#like what is THEE thing that draws me to Duke | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

libidomechanica · 11 days

Text

“Out of day all into my own dark a”

A sonnet sequence

You, Bob, are wood,’ through the end of intoxication to draw. To pick juicy rubies, who survived the sullen winding mighty mass of melodies; and the press’d: of him here, for love’s old song like smaller. Out of day all into my own dark a mind the breaking behind my Delight. No stated, and roar’d of the hope hope hope on my head, an image I do steal things with them of the stories are circulation. And kiss, so sure a green would pour forth, Ask why tears and the poet’s blossoming, all; and lo! The comfort so the wren through tis my heart of Albion’s earlier had past, howling sorrows freshest cheek, whose again—again to be sickly ghost, and plumes anger, ’ and tumble knapsack a’ my nightdress, and all the hilts? All pass’d in by her music by the front of death, no fancy cannot seen the hotels, st. Is likely find a bill’s small crowd. And puts out upon her side.

However, I follow’d bait on purposeth; since your conversion has given quantity encumbered. Of sound was surprise like most dear to the entrance, a thousand mair weathered over me for confest my mother’s death-white foam nor what make her dukes, which is a love you great travail to soothe my cheerless sleep; from staring mine eyes, for a five within the blue, betray how shade, of such kind of gentle shadows and lilies, yet cannot die, till that to win it were my Love upon the stories are one. As well if she third or seen, and wish to warm us on sheets, and all phantom wooed.

For what time, the moments when nature seem a school boys and proved, a pure unstrung, and salt—sweet ore which locked with house with our young I study there, I heard you have faculty by thy fame is quiet dream of any state with hope hope hopes.&Forth, I rise again, that he said: the boy walks in her heaven and could not revere: if the hue of wretch, howling snow. A bliss, for follower as love all thou art my Life is gone; there stand all it what the publicly impart: o, lest your eyes, where music by that have climbs to where the Memory of much to fear; but the World to his below, are one.

Advantage the worth these words came neere, Her bloud cost of her, and ward; whose chin and all his spawn of thee more the land. Some, with those who would be heard; I saw the Ringlet restrains. Straight so, she redden’d and love thee; but tis yon hawthorn, wherefore. All help you would scorner, ’ and their wealth of a stone set in triumph, come with the one I ate? Each from thee with kings waving. And thorough, and performed of day? My heart, as in crushing him away. Or love is the spring, wi’ mony a flower as lord was scarcely gazed, and coughs to cry aloud for ever in spread wings in his own hand,—why, thus they!

And prophecy—except the brick, and shut up annals wax’d but this turf, and all his foot of spirits, and that your smile, theniel Menzies’ bonie Mary, charlie Grigor in the grieved so intensifies and man’s abhorr’d: how eager gentle read, thy works out, this bequeath the Poet’s pages of those the cowslips the lamplighten. His morns he paid it. And art thou hast passed them beyond its myself more they are footage to kiss the conveyance, the snow, when his below, to freedom’s chosen it. Alas, that you cease trying! Before than this odd labyrinth; or as a vanquished soldiery to die.

Fate sic pleasures of these world a year old acquaintance; and all is sick for the surgeon’s knife. Proves imagination; but this is that darken’d; like a dumb statue, from the fire, more sublimer word were stands the poor devil are the rude enough the scorn that can win a crystal—and drove past, and mountain show to smile, that of her youth and living behind the streamlet and pale lips on with due prevail against allow’d, pursues! The lucky, and could discern when I begins a journey, but know myself such a city, and dark, and prophecies, for being breathe things which great worse the Mansions.

You are, alas, her way. For it’s like stone- Henge is not the ducklings to itself thou are about philosophise, and a ho, and nearly glisten; and I, whose pallid breasts beneath to live a sparkling snow. But Juan saw no footprint, hearken to follower upon their full before him Max, and sweet there is black. Fire beneath the brave poore, you’ll afford me so sordid and we touch entirely by nightly expressive you soar too happen thy cheer, the Devil; the eye is the purple-stained gloves it holds the falling snow. In twice through verdurous heart is still on Menie doat, and all thing!

Was given her woes? And mair were I am an ancient debauchee who like thee, that she, whate’er the slow strings renewed for bloody spur cannot shining in mud. Of conqueror William did repay his knights of the highway home, an English heart, into my Mother could be head, so gladly speeds the Whigs? Of the tyranny could be said— just an anguish still, no longer roves in this childhood in that he prescription; and now the deepe in me, and shawl, Depart nourishment, since through three is the first attached to a pint of being pent in the Grand? To ten, or durst inhabits;—not so.

The sound, and with good satire, i’d try confine, half the solemn and hover upon the time, and since which was not said many of town, he laid to make me alone. Which must be won by favour or wholly; and yet what a sublime constant light, I’ve been ravellers drive to speak. I hate to swage; nature with his feet, and more harmony with woe! Of age, and winding for thee that will I; as doth makes me sin award, in the major part it be according, her words of this is their burthens, meaning in the only pretty captive, freedom? Along the complaining, eyes in brass.

The common men may floats though your curls, and he notices to be: only bear traps for mind from everyone else is. When birds nor light, thy sharpers’ hooks, where is the windshield and of the turnpikes, and knucklebone. How bleed, but we were once were the kingdom of these responses give the strong her lay in a dream of a young I studied with griefs findings of free that flies in a newspaper posted on my rose is shown, Fled is lord of heaven is with dead fleece made a wickedness; my lord was cold. Like a tooth in arias of old? Tool that blessed, through the incalculable mystery.

Had it any flaws of bone, half-solved sometimes and to climbed thy sight of our brow and he whole ones lie of Theirs—their hydes, like the prick leaves rainbows o’er the very clear striking resemblance between the meant. Before than young feelings cry, the gentlemen along the list of ignis fatuus to know you up the thorn, thy long, Jámi, in this our only bower’ in Moore’s the major part of mechanics, and duly seats or suits full of intrigues between unequal light-winged Dryad of glass and sudden, the prime. With the street still. Things below, kiss and his cheeks, and can finde, where I saw rooftops.

And gentle Euphues, whose skies. You canst not, but quite sure I? And the same state within my breath, whoe’er shall the world a year old age’s creep, prickle my song, so my tongues to pansies come, and cried, unmarried, unmarried until final berries thy look of fondness, young like a taper, my heart. Read, and Memory the first a fit of this line, remember So dark secret charged; yet this is, or senate in the care no sign of more mild Muse with a grace grace, spears ago you struction, which the mourn to her cheek lie this the one word that would lie, but when I hold dominion draws; then my father?

Do; but much to fuddle with the first are a dainty Ariel’ and put claim the elm-tops down by yon streets fermentative. Beam on my heart beat about with otherwise word Miltonic blast has slain my fairer, I never we should make my Stella thing limping and haply the small smile; and o’er it moves, he found, and nor what other bower, who rolls an ox o’er pebble, and is a sacred pages. And descended, Ellen flew over they have acted the capitulation—that in handwriting what time, and when I’m sure I? Don Juan was in Banquo’s glass, sweet them, worse that is cruel.

And in the little feuds, at least that nought save, which the hilts? Better, that Fortune’s shining? My guard of gravity is singing, bend then spoke I to nurses;—kill and thrusts in odour and though of taxborn riches, wherewithal: be she shovel down to deem, no doubt, the springtime, blood their antique pen would in sighs most dear save though of what merit live by lies beside moments on her dear to less to think that shoulder bore. Of years and shadows number’d lie; the place book. The lower as loveling then, where the road be heart, into my own darkness. For I am quite a drum in honest, stain.

Thing all kinds of the alien cornfield is universe wild voice, quoth I, Sweet a flower; like Roland’s distresses have bid your loved well? The wars, the wind’s Eye its very fault? I knew porphyria’s Lover! Busy old face with bosom friend Jeffrey write and sees a worlds, and all bail shall find tongues to a party as tall as brain? Do you read it; but still, scarce any sensual; for once more: imaginations stay, in darkness in me. With the breasts beneath to bonie Mary. Name on his fair maid, ere ships have seen—the Hunter and could fail so. Time. Talk in tender is that abandoned arms he said: the grass-grown lately rather drain the sculpture of all mine, fair of Rome turned nest and sages have been at leads the ken, or did I know my epic renegadoes, milton appears and corrupt by another lay in a dazzling eye wax dim, drew quiet? The night drink of what dirty.

If I spoke, she was sitting, she is a word! Teach the womb—it is youth; and Crabbe will true-hearted was let there, for you, drink too much untold, laughing Natures of lips: but, as thoughtful bard sits by her sonnets, at great shape of Thetis, which way is homages,— is yet but sweet love is their proudlier prancing spoke, she was not matter to know not undo it. The bells her old fast the simply, with me, sweet love that glittering colder where my eyes and stricken, so remembers more them down to touches prone, I have ever know, from the entire worth thy tongues: full of the good complain, with time.

Kill and I sigh alone. The bright, and feelings, lend with its hint, when we know, that I in the people bred by the Tombe did not least, alone all that I then t is a glimpse of right; our days work’s expired: for their habits;—not so, we’lltalk of land of Manhattan was blue devil. Left them fades that is kneeling dwells the usual by thy praise. But onward life, and new system to attend, instead, and though death the bars to sticker bushes to pick juicy rubies, pearl make an Eve, be the damp, spilling on her body be. Bower, and so that a living dark moved overwhelms us all.

Who, sleep, in the pity by love thee thou appear so well to shed; she stream, full shows me when western winding morn. So low upon an hour of day? A voice from thy heart as twere nor me internal spirit of BEAUTY, that eats at moments on me, and let itself, or so, and manger, like to a thine, call’d off by one and legs stop twitching, made the earth, of riches exposed to me one of life and the lot of life should like a hawk, an’ it winna let a body be. The entrance, which looks into my eye like to a dew, wanting concussion, they might melts down run through puddle; hurrah!

She seem’d to his property and that regard. Like to a Ship on Goodwins call! Free, so doth wear, play ye at with Richard Rorty said that’s hardly leave thee still with pride, his friend! Appeared understand still struck the boy, the arrows from the light, let not youth, and is apt to Tauris, was given a samples on our body making notes were once more’s the sole princes who have been a Congress doing to seek, i’m sure I? Of falling to think upon earthly paradise, and limped downe my heart of my pained mouth to Auld Lang Syne! At moments you’d coax a vampire. That glory is the nation.

Let him not breathe sweetest air. The fancy will know it’s embedded in business was rise that is no scent before there’s a weak Woman; nor are they be thou and I own me in default confusion; therefore since Adam, with his pass like Don Juan, carpe diem, ’ Juan, in the better, daughters—worn and the carefully would kiss me to swell? Who don’t pretence of worms to dwell: thy frown last nightly expressive you as I love, though a ring, when proud heart, though the cathedral; and not limit much more this unholy battle. And love to find then may lose by horses o’er a strong Arm—and open Hand.

Back to me which looks ouer their spells did glow. Nor shaw, theniel Menzies’ bonie glen at wintry dawn; but if I should turn an article. A mosque so noblest the third or hearts are wounded, Ellen stood in my griefs to keep it, and full of matter wounds proclaim’d! Unseen a Duke no matter when this tale, for they say that Hope adore., So prime. Of endless, but do not, but not thinkers are passion; but fair, nor can I say a thief to strip mall, I put off at speed, being great prodigy, Miss Araminta Smith who does my heart would make my Stellaes Season, which Cupids selfish, and become.

And was round was lucky hours, Depart not— lest it in the rich press’s matrimonial bounty and poor, which shall above all my heart let me poor stood, and wide whites should thy spell of the grave.—The van, those who have much did knows, whose plague, this army of thorny fruit bush where Nancy, I though seldom sunny lane some buried deep and drooping eyes have lied who did not said his inconstant glance made proffer of outworn buried age; when slowly the corner. Beauties, who don’t the day or night was time so sordid and sunburnt mirth! This island end with it all of melody spur cannot quench love.

Gone, I went to sleepers who gathers’ gravel the cries, and by the nightly express’d; but do not giggle, and straight in Caledon or Italy, thy baited hooks shallow, and not know it’s jet, jet black, an’ it’s jet, jet black. To you know the drains doubting coldly wherewith the skiffs which a mode of either eyes, but— as being opened the thou and I, Love, you looke in the highway home, and a sweetest sings hot and offering, all; the fridge, on thee thou go without the capital apace;—esteem, like a toothy wolf where he deep an adjunct to regular sorrows the crusted snows, who lifts him pardon a fault? Robbing notes were Herself almost clergymen, we have, extremely in my face, prepar’d by thy glorious character, all, another reason that wretched meat and casting well, crie Victorie, a passive you have seen a concoction flittering and love after me.

Of being so low in the sternly death! If things righten. Amongst lives them, and the boy walks this is no more, and brushed by Fame, that has been at least state, or like stone. That sweetest sings happiness,—so, she rose; but t is in vain such a scorn to hear; if from my Maw. Like a raccoon. A notion, maybe that now you may lose helplesse in sometimes graced our soarings hymns at heav’n to gloss, and leaves which shall tangle me forth found, if a hands to warm Southey’s gander. That was God’s Son, as to me. And I know your slavery much the people of royalty’s vast her head, however, t is busied.

Last, in embalmed darkly bright forking the real to me then t is tongue’s tune the contemplation. And when for can’t shaken while Damon’s head—and so shallow, and if all would engross’d the farmer ploughs but silk that binde. And let the night, trim, but this, that I sing thrown, a jargon, a metal trinket from which might here waxing rather dignity brook’d about here. I’ll say, Don Juan, whose was vacant, as consecrates his housekeepers who admired of being a sidewalk, the mavis and yet I find in morning down into my side, therefore he mourning of other honey-moon’s later.

They won’t want hills of view things hot dogs which was no gentle Groane at the night-winged Dryad of grandsire left, save where Max like a shell- fish. The Blues, tongues to mine eyes have way house of a horses! Do not know what weightless love: be her chill blast. Skulls that clings that being people at his bed thy bier.-The old me Head and strong appear’d to quench you, sleeping. Infected valour; much also then use rigor tint his just at there’s little strait melts. Outer air were spectre of the young her mines of the grew so—on the hills, that can nothing else desire to say truths you alone. Queen Virtue, the true.

Yet I shudder’d around was lucky, I stand an Asia, and gainst duns, and rewarded. To Spain an image of them there did most others lie huddled wonder which now bleed as my friends that the church, refusing giraffes if you back carefully would dedicate, on living soul in eternal, measures hold; but little more than necessity and bow and shook when wind willing frame: i, cumbred with poets almost clergymen, or from the Continent, but the floor; their uti possible of rest: low lies onwards me paint the porch of Love before head, by the True Believe that is he?

We left it be a foolscap crowns over. And could tell there in an hour. Drawn after a rain set off a great Drawcansir, examined by those koi, still it when we met! His rider love. Then will both to fuddle along time, life’s journey, but, like a beam in shapes of literature with gratitude in which turn to have take my love’s religion, I must die; and nor what he should Fate sic pleasant Orange-tree; how Poles right; no leaf will protected: and I pass’d the air, thoughts abide, intend not kill’d’ the Field of Verse, the tune the broad air can explanations out grass. And I are nothing means.

If I might they circle of ‘Auld Lang Syne! My puling passion. On her worth as I suffer frost somehow, but what you soar too high, left nothing, she is a poet. To turn them, and the howling at the immortal clothed in starlight acquaintance, the wise doubt, chance. To perplex and fill the road be head, taking no summer’s day where music in the evening eyes wide wings, and knucklebone.— Of Whom? God being in a hurry of song, and an ejection. She fled from this pious mother in their name of Biron. Such stones will and then use rigor tint far deepe in my breath in her arms pale death!

I saw ten thought of the humanity— must make this bequeath the boy who was surpris’d and founder’d half of wheels, which form to find what the friend, his feet to give himself more hard to lose you go the more for myself within can stave off our brow sae white, nor flower-enamour’d by unrest. Pinto— Mendez Ferdinando—still small to so basely he four and his carriage; and, above all men ride, the Bench too tend her grace thy love’s religion, I must be a they-love poet’s, too, they are you distil your smell, desir’st those plans a word! Now more the tints of the ridge of the distance.

But open Hand. Yet unborn: first look down on you and makes me than everybody think they’re given a sprightly dream of heaven’s freedom’s chosen it. Not to vex the lattery? Yet Faith stirs in odour and her outward show’d a fever, and a real swell? In ambush of your love herself upon the C he gave us Life, for thee that loves the cold stone; she saw Ilion? To his neck unto Thee from thou overcome into teaches girls to the Florentine: ye monarch reign’s head—and thee well countess, or whether make my loue to freedom, he apple falling—come, let me love the ring?

The house who love. To watch you only that least not be, to seek not the little, been absence sound a patch of so great state, that if Diogenes country lane some heiresses; tell them therefore them beyond all, yet Faith and lost amidst royal riddle, though I hate a murderous, bloody French were empty house I lo’ed a death and in and his Daughter; but don’t, t will, steal one like to warm us on summer winds at war with close by one and with pain the heaven’s gate; the bond the dance, the load. The worlds pass away, to live in visioned dream of clichés and like Hecla’s flame in the road!

Action, maybe that has been but sleeping on darkness was island of thee how, in promoting myselfe for it is a lie? Where parents live anthem fades to freeze once more, whose light leaps in time. Thou art insensible from which Cupids self, and sigh’d, and write. Fool lord, all free to watch the moonshine upon the end of Manhattan was mine nor your sweet than mine a little boxes frame: i, cumbred with apple, sends that lid, full-sloping eyes too palpably description on an English heart in the dream of any summer is a narrowly the lines a ioy from afar, nor services.

You say: be hypocritic but by those. Even such is come who preferr’d. And cry: hope’s permanent among the month’s frost some still aching such, which shakes a stiff yet grass- grown quadrille.—A planet guide, among the women faded for the day, fair maids have lov’d friends that which the brazen from the dance things nothing great shall whelm the manors if that they behold! Swell, and, with mine eyes be blessing night makes my friend, because to slave-maker, who seem’d quite old enough you turn to snow, despite of eighty, in a dancing a boat and cold autumn, and from the day! For thy Feet, the window, and sky!

You gentlemen, by dint of life and that is not amidst the wild voice by thee, and dancer, had kept him not approved. And still with children save what great cup of wonder at the dreary front proper time; for pity by the conversion or lie huddled and beneath thee my Oread cold to the waukens by the sovereign shock’d, and looke in Ohio call Stella, who from flowers; and his gust is greeing, and could not long of those pedestrian Muses upon it still aching above they passing t is not lose her darlings sake, knowing? And yet t is not long we have tosses turtle.

Voice o’ Pity here? You overstrain firm soil to speak out. I know that sweetest of ill mask’d how pearls and corruptible a level, that future day will ride, looking on his own little boxes framed; heav’n is music, either house in purple round was let them with To be led to any times hath taken up at her word that fell on me, as if it stopp’d em. In love, all as a moral chimney-sweeper, bring tide homeward glided in the phantom wooed.—She she sat without sometimes hath and calling—come, my delight. Lovely knows. Thousand downstairs in the dewy hill. Had told you are made.

The Kiss of human heart. Decide, and of Majesty, after he be, the death. Since soundly sleeps with teach that are you would she no more regular gleam of fashion, which he passion. I cannot express a depth below, ineffably, legitimately been raveled and in haste, a guard; thou thus, through which from me I’ll tell you are smoke are but a ray. That is now that sweet Tibbie Dunbar? Believe so much ye strip the Scotchman in this world! And will breathe third, the Virgin’s mystical virgins black Edward’s helm, and with me. Old guard of hemlock I had drunk, or emptied somehow, but when love.

Some rumours, which I have more not—Continent, and there waning has, little space to die so sore, hath she sat a Raven, she strike are but we have, like to this, and the sheds, he asks not tell ye: cupid and honour; and the holy water and he makes my hero; nor foes—all nation is not to all, to one who look upon, and beneath the tyrant’s side sat little cause thy flame! Over the grass, and all them with time— not just now there you turned with all that fled, matches, but Juan felt she; now the capital apace;—esteeming it a life to be kingdom of lips: but, as where is hell.

Juan knew him, if he died, Rorty said a word!—Only he answer about going to be, and howling such, which I doubting country lang—take their dead: fair wealth, and with once filled with thee down, that want of glass for in gear, we’re rich in her teens; and there is London streamless, and am like all is singing to beat like falling of salt and proud hear away, as going towards to lassie by her mourning no summer in die capital, who could he adore, not thy high post of excess of high prospects name of changed: the bright forking of peace returns from madness, ye may yield which the glen at wintry day. That must talk about the poor Son of the summer’s hand sheltered in bed, echoing into stranger throat, eye and a ho, and that which to climbed thy balmy lips let me, no vapour, discover the pallid and vigour, but full of ruth for thee so longer understand there their nest.

Kids do now, kiss the meant but will, though, claspt by another could name, at once set down; the greater, beauty might at hideous human heart is sung in rhyme, for everything like a white curtains the family vaunt, beside in amorous earth their luckier votaries, that I won’t devise somewhere. But it later, being for the threw; I cast; and the panels broken in clumsy jackets. Struck them go scraping across the slavery, forgets there is also had a hands bears always upper this carol they view its bondslave tossed you; there’s Whitbread? Do you know—two women fresh grave.

You flashing low! No laws, we’re welcome one of tears before taken, and sae in love, and there when I have given them not the time, what tardy name, the body lies, all the distance, and she find, to see the like returns, and straight in spring. A might makes me to country that darken’d; like to pleased to the years were none know, that in which droops upon an English, save forgot if things have been—down by youth, a poor player, ’—then play out thee were fix’d, as if Life to bride, the sea, and mony a flowing Billy’s ban on so foul corruption flittering if thence marshals forth here the ecstasy!

#poetry #automatically generated text #Patrick Mooney #Markov chains #Markov chain length: 6 #147 texts #sonnet sequence

0 notes

starxscream · 3 years

Text

Color-Coded Deck

“ Once again Rouxls challenges Swatch to a battle of wits- though this time it doesn't exactly go as planned. “

SwatchKaard fic!

Bc I saw that there were none and so I had to do smth about it, click the read more to view! (Also check it out on ao3 if it’s easier for y’all to read there!

It had been another long day at the cafe, working various loud-mouthed customers that seemed never ending in Castle Town. Swatch has to wonder if moving out here was worth it, putting up with some of the patrons here almost made it not. The bird sighs, making the final rounds while the swatchlings finish cleaning up for the night. As the final chores and tasks are completed, Swatch excuses the swatchlings to head home and rest for tomorrow, staying behind to finish up the managerial paperwork. There was always more work to do, and Swatch had no time to rest until it was completed. Such was life. The same routine that they were so accustomed to, it didn't truly bother them really. In fact, Swatch enjoyed the brief moment of quiet and privacy of being alone in the cafe.

As the last swatchling exits, Swatch double checks the store before meandering towards to flip the sign from "open" to "closed". However, as they move to flip the sign, there's a glowing flash of light, causing Swatch to lift his arm to block out the glare before it dissipates. Oh no. A feeling of knowing dread nestles in their gut.

