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enochianribs · 4 years ago

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until it no longer hurts. (cabin/wing fic). read it here, or under the cut.

(accompanying playlist / aesthetic board (thanks @disableddean)

CHAPTER 3. (formatting is lost via tumblr text post fyi)

ch.1 / ch.2

As he lays there, unconscious to the world, and all those things that go bump in the night, his life sorts itself cleanly into two: before and after— not for the first time.

In fact, there were several times before this. There was before the fire, before the loss of his mother, before John started hunting, before Jess died, before Sammy went to rehab, before Dean picked up that knife.

Before before before.

The question has hung in front of him for quite some time now.

What happens after?

What happens to him, when all is said and done?

The bed is warm and soft and he sinks into it. A hand presses against his chest, pins him down and muscle memory tells him to go for the knife, fingers flexing outward and then curling in, his nails catching on the sheet.

This is safe.

Here in this moment, no one can touch him. The tiny flowers on the sheets molt before his eyes, little petals rising out of the fabric and blooming. They're feather light against his bare skin, and the weight of his body is crushing them. He makes a noise of upset, and a hand comes down to press a finger to his mouth, hushing him gently.

<It's okay.>

Slowly, he wakes. The warmth from the finger still lingers against his lips, but the bed is hard where his face presses against it, eyelashes fluttering, his eyes open just a crack. The wood of the table greets him, and the sunlight is just now poking through the blinds once again, casting the same lines across the pine knots, along the curves of his outstretched forearm and across where his head faces towards the sun.

"It's okay." He murmurs, and for an incredibly brief moment he is perplexed by why the words slip from between his lips, until one of his knuckles grazes bare skin.

His evening comes back.

Before.

Before Wings.

Slowly, Dean sits upright, suddenly entirely aware of the being lying on his table, and his heart beats in his mouth and his fingers catch on something, pulling him even further from the comfort and haze of his dream. He ducks his head in, looking down at where his hand is stuck. His fingers are still woven between Wings', his own a shade lighter.

Dean sits very still.

He’s afraid to make a sound and wake him up, so he stays there for a moment, assessing the situation he’s willingly walked himself into.

The stranger’s chest rises and lowers every few seconds, almost imperceptibly so. The gauze is brown from oxidized blood, but it doesn't appear to have been soaked through in the night, proving Dean's improvised medic work satisfactory. The stitches held.

Huh, Dean thinks. He should be thankful for the live or die experiences thrust upon him by his father's recklessness.

Half the time, Dean's afraid he took pages out of John's book.

And that would be okay. Well, it wouldn’t— but he— he could cope with that. He could work through it. He’s beginning to understand that even as the world ended, it would still spin, and day would come and the night would consume and he’d be okay.

It’s unspeakably comforting, the feeling of fingers tucked between his own, the way Dean’s calloused palm presses against another, like a bond is forming quietly between a man waking from his dream and another still ensnared.

“It’s okay.” Dean says one more time, the words an impulse.

Wings stirs, his upper lip twitching a hairsbreadth, and Dean braces for the cry of pain that always comes with waking, even if it’s not aloud. Anticipating the event horizon of his world ending with Wings consciousness, Dean grabs a glass of water, and the bottle of alcohol, and a rag before coming to stand next to his head, his thighs pressed against the edge of the table.

He stares down at him, and his head feels clearer than it did last night. The stranger’s hair is unruly, unkempt, and Dean can’t tell how long it’s been like that— how long this winged man has been living in the forest. The locks are nearly as dark as his wings, but the sunlight exposes their truthful deep brown color. It’s tangled here and there, and Dean has to try and restrain himself from carding his fingers through it to work out the knots. A residual caretaking instinct he has had yet no luck fighting.

When they were kids, Sammy always refused to brush his hair, and it was never really a problem when it was just him and Sam. But school begged a shred of presentability from the two, lest child services were called, so he kept up Sam’s appearance for him. Dean kept them fed, schooled, he took care of them both, though Sam always came first.

Should have always come first.

Now Dean’s here with someone else’s blood under his fingernails, and there’s a hunter on the loose who probably has it out for them both. And he’s not even a real hunter. He's just some guy with a gun and a penchant for killing things.

Dean’s officially in over his head.

Dark smudges look like they’ve been pressed underneath his eyes with two uncaring thumbs, and a distinct line of his cheekbones drags in a swoop across either side of his face. His lips are full but chapped and Dean wonders why he cares, but the urge to dab a spot of lotion against them nearly overpowers him.

He’s trying hard to ignore the wings.

There’s finding a human man and then there is finding a man with wings, real wings, with muscle and tendons and quivering feathers, and yep there it is, that edge of panic.

The word hangs over his head but Dean refuses to use it. His mother’s bedtime stories aren’t real.

Demons are. He knows that now, though they are few and far between. But the a-- no.

Dean shakes his head.

There's never been any proof.

He rocks his weight from foot to foot, debating his best course of action. Minutes pass, but the man doesn’t stir again, so finally Dean sucks it up and takes his hand and pats it against his cheek, gently. His skin feels rough against the surprising softness, even the barest hint of stubble is nearly feather soft.

He comes to sit on the edge of the table.

“Hey.” He murmurs, uselessly. “Wake up?”

Please wake up.

Wings’ head moves, only slightly, pressing against his hand. Dean freezes like a deer in headlights, caught touching when he should have only been looking. Heat crawls up his cheeks and his stomach flips.

“Fucking hell, Dean.” He mutters, pulling his hand away and he cocks his head, unsure if he really heard a quiet, sad noise leave the man still lying seemingly unconscious on his table.

A warm, steady hand snakes out and grabs his wrist. Dean swallows his own quiet noise. It takes everything to look up again, scared of what he’s going to see.

When they lock eyes that fear melts.

Wings flexing underneath his back, extending as far as they can go until the longest feathers graze the floor and the farthest tip brushes the wall near the dining table, the stranger looks up at him with clear eyes. His lips move rapidly, as he soundlessly repeats something over and over. One side of his face clenches up in pain as he tries to sit up.

Dust particles drift from the rafters like nothing is amiss, little bokehs proving that what Dean sees is real. He still doesn’t believe it.

“Hey, hey, hey,” he keeps his voice low, holding his breath and extending his hands, palms out, as a friendly act. “I’m not— I’m not gonna hurt you, just, you gotta let me get—”

Before Dean’s fingers even lift the bandaging to inspect the damage, there’s a forearm against his throat, and he’s pinned against the table by strong arms and they form an iron cage to hold him there. Two strong legs straddle him. Whatever he was going to say dies in his throat.

“Wings—”

The stranger barks something out, the syllables harsh and completely foreign, staring down at Dean with a combustion-prone concoction of fear, confusion and leftover adrenaline mixing behind the blue.

“Please I—”

The arm presses against his windpipe even harder, and Dean meets the icy stare. Wings tilts his head, and his eyes narrow, his lips hanging open slightly, like he wants to say something.

“I’m trying to help you.”

The pressure lessens a fraction, and Dean takes the opportunity to whip his arm up, hand sliding between him and Wings’ own, and he pushes him away and back a short inch, but it’s enough to throw the smaller man. Finally free, his throat drags in a breath but he doesn’t plan on giving wings another opening, so he brings his knee up from under the other man, using it as a brace to prevent him from overpowering him again.

He says the first thing that flies through his pea-brain. “Who are you?” Lord help him, he may just be the stupidest man alive. “What do I call you?” Asking him to introduce himself seems like the dumbest possible direction for the scene playing out.

With the quilt long gone, the stranger is fully indecent again, and Dean’s trying very hard to ignore it, because it’s the icing on the unreal cake. Fire creeps up his cheeks regardless and Dean squirms.

A black arm brings itself up and around Wing’s body curling as though it was a protective stance. It reminds him of a knight with a shield. Everything else about his posture screams prey animal, and Dean can tell when the ghost of a fight is reverberating through someone’s muscle memory.

What the fuck did Campbell do to him?

To top it all off, Dean realizes he did a terrible job of cleaning the blood away from his mouth. The blue takes over his eyes as his pupil’s become pinpricks of something primal and it doubles with the dried blood smeared down the hollow of his throat.

“Hey,” Dean’s voice is low and shaking and he feels just like he did when he spent all those years helpless, just a child yanked around. “Stay with me. C’mon.”

The wing lowers, and as it does so it catches the light, and the entire wing is made up of feathers that look just like the ones sitting on his mantle, an oil slick in sunshine. Without thinking, Dean brings his hand to his thigh and squeezes it, thumb digging into the meat of it. The touch is meant to be grounding, though he’s not sure who for.

“You know me.” He hums, in a futile effort to comfort him.

A flip must switch in the stranger’s mind, because he nods suddenly, pulling his weight off of Dean and settling down on his own legs, his wings larger than life, spread out in the room.

“Dean.” He says, and it sounds reverent, his voice rough, the syllable catching in his throat. He doesn’t seem to notice, but fresh scarlet blooms across the bandage. “Dean.”

Dean stays as still as a statue and he can’t recall ever saying his name, though that’s usually how it goes for most anything. Words pour out of his mouth ceaselessly, and he’s always embarrassing himself, dumping his scattered thoughts on poor unsuspecting souls: hey, did you know that Led Zeppelin were tolkien fans? Simply because he’d seen someone had walked past wearing a Tree of Gondor shirt.

But Dean doesn’t remember saying his own name. His fathers harsh words rattle around inside his mind: kill first, figure out what it is later.

This thought has to wait, though, because the bullet wound seems to have caught up to him, and Wings slumps forward, his entire body going limp in Dean’s arms, his wings thumping down against the table. Dean drags his hands up his back, until his fingers are buried in the downy feathers that molt into his shoulder blades. Dean can’t be certain, but he feels warmer than last night, like he’d been sleeping next to a fire.

Fuck, fuck fuck.

Dean has no idea how to treat an infection, not really. He can try and prevent one from happening, sure— he’s done that what feels like hundreds of times. But if the infection takes hold it’s out of his hands and he’s going to be left with a dead winged man on his table, or a possibly alive winged man forced into the spotlight.

Dean presses his fist to his mouth, and his body feels like a bow-string pulled too taut, threatening to snap. There’s no one who can help, and there’s no one he trusts.

Dean sits there for nearly thirty minutes, ignoring where his friend’s blood has stained his shirt. The cabin smells like iron, and like feathers, which he hadn’t realized was a distinct scent until it filled up the room. His phone sits in his hands.

The texture of the rug on the floor blurs with the sound of the ragged breathing next to him.

His phone rings.

His fingertips burn where they touched his warm, soon to be cold thigh.

It rings again.

“Hey.” Dean expects Sam’s voice on the other end, and blinks, confused when he’s greeted with a familiar short drawl that he can’t immediately place.

“Missouri says he’s gonna be fine, kid.”

The voice belongs to Pamela.

“Who?” Dean stands up abruptly. Is she outside?

“Your birdman.”

Dean doesn’t acknowledge the remark. “Who?”

Once again, Dean is privy to a conversation happening away from the phone. It sounds like another woman talking, and she sounds annoyed.

“Oh. Missouri. The ol’ wife.”

“Wife?” He runs a quick calculation in his head and then raises his eyebrows. That tracks.

“Dean Winchester, are you listening to me.”

Uh, no?

“Yeah, yeah okay. I heard you. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Whatever she thinks she knows, she better not.

Something that sounds, in a honey sweet and dainty voice, like ‘Give it here’ comes from the other end and then she’s speaking to him directly.

“Dean Winchester?” She asks.

“Speaking.”

“Mmkay, good. You better listen up, sweetheart because he’s gonna be fine, but I’m still sending Pam your way. She was a nurse before she retired early, so whatever is wrong with the wound, she should be able to help.”

For once, Dean is rendered speechless, and utterly, utterly confused.

“You still there?”

“Yeah.” Dean croaks. “Yeah, I’m still here.” He looks over at where Wings is laying. His skin should look sunkissed, but instead beads of sweat form along his tendons, and they’re pulled tight, his body tense even if he’s out cold. “How do you know about him?”

“Pamela and I… we share some unique gifts. But that shouldn’t concern you right now. You’ve got a fallen angel dying in your living room. She’ll be there in about fifteen minutes, alright?” She doesn’t wait for his response. “Go dig up some of Rufus’ old stash. The good stuff.”

“Why?” He feels deeply out of the loop.

