#light browns that remind you of marbles in the sunlight

[dropkicks]

can't believe i ever let people convince me brown eyes weren't beautiful

[thefandomthings]

𝐒mall 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐝𝐨 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐇𝐢𝐦

𝐏𝐚𝐢𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠: The Older Brothers (Separate) x Gn!reader

𝐖𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬: A little, like smidge suggestive, smidge of possessiveness

𝐍𝐨𝐭𝐞𝐬: I apologize if the brothers are Ooc, and for any mistakes

Part 1 Part 2

Do not copy, or repost my work

Lucifer is a busy demon

You never fail to notice the irritation he has when he wakes up and has to make coffee, it takes time off of his schedule for the day.

So, you made a plan to wake up before he did and make him a fresh cup of coffee and go back to bed before he comes into the kitchen

Lucifer was delighted and much happier throughout the day when we wakes up to the strong smell of his coffee

But eventually his curiosity gets the best of him.

Who has been making his coffee for him, and who knows him well enough to make sure there is enough for 3 cups?

He has a strong idea who it is once he realizes you are harder to get up in the morning since the mystery coffee started.

Lucifer decides to catch you in the act, to answer his suspicions and thank you

The Devildom is still dark, clouds blocking out any sunlight from the human and celestial realm. It's around 6 in the morning, your bare feet are cold against the long hallways of the house of lamentation.

The house is getting colder as the seasons pass, your having to wear a sweater or a robe when you wake up in the early mornings. Maybe you should mention to Lucifer that he should think about turning on the heaters at night.

Your rub your eyes triedly when walking into the kitchen. Flipping on the light above the stove, you turned the coffee maker on, the small bulbs lighting up the darker area. You reached above the coffee pot and dug out a paper filter and the ground coffee.

Once you cleaned out the pot, you set it in the maker. You opened the package of filters and put on it along with the ground coffee beans. The smell is strong, almost enough to make your eyes water.

Lucifer likes his coffee black and some water to thin it out. It reminds you of your father, he likes his coffee the same way. You smile fondly of the thought of your dad.

Your body tenses when the coffee makers makes a rumbling sound as it begins the process of making the coffee.

You lean against the counter and watch the steam flow out any open space, the brown liquid pouring into the glass pot. You felt your soul leave you body when the kitchen lights flicked on.

Lucifer, in all his glory, stood at the entrance of the kitchen. Sleep still visible in his tired eyes, his hair slightly sticking up, his silk PJs wrinkled and sticking to his robe. You blush at the sight.

"MC" His voice is groggy and dry, but he had a small, kind smile on his face. "Hi Luci" You make sure to stay quiet, not wanting to wake anyone else up.

"So it has been you? Waking up at such early hours just to please me?" His voice is low and teasing but there is genuine happiness in his voice.

"Yes, I noticed you got irritated and it took a lot of time out of your day to make it" You explained, pressing your palms against the cold, marble countertop.

Lucifer hummed and walked over to you, his slipper gently hitting the hardwood floor. His ruby eyes never leaving you, his smile never fading.

When he got to you he brought you into a hug, his hand in your hair his other around your waist and shoulders. You smiled and wrapped your arms around him, hooking themselves under his arms and resting on his shoulder blades.

Your cheek pressed against his toned chest, your eyes closed as you and him begin to sway. His head rested on yours while he held you close. His chest vibrated as he started humming, it's faint and quiet; only you and him are able to hear it.

Lucifer never has or had someone to care for him in such a little way, but it effects him so deeply he can't help but fall more in love with you.

You have such a kind soul, he had sensed it ever since you arrived. He doesn't know what he did to deserve you, but he is eternally grateful.

I truly believe The Great Mammon, is forgetful af.

He is always leaving something he needs behind.

Like his sunglasses, his favorite necklace, his favorite pair of earrings, even his car keys, or his favorite powdered foundation for modeling sessions.

The list goes on and on.

You noticed his forgetful habit before you even started dating him.

You constantly reminded him, a few or more times before he left the house but he always manages to leave something behind.

While you and the boy's were out at the mall one day, you decided to get him something to keep all of his things in.

A purse was a little to girly and he'd probably be embarrassed to carry it around, tho yk he would try just for you.

A wallet was to small to hold his car keys and foundation.

Plus, he already has a gold wallet he kept with him everywhere he went, even in his sleep.

Then you found it, the perfect thing just for your Mammon.

You just so happen to find it in Bath & Body works. The small black bag was perfect. It was big enough to hold his car keys and anything on the bigger side, but also had smaller pockets for jewelry and extra grim.

You couldn't help but smile, your chest buzzing with joy. You grabbed the bag and stepped in line. The line was long, all the demons are impatient, big or small. Always grumbling under their breath.

You always felt uncomfortable around all of them, especially when you didn't have one of the brothers with you. They despise you for being human, they think it's fun to pick and make fun of you. For literally anything under the dark sky of the Devildom.

You've learned to ignore it, one of the brothers or you handsome boyfriend usually scares the shit out of them anyway, but when it's just yourself your are a little more vigilant.

"Hi, this all for Ya?" The cashier was faux friendly, of course. Her name badge crooked and her hair was unneat and definitely unkept.

"Yes" You handed her the bag and got out the credit card Lucifer and Mammon had made for you an only you.

She gave you the biggest side eyes you've ever received. The card is black and gold, the royal stamp in the middle of it. A sparkly Gold outlining the edges making a pattern towards the marking on the back. The mark of the greedy, you and Mammon's pact mark.

You knew he would know once you mad a purchase. His pact mark stinging as you got greedy when buying something, a courtesy of having the bond with the Avatar of greed. Always craving something more, always wanting and needing it. The items would shine and beckon you in, temptation tugging at you.

You swallowed the thought of buying the whole store and quickly left. You could feel the greed seeping into your soul.

"Oi! MC!" Mammon's voice quickly brought you out of your tempting thoughts. You watched him jog towards you, his limba ring glowing a beautiful gold.

"Hi Mams" You said breathlessly, your own eyes shining a bright yellow. Mammon's face flushed, his pact mark stinging into his skin. But it felt so good when it did, he need it to sting more, to watch you get greedy infront of him or, even better, for him.

"I got you something" You smile so softly, it brings him to his knees.

"O-Of course you got the Great Mammon something, who wouldn't?" He grinned and curiously watched you hand him the white and blue plastic bag.

Mammon's face was bright red, his hands reached into the shopping bag and took out his gift. His eyes shines with happiness, a bright smile engulfing his beautiful face.

"I got it to hold the things your forgetting all the time, you just put it in there so it's all together" You explained holding into his free hand and swinging it back in forth.

Mammon wanted to cry. You are so perfect. So kind, so sweet to him. His perfect human. All to himself.

He brought you into a bone crushing hug, the bag you got him he held tightly in his hands. You giggled and hugged him back, running your fingers along his spine and shoulders.

Mammon made sure to always keep the bag with him, a small picture of you and him tucked away in his wallet and that bag. He also spoiled the shit outta you at the mall that day.

Levi is probably the second most untidy out of his brothers, next to Mammon.

Games all over the floor near his tv, his dirty clothes basket overflowing with clothes, his blankets unwashed.

Its just a mess.

And I picture you as sort of a neat freak some days, you don't mind the mess it's just not and organized mess?

Levi is embarrassed about his room and he does try to make a mental note to keep it cleaner for when your around but he forgets. To engrossed by his games to remember.

You know he trys to remember to clean it but, Levi can't help himself when all of his gaming friends are playing in he's not

He is the Avatar of Envy after all.

So while he games and you are just hanging out in his room, you decide to pick up his cave.

But only behind him so he can't see, Levi doesn't really notice nor does he hear it, his headset on all the way.

He does notice after you are gone how his room feels cleaner, bigger. Maybe it was just your calming presences.

You do this quite often, and you even clean up his games on the floor when he's at a student council meeting.

DO NOT ENTER

The sign on your boyfriends door reads. You are surprised Levi gave you permission to go into his room without him there. It make you smile knowing that he trusts you enough.

It's almost and intimate thing. His room is his safe space, where he can be himself and not be bothered by his brothers. Where he can watch all of his shows without being teased. Where he can cosplay all of his favorite characters and daydream of what they'd be like in person.

You find all of this adorable, it's what makes Levi, Levi.

When you are inside his room, Your are hesitant in cleaning up his gaming space, that is almost sacred. So you decide to leave it be untill you ask his permission. But his room is starting to smell from Levi's dirty clothes that continues to pile up against the wall.

You begin by separating his nice clothes form his everyday clothes, those go to the dry cleaners on Tuesday. The rest go into your laundry basket and down to the laundry room.

You hope the meeting will be and extra bit longer today, so you could be in and out before Levi and the brothers get home. If Lucifer found out you were the one doing his laundry and picking up his room, he'd hang you and Levi off the roof like Mammon.

You have your headphones on, one ear isn't covered so you could hear the loud stomping of the boys when they get home. You start humming with the song that rings into you ears, your head bobbing with the beat.

You carry down a load of Levi's laundry. You get the washer ready and start it, his shirts getting wet as the washer fills with water. You bring the rest of his shirts and his socks and put them into the second washer, that sits underneath the first one. With 8 people living in one house you have to have more than one washer and dryer.

While his clothes are washing, you decide to clean around his bed and dust things off. Henry, you and Levi's adopted son, watches out of his fish tank. You lift things up and dust underneath them but set them right where they once were.

After dusting, you clean up all the trash around his tub and put it in his little Ruri trash can next to his night stand. You check all the wrappers to make sure they don't have anything Levi would like on them before throwing them away.

You fail to notice your headphones slipping onto your uncovered ear. But you continued on with making his Tub the most comfortable it could be. His Ruri pillow directly where he likes it.

Being so occupied in your own little world and the music blasting in you ears, you didn't hear the heard of elephants coming up the stairs and Levi opening his bedroom door.

Levi watched you with a dark blush on his face. How you finished making his tub the way he likes it, the way you folded his clothes and set them neatly in his dresser. And all with a small smile on your face.

"Uh, MC." Levi finally spoke, his hands in his jacket pocket. When you didn't answer he saw you had headphones on. He knows you weren't purposely ignoring him, but he felt envy creeping up on him.

He knew he had to thank you in some way, but his anxiety spikes at the thought, his envy washing away. He decided on the just hugging you from behind, but he didn't want to scare you.

Levi slowly tapped your shoulder, you could feel someone in the room with you but you choose to ignore it. You have a very good idea who it is now. You slip your headphones off and see Levi's pale hand on your shoulder.

"Hi Levi" Your voice was so quiet and calming, you weren't surprised at all. His face was tinted a cute pink, his ears red.

"MC, Can...Can you stay turned that way?" He requested. You nodded and faced away from him.

A few seconds later you felt his slim arms around your waist, his head laying against your neck and shoulders. His breathing was fast, and his heartbeat was quick. You smiled and layed your hands over his.

"Thank you"

You almost missed it, his voice so quiet, his chest rumbled against you as he spoke. You smiled and leaned back against him.

This was Levi's way of saying thank you and showing affection You couldn't be more proud of him. He is slowly getting over his shyness and Tsuendere attitude. But You wouldn't have it any other way.

[moneypowerglorymiddleofmiami]

— make do. (of seas and torment entry)

summary: you suppose fencing in a frock isn't all that different from playing roughly as children.

pairing: luke castellan x daughter of poseidon!reader

warnings: mayhaps inaccurate fencing descriptions, unresolved sexual tension

of seas and torment, to vex a viscount

⚔°⋆.ೃ࿔*:･

You watched with passive interest as Luke’s hands toiled on the blade of the sword. The piece of fabric sheathed in between his fingers hugged the blunt edge of the steel as he moved in patterns of ups and downs.

“I admit, I much prefer sword fighting to fencing, but I suppose we shall have to make do.” You disrupted the steady flow of silence between the both of you. The lack of rancor in your interactions these days was truly disconcerting.

Luke merely turned to you, as if he’d already expected you to speak. The morning sunlight peeked through the branches and boughs of the trees behind him. His eyes turned into an ethereal shade of brown, the muscles of his forearms and fingers rippled underneath the illuminated heat, the curve of his nose and the dips upon his cheeks looked as if they were chiseled from marble. You surmised, as he stood bathed in the light, that he looked like a god. You had half the mind to turn away for fear of damnation.

“Are you suggesting I fight against you?” He asked. He cocked his hip to one side. He turned the sword clasped within his palm to inspect his work. You squinted as the metal glared because of the sun.

“It would seem so, yes.” You replied dryly. You stood up from your seat on the bench, the skirts of your frock faling beneath you and onto the grass. You perused the selection of weapons on the table as you walked closer, hand already extended to pick your choice.

“I think not.” He snapped. “I do not wish to hurt you.”

You scoffed. You toyed with the hilt of your chosen sword, and studied the feel of it in your hand. “We played roughly as children. I do not see how this is any different.”

“We were children.” He said matter-of-factly, as if that would explain his hesitance.

“And what could have possibly happened within the past few years to disallow a benign game between two friends?” You rolled your eyes. You grinned at him. “The only change to note is the obvious superiority of my swordsmanship to yours.”

“I have my doubts on the matter.” He replied passively as he turned around to tidy his supplies. You pushed the tip of your sabre against his back; the fabric of his jacket creased due to the pressure. Luke paused in his movements.

He turned to his side. “You are wearing a dress.”

“We both know that is of no issue.” You sniffed dismissively before you retracted your assault.

“It is highly improper.” He reasoned, though you were certain he knew it was a futile attempt.

“You’re stalling, my lord.” You laughed. Your voice tinkled higher near the end, his title slipping out of your mouth more teasing than respectful. “I’m beginning to think you do not know how to wield a sword at all.”

“Preposterous.” He murmured underneath his breath. He proceeds to aggressively pull on a padded glove onto his palm, his glare directed solely at you.

“Honor me as you would a real opponent.” You reminded him.

“You have my word.” Luke replied. Provoking him was all part of your plan, after all; it was the only way to ensure that he played harshly.

“En garde.” You remarked as the both of you crouched down to the proper beginning posture. Your blades met in the middle.

You tapped your blade against his as you shifted towards and away from each other in miniscule steps. After mere seconds, you lunged forward. He blocked your attack with a tilt of his sword. You continued with your offense— hit after hit directed towards his direction.

“I thought you were supposed to be skilled at this.” You teased him. Your breaths turned heavier with each moment of exertion.

“We’ve barely begun, Jackson.” He tutted. You smiled at the deliberate use of your surname, the gesture oddly brought back a semblance of familiarity that was hidden away when he left.

“But you're the one backed against the tree.” You responded with a mocking pout. He moved forward to attack you from beneath; you raised an eyebrow as you deflected.

“Truly unfortunate.” He remarked disinterestedly.

“You don’t seem the least bit vexed.” You squinted your eyes. You rounded your sword against his.

“It might come as a surprise to you, but not everything you do begets a reaction from me.” He replied with an amused smirk. The corner of his lips tilted up in a boyish, self-satisfied little grin.

“That, I shall never concede to.” You shook your head, your own grin matching his.

Luke swung his sword overhead. The metal whispered as it moved against the wind, following a circular pattern before arching. The sudden veer surprised you, and before you knew it, the tip of his blade landed right against your chest.

“Fair play.” He winked.

You huffed. His sword was still pressed against your skin, yet his attention was elsewhere. His pupils were blown wide as he stared at something else upon your person. You followed his line of sight— his gaze was intent on the beads of sweat that trickled down from your jaw to your decolletage. You blushed crimson.

You stepped away from him. Luke turned away.

You pulled out a handkerchief from your reticule to relieve your skin of its dampness. You concealed your smile.

[straykidshoe]

You're so pretty

PAIRINGS: Seo Changbin x Fem!Reader

GENRE: Mature (Smut)

MUSIC: Collide (Feat. Tyga) by Justine Skye

CONTAINS: Established relationship, shy!reader

SMUT WARNINGS: Thigh fucking, shower sex, groping, soft!changbin. Please message me if i misseed anything.

WORD COUNT: 1,530

A/N: For all of my shy girlies out there <3 hope you all like it!

You woke up later than usual- the mid morning sunlight streamed in through your sheer curtains, casting your window patterns onto your white sheets. Your spine tightened as you rolled over, searching for the familiar comfort that would normally be next to you, haphazardly tangled between the duvet- his chest rising and falling gently, letting you snuggle into his shoulder. Sitting up, you rested your chest on your bent knees- as you rubbed the sleep away from your eyes you scanned the room; missing the usual warm body that would’ve pulled you back to bed, lulling you back into a deep sleep.

You noticed how you were completely bare underneath the blanket, fresh memories of the night before flashing in your mind. You could feel your skin tingling as you remembered more and more- his skin against yours, him on his knees in front of you, dirty things whispered against your neck and ear. What a way to start the morning. 

You glanced over to the nightstand opposite you, noticing a neon yellow in your peripheral. Stretching over, you read the note whilst sipping on the water that was left next to it,

‘Tried to wake you up, didn’t work. I have a bruise to prove it. 

I’ll be back soon. Breakfast is outside. Try not to miss me too much.

P.S: I can still taste you on my lips.’

Goosebumps erupted on your skin, your nipples getting harder from the heightened sensitivity, shivering slightly as you looked around your room before pushing up and slipping on one of Changbins shirts along with a fresh pair of underwear. Stumbling out of your bedroom, you plodded your way to the kitchen- cringing at the loud slapping noise that echoed in the empty apartment. You felt yourself light up as you saw your favourite, toaster waffles with chocolate spread- you reminded yourself to thank your boyfriend later. Once you had finished your breakfast, you cleaned the house, brushed your teeth and hopped into the shower. 

