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troublesomesnitch · 4 months ago

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Meeting Vhagar - Drabble

Aemond x Wife!Reader

Much to your dismay, Prince Aemond insists on bringing your little son to Vhagar. Set sometime during the Dance.

Contents: Just a little practice thing... Dad!Aemond, Targaryen parenting, subtle fluff. Little bit of subtle angst too. No filth this time..

Words: 3000, and very sloppily proof read.

The carriage can only take you so far as to the Iron Gate.

Beyond its massive doors, the Rosby Road winds North, poorly maintained and full of potholes, as it is the shortest of the main roads, and thus the least important. It is not as busy as others, and the gate is not guarded as well - clearly, as the men who should be protecting it are presently engaged in a game of cards, laid out on top of a large, flat rock.

That is where the driver will wait, but it is not your destination.

There is another little trail. One that runs in the opposite direction, scarcely used and partially hidden, visible only to those who know it. No horse or wagon can make the journey, and there is no option but to walk - first along a narrow, trodden path, and then further still, down treacherous steps, carved into the very rock the city rests upon. Past the watchtower, and across the Northern beach, to the vast caves of Maegor the Cruel, where Vhagar has made her nest.

You walk alone, just the two of you. The prince in his coat and boots, and yourself in attire much less suited for the occasion. Fine shoes, fine skirts, and with your little son cradled in your arms.

The gentle rocking of the carriage has lulled him to sleep. Four months old, he is, and a source of such joy that your poor heart can scarcely contain it. From his first high-pitched cry when you brought him into the world - oh, the pains of labour were all but forgotten, as was the threat of the raging war. And when the prince came to see his son, you could hardly even bear to let him hold him.

He wanted to bring the boy much sooner, but both you and the dowager queen staunchly put your foot down against that. Children should not be brought outside the home until they have at least lived through the first perilous weeks, and possibly even their first fever. And even then, most would argue, they have no business being around ferocious animals.

“I don’t like it,” you say, for the umpteenth time, taking the hand offered to you by the prince to help you cross a treacherous stretch. “It is mad, bringing an infant to such a beast - ”

“Vhagar should know him,” he says, steadfast and determined. As he has done whenever you voiced your concern.

It does nothing at all to calm your nerves. But it is his most compelling argument, and the only reason you have allowed this lunacy in the first place. So the dragon would recognise the boy as his, and as one of her own. So she would know to protect him, if - something should happen.

You make it halfway across the pebbled beach before the prince pauses. And you do too, lifting your gaze to follow his line of sight; see what he is looking at.

An enormous, greyish mass, some yards away, that at first you thought was a moss-grown rock, or years of washed up seaweed. But the mass makes a rumbling noise and begins to shift and lift itself, slowly and carefully, as though with much effort. Part of it becomes a leg, another part unfurls into a great wing, and the rock nearest to you becomes a head, with a mouth full of jagged teeth, and two eyes opening slowly. Amber in colour, and with slitted pupils staring straight at you.

“She can sense me,” the prince declares, with no small amount of pride, lifting his chin and straightening his back.

You, however, are paralysed, utterly shocked by her vastness. You have never seen Vhagar this close before, and though you knew of her impressive size, it is one thing to see her soaring across the sky, and quite another to be right next to her, unprotected and vulnerable.

It seems to you that the span of her wings could cover half the city, that entire buildings could fit in her mouth. And certainly, she could end all three of you with her fiery breath, or with a single swipe of her claw or her massive tail. One wrong move, even if accidental, even if she did not mean to - you would all be dead.

“Come,” the prince says, pushing at the small of your back. But you stall, digging in your heels, frozen in place at the sight of her.

“I’ve changed my mind,” you stammer. “We should go back - it is not safe…”

The prince gives an overbearing, if somewhat irritated sigh.

“Dragons are loyal beasts,” he reassures. “Vhagar is loyal to me, she obeys me - ”

“She is a beast,” you hiss, hugging your drowsy son closer to your chest. “She cannot be trusted. It is too dangerous - I won’t let you bring him any closer - ”

Prince Aemond does not like to be challenged. He turns around to look at you coolly, his voice low and scornful as he speaks.

“Is your opinion of me so unfavourable, wife, that you think I would risk harm to my own son?”

“No,” you respond, quietly, but truthfully. Since you were married, your opinion of the prince has only risen, slowly but surely. And it continues to do so, still - though perhaps not right now. “I don’t like it - ”

“Mhm - so you said,” your husband says dryly, all but wrenching the swaddled boy from your arms.

He does not complain, the boy. Prince Aemond comes to visit often, at least once a day, and sometimes more. He sits with the child, reads to him, lets him fall asleep in his arms - not for very long each time, but it is at least enough for the little boy to recognise his father’s low voice and stern face as something safe and comfortable. As is evident from the way he now settles against the prince’s leather-clad chest, tangling his little fist into a lock of his hair.

The beast remains still, pensive as her rider approaches, her serpent’s eyes fixed on the thing in his arms, on what he is bringing her. Your most precious treasure, your life’s very purpose, completely at the mercy of the greatest dragon in the world.

You might have felt more at ease if the soft, sparse hair on his head had been silver like his father’s, but alas, it is not. It is exactly like yours, and only the bright violet of his eyes gives away his true inheritance.

And that seems like too little a thing for such a large creature to notice.

Prince Aemond calls out in that strange language of his, with the open vowels and the rolling R’s. It is beautiful, especially in his mouth, and the dragon responds at once, contorting herself to let him touch her wrinkled neck with affection. Which is a strange sight, but what is even stranger is the way she grumbles - as though she likes it. He speaks to her as if she was another person, in long, full sentences that are much too complicated for you to even attempt to understand. There is only one word you can make out, for the sole reason that he says it twice - yoreliatzeh, or yorelatzya, or something akin to that. You haven’t a clue as to what it means.

Vhagar snorts once, and the prince steps back to give her room to move, to rise up onto her legs and bring her head closer, her nose almost touching his hip. While you stand at a distance, staring at the utterly bizarre scene playing out in front of you. A fearsome, vicious beast, sniffing the child like a dog would. Gently and carefully, only she is so big that each of her cautious breaths is like a small gust of wind, making your husband’s hair billow about his face. When she makes a grunting noise, he carefully unwraps some of the swaddlings, holding the child up to let her see him better, smell him better.

He is bright, your darling boy, and curious, like all babes and children. His eyes are wide as they take in Vhagar’s scaly form, and he gives a soft squeal of surprise or wonder, kicking his little feet under the blankets. Reaching his arm towards the beast's massive head, her massive teeth -

“Aemond, please - ” you gasp, clutching your hands to your throat.

The prince turns his head to give you a stern look, one that clearly shows he is running out of patience. And maybe this time it is justified, because your fearful outburst startles the boy, who begins to squirm unhappily in his father’s arms. Fussing and whimpering; a sound that is as painful to you as salt to an open wound.

“Bring him to me,” you plead, “can’t you see that he is frightened - ”

“He is frightened because you are frightened,” the prince says, as soft spoken as always, but with a hint of something sharp underneath.

He cradles the boy closer to his chest, bouncing him gently, holding his head and murmuring soothing words. Exactly as you would do, and to the same effect. It calms him down, and his big, round eyes start darting around again, taking in his surroundings. The dragon, the grey sea, the fine silver clasps on his father’s clothes. It does seem that the latter intrigues him the most.

Vhagar lifts her neck and tilts her head just slightly, seemingly very interested in the child, in this tiny little creature; the way he moves his little limbs, and his soft coos and noises. There is an almost… thoughtful look in her eyes, or at the very least a curious one.

It makes you wonder about the extent of her perception. Whether she truly knows that this is Aemond’s child, that it came from him, from his body, his flesh. If she can sense it somehow, through the bond they purportedly share, or if she understood it when he spoke to her.

How intelligent is a dragon? Are they like dogs or horses, able to learn the meaning of certain words, but not the full breadth of language? Or do they think as people, with nuance and emotion, and a mind as vivid as your own.

You do not know. You suppose no one really does.

“Come,” the prince calls, reaching his arm towards you, beckoning you closer. However, a single glance at Vhagar, whose mighty gaze is now focused on you, is enough to inspire disobedience in even the most well-behaved wife.

“I would really rather not - ”

“She must know the both of you,” he insists.

“Is that - necessary?” you squirm, wringing your hands, very much aware that you are not a dragon rider, that you haven’t a drop of Valyrian blood. “Vhagar has no reason to think fondly of me…”

The prince scoffs.

“Are you not the mother of my child?” he says. “Now, come.”

You must go to him. He is your lord husband, and he is a prince, and such is the way of things. But you are not at all glad to, and you walk with shaky, reluctant steps, gripping onto his elbow and cowering behind him like a frightened child.

You close your eyes when the dragon lowers her head once more, bringing it towards you. A sudden, low-pitched growl makes your heart tremble, but the prince speaks a soft command. Lykirī, Vhagar. Lykirī.

It has a calming effect on you too. As does the arm he keeps outstretched in front of you - solely for your comfort, you assume, as it would make no difference whatsoever, should Vhagar decide that she does not like you. But you appreciate the gesture nonetheless.

The air is warm, this close to her, and your skirts move around your legs when she breathes, slowly and deeply, while the prince speaks to her in soft tones. That word again, the one from before, and many others. You know the words for wife, for king, for father, brother, sister, even for dragon, but he says none of those now, so you have no guess as to what he is telling her. Or if she understands. Or what he would call you, if not his wife.

This woman is my - spouse? lady? lover?

You do have a kind of love for him, and sometimes you think he does for you, too. Sometimes. One can never be sure of anything with the prince, who keeps himself so closely guarded. Even after more than a year of marriage. Even now that you have given him a child.

The birth went mercifully well, but your recovery was long, and he has only recently begun to come to your bed again. And so far, only a handful of times. The first time, it was so painful for you that the act could not be completed, and the second time, he finished so quickly that it barely even counts. The third was better. Pleasurable for both of you, but still strange after going so long without it - at least for you. It is both likely and possible that the prince satisfied his urges elsewhere while your body was indisposed. You do not know. Nor do you wish to.

The ground shifts beneath your feet, and the heat around you lessens, as does the heavy smell of burned flesh and brimstone, the very same one that so often clings to your husband’s clothes. When you open your eyes it is to the sight of Vhagar, settled onto her belly, her head laid atop her claws. Calm and docile, and with a deep rumble coming from her chest - one that is probably a sign of contentment, even if it sounds utterly terrifying.

“Touch her,” the prince commands, giving a gentle push to your back. “You have nothing to fear, touch her.”

It is quite clear that Vhagar is unruffled by your presence, that she is resting. But with her eyes heavy and half-closed, it makes her look so menacing, so evil - even though you know that evil does not exist inherently in any beast. Only in those who train it.

You draw in a steadying breath, gathering up your courage, reaching your hand out - only to then think better of it and let it fall.

“I am afraid to,” you whisper.

The prince sighs. But his hand closes gently around yours, bringing it to rest on the side of her nose, first the tips of your fingers, and then your whole palm.

It is like nothing else you have ever felt, her scales. You always imagined that a dragon’s skin would feel like leather, but Vhagar’s skin is so much tougher, so much rougher, like running your hand over little rocks. And she is warm - so warm, as though a fire is always burning somewhere in her throat.

She does not object at all to your touch, even when the prince withdraws his own hand, leaving only yours. Only you and Vhagar. The largest, oldest being in the world.

To think, the things she has seen. The conquest, the Dornish Wars, the very founding of the realm of the Seven Kingdoms. Dozens of castles have crumbled in her fire, and thousands of people have perished, and she has fought and won hundreds of battles; torn through stone, rock and earth as though it was boiled jelly.

It is at once terrifying and romantic, like something from a fairytale, or stories of ancient times. A creature of such myth and legend that you almost feel as though you should bow down to her, as one does before a great matriarch.

Vhagar the Conqueror. Queen of all Dragons.

She closes her eyes when you draw back.

“He might ride her too, some day,” the prince says quietly. Wistfully.

“But dragons only have one rider - ” you protest, cutting yourself off when you realise what he meant. What he left unsaid.

This is war. The realm is at war. Death is everywhere; at the end of a blade, in the point of an arrow. And if not on the field of battle, then in tainted water or plague-ridden camps; empty bellies or festering wounds.

“You shouldn’t say such things,” you mutter, looking down at your feet. Your dirtied shoes.

The prince does not answer. A heavy mood has settled over the rocky beach, something vast and bleak and empty, only compounded by the surroundings. The colourless sky, the sombre crashing of waves. Even Vhagar gives a doleful sigh, as though she too is weary of what is to come.

She has been the prince’s companion since childhood. He was born to the queen, but Vhagar made him what he is, made him ruthless, made him brutally ambitious. Made him Aemond One-Eye, Aemond the Kinslayer. Prince Regent, Protector of the Realm. She has known him boy and man, as well as any, and better than most. She has known him in life, and she may yet know him in death.

You push that thought away as forcefully as your mind allows. You shouldn’t think such things.

A coo from your son breaks the tension, and his eyes turn to the sky, where a large heron is flapping its wings. The afternoon is turning to evening, and soon the bell will ring for supper - something warm and comforting, you hope. You are cold, your breasts feel sore, and you have most certainly had enough excitement for one day. For several days, in fact.

“Can we go, please,” you breathe, looking up at your husband with wide, pleading eyes.

“She is tired,” he says, with a soft glance at Vhagar’s terrifying face, and a gentle touch to her side. “Yes, we should.”

—

You walk slower on the way back. Uphill, with sore feet, and your boy now fast asleep in your arms. Safe and snug where he belongs.

“My Prince,” you begin, sweet and innocent. “What does… yoreliatzeh mean?”

There is a sly little smile on his face when you look at him, a self-assured look in his remaining eye.

“Jorrāeliarza,” he corrects, with an artful pause before he continues. As though to keep you in suspense. “It means dear. Or… beloved.”

If he sees the sudden blush on your face, he does not let on.

“Jorālitzeh.”

“No,” he says. “Jor-rāe-liar-za.”

“Jor-rāe-liar-za,” you repeat, trying your very best to mimic the exact movements of his mouth, the way he gently rolls his tongue. “Jorrāeliarza.”

“Better,” he nods, and then you round a corner, just in time to see the guards hastily hide their cards away, and the driver shuffling back towards the carriage, eagerly shoving his winnings into a pocket.

Jorrāeliarza. Jorrāeliarza. Jorrāeliarza.

Dear. Beloved.

You like that very much.

Please feel free to come into my asks or DMs with critique of my fics! Constructive is preferred, but not required.

Tags. @arcielee, @targaryen-madness, @aemondsbabygirl, @qyburnsghost, @blackswxnn

I am a mess with the tagging, I'm so sorry if I forgot or wrongly tagged anyone. Let me know, I will fix it.

#aemond x reader #aemond x you #aemond targaryen x reader #aemond targaryen x you #aemond fanfiction #aemond targaryen fanfiction #aemond fic #aemond targaryen fic #aemond fluff

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pocketseizure · 3 years ago

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A Noble Pursuit

None of the lessons from the Gerudo Classroom have prepared Rhondson for married life with Hudson, who has grown restless and disappeared from Tarrey Town a year after its founding. She travels to the Akkala Citadel Ruins to hunt for her husband while reflecting on the bridges that will need to be rebuilt in order for Hyrule to embrace a peaceful future.

This story about archaeology, castles, ruins, cultural differences, giant monster friends, and what it means “to live happily ever after” was written for @memorabiliazine, and it’s also on AO3 (here). The accompanying illustrations are by the stylish scholar @pocketwei.

. . . . . . . . . .

This wasn’t the first time Rhondson had set off on a husband hunt.

It was late summer, almost a year after the ghost of the Great Calamity vanished from the castle. Most of Hyrule was still green, but the first touches of red and gold had already begun to appear on the trees of Akkala. It was chilly when Rhondson left Tarrey Town, but the morning fog had lifted and the sky was crystal clear.

Rhondson had always enjoyed mornings. Most people woke up early in the desert and took a nap during the worst heat of the afternoon so that they could stay up late into the evening. Rhondson kept the same schedule in Tarrey Town, a practice that Hudson found inexplicably upsetting. He complained, almost every day now, that she never went to bed with him. He insisted that a man and his wife should fall asleep together. Rhondson explained that she enjoyed sewing by lamplight at night, when the world is quiet and even the plainest thread shines like gold, but he refused to understand.

Hudson had recently grown restless. Perhaps it was because of the tension in their relationship, or perhaps it was only the change of season, but he left Tarrey Town one afternoon and never returned. Ashai’s classes hadn’t prepared Rhondson for this. They’d talked so much about how to catch a man, but never about how to keep him. She wondered if other vai had the same problem. All of the romances she read when she was younger ended with a “happily ever after,” but what was supposed to happen the next day? And the day after that?

All things considered, Rhondson was content with her life in Tarrey Town. Her feelings about the settlement had been ambiguous at first. The location was out-of-the-way, to say the least, but the town received more visitors than she’d expected. The son of the two Sheikah researchers who lived in an old lighthouse up on the northern cliffs made his living as a traveling merchant of fine clothing, and he saw to it that Rhondson always had work. Tarrey Town was unique in its appeal as a marketplace for goods from all over Hyrule, and Hudson’s brightly painted modular houses had become something of a tourist attraction. He’d been flooded with orders for summer rental homes, and a satellite community had sprung up on the other side of the bridge to satisfy the demand.

Hudson managed to keep himself busy, but he seemed to harbor doubts about establishing Tarrey Town on such a small island. To make matters worse, many of the people who’d come to town for the summer were starting to drift away as the days became shorter. Perhaps they were worried about Akkala’s infamous autumn thunderstorms. Rhondson happened to enjoy the heavy rains, whose gale winds and lightning crashes reminded her of the sandstorms back home, but she understood how the violent weather and sudden drop in temperature might put off people who weren’t accustomed to the climate. She’d camped at more than a few oasis waystations during her travels, and she knew it was perfectly natural for the population of a place like Tarrey Town to wax and wane with the season.

Rhondson tried to explain to Hudson how it was normal for people to come and go. Many of the town residents were nomadic by nature, she said, and they had no excuse not to indulge their wanderlust now that it was safe to travel. Hudson adamantly refused to listen. He insisted that a man’s home was his castle. But why not have two castles, Rhondson objected. And people would come back next summer, she reasoned. They’d had to hire new workers to perform upkeep on the vacation homes during the winter, after all, so it wasn’t as though the population was shrinking. If he was feeling ambitious, she added with a wink, they might be able to add their own contribution to the town’s population.

“I’m just not sure how long this town will last,” Hudson replied, ending the conversation with a sigh.

His admission put Rhondson ill at ease, and she couldn’t help recalling Hudson’s anxiety when she realized that he hadn’t come home during the night. “Sometimes you have to treat voe like children,” Ashai had once explained. “There will be times when they take action without thinking about how it will affect you, but it’s likely that their behavior comes from simple thoughtlessness, not spite.” Rhondson didn’t know about that. She’d met enough silly and immature vai in her life to understand that voe didn’t have a monopoly on being pigheaded. Still, if Hudson had gone out and gotten himself lost, purposefully or otherwise, she might as well go find him.

Rhondson set out from Tarrey Town and walked due south, pacing herself as she made her way up the gentle slope of the hills leading to Upland Zorana. Once the mountains began in earnest, she turned west at the road leading to the old stone quarry and kept going until she could see the waterfalls at the source of Lake Akkala.

She’d crossed the Sokkala Bridges when she first came to Tarrey Town instead of taking the longer road to the north, and she was just as impressed by them now as she was then. The log bridges were simple structures, really, not much more than planks laid over support pillars embedded in the banks of the rivulets flowing from the waterfall basin, but they were sturdy and well-constructed. A traveler could cross them with ease, secure enough in their footing to look up and appreciate the rainbows that danced in the misty spray of the waterfalls.

Not every bridge needed to be the Bridge of Hylia, Rhondson thought. Perhaps it was better if most bridges weren’t, in fact. The Bridge of Hylia was a magnificent piece of work, to be sure, but it seemed as though it was already in a state of disrepair even before the Great Calamity. Judging from the conversations between Hudson and his former boss Bolson, no living stonemason had any idea how to repair its gargantuan supports. Meanwhile, more modest structures like the Sokkala Bridges could be maintained whenever the need arose. In their own way, the Sokkala Bridges were just as important at the Bridge of Hylia, even if they never became monuments.

As she crossed the final bridge, Rhondson could see the hazy outline of Akkala Citadel rising in the west. Its massive size was impressive, but she couldn’t imagine it being particularly beneficial to anyone. Truth be told, the ruins weren’t much more than a glorified pile of old stone bricks that could almost certainly be put to better use elsewhere. Speaking of which, Rhondson was starting to get an inkling of where Hudson might have gotten himself off to. “A man’s home is his castle,” he liked to say, and how intriguing it must have been to have an actual castle so close to home, especially if its materials could be repurposed.

Rhondson headed north when the road forked and made her way across the old high bridge over the river, carefully navigating the deep fissures in the stone. Once she was safely on the other side, she began climbing the winding path up the mountain.

The leaves of the trees on the upper slopes of the hill had already turned a bold shade of crimson, and the weathered steel of the Sheikah Tower gleamed in the sun. Rumor had it that the citadel used to be patrolled by Guardians, but nothing confronted Rhondson save for a few moss-covered remnants of ceramic casing. Parts of the road had been washed away in a landslide, probably after the Malice swamp dried up, but the majority of the paving stones were still intact.

Rhondson entered the gatehouse at the foot of the outer wall surrounding the citadel. The inside was littered with rubble from a century-old battle, and the remains of more recent Bokoblin campfires were scattered across the floor. A partially overturned Guardian occupied a corner of the room, its segmented legs folded neatly underneath its casing like the paws of a sleeping cat. When she first set out from the desert, Rhondson had been terrified of encountering a Guardian, but she’d grown fond of the broken bits and pieces of their chassis that had been left beside Hyrule’s roads to remind travelers to remain vigilant. Their round faces and decoratively textured bodies were actually a bit cute, like oversized toys.

Rhondson passed through the gatehouse and entered a small courtyard. The walls of the citadel rose on every side of the open space, but the gaps between turrets were wide enough for the sun to shine through and warm the paving stones. One side of the courtyard was dominated by a large alcove that was probably used to shelter horses. The bare soil under the dilapidated wooden awning was covered in pale green scrub bush and dotted with bright yellow wildflowers.

A covered walkway ran along the opposite wall, connecting the gatehouse to the larger body of the citadel. As Rhondson followed the shaded path, she imagined how heavily the snowfall would accumulate at this altitude. She didn’t envy the soldiers tasked with shoveling duty. She glanced at the enormous wooden door that marked the entrance to the main hall, but its iron fittings were orange with rust. Thankfully, the smaller door at the end of the walkway was barely hanging by its hinges, and Rhondson had no trouble pushing it open.

She called Hudson’s name into the shadows of the citadel. Aside from the echo of her own voice, there was no answer. It probably wasn’t safe to go inside, but she had already come so far. Rhondson figured that she may as well make sure that Hudson wasn’t here before she left.

The interior of the fortress wasn’t nearly as impressive as its silhouette. The entryway was much smaller than she expected, and the floor was made of packed earth. As Rhondson’s eyes adjusted to the gloom, she could see that the wooden beams of the ceiling were exposed. They were dark with ash. The smoke had probably come from the tall braziers secured to the pillars set into the stone walls.

