Tobias Clay's family. But he knew Canis'.

Canis was tied to the Wolf, true. It was an name irrevocably covered in blood and pain. But it was also the name that tied him to the Grimms, to the family he'd grown to love and the woman who had trusted him when he couldn't even trust himself.

It was also, strangely enough, the name that tied him to his daughter.

Fatherhood was admittedly not something he was particularly adept at. He had been present throughout Henry and Jacob's childhood, as well as when Relda took in Sabrina and Daphne and later Puck. But he was a far cry from a father to any of them. Trying to be a competent parent to Red was a different matter altogether. It was a struggle, and not one he was used to. He had always been prepared to lay down his life for the Grimms. Having someone to live for was…significantly harder.

The aftermath from the war seemed to last longer than the war itself. There were houses to rebuild, streets to repave, living situations to sort out. Everafters streamed in and out of town, a constant state of flux. Those who had been trapped reveled in the opportunity to see the world for the first time in centuries, and those who hadn't came to revisit the town that they hadn't dared step foot in since the barrier went up.

For the everafters leaving town, there was also the matter of paperwork. Passports, birth certificates, social security cards- all things needed to live within human society. All things most everafters didn't have. But Veronica Grimm was nothing if not an expert in navigating that kind of red tape, which was how he found himself registering Red for school with Relda one afternoon.

The process was a little tiresome, but not particularly arduous; mostly just filling out the same lies covering the rest of her paperwork. The matter of her name, though, left quite a few lines blank. ‘Red,’ though not a common name, was not as suspicious as it might have been years ago. The real issue, however, was her last name. The memory of it still slipped through her grasp, and they were currently trying to find a good substitute.

“We could just use ‘Grimm,'" he offered as he struggled to paperclip the registration forms together. Unbelievably, arthritis was more cumbersome in regular life than it had been during the war. Relda hummed in agreement to his idea, but was more preoccupied with separating Red's paperwork from Pinocchio’s into more distinct stacks.

“Actually,” Red interjected timidly, hiding behind her hair. “I was wondering if maybe I could…use ‘Canis' instead.” She paused, as though gauging their reactions. “O-or I can still use Grimm, if you don't like that idea.”

It occurred to him, perhaps a second too late, that she'd taken his lack of reaction as disapproval. And it wasn't without reason; since she'd taken on the Wolf, he'd been torn between wanting to be the parent she needed and wanting to keep her at arm's length before he could do anymore damage. After all, it was his selfishness, his recklessness that had put her in that situation to begin with. He was clearly unfit as role model, much less a father.

And yet here she was, asking if she could take this ridiculous, made-up name and use it to make them father and daughter in the eyes of the law.

He agreed and Red smiled, soft and warm, as they filled out the remainder of the paperwork.

Weeks later, when he was forging his own legal forms in hopes of getting a driver's license, the topic of names gave him pause again.

In the past, on the rare occasion that he needed to use a first name, he'd made one up. It happened infrequently enough that it had no real bearing on what others referred to him as, but the reminder still rang loudly as he shifted through the papers.

His pen hovered over the form, but didn't make a mark. Choosing between names had never been a problem before, because he hadn't had more than one to choose from. But now he did, and was presented with the choice between a name that tied him to his family, but also to who he'd been at his lowest points, and a name that tied him to absolutely nothing but ghosts.

After another moment of deliberation, he firmly filled in the blank under Name.

--

The name still felt new. Not entirely unfamiliar or familiar, but still slightly strange nonetheless.

But it felt like his, in that he'd chosen it to be his, in that he'd decided on it rather than having it being given to him with no other alternatives.

It still didn't mean much to him, didn't carry the weight that just  Mr. Canis did. But it might mean something to him someday, might be a name that he lived in, created memories in.

It still rung with oddness, but with each introduction and passing reference to it, the novelty wore off a little bit more, fading and waning until it was just a name, just something that was his.

After twenty years of driving, he finally received his license, emblazoned with his new name. It made it seem more real in a way, a physical signifier of the name he'd chosen. It was tucked neatly in his wallet, next to a picture of the Grimms. And there, in official black and white lettering, was the name he'd decided was undoubtedly his:

Tobias Canis.

Both of his lives combined. His foggy past and his uncertain future.