“To calm your nerves. I can feel them from here. Alright now, I’m gonna hang up. Sit tight until she gets there.”

▵▿▵

Knuckles rap against the door, and Dean nearly jumps out of his skin. From the time it took him to hang up to Pamela showing up at his door it had started to rain again. This time the storm was black, and he had a feeling there would be no sunset, just the dimming of the sky until the charcoal was pitch. He flips the porchlight on as he opens the door.

Pamela’s black hair is caught under the strap of an army green duffel bag, and the rain drips down her forehead and off her chin, smearing her smokey eye shadow slightly. Standing next to her is a woman Dean hasn’t met yet. She stands tall, and if there is a height difference between her and Pamela, he can’t tell. Her ringlets are just as soaked as her wife's and her dark eyes catch the yellow of the porch light. Inexplicably, they're warm, and Dean lends himself to trusting them.

“The psychic forgot her umbrella, huh?” Dean asks, stepping aside to let them in.

Missouri makes a face.

“I was gonna say you’re the prettiest thing in these hills but…” Whatever she was going to say, dies as she takes in the sight strewn across the dining table.

Pamela sets her duffle bag down in one of the seats pulled away from the table and then her arm goes limp as she stands there. Missouri stops by her side, the fingers of her hand trailing her arm until it rests stationary by Pamela’s, their pinkies intertwining.

“Seeing and believing are truly two different things.” Missouri sounds almost reverent.

“Yeah.” Dean breathes, and, actually, he gets that. “Earlier, on the phone you called him a…”

“An angel.”

There are a million questions he could ask but he settles on one. “How do you know?”

Pamela tears her gaze away for just a moment, to look over her shoulder at Dean. “That’s a long story for another night. Right now, we have an angel to save. You look terrible, by the way.”

“Mmhm. Dead on your feet. There’s nothing you can do to help right now. We’ll take care of your angel.”

“Have you eaten anything since you found him?” Pam asks. The duffle bag zipper slices through the ambient silence between words, and she rifles through it for a solid minute before she finally produces a pair of tweezers and what looks to be military grade cotton balls with a pleased grin.

His stomach makes a pathetic noise in response, however instead of making a move to eat something, he's standing there staring validly, wondering why these two women who live in the middle of nowhere are completely calm about Mr. Comatose being heaven sent.

It’s fairly obvious from the way their backs are turned to him now, heads leaning in close until they're almost touching so they can whisper in confidence, that he isn’t going to get any answers tonight.

The exhaustion hits him like a tidal wave, breezing through his muscles, seeping straight into his bones and burrowing in his marrow. Pamela seems to have some left over hospital grade drugs in her nursing kit, and his new friend is completely subdued under the quiet blanket of sleep.

“Dean.” He tears his gaze away from the middle distance, where it had gotten comfortable to see Pamela watching him, her eyes narrow with concern. “I don’t want to have to take care of you next. Eat something and get some rest. You’ve done enough. We’ll be out of your hair once we’re done.”

Dean shouldn’t trust them. But he does. He doesn’t have any other choice. Shuffling around, he shows Missouri the outlets, where Rufus’s first aid-kit (nearly an end-of-days cold war quantity) stash is shoved into the top three shelves of one of the three storage closets. Missouri promises to lock up and leave the key under the worn-through doormat, and Dean nods sleepily.

Missouri pats his cheek, and for the briefest of moments, Dean misses home. He misses Sammy. His life had never been simple or easy or even nice, but at least it had been predictable.

“He’s gonna be okay, sweetheart. I promise.”

▵▿▵

When he wakes, he’s in his bed and sleep-drunk, and there’s an empty space to his side, a starless void that he’d never been able to fill. In his living room lies the moon, and the stars, and the hopeful sliver of himself wonders if even the sun can be found there as well. The cabin is peaceful, a comforting fog of quiet wrapping him up. Sleep drags him under again, and he goes willingly.

#uinlh #cabin fic #*#mine

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nonbinary-ghost · 4 years ago

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Nightmare Heart Reborn

Another Hollow Knight story thing. For some reason I’ve been supper preoccupied with the creation of the first Grimm and ended up writing way more than I intended to for it! In short, this one-shot follows a moth abandoned by the Radiance and his deal to become a vessel for the Nightmare Heart.

CW: Suicide contemplation, Drowning, Burning Alive, Abandonment

The lanky moth collapsed into a heap on the rough stone floor, too exhausted to move further. Wind howled lonely at the mouth of the small cave he’d found, but for now he was safe from the scouring sands and empty wastes. He lay on the floor of the cave amongst dry leaves and coarse sand, his breath shallow as it echoed in his ears to fill the silence.

The awful silence.

With a small noise of despair, the moth curled in on himself, wrapping his wings tight as he shook, as if their dusty gold and white drapings could hold him together as his world fell apart. He was alone now, truly alone, and the ringing silence in his mind felt like a gaping hole in the center of his being. Where once there had been the soft murmurings and singing of other moths, and the warm golden glow of his goddess, there was now nothing but deafening silence and cold darkness. Why? Why had they turned away from him? He’d tried to feel the Dream, to be content in the Radiance’s light. He had wanted so much to be one with the song that rose and fell with the golden light in his people’s thoughts. But his mind could never rest in those pleasant dreams and hopes. It always wandered to the suffering of the scared and the hurt. There were so many who hurt, who feared. The pain of loss, the fear of death, it all stained the very edges of the dream he’d once shared with his people, and his heart broke in sympathy for them, for those who suffered in silence just as he. But he’d tried to ignore those feelings. He tried to mask the rising fear inside of him that he must be flawed in some way to be so preoccupied with such unpleasant thoughts.

And yet…

Yet, despite his efforts, his voice had become a discordant note in the Radiance’s melody, a dark stain on their shared dream. And so they’d driven him away. They abandoned him to the darkness and fear.

Tears burned his eyes as he clutched at the sharp ache in his chest.

Maybe he was broken.

As the moth lay in the cold, damp sand and refuse of a wasteland, he considered never rising again. He could just lie there and let it all end. Let the bitter wind steal his breath. Let the gritty sand bury him. Let the wandering, mindless bugs of the wastes find him, bite him, bleed him. His disappearance a good riddance to all he had once called family.

A broken voice no one wanted to hear.

A lost moth forever banished from the Radiance’s light.

Exhaustion and misery blanketed him, eventually dragging him into a fitful sleep filled with the images of the scornful faces of those who had driven him from his home. In his dreams, they watched him indifferently as he struggled to keep his head above churning black waves, their faces a distant light far overhead. They all waited to see what this unworthy moth might do, to see if he had the strength to rise from the cold water, the courage to face what was ahead.

He didn’t.

A large black wave crashed over him and pulled him deeper under the turbulent waters. The light vanished immediately and he sank, flailing feebly at the cold pressure as he choked on the salty liquid. His motions slowed as he fell. Was this not what he wanted? A quiet oblivion? Death was easier, and in this endless nightmare, far less painful to consider than a life of exile.

He gave in to the black waters.

But as he sank deeper, a strange red light began to bleed into the darkness. The moth lifted his head warily as he drifted to the bottom of this dark sea of despair. He settled gently on the ground’s soft surface and he found he could again breathe. The pressure of the water remained heavy against his chest, but it did not choke him to take it in and he took a slow, almost disappointed breath.

Red light pooled around him, pushing away the darkness and warming his chilled limbs. That light felt so familiar, warm and comforting like the Radiance’s light, but softer. A faint, steady thrumming could just be heard under the moth’s breathing, and he blinked, glancing around in confusion. Was this another nightmare?

You poor child.

The words were a mere whisper in the moth’s thoughts, weak but gentle. He went still at the sorrow behind the sound.

How could We turn Our light from you? You needed Us so desperately, and We turned away…

The moth realized that the words came at the same slow beat of the strange thrumming in his ears. He laboriously pushed himself up to his hands and knees, cocking his head as he searched for the source of the sound.

“Who speaks?” He asked aloud, his voice smothered by the water still in his lungs.

The Heart of We who abandoned you.

Confusion made the moth’s antennae twitch. Was this one of their lost kin? Another moth here to offer sympathy? No. No, the feeling of this red light so warm against his fur, the soft presence in his mind…

“Radiance?” he breathed, a flicker of hope flaring in his chest.

Not as such, whispered the words, and the moth felt the flame of hope turn to ash on his tongue. The voice continued: A part of Her. One We scorn and abandon just as We do you. We are part of the same whole, but She who calls herself Radiance smothers Us here in solitude as She ignores the suffering of Our people.

The moth’s head spun but he did not have the heart to try to understand. That briefest flutter of hope that his goddess had not abandoned him had filled him with such pure light, had made his heart soar. But now that hope was extinguished with a cruel certainty, and the despair came crushing back. Was he truly lost then? Alone, abandoned, voiceless, forever scorned from his goddess’s light with no hope for redemption?

“Why am I here?” he whispered as he stared down at his hands pressed against the strange quilt-like ground.

We – I heard your pleas for oblivion. I cannot save you from your fate, Dear Child, but I can at least spare you from it.

The moth lifted his head at this, his heart fluttering in his chest.

I can offer you the oblivion you seek. Your memories, your thoughts, your mind – they can all become a part of me, and you will be free. Gone, without any lingering dreams or regrets to keep your mind tethered to this place.

What I offer you is not peace, child, but destruction. A true oblivion.

The moth considered this. He knew that death did not always mean peace. He had walked the dreams of those lingering regrets, and fears, and hopes left by the dead. He did not want to stay in this world in any form. His dreams were naught but nightmares, his regrets many. He did not deserve any form of afterlife, even as the faintest echo of his mind, nor did he want it. True oblivion…

“What is your price?” He asked, willing to give up everything for the fulfillment of this last hope.

Your shell, whispered the beating heart. Become a part of me. I will use your body and memories to fully separate from the Radiance. For too long We have abandoned our children to despair – no longer! It can end with you. Become my vessel, and I will take in every lost and broken soul, and cleanse the lands of the flames of fear and pain. You will have the oblivion you so crave, and your empty shell will serve to consume the misery of the living.

“I could help others like me?” the moth asked in wonder. By accepting this offer, he could create a home for those his people abandoned? The feeling of hope in his chest grew at the thought of no one suffering as he has ever again. “You would take them in?”

Every soul scorned by the Radiance’s Light will find a home in the Hearts’.

A quiver of emotion fluttered the moth’s gold-spotted wings and he pressed a hand over the pounding of his heart. It beat fast, from fear or excitement, out of sync with the slow, languid thrumming still in his thoughts. He considered this offer carefully. Was this really what he wanted? Did he truly want to cease to exist? If he refused, could he seek out a new life somewhere? Find others turned away from his goddess’s light, and build a new home? He knew not if he had the strength to do so. The emptiness in his chest choked him, threatened to drown him. There could be no home like the one he lost. There was nothing in the wastes but sand and mindless bugs – nothing like the light and song and love of his homeland. But there had to be others like him, others whose nightmares and fears had driven them from the Radiance’s light. He had seen their dark stains on the Dream. Were they lost out here too, as alone and empty as he?

Despair exhausted, rage flooded in to the small moth, making his heart pound harder.

How dare the Radiance treat her children so cruelly. She had no right to abandon them so, to drive them away. Were they not all the Radiance’s children? Were they not all deserving of the promise of love and protection? His hands clenched into fists against the quilted ground as that emotion thundered through him, one he’d fought so hard to suppress for the entirety of his life. The rage pounded in his chest, swirling with the lingering despair still pressing down on him. He could change that, could change the fates of those like him. He could give the lost children of the Old Light a home. And for what? A quiet oblivion – one he already sought and longed for as deeply as he missed the light.

“I accept your offer.”

A sharp flare of scarlet light burst to life before him and he flinched as a massive, beating heart filled his vision. He fell back as he craned his neck, trying to see the entirety of the red heart, but the edges of the shape were lost to shadow far overhead. The warmth of the red light intensified against his wings at the heart’s nearness. The moth rose unsteadily and cautiously approached the heart, his eyes locked on the bleeding gash seeping tongues of crimson flame that severed the center of that heart. The slow, beating thrum that had whispered at the edges of his mind filled his ears now, and he could see the heart beating in time to the sound.

There is no coming back, warned the soft voice of the Heart. Enter the flames only if you truly wish for the oblivion I offer.

He paused at the edge of the flickering scarlet flames, staring up at the massive red heart.

“Will it hurt?”