Rhondson walked across the hall, glancing around her with interest. A few piles of old leaves moldered just inside the open service door, but the room was remarkably clean. The tapestries displayed in the bays between pillars still retained some of their color, and wooden weapons racks still clung to the stone walls next to the main gate. Rhondson realized that the earth floor must absorb the humidity of summer and the chill of winter, keeping the wood and cloth relatively preserved. The layer of ash coating the wooden beams of the ceiling probably helped protect them from the elements as well.

Large passageways ringed with shallow arches connected the central hall to the east and west wings, but Rhondson was more interested in a spiral staircase carved into the back wall. Although she had to bend her head to enter, the stairs bore her weight. Each step dipped slightly toward the middle from centuries of use. As she climbed to the next floor, Rhondson was amused by the thought of walking in the footsteps of people who had lived so long ago.

The room above was much smaller than the citadel’s entrance, but its ceiling was almost as high. The walls were constructed of the same unpainted white limestone as the fortress exterior. Their rough surfaces were irregularly broken by small rectangular windows positioned slightly above eye level. Some of the glass panes were missing, allowing a cool breeze to enter the bright and sun-warmed space, but the floorboards were level and seemed solid enough

Rhondson began to make her way from room to room. Her first thought was that the haphazard layout was due to poor planning, but she gradually realized that different parts of the Akkala Citadel must have been built at different times, more than likely after various battles. Very few furnishings remained in the deserted fortress, but the architecture differed so drastically between rooms that it was clear she was walking through different periods of history. Rhondson was amazed by the evolution of the windows, which became larger and more ornate as she walked. She imagined that this was what Hyrule Castle must look like, an amalgamation of architectural styles that had grown and transformed along with the kingdom itself.

Rhondson enjoyed her stroll through the ruins, but Hudson was nowhere to be found. The sun was already low in the sky, so she made her way outside and began her descent. From her vantage point at the top of the path, she could see a flat patch of land at the base of the hill. The soldiers stationed here must have used it as a parade ground for exercise and training. It would be as good a place as any to make camp.

Dusk had begun to gather by the time she arrived on the field, and the shadows lay long across the tall grass. Rhondson didn’t see the Hinox immediately, but she could smell it. The odor wasn’t unpleasant, but it was unmistakable. As soon as she realized that she wasn’t alone, Rhondson turned to leave. Most Hinoxes tended to ignore the travelers that wandered into their vicinity, but she didn’t want to take any chances.

Without warning, the Hinox bellowed. Its scream sent startled birds up from the nearby trees in a rush of beating wings and angry squawking. Rhondson prepared herself to make a run for her life, but she was stopped in her tracks by a voice she would recognize anywhere.

“Don’t cry, you big baby. It only stings at first. You’ll feel better in two shakes of a blupee’s tail.”

Rhondson shook her head with amusement as she walked across the field toward the source of the voice. The Hinox pouted at her, giant tears spilling from its eye.

“Hudson?”

The broad-shouldered man crouching beside the Hinox jerked his head up. “Rhondson? What are you doing here?”

“I could ask you the same thing. I came looking for you. Is this where you’ve been this whole time?”

“I meant to come back last night,” Hudson replied, averting his eyes. “But this oaf hurt his foot while helping me clear away the rubble on the path up the mountain, and I couldn’t just leave him like this. The wound would have suppurated, and he’s all alone out here.”

Rhondson gave the Hinox a closer look and saw that it – he – had a deep gash on his heel. Hudson was cleaning it with a balled-up wad of fabric. If she wasn’t mistaken, it was the first workshirt she’d sewn for him. She’d made it just as they were starting to get to know one another, before she knew his measurements, and it fit him poorly. She asked him to throw it away and bury it with the compost months ago, but he’d apparently kept it. Hudson was surprisingly sentimental for a man who insisted on utility over decoration. It was one of the things she liked about him.

Rhondson smiled as she shrugged her pack onto the ground and dug out a jar of safflina salve. As Hudson helped her dress the Hinox’s wound, he explained that he had indeed come here to assess the state of the stonework. He assumed the citadel would be in ruins, but the structure was still sound. It would be a shame to dismantle it. With a few minor renovations, it would be almost as good as new. Still, making it more habitable would mean reducing its efficacy as a fortress.

“But what does that matter?” Rhondson asked. “Who’s going to attack it?”

“There are monsters roaming about, and…”

“Does this ‘monster’ look like he’s going to attack anyone?”

The Hinox had fallen asleep as they talked and was snoring lightly.

“He’s not a monster,” Hudson replied with a frown.

“Exactly. It seems to me that you’re already thinking about hiring him to work for you.”

“I’m not… Well, I guess I am. Having a Hinox around would be useful, especially if I decide to fix up this place, but we’d have to knock down some of the interior walls to make more room for him.”

Rhondson winced as she remembered all the times she’d banged her forehead on Hylian doorways. Now that she thought about it, there was no reason for those doors to be so low in the first place, especially not when her husband could so easily make them more accommodating. “Weren’t you planning to knock down the walls anyway?” she pointed out. “You could use the materials to repair the bridge.”

“But it’s disrespectful not to honor the past,” Hudson objected. “Shouldn’t the history of the Akkala Citadel be preserved?”

“It’s in ruins.” Rhondson put a hand on his shoulder. “One day you’ll have to come with me to visit my family. Everything in Gerudo Town is built on top of history. Nothing gets done if you worry about preserving the past as it once was. Living things change, and that includes old castles like this.”

“Maybe it includes towns too,” Hudson replied. “I guess it won’t be so bad if Tarrey Town grows. We could have a sister city maybe, right here on this hill. It would be a convenient waystation for travelers.” He thought for a moment. “And a good place for Hinoxes, too. It’s built on their scale, at least, and they’re all over Akkala. It’s a shame they always have to sleep in the open. Besides, Mason looks like he could use a friend. He’ll be lonely without me.”

Mason? Rhondson grinned at the name her husband had assigned to the Hinox. “Are you going to bring him home, then?” she asked.

“Home is wherever you are, Rhondson. We’ll go wherever you like. I missed you.”

“I missed you too, but we can spend a night or two away from Tarrey Town. I’d like to go back to the citadel tomorrow morning. I don’t think anyone has been inside this place for at least a hundred years.”

The sun had finally set, and stars were beginning to shine in the deepening indigo of the twilight sky. Rhondson smiled as she pictured the castle on the hill once again filled with lights. There was a certain charm to speculating on what the past might have been like, but the future held much more potential for imagination.

#Legend of Zelda #Breath of the Wild #Rhondson #Gerudo culture #Memorabilia zine #pocketwei #architecture #ruins #Zelda zines #Zelda art #Zelda fic #my fic

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deepdarkdelights · 4 years ago

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10 Days (Jungkook x Reader)(10 Seconds Pt 2)

Pairing: Jungkook x Reader

Word Count: 7.9k

Warnings: Yandere, Stalking, Obsession, Non-Consensual touching (This becomes intense, if this is triggering for you please do not read), Kidnapping, Hard Manipulation, Mentions of past abuse/torture, Brainwashing, Blood

I do not condone the acts displayed in this story nor do I believe any members of BTS would actually engage in this type of behavior. This is simply written for entertainment purposes and should not be taken as a reflection of my own values, opinions, or morals.

Preview: There he was, the monster that you knew had been hiding behind that sweet face. Jungkook had several personas, the domineering kidnapper, the dotting boyfriend, and the whiny child. This was the one you had been waiting to see, the one that had violently slammed your head into the hood of your car that night. The one that had drugged you and zip tied you in the back of his car. He was always there, just sitting beneath the surface waiting to come and get you.

Read Part One Here Read Part Three Here

You had never felt more hopeless in your entire life. It felt like your energy had been completely drained from your body. His parents still stood by the door, talking amicably with their son. His mother practically had stars in her eyes as she was nestled close into her husband’s hold. Nothing scared you more than the thought of being in her place one day. Chills of disgust rolled down your spine as you imagined yourself and Jungkook together like that. His arm curled around your shoulder as you came home to your son, hanging for dear life onto a terrified girl, her eyes wide and brimming with tears begging for help. Is that what your life would be like? Would you too fall victim to your captor like she had? Would the cycle continue and for how long had it been happening in Jungkook’s family?

Your heart thudded in your chest as your eyes zeroed in on the door behind his parents. Could you make a run for it? Could you get away from him if you tried now? Or would that be your death sentence? You were undoubtedly outnumbered, but his parents were on the older side and it would be much harder for them to run after you. It was just Jungkook you had to worry about, his mother seemed harmless and his father was too caught up in his wife. Maybe you could do it, when would you ever find a chance like this again? They hadn’t even locked the door!

Your grip on Jungkook’s shirt began to loosen as your gaze was pinned to the door that was lightly swinging open with the breeze. You could do it.

“(Y/N).” Never mind, you couldn’t do it.

“Baby, I need you to listen to me. I know you’re anxious right now but I need you to be a good girl, okay?” Jungkook asked, turning around to cradle your face.

You nodded your head in compliance as his hand slipped away from your face to cradle your own. He tangled your fingers together and slowly led you over to his parents. His mother had a huge grin on her face and she seemed genuinely excited, vibrating with joy as you approached. Jungkook nudged you in front of him and rested his hands on your shoulders, his grip tense like he was warning you to behave. His father fixed you with a stern look, your body shuddering at the familiarity. He was so much like his son that it was scary. It really did seem like there wasn’t a way out of this and your heart shattered at the thought. You were going to be stuck with a family of people who were deluded, they actually believed that this was okay.

“Hello dear, it’s so nice to meet you.” She said with her best attempt at a comforting smile. It was strange to think she had once been in your place when she seemed so satisfied with her life. Fuck, she had even given birth to her kidnappers son. Would that be expected of you? Were you supposed to help continue this sick cycle? At the rate that things were going, you weren’t sure how long you could hold Jungkook off. He was clingy and becoming more handsy the longer you two spent together. Carrying his child may become a reality faster than you had anticipated.

You felt Jungkook’s fingers tense as he dug into your shoulders a little harder, you still hadn’t answered his mother.

“It’s-It’s nice to meet you.” You choked out with a smile that looked more like a grimace. You were not convincing whatsoever and that was reflected in the harsh stare of her husband.

Your heart continued to pound violently in your chest, what were you supposed to do? It felt like the walls in the room were slowly closing in on you. Once again, you were reminded that there was no escape. You were like a songbird trapped in a gilded cage and you desperately wanted to stretch your wings and break free from your prison. You could feel the panic attack coming, this hadn’t been the first one since Jungkook had taken you and it certainly wouldn’t be the last. Your chest was tightening and it was becoming difficult to breathe as your heart hammered harder than before. There were a million thoughts racing in your head all at once as crisp tears began to roll down your cheeks. You clasped your hands together in an attempt to stop their trembling as your gaze zeroed in on the creaking hinges of the screen door. You were losing it. It became harder to keep a grip on reality as you felt the wave of anxiety come crashing down over you.

“Are you alright, sweetie?” Mrs. Jeon asked, her voice brimming with worry as she approached you. She gently grabbed your hands and pulled you away from her son who whined in irritation. Her dainty hands carefully smoothed your hair back as she tried to meet your gaze.

Of course you weren’t fucking alright. Any sane person would be able to see that from a mile away. You had been locked up for only God knows how long with one person who could change moods so fast it would give you whiplash. Her caring question only made everything worse, you were expected to say that everything was okay, that you were happy with her son and delighted to meet his parents. You were supposed to be the dotting girlfriend when you were so obviously the distraught victim.

How could someone with such a gentle, caring, motherly touch horrify you so much?

With a choked sob you pushed her off of you and made a sprint for the door. Within seconds you were flying through the door frame, your bare feet slapping against the wood of the porch and flying through the stretch of grass that spread over the empty field surrounding the house. It was windy and the sky was clear, the pale moonlight shining down on you as you desperately ran. You could hear Jungkook behind you screaming your name. His voice was a blend between being distraught and riddled with anger.

If he caught you, would he kill you?

His footsteps were loud and fast, he was sprinting as hard as he could to catch up with you but you were far too desperate to let him catch you so easily and so quickly. Before you knew it, you were in the forest. The trees were tall and thick, covered in moss. You weren’t thinking at this point, in fact you were just blindly running hoping to God that just maybe you would be able to out maneuver him.

You had never really tried to escape Jungkook, well you had never been able to actually try. Hell, this was the first time you were even near the front door. You couldn’t let him catch you as you would never find another chance to run away from him again. Not to mention, moments before his parents had entered the lake house, he had warned you that he was not above punishing you. You didn’t want to even think about what his punishments would entail for you.

Your legs were burning under the strain of running. After being bed bound for most of your time with your captor, you had barely done anything that was remotely as active as this. You were sure your feet were bleeding, they felt numb and slippery. The adrenaline pumping through your veins masked your pain as you pushed yourself harder. It was dark and hard to see, numerous branches had already snagged your clothing and whacked you. You really were at a disadvantage, weren’t you?

At this point, you had no doubt Jungkook would catch you. He was stronger and faster than you, you were completely outmatched in terms of endurance. You pumped your legs faster and harder, running down a slope of rocks and leaves that almost sent you tumbling. With a wheeze, you whipped around another tree and crouched down behind it and the large rocks that surrounded it. If you couldn’t outrun him, maybe you could hide from him.

You heard him come to a halt moments later as he heard your steps cease. You quickly slapped a hand over your mouth in an attempt to stifle your deep panting breaths. You could make out his head and shoulders from where you hid, he was spinning on his heels as he scanned the area around him. It was dark as the trees covered the light of the moon. Hopefully, this would make it harder for him to find you.

“(Y/N)?!” He called, his chest rising and falling rapidly with quick breaths. “Baby, I’m not playing around. You better come out right now if you know what’s good for you.”

He was fuming, it was so obvious. You could vaguely make out his tense jaw and the bulging veins in his neck. His head continued to swivel from side to side as he tried to find you in the dark.

“If you come out right now, your punishment won’t be that bad.” He spoke again, pacing back and forth as he continued to search for you. “You really disappointed me, I thought you were my good girl again. I’ve been so good to you but you keep testing me.”

You squeezed your eyes shut as panicked tears sprung forth. For someone who claimed to be in love with you, he was so good at making you cry. Your nails dug into the bark of the tree as you pressed your forehead to its trunk. He was going to find you, you never stood a chance.

“First, you take my affection for granted. Then, you question my love for you and accuse me of mistreating you. And then you throw my mother away from you like trash. We were doing so well but you just had to stop behaving.” He said with a distressed sigh as his footsteps grew nearer. Your body stilled like a deer in headlights, this was so familiar. And all at once, you were taken back to that night.

His light footsteps, the darkness, and the fear.

“All I want is to love you and take care of you, but you don’t see it that way do you?” He questioned, his voice became louder and closer. “I told you before, baby. You and I were meant to be together, from the moment I saw you I knew you were mine.”

His words were beginning to sound fuzzy as your ears rang. You had worked yourself up so much it seemed like even your own body couldn’t take it anymore. You felt sick and lethargic, and you knew it would only be a matter of seconds before he found you. Because no matter what, he would always find you.

A pair of hands latched onto your shoulders and yanked you out of your hiding spot. Game over. Jungkook turned you around violently and pinned you to the tree trunk. His eyes were so dark you couldn’t discern his iris from his pupil. He was good at making you cry, and you were good at pissing him off.

“What the fuck were you thinking?!” He yelled, shaking you by the shoulders. “I let go of you for ten seconds and you run away?!”

Your eyes snapped shut as he screamed as you, his grip tight and bruising.

“Open your eyes, right now.” He growled, his voice low and stern. “Look at me when I’m talking to you.” He continued.

Out of fear, you opened them and met his dark gaze with your own. His jaw was clenched tight as he looked at you, he was doing his very best to show you how displeased he was. It was still jarring how easy it was for him to slip between the roles of a love sick puppy and an enraged kidnapper.

“We are going home,” He said, his voice steady and deep. “You are going to apologize to my mother and father for your behavior and wait in your room for me. You are not eating tonight, not after the way you acted. Am I clear?”

You nodded so fast it looked like your head would snap right off of your neck.

“I said, am I clear?” He repeated, staring down at you.

“Yes.” You replied, your voice soft with fear but loud enough for him not to ask you to repeat yourself.

He released a soft sigh as a barely there smile graced his lips. He loved your compliance.

“You know I don’t like scaring you, baby.” He cooed, the anger slowly dissipating as he pulled you into his embrace. “But I have to when you act like this, and you know I’m going to have to punish you.”

And with that, the dam broke. Ugly sobs broke free from your chest as the tears came flooding back. You were such a mess, such a crybaby that couldn’t do anything right. You could only hope that your tears would save you from whatever pain he had in store for you.

“Jungkook, please!” You sobbed. “I was - I was scared!”

“I know baby, I know.” He hummed, smoothing your hair as he cradled you to his chest. He lowered his palms to your thighs and scooped you up, carrying you much like a parent would an infant.

“You had a stressful day, didn’t you? But still, I’m really mad at you babygirl and crying won’t solve anything.” He said, he sounded like a parent scolding their child. And much like a child, you clung to him as you wailed. In response he softly hushed you, rubbing your back as he began the walk back to the lake house.

“I’m sorry!” You croaked, burying your face in the juncture of his shoulder and neck as your tears stained his hoodie. And you were sorry, because now there was the high probability he would hurt you for your actions. Maybe if you had waited then you could have found a better way to escape him without getting hurt. But you were panicked, your body thinking for you instead of your brain.

“Such a good little girl,” He sighed, rubbing circles into your back. “Apologizing without me having to tell you. If you keep being my good girl, then we won’t have to fight anymore.”

You nodded your head rapidly, spurring light laughs from his throat. If behaving bought you time and saved your life, then you would do it. Just until you could find a way out of this, if there was a way out of this.

“Are you - are you gonna hurt me?” You sniffled, your eyes clenched shut as you hid yourself from his gaze.

“Baby, I promised you I would never hurt you again. That night…that was a one time thing. You know that, right? You know I would never hurt you?” He asked, his voice worried at the prospect that you thought he would hurt you again.

Your silence was enough of an answer.

“Oh no, my poor baby.” He gasped, squeezing you tighter to him. “So that’s why you’ve been acting this way, huh? I was too rough with you, you must still be so confused. I haven’t been very attentive, have I? Don’t worry, sweet girl. We’ll sort this out tonight.”

For the rest of the journey back there was a heavy silence between the two of you. It was accompanied by Jungkook’s soft touches and light kisses in the dark. Your little stunt seemed to only make him more affectionate than he was before, had he deluded himself into thinking this was all his fault? That he hadn’t given you enough attention and that was why you ran from him? Of course, in his mind you would never leave because you didn’t want him. Only because you didn’t have enough of him. The more time you spent with Jungkook, the more you realized how unstable he was. You were never sure what he was thinking, and that was scary. Never knowing what someone was going to do, that uncertainty was fear inducing.

It wasn’t long before the two of you had returned to the porch of the house, the door was still open but the screen door was shut allowing you to see into the hallway that led to the kitchen. You could make out the back of Jungkook’s father and the sweet voice of his mother, singing while the clanking of pots and pans followed. If this were under different circumstances, you would find it sweet.

Jungkook still held you, his chest pressed tightly to your own. His large hands cradled the back of your thighs, you could feel his thumbs lightly swiping the expanse of flesh. He dropped his head into the crook of your neck and took a deep breath before planting a soft kiss to the smooth column of your throat. It took everything in you to hold back the shudder that wanted to shake your body.

“You remember what I asked you to do for me babygirl?” He murmured, pulling back to look you in your eyes. The anger that had previously clouded them was no longer there, his soft gaze had returned once more. You gave him a quick nod and he smiled, carrying you back into your prison. His steps echoed down the hallway causing the singing to cease and his father to turn in his chair. Once more, he fixed you with that stern look that scared you shitless. Although this time it was far more intense and utterly annoyed.

“Go ahead.” Jungkook whispered, his breath ghosting over the shell of your ear. Already, this was completely humiliating. Not only did you have to apologize for trying to escape your kidnapper, but you had to do it while he cradled you like a child.

With your eyes trained to the floor, you began. “I’m sorry for all the trouble I caused. It won’t happen again.”

Mrs. Jeon smiled again, her hands clasped together as she cooed at the sight of her son holding his “girlfriend” as she liked to say. “It’s alright sweetie, trust me, I’ve been there.” she giggled.

Her words were meant to comfort you, instead they deeply disturbed you. The way she so casually referred to her kidnapping was disgusting. She talked about it like it was something normal that everyone went through, like it wasn’t a horrific crime. She was brainwashed, so many years of being with her captor had turned her into a compliant doll. She was everything you feared and everything you desperately hoped to avoid. But once she was like you. How many times had she tried to run before she realized it was impossible to get away from him. How many nights had she spent crying over the life she had lost, missing her parents, her friends, and her family? When did she realize that her life was over? There was no saving her, and soon there would be no saving you.

“(Y/N),” Mr. Jeon spoke, his voice threatening. “Don’t do it again.”

You could tell that his words had a double meaning: Don’t run away again and don’t touch my wife like that again. You gave him a swift nod as your grip on Jungkook tightened. At that moment, he was the most familiar thing to you. And you could tell he was enjoying it.

“Son, we need to have a talk.” He continued, fixing his stern gaze onto Jungkook who stiffened in response.

With that, Jungkook swiftly turned and began to carry you away from the kitchen. He moved quickly as he squeezed you to him tighter than before. He seemed nervous, like he knew what his father wanted to talk about. You had never seen Jungkook look nervous. Angry, distressed, remorseful, but never nervous. He threw the door to your bedroom open and gently set you down on your frilly comforter. His hands came up to cradle your face once more before he leaned down and softly pecked your lips, a soft sigh breaking free from his chest.

“I need you to stay right here, okay? I’ll be back soon, we have some things to discuss.” He reminded you, pressing another soft kiss to your lips before standing and exiting your room, the door shutting behind him and the lock twisting shut.

Your heart hammered in your chest, what did his father want to talk to him about? What would Jungkook discuss with you? How bad was your “punishment” going to be? There were so many unknowns spinning around in your head. You really were a mess, weren’t you? You had always thought that you could take care of yourself, and your kidnapping had proven that to be false. You had devolved into this different person you didn’t know. Before, you never cried as much as you did now. Before, you didn’t cower in anyone’s presence. In such a small amount of time, you had already become a shadow of your former self. At the rate you were going, it wouldn’t be long until you were empty and broken.

You were jolted from your thoughts when the screaming started. It was Jungkook’s voice, deeper and louder than you had ever heard it before. You couldn’t make out exactly what he was saying, but whatever his father wanted to tell him had set him off. You shuffled back into the bad, wrapping the comforter around you to provide you some feeling of safety. An angry Jungkook is an unpredictable Jungkook. The low, sweet voice of his mother was trying to cool him down but that was far from working. You could hear him snap at her, Mr. Jeon’s voice rising over all of them in a clear and loud yell. Silence followed. Whatever they were talking about, it wasn’t good.

A loud crash shattered the silence that had heavily hung in the still air. Your body jumped in response and tensed in preparation for more noise to follow, but there was none. A beat of silence passed before you heard the tell tale steps of Jungkook’s boots stomping down the hallway. In seconds the door to your bedroom was flung open and slammed shut behind him so hard the frame shook.