The hot water cascaded down from the large waterfall shower head above as you scrubbed at your soft skin with a washcloth- the bubbles frothing with the friction. The small speaker you had set up in the bathroom played a random song from your playlist, humming as you swayed your naked hips to the beat.

The velvety vocals bounced off the marble walls, echoing around you- aiding the large man who was currently sneaking into the room. Suddenly, you felt two large hands encircling your waist- gasping out you twisted around in their grip, relaxing your face when you saw your boyfriends smiling face gazing down at you, ‘Babe! What are you doing?’ feeling your face go red, you hold your sudsy hands up against your exposed breasts. 

Changbin gently removed your hands- holding them in his large palms, ‘I felt lonely at work.. So i’m here’ he kissed the tip of your nose, laughing when you tried to look anywhere but his exposed torso. Your tongue went dry, five months of dating him and still- he manages to turn you into putty. Granted it was pretty easy, but that’s besides the point, ‘You left a few hours ago..’ you mumbled, fiddling with his fingers.

He was aware of your shy personality, finding your stuttering and avoidant nature adorable, ‘Should I go then?’ he questioned, a teasing lilt to his voice. Finally looking up, you met his large brown eyes, ‘N-no, it’s fine..’ chuckling to himself, he bent down and kissed your lips, making you even more flustered- your blood turned to lava, heating up all the pathways within you. 

The soft caress of his tongue made you weak it the knees, feeling your pulse dangerously escalate spurred him on- you felt his cock getting hard against your thigh. Panicking slightly, you pulled away- returning your gaze down to the shower floor you stepped out of the water, giving him space to soak himself in the warm downpour. He smiled softly, keeping his hands firmly planted on your hips, running his thumb up and down on the soft patch of skin. 

‘Help me?’ he asked, placing your coconut body wash bottle in your palm, with shaky fingers you squeezed out a generous amount of the thick liquid into your cupped hand. Taking a steadying breath in, you started at his neck, gently massaging the fragrant cleanser into his skin. You tried to meet his eyes that were staring down at you.

‘Stop looking at me like that..’ you grumbled, moving your hands down to his wide shoulders,

‘Like what, baby?’ Finally finishing his left arm, you moved onto the right.

‘Like you want to eat me.’ He laughed down at you, kissing the crown of your head. 

‘Can you blame me.. you’re delicious’ he purred into your ear, kissing the skin behind. You looked up at him through your eyelashes, smiling to yourself as you tilted your head up the need to kiss him again overpowering your nervousness. 

Instantaneously you felt relief wash over your entire body, as Changbin moaned into your mouth before hugging your midriff with his arms. Your core began to leak juices down your thighs, but the dull ache radiating from your walls made you whimper in pain; goosebumps raised on your skin, the duvet of steam creating beads of moisture to form on changbins toned stomach. Anxiety quickly rose within you, like water boiling in a pot, as you felt his calloused fingers drag up your pillowy thighs brushing against your pussy. You quickly pulled away, keeping your hands planted on his tapered waist; your boyfriend's face was painted in confusion, ‘What’s wrong?’ 

You chewed your lips, contemplating whether you should tell him the truth and risk upsetting him or gritting through the pain as he once again roughly fucked you into oblivion. As much as you wanted to please him and his insatiable habits, your poor vagina couldn’t handle his aggressive assault this time round. 

‘It hurts..’ you whimpered, nuzzling in between his pecs, trying to hide your red cheeks. He cooed down at you, ‘Aww poor baby, it’s okay- let me take care of you..’ He reached for the shampoo bottle but stopped midway when you rested your small hand on his bicep, ‘Wanna make you feel good, binnie..’ you gazed up at him, eyes starting to water from desperation. 

He took in your appearance shimmering, wet skin with large sparkling eyes and red cheeks. You look adorable, and so ready to be ruined..

‘You sure?’ He caressed your flaming cheeks with his large palm, smiling softly when you relaxed in his hold whilst nodding your head, ‘Okay, I have an idea..do you trust me?’ he asked, caution evident in his voice, ‘Yea, just want to please you.’ 

Suddenly, he twisted your body in his hold, so that your back was plastered against his front- snaking his hand up your stomach towards your breasts, he played with your puckered nubs whilst sucking on your pulse point. Moaning loudly you arched forward, pushing your tits further into his cupped palms, he chuckled against your wet skin whilst nudging your thighs open slightly with his thigh. Your breath hitched, ‘Relax precious, it won’t hurt at all..’ Changbin murmured against your neck- feeling him slide into the small gap he created you whined at the feeling of your thighs encasing his hard dick, the precum staining your skin leaving a path down as the water washed it away. 

His heavy pants tickled the shell of your ear, he ensnared your neck with one large hand as the other held your pelvis against his, ‘You ready princess?’ meekly nodding your head, you gasped when he slid out of your thighs; before slowly re-entering the thigh gap. You let your head lay limp on his shoulder, the overwhelming feeling of his cock slowly getting slicker and slicker with your juices and therefore moving with more ease between your flesh made your entire body shiver with excitement. 

Both of your moans echoed around the shower cubicle, mingling with the sound of both of your pelvis bumping together rhythmically. Slowly, Changbin’s moans turned into desperate whimpers and groans, you could tell he was teetering on the edge of his orgasm- his cock twitching helplessly against your cunt.

His thrusts became sloppy as his stamina was running out, wanting him to reach his high- you squeezed your thighs together, causing him to gasp against your shoulder, ‘Fucking-’ he bit down on your skin, secretly hoping that there would be visible marks of his teeth descorating your pure, clean canvas.

You started moving back and forth in tandem with his movements, fervently and messily clenching your thighs. Soon enough his breaths started to quicken as his moans became high pitched and the reflection of his face in the faucet showed his eyebrows being drawn together harshly, ‘Please cum around my thighs binnie, wanna feel you…’ your words threw him straight into his orgasm as he drew back completely- jerking his cum onto your ass and back thighs. 

Breathing heavily, he twisted you back around- bumping his nose against yours, ‘you look so pretty covered in my cum baby..'

[inhuman-obey-me]

💎 with lucifer please!

jksgvdsl this is so late that literally a whole entire new OM game has come out since, I am SO sorry for the delay on this one!!

"The more the diamond glitters, the more it can deceive." - Lucifer

(Nightbringer 8-A spoilers below the cut!)

It's a beautiful day in the Celestial Realm. Light shimmers off the ground like magic, and a gentle wash of warm sunlight glows upon everything in sight. Greenery entwines itself elegantly over the splendid white marble of the palace. It's the kind of day that reminds Lucifer of everything that makes the Celestial Realm so lovely. His home, the only home he's ever known. The only one he's ever wanted to know. Beautiful, shining. Perfection.

Just like he's supposed to be.

That's why, the first time Lucifer had descended to the Devildom, he was sure he would not be impressed. His landing seemed to confirm it -- the soil was awful, the chaos too noisy, the endless dark of the sky casting a veneer of unease over everything.

And then there were the demons -- wicked, abominable monsters, tricky and untrustworthy. There wasn't a moment to let his guard down., in a place like this. The demon prince had greeted him warmly, sure. The prince's butler was ever smiling and polite to him, if a tad derisive about the angel's alarm at the blackberry filling inside his cake. But Lucifer refused not to be too careful. He knew all about the ways demons used their honeyed words to manipulate the innocent into doing their bidding.

So certainly, the prince's goals, as he described them, seemed lofty and admirable -- a shining future for the betterment of all. But the more the diamond glitters, the more it can deceive. Demons are not to be trusted. Isn't that right?

Yet it is he himself, the illustrious morning star of the Celestial Realm, who finds himself lying and deceiving lately. The ideals that the demon prince espouses, suspicious as their speaker may be, do seem righteous, and Lucifer cannot understand why his Father keeps dismissing them out of hand. Meanwhile, his beloved sister's trial awaits, just days away, and she seems destined to find no mercy. Conflict swirls in his mind constantly, thoughts he knows he can't share with any of the other angels. Especially not with any of his fellow seraphs, his heart drifting away with the pull of his secrets -- from Michael, from Raphael, even from Simeon.

Of course, he knows how sharp Simeon can be. Easygoing though he may seem, he has never been so easily deceived. He's sure, sitting across from him even now, cheerfully chatting over tea together, that his dear friend can tell just how much has been weighing on his mind, even if he doesn't know exactly what that weight is about.

But he doesn't ask, and for that, Lucifer is grateful.

"Raphael," Simeon says instead, "why don't you sing for us? Lucifer has been away on business so often lately, I'm sure he misses hearing your song."

The younger seraph nods seriously. His voice is clear and light as he begins, as if purifying the very air it fills with his music. Simeon, brown hair gleaming golden with sunlight, hums quietly along with a sweet smile, and reaches over to refill his friend's now-empty cup.

As the warm floral scent wafts up gently off the drink, slowly the thoughts swirling in Lucifer's head begin to finally melt away -- at least for now. At least for today. He can let himself have this -- one beautiful, shining day in the Celestial Realm, relaxing with his closest friend and just enjoying the perfection of it all.

Soon, he thinks to himself. Soon, there will be no more lies. No more deception.

[kangaracha]

skz + devil by the window

just for you rain <3

LYRE LYRE

---

"What do you think?" asks the boy by his side, one hand heavy on his shoulder and the other spanning the distance between them and the painting that stares at them from the wall.

Jeongin doesn't know what he thinks. The canvas is large, stretching down to his feet and right up above his head, gilded in a frame of golden roses that look out of place against the severe grey of the stone behind. The colours are too bright, the subject is too dark, and the sunlight that falls in cleverly placed shafts across its surface seems to only come from the darkest corner of the room-

"It's kind of boring, isn't it?" he questions, peering past the gold and the grey and the visible footprint of a paintbrush on its surface to the image beyond. A room of cream and honey brown stares back, a table set with chairs and placings adorned with a bouquet of pale lilacs. Above the table, a window creaks open, a breeze blowing the soft gauze of the curtains back to show a glimpse of the world beyond - upturned earth, coils of wire, black clouds and hazy fog over a morning so silent that not even the birds dare to disturb it.

Chan's hand slips from his shoulder, disappointed. "Why is it boring?" he questions, his fingers closing the distance between himself and the paint, that peels and flakes from the surface of the canvas. 

It crackles under his touch, loud enough for Jeongin to hear. "Because no one is in it, and nothing is happening," he says, cringing at the sound. "It's kind of depressing too. The window didn't have to be like that."

Chan's hand moves, tracing the shift of the curtains in the breeze, the dust that's settled on the windowsill. "Yeah, okay, I get it now," he admits. "You're right."

Jeongin wonders what he sees, standing that close to the painting - if the room is visible at all, or if he only stares out at the intricate details beyond the window. From here, the trickery of light and shadow makes it look like he's about to climb through that window into the warzone beyond, only the strange positioning of his hand and the gaudy frame to remind him that it is just a painting, flat to the wall and inaccessible to flesh and bone creatures such as them.

High above them but not so far behind, footsteps pounding their way down the stairs announce that they have been found, down here in this obscure corner of the house. Loud and heavy, like the stout character that they carry around their sweeping curve and out into the space of the empty hall that yawns behind them. "Everyone is looking for you, you know," Changbin says, even louder than the sound that his boots make on the marble floor. "And you're down here-"

Chan's hand slides from the painting, fingers curling by his side. His palm is painted in brown and red, his fingers tipped in black from the stormclouds above. "I've been gone for five minutes," he says, letting a single, put-upon sigh drag itself out from between his lips. "Seungmin was just down here."

"Yeah, and now Minho wants to hunt him for sport." The delighted grin on Changbin's face doesn't match his words, but Jeongin doubts he is being serious anyway; Minho is like an old dog without any teeth to gnaw with, only causing a ruckus when he feels like it. "Anyway, they're not just looking for you. It's our last night with our I.N-nie after all, and you're keeping him all to yourself."

Hands reach out, trying to grab at him - Jeongin darts away on instinct, too used to the cat-and-mouse game and the suffocating squeeze it always ends in. He'd almost feel bad, on this particular occasion, but Changbin isn't deterred, following him doggedly with the kind of wicked grin that means he's maybe enjoying the game a little too much. 

The realisation that it really is his last night in the house hits him as Changbin's arms encircle him, lifting his feet off the ground as he squeezes as hard as he can. It's hard for his heart to break when he can't breathe, but it tries anyway, scraping at the inside of his ribcage and curling in on the ice that creeps around it, the fear of what comes next. There's only hours left now - and he knew that already, he did, but he'd been pretending that if no one says it then it's not going to happen, that he'll wake up tomorrow and the house will still be here and Seungmin will be sitting on the end of his bed complaining about the sun rising and it will be another day yet until he is supposed to leave.

"Maybe I'm just going to miss him more than the rest of you," Chan says around the huff of Changbin's laughter in his ear, feigning accusation just for fun. Chan's good at that, the switch from motherly to childish on the flip of the dime; always watching, always tuned into the turn of the conversation, anticipating which direction to take it before the rest of them even know what they are talking about. 

Changbin drops him without warning, his mouth open in indignation. The first breath Jeongin drags into his lungs is shaky and half-empty; the second has to work its way around the laugh that escapes on his exhale, triggered by the sight of Changbin's face, and the loud yell that rattles the ceiling. 

Chan backs away towards the stairs, hands outstretched, abandoning Jeongin with Changbin. He's giggling, the coward; Jeongin doesn't even try to fight the heavy arm that throws itself around his shoulders, closer to a headlock than a guide, and drags him after Chan, all the way to the bottom of the stairs. "Do you think I don't love him?" Changbin asks the older boy, his voice rising higher and higher into the house the further up the stairs they climb. 

"Do you, Changbinnie?" Chan questions in response. He's climbing backwards up the stairs, one hand on the railing for balance and the other taunting Changbin. "Do you really?"

"I loved I.N-nie before I even knew him," Changbin claims. The words bounce off the walls and back into Jeongin's ears, loud enough to hurt them - he wants to cringe away from the source, but Changbin pulls him even closer before he's even finished speaking, his elbow squeezing at the back of his neck. "You love me too, don't you Innie? More than anyone else?"

READ MORE

[ghostoffuturespast]

OC Playlist Meme & WIP Wednesday

Tagged by @merge-conflict Thank you kindly! 🧡I didn't have anything written last week when you tagged me...

I'm not sure if I did the homework correctly, but pick a song(s) that goes along with something you're working on? (Doesn't have to be writing) Or do a playlist for an OC? That second one sounds like less work lol.

Tagging with no pressure: @shimmer-like-agirl @vox-monstera @wanderingaldecaldo @fly-amanitaa

Here's the song:

Echo Home by The Kills

Here's a spoiler for the next chapter:

Sounds of life marched on outside the walls of her apartment, the clamor of the mundane counting away the minutes and hours.  The quiet of the moment settled on V and River's shoulders though, blanketing them with the heavy burden of the world.  Of reality.  V closed her eyes and laid with the pain, every breath straining her ribs and the rest of her broken body.

Everything hurt.  Ached.

A tender touch on her forearm made her eyelids flutter open.  She watched tan knuckles trace the cyberware embedded in her arms, the bruises and old scars that marbled her skin.  All the things she hated.  Brown gazed down at her from the edge of the bed, tinged with warmth and sadness.

“What is it?”  V blinked, too tired to speak more than a whisper.

River heaved a sigh.  “You know I hate seein' you like this, right?”

"Because I’m incapable of taking care of myself…  Because I'm just as ugly on the outside as the inside now?"

"No…" He shook his head and paused to stare at the hand on her arm.  Hesitating.  "Because it reminds me of all the times I’ve fucked up… And because you don’t need to keep doing this to yourself.  Punishing yourself for things that aren’t your fault."

"It’s– it’s not like that."

"Is it?  Pretty sure I know what martyring looks like.  Did it for fourteen years."

V searched the bags under River's eyes, evidence of his recent sleepless nights.  "Still doing it…"  He didn't defend himself and she winced as she shifted, her hand trying to reach for his.  "Aren’t we just two workaholics?"

He met her the rest of the way, entwining his fingers with hers.  River's thumb wound circles in her palm as he looked out the window, dawn breaking into day.  The neon of the city faded with the early bloom of sunlight.

Glancing back at her, River lowered himself onto the bed and laid next to her, the mattress sinking under his weight.  "Could go for a nap."  Their chests rose and fell before he spoke again.  "You should get some more rest too."

"Honestly, not sure if I know what resting's supposed to feel like.  If I know how."

Metal replaced flesh and blood as River's organic hand brushed the side of her face. The caress came feather light, as if he worried about breaking her further.  "Close your eyes."

Amber and brown.  Side by side.  She didn't want it to disappear.

But V did as he asked and she breathed him in as he kissed her.  The forgotten scents of leather and earth spilling over, a balm on her senses.  The connection a solace to their battered spirits.  River's touch was infinite in its softness and so impossibly warm that she'd give everything just to drown in it.

She didn't want it to end.

"Feels a little somethin’ like that."  He murmured against her lips.

Salt stung the corners of her eyes, the tears descending like ocean waves.  “River… Stay?  Please.  Just a little while longer.”

She pleaded to him.  To her own body and mind. A dying wish to keep dreaming. A warm hand soothed, wiping away the cold tracks left on her skin and giving her something solid to hold onto.  To come back to.  A reality she never wanted to fade away.

River placed another kiss on her lips, a gentle touch that stitched her back together and erased the pain.  “I’m here, V.  I’m here.”

[feral-teeth]

🖌, 🕰, 👀 & 🍂 for the ask game 🫶

🖌️- Do you have/want any tattoos?

I dont have any, but I love the idea of tattoos and i get sick of seeing and feeling things being on my body really easily (like watches or like temp tattoos) so idk if its the best idea for me? I would probably only get something very abstract or something i really love.