Yes. The words paused. Then- All of you will be burned away. Your hopes, your dreams, your essence. I will know your memories but they will not be mine. Everything you are will be consumed by the scarlet flame.

It will hurt.

I am sorry, Child, but I cannot change this.

Do you still accept?

Fear was the faintest flutter in the moth’s chest, but no thoughts of hesitation crossed his mind. Chin raised, he stepped straight into the open wound in the bleeding heart.

Scarlet flames roared in his vision, their scorching heat beyond anything he could have ever expected. Blinding pain seared through him and he opened his mouth in a scream, pulling the flames into his lungs and burning his throat, destroying his once beautiful voice. He took that pain deep into himself, offering no resistance as it tore into his mind. One by one, every memory was consumed by those scarlet flames – his mother’s pride when he first sang, the pain of his broken wing, the despair of his brother’s death at the hands of illness, the fear of abandonment, the rage at the Radiance for turning her back on him and his fellow lost kin – the memories, everything he was, rose to the surface of his mind to be scoured away by cleansing fire. And he welcomed it. Fed it every part of himself until there was nothing left.

The flames burned away the moth’s pale white and gold wings, turning them into thick leathery things of black and red. The mane of fur around his neck vanished in a burst of crimson, and the flames coursed down every limb, burning, changing, until the bug that had entered the heart was no more. The world became a sea of red and pain. Then…

Nothing.

The moth awakened in that lonesome cave slowly, his eyes opening to reveal pupils that burned with a scarlet fire. He sat up tentatively, leathery wings splayed awkwardly. Confusion lay heavy in his thoughts and he stared down at his hands…hands? He flexed the clawed finders experimentally, feeling the way the glossy black shell and shifting joints moved. The Nightmare Heart smiled then, the expression feeling unnatural but right, somehow, and he stood on shaking legs. He could hear the pounding of the Heart in his ears, strong and steady, and he turned towards the cave’s entrance. He wrapped his warm, leathery wings around himself as he marveled at this vessel, this new form that finally freed him from the Radiance’s shackles.

He was Him, now. Not an Us, not a We, not a part of the lying Dream that turned away from the suffering of the world. He was Himself at last, a being all his own. A laugh, filled with elation, rumbled from his ruined throat.

He was free.

#hollow knight #hk grimm #nightmare heart #my writing #this was almost cathartic to write #cw suicide #cw burning alive #cw drowning #cw abandonment #If there are any content warnings I missed please let me know #I know this scene is a little heavy #and I don't want to miss any tags for people's blacklists

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vivifrage · 4 years ago

Note

Could you do 29 with Grimm and Hollow please?

29. I think it’s cute.

(We're letting Grimm survive a little longer in this one lads)

He could not help but chuckle as he slipped into the nursery. Knowing that Hollow had become Midwife's apprentice, and that part of their duties involved childcare, was very different from seeing them in action. Calm, patient Hollow would be a natural at it, he knew. They were too kind. Too sweet.

And there they were. Lying on the floor, nosing a tiny hatchling, while more nestled against them, buffered from their cold form with a quilt. The hatchling by their face beeped, rolling onto their stomach and stretching. Small, soft, and grublike as they were, they contrasted incredibly with the ex-knight, all sharply angled horns, gangling limbs, and jagged scars.

With a few nudges, the stray hatchling crawled over to their siblings, wiggling into the pile. There were two clutches' worth, if Grimm remembered correctly. Much more of one than the other, but both the same age, born from the first egglaying Hollow attended.

"Excuse me," he said, stepping around scattered toys and blankets to stand before Hollow. With a grunt, he sat down, rubbing his side absentmindedly and trying to draw a deep breath. It faltered, but his smile did not.

"How adorable," he cooed, reaching out to pet them. The couple hatchlings he patted chirped, shifting about. So velvety soft. So round. So much like Grimmchild, still rather young themself.

Hollow watched him, Void flickering around their eyes. Even with a smile, it didn't slow.

Grimm pulled his hand away, chuckling as Hollow's Void slowed its writhe and they nuzzled the babies. "Feeling a little broody, are we?"

Hollow eyed him, but gave up nothing. He would have to be better than that.

"Ah well". He rested one hand in his lap, supporting his head with the other. "I think it's cute."

#Hollow knight #jaxx writes

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herocarved-a · 3 years ago

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“The strength of your heart makes you who you are. Not others and their hearts; just you, and yours.” / @dawnled

they’re in the hammock, pressed together so tightly it’s impossible to tell where one ends && the other begins. it’s still winter on the islands && the skies are grayer, cloudier; it threatens to rain, but they’re warm beneath the quilt sora dragged out with them earlier in the day. he listens to the broken heartbeat of his dearly beloved with a guilty frown as his war wrought fingers trace nonsensical patterns atop the sleep shirt riku never changed out of that morning.

it’s unusual, definitely, for the keyblade master to allow himself to remain in such a casual state --- but then again, sora only needs to hear the hollowness of his heartbeat... when he closes his eyes, the keyblade hero remembers riku’s heart station && the broken shards of cool blues && purples to mirror his yellows && oranges. he sighs his preoccupation into riku’s ribs as he twists to nuzzle into his knight’s warmth.

the little hero, war torn && broken by the words of others, almost misses the quiet, aching voice of his boyfriend in the downward spiral he finds himself in. a whole year away && his heart’s been broken the entire time. it’s my fault. it’s hard, impossible even, to wrap his mind around the idea that another year’s gone, that he’s grown up in that time. it’s not fair. why should he keep losing time? why does riku have to always be alone? why can’t he do anything right? sora’s fingers curl into riku’s shirt tightly, as if in search of an anchor against the rise of self-loathing that stings at the back of his throat.

it’s like riku knows the thoughts that plague him.

sora shifts again, this time to peer up at the profile of his beloved, with his guilt && sadness && trauma nested deep in those dim eyes, in those furrowed brows. he tries to look away before riku can recognize that hurt, but of course riku’s faster; he feels those fingers, so gentle && caring, at his cheek && sora sighs, long, endlessly long, the longest, saddest sigh he’s ever sighed, probably.

my friends are my power.

for so many years, that had been his mantra against every naysayer, every adversary that taunted him, that fought him. && he did find strength in the bonds he shared with his friends. he still does! but when did he stop believing in himself? without them, i’m nothing. when did his friends become his everything? he thinks of donald’s mutterings about how sora’s failure during his exam caused his own loss of strength; he remembers being called useless && hopeless if he’s ever left to his own devices.

“i tried to save kairi on my own. i wanted to prove i could do it on my own... but i messed up. i... died && you had to come save me again, even though i broke your heart. i really am hopeless on my own, riku.”

it’s rare for sora to disagree with the boy --- no, man; they’re no longer kids --- that he puts so much faith into. it’s rarer still for sora to turn his gaze away from riku’s, to be the first to break eye contact. it’s a day for rarities, though, && sora returns his ear to the hollow, unsteady beating of riku’s heart. it’s hard to say if it brings him comfort to hear it continue to try, or if it’s with a guilty conscience that he continues to listen to it struggle on.

#dawnled #ic .#starter .#answered .#v . post kh3�� .

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eystuary · 4 years ago

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Welcome to the fishing line!!

Hello everyone, welcome to @eystuary if you like my art or want to see more of what I draw, Do consider leaving a follow and reblog any pieces that make you smile! My name is Estrella, though I go by Est or Estrey. I’m currently a self taught artist just making art for fun! My pronouns are she/they, and I’m 20 years old, my birthday is in September making me a Virgo. My Mbti + enneagram test say I’m an ISFP 9w1. My art tag is #Eyst or #Artest (Please don’t follow, if you ship real people, inc*st ships, are a minor attracted persons, kink account, terf, ddlc/cgl, and anything in between what's listed) [Do not repost my art period. Sharing in discord servers and using them as icons is fine, as long as you reblog and leave a like on the original post!! linking people back to my blog is also appreciated as well.]

I’ve recently moved from my main blog @cubed-melon. I made the decision to start fresh mostly for organization sake, since @cubed-melon is so full of content that isn’t my art work, and is just old in general, feel free to look through my old blog if you’d like, My art tag is Artest it mostly consist of Tower of god artwork. I also have an old splatoon art blog @coroinka that I have not posted on since maybe early 2020-2019 you may also check that out if you’d like!! click read more if you want to learn more rules or other fun facts about me!

Ask/submissions/dms

I am always open to both asks and submissions as for what I allow to be asked is a another thing here is a list of things you are welcomed to send,

- Questions you have about me or my art

- Art request or suggestions

- small talk/ conversation

- pictures of your pets dogs, cats, birds, reptiles etc

- whatever comes to mind!!

- clarifications, warnings, reminders, ect. You may always message me if I forget to tag something, or if you have any other issues with something I post, please contact me about it in my asks/dms first, and I’ll do my best to resolve whatever I can!! Just work with me and I’ll see what I can do!!

- if you just need someone to chat with at any given time

What not so ask or send

-Anything listed on my Do not interact section of this post with reason

- Anything hurtful or cruel about me or anyone I’m friends with.

- Most drama or discourse (unless its something you desperately think I should be aware of!)

-unironic threats of violence against myself or others.

I have the right to choose not to respond to asks, submissions, and dms. If I choose, I’ll do my best to respond to what I can, but apologize to the ones I can’t.

Here is the section of my pinned post where I can go into a bit more detail about what I like!!

I enjoy a good handful of media, and would love to talk about them with anyone at any given time as I do enjoy meeting others and making friends through shared interest!!

Most recently I’ve been really into Genshin Impact, so it's been my focus as of recently ! but don’t be surprised if you see me drawing for other series, or my own original works, as my blog is focused on me just drawing what makes me smile, and in turn I hope it brings joy to others as well!!

Here is a small list of things I like. I'll try and update this every few months if something new happens to make the list!! other hobbies outside of art include but not limited to -Fishing even though I haven’t gone since I was little!! -Gardening, my favorite plants in my garden right now are my sunflowers, and zucchini plants!! also the lemon cucumbers <3 -Voice work/Voice acting, I never really practiced much until recently, but its something I do enjoy!! - Playing games and watching shows -sewing I’ve made a total of two quilts !! Top 5 favorite Fictional characters -25th Bam from Tower of God -Minamoto Koh | from Toilet-bound hanako kun -Bennett | From Genshin Impact -Pearl | From Splatoon 2 - Maki Zenin | From Jujutsu kaisen

Anime/tv series/manga series

-Mob psycho 100

-Demon slayer/Kimetsu no yabia

-Toilet-bound hanako kun

-The promised neverland

-Jujutsu kaisen

- Hunter x Hunter

-Tower of god !!

Video game series

-Genshin impact

-Splatoon

-Pokemon

-Animal crossing

-Hollow knight

#About me #Eyst #Artest #Kinda long post #pinned #posted 5.25.21 #my computer mouse died while working on this

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englass · 5 years ago

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Threadbare

Pairing(s): John Seed x F! Reader/Deputy

Warning(s): A little bit of Possessive Behaviour near the end (when isn’t there in my fics haha)

Word Count: 9,101

A/N: Gonna use this opportunity to apologise to @starsandskies @softseeds and @seedlingsinner for not getting back to you on your ‘Last Line Meme’ tags, I’ve been working on this and didn’t want to risk spoiling anymore of it than I have 😅 Apologies again, lovelies! ❤️ Now, I hope you all enjoy this inconsistent mess; I’m just glad that it’s finally over!

Also, side note: this is the final/original version of ‘A Moment In Time’ that I never thought that I’d finish, so... yeah, I actually finished it; oops? 😅

- - -

The room is quiet, save for the gentle rustle of fabric and your calm breathing, only ever holding when your concentration tightens or a loud sound catches your ear. It’s a risky move you’re making, being here of all places. All it would take is one slip up and any patrolling Peggies would come running. In your current position, rifle resting just out of comfortable reach against a nearby night stand and hand gun securely holstered to your thigh, the potential outcome could be precarious.

Still, such thoughts are far out of mind. If anything, for once, your mind is not plagued by the worries, fears and demands of the people. It is quiet, tranquil, filled with an occupied motion that lulls and eases. It is the most peace you have had since this whole debacle began; and secretly, unknowingly even to yourself, you take your sweet time and milk it for all it’s worth. An unconscious action deeply needed.