Jungkook’s body was shaking in rage as he paced the open space at the foot of the bed. He was so caught up in his anger it seemed like he didn’t even notice you were there anymore. That was of course, until he did. His head snapped up and his stare met yours, without a word he cleared the footboard of the bed and pinned you to the mattress. On impact, your eyes snapped shut. His hands gripped your thighs and yanked you closer to him, forcing you to wrap your legs around his waist as he buried his face in your shoulder. He was softly mumbling to himself as he nuzzled the fabric of your sweatshirt, the lightest of tears staining your top. He was crying?

“I don’t want to hurt you.” He choked out, his body shaking as he held you close to him. “Just because Dad did it that way doesn’t mean I have to.”

You were frozen beneath him, unsure of what to do. Jungkook was clinging to you like a toddler to their parent, babbling nonsense as he tried his hardest to stop crying. Each time you thought you knew him, he proved you wrong. Jungkook chose several personas in your presence, the domineering kidnapper, the dotting boyfriend, and the whiny child. You were scared of him because you could never tell which version of him you were going to get.

“He said I might be wrong, that maybe you aren’t mine. But he’s wrong, I know it! We’re meant for each other, I love you and no one can take you away from me. Not even him. He told me I need to be harsher with you, I need to hurt you so you understand.”

So that was how he did it. Jungkook’s father trained his mother with pain. He hurt her and would only stop in exchange for her obedience. No wonder she seemed so compliant, so in love with him. He had trained her like a dog, she associated him with pain and love simultaneously.

Jungkook pulled back from you, resting his weight on his forearms to take in your face. His cheeks were flushed and his eyes were red from crying. He really did look pitiful, if anything he looked like you since you spent most of your captivity in anxiety and bouts of intense crying. He slowly raised his hand to your face and lightly stroked the flesh of your cheek. If you didn’t know any better, he would look like a man that was in love with you. But you did know better, he was just a boy in a man’s body who had been raised to think this was normal. And for a moment, you genuinely felt bad for him. For a moment, you thought you understood him.

“I won’t have to hurt you if you listen to me. I still have to punish you, but if you’re good then I don’t have to hurt you.” He whispered, sniffing sharply as he leaned back to wipe the tears from his face.

Your legs were still tensed around his waist as he dragged you up to his chest, pressing the two of you so close together that you could feel his heart beating. He scooted backwards off the bed and carried you back to the bathroom. This was beginning to feel like your first day with him all over again. He set you gently onto the counter and pressed a lingering kiss to your forehead before kneeling down on the cold tile. His fingers delicately lifted your right foot to allow him to inspect the damage you had inflicted. His face contorted with wince as he looked at your foot, silently lifting the other one to inspect it as well.

“I hate seeing you like this, in pain.” He sighed, his fingers gently stroking the delicate bones of your ankle as he looked up at you from in between your legs. Your face flushed at the sight causing you to tilt your head back against the mirror behind you. Anything was better than the position you were in right now. Jungkook cooed at the light blush that dusted your cheeks as he began to work on the wounds that littered the once smooth skin of your feet, always stopping when you would flinch or cry out from the pain. Sometimes, he could be considerate. But you didn’t want to think positively of him and you most definitely didn’t want to feel sorry for him. You didn’t want to feel anything for him. You found yourself having to remember that he was a monster, even if it wasn’t his fault he was still a monster.

A soft kiss pressed to the inside of your ankle forced you to look at him once more, a sweet smile graced his lips. The one that made him look like an innocent bunny.

“All done.” He smiled, rising up in between your legs to trap you to the counter. Jungkook always found a way to remind you of your inability to escape him, the amount of times he had pinned you today was outstanding and concerning. You really were fucked.

The sweet smile slowly slipped from his lips as his eyes flicked down to your lips. His eyes were dark again, half lidded in a daze as he looked at you. You weren’t stupid, you knew what he wanted. He swallowed harshly and leaned closer to you, cupping one side of your face as he softly stroked your bottom lip with his thumb. You could feel his hands trembling as he took in a shaky breath. He acted like you were a drug that he could never get enough of, each hit he got sending him into a deeper addiction that he craved. And God, did he want you. He wanted all of you, everything you had to offer, and more. He took another breath and leaned in, attempting to kiss you. You quickly turned your head away from him, his soft lips connecting with the smooth skin of your cheek. Instead of getting mad, he pressed another kiss to your cheek, the corner of your mouth, and gently peppered butterfly kisses to the curve of your jaw. In a panic, you jerked away from his touch only to press yourself tightly to the mirror behind you.

“I think,” He began, stopping to clear his throat. “I think I know what your punishment is going to be.”

Your heart jerked in response as his hands gripped the tops of your thighs. You had hoped maybe it wouldn’t come to this, that he had been bluffing this whole time. But if his father was so keen on punishment in his household, it only made sense he would want his son to follow in his footsteps. He had done it first, and he knew what “worked.”

“You can’t say no to me, baby. For ten days, you have to do what I want. Just for ten days.” He said, his tone gentle but you knew this wasn’t a request; it was a demand. You quickly shook your head from side to side, grasping his wrists and attempting to pull them off of you so that you could curl into yourself.

“Baby, baby! Listen to me!” He cried, catching your hands with his own while trying to meet your eyes. “You either do this for me, or I’ll have to hurt you. You know I don’t want to do that, but if I have to do it then I will. If my dad sees that you're non compliant, that you’re not being my good girl, he will try and get rid of you.”

You stilled at his words. So that’s why he had been crying so hard earlier. His father had given him an ultimatum. Jungkook had to hurt you if you misbehaved to “train” you, as his father had put it. If he didn’t see your compliance, then he would get rid of you. He would kill you for trying to free yourself.

“Jungkook…I can’t. I can’t do that. I just want to go home.” You replied, your voice weakening into a whimper as the tears rushed forth once more.

“I know this is hard for you baby, I know you need more time but I can’t keep waiting. Not with them here. Soon enough you’ll realize you are home, all you’ll need is me.” He whispered to you. And just like that all of your sympathy for him flew right out the window. At the end of the day, Jeon Jungkook was selfish. He took his father’s warning as a way to get what he wanted: you no longer being able to deny him. Jungkook is a monster, the perfect example of a wolf in sheep’s clothing. Those big, brown, doe eyes of his were concealing a dark force that was restless inside of him. That sweet smile of his hid the fangs and wrath harbored in him. He was something from your nightmares, hidden by a boyish face and a deceiving innocence. You never hated anyone as much as you hated Jeon Jungkook.

“Tonight counts as day one, you only have nine more days to go sweetheart.” He smiled, rubbing the tops of your thighs is what would have been a comforting manner if you didn’t detest his touch so much.

“Come on, you’re sleeping in my bed tonight.” He informed you, scooping your body up once more as to not have you walk on your injured feet. Not only did you have no choice but to listen to him, but now you had lost your mobility for the time being. Your teeth sunk into your lower lip, stopping yourself from snapping at him. Time had proven before that you could break, and if you broke this time it could have deadly consequences.

Would it be better to let yourself die? Would you rather live a life of captivity over the freedom that the dark embrace of death had to offer? No. You were many things, but unafraid of death was not one of them. If you were, then you would have forced Jungkook’s hand or his father’s a long time ago.

Jungkook set you down on the covers of his bed, rifling through his drawers to find something for you to wear to bed. He came back to you with a large white T-shirt in hand, something you had seen him wear many times. There was no doubt in your body that he was thrilled with this situation. Not only did he have you in his bed, but he would have you in his clothes. Jungkook sat down beside you once more, silently helping you out of your clothes. You still flinched from his touch, but tried your best not to say anything. The less you struggled, the faster you would be clothed and less vulnerable. To Jungkook’s credit, he tried his best not to openly ogle your semi naked form. His gaze still lingered, his eyes still looked you over, but he clothed you and that was that.

Once he had finished, he leaned back into the bed and kicked his boots off. He turned to look at you for another moment, taking in your body covered by his sheets. He swallowed harshly before turning away from you and opening the drawer of his nightstand. Once he faced you again you noticed the glinting metal in his hand. Handcuffs. Part of you shuddered at the thought that he kept those by his bed, the other part of you tried your best not to freak the fuck out.

“I can’t trust that you won’t try and leave while I’m sleeping.” He explained. “I don’t want to have to do this, but I need to.”

“I won’t leave.” Lie. “It’s going to be hard for me to sleep handcuffed to the bed, I learned my lesson. I won’t run.” You had tried your best to seem like you weren’t denying him, the word “no” had never passed your lips.

“It’s okay, I won’t cuff you to the headboard.” He answered, slapping the cuff to your right wrist and the other cuff to his as well. What the fuck. He leaned away from you to turn the lamp off, plunging the room into darkness. For a moment, you couldn’t see. But you could feel him. Jungkook peeled the sheets back and slid underneath them behind you, slinging his cuffed arm over your waist and pulling you back against his chest.

Motherfucker.

“Jungkook-”

“Go to sleep, baby.” He cut you off, tensing his arm in warning as he rested his chin on the top of your head. You barely slept that night.

You woke up by being blasted from the light filtering through the window. He had left the curtains open last night. And not to mention, you were extremely uncomfortable. You were hot as hell having Jungkook wrapped around you like a giant koala, your wrist was chaffed from the metal cuffs, you had a headache from the bright light, and something was pressing hard into your lower back. You huffed in annoyance, trying to shift away from the man behind you only to still when a groan shook his chest.

Oh. Something hard was pressed to your lower back.

You shivered in disgust, rolling awkwardly to unwind his arm from around you so that you could get away from his…situation.

A sharp knock on the door made you jump while simultaneously waking up your captor. “Jungkook? (Y/N)? I made breakfast! Come out before it’s cold!”

Jungkook groaned again, slinging his arm over his eyes at the sound of his mother’s voice. He took a deep breath before sitting up and retrieving the key to the cuffs, swiftly unlocking it and separating the two of you. You hastily stood up, putting as much distance between the two of you as you could. Jungkook still remained in his bed, eyeing you as he titled his head back. You felt shivers run down your spine from the look he was giving you. You had no doubt you knew exactly what he was thinking about.

“Jungkook!” Mrs. Jeon yelled again from the other side of the door, her swift knocks returning once more. Her impatience knew no bounds as she finally gave up and swung the door open. It was quite a sight to see, such a small woman looking so angry. Jungkook actually looked scared for a moment.

“Jungkook, I said breakfast is ready and getting cold! Don’t ignore your mother!” She scolded him, waving a spatula around as she yelled at him. This sight was just too normal, it was so strange to think that you were kidnapped. Never in a million years did you ever think you would see your captor’s mother yelling at him like he was still a child.

Jungkook sighed, trying his best not to lash out at his mother lest his father hear their exchange. “You waited all of ten seconds, mom.”

“That doesn’t matter! I shouldn’t have to wait!” She replied before taking a hold of your elbow and tugging you towards the hallway. “Now, are you coming or will you make your mother wait longer?”

“I’ll uh, I’ll be out in a few minutes.” He answered awkwardly.

“Fine, suit yourself.” She huffed before dragging you out of the bedroom and walking you in the direction of the kitchen. But not before you saw Jungkook mouth, “behave” with that stern look returning to his face. Right, it was day two.

“It’s time for some girl talk!” She beamed, ushering you into a seat where a plate of food awaited. “So, tell me. How did you and my son meet?”

She couldn’t be serious. This had to be some twisted joke, right? The look on her face spoke volumes, she was genuinely curious with a smile so similar to her sons spreading over her face. You wanted so badly to scream in her face that he fucking kidnapped you, that you barely knew him when the two of you were in the same classes. You took a deep breath in an attempt to calm yourself. No matter how badly you wanted to scream and cry, you couldn’t. The threat of Jungkook’s father was still near, if you didn’t behave he had no qualms about “getting rid” of you.

“Uh, we met in high school.” You answered, poking at your food and refusing to make eye contact with her.

“High school sweethearts! How cute, that’s just like me and my husband!” She gushed. She was just as deluded as the rest of them.

Your silence caused her lips to turn downward, the smile slipping off of her face. A look of understanding crossed over her eyes as she gently reached across the table to cradle your hand in her own.

“I understand how hard it is at first.” She said, your head snapped up to look at her. This was the first time she didn’t seem bubbly and in love. “I ran too, you know. It’s overwhelming, becoming a part of their world and learning that way they love. My husband was strict with me, but he had to be for the sake of our relationship.”

And just like that, your hope died again. She thought she was in love with him, that he did all he did because they were meant to be together. She was like you once, and she had lost the fight. Your eyes dropped to her hands that held your own. To your horror, you noticed the deep scars littering her wrists and palms. On the inside of her wrist was the most prominent scar, a large J carved into her skin. If her hands were that scarred, what was she hiding underneath her shirt and pants? Was her whole body subjected to the torture that her husband called love? He had conditioned her with pain, he had made her into what he wanted her to be.

“Baby?” Jungkook called, walking into the kitchen with a worried look on his face as he took in your stiff posture and disturbed expression. He came to your side immediately and settled his arm on the back of your chair, his eyes scanning over you to make sure you were okay.

“Are you feeling sick, sweetheart?” He asked, pressing his lips to your forehead making his mother smile at the display of affection.

You shook your head and stopped yourself from flinching away. After all, you couldn’t say no to him.

The days began to pass quicker after the incident with Jungkook’s mother. You had learned his parents would be staying in the guest house to give the two of you space while also keeping an eye on you. You could feel yourself spiraling in the aftermath of everything that had happened. The only thing that was keeping you from lashing out again was the hard glare Jungkook’s father constantly had trained on you. Not to mention, your compliance was the only thing preventing Jungkook from hurting you the same way his father had his mother.

Each day proved to be more straining than the day before. Jungkook would push for more from you, he would start with small things and gradually work his way up to what he really wanted. And it was exhausting. You never stood a chance against him. He was a monster that had disguised himself so skillfully that even you didn’t see what he was doing when this started.

Day 3: You weren’t allowed to sleep in “your” room anymore. His excuse was that his dad wouldn’t approve of leaving you alone. But you knew that was a lie, he just wanted to have you to himself for as long as he could. He took your privacy from you, the one thing you had been allowed to have.

Day 4: You spent the day together watching movies. You weren’t allowed to leave his hold the entire time. You weren’t allowed to deny his touch no matter how much you wanted to jump out of his arms and make a run for it for the second time. He held you the entire day and it felt so suffocating.

Day 5: You weren’t allowed to see his mom anymore. You were only allowed to talk to him, you could only spend time with him. You felt like you were going crazy being with just him again. Sure, his mother was completely brainwashed but still she was someone that wasn’t him.

Day 6: You weren’t allowed to dress yourself anymore. You hadn’t objected, but you did try and tell him that you could do it yourself, that you were an adult. But of course, you weren’t allowed to deny him. If you did, then he could hurt you. If you did, his father could kill you. What other choice did you have? How could you fight back when there was nothing protecting you except your captor’s empty promises? You hated the feeling of his hands on your body, skimming over your exposed flesh as he would change your clothes.

Day 7: You couldn’t deny his affection no matter how much you wanted to. You had found yourself pressed into the couch cushions, one of his hands woven through your hair as the other stroked your waist, his lips locked tightly to your own.

“Kiss me back.” He had whined into your mouth, harsh pants of air bursting over your lips. And reluctantly you did, because what else were you going to do? You had no other choice, there was no escape. Not while both of his parents were here. You had foolishly hoped that you could last ten days with him. That your punishment would end and you could regain what little freedoms he had given you before.

Day 8: You couldn’t sleep, not while he was doing what he was behind you. You had kept your eyes clenched tightly shut but you could still hear what he was doing, you could feel his breaths hitting the back of your neck as soft moans burst from his throat. His one hand gripping your hip tightly as he worked himself up, moaning your name desperately as you pretended to sleep.

You were disgusted, but you knew it would be better to pretend you were unaware than to snap at him.

Day 9: That night, he told you he wanted to bathe you. He wanted to cross the one hard line you gave him, and you were breaking ever so slowly. You didn’t flinch when he stripped you of your clothes or when he cradled your bare body to his chest, settling you into the tub. His eyes were hooded in lust, his gaze and hands straying as he washed you. This was what he wanted, full dependence and utter compliance. All you could do was close your eyes and pretend he was someone else, that you were anywhere but there.

Day 10: He wanted you. That was his “final” punishment. He had you laid out in the center of his bed, his hands running over every part of you he could touch while his lips marred the column of your throat. He was breathing heavily, raising himself up to kiss you as he reached down to pull your shirt up, only disconnecting from you to rip the fabric from your torso. He let out a deep groan, even though it was nothing he hadn’t already seen the night before. He frantically gripped the waistband of your pants and yanked them off to reveal more of your skin.

“My pretty, good, little girl.” He cooed, stroking your hips before his fingers curled into the fabric of your underwear, attempting to pull them away.

A sudden clarity overcame you and you couldn’t hold yourself back any longer. Your hands snapped down to his wrists and held them tight, trying your hardest to fix him with a glare you didn’t know you were capable of.

“No.” You bit out, your nails sinking into the skin of his wrists.

“No?” He laughed, that dark look returning to his handsome face. “Don’t you remember, baby? You can’t say no.”

There he was, the monster that you knew had been hiding behind that sweet face. Jungkook had several personas, the domineering kidnapper, the dotting boyfriend, and the whiny child. This was the one you had been waiting to see, the one that had violently slammed your head into the hood of your car that night. The one that had drugged you and zip tied you in the back of his car. He was always there, just sitting beneath the surface waiting to come and get you.

But you were tired, so fucking tired of being scared all the time. You took a deep breath and squared your shoulders, fixing him with the darkest glare you could manage. This wouldn’t go his way, no matter how much he thought he was winning, no matter how he played you like a Puppeteer controlling his helpless marionette. And with conviction you bit out that one word you had agreed not to say.

“No.”

#bts #bts jungkook #bts x reader #jungkook #jeon jungkook #jungkook x reader #jeon jungkook x reader #yandere #yandere bts #yandere jungkook #bts fanfic #yandere jungkook x reader #yandere kpop #yandere bts x reader

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ladymercysletters · 4 years ago

Text

You’ll Do Nicely

Benedict Bridgerton x Reader

Prequal 1 of the If You’ll Have Me Series

Word Count : 1952

Warnings: some trigger warnings including: Alcohol abuse, Gambling addiction, child abuse, spousal abuse. It’s not overly heavy but if you’re triggered by any of these, proceed with caution

A/N: This is the first prequal chapter of the If You’ll Have Me series. It doesn’t actually have any Y/N x Benedict content because it takes place before they meet. This is the chapter on how Y/N became a Duchess.

The summer season of 1809 was, it seemed, to be yet another uneventful one, with no suitors… yet again. At your coming out last year you had received the attentions of a fair few of the younger gentlemen of the ton, in fact your dance card had been almost full until they realised who your father was. Since they had realised that you were one of those Buxton’s your dance card had remained almost empty in its stead.

It had always been a burden to you and your family; your father was a gambler and a cad, he owed almost everyone money, and the ones he didn’t owe still knew about it. You were sure he had not paid one bill at his club, but you could have placed a fair bet yourself that he had drunk more than his share of whatever they stocked.

For as long as you and your siblings could remember he had come home drunk and empty of pocket most nights; taking his anger out on any one of you he could lay his hands one. When you were very small your mother used to get in between you and your father, covering you all and taking his rage for you. As you grew older your mother lost her will, instead slumping against the wall in defeat as he took your brother over his knee and lashed him. His excuse was always that it will teach him not to do as his father does, and after the first few times you all relented; your brother would stand in front of his two little sisters, and you would quietly usher your little sister away and out of his reach as your brother took the punishment.

The sober fact of your family’s reputation was enough to pull you back into the present. Dinner with your family was never a joyous occasion; though you all ate together talking was never allowed between you and your siblings and your parents never much mingled beyond greetings and farewells. Your mother sat at one end of the table, taking the tiniest of mouthfuls of soup with an unreadable expression; whilst your father sat at the other end, slurping each full spoonful with his napkin tucked into his collar. With a cough to clear his throat, all eyes flitted up too look at him.

“The Duke of Pembrokeshire was at the Devillier’s ball the other evening.” He said into another spoonful. “He asked after Y/N.” at the mention of your name, eyes turned to you.

“The Duke of Pembrokeshire?” your mothers asked “Portland? Isn’t he…”?

“WHAT?” your father snapped, dropping his spoon into the soup with a clank. “He is a Duke. He has shown an interest in our otherwise plain daughter. Am I to refuse him?” he spat. The silence of the evening returned and your mother receded back into herself. You were sure you remembered the name Portland from somewhere, but for the life of you, you just couldn’t place it.

Later that evening it dawned on you, you sat bolt upright in bed at the memory of you and your brother: looking through a crack in the door at your father and his friends, all sat around a moss green table playing cards. The stench of alcohol in the air and the sound of snuff sniffing constant. That’s when it hit you; Portland was your fathers friend, a large rotund and red man that you and your brother had nicknamed Porty because his face always seemed to be the colour of port. He couldn’t be who your father expected you to marry, he must have died and left his title to a son or a nephew. With that lingering thought you dropped back onto your bed and tried your best to get some sleep.

The next evening you and your family arrived in Hampstead, somewhere. Yet another ball that you had only just managed to find a dress for. Your brother always managed to escape these events, being twenty-two and fresh from university, he often made his excuses and escaped off into the night. Preparing yourself for another evening as a social pariah you steeled yourself as you entered the grand ballroom. No sooner had you exchanged pleasantries with your host and a few surrounding families than the dragging of feet drew your attention.

“BUXTON MY OLD MAN” cried the almost fully spherical man; the bulging buttons of his overstuffed waistcoat straining with effort. This must be Portland. Your father seemed almost afraid of him and you rather suspected he was. Once he had finished greeting your parents his attentions turned to you. His lecherous eyes crawled over your skin, and an even worse laugh - somehow wet and dry at the same time as he coughed into his fist made your little supper appear in your throat whilst he inspected you like some prized heifer.

“Yes. You’ll do nicely” he leered, circling you and clearly leaning over your cleavage. You felt sick to the stomach at even being looked at by him. You smiled politely, trying to pull your lips so tight no-one could see them trembling, and made your excuses to find sanctuary on the other side of the room. You swiped a glass of punch from a footman’s tray and stole behind a large bouquet in one corner of the room, content to become part of the foliage for as long as possible.

“You’re doing an awful job of hiding you know.” A deep voice rang from the other side of the arrangement. “For starters you’re not even the same shade as the wall.” You peaked out from behind a rogue frond to see Henry Granville, one of your only friends in the room: he was, as usual, immaculately dressed in a darkly patterned waistcoat and burgundy jacket that matched his new wife’s elegant chiffon trimmed gown. They truly were a balm to your horrible evening.

“I was trying to blend in with the foliage if you must know, though in a blue gown I do suppose that is difficult.” You muttered, stepping out from behind the column. “In truth I am hiding from one of my father’s friends.” You gestured to your parents across the room, your father hunched over with the old duke as your mother stood abortively aside.

“I’m sure whatever they’re discussing has nothing to do with you.” Henry said, trying to cheer you up.

“He was inspecting me like cattle. There is no doubt in my mind that my father is selling me off.” You sighed, taking a strong swig of your decidedly non-alcoholic punch.