Attached are the marble tattoos i would get on my arms and legs! Like i imagine black or gold marble along my shoulder and down, cutting off where there woukd be patchwork tattoos (like a mix of spencer agnews and anthony padillas)

Heres the link to my tattoo inspo board :3 - its among all of the other boards in that folder

I also know that once i get top surgery i want to put like, something cool on the new free real estate on my chest once it heals - like a cool feral dog or like stitches or something cool. To represent how fucking sick and badass being trans and getting top surgery is. And also being a furry i need like teeth or something feral looking on me (i wonder where i got my username from lol) ik someone on insta whos trans and he has these SICK tattoos like paw prints on the palm of his hands and some other rlly cool ones!! His name is Fox i think? Hes a huge inspo for me and my furry journey/trans journey for a while.

Also a tooth. Cuz fuck yeah

The future of having patchwork tattoos on my arms when i get money for it… it keeps me going. I cant wait to look fucking HOT esp w black ink cuz i find it super hot and more aesthetic on me.

I remember there was a self-love influencer and she had two tigers on her belly, and i loved the idea of that and to appreciate my stomach more.

. I also love the idea of having angel wing tattoos cause i used to always imagine having angel wings and wrapping them around me when i was scared or needed comfort. So they would represent that comfort. I also imagined them like, dragging on the ground behind me sometimes, like my wings were too big for my body. I imagined them as like gold and red and w like splashes of bright colours.

🕰️ - What time is it where you are rn?

Well its 6:01pm as i start to write this - lets see how long it takes for me to post it lol - checking in its 6:26pm - now its 6:35pm - 6:40pm abt to post

👀 - what colour are your eyes?

Brown, but golden in the sunlight! I have an old photo that i love when i was in British Colombia in the car and the sun was shining so perfectly and i got a picture of my golden eyes. Its such a beautiful picture i might just find it and post it here after i answer this <3 also reminds me of a photo i took of the mountains out the window that was literally a perfect screenshot of the beautiful moment. It makes me miss my old instagram where i used to only post aesthetic photos i took 😔probs gonna make my personal account do just that now 🫡

🍂-whats your favorite season?

Fall always! I love the season i was born in (i heard thats usually a proven thought) and even tho its moving into dead winter, it feels like new beginnings and a clean, fresh start because school used to start for me around then and its my bday in fall too so its like new school supplies? Presents? Money?? Amazing. This will surely change my life for the better! And all of this ruin and pain will fall behind me cuz i have new clean fresh pens and a new journal and a new schedule i know ill just drop after a month ! (Digital planners saved me sm omg)

But i also love every season and the poetry and meanings and atmospheres they bring. I always get so sad in the winter, but that sadness and pain being surrounded by so much joy and brightness and christmas lights and a hazy glow makes a good contrast for poetry and your own depression so 🤷 spring is new beginnings. The contrast between winter and spring and meaning new life and the dead rotting and turning into something that helps the fertilizer grow is such a strong concept for me. Summer being so hazy in the heat with heat lines coming off of the sidewalk, your ice cream melting onto the hot pavement, making it sizzle. The sadness that summer can bring too. The heat and fun and sun that everyone seems to be having while youre stuck inside or watching them through a haze of your own, you want to break the glass between you and the others but its just too thick, so you just slam on the glass, yelling, hoping that someone, anyone can hear you on the other side.

Back to fall - Now my bday just makes me sad 😔 whats funny is that it usually still feels like summer when its my bday, so its like im still in that hazy summer, preparing for the winter and dead leaves on the ground that are pronised every year.

From this ask game - get to know me! 💖

[lunarrosespirits]

Noelle the Mistletoe Faun (Mod Moon Lily)

Here is the second Yule event spirit, this time from Mod Moon Lily!

Name: Noelle Species: Mistletoe Faun Gender: Female Pronouns: She/her Sexuality: Demiromantic Alignment: Light

Personality traits: Quiet, Timid, Gentle, Thoughtful, Bubbly, Warm, Kind, Cheerful, Giving.

Personality: Noelle has a very warm, cheerful, and bright personality although she is often very quiet and timid and it can take her some time to warm up to and trust others. She had some difficulty understanding social cues and reading facial expressions when she was younger, but worked really hard to improve this to fit in more. Because of this however, she was the victim of some bullying and has been treated as an outcast. In the past people have commented on her strange behavior and told her she was off putting and talked too much about the things she cared about. This has caused her to become more socially anxious, quiet and reserved than the ideal version of herself. You can often find her sticking to walls and looking at the ground in social gatherings worried she may upset someone. If she does ever catch herself rambling about something she will stop midway through talking and apologize thinking she may be making the other party uncomfortable or they do not actually care about what she has to say. It can take Noelle some time to warm up to someone and feel comfortable, she does slowly come out of her shell and begins to build confidence on her own. She still needs to be reminded from time to time that it’s okay to express her boundaries and the people who care about her want to know what is going on in her life. When Noelle does feel more comfortable her eyes light up with wonder and she is one of the sweetest, brightest and warmest spirits you could meet. She loves to share parts of her culture and interests with the people she cares about. Some of her favorite things to do with others would be winter related activities like ice skating, ice and snow sculptures, baking, decorating cookies, and showing her friends her permafrost plants/flowers and the crystals/rocks in her collection. She is also an incredible giving spirit and loves to give others presents she makes, or finds. She will often bring flowers, handmade presents, baked goods or rocks that she thinks are nice and give it to someone as a sign of her affection or to cheer them up if they are having a bad day.

Description: Noelle has a very dainty and delicate, yet inviting appearance even among her cool color pallet. She is a bit shorter than most, reaching just about 5’0 or 5'3 if you count her horns. She has shorter silvery white hair that just barely reaches her shoulders, brushing against them lightly with their soft curls. Peeking out from the sides of her hair are two droopy faun ears that are slightly darker than her hair, in a silvery white mimicking the freshly fallen snow of her homeland. Decorating the outer tips of her ears are white spots resembling snowflakes and offsetting the gentle brown rimming the inner part of her ears. Noelle is often seen wearing a gentle expression with large round doe eyes almost permanently fixed on the floor. Her long white eyelashes are often obscuring but standing out from her evergreen colored irises. Her scarlet pupils are so dark they appear almost black, but when her eyes catch glimpses of sunlight her pupils reflect different shades of red like dark marbles. Noelle’s face is a bit smaller, and round with her incredibly pale icy skin. Due to Noelle’s home being permanently covered in snow and frost, Noelle’s nose and cheeks have taken on a permanent rosy hue, bringing more warmth to her features. Her body is smaller and willowy, although it is hidden behind the oversized sweaters, scarves, mittens and she knits herself. From her waist down Noelle's skin transitions to fur and faun legs in the same silvery gray as her ears. Closer to her ankles, the silvery gray of her coat transitions to a pristine white matching the spots along her ears and hide. On her hooves her white hairs cover her dark chocolate brown hooves slightly.

Noelle can also shift into a doe form, although still smaller than most, reaching only about 4 ft tall even with her horns. Her coat is the same silvery gray as her faun form that almost blends in seamlessly with the snow around her. Decorating the bridge of her back and hide are pristine white spots mimicking snowflakes on a snowy evening. On top of Noelle’s head in both of her forms are two smaller wooden antlers with mistletoe leaves and white berries that never die or fade.

Hobbies: Gardening, making ice and snow sculptures, pottery, decorating/making ornaments, making homemade hot chocolate and peppermints, baking, cooking, walks in nature, feeding birds and small animals, collecting unique rocks, crystals, and leaves, knitting, reading, permafrost stained glass, flower pressing, ice skating, making gingerbread houses and decorating cookies.

Likes: Winter, snow, Yule, fairy/Christmas lights, hot chocolate, peppermint, baking, warm and cozy aesthetic, candles, blankets, fire places, camping, nature, plants, art, sculpting, calming music, peace (anti violence and war)

Dislikes: Bullying, loud or too many noises, being over stimulated, certain fabrics and sounds, bitter foods, yelling, cruelty, violence, animal abuse, environmental neglect, disrespecting others’ practices, dark spaces

Favorite color/s: Gray, yellow, scarlet, green, icy blue Favorite animal: Pigeons, Mice, Reindeer, Rabbits

Magic: Green, Snow, Frost, Healing, Cleansing, Creativity

Companionship: Noelle would like a smaller to medium sized family if possible, at least until she feels more comfortable in her home. Ideally she would like a medium sized close knit community she can feel safe in as she gets overwhelmed in larger crowds and around lots of people. She is willing to go to a family that will eventually grow larger as long as everyone is kind, understanding and patient with her. Noelle is not the best at expressing her needs or boundaries and she sometimes needs someone who she trusts to gently coax them out of her. Because of this, and her possible Autism diagnosis she is classified as a special needs spirit and would do best with someone who is already established with astral travel and communication although she is not against having a beginner companion.

Bonding activities: Building snowmen together, ice skating, going on walks in nature especially in winter, reading, listening to calming music, making homemade tea, hot chocolate and peppermints, baking, knitting, watching comforting feel good movies, cozy games and hobbies.

Culture: Noelle’s homeland is reminiscent of an eternal winter wonderland and although there are different holidays, the winter snow is a constant in every phase of life. Their equivalent to Yule and Christmas is more of a culture than type of year to Noelle’s species. Many of Noelle’s hobbies and interests revolve around this time of year. Due to how important Christmas is to Noelle and her species it's really important to her that she goes to a home that also celebrates some form of Yule or Christmas or at least is comfortable with her talking about, decorating and celebrating this part of her culture. Noelle would never want to make anyone uncomfortable or push her beliefs on anyone else, however it would make her very happy to have a companion to celebrate with.

Extra: Although Noelle is not officially diagnosed yet, she believes she may have or at least have symptoms of Autism. She is hoping to find a therapist, group or community she can feel safe talking to and sharing her unique experiences of how she views and processes the world differently than others. It is really important to her that she feels safe in her new home. It’s important her companion takes the time to understand and see things from her point of view and try to understand and help her feel more comfortable as much as she tries to help others feel more comfortable. Noelle is working on trying to accept this part of herself and does not want to be with a companion who will try to change or make her feel bad about who she is.

Price - $60 USD Conjurer: Mod Moon Lily

[velidewrites]

Mine | Elucien One Shot

Summary: Is it love, or is the bond forcing us together?

Word Count: 4.1k

Note: My heavily unedited submission for the Day 3 of @elucienweek2022 - Bonds <3

Warnings: Injury, mentions of abuse (this fic heavily touches on the abuse Lucien sustained as a result of Tamlin's emotional state in and post-ACOWAR). Proceed at your own discretion

Lucien left the Spring Court with blood in his mouth.

The place had turned into a ghost of what he used to call his home. A dark and hollow shell of memories that no longer mattered, dimmed by the horrors of the present. Ornate halls of marble and gold had once been thriving with life, servants buzzing like the bees behind the bright windows, tapping lightly against the glass, begging to be let into the vibrant manor. Now, the walls were dull with grey light, as if the sun itself decided to shy away from their ominous ambience. Even the gold crept its way down the columns, scratched brutally by what he could only describe as nails that had somehow managed to claw their way into the stone. Lucien knew full well what caused such barbarous damage, who sucked the life out of the heart of Spring—a beast that, at one point in his long, dreadful life, he’d considered his friend; his brother, even.

Stepping out of the manor, cold despite the blooming spring, Lucien held his head high with whatever was left of his dignity. He would not be coming back, no matter how many letters he was sure to receive in the coming weeks, no matter how many pleading words would beseech his forgiveness. A breaking point had been reached today, an end of a path with no way to return. And though the red, pink and white roses blossomed wildly in the remnants of what used to be a magnificent garden, Lucien did not miss the sight of thorns this time. The tangy, metallic taste on his tongue reminded him of too many times he’d been stung by them, too. Without remorse and without consequences.

Cauldron, his face hurt. Thankfully, he had been used to pain.

He knew the beast would still be roaming in the large yet empty rooms, trashing everything in its wake—golden plates, crystal chalices, dark, wooden tables. Picturing the broken pieces of porcelain mixing with glass shards that would catch the weak sunlight, reflecting the life they used to share, Lucien left the Spring Court, never to return again.

***

Nyx must have been the cutest little creature Elain had ever seen. But by the Mother, was he loud.

“Please, darling,” she cooed, tuning her voice to the softest possible pitch. Somehow, it only made things worse. “Please, don’t scream.” He did. “The party is starting in fifteen minutes. Your party,” she argued, taking everything in her power to remain calm, rather than succumb to insanity.

The child wailed again.

“Please, stop crying” Elain begged, on the verge of tears, praying for the newborn to occupy himself otherwise to any gods that would listen. “People will bring you presents.” Pathetic. Did a newborn even understand the concept of gifts?

From the growing volume of high-pitched screams, Elain guessed not.

“Nyx,” she pleaded in her last attempt. “There are guests who want to meet you, coming from all the corners of Prythian. High Lords, even. That’s how important you are. You can’t welcome them by screaming your lungs out.”

A fitting welcome, her nephew’s tearful eyes informed her.

“Elain,” Feyre said behind her, the long, deep-blue train of her velvety gown trailing her steps as she strode into the nursery. The screams immediately stopped.

She whipped her head back, honey-brown eyes wide with shock and, Elain hated to admit, a little bit of jealousy. “How do you do that?”

Her sister chuckled, blue-grey eyes twinkling with amusement as she reached her side. Reaching into the bassinet, Feyre gently picked up her son, cooing soft words of comfort. Nyx, now happily resting in his mother’s arms, started babbling happily, chubby little fingers tangled in the golden-brown locks falling neatly down the sleek back of her dress. Elain still couldn’t comprehend just how alike they looked—the way small dimples creased their cheeks when they smiled broadly, the way their eyes sparkled with the same kind of mischief. She supposed she just couldn’t believe her younger sister was a mother now—though there was no denying motherhood suited her. Elain had expected nothing less, from the way Feyre had taken care of their family back in their cottage. When the days would get too long and cold to leave the thin, feeble walls, and yet, Feyre had always managed to keep the fireplace warm and their bellies fed. Enough to survive—enough to, one day, be able to live.

Elain was still waiting for that chance.

Something tightened in her chest at that—guilt, perhaps—as she let her thoughts wonder, watching her sister gently attempt to pull her son’s hands from her hair. What seconds ago had been an intricate updo was now a complete mess of tangled pins and strands, though Feyre didn’t seem to mind, her face radiant as she grinned back at her child. Elain knew she should have been grateful—for many things, like the two-month old addition to their lives. Like the smell of fresh bread she got to bake every morning. Like the sunlight over the garden she got to grow. Simple things, like the free access to hot water or roof over her head—more ornate than necessary. Elain had been offered everything, but deep down, a treacherous feeling crept up her chest, settling anxiously inside her heart.

This life—this family—was not her own.

Elain hated that.

“Where did you go?” her sister’s voice pulled Elain out of her thoughts.

She shook her head, forcing a smile onto her lips. “Nowhere important,” she lied. Realising that wasn’t enough of an explanation, she offered, “I’m just happy to be here. To have this.”

Feyre’s eyes gleamed as her gaze slid back to her son. “Me too.”

Elain had enough.

“So who’s coming today?” she asked, desperately needing to change the subject.

Pursing her lips in thought, Feyre looked out the window, as if the sky held the answers to all of her questions. Elain wished she had that sort of certainty in something so trivial. For her, it used to be the sun. Sunlight made her skin warm and her eyes bright. Happy. But with each passing day, Elain felt as though she was being further submerged in darkness.

“Helion,” Feyre said, eyes searching the clouds knowingly. “He said he’d take his Pegasi. They’re beautiful creatures, you’ll see. You will love them, Elain.”

Elain didn’t care.

Feyre continued, “Varian said he’d come.” Elain forgot who that was. “Though I assume he’ll be late. Amren invited him over for…ah…pre-drinks.” Right. He was the white-haired prince Amren was seeing. Still, what did it matter? She’d exchanged perhaps two sentences with Amren in her life. She doubted there would be any more coming.

“Mor invited Viviane, too, though she might still be occupied. On business in Vallahan, I believe. Let’s see…” Elain had stopped listening, forgetting why she’d asked in the first place.

All these people and yet not a single one tied her to this new life she’d been given ever since emerging from the Cauldron. No bond to the night sky of this Court, no matter how beautiful the stars that draped it had been.

Elain had many homes in her lifetime. Her childhood home, though Elain had only remembered flashes of it—the ballroom, the chandeliers, her mother’s tea room, where she would host all the women she hated, simply for the pleasure of flaunting her grand life to their faces. The cottage, a place she never thought she would call her home and was still reluctant to think of it as such. The lavish manor gifted to them by the male her sister had once loved. Greysen’s home she’d thought would be her last. The House of Wind, a blur between her visions. The townhouse, where she’d planted her first garden and poured her new, immortal soul into it—a place she’d allowed herself to heal. Heal, but not live.

And finally, this.

The River House, Feyre had called it, from the way its opulent grounds overlooked the sparkling Sidra. A beautiful residence with enough space to host Feyre and Rhysand’s entire family and more. To welcome more children whenever the time would blessed them with the opportunity. To roam around the gardens, play in the trees, picnic under the moon that sent the stone walls gleaming. The perfect home for eternity. But not Elain’s.

“And Lucien, too, of course.”

Elain’s arched ears perked up at that, something cold in the pit of her stomach spreading fast enough to make her blood freeze in her veins. “What?”

“Lucien,” Feyre repeated, and Elain fought the urge to cry at the sound of his name. “He said he’d come.”

Her voice was tight as she demanded, “And you didn’t think to tell me that?”

Feyre’s brow lifted in surprise. “I didn’t think you’d care.” Her tone was careful as she spoke, “You leave the room whenever his name is spoken.”