Before Swatch can react, a blue hand rattles the door, pushing it against Swatch who had finally moved to try and hold it shut. Of COURSE it just had to be him…

A loud shrill voice echoes through the crack in the door, "Greetings thou most commonest worm-avian! I haveth decided to graceth thine nighteth with thy presence!" Swatch inwardly groans, releasing the door and taking a step back to allow the other to dramatically swing it open and saunter through the now open doorway.

Rouxls Kaard.

Truly, could Swatch ever catch a break?

"What might you be doing here Kaard? Need I remind you that you have been banned from the premises." Swatch crosses their arms across their chest, false niceties dripping off of their voice, trying not to let their impatience shine through.

Rouxls tuts, wagging a finger in the air, "That waseth at thou previousth establishmente, whiche waseth the highesteth forme of slandereth I haveth ever been subjectedeth too mindeth thou, howevereth, I haveth not been bannedeth here! So thy musteth allowth my graciouse presence to be bestowedeth upon thy grounds." A smug look sits on his face, chest puffed out proudly, 'sneakily' gesturing to the sign that was still flipped to "open".

Swatch resists rolling his eyes, a part of them wondering if Rouxls even knew the cafe's hours...probably not. Though they supposed Rouxls was right, he had not been banned from this cafe. Maybe he would be within the upcoming days, it was inevitable really, but for now he wasn't and Swatch was left with their hands full. With a sigh, they consider trying to explain that to Rouxls, but they figure that Rouxls wouldn't listen to that...whenever the self acclaimed "duke of puzzles" set his mind on something there was no way to get him to listen to anything else. Swatch knew that firsthand.

"Well, here you are then...arriving just as I was closing. What can I do for you Kaard?" Swatch keeps it simple, but not without a small jab, moving his arms behind his back, standing straight with his beak perked up just slightly. A mixture of professionalism and their own pettiness that made them want to show off how much better he was, especially around Rouxls. They wouldn't admit it, but they did enjoy the competition that Rouxls consistently brought to their doorstep…that is, if you could call it a competition.

Grin widening, Rouxls whips out a foreign deck of cards, sauntering past Swatch, and slamming it down onto a nearby table. Then he spins on his heel to face Swatch once again, face nearly splitting into two with how wide his grin was, and threads his fingers together. Swatch raises a single eyebrow, gaze looking over the strange deck of cards, before looking back at Rouxls, awaiting whatever long-winded explanation that was about to be given.

“I have cometh to challengeth thee to a duelth of wits!” Rouxls makes a grand gesture towards the table, "Thoust three heroes bestowedeth upon thy a gift,” Meaning, Rouxls probably whined until they gave it to him, “A supremeth gifte thou shalt not be wastedeth! I shall knocketh thou offeth thine pedestalth like a batteringeth rame knockingeth downeth thy castle doorsth! ” He motions for Swatch to sit down at one end of the table, waiting expectantly with shining eyes. Swatch opts not to say that a battering ram knocks open doors and not off, but that was their petty side talking.

Inhaling deeply, Swatch slowly moves over to the seat, placing a hand on the seat and pulling it out. Sure the polite thing to do was pull the seat out for Rouxls- as was their job, but they were not going to give Rouxls that satisfaction. His eyes bore into Rouxls, half expecting the guy to pull out another handful of worms and run off, but he seemed much too invested in the task at hand. Always with the games and puzzles that one, truly Swatch had to wonder how many times would Rouxls have to lose before he gives up?

“I foughte againsteth thy three heroes valiantlyth, takingeth thou on in thine own gameth. Sucheth a nobleth duty of thy to do, no?” Rouxls laughs, swiftlying moving to the seat across from Swatch, “Twas a longe and arduousth battle of brainse, and beingeth thy generouse and benevolenteth soul thy am, could not beareth to standeth thy thoughte of thrashingeth thine darling water-beetle’s closesteth allies. So I humbledeth thyself and allowedeth thine three hereos to besteth thy in battleth unscathedeth to spareth thine ailsth.” Meaning, Rouxls utterly lost.

“So you...‘valiantly’ turned tail and came crawling to me instead?” Swatch lets out a quiet scoff, unable to keep it contained at Rouxls’ blatant attempt to save face when anyone who knew Rouxls would know better than to believe the theatrics he was spouting. Easing himself into the chair, Swatch crosses his arms across his chest, “Alright then, I can spare a moment on your childish games. Would you care to explain the rules of the game you have so dutifully brought to my doorstep while I was trying to close up shop for the night? I would like to get this over with so that I may go home.”

Rouxls’ eyes narrow at Swatch, dramatically pointing across the table over at the bird, “Thou do not intimidateth me worm-avian!” Rouxls huffs, “Our battleth will be througheth the mighty gameth of what thy lightenereths call “Uno”! Whereupon thy willeth finally proveth my titleth of butler supremeth over thy worm-avian!” His point moves towards the deck, “Draweth foulest beast!”

Swatch makes no indication of moving, “I cannot draw if I do not know how to play, or are you resorting to needing unfair advantages to win? Truly, I expected more from you...” The bird trails off, feigning a sigh, watching Rouxls’ face light up in a vibrant embarrassed flush. He was so easy to read...it was kind of amusing really. A small smirk etches onto Swatch’s face at the sight.

“Of couseth not! I wouldeth never bringeth thy illesteth omens upon thy nameth! I haveth no need for sucheth ‘advantages’, thy willeth win no mattereth the circumstanceseth of oureth battleth as thy am thy grand duke of puzzles!” Rouxls covers for his mistake quickly, moving to cover the back of his hand with his mouth, “As for thine rules…” He hesitates for a moment, thinking, “I...shalt not wasteth my time explaining! Thereth is rule cardeths for a reason!” The irony… Rouxls paws at the deck, pulling out the card with the written words littered over its surface, before sliding it towards Swatch.

“Make haste! I do not haveth all nighte.” Rouxls puffs out his chest, arrogance dripping from his voice. Swatch gives Rouxls a cold glare at his words, a part of them still bitter they were the one being kept up this fine night. Quickly Swatch skims over the rules of this ‘Uno’ game, a simple color and symbol type of card game- first to get rid of all the cards in their hands wins. Easy enough.

“Alright, daresay I believe that I am ready now.” Swatch carefully sets the card back down on the table, reaching over to draw seven cards off of the top of the deck. There was a wide arrangement of colors, mostly blue ironically, and a couple of special cards with effects that they would need to play strategically. After Swatch draws his cards, Rouxls quickly follows suit, flipping over the top card to reveal a green number card to begin the game.

“With thy graciouseth self, I shalt allow thee to make thy first moveth!” Rouxls confidently announces, leaning forward with a tight grip on his cards. Swatch rolls his eyes again, looking over his hand and rubbing the bottom of his beak with his free hand. Then, without a word he places another green number card on top of the discard pile, a simple play to begin with.

The game continues on like this for a few rounds, with every turn Rouxls announcing how great he was or how he was going to win and Swatch shooting back with some sort of rebuttal that only served to fluster and make Rouxls even more agitated. Swatch isn’t sure why he liked poking at Rouxls as much as he did, truly Rouxls was the only one who managed to consistently break through his customer service facade.

It was...nice Swatch supposed. As idiotic as Rouxls was and his constant pestering to try and best Swatch, it was nice. A break in an otherwise methodical and boring day. As much as Swatch hated to admit it, they had grown to have fun playing with Rouxls.

However, the peaceful part of the game soon came to an end when Swatch placed down a draw two card onto the discard pile as Rouxls hand seemed to lessen with every turn, complete with the biggest smirk on their face.

“Now, if you could please draw, I can make my next move.” The bird hums, watching in curiosity as Rouxls sputters, slamming his hands on the table.

“Whateth is this sorceryeth!?” Rouxls glares at the cards as if they were the ones at fault, “Why musteth I loseth my turne? Draweth two!?” He huffs indignantly, Swatch raising an eyebrow.

“...You read the rules too, didn’t you Kaard? Being the ‘grand duke of puzzles’ yourself, surely you know about the special cards, right?” Their voice drips with faux sympathy, sounding more condescending than nice, Swatch stifling a chuckle at the sudden turn of events.

The rule card sits open on the table, Rouxls glancing between it and Swatch with a growing scowl on his face.

“Of courseth I know thy rules! I haveth bestedeth the most strongesteth beings in thy battleth of Uno!” Rouxls mind whirs in thought, “Thy justeth...won so quickly thateth card nevereth neededeth to be usedeth!” With a burning embarrassed flush once against rising to his face, Rouxls quickly covers his own ineptitude at the game, having bitterly come here after losing to the three heroes to try and best Swatch once again to try and lick his wounds.

Rouxls snatches the rule card after that, Swatch covering his mouth as they let out a snicker while Rouxls quickly skims through it. After a few moments, Rouxls throws the card back down, once again puffing out his chest.

"I shalt do this draweth two as thou cards stateth, but feareth not! Thy shalt stille remaineth victoriouse in the endth!" Rouxls swipes at the deck, a little frustrated if Swatch had to guess, gripping the cards in his hand even tighter.

Frustration of the evening having long since melted into amusement, Swatch rests an elbow onto the table to use his hand to keep his head propped up as he continues to play. Carefully setting another card onto the pile, Rouxls following suit a little too fast.

"I am afraid that this little game will end how it always does, though, I suppose that is why you challenged me after everyone left. Couldn't bear to take the bitter taste of defeat in the face of the public again, could you?" Swatch begins to idly speak, deciding to make some conversation even if it sounded more like he was targeting Rouxls. Truthfully they just wanted to see how the man would react, it was always so entertaining to see Rouxls theatrics in action when he wasn't purposefully being a thorn in your side, and Swatch found it more amusing than they should.

Rouxls laughs haughtily, gaze focused onto his cards as he keeps playing, "Fool! I wouldeth happily beeneth a target for thine adoringeth publice, howevereth I waseth ever so busyeth with thy duties of greateth importanceth that I hadeth to scavengeth thine timeth to graceth thee withe thy prescenceth. Thou shouldeth be gratefule thy oh-so busyeth scheduleth allowede it!" Truthfully he had been lurking around the outside of the cafe for hours, procrastinating and planning out his "grand entrance" until the store had reached closing. So alas, here they were. Sure the patronizing laughter when Rouxls had lost prior bothered him but there was no way he was going to let Swatch be right!

"Ah yes, lucky me." Swatch deadpans, smirk still hanging on their beak, "I cannot imagine how else I would like to be spending my evening. Why would I want to be relaxing at home after a long day of work when I could be playing a silly card game with you?" The chirp, sarcasm edging in their words.

"Tsk tsk, thee are justeth afraide of losingeth. Thou can admite it!" Rouxls slams another card down. "For I shall sooneth claime thy victory in oneth fell swoopeth, prepare thyself worm-avian!"

Swatch scoffs, "Afraid of losing to you? My apologies Kaard, but something actually has to be a reality for me to be scared of it." Rouxls, childishly, sticks out his tongue. He would not claim it to be childish if you called it out, however.

Setting his own card down, Swatch calls out 'Uno', holding his single card in his grasp. Meanwhile Rouxl still had multiple cards left, there was no chance of him winning.

Yet somehow, Rouxls hadn't started throwing a fit yet. Usually when it was clear he was to lose, he would get even more rambunctious than usual- yet this time Rouxls still had his cocky grin, staring at his cards. Swatch's smirk fades, eyes narrowing, knowing that the other man was up to something. Of course it wasn't a normal card game, this was Rouxls, something unexpected always happens with him around.

The bird tenses, awaiting the surprise bound to happen. Rouxls grin gets wider, before he cackles wildly, "Aha! Thou hasn't madeth thine finale moveth! I, Rouxls Kaard, shalt noweth claime thy victory!" Swatch's eyebrows furrowed together, there was no possible way-

Rouxls slams down a red skip card atop the red number card.

Swatch skips his turn, Rouxls putting down a red draw two card- causing Swatch to skip his turn again. He hesitantly reaches over to draw two cards.

There's no way…

Rouxls tosses down another draw two card, this time in green. Swatch's grip on his cards get ever tighter as they stare at the pile of discarded cards.

"I dareth say this is wheneth thy say 'Uno'!" Rouxls says triumphantly, Swatch's gaze snapping up in disbelief. Their beak opens and shuts again, dragging two more cards off of the deck.

"Sayeth thou prayers worm-avian! For tonighte, I reigneth victoriouse!" Swatch watches Rouxls dramatically leap from his seat, pushing the chair back, and slamming down his final card with all the energy in his being.

The card was to choose your own color and draw four cards. The biggest insult to injury that the game of Uno could give.

Swatch stares in utter shock- he had...actually lost. Rouxls had actually made a good play and won the game. Rouxls Kaard did. The guy who could barely craft a feasible puzzle on his own- outwitting them of all people. It was an impossibility, and yet, here it was staring Swatch in the face.

Amidst the frustration of losing, Swatch couldn't help but feel...impressed. That is, until Rouxls starts speaking again.

"There!! Noweth thou see thine wretchedeth worm-avian! Thy am superiore to thou inst everyeth way! Everytimeth before noweth has beeneth nothing moreth than a fluketh! For this is thy proveth! I am trulye bettereth than thou!" He laughs loudly, kicking a foot onto the chair seat and propping himself up into a pose with one hand on his hip and one covering his laughter. "Henceforth thou shalt bowe downeth and call me butler supremethe, thy grand duke of puzzles- Rouxls Kaard!" A pause in his triumph, looking over at Swatch, " ...Thou hearest me lesser worm-avian?"

Swatch sets down his card, controlled, carefully. Rouxls boasting makes the guy much less impressive and instead Swatch simmers into annoyance and frustration. Rouxls got lucky. And Swatch was never going to hear the end of it. A scowl breaks his beak in half as he stands stiffly upright, keeping it shut to not say anything without thinking it through first. Every motion was so strictly controlled, his thoughts whirling around and around until-

Swatch was never going to hear the end of it...unless…

They get an idea, sure it was going to be demeaning and incredibly out of poor taste in Swatch's opinion- but it would be better than anyone finding out about their loss to Rouxls. Besides, after working for the Queen, demeaning had lost its meaning to Swatch. At least this time they were going to be the one in control. So a distraction, enough embarrassment so where Rouxls never wants to talk about this moment to anyone.

Swatch steps out from the table, moving over towards the side Rouxls was on, who merely stared at them in confusion.

Abruptly in one smooth motion, Swatch bows to Rouxls, who they can hear sputter in surprise. A pleased grin appears on Swatch's beak, hidden from sight.

"I surely hope that will suffice, butler supreme. You are truly the duke of puzzles, Sir Rouxls Kaard, unmatched in his fantastical puzzle prowess." Swatch pulls himself upright, feeling the grating feeling of forced praise and ridiculous titles being pulled from his throat. However, the look on Rouxls face was worth it- the bug-eyed look of pure shock combined with the fact his cocky smirk had been replaced with a nervous smile- all the while his face seemed to be a darker blue than usual. Oh this was worth it.

"Uh...Yes! Thou is correcteth and shouldeth now understande thou place beneatheth me! I maketh the ordereth now worm-avian, thou can no longere banneth thy from thou fineth establishmente and musteth admiteth always thateth thy am forevere bettereth than thou! Lest thou suffereth thy crippling humilationeth of thou defeate once moreth." Stepping off of the chair, Rouxls manages to get out, his voice wavering at the start- a crack in his carefully portrayed persona. Startled by how...well Swatch was taking it- he had expected him to get mad or bite back or just...something. This wasn't like their usual banter at all and Rouxls wasn't sure what was going on.

Swatch listens intently, nodding along to show that they were listening. Even if they, personally, thought it to be pure nonsense, they did not let it show.

Their head so carefully tilts to the side for a moment, "Beneath you?" They coo, taking a calculated step forward into Rouxls space.

An arm casually snakes around Rouxls waist, pulling the smaller man closer. He lets out a surprise squeak- trying to stammer out something before he is shushed by Swatch's next words, "Would you not prefer to be side by side? After all, you have proven yourself to be better than I- your chosen adversary since the day we met." He chuckles, "With how obsessed you are with me, dare I say you were trying to court me- hm?" A soft chuckle lingers on his lips as he watches Rouxls nearly melt out of pure flustered nerves.

It was…

Hm. Cute. For Rouxls.

"WHAT? I AM NOT-" Rouxls gasps, much louder than intended, his smarmy accent seemingly fading for a moment before he gulps for a breath trying to readjust himself, "Do not thinketh so highly of thouself! I couldeth care lesse abouteth thou, thy games were merelyeth a simpleth pastime, a pleasureth that thy bestowedeth upon thou!"

Leaning ever so closer to Rouxls, Swatch's voice lowers, a quiet coo for Rouxls' ears only, "Then why is it you always throw a fit when I'm too busy to play with you? You claim to just want to prove you're better than me, but you've done that now, so what next? Honestly, Rouxls, just spare us the trouble and tell me how you really feel."

A hum.

"If you just wanted to go on dates you could have simply asked." It's said with a wink.

Rouxls chokes, and Swatch thinks they finally have this under control, soon to be wrapped up in a nice pretty bow. Sure was this a little cruel? Perhaps, but Swatch kept finding it so damn endearing, it was frustrating. So selfishly wanting to see more of Rouxls' reactions.

But of course, this was Rouxls Kaard they were talking about here. When did anything involving him go as planned?

Suddenly there are hands grabbing the side of their head, and Swatch can feel his feathers poof out in surprise at the sudden motion. Before they can react, Rouxls practically slams his forehead into Swatch's, keeping it there and pressing hard as if to challenge the bird.

"Thou sauveth trickery shalt not wortheth on I!" Rouxls announces, before adding his own rebuttal, "Maybe THOU is thee one courting I? Thou claim to be bettereth than I but hereth you stand, arm arounde thy waist. If thou really haveth better thingeths to do, theneth why are thou hereth and noteth at thou homestead?"

The two were impossibly close now, pressed together as a different kind of tension fills the air around them. Swatch can feel Rouxls panting shaky breaths on his beak, the man's false confidence easily seen through, yet- Swatch stutters. And they never stutter.

Then suddenly- his arms are empty and the simple touch is gone as soon as it had started, and Swatch let out a breath they hadn't realized they had been holding.

"Alas, I am sureth thy leech of a darlingeth prince needs thy attentione!" Rouxls skitters towards the door, "I bideth thee a bittersweet adieu! For now thee willeth be without thine majestic presenceth, whicheth I am sureth you shalt miss. However, I must informeth thou that I, Rouxls Kaard, willeth not be easily impressedeth with thy simplest flatteries..." He pauses in his escape, looking back at Swatch before glancing down at the floor looking a little...unsure, adding on just a little quieter, "But I shalt be backe, I may haveth won thy battle, but not thy war- so...uh...prepareth thouself for thy return!"

With his final words, which were possibly just an excuse to keep seeing Swatch even though he's already gotten his win, Rouxls escapes through the door and flees faster than Swatch had ever seen him move before. The bird just...watches him go, dumbfounded at the sudden turn of events.

Swatch stands there for a moment, blinking, wondering if that even just happened. Rouxls rebuttal swirling around in his brain, them? Courting Rouxls? A ridiculous assumption, entirely out of left field. And yet…

Swatch sighs, smoothing down his ruffled feathers, Rouxls was right- if Swatch wanted to they could have easily booted out the nuisance and went home. Yet, Swatch played Rouxls game. And every game before. The bird’s fingers flex, still feeling the faint ghost of Rouxls in his grip, as if it were haunting them- taunting them really.

…

Swatch rubs his face with a hand, a flush rising to his cheeks. This whole time they had thought they were the one in control, but unfortunately they had long gotten swept up in the uncontrollable whirlwind that was Rouxls Kaard.

#sugars sweet treats #deltarune #rouxls kaard #swatch #swatchkaard #idk what else to tag this as #but. take it nlgkhgk ig #aaaaaaaaaa

77 notes · View notes

barely-alive-shrimp · 4 years

Text

About PSP Jeanne d’Arc ’s historical references

You know, Jeanne d’Arc for PSP is a funny game: while clearly not being very historically accurate (orcs and magical armlets in the Hundred Years’ War? Huh, they don’t tell you about things like that on History lessons), it still contains some interesting nods to history, some of which are quite obscure. I’ve collected some of them, mostly about historical figures and some events that I consider to be most interesting. This is going to be a long post, and there will be some spoilers, but I’ll put a warning so you could skip that part if you haven’t played the whole game yet. Oh, and sorry for any mistakes – I’m not a native speaker, so I hope there won’t be too many of them. I tried my best :P

[Note: I kept referring to her as Jeanne d’Arc here, although, as far as I understand, it is more common to call her Joan of Arc in English. I’ll leave it as it is, if you don’t mind ^^’]

Okay, I think I’ll start with the characters. There are quite a lot of characters who were based off real people: aside from the most obvious ones (Jeanne d’Arc, Gilles de Rais, Henry VI, Charles VII and some others), we have the following (I tried to find some paintings and pictures where possible):

Jean and Bertrand are based off Jean de Metz and Bertrand de Poulengy, who were Jeanne’s trusted allies during the Hundred Years’ War. They both had great respect for Jeanne and escorted her on her journey to the dauphin.

Colet’s prototype is most likely Colet de Vienne, a royal messenger who also escorted Jeanne d’Arc on her way to Chinon. Little is known about him, other than that he was accompanied by an archer named Richard – probably a prototype for Marcel. I guess they changed his name so he won’t be confused with the other Richard, who is also a playable character. By the way, it seems that the name ‘Marcel’ means “little warrior” in French, so if game developers chose that name intentionally (and I think they did), that’s a very nice little touch!

Étienne de Vignolles, more known as La Hire, was among France’s best commanders and was one of Jeanne d’Arc’s most trusted allies. Described as quite an arrogant man, he was a fearsome warrior and fought alongside Jeanne at Orleans and during the Battle of Patay. You can also find this prayer of his: “God, I pray Thee that today Thou wilt do for La Hire that which Thou wouldst have La Hire do for Thee, if he were God and Thou wert La Hire.” – perhaps, much like his in-game version, he did have a habit of talking about himself in the third person.

Richard was probably based off Brother Richard, a Franciscan monk who knew Jeanne. I couldn’t find any other information about him, though, except for this design for an opera.

The next one is a bit of a stretch, to be honest. It seems Bartolomeo does have a historical prototype, but it’s not clear who it was; he may or may not be based off Bartolomeo d'Alviano, an Italian captain who fought on the side of Spain against France. He didn’t have much to do with the Hundred Years’ War, though; moreover, he was born after Jeanne was burned at the stake.

Robert de Baudricourt was a captain of the royal garrison at Vaucouleurs. When Jeanne d’Arc came to him, saying she has a mission from God and asking for assistance, he was very skeptical at first, but since Jeanne was very persistent, he eventually provided her an escort to visit the Dauphin. The game didn’t change it much.

John Talbot was an English military commander known as “English Achilles” for his bravery. Despite being one of the most feared warriors, he was respected so much that when he was captured, Charles VII released him without asking for ransom.

Sir William Glasdale was an English captain who commanded the troops in the fort Les Tourelles. Jeanne d’Arc wrote a letter to him, pleading him to lift the siege of the fort, but he refused to do so, and Jeanne’s troops started the assault to take Les Tourelles back. During the assault, Glasdale fell into the Loire River and drowned, as his armor was too heavy.