“You are only twenty years old, surely your mother will want you to at least stay for another few years yet?” Lucy asked comfortingly. You sighed dejectedly as you looked back over at your mother, taking absolutely no interest in anything and looking rather far off.

“I doubt my mother would care whether I stay in society or not, just as long as she doesn’t have to deal with my father any more. Please Henry.” You turned to face him and his new wife. “Tell me about your latest commission or something, before I slip into further despair.” Granville continued to relay you with the latest he had heard whilst behind his easel. The wonderful thing about being an artist by royal appointment, was that one was always within earshot of some rather salacious gossip.

By the time you returned home from the ball you were exhausted. You went straight to bed, furious with your father and not able to look anyone in the eye as you sat on what could be your future.

An hour later and you still weren’t able to settle, even going over your conversation with Henry and Lucy, trying to fool your mind into thinking all was well, before deciding on some warm milk to quell your thoughts… and possibly a snack. Sneaking down the staircase and down the hall, you spotted the light in your father’s study still on and you could hear your mother’s voice. You moved closer to peak through the crack in the door.

“He is Two and Forty years her senior! What on earth were you thinking?”

“Do not question me you bitch, he is a Duke, I thought you would be happy for our daughter.” He said, taking a swig of his drink. “Or would you rather me make him wait until Barbara is out in Society, perhaps he would like her better?”

“Don’t you dare!” she gasped. “He is older than you, how do you expect her to … AAhh. Gabriel, stop! No! Please!” you stepped away from the door at the sound of cracking skin; tears in your eyes as you ran to the scullery before your father realised you had heard.

***

A tradition that you and your brother had started a few years ago, and eventually brought your younger sister Barbara into, was the midnight drinking of claret in the little used small parlour. You would sit around the small room, only the candles you brought down from your bedrooms to light it, as you poured yourselves a glass and talked.

“You cannot sister, I will not allow father to marry you off like this.” Your brother stated, after you recalled the argument between your parents several days earlier.

“Sebastian is right sister. Portland is ancient and this is only your second season!” Barbara said hopefully, her innocently hopeful voice breaking your heart further.

“If he does not marry me off, he will wait for Barbara! And I will not allow that!” you said, cutting her off before she could say anymore. Your siblings shouted their surprise and horror as you tried to shush them. “I heard him and mother arguing the other night, father threatened to marry you off to him as soon as you are out.” You concluded. The silence in the room was deafening as you all mulled over your fate. Hardening yourself to what was about to happen you continued. “I will marry Portland: however old and drunken he may be. I will not allow you to come to any harm because of father’s gambling.” You said, stroking Barbara’s cheek. “There is no chance of me marrying anyone else, fathers’ debts have seen to that, and perhaps now that I am to be a duchess your fortunes may be brighter than my own.” Your brother shook his head in disbelief; your tone remained calm, through out your decision, as though you had already closed yourself off from any other emotions.

“Well.” He sighed. “Let us hope the scabby old goat cocks his toes soon after.” He raised his glass in cheers to his little speech, smiling when both of his younger sisters berated him for his candour before joining the toast anyway.

***

Not six months later, in late January you found yourself walking down the aisle of the small chapel on the Pembrokeshire estate. Like everything else on the estate, the décor was ostentatious and overly gilded. You felt much like any other object the duke owned in that moment; your dress was overly laced and flounced, and the train was far too heavy for you to pull with your head down the aisle. Speaking of your hair; it was piled high on top of your head, thick forced curls in layers making you look like a profiterole tower, as your father’s arm tightened around your shaking hand dragging you up the aisle quicker than your feet managed to move. A half an hour later you were no longer Miss Y/N Buxton, daughter of the 3rd Earl of Upshire – but her grace, Lady Y/N Portland, Duchess of Pembrokeshire.

#Bridgerton #bridgerton x reader #bridgerton imagine #benedict bridgerton #benedict bridgerton imagine #benedict bridgerton x reader #henry granville #my writing

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justonemorechapternicercy · 3 years ago

Note

If you are still doing the prompt thing~ Types of kisses: 3 Dialogue: 2 & 7 Ship: anybody from Percy’s harem! Thank you!

3. A breathy demand: “Kiss me” - and what the other person does to respond.

2. “Shut up and hold me.”

And

7. “It looks good on you.”

Percy had plenty of secrets.

He lived in a world where the Greek gods were real, where monsters attacked him and the other demigods on a regular basis, while still needing to go to school with mortal kids and teachers, hiding the truth from them. He lived in a world, where everybody knew everything about each other, where pronouncing the name of a god would invite that god to listen in the conversation. He lived in a world, where you had to be very careful if you wanted your secrets to stay yours.

Mostly he succeeded. Nobody knew the true extent of his first step-father’s abuse nor the real reason for his blue food obsession. It was still a secret that he could sing, and that he had a big collection.

As in- a big collection of gods, who wanted to pretend that they hated him, yet would do anything to spend a night with him.

(The first one was Mr. D. It was a shock for Percy, as he believed that the camp director hated his guts, but turned out, he was just horny and mad for being horny. What was even more of a shock that how… caring he was as his first. But when words got out that Dionysus popped the little hero’s cherry… let’s just say, the punishment he got for chasing after that nymph Zeus wanted, was nothing compared to the one he got for fucking the Sea Prince before the King of Gods could.

Who gladly took over his son’s place at Percy’s bed, showing him that his past conquests had no reason to deny his advances. Saying that Percy couldn’t walk properly for a few days after Zeus left him alone to go back to his furious wife, would be an understatement. But the young hero couldn’t rest adequately, because his next visitor, just as shocking as Zeus was, didn’t come alone to wreck the little hero completely - Persephone wanted to taste the Sea Prince as well.

The King and Queen of the Underworld changed everything Percy knew about pleasure, sex, and sexuality. Unfortunately, they also had to leave their pretty prince. Percy knew it was dangerous to fall in love with a god - either because of jealous significant others or because it could only end in heartbreak -, but he lost pieces of his heart each time a god left him all alone. Yet, he didn’t want to stop. He craved for them, he needed any god who paid even the smallest amount of attention to him.)

But the secret he held closest to his heart was that he liked to dance. Just losing himself in the music, moving his lean, athletic body to the rhythm of the song. But it wasn’t just the dance itself he was self-conscious about: it was the way he dressed during his dance sessions.

He liked to dress up in a skirt so mini it didn’t really cover all of his booty. In pretty, lacy fabrics, leather shorts, and flowy dresses. He just loved feeling pretty - but even if he had sex with various gods with different kinks, even if he was probably the most sought-after hero of all time, he still had some lingering insecurities about his body, his femininity, his kinks.

And being a crossdresser as a Greek hero - was not something he ever heard of. (Also, he was afraid of others’ judgment. The Aphrodite cabin was always looked down on by the other cabins for being “girly” and “too pretty for battle” and he wasn’t ready for the bullying he would receive for not being a proper, manly hero.)

So, he only shared his hobby with the loneliness of his room, his favorite plush shark he got from a “secret admirer”, and his pet moss ball. His mother knew he liked to dance, and that when he was younger, he liked to try out her clothes, but she believed that after Gabe beat him up for wearing make-up, he gave up all of it. He didn’t - he just made sure nobody could catch him doing anything not “normal”.

He would always lock the door of his bedroom, put his earphone in, and blast his songs without care for the world around him. He would dress up in one of the pretty dresses he bought from thrift shops from the money he got from selling candies even in camp, and dance until he was a sweaty, tired, grinning mess. He would mouth along to the lyrics of the song, careful not to sing it aloud, jump so high he would feel like he was flying, spin around until the dizziness took over.

He would feel free.

---

Triton heard things… Things he wasn’t sure how to feel about.

On one hand, it was good to know that his little brother was not mortal enough to freak out of the thought of being together with his uncles.

On the other hand, Percy Jackson - the pain in his ass, the bastard son of his father, the pretty hero of Olympus, the boy he just couldn’t erase from his thoughts -, was having sex with his uncles, and two of his cousins.

Which just had to be gossip, right? There was no way more than one god had their wicked ways with Percy before he could even determine himself to woo his little step-brother. Right?!

This was why he was standing in front of the door of the apartment Percy lived in with his mother, step-father, and baby sister, ready to knock on it. He lifted up his hand and hit the wood with his knuckles.

No answer.

He tried once again.

No answer.

Being a god had its perks - no locked door could stand in his way. He just flashed himself in the quiet apartment. Triton thought nobody was home, but the sound of somebody’s movement lured him towards a room, which’s door was slightly open.

He peeked in and for the first time in his immortal life, he felt like he was hallucinating or that he died and went to Elysium.

Because the boy he wanted to make his forever, was in nothing, but a pastel pink, lacy babydoll, hips swaying seductively to a beat only Percy could hear. Arms flailing in the sky, strong, long legs moving fluidly, he whirled around like a pro. He threw his head back to expose his pale, long, beautiful neck, and Triton could do nothing to stop himself from moving towards the fucking tease.

He strode towards his prey and wrapped his arms around those slim hips dressed up in enticing lace. The sudden movement startled Percy, and the fight reflexes started to kick in, but as he turned around to shove his attacker away, he saw Triton, with his eyes burning in want. Percy gulped.

Triton stared at the boy blinking owlishly at him, lashes fluttering against his cheeks, fluffy hair stuck to his sweaty forehead. It was the most beautiful sight he’d ever seen.

“It looks good on you,” Triton growled, his hand stroking the hem of the babydoll, close to Percy’s bottom. The boy’s blush ran down from his cheeks to his neck, meeting the similarly colored fabric on his chest. The god wanted to explore all of the exposed skin with his lips, tongue, and teeth, marking him his.

“I…” Percy started, but nothing came out. He bit into his lip, uncertain, but seeing nothing but naked want in his half-sibling’s eyes, he came to a decision. “Kiss me,” he demanded breathily. He pressed closer to the other male; soft textile brushing his smooth legs, strong arms holding him tight, fingers teasing his naked skin. His breath hitched as Triton leaned closer, and his wide eyes fluttered close when their lips finally touched.

The god kissed him like no one before. He felt cherished, praised - loved. The earphone hanged uselessly from his neck, breaking the apartment’s quiet by mutedly blasting a distinctive, upbeat violin solo.

When they broke up, Triton whispered teasingly, “Will you dance for me?” His eyes shone with mirth, but he honestly wanted to see more of the dancing of his beloved. He wanted to enjoy more of his graceful moves, the passion he radiated when he danced.

But seeing Percy embarrassed, red face hidden in Triton’s shirt, the god knew that his Sea Prince was not yet ready for that. But, if he was lucky, he would have an eternity to watch as his beloved was swaying at some melody.

“Shut up and hold me,” Percy mumbled into his chest, and he gladly obeyed his order.

#gen's prompt game #prompt game #anonymous #percy jackson #percy's harem #triton #triton x percy #tritercy #dionysus x percy #hades x percy #persephone x percy #percy x zeus #crossdressing #crossdresser Percy

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wallwriterstuff · 4 years ago

Note

If you're available I would love to see a Twilight request! The reader has a one or two year old child. She falls asleep with the child in a nearby playpen napping as well. Edward, Jacob or Emmett(Or even the Cullen family returning home from a hunt) arrive and find the child awake, out of their playpen, face covered with marker marks and in the process of coloring sleeping mom's legs. Thank you so much in advance!💖💖

So this took a while because I really struggled to think of a way to write this at first, but I finally got an idea I was happy with because it combines a cute request with some quality Emmett and Rosalie fluff! I hope you enjoy it chickadee :D

Dream A Little Dream

Words: 2756

Warnings: None, just a simple bit of fluff!

Summary: Emmett needs a reprieve from Rosalie’s temper tantrum, so he goes to check on a DIY project, only to find someone else is living their dream.

“C’mon Rose, talk to me, just tell me-“

“Get out Emmett!”

The door had slammed between them before he could dare say another word, but Emmett was nothing if not persistent. He had spent 66 years married to the woman after all and if he had learned anything from that experience, it was that Rosalie’s temperament was as precarious as an unweighted seesaw - he was confident she’d be cuddling him by tonight.

“Babe.” He rapped his knuckles against the door to the garage but the only reply he received was the loud and sudden blast of a bassline from the CD player. His eyes rolled and he puffed out his cheeks, exhaling in a huff and turning away from the garage to leave his wife to cool off. Edward remained seated at the piano, grinning down at the keys while his fingers diligently moved across the ivory keys.

“No, I have no idea what’s wrong with her.” His voice drifted through from the music room, carrying on the sweet notes of the song he’d composed. He hadn’t played for quite a while but it was a nice, soothing change to listen to the melody he plunked out, Alice’s sugary soprano harmonising beautifully with the key he played in. Emmett scowled in his general direction, moving through the house towards the front door.

“Where are you going?” Carlisle’s voice made him stop and turn, his hand on the door handle.

“Out. Rose needs space.” He answered. Carlisle’s brow furrowed, his expression troubled. Emmett couldn’t quite understand it himself. He had never really seen the downsides to vampirism, not when it had gifted him an eternity with his very own angel, not when it came with the added perks of agility and strength and speed he could only have ever dreamed of in his human days. He didn’t have it in to lament for his soul or whatever the rest of them seemed to do. They were vampires, and vampires drank blood – accidents were inevitable. So what if the Swan girl fell prey to Edward’s temptations? They moved on and returned in a few decades when the memory of her had faded, as they had done before and would no doubt do again.

It really wasn’t rocket science! They all knew the laws and neither option was a particularly bad one to him. Either Edward got a good meal, or he had a chance at finding his epic love, his Rosalie, and he might stop brooding for the first time in over a century. Rosalie’s desire to kill the girl was understandable but so was Edward’s urge to protect her, but Emmett didn’t need to be Alice to know there was no future in all the realms of probability that could ever exist where Bella Swan would grow old and grey. Isabella was destined to die one way or another.

“Be safe.” Carlisle’s words made him snort, a smug grin crossing his lips as he opened the door.

“Me be safe? I’m the most dangerous thing out there.” He quipped. Emmett left without looking back. The forest flew past him in what should have been a blur of greens and murky browns, but his eyes saw every detail. Each crack in the bark, the dew glistening on cobwebs, the smallest of insects scuttling up the stems of leaves…it was all a gift to him. He would kill for Rose to see the beauty in it all as he did but she never would. Rose had had all her dreams taken from her by Carlisle long ago, and she was forever going to be bitterly frozen, trapped in her own cycle of self-loathing. He’d burn the world if it put the faintest smile on her face; had taken her to the most incredible places with the most astounding views, bought jewellery so expensive it made even the richest men shudder in disgust at his actions. The one thing that would make his love truly happy was the one thing he could never give her, but he had been thinking of ways to at least soften the heartache.

There was a house (a small ramshackle thing a few miles out from their own sleek residence) that he’d visited once or twice. He’d taken photos and done some minor fixing up of the place, making sure the roof no longer leaked, that the walls were weather-proof and so on. Emmett had laid floors, plastered walls…he’d made the small house viable once more and the only thing he had yet to do was take down a portioning wall between what he envisioned would be the kitchen and lounge space. It would be his anniversary gift to Rosalie, a place she could truly make her own, where she could build her own home. There may not be little feet pattering on the wooden floors, but he could give her two out of three couldn’t he? Renew their vows so they were confirmed husband and wife once more, help build her a home…

He slowed when he neared the site, his nose twitching. Emmett inhaled deeply, an odd mix of smells drifting up his nose. He didn’t remember peonies, and…was that lavender? Emmett approached his little project cautiously, straining all his senses to read his environment, predatorial instincts rising to the surface. A heartbeat, odd rhythm…no, two heartbeats? One slower, one faster, neither the same sort of pace or rhythm as any animal roaming the woods. Humans then? Emmett frowned deeply, struggling to understand why hikers would come all the way out here as he picked his way over the tree roots trying to trip him up, hand dragging over moss covered bark.

A billow of white was the first thing he saw, a sheet in the light breeze. It fluttered, surrounded by bright coloured clothes much too small to be adult sizes, and damp towels. There had been a brief moment of sun this morning but Emmett still had to scoff. Whoever had stolen his project from him was clearly no native to Forks or they’d have known better than to hang their laundry on the line at the slightest bit of sun. Sunshine rarely lasted in Forks. Emmett paused, looking at the fence now enclosing the house he had transformed with his own bare hands. He definitely hadn’t put that up, nor did he recall painting a fence bright green. He hadn’t installed a laundry line either but someone had driven that stake into the ground, the line coming from some sort of contraption nailed into the exterior of the house.

Someone was definitely living in his DIY project, and he was not-

“Shhhhh!”

Emmett was paralysed briefly by the little giggle that followed. It was a soft sound, full of innocence he could never recall having, and it came attached to the sound of scratching and squeaking. His brows pulled low over golden irises, his body moving of its own accord. It had to be a child, but who would leave a child alone in front of their house? Was it even supervised? His curiosity had piqued and though he wanted to be frustrated he just couldn’t be. Maybe Rose wouldn’t ever get to live in this house with him but someone else had clearly made it their home, someone who had achieved the dream Rose had always wanted. He wasn’t quite sure how he had managed it but he had to sigh, because only he could attempt to resolve his wife’s bitter disposition and end up adding to it instead.

He didn’t recognise her. From the exterior alone Emmett could tell that in the few weeks it had been since he’d last visited this place, she’d put a lot of effort into making the house a home. The outside had a fresh lick of paint, the windows clean and windowpanes a freshly painted grey, the front door a bright green to match the fence surrounding the house. A wooden picnic table had been added just in front of the kitchen window, and she was sat folded over with her head resting on her arms, eyes closed and skin peppered with goosebumps. Stray wisps of hair blew about her face as his eyes tracked down her figure, noting the gentle, even breathing and the way her eyes twitched about under their lids in her sleep. Beneath the picnic table was the source of the musical laughter.

Emmett crouched, forearms resting on his knees and lips curling into a small smirk as he watched a curly haired little boy press a marker pen to her leg, scribbling a design into her skin. She didn’t even appear close to waking, but the temperature had dropped and clearly the little boy had escaped from the playpen across from the picnic table, the door open and the locking mechanism snapped, paper strewn about the garden by the breeze. Emmett could see the dirt under her fingernails as he got closer, a pair of gardening gloves on her opposite side. She’d clearly done her laundry and a bit of gardening while the sun was out, leaving her son to play in his playpen, but the little boy had seen an opportunity once she’d fallen asleep and took it.

He had the cutest little dimples when he smiled, green eyes shining bright with mischief. Emmett chuckled lowly, zipping about the garden to clean up the papers he’d spotted before approaching the picnic table and clearing his throat.

“Excuse me, miss? Miss?” he called. Her eyes fluttered open, confusion evident in them for a second before she jumped, straightening in her seat and watching him with wary eyes. Emmett watched her glance to the playpen, her eyes widening. He could hear the way her heartbeat leapt in her chest, the panic stricken expression she wore telling.

“Oh my – no no no –“

“Erm Miss? Don’t panic, he’s under the table.” Emmett smiled, flashing his own dimples in an effort to calm her. He was a naturally unnerving being after all and most humans tended to be either hopelessly attracted to him or deathly afraid – there wasn’t really an in between. She whipped her legs out from under the picnic table, moving so swiftly Emmett was left in awe. She very quickly scooped her son out form under the table and swung him onto her hip, cradling him close and closing her eyes. Her heartbeat began to calm, her breathing growing less rapid now she knew where her boy was.

“Oh god, thank you. I…I guess I fell asleep, the weather was a lot nicer earlier,” She shivered a bit, hand cradling the back of her sons head until he wriggled in her grip. “Not now baby just – really? Oh Damian!” she groaned exasperatedly. Emmett watched amusedly as she licked her thumb and rubbed furiously at his cheek.

“No Mama! No!” the boy cried, squirming in her grip. His face was covered in marker pen, a mixture of blacks and blues and pinks all swirling over his cheeks and down his nose. Emmett couldn’t help but chuckle.

“He’s a real mischief maker huh? He got your leg to.” He informed her. She looked down to her leg with another soft groan, her cheeks turning pink.

“Sounds about right. Have you ever tried to renovate with children?” she questioned, shaking her head. Emmett shook his head, his eyes stuck on the little boy. He shared his mother’s dark hair though not her eyes. Emmett wanted to be upset his plans for Rose’s anniversary surprise had fallen through, but he had been stupid enough to not check the market for this property and it had gone to someone who clearly needed it, though the property was fairly out of the way and an odd choice for a young woman and her child. She seemed intent on making it somewhere nice to live for them both though, and for that he couldn’t fault her.

“Never had any of my own, but your boy sure is a handsome guy. I did renovate this place though, I’m glad it went to someone who needed it.” He admitted, rubbing the back of his neck. Her eyes widened, the surprise in them obvious.

“Oh! It was you! The real estate agent said they had no clue who had started the renovation’s, but it didn’t stop them selling it to me…we didn’t know it was taken.” She bit her lip, hoisting her son higher up on her hip. Damian was still wriggling slightly, looking up at Emmett with wide, curious eyes. It was clear what she was worrying about it, but Emmett shook his head, hands held up before her.

“It’s yours, really, me and my wife live nearby, this was a second property we didn’t really need. It wasn’t like I checked it was for sale or anything either, you won it fair and square.” He promised. The relief was palpable in her eyes as her son squirmed again. She set him down, hand running through his curls briefly before he darted back into the house. She watched him go with a small smile.

“Well I’d be happy to give you the tour of the place, if you like? Show you what I’ve done with it Mr….”

“Cullen, Emmett Cullen.” He introduced himself with a nod, knowing his frigid skin would put her off if he dared shake her hand, and he didn’t want to put her off. Emmett’s brain was spinning a hundred miles an hour, and he was starting to form a plan. Rose might not get to live in the house, but she could spend time perhaps with the one thing she wanted more than anything. Her smile brightened.

“Y/N L/N. Maybe if you give us a little time to clean up first you could drop by later? Neighbours seem rare out here, it’ll be nice to know someone.” She admitted, tucking a stray lock of hair behind her ear. Emmett tilted his head slightly, glancing up at the house.

“Yeah. Yeah I er, would you mind if I bought my wife to? She had plans for this place, think she’ll enjoy seeing how you designed it for yourselves.” He said. She didn’t hesitate to nod and he tried his best not to feel too pleased with himself.

“Of course!” she agreed, and with a time organised between them Emmett sped off home to barrel his way into the garage. Rose was stuck beneath a car still, her BMW to be precise, though Emmett could never fathom what exactly she found to tune up on that thing – he was sure she spent more time under the car than under him. When she didn’t respond to his tapping on the hood, he pulled on her legs till she wheeled out, her expression sour and a smudge of grease across her cheek.

“Emmett.” She huffed. Emmett grinned down at her, completely unperturbed by her pouty glare.

“Rose. Come on, shower, dress up, do whatever it is you do, we got an appointment to keep.” He told her. Rose’s glare was enhanced by the way her nose wrinkled.

“An appointment? Emmett I swear if you’re trying to get me to go to marriage counselling again-“

“I’m trying to make you smile again.” He groaned exasperatedly. Her expression fell immediately, her golden irises softening from hardened topaz to gooey caramel. Emmett sighed, pulling her to her feet and reeling her in close. She was made for him, her body fit perfectly in his hands, against his. She was his shining light but she had been so dim since Bella had come to Forks.