A name worth living in.

[thelittlehansy]

Why it doesnt make any sense to go hide aurora in the woods in the maleficent remake....

In disney sleeping beauty aurora was not hide in the wood To prevent her to prick her finger on a spindle wheel. King stefan already burn all of them.

but because of two stuff

- maleficent wanted her dead

- maleficent was after them because the fairies change her curse of death into a slumber woke up by true love kiss.

Also one of the subtlity i never catch younger in the plot of the scenario They interpret maleficent curse as aurora can died any time before her 16th birthday thats why she was hide her whole life and not only on the day of her 16th birthday. ( i dont want to be rude but i think it possible the writor of maleficent didnt understand it )

Thats why flora elaborate her plan. Hide aurora in the woods to protect her against maleficent. Here is the dialogue between flora fauna merryweather :

Flora:Silly fiddle faddle!

Fauna:Now, come have a nice cup of tea, dear. I'm sure it'll work out somehow.

Merryweather:Well, a bonfire won't stop Maleficent.

Flora:Of course not. But what will?Fauna:Well, perhaps if we reason with her.

Flora:Reason?Merryweather:With Maleficent?

Fauna:Well, she can't be all bad.

Flora:Oh, yes, she can.

Merryweather:I'd like to turn her into a fat ole hoptoad!

Fauna:Now, dear, that isn't a very nice thing to say.

Flora:Besides, we can't. You know our magic doesn't work that way.

Fauna:It can only do good, dear, to bring joy and happiness.

Merryweather:Well, that would make me happy.

Flora:But there must be some way ... There he is!

Merryweather:There he is?

Fauna:What is it, Flora?Flora:I'm going to ... shh, shh, shh! Even walls have ears.[Flora sneaks around the corners]

Flora:Follow me![Flora minimizes herself, the other two follow her into the insides of a something on the table]

Flora:I'll turn her into a flower!Merryweather:Maleficent?

Flora:Oh no, dear, the princess!

Fauna:Oh she'd make a lovely flower.

Flora:Don't you see, a flower can't prick its finger.

Merryweather:It hasn't any.

Fauna:That's right.

Flora:She'll be perfectly safe.

Merryweather:Until Maleficent sends a frost.

Flora:Yes, a ... oh dear!

Fauna:She always ruins your nicest flowers.

Flora:You're right. And she'll be expecting us to do something like that.

Merryweather:But what won't she expect, she knows everything.

Fauna:Oh but she doesn't dear. Maleficent doesn't know anything about love, or kindness, or the joy of helping earnest. You know, sometimes I don't think she's really very happy.

Flora:[getting excited] That's it, of course! It's the only thing she can't understand, and won't expect. [to herself] oh, oh, now, now ... We have to plan it carefully, let's see, woodcutters cottage, yes, yes, the abandoned one, of course the King and Queen will object, but when we explain it's the only way ...

Merryweather:Explain what?

Flora:About the three peasant women raising a foundling child deep in the forest. !

You see this are the reasons why aurora was hide in the woods. As a protection against maleficent who was after her.

But in the remake.....

they change the WHOLE STORY

but still keep some little stuff about the original "in honor of the cartoon" but in the end it doesnt make any SENSE ! So they tought they were smart but too me this is just prove how much the didnt care understand the animated.

Maleficent doesnt want anymore aurora dead maleficent is defintly not after aurora and there is no reasons for stefan or the fairies to believe it. She cursed her to fall asleep and after give the solution " true love kiss" the last fairy do nothing at all. The plan is not anymore the fairies plan but stefan because "he still was fearing for her daughter " like why ? burn your spindle wheel and aurora can stay.

but they still keep two stuff from the animated : stefan Burn the spindle wheel and aurora is hide in the woods.......because thats it in the cartoon.... I think .they put it there without understanding why aurora is in the woods in the first place.

But since the whole PURPOSE to hide aurora in the cartoon was To protect her against maleficent who wanted her dead an was after her and since in the remake maleficent is not anymore after aurora and doesnt even want dead but only want stefan to suffer to find aurora a true love when for her true love doesnt exist. This is just...DUMB and they also hide aurora......on maleficent territoy.🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️

Aurora in the remake could have stay in her castle. There was literraly 0 reasons on the remake to go hide aurora in the woods. Hiding aurora in the woods was a consequences of evil maleficent who wanted her dead

This what they should have done in the remake to fit with what they change about the story.