Every so often you take stock, pausing to look, only to end up staring at nothing in particular, around the room you hold court in. It’s a surprisingly large room and it is as gorgeous and telling as the man it belongs to: all high-class with expensive taste, yet subtly simple – modest in design and openly exquisite in every minute detail. Almost everything, save for the immaculate wooden furniture and feather-soft carpet, falls within the spectrum of blue. It creates an oceanic space filled with a deep and enriching sense of stillness and liberation, emulating the ebb and rise of a tempered wave.

It’s an absent wonder why sloth is visualised as the coercing colour.

You shift slightly, readjusting your position as you turn back to the article of clothing in your lap, eyes layered with an embedded fatigue not aimed at anything in particular. The glaze is misleading, your movements speaking not of a tired body. Instead, they are easily measured with a humble confidence, working at a steady pace with a precise and focused concentration, all benign.

There is an edge of paranoia, sharp and teetering like the point of a knife. It fuels the anvil-heavy weight on your shoulders, makes it hard to breathe even the shallowest of breaths. Worry gnaws at your edges alongside its cutting twin. ‘What ifs’ are a dangerous line of thought, yet even with an empty mind it turns in the background, twisting and coiling like a viper as worry and paranoia feed and pamper it.

The stress of the situation – the position you’ve been made to hold, a final bastion in a red-dyed field – has left a very real and scarring impression upon you. A bitter taste you can’t wash out.

It’s why you draw out your time with a self-imposed task that could be over within a matter of seconds. You drown yourself in an old action and memory, away from the war you have been made charge of.

It actually makes for quite an interesting scene.

Away from the tragedy of a civil war and the reluctant role you play in it, in the confines of a grand modern home, one would see the image of domesticity. A young woman sat on a satin quilted bed, expression relaxed and eyes tinged with oblivion as they lose themselves in a rhythmic motion, effortlessly mending a piece of male attire with a needle and thread in hand. A simple kit that the young lady wields with a conviction that rivals that of a knight and his sword.

Yes, quite a scene it makes.

Admittedly breaking into the infamous Seed Ranch wasn’t the best place to host such an image, despite how well you fit into the frame (obscenely so), but it wasn’t your idea to come here in the first place. No, the Resistance has a way of... puppeteering you. Not that you would ever openly admit to such a thing.

Thankfully you have it on good authority – ‘it better be on good authority’, you had snarled, before stalking out of the door of the outpost you had been visiting – that the youngest Seed would be away for the day. Overseeing another load of confessions and such, you had no doubt. It would be the perfect opportunity to take the ranch for the Resistance; loot the cave while the dragon is away, so to speak. Perhaps that’s why, along with the decrease in guard numbers, you had somewhat made yourself at home, taking your time to slowly wander the grand ranch and really take it all in; all in its full and undisturbed splendour.

Arguably you could do so once it was under the Resistance’s control, it would be a lot easier and less stressful to do so then, but you are not naive enough to believe that they won’t change anything once it’s theirs. No, it’s better to see it as it’s intended to be, before that travesty occurs.

Yet, despite your initial wanderings into the many, many rooms around the ranch, it was John Seed’s bedroom – of all places – that had caught your eye. It is why you are currently perched contently on the man’s king sized bed as you tend absently to one of his shirts.

It’s truly silly when you think about it, it’s just a shirt after all, but it turns out that sewing your younger sibling’s toys and clothing growing up has ultimately left a very lasting impression upon you. You had found solace in the action growing up and you still felt it now, more so than ever with the violent turn your life has taken, and you wanted nothing more than a brief moment to try and capture that same tranquility once again.

Although, in all honesty, even you know that you’re not potentially endangering yourself like this for a reason so small and seemingly petty.

With your modest sewing kit on the night-table next to you, and the faintest whisper of the birds songs outside, you pause to look over your work. It’s not turned out too bad, it won’t be the worst you’ve ever done, but not the best either. Not that you believe for a second that John would actually appreciate the gesture, no matter how perfect it turned out.

John Seed, though mainly known for his slippery lawyer ways and role within the infamous Eden’s Gate, was a very rich man. His life before Eden’s Gate, before being reunited with his lost siblings, had him as a rather successful property attorney from what you’ve heard, and it’s from that life and accumulated wealth that’s allowed the project to get as large and domineering as it has done.

It’s also allowed him to lavish himself in some of the most luxurious, and most audaciously expensive, brands that you’ve never heard off. Not only was he good looking, tall and slim with a lean frame painted with tattoos and gifted with a pretty face home to a devilish smile, but he dressed impeccably well.

It was near impossible to not initially swoon at such a charming character, but sadly he was a bit of an open book. The exterior may be exquisite, utterly unique and persuasive in how it draws you in, but it’s too easy to read and you find it’s pages to be littered with an underlying venom and rage; a bitterness that may be understandable, but hardly justifiable.

It was actually quite sad when you chose to sit down and actually think about the man and his siblings, to sit down and try to read them as best as you could. Each of them were broken in their own ways, left in disrepair, from the lives they had lived. You had even gone so far as to read Joseph’s physical book, the bible by which Eden’s Gate knelt before, to see if it could tell you more. The question of how they became – how you know them to be – a guiding hand as you flicked through the yellowing pages and over painful words.

Theirs was truly a sad story.

Still, you know it is no excuse for what they have done, or what they continue to do; and yet there is a part of you that, secretly, knows that you do this simple gesture for more of a reason than out of habit or past influence. It’s a simple but nice gesture and, although you don’t feel like it’ll be appreciated, you’re sure it’s something that they – John in-particular and especially so – have never been given before. At least not willingly.

If anything, with how rich John is, you wouldn’t be surprised if he just brought a new shirt from an equally fancy, if not tear-inducingly expensive, brand without even batting an eye. That’s if he didn’t get it custom made. You’re pretty sure your average store doesn’t sell plane printed jackets and Eden’s Gate belt buckles after all.

Even so there’s no need to waste money, even if he can burn it and still be well off, when you can just as easily fix it. Besides, it’s actually a really nice shirt. Even with its predictable colouring.

Despite all the terrible things the man has done, and will no doubt continue to do, you can’t help the small smile that blooms across your lips. The knowledge that the Baptist, the dreaded Reaper, of Eden’s Gate has a favourite colour and is so shameless in embracing it is strangely humanising to you; and also surprisingly sobering.

At a leisurely pace, mind now hollow with an echoing sorrow, you pierce the fabric and loop the needle through the gap between the strand of thread and pull, creating a knot. You do this a second time, creating another knot to make sure it stays, before you reach for the small scissors in the kit beside you, cutting the remaining thread loose.

With a soft touch you run your finger over the fabric, silently marvelling at its heavenly texture as you thoughtfully look over your finished work. The thread you’ve used isn’t as high quality as the shirt itself is made out of, a fact that actually irritates you, but it’s the best that you own and you find yourself sighing in resignation; leaving it be.

Yes, it’ll have to do.

With a lingering gaze you start to slowly turn the shirt back to being inside-in, taking your time to enjoy the quiet that’s fallen over you. It’s only as you go to straighten the shirt, holding it out in front of you and giving it a final, critical look-over, that the silence breaks and you’re startled out of your revere.

Looking toward the bedroom’s door with wide doe-eyes you are shocked to see none other than the Baptist, John Seed, himself standing at the threshold. Eyes equally as wide, but much more bemused than your own, staring at you as you internally curse your luck with a tensing jaw.

He isn’t supposed to be here...

“You know, I must admit, Deputy,” he drawls with an intriguing lilt, ocean eyes dragging over you as he leans his lithe form against the door frame with crossed arms, completely at ease despite the situation, “I never pegged you for a housewife. It makes for quite an... interesting image. Did you also happen to cook me a meal and do the laundry by chance, darling?”

His smile is mocking, sharp and cruelly delighted, and it has you flushing in a mixture of shame and restrained anger. The fact that you’ve been caught in such a position puts a nasty dent in your pride. You know how this looks: the fearsome Deputy, poster child and head of the rising Resistance, sewing; and not just sewing, but sewing the damned enemy’s – a man on your given blacklist – shirt of all things.

It’s a colossal embarrassment.

You’re also aware of what this could do to your reputation if this got out and you don’t need John Seed, the smuggest bastard around, to gloat over that. Nor do you want him making smart quips that you know he’s more than likely going to constantly torment you with now over the radio for everyone else to hear.

Life’s a living hell at the moment as it, and you don’t need something like that being added to the proverbial pile. The humiliation would kill you quicker than a piece of shrapnel from a plane crash.

“Oh shut up,” you snip, “like I’d do you the honour; and if anyone makes for an interesting image around here it’s you, unexpected as you are,” you sass lowly. “Honestly, when are you going to do us all a favour and just fuck off. Maybe you should go and play with that little toy collection of yours like a good little brother instead of harassing all of us, now that would be an interesting image.”

It’s hardly even a half-baked comeback you give him, your bite a mere brush of teeth, yet it’s still enough for his expression to turn into something testing. A tick in his jaw as his icy eyes pierce you like a needle, pinching and uncomfortable; attention grabbing in the worst way possible.

The look is near enough water off a duck’s back. If you’ve come to learn anything from your few, but nonetheless taxing interactions with the man, it's that he won’t take the risk of action unless he’s a hundred percent certain that he has you right where he wants you; where you can’t or won’t fight back.

He wants things, people and confessions alike, handed to him on a gem encrusted platter. Given to him so he can play his twisted little games and break all his new and precious little toys. Always pushing past limits and breaking you down until you can do anything else, but give him exactly what he wants. Spoiled brat.

Perhaps John isn’t as absolved of his sin, carved into his chest like a fatal warning, as he thinks he is.

Closing his eyes John kisses his teeth with a restrained annoyance that is difficult to miss. For all his talk of wrath, and how well you embody it, he puts you to shame in how well it suits him, wearing it like a second skin and parading it like a model wrapped in Prada.

“As much as I’d love to spend my free time doing things that don’t concern you or your petty Resistance, it’s a bit too late for that now, isn’t it dearest,” he hits back with a chilled, but airy quality. “After all, you’ve made yourself quite a fixture in my life as it is, and I don’t believe for a second that you’d actually want out of that.” There’s a hint of something knowing in his words that doesn’t sit right with you. “And in case you haven’t noticed, but this is my home that you’re trespassing in. I’m pretty sure you’re breaking the law actually; you hardly have a warrant after all, Deputy,” he bites, cruel and vile and so self-satisfied.

For a brief moment the twins of worry and paranoia raise their heads with salivating jaws, itching like an infection to tear into you as you suddenly start to fret over John’s motives for this back and forth; along with the simmering anger that lurks beneath the water.

The anticipation of what his next rage fuelled actions could be is rattling. You can’t tell if he’s going to laugh this all off like some sort of bad joke or straight up lunge at you with the likes of a wild animal by the end of this. He can be rather unpredictable, and it’s that unpredictability that makes him so feared throughout the Valley. It’s what makes him so dangerous.

Yet it seems you can do nothing but poke the bear lately, your own frustrations and stresses giving you a false and reckless bravado. Albeit with a soft and unthreatening tone.

“And do I look like I care? We’re at war John, I’m pretty sure anything goes; your methods have already proven that. Now, are there any other normal past-times that you want to mock me for while I’m here, or am I free to go?”

Internally you wince. That came out a lot more defeated than you intended it to be. Still, you hope he at least concedes on this petty back and forth of yours and actually lets you leave–

“I’d hardly call your level of wanton wrath ‘normal’, Deputy. Tell me, what is your total body count at the moment? How many innocent lives have you gorged yourself on in order to fuel that gluttonous soul of yours, until it’s satisfied with the carnage you leave in your wake? Don’t worry though, you’re in safe hands. I’ll be sure to give your soul a good scrubbing once I get you in my chair. Starve it out of you until you bleed across my floor...”

You don’t say anything, merely roll your eyes and gently shake your head at the flip in attitude, continuing to look and touch up the shirt in your tender hold. He’s likely lost in his own warped thoughts if the way he stares through you for moment is any consolation. However, even lost in thought, you’ve found that John is not one to keep quiet for long, and he quickly proves that notion right.

“You know,” he says suddenly, conversationally; tip of his tongue wetting his lips as he looks for all the world like he just discovered the weight of gold, “if you wanted to confess to me you could of just called. Really, you needn’t go through all this trouble just to make my life easier, darling. I could have set up a welcome party and everything for you. Pulled out the red carpet, set it all up and made it all nice and perfect, for you... just for you, Deputy.”