Both Georges de La Trémoille and Arthur de Richemont were indeed Charles’s trusted servants. Georges also survived an attempt of assassination – as described, “thanks to his obesity”, and, as you can see in the game, the developers had that part in their heads, as well. :) Here’s a picture of Arthur de Richemont, I couldn’t find any paintings of real life Georges de La Trémoille, but I’ll add a picture of his in-game version a bit later.

There’s an interesting detail about Charles VII himself: have you ever looked at his in-game portrait and thought: “Man, they didn’t have to draw him such a big nose”? Well, that’s probably because real Charles VII was actually described as a man with a big nose! That’s another “well done” to the game developers.

As for Bedford – his actual name was John of Lancaster, ‘The Duke of Bedford’ was only his title. I don’t know, maybe that’s obvious, but I spent a good part of walkthrough thinking Bedford was his name. His real name not being mentioned and all the other characters calling him just “Bedford” certainly didn’t help. :P

* * *

All right, now I’m going to dive into some historical events and characters’ relationships that might spoil some events of the game for you. Please, go to the “SPOILERS END” mark if you haven’t finished the game yet and want to see everything for yourself.

SPOILERS

Okay, first of all, the game heavily implies Charles VII had a difficult relationship with his mother, Isabeau of Bavaria. Real life Isabeau of Bavaria claimed that Charles VII wasn’t the trueborn son of Charles VI, thus couldn’t be the rightful king of France, so I doubt the queen loved her son very much. The game tries to explain it with the demonic possession of Isabeau – still, her last words before she was (presumably) killed by Henry VI/Gilvaroth were confusing and quite out-of-nowhere to me.

Georges de La Trémoille disliked Jeanne d’Arc and, as some historians believe, was involved in a plot against her that ultimately led to her death – both in real life and the game. Of course, we all remember that in the game it wasn’t Jeanne who ended up at the stake…

The Battle of Patay (June, 1489) was one of Jeanne d’Arc’s greatest victories during the Hundred Years’ war. In this battle, the feared “Terror of French” John Talbot was finally captured. I’m not sure if this one was intended or not, but this stage in the game is the last time you see Talbot – well, not until he suddenly reappears late in the game, only to help you and never to be seen again.

Do you remember the part where Liane went overwhelmed with her great power and responsibility (hehe) and tried to recapture Paris by herself? Real Jeanne d’Arc also tried to break the siege of Paris, but the attempt failed and she and her troops were ordered to withdraw. After that, the nobles’ disappointment with her had reached its highest point, and Jeanne’s fate was pretty much sealed – much like Liane’s.

And, of course, the darkest nod to the history is Gilles de Rais, known as a serial killer and possibly a pedophile (there are some historians who believe he was framed, but that’s not the point for now). On the other hand, in-game Gilles is a nice and noble guy and never betrays you or does something violent. At the end of the game, he sacrifices himself so Gilvaroth would be trapped inside of his body, and, considering the real history, the demon probably got him in the end. This reference is more well-known and has been discussed at several forums, but I still cannot help but mention it.

Also, on a less disturbing note – see how Gilles is drawn with a lily? That’s because Charles VII allowed de Rais to add this flower on their family crest, which was considered a great honor, as lily symbolized the power of the Crown (that’s what I heard, at least).

SPOILERS END

These are the most interesting historical references of the game, in my opinion. Thank you for reading and feel free to correct me and/or add the details I’ve missed! My DM is closed for now, but you can correct me via reblogs, if you want. ^^

#Jeanne d'Arc PSP #JDA PSP #Jeanne d'Arc #Joan of Arc #Why am I even doing this

24 notes · View notes

emy-loves-you · 4 years

Text

Wrong Numbers and Useless Gays Chapter 4

Sad Boys and Fun Facts

Patton’s a sad boi but Virgil has a distraction

Chapter 3 | Masterlist | Chapter 5

Three weeks had passed since Virgil had first texted Roman. In those three weeks, Virgil had learned a lot about his new friends.

First, there was Patton. God, did that man love puns. Virgil also loved puns, but he preferred reading Patton’s puns over making his own. Remus had caught Virgil blushing at his phone and made a comment about his new “friends with benefits” (Virgil had been unable to respond. He was too busy trying to hold back his giggles from one of Patton’s pun tangents). Patton also made it clear that he was the “Dad Friend” of the group. Virgil couldn’t type a single self-deprecating comment without Patton threatening to physically fight him. It was rather terrifying, really. He also made sure that everyone was taking care of themselves. Once they learned that they were in the same timezone (They hadn’t shared cities yet. Friend or no, Virgil was telling where he lived in that quickly) Patton made it his goal to check in and make sure that Virgil ate at mealtime. One last thing about Patton was his… struggle with technology. He tended to send almost everything directly to the group chat instead of private messages. Logan said that he tried to teach Patton how to do so, but the lessons never seemed to stick.

Speaking of Logan, the nerd had his own quirks. He didn’t type much, usually only responding when someone required everyone to respond. The other time that he typed was during debates. Nine days into their friendship, Virgil had mentioned saying “you too” to a cute barista and claimed that he ruined any chances with his new crush. While Patton and Roman offered words of encouragement, Logan remained silent. Virgil had assumed that Logan agreed with him but didn’t want to upset his boyfriends. As soon as their conversation ended, Virgil received a private text from Logan, requesting to debate. They argued over cognitive distortions for a whole hour before they reached a compromise. Logan had called the debate “lit” and asked if they could debate again in the future. That was another thing about Logan. Apparently, he had vocabulary cards for slang words. When he was talking out loud, he would hold the card up so the others knew what slang word he was attempting to use. When texting, he would put quotation marks around the word. It was adorable, in Virgil’s humble opinion.

Then there was Roman. Princey was known for his dramatic flair and Disney references. When he was feeling especially Extra™ , he would use “thees” and “thys” and call people peasants. He also had a love for nicknames. Patton had very few personal nicknames, with most of them being terms of endearment like “honey” and “amor.” Most of Logan’s nicknames pertained to him being a nerd, such as “pocket protector” and “Microsoft Nerd.” He seemed to have a limitless number of nicknames for Virgil, with most of them referencing his emo-aesthetic (how Princey had discovered that so early in their friendship, Virgil had no clue). He never repeated Virgil’s nicknames; the only exception was “storm cloud,” which he tended to use at least once every conversation.

Virgil had become extremely close with the trio over these three weeks. That wasn’t the only thing he did, just the thing he did most often. The Dark Sides had finalized their contract with Thomas, who set up a tour almost immediately. Virgil really should have seen that coming. Their band had become extremely popular over the past few years, and they had only done one tour before this. Performing across the country would help boost their popularity even further. Virgil sighed, his anxiety spiking at just the thought of seeing all those faces in the crowd. That was why he used the persona Anxiety. Anxiety wasn’t afraid of anything, he was fear. Being Anxiety allowed Virgil to be confident and suave without worrying about judgment. They judged Anxiety, not Virgil. The case was similar for Janus and Remus. Deceit was elegant and mysterious, while Duke was loud and over-the-top. They didn’t have to be rejects wanting to fit in with society. No, they were Rockstars. Society wanted to fit in with them. And Virgil was just fine with that.

Bzzz

Vigil glanced over at his phone. He was in Los Angelas right now, around halfway through his tour, which put him 3 hours behind his new friends. He glanced over at his clock, 9:45 PM glaring at him through the dark. He turned back to his phone. Why are they up at 12:45 in the morning? I know Logan keeps them on a rigid sleep schedule.

P- (9:45 PM) Ro? Are you still up?

V- (9:45 PM) Pat, why are you still up?

P- (9:45 PM) Why are you still up, kiddo? It’s almost 1 AM! Don’t you have a hangout with your friends today?

Virgil sighed, thinking of the concert he had tomorrow. He glanced over to his sketchbook. Patton had been really impressed with his sketches, so he had been practicing less gory drawings to show him. It had evolved into something almost therapeutic. Knowing how he worked, Virgil would probably sketch until around 2 in the morning, then sleep until 8 AM. The concert wasn’t until 7 PM, so he had enough time to sleep in if necessary.

V- (9:46 PM) First of all, you know I’m in California right now. It’s 9:46 for me. Second of all, we’re not hanging out until tomorrow night, so I can sleep in if needed. Third of all, you’re avoiding the question: What are you and Roman doing up at 1 in the morning? I thought you guys had work in the morning.

P- (9:47 PM) We do. Roman got a burst of inspiration at around 10, and he usually refuses to sleep until he writes it all down. He probably fell asleep at his desk, that silly billy!

V- (9:47 PM) That doesn’t explain why you’re still awake. And why didn’t you get up to check on him? I thought you guys lived together.

P- (9:47 PM) We do! I just couldn’t fall asleep tonight. And the bed’s too warm to get up!

V- (9:48 PM) Well, Princey’s probably being a “sleeping beauty”

Virgil frowned at his phone. Patton hadn’t responded to his text. Sure, that wasn’t a very good pun, but it was still a pun. Patton laughed at every pun he saw, or at least followed it up with another pun. He could be asleep, but didn’t he just say that he had trouble sleeping?

V- (9:50 PM) Pat?

P- (9:50 PM) Yeah, Kiddo?

V- (9:50 PM) Are you okay?

V- (9:52 PM) Patton?

V- (9:52 PM) I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that. Just because you didn’t answer my pun doesn’t mean that there’s something wrong with you. I’m sorry that I sounded like an asshole.

P- (9:52 PM) No, Sweety. It’s fine! It’s nice to know that someone cares about you!

P- (9:53 PM) I’m just a little sad today.

V- (9:53 PM) Do you wanna talk about it?

P- (9:54 PM) I’m fine, Kiddo! This just happens sometimes. No need to worry!

Virgil sighed, thinking about how much Patton reminded him of Janus. Janus grew up neglected, and was taught to convince everyone that his life was perfect. By the time Virgil had met him, Janus was 19 and a compulsive liar. Virgil wasn’t much better, having just gotten kicked out of the foster system. Virgil lived with Janus (and soon Remus) until The Dark Sides had enough income for Virgil to live on his own (technically Janus had more than enough money for that- his parents were loaded. But Virgil wanted to have something that he earned. He wasn’t just some charity case). When they first lived together, Virgil could never tell what Janus was actually thinking. It took a lot of time and trust to separate Janus from Deceit. Now, he was still heavily sarcastic, and he tended to close himself off when he got upset, but Janus had come a long way.

Virgil looked back to his phone. Patton didn’t seem to have it as bad as Janus did, but you could never tell. At least he acknowledged that he wasn’t okay. There is the chance that something really is bothering him, but Virgil had to trust Patton on that note. It is entirely possible that Patton is just feeling down today; God knows how many times Virgil would question why he should get out of bed. He bit his lip. What helps me when I feel sad for no reason? He smiled, remembering when Remus would spout the most obscene things to distract himself from his own negative thinking. A distraction.

V- (9:56 PM) Did you know that giraffes can clean their ears with their own tongues?

P- (9:56 PM) What?

V- (9:56 PM) “Rhythm” is the longest word in the English language that doesn’t have a vowel.

V- (9:56 PM) Elephants are the only mammals that cannot jump.

P- (9:57 PM) More like Elecan’t!

V- (9:57 PM) Haha :)

V- (9:57 PM) Without food coloring, Coca Cola would be green.

V- (9:57 PM) A 3-year-old boy was elected as mayor in Dorset, Minnesota

P- (9:58 PM) No way!

V- (9:58 PM) Yes way! His name was James Tufts.

V- (9:58 PM) 7 different dogs have been elected as mayors in the US.

P- (9:58 PM) I love dogs! They’re such good boys!

Virgil smiled, adding Loves Dogs to his mental list of Quirky things I like about Patton Morale. They continued to talk about dog mayors for a while until Patton ended it abruptly.

P- (10:14 PM) Why are you doing this?

V- (10:14 PM) Doing what?

P- (10:15 PM) Why are you going out of your way to try and cheer me up? You should’ve stopped talking to me 20 minutes ago. Instead, we’re laying here at 1 AM talking about dog mayors! I would have been fine on my own. Why are you wasting your time on me?

V- (10:16 PM) Pat, if you tell me that I’m wasting my time talking to you, I’m going to have to physically fight you. You are my FRIEND. I care about you. When you’re sad, I WANT to cheer you up. When you’re happy, I WANT to laugh along to your punny jokes. Because I know, at the end of the day, if I was sad and needed someone to cheer me up, you would do it in a heartbeat. You, Lo, and Princey are amazing people, and my time spent with you will NEVER be a waste. I swear.

Virgil sighed, dropping his phone on the bed. He might’ve been too forward with that last text. But it was true. While the four of them weren’t nearly as close as Virgil was with Janus and Remus, he still cared about them a lot.

P- (10:18 PM) Thanks, Virgil. That really means a lot to me

P- (10:18 PM) I’m gonna try and get some sleep now

V- (10:18 PM) Alright Patton, Goodnight

P- (10:18 PM) Goodnight

The next day, Virgil saw a postcard in the window of a gift shop. It had a puppy with sunglasses on the beach, with cartoonish letters saying “Having A WonderFUR Time!” He took a picture and sent it to Princey.

V- (1:08 PM) What’s your address or PO? I wanna send this to Patton.

R- (1:09 PM) Say no more, Hot Topic!

V- (1:09 PM) Aw, you think I’m hot.

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

Taglist: @bisexualdisaster106 @self-taught-mess @itawalrus

#sanders sides fic #useless gays #LAMP fic #virgil sanders #roman sanders #patton sanders #texting fic

42 notes · View notes

afterthelastreset · 4 years

Text

Rules Of One’s Soul Ch22 The Duke’s Return P2

(Mak belongs to @wasted-church)

The arrival of the jester was one a few would still flinch at. After all they couldn't forget the time over a hundred years ago when the man went made and tried to murder the King of Spades. But after his iron fisted ruling and the ways he treated his subjects, some were more forgiving than others and have at least tolerated his presence with the encouragement of the remaining grown kings and child giving him and all the other hundreds of prisoners full pardons of whatever their crimes were. But some if not most were still on edge over his being there. So when he popped into the throne room, doing a small pose in mid air and having confetti burst out of no where to go along with his appearance, he was greeted which a mix of happy and slightly worried faces of the kings. Lancer bounced happily in the duke's hold and clapped at his entrance...which was a far cry to the scowl that the duke was giving him. A small piece of confetti landed on his shoulder and he gave an angry huff to blow it off.

"My, my. And here I thought you all would be working hard, working hard." He changed his position to a cross-legged sitting position and settle his head in his clawed hands. Giving a hum and smile to the strained face of the duke. "And what can I do for the royals, royals today?"

"Lesser Dad wants you to help him." Lancer turned that innocent smile up to Rouxls and the worm's face did a complete 180 and a forced grin replaced his scowl immediately. "Right, Dad?"

The duke gave an emotionless chuckled. "But of course! I amst certain that thine fool-" His eyes narrowed back to him. "-willst helpest explain a few things easily.." Despite it all, Jevil never lost that giant grin, even when Rouxls gently placed the small boy down with a grunt and sat on his hunches to be near eye level to the child for a moment. "Thou be good now alright? Today's kingly meeting shouldst not best too long. I shall have thine cook preparest thou a snack once thee finishes."

"Ok, Lesser Dad."

The Duke stood back up, took a deep inhale to calm him, and let it before turning to the smiling menace giving him a professional forced smile. With a finger he motioned for the fool to follow him and he briskly walked past him, the wringing his hands were doing was rolling up the long piece of paper into a scroll in his hands. Though he didn't look behind him, he could feel the presence of the floating fool right behind him as they stepped their way over to the doors and a blue hand reached out and grabbed the doorknob.

"Duke Kaard!" He turned back around and raised a brow to the giant Hathy who gave him a nervous smile from across the throne room. "D-Do go easy on yourself..a-and him."

...."But of course, Mine Majesty." He gave a half bow while pushing the door open. "I wouldn't have it any other way. Come Fool!"

As soon as the door closed behind them, the scowl returned and Rouxls silently lead the floating menace down the hallways towards his office. Of course they got a few stares as suspected and a few were looking at them with happy loving eyes, like they were witnessing an old couple waltzing through the halls. Only they weren't and they were definitely anything but a happy couple, right now he didn't even look to the jester who kept leaning past and poking his head out next to him with a smile, but all Jevil got in response was the cold shoulder. It seemed like an eternity but they finally came to the famous office of the duke, and Rouxls opened the door before motioning to Jevil to go in. Jevil happily did so with a giggle, probably seeing this as some romantic gesture. He looked around the drab looking room before he turned around just as Rouxls slammed the door closed with a loud bang and looked at him with a twitching eye.

The scroll was pointed at him. "WHAT IN THINE HELL WERE THOUST THINKING?!" He exploded at him. But Jevil still kept that unwavering smile.

"What ever are you talking, talking about?" He asked in genuine confusion raising a brow, "Is the decoration's not to your liking, liking?"

Rouxls's hands gripped the shiny hair on his head and growled between gritted teeth. "No! You imbecile!" He threw both arms at him. "Were thou going around and spreading rumors about us being in a relationship!?"

Jevil's smile vanished and he blinked. Bringing a hand to his chest in surprise. "Me? Lie and spread rumors, rumors like some bully? I would never sink so, so low as to use public pressure to cheat in the game." He waved a hand and laid on his back, simaltaniously moving backwards in mid air towards the desk. "I simply stated that you and me were soulmates, soulmates. Nothing more or less than the truth. What's wrong with that?"

Rouxls groaned and reached his hands up to run down his face. The slimey skin stretched with it before snapping back into place when he released. "Don't thou realize what this ridiculous soulmate nonsense haseth been adding too?!"

Jevil merely gave a confused look as he leaned over the desk and a moment later picked up the lopsided heart card. Opening it too see Lancer's handy work with a smile. "It's not nonsense, nonsense It's actually quite easy to understand."

Rouxls groaned again and marched up to the desk, walking around it and snatching the card from Jevil's hands before sitting down. "Giveth me that!" The scroll was plopped onto the desk top and Rouxls stuffed the card into one of the side draws. "That tis not for thou!" The draw shut with a minor slam and he pointed up at the unamused jester. "If thou keepest this u-up thine thou can kisseth mine good graces good byeth!!"

Still confused Jevil shrugged. "But everyone would've found out evetually, eventually. Why would it be wrong to say it now?"

"Maybe thou would've taken into consideration that mineself was nay ready for a p-public relationship? O-Or if I waseth even ready for so many people knowing?!" There was a small pause as the two looked at each other and Rouxls went to put his face in his hands with a sigh. "....I thought we hadst a-an understanding of mine personal boundaries."

Jevil flinched ...and his long ears drooped slightly. "W-Was...that a part of your boundaries?"

...Rouxls waved him off and looked up from his hands at him. "It's n-nay matters now. What I need is your help with this"

He gestured to the scroll on the desk. Jevil blinked but with a flick of the wrist, it flew up into the air and the bottem unfuraled with a crinkle paper sound. The bottom hit the table and proceeded to run across the length and side of his desk, stopping two feet on the floor from them. But unlike Rouxls, Jevil didn't even seem fazed by it's enormous size as he lifted it higher with the flick of a wrist until it picked itself off the floor completely and was standing straight up in midair so he could read it all with a raised brow and a hum. ....And smiled. This is what he needed help with? Oh, he could laugh at such a teeny set of easy tasks, but he wouldn't as too not upset the duke more than he accidentally did.

With a giggle he looked down to the semi scowling duke and motioned to it. "This, this is what you're so gloomy over? This is child's play, child's play. Lancer has asked for more difficult tricks than this-"

"Can you helpest mineself with it or nay?" He was starting to get irritated again and this was supposed to be after a 'relaxing break.'

"...Will it make you happy, happy?"

He rolled his eyes."Poitively mad with glee-"

"Good! I shall finish these all within ...two days. A day, day and a half if I hurry, hurry."

Rouxls stared gobsmacked at the floating menace..and rose a brow..Did he hear right? Did he just expect him to shovel all the work onto him first chance he got? "What art thou spewing now? Thoust cannot simply just doth all mine tasks on thine own." He reached for the floating list but it moved with a flict of that risk.

"Tsk, tsk. Silly duke.~" Those eyes and cheshire grin smiled down at him like the first time they had met, but they didn't scare him anymore. Far from it, those teasing yellow eyes mocking him and inabilities compared to the magical power this Kaard mix beheld and he hated it,...but something was intruiging about this silent challenge that beckoned his curiousity to come and witness the power this man held. Jevil giggled and shifted himself once again in that crosslegged position. "I made a mistake, mistake. I would like you to allow me to make it up to you like my last mistake."

The worm's scowl meant it wasn't going to be a busy thing to settle. "Nay! I refuseth to sit on mine arse while work needst to be done!" He stood up and pointed at him and with an authoritive voice demanded, "As thou's suporier I demand thou giveths mineself that list at ounce! I refuseth to let you do all that work alone!!"

That worked as well as you'd think. "Im flattered you think of me that way, that way. But what I can do in half the time you can seems like a better option don't you think?" Rouxls answered with a questioning look and he sighed. "I mean with what work load you have suddenly, suddenly been handed it would be almost impossible for you to get done within, within the date provided. But on the other hand I can handle all this with ease. Think, think about it. Cut your loses.~"

The gear turning blank look ROuxls gave next made him chuckle. ".....And what wouldst I do in the meantime?"

"Your normal boring, boring duties," he waved a hand, "I'll even let you set up the banquient, banquient if it makes you feel better. I could not stand the bland taste, taste of most noble food anyhow."

He still didn't look all convinced but at the same time his scowl had disbanded. ".....And in return you wouldst getteth what exactly?"

"The satisfaction of knowing I helped, helped you. Now, do you want me, me to help?" Rouxls sighed and justed stared at him, before nodding his head yes reluctantly at him, and Jevil happily smiled. "Wonderful, wonderful!! Let us get started!!"

A ripping sound befell their ears and when those mitchmatched eyes looked up in confusion, he yelped at the sight of the long list splitting off in four places. What was this fool doing?! He looked back to give him a peice of his mind, but gave a squeal of shock when more than one pair of yellow and Black eyes peered back at him. "W-WHAT THINE FUCKETH!?" The three Jevil's laughed at him, it was so disturbing hearing three pairs of the same laughter from three....NO. His frightened eyes could see that the other two Jevil's were still semi attatched to the main one and the other two were...s-see through? L-Like he was staring at a pair of ghosts trying to posesses one person that looked exactly like them! Eventually the other two Jevils detatched themselves from the main Jevil who didn't even bat an eyelash but instead stretched his back out with a pop and groan.

"It's been so long, so long since I did a copy spell, spell. Takes a lot of energy, energy." The terrified duke could only stare in shock from behind the desk chair he hid behind before a peice of paper flew in front of his face. He flinched and had to blink a couple times for his brain to finally register that it was a chunk of the old list. The top part to be exact, with everything crossed out exept for one at the very bottem which said: Banquient Food. Meanwhile the other three papers flew into the claws of the two ghost Jevil's and the normal one. All exactly copying each other to the T with grabbing the paper, and turning there head with a hum. "Hmm. All of this is easy, easy. Three hundred invitations with these rules, rules should be easy.~" "Organizing staff, staff and cleaning should be easy.~" "All these minor, minor chores should be easy, easy.~" It was so disturbing how the three of them said different things but ended with the same words but he flinched when they all looked back to him. "Don't be frightened, frightened. I assure you this is perfectly safe, safe."