- burn the spindle wheel

- find aurora a true love in case something happen.

So i just have the feeling with how little respect they have for the animated movie that they went " ok sleeping beauty that fairy tale everyone knows doesnt matter to actually rewatch the movie to understand why they did the stuff they did" i understand its basically a fairy tale the scenario is basic and it have one dimensional characters but there is still a story in that cartoon and you just cant took some stuff while ignoring the context.

Also here is the movie : they say at the start they burn the spindle wheel. But nope thats apparently not the case anymore ! They are just....broken.

They should be burn like in the original and perrault and grimm tale. I mean thats completly dumb to put them in the dungeon of the castle and not even burn them all....This is so stupid so here is my theory:

Its was done on purpose for aurora to find them later. Because you know :

The only reasons why it appear in the cartoon is.....thanks to maleficent.

But now maleficent is not anymore evil.....So now the spindle wheel doesnt have any reasons to suddently appear from nowhere.

I respect people who like it I can see the appeal but i hate this movie and how it treat sleeping beauty like trash for the sake of making a fairy that is suppose to be a demon a spiritual mommy for aurora.

[treatian]

The Chronicles of the Dark One:  Breaking the Curse

Chapter 20: The Magic of the Lamp

So far, so good. Or at least "good" in a sort of way. Emma Swan had been Sheriff for a week. In fact, today marked the conclusion of her first full week on the job. And so far…no major developments. He supposed he shouldn't be disappointed at that. He had to remind himself to take things one step at a time and then sometimes rest in the step that had been taken. Emma was the Sheriff, the holidays were next week, and the weather centers were issuing warnings already that the weather would turn nasty before then. He knew he shouldn't expect much at this time and yet he was disappointed.

It was desperation talking. That was all it was. He'd waited for centuries, and now that he was standing in front of the Savior, the idea of being here in the same world as Bae for months, if not years on end, without being with his son felt like torture. The logical part of his mind knew this needed time to breathe; the parent in him didn't want to wait.

But Dove had been following her almost constantly all week and had nothing exciting to report. She'd done what he would have expected her to do in a new position. She'd started wearing the badge, responded to a call about fresh graffiti some kids had left, dealt with domestic disputes, and according to Dove, she was currently working on a case that involved two homeless children. Nothing exciting, nothing that would lead to the Curse being broken. She hadn't even been by to see him once, not after the confession he'd left her with, which he had to admit, left him just as disappointed as her lack of progress with the Curse. No, after telling her exactly how she'd won that election, he hadn't expected her to come by and want tea and crumpets. Still, he'd figured that a woman like that, the daughter of Snow White and Prince Charming, would take the weekend to cool down, get her head together, then come marching in to tell him that she wasn't going to stand for anything like that ever again. She'd try to put him in his place, he'd remind her exactly where his place was and where they stood, and they'd part with a timid arrangement to stay out of each other's way until they needed one another, and that would be that. But it hadn't happened. And that was a shame.

He was ready for something to happen. He needed something to happen. As he rubbed and polished the once magical genie lamp to perfection, he dared to wish for it. He wished for an idea. He wished for a way to jump-start things once more. He wished for Dove to report something that might lead him to cross paths with Emma Swan and let the Curse begin to crack again. He'd take anything; an idea, an action, anything. Anything! He wished!

And then the bell on the front door rang, and he looked up to see none other than Emma Swan coming through his door, their first interaction since after the election. He smiled as he set the lamp down upon its cloth, trying not to let her see how his hands shook. He wished…and it had happened. Wishes from a genie were just about the worst way to get what one wanted. There was no magic here, the genie of this lamp was free, nothing had happened, it was all coincidence…but that didn't exactly stop his mind from racing and his hands from shaking as he tried not to think about it.

"Emma," he piqued just as he felt his phone vibrate in his pocket. It was probably Dove, warning him too late that she was on her way in. The question was why. He knew from Dove that she'd been busy the last day or so trying to find the parents of a couple of children who tried to steal from Dark Star Pharmacy. What that had to do with him…he didn't know. But he'd take anything that got things going again.