It doesn’t make sense to you how he can warp what strangely sounds like the most sweetest and innocent of words into something so filthy, sinful and ultimately twisted; as if whispered around a forked tongue made of false promises and sugared venom. He’s an expert at his craft, you’d give him that. Sadly though you can’t help but skim over your absent companions playful jabs and blasé observations with a newfound air of caution.

The beast of worry looks at you with a telling, razored grin.

“... Flattered,” you drawl warily.

For such a simple and plain response you don’t feel that his boyish grin – filled with an emotion that is so foreign on the sadistic and calculating man that you feel the lazy shift of fear beside the intent prickle of paranoia and worry; something self satisfying and grateful and speckled with awe – is justified.

Like the flippancy of the wind John’s expression shifts, fluidly, into an emotion akin to a played up indignation. He sharply huffs through his nose.

“You should be. I make so many exceptions for you my dear and you do nothing but repay my kindness with more bloodshed. It’s rather rude of you in fact.”

“To be fair,” you cut in with a tired glower, careful with were you step in this game of twister, “your kindness leaves much to be desired. It’s not like anything I’ve ever seen, so forgive me for misconstruing your intentions.” It’s said with the most blatant sarcasm, dripping thickly like molten tar, and yet John lights up like a town on the eve of Christmas. The remains of his coiled agitation shifting into an unwarranted giddiness.

Good Lord, you’ve not even spent five minutes with this man and already you’ve got a killer headache.

“Oh? Should I learn by your example then, my dear Deputy? From this... quaint little gesture of yours, hmm?” He’s eyes hungrily roam over your lap, no doubt acutely aware of the way your thumb has comfortingly been brushing over the silken fabric of his shirt. “Not to say I don’t appreciate it mind you.”

You can’t stop the roll of your eyes nor the huff that accompanies it. “Trust me, John, there’s no gesture here.”

He makes a sound in his throat, chimed with a badly contained mirth. Slightly, barely visible from your perch on his bed, he leans forward with something almost predatory in those sea-deep eyes of his. “Then what’s that in your lap?”

You turn to hold his gaze, icy and sharp with a smugness that screams of a known victory. He’s got you there. Your teeth grind into each other as you will for a retort to come to mind, but nothing does. With a heavy exhale through your nose you turn to the ceiling and pray for the strength to survive this ordeal.

Not that you’re completely confident that you will. With a swift flare of frustration one of your hands shoots up, palm facing skyward, in a half-arsed admission. “I don’t know. I don’t know, okay, I was just trying to be nice I guess.”

“Nice? You?” John barks mockingly, “Oh don’t make me laugh, Deputy. You’re a killer; there’s not an ounce of mercy in that tainted soul of yours. After all,” There’s a humourless chuckle, a glint of something vicious in his sea-deep eyes, “what ever happened to serve and protect?”

The look you throw him is completely disbelieving, practically aghast from insult, but there’s also a familiar rage resting within the glaring pools of your eyes that John knows rather well. Truthfully, it’s not something he’s ever seen in you before, more a muted irritation than straight up fury, and it thrills him something fierce to see it threatening to come into full bloom.

Conflict has never been in your veins. You came from a quiet and career driven family, to the point where your parents were hardly ever around. Arguments were rare, and if they did happen they never lasted long. You didn’t have the courage, nor stomach, for such things; and despite how much this County has twisted your placid instincts into something sharper, more aggressive and impatient, some things will just never change.

Lips in a tight line, brow furrowed and eyes ablaze in a dirty glare, you look away from him; down to your lap then across to your resting rifle. He’s not wrong, and ultimately that hurts worse than anything physical that he could very well do to you. The battle of your morals – your conscious – against your duty, against the pedestal that everyone has hoisted you up onto like some sort of savour – another Joseph almost – , is a constant one.

“Then what does that make you?” You ask quietly, something cruel lurking beneath the surface of your own waters. “What makes what you do so good, so much better and different than everyone else? Because you believe your brother, because he believes he talks to God?” There’s a huff of a laugh, a mocking condescension hissing with fangs bared, “don’t make me laugh, Inquisitor.”

John’s away from the door frame before you can even blink, a warning shift that tells you that this is no longer a strained, but casual banter between enemies. There’s a familiar glare in his eyes, dark and treacherous like the deepest waters and daring you to get a little closer, to swim a little deeper; to say another word against his brother.

Despite your writhing worry at the sudden tension in the air, twisting and flailing and coiling, you take a deep breath, let it suffocate you a moment too long, and then let it go. Tracing the lines and scratches on your rifle as your shaking anger lessens into a quiet ache. You’ve never been able to maintain it for long; you’re just glad that it no longer makes you break down crying anymore.

John on the other hand...

“Joseph,” he starts, voice so tight that it trembles, “wants to save people.”

“And you don’t?”

There’s a pause; a subtle shift.

You watch as John’s jaw gets tight, his head tilting the slightest amount to look down his nose at you; arms crossing over his chest in a defensive gesture as he leans back against the door frame again; a faux display of casualness.

It’s all the answer you need.

Slowly you nod your head, an acknowledgment even though you needn’t give one. A murmured ‘right’ scoffed under your breath. In all honesty you didn’t expect him to be so (indirectly) honest with you. In a way you can very much respect that, appreciate it even, but in another it only has the beast of worry grinning hauntingly at you; a new dread crawling up from the deep. It’s twin sewn from paranoia slinking up beside it with an equally telling flash of teeth.

Surely he can’t be doing this just for Joseph, just for the Project; there has to be something more that he’s gaining out of this. There has to be.

“Atonement,” the word is drawn out, a slow and delicate dissection, “is the absolution of sin… without it we are left to fester in the disease of our past transgressions. If we are not absolved of sin then we can never even begin to hope to be allowed entrance into Eden. However,” the baptist gives you a pointed look, head ducked and eyes alight but shaded, a stray strand of hair falling loose, “that decision must be genuine. They must want to atone, otherwise what would be the point?”

There’s a bitten laugh that scraps between his teeth; bared in a feral frustration that speaks of long talks and discussions that lead to nowhere but dead-ended roads. A hand claws through his hair, putting that stray strand back in place as he looks to bite at the inside of his mouth; eyes briefly cast to the side.

The afternoon sun, gradually turning richer as time goes on, catches against the satin blue of his vest, making it shimmer like the clearest of Caribbean seas. With his gaze turned away from you for the moment you can see the way the light glazes them, can see the hellfire for all it’s worth beneath those choppy waters; the rage given a flare of new life with the setting sun as the shadows stretch and consume, turning the once clear and shallow waters of his eyes deep and foreboding.

You think you may actually be starting to see some of the truths that lie within the Book of Joseph.

There’s a hesitant inhale; a steadying breath.

“But, it is the will of The Father to save everyone, regardless of if they are worthy of it or not.”

Looking away from the shirt still in your lap you turn to John, many questions on the brain, but only one that gets voiced.

“So you don’t think I’m worthy?”

John blinks. A moment of consideration before he meets your curious gaze; stars glinting against a multitude of emotions, all buried and unspoken, but telling all the same.

“I don’t think you believe yourself to be worthy.”

The bluntness of his response catches you off guard, eyebrows jumping high in surprise. It’s straight to the point in a way that you never imagined him to be, and you can’t help the interested ‘oh’ that melts on your tongue in response, lilts in newfound curiosity as your head tips to the side ever so slightly. “What makes you say that?”

You half expect a smile and some sort of jab, another dig to attempt to provoke you and prove a point that only he is fighting to prove. Yet, he does nothing of the sort. He’s quiet, simply watching you, and it’s with a strange type of realisation that you realise that, not only is he back to looking relaxed and at ease, but so are you; the tension lost and in its place lies a peculiar air, a feeling of contented melancholy almost; an accepting moment of reprieve within the wheel of fate.

“You’re still here,” he answers simply, an airy awe cushioning his tone, “if you didn’t want to be convinced then you would have left a while ago. You wouldn’t be asking me in the first place.”

There’s a tightening anxiety in your chest, a truth struck too close. Are you really that easy to read? Is your dissatisfaction and growing suspicion of the Resistance – coupled with your thirst to learn more about the local cult and its founders – really that obvious? You should hope not, such things will get you into trouble if you’re not careful. Satisfaction over discovering such things would certainly not bring you back if that were the case.

“Tell me, Deputy,” there’s a new glint in John’s eye, a new interest piqued, “what is it that you’re looking for exactly? Because whatever it is apparently can’t be found within your little Resistance, otherwise you wouldn’t be entertaining me like you are, nor would you be concerning yourself over such a touching gesture.” Surprisingly there’s a lack of sarcasm to his tone this time around as he loosely gestures toward your lap, where his shirt still lies under your gentle touch.

You suck on your tooth for second, petulantly glancing away with a quick, but weak rebuttal of, “It’s not a gesture.”

A familiar, if not slightly fonder and more teasing, lopsided smile lights up across John’s face. This strange companionship of yours back on steady waters. “If you say so, my dear.”

The warmth of the gradually setting sun is a welcome blanket at your back, the stillness between you both comfortable despite the different lines you draw and stand on in this war. Faintly you can hear the chatter and motions of the guards outside, the rumble of distant engines, but they quickly fade into the background as you genuinely consider John’s words.

Just what are you looking for?

You’re not too sure, and you don’t suppose John would appreciate such a response no matter how honest it may be. Really, if you were to be insanely honest with yourself, you would guess you are looking for a reason to stop; a reason to turn your back on those you are fighting for and not those who you are fighting against.

No matter how many times you humanise the Seeds, excuse their actions on past situations, you can’t justify what they’ve done. You may one day forgive them, when all is said and done and this whole sorry war is nothing more than a story for the grandchildren; but you could never forget the horrors they have put people through, the uncountable and unimaginable things they have done to get to where they are now; to both you and the residents of the County.

Yet, does that justify what the residents of the County have done? Does that excuse the crimes and damages conceived by the Resistance? No, no if things were even a sliver close to normal, if you were actually a proper deputy and not so damn green, then maybe everyone would of been locked behind bars by now; and you would be no exception, right beside them with blood covered hands.

The world has never looked so grey to you as it does now; and that honestly scares you worse than any cult.

“But please,” John continues after a beat, breaking the silence, “indulge me; what is it you’re after, my dear? What is it that you are really searching for?”

Absently your thumb brushes over the fabric in your lap, a heavy hesitancy causing you to take your lip between your teeth, biting at the skin there until the taste of copper hits your tongue. Eyes downcast as you debate with yourself over how honest you can be with John, how raw you’re willing to let yourself became in front of someone like him; as an enemy, as an ex-lawyer and – maybe, just maybe – as a friend.

You look up at him, see the interest and something else that you can’t quite name dancing like fireflies over a lake’s still surface. Watch as he patiently waits for you, for what you think and have to say… It’s a nice change, if not a little strange.

Without a thought you smile at him, a beam too tight that it doesn’t quite reach your eyes, a huffed laugh under your breath. “Nothing much,” you squeak, “although a decent meal would be a start.” The laugh lingers on your breath, eyebrow cocked and lips tilting into lopsided smile; an intended joke.

John looks wholly unimpressed at your bid at humour, his own eyebrow raising casually in a silent question. Surprisingly though he doesn’t say anything in response, doesn’t call you out or outright accuse you of lying, even though you both know that you just did.

Ultimately, it leaves you with a new type of uncertainty, anxiety rising once again as the smile slowly falls from your face. Still, you push past it as best you can, clearing your throat awkwardly as you decide to stand from your seat on the bed, looking and then making your way toward the set of draws on the left where you had found his discarded shirt.

You feel, but still try to ignore John’s eyes on you as you place the shirt back in (what you hope is) its original resting place, neatly folding and fitting it between others not unlike itself. Briefly you brush your fingers over the collar, savouring the uniquely expensive feel of the shirt before closing the open draw. No doubt you’ll never get an opportunity like this again. It’s a little sad in a way.

With a quiet hum you turn – back facing John – toward the bed, and with a casualness as if you own the place you start brushing down and straightening where you’d been perched on the edge of the bed, smoothing out the creases.

Admittedly, with the sudden lack of conversation, John’s silence is really starting to get to you, a familiar edge of paranoia creeping into the forefront of your mind like scavenging rodents. You listen with a keen interest as you finish your work, the rustling of fabric and your own soft breaths the only sounds that really catch your ear.