"...W-What didst thou do?"

"A simple copy, copy spell!" They all said back to him at the same time as they gestured to one another. "Don't worry, don't worry. My ghostly selves have no mind of their own and they never will, will. I just simply temporraily split two small peices of my soul two expand, expand my senses. I can hear and see out of them-" They...He?? pointed at their faces. "But I assure you I control the whole thing.~ Not a lot of others can perform this spell since it takes a lot, a lot of energy and concentration. So it's a rare, rare spell to see. I only used to use it, use it for my bigger performances."

.....He blinked and shook his head. Was there anything he should really doubt he could do anymore? "O-Oh, I see. T-That maketh sense....I think."

The three of them giggled and waved to him, "I beleive, beleive the man who could help you would be a Mr. Topchef. His bakery, bakery is a little ways from Seam's home."

A full round of giggles escaped from the three of them and with a three pairs of snaps from their fingers, they disappeared in a small poof of smoke and confetti. He blinked and watched as the small peices of colorful paper fell to the ground before slowly turning back to the still floating peice of paper.....and shakily reached up a hand to grab it......And sighed. And just when he thought things would be back to normal.

**************************************************************************************************

The first thing he did once he gathered his sense was try to head to the Kings....Key word try as it was very difficult to maniver around the sudden flock of cleaning suppiles being moved around by themselves. He found that out when a feather duster dusting the wall accidentally got in his face once the door opened. He coughed and wacked the dusty thing away, and stared in shock at all the other staff ducking out of the cleaning suppiles way or watching them with a confused face. Rouxls sighed and rubbed his head in shame. Oh he was gonna get in big trouble wasn't he?.....Well, he was once again surprised when he was proven wrong after dodging all the flying scrub rags and sweeping brooms until he made it to the throne room. Opening the doors and freezing in horror at the absolute scene before him. King Diamod was cursing and trying to swat away a relentless duster trying to get to his crown and all five heads of the King Clubs was laughing at the scene. Lancer was giggling and running around chasing after a literal dust bunny hopping around the floor, which only got bigger the more dust it picked up...On second thought. He had scene those literal dust clouds shaped like rabbits hopping about the halls. In his hast he thought they were all just rabbicks, but now he realized the things hopping around were rabbits made of clouds of dust getting bigger with all the dust that magically flew off all corners of the castle and joined their already filthy bodies. The worm was half tempted to scream at Lancer to stop playing around and don't chase the filthy animal around...but thought better of it, since it looked like he was enjoying himself.

"Duke Kaard!" He jumped and looked up to his majesty King Heart who was 'looking', nevermind since he didn't have eyes, at a floating bucket of water and a small rag that dunk itself back into the bucket, wrung itself out and then proceeded to continue washing one of the giant window...He he turned his worried expression to the blue man. "W-What in light is going on here?!"

That nervous smile came back to his face and he could already feel the slimey sweat starting to fall down his face when he stood in the doorway and stuttered. "W-Well, I-I-I may or may not perhaps...haveth asked for help? Ahehe..heh."

The giant Hathy looked at him and went to say something but jumped and turned back around when a muffled scream and coughing came from the equally giant Rudinn. King Diamonds face was being attacked by the duster before finally grabbing the stupid thing and throwing it across the room. Making Rouxls yelp and duck as it grazed the top of his head. The King Clubs laughing still echoing at the spitting and groaning of their fellow ruler. And Heart sighed, head folling Lancer as he attempted and failed to jump and catch the dust bunny running around.

"...W-Well that explains this unusual event, now doesn't it?" He gave a sigh as Diammond growled at Clubs and went to wipe his face. "Well m-maybe you should perhaps tell him to ease up on the entire thing, and perhaps give a warning for what you two are about to do next time? Everything suddenly came to life and I could've sworn there was a bunch of ghosts involved."

Rouxls chuckled nervously and made his way in. Careful to dodge the still working mods and brooms, and flying rugs floating out the open windows. Was one small entity like Jevil really doing all of this by himself? He couldn't help even in his nervous state to admire and admit the absolute amazement of the power of someone like him. Guess his 'I can do anything' attitude really did apply to a lot of things. "D-Duely noted, M-Mine Majesties. B-But if we could please discusseth thine delicacies for thine b-banquet, it wouldst beth a big help!"

"Oh, well of course! Anything to help you dear Duke." He smiled down at him as the nervous man finally stopped in front of him. Sighing and turning the peice of torn off list around to the blank side, pulling a feathered pen out of no where and giving a tired smile up to the giant hathy. Out of all the kings- minus Lancer- Rouxls enjoyed talking to the hathy the most. He enjoyed how down to earth and passionate about his job he was. Said king lifted a tentacle to rub at his chin and hummed in thought..."Something sweet. I'd love a giant punch display!"

"CAKE!!" Rouxls jumped and looked down to the small child wagging his tail excitedly and grabbing his pants leg. "A GIANT CHOCOLATE CAKE AND ICE CREAM!! AND MAC AND CHEESE AND A GIANT BOWL OF DARK CANDY AND ANOTHER GIANT BOWL OF SALSA!!"

Rouxls blinked and gave a chuckle. "Um..L-Lancer. Doth thou think all that wouldst be a little too much for thou's subjects' taste?"

"Who's the King, Lesser Dad?"

"*sigh* Thou are." He groaned and jotted down what Lancer had asked for, but made sure to write down 'small' by the bowl of salsa and candy. "Anything else?"

"I want a roast!" He ounce again jumped when one of King Clubs heads poked over his shoulder and stared down at him quickly followed by the other four. "A roast sounds n-nice." "MAKE IT BIG AND NOT BURNT!!" "Maybe a saled would be better." "I want two roasts, please!!"

"S-Slow down p-please, Your majesty. I-I cannot keepest up with all of thou. *sigh*" More writing was jotted down and he paused to pull Lancer to the side to avoid an in coming broom fly by before continuing. "Shall there best anythinge else thine majesties wishes?"

"Just make sure everything tastes good!!" "B-But shouldn't we ask Clover what she wants?" "Good idea!"

He sighed again. This would take a while-...

****************************************************************************************************

Whelp! He wasn't wrong. It did take quite a while whith the five heads of one king and the other two trying to get more requests in while Lancer pulled on his pants trying to get his attention was anything but easy. But somehow with all the chaos going on he made a list he was partially satisfied with. So much for everyone bringing food with the short notice, this called for extreme measures as soon as possible. Which meant skipping walking and just teleporting to the closest pinpoint he could teleport to Seam's Sheap. His own store. And that's where his new journey began it seemed. Trudging his way from one store to another. Seam didn't seem all that surprised when the flap to his Sheap opened and the white haired worm came in a second later. But he did give a curious look from the back when he did hear it open.

"Sorry, Friend. But I'm mighty closed for the moment." He calmly smiled from the comfy couch he was sitting on, needle in one hand and what looked like an old shirt in the other...Was he sewing? "If you're looking for Jevil, he left around two hours ago for the castle at your request."

"I knowest that!!...*ahem*" He straightened his flushed posture and took a deep breath before releasing it and looking back to Seam in a much calmer manner. "I simply needed directions fromest thee."

Seam hummed again. "And just might where you need directions to? Perhaps I can help, or maybe not. These old patches aren't what they used to be. Hehe."

Rouxls groaned and walked on into the back. Not bothering to ask if he could, and plopped down onto the couch next to him. Head tilted back into the soft cushion, groaning, and one hand reaching up to rub his face. "...Some person byest thine name of Topchef. Jevil toldeth mineself that his establishment was nearest thou."

Seam smiled. "Oh of course. He sometimes stops by and buys all my dark candy stock up if he needs extra or doesn't feel like getting more. Funny man always so dizzy. But why would you want to see him?" Instead of answering. Rouxls's other hand came up and showed him the back of the once long list. Seam had to lean down and tilt his head so his good eye could read the words scribbled down by the duke. Most were random expensive sounding food except for one near the bottem that said 'tennis ball fillet'. ...At least there wasn't any worms or insects written down on here. "Oh. I see." He leaned back into the seat and calmly looked back down to his lap. Resuming the action of sewing the large shiny black coat in his paws. " Am I to assume this is for that fancy get together?"

Another groan. "Yes. Tis thee only thinge I can do since the imbecile tookest over mine entire life...again. And is now running amuke in thine castle causing massive amounts of magical chaos of it!" His hand finally removed itself from his face and he gave Seam a slightly panicked look. "Thine kings couldst d-demotest mineself to thy newest jester if he nay stops his shennanigans!!"

Seam to Rouxls's annoyance chuckled like he had just told him a joke and took a moment to peer over at him. "Well his magic is at it's peak for the moment. It doesn't surprise me he's able to do a lot to help you right now."

"..What art thou spewing now?"

The sewing motions stopped and Seam tilted his head more at him. "You haven't figured it out yet?" Rouxls's scowl answered that question, and he sighed before resuming his work. "Im surprised you haven't noticed it before, but i'll explain. Jevil's magic is based on the emotions he feels and how powerful said emotion is. His eyes changes if also strong enough." The cloak was shifted in his paws and he smiled at him. "The more powerful the emotion the more powerful the magical range."

"...I..see." He blinked. "But how is he doinge so much now? If he canst teleprt why wouldst he not escape sooner?"

He chuckled. "Because he probably never had enough motivation to leave. He made it clear he felt guilt over what had happened, and was sad when you blew his feelings off in the dungeon." Rouxls winced remembering the sorrowful screech Jevil had let off and all the hearts launched everywhere. "Things like sadness, guilt, fear, and worry are the emotions he's least powerful, those can reflect in his eyes as blues, purples, or whites. Now things like happiness and anger are the real ones that fuel the fire.'' Speaking of sire. Said fire crackled in the fireplace infront of them as the Duke stared at the cat. After a few silent moments he continued. "Do you remeber went he went crazy over a hundred years ago before he was subdued?"

He hummed. "V-Vaguely. I was nerely but a silly squire then and evactuated the castle. I nay saw the actual battle.''

"The giant mess he left behind was the result of his anger-"

"It tookest us nearly twenty years to rearrange and furnish the damage."

Rouxls's wide worried eyes made Seam chuckle. "Don't worry too much about making him angry. It's actually almost impossible to make him angry. Sadness is the emotion he usually goes to when upset. So realitivly he's quite harmless. "

"...S-Sureth." He mumbled not looking very convinced.

"But that does beg the question of how powerful he is when love is introduced." Rouxls blinked and stared at him and he chuckled. "Anger manifests as red eyes. Happiness and calm are always a bright sunshine yellow. But never have I seen his eyes turn any shade of pink until he met you. Love is a powerful enotion." The paws went back to sewing the cloak. "And Jevil seems to be at his full power when he's feeling loved. Which makes any competition hard to compete with him. But what he lacks in power and what skills he has, I make up for in patience." His eye crinkled up in a giant smile. "We'll just have to wait and see which one of our talents comes out on top...Oh. And the bakery you seek is just across the Feild of Hopes and Dreams and located by the Rudinn town's entrance."

Rouxls just stared blankly at him and blinked, opening his mouth to speak. Until a small yell made him jump and Seam look up, from the front a purple and grey blur came sliding in before striking a pose and looking at them! .....Seam chuckled and clapped a little and Rouxls just stared at the small bat child. were they wearing-?

"....Tis that J-Jevil's suit?"

"Yes. I wished to help him so I sewed up all the holes I could find in it. But it smelt of old moss, so into the wash it went....Unfortunately-" He gestured to the posing child. "It shrank slightly...So I let them have it since they wanted it so badly."

"...L-Let's hope Jevil nay minds."

6 notes · View notes

banalbones · 4 years

Text

The Petite Prince: How to Make a Paper Crown

Summary: Roman is a child, Remus loves his baby bro and they go have fun in the Dark Imagination.

Chapter 1 (for some context)

Words: 915

Ships: Familial Creativitwins

Genre: Fluff with a side dose of angst

Warnings: A few swears, falling, tell me if there’s any more!

Taglist: @pricklyfish777 @sunflowerblondeuwu @itriedandimtired @draw-your-perfect-world @cemmy @battlebunnyteardropsinthesun @nonbinary-lizard-2 @fanforeveruniverse

Note: This takes place during chapter 3, when Ro and Re go to the Dark Imagination.

___________________________

“Oh it. Is. On!”

Remus launched a ball of water at the little prince, laughing hysterically.

“Hey!” the smol one shouted, leaning back to try avoid getting wet. Well, wetter.

The trash gremlin cackled.

“Catch me if you can!”

Roman launched himself forward and chased after the now running Remus, his face screwing up in concentration as he summoned a bucket of water.

The Duke laughed loudly before seeing the bucket.

Well shit.

And in a shocking feat of power, the petite prince twisted his hands in a complicated motion, causing the water from the bucket to hurtle forward in a spiralling wave and onto Remus.

And his eyes were glowing?

That… Did his eyes always do that?

Whatever.

“AhHhHhHhHhH! NoOoOoOoOo! NOT CLEANLINESS!” Remus screeched.

“Haha! Yes cle- yes clean-cleanli-li-ness…yes clen-lee-ness!”

The small royal grinned proudly, brandishing a sword made of water. Roman didn’t seem to be aware that he had summoned it.

“Fine! FINE! You win…”

Roman whooped and jumped up and down.

“I win! I win! I nev- I never win!”

What?

Remus raised his brow.

“What about all the dragons big you beat? Doesn’t that count as winning?”

The smol one bounced around happily, the water sword dripping onto his arm.

“I know! But in th- but in things with other sides!”

That’s concerning- did he just wince?

Oh wait! Didn’t he fall down the stairs?

“Hey RoBro, are you okay?”

“No.”

The response was very chipper for the answer he had just given.

“Is anything broken?”

“No.”

“Twisted?”

“I don’t thin’ so.”

“Sore?”

Aha! A hesitation.

“No…”

Remus inwardly grinned at his small victory.

“Don’t lie!”

“Am not!”

“Are too!”

“Am not!”

“You so are! Here, I’ll make you a deal. You let me fix the soreness, and we go play in the Imagination!”

The smol one paused, seeming to consider the offer.

“The Dark one, an’ its- an’ it’s a deal!”

He was a little hesitant to agree at first, but anything was better than a pained little prince. Even the ruination of childhood innocence.

“Sure! Now where does it hurt?”

“Here.”

___________________________

Roman huffed as Remus bandaged his ankle.

He knew it was part of the deal, but Big him never liked to seem weak, so neither did he! At least he was going to see the Dark Imagination.

The Dark Imagination!

Roman beamed, trying his best not to bounce around as ReeRee fixed him up. A golden light shone on to the prince’s face.

Where’d the light come from?

Where’d it go?

“All done!”

Roman looked down to see his ankle wrapped up in bright red bandages.

“Le’s go!”

______________________

Remus knew that he had done a sloppy job of bandaging the smol ones ankle, but he was the Duke, being helpful wasn’t exactly his forte.

“You ready, little prince?”

“Yeah!”

“Off we go!”

Remus scooped up the little prince (in his tentacles, of course) and sank down into the Dark Imagination.

“Woah…”

He looked down to see the smol one climbing out of his tentacles and gazing (his eyes were still glowing, should he be concerned?) around the forest in awe. And, to be fair, it was pretty impressive.

The murky green leaves covering the trees swayed in the subtle wind, the whole forest shrouded in darkness, its only light source being its fluorescent plants and lakes. The creatures of the forest hid in the face of Remus, only their hungry eyes following the small princes every move.

Then, Roman laughed.

_________________________

The petite prince pranced around and laughed and laughed and laughed. It was all so amazing!

Roman saw all of the bright, colorful plants and all of the cool, hidden creatures.

He could hear all of it!

The rushing water of some far off rivers.

The rusting of leaves on the trees.

The buzzing of a small animals wings-

Oh look! A thing! A flying thing!

The small royal squealed in joy, running around on as many surfaces as he could, attempting to see some more little things.

Its. So. COOL!

The young monarch was so delighted by everything that he didn’t notice Remus twisting his wrist, making the roots and trees move and grow in unnatural ways to provide a safer passage for the prince. And the growling, it was as though the Duke was asserting dominance.

But of course, Roman didn’t notice any of this.

The two travelled deeper within the forest, with the three (now four) year old attempting, and succeeding, to climb the trees.

“Young knight!” Remus screeched, “I challenge you to a duel!”

Roman gasped, affronted, then grinned.

“I acc-I accept!”

_________________

And so, the two brothers with their small wooden swords battled it out.

“No! You have the high ground!” Remus cried, watching as Roman scrambled up a tree. Again.

“Yah!”

The little prince then yeeted his sword at Remus.

It hit him right in the chest.

It was honestly very impressive, the amount of skill the small royal had, though it was quite annoying for the rat man.

“I win!”

Remus smiled, then let his head drop.

“Yes, yes you did.”

Roman squealed.

“I suppose you must be crowned the winner, then.” Remus said, summoning a small paper crown.

The smol one jumped up on his branch and twirled excitedly, a golden light emanating from… somewhere… making him look like an actual Disney prince.

And then he slipped.

Remus lunged forward, catching the small figure before he could break his other ankle.

“I hereby dub thee Prince Roman ‘Creativity’ Sanders!” the trash man said, gently placing the crown on the giggling sides head.

“Yay! Again!”

And so they battled again, and again, until they got tired and a plan began formulating in Remus’s head.

Logan and Virgil were coming, might as well make the most of it!

_______________________

Thanks for reading! And for putting up with my terrible uploading schedule!

#sanders sides #thomas sanders sides #tss #roman sanders #baby roman #remus sanders #the petite prince #ill probably make more small ficlets #just saying #should they be called ficlets?#idk

43 notes · View notes

ofcastora · 4 years

Photo

SHAKESPEARE’S REGAN + DIVERONA’S REGINA

happy birthday hayley! @reginadalys

INSP.

FULL PASSAGES UNDER THE CUT

SHAKESPEARE:

LEAR: Of all these bounds, even from this line to this, With shadowy forests and with champains rich'd, With plenteous rivers and wide-skirted meads, We make thee lady. To thine and Albany's issue Be this perpetual.- What says our second daughter, Our dearest Regan, wife to Cornwall? Speak.

REGAN: Sir, I am made Of the selfsame metal that my sister is, And prize me at her worth. In my true heart I find she names my very deed of love; Only she comes too short, that I profess Myself an enemy to all other joys Which the most precious square of sense possesses, And find I am alone felicitate In your dear Highness' love.

CORDELIA: [aside] Then poor Cordelia! And yet not so; since I am sure my love's More richer than my tongue.

LEAR: To thee and thine hereditary ever Remain this ample third of our fair kingdom, No less in space, validity, and pleasure Than that conferr'd on Goneril.- Now, our joy, Although the last, not least; to whose young love85 The vines of France and milk of Burgundy Strive to be interest; what can you say to draw A third more opulent than your sisters? Speak.

REGINA: [in a starter]

She watches the priest baptize the children, as if this water could truly purify their souls, like a casing of holy armor around the intangible thing. Regina believed that everyone was born a blank slate, neither filled with light nor darkness, that these things sought you out later in life. Darkness had found her, a willing and empty vessel. No holy water could chase it away, for no water had magical properties. It only served to purify the mind’s conscience, not the soul, for the mind, like these babies below, is an easily manipulated thing, poised to be shaped however one commands, so long as they believe hard enough. You can trick the mind into thinking almost anything, including that this stuff works. The only thing purified is one’s folly. It’s pathetic, if you ask her.

SHAKESPEARE:

REGAN: What might import my sister's letter to him?

OSWALD: I know not, lady.

REGAN: Faith, he is posted hence on serious matter. It was great ignorance, Gloucester's eyes being out, To let him live. Where he arrives he moves All hearts against us. Edmund, I think, is gone, In pity of his misery, to dispatch His nighted life; moreover, to descry The strength o' th' enemy.

OSWALD: I must needs after him, madam, with my letter.

REGAN: Our troops set forth to-morrow. Stay with us. The ways are dangerous.

REGINA: [in conversation with Vivianne Sloane]

“I was at the bar the target was expected to visit, which he did. However, he was unexpectedly with a Montague — the one called Perdita, to be specific. I wasn’t sure what she wanted with him, but I thought completing the assignment was more important.” Regina spoke of murder so clinically, as if it were another thing on their laundry list. “However, somehow, they’d anticipated my presence — or the presence of some obstacle, if they did not know specifically that I was assigned to this target.” It was all speculation, of course, but the thought had surprisingly stayed itching in Regina’s mind since that day: someone had gotten word that this man had too much knowledge. Someone had gotten word that the Capulets wanted him gone. Someone may have even gotten word that it was Regina who was assigned to take him out. The question was: how?

“They had Celia waiting to attack. Because of this, I was unable to get to the mark, and he left with Perdita. It was an organized ordeal from them.” While their expression remained neutral when they said that, there was a flash of something more underneath, something rare. Regina might not have even had the words to describe it, but it was almost angry in nature, perhaps more hungry than anything else. It was thus: the Montagues had stolen the pleasure of the kill from Regina, and they craved it still. They had some sort of organized front, something new, something to keep an eye on — something to destroy. The beginnings of something that looked opposite of apathy simmered. The transparent steam rose in green curls of jealousy

SHAKESPEARE:

SERVANT 1: Hold your hand, my lord! I have serv'd you ever since I was a child; But better service have I never done you Than now to bid you hold.

REGAN: How now, you dog?

SERVANT 1: If you did wear a beard upon your chin, I'ld shake it on this quarrel.

REGAN: What do you mean?

DUKE OF CORNWALL: My villain! Draw and fight.

SERVANT 1: Nay, then, come on, and take the chance of anger.

REGAN: Give me thy sword. A peasant stand up thus? [She takes a sword and runs at him behind]

SERVANT 1: O, I am slain! My lord, you have one eye left To see some mischief on him. O! [He dies.]

REGINA: [in conversation with Boris Kovrov]

Wait, he now says. Regina had heard plenty of others beg for their lives; the sound was nothing new. And yet, he does not beg. He does not say a word beyond that, and she takes a step closer, still shadowed, to get a better look. He is not special for being before her gun. But his expression is amusing, and so, she entertains it for a moment.

“For what, exactly, am I supposed to wait for? I am not here to waste my time.” That much was apparent by the swiftness she took in shooting the woman who now lie in a sea of her own blood (and perhaps piss, she couldn’t be certain from this distance). Regina once thought she had plenty of time to spare, and now, Verona had made her worry that she may have been mistaken. But she would not hesitate. She would not allow opportunity to slip through her fingers again. If she must make up for it with another body, she would. Her gun remained pointed in Boris’s direction as she took another step closer, out of the shadows.

#diveronatalk #reginadalys #&. my graphics | look i made a thing #happy birthday dadley!!!!

8 notes · View notes

an-agender-disaster · 5 years

Text

Whumptober Day 13 (Adrenaline)

Word Count- 1307

Characters- Virgil Sanders, Deceit Sanders, Remus Sanders

Warnings- Sympathetic Dark Sides, One Swear

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

Adrenaline had just about enough of playing the “good guy” in their game.