That she did. But for reasons far different than her sister had imagined. “It would have been nice to have been given a warning.”

Adjusting the baby to sit in her arms more comfortably, Feyre sighed. “Truly, Elain, sometimes I wish I could sell the stars to understand what it is you really want.”

So did she.

So did she.

***

The smell of freshly-baked bread hit him first.

It was ridiculous to think a manor of this size could feel so homelike. But if there was one person with the ability, it was her.

His mate.

Oh, how he’d dreaded to see her.

Entering the spacious family room, Lucien expected Elain to be absent, surely having scented his presence crossing the threshold; perhaps even earlier, when he strode through the front garden, admiring the work that had gone into making an empty land a thriving corner of life. His suspicions were confirmed when he was welcomed by her sweet absence.

It was for the best, Lucien told himself.

What a pathetic lie.

He had no idea why he’d come in the first place. The thought crossed his mind when he was greeted by a cold stare of his mate’s sister—the viper—and a tight smile of her own mate. A decent male, Lucien thought, that seemed to hate him for reasons beyond his understanding. Lucien did not care. He had not come for him.

In truth, he hadn’t come for Elain, either.

He’d given up on trying to force conversation on her when she’d clearly rather do anything else. Lucien supposed she’d rather grow into soil and become a silent, unmoving flower if it meant never have to sustain a shred of time spent in his presence. He couldn’t blame her. He was starting to grow increasingly tired of himself, too.

Lucien Vanserra, an everlasting imposition, he thought bitterly as Azriel, Rhysand’s spymaster and, Lucien knew, best torturer, offered him a cold nod. Gods, he’d now started wallowing in his own despair. The Spring Court visit had not done his mood any favours, either. All Lucien now wanted to do was return to the human lands, sit in his favourite, worn out burgundy chair, and stick a bag of ice onto his face, fading out into a dreamless sleep. The perfect evening, just sleep and the easing pain. Not whatever this evening was supposed to be.

But he’d promised Feyre he’d come. He did want to meet her child. He really did. Today had just been…bad timing, he supposed.

To think the stubborn, crass woman he’d once sent to the naga was a mother now. Crazy world.

As if his thoughts conjured her, Feyre strode into the room with a baby in her arms. Lucien almost gaped.

They looked so similar. It was only natural, of course—as a mother and son would. Lucien hadn’t exactly looked like his mother, perhaps that was why he’d allowed himself to be taken by surprise. He hadn’t looked like his father, either. Thank the Cauldron for that.

Feyre’s son, though, was a spitting image of his mother, with the way he smiled, a broad, toothy grin that made Lucien’s mouth twitch in return. The gleaming blue eyes that promised a good fight if prompted. He could see some of Rhysand’s features in him too, naturally. But this child was nothing if not Feyre’s—his friend’s—son.

She beamed as her sparkling gaze landed on Lucien—the first warm welcome he’d received so far—and made her way to approach him, the baby babbling happily in her arms. Standing in front of Lucien, she offered a clumsy kiss on his cheek, careful not to squish the baby between their much larger bodies.

“I’m so glad you’re here,” Feyre greeted him, eyes motioning down to the chubby mess propped up on her hands. “This is Nyx.”

Lucien’s brows furrowed . “Nyx?” he asked. “Like the goddess of night?”

Feyre’s eyes flashed in surprise. “Exactly.”

His gaze slid back to the child, its small wings gleaming darkly despite the golden rays of sunset peering through the windows. “Seems fitting,” he said, unable to resist the urge to snicker when Nyx angled his tiny head slightly, as if taking him all in.

The baby was ridiculously cute. Adorable on the outside, but with nothing but pure mischief sizzling behind his big, innocent eyes. He was definitely going to be a troublemaker, Lucien decided. Something warmed inside his hollow chest at the thought.

He almost didn’t notice Elain had entered the room had it not been for her scent.

It infused the air, a sweet mixture of jasmine and honey, and filled his nostrils mercilessly, forcing his head to her direction.

There she was, looking so achingly beautiful he forgot all about his swollen face.

Draped in a gown of bright amethyst, Elain was a picture of a dream too good to be true. The soft fabric accentuated her curves, the sparkle of her skin—healthy after months of malnourishment, and Lucien couldn’t help but sigh in relief. Her golden-brown hair reflected the light of the sun outside, shining like a sun of its own, and her eyes…

Her eyes. Lucien would happily drown in them. Pools of honey, rich and full of flavour—sweet and vibrant, with hidden taste of something he felt on his tongue, but had yet to identify.

Full of delicate grace, her gaze landed on him at last, widening in surprise to find him staring right back at her.

He looked away and cursed himself for the decision right away. Leaving her bright eyes was like stepping out of the warmth of the sun into darkness—a cold room with no windows, tight and suffocating. He found himself trying to meet her eyes again, like they were his only way onto the next breath. His chest tightened when he realised he would not be getting another.

So he turned away, and did not seek her again.

***

Against her best efforts, Elain had dragged her sister to the side as soon as Lucien was done with her.

“What happened?” she hissed, her tight grip not letting go of Feyre’s arm.

Blue-grey eyes widened in shock. “What do you mean? We just talked.”

Elain was stunned. Was her sister really that stupid?

“I’m not asking what you two were talking about,” she seethed, her blood starting to boil inside her veins, threatening to burst them open at no sign of an explanation. “I’m asking what happened to his face.”

Feyre went still as death.

“Elain,” she breathed.

“Tell me,” Elain commanded, voice dropping so low she could hardly recognise it herself.

Heart thudding in her chest, Elain fought the urge to remain still, every instinct shouting to run to Lucien and drag him to whatever had caused the skin under his russet eye to swell with colours that should never stain his usually handsome face. She’d noticed the dried out bloodstains smearing his tunic, too. Hidden beneath his jacket, but Elain had noticed because she’d looked. Of course she’d looked.

She hated that she had.

It was only the mating bond, she had told herself. Not her own mind.

But she needed to know anyway. If only to calm her raging heart.

“Well?” she pressed. Nyx stirred below her, whining in her sister’s arms.

“Elain,” Feyre repeated. “You’re scaring the baby.”

The swell of his golden-brown skin, the small cut beneath his cheekbone, the light tremble of his large hands—mate. Mate, mate, mate.

“What’s going on?” a voice sounded behind her. Rhysand.

“Nothing,” Feyre said quickly, though Elain did not miss her eyes shooting him a knowing look. She’d been living around them long enough to know what it meant; Feyre had entered his mind—a skill Elain had utterly despised—telling her mate to take the baby and wait for an explanation later.

Soon enough, Rhysand had left the kitchen with his son, dozing off in his father’s large arms, and she and Feyre had been left alone.

“Lucien was at the Spring Court today,” Feyre informed her quietly. It was not enough.

Elain was only growing more angry. Stupidly, irrationally angry. She didn’t care. “With Tamlin?”

Her sister flinched. “Yes. He’s…not doing well. Especially after finding out about the baby.”

Elain went rigid, feeling her face drain of colour at the realisation. “Why didn’t you do something?”

A long silence.

“It is not out place,” Feyre finally said, eyes set firmly on her tattooed hand. Elain fought the urge to scoff. She couldn’t even face her.

She turned on her foot and strode out of the room. “Where are you going?” her sister asked behind her.

Elain didn’t look back. “I need to speak to my mate.”

***

Lucien found the quiet of the small library oddly satisfying.

He’d dropped onto a chair, resting by a pile of old books scattered on a small, wooden table. The room had been decorated in a dark colour scheme, with splashes of emerald green on the chairs’ soft cushions and parchment-like maps hanging from the walls. The design was pleasing to the eye, but unusual—human, almost, which made him wonder if Feyre had modelled this space after her father’s old office she’d mentioned to him on a few occasions.

Hoping to catch a breath after the day’s exhaustion, Lucien’s head tilted back, and he closed his eyes, content to welcome nothing but silence.

He was quickly denied the option as her scent hit him like a crashing wave.

She was raging, that had been clear. Her furious haze sent his eyes open, immediately on high alert and in search of anything and anyone that might have imposed such a state on his mate.

Lucien’s chest heaved with a breath as their eyes met—a pair of russet and gold, gleaming in confusion, meeting one of simmering flame. Had he not been sitting, Elain’s gaze might have sent him off his feet, so full of hurt and anger they seemed to burn. She looked completely and utterly feral.

He wasn’t sure whether he should be concerned or turned on.

“I’ve been looking for you,” Elain said, emotions clear despite the tightness in her throat.

Lucien sat up. “Oh?”

“I want to speak to you.”

He almost laughed. Her words awoke something cynical in him, a side he had grown accustomed to in the two years she’d refused to utter so much as a single word in his direction. “Since when?”

His tone seemed to knock the rage from her—temporarily, at least. “Excuse me?” she asked.

Lucien leaned back in his seat, arms crossed as he spoke, “Since when do you wish to speak to me?” he repeated, only to add a second later, “My lady.”

As cynical as he was, Lucien had still been a gentleman.

Her lips formed a tight line. “This is not the time. I—”

“When will it be the time, Elain?” Lucien asked, unable to stop the word pouring out of his mouth. “It has been two years. Two years. I have only ever asked for a conversation. To meet you and talk about this Cauldron-damned bond,” he spat the word out as if it burned. “Hate it all you want, but I know it leaves you restless as much as it does me. It doesn’t stop at dreams, every waking moment I am reminded we are tied to each other, even though neither of us ever asked to be. I have only asked for a conversation, Elain.” Right now, he hated how her name sounded on his tongue. Hated the way it tasted so good when all he wanted to do was chew on it and leave it crinkled like the folds of his heart. Mates were supposed to be equals.

They would be equally broken.

“But you denied me even that. I wouldn’t have forced you into anything. I wanted to tell you that I wished to know you and give this bond a chance because the alternative would leave us both in pieces that could never be picked up and put back together. I wanted to tell you that even though I already had someone in my life as much as you did, you plagued my sleep every single night since I felt our bond snap into place. I wanted to tell you that I wanted to fight for you because no one had ever fought for me. But most importantly, I wanted to tell you that I would be yours—only if you wished me to be. Whatever you needed—a mate, a lover, or a friend—I would be there, my only goal to make you happy, to make you safe. To make sure you had a life you wanted to live.”

Lucien couldn’t finish. He was in too much pain, physically and emotionally, and his words hadn’t mattered anyway when she’d already made up her mind and denied him. Every Solstice, every chance meeting. So he slumped back into his chair, and exhaled.

There was a long silence and he didn’t think she would speak again—grace him with an answer. She wouldn’t.

Elain only asked, voice clear as she raised her chin, “What happened to you?”

Lucien sighed, propping himself up to his feet. He didn’t look at her as he said, “We should get back to the party.”

“I mean your face. I want to know what happened.”

He stiffened, his spine a straight line as she stepped in closer.

“My lady—”

“Sit,” she commanded. What else could he do but listen?

“I have slayed kings before,” Elain said, standing inches away from his frozen form. Her eyes fixed just below his russet eye, she leaned down, reaching out a hand to put on his cheek, the movement halting mere inches away from his scarred face. “I won’t hesitate to kill again.”

Lucien could only gape as her fingers brushed against his skin, trailing the scar that slashed over his golden eye. “Elain—”

“You’re right,” she breathed, and he felt the soft air on his cheek, caressing the swelling so gently he forgot all about the pain. “I’ve been avoiding you. Denied you. Do you want to know why?”

He swallowed hard. “Yes.”

“Because of this,” Elain said, gritting her teeth as if the words physically hurt. “This bond. It makes me think, it makes me act in a way I never had before. I am afraid of what it might to do me.”

Lucien stopped breathing. 

She continued, “When you’re near me, all I feel is you. You fill every nerve in my body and every thought in my mind. You overwhelm me. You consume me, but it doesn’t cause me pain. I want to be consumed. And I want to consume you in return.”

“You have me,” Lucien rasped. “You have all of me.”

“Your heart keeps chanting to me,” Elain said. “You are mine, and I am yours. Is it true? Or is it just the bond?”

When he dared touch her, slipping her hand from his cheek into the strong palm of his own, it sent nothing but light into their souls. “My heart,” Lucien said. “You can crush it, trample it, shred it if you like. But it is true.”

Fresh honey swirled in her eyes as she looked at him for the very first time—not at her mate, but at Lucien. “I wish to protect it. I wish to cherish it the way it deserves to be. I wish to keep it safe. Most importantly, I wish to get to know it.”

Was this what life felt like?

“I wish to know yours, too."

[lumosinlove]

Well, this got longer than I thought it would, so I’ll have to publish in a few parts as I write...

But Happy Birthday, Finn, my favorite :)

Find it here on Ao3

~

Of Silence And Slow Time

part i of iii

~

New York City, 1920

~

Everyone told Finn that the statue looked like him, that he simply must go and see it.

“Really, Finn,” his older brother Alex said. “It’s the eyes, the face, it’s the mouth. It’s uncanny.”

Finn had just looked over Alex and the man and woman he seemed to always have at his side ever since the war ended. Natalie, a nurse whom he’d met in France, and Kasey a Canadian from another unit—they’d ended up in the hospital together.

“It’s in France,” Finn said flatly. “I know you’re forgetting about it all, but I’m not exactly keen on going back there. It took me ages to get home.”

It had taken everything for him to get home.

Alex, to Finn’s relief, nodded at Natalie and Kasey to go get themselves a drink at the bar down the street, told them that he’d meet them there. Finn stared down at the book open and unseeing in his lap. He wasn’t even sure what he was reading, on that he wanted to. His mind didn’t seem to follow him just right these days. Cars became bombs sometimes. Sleep was all dreams.

Alex sat beside him on their parents’ old sofa.

“Fish,” Alex said softly, and moved his hand slow, where Finn could see it, before resting it gently around his shoulders. “You can’t sit here all day. That’s not going to help you, and I know you don’t like it. You’ve never sat still like this.”

“I’m not going back to France.”

“It’s Paris,” Alex said, and gently flipped Finn’s wrist over to reveal the tiny globe his friend Jackson had dotted there with a needle and ink. “You’ve always wanted…don’t let this war stop you any longer.”

Finn stared down at the reminder he’d asked his friend for, ink permanent black. He’d never been farther than New England before the war. Paris, he’d always thought, gazing at his collection of books. Rome. Athens, Barcelona—

Finn swallowed hard. “Looks just like me, huh?”

Alex’s grin was enough to pull one out of Finn, just slightly. “It was bizarre.” Alex squeezed his shoulders. “I’ll even meet you there later if you want, once we’re through with Canada.”

Finn sent a wary glance towards where Natalie and Kasey had left.

Alex raised an eyebrow. “You’d like them. And, who knows who you’ll meet over there. We ran into all sorts of people, people like you’ve never seen. It’s why—” Alex broke off slightly, and looked after the nurse and soldier, too. Finn blinked at the nervous bob of his throat, and then his smile. “There are all sorts of love and art in this world of ours. I know it feels like it’s all war, I felt that too, but it’s not. Please let me help you see that.”

Finn rubbed a thumb over his tattoo, and closed his book.

Everything felt like war. He was so tired of it he thought he’d be crushed.

He looked up at his brother. “I don’t have much money.”

Alex just grinned and slapped him on the back, then pulled him into a tight embrace.

~

Finn arrived in Paris with a lump in his throat. He stumbled through half-French greetings and requests to his taxi, who looked at him sourly and turned out to have dropped him off four streets away from his hotel—maybe on purpose. Maybe because it was barely six in the morning.

Finn was annoyed at first, and then he began to walk.

Paris’ cobblestones were like those in the West Village, only they weren’t. There were glimpses of his home in the uneven tread of his feet, but these stones were darker, as if soaked with more time and more place. It calmed him, while the brief glance towards France’s rolling hills had sent him back to his cabin on the rocky ship, shaking and gasping for air. He’d barely eaten during the entire journey besides forcing down the occasional breakfast sludge, and his legs had wobbled so fiercely upon stepping back onto land, he’d had to sit down.

Finn paused now, closing his eyes and leaning against the nearest building. He’d been so stupid the first time, decked out in his new uniform, eyes on the war like it was some prize to be won. The comfort waned with his scattering mind and Finn tried to draw a steady breath in. The lump in his throat only grew tighter and he squeezed the handle of his small suitcase.

“Monsieur?” came a voice, spilled over with concern.

Finn’s eyes flashed open and he pushed himself straight, blinking through the pale morning light. There was a boy standing there, around his age, with bright blond hair and worried blue eyes. He was tall, with a neat white apron tied around his hips.

“Ça va?” the boy took a hesitant step forward. His eyes glanced towards Finn’s suitcase, and he nodded in realization, then spoke in accented English. “Are you all right?”

Finn looked behind the boy to see the cafe, slowly opening, from which he must have come. There was an abandoned stack of chairs he was putting out for the day, and his apron had an embroidered name at one corner, Finn realized, that matched the sign above.

Le Lion.

“Yes,” Finn breathed, but found himself unable to speak louder. “I’m fine.”

The boy just shook his head, and gestured behind him. “Non. You must sit down. S’il vous plaît. Please.”

Finn didn’t know how to refuse him.

A few minutes later, he found himself stationed at one of the cafe’s tables with a steaming pot of coffee in front of him, a croissant, and a plate of softly scrambled eggs.

“You look like you need more than butter and bread,” the boy had said, wiping strong looking hands on his apron. “You are from America?”

Finn nodded. He had been worried he would be able to stomach the food after the boy went through so much trouble, but upon his first bite of eggs, he felt ravenous.

“Yes,” Finn nodded, brushing his hands off from croissant crumbs. “Sorry, yes,” he held out his hand. “Finn.”

“Leo,” the boy smiled, and took his hand. “It is a pleasure.”