With your back facing the infamous Baptist you would have thought this would be a great opportunity for him, your more laidback and docile nature on full display for him to take advantage of if he so wished to. It really would be a perfect opportunity.

Yet, as you turn around, once more with a hum at your work, you find that John hasn’t moved from his spot in the doorway. If anything he still looks very much at ease there, completely comfortable and unconcerned as he rests his lean frame against the door, arms and legs casually crossed as he simply watches you with soft eyes; reflective pools that refuse to hide even the tiniest of emotions. Yet, strangely enough, you suddenly feel as if time is impervious to the both of you. As if there is no one else in the world, but you and John.

The sparkling sapphire of his eyes, deep and as unfathomable as the ocean, whisper in dulcet tones the promise of a loving caress within the safe haven of his gaze. An unexpected gentleness in the sorrow of a buried plea, a want for something never owned, but always craved. Such a display of tenderness, from a man that you know to be cruel and volatile at times, is so far removed from the usual turbulent seas in his eyes that it makes you feel breathless.

His face – strong defined jaw, coupled with an immaculately trimmed beard, and skin a naturally tanned hue that looks as smooth as the silk of his shirts – is not masked by barely contained snarls of rage like it often can be, nor the sharp displays of malicious mockery and petulant pleasantries that hiss between his fangs when bared. Instead he bears a freedom and fondness that has your heart racing, a strange vulnerability on his suddenly boyish features; an unfamiliar, yet not unpleasant, warmth stroking over something deep within your chest that you had feared you were starting to lose.

A thought skims across your mind, and is banished just as swiftly as it had appeared; but even so it leaves an impression that you can’t help but entertain. No matter how futile and unachievable it may be; a hopeless romantic forever at heart.

Lost in fanciful scenarios that will never come to be you don’t notice the way that John also takes you in, cataloguing every minuscule detail and committing it to memory with a keenness that rivals the amount of silver on his tongue.

With where you stand, still and serene in the heart of enemy territory, the large window of his bedroom holds proudly behind you. The fading afternoon sun casting a light pastel orange across the earth and room, beaming through the glass and haloing you in a warm and intimate glow, your form mesmerising and ethereal with how at peace you look when held within such a divinely born light.

Your eyes, typically brimming with a wrathful defiance and a gluttonous need for misguided justice, are a demure beacon that glitters like the limitless galaxies within the cosmos. A flare of hope and unconditional love, soft and reassuring, for all of those that catch a glimpse of your guiding starlight. And although he feels unworthy, tainted and irrefutably damaged as he is, John also feels unbelievably blessed to bare witness to such an otherworldly sight; to be gifted with the absolute vision that is you.

And, for a moment that never quite ends, John can’t help but question how you could be hell-incarnate when heaven touches you oh so sweetly.

There are many words John Seed would have used to describe you, none of them necessarily complimentary or flattering, yet in this shared time between the two of you – just the two of you – only one word comes to mind as he unknowingly, longingly gazes at you.

Angelic. Yes, angelic you truly are. Stunningly and perfectly angelic.

John can’t remember the last time he felt this way about anyone, if he has ever felt like this at all even, but suddenly he finds that nothing else matters to him. Not the Project, not his brothers, and not even the work that he should be doing but that he had slipped away early from, because – frankly put – he was tired. He was as fed-up with this war and the responsibilities placed upon him as he suspected his dear Deputy to be. Both falling foul to your shared sin of sloth in regards to the duties you uphold.

Yet, John at least holds direction and dedication to the work divinely placed upon him. Knows what the end game is and strives to achieve it to its fullest potential, but you? You’re wavering; you’re doubting. Straying away from the path you are on, looking into the distance for something else, all the while refusing to even acknowledge the right one. The one alongside him.

You may not say it, nor ever even admit it, but John knows exactly what it is you are looking for. Knows the evidence that you’re desperately trying to compile in order to build a strong case in favour of yourself and the choices that you’ve been making, wanting to justify yourself and the many actions that you’ve made until this point between you both in the name of your feeble Resistance. And John also knows that he and his siblings are partially to blame for that.

If it wasn’t for them, you wouldn’t have to try and stand alone for yourself in your own self made courtroom. Wouldn’t have to stand before your self-conscious as you pleaded your guiltlessness before your own guilt. But, really, that’s why you needed a lawyer; that’s why you needed him. John could help you with that, could show you a better path where you could be free of such shackles. He would stand and defend you where no one else would; he would protect you when no else could.

He just wished that you’d let him. Wished that you would just sign the contract laid out before you so he could aid you, so he could fight for you. Yet, you still refuse to bless him with the payment of his favoured word. You still refuse to acknowledge just how in debt this battle will leave you without his help. It’s a small ask, a tiny payment, for a lifetime of rightful assurance.

Yet, John wonders if maybe it’s not just the courtroom that he wants to defend you in.

In his previous life, before the Project and his reunion with Joseph, John likely wouldn’t have even paid you a second glance. You’re a bit of a Plain Jane, have a very girl-next-door sort of look about you. Yet, in the wake of this interaction, bathed in the golden hue of the setting sun, John can’t think of anyone more beautiful. So human and down to earth; lost and conflicted, yet certain and firm. You really are an oddity, and one that John finds himself genuinely wanting to learn more about.

True, he had always had an interest in you, especially when this war between you first began, but it had always been a professional interest (despite what many thought or claimed). You needed to join the Project, Joseph decreed it so, and although his interest had risen to a slightly more personal level it was still business; without you he wouldn’t be able to reach Eden. His fate was in your hands.

Yet, fate seems to want to play you both into each other’s arms, for if it didn’t then surely this sacred moment between you both wouldn’t be happening. Surely, if this wasn’t meant to happen, John wouldn’t be longing for the love that Joseph promised him – the love that only you could give him – like he suddenly and hopelessly is.

John knows where he stands in this war, it’s a fixed point that he can’t move away from even if he eventually decided that he wanted to, but really his dear Deputy is still undecided. You still have a choice to make in this divine plan; you still have time to choose. And, funnily enough, it looks as if you’ve already started to make that choice. That curiosity of yours, you being in his home – on his bed – looking so domestic, like a wife waiting for her husband… to John this is a sign, a hint, a mere taste of the future that he’s always secretly hoped and longed for. A prophecy in its own right.

Yet, as much as he wants to fight for you, to defend and cherish you, he regrettably knows that the time for such things isn’t quite here yet. It’s close, certainly within his reach, but you need to meet him the rest of the way. You need those final damning pieces of evidence before you’ll come to him. You’ll want every piece of evidence available before you’ll walk your chosen path; and although he shouldn’t interfere, John could very easily acquire such evidence for you. He could very easily make such evidence for you. A little more time, a few strings pulled and a couple of sins stripped, and he could give you everything you need and so, so much more.

The temptations of the promised future are a fruit too sweet not to savour.

Eden’s Baptist watches with a fresh interest as you sigh heavily, chest rising and falling with the action, as you start to walk towards him. John’s chest tightens, flutters under the way your sparkling eyes meet and hold his own, only a hint of uncertainty, a fleeting touch of something questioning – do you feel it too? Do you feel this like he does? – on your face before you look away, glance down like a bashful bride, and come to stand next to him.

He doesn’t move from where he’s been leaning against the door, doesn’t even dare to breathe in case this moment is blown away like ash on the wind. Yet, when nothing happens and all he can focus on is his and your own gentle breathing, he takes a gamble and swallows thickly, slowly turning his head so he can look down at you next to him, naturally pretty despite the odd scratch and speck of dried blood on your well worn clothes.

The tension is palpable between you both, not so tight that’s it choking you, but tight enough that you can certainly feel it; hear it moan like a bow dragging steadily over a cello’s strings. Although, not as ominous as one would first suspect, but more melancholy; a rich sadness. As though despite how much you might want and wish for something, it will never come to pass; a sad inevitability that you can do nothing but walk past, never to stop and consider. Or at least you shouldn’t, for only heartbreak lies down those withered and desolate roads.

Which is why you shouldn’t stop, why you shouldn’t be wanting to reach out with a tender touch, a reassurance to this greedy want of yours for something more out of this moment, for more out of this strange connection and unlikely companionship you have discovered between the two of you. You shouldn’t feel this safe when standing next to the man that wants to starve this Valley into submission. You shouldn’t feel so at ease around a man that derives a sick thrill out of torture and the power it gives him. You shouldn’t feel like you’ve finally found a home when you’re sitting on his bed with his shirt in your arms.

You can’t deny that you’re attracted to him, that there clearly is some sort of unexplainable connection between the both of you, but whatever this connection may be… it can never be explored. It can never happen. You will never side with Eden’s Gate, and even if you decide that you can no longer be with the Resistance, it’ll be for the same reason why you can’t join Joseph’s cult. Ultimately, your decision, whatever it may be, will change nothing. Just like nothing will change John’s decision.

Ruled by the cry of your heart and the attachments it’s quick to make you hesitantly lay your greedy hand upon him, turning slightly as your right hand crosses you in order to gently grip his toned arm; the familiar feel of uniquely expensive silk sliding pleasantly

against your skin.

You feel him tense under your hand, arms tightening from where they are still crossed across his chest, but you don’t blame him. Really you’re not even too sure what it is you’re doing, this will only hurt you more when you walk away from whatever this could’ve been if things were different, but you always have had a bit of a penchant for torturing yourself with things like this.

So no matter how much the ‘what if’s’ will wound you in the future you still immerse yourself in the feel of him, of the way he relaxes as your thumb brushes back and forth in a comforting gesture against his arm, the smell of his cologne naturally intermingling with his natural scent… it’s a bitter torture that already has the tears coming to your eyes, but still you stay a little longer; heart hopefully romantic even though you know better.

This – the two of you – could never work.

“Deputy…”

“You know,” you cut him off, the slightest fracture in your softened tone, “I didn’t mean what I said earlier, about your planes. They’re not toys; they’re really cool actually,” there’s a buried laugh under your breath, a small smile that speaks of a brief reminiscion, “the way you have them all set up, cataloged with their little name plates… it’s really cute. It would be super cool if you had them hanging down from the ceiling though; like, having them act out dog fights and things almost. Can you imagine it?”

You giggle there, head ducking as you get lost in thoughts and bitter imagines – helping to set them up, walking in and seeing them like that, being lifted and twirled under them like stars in the sky – that will never be.

This war has taken everything from you, has made you doubt and lose sight of who you were before. Even your dreams for the future, regardless of who they may be with, have been tarnished by the stains on your hands and the things you have been pushed into doing. How could you ever have a normal life after this? Who would want a life with you after all of this? It all seems so impossible and far too far out of reach for you now.

Although it may be cruel, your wandering thoughts and the reminder they bring is a good grounder, and in turn your smile sours; even as one blooms sweetly across John’s face, a light dusting of pink across his cheeks.

For the better, you don’t see it.

“Anyway, I better go; got a County to save and all that after all. I’ll see you around though, John,” you pause, hesitate, desperately cling to this fleeting moment that’s finally reached its end, “take care of yourself now, sweetheart. Lord knows we need to...”

With nothing else to say, that quiet piece of compassion laid out before him like a final offering, you leave; letting go of his arm with a parting squeeze and a faint caress as you pull away, walk past him and out the door until you’re eventually lost to him yet again. A weary ghost bound to forever wander the lonely battlefield.

John doesn’t follow you, doesn’t even reach out to stop you like a part of him begs him to do, and instead merely turns to watch you leave. Head down and arms wrapped comfortingly around your waist. He really should stop you, force this moment to last for as long as he can get it to, but he doesn’t; and that surprisingly hurts him, letting you go. Yet, the pain it brings only hardens him, makes his thoughts straighten and become resolute in the face of the same realisation that had dawned on him only moments before hand.

And as the sun sets over the horizon, the sky streaked in sunburnt northern lights, colours shifting like water with the flowing of time, John finally moves to sit in the same place you had been on his bed; alone and lost in thought. Reaching out to pick something up off his nightstand as he draws his elbows to rest on his spread knees. His hands cupped against his mouth and securely around your forgotten sewing kit, as he stares blankly at your abandoned rifle.

Another sign in and of itself.

Although you hadn’t been looking at him when you had left John had certainly been watching you. He had seen the way that your eyes had glistened like unsteady waters as the courtroom erupted into a debate that you felt that you couldn’t win; the choice taken from you as your morals and exploited loyalty raged and dictated the sentence you should face.