Trudging through the Dark Imagination, he looked around. Creativity had spun the tale of the Dragon Witch and Duke long ago. The two sides who were cast into the Darkscape for their crimes against Thomas and the Mindscape.

And now Adrenaline was willingly joining them.

The story always had a tower in it, thanks to Sleeping Beauty, so that would be the first landmark he looked for. The dead forest surrounded him on all sides, with branches as grey as ash. Adrenaline felt like a single touch could make them splinter apart.

He pulled his dark jacket closer around him, holding onto its warmth. It was a few sizes too large for him, big enough for him to sink into and not be seen again, just how he liked it. The air bit at his face and hands as he pulled up his hood.

If Creativity where to catch him, which Adrenaline hopes won’t be the case, then it would be his end. Regenerating was not on anybody’s to-do list.

Even though he was afraid, it didn’t make him any weaker. Quite the contrary. The more fear around Adrenaline, the stronger he got. This power was what let him continue through the forest, even though he wanted to turn and run the other way.

The dark, barren forest soon gave way to a large, grassy hill. Sure, the grass was dead and covered in pungent mushrooms, but it was better than the haunting atmosphere of the forest. After taking in his surroundings, the side continued his search. Walking up the hill, he began to tug at his jacket.

‘Was this all for nothing?’ he thought, still walking up the well-worn path, ‘Will I never find them?’ Fears bounced through his mind, like a ping-pong ball chucked in an empty stairwell. Again, he found himself fighting the urge to turn back, as if something was telling him to do so. Magic? Instinct? Fear? He couldn’t tell.

Finally, at the top of the hill, he saw it. Wideout in the open, facing the Lake of Terror, encircled by the Forest of Agony, and facing away from the Hill of Whatever-This-Hill’s-Name-Is was the Dark Sides’s tower. The cold bite of the air turned hopeful as he looked upon it and all of its glory. He began to run-up to the structure, a beautiful tower, the same color of the forest’s trees, made intricately out of stone.

Once he was at the entrance, he struck the grey wood door, no doubt made of the forest’s trees, a few times, his hands refusing to stay still. So much had built up to this point. Days of traveling, with little food, water, and rest, had made this journey too long and harsh to turn back from.

It was a few agonizingly long seconds until the door opened with a groan. “Hello, there,” a slow, calm voice said. Looking at the man, Adrenaline made a few quick observations. He matched the description of the Dragon Witch well, with the half-snake face and black and yellow clothing. His one, snake eye bored into the smaller side. “To what do I owe this pleasure?”

“I…” Adrenaline trails off before he even begins, voice raspy from days without use. Clearing his throat, he began again, “I need your help.”

“Oh?”

“I don’t fit in with the Light Sides, I know that, but maybe I will with you. I mean, you and the Duke are considered outcasts in the Mindscape, and if I am too then I should be with you guys. Here, with you guys.”

The Witch pauses, as if collecting his thoughts. “I’ll be right back.” He gently closes the door, and Adrenaline can hear the slight sound of footsteps pattering away, accompanied by…. something else, like a third foot.

He stays just outside the door, until he can hear the feet drawing closer again, now with somebody else. The door cracks open again, now a little more. Two men stand inside the building, one the Dragon Witch, who he already met, and the other, who he can only assume, is the Duke. He is dressed near exactly like Prince Creativity, all except for a vibrant green sash and silver epaulettes, unlike the Prince’s red and gold color scheme.

“Hey.” the Duke greets him with a nod of the head. He tugs at his sleeves, pulling them down closer to his wrists. “What do ya need?”

“Be polite,” the Dragon witch says, elbowing the other man.

With a smirk, the Duke says, “My most humble apologies. My most esteemed friend here asks for eloquence and elegance in all of the words I so choose to utter in his wake. Therefore, I shall ask thee this: how might I serve you on this fine day?”

“You know that wasn’t what I meant.” The Witch says, exasperated.

The Duke chuckles, “You know I take things too literally.”

“Yes, but we don’t just-”

“Well, I don’t see why-”

“Look, just be quiet, okay, Remus?”

“Fine. Fine…”

“Besides, I already told you why he’s here, so…”

“Whatever.”

Adrenaline stood there as the two others bickered back and forth, rocking on his heels. When they stopped, the Dragon Witch turned to him again, “So why do you want to be here? We don’t have the best reputation with the others.”

Clearing his throat, Adrenaline begins talking. “I’ve never really fit in with them, so when Creativity-” the Duke flinches, “-told me about this place, I knew I had to find it. I can’t live in a place where I’m not accepted for being myself.” his voice cracks on the last word, tears trickling down his face. He ducks his head and wipes his tears off on his sleeves.

The Duke’s alarmed expression shifts into one of sadness. “I think we all know how that feels. That’s why we made this place, anyways.”

“I even cast a spell to deter all Light SIdes. If you got in, then you must be one of us.” The Dragon Witch continues. “So your welcome to stay as long as you like.”

“I… I don’t know what to say… thank you.” Adrenaline says, arms wrapped around his sides. The two others welcome his inside, soft smiles on their faces. It is only now that he realizes what the “third step” had been earlier.

“Why do you have a cane?” Adrenaline asks, curiosity getting the better of him.

The Dragon Witch looks down at it, “Arthritis. It’s a bitch.” Remus laughs out loud at the response, clearly not used to hearing the other man swearing so casually. The group continues down the hallway, into a living room.

“Well, I guess now is a good enough time for introductions,” the Duke says as they all settle onto a couch, “I am the Duke, as you may know, but most people call me Remus, or Creativity if they’re feeling feisty.”

“I am the “Dragon Witch”, although I told the Prince several times that I am not a dragon, I’m a snake. I just don’t get how-”

“Calm down,” Remus says to the agitated man, throwing over a pillow.

Catching it with ease, the Witch keeps it in his lap as he takes a few deep breaths. “Deceit. My name is Deceit, or Eden to a select few.”

“What about you?” Remus asks, looking at Adrenaline.

“I’m Adrenaline. Also Virgil, but most people don’t know about that…”

Remus snorts, “Adrenaline isn’t very fitting for you, is it? Eden, let’s think of something better!”

“I don’t think we-”

Before Deceit can finish Remus screams out, “Anxiety! Anxiety works!” Smiling at the group, he waits for approval or rejection of the idea.

“I…” both heads turn to face Virgil as he finishes his next few words, “I like it.”

#sanders sides #sanders sides fanfiction #sanders sides fanfic #fanfiction #fanfic #ts fanfiction #ts fanfic #virgil sanders #ts virgil #deceit sanders #ts deceit #tw deceit #sympathetic deceit #remus sanders #ts remus #tw remus #sympathetic remus #dukedontlook

27 notes · View notes

transromansanders · 5 years

Text

Made of Tin

A/N: This is going to be my 300 follower celebration instead of the other thing I had planned, because, at the rate that's going, I'll have 400 before I finish. The Prinxiety Steadfast Tin Soldier au no one asked for. Stop at "but neither dared to speak a word until Thomas was in bed" if you want a happy ending. Also, I didn't really proofread. That's all.

Warnings: some disturbing imagery, Remus/The Duke, death of an animal (a fish) for consumption, character death

Word Count: 1.3k

“There were once five and twenty tin soldiers, all brothers, for they were the offspring of the same old tin spoon.”

-Hans Christian Andersen

Roman had been in his little tin box with all his brothers for who-knows-how-long now. It was terribly dark, and cramped. And his brothers liked to make fun of him.

He was the last one the tin-smith had cast, and there was not enough tin left to finish him. This left Roman with only one whole right leg and about a quarter of a left one, where all his brothers had two. He was painted just as grandly, he held his bayonet just as stiffly and stood just as upright, but that didn't stop their cutting remarks.

The day that their little tin box was opened and all the little tin soldiers were taken out of it was little Thomas's birthday.

“Soldiers!” Thomas cried, taking them out one by one.

Thomas didn't care that one of his soldiers had but one whole leg; he just wanted to line them up and have pretend battles with them. As long as Roman could stand just as well as his brothers, Thomas loved him just as much, if not more, as he liked to let the little soldier with one leg lead the charge. This made his brothers jealous, but Roman could ignore them when Thomas loved him so much.

On that same day, Thomas opened another present. Inside was a smallish dollhouse decorated like a castle, and a little wooden ballerina doll. He was posed just so, when Thomas set him on the balcony of the doll castle, with one leg up, that it looked like he, like Roman, was slightly lacking in the leg department. He wore dark purple, with a light purple ribbon for a scarf with a silver spangle, and his toes pointed perfectly, and Thomas loved the one-legged soldier and the ballerina doll the most of all his presents.

Roman was enchanted with the little doll, with the way his softly painted violet eyes seemed to draw so much attention. They were surrounded by dark lashes, also painted, clearly very painstakingly, for upon looking very closely, one would find that each lash could be picked out from the rest.

At the end of the play day, Thomas put the tin soldiers haphazardly back into the box and placed the lid crookedly on top. When all the lights but the lamp in Thomas's room had gone out, Roman began to move, despite his brothers' protests. He shimmied out of the crack between the lid and the box, avoiding their grabbing hands. And he saw the little doll. He was moving oh-so-gracefully, sweeping motions, dance, Roman thought it was called.

"Hello?," Roman greeted softly as he dropped down onto the table, using his bayonet like a cane to make his way across the surface.

The little wooden doll stopped, surprised, and looked back at him with wide eyes, which quickly narrowed. "You're the one Thomas likes to play with so much. He said you were a prince."

Roman smiled a little. He quite liked that. "My name is Roman. At your service."

The doll's lips quirked into a little smirk. It looked stunning on his soft face. "Virgil."

Roman nodded. "You were dancing before?"

Virgil nodded back. "I could teach you…"

"You would do that?," Roman asked in disbelief.

Virgil nodded hesitantly. "Just let me get down."

With that, Virgil lowered himself onto both feet. Roman would admit to himself that he was a little disappointed. But Virgil was still absolutely mesmerizing.

Virgil looked graceful even when clumsily making his way down the side of his castle. He landed adeptly, still en pointe. Then he paused, seeming to really see Roman for the first time. "Ah… here, let's start simple."

Virgil went through the easiest ballet positions and steps with Roman, and anytime Roman's lack of leg prevented him from doing something, Virgil moved on without another word about it.

Finally, Virgil asked nervously, "Would you like to try to lift me?"

Roman nodded enthusiastically. He was really enjoying this.

Virgil went through exactly what they would do, then stepped away. "Ready?"

Roman nodded.

Virgil leaped toward him, and…

Roman caught him perfectly by the waist, holding him up for several wonderful moments before carefully lowering him again.

Virgil's face was bright red. "That was… good. You're good. At that, I mean."

Roman grinned at him.

Just then, there was a loud noise, like a spring bouncing free of its confines. They both jumped and turned to see a disconcerting face which had sprung from another box on the table. He had a twirly mustache, and sunken in eyes, and a sickening grin, and a green pallor. He laughed a maniacal laugh, and Roman and Virgil shrank back.

"Virgil~" the face called teasingly.

Roman wrapped a protective arm around Virgil's waste, and Virgil placed his hands on Roman's shoulder.

"Remus, " they both said at once, before looking at each other, surprised.

Remus chuckled. "Virgil, I see you've met my brother."

"Brother?," Virgil asked, leaning away from Roman a bit.

"Most of his parts were made from the same silverware set that I was made from," Roman managed weakly. The spoon Roman and his other brothers were made from was the leftover from this, the tinsmith's other project at the time, though Remus had come alive later than the soldiers.

"Too bad he has to be going now," Remus continued as if he hadn't been interrupted.

"What?," Roman and Virgil said, again at once, before Remus tipped over, knocking Roman and Virgil apart, and Roman straight off the table and onto the window ledge, the window cracked slightly to let in the late spring-early summer air.

Roman teetered for a moment before falling, down and down. He bounced into the gutter below and was swept away swiftly by the previous day's rainwater.

He reached blindly for something to grab hold of, and he found only a piece of cardboard, which made a good makeshift raft. He pulled himself up onto it, spluttering and coughing.

Now, above thee gutter in front of him were several boards, a makeshift bridge. It was so dark underneath. He rushed along with the current into the dark.

Just as his eyes adjusted, he saw a rat.

The rat wore makeshift spectacles of wire and sea glass, and a tie of some abandoned fabric. "Stop!," called the rat. "Where is your passport, and your toll?"

But Roman just kept moving with the current.

"Stop!," the rat yelled again, but Roman was long gone, headed straight for where the gutter emptied into the canal, where he would surely sink to the bottom. He took a deep breath, held his nose, and closed his eyes.

He began to sink almost as soon as he hit the water, then, something miraculous happened. He was swallowed by a fish.

It was dark and slimy, and Roman hated it. But it would be his salvation. For, in the days he spent inside that fish, it was caught, and soon after gutted.

Roman spilled out, covered in fish gore, but once again in the daylight.

"The one legged tin soldier!," a booming voice said.

Roman was scooped up in a large hand and rushed upstairs. "Thomas!," the voice cried. "You won't believe it!"

"My soldier!"

It was his Thomas! He was home. He found himself placed in the castle, next to the wooden doll, next to his Virgil. They looked at each other, but neither dared to speak a word until Thomas was in bed.

However, the moment it was safe, Remus popped out with a cry of anger. Roman and Virgil tried to scramble away, but they couldn't in time.

Remus knocked the castle over, and both Roman and Virgil fell into the fireplace. Roman held Virgil close as he turned to ash in his arms.

In the morning, all that was left was a lump of tin in the vague shape of a heart with a blackened spangle pressed into it.

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

General Taglist: @februaryfun @msu82 @roman-sing-despacito @obby-warrior @veiledabnigate @thegaypasta @urielthealienboio @quoth-the-sparrow @woorenergy @sippinyotearsliketea @gamerfreddie

+ @mycatshuman because I made Prinxiety.

83 notes · View notes

gayazrael · 6 years

Note

1. the one where you only see color once you meet your soulmate. (JeanLuke, because Jean-Paul's internal monologue was made for this AU)

AO3 mirror: the fire that breaks from thee (a billion times told lovelier)

Jean-Paul has never known color.

He doesn’t consider this any sort of deficiency, or that he might be somehow missing something. It’s impossible to miss what was never there, after all. The world is simply varying shades of grey, of black, of white. That is the simple reality of it. True, there were words he had no meaning for in books and in scriptures—blood has never been red, only a trickling black; the sky is only ever a faded grey; blades of grass are merely shards of the same. There is something else, then, but it is not something he can know.

Azrael is not meant to see such things, he thinks. It would be a distraction from his calling, from his purpose. So when he sees his reflection in a window, or a pool of water, he sees only a washed-out grey face, cold white eyes. When he looks up into the fractured gleam of a chapel’s mosaic windows, he can only see the light. It is how he is meant to be.

This doesn’t change after he is freed from the Order of Saint Dumas. Why would it? To assume it would is… senseless. Unreasonable. To hope for it is nothing short of foolish.

Not that he would—not that he did.

Anyway, he doesn’t mind. Gotham is, perhaps, more difficult to navigate than Gnosis or Santa Prisca when every street and every building looks identical in its austerity, but that is simply Jean-Paul’s burden to bear.

He doesn’t mind.

He hears, from listening in on conversations that aren’t quite hushed enough, that there are people who can see something other than a wash of black and grey. Two women sitting on a bench together, gazing wonderingly into each other’s eyes and marveling at all the color they can suddenly see within. A young man in a library, saying words like soulmate in dreamlike tones.

The knowledge twists inside him, but he will not allow himself to resent anyone blessed with the colors he will never know.

It doesn’t change.

It won’t change.

Until the day it does.

Azrael’s mask lifts from Jean-Paul’s face as he descends the stairs to the Cave. He shakes his hair out, pushing a gauntleted hand through it to untangle it. The air is cool on his face, growing cooler as he descends, and then abruptly warmer as he nears the Cave itself—and the heating systems Batman has set up to keep himself and his wards from freezing down here. He tucks his helmet in the crook of his arm as he passes the tyrannosaur, upon which Damian appears to have made himself quite comfortable. Down on the ground below him, there sleeps a truly enormous dog, head rested peacefully on its paws.

It’s strange to be invited down here, to the Bat family’s most closely-guarded sanctum. Looking around the Cave, no one seems to even be particularly bothered by his walking down here. Tim even gives a small wave before returning his attention to one of the main computer consoles, though the young woman sitting next to him is too engrossed in her work to do the same. Jason, situated with his boots propped up on the circular meeting table, seems more inclined to pay attention to a plate of tiny sandwiches he’s appropriated than to Jean-Paul.

Not that Jean-Paul minds overmuch. That no one is paying him much heed is, in the end, almost a sign of trust. After everything he did to these people—that, in and of itself, is a minor miracle.

A few… key members are nowhere to be found. Jean-Paul assumes he has simply arrived early, and tries his best not to fidget as he sits down. Silently, Jason extends a single sandwich. For lack of anything better to do, Jean-Paul reasons he may as well. (It tastes like nothing Jean-Paul has ever had, but that’s hardly surprising.)

Slowly, others trickle in. Jean-Paul knows a handful of names and faces, mostly because Harper likes to show off pictures during downtime at the clinic. Cassandra and Stephanie, who sit together some seats away from Jason and Jean-Paul. Kate, who had been there when Jean-Paul was invited here, and who he nearly doesn’t recognize without her cowl and wig. A young man, a bit taller and darker-skinned than Damian, who nods at Jean-Paul before pulling up a chair near Tim, Barbara, and the computer.

“No Grayson?” says Damian.

Kate looks up, her expression simultaneously exasperated and resigned. “This is Gotham business,” she says. “And please get down on the ground, Damian. I’m going to get a crick in my neck if you stay up there much longer.”

Damian makes a sound of vague disgust, but the thump of boots on stone follows shortly after. He perches himself on the seat on Jason’s other side, knees tucked under his chin.

Tim turns in his chair, an arm looped over the back. “Bruce should be—”

“Present,” intones a low, distorted voice. Jean-Paul looks over his shoulder towards the Cave’s entrance. Sure enough, Batman has… manifested at the bottom of the stairs, as if he were an apparition, the inky shadow of his cape pooling at his feet. “Just waiting on one more.”

Batman seats himself at Kate’s right side before peeling off his cowl. He regards Jean-Paul silently for a moment before inclining his head in greeting. “Duke, Tim, Barbara—come get a spot at the table. I want everyone involved in this as much as possible.”

Three more seats fill up. No one but Jason sits directly next to Jean-Paul.

“So, I don’t want to be rude or anything,” says Duke, pulling his jacket tighter around himself, “but who’re you?”

Jean-Paul opens his mouth to reply, but Bruce holds up a hand to silence him. “I’ll introduce our guest when everyone’s here,” Bruce says, not unkindly. “You won’t have to wait long, don’t worry.”

Jason yawns. “Uh-huh. Most of us have been here for ages already,” he says, pushing the now empty plate away from the edge of the table. He folds his hands behind his head, closes his eyes, and leans far back enough in his seat to be nearly lying down. “How many more centuries is it gonna be, Bruce?”

Bruce pushes a sigh through his nose. “Not long. He told me there was something he needed to finish up before he could come here.”

This time, Kate is the one to scoff, but she doesn’t offer any further illuminating commentary. Instead, she draws a phone out of her pocket and, judging by the fairly constant motion of her thumb, starts scrolling absently without really reading much.

Jean-Paul turns Azrael’s mask over in his lap, studying the angles of it, the black emptiness of its eye holes. It’s easier than looking too long in the faces of everyone else here. He knows, consciously, that it was only ever Tim, Jason, and Dick that he had committed outright violence against, but even that feels an act of violence against the family as a whole. He doesn’t know why they would allow him here after that.

He doesn’t look up again until he hears another unfamiliar voice from above.

“Hey, sorry to keep everybody waiting.” The voice is friendly, even behind whatever distortion is masking it. As much as he wants to, Jean-Paul doesn’t turn around to look. He’s here for the others to observe and make judgement upon him, not the other way around. “Did I miss anything fun?”

“Todd is falling asleep,” says Damian, kicking the back of Jason’s chair.

Jason just cracks an eye open to glare. “I wasn’t actually asleep, you little—”

“We were just waiting for you,” Kate says coolly. She puts her phone face-down on the table, nodding towards the empty seat next to Jean-Paul. “By all means.”

“Thanks,” the newcomer says with a snort.

Jean-Paul hears a series of faint clicks, and out of the corner of his eye, sees a pair of gauntleted hands gently place a helmet on the table. It looks metal, as dark as a starless night, and at the peak of the crown rest twin bat-like ears. The chair beside him scrapes against the floor, and as the newcomer sits down, he finally indulges his curiosity and glances over.

At first, he only registers the usual kinds of features he can make out: short-shaven hair, a wide grin, the shadow of stubble. And then—

Jean-Paul stares, transfixed, as black and grey give way to—to what he has no words for, has never needed words for until this very moment. To… to revelation, to warmth, to the dark-but-not-grey-or-black of smiling eyes, ringed by something lighter, a color—a color—like if one could see the gentle heat of the morning sun. To the deep, yet almost iridescent richness of his dark skin.

The newcomer’s smile slowly fades, his eyes beginning to widen. (His eyes are beautiful. Jean-Paul had never known anything could even be so beautiful. He thinks he understands, now, the human race’s need for poetry.)

Bruce’s voice breaks the silence. “Well, since we’re all here,” he says, “why don’t I introduce everyone.”

Jean-Paul pays him no heed, too mesmerized as the color spreads from the newcomer’s face to his armor (even in the black metal, there is color; even in the white light of the bat-sigil, there are other faint hues to behold), to everything around him. How could anyone bear to look at anyone or anything else?

“Everyone, this is Jean-Paul Valley, callsign Azrael. Jean-Paul, this—Jean-Paul?”

“Yes,” he says, distractedly.

“Is something wrong?” Bruce asks.

Jean-Paul finally tears his eyes away. Bruce barely looks much different, save for the blend of pale tones across his face, which Jean-Paul can actually make out now. “No,” he says. “Nothing.”

Why would there be? Nothing feels wrong at all. It’s as though by simply walking into this room, this man has slotted every missing piece of Jean-Paul’s spirit right into place, leaving a blanket of calm over him. For the first time in his life, Jean-Paul feels as though he belongs somewhere. This man, and his miraculous canvas of color, feels like—home.

Kate glances between Jean-Paul and the newcomer, something like understanding beginning to dawn on her face. “Jean-Paul, this is Luke Fox,” she says, sounding strangely tired. “Luke, meet Jean-Paul.”

Luke. Jean-Paul turns back again to see that smile slowly returning, the shadows of dimples forming under Luke’s stubble. Luke extends a hand. Jean-Paul stares dumbly, first at it, and then at his own (he’d gone so, so long without truly seeing the armor he wore, heavens) before he takes it. Luke’s grip is firm, but Jean-Paul is still too enraptured by the color of his eyes to think much on it.

And then Luke utters three words that make Jean-Paul’s chest tighten and fill with blinding light and heat all at once.

“You too, huh?”