Finn found himself returning that smile with one that, for the first time in a long time, felt like his own. He tried to put coins into Leo’s hand when it was all over, but Leo simply waved him off and said he hoped to see Finn again.

~

The Louvre was more than Finn could have imagined. It was like walking across the ocean floor, new rarities at every corner. And, of course, there was the matter of the statue. Alex had said it would be with all the other works from ancient Greece. He didn’t have trouble following the signs to the correct gallery, walking through the white marble hallways. When he did reach the Greek galleries, his first thought was that the perfectly white statues nearly blended in with everything else, at least until he found a plaque that said it had all been painted once. Finn smiled to himself. Maybe his apparent stony doppelgänger had had red hair, too.

Imagining Alex and his long stride in these halls was easy. And it was quiet here, and distracting, which let Finn close his eyes for a moment, inhaling the scent of old stone, like a church, or a river’s bank.

When he opened them, he had found it. He was staring into his own face. His eyes were blank. He reached up to feel the shape of his own jaw as he looked at the statue’s, on display in the way the head was slightly turned, jaw set, brow low, as if in focus. Finn blinked, pulled out of the daze of seeing it, and his eyes landed on the museum card beside it. There was a word in ancient Greek, said to have been carved more visibly into the bust’s base. Future, it translated to. Thought to be made in the name of a God, though he may be lost now. There is no other surviving work by this artist.

Finn looked back at the eyes, so much like his own he could have seen brown there in the blank irises, and thought about when this strange statue had been carved. He’d always loved the way ancient Greece was sometimes described in poetry. It had gotten him through many long nights in the trenches. Serene, warm, and with nothing to do but lounge in the olive groves. Working the land and coming home at sundown to wine and honey and spiced meat. He’d longed for it. He longed for it still, this simple-seeming past.

The next thing he felt was warm wind. He smelled salt water.

The museum melted around him and his shoes slipped into sand before disappearing entirely.

~

Finn turned around to the sound of someone shouting, worried it was at him, only to find a brunette boy storming towards him—then past him—a foreign language continuing to fly off of his tongue. But more importantly, the boy was dressed in a simple garment of white cloth that left his strong, tanned legs and arms completely bare, and his feet were sandaled. Finn reached down to smooth his suit, only to find it gone, as well, replaced with a similar getup. He stared down at his bare skin, so pale in the bright sunlight.

And then the foreign language morphed, like a scratched record, and became English to his ears.

“—I’m telling you, Leo, I won’t go. Not without you.”

Leo?

And there the blond boy was, sitting in the shade of low trees at the edge of the beach. He was holding some sort of musical instrument, plucking at its strings almost sadly, head bowed.

“You have to,” Leo replied. “The oath says—“

He stopped mid-sentence, having looked up and spotted Finn. It made the brunette turn, and then Finn’s back was in the sand and there was a thin, rough blade at his throat.

Green eyes bore down into his own, a growl ripping from the boy’s throat. “Spartan.”

Finn choked out a breath, his hand going around the boy’s wrist. “No—no.”

“Logan,” came Leo’s voice, and then the knife’s pressure was released, pulled back by Leo, but the boy—Logan—was still sitting firmly on Finn’s hips. Finn felt his entire body flush with the sheer lack of fabric between them, but Logan didn’t seem to either mind or notice.

“I’m not a—Spartan,” Finn managed. “What the hell, I…” He looked to his left, at the sparkling waves lapping there, and then to the two boys looming above him. “Where am I?”

That made both of them freeze, the knife twitching in Logan’s hand.

“Ithaca,” Leo offered timidly, then glanced out at sea, as if that was where Finn had come from. Finn just stared at him.

He was the boy from the cafe. He was sure of it. His blue eyes filled with the same concern as they had on that early morning cobblestone street.

“Are you all right?” Leo asked.

“He is a spy,” Logan said, and went for him again.

Finn was ready this time. He knocked a leg around Logan’s waist, putting him on his back, and then rolled away from him and to his feet, knife in hand. He raised it for the two of them to see and then tossed it a little ways down the beach. “I’m not a spy. I…I’m just lost.”

It was true. In more ways than he’d even thought before.

“Please,” he managed more quietly.

He watched Leo and Logan exchange a look, unsure of what it meant, until Logan turned on his heel and Leo gestured for Finn to follow.

~

“Are you at war?” Finn asked he was led through the city streets. It had been a hot walk up a long road built into a steep hill, all the way up to what Finn assumed was the inner city and acropolis. Water ran along the side of the street—no doubt with sewage—and they crossed via stepping stones, pressing themselves against the walls whenever carts rattled by—carts filled with men with shields and swords or spears.

Logan, who brought up the rear behind him, having retrieved his knife, scoffed. “Aren’t we always?”

“And where are you taking me?”

“Where we take any question we can’t answer,” Leo said from in front of him, golden hair gleaming. “Pascal.”

[valwentinefics]

In the meadow

Jasper Whitlock x reader

REQUESTS ARE OPEN

A/N: I turned this in in grade 11 in school... decided to post because I love Jasper. If I missed a part that says Bella lmk, it was from my twilight rewrite.

Forks was a blue tinted town. From the moment you step in, to the second you leave, everything was dulled by fog, coated in a washed out blue. That’s not to say its a bad thing. Forks was calming, serene, closed away from the drama of the city. Forks was a desaturated haze, nothing was dramatic, different, or complicated. You could count on it and those in it to stay the same. The smell of fresh bread from the local bakery, the looming threat of the next rain,  the overly kind ladies in the school office.

Jasper changed that though. He was the warm light poking through the clouds, a teasing bit of hope for something more, a life not so simple and predetermined as mine. He gave me the chance to be more than Y/n, the chief's daughter, the new girl. Jasper was the expansive clear sky, a beautiful reminder that there's more to the world. Jasper was the wind blowing through my hair as I drove, a small breath of freedom. Jasper was the sun, and god was I Icarus. 

The grass damp against my back, it would have been uncomfortable in any other moment, if I was with anyone other than him. Jasper sat up behind me, His hands toyed with a gently plucked bunch of baby’s breath, adding it to the the braid he had oh so carefully crafted in my hair. 

Moments like this were ones I savored, the comfortable silence between us, the stray strings of sunlight reflecting on his marble skin. I would give anything to keep myself right here, comfortable, safe, content, and happy. 

“Hey, Y/n?” A cold thumb ran itself across my cheek, treating my skin as an antique. 

I opened my eyes at the sound of Jasper’s heavily southern accented voice he only felt comfortable to let me truly hear, tilting my head to meet his honey amber eyes with my own chocolate brown ones. He looked so pale compared to the dark yet prominent colours surroundings around us, yet they only served to compliment his godlike beauty, along with the small shimmers of light dancing on his skin.

“A penny for your thoughts?” He continued, having my attention.

“I’d rather a kiss instead.” A soft smile escaped his soft pink lips, planting a cold yet meaningful kiss on my forehead.

“So what’s going on in that lil’ head of yours?” I let out a soft laugh at his finger rapping on my temple.

“I was just thinking, about us,” I began, sitting up and facing him, my braid gently placed on my shoulder to not mess up his handiwork. “I don’t want this to end, but you know it will one day. I’m still human Jasper.”

He let out a sigh, knowing where this was headed. “You have so much to experience darlin’, so many things I can’t give you, things you can’t have if you’re like me.”

“I know what I’ll be giving up Jasper, I just don't want you to leave me when I’m old.”

Jasper let out a small laugh. “Don’t expect to get rid of me that easily, but if you’re adamant about turning, marry me.”

I let out a small laugh before realizing he was being serious. “Jas, I’m too young for that!” I swatted at his arm, slightly hurting my hand in the process.

“Then, darling, you’re going to have to wait until graduation when I propose to you next.” he planted a kiss on my cheek. “Now turn back around and let me finish your hair.”

[mckennamayfairgoode]

Show Me the Foothold From Which I Can Climb [Part One]

Billie Dean Howard x Reader

Word Count: 6k

Request: i saw that your requests were open and i wanted to ask if you could do something for billie x reader, i LOVED your other one. -requested by anon

Warnings: Nothing yet, except minor character death, but it will get VERY heavy later on. (Future TW include: addiction, alcoholism, grief, depression, suicidal thoughts.)

A/N: I’ve spent too long working on this, so I decided to break it up into parts and post it instead of going back over the same scenes again and again. I’m not sure how many parts it will be. Probably three or four. A big thank you to @lucyintheskywithxanax​ as usual for being my plastic duck. You are The Best (no, really, you are). ❤

Song: Mountain at My Gates by FOALS. Also mentioned is I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles) by The Proclaimers.

“Let’s take five minutes, okay? Sorry, everyone, they’re being stubborn today.” Billie smiles apologetically at the camera crew and the sight of it alone is enough to ease the mounting frustration in the room. Shoulders relax and tension melts away as if the atmosphere hadn’t been stifling just moments before. You call it ‘The Billie Effect.’

“Five minutes and we’ll try again,” the director agrees, giving the crew the go-ahead to take a break. There’s a spattering of pleased murmurs before everyone uses the opportunity to disperse around the house or go outside for some fresh air.

You adjust the camera on your shoulder and watch as the director walks up to Billie, his hands moving in animated gestures as he speaks. You can’t hear what he’s saying, but you can imagine. The long day has not made him any more pleasant to be around. The smile on Billie’s lips is charming as she attempts to sooth his ruffled feathers. It only takes a moment, one hand resting on his shoulder to make the interaction seem more intimate than it is, before he turns away from her with a satisfied expression that makes something inside you tug unpleasantly. Once he turns away from her, Billie’s bright expression falls and her brows pinch together. 

You wait for him to walk away before easing up to her side, eyeing his back as the distance between you grows. “Was he giving you trouble?”

“He’s the director of the show, Y/N,” she points out and when you turn to her, you see that her smile has returned, beautiful and real and just for you. Your heart seems to breathe a sigh of relief.

You shrug the shoulder not currently occupied by a camera. “Yeah, well, without you there wouldn’t be a show,” you remind her, annoyance clear in your tone.

Billie laughs, low and husky. “Easy, tiger.” She wraps a hand around your bicep and runs her thumb along the edge of your shirt sleeve, barely dancing across your bare skin and shooting tingles up your spine.  “Everyone has their part to play, even him.”

You roll your eyes. “It’d be easier if he played his part somewhere else,” you mutter.

She grins, her big brown eyes dancing with amusement. You watch that familiar teasing glint bleed into them like wine stains into a beige carpet.  “Careful there, sweetheart. I’m starting to get the impression that you care about me.”

“And I’m starting to get the impression that you want me to care about you,” you retort playfully, watching the pleased smile morph her beautiful face into something soft and sweet. No one gets to see her like this. No one but you. That smile only lasts a second before her shoulders tense, just barely, just enough for you to notice. Her gaze flicks to the side. You’ve been around long enough to know that she’s feeling or seeing something you can’t. Your voice softens into a soothing tone. “Everything okay, pretty woman?” 

Billie startles, her grip tightening on your arm as she steadies herself before she flashes you a comforting smile. “Just fine, sweetheart.” She raises a slender hand and with one long acrylic nail extended, points to a spot in front of you both. “I can feel them right here, but they won’t come out.”

You both look at the space like your combined staring power will overwhelm the spirits and force them to reveal themselves. You don’t realize how close you’ve drifted to one another until you go to nudge her shoulder with your own. “They will,” you say. 

The darkness in her eyes eases at the conviction in your tone. She raises an eyebrow. “And how do you know that?” she asks. “We’ve been here for eight hours and have nothing to show for it.”

You resist the urge to move a wayward curl back behind her ear.  “You’re Billie Dean Howard. No one can resist you.”

Her smile turns sly. “Not even you?”

You turn to face her and feel your heart stutter. She’s already looking at you, her eyes warm and tender. “Not even me,” you finally say, your tone leaving no doubt that you are dead serious. The space between you is so small your noses would brush if you tipped forward. There’s a split second where you think you might kiss her. If you weren’t in the middle of a haunted house surrounded by your coworkers, if you were alone, and if she was looking at you like she is right now, maybe you would lean in and wipe that sly smile from her face with your lips. 

“You ready, Billie?” A masculine voice startles you both out of the moment causing you to jerk away and take a step back from each other. Billie is elegant and composed as usual, but your heart thunders in your chest like you are a storm splitting open the sky. You glance at her lips. Had she been leaning in too? 

Billie gives the director a nod before turning back to you. The intensity hasn’t left her eyes. You search them for a moment, find the sincerity there and anchor to it with your heart. A slow grin spreads across your face and you nod to the starting marker on the floor. “Come on, pretty woman. I promise to get your good angle.”

She scoffs, an amused expression lighting up her face. “You always get my good angle.”

“It’s not the only thing I plan on getting,” you flirt. “Maybe if you’re lucky I’ll prove it to you later.”

Billie laughs and tosses her wavy curls back. “Don’t make promises you can’t keep, sweet thing,” she purrs, trailing her fingertips along your shoulders as she passes behind you.

You watch her go and know your expression must be lovestruck. Her presence always makes you feel weightless, a bird’s wayward feather in free fall. You think you might be able to float to the ceiling if you tried.

“You don’t really believe in this bullshit, do you?” a voice asks over your shoulder. You glance behind you to see your new assistant standing there looking perplexed and bored.

You raise an eyebrow, shifting the camera on your shoulder. “Why are you working here if you don’t believe it?”

He shrugs, following you to the mark and standing behind you. “Needed the experience,” he says simply.

You look into the viewfinder, adjusting the angle and shuffling until the sunlight streaming in from the living room window carves highlights into Billie’s cheekbones. She looks like a marble sculpture, like she belongs in the Louvre and not this haunted house in southern California, like she will be cemented in time, beautiful and endless. “Stick around,” you tell him. You pull back, look over the top of the camera, and lock eyes with Billie from across the room. “She’ll get them to show. She always does.” 

--

“Holy shit.” Your assistant's voice comes out in a breathy whisper, barely audible over the rattling sound of wheels rolling along the pavement.

You grin but resist the urge to snicker, because you’ve been there before. Skeptical and unsure, drawn to Billie of course, in awe of her smile, but not a believer in anything you couldn’t physically see. Then she had brought a derelict house to life with light that was not natural and shadows that liked to play pretend and you had watched her speak to someone whose presence you couldn’t even feel. That moment had changed you. 

Once upon a time, you had been so very small and fearful of the things you did not understand. Locked in your castle and warned away from the room at the end of the hall, you were protected, but sheltered, and your world had been so very small along with you. Until one day, you met a princess with golden hair and big brown eyes, who was kind and good and could see things you could not. 

The princess had taken you by the hand and led you to the end of the hall where she cracked the door open so that you could take a peek into the room you were not allowed in. Inside that room was a darkness and in that darkness was a glimmer of something bigger than you. You’d tugged at her hand to ward her away from the things you feared, but she stood tall and faced the darkness head on.

“Don’t be scared,” she’d said. The princess turned on a light - you think it came from within her - and the darkness shrank back, twisting into shadows that held out their spindly arms but could not reach you no matter how hard they tried. She looked at you and she smiled. “I won’t let them hurt you,” she promised and you believed her. You were a mountain and you were not afraid of anything. 

“You’ll get used to it,” you say, reaching the studio van and gesturing for him to help you load the equipment cases inside. 

He doesn’t look like he believes you. In fact, he looks like he might lose his lunch right there on the sidewalk. He wouldn’t be the first who couldn’t handle a glimpse of the other side. Ignoring it won’t make it go away, but you don’t say that. Instead, you latch the doors behind you, bid him goodnight, and meander down the sidewalk in the direction of your car. 

You watch the van’s tail lights disappear around the bend for only a moment before Billie’s soul inevitably calls to yours and you turn to look for her. She’s still standing on the front porch speaking with the homeowners. Not surprising. Billie hates to leave a job half finished. She nods her head empathetically, places a hand on the man’s arm, and says something charming no doubt. The couple laughs in response, just as you knew they would. No one can resist Billie Dean Howard. You lean back against the hood of your car, tuck your hands into your pockets, and wait.

It doesn’t take long. A few minutes later, she struts toward you like she’s on the red carpet and not a cracked, chalk-covered sidewalk in the middle of the suburbs. Your heart flounders in your chest like a fish on the deck of a boat and you wonder if you will always be this helpless when faced with her presence. “Hey, pretty woman.” You nod to the road behind you. “Wanna go for a drive?”

“And where would you be taking me on a Friday night?” Even across the distance, you can see the mischievousness in her expression. Billie loves to play games, and you are more than happy to indulge her.  

You reach in your pocket for your keys, absentmindedly playing with them as you grin. “Sorry, I can’t tell you that. Try again.”

Billie slows to a stop in front of you and tilts her head, eyeing you with a barely concealed smile. She tries to look stern but the glitter in her eyes betrays her. “What are you up to, Y/N?”  

You shrug. “I’m just keeping my promises,” you say simply. You reach over and open the passenger door for her with a flourish. “Your chariot awaits.”

--

“We’re here,” you announce, stepping out of the car and shutting the door behind you. 

Billie follows you at a leisurely pace, her head turning this way and that as she takes in your surroundings. She looks out of place up here, like a beautiful porcelain doll left in the middle of the woods. She is your diamond in the rough, your supernova in an empty sky. She burns. You wonder if it’s for you.

“Sweetheart?”

“Yes?” you respond, already knowing the question that will leave her lips.

“Why have you brought me to a cliff?”

You laugh and hold out your hand. “Do you trust me?” you ask, serious despite the light tone to your voice.

Billie does not hesitate. She sets her well manicured hand in yours, looks you in the eyes, and says, “Always.”

You have to swallow the lump in your throat to respond. “Good, because I was going to drive us both off the cliff, but there’s a concrete barrier in the way. We’ll have to go on foot and just jump off instead.”