“Emmett-“

“Rose, babe…I know you. I only have eyes for you. Who cares about some human? This family is immortal, we’ll survive it like we’ve survived everything else that comes our way. For one afternoon, just one, can I please, please have my wife back?” he pressed his forehead to hers, running a hand up and down her back. Rose remained tense for a while, but slowly her arms wound around his torso.

“What did you have in mind monkey man?” she tilted her chin, her lips a fraction of a centimetre from his own. Emmett’s smile returned.

“How’s about I take you to meet a really cute baby?”

By the end of the afternoon, seeing Rose smile at the young boy in her arms while he pretended to admire the newly fitted kitchen in Y/N’s house, Emmett started to understand what made her dream so beautiful, and so painful to wake from.

#twilight #twilight fanfiction #emmett cullen #rosalie hale #cullen family #emmett x rosalie #reader #Emmett is an absolute dumbo but he loves his wife #Rosalie is just stubborn #I bet he's really good at DIY secretly #this man knows plumbing like Mario

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smilemoreimagines · 5 years ago

Text

something tragic about you (Geralt x reader)

Part 1

length: 1,792

tw: death of family, physical abuse, canon-typical violence

Your ears come out to a slight point, but are not entirely without a human roundness. On one, at the edge, is a scar, thick and paler than the rest of your skin. You resent the human in you; years ago, you tried to cut it away into a full point, rid yourself of that which reminded you of your humanity, make yourself into a true elf. But the pain was too great and you could not finish it.

You are not angry with your father for being human, but you’re not exactly not angry with him either. Humans took both your father and your mother from you when you were too young to remember much of them, so that now you aren’t able to feel anything in particular if you try and call them to your mind. And you are riotously angry for that, that you were never able to know them, that humans stole that privilege from you by burning your village to the ground after slaughtering its people as you watched in mute-horror hidden at the edge of the woods. All you retain of that night is the scent of coppery blood and screams and flickering fire. And laughter.

You stayed in the charred wreckage for days, sleeping in the ashes of what had been your home, until a trader and his wife rode in expecting a bustling market day but instead found you, tiny and starving. They brought you to the nearest village and left you there on the street, not wanting to cart along a toddler half-elf. All you had left of your family and childhood was your mother’s embroidered shawl, which you were not supposed to wear outside of the house but took anyway; it was cold and you had wanted to gather winterberries and the shawl was warm and beautiful. You are glad you took it.

You have worked in the tavern of the town ever since. You no longer know how many years it has been. Two decades? Three?

The original owner of the place was not exactly kind to you, but he very rarely ever hit you. You’re sad, in a way, that he died, because his son Lyden is not as tolerant of your kind. He strikes you over the smallest of things: a few drops of spilled ale, a customer complaining of your elven blood, a customer desiring you for that very same reason. But you’re thankful for that last one, that he refuses to make you join the pretty girls upstairs. You have instead earned your position as a barmaid, and if you have to avoid the pawing of men wanting to fulfill a fantasy, you will. Anything to not be a girl faking moans into the night, being pinned night after sleepless night into a hard mattress. Not that you catch much sleep, either.

You do not like your empty, lonely room at the end of the upstairs hall. Rather than sleep there you slip out into the woods, and creep back in before dawn. The other girls know this, and most are kind and do not tell on you, but sometimes you are unlucky enough to sleep in and come through the back door when the owner has already risen from his bed and crossed the street from his home to the tavern to rouse the girls and collect payment from the men who stayed the night.

On those unlucky occasions when you are caught you are beaten worse than usual. If ever you catch a glimpse of your back in the mirror after a bath, you try not to think of the sound of his belt meeting your skin. Your keeper does not like that you have some secret place to go in the night.

Even if it is just the stars and the moon that you are looking up at from your bed of moss, wrapped in your mother’s shawl.

Out here you don’t feel as though you’ll suffocate, the open air gifting you with wind, cicada song, animals rustling. Sometimes, if you lay still enough, deer will walk near you, regarding you with soft eyes.

Tonight though, you hear none of these things that you love. It is unnaturally quiet and still. When a twig cracks nearby your body is already coiled and ready to jump up. You scan the trees, not able to see much from the light of the sliver of moon, until it gives you the flash of eyes in the dark, and then you can see the man walking towards you, fast enough to make you nervous.

“Get down,” he rumbles, but in the next moment another stick snaps behind you and you whirl around in time to see too-long teeth and a clawed hand swiping at you. You stagger back but it’s too late, those claws tear through your arm and there is only pain, white hot and searing. You think you would rather the dull ache of bruises. You think you would rather death. You think nothing and hear the unnerving sound of something sharp sinking into something living, the thump of a body hitting the forest floor. You hope that the beast will kill you quickly and be done with it all, but you feel nothing but the persisting agony of your arm and then a soft touch on your shoulder.

A voice full of gravel tells you that you will be alright.

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

You wake under the cold blue sky, blink hazily at a sun that is already halfway to setting. You’re laying on something soft -- a fur blanket? -- with a heavy cloak thrown over you. Your arm is hot, a stabbing, throbbing pain. You wonder idly at what happened to it, and then remember throwing your forearm up to block that creature from anything vital.

And then you process that it’s noon. You cannot even imagine the beating that you will get. You bolt up, crying out at the searing pain, but struggle to your feet anyways, letting the cloak fall off of you. But then a man is in front of you, golden-honey cat eyes wide.

You sway on your feet, dizziness overcoming you. “I have to get back,” you say, “Or I think he might kill me.”

“Fuck,” he says, before you tip over. He catches you easily, but one hand presses into your bandaged skin and you scream.

“Fuck,” he says again.

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

When you next open your eyes it’s sunset and the man is sitting right beside you, his cloak once again thrown over you.

When he sees you stir he places a hand on your shoulder, a gentle pressure, and says, “Easy, little elf. You lost a lot of blood.”

You don’t have time to worry about that. You sit up despite the hand meant to keep you down and ask, “How long have I been asleep?”

“Somewhere you need to be?”

“How long.”

He grunts. “Almost two days.”

Two…? Shit. Fuck.

You try to get to your feet again, but he just grabs the hand of your good arm and tugs you back down to sit, which is when you notice you’re no longer wearing your dress. Instead you are practically swimming in a shirt that smells of pine and horse, and your shawl is wrapped around your shoulders.

You look down at the shirt, then at him.

Unfazed, he says, “Your dress was soaked in blood. It’s nearly winter; you would have frozen.”

You can’t say you wish he’d left you in a blood-soaked dress, so you let it go.

Next, he asks, “Who do you think is going to kill you if you don’t get back?”

You don’t want to tell him. You don’t know this man. You grip the shawl tighter around you and look at the ground.

“Is it the same man that bruised you up and left scars on your back?”

Now you look at him. No one has seen them before. Lyden never hits you where it will not be covered by your clothes. He likes to kick you once he has you on the ground, so your back is nearly always painted black and blue, not to mention bloody when he lashes you; you often have to sleep on your stomach.

And now, with this new wound that has already seeped through the bandages…

“How bad is it?” you ask. “How deep?”

He shakes his head.

Fine. You pull at the knot tying it together and unravel the stained cloth before he can stop you. For a moment you worry you’re going to faint again, but the feeling passes. It is four gashes into the meat of your forearm. The worst two are stitched fairly neatly, but the edges still tug apart slightly, just enough that you can see more of your own inner anatomy than you would care to. You are careful to keep your arm palm-up so you don’t brush anything along the ragged cuts.

“Please cover it again,” you say. “I shouldn’t have looked.”

He sighs and reaches into a bag laying next to him, procuring a fresh cloth. As he re-binds you, you can’t help but think that like this you won’t be able to fulfill your duties as a barmaid. The only work you will be able to do, that requires no lifting, is on your back, under the weight of a man.

You do not like the feeling of fear, of powerlessness, but now it seems to ooze from your heart. Your eyes are still on his face but your vision unfocuses, blurs. You can’t remember the last time you allowed yourself to cry, to give in to hopelessness.

“What hurt you? Left you so beaten?” The heaviness in his voice requires an answer.

You choke out a laugh that is more like a sob, tell him, “Not what. A man. A man who will now have no use for me other than to fulfill the perversions of his customers.”

This man, who saved you and has cared for you even though he knows you are elven, shakes his head and growls, “Then that is no man. He’s worse than the beast that tried to kill you. He chooses to hurt.”

You nod and wipe at your wet face, more angry than scared now and annoyed at yourself for crying in front of a stranger.

“If you truly need to return to him I won’t stop you,” he says, but you don’t make a move to leave.

The dying sun, in a last burst of light, glints on the pendant that hangs from his neck, and something in your memory clicks. The wolf pendant, silvery hair, gilded eyes...

“You’re the Witcher, aren’t you?”

He hmms, and nods.

#geralt x reader #geralt of rivia x reader #the witcher x reader #the witcher fanfiction

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lupinlongbottom · 5 years ago

Text

Ordeals

Charlie Weasley x Legilimens!Reader

Summary: (Y/N) has a hard time sleeping after the war, good thing her husband is there when she wakes up.

Prompt: A lovely request from @cutie-bug (that took WAY too long to get out of my head, I’m so sorry!)

Word Count: 1.6k

Warnings: none

A/N: uh. hey. i’m back. whoops. sorry for the hiatus. i’m trying to get back into writing, but it’s been increasingly hard for me of late. in the meantime, however, enjoy a lovely fic with our fave dragon boi.

A sliver of light filtered through the moss colored curtains, shining directly onto the dark covers of the bed beneath. The sheets rose and fell with the deep slumber of the redheaded man resting under, gently lifting momentarily to fall back down. The morning had barely begun, the sun only recently rising, but that had left no impact on the other owner of the bed.

(Y/N) had been sitting upright, head in her hands, for at least an hour before the sun rose. The war may have ended nearly a year ago, but the nightmares never ceased to end. It was easy to rationalize that the fighting and bloodshed had ended when she had woken, but the sleepless slumbers left her no deliberate way to understand the reality. It had become a habit to live off three to four hour nights of interrupted sleep.

A sputtering cough came from (Y/N)’s left side, her head turning ever so slightly towards the sound. Charlie usually had woken up by now, but yesterday had been a long day at the dragon sanctuary, loads of new eggs had finally hatched and were in need of constant supervision. Voldemort and his Death Eaters had come into owning a few dragons, neglecting their basic needs as creatures and using them for their own selfish purposes. Charlie was chosen to lead the rehabilitation of the few dragons rescued, leading to late nights and early mornings.

“(Y/N)?” Charlie muttered, voice thick with sleep. A chunk of his red locks fell in front of his freckled face, forcing the half-asleep man to push them back into place.

What’s wrong?

“I’m fine,” (Y/N) responded curtly, as she had every morning.

Doesn’t seem like it.

“No, really. I’m really fine.” She rose her hand up in protest, glancing away. The small gemstone from her ring caught the ray of light, sending a glittering shimmer to her eye.

“Stop reading my mind, love,” Charlie yawned, pulling his arms above the sheets, stretching them out for the day. “And before you say anything, I know it’s stronger when you wake up, but you and I both know you’ve been awake longer than you’d care to admit.”

(Y/N) sat in a stunned silence. Of course her husband could see through her possible excuses, he had been doing so since the war ended. A soft echo of Charlie’s voice rang through her head.

How long?

“I’ve only been awake for an hour or so. I’ve tried to fall back asleep but nothing worked—not even counting dragons.” (Y/N) chuckled airily.

“What was it this time?” Charlie had fully sat up, parallel to his wife. His white pajama shirt was bunched and twisted up from his sleep.

“The usual,” (Y/N) groaned. “We were back at Hogwarts, fighting some Death Eaters,”

I bet I looked great.

“You did look pretty great, like usual,” (Y/N) responded, elbowing Charlie slightly. He smiled lightly. “But this time, you didn’t dodge. The spell… it hit you.” The sound barely leaving her lips.

“But I’m still here,” Charlie gently rested his hand under (Y/N)’s chin, cupping her cheek. “I’m always still here.”

“I know,” Her head softly pushed into his grip. “But if I lost you, I don’t know what I would’ve done. Merlin, what would I have told your mother? She would have lost two sons in one day and—”

“But she didn’t,” Charlie said, tone sharp. “Fred is gone, that can’t ever change,” A deep sigh. “But I’m still here, see?” His hand enveloped (Y/N)’s, circling the back of it with his thumb. “You still feel me, right?”

(Y/N) nodded. “I just wish they would stop.”

“I know.”

The two sat in silence, the familiar pacing of their breathing settling both of their worried hearts.

“Your hands are always so cold in the morning,” (Y/N) spoke up, slowly pulling her hand away from Charlie’s icy one. “I still think you should wear a pair of mittens while you sleep.”

“Once you learn to knit, then I’ll consider it,” Charlie laughed, his fingers tracing over his other knuckles, twisting his wedding band. “Besides, you’re always there in the morning to warm them up.” A peck landed squarely on (Y/N)’s temple, soft and wet.

“Gross.”

“Can’t a man appreciate his furnace of a wife?” Charlie asked, voice slightly hurt. (Y/N) rolled her eyes before kicking one leg off the side of the bed, her second soon to follow. “Wait, love—”

“I’m not in the mood, Charlie. Deal with it yourself, you have two—rather cold—hands. I put more tissues in your nightstand if you really need to—”

“Who’s the gross one now?” Charlie said, gripping onto (Y/N)’s sleep shirt, preventing her escape. “As much as I appreciate your extremely polite decline, that’s not why I was stopping you.”

“Wouldn’t have been the first time,” (Y/N) shrugged, kicking her leg back onto the bed. “Not that I usually complain.”

“Neither do I,” Charlie laughed, the sound bouncing off their small bedroom walls. “As much fun as that would be, that’s not what you need right now.”

“What I need?” (Y/N) questioned, resettling back into the nest that laid before her.

“What you need, indeed.” Charlie repeated. “Quite clearly you’re need of some good, old fashioned, Weasley cuddles.”

“Charlie, you know I want to—”

“Shush!” Charlie hissed, patting the sheets closer to his open arm. “Come on, in you go.”

(Y/N) rolled her eyes, a small smile breaking onto her lips. She nuzzled her way into her husbands side, fitting like a missing puzzle piece.

Smells good.

A wider smile tugged at the corners of (Y/N)’s mouth, hiding her happiness in her husband’s chest.

“You know,” Charlie hummed, fingers weaving through (Y/N)’s hair. “No matter where we are in the world, as long as I can have you in my arms like this—just like this—it feels like home.”

“There you go again,” (Y/N) sputtered, blush creeping up her neck. “Saying everything that’s on your mind like it’s nothing.”

Charlie chuckled. “A habit I picked up from courting you, love. You’d be able to read my mind anyway, might as well beat you to the punch, no?” He angled his head down, eyebrow teasing his hairline.

“It’s fun to read your mind,” (Y/N) spoke honestly, weaving her hand under the blanket to rest on Charlie’s thigh. “You know I try not to do it often, but it can’t be helped.” She shrugs, fully resting into Charlie’s side. “Besides, I like your honest reactions.”

“Reactions? To what—” It was in that moment that (Y/N)’s hand began gently moving up and down his thigh.

Merlin…

“To that, my dear husband.” (Y/N) chuckled, stopping all movements entirely. “Those are the reactions I live for.”

“I thought you weren’t in the mood?” Charlie mused, clearly enjoying the game his wife was playing.

“Oh, I’m not,” (Y/N) smiled, removing her hand to her side, leaving a small peck on Charlie’s jaw. “But it’s fun to tease. Your face—”

“—color matches my hair,” Charlie rolled his eyes. “Yeah. I think I’ve heard that one before.”

Only a thousand times

“A thousand and one, then.” (Y/N) laughed, peppering more kisses along her husband’s jaw. The soft smacking sounds echoed through the room, filling the empty space with love. With one swift motion, Charlie angled his head towards his wife’s attentive lips, capturing the delicate two between his own.

“You know,” Charlie began. Another kiss. “I have to be at work in an hour.”

(Y/N) groaned, running her hand down Charlie’s chest. “I know,” she breathed, patting his chest lightly. “Those dragons can’t do anything without their dad, huh?”

Charlie’s chest rose with laughter. “Yeah, except maybe burn down a village or two.” He snuggled closer to (Y/N), filling the empty spaces with blankets and comfort. The soft morning sun continued to filter through the curtains, cloaking the lovers in a ray of light and hope. (Y/N)’s features were practically glowing against the rays, illuminating the face Charlie loved so dearly.

“You know, I don’t have to read your mind to know what you’re thinking.” (Y/N) smiled, peering up towards her husband’s eyes. The brown irises were gleaming with life, stoked by the expression he had only ever fathomed emoting to her and only her.

“Oh yeah?” Charlie hinted, pressing a soft peck to (Y/N)’s forehead. “Then what’m I thinking?”

“That I should go put a pot of coffee on if you’re ever going to leave this bed.” (Y/N) yawned, retreating from their love nest, pulling the dark sheets to the side.

“Ah, exactly that,” Charlie said, watching (Y/N) swing her legs across their bed, moving to exit their bedroom. “See? You don’t need to read my mind to know what I’m thinking, love. It’s our special connection.”

(Y/N) smiled, turning towards their kitchen. The wooden floorboards creaked with every step, almost drowning out the sound of a faint thought, one of Charlie’s, one (Y/N) practically missed.

I love you. So much.

General Tag List: @maralisa124 , @leighxlover , @hey-its-me-rai , @missihart123 , @biatheintrovert , @luna-xxxxx , @chocolaterumble

Charlie Weasley Tag List: @sungoddessra , @crescent-ia , @phantom-pheonix , @dccomicnerd-world , @marveltrash99 , @graymountaingal, @storiesbycaroline, @mytinybaguette , @garbdump

want to be added to a tag list? hmu in the replies or ask box with what characters you’d like to be tagged with!

#charlie weasley #charlie weasley x reader #harry potter #harry potter x reader #Harry Potter Hogwarts mystery #charlie weasley imagine #charlie weasley imagines #dragon boi #hogwarts

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aleesblog · 4 years ago

Text

Review of Brazil that never was by Theodore Dalrymple published in Revista Oeste November 2020

Professor Andrew Lees is one of the greatest experts in the world on Parkinson’s Disease, but he is also a highly accomplished writer who has just published a short book titled Brazil That Never Was. It is a kind of dream-memoir as well as investigation into the fate of Colonel Fawcett, the British explorer of the Amazon who disappeared in 1925 with his son and was never found despite many search-parties sent out to find him. His disappearance was world news and exercised a continuing fascination that even now has not evaporated completely. There are people who are as devoted to the disappearance of Colonel Fawcett as others are to the disappearance of Sherlock Holmes at the Reichenbach Falls.

Professor Lees grew in in the North-West of England at a time – it now seems a whole civilization ago – when Liverpool was still a great port and ships plied regularly between it and Manaus or other destinations in Brazil, returning with cargoes of brazil nuts, rubber, chocolate and molasses, having voyaged outward with pianos and other such essential goods. He watched sailors arrive from Brazil with brilliantly-coloured parrots destined for the local zoo, very exotic in the monochrome of urban England.

When he was a child, Professor Lees’ father suggested that he read Expedition Fawcett, a compilation by his son, Brian, of his papers, letters and manuscripts, that was published in 1952. The young Lees was captivated. By a strange coincidence, I read this book too when I was about the same age, my main memory of it being that of the dormidera, an enormous black anaconda so-called because it snored loudly in its sleep. Fawcett claimed that anacondas grew up to eighty feet long and made trails six feet wide, though he himself had only seen one sixty-two feet long (which, of course, he shot) and which was comparatively slender because it had not eaten for a long time. Fawcett tells us that the breath of the anaconda is foetid and has a paralysing effect on its prey, like an anaesthetic gas perhaps, though I would imagine that few people have examined its breath that closely.

Fawcett, a kind of Amazonian Baron Munchausen, rather spoiled anacondas for me because, when I saw them in the zoo, they were indeed of impressive size but nowhere as big as those in Expedition Fawcett, nor did any of them snore. Somewhere on the internet there is a film of a jaguar fighting an anaconda, though these days with the ability of computers to fabricate almost anything, one doesn’t know whether the film is veridical. At any rate, the jaguar emerges triumphant, which is as it should be because it is higher up the evolutionary scale than a mere snake. Somehow, I feel it wrong for lower animals to triumph over higher, as Madonna seems to have done over Mozart.

With enormous diligence, the author has discovered that Fawcett, who went in search of lost civilizations in the jungle (these days, you don’t have to go further than London or Paris to find lost civilizations), had very peculiar mystical ideas, so peculiar that I have difficulty in understanding them. However, his wife and many of his friends also had these ideas, so refused for many years to believe that he was really dead, believing him to have some shadowy existence in a spiritual world beyond ours.

This little book, read in a couple of hours, is (among other things) a meditation on the relationship of childhood memory to reality. Growing up in the somewhat gloomy and grey post-war years in Britain, Brazil was imagined by Lees as a place of colour and vibrancy where poverty was at least compensated for by carnivals and good weather. (Poverty is much worse in the cold, and I remember someone saying to me in Cuba that the regime could not possibly have lasted in a worse climate, though perhaps North Korea is a counter-example.)

At the end of the book, the Professor takes a trip to Manaus. Ever since I first heard of Manaus, at about the age of ten, I have wanted to go there. My Manaus, of course, was the city of the rubber barons, the opera house and Caruso, who sang there. How extraordinary to have a belle époque opera house in the middle of the jungle, with an audience in white tie and tails! Of course, it was a British historian, literary scholar and Polar explorer, Sir Clements Markham, who ruined the South American rubber industry, and with it the opera house, by arranging for rubber seeds to be smuggled out to Malaya and ultimately to Java; but, like Professor Lees had, I still have a desire one day to go.

His account of what he found is distressing, at least to someone such as I with romantic notions. Ho took the bus from the airport:

Alta de Tarumã, where Richard Spruce [a Victorian botanist of great

distinction] had identified four previously unrecorded moss, now lay

on the cancerous edge of the city, overrun with gated communities,

walled-off sugar fazendas and dilapidated bathhouses. The once

beautiful waterfall was reduced to a litter-strewn muddy trickle.

Manaus was a metastasis in the earth’s green lung…

A little further on, things were if anything worse:

A concrete was zone of crumbling ten-storey buildings came into

view. There was a nauseous stench of diesel. A Shell garage, rows

of shops with roller shutters defending their windows, overhead

bridges, corrugated iron shacks, sallow walls covered in graffiti,

bracketed streetlights, telephone wires, parking lots filled with

trucks, and a Coca Cola bottling plant all shot by.

This is nothing like the Manaus of my dreams, though I am perfectly aware that the Manaus of my dreams necessitated for its production appalling exploitation. However bad working conditions may be today, they were much worse then. All the same, I cannot help asking whether, were we to reproduce those past conditions, we should be capable of producing something that future generations would like to see or feel nostalgia for? The answer, I think, is obvious. Will our future civilization be so hideously ugly that it will make what Professor Lees describes seem by comparison like Renaissance Florence?

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sharksandothernonsense · 5 years ago

Text

Traditions (Redwall Secret Santa 2019)

Written for @divebombmod, for the @redwall-secret-santa exchange! This was based on the prompt “Matthias and Cornflower enjoy a summer day together”; I went a touch angstier than I meant to at the beginning, but I hope you still enjoy reading it!