He knows you felt it, knows that there is something special between the two of you, and that it’s taken this moment between you – this one act of rebellion stemmed from your curiosity – for him to see it; for him to finally grasp the meaning behind his brother’s plea.

You were right when you had questioned him on his lack of care regarding the Atonement; how he doesn’t care to save those that don’t believe, how he doesn’t want to put in the effort for those that will only put it to waste. If their motives are not genuine then the process is entirely pointless. Although, John won’t deny that there is a certain gratification in having such control over someone. Forcing them to say yes, purely for their own survival, is not the intention, but it certainly works all the same. After all, Joseph hasn’t exactly scolded him for his methods; especially if he gets a little therapy and self management out of it.

But what of you? What do you have as an outlet, as a way to cope and make the prize all the more sweeter? Better yet, what is the prize that you’re working towards, because John certainly has his in mind, and it won’t just be the end of a cruel and uncaring society.

You’re a puppet, both in terms of your occupation and the leading role you’re now being made to fill, dancing on fraying strings. Strings that John could fully free you from, help to cut you loose, if only you would just say ‘yes’. He’d be able to properly protect and defend you then, reassure you in your choices and how the things you’ve done were never truly your own; your caring nature merely exploited by those that you were forced to associate with while under the influence of shock. The trauma brought on by that helicopter crash disorientating you and leaving you vulnerable toward their manipulative and pressurising ways.

At least if you were to say ‘yes’, John would be able to safely guard you and your surprisingly tentative character. He would be able to love and cherish you, hold you close like no other, and make it so that you would want for nothing while in his arms. He could actually keep you in his bed, smother you in the pleasure that he would gladly give you as his beloved; chain you there as he ravished you and the softness that you would offer him, that you allowed him a tantalising glimpse of.

If you said ‘yes’, then John would finally be able to secure you and your loose strings, worn and threadbare under the continued pressure of your wailing guilt, to his own tangled ones; knotting them together until they have been sewn into something new, becoming one and the same. And when that finally happens, you will be entwined around a silk too rich and blissful to be so easily frayed.

#thank god it’s over #i’m done!#I’m not sure how I feel about this still #but then again i never think highly of my work so...#john seed x reader #john seed x female deputy #john seed x deputy #john seed #fanfic #fanfiction #my writing #fc5 #far cry 5 #far cry

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pseudonimh · 5 years ago

Photo

About 24 people currently took notice and liked Honey Carver and I am BAFFLED-

And so I made another boy called Quilt because honestly making Hollow Knight Oc’s are very fun.

#mew doodles #mew speaks #hollow knight #vessel oc

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aria-i-adagio · 5 years ago

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Laughing with a Mouth of Blood

The absent moon moon leaves the night sky painfully dark. Stars prick the black sky, but perhaps more brilliant for the absence of any other significant light. I dread new moons. They only bring loneliness, a lacuna in my days that sometimes renders them as black as the sky without the moon. Asra, my teacher, says those are the best time to begin a journey, and so, those are the nights he’s most likely to leave me. He’d stayed for two months, nearly three, since he returned from his last journey - longer than usual. But this is the night of the new moon, and he’s been packing his bags since the middle of the day.

“I’ll miss you while I’m gone.” His reassurance is hollow. He’s leaving anyway, but his eyes are always sad when he goes. I still don’t understand why he continually goes off, and there’s always the nagging feeling he needs to get away from me - that I’m too much, too difficult to handle for long stretches of time. “Here. These are for you. Something to play around with while I’m gone.”

I take the small rectangular bundle from him and unwrap the silk from around it, hands suddenly shaking. Is he serious?

“Your tarot deck? Why would you leave your cards with me, Master?”

I know I’m around twenty eight, or at least, that’s what Asra’s told me. My earliest memories are from three years ago. Confusion, and pain, and Asra’s worried face. There’s not nothing before that, not exactly, but everything there is a cloud of smoke obscuring whatever came before. Since then he’s been my teacher for, well, everything, but specifically for fortune telling. While other things come to me as naturally as air entering my lungs, the meaning of the cards is something that lies somewhere outside, somewhere strange. I can read a recipe for an herbal remedy and just know the adjustments need to be made or spells need to be said to make it stronger, but understanding otherworldly things and telling fortunes - that’s Asra’s speciality. I have a old worn deck that feels more familiar in my hands and that I practice with on my own, but Asra’s is different. The hand painted cards vibrate with magic that the silken prison can’t quite control and whisper with voices anytime I take them in my hands. Sometimes those cards frighten me. “Do you actually think I’m ready to use your deck?”

He sighs and folds my fingers around the cards. “I wish you wouldn’t call me that.” I know he hates me calling him master. That might be why I did it. He tilts his head down and for a moment his fine, white hair falls over his eyes. Cherubic - that’s a good word for Asra - in both connotations, both a beautiful, whimsical youth and a fiery, many faced angel guarding the path to the tree of knowledge. “And you know that I can’t answer that question for you, Dema.”

“Why don’t we ask the cards then?” Asra never answers my questions - at least, not the important ones, the ones that I couldn’t just as easily find the answer for in a book. Maybe the deck will be more forthcoming.

The back room of the shop is set up for card readings. And, if I’m honest, equally well for the catnaps that Asra and I are both prone to taking throughout the day. It’s my favorite room in the shop and often easier for me to sleep in than the single bed upstairs. Colorful cushions - colorful, worn, embroidered, beaded, fringed, silks and velvets and quilted cottons - are piled in two of the corners, tumbling out across the floor. Lamps lit with magic are suspended over a circular table casting a warm glow on a purple velvet cloth that’s been repaired many times more than once. Tapestries cover three walls, faded in the places where the sunlight hits them in the afternoon. Shelves are build into the fourth, cluttered with knicknacks, and littered with old books that don’t actually have much to do with anything but add to an air of arcane knowledge and mystery. A crystal ball that we don’t actually use unless a customer insists on such a thing and doesn’t seem to care that we’re bullshitting our way through the fortune sits centered on one shelf refracting the lamp light.

We settle at the table, next to each other, rather than on opposite sides, shoulders amiably close. Something smooth and cool slides across my bare foot, then up my leg and into my lap, settling herself into a comforting serpentine coil. Asra’s familiar. I’ll miss her as well, maybe even a bit more than him. She’s less complicated. Her beady red snake eyes and cool body curling around me in welcome are my second earliest memory. I shuffle through the cards and find the Devil. Asra raises his eyes.

“A goat for the Capricorn new moon. Ambition, desire.” I explain as I lay the card on the center of the table.

“You have been practicing on your own, haven’t you?”

“What else am supposed to do when you’re away so much?” Well - read and drink too much and sleep too little or too much, but I don’t care to confess the second two. I turn the cards back over and shuffle them three times. I pause and take a slow, deliberate breath before laying out the first five, two just underneath the Devil card and the next three in a row beneath those.

“First card, cost of achieving ambition.” I flip over the card - the Six of Swords, reversed. “Whatever it is, I’ll have to give up looking backwards and holding to the past.” A strange card as I can look backwards all that I want but there is nothing there except flickering shadows I can’t quite make out and a hazy smoke that obscures even those.

Asra leans his elbows on the table and rests his chin on his folded hands. “And just what do you aspire to?”

I look him in the eyes and let the right side of my mouth curl into a half smile. “Are you the only one who gets to keep your own counsel?” A good enough answer, but if I’ve honest I’m not even sure what my ambitions are, but I can’t continue in this never ending loop of trying to recreate, reconstruct myself from whatever traces remain of my past.

“Second card, cost of failure.” Another reversal, this time the Queen of Wands. Upright, she would speak of place of personal integration. But reversed, she’s the sign of fractured person, lost amongst the clamoring demands of others. As Asra’s cards often do, she whispers in my mind warning of a never ending, ever nasty confusion, and the bitterness of being manipulated.

I turn over the first card on the second row. The Five of Cups, once again reversed, but in this case, not negative, even it is once again mysterious. “How to compromise.” It speaks of resilience and recovery of meaning from loss, but how am I supposed to learn from the past - past pain, past mistakes - if I can’t remember any of them?

The upright Six of Cups appears next, indicating the nature of my desire. It speaks of the past again, a longing for familiarity and the comfort of unquestioned love. I let my fingers linger on the card and go still for a moment too long. Asra, with his infuriating, one sided ability to read my mind, wraps and arm around my shoulders and pulls me close. “I’ll be back soon enough, I promise.”

Asra’s embrace is hollow when in a few minutes he’ll be leaving yet again. I shrug his arm off my shoulders and flip over the last card quickly. In this spread, the final cards speaks to what one stubborns hold onto, to their own detriment. The upright Nine of Swords appears. A mind forever turning back, turning back onto itself, onto old traumas, ever losing sight of what could be in the future. Asra’s lips are pressed together as he looks over the spread. “You have a lot at stake.”

“And letting go of the past - that repeats, but how can I let go of something that I don’t have?” Annoyed, I start stacking the cards back into the deck. They haven’t been much more help than Asra.

“They could be referencing habits, states of mind. Sometimes the absent leeches all significance from the present.”

“Tell me about it.”

When I pick up the Devil card, a second card that had been stuck to the back pulls away from it, dropping back against the surface of the table. Asra picks it up before I can and holds it out in front of us. This card has no figures, just the image of cliffs and a sun that is either rising or setting. The Fool. A card for starting, or for starting over.

“They say be brave, Dema.”

Asra holds out an empty hand, and I place the deck in it. He sets the Devil card aside and then rapidly shuffles the deck with perfect, practiced motions before laying out five cards, the same spread as before. He turns them over without narration, pausing only briefly between each card: Knight of Swords, reversed; Five of Swords, upright; Four of Cups, upright; Two of Cups, upright; and finally the Magician, reversed. As with the cards I pulled, a theme runs through the cards that Asra has dealt for himself. Dangerous impulses. Ambiguity of whether a battle was lost or won. They speak to the danger of isolation from others and the need to let go of tightly held control. The reversed Magician at the end integrates the rest of the reading. Whatever end Asra desires, his willpower alone will not be enough to obtain it. Not this time.

He leans over the table, drumming his fingers against the Magician. For a moment, the rhythm of his fingers against the table obscures the sound of someone rapping at the door. The knocks become louder, more insistent. A customer at this hour? We both look up from the cards and at each other. Asra takes my hands in his. “I better leave.” He presses a kiss to my forehead. Fond - or, at least, I’d like to think so. “Try to stay out of trouble while I’m gone.” The rapping at the door continues as he drapes Faust around his neck and takes his hat down from a hook by the door. And then he’s gone, and I am left with his cards and a growing sense of dis-ease. The Four of Cups draws my attention. Asra’s deck is abstract - an iridescent fish with three dark cups beneath and a golden cup above, but the traditional cards depict a youth mourning three cups that have overturned before him, while ignoring the fourth full cup that an outside hand offers him. And the Two of Cups placed in the position of the need underlying Asra’s goals is ironic; his actions are forever fighting any real emotional intimacy with another.

The knocking on the door continues, growing quicker and more obstinate with each moment I ignore it. I walk back to the front of the shop and open the door, ready to tell whoever was there that it was past midnight, we were by no means open, and they could kindly fuck off. The woman at the door - tall, head wrapped in an elegant silk scarf - pushes past me and into the shop without waiting for an invitation.

“Are you the cardreader? I will not suffer another sleepless night.”

Her voice is haughty, but there’s a nervous energy in how she moves her hands, twisting about each other, as jewel encrusted bracelets jangle. A wealthy woman who expects her demands to be met, whether they’re reasonable or unreasonable, and regardless of the burdens they may place on others. But I’m familiar - too familiar - with restlessness like that without knowing a way to cure it. If she wants someone to find a way to help her sleep she has not come to the right place.

“I … um, I …”

“You must read the cards for me. You. Your reputation precedes you.” She unwinds the scarf from about her head revealing an elegant face, all clean lines and red eyes with an imperious look to them that convinces me that telling her no is simply not a viable option, and I lack the energy to try anyway.

I beckon her to the back room. She follows and takes one of the seats, her immaculate silk gown contrasting with our worn furnishings. Asra’s cards are still on the table. I sit opposite of the woman and begin to gather them up.

“What question do you have?”

“Do you not already know?”

I shrug and take the Devil card back out of the deck, replacing it at the center of the table. I don’t feel like deciding on a different spread to use. Her eyes flick to mine with something akin to surprise. “The Devil?”