She chuckles, low and throaty in just the way that makes your spine shiver. “Oh, darling. I’m going to need some incentives if you’re going to make me do all that in these shoes.”

You smirk and, mindful of her expensive heels, begin leading her down the smoothest path to the cliffside. “I’m sure I can come up with something.”

“I’m sure you can,” she purrs. Her hand in yours is soft and warm. You have held hands before. Large hands, small hands, the hands of those you love and hands from a distant past that you haven’t held for a very long time but still remember. There had been fingers wrapped around a thumb bigger than yours, hands clasped palm to palm as your brother helped you cross the street, pinkies interlocked to cement promises that would surpass time and age, fingertips pressed together beneath the table in the library with the girl who always laughed at your jokes. They were not like this. Holding this hand felt like coming home. Like you were meant to hold it. Like you have held it before.

As you near the aforementioned barrier, you turn to her with an impish smile. “Close your eyes,” you say.

Billie quirks an eyebrow. “I don’t usually do that on the first date.”

Your heart jumps, excited, happy, hopeful. “You let me bring you to a cliff on our first date?” you ask, playfully appalled.

Her smile grows fond. “It’s starting to grow on me.”

You bite your lip to quell the grin forming and tug at her hand. “Come on, the incentive lies in what will happen after you close them.”

“Well, how can I resist when you put it like that?” she teases, shutting her eyes and trusting you to guide her the rest of the way. You do, one careful step at a time, until you are near the edge. You look out over the view and feel your soul untangle itself from your heart, but it does not leave, not yet. It wants to be free, but it doesn’t want to go alone. 

You glance back at her, just a moment, maybe just to check that she’s real and not a vision that lives in your head. “You can open them now.”

She does. 

From a bluff overlooking the city, you watch as the sun sets, a jeweled crown that settles itself on the head of a skyscraper, radiant and eternal. Just for her. For the princess in your fairy tale. Almost as if you had willed it into existence all by yourself, lights start appearing in the city. Streetlamps, headlights, lights from offices and businesses and apartments; all of them blink on, one tiny speck at a time, until the whole of Los Angeles is alight with stars of their own making.

You don’t say anything and neither does she. You don’t need to. Billie’s fingers slide between your own, more intimate than any night you’ve spent in bed with another woman, and she squeezes. Just once. Your soul follows the invisible thread between your hearts and entangles itself with hers. They float away together like flower petals on a summer breeze.

You turn to her as she looks off into the horizon. Your eyes follow the shape of her face, from her forehead to the gentle slope of her nose, the curves of her mouth to the jut of her chin, and you wish you were tracing it with your fingertip instead. The setting sun casts a glow to her hair turning it different shades of molten gold and pink and you think you have never seen a more beautiful sight.

When she turns to face you, your eyes meet and your noses touch, much like they almost had earlier that day. Only this time there is nothing stopping you from closing the distance. Your breath hitches, your heart thunders, you are a feather in free fall, but you will not be afraid. Billie would never hurt you. Not your protector, your safety, your light.

You tangle your free hand into her hair and pull her close enough to brush your mouth against hers. It’s soft and tender, flowers grazing in a moonlit meadow, the gentle fluttering of a butterfly’s wings, the ocean lapping against the sand on a lazy, summer night. 

Her other hand reaches for your cheek, pulling you closer. You melt against her, breathe her in, think maybe this is what happiness is, maybe this is what eternity would feel like as long as you are with her. She sighs into your mouth like she has been waiting for this moment as long as you have. Your soul ignites as her nails graze your cheek, gentle and revering, like you are precious, like you are important, like you are the flower petal that may float away.  Maybe you fell in love with her then. Maybe you have been in love with her all this time.

--

“Hello?”

“Hi there, sweet thing. Where are you?” Your tired ears perk up at the sound of Billie’s voice, a smile lighting up your face as if it had been waiting just for her. 

“Hi, baby. I’m at the studio going over the footage from yesterday. Are you still at the interview?” You glance out of the nearby window. Night has already fallen and rain pelts against the glass like a swarm of angry bees. “It’s late.”

“It ran over by two hours,” she explains, her voice tight and clipped. 

You furrow your brows. “You don’t sound happy about that. Did it not go well?”

You hear the flick of a lighter. “If you call four hours of talking in circles ‘well’ then one would say it went perfectly fine.” She sighs. “Maybe I was just impatient.” 

“For what?”

“For you.” Your breath catches in your throat. You almost trip going down the stairs but manage to catch yourself in time. “Y/N?” 

“I’m here,” you manage to say. 

You can practically hear the smirk in her voice. “I’d like to see you tonight. What do you think?”

Heartbeat thudding in your ears, you finally reach the main lobby and come to a stop in front of the studio doors. Thunder rumbles through the building, shaking the glass and seeming to bounce off empty corners to echo back at you. You can barely see the street behind the sheets of rain. Maybe Hell has finally frozen over and Los Angeles is in the midst of a hurricane. “I’m thinking it’s the perfect night for a movie and takeout,” you say once you’ve gained control of your vocal chords.

Billie exhales. The sound of it wavers; she’s smiling. “My place is closer; is that alright with you?”

“Yes, of course,” you respond and hope you don’t sound too eager. Even though you are. Even though all you want is to see her look at you with that exasperated fondness that makes your heart melt. You want her to push you away, to laugh, to pull you right back in before she kisses you senseless. You just want to be home.

“Good,” she pauses and you can picture that fond expression in your head as clearly as if it were right in front of you. “See you soon, sweetheart.”

You bite your lip, trying and failing to soothe your expression into something calm and collected. “See you soon, pretty woman.” You don’t even bother putting on your jacket before dashing outside into the torrential downpour.

--

Traffic in Los Angeles is always congested at best no matter where you go. Cars, taxis, and buses stay bumper to bumper until you get further away from the city and closer to Billie’s suburbs. The rain makes it hard to see the road, let alone other cars, so you keep your hands tightly gripped around the wheel and maintain a steady pace as you follow the bright yellow shape of the taxi in front of you.

Even with the storm raging around you, you feel invincible, like nothing can touch you. Thunder rumbles in the distance, lightning cracks the air, and rain pelts the roof of your car like lead bullets, but you don’t hear any of it. Your mind is a paradise and it is so quiet. Your thumbs tap rhythmically against the steering wheel as you sing along to the song on the radio.

“But I would walk five hundred miles and I would walk five hundred more-”

You let the music sweep its way into your very being, washing over you and bringing with it a sense of peace. It makes you think of Billie and you realize you’re never not thinking of Billie, not anymore, not since she planted herself in your earth and lit up your night sky with a blazing sun. It feels like she has intertwined herself so closely to you, to your heart, to your soul, to your spirit, that you are no longer sure where she ends and you begin.

Captivated by her smile, enraptured by her kind heart, drawn to the passion that runs through her veins in lieu of blood, lovesick, lovestruck, love, love, love. Every little memory you make with her anew blinks on like a star in a sunset painted cityscape and you want to point your finger in its direction and tell her the tale of how a princess - with light embedded in her soul - saved you from your castle.

You’re thinking about her still when you notice the taxi peel off into the next lane. You don’t see him until it’s too late. 

A boy on a bike.

He darts in front of you out of nowhere or maybe he had been there the whole time and you just couldn’t see him in the rain. You see him now. Time slows down to a crawl - or maybe it never slowed at all; maybe you have been on the other side all along. 

He’s wearing a blue jacket. You notice it as your foot slams on the breaks, as you twist the steering wheel to the side in an attempt to swerve around him, as your car’s tires screech and slip against the rain-soaked street. It’s navy blue. You hear the sickening thump it makes when you hit him, feel the car jerk as you crash into a utility pole and the airbag knocks you in the face hard enough to make you black out for a second. Maybe two. You’re not sure. All you know is that when you finally summon the strength to open your eyes again, you’re assaulted by the smell of chemicals from the deployed airbag that burn your nostrils when you breathe. Your body aches from where you slammed against the seat belt on impact, your face, your chest - your heart, you think - but you can barely feel it. You are numb.

You blink rapidly to clear the dark spots from your vision, but all it does is serve to make you dizzy. Your head spins, feeling much like the inside of a snow globe after it’s been shaken up by an overeager child. With panic churning  inside you like a hurricane, you claw at your seat belt. Your fingers are shaking and clumsy and they don’t seem to work anymore and sobs well in your throat because this can’t be happening. It must be a dream, a nightmare, anything but what you know deep in your heart that it is: reality, the darkness whispers. A tendril of it slithers through the keyhole. It watches you. It is grinning.

“Come on, come on,” you mutter, or at least you think you do, before throwing open your door with one hand and scrabbling for the seat belt latch with the other. You manage to hit the release and go careening out of the car, landing on your hands and knees with a smack against the wet pavement. 

A man runs up to you, clutching your arm and pulling you up with large, gentle hands. Rain falls into your already blurry eyes, clinging to your eyelashes like tears as you look up at him and notice he has a full, greying beard. His mouth is moving but you can’t hear him over the ringing in your ears. 

You look away from him, searching, wild, crazed. Maybe you are crazy. Maybe you are a lunatic. A crowd has half formed on the side of the road, sporting parkas and umbrellas. Like anxious birds, they flutter around a slumped figure laying unnaturally still on the ground. It wears a navy blue jacket.

You push the man away, stumbling on shaking legs like a newborn foal as you attempt to cross the distance between you and the flock of people. Dread fills your bones, cements itself as a lump in your throat, but you don’t stop. You can’t. Someone on their cell phone tries to reach out to you, but you shove their hands aside. Rain soaks the thin cloth of your t-shirt causing the material to cling to you like a second skin. But you can’t feel it. You can’t feel anything. 

You fall to your knees before him, landing with a splash in the puddle beneath you. Your mouth moves rapidly as you speak words you can’t hear: a chant, a plea, a prayer. Wake up! Come on, kid, just wake up. I’m so sorry. Please, wake up. All my fault, I’m sorry, I’m sorry. You beg - to gods, to monsters, to spirits and ghosts and the nature of things - but it falls on deaf ears as if you had never spoken at all. You feel for his pulse, for a sign, for anything. There is none. The darkness laughs. It is muffled behind the door but you can feel the vibrations of it running through your veins.

You hunch over yourself, fingers clutching at the wet pavement as you dig your nails into the asphalt, wanting to crawl inside your own body like a cocoon, wanting to feel something, anything. The ringing in your ears is so loud, so intense it fills your head and drowns out every other sound. The woman who has knelt down at your side and put her hand on your shoulder as she tries to speak to you. The thunder you can feel rumbling through the earth beneath your palms. The sirens from emergency vehicles you only know are there because the red and blue flashing lights cast a glow on his motionless form. You have never known another sound. It rings and rings and rings. It is endless.

You want to close your eyes. You want to block it all out, pretend that you’re still in your car, that you’re almost to Billie’s suburbs, and any minute now, she will greet you at the door. Well, would you look at that, she’d say. I don’t remember ordering dessert. Her eyes would glimmer and she would smile, beautiful, radiant, the light inside of her too bright for her to do anything but shine.

Billie- Your mind latches onto her like she is your buoy in the middle of the sea, and just the thought of her will keep you afloat even as the darkness uses its spindly arms to pull you under the surface. You reach for the invisible thread that binds your hearts together and, insistently, desperately, you tug. I’m so sorry, Billie. You force your eyes open. You force yourself to look at him. At the boy you did not see.

His bike lays in the middle of the road, bent and misshapen. The back wheel is still spinning.

From your open car door comes the notes of a familiar song. It echoes through the night, beneath the steady beat of the rain and the high, rumbling noise of thunder, and it is not beautiful anymore. It is haunting.

“Just to be the man who walked a thousand miles-”

You can’t feel anything.

“-to fall down at your door.”

--

“Will sh- b- okay?”

“Mil- conc-ssi-n, sh- in shock-”

“Try -alking t- he-”

Voices echo around you, so muffled and distorted that you can’t understand what they’re saying. They sound like they’re coming from very far away and the effort it would take to listen far outweighs the energy you have. You feel drained, like you’re sitting in the bottom of a fish bowl and the words bounce off the water to somewhere else. Not to you.

Not until you hear her.

“Look at me, Y/N.” Hands cup your face in a gentle hold, fingers tenderly stroking the skin of your cheekbones. The voice is so familiar. It cuts through the haze fogging your mind and you reach out as if to embrace it, to let it crawl inside your heart and warm you from the inside out. “Come on, sweetheart. Look at me.” 

You blink. Billie? Your eyelashes flutter as the world gradually comes into focus, no longer a kaleidoscope of colors and shapes. With it, comes an angel. An angel with sunset hair and glimmering eyes and a kind smile. “Pretty woman?” you ask, and you wonder what happened to make your voice sound so raw and broken.

“There’s my girl,” she murmurs, ducking her head to meet your eyes. “Focus on me, baby.” You try to, holding her gaze like you would rather drown in it than face the demon you can feel hovering over your shoulder. She has a furrow between her brows, the one she has only when she’s truly upset. Why is she so sad? Why are you?

“Billie, I’m so sorry,” you whisper, but you can’t remember why you’re sorry. Only that you should be. Only that your heart aches, you smell like chemicals, and it feels like you just went a round with a boxer and lost. But it’s all a blur and you can’t remember why.

Billie reaches up and brushes your hair back away from your face. “It’s okay, sweetheart. Everything’s going to be okay.” Her smile is forced and the implication behind it only stirs the panic forming inside you until it spins so fast that it feels like you’re standing in the eye of a hurricane. 

“Ma’am, we need to speak with her,” a voice speaks suddenly from the doorway and you snap out of your trance, out of the safety of Billie’s gaze, and find yourself in a hospital room, in a hospital bed with an IV in your arm. The walls are a stark white that hurts your eyes to look at. It’s bare and sterile and impersonal; it feels like you just woke up in a padded cell where you are gradually losing your mind.

Billie looks over her shoulder; you follow her gaze and feel your stomach drop unpleasantly. A police officer stands just inside the door. You become suddenly aware of a bone deep chill pervading your entire body. There’s a blanket pulled up around your shoulders but you can’t seem to stop shaking. Why can’t you stop shaking? 

“No,  you don’t,” Billie says, the words tense as they leave her lips. The edges are sharp and you know if you were to reach out, they would cut you just as easily as a blade. You have never heard her sound like that before. “She’s still in shock. She won’t be able to tell you anything you haven’t already figured out from the cameras.” Your mind falters. The hurricane intensifies, becoming a swirling mass of wind and rain. It threatens to swallow you whole.

The officer steps into the room and raises his hands in a placating gesture. “It’s just procedure, Ms. Howard.”

Billie frowns, standing up and sliding in front of you as if to shield you from him. “I don’t give a damn. You could drag the Dalai Lama down here for all I care. I’m not letting you speak to her until she knows what’s going on.”

“Well, I’m not the Dalai Lama, I’m an officer of the law and if she’s responsive, I need to take her statement,” he insists, not unkindly. He looks over Billie’s shoulder at you, his expression apprehensive and sorrowful. Something is very, very wrong. You can feel it in your bones. The hurricane lashes out at you, angry and scared. You wonder if the hurricane is you.

Their argument drifts to the background as flashing lights from the window capture your attention. Blue and red. Familiar. The colors start to blur as rain hits the glass pane and you can only watch, mesmerized, as one droplet becomes two and three and then thunder - it rumbles so loudly it startles you and your heart leaps, pounds, races in your chest - and, suddenly, as if it had been this way all along, the hurricane is not inside of you anymore. It is all around you, surrounding you, and you are stuck within, caged like a bird, trapped like a ghost in a haunted house, you are a lunatic in a padded white cell. 

And then you remember.

Rain. So much rain. Sheets of it that slick the pavement and thunder that shakes the earth. But you are going to Billie’s, where you are warm, where you are safe, and a little rain is worth it to see the look on her face when she opens the door and sees you standing on the other side. Well, would you look at that, she’d say. I don’t remember ordering dessert. And she would smile and she would shine and you would walk among the clouds like a god. 

Something inside you stirs, something troubled, something bigger than you. An exiled giant chained to the mountain pass, a forgotten creature locked in the depths of Hell, the darkness behind the door. For the first time since meeting Billie, you feel afraid.

A taxi, bright yellow, the color of sunflowers and sunshine and that knitted sweater Billie likes to wear in the summer. It veers off; you watch it float away, along the yellow brick road, maybe into the sky to Neverland, down the rabbit hole, it goes and goes and goes. And then a boy and a navy blue jacket and a bike with a misshapen wheel that never stopped turning.

The darkness pushes at the locked door, snaking it’s spindly arms along the edge, seeking for a way out, searching for a weakness. You can feel its eyes on you, watching you through the keyhole. 

A mistake, you didn’t see him, you tried to stop, to swerve, you tried to do anything else but what you did, it’s your fault and you know it, you did this. The road was so wet, you could feel it beneath your hands, flashing lights illuminate his body, blue and red, someone touches your shoulder but you can’t feel it, wake up, wake up, unnaturally still, a song, your ears ring, it’s endless, still, so still, blue and red, it casts a glow to his face, but I would walk five hundred miles and I would walk- You dig your nails into the pavement. You can’t feel anything. 

You did this. It’s your fault. It’s all your fault.

You can feel it the moment the lock shatters and the door swings open. It feels inevitable, like you have been staring into the abyss this whole time, and it has finally decided to swallow you whole. The darkness slithers out and you watch it with bated breath. You have never known a fear this great, the moment you stared into the darkness and didn’t have your light. 

Your soul calls for Billie, screams out her name, begs and pleads for her to protect you like she always said she would. You reach out for the invisible thread tethered between you and you tug and tug and tug but your hands are slippery and you can’t hold on. Your fingers brush her sleeve. 