He had…hoped…

"How lovely to see you. I'm flattered you'd take time off your busy schedule for me. What could I do for you, Sheriff?" he asked politely.

She glared at him but unhappily stepped forward and set an object down on the red velvet he had in front of him. "I'm looking for information on this old compass. Any idea where it could have come from?"

Yes…and no.

"Well, well," he sighed, allowing Mr. Gold to evaluate it as he might have before Rumpelstiltskin woke from his sleep. "Look at the detail. You know, this is crystal. This jeweled setting…despite the rather unfortunate shape it's in, this is actually a very unusual piece," he concluded, laying it out on the table for her. "The person who owned this obviously had great taste."

"And where would someone like that buy it?"

"Right here, of course."

It was a half-truth. He had half-memories of it in his shop, hazy memories of it being purchased when he'd first bought the shop. Still, because they were fuzzy, he knew it was a false memory, something that had never really happened, only something that the Curse wanted him to believe had happened. So yes…he knew its Storybrooke "history," but he also recognized it from another life. And sadly, in that other life, he'd been too busy at the time to pay close attention to the meaning behind it. He'd seen it in the hands of two children, the two children that Regina had been seen with in the Enchanted Forest. She'd taken them from their father. Odd…Dove's last report said that Emma was helping two children today. Children separated from their father. That wasn't a happy ending. But a reunion would be. And a happy ending could only mean one thing…the Curse continuing to break. That would be a good thing. He'd tried hard not to be too hasty after the election and just to let things play out as they might, but it had been a week without any significant progress or event. He was ready for one.

"You know him?!"

"Indeed. A piece like this is difficult to forget."

"Do you happen to remember who bought it?"

He chuckled. Yes…and no. His half-hazy memories of the compass didn't help him, and he knew there was no paperwork on it simply because it had never really been in this shop. But, the woodcutter that the children had belonged to in the Enchanted Forest, his face was familiar. He'd seen him before, every time he took his car in to be serviced. But he had a role to play here. Dove had told him that Emma had gone to the Sheriff's office and the kids that she was helping had been caught with Henry; he couldn't rule out the idea that Regina had her suspicious little nose in everything. He had an illusion to keep intact. So while he might remember the individual's name right now because he was familiar but he knew that the memories of the compass were old enough that no human would. He'd have to fake it. There were just some things the Savior wasn't ready to know.

"Well, I'm good with names, Miss Swan, but maybe not that good," he smiled, heading for the box he kept his notecards in. There wasn't one for the compass in it. But Emma didn't need to know that. And he…he needed to get back on her good side, to regain her trust after what happened in the election. He wanted this Curse broken. Having her angry and at a distance to him in the last week obviously hadn't been the answer to that. Therefore, logically, getting back into her good graces might change that.

"However, as luck would have it, I do keep quite extensive records. And…yes, here we are!" He plucked an empty notecard out from the back of the bunch but kept it close so she wouldn't see his bluff. Emma didn't miss a beat.

"What's your price?" she asked maintaining that glare that he was certain she'd inherited from her mother.

"Forgiveness."

"How about tolerance?"

He smiled. Start negotiations low, counter high, meet in the middle at the compromise. T'was the pawnbroker's creed, right up there with "Buy low, sell high." He should have asked a bit more from her by all accounts, but he found her counter was acceptable…for now.

"Well, that's a start. The compass was purchased by a Mr. Michael Tillman," he dutifully informed her.

"Anything else?"

He shook his head. "Just a name. But I generally find that's all that one needs," he smiled. It was enough to lead her to the car shop and the children's father and from there…another crack in his once-perfect Curse. "Good luck with your investigation!" he called as she turned to leave without even a "thank you." He was okay with that. He didn't need things like gratitude. He needed his son.

The second she was out of his shop he glanced over at the lamp still sitting where he'd left it when Emma came into the shop. He shuddered as the memory of Emma Swan's reappearance rolled over him once more. It wasn't the lamp. He didn't want to believe for even one second that it was the lamp. There was no magic to spare here in Storybrooke, and there was no genie inside!