(Posting to this blog for easier sorting--this is a sideblog to @autobotscoutriella, but I was afraid this would get lost in the Transformers stuff today.)

AO3 Link for anyone who prefers to read it there)

The first morning of summer dawned warm, bright, and cloudless, the sun burning away the last few traces of spring dew on its journey into the sky. Golden traces of sunlight danced across the Abbey pond, rippling reflections turning the still water into a kaleidoscope of colors that danced under a brilliant blue sky.

Matthias the Warrior made his way across the Abbey grounds at a leisurely pace, taking the time to admire his beloved home along the way. The seasons never changed Redwall, no matter what effect they had on the creatures that lived there; the weathered red sandstone had stood tall and strong and safe through countless winters and summers, and Matthias had no doubt that the Abbey would outlive him and many generations after him.

“Morning, Matthias!” Jess Squirrel bounded out of an apple tree with an armload of dead branches strapped to her back, straightening up and adjusting her bundle. “Have you seen Cornflower this morning?”

“No, I’m afraid I haven’t.” Matthias paused mid-stride, momentarily distracted from the beauty around him. “Is everything all right, Jess?”

“As far as I know, it is,” the squirrel told him. “She mentioned looking for you when I passed her a few minutes ago, that’s all. Shall I help you look for her?”

“No, that’s all right. I’ll find her.” Matthias smiled and changed course, starting toward the outer wall and the nearest stairs. His wife had her predictable patterns, especially when the seasons changed, and he knew exactly where to start looking.

Sure enough, Cornflower stood on the walltop over the gateway, gazing out over the Abbey grounds, the pond, and the orchard. Matthias called her name as he approached, and was rewarded with a smile, one that still took his breath away just as much as it had the first time he had met her all those seasons ago.

“What’s going on?” The Warrior wrapped an arm around his wife’s shoulders, the two of them leaning against each other as they watched the Abbey coming to life below them. Everywhere they looked, creatures bustled back and forth, beginning to prepare the lawns for the new season’s celebration planned that afternoon.

Cornflower rested her head on his shoulder, humming softly before speaking. “Nothing, really. It’s going to be a beautiful day.”

Matthias smiled at her. “Not as beautiful as you.” He kissed the top of her head and held her a little closer. “But I know there’s something on your mind. Is anything wrong?”

“No, not exactly.” Cornflower sighed and leaned contentedly into Matthias’s side. “Season changes always remind me of waiting for you and Matti to return. He was so young last summer—they all were.”

Matthias nodded, sobering as he remembered their long quest, the terrible fear of not knowing if he would rescue his son in time, or if either of them would ever see Cornflower again. It must have been even worse for Cornflower, waiting at Redwall and facing down the raven general without knowing where they were or if they were even alive. And if he thought further back, to the Summer of the Late Rose, the memories of the terrible war and all the friends they had lost still lingered. “Summers haven’t always been easy for us, have they?”

Cornflower laughed softly. “No, they haven’t. It’s a shame. Summer has always been my favorite season. It’s so beautiful. The birds, the flowers, soft night breezes, watching the little ones chase fireflies…but the memories are still hard.”

Matthias rubbed her shoulder, watching Ambrose Spike and the young otter Cheek working together, with much grumbling and mock-complaining, to set up the first long trestle in the orchard. “You know what? We need some summer traditions that don’t involve kidnapping, mayhem, or the Abbey under siege.”

“Do you think so?” Cornflower tilted her chin up slightly so she could meet his gaze, a hint of mischief in her smile. “Well, I suppose that sounds like a good idea, as long as it doesn’t involve fishing.”

“Oh no.” Matthias laughed at the thought. “Matti and Sister May have taken over that tradition. Perhaps we could convince them to share the pond and enjoy a quiet midnight sail?”

“You may not need your sleep, o Warrior of Redwall, but I do,” Cornflower teased. “Perhaps we could find a tradition that doesn’t take place in the middle of the night.”

Matthias watched the Abbot, Sister Agnes, and John Churchmouse setting out a breakfast table beside the main Abbey door, arranging it so that creatures could either put together trays and find somewhere to relax and eat, or simply pause for something on their way to complete the morning’s tasks. “I might have an idea. How would you feel about taking our breakfast outside the Abbey today?”

“Outside?” Cornflower blinked in surprise. “Well, we can’t go on too much of an excursion. The Summer Feast is tonight, and they’ll need our help with the preparations soon.”

“I’m sure they can spare us for a little while. Besides, I know you’ve been working harder than any of them in the kitchens, and Mattimeo and I spent all of yesterday helping Foremole and his crew prepare the baking pit for tonight,” Matthias reasoned. “There are plenty of willing paws already helping, and we’ll be back in plenty of time for the final preparations. What do you say? A breakfast picnic in Mossflower Wood? It’s a beautiful day. We should at least stop for a little while to enjoy it. I’m sure our friends will understand.”

“You make a very convincing argument.” Cornflower squeezed Matthias’s paw and straightened up briskly. “Right, then, I’ll tell the Abbot you and I will be back before noon, if you’ll pack us a picnic basket.”

***

Mossflower Woods was peaceful and beautiful, with birds twittering in the distance, bees buzzing around newly blooming flowers, and the faint ripple of the River Moss audible on the breeze rustling the towering trees above them. There was no need to hurry, not under these circumstances; Cornflower and Matthias strolled leisurely through the forest, paw in paw, pausing here and there for Cornflower to collect a few pawfuls of herbs for Sister May, and for Matthias to examine a tiny grove of new saplings that had sprung up in a small clearing.

“It’s good to see the forest has recovered so well,” Cornflower remarked, brushing a paw gently along a new clump of brilliant green ferns. “I remember when this part of the woods was still burned and crushed after Cluny’s army passed through. Now you’d never know they were damaged, except for the old tree stumps.”

“And even those have been covered over by moss now. There’s no sign an army was ever here,” Matthias agreed, sitting down beside one of the stumps in question and gazing up at the leaves forming a soft green canopy overhead. Glimpses of a brilliant clear-blue sky were visible through small gaps, and rays of sunlight filtered down to create shimmering golden patterns on the forest floor. “It’s amazing, isn’t it?”

Cornflower settled down close to him, tucking her herbs into a corner of the picnic basket. “It is,” she agreed. “It’s been a long time since I’ve been out in Mossflower in summer.” She leaned over the basket and kissed Matthias on the cheek. “Thank you for this. It’s lovely.”

Matthias felt himself blush right to the tips of his ears, the same way he had when she had first kissed him all those seasons ago, and smiled at her. “So you like the tradition?”

“I think we should keep it.” Cornflower smiled, her eyes sparkling in the sunlight.

“I do too.” Matthias took her paw, and thought how very lucky he was that Cornflower Fieldmouse had agreed to give him the time of day all those seasons ago. “I don’t know where I would be today without you, you know.”

“I know.” Cornflower winked at him, squeezed his paw, and added, “You would still be the Warrior of Redwall, I am sure. And I would still be proud of you. But without you and I, we wouldn’t be here in Mossflower Wood today, making our own traditions—and there is nowhere I’d rather be than at your side.”

There was nothing Matthias could say that could adequately convey what he felt at that moment. Instead, he simply drew Cornflower close, and the two of them sat together in the warm sunshine, listening to the birds sing and the bees buzz overhead as Mossflower Wood came alive with the sounds of summer.

#redwall #redwall secret santa 2019 #Matthias #Cornflower #fanfic

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piracytheorist · 6 years ago

Text

A Resting Place

Summary: Three times Killian visits his mother’s grave.

Note: Probably implied by the summary, but this isn’t a happy fic. You have been warned.

Word count: ~2.8k AO3

They could still remember the way, all up the hill to the market. The track looked a bit smaller, thinner than he remembered it.

"Did we really use to race to the top?" Killian said, starting to pant.

"Come on, Lieutenant. Don't tell me you're tired already."

"Wouldn't dream of it."

There were old trees he remembered from their childhood, and there were also new trees and plants around them. When they reached the top of the hill, both of them leaned on the oak tree there, catching their breath.

"What do you say, Liam? A race to the top of the tree?"

"And ruin our new clothes? You're better than that," Liam said, laughing.

They turned their sight to the market. It was almost as he remembered it; the tailor, and the fisherman, and the butcher, and the blacksmith...

"Mrs. Austin," Liam said softly and walked towards the blacksmith's place. The much older woman was sitting on a chair, scrubbing rust off a metal bucket.

"Mrs. Austin?" Liam told her, assuming a formal stance. Killian copied him.

"Blimey," she said. "Naval officers in our village? Haven't seen any in decades!"

"Well, it's always nice to return to your roots," Killian said with a smile. He'd really missed that place.

"Roots? What are ye talking about, lad?"

"Oh, Mrs. Austin, you're breaking our hearts," Liam said. "You don't remember us?" He pointed at the both of them.

Mrs. Austin looked at them carefully. Granted, they were little boys when they... left, but they couldn't have changed that much...

She raised from her chair, placing the bucket on the floor. "The Jones? You're the Jones boys? Why, I'll be damned!" she exclaimed as a smile broke in her face and she wrapped her arms around Liam. She pulled away and said, "Those wild curls, Liam, right? And oh, little Killian!"

"Not so little anymore," Killian said and embraced her.

"Oh, you'll always be little to me," she said, and Killian looked over her shoulder to Liam, who playfully raised his eyebrows at him. "Oh, you're all grown up!" Mrs. Austin said and pulled away. "And accomplished!" she added, pointing at the badges on their uniforms. "Come, come! I have soup!"

Killian's mouth watered, remembering how he always loved her vegetable soup the most. But they didn't have a lot of time, they were already running off schedule.

"Thank you, but we must be on our way. Is our... home still were it used to be?"

"Aye, but another family resides there. Tell them ol' Grandma Austin sent you, they'll let you in to see your old place," she said with a smile.

"Thank you, Mrs. Austin. We hope we can visit again soon," Liam said, taking her hand and kissing it. Killian repeated the gesture.

"Look at you, all gentlemanly! Farewell, lads!" she gestured in pride with her hands and sat back down on her chair, retrieving the rusty bucket.

"Grandma Austin," Killian noted.

Liam smiled. "Still the same, though, sweet and welcoming."

"Was the place really that small, or did we grow up?" Killian said.

"We grew up. But it's not really that different, is it?"

"It's not... and it is."

When they reached their old home, they both paused outside. It now had a wooden fence around it and the roof looked better than they remembered it. More solid, well-fixed...

There was a woman and a boy, about thirteen years of age, in the garden. They were cutting pieces out of a tree log, probably preparing for the upcoming winter. A scent of stew was coming from inside.

Killian's chest tightened, and he had no doubt his brother had a similar reaction. They both had wonderful memories of this place, at least up until the last year they lived there. No, that time had been full of concern, or worry, of their mother barely being able to stand in the mornings...

"How about we move on?" Liam suggested in a rough voice. Killian saw him swallow hard, and turn back to the track. Killian stayed back for a few seconds, mouth going dry with the memories... and the nervousness.

He'd only visited the cemetery once, on that fateful day. They hadn't stayed long in the village after Mama's death, but for that little while he couldn't even set foot towards the direction of it.

And now both brothers were taking that very same road.

"Turn right at the old willow tree, walk to the lemon tree orchard and turn left," Liam whispered.

Following the old instructions, carved to their head despite never having followed them, they both halted at the sight of the old grey tombstones from afar.

This place had definitely become bigger since they left.

"Do you know where it is?" Killian said softly.

"No, but we can look around, right?" Liam said, and Killian noticed how tight his voice sounded. "We didn't bring anything..." Liam's voice trailed off. Indeed, they didn't know if they would even find the village, or the graveyard, or her grave.

The lack of flowers and any kind of colour around only made the place even more sullen. However, a pinch of blue at his right caught Killian's eye and he turned.

"There," Killian said. Reaching down, he plucked small bouquets of wild forget-me-nots growing there. "She liked blue, didn't she?" Killian said with a sad smile.

Liam nodded and put his hand on Killian's shoulder. They went on.

Even if they'd remembered exactly where her grave was, they wouldn't have gone immediately there. Searching for names, they saw that many people they knew as children had now passed away and were resting there.

"Mr. Hence, the baker... Ms. Bierman, the horse breeder..." Liam said as they read the names on the tombstones. Killian couldn't even remember some of them, he'd been so young.

Liam kept on reading names aloud. "Grace Abelson, John Vatter, Philip Smith, Alice-"

They both stopped short at the name. Killian looked at Liam, who looked stricken himself. He wasn't ready to look at it.

But if he'd thought about it... he would never be ready for it.

He looked at the gravestone. Alice Jones Beloved wife and mother

It was simple, engraved by hand like all the other gravestones, and clean from moss and dirt. But it felt heavier than any other.

It pained them both to see it.

Killian squeezed the stems in his hand. All this time that had gone by... it was their first time since they left, visiting this old place, and Killian wondered if anyone cared. Granted, it was relatively clean, but there was nothing to indicate anyone left her flowers over the years. He could see dried-up flower stems and wreaths in most of the other graves. Not all of them, but still...

"Come on, Killian," Liam whispered.

Killian knelt and set the flowers down, right in front of the gravestone. He laid a kiss on his hand, then touched the ground where she lay.

He felt Liam's hand on his shoulder as he too knelt down beside him. "We miss you, Mama," Liam said, finally allowing the emotion in his voice to show.

Killian let his tears fall freely as he put his hand over his brother's.

The next time Killian would visit his old village, the reception was much colder.

He was a pirate, an infamous one in that, and the village knew. He didn't bother to be subtle, however. He only paused to touch the familiar oak tree at the top of the hill, before he beckoned to Milah to walk forward with him.

He strutted down the road, noticing how worried parents moved to shield their children from the two armed pirates entering their quiet village. Killian looked around for any old people that might recognize him, but there were none. That bulgy man outside the blacksmith's shop could be Bill, Mrs. Austin's son, whom Killian hadn't had the pleasure of meeting the other time.

However, they locked gazes with each other. There was something in the man's eye, something that could be recognition... but Killian simply moved on.

He'd come prepared this time, and had hid a small wreath, with bigger flowers that would last longer, under his leather duster.

"Wouldn't want the simple people to assume Killian Jones is a romantic soul," Milah had teased him before they left the ship.

He motioned for her to stop when they reached his old place. It looked all abandoned now. The windows had broken, the roof was full of holes, and there was mould growing on the outside walls.

He noticed Milah looking behind her back when he stepped forward. The old wooden gate creaked when he opened it to enter the neglected garden.

"Are you sure you want to go in? You told me it was just a..." she trailed off.

"Just a moment," he said softly.

Walking into the garden, soft and happy memories came to his mind. He, Liam and Mama playing in the garden. Laying down in the grass at night, looking at the stars and singing.

The lock on the door was broken too, so he stepped in unceremoniously.

Definitely abandoned, he thought. There were broken furniture inside, dust had collected everywhere, and even wild plants were growing from the floor, finding their way through the old, dirty wooden planks.

He swallowed hard and looked to his left. The door to his bedroom had cracked off its hinges and was resting against the wall next to it. He stepped inside.

It was empty. Again, grass and wild flora was growing through the floor, and mould was covering the walls.

"Killian..." he heard Milah say softly.

Suddenly, it was too much. The house was suffocating him. He turned on the spot and walked outside, breathing in the air as if it was his freedom.

He didn't stop walking. He took the old path, turned right at the old willow tree, walked to the lemon tree orchard and turned left. Milah was right next to him, silent.

Finally, he spotted the gravestones. Again, more than he remembered from any time. He turned to the graveyard, when that same blue caught his eye again and he turned. There were still forget-me-nots growing there, so without any comment, he bent down and picked up as many as he dared. There was a voice in his head, telling him to leave behind some so that he could find them again the next time he visited.

He entered the graveyard, taken aback by its size. He wasn't sure he could find her grave again on his own.

He started reading the names, all of them unknown but for one. Yvonne Austin Beloved sister, mother and grandmother

"Mrs. Austin," he breathed. He saw Milah stop and turn to look at him.

The gravestone looked new. There were even parts of it that still shined, it couldn't have been very old.

He only wished she'd lived a good life. If only he could have come here sooner...

Reaching under his jacket, he pulled a few flowers from the wreath and let them rest against the stone.

"You will be missed," he whispered, then went on.

After a few minutes of search, it was Milah who called at him.

"Killian, come here."

He saw her looking at a stone not too far from him, and he felt his chest tighten.

He would never be ready.

He stepped forward until he reached her. Her expression was grim, so he turned to the gravestone. Alice Jones Beloved wife and mother

It was just as he remembered it. Still clean from dirt, but bland and... empty. With tears starting to fill his eyes, he took out the wreath and placed it and the forget-me-nots down on the ground. Once again, he kissed his hand and touched the ground, but then stood up without a word.

Immediately, Milah's hand found his, intertwining their fingers.

"It's okay to cry," she whispered.

He didn't.

It was raining slightly.

There was no path now. Only grass all around what used to be a dirt road, and only the slope and the oak tree at the top seemed to signify that was the old path.

One hundred and eighty-two years, and the tree itself still stood tall and strong.

Unlike the people and places in his life.

He put his hand against its bark. He and Liam, along with other children in the village, used to play a lot around it, on it... and if what he'd heard was true, then it outlived life itself around it.

He swallowed hard and turn to look at what used to be the market.

Somehow, he thought that the sight of the burnt-out remains hurt more than if it had simply been abandoned. He could still make out the structure of each building, but they were beyond repair... and there had been no survivors to claim them anyway.

He walked on, looking at each building, struggling to remember. The blacksmith's place, the baker's place, the surgeon's place, wasn't it?

Why didn't they flee in time? What happened to that place? Was it war... or looters?

He knew he was reaching his old home.

Home. Even after so, so many years of not walking down that path, he still felt he knew it by heart.

Only the building wasn't there anymore.

He stood there, mouth slightly open as he stared at the wild grass growing all around the now empty, flat lot where the place he grew up in once stood. There was nothing left, not even a wall, a stone... nothing.

He felt his chest start to tighten, his heart float to nowhere.

He turned around. He didn't have any flowers this time.

There was no old willow tree anymore, no lemon tree orchard. In the place where he remembered them was a flat, empty space where only grass grew.

That must've been where the survivors from the harbor town below buried the remains of the villagers. No gravestones here, but the lack of trees provided a clear view to the old graveyard further away.

He didn't want to step on the mass grave, but there was nothing signifying where it started and where it ended. The village had been destroyed nearly a century ago, rain and snow had washed the markings away. So he simply stepped forward.

It wasn't just with time that the trees he'd used as marks had gone away. The fires had probably reached far into the forest, and what had grown back seemed very young... and colourless. He couldn't spot any flowers this time, no matter how much he looked around.

His chest tightened even more when he approached the old graveyard. Stones had fallen off, others had cracked, covered in moss, weeds and vines all around them.

He didn't want to remember where her grave was. He didn't want to imagine Milah looking down at it, beckoning him to walk there. Her voice, as she called him...

But he did. Somehow, this time, he remembered everything. He needn't look at other stones. Not that he'd recognize any names anyway.

He clenched his shaking hand into a fist as he approached it. His eyes started stinging, and the duster felt heavier on his shoulders than usual.

He turned to look at it.

ice Jon ved wife and m

A soft sob escaped him at the sight. There were vines covering some letters, and for almost a minute, he stared at the stone. Even the visible letters seemed worn out on the stone. He sniffled and leaned down, pushing the vines away, first the ones on his left, then the ones on his right. Without thinking, his fingers lingered on the word "mother". They traced the engraved letters, willing themselves to feel something. It wasn't just a stone, was it?

He opened his mouth, trying to command his trembling lips to form any word, but his legs gave out instead. He knelt on the ground, fingers still touching the stone as sobs overtook him.

It felt different here. It was... quiet. No sound of people, or waves hitting the hull of the ship, no mast creaking, no wind whistling in his ears...

He'd been used to mourning Liam and Milah anywhere at sea. Whenever grief overtook him, all he needed to do was walk to the rail of his ship or the nearest beach if he was on land, and think of them, their souls free in the endless blue sea. But here, he was surrounded by death. Bodies eternally resting on the ground right under him, here where endless tears have surely been shed.

The air felt heavy. The silence was deafening. The hills around him were suffocating despite their long distance from him.

So much death around him, yet here he was all alone among the living.

"Why?"

His voice trembled.

"Why?"

#Killian Jones #Killian Jones ff #kj ff #Liam Jones #Milah #angst #mourning #piracytheorist writes

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drdanwrites · 7 years ago

Text

***One Love: William Stafford x Reader Series Chapter 1***

Hope you guys like this! I’m excited to start this series as there isn’t many William Stafford fictions out there!

The torrential downpour hit the trees like a loud tenor choir. Each drop hitting hundreds of leaves and branches before crashing to their doom on the forest floor. For a while the rain was the only noise to be heard, but faintly and gradually the thunder sounds of a horse's hooves could be heard echoing the forest. The beast was large and ran with purpose as it narrowly missed trees and roots on its journey. The rider upon it’s back was light and covered in a large cloak. It was thick and black, helping the rider blend in almost invisible to those who witnessed the animal ride by. The rider held tightly onto the horses mane and kept her head pressed against its neck. From within the cloak she could hear the nighttime noises of the forest. No one had followed her, to that she was certain. This horse was not one of the royal family, but one she had bought on a bribe from a farmer who lived on the neighboring village. Nothing was to be traced back to her, she needed this ride to be as invisible as the night.

As the horse reached her destination, the rider climbed off quickly and looked around. There was no sounds this far into the forest. No one had any business being this deep into its heart. The rider quickly tied the horse to a nearby tree and turned. In front of them was a broken down cottage. In the dark of night, the wet moss and ivy that had entrapped the house reflected the light of the moon. The cottage itself was crooked with age and looked to be deserted with time. It was mere steps before the rider made it to the front door. With their knuckle, they wrapped on the door. Three long and one quick tap. There was no noise or rustling to give away any other presence there but the rider knew someone was there and that someone had opened the door.

The carriage door opened with a ghastly creak. You rolled your eyes as you looked to take the hand of the driver. As your head pops out of the carriage door, your handmaiden Melanie begins to walk beside you as your feet touch the ground. She keeps up with you stride for stride.

“What a ride.” Melanie commented. You had known her all your life and her outburst of conversations were never out of place.

“It wouldn’t have been so drabe if we didn’t have such second rate accommodations.” You roll your eyes as you both stride to the castle entrance. Melanie gives a quick laugh.

“Oh, you poor thing.”

The castle echoed with the sounds of heels on stone floors, as your possessions were being brought into the foyer for your cousin’s servant to distribute to your accommodations. You stood around with Melanie, linked arms together. Soon a new sound of footsteps reverberated around the foyer and your cousin, King Henry the VIII graced you with his presence. Instantly, you and the rest of the foyer bowed to pay their respects to his lordship. A giant smile was presented on his majesty’s face as he quickly made his way down the staircase and to your level. You stand back up from your courtesy and smile back.

“Cousin! What a great honor it is to have you staying with me at court! I’m so happy you accepted my invitation.” He takes you into a very informal hug. You were the only person he had ever treated with such familiarity. As you return it, you sink back out of his arms.

“Well, when the King of all merry England tells you he has a surprise for you, one does respond very quickly.” He presents his arm for your to take and you wrap yours around it and the two of your begin the journey up the stairs.