The darkness seems to smile. You can feel its amusement, its maliciousness, its cruelty. You are frozen in place as it moves towards you, ensnared like a rabbit in a trap, you are a lunatic in a padded cell. It’s spindly arms reach out. I’m so sorry, Billie. It embraces you like an old friend.  

You let it.

[anakinisvaderisanakin]

Grudge; aka a young Jedi tries to drop a bridge on Vader’s head, and it goes about as well you’d expect (for the people out there who want to see Vader being the insanely powerful murder machine he is)

“This oughta buy me some time,” the young Jedi muttered to himself in relief, while he watched the reinforced foundations of the giant suspension bridge stretching across the gouge of which he found himself at the bottom begin to give way.

He strained every muscle in his body, sweat pouring in thick globs down his forehead as the sandstone structure rumbled and whined in protest, cracks appearing in intricate patterns as they traveled and expanded rapidly along the eroded sides. The suspension cables stabilizing the viewpoints that had been carved into the natural overhang of the rock at either side of the bridge’s anchor points had already snapped under pressure. Picking up tremendous speed, the man-made platforms came hurtling down both sides of the canyon - and with them gushed an abundance of loose boulders, rocks, pebbles and sand knocked free by the sheer power of impact. A cloud of golden brown dust rushed past the young Jedi, who fought to keep his eyes open and ignore the grains blurring his vision with tears and mud.

A tiny but sharp rock struck the side of the Jedi’s cheek hard enough to draw blood, and he winced, faltering momentarily but quick to regain his bearings. His gaze remained fixed upon the top of the bridge, and the supporting pillars shouldering its ornate design against the bedrock lining the sides of this artificial crevice mined in the sandstone. Once, this canyon had functioned as a floodgate system, the only reminders of its glorious past now being the saltwater dam waiting several miles downhill. That, and the dry, dusty and cracked salt lake desert resting beneath the young man’s feet. This had been yet another attempt by the Empire to exploit and deploit a new, untouched system for its natural resources. The flood delta upstream was all but dried out, its ancient trackways drained, abandoned and littered with wildlife carcasses. Yet another ecosystem destroyed by Imperial greed.

But Jedi Knight Jarl Oda hadn’t come to Jansenn to become an environmental activist, although he had been tempted to at the very least severely cripple the Imperial machinery ruling the system more than once. No, Oda had come to seek refuge. Like any other survivor of the temple massacre - if there were any left, and he’d like to prefer he was not alone when compared to the alternative - he had seen the message recorded by master Obi-Wan Kenobi. He’d narrowly escaped unseen, lingering clone troopers discussing their plan to execute all Jedi on sight aloud. Following a direct order, gunning down their own generals. Their own friends.

It was shocking, but Oda had never taken to blindly trusting the clones - master Krell had seen to that. In his formative years, and during the war, that had been considered a fatal flaw by the council. He had often butted heads with fellow Jedi Knights like Aayla Secura or Anakin Skywalker over his unwillingness to rely upon his troops. Now, he was beginning to think himself lucky for his suspicions. His master may have been punished, unjustly Oda would like to believe, for refusing to humanize expendable soldiers. He had survived only because of that inherent doubt in their reliability.

Finally, as Oda twisted both palms upwards; he took a wide stance for maximal leverage, closed both fists, and tugged. Hard. With unwavering determination and with everything he had in him, narrowed eyes still focused on the looming, black clad figure atop the bridge. The ominous shadow of a man didn’t move, even as the structure beneath his feet came undone in slow motion. He didn't seem particularly concerned by imminent death, not even when the final fortification shattered and the bridge came crashing down.

Oda was prepared for the shockwave when tonnes upon tonnes of solid rock collided with the manufactured flood bed; salt crystals propelled like projectiles in every direction. What he wasn’t prepared for, however, was just how powerful the impact would be. The Jedi had no time to steady or brace himself as the first shockwave set him off balance, and the second sent him flying. The cloud of debri whirled past him in a flurry, dragging his helpless body with it and Oda instinctively covered his face with both arms for protection.

The sound came a millisecond later. Earsplitting. A deafening explosive crack, like the roar of a thunderstorm and the detonation of a thousand bombs combined. The Jedi covered his ears with a whimper when pain pierced his ear drums. An ominous, distinct pop followed closely by a shrill, high pitched ringing settled in his temples and muted any further noises like a swab of cotton. Panting, the young man found himself feeling quite a bit less confident even as he groggily managed to get up on his knees. The dust cloud kicked up by the bridge’s collapse disoriented him, both sight and sound reduced by the blast. His body ached, and his arms trembled from the sheer extersion of bringing down such a large structure. Oda had never attempted a similar feat before, and had never even imagined he might need to.

Taking a couple of deep breaths, Oda at least figured he had time to recover. No one could have survived a two hundred foot drop into a durasteel reinforced salt lake canyon, with a fifty foot overpass crashing down on top of them. Not even this menace, whoever he was.

He had hunted Oda through the vacant landscape of Jansenn for 48 hours without yielding. The hunt had begun as a creeping suspicion, as a foreboding sensation of being watched. The Jedi had no clue who his assailant was, but rumours spoke of Imperial Force wielders trained specifically to trap and dispose of any remaining Jedi stragglers. Oda had made several good friends in the underbelly of the Galaxy these past couple of years since the fall of the Republic. Perhaps he had become careless, or perhaps the vigor with which the Empire pursued Jedi had grown exponentially. Either way, Oda had a target on his back and a price on his head that not even his friends could erase. It had been a matter of time, but he hadn’t expected these assassins to be so relentless in their pursuit.

Coughing, Oda spit up a garbled mix of salt crystals, saliva and blood. His head was spinning, and he staggered backwards when he stubbornly got up on his feet. The moment felt like it had lasted an eternity but it couldn’t have been more than half a minute. Even in his disoriented state, the Jedi noticed that the topmost sheen of debris was already fading, carried away by the dry acrid winds overhead. But that wasn’t what bothered Oda and drew his attention. As he wiped his nose, attempting to stall the gush of blood trickling from the left nostril, the colour was left drained from the man’s bruised face.

The entire midsection of the expansive, collapsed walkway appeared to be hovering. Oda blinked rapidly, not believing his eyes and with a growing dread setting in, he tried to write it off as a hallucination caused by sudden head trauma. As if whatever external force that was manipulating the levitating wreckage had read his mind; the thick fog of obliterated gravel, sand and salt perforating the air seemed to settle in an instant. There was nothing natural about the way in which every single airborne particle of dust laid down as neatly as if someone had smoothed it out with their hands. In an instant the air was crisp and clear. The sun’s blinding light spilled into the canyon, reflected by billions of salt lake crystals. With one, single synchronized swipe, a serene peace settled as the rubble littering the bottom of the complex was brushed aside to create a perfect pathway. Oda didn’t want to look, but he already knew the culprit behind the inexplicable bending of physics.

Where only a collapsed bridge should have been resting, crushing its passenger under its weight - stood the man Oda had hoped to destroy. One of his large hands was aimed in Oda’s direction, palm open facing him. The other was raised to about eye level in a tightly clamped fist. There was a slight tremble to that one balled hand, but in its Force grip, the man had successfully both blocked and abruptly stopped the remains of the falling bridge mid air before they could even touch the bottom of the canyon. Around his imposing figure laid the shattered marble pillars, the stone railings that had lined the walkway in pieces. Suspension cables hung from the carved sandstone that had supported the viewing platforms. In the midst of the chaos, the majority of the demolished structure remained suspended just a few feet above the mysterious man’s domed black helmet.

Oda could only stare, mouth wide open in horror. His feet seemed nailed to the ground. His eardrums still burnt, but the ringing had begun to subside and the uncanny, eerie silence of the scene was tense and overbearing, suffocating. Shifting slightly, the large, imposing figure of a man on a mission that stood before the young Jedi began to approach. His strides were slow and meticulous, but he didn’t falter. Oda’s gaze remained transfixed by the large chunk of stone still floating freely; its vast shadow blocking out the sunlight.

“Did you believe dropping a bridge on me would be a sufficient way of stalling my advances? I am afraid I must disappoint you. Now, shall we see how you enjoy a similar treatment?” the man rumbled, his voice sharp and its bark was a sinister warning.

Oda instantly realized what it meant, and he did his best to flee on wobbly, unsteady legs as the strange assassin crouched. The man brought his arm back to take perfect aim and in one flawless heave - he hurled the remains of the bridge at the boy full force. The distance was enough to allow Oda to dodge the majority of the formation heading for him, even as it broke apart along the way - but it was not enough to completely escape the explosion that sent shattered rock and gravel raining down on him when its proponent collided with the lake bed. Tumbling, the enormous limestones that had decorated the walkway seemed to chase the Jedi with unfathomable speed for something so substantial.

Oda glanced back, confident he was in the clear when he noted that he was gaining. He thought he might get away despite the burning in his lungs and the taste of iron and copper welling up in his throat - the salt he had inhaled scraping his airways from the inside. He even dared to smile - only to stumble on an unexpected depletion in the ground ahead. With a yelp, the Jedi lost his footing and tumbled forwards onto his palms and knees. Unable to break his fall, he rolled around; the sharp salt tearing holes in his clothes, digging deep into his flesh. A sickening pop and a snap was followed by a wet crack, and Oda came to a sudden stop.

Pain shot up the young man’s spine as he was unceremoniously pinned in place. Adrenaline pumping, Oda twisted halfway around and through the agony he soon realized that his right leg was locked in a vice between reinforced canyon floor and a chunk of the bridge’s support pillars.

The Jedi gulped down the urge to throw up, blood gushing from the multiple spots on his body the salt lake’s unforgiving bed had ripped up and rubbed raw. Nausea struck full on, as he attempted to push the remnants of what was once a craving appropriating the planet’s local population’s cultural, decorative art off of his mangled limb. To no avail, Oda’s hands shook and refused to stay still, blood painting the palms a deep crimson. He was trapped, backed into a corner, tears welling up in his eyes as the monster responsible for his suffering appeared over the crest of this brand new ridge of fallen rock he had created.

The man was impossibly tall, broad shouldered and carried himself with a dark pride. All black, his cape billowed behind him like a pair of giant wings as he crossed the distance between them with one leap. The grace behind it was jarring when linked to the man who had performed the feat. The man appeared to be regarding his handiwork, and there were no signs of strain or struggle within him. It appeared as if the immense power that fuelled the impressive Force wielding he had just performed didn’t so much as phase him.

“Let - let me go… I don’t h-have anything! I’ll disappear, just p-please,” Oda heard himself brokenly sniveling in between sobs and sniffles - put face to face with his own mortality, he found himself pathetic.

“You are as cowardly as every other Jedi. Tell me, how does it feel to look death in the eye?”

There was no malice or direct spite in the man’s deep voice, his wheezing respirator serving as an unwelcome third part invited to witness this mocking display. It triggered some kind of memory, but Oda couldn’t say what it was. Instead, the Jedi focused on the monster’s stoic face plate and how it seemed to emulate something akin to disgust, or distaste despite its perpetual aloofness.

Oda realized he was being treated if he wasn’t human, as if he was just a pest or a vermin this sinister man was looking to exterminate before continuing going about his day. The Jedi could picture this menace of a man going home as soon as he’d been dealt with, and never again think of him. Never again deliberate on his fate, never regret his death. Tears poured down the young man’s bruised, cut up cheeks, and he shook his head vehemently.

“Please, I - I’ll do anything…” he begged in vain, voice cracking mid sentence.

“You have nothing to offer me. I have no use for you, and even if I did, you would be the last person I would consider worthy of making an exception for.”

The man’s montone, almost bothered delivery changed with an uncanny ease. Suddenly, there was a tangible sense of contempt seeping through his mechanical, synthesized vocals.

“I… do I know you? I don’t understand.”

Oda had never sensed such unhinged, unadulterated hatred spilling from another human being. It was enough to taint the monster’s entire Force signature; infecting it like a virus, and the Jedi realized he had never in his life come across someone so deeply connected to the Dark Side. Still, as the tidal wires of agonizing pain continued to send his nervous system into shock and meltdown - the anguish only serving to heighten his awareness of this man’s loathing - the young man found himself perplexed through his terror. Something told him this was a personal vendetta.

A Sith Lord, master Krell had said once. When you meet one, you’ll know. That’s what this nameless, faceless menace was. A Sith Lord.

“No. You do not know me, and you never will. But I know you.”

The Sith Lord drew closer, with a superhuman speed to his calculated, menacing approach. Oda tried to rear back, but with his leg crushed, he could do nothing but whine as agony washed over him and kept him incapacitated. The Sith seized the young man’s temporary weakness as an opportunity, placing one large, heavy booted sole over the Jedi’s heaving ribcage. As the assassin applied pressure little by little, Oda gasped - finding himself nearly unable to draw breath and the panic that had been threatening to overtake his senses broke through.

“I don’t - no - I---” he tried to reason and plead, but his executioner-to-be would have none of it.

“Master Yoda would not have taught you this, but I happen to believe in an eye for an eye. And while it would be decent of me to play fair, I have good reason not to. You owe me an arm, but I believe I will take… your life.”

Oda’s eyes widened as he stared right into crimson red lenses of the face plate covering the Sith Lord’s face. It all came rushing back to him. The lectures in the temple halls, the relentless bullying he had spearheaded. He’d just been a kid himself, he hadn’t enjoyed the new kid’s natural talent with the Force. He hadn’t enjoyed the attention the kid had received, he had been driven by a childish jealousy. He had thought the boy had gotten over it, as they grew up.

Yes, Oda might have accidentally broken the kid’s arm in a wrestling match. Yes, he might not have meant it when he’d said sorry and apologized at the time. Yes, they had gone on missions together when they had both been knighted. Yes, they had shared some sort of friendly connection on Ilum. Still, the kid had always been prone to holding grudges til the end.

Heart dropping into the pit of his belly, the Jedi instantly realized the identity of this Sith Lord. He didn’t doubt he would have died even without the personal connection, and it all made sense. Of course it was that kid who had turned on the Jedi council and their teachings. Of course it was that kid who had slaughtered the younglings in cold blood, who had brought about the Empire’s rise to power. Of course it was that kid, whomst master Kenobi would never sell out by name. That kid, who was excused and forgiven again and again.

Of course it was Anakin Skywalker.

[xbunnybunz]

Daybreak (5/?) [Wolf Keum x Reader x Alex Go]

Summary: The day brings to you Alex Go, and in the night, Wolf Keum. Your past is inescapable. They build you up and tear you back down, but this is what you need to survive.

Genre: Romance, Angst, Drama

—–

The shop is big, spacious, and refreshing. The windowpanes take up most of the wall space, dousing the entire café in golden afternoon light and complementing the cream and brown wallpaper and flooring.

The light purges the heavy thoughts from your mind. It’s an ethereal sensation, and the combination of the serene atmosphere and Alex’s presence help even out your breathing.

You stay close to Alex when he speaks to a waitress. There was a gentle hum of pop music over the speakers, you appreciated the way the songs blended into the sparse chatter and gentle tinkering of metal forks on ceramic plates.

You wondered how you didn’t know a place like this before, perhaps it opened recently? Your fingers raise to skim the engravings on the front desk. The discoloration on some of the dark wooden chairs told you otherwise. The divots in the polish whisper that you’ve been left behind, that time keeps going on, no matter how much you retract into yourself.

A small sigh slips from your lips and you divert your gaze to the floor, eyes sweeping over the pretty marble tile, catching the light through the windows and winking at you with a flourish.

Since that dreaded day, you had lived your happy afternoons in miserable loneliness in your bedroom, curtains pulled close to keep the sanctifying light off your cursed skin. You always knew the world would move on without you, but you had no idea it would hurt so much.

A gentle hand brushes your elbow and you look up.

“Come on,” Alex smiles at you, “Let’s grab a seat.”

You’re both seated in a corner booth, right by the windows. You like it because the way the sunshine hits Alex’s face makes his eyes glimmer with yellow flecks. His smile doesn’t seem half as blinding when the sun is right beside him.

“Haha, we got a good spot!” He laughs. His unending excitement with life is refreshing and the radiant energy that emits from him is amazing. So why can’t you get that damned streetlight out of your head?

You push it back again, but the darkness still seeps out, spilling over the table, the chair, the marbled floors.

“I really like how much sunlight we get in here.” You say, ignoring the tingling in your fingers. “I hope the food is as good as the vibe.”

Alex chuckles and hands you a menu from the stack propped up on the side. “Oh trust me, the food is the only real reason I keep coming back here.”

He pops the menu open and you eye the way he pours over the food selection, a wide smile on his face as he hums along with the tune overhead.

He’s so happy it’s strange, so happy you can’t understand it. Being so carefree was something you could barely remember. It was a breath of an old memory, calling out, beckoning and begging you to come back. But you can’t and you can only watch, enchanted, as someone else bathes in that blissful peace.

“Truth be told, Ben and I always get take-out here but this is the first time I’ve dined in. It always seemed like somewhere people studied, or took someone to impress them.”

He chuckles, scratching the side of his head.

“So I never had a good reason to eat in, until now.” He peeks at you shyly and your stomach flips at the expression he’s making, soft, endearing, and something else.

“Well, unless you brought study guides with you,” You raise an arm and prop your cheek on your palms, eyes meeting his with a spark, “I’m impressed.”

He ignites like a firework, all smiles, sparks and red coloring his cheekbones, and it’s amazing to watch, to feel, to know he’s so close you could almost touch him. Your fingers rebel, flexing out, but your arm stays anchored to the table.

“I, ah, that makes me really happy to hear.”