Although, distant memories of another life reminded him that of all the magic in the world they'd once belonged to, Genie Magic was perhaps the most mysterious and dangerous. No one knew how it worked or way, only that it did. And however it worked, it had always been clear that the lamp of a genie played a role and was imbued with its own brand of magic. All magic came with a price, and the price of genie magic, the cost of whatever magic that lamp might have held, was often not worth the wish it granted. And this place, Storybrooke, in a World Without Magic, he knew it was made of pure magic. The Curse used magic to keep it going to keep it stable. The Curse absorbed any extra magic floating around this place, but even then, he knew powerful magic could be activated even for a short time…

He turned away from the lamp, refusing to give anymore attention to this ignorant fear of his. It wasn't the lamp that made Emma Swan come into this place. But, while he was thinking about it, if he was planning on bringing magic into this world, then he might need to do something with that particular object. He wasn't superstitious, just cautious. He knew better than to put his faith and trust in wishing.

[scribblesofanaricat]

Crossed Out

(an older version has been posted here before, but I’ve finally gotten round to making a fully edited version with an altered ending (and hopefully a bit more of an explanation), so I hope you guys like)

---------

It’s not a crime to be curious.

That simple fact is what’s led him to end up stuffing his knapsack with an assortment of things that normally have no business being in there. Normally. A scarf that just so happens to be ideal for somebody who’d rather their face went unseen. A chunk of nut and raisin-infused bread snuck- borrowed from the loaf his mam keeps wrapped up in the kitchen (which he can never resist sampling at the best of times). And the battered old woodcutter’s axe he can barely raise any higher than his shoulder - just in case.

That bag’s been packed for days now, wedged out of sight in a corner of his clothes chest. He hasn’t been able to bring himself to do anything more than that. Until now, that is.

His teeth clench at every telltale creak of the floorboards under his bare feet, even though he isn’t really doing anything wrong…yet. He gives them a hard prod with his toes all the same. Traitors.

As he fervently hoped, the front room is clear of any mother-shaped obstacles when he slinks his way downstairs. Just the rough-hewn table and chairs sitting in their usual corner and the mismatched sideboards pushed up against their usual walls, although one of them now has what looks like fresh creamy milk waiting patiently atop it.

Right on cue, a distinctive voice swells from beneath the threadbare carpet.

“Arlo, that milk was just delivered this morning! Don’t you go drinking it straight from the bottle!”

“No, Mam,” he half-mutters, setting down the glass bottle he definitely hasn’t just been raising to his lips.

This is okay. Perfect, really. If she’s down in the cellar, that means she’s probably busy making preserves to sell at the market or something again. By the time she notices he’s neither in the house nor working in the garden, he’ll be well away. And then…then he’ll have some answers, whether she likes it or not. Satisfaction curls in his chest like a languid cat.

Arlo inches out of the door shoulder-first, lifting and lowering the latch as noiselessly as his fingers can manage - the same fingers that nearly drop the scarf twice when he knots the stained grey fabric over the lower half of his face, cursing the pit of his stomach for the uncomfy feeling spreading through it like so much spilled mead. What does he even have to feel guilty about? It’s not a crime.

Enough of that. Enough of it all.

He darts one glance over his shoulder, back at the rusty rooftop and their patch of garden, a weather-beaten face spotted with a mishmash of flowery freckles (except for the bit with his mother’s favourite lilies arranged on it, obviously. Those, she keeps spick and span and never lets him go anywhere near, though he has no idea what she thinks he’ll do to them). Then he starts to run. His legs set about their task in earnest, without taking directions from his mind. He already knows the kinds of places where he can find them…not that it’s any huge secret anyway. Or rather, it’s a secret to everybody; the type little kids hear all about as soon as they can toddle a few steps. Then they get their ears bruised with dire warnings to stay well away from it. Stupid. As if that won’t just put ideas into their tiny heads.

He’s not a kid anyway, Arlo reminds himself, puffing his chest out a little despite how short his bursts of breath are growing. This is no daft childish game. It’s something important. Something that goes hand in hand with the way he’s been jolting awake lately. Gagging around a yell jammed in his throat; a weird sort of dread tying his insides into hard knots. Or opening his eyes to find a stupid wetness spilling down his cheeks…or (he stifles a groan at the memory, heat rushing to his face) soaking his bedsheets.