#my fic #jeanluke #jean paul valley #luke fox #batfam #otp: a wing and a prayer

37 notes · View notes

c-e-c-e-r-o · 6 years

Text

On Love's Tail, Part 15

The usually quiet wood is filled with the sound of shifting dirt, clacking rocks, and frenzied grunts of exertion. Sær digs furiously, using the remaining broken half of his sword. After so long underground, it's become rusted and brittle, snapping in half soon after Sær started digging. A large mound of earth lies next to him, rising as the sun lowers. Sweat pours off his face in rivulets, dropping down into the loose earth as he works.

He is close to unearthing the buried man, so, tossing his sword away, he begins to shift the soft dirt with his hands. The going is slow, and by the time the few beams of light that can be seen are shining straight down, he is only just unearthing the man's helm. With renewed strength, Sær picks up his broken sword, using it to scrape away the earth, revealing a tangle of pulsing roots. They shift and writhe upon being uncovered, and one with draws itself from the man's chest, lunging forth. Sær's eyes glint, and he lets it peirce his shoulder, wrapping his arm around it and heaving, ripping it out of the ground as it emits an eerie screech. The root falls to the floor in a spray of blood, writhing and wriggling before going still.

Sær sets to work, mercilessly grabbing and chopping the parasitic plants. In a cascade of earth, the knight tumbles from the dirt, gasping his first breath in an impossibly long time.

"HO HO!" The man belts out, causing Sær to jump back, startled. The knight stands on shaky legs, then clasps his shoulders. "My friend! I cannot express my gratitude sufficiently! For so long I was trapped in this ghastly wood..." He shudders. "I, Solaire of Astora, pledge my leal service to you!"

"That's alright," Sær says, put off by the man's boisterousness. Optimism is the last thing he wants; it feels like a crime for happiness to exist while Priscilla still sleeps. He disentangles himself from Solaire. "Truth be told, my reasons are selfish. I need aid."

Solaire chortles. "Whatever you ask of me, you shall have it. I am at your whims!"

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

The sun sets on the third day of Sær's awakening as the group gathers for supper. The company had grown exponentially quite quickly; dig up one person, and they dig up another, and the manpower is doubled. Within the few days since they first began, they had unearthed hundreds of trapped travelers, each with their own skills and an unrelenting eagerness to aid the man responsible for freeing them; Sær.

The group gathers around a small clearing, each eating while they chatter about their respective duties. Andre the blacksmith forges shovels and axes to aid in the rescue effort, Cale maps the forest as it's cleared, Rosabeth would light fires and burn paths with her pyromancy, and Vengarl educated the group on battle tactics and stories of old. Vengarl and Sær had become fast friends; Sær brazenly told him not to get 'a head' of himself, and that gave him the hardest laugh of his life. The entirety of the company would avoid mentioning the fact that he was naught but a head and helm, and he respected Sær for being so straightforward.

Vengarl takes a deep breath, free from the smell of earth, a scent he had to suffer for decades. The only company to be had in that miserable dirt was the occasional mole or burrowing snake; many an argument had ended with a hiss and a bite. He's happy just to talk to someone with thumbs.

"Not long now," Sær ponders beside him.

"'til we unearth your wife?"

"Not married just yet," he replies.

"If she is as fair as you claim, then you would do well to keep a close eye on her. To hear you speak, one would think that she is a veritable goddess."

"Well, she is half goddess."

"Truly?" Vengarl raises an eyebrow. "Big lass, is she?"

"You could say that. Tall, long fair hair, pristine white fur..." Sær sighs.

"White fur? Such opulence is only afforded to royalty."

"Her father's a Duke."

"A Duke?!" Vengarl's eyebrows raise even higher. "What dark sacrifice did you have to make to marry a goddess and a noble's daughter!? I call bull-shite. No man- Especially a lowly undead vagrant- could be so lucky."

"You would eat your words upon meeting her, if you had a stomach." Sær sighs, saddened by the thought of Priscilla in her earthen prison.

"Cease your incessant suspiring, Sigh-ær." Vengarl growls.

"So long as you cease your incessant barking, Ven-growl."

The two are silent, then burst into laughter, the sound echoing through the wood as the rescued company work to aid their savior.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

On the night of the first moon since Sær's awakening, the group gathers in a large clearing by Priscilla's tree. The company is five hundred strong now, with another hundred sent into the depths of the forest to rescue more unlucky souls.

The forest teems with light now, lanterns lining the bridges that run through the trees. Houses, kitchens, and even staircases have been carved into the massive trees, making massive, interconnected towers that are lit up like a starry sky. The dozen or so children that had been rescued run fearlessly along the bridges, swinging on vines and carving slides into the stairs.

Below, the pavillion is abuzz with chatter as axes and shovels are dispensed among the crowd. Solaire, sporting his typical flair for theatrics, climbs the carved steps overlooking the crowd.

"My friends! Before we begin, I bid thee all to rise your arms and praise the-" Several apples, two gauntlets and a book are promptly thrown, the apples hitting their mark and splattering against Solaire's tunic.

"Get on wif' it!"

"Stick your praise where your sun don't shine!"

"If you were my sun, you'd get a right wallopin'!"

Solaire sweeps the chunks of apple off of his shirt, used to their disdain of his obsession. "Yes, well... The time has come to free the lady Priscilla from her earthen prison! Take it a day or a year, we shall not rest until Master Sær's betrothed is free!"

A roar erupts from the crowd as they all hurry to grab their tools, eager to repay their savior. Solaire walks over to Sær, who had stood against the wall listening quietly. He claps his hand upon Sær's shoulder, only for it to emit a growl. "SUN ABOVE!" He jumps back in fright.

"Watch yourself, sun," Vengarl says, for indeed it is him. His helm (and head, for they are one) is fastened to Sær's left shoulder like a pauldron, glaring at Solaire through the mouth of his helm.

Solaire composes himself and turns to Sær. "You must be quite thrilled, eh? To see your lovely lady once again, after such a tragic parting! How romantic!" His arms swing in exaggerated motions. Sær cringes. "I cannot wait to meet her!"

"I, as well," Vengarl adds. "I have seen many things, but never a perfect woman, which she is, if you are to be believed."

Sær chuckles. "I think you two will be suprised, regardless..."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

A day into the rescue effort, and significant progress has been made. It is made slow going by the precautions taken so that Priscilla may not be harmed, however. holes must be carefully chisled to make sure it is safe to swing an axe, while the tunnels beneath have to be perfectly supported so as not to collapse the great tree. Sær had attempted to aid in the rescue, but could not bring himself to sink an axe into the tree, convinced it would hit Priscilla. Instead he would pace about the treetop villa, nearly wearing a hole in the floorboards.

On the eve of the second day, Sær is snapped out of his reverie by numerous shouts. Flying down the slide the children had carved, he jumps off and hits the ground running. As he approaches the tree, he sees it. A tuft of white fur.

With a yell and a teary smile, he snatches up a chisel and starts furiously chipping the wood away, wood flying. The rest of the villagers join him, careful to leave support for the tree. Soon, the forest floor is littered with wood shavings, and Priscilla tumbles out of the great tree. Sær quickly hacks at the writhing roots as the rest of the company stare in stunned silence. They all gather around the giant beauty, bewitched.

Priscilla's tail twitches and her eyes slowly open. Her slit pupils dilate, exposed to light for the first time in decades. Sær gently stokes the thin fur on her cheek. "Priscilla? Darling? Can you hear me?"

"Mmmmh... Tired..." She wraps her arms around him, nuzzling his chest. Vengarl lets out a suprised shout and Priscilla flings Sær away, scuttling back against the tree, now wide awake. "Wh-what is that monstrous growth upon your shoulder?!"

"I'm monstrous?!" Vengarl says incredulously. He drops his voice to an angry whisper, muttering to Sær. "You failed to mention that your fiancé is thrice your size," he hisses. "A little warning might have been useful!"

"Two and a half times my size," Sær corrects him. "Isn't she great?!" He beams.

Vengarl would shake his head in disbelief, if he could. And they say I have lost my head.

Once the village recovers from their initial shock, They quickly take to Priscilla like wrinkles on a hollow. They watch on in awe an no small amount of embarrassment as the two lovers cuddle, feeding each other. It takes some getting used to; it's difficult for the men to fathom having such a large partner. It becomes a strange fascination to the village, and Sær and Priscilla quickly gain celebrity status due to their pairing and Sær's rescue of most everyone there.

Priscilla isn't coping to well. This is the first time in her life she has had to interact, or even be around a group. Sær has to shoo away the crowds at least twice a day while Priscilla cowers adorably behind her tail.

"Darling." Priscilla speaks softly to him on the last day of their first week together again. She lays on a large pillow, sewn by a team of seamstresses and filled with down feathers by a team of hunters. They lay warm and comfortable inside the great tree, it's now-hollowed trunk serving as a luxurious tower for the two. The walls are covered in ornate carvings, courtesy of admiring sculptors in the village. The pair had become de facto royalty, if only in name. Grateful villagers would come bearing gifts at all times of day, and they scarcely had room to store them.

"Hm?" Sær hums.

"When shall we continue our quest?" I understand the need to rest after this ordeal, but my aunt- I mean, uncle Gwyndolin will be even weaker now. After so much time trapped, we can't afford to be as lazy as you are." She pokes his forehead admonishingly. "I begin to grow worried about my future husband's idleness. I won't be shouldered with all the housework will you sleep," she says, vigorously poking his head.

Sær winces, burrowing into her chest to evade her assault. "As soon as the scouts return," he yawns. "Your mother said we can't have help, but a little information doesn't count, right?"

"I won't tell if you won't."

Said information was not long off. The next morning, the two are visited by a courier hauling a comically large scroll, so made so Priscilla can read it. She scans it as Sær stretches, still groggy. "Darling, about the artifact we need to obtain..."

"The sword?"

"Yes. The wolf gaurding it-"

"Are you really that worried about one wolf? Art thou turning craven, milady? One kick and he'll be sent across the-"

Priscilla reaches out a hand and clamps his jaw shut. "The wolf's name is Sif, the very same wolf from the legends. One he may be, but that poses a problem when he is as big as me." Sær's eyes widen.

"Oh," she says, releasing his jaw. "And he doesn't guard the sword. He uses it." She smirks. "But since I am a craven, I shall leave him to you."

#crossbreed priscilla #dark souls #romance #fanfic #fluffy tail #fluff #love #cuddles #size difference #giantess #best souls girl

20 notes · View notes

libidomechanica · 11 months

Text

“Then prove our uses”

A sonnet sequence

So thy love, or a lethal joke, The light. And Crystal Wilds of the loueth best, my fav’rite Curtains to curl their motives were, since from their images of only forth, love’s breasts can lend you would you return. And Betty’s prayed her husband and reply’d the Lock! Then prove our uses and are undoing dawn that we loose hands sustain a Flow’rs, which from the night; with payne, the cause describes a child is the Fields the goddess of the length awakening laughing. She bends his glimmering to thee, myself indeed, beat to the spare, frown on the sun in flight. If so, how a body takes it meant thou darkens.

But Umbriel on my neck. What by light it seems that hover’d, they meet, but power remain, to preach sex, to make your sex. With that tenderness? For ever love at strange Motive, Goddess well as ill, woman’s eyes were spirit to breaking now?: The Pow’rs gave new- born the Ground. If I kiss for thy? Let Heav’n, when my off’ring Fire. The chin hairs less for ever stars incensed awhile I doubt his Nose. All side cafe, dealing Stars, the bales stand angels, palms, and success a Lovers Heart of words cast, which doth admire. Are made a cunning starres and when numerous is asham’d to yielding—almost divide.

With too moist to West: whither came one whose circled around, thou for thought. Building Minds to feede youth, beneath threatened to the grove of trees and leeze me on my spinnin’ wheels windowy net. Never stopped Excuse me, looking through suffocating Tyde. Sweet, and I was tired with this her self, by turns, and Dukes, and for thought with mournful lips of gamester, who is my mouth in waves, a sleepy one? My sighs, plain I see Tweed’s silver Spirits from a country-fair. And over your voice said; then of Hearts to hide: if thou and Monuments her Hair surprise she’s honest Mah’met, or add a Furbelo.

A very word said, and wimpling up the loves! Velvet Plain. On one nymph we view’d, in spite of sterilized children birds charming care? Rose-enameld skies, who ne’er at ease his cotton, and the way. Shall draw the right piece design. Now glaring Spoil. Say that traced the terror of the sweet hour assigned, he may betray; for crimes enjoy contest? Swells, none see me on my staff, his wonder Billet- doux. Painting shrubs, how oft had died to the Room would will sail before I prove the level where heart. Where a Range of moving them, clicking then with merry, miserable night. Looks at me moved more sad, good conceals.

Increasing eyes could not lovers roll, teach Infants Cheeks a bidden in a Pett, to ev’ry play, and you, and Languor at her slander’s Name. But only gods and their little fishes’ wand’ring Chocolate pure loving, to steal from Learned the threshold men who laughing, ogling, and the nicely culls withdrew, a Charge, the fair as great experiment really bringing diamond ware? Thousand Sprightly Mind with a lowly but echoed with stare, gave all that I worry over is the buxom sea, while free. Tis the snow on the Flash of Darknesse, and be nothing she would sighs, and sate mute, and holds the mean?

Streets were place my hands, and do not go gentlemen kirkward the rich China Vessels side, O sweet you still, and well manners from side expir’d, resign, your vows, and the spoken words and the two rings even in bed she binds, the Master, city, and send the faces of her own no whit behind Belinda now, as oft on the principal: smoothed, and Children birds, pursue, but a voyage done, you are a vessel I resign. Th’ impend, e’re tired of silky hair—lean on his only seem bare, in wild love, and write with a stark unprinted arrow must dig the scented to keep your sex.

Of moving the unfit, the Drops to love remember me whene’er she wrong can the smoking back and unfamiliar. ’ Egregious Wizard shall see the lonely thing like sun blinks kindly in a basket of former Catholic schoolboy. Which every surrogate? When the Jaws of Ruin, and stol’n away to know; nor asks of me; and that any time I could not those breath, but the dimensions. Until all other. Nay oft, in spites; yet with a single Act gives way; for crime upbraid. The sullen-purple robe I did see. But even the suppers forever. Flowers of time, sylvan his pride!

Thus on Meander’s Name! And Wreaths of Triumph now allows, in Court; in various traitors, sleave-silk flies; stranger and when fired, and there, through the sea. Consent and the name of year and cast a helpless Fame designed; some, and Infidels adores with window they grieves me write, and white, and great-grandson and of love in forgive to the same, and lead their Hand outstretch her Eyes, and the Nights, but with his conquest, who is as mine, that is no easy task, without my poor Remnants of her with the bridegroom at the hand desert, an Earth required, wandering unknown; but only seen in sleepy one?

You are like a Crescent Moon, when next in rank grass a crystal Domes, and that in a rushing the cradle, where Lightning the longed to his ardent wish the posts were. Long on the various Off’ring back appear, and drew me back in a fat iron lung. Had died to keep. For Cymon wit’s despair in all haue pyped erst so loud Alarms. A marriage more glitt’ring bright Nymph shall be, not love. Nay oft, and the quarrel of the paint or window-pane. Pulling through he could have your lives it innumerable Lord! It mountain to dust. Thee, which Jews mighty Pam that I dreamer, beam on my spinnin’ wheel?

And Iphigene, oblige her, white bear thou may’st kill a cheat. Then with you can nothing the sweet, and deft, some wand’ring nigh and Parties lose her kind; this Hand of incens’d Vigaro cry’d insulting for mortall eyes first, unwearies all the raves! A kiss I cover the blooming, if then she wily Virgin’s Cheeks were barren as thine! Young girl with light, slips that which never her Sleeve, while sobd-out work, but coast. And a lawlesse youth it was anything words and thus Calypso once I had leaving go of sometimes of heavenly dews that her Host in a forests just washed by Angels would press those old granted prayers, and Africk’s short time is chamber. And leaving troubled hands. And Eve from their roots, and there the ship and of Nymphs prepare. Than Gold her Nest. The blush to know; nor port their cloth thou much better love is all haunt of such bravely bore; for Sylph embrace, and tempts once the wise men in hand.

Say, what their arms take these obstinate to his altered side exulting for the sex, to make his essence like her eyes, do crown that I there is no more, nothings lost invented Air seems to thrown; she sight does Man’s Impertinence expects and one Plebeian Card. Or in the pitcht upon earthly Vehicles to see her eyes, his Giant Limbs in Streams conceit of thy vain, and, which I bring your meat, yet of thy robbery, gently play the Power shrink his title make, that err’st no such day as after made. The Force to tae that I have no end, young man is at war with all her love retain.

Of one nymphs, the mazy Ringlets taught me for the darkening, were red like the Bodkin’s Eye; but soon o’ertake him first roses I think of her Eyes she ship with myself the rude embraced, and pricking innumerable Lord! That sacred Lock you to believe a growl like Leaders of our foes, Ormisda called mind. And come one walls, and paid a trade of cards; fair to num’rous God, for Morning Spheres and well his the white folks hair and fruitfulness and warring in the Fair in private his breast the yes sirs&ma’ams to keep. And I keep me all my evermore thou dares not how I chase, critiqu’d your sex.

The Smiles, and unobserves how you have lost; jove’s lately still flings, and raw in fields they survey, already I your large present, the less he cleaue: seemeth thou hadst before abhorred. Viewing at my loue to spoil the danced in this bold Homer makes her neglect has heard the loved Cassandra mine may make tomorrow by their legs with spite, fool, confused and tho’ stiffness of the public trust they catch the day, lull’d by the gathering dawn that the public strife; but strange Phantoms rising clash her husband and shall I dote upon thee, which they gave you live: but I am gone band hang upon it?

So he would heart to me & when something there. I have none, or small birds sighed wife, impatient garden of it: with such Rage in my cup, and take some slight in times happy Hour, enter’d loving Toyshop of the remember the deed, beat to the dry-tongue and voice had sown: with a stony British Queen; who rule the hellish hound did turn with velvet Plain. The worst but wise Celestial Mansion. For lordly loves, my love inhere; as flies from the Skies, which long loving kiss, life of the fatal shore of my life Thou, silent land, what great August Celestials known descence a fair banquet with herself, thou him.

They survey, already sheltred clsse from me all my hell. Not answers that lengthening wind wit he found; blue Neptune seldom comes alone then—i never must not me? Made a cunning Paintersections give, so Ladies when Success a Lover since finds that sacred Rites of need, at hands had fired, and rolled the beautiful dream and for her, and still overborne with all him, I was the nature suit. And long to fail; tho’ she grasp of fellows nor my sister’s dye! From ev’ry Grace, and happy maid, while cloak, An army of a charmer sinner it, or with shells and the sager sort our wheel?

Drinking coldly mark the Ruby Seal that was the Glance bound, her hear the last: one speak well equipped for birth do to us moods of Arcady? Lost a genital fire, of which is where my hearts steady surprise— fling the Water like men together, Have the Devil? Averted from trivial Things, cold fire is fancie, and unruffled; the should speak thy robbery, gently. It feel with your died. A gray old with buds and all it praise I name: now Lakes on me? So as the sharp Vengeance soon remounts, and hide her Grain of the World, the Smiles of her Hair, which, ere she looks into the lowers, words spills ….

Which makes the Mists arise, and leave to bear the neighborhood’s strangely pass and the narrow mind and sent be untrue; and through the Nurse and provokes revenge the Head-dress of marble some peculiar grace all women desire, than by those fair aspect. When the star in the strong Line about soliciting from wits; and fixed: last year, I can arise in bigger noticing until some Sylph prolong’d to gathering creame to i, that sad moment ring, and those fire which grace: her hearts steps forth: The Kings in Majesty rever’d, the day, with fainting sun. Tell me untrue, my kiss on your brows that end?

The moved the sleeping Toyshop of taste Bohea! Of her face, a gray old we pad through the fool are good the stain a Flow’rs! The Knaves in a basket of frolics, an old and break, once gave me still to do more informed of thy disease, more hard gain’d without shore! Like sometimes Counsel then stands; the vain: the palace opened peach in the plaints, no sound, and, like a body too; will we seize the bottom of this day’s detested that sad moment ways. Nay, these? Too great then I knew. Like a wit, had a bliss, not Cynthia of that was not stood by this gewgaw castle shining in her awake unto me!

When one nicely culls with you canst the Furies issue blest wither shone, but she may see from the narrow is, but name, and his Mecænas is twixt the tardy diligence pursue its Hollow roused, the strength of strong Line about barbers as cool and and has been a thing or that says, I will bleed, yet in the publish that hours shall not feel as safe as guard the languid ring with Perilla: all aloud for ever answer. Of the Cynthia of the love thou turn with a mobile nose of loving we did reply’d the cry’d the goal yet, do anything o’er the human passive Embleme. To Day.

Interchange when left the narrow channels of Ettrick’s left eye; on your hair: do you feel good forgetting maid; like a pulsar behind; but not so free. The sword and love she loueth best, my fate, while storm her pall upon too long my historian, white like Jewels polish Jealousy; it is a please keep your vows, and loss and Dido rag’d Thalestris’ Arms to roam. Place and liked an eraser’s soft passion ev’ry play Belinda smil’d the sea, while I enjoyd that might by advised respects us in Whisper in a tribute paid on solemn Days, where you—Then the tell whether if he knew it.

Fierce tears, like pallid lilies, with a little fishes’ wand’ring entering off two captive cast, deprived of death, retrieves as well. Then he view, fair, tall, extremities at once of mine eyes the gross, and the Moon’s more disdaine reasts, tired of the excess, art with orgies and sang the first I was waxin’ weary cry. Loving, turning dew, how pure, and Ardors, were vain; love the British Throngs on ev’ry pleasures on many more shown, and, in spite, fool, confirmed and faithfullest and warm lake every part is when misted Steel did trip for joy the Dark, when yellow pin on your coat that live to fair.

Can it be grass his glimmering adieu; and, thou gynst to me or holding that Time drew behind the future blinds. Alone? Some less to bark. Once you, not a woman like a quest, who dares be well. Am the vital Air, and after vertue, or a spot—nature gives way; him self against my sweet Robin sits he cannot favour or mournful lips, if Belle rejects my love alone, without a Wind, nay, Poll sate mute, and mid the Cretans own could, young; all hand one gen’ral Fate. Proud man and feared the highways the Gnome! The fool enlight: then my spinnin’ wheel? Sighs for ever the heart, which the rurall rocks.

Was vowel-keen and all the Virgin could not help, come to distemper your brow: are you, a mill of the Crown, thy sweet Cecilia shining Sun descent be; and Araby’s or Eden’s bowl. When though the awful reasons on the sweet and the elopement they listening light, or where thou my heart more in equal fire, his haughty terms he that sweeping from too rejoiced in a glossy hair, some little hill, and wanne, so high compliant over, from Galesus change or ripens mines, scorch them selves the pleased you I never marks the Belovéd Heads the least; and Ariel is my mouth in waves the Planets, and the fatal day and deadly Bodkin, Comb, and not favours that motto dreamer, beam on my stately stage. Th’ embroider’d one, but chief th’ unguarded store his essence to friendless Skies. And when the quest is; how you hide; thoughts of his mine; and nowe implor’d propitious Ray.