“England is merrier for your presence.” He says as he taps the top of your palm. Henry and you have been very close all of your life, as each of you were the younger sibling and in the shadow of your other siblings. The two of you became very close, he never asked you to be formal with him after he became the King and always consulted you on his lasted conquests.

“Now, cousin, enough of the pleasantries. Tell me, how goes life?” You both had a lot to catch up on. With Henry’s schedule it was hard for you both to keep in constant contact. When you received Henry’s letter summoning you to court, you were overly delighted to report to him at once. You both continued to walk past random servants and they each bowed as you crossed their paths. A large wooden doorway stood in front of you both and upon reaching it, Henry flew open the doors for you. He gestured for you to enter first. You walked right in and found a seat before a grand throne. Henry climbed the two steps to the massive throne and sat upon it with a little jump. You curl your legs under the chair and fix your massive skirt, fixing the wrinkles that shouldn’t be. Henry observes you as he leans into his hand. He chuckles as he watches your obsessive particulars. You look up and sneer at him as you did when you were both children.

“Life.” He repeated to remind you of your question. “Life is so vastly complicated when God ordains you with such a heavy burden. I am a great King with a kink in my chain.” He looks down to the floor, distracted with his internal struggle.

“Cousin.” You haven’t seen him like this in quite sometime, you stand and sit upon the stairs underneath the throne. You place a sympathising hand upon his throne arm. “Tell me, what vexes you so. I’ve never seen you so distracted.”

“My wife. She cannot bear me a son.” He says as a matter of factly. He stands angrily as he says it. “Our family lineage is only as good as the members who carry it. The history books will lose us without an heir to the throne. We have Mary of course… lovely girl… but a son…” He looks out the window dramatically and smiles at the thought. “A son would means I can live on in him. Life would not be for not.” Turning back, he comes back and sits next to you on the steps. “I grow tired of her, Y/N.”

You scoff.

“Well I could have told you that. I do believe I was the one telling you not to go marrying your brother’s wife. Just take up with your normal parade of women if you’re bored. You must have women throwing themselves at you.” He kicks at the step with his heel, almost showing a vulnerable side that not many people have had the opportunity to see in the king.

“I can’t even think about those women after I have just met an angel sent from heaven.” You hide a laugh and Henry tilts his head disapprovingly.

“I’m sorry cousin, it’s just… I believe I’ve heard this saying leave your lips several times before…”

“Oh, but this is different.” He says excitedly. His excitement becomes almost too contagious and immediately an electrifying smile shines on your face. You take his hands in yours.

“Do tell Cousin and don’t spare any details”

“Do you know of the Boleyn family?” You take sometime to ponder this. “As in Thomas Boleyn.” Henry says as he catches on that you haven’t the faintest idea, but by mentioning Thomas, you seem to recall your father briefly mentioning this family.

“Ey! Would that be Thomas Howard’s brother?The Duke of Norfolk?”

“The very same.” You observed the boyish grin on his face and you can’t help but be in favor of this affair. Being the King had taken its toll on your cousin and you rejoiced to see the joy etched into his smile. Henry continued on explaining how he had been invited to the Boleyn’s manor and while it had seemed Anne would catch his eye, it was his eldest daughter Mary who ended up stealing his affections. “I’ve requested them to come to court. I just need her presence.”

The two of you leave the throne room and continue down the castles corridors to your new living chambers. You both continue to talk about the Boleyns and your parents back home. As you reach the door, Henry turns to you.

“This is where I leave you darling cousin. Get some rest and I will send for you later, I have someone I would like for you to meet.”

“Ooo so much mystery. What are you plotting?” Henry breathed a sigh and took you in his extended arms.

“It is about time we looked to find you a proper suitor, Y/N. I believe I have found such a man.” Your heart began to race, a nervous panic washed over you like a cool splash of water from a bucket. Henry's eyes searched yours for some kind of reaction. You managed to paint a excitement look on your face to appease him, but inside you're terrified.

It wasn’t long until your things were moved into your royal chambers. As the transition began to calm down, you slowly approached the window to see you weren’t the only guest to arrive. The courtyard was filed with commotion. You strained to see the woman who had stolen your cousin's heart… for the time being. Suddenly someone else distracts your glance. A man commandeering the ruckus gained your attention. You followed him as he began to direct different people as to what they needed to be doing. As you watched, he suddenly stopped and took his hat off. The hair underneath was ginger and he ran an obviously frustrated hand through his short curls. You studied his face and found yourself longing after his perfectly plump lips. Melanie had somehow managed to sly up next to you and cooed as she noticed what was distracting you. As she walked away, you continued to stare at the man outside. You didn’t recognize him as anyone of royalty or class, but there was something that was keeping your eyes on him. He quickly looked up and the two of you connect for a moment. A moment that would stay with you both forever.

***LET ME KNOW WHAT YOU THINK! I’D LOVE TO CONNECT AND GET SOME FEEDBACK ON THESE NEW SERIES!****

***MAGICAL OFFICE EPISODE 6 WILL BE POSTED EITHER WEDNESDAY OR FRIDAY*****

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selenelavellan · 8 years ago

Note

MOAR PERSEPHONE MYTH DIRTHALENE PLZ

Underworld AU Part 2

Part One

Dirthamen, Turmoil, Mythal, and the other Evanuris belong to @feynites

Ashokara and Kassaran belong to @scurvgirl

Melarue belongs to @justanartsysideblog

TW for Fire, Murder, Mentions of Children Dying and/or being injured.

There is no sunlight in the Underworld.

No birds sing in its sky, no rabbitsfrolic through its fields. She has never known a time without therays shining around her. The fields here are barren, made of dirt andmoss with rivers of magic and flame running through them. Nothinglike her Nanaes lands, with their towering trees and flourishingplants tall enough to hide those in need of protection. There is nofarmland that she can see, no sea of flowers to bloom with her laugh.

The air is heavy and cold, whipping at the bared skin of her leg whenit peeks from between the drape of her robe. The only warmth Selenecan find seems to be buried within the hand of the God helping herstep out of the boat, and onto the shores of his kingdom.

There is no sunlight, but there arestrings of luminescence throughout the streets. Hung like decorationsover homes and walkways. Brilliant blues and greens giving a softglow to the world around them, like pieces plucked and stolen fromthe world above. The buildings are simple, with tall columns forgedfrom stones unfamiliar to her eye. Streets converge into each other,each step placed with purpose. A path leading to what seems to be amassive, twisting labyrinth that stretches up and up and up in aninfinite loop.

It captivates her entirely.

“Come,” whispers the man besideher. “I will show you our home.”

Selene shivers as she tears her eyefrom the maze, and feels something whisper beneath her skin. Awarning, perhaps?Or a promise.

She has no time to dwell on herthoughts, as she is swept through the thoroughfare. Signs and facesilluminated in the dim lighting. Some point at the pair, or whisper.A few wave, and Selene finds herself oddly compelled to return thegesture with the hand not being tightly grasped with gloved fingers.

There are people, here.

Are they all dead, she wonders?

Shouldn’t there be more of them, ifthey are?

It seems no more crowded than the townnear her Nanaes home. Indeed, she has seen larger crowds at herbrothers unveiling in her youth.

Still, she is lead without hesitation over cobbled stones, until the homes and light vanish onceagain. Until she is standing in the shadow of a massive palace,covered in pomp and elaborate carvings. It is very old, older thananything she had seen in the town by centuries, at least. It towersfar higher than any other structure she has come by down here, savefor the labyrinth.

And it seems so very, glaringly,out of place.

She is about to ask him, to inquireabout the strangeness of the palace and the sharp contrast of itsfeatures to those of his own, someone whose entire wardrobe seemsdesigned to help him blend into backgrounds and shadows and moveunnoticed.

Someone else emerges, first.

“You are late,” they snap, stridingconfidently towards Dirthamen in a long coat and tall boots. “Wehave become backed up.”

“It can wait, Turmoil,” he returns.“We have a guest.”

They blink, eyes narrowing as they seemto notice Selene for the first time. Their gaze rakes over her,stopping as it reaches the hand still joined with their masters.

As they notice the rings.

“Are you kidding-” they groan,rubbing a hand down their eye. “We will deal with that later. Thedead will not wait.”

“Of course they will. It’s not asthough they have somewhere else to be.” Selene jokes, trying toease some of the tension in the air.

It doesn’t work.

The shoulders of the God beside herraise sheepishly as Turmoils jaw practically drops in shock.

“She does not even know how wework-” they hiss.

“She will learn,” he insists.

“If you expect me to teach her, youwill find yourself sorely disappointed. My plate is full enoughtrying to keep your head above water.”

“I was planning on teaching hermyself, in fact.”

“Oh, and in the meantime, we’ll just,what, let the dead run loose, all…” their arms shoot up and makea sharp spiral gesture “All willy-nilly,because our King is busy with his…his….” he gestures wildly andturns towards Selene “Whatever you are!”

“I’mjust visiting.” she tries to assure him.

“Ohgood! We are doing toursnow!”

“I’llshow her around!” chimes in a new voice. High, and young. Seleneturns toward the source, and finds a young Qunari girl with stillbudding horns grinning up at her.

“Thatis not necessary, Ashokara.” Dirthamen frowns.

“It’sfine! I’m all done with my chores, so you can go work and I’ll helpher get settled. You can always come find us later, right?”

Dirthamenglances back to Selene uncertainly, finger rubbing gingerly at thering on her finger as Turmoils foot taps impatiently behind him.

“Isuppose that would be best for everyone,” he finally says. “Pleasedo not allow her to come to any harm.”

“WouldI do that?” theyoung girl retorts with an innocent look on her face.

Dirthamenonly frowns deeper in response.

“We’llbe careful,” she agrees, arms looping behind her back. “Noswimming, I promise.”

Turmoilhurriedly pulls everyone into agreement, dragging Dirthamen into theovershadowing palace as they fill his arms with scrolls and beginwhatever sort of work they do.

Selenesupposes she will find out soon enough.

“Sooo…”Ashokaradrawls from beside her “You’re the new Queen, huh?”

Seleneblinks, as she refocuses on the child standing beside her. “I’msorry?”

Theyoung qunari points to the ring on her finger “You married theKing, that makes you the Queen.”

“Oh,”Selene says as she glances down at the piece of jewelry “We didn’tget married. He just gave me a gift, is all.”

“It’son the married finger, like my mama’s used to be.”

“Customscan vary from culture to culture. You’ll understand more when you’reolder.” Selene explains.

“I’malready 809. How old am I supposed to be?”

Seleneblinks.

Blinksagain.

“I’msorry. 809…what? Seasons?”

“No,years. How old are you, like a billion?”

“No!No, I’m-I’m 25!”

“Ohhhh.Sounds like maybe you’rethe one who doesn’t understand then, huh?” Ashokara hums knowinglyas she begins to skip away.

Selenestaggers after her, still curious for more answers.

Andalso determined to prove the girl wrong, just a bit. She certainlyisn’t married. Shewould know.

…Wouldn’tshe?

Whenthe sun rises over their fields, and Selene has still not been found,Melarue begins to rage.

Itstarts quietly. Small bursts in the shadows, a few buds pluckedbefore their time, a tree or two robbed of its harvest before bearingany fruit.

Aelynthihas not heard from his sister either. Nor has his husband, or histeam of warriors hunting for her in lands beyond their immediatereach.

No oneelse seems willing to help with their search. Elgar'nan and Mythalare too preoccupied with their own duties, and send only promises tohelp when they have the resources to spare. Andruil is busy huntingher wifes newest creation for the Summer feast, Sylaise and June withcleaning up the previous nights affair and planning the next gathering to beheld.

Seleneis not a priority, itseems.

Sothey will make her one.

Theforests housing Ghilan'nains prey begin to rot, and crumble. Leavesturn to gold and then to brown, falling long before they are due.Crops begin to mold, and expire. Acres of flowers, planted for theirdaughter, for her bloom, for her laugh,turn to cold barren plots of dirt and sand that will provide neitherlife nor sustenance now.

Thetrees no longer give reprieve from the blazing heat of the sun,forcing people into their homes, sending them to curse the God whoburns too intensely, who must not care for them any longer, who keepsthem in such a fatigued, drowsy state. The grass turns sour, ruiningthe milk of any cows or creature who taste it. Parents reliant on theproduct to feed their children, cry out, cursing the Goddess who issupposed to look out for their families, who is meant to aid themwith her heart and her wisdom.

As thepeople grow more anxious, more hungry, more in need of help, Melaruenotes, the other Gods begin to pay their concerns more attention.

Mythalknocks on their doors before the week is even out.

“Melarue,”they coo. “What seems to be ailing you?”

“Youknow well that my daughter has vanished. Do not play these games withme. I am tired of them, and the people will not survive them longenough for you to get your fill.”

Mythaltsks. “This is a tantrum then, because your daughter has chosen toleave you? You are not so weak as that, Melarue. She will come back,in time. Children simply need their space, to grow, and to learn.”

“Selenewould not leave me. I understand you may not grasp that a child maytruly love their parent, but she would not run like this. Not fromme.”

“Shewill come back when she is ready,” Mythal dismisses “There is noreason to punish the people for her mistakes.”

“Youhave done something. I know you, we have known each other far toolong for me to believe you are not behind this in some capacity.”

“Treadcarefully. Accusations like that sound suspiciously like treason, andyour rage is rising to the surface. We would not want another war.There is no need to exile another member of our pantheon.”

“Asthough you did not manipulate the state of things to fit the end youdesired, even then.” Melarue snarls, taking a step closer to theGoddess.

“Howdare you. Iloved my son, I never would have-”

“Youlove power more. Yourson was unstable, he was unable to care for his wards, and you wantedanothers domain because your own was weakening. I see through you,Mythal. I will not sacrifice a singlechild, and the world will remain barren until my daughter is safelyreturned to me.”

“Youwould not sacrifice the People. You are bluffing.”

Melarue raises a single, perfectly sculpted eyebrow. “Itwould be a shame, would it not? For the People to perish while theGoddess who claimed to protect them did nothing? I would hate foryour image to suffer because you thought my threats empty.”

Mythal hesitates.

Then turns, and walks out as calmly as she had entered.

Melaruewaits for her to leave entirely, before donning their cloak andsweeping into town.

Someoneknows where their daughter is.

“…andthat’s section twelve, and that’s fourteen over there…” Ashokaradrones on, pointing down different intersections while Selene nodsalong beside her.

“Everythingis so well organized here,” Selene notes. “It’s very efficient.”

“It’sboring, y'mean.”

“Ilike it.” Selene grins.

“Yeah,well. The people like it better now, too.”

Selenepauses, hesitates with her foot just barely off the ground. “‘Now’?”

“Yeah,sure. Since Dirthamen took over.”

“Hewasn’t always the God of the Dead?”

“Nah,he used to be wisdom and…I dunno, some other stuff I guess? I neverknew him then, he’s been here a lot longer than me. Some other peopleremember before, though. It was pretty bad, from what I hear. Hebuilt the labyrinth, and now that’s all anyone talks about. Or does.”

Seleneglances up, attention stolen once more by the swirling, growingpuzzle in the center of the city, and the hushed whispers pushinggoosebumps over her skin.

“So…itwasn’t always there?”

“Nope.”

“Whendid it show up?”

Ashokarashrugs “Before I did. You’d have to ask someone older.”

“Youwere never curious?”

“Ew,no.” Ashokaras nose crinkles. “It gives me really awfulcreep vibes, just from looking at it too long.”

“Oh,”Selene hums curiously. “You showed up…almost eight centuriesago, yeah?”

“Yeah….”

Herhead turns to look at Ash. The previously energetic girl suddenlyturned morose, staring down at her feet. With a gentle nudge, Seleneoffers a warm smile.

“Doyou wanna talk about it?”

“I’mnot really supposed to…”

“Well,I’m the Queen, right?” Selene grins “You can tell the Queen. I’llgive you a royal pardon if anyone tries to give you trouble.”

Ashokaraseyes narrow, and dart from side to side before she snags Seleneshand, and tugs her away from the buildings, and back towards theriver Styx. They take shelter at the foot of a large dune, and Ashokara settles carefully onto the ground.

“Youcan’t tell anyone, ok? Mama and I aren’t supposed to tell people whathappened.”

Selene nods, andsits down beside the girl on the shore.

“So…whenI was…still topside,” Ashokara explains “Father wasn’t verynice. He yelled a lot, and he hurt Mama. One night, he was screamingmore than usual, and he tried to reallyhurt Mama. She got hurt so bad she stopped breathing. I was little,but I knew what that meant, and it made me so mad,and scared, and I couldn’t understand why.Mama’s so nice, she didn’t deserve to get hurt like that.”Ashokaras gaze grows distant, as she skips a rock across the river.“I lost control of my magic. I wanted to make himhurt, too. I wanted to save Mama, but I didn’t know how. He and Iboth burned, until we were all…down here. It was really different,when we arrived.

Everythingwas really crowded. They were still recovering from some big fight,so there was rubble everywhere and bodies pressed up against eachother, and everyone was freaking out. Father was right next to me,still, and he was so angrywith me, once he realized what had happened.”

Ashokaralets out a stuttering breath, hands rubbing tenderly at the tips ofher horns. “But I looked around, tried to get away from him. Alittle ways away, I could see Mama in the crowd, and I tried to runto her but I….” Ashokara trails off, sniffling and wiping away afew tears from her face as she tries to calm herself down. Seleneplaces a soothing hand on the girls shoulder for support, andAshokara nods before continuing. “I tried to go to her, to makesure he couldn’t get to her again. To feel safe again, myself. But Icouldn’t get through the crowd, and when I tried to get aroundeveryone, I fell. Into Phlegethon.”

Sheflings another rock towards the river running parallel to the Styx,and Selene watches as it bounces off of a barrier. “ There weren’tany barriers to keep people out of the rivers, then. If you fell, youwere just…lost. Phlegethon is the River of Fire.It hurt. It hurt so much,I couldn’t stop screaming. I don’t even know how long I was in there.Everything just blurred together in what felt like an eternity oftorture. But then Dirthamen pulled me out.”

“That was verykind of him,” Selene says.

“I guess. He andMama made a deal. He was still trying to sort everything out downhere, and having people just popping up in the middle of town made ithard for him to work or something, so Mama agreed to work for him ifhe’d save me. Now she spends all her time ferrying people on thatstupid boat….”

“She loves you.”Selene whispers, a sharp pain of guilt in her chest as she thinks ofher Nanae, still in the world above. How much time has passed sinceshe’s been down here, she wonders. They must be so worried…

“Iknow,” Ashokara sighs, snapping Selene out of her reverie “I loveher too. I get to see her still, sometimes. And Dirthamen lets uslive in the palace, so I don’t feel so alone when Mama’s working. Butit’s got all these empty rooms, and there’s no one but me and allthese other people that work for him, and they’re alwaysworking, because people neverstop dying, and it’sjust…it’s lonely.”

“I’m sorry.”Selene offers, at a loss of what else she has to give.

“Yeah, well…”Ashokara sniffs. “Life happens. Or death, as it goes.”

“…Are you?”

“Am I what?”

“Dead.”

Ashokara snorts.“Nah. When he pulled me out of the river, he fed me a piece foodfrom here. So I’m technically just a resident of the underworld, notone of the dead.”

“So the people intown aren’t dead?”

“No, they justlive here. Sort of. Mortality is weird in this realm. Like, you canchoose to die if you get approval, or you can get hurt or murdered ifyou piss someone off or something, but you can’t get sick and youdon’t age unless you want to.”

“So you choose tolook like a kid?” Selene teases.

“You would beamazed what people let you get away with when you look like this.”Ashokara grins.

Selene laughs, loudand light. The ground beneath her erupts into greenery, flowersblossoming at her feet, in a wide spectrum of colors. Ferns trailaround her, making patterns to match her timbre until she stops forbreath.

Ashokara stares ather in wonderment.

“Howdid you do that?”

Selene looks aroundat the new greens around her. “Oh, it just sort of happens,sometimes. I get it from my Nanae, but they can do it at will. I’mstill learning, so it tends to just sort of…” She gesturesvaguely “Sprout.”

“Nothing growshere, though. Nothing but lilies, and those still require almost awhole team devoted just to growing them!”

“….whoops?”

“Can you domore?”

“Perhaps later,”booms a deeper voice from the top of the hill behind them. “Selene,will you come with me, please?”

Selene swallows,looking guiltily up at Dirthamen as she brushes some sand and dirtfrom her robes and helps Ashokara to her feet.

Hopefully he won’tbe too upset about the plants.

#Answered #Underworld AU #Dirthalene #Filed under 'things i dreamt i had already written'#i really thought i had already written this because i had it all planned out and my notes done and????#nope i left everyone hanging MY BAD #heres some world stuff and hinting at other plot stuff and ~*mysterious pasts*~#(Probably not so mysterious Im not very creative and its probably easy to infer what happened)#theladypirate #Melarue #Ashokara #Selene lavellan #If Turmoil isnt right #(theyre probably not but i didnt have much to go on other than a note to myself to USE TURMOIL THEYRE CANON FOR DIRTHAMEN)#let me know and I will do better moving forward <3

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biofunmy · 5 years ago

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Seeing What the Fighting Is All About on Alaska’s Coastal Plain

Up in the right-hand corner of Alaska, like something freezer-burned and half-remembered in the back of the national icebox, lies a place called the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. The refuge is the largest wildlife sanctuary in the United States. It is the size of South Carolina. It is also home to the country’s second-largest wilderness area. It has no roads, no marked trails, no developed campgrounds. The Coastal Plain, the narrow strip where the refuge meets the sea, is home to more diversity of life than almost anywhere else in the Arctic. It is the kind of place where you can pull back the tent flap with a mug of coffee in hand, as I did one morning in June, and watch a thousand caribou trot past.

The animals came slowly at first, by twos and by threes, and tentatively, lifting their black noses to catch the strange scent of 10 unbathed campers. Then they tacked across the river. Near the front was a bull with a rack big enough to place-kick a football through its uprights. Mostly they were females in dun coats, serious mothers leading coltish calves that slid and played on the snowfields that still collared the tundra’s low places. Ungainly in looks, but a natural for work — each hoof a snowshoe, with hollow fur for warmth and to buoy them across gelid Arctic rivers. The calves had been born three or four days ago. Already they could walk farther in a day than a human.

The few caribou became dozens. They materialized by the hundred out of the heat-shimmer that rose off the tundra, like those lawmen bringing hot justice in old Sergio Leone films. Confident in their numbers, they surged past the encampment, urged by some twitch in the marrow to keep pushing toward the coast where ocean breezes would scatter the mosquitoes and bot flies that soon would torment them. We watched for a long time, not wanting to move and disturb anything.

“This,” someone whispered, “is sacred.”

In late 2017, a Congress controlled by Republicans badly wanted to pass the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. To help win the crucial vote of Lisa Murkowski, the senior Republican senator from Alaska, the Senate added a sweetener, a provision that opened to oil drilling the refuge’s Coastal Plain, a roughly Delaware-size piece of ground where the Brooks Range reclines and the tundra tilts toward the Arctic Ocean like the baize of an old pool table.

Most of the country thinks that’s wrongheaded. Seventy percent of American voters oppose drilling on the refuge, a survey by Yale University’s Center on Climate Change Communication found at the time. They don’t want oil drilling where these calves had just been born, and where they now walked, and where wolf and bear and wolverine stalk them, and where threatened polar bears find respite in a melting world, and where more than 200 species of birds have been recorded, including many that brighten your day in the Lower 48, from the tundra swans that head to the Chesapeake, to the mallards that hunters stalk in Arkansas.