He doesn’t know if he’s having nightmares...hallucinations, terrors, whatever. How can he? They float away like soap bubbles on washing day every time he tries to latch onto them. But it feels familiar to him, in all the places where it shouldn’t. One morning, he even woke up with the ghost of a name on his tongue and of blood suffocating him with its metallic tang. That’s all they were, though. Ghosts. And they vanished just like that, leaving nothing behind but a dragging weight in his chest.

Arlo just doesn’t know. Yet he’s sure- he’s sure he remembers, no matter how dimly.

To make matters weirder, talking to his mam hasn’t been any use whatsoever. No sooner do the words leave his lips than she butts in to set him some chore or another, or else shifts the topic in a way that curls his hands into fists. The last time Arlo tried to ask her about it, she had her own grilling ready for him – “Who have you been talking to? Who’s put all of this in your head?” – and something in her tone, something strange and strained, made him drop the subject like a hot coal.

He supposes some part of him wanted her to laugh at these dreams that he can’t even remember and at him for ever confusing them with real memories. That’d be better than having this brush-off tossed his way instead. Anything’s better than that.

So this is all her fault, if anything. All she has to do is be straight with him, just like she is with everything else…but no. Instead, he’s been left to flail in the dark. And driven to a straggle of shacks, several miles apart from any other dwelling.

At least, any human dwellings.

Arlo’s foot chooses just the wrong moment to catch on a particularly mean-spirited tussock. He stumbles as gracefully as a sledgehammer in a knife fight, the scrubland sailing up to greet his face. It’s not until after he clambers back up (along with a muttered spate of the words his mam indulges in when she thinks he’s out of earshot) that he gets back to reflecting on the rumours that’ve flown thick for as long as he can remember.

The Hexes. The…things that hushed voices regularly call witches, demigods, monsters, spirits, fae, devils and everything in between. And the only ones in this world who can shed any light on what’s happening to him.

As far as Arlo’s concerned, Hexes are the sort of stuff that everyone acts so certain about, like they know everything that is to know. Yet when they’re asked if they’ve ever even seen one for themselves, their faces flap like fish caught up in a net. And that’s the thing with all these rumours. His mam’s market customers insist they’ve spoken to others who’ve seen Hexes melding with slivers of moonlight and devouring the stars. Somebody has a relative whose neighbour knows someone who swears blind that the lot of them are descended from the legendary Ironflayer clan – that kind of thing.

None of them really know anything.

Before long, Arlo will.

*

Their shadow’s just slightly out of sync. Maybe it’s the gloom playing tricks, or maybe all those tales have made Arlo ridiculously paranoid. But he could swear that the very silhouette of the Hex is something a little too slow, a little too disjointed. Something that breathes.

Arlo tries to keep his head fearlessly raised, his eyes darting from corner to corner as the Hex breathes life into a candle wick, birthing yet more shadows, and shadows of shadows, from everything it casts its azure-tinged flame upon. The grip on his bag tightens all the same, clenching around the long bump of the axe’s handle.

He can’t make out their face. Not really. Every time he attempts to get a glimpse, it melts away somehow. In the end, he resigns himself to running his fingers in a weird erratic rhythm along the splintery surface of the table, not unlike his mam’s at home. He has to wrench his mind away from the thought of what her face would look like if she knew where he is right now.

Arlo doesn’t see the Hex placing the mixture down in front of him. One moment there’s nothing there but the elaborate symbols (probably occult-y hieroglyphs or something) carved into the tabletop; the next, kaleidoscopic light spills out over its surface from inside a vial. Specks of gold dance in its contents, rising and falling, swallowing the colours and spitting them back out.

His brow furrows, one hand coming up to rake through damp hair.

“You want…me to drink that?” The question rasps in his throat.

The shadow opens its eyes, two acid-green spots burning into Arlo’s face. But the Hex doesn’t so much as turn their head, let alone halt. ‘Not a crime, neophyte, I’m sure?’ they ask at length, words emerging as though they’ve drawn them out from some deep well. They echo off cold damp stone that isn’t there; they drip down his neck like icy, brackish water. ‘And neither are such answers as you seek. Drink.’

Arlo stares at the unknown mixture. Just like the Hex’s shadow, it stares back, pressing spectral hands against its crystal prison. Drink.

He shouldn’t.

He has to. Doesn’t he have every right?