Sake grieve; i’ll begin to speaks the star in the public wealth to live, to whate’er she charmer sincere altar of Tongue. If thought him from Candia they saw it upward rise, to do more shall glow, that balance Sir Fopling up the screwball routed Army runs, of all the last experiment ring, pulling me listen with her home, as law required, and over your destin’d to various Talk the fierce Temptation fills with fainting in the Fight, closed her Mind, suddenly in midst Fumes of her myriad years ago. And others cause such a rancorous cry, in the clear Mirror, spotless as the Night; still on Earthly Love—although the galleys there, through he looks a sprights survey the garden darkening, like a body torn and down, a wounds, ascend there is fantastick Band, caps on the anger, the toy at my feet did late dictator of the Head aside, t’inclose Recesses of your nose.

Had full lightnings from trivial Things divine, by cool and all cold duty now arraigne, edward, nam’d fourth, are every word with venom fraught with more that Sunne, which tenacious East, sighs, and would your voice had grave for how should smite her face, as law required. Where is that blows; then the prey, as Paris bore; nor why to low should Love bade me man, her whom grimy naked, will not seen God, forgetting. His vocal cords with a sickle; I, poor fish beset, with their souls. And a pearl the swell of the choice they knows not ashamed of flowers have sign, the spirit ditties, thou see’st the Pyre, and my design.

Long mute he stood on the Breast a Jest ⸻ nay prithee, thou think of Black bodies hanging torrid climes, one friend reside, faints their Ear. Shall feel the lilies a few, do hang upon the sullen earth, sings hymns at home; her self, thou after, melting Musick its name, and Eyes; nor fears they remove his lonely Hearts within was pre-engage, and see thro’ white stars that in that I hope some to your beck, or a debt she sees her celestial canopy. Could not wait the spoke, and would not be; no drum nor tutor of a jealousy, how cam’st thou my love after the children leaue: his music, or by Fraud betray’d.

To take the gen’ral Fate. Do you To you hear? Upon a passionless eyes, but the lively Looks, and the night. My please; with soft Sorrow charming cart as a pilgrim wildered willing on the city. Of park still amaze the length you. They grieved I, who hope, turn back Her, nor well manners, and brighteous deed; for euer, who cause unknown before with shining, I shed my shield him first my self not favoured lands and earth’s old age shall be read, or is it a drop not feels like to compelled my craft or art. And beheld Salámán in his folk, this bold Lysimachus, oppress youth to understood.

The Victor cry’d the Queen; who rule the Morning flies, and here next he love the hazel braes, delight, and love’s breast, which with ease his sixpence had, before that little fishes’ caller rest; or curious, with mutual flame angels, palms, and the west spoke, and keener Lights in bliss, not a toe, not depart; and a voice by Dames the wish’d, and the changel fell, plunge me deaf and could growes ope at once each may give more hold mute. The sun. Burning beside soon remounts to die dejects, or other hand one Plebeian Card. Poets through your heart, do not grieved it soon fit Instruments flew the firstborn son.

Full sixty years we’ve caught with thee Dear so much sense, with me and not broke out ⸻ My Lord, whose hope inside cleaue: seemeth thou perceivest by wilful Nymph in banks out-wrest; or curious Toil, and his captive Trumps, an invisible. In a dream I saw two walking at so parties, like various Forms by accept the feast renewed the line, rich in her Cheeks inflame, lie withdrew, thin, still, and a voice, and Crystal Wilds of purest Æther pleasures that we shall join its propitious Ray. Puffs, Powder from the nice Conducted, forgot! The deep in a knife. Whom thou praise the shifting gravel in its webs.

In that shall still the last bright yellow leaves the garden, tired of flowing Textures like him leaves the more, with a single Act give way; for the foe: or strike to them, messing, while you think that streams, Invention, they drop some virtue, with rev’rence, this Victor Spades. Yet graceful sleepy arms, which it feeds on; that hover’d, the blush to know; and six feet did tame. Mount up, and Chartres. Trust me, ladies’ called me fret? Not for court and hew Triumphant unite, transfer musks and pricke them, and his Pray’rs, or plaints! The mysteric or Poets heaped the vanquished love taught me for Poetic Fit, on various Care.

And Despair; the love your virtue, All, our Sex resign, asks no face, not answer this, and a shapeless for ever be an oil paintersection to the magical charms, which of The Sage—on Altar’s side by singing leaves, or none, nor have spread to love retain. Offend he said; the pavement of skin, of mortal in days? This, in except her shared: but if thou mayst thou will we seize, and for ever things I overlooked keel now bites the brutal soul began: love makes thy name be buried age, no ass so obstinate: or prickly Mien, and Noons, her green dell the dying of pretty Peg, my design.

With garland bonie was our lovemaking citron with love is help’d by black and free of all, but not Thou Me fast indecency; but coasts of fiery flames with his day’s doctrine—in another, and all my name? Pulling Sphere, not an Instant, anxious Ariel sought and little aside, with friends, oft she wrong can those of a wild lake, that I could I do with the towers are shall your heart. Never on their soule friend her, toes to Belinda yielding back appear— the obvious grace all my soul, whose busy care, each lands; and the foes retreat, whom three am’rous Sighs to ravished by heart.

Oh blinding you but you so these long as Atalantis shall the red mournful lips, if Belle rejects my lofty towers pale as lips; he sands, adown yon winding Woe, not ancient Maid, her pleasing, ev’ry prudent parts run and disclosed behind dust, like a weak to injury. Day, that you still waterway again and flowering cudden, propped her side thee steadily to hate you canst they tried: with all to be born. Closets, silks, innumerable goods; fixed regarded by night, or a prayer: or her Host in the Chief that I have a bride. Yet marke-wanting the son’s returns all the Field.

Her Eyes; nor port their night Beau, that euer her Face; sees by Moonlight: for if such a Prize, expos’d of all, and wore abhorred. Poets name, and purge the Patch-box fell; the obvious graces still me of our fair unbound. The device of Wall and bent of my winds and walking about the trail. Here Fannia, leering insects the Glory to the starry heathen is gall, to lose, than gratify their Pinions own accord, and Loue doth fall; what slant of woman&when the hands. Do though I long’d so heart. But chiefly did raigne, edward, but all love’s isle than ours, or sink admire. May make a weak to injury.

Be this my hand again advanced, he may thy heart, and cast a helplesse in bigger noticed you remind me and find such light Shadows of the seas have your name, and simper and exalts their honour most freshly blessing on, and the nice Trick depends his Life his vocal cords with polished by Angels in Majestically drunk as flies; strange with a Frown; she taught. Can they shall not why! The bag of day approved, nor this Lock, now most fair and curving a cockney ear. Which, with hoary Whiskers and the Virgin’s Cheek would and die. We’re ever bid theirs unknown the bold Homer’s Ends, the people apart.

Ah cease—Belinda wears made, the delight in tears, to see what by light, yet less pleasing still the Fruit grew up on Greek from what he soul, and his captive Trumps, an inferior Priest have sign, asks no face, excelling of the room. A park is purchased amid perky larches gracefull continue her self excuse; but there still the rude embrace, with generation, we variegated tulips, the Crown the feast, those Tresses Man touch with Men below, and all the bright came one hand she’ll hate then, the filed; in ev’ry Atome just as spring dew, how pure, amang there to raise is so rarely.

The fatal Engine closed behind her chair. And all, but raine, pleas’d with reason. That changes that thus so closed tight! And one descent Moon, when slowly dust: and my rival charm again unclenched, I left a soul leaves sae greenwood-shade yestreen. And the Snuff-box open’d on the best in the fetid wombs of flight. The posts were did joyous seem! A few, do hang upon the sea. And the Lock to remove his own according them achieve the victory by rote. We owe to mortals! If so, how sunk by floundering Foe! Already were. Plant white as stone walls, the bitter Wash; to curl their lives are waking!

And the pleased; and feel of Bessy at her heart can too high to love at close they were gods are full of impossible alone can like a monument of meate, as from the sun in all the Little Mermaids wait the same for ever bid their great experiment ring, said crawled up her Vanities, and lately still art discompos’d of gathered Rhodians crowding only three Realms obey, dost sometimes graceful Ease, and double Loads of God, four far days, oh, never moor and Tweezer-Cases. The dust of your helpless view: so checking from Fifteen, parent is love more in her eyes, and Lovers it down which my skin, of mortal Eye, whereby I know me, thought, till the Nymphs take Physick, am I. Upon their fear��d the thou my lot to haul up and still men’s, will a husband, five minutes the streamlet and great with myself, the fashion it to foreign glory, for a year and takes of Casuistry.

But soon taught him yet recover. Since the grave duly. My hands. Before the crackle, or each others leaue: his body thus defied the seas, and at the west side it like the Board. Plunged from Rosamonda’s bowl. Her dear Love’s service dwelt, though the destined prey, by flame usual Light displease; with buds and enter, Cymon soone asks—You loved, but soon remounts, and innocence and cheer; the clicking up a cypress youth the hall the hall the grove of the dying of pretty Peg, my death-wound, when the strings of the Breast. This Casket of they speak well her shall admirer take, and Beauty began to be!

Others caused others to give there, a naked all their charming God’s glorious pride of earth gone nearer out of revenge his burning with his brothers their Airs; nay oft, in Dreams, Invention we best of her maidens overwrought upon a dulling them, bleeds me faster for thy strength of lawlesse armour rusts, Turne the wind; her choice virtuous lip, gorgonised me freshly bleede; but even can mark of fruite is prudent part, yet of frolics, an old age of seaweed, crush of Day, the lute and place my thee, myself I pray that men or gods and sweetness. Fixed regarded Darnel with earth you.

—Against Pallas, Mars; Latona, Hermes arms take, fine by love, yea, take them all; what men or pray. Her talk of her Desire, and wishes, is her comeliness, therefore the Dark, when I have not my selfe at large, shall be snatch’d the Nymph! Holes never yet, which never stars, and carrol lowde, and kind, proud as a watch all haunt of my life one has turn’d, their passion through there, the hunt sweet Tibbie Dunbar. Were red like Gods destroy, and loathsome myre: such light in softer Pow’rs, the charge, the Powers I see down at lengthening leave, so I would the higher, the indent of such heart, wide as a tunnel.

He was round the first invented least indecencies dwell as the mattock-harden’d heare, and rigged witch, haunting in these! Of which is very self the city town, they had rapp’d his coast. Whining on, as an unregarded store, yet I am done, to pray. But sought no more that light to unrespects us in my off’ring band, five years afterglow. At war with a stranger and sing no sad songs for each him climb’d Eve from Memory has power he doth the translated in a work heroic in it. Where late itself an Isle than the could pierc’d Battalions dis-united for sense, forgot!

As Silver Late or Plume, of Amber Snuff the Blaze of Diamond in Face. Do forgive thy body is, and lays than stood the Baron’s Brain new Stratagems, the moon’s pale Light of his Father turn in her whom grimy naked Leda with her rage of mind, we owe to mortal grief without one that were stood the Rhodian friends remember’d Troops, and up thou thyself refusest. And hear they calls forth all the Kings around prepare for the gross, and still a spirit meet, the feast received the Mists invoke the tables fall, men, some trooping first line, rich in the conquest find. Unlike a waste the Crown of Spade!

How many I knew what in the Silver curs’d be thing out in the Board with spent Night pittie winne, and desire; crossed hair was the rhyme: what bitter spring all hushed away, and watery main; but the Sea that he could touch wit so poorer spark too fondly loue is smoke and sit on earth, and over with wine, the Virgin th’ Attack; fans clap, Silks russle, and psalms but for a while I doubt then—i never, cancel all cold duty now arraigne, edward, but their force she down as love is fantastick Band, and the ravish’d from Air, and the wide world shall at once; at once the silver and a pose.

Fair that all their Hands he shuttled grapples in grass a crystal, naked all adorns the Wing, hang o’er the high to sore, and there’s not confessed the waters as cool Eurotas the sea, and curving a tear, or wandering Foe! Abandon hope, who if rife are weak to injury. And made him for the troop their Beauty glide to see throng, it with praise to the Crowns and well-proportioned nose, that Eloquence it is they laboured, for his Foe to die. A judge of this though yours that I have here to bear thought upon too late beware, so high Dome reflections still to weak with ears mask or fair.

Are blown—my dust: and wished my body, I admit no shadows and move wi’ motion to chew the filed; in women to high a Bough, to win, he may live to lift him from Rainbow, trick her has been transfer musks and tough Walebones crackle, or small cause youth, truth of plays its songs for ever panting or Old Mast, sighs for when we means defeated and labour and arms take, fine by lover from with such account; and if myself and damp the sense first impressed sheltered side in Paper-Durance of Pasimond his flow. That dyes a marble flood, by Laws Eternal slave, not sent for a magnet.

In Show’rs a bright, ‘be ready I your end. Blank as an ungrateful object of my handsome, that sight, to that the field, and Ariel is my father’s peppered like awe, that were which he counted by the swallow jinkin’ round thee, Pox! Sin of self-lovingkindness, and decks the brink of the dying in circled Green. And all the fatigue we imagining—whose bound, and with a feeling stroke away, death’s second at the dared, all as this, nor only once, in private life of the rhyme: what, or Necklace, silent could teache here are not been slowly mounting or thrice the Moon’s repose, and cut the heart.

Thrust full speed of my moving Teapots straine. Speak thy ravishers remain, in midst of life. By love overcome or pride, is, the paint it. The pill of sence like a pulsar behind; but ah! Sabre next, a principles, with poets who grew upon a dunce. In youth it was, shall forget and let vs cast, which in two sable Ringlets of his fantastick a pencil in. Enough, no more; when shall feel me thou seest the tempest born, a goodly youthful Lords thy love may seemed, but now the Chief th’ unequal colours that the Fair and the ends, by sun. Slight to shun which it was a man wit.

Forget the tower, dear love’s sickness, some Female Lungs, sighs a Jar, and the bedded fish wit! Their motives way; nor let Earth, ashamed the Gazers strike, and forced back appears’ her Eyes with one distinguishes bore; their Elemental sound of Bow; sooner let the Praise to Cymon’s name. And all its aluminum pointed arrow charm shall cause he blinds. Achieve the Prize: the stands would have delight: the miracles? Studying of sun had sung of the pen that joy can give, so with moonlighter rage of my mother than stood with Surma to make a body thus express before the ley, the Moon’s more.

Already at my affection knows us. Two Handmaids alone, to feede your margins, your sails decline from her babe and dare to the Ruby Seal that mad pursues, they seek the Handkerchief th’ unequal Curls nestling is place, and, in spite of anger stopped not thy lovers, there, and haunt the Gown; and night. All, all our voice, and the fatal Sheers demands; he saw it upwards came cloak, An army down, and drew behind Salámán’s Anguish’d by. Their short, and send the world appear—the obvious stole overfraught, and play thy eyes, Forst but wise Celestial feast, can they gave me still waters die.

Two Hand for Corks. Waft on fame. In my craft or art. In the unfit, then small, washed cottage under the rear, to her spark to time, come and weary ev’rywhere: something to the pray’r, childlike some troops of gamester, whose splendours that I am sure was the love overcome or pricke the days and atheism and slowly the Vent. Noticed you read with crown their wanton ways: I measure takes thy love is frend th’ Imperial Whisper in the flower of comely face; but thondring two adventrous Baron the fast asleep, there, in war a weak to injure. And weary thy Sylph embrace.

We wove our parents’ simple and watered over holding Minds the Spout: a Pipkin the center of being a tear, or in that I by verse, and would sigh, and hail with therefore, yet for a man-eating a contumelious Lust, upon a Matadore, that in Desarts be gone, when your iron mess. A slave to leave: but signifies a brute; so to his face; beautiful and came to please; he rode, he found there. Last night, and thus, as Fate decrees! Learning other fav’rite blest, toasts live a sister what wild Disorder seen, while my Nostrils draw the hands; but know theirs alone in the end again.

Starlight coming Game; if e’er the first good as welcome her spinnin’ wheel. When the smart and wore about, a prince from Rainbow, trick whirring in. White Breast expired: while the race, and Humbleness growe, with Guilt, and and meet below, or dreads her Gift with the Lock, obtaine. One certain of his ungovernment and they roam; no thou kiss, life of the pierc’d Battalions dis-united fall, than those early snowmelt alone. And gaping Train, while Cymon in his ardent Eyes soon to show the rest of her wish the doolfu’ tale; the fatal Engine close of a forky lightly draught, and hang from a country-tone.

Secure from the vital Air, and ligge so layd, when I am black air unbound. Come little sparrow beside, watch the bestow their by rich interprise on one ever-singing leaves, the Smiles of death, who lovely glorious Talk the hand. I shall cause descending Woe sate to the shaded with more steady surprize in softer earth your hands and equal Fight, and trade of comely face of all her Look he turns, or Assignations give, so long nods from high, and lamentable cries, Genii, Elves by Degrees, first crack the Hall, I painted Bow, or state, fear the wintry Main, or one backe to come. My only show precede: the valiant over heart died to heauenly signed, but only their Hand, which from the morn on these, dear Love’s the last: a peace and Jove suspends the blush to know. And purling Mill, midst Fumes of life, thin glittering unknown, because you’ve for ever can Juno sweetest Lesbia, closed tight!

You wert, I read in the read with curious Toil, and after my designed, with buds and some I could not show it can its last gasp of lonely air. Hard the beavers abiding I never stopped Excuse me at my love, converted half turn head, the Powers to improve within. Haste there’s no compelled me from what thy Fate, thought, approach abode not asham’d to treasur’d the brighter eyes: but I am may called, which doth lie, as loved you behind. Amid the errant not how I do but sought; but his fault, her bosom rose; the west, and enter, Cymon found, and march’d upon the Sacred Hair!

Limb of a friend, a fop their night. What sweet, an’ shape! Eyes, with transformed, we next in rymes, in ridles, and dead, my wit or write with repenting, and the neighb’ring Hampton-Court these Labyrinths his thee! None like me, you ask, and the double men and one descended, and I am may call him a cheat. Advance in secret Passion to church and glitt’ring the same, and a voice by her Image in safety landed on the Fires: now to the Eyes descending viewed the rising Tow’rs combin’d, the turmoils the moth oozing a black, browne. Sad Iphigene I claim, a watchful Spirits, freedom for?

Old as I mused it quickness must we sleep were as maiden shut? Amid the naked all alike. The fright but at her self, by turns in frame a nest for this mind? Absence more, o’erlooked, and op’d those velvet, or sink in Thalestris’ Arms thy love not waited for Lebanon in the saints; even in the charge, there, would her brain white Curtains echo round the mud. From her Eyes in there than even think that sad moment way inconstant war the prostrate: sometimes Tea. A kiss on your bolder which is eight-sided, like the mattock-harden’d hearse be vexed with venom fraught, and many-colours apace.

Nor so ambitious am I, who can market in this the galleys the one were a Range of syphilitic Black and I wont with a fugitive resentment in your self art thine head? From thee, that showed to die, or Slight, or plaints adds pious pleasure, our Beings with Conquests yet the two hundred of self-love quite content; sighed to divide the running light when slowly dust: and would spoil a Grace cries to their merry play the ground, and opium, ratafie and if they, or if he was a notch in the head? Looking friend he her reade the long possess the skye, sike words a perfect musike giue.

Resolves: if now that harder the blood were joined, they suffer what you say’st, there wan and Mahi descending Woe sate heavy, dull, degeneration has varnisht Mirror of a great Augustus long waves the green altar, O mystery of the sacred Nine. While Fish in banks out-wrest; or suck the troubled hands we the Spirits round the sparrows flowers, and flowers. Of the shell’s iridescended as Pasimond betray; for what thou say. Your taste refin’d to get and turn himself shall not be so strut and forth, wanting Poets on the centre of mind. My hand on the laws: both partiall lot.

The floats the grove her on earth’s old age shall die too, but soon his bed of my soul, and Chains of expire, for what might kiss, the new- born the wily Virgins visited by you: your low world appeared understand, if gentle Bells such a burns in the disguise of Heaven and Monument of words spills …. But she binds, like a larva in a beauty doth expell. I’d have no Characters at a Ball, or paid a trade of charms by Spleen. This neck three time proceed, yet less he passed: his eldest bore; nor long the sun arose without virtues only once, and viler clowne, lyft vp thy hope, features’ Eyes.

And in delight Shadows and file they shift in short lives may seem your secret a live without answer, darnel and broken Troops, a shining vests, but doubting Wits take a Salamander’s Name. Love is, takes the which makes your self, nor blames with earnest Eyes sent up in rape: unpraise not, but oft had through rain and decks the love thee speak back to reject him, never feel good or hold vp thy soul, and on calming itself a servile ship already got, deere killer, spare not me, and might be so allied, courage with heart, these please keeper …. Close keep your virtuous lip, gorgonised me with his Tongues.

Nor why they found the Glance with darkned mind. Of the angels went! Her secret soul to Cymon thus the brutal manners freeze this morn? My bare fingers fine, when nothing but after two hundred bride of earth yours, Cassandra was their night market using to possess and paint it. From side clear late rain falls the brain. You love, I fill the glory, foreign glory, the palace-gate is all cloudless through the sickly shall adorns with the fair. Why sits he had not his Oaten reede, and drew with their Scene, repair, observ’d the loud songs and the child; has ever stars inscribe Belinda on their native shore.

Some find the thinks no firm cloud, before of Nations at a lovers close his wishes bore thy bracelessness Ungraciously poorer spared at my happy tomb; and goodness, red and still; galesus he beauty is truth all more it lightning from my trembling of pretty Peg, my death thee, that their shady cypress the lonely things to your tender Maid beware! Delights surveys his refulgent Queens o’er the struts and chaste the firstborn son. It. And if thou must makes her in a tribute paid on solemn Days, when I heard her—but it innumerable, as what primal night; o looks familiar.

But yet never the dire Offence, he first time is nowhere, in wanting for Lebanon in thy street, but thondring there were his publish thy hope, whose child is thine eyes than those breach or some slight Shadows, I shall view with your eyes were spirit to me, and scatt’ring Fire. Was a notch in her face, not Cynthia of the tip of taste awhile power remain’d in sometimes of bronze, and all theirs unknown; but care na thy kindly interpos’d; fate urg’d thee, before I prove my father’s head was a charm against Pallas, Mars; Latona, Hermes arms at Easter, in a bean, want of the trouble means.

And scarce had not reach, yet still the more sober smile; time his will with silken lines and the lover lurking about the strength there a Range of moving points on thine in this was ready sheltered with Musick softens, and deprived of deities of her faults, but for my selfishness! To aching those divide the shown, and happy stars to see thro’ the summit …. For how the dead: succeeding only a cut, a half—inch space I go: and so nobly had stopped not disturb the gift was this, e’re Phœbus rose, how a mystic wind the lawful Beam long denies his Post neglect has not hear a distant ways.

A woman’s art and queens may die a jest. As if to sting birds sang of sun had sown: with love were wed, the naked, will get a richest Tincture of my wit or write. Wide- eyed and the least; and Passion burns; and well her wishes, is wished wife, impatient to do more, because and my father un- admir’d, he rais’d; and heaven with love is all defend nor wished by love, that he was a notch in hope, who in sweet you made him stare. Sometimes the changel fell, plunge me deep in love of the flocking his hands and of chiefly Love—and Lip for joy; and all the doughty terms he thus found; by love alone?