Fights such as the one over the refuge are, for most of us, abstractions — tussles over lines on a map of a place we will never see, and will never know. I was tired of this. I wanted to see this place. I wanted to see what we still have, and what we are willing to gamble, for money and for oil.

Getting on Arctic time

North of Fairbanks, the country seems to get bigger and the planes get smaller. Our four-seater arrows north, into the Brooks Range. The pilot finds a notch between mountains and sets us down on a cobbled bar beside water that’s the scuffed green of a dime-store gemstone: the Hulahula River. We transfer to a second plane, smaller still, that swoops down and deposits us downstream. We are 10, in all — a lawyer and his son, a retired teacher, retired doctors and avid birders, Libby and Victor — all here for nine days to float the river for about 90 miles on its course through the Coastal Plain, until, exhausted, the river empties itself into the Beaufort Sea.

But first, mountains. We set up camp in a great scoop of valley and wander, dazed at the sudden change of scenery after Fairbanks. The Brooks Range in summer disorients the newcomer: The rivers run north. The sun seems to rise there, too, after “setting” briefly behind the peaks each night. So far north, the mountains wear no trees at all, but instead are stripped bare, showing off the veinwork of their naked flanks. They are not so bare as they seem. What lives here grows low — lichen, moss campion in purple pillows and Arctic poppies whose dish-flowers track the sun.

The lead guide with the outfitter Arctic Wild, Andrew George, is 39 and from Dallas, but has more Alaska in him than most Alaskans born here. Each summer he runs a fish wheel on the Yukon River with his wife to cache and smoke salmon for winter, when he runs trap lines with his dog team. On his last job, he says, he was paid in gold.

At dinner Mr. George has a message for us. “We’re going to be on Arctic time,” he says. “We’ll eat when we’re hungry. Hike when we want to. Move when we got to move.”

Paddling north

By mid-June the Hulahula River, named by whalers after the Hawaiian dance, is not a deep river nor does it usually pose, for the experienced boater, exceptional challenges. But it is fast and its waters are a life-taking cold. The night before shoving off, the nervous and the curious among us pass around topographic maps of the week’s route, marked in esoteric shorthand with the accumulated wisdom of past guides.

“Class IV scout + portage if necessary run at high water”

“Big haystacks”

“Run Right”

“Tight + Rocky”

“Lots of Aufeis”

“Wolves?”

All we really need to know, though, is to paddle north. To the plain.

The next morning, Patrick Henderson — assistant guide, expert boater and a great chef — whips up Spam musubi, an Hawaiian snack of grilled Spam atop a neat brick of rice, wrapped in nori. We wrestle into drysuits. The guides cinch hard on the straps of life preservers. (“You can’t drown if you can’t breathe!”) We push off in a cold spitting rain, drifting over quick green water. Restive with its course, the river chews at its banks, sending clumps of wildflowers into the water.

Mr. Henderson rams our raft into the shore and motions for quiet. Two football fields distant stands a musk ox, chewing on grass. We pile out to snap photos. The ox turns. Stamps. Nothing says “get back in the boat” like a 600-pound bovid covering ground, fast.

We drift on. There are caribou tracks on the shore, and wolf tracks that follow the caribou tracks.

“What time is it?” somebody asks.

“The time is now,” Mr. George replies.

We drift and paddle and drift more. Faced with the unceasing light of an Arctic June, time loses shape. The tyranny of the alarm clock is replaced by a fainter pulse, usually lost to us nowadays: the rhythm of natural places. We eat later and later, and take meandering walks in the convalescent light of midnight.

One night after spaghetti, Mr. George suggests that, with the weather so fair, we break camp and paddle all night, out of the mountains and into the foothills. A few hours later, Dall sheep watch us splash through rapids from the grandstand of canyon walls. A moose startles. The sun drops behind those walls. The world, and lips, turn a shivery blue. Finally, the mountains release the river. The sun splashes us with caramel light and reviving warmth. “Morning is a place around here,” one of the guides says. We pull to shore at Old Man Creek, where the guides cook breakfast hash and we collapse on shore, only waking when the afternoon sun heats the tent.

‘Welcome to the Arctic Plain’

On the seventh morning the last foothills bow out. The land becomes as flat as a tabletop. The final rapid throws a slap of 45-degree water to the cheek. Call it a baptism. “Welcome to the Arctic Plain,” Mr. George says, standing in the stern of our raft like a Mississippi boatman.

So this is what all the fighting is about.

For almost a half-century, the stretch of land between mountains and sea here has been a sanctuary with an asterisk. In 1980, Congress passed the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, which greatly expanded the original wildlife range; designated most of it as wilderness, off-limits to development; and renamed the whole place the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Congress did not include the 1.57-million-acre Coastal Plain, but directed in Section 1002 that the area continue to be studied. For nearly 50 years a battle has been waged between those who think drilling in the so-called 1002 Area is Alaska’s birthright and can be done well — the oil industry, many of Alaska’s politicians, the native corporations that would see needed funds from drilling — and those who say the place is too valuable for other reasons, and also too wild, to drill.

No one knows how much oil is under this ground. Only one exploratory well was drilled, decades ago, its results a secret. An investigation by The Times found those results disappointing. The federal government’s last estimate was that a mean 7.7 billion barrels of feasibly recoverable oil may lie under the 1002 Area, or the amount of petroleum the United States uses in one year. But opening up the area might also eventually open Native Alaskan areas for drilling, and make adjacent state lands more profitable to drill, if new pipelines and other infrastructure are built.

The 2017 tax law that opened the refuge to potential oil development requires a minimum of two lease sales in the refuge of at least 400,000 acres each. One must be held by the end of 2021, the second by 2024.

But a draft of the required environmental study released earlier this year by the Bureau of Land Management, the author and the agency that oversees drilling on public lands, contained mistakes in basic ecology and didn’t seriously look at climate change’s effect on permafrost. That’s according to nearly 60 pages of corrections and additions to the study that were proposed by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service, the agency that manages the refuge. The study even mentions a river that doesn’t exist, pointed out Michael Wald, a co-owner of Arctic Wild. Environmental groups have vowed to challenge the study, and any drilling approval.

Proponents have pitched drilling as a windfall to the United States Treasury — $1.8 billion, by an early White House estimate. But a Times analysis has found it may yield as little as $45 million over the next decade, or less than 3 percent of what’s been sold to the public.

What we do know is the area’s natural value. During the brief, frenetic Arctic summer, millions of waterfowl and shorebirds use the Coastal Plain here before dispersing to every state in the union, and almost every continent. Two dozen of them are birds of “management concern” by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service. Some are in even more trouble.

Even closer to the coast are polar bears, listed as “threatened’’ under the Endangered Species Act. The population of polar bears in the Southern Beaufort Sea has declined 40 percent in recent years, thanks largely to impacts related to its shrinking sea-ice habitat. Now these bears increasingly use the Coastal Plain, where females first raise their newborn cubs.

Steven Amstrup, who for three decades was head of the federal government’s polar bear research program and now is head of Polar Bears International, has urged against energy development here. So have the 200 Alaskan members of the Wildlife Society, a professional group of wildlife biologists and managers.

An unending circuit of caribou

And then there are the caribou. The previous day, from our camp on the boundary of the 1002 Area, we watched as hundreds fed on cottongrass and willow buds. We spent the day stalking them with cameras. They always edged farther away, as if they knew the limits of an amateur’s telephoto lens.

Few Americans probably realize that their nation possesses one of the world’s great migrations. Although there are variations, most years the 218,000 animals of the Porcupine herd of barren-ground caribou move in an unending circuit — from the south side of the Brooks Range; around the eastern and southern side of the mountains; then westward in late spring onto the Coastal Plain to drop their calves. They spend the summer fattening up on tundra plants. Then they reverse course. These caribou are the original commuters. A female will walk 2,700 miles in a year, on average.

The Coastal Plain has all of this — the birds, the bears, the caribou. It is still a place that can say its own name.

A week earlier, we had briefly landed at Arctic Village, a native Gwich’in village outside the refuge’s southern boundary. The Gwich’in are against drilling. The caribou forever have walked past Arctic Village on their circuit, and their meat has fed the Gwich’in, David Smith, the second chief, told me. Where the caribou are born — where the drilling might happen — his people do not even go, he said. “This is kind of where life begins,” he said. “It’s God’s place.”

An energy industry representative told me that oil and caribou can mix, that it has been done before with success elsewhere on the North Slope.

That’s misleading, countered Ken Whitten, who, for many years, was Alaska’s lead state biologist for the Porcupine herd. Yes, caribou inhabit some areas around Prudhoe Bay, where the pipeline begins. But studies around the oil fields have found that pregnant females will avoid development. As development increased, calving caribou were pushed southward where the food wasn’t as nutritious, resulting in the mothers having lower-weight calves.

These problems will likely be exacerbated in the refuge, said Mr. Whitten. A 2002 report by him and others predicted that extensive oil development would probably stop the growth of the herd, and perhaps worse. “We don’t think there’s any way you can have a large oil development on the 1002 and not have adverse effect on caribou.”

Another caribou expert told me that they simply don’t know for certain what will happen when pipelines and drill pads are introduced into a valuable habitat. While some caribou will walk miles to avoid a road, said Lincoln Parrett, regional research coordinator for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, others have noted that caribou in some places do acclimate to low-density development.

Treeless, flat and far from desolate

Caribou line the shore as our rafts drift onto the plain. They lift their snouts and hunt the air for a memory that tells them whether to run. But they do not run, at first. And we drift close, staring at one another across a moat of ice water.

The sun rides its circuit above camp. The days heat up. June will be the second-warmest June on record in Alaska. In our bags, the chocolate is melting.

Over the next several days we camp and float and camp again, occasionally taking long walks across the lumpy mattress of the tundra.

The Coastal Plain confounds a first-time visitor. It is too big. It is too treeless, too flat. The pancakes at breakfast had more relief. Trying to make sense of things, I head out with Libby and Victor, expert birders. Cast your eyes downward, their actions say. Where there are no trees, the ground is full of life. Scoops in the dirt are a sign that a grizzly bear has rooted out a ground squirrel. A twitch among the tussocks is a buff-breasted sandpiper, flown in from winter vacation in Uruguay.

“There’s a Baird’s!” Libby says, pointing out a Baird’s sandpiper. “That’s the one that winters in the high Andes, after raising its babies here.” It has made a nest for four speckled eggs on a gravel shore of the river. We wonder at the tenacity of having come so far to place such a fragile bet.

“The Arctic Plain is really nothing,” Don Young, Alaska’s representative, said during a 2011 Congressional hearing on the refuge. “It is not the heart. It is the most desolate part of the area.”

‘Desolate!” we say each time a snowy owl lifts off in search of a lemming.

“Nothing here!” we call out to one another as the next herd of caribou shimmers into view. We know better than to chase them, now. And we wait, patiently, for their arrival.

The sun is high. My watch is dead. It is exactly the time it is supposed to be.

Christopher Solomon, a 2019 Alicia Patterson Foundation fellow, was the 2018 Lowell Thomas Travel Writer of the Year.

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autumnpawtribe · 6 years ago

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The Spirit of the Greatmother

The fire was set up inside the little hut Jocamo kept now outside Dazar'alor. It was the home of their ancestor's nativity and close enough to Bwonsamdi's realm that she might come more willingly than in the Echo Isles or Hillsbrad. She had connection to this land and was a staunch worshiper of the Loa of Graves. The ritual was Uncle Jack's idea, since he had no earthly clue where the artifact had gone. The questioning of the heretical abbess and her abomination of a minion was fruitless. The artifact had not been in the old Shaman's belongings either after her death. None of the errant and living children of the Old Oracle apparently had it either. It was needed now, the last time it was seen having been when Vahari's daughter Ki'la had been given her name.

What they sought was the book that held the names of the old Farseer's descendants, and the rituals for naming, dedication and death in the old ways. With a new infant in the family, it was needed once again and mysteriously disappeared after Ki'la's naming and Han'dali's death.

Kit and Jocamo had set up the bowls and incense, Hari had brought the sacrifice, which no one said anything about nor questioned. Reshka had been tasked with gathering wood and Vol'raka with the words needed and the sacrifice itself.. He'd spent too long with elves, pandaren, and others. He needed to remember that he was a troll and all that entailed. He had left Tiny with Xiao for the day and told him to not ask questions when he returned. There was no room for argument in Vol'raka's voice when he left.

The flesh that was in the bowl smelled heavily of dwarf. The Dark Iron Male struggled little when Vahari did what she did best. It knew nothing of its death and probably only remembered the moments before it was taken from Boralus. Vahari's knowledge of a clean death and quick kill was useful in many circumstances. She claimed it meant the meat was not sour when she would take the body back to the Echo Isles for her family that evening. “Fear makes it taste off.”

The wood smelled sweet and Kit praised Reshka for what was chosen. She'd learned well in seeing rituals to call spirits before and had picked that which would smell sweetest and call out the old Farseer from the Other Side. Kit'raka's herbs were sweet as they filled the air, set off and flavored by the salt of the Great and South Seas. All things had been chosen to call more than one spirit, though not everyone wanted speak to one that they would call upon.

**~*~*~*~*~*~**

"Farseer Azu'lana. Servant of Bwondsamdi and Oracle of Nyx. We seek you for your knowledge. I, your grandson Vol'raka Raptorblood, Vol'raka Shadow's Son, ask that you come."

The big troll was bowed low beside the fire, arms forward and head to the bare floor. His war paint was gone, replaced by ash bound by the blood of their dwarven sacrifice. His chest was bare, and his kilt one he had not worn in a long time, since he had last led a true ritual to send his father to Bwonsamdi's care. His words were a true song, a steady beat and soft dance of tongues as he spoke, the language he had been raised to speak. He'd coached his cousin heavily to make sure her accent was not too terribly off. They didn’t need to annoy or call some spirit she didn't quite mean to.

"Greatmother Azu. We seek you for your wisdom. I, your granddaughter, Iresh'ka Daughter of Rhunak'hor, ask you to come to guide my cousin." As the Mag'har girl knelt, she kept her arms tucked up next to her chest, palms down and head bowed against the ground. She had Vahari braid Star Moss into her hair, the earthy smell mingling with the smoke that was thick in the air, adding to the scent of the herb that Kit'raka had provided.

Vahari knelt with her arms out, letting the heat of the fire lick her hands. She relished in the feeling of pain along her skin and let the feeling flow into her words. She had called spirits many times before, just not these three in particular. "Father, Un'lai Shadowsear. We seek you for your guidance and the benefit your granddaughters. I, your daughter, Vahari Hearteater, daughter of Han'dali, Ask you to come "

Kit'raka's head was bowed, but not low. Her eyes were closed and the elements came to her with her part of the song. Fire and water danced in her hands, earth swirling before her, wind teasing along her long braided blue-black hair.

"Azu'lana, daughter of Saren of the Zandalari. We seek you for your power, that which you gifted your blood. I, your daughter, Kit'raka, born of the Redwalker, I ask you to come."

"Sister, Handali. We seek you for your stubbornness. I, your brother Jocamo of the Raptari, Son of Azu'lana, demand you come." Jocamo stared into the fire, the flames dancing in his amber eyes. He had no fear and could demand that his twin came. They were blood bound to Bwonsamdi at birth, though he had left the teachings of Death for that of the Master of Shapes. He had told his sister and niblings quite plainly that he would ‘make the old bitch do as she was told for once’.

The flames danced and turned grey slowly, the song now taken over by spirits.

The five that surrounded the fire sat up, Hari and Reshka’s job to maintain the beat of the song until the trinity of spirits came. Intent on learning, the orc watched her cannibal cousin as Hari helped her maintain the pitch and tone that the old language was based upon.

The three that came forward were as far apart in demeanor as could be. The male troll, small and obviously Darkspear was grinning brightly as he sat between his son and daughter his head was bald and he looked only barely older than his youngest son, green skin once again unmarred by the ravages of shadow that had taken his life. “Someone got laid…. Cute kid, Little Raka. Takes after her grandfather, I can tell.”

His wife materialized between her brother and sister with the most sour look on her face, glaring at Jocamo as her grass green and sun-gold hair flowed down in a loose river over her back. She sat between her brother and sister, arms crossed and pouting. “Shut up, Un’lai. That abominable spawn does not deserve that sweet girl. If I didn't know better..”

“Say nothing, Han’dali. You will regret any words of negativity or hate against anyone in this circle. Your brother called you in peace, do not break that peace.” The old farseer smiled as she materialized above the fire and floated to settle between her adopted granddaughter and her giant of a grandson. “They mean you no harm, so neither should you mean them any. No sense in being a bitch, daughter.” Azu’lana smiled, her younger image gazing between those who had gathered. This woman was Zandalari born and bred. Tall, thin and not quite willowy, with blue-gray fingers that ran through spiked up bright violet hair, the amber eyes that all of her children and grandchildren had inherited giving the full effect of her smile. All of them knew to trust, but be wary of the farseer. Grandmother or not, her wrath was terrible when crossed. Vol had sincerely hoped that she would be able to help them. The command she seemed to have still reassured him greatly.

“Now. Business, I have no intention of being in the mortal world more than I need to. Tell us what you seek, we will tell you what you wish to know.” “Within the bounds! I mean, yeah just because Vol got himself a peice of Zandalari ass…” Un’lai nearly cackled to himself. “Thre are rules, you know the rules of calling. We can only do so much, ya know.”

“By the ancestors, Un’lai!” Han’dali looked appalled and swatted at her husband with a spectral hand. “You will corrupt Little Iresh’ka with your filth! She does not need to hear about your disgusting proclivities.”

“Azu! Are you sure this one was not raised by elves, I was saddled with frigidity…” Un’lai scowled, not something he usually did. “Of all your daughters, you gave me this one.”

The Mag’har woman just rolled her eyes as Jocamo and Kit laughed at their sister and her husband's continued bickering. It was well known that Un’lai had wanted another and would have waited for the younger daughter, but the mating had been dictated by a Loa and would not be undone. Everyone knew who that younger daughter was Kit’raka.

“Oh shut up, Dali. She is not little ANYTHING.” Kit smiled at the half-orc girl and then looked back at the spirit of her older sister. “Trust me, She’s got a mate, Un’lai is the least of the corruptions. Of all trolls, you act most like a passionless human. How you two produced seven children, I will never know. For right now, can you two both please focus on the here and now, not whose cock is fuckin who or what?”

The spirit of Han’dali went to open her mouth before she was silenced by her mother’s sharp tongue. “Not another word from you, Han’dali. I told you plainly. I do not wish to be here. Say no more unless a question or task is asked of you.” The spectral druid looked away, shaman and shadow priest actually turning to business. “Speak your request, children. I will not give you much time for this.”

“Your book is missing.” Reshka blurted out the words, the spirits turning to look at the little mag’har girl. Her hands went to her mouth, covering them up as if she knew she would be in trouble. Jack shook his head right along with Azu’lana’s, Un’lai and his children stifling laughter. Kit’s shoulders were shaking with holding back her own giggles. The girl scowled, looking between all the trolls that she had know for her teen years. “I’m.. “

“She’s as impetuous and impulsive as her mother, that hot little Sin’dorei. If only my brother had not snapped her up first. Should have taken more than one wife….” Reshka turned red with fury, Azu’lana’s gaze at the shadow priest’s apparition. “Don’t look at me like that. She has an ass that won’t quit.”

Reshka’s face kept the scowl as Azu’s voice boomed through the room. “Enough. Un’lai. Silence! We will forgive the child for her words. She will say NO MORE!” The scowl fell from the huntress’s face as she looked away. Azu’s tone became angry as she turned to the one who began this call to her when she did not wish to be there. Vol stiffened up and stared his grandmother down hard. This was his job and it was now at the hard part.

“Speak, Raptorblood. Make this worth my while. You have a great granddaughter of mine, and for that I came. Speak your words, ask your question.”

“Where is the Book of Rites, written by You as Oracle of Nyx, as Matriarch of our family. We are in need of the rite of names and dedication.” His voice was strong and rang out, not demanding outright, but making sure his request was heard and heeded.

Azu’lana smirked, waving her hand dismissively. “You did not need it for the child’s birth. You knew those well enough. They were not OUR traditions, but you made do.”

“I had too little time to track it down. The ritual used was of her mother’s family. The child is no longer hers, and it is MY right to name my daughter. The book is not with your things, No one has seen it since Ki’la was named and I am going to name my daughter properly. Kit has agreed to help on the day of the ritual, but..” He sat up straight, looking the old shaman directly in the face. This was an old woman who respected strength of character, loyalty to the family, especially the ones you choose for yourself. Excuses were nothing to her, she wanted to know plain and clear what was wanted. She craved solid things, not honey sweet words. He knew how to get what he needed from his grandmother, he needed to show he had not forgotten.

“I will name my Child. Either she can be named as the rest of her kin, or I will find my own ritual and bind her to her Loa on my own. Your call, Mama Azu. She is your great grandchild, and I know how selfish you are over those born of your blood.”

That made the shaman spirit smile brightly. “Vol’raka still has the spirit he was born with.” She turned her face to Un’lai and then Han’dali. “It is your son who took the book from my things. I task you two to find him.”

The five living ones in the room blinked as both druid and priest disappeared. Azu’lana smiled toward her grandchildren, her son and daughter sitting in relaxation. “Now that they are gone and off to do something productive, I will tell you my prophecies. Vahari, a good choice that shifter. I expect more great grandsons from him.” Her gaze rested on Iresh’ka, letting her eyes soften. “Let no one give you shit over your mother. She may one day be a good mother to her brood. She has to find out once again how to be at peace. One day you may forgive her, but I am not sure you will forgive her your ancestry.” Finally she settled on her grandson. The hunter took his height from his grandfather, her amani mate nearly as tall as her gentle giant grandson. She’d favored the boy, if only the reason being that his mother actively despised him. “You do not get to keep the book. Vahari will keep it in her care. Your brother Alash’zu has the book, he thinks that it is his. He may have been my apprentice, but he is an idiot.

“Listen all who hear my voice, for I will not speak of it again. There are to be five that will be called by their own. Jani, Gonk, Pa’ku, Bwonsamdi and the Shadowhunter will call upon each in turn and in kind. Some are born, some are not, but all will know who calls their service. Old ways must be taught. They must be brought up in that strength.”

Azu’s voice quieted as Han’dali and Un’lai came back, the druid huffy and Un’lai laughing hysterically. “That idiot took it to the Maelstrom. He thinks it will be safe and no one else in the family will come looking there.”

Azu sighed loudly, pointing at Kit’raka then to Reshka. “Like it will be safe there. You two get to bring my book back.” Vol and Hari both scowled as Azu spoke, confused as to why Iresh’ka. “Tomorrow, Kit’raka. She needs training anyway. Spirits do not come as well as they should for her and only being a wolf is not enough.”

With that, all three phantoms disappeared, Vol’raka and Vahari eyeballed between Kit and Reshka. The older female smiled and stood. “Just because she's elf doesn’t mean she didn’t inherit shit from her father too. Someone found their latent ability to call elements. I’ve been lax in finding her a teacher, guess its my time to teach you how to be a Shaman, huh kid?”

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