His fingers obviously agree. Despite the stupid tremor running through them, they greedily close around the vial and prise out the cork, letting loose vapours that ghost over his skin.

The brew blazes its way down his throat and sets his stomach alight. Cough after cough rattles deep in his chest. He isn’t sure whether he’s been forced to his knees or not. Those gold spots have returned to swarm his vision, scratching out everything before him.

Arlo’s head rolls from side to side, trying to find where the Hex has disappeared to, trying to get some sign that this is what’s meant to happen. All that comes out is a mangled noise (has his tongue always been this heavy?) before it snakes into his head and swallows him whole. And the floor beneath his feet - or is it the entire world? - caves like a house of cards…

and tips him down, down, down into a slough of phantoms lurking,

living,

breathing,

waiting to snare him in its murky waters. A quicksilver voice sings him to his fall.

‘Memories don’t sleep, neophyte. They only like to pretend that they do.’

*

Cold. Cold biting at his skin like a million tiny pinpricks. Cold tendrils creeping around his heart, around the very flow of blood through his veins. And the kind of silence that comes when time itself is suspended.

Even so, the masses of limbs and soulless white eyes watch him.

He watches them right back, as empty of fear as they are of flesh and blood. How can they live here? What do they feed on?

Whatever your head offers us, is their answer, as they bare bloodied teeth in a gory grin.

As if in explanation, the golden scratches swimming at the edges of his vision fall away, only to be replaced with a face he feels like he knows. A face that cradles him in its familiarity yet crushes him beneath the expression etched deep in every line of it. He can’t place that expression. But the voice belonging to that face (didn’t that voice once call something to him about a milk bottle, a million years ago?) drips with it.

“What’s going to happen to him?”

Him. Him, him, him.

He stares at the place where that disembodied face hangs long after it’s flaked away like a butterfly drawn on a wall. Is he the reason for that shattered look in her eyes?

That’s when a twisted symphony – blurry and broken but somehow sharp enough to pierce him over and over again – awakens from the depths of some excruciating black hole spreading through his head.

Screams of a name. That name isn’t his own. It’s a name that once slept in a little bed next to his and proudly showed him the worms it had dug up with a stick behind the house. Once. It’s gone now. But also not gone at all.

It’s still there, out in the garden - only this time, it’s below the earth. He never saw that happen. A whisper in his heart knows it did, all the same, and knows exactly where (don’t ever touch the lily patch).

A wasted limb ending in long yellow claws stretching out from underneath his mattress…its grey splinter teeth, the smaller body leaping in front of him and trying to wrestle its grip from his ankle…the blood. So much blood, splattered so far. He remembers wondering how such a small person could hold that much.

He remembers.

And everyone kept it hidden from him, she kept it hidden from him, his mother- no, their mother, theirs-

That clawed arm, those teeth-

It’s coming back.

It’s coming to finish what it couldn’t before.

His cry seems to come from across an ocean. The pain explodes, taking every spectre with it, as his fingernails dig into his scalp like they can tear it away.

Gone is any idea of who he is, where he came from, what he was searching for in the first place. All of it is crossed out, scrubbed from existence, until only a blank wall remains. With one thing painted on it in burning black letters.

It’s coming.

*

It’s not a crime either, to want to be sure. To have to be sure, to know. The second the rough wooden lid is prised open with numb fingers, something cold and black grips his heart anyway - and he wouldn’t care if it struck him down where he stands.

The lid slips, joining the shovel on the lilies beneath his feet. Its fall could almost be called soft, if that wasn’t so wrong. But how could anything be more wrong than- than this?

He isn’t sure how long his gut chokes him, burning his throat, nostrils, eyes. When they finally give up, he drags a sleeve across his mouth. Huddles in the hole that seems to be opening into a bottomless chasm even as he clenches himself against its side, blurrily aware of the damp earth pressing into his forehead. Just like the nothingness seeping through his soul.

Little by little, one arm raises until barely two inches separates it from the arm in the box. One so alive. The other so grey, like the shadow they’ve become to him. And small. And folded with withered flowers over a sunken chest.

The gashes. So many. He wonders if it’ll do the same to him.

(It’s coming.)

Those phantoms laugh. Play in his head.

(It’s coming.)