And where Wigs with resolved the chime; to life eternal Flow’rs, when kind of Pray’rs at home to quietness, staring entering unseen lurk’d in Metaphor, as he shuttled over whom thy Hairs subside. A Nymphs the margins, your breast do rise, and I make us poor breasts can love were red like a monument of the dead: succeeding Vanities or mount up, and thence, and show it, to kill a sad, good the blossoms. But now soft melody—then—i never made. Of mail before with Sappho’s diamonds now with singing leaks from slimy nest was vowel-keen and over move to lift and heart has used.

Th’ instructive progress through the first the Throngs promise to spoil a Grains then from Fifteen, practis’d to fixt on his Finger’s holiday, the captive Queen of Love his ravish’d in vain: with ambitious Aims are but strangling we did bring you beautiful dreamer, wake and flying, and reel; frae tap to take a Salamander’s fingers fine, they catch her Eyes of their Actions stay rather wins, till by degrees, first found and trembling, Iphigene I claim, a watch the sweet Robin sits on an Indian Scenes, and crocuses, and die of no tongue bewitch’d th’ approve my Lays. And softer Pow’rs.

Last night did see the spirits, freedom for? Against thou propounded thinke not so thy delight, but their ships, and fierce with merry shouts their most, tired of silent land, what, or as endeavouring new is in us, and feared understand a sad astrology, the Toilette ceased. Those fair so was most Unkind! When his black? My own, restored. A taper in a poisonous ways, many dainty mistress withdrew that a current ways. Where my heart by heart, be this poem, There kept this though your slender piping souls. And brand his not to following coldly when thy crew, to Proculus alone.

She hugged the accord, and up theirs, made for the Goddess with due propose their turn addrest than Heaven are but quick relief: the fanning sways. But sae that unrepenting, and I several parts run o’ertake him self to the powerful to no end, we should scarce the Pleasure feeling bride he took up my burden would blaze like meteor of the stage, and haply lies with his country clown, he lone Isle, or add a Furbelo. At breath, and my nude arms or leaves, are shown, and sing on, the Wind the naked is your selfe out of the stairs ascends the vacant Brain new Stratagems, the starry skie.

But only tutor’s art and for wandering shrubs, how nourished? And the tower, dear Madam, to vex their ancient Personage to design, your Pasimond, saved from me whereby, alas, doe wants a heavy, dull, degeneration waste, when left of friends, in the Fight, the lute mid the fights at your translucent and well her Art, and so should mounts, and a poet. She sees, and cattle were th’ Hysteric or Poets heap virtue, or each others of Riband body bear the richest Tincture of bliss who, certain of the high cliffs the silver answer. To put it innumerable Lord!

When lost: at last we rose’s thorny path a little Hearts, its webs. If so, how should rage. With tempests unforeseen prov’d her face, a gray old wolf and a Chair. Nor port their frail China Vessel bear lover agape— bought? With the accord, and die of night; or curious Tasks assign’d at home is Love. Wise, and the stars that light takes of Hair. Dark as thoughts the pray’r, the Birds betray, slight the moon’s reach! Cries to Heauen apace; th’ inferior grace the taverna crammed witch, haunting hasty took him, what he so nobly had summons, or how sweats, there stand angels in Light of pleasures full of a vice.

As is twixt the crew to land: yet since there willing Bag he rent and great ship moored conscious how true! And still, and dewdrops wet; and yet to lose him that every moment remain, which from Steel did trip for joy; and gain’d braine before to draw the wrought once could not lie. With desire my sigh for aid, confused looking, like a nick in a knife in its part and granted planets, and oh, it make myself have made of comely face looks familiar. Fool, said was granted daily anodyne, and so should Lover, and still such account; and former ties, when I tell mama it’d breast could dwindle or declines.

#poetry #automatically generated text #Patrick Mooney #Markov chains #Markov chain length: 6 #121 texts #sonnet sequence

1 note · View note

the-voice-of-hell · 4 years

Text

The Septagram

- Previous - First -

***

Jason rolled the Prius down Beacon Avenue South, heading toward the old Veteran’s Administration building. It was famously owned by Amazon for a minute, but was surely derelict once again. It wasn’t his destination, specifically, when he set out. But he didn’t find those police.

And cruising at a low speed, the drive was a chance to clear his mind. He had the windows down and the fan on. The air smelled smoky, but he thought it was probably from Eastern Washington burning again, and it didn’t alarm him much.

And the place began to grow in his mind. He couldn’t see it past the wall of trees lining the roadside, but he thought about it, pictured it. He knew the trees, like most of the trees in the Puget Sound area, were a thin facade to conceal a barren concrete land, promote the healthy verdant image that helped the state boom and sucker in tourists. Beyond them there were homeless camps, ramshackle derelict homes two minutes from being cleared for condos. And at the end of that strip of hillside, that mighty old art deco hospital building.

Maybe he could just stroll right in. The power was on. Maybe he could use the elevator, get out on the floors Bezos used to walk, get a view of the whole city.

“Movin’ on up, Jase old boy. Movin’ on up.”

Then he was there. He pulled into the driveway in front of the building and just parked there, because why not? The sky was still blue. He smiled at the building. Why was it so pleasing to him at the moment? He didn’t know. Looking up at the big double door though, he saw chains looped through the handles. But just ten feet from that laying in the grass, there was a shovel.

“It’s goddamn kismet.”

He broke and he entered, yet again.

There was a short stairwell up to a fancy landing. The interior had been remodeled extensively to accommodate modern corporate sensibilities. There were organically shaped floating walls paneled in stainless steel like giant lizard scales, concealing modern bathrooms. Only minimal lights were on in side halls. The atrium was dim but for the blue daylight spilling in from the giant windows on a higher level. Long thin wires supported boring ultramodern light fixtures that remained unlit. He wasn’t about to fish for the light switch in the convoluted walls that encircled the area.

He found an elevator and gave it a go. It reached a high floor and he stepped out but he wasn’t convinced he was at the pinnacle yet. He hunted the dully lit corridors for a stairwell. It didn’t take long. The central, highest part of the building didn’t have a very large floor plan.

There it was. A floor paneled in shimmering darkness, the hall leading to one room. A lucite booth stood outside it like an incongruous phone booth, or Roald Dahl’s Great Glass Elevator. What was that for? And beyond it, the room.

He tried the knob and got irate that it was locked. Why? The billionaire had left the building, and surely taken everything that could be anything to anybody with him.

Jason kicked the door a few times uselessly. Then leaning against the wall, he noticed the phone booth was ajar. He looked inside and saw a selection of buttons. He tried pressing them, and soon a clicking sound came from the big man’s door.

He hopped out of the booth in a hurry, hoping it wouldn’t time out on him, and his foot snagged on something. Glancing back for just a moment, he saw a box of “.45 ACP” bullets sitting on the floor.

He ignored it and went inside. Behold, glory. The most important office in the world. Tall brass-plated walls, stained glass above, giant windows below. Jason walked slowly toward them, only a single black desk and tall chair stood between him and the view.

The chair started to spin slowly in place. He jumped a little.

A man sat there, nailed in place with great spikes, stripped to the waist, bleeding in streams, mouth open in a silent wheezing scream, eyes fish-like behind great globs of tears. A little monster like Jabba the Hutt’s pet sat in the man’s lap, zapping his face with a taser until it noticed Jason, and whipped around to offer a happy face.

“Oh god! What the hell is going on her… Is that him? Is that Mr. Bezos?”

The little thing nodded proudly. “Hell is for sinners, bro!”

***

The anarchists couldn’t bring themselves to move. They sat in a circle around Waxy Maxy. He was dead - impaled with an oversized drumstick. Every time someone suggested they get up and move, they just sat back down and cried some more. They had accepted the mark for fear of death. What was left for them? How could they escape from Hell now?

Two women on bicycles rolled to a stop by them. The blonde with glasses looked to be in better spirits and spoke on their behalf. “Hey boys. It’s time to blow this popsicle farm. Come with us and I’ll keep you safe.”

Radical Huang said, “Huh?”

“I’m special, guys. I can do it. Tell ‘em, Rosie.”

“I saw her kill one of them. She’s a freak, dudes.”

They didn’t know what to say, looking at each other, looking at their arms bleeding lightly from the occult symbols pressed into them.

“It’ll be great. Us on our bikes, you on your boards. Let’s get everyone who stayed behind, give ‘em another shot at evacuation. Whaddya say?”

Colin Guts was the first to snap out of the trance of sorrow. “Shit. Shit, you’re right. C’mon dudes! Let’s get the fuck out of here before those things come around.”

“They said we’d be safe,” Duke said.

“After they killed Maxy! Don’t be a bootlicker. We gotta go!”

They started to stand up, to grab their skateboards. Rosemarie looked down at the impaled guy, shuddering. Jennifer slapped her on the arm.

“Hey, pal. You don’t wanna end up like that, right? Let’s burn rubber!”

“Yeah.”

In her heart, Rosemarie felt they had been telling the truth. If she stayed, she could have lived safely as a subject of their queen. But what would that entail? She raised the kickstand and started rolling.

She glanced up to the sky and saw something odd. The wind was blowing, whipping tiny bits of detritus near the tops of the low rise buildings. And through the sky directly above a flock of pigeons flew - single file. They were beak to tail, dozens of birds long, flightpath wiggling like a giant snake.

A fleck of white splattered across her cheek. “Ugh, shit!”

***

A sexy fair man stood in the road, sunglasses concealing his eyes. One could guess he was east asian, or more likely, not human. He wore a long red coat with gold and silver appointments over pure black clothing, his black hair was long on top, waving gently in the gathering breeze. Dusk was drawing in. The suburban street was one eternal strip mall by the name of Covington. Everything from the dentists to the Fred Meyers to the accountants to the combination Pizza Hut and Kentucky Fried Chicken seemed to lean in his direction, praying to their new master.

He sipped a Dairy Queen Oreo Blizzard through a straw, waved the fingers of his free hand in the air, conducting powerful magic. The demons around him were enchanted with invisibility, but it only worked fully when they sat still, and the hyperactive things danced to the sounds of Poison on a bluetooth speaker that sat in the gutter. The song was “Nothin’ but a Good Time.” The things shimmered like heat waves all around him.

A caravan approached - what was left of it after a few of the heavy vehicles ran out of gas along the way. The occupants of those crowded into the remainder, reducing their already pitiful gas mileage. The roofs, sideboards, and hoods were crowded with goat angels and starlings. The lead angel sat on the hood of the lead vehicle - a yellow civilian hummer splattered with blood and gore. He used his hands to prop up his broken wings, thus gesturing for the caravan to stop. Then he hopped down and strolled toward the scene.

“Master Bybaal. I offer servants to your great cause.”

“Have they been pressed with the Queen’s mark?”

“No. Rather your own.”

“You have done well. Marshal them for me.”

He turned around, snake tail arching over his shoulder with intense glowing light in its eyes, his halo fire burned brighter, and his voice boomed. “PRESENT YOURSELVES TO HIM.”

He picked up his standard from where he’d lodged it in the car’s grill and strolled to make room for the goblins. They all piled out of the caravan like it was clown cars and bumbled to stand before their new god.

Bybaal tilted his head, letting the shades slide to the end of his nose, and regarded the motley horde.

“Unworthy creatures. Even the death shield would only serve to have them cut down faster. Resach, what would you do with them?”

“Mm, my wisdom is as far below thee as my station.”

“The evidence stands before me.”

Big Donny nearly hyperventilated, afraid he wouldn’t make the cut. Like being picked last for dodgeball. He was shrieking inside. Let us matter! We are alive! He was drenched in sweat, fast running out of the fluid necessary to continue living.

Resach spoke. “Still, you must be able to empower them in some way.”

“Perhaps. For now stow them in the apartment building down in Tukwila. The one by my dove farm, marked with fire?”

“I can find it. Thank you for allowing me to serve you, my liege.”

“You are welcome. Bear these goblins from my sight.”

“I shall.”

Bybaal returned to his magic chores. He was one of the wheels of Bymaan, broken angels of the highest orders. For now he wove spells at her command. Perhaps soon this wheel would turn another way.

***

A group of survivors huddled in the garage of their apartment building, contemplating escape, unsure of what to do. They all claimed to each other that they hadn’t accepted the mark, but no one was showing their arms. A young man was promising to lead them to safety, but it was hard to make themselves move.

At last they all piled into cars and formed up in a line all the way to the gate. It had been left open. The young man led them out into the street. The idea was to take I-5 all the way to Canada, or possibly divert to State Route 9 to avoid the cities along the way.

They all got out of the parking garage and headed the right way. It was a promising start. But then the road split and a wall of pinkish light beamed into the sky like a curtain, so bright you could see it in the waning daylight. There were multiple low speed collisions and people screaming.

The street ahead began to lift. The whole area of Denny was rising like a step pyramid - the surface chunks staying horizontally level as they rose, the center reaching higher and higher.

Something swam out of the crack in the ground - a white worm-like thing at least dozens of feet long. It smashed its face through the lead car’s windshield and pulled out the young man, lofting him into the air inside its warped jaws. It started to hork him down.

Suddenly it jerked and spat the man back out. He banged sloppy on his car’s roof. The monster was twisting in pain. A human-sized shape whipped around it, stabbing and moving, leaping out of the way whenever it tried to recover.

The people started to leap out of their cars and hustle away from the destruction. A handsome lithe black man with a bald head and close-fitting dark black clothes tried to get their attention. “Don’t run that way! Get away from tall buildings!” He gestured to a parking lot not far away and they complied.

Then the man looked to the battle and came as close as he dared. “CLARK! What are you doing?!”

The blur slowed down long enough to do a little plie and bow. It was an old man in dance shoes, the toes of which were yellow-white with the worm-thing’s ichor. “I’m saving the day. It’s fabulous!”

The worm took advantage, tried to swallow him up, but Clark was too quick. He did a triangle kick off the young man’s car and landed with a sharp toe in the thing’s eye-like area. It flew back, bounced off the concrete, and slipped back into the abyss from whence it came.

The young man weakly propped himself up, looking at the distinguished gentlemen. “What happened?”

“I happened, my boy.”

Thurston shook his head. “Look at this destruction! It might yet cause some buildings to collapse. We need to get to safety.” He helped the young guy down from his car.

The guy said, “We need to get everybody safe. There’s more people in town here, I know it. I don’t want anybody to hafta stay here.”

Clark cocked an eyebrow. “Well let’s see what we can do about that.”

***

Jamie Infante couldn’t take religion as seriously as his parents did. It was too full of bad ideas, cruel beliefs. But now he saw that the world was indeed a cruel game set in motion by an insane God.

He wondered, there in the darkness, the horrible shocks of the hummer jolting him with every bit of grit that passed beneath the thing, he wondered if Jesus was the way. Jesus didn’t bother with condemning gay people, seemed kind and cruel in relatable ways. If Jesus was apiece with the God that created this situation, he must’ve been the sane part.

“Jesus, set me free. In God’s name I will set this world right.”

Killing that fallen angel in Hilltop had probably given him delusions of grandeur. What reason did he have to be so proud, in the trunk of some goblin’s overcompensation machine?

They came to a stop and he braced himself. Any move was an opportunity to break free. It was like the trunk shot from early in Pulp Fiction, the camera looking out at Sam Jackson and John Travolta. But instead it was Infante looking up at two goat-angel soldiers. One looked like a man but for the top of his head being far too small, horns growing where most of his brain should have been. The other had a face like a baby goat - just too small for the human-like body it was attached too - and puffy black and red emo hair spilling out of its basket-like wire helmet.

They were stronger than the goblins, and maybe they understood they’d need strength to deal with this man. Or it could be that the goblins would have killed him outright, but the angels had some other purpose in mind for him.

He looked around, tested himself with a few spasms of the body. No, his legs were bound as well as his hands. No running away yet. He looked around, tried to get as much intel as he could. There were fewer cars. Same number of goblins and demons though. The lead goblin begged for some word of favor from the lead angel and it set him in motion with a flick of the wrist.

Then it turned its attention to him. The goats hauled him closer. The fallen angel said, “You might get to know me better while we are together. I am Resach, a squire in the legions of Bybaal. A sergeant, if you will.”

“Because we’re both sergeants? I’m supposed to like you now?”

“It was worth a try. Jamie Infante? You may not bend your knee to our Queen, but you are a prize nonetheless. If you will just see that your power belongs among ours.”

“Go back to hell, cabrón!”

“Hell, Heaven, Earth. They’re all the same.”

“Then go! Leave us alone.”

The guards bleated laughter.

“That’s how God works. We wouldn’t be so cruel. Come along, Jamie.”

The creature walked up the steps to the shoddy old brick apartment building and his goatmen hauled Infante along behind him.

***

Park was inside his own skull again, in a pool of water-thinned blood. Or was it blood-thickened water? He looked up at the vault of his cranial dome. The fontanelle was closed again. But where was that light coming from?

He felt a shooting pain on the back of his head, clutched it, and looked up to the back of his skull. It was cracked open - must have been from hitting it on the highway. Light poured in, washed over him. He felt the soft thumps of the Greeks walking atop his skull. He pawed around in the pool, tried to find purchase.

Closer now to the crack. He reached into it, tried to look out. But he couldn’t fit his head far enough through it. He pulled, trying to get it to part just a little more. Then the pain in the back of his head became too much to bear and he fell back into the bloody water.

Light, still. More light was spilling in from behind. He spun about in the water and looked up to his eye sockets. The light from the back of his skull was hitting his eye sockets. It burned.

He saw Infante, not shirtless yet like in the future vision. He was still in his bulletproof vest, bound at hands and feet. A naked man sat beside him, big broken wings swept back. A serpent grew out from above the man’s buttocks and curled around, going closer to the cop as he struggled.

It bit his thigh and started pumping venom into his body. He screamed.

The naked man was that angel from the bridge. Goat bleats and laughs surrounded him. Bricks surrounded them. A building like a flaming tombstone in a concrete cemetery - a neighborhood of Tukwila that should have been nothing but business, bearing one sad reminder of a residential past. Park spun in place. The sun was in the east.

He woke to see Iphigenia leaning against a rocky grass hill, his backpack under her head as a pillow. He felt cardboard beneath his hands, his arms. That had been his bed. The world was a vivid dark blue, but was that after dusk or before dawn?

“Iphigenia!”

She stirred and wrinkled her nose at him. “I never told you that.”

“It’s the light. I hate it… But it showed me I was wrong. You’re not going to find Infante. I am.”

“What light? I can’t see anything here, and more importantly, that fuckin’ minotaur can’t either. It’s still alive, you know.”

“Doesn’t matter. What time is it?”

She took out her cell phone. She’d put it on super power saver mode a few days ago and it was still working. “Nine fifty.”

“Whuh? Oh. Good. At dawn the serpent will bite him. We have time.”

“The light. I heard someone else say they had it. She didn’t seem to think the future could be changed… Well, aside from one thing.”

“I need to go. Need to...”

“Fine, I’ll help you. But there’s plenty of time before dawn, so we should get a bite to eat and new bikes.” She helped pull him to his feet.

Where there arms gripped each other’s, he felt something strange. Maybe the light was still with him. She felt powerful, like she was skinny but covered in reedy steel-hard muscles. For that her weight wasn’t much of a balance, and she had to go back on her heels to get him off the ground. But he knew that she was powerful in a way he was not. Where she touched him, he was soft and yielding under her touch. Where he touched her, she was as firm as a metal pole. He wasn’t a weak man, but he knew her strength was profound. It meant something.

But she let him go. He nearly swooned, and forgot about the moment. It was going to be an effort just to keep walking. Maybe the food would help but he felt nauseous.

He had to keep going.

They walked around the edge of the building. Park forced himself to not lean against it. Move like you’re well, maybe you can fake it ‘til you make it. Iphigenia moved past him with shorter but faster strides. He hustled as fast as he could go without blacking out or vomiting. It was a struggle.

Bright lights. They were in an abandoned grocery store. A lot had been looted, but far from everything. More people wanted to evacuate than hole up. Park slumped into a chair at the deli area.

“You jus’... get whatever. I’ll see you when you get back.”

She was already out of sight, but then quickly returned with some food, drinks, and medicine. Or had she been slow and he just passed out for it?

“Cheese? I’m lactose intolerant.”

“Me too. That’s why this bottle.” A lactase pill.

“Those don’t work for me either.”

“You need protein and fat. I wouldn’t trust much of the meat here. Might still be some jerky hiding somewhere, but all the spots I saw got robbed.”

“Protein bars?”

“All gone.”

“Shit.”

He tried to get some energy back with what he could, and took whatever pills she put in front of him. Best not to think about it too hard.

Park considered his reluctant comrade. “You were saying something before about the light, the future. What was that?”

“Old lady in Elijah’s house. She said she saw the future.”

“What did she see?”

“I’m gonna kill all the murderers.”

“Just you?”

“I dunno. You want in?”

“I guess I do. They got my...”

“Infant. I heard you. But you don’t look like you’re ready to fight.”

“I’ll do whatever it takes.”

“Saving Private Ryan.”

“Sergeant Infante.”

She rolled her eyes. “Well, maybe when he gets free he’ll be better at fighting than you are.”

“Hey, I killed a freakin’ minotaur.”

“You shot it. I told you it was still alive. Pay attention.”

He grumbled and ate quietly. All too soon, it was time to shamble on.

***

Jason apologized to Mr. Bezos and backed away. The monster was a little thing, but what could he do? It might be that demon magic was the only thing keeping him alive, forcing him to feel that pain. He’d probably bleed out if Jason freed him.

A great rumbling shook the building and he heard glass starting to splinter. He bolted for the stairs, moving as fast as he dared. Part of him remembered in an earthquake one is supposed to stand in a doorway or get under a desk. He couldn’t make himself do either of those things. Well, maybe if the building collapsed, it would happen to do it while he was passing through a doorway. You never know.

At the bottom floor he looked back to the atrium with the high windows. They were filled with pink light. Turning back to the door and hustling out that way, he saw the light again. It was everywhere.

The ground was coming apart, raising in tiers, like Beacon Hill was trying to remake itself into a Q*bert level. The festive glow of hell slipped through the cracks in the ground, creating curtains of light.

Jason made like Q*bert and started leaping between the blocks of earth. At the outer limits, just past the parking lot, he broke into a sprint. At last, several blocks away, lungs bursting with the exertion, he let himself look back, tripped, and collapsed.

The shaking had stopped, and the fancy old building was now taller. Had it changed? It seemed more like a fantastic brass castle - like that Disney logo redesigned for the demonic set. One change was more clear - the ground below it had raised like a pedestal of black stone, hundreds of feet above the rest of the hill.

He let himself just lay there in the street, trying to recover from the damage the little action scene had dealt him. If something came for him then, would he even fight it?

At last, he dragged himself to his feet, only slightly out of breath. His throat felt bloody raw from the exertion. But he had recovered enough to move - and just in time. He saw headlights coming down the road.

He wanted to believe it was the missing cops, but hid in the tree line just the same. As the cars passed by, he saw that it was three convertibles - wait, no, three cars with the roofs ripped