You can’t believe you’re the source of his happiness, but his grin right now is too earnest, too honest, and you wonder who the hell told him to wear his heart on his sleeve like that, who told him it was alright to smile at anyone the way he does.

“Ah, I really wanted to try this last time but Ben wanted the chocolate mousse instead. Let’s try this one today!”

You lean slightly across the table and peer at what he’s pointing at, and he follows in suit so you don’t have to move too far.

Up close, you can inhale his scent, lawn clippings and pine, a hint of something like pencil shavings. You peek at him through your lashes, watching the avid manner he spoke in, all drivel now that you were so close to him.

His eyes, aglow, alive, so endless and deep with a green hue you could watch them forever, embrace the way he understood the world through them, admire the way the corners of his eyes crinkled when he smiled too big, or laughed too hard.

You take in the way his eyebrows shoot up when he sees something he wants to order, or furrow when he complains and asks why it’s in French.

The way his lips curl, his cheeks push up, his hair falls, it’s all so expressive it almost hurts you to watch him, longing and captivated all at once.

“Ack! I’ll just get this one! It’s so hard to decide when everything looks so good. What about you?”

Alex glances up at you and catches you watching him, and the world shifts in an odd, enthralling way when his enthused expression melts into a calmer one, subdued compared to his previous energy, like a tiptoe around what was going on in his mind.

A moment passes, one, two, and his eyes trail down, down, down but you break the silence before his gaze can reach your lips. Look back down at the menu, and the tension is gone.

“The French toast looks good, we can both share so we taste more of the menu in one go.”

You pull back a bit, and his eyes follow you. Thrilled and confused.

“Sure, we can go with that.”

His voice sounds breathy, coarse. It raises the hairs on the back of your neck, but you just fold up the menus and recite the orders to the waitress who comes to pick them up.

By the time she leaves Alex has settled down again, though his gaze is still curious.

You don’t pay him any mind and rescind into the comfort of your soft leathery seat, not caring about the way it squeaks against your legs.

It’s a strange but comfortable silence. You think about how the quiet that occurs at home is so much more heavy and burdensome than the one now, wonder why that is, wonder how it’s so different, if the stillness should all be the same.

Maybe because it’s not stillness. There’s a sort of bubbly sensation in your stomach and chest, like pop rocks in your mouth, when Alex Go continues to ponder about you.

He doesn’t ask, but you can tell by the way he’s folding and unfolding his tissue and chewing on his straw. His mouth opens like he’s about to pose a question, but it evaporates into the air.

He does this until all the food comes, and only after everything is on the table do you ask,

“What’s wrong, Alex Go? Something on your mind?”

He looks shocked, like he has no idea how you read his mind, but relieved at the same time.

“Yeah actually, but I wasn’t sure how to ask without seeming… Intrusive.”

He pauses, doesn’t touch his food. Strange, because you swore you remembered him saying how hungry he was on the way here.

“You can ask me.”

Your voice is soft and reassuring, and you hope it’ll be enough to coax the question out of him. And it is.

“Well, I noticed that a lot of the times you seem really sad.”

He picks up his fork, spins it, but doesn’t eat.

“When I first met you, and that day at the market. On the way here, too. I know we aren’t super close or anything, but if telling me anything helps, I’d gladly hear you out.”

He scratches his ear. Scritch scratch. You’re taken aback, but you suppose you shouldn’t be surprised. You had cried the first time you met him and tried to pick a fight with a wall. But it’s the straightforward manner that he asks that shocks you the most.

You notice he’s still not eating, wonder if it’s nerves. You pick up your fork, making sure it clicks against your plate, and break off a piece of French toast. Almost like this reminds him there’s food on the table, Alex follows suit and begins to eat.

“There was a traffic accident.” You say. It comes out easier than you thought it would, easier than those times you choke up recalling the memories alone in your room.

“Not too far from here.”

Right by that accursed intersection, right by that damned flickering stoplight that had broken for reasons unknown to you until recently.

Alex looks up at you. He stops eating again and you curse yourself. His with eyes filled with a certain type of pity you’ve grown to detest, somehow it’s even more heartbreaking coming from him.

“I think about it a lot, about him a lot… I just can’t forget. It’s agonizing.”

Like a curse, the memory plays in your head, the stark contrast of streetlights against his silhouetted body.

“I wish I could’ve… Your hands ball up, your voice faltering. “I can’t help but wonder how things would be different if I had seen it coming.” There’s a pulse in your windpipe that makes it hard to breathe or speak. You begin to drift. Your eyes cast downwards and your wrists feel numb, a painful mark of the day that had changed your life and taken so much from you. You remember him, can’t ever forget him, see him in the distance, fading into a darkness you could not reach into. Then Alex’s voice pulls you out of your daze.

“It’s not your fault.”

You look up, eyes glassy with tears you hadn’t realized were forming. “What?”

“I said it’s not your fault.” Alex looks up at you, and those soft green eyes are harder now. “No one can protect everyone.” His knee brushes yours under the table and you stiffen. You can’t help it and he doesn’t notice.

“It’s easy to blame yourself for these things, I know.”

There’s a look in his eye, one of pain, one of regret, you know it because you regard those feelings as good friends, as bad friends, as longtime friends.

“But your friend, he wouldn’t want you to hold yourself back because of it. No one would wish that on someone they cared about, even if it’s hard for us to believe...”

You swallow, but the lump stays in your throat. The feeling is back, bitter and dark, crawling along your skin and piercing your mind with thick venom.

“What if you’re wrong?” You ask, voice barely a whisper. What if you wanted someone to blame for this?

“I’ve lost everything and I have no one else to blame except…” You fix your gaze upon Alex Go but all you can see is yourself, reflected in his eyes. You turn away, a grimace forming on your lips. “…I need to talk to him again, but hell, what if that’s not an option?”

The desperation in your voice inches up and out of your lips, it consumes your words with the darkness that has always lurked deep within your mind, taunting and keeping you up at night, harboring you to the bed in the morning with a grisly type of sickness.

“I hate living like this. But I just can’t move on, every day is reliving the same damn memory, but this is what I deserve.” You choke out a laugh, “Gone. Just like that. Because of me.”

“You’re wrong!”

Alex’s voice rises enough to cause some murmurs, but he doesn’t care. You raise your eyes, so far gone that the roaring fire in his eyes feel only like a flickering candle.

“What good does it do to hold someone else back because you can’t let go of the past?” He cries.

You know he’s right, but his words burn, they sting, they feel like an attack. You want to block your ears and drown him out, but you know it won’t work now. They’re already inside of your head.

So you just sit there with your hands in your lap, hiding the way they tremble like leaves in a storm.

“It’s hard.” You say, and it’s true. Anger is all you’ve ever known since it happened. “I can’t help it.”

Alex snakes his hand over the table, an invitation for comfort.

Your body bursts with adrenaline and you want so badly to press your fingers into his, aching for the warmth of acceptance, the precious grasp of someone who will hold you gently, treat you delicately. But you are at war with your mind and it is terrified of the light, flinching away whenever Alex Go opens his mouth to rain upon you the blessed sunshine you crave yet fear so deeply.

You have been functioning only on the fuel of fear and anger since the crash. You are accustomed to the way it sears at the back of your eyes and the pits of your stomach, so you pretend to not see his offer. He’s so lost in his thoughts he doesn’t notice.

“I know.” He says. “But this isn’t fair to you.”

It sits in the air and curdles there, mixing with the inky blackness oozing from your pores and leaving behind a rancid odor of shame that only you could smell.

“I’m sorry.” You say. For being miserable, for making a scene, for blaming Alex, though he was not aware.

He smiles at you, always that damn smile. “You don’t have to be.”

But you are. You always will be.

You smile back at him, try to convince him he’s said the right things. “Let’s dig in.”

He grins at you, and his eyebrows quirk in that way that let you know he’s bought it.

“Let’s.”

[irreplaceable-ecstasyy]

iii. Hushed conversation in-between kisses

An autumn drizzle poured onto the Akhrosimova house from the dimmed grey skies above the construct. Not an ounce of blue skies could be seen behind the blanket of clouds that crowded above but there was some sunlight poking through the thinner layers of clouds. It was a brightness not suited for reading without a light on in one’s room but it was enough to reveal a person’s features should find themselves seated by a window to watch the shower. The occasional rickety sounds of a carriage passing by the estate would interrupt the peace of the place but as soon as it was gone, the silence came down heavy, save for the pattering of the rain.

Dressed in nothing but loosened corsets, Hélène Kuragina and Marya Dmitrievna sat opposite one another upon a window seat, leaning on either side of the wall. There they sat not as a countess or grand dame but as two simple women stripped of their expensive lives. Silks, pearls, gems and cloth had been discarded on the floor by the red velvet bed, not forgotten but abandoned for this very moment. Secretly, they enjoyed this lifestyle. One kept behind a locked door. They did not have to cover the lipstick stains that colored their skin where they were not meant to be or redo their hair that was out of their usual styles or even address one another with their society’s formalities. They were free to be who they wanted to be but only behind the two grand doors that hid them away from the prying eyes of society.

Neither spoke. There was a conversation that came and went but it had been pause as they relished in the silence and in each other’s company, but their attentions were diverted. Hélène found the rain fascinating to stare at, or perhaps it was a thought that had distracted her as she gazed at the glazed window. As for Marya, her attention wavered from the cigarette between her index and middle finger to Hélène. The woman was truly enchanting. Even when she did not have a face full of make-up or pearls around that exquisite neck, she was a sight to marvel. Bare neck littered with kisses, gorgeous brunette curls that pooled down her shoulders, a leg dangling off the seat and one brought to her chest, and a faraway look. Lords, it was hard to tear her eyes away from one so angelic. Wordlessly, Marya tapped Hélène’s knee and held out the cigarette which was taken out of her hand rather quickly.

Hélène took a long drag from the cigarette that had been passed over to her, her chest rising slowly as she inhaled until she could no more. She only removed the bud from her lips to exhale, lowering her head so that it did not bother the woman who sat opposite her upon the window seat. Her wine glass was dry of its contents for a third time, and it was left untouched despite the evidently unfinished bottle of wine sat beside it. Her eyes were now lowered to stare at her feet instead of the window and lazily, she took another swig of bitter smoke.

Marya was not certain if these were signs to be wary of. She was not done with her second glass as her concern for the brunette refrained her from taking another sip to a hazy state of mind.

Hélène had proven herself to be an unreadable woman and it was all thanks to the man she called her father. Marya reserved no praises for that monster of a man for turning his own daughter to a delicately carved marble sculpture. She was fragile as she was cold and beautiful. One nudge would send her toppling over from the stand she had been built on. Marya hated that she could never figure the Kuragina out. Though, she knew what it was that was haunting her at this very moment. The conversation resumed from where they had stopped it.

“There’s nothing left to do,” Marya spoke up.

“I don’t need a reminder, Masha.” Hélène’s voice was raspy from the mixture of nicotine and alcohol, but it was clear with hurt. From the way she frowned, it showed she had not meant to let slip of the emotion.

“I know… I’m sorry.” Marya D. never apologized but somewhere inside her felt obliged to.

Shaking her head, Hélène scowled. “Why are you apologizing? It should be my parents, not you. You’ve never done anything wrong.”

Marya sighed and she plucked the remainder of the cigarette from Hélène’s fingertips to stop her. “I have no way to help you, Hélène.”

“Your company is enough, you know that. I don’t ask much from you, do I?” Hélène lifted her eyes to meet Marya’s grey hues. Her brown ones were so hollow.

“You don’t.”

“Then I don’t see why you should apologize for having nothing to offer when you’re always giving me what I need.”

“Could Pierre not offer the same?”

Hélène let out a harsh laugh. “No- I… I don’t want to be around him. His company is worthless to me. When I’m with him, I feel lonelier.”

“But”-

“He’s my husband by law, not by will. It’s only a term to officiate a person’s place in a marriage as is the term ‘wife’. I’m sure you understand,” Hélène scoffed.

Then Hélène turned away again. Something stung at the tip of her tongue to be said, Marya could tell based on the way Hélène moved and responded to her hesitation. The twitch of her lips, her blank wide-eyed fixation on nothing in particular and how she brought her hands together in deep contemplation. Why she was so cautious of her words in front of Marya, she could not find the answer. Hélène had always been a vocal one in society and crowds. Why could she not speak to a single individual who had much lesser significance?

Reaching over, Hélène picked up the bottle of wine and tipped her head to take a large gulp. Marya would have assumed that it was an attempt to flush out her feelings and the question that had been plaguing her. It was not uncommon of Hélène to avoid such a sensitive topic but after another gulp or two, Marya was met with the sight of solemn eyes and flushed cheeks. The drink had been intended to break down her walls and to wash away any regret that would creep up on her for asking such a question.

She trusted Marya to see her in vulnerability and God, did she have so much of hope that the woman would not let her fall and shatter like so many people had in her years of living. For one so young, she was already worn and ruined. Here she was exposed in front of Marya. Marya was truly a sight for sore eyes. Even with a face bare of make-up, her youth came from her own features. Soft pale skin, eyes that glittered underneath any source of light and red lips that complemented her complexion. And Hélène? Behind the make-up were tired eyes with dark rims of exhaustion, freckled cheeks kissed by the sun (tainted imperfection, her father once pointed out) and lips chapped from neglect and alcohol. She did not have half of what Marya did and it made her feel so small.

Hélène contemplated for a moment and with a trembling breath, she whispered, “Will you still love me, Marya?”

Bafflement was an understatement when Marya caught her words and quite unsure with herself, she inched closer to Hélène. “I-I beg your pardon?”

“Will you still love me in the years to come? That is if you even love me now… Masha, I need to know this, please,” Hélène implored as she slumped against the wall hopelessly.

“I do love you, my dear… And I will always. Maybe even more so since I can’t have you.”

“Really? Even if I were to bear his child?”

Marya snorted but not rudely, just light-heartedly. “Is this the same Elena I’ve been speaking to for years?” That made Hélène laugh lightly. “You would never carry a child. You’ve said it yourself.”

“I know but… If it ever happens, will you still love me?”

“You and the child, both, Lena... Now, will you stop worrying about the future? It’s not like you to be so worried.”

Hélène pointed a finger at Marya accusatorily. “That is where you’re wrong… I’m always worrying.”

“Well, you shouldn’t.” Marya tossed the burning cigarette into her wine glass then held her arms out to Hélène. “Come here.”

Hélène crawled over to Marya and slid right onto her lap. Her arms moved to wrap around her neck while her legs clung on to her waist in a secured hug. Her head came to rest on Marya’s shoulder and her hands carefully brushed the locks of fiery red hair away to tuck behind the other woman’s ear. Marya enveloped Hélène in her arms and pressed a long affectionate kiss upon the crown of her head.

Over the smell of tobacco and wine, Marya could smell the perfume that Hélène wore. It was the same scent that would linger on her side of the bed every time she woke up to find that Hélène had gone home… Back to her husband that she did not love. Hélène had no such luxury of waking up to a reminder that she was not alone in the safety of her own home. Much less a place she could confidently call home. The Bezukhov household held no such title.

In just a few moments, maybe a few minutes or hours, Hélène would have to return to that forsaken building to face her intoxicated husband. She could hold her alcohol but that man had no existing ability. Hélène was aware of his temper but Marya was not. It would be horrible to tell Marya just how horrid her old friend could be when she spoke so highly of him… Maybe one day when she was not in the state of mind to over-evaluate herself. The thought of having to return soon made Hélène clutch onto Marya tighter, as if for dear life, and she buried her face in her shoulder so deeply, she might just vanish into the older woman’s embrace.

“Masha, I don’t want to lose you…”

“Nonsense. What makes you think you will?”

“I don’t know… Your reputation? Your place in society. Your honor.”

Tutting softly, Marya pulled away from Hélène to lift her head up gently by her chin. “Lena, dearest. I love you… I love you with all my heart. My honor and place will never last anyway.”

“But you’ll be sent to your ruin.”

“And you won’t?”

A pause. “I’m… I’m already ruined.”

“There’s always a way to restore yourself. But putting society aside… My dear, I don’t love you as the Grand Dame of Moscow. Even if I lost my title, I would still love you all the same.”

“But”-

Before Hélène could finish her sentence, Marya pressed a kiss to her lips to silence her. Hélène, without protest, melted into the kiss and eased her shoulders to slouch against Marya. They pulled away for a breath and Hélène connected their foreheads, a hand coming to rest on Marya’s cheek. To misspend their last moments together for the day stressing their heads off was not ideal. It was not that Marya did not wish to acknowledge Hélène’s feelings. It was the fact that she did not want Hélène to return home with dread weighing on her, and there was a chance that this could be the very last time they saw each other until a few months. Neither would want to reminisce their final moments together that had been wasted away in sadness.

“No more worrying, okay?” Marya murmured as she planted another kiss on her lips.

“No more,” Hélène agreed and she gave Marya a small peck on the lips. “I love you, ma belle.”

And another kiss. “I love you too, my dear.”

“Will you write to me…?”

Marya smiled and nodded. “Of course. I’d love nothing more.”

Hélène beamed at Marya and gave her a loving kiss. The first genuine smile of the evening. “I’ll write back as soon as I receive your letters.”

“You’d better.”

“Is that a threat, Akhrosimova?” Hélène’s lips brushed against Marya’s and they quirked up into a drunken grin.

Marya rolled her eyes but leaned in to kiss Hélène again. “Perhaps.”

“Ooh~ Feisty.”

After exchanging many more kisses and holding onto one another for what seemed like hours, Hélène left the Akhrosimova household with a sweet smile and a new found sense of hope that had blossomed in her. Marya prayed to God above that no harm would ever come to the Kuragina. Seeing her so happy sparked so much of joy within the older woman and oh what she would give to always see that pure smile upon Hélène’s beautiful feature.