“It’s the new moon in Capricorn. The Devil represents goals, ambitions, and the lengths we’ll go to for their sake. Unless you have a more specific question about what bedevils you?”

She shakes her head. I shuffle the cards together once, then push them across the table for her to cut. “Into three.”

She leans over the table, and errant locks of luxuriant purple hair fall around her face. Once she cuts the deck, her hands hover over the cards before settling on one of the piles. I pick it up and deal the cards out.

“These first two cards indicate what you will have to give up in order to achieve what it is you seek and the dangers if you fail.” I turn them over for her: the Five of Cups and the Emperor, both reversed. She glances at the cards and then looks back up at me.

“Well?”

I close my eyes and let my mind drift. The words come to me almost automatically. “You’re lost contact with your home and those who truly care about you. If you want to succeed, you’ll have to let go your self pity and the slights you perceive. If you don’t, you risk becoming a tyrant, exerting power other others for no reason other than to indulge your ego.”

“Is that so?”

I open my eyes and meet her gaze, daring her to argue with me. “There’s no is, my lady, only might be.” She lowers her eyebrows in annoyance and then nods for me to continue. “The next row suggests the way to proceed.” I turn over the upright Five of Wands. The words come to me quickly, more abrupt than usual. “It’s necessary for you to learn to compromise with those you have been in competition with in order to achieve your goals. But be wary of confusing your friends and your adversaries.”

“And what does the next card speak to?”

“What it is you truly desire.” I turn over the Six of Wands. “You what success and public recognition, but the shadow side of your ego remains. Make sure your acts serve others as well as yourself.” The woman touches a finger to her chin, contemplating the cards in front of her. I pause, but she doesn’t ask me any further questions. “Shall I turn the last card?”

She nods. The final card reveals itself as the reversed High Priestess. Before I can speak, the woman trails her fingers lightly over the surface of the card. “She was always my favorite.”

“A powerful card.”

“What does she have to say to me now?”

I close my eyes, the words don’t come as easily as the past two, but eventually the whispers reach my ear. “You’re currently in a state of confusion, but if you listen to your deepest self, you already know the answers that you seek.”

“Is that so?” The woman holds up a hand. “Say no more.” She stands and walks out of the reading room. I follow her back to the front of the shop. She starts to wind the scarf back around her face, then pauses and gives me a considering look. “Your fortunes are not so different from others, yet there is something about you that piques my interest. I have a proposal for you.”

“Proposal?”

“Don’t be nervous. I require little of you. Be my guest at the Palace for a short while.”

“The Palace?”

“Ah, you did not recognize me. That is … intriguing. I am Nadia Satrinava, Countess of Vesuvia. Come. You will be afforded every luxury, of course. I ask only that you bring your skill with the cards. And your honest interpretation of them. I have need of assistance. To solve the mystery of my late husband’s murder.”

The Countess - that explains her manner, and why I didn’t recognize her. Nadia Satrinava had been a notable recluse in the three years since her husband was murdered. The city had continued in her absence, but only haphazardly. Multiple rumors about her traveled through the network of tea houses and coffee shops: she was a frivolous lush, a tyrant growing fat on the city taxes, a witch who bathed in the blood of her maidservants. One statement, however, remained consistent. Nadia Satrinava despises magicians and fortune tellers. What possible purpose could one like her have for me?

“I -” When I open my mouth, I feel a nudge within me, much like when I hear the cards speak. Consciously, I can’t think of a good reason to agree, or a good reason to decline. Might as well allow my subconscious the deciding vote. “I accept.”

“I am pleased. Until tomorrow.” She gives me the kind of indulgent smile that I usually save for stray animals and steps out of my shop, climbing into an ornate carriage and leaving me in what for a moment feels like dust and ashes.

I close the door behind her, wondering why I had agreed to her proposal and what would happen if I simply didn’t go to the Palace. The spectacle of her arrival and demands - a demonstration of wealth and privilege - gnawed at me. Down here amongst the hoi polloi, we have more respect for each other’s time and sleep. Still, a part of me was legitimately intrigued, and another knew that it would be sensible not to let myself get bored while Asra was gone, but a third part of me - whiny and indulgent - really just wanted to lose myself in a book and a few bottles of red wine for the next week or so. Use the time without Asra around to make me do things like adhere to a relatively set sleep schedule for some try again at allowing my inner demons to go into combat with themselves. Not that the strategy had yet produced the desired effect of the demons destroying each other.

A voice interrupts my musings.

“Strange hours for a shop to keep.”

I jump, and my eyes dart around the shop, peering into the dancing shadows created by the hanging lamps.

“Behind you.”

I turn. A figure, easily taller than I am by a foot and change, leans against the back counter of the store, wearing a beaked mask, bone white, red glass in the place of eyes. A high pitched ringing builds in my ears, and my heart pounds in a chest that feels as though it is shrinking by the moment and. My toes have become roots, sunk into the floor, holding me in place. The ringing in my ears swells to a peak, and - suddenly - I collect myself enough to dart for the back room. A door leads out into the yard a chance at to escape. Escape this time.

The figure catches me about the waist. I flail wildly, landing a kick, and the beaked figure drops me with a grunt. I hit the floor hard, rolling and knocking my head against the door frame.

He peels off his mask and holds out a placating hand. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you. At least, not that much. How - how badly did you hit your head?” He kneels down and leans over me. Under the mask, his face is pale and angular, one dove gray eye and the other covered by a patch. He’d be handsome - perhaps - if he got a few good meals and a bit of sleep into him. He extends his hand toward me again as if to push back the hair that has fallen into my face. Some distant part of me wants to let him. Instead, I curl my upper lip into a snarl and glare at him. The asshole shouldn’t go breaking into people’s shops - especially not wearing one of those masks. He sits back on his heels, looking stymied.

“Look, I only want to know where your master is, and I’ll leave you alone. My sources say this is the witch’s lair these days.”

I push myself up on my elbows. The room spins around me as I do, and I close my eyes, leaning back against the doorframe, silently cursing the man and the rest of this night. “Why should I tell you anything?”

“Protective of him?” He laughs, tries to at least, but it sounds like he heard that particular joke way too often to still find it funny. “You shouldn’t be. He takes what he needs and leaves you to rot if it suits him.”

I shake my head. Mistake. Even with my eyes closed I feel like I’m underwater and can’t find the surface. “Asra’s not like that.” Shouldn’t have used his name, and I can hear the s and the r slurring together as I do.

“Oh hell, either you’ve been drinking, or you did hit your head hard. Listen, I know you don’t trust me - and you shouldn’t trust me - but I’d, um, feel a lot better if you’d let me see how badly you’re hurt.” His hand pushes my hair out of my face. I don’t move to fight him off. His touch is gentle; I don’t think he has any intention of hurting me, at least not any further. Besides, my mind is moving too slowly to recall any defensive or offensive (or really any) spells. “Damn. That is a bump. Really, I’m really sorry about that.” There’s a rustling of fabric and his hand returns to the side of my face, bare skin this time, warm for a moment and then flaring icy cold. As the cold fades, so does the ache in my head, the ringing in my ears, and the general disorientation.

I open my eyes and slowly rise to my feet, holding tight to the door frame as I do. Grabbing the doorframe wasn’t necessary though; any effects of hitting my head are gone. The man crouches at my feet, pulling a glove back over his left hand. He looks up at me and grins, auburn hair falling around his face in waves, a long-limbed gargoyle with a single kind eye. “Feel better, my dear?”

“Yes. Now go.”

“Ah ah.” He puts a hand on the counter and uses it to pull himself upright, wavering a bit on his feet before he finds his balance. “I’d still like to know where the witch is.”

“Wouldn’t we all?” I can’t kept the bitterness out of my voice. The man raises his eyebrows at me in surprise. “I’d like for you to leave now.”

“Hmm. Maybe we should ask your cards.” He pushes past me into the reading room, clearly familiar with the layout of the shop, and sprawls in a chair that is too small for him, long legs extended on both sides of the table. “He’s redecorated a bit. That creepy skull is gone.”

Presumptuous bastard. “There’s not a magic I know of that’s powerful enough to find Asra when he doesn’t want to be found.”

He shrugs and loosens the collar of his jacket. “Maybe they can answer questions the witch wouldn’t anyway?”

“If I do a reading, will you go away?”

He turns in his seat and smiles at me. “Promise.” He winks as well, but with the eye patch the expression doesn’t exactly work. “So tell me, shopkeep, what do your cards know about the things I seek?”

With a sigh, I sit down across from him and shuffle the cards. Another unwelcome guest with an unspecified question about some vague plan. It’s a new moon in Capricorn indeed. Besides, that spread seemed to be at least relatively forthcoming tonight. Again leaving the Devil at the center, I deal the cards on the table between us and and tap my fingers against the two in the top row. Something tells me I should make him flip the cards himself instead of waiting on another to hand his fate to him.

The Page of Wands, reversed and the Eight of Swords, upright - the cards are particularly coherent this evening. “Whatever it is you came to ask about, you need to quit wavering between your options and make a decision, things may turn out better than you think, especially if your intentions are pure.”

“Oh, it’s very rare that my intentions are pure.” He smirks at me, and I glare at him. A quiet voice inside me - not the cards, something else - wants to argue with him, to tell him to quit hiding behind flippant comments, but I quash it. I don’t recall ever having seen him before. What do I know of his intentions?

“And failure to act won’t save you. It will only leave you trapped in a prison of your making, a victim of no one and nothing except yourself.”

“What do the other cards mean?” He pinches the bridge of his nose with his left hand and shakes his head. Does he have the beginnings of a headache? It would be only fair. He’s certainly been enough of one. But still, those aren’t the cards if a happy man. I touch the back of his right hand in a gesture of sympathy that surprises me at least as much as it does him.

“They’re intended to help you understand how you might change, why you want to, and what holds you back.”

He looks me in the eye as he turns the card over, and I can see nervousness of his face. Not a good night, not for any of us. We look down together and see a familiar - all too familiar face. Death.

“Death. Ha. Death cast her gaze on this poor wretch and turned away. She has no interest in an abomination like me.”

Abomination? That’s an interesting noun to apply to one’s self. “Don’t be so quick with your interpretation. The cards aren’t literal. Death symbolizes many things.” I pause and let my fingers hover over the card. When I close my eyes, the symbol on Death’s standard from the traditional deck comes to mind. A five pointed rose, a symbol of the eternal processing of rebirth, life spilt forth from an ever flowing fountain. And beyond that, an ambiguous sun on the horizon. Rising or setting is a matter of perspective, but here, I feel that the rays of light are creeping toward dawn. “Resurrection is the other side of Death. You have a chance to redeem what has been lost in the past. If you’re willing.”

The man gives me an odd look. Underneath my fingers, his right hand turns over - unconsciously, I suspect - and his fingers curve ever so slightly around mine. “Some things are not so easily redeemed.”

“Who said anything about easy? Go ahead, turn the next one.”

The Four of Wands, upright. “Harmony, balance. You seek a end to the conflict within you, but -” The other cards are still whispering, tempering this one’s relative felicity. “That’s something that you must choose for yourself, even if you are surrounded by others. Yet, unless you’re willing to take their hands you’ll still be trapped on your own.” I pause and watch the subtle changes in his expression: the barest hint of an eyebrow raising in curiosity and then settling back into a stubborn frown.

“And the last?” He turns over the final card: the Hanged Man, reversed.

“He reiterates what the Page said. You’ve contemplated for too long without making a choice. And -” I tighten my fingers around his. “While your concern for others can be good, it also leads you reject what they would offer when it would save you all.”

“Hmm.” He touches a finger to his chin and looks at me, an odd expression on his face. “Have we met before? No, surely I’d -” His voice trails off, and he stands and straightens the lapels of his coat. Intrigued by his response, I follow him out to the main room. “Listen, shopkeep, the witch, he’s taught you his tricks, maybe he even cares about you. But, when he returns, seek me out. He’s far more dangerous than you know.”

“I don’t even know who you are.”

He bends to pick his mask out of the floor. I shudder as his movement reminds me of its presence, a visceral twisting, deep in the pit of my stomach. Stepping back and to the side, I put the counter between me and the hideous, awful thing. He gives me an odd look, then tucks the mask under his overcoat instead of putting it back on. “Julian. You can call me Julian.” He pushes open the door to let himself out and looks back over his shoulder. “I really am sorry that I scared you so, my dear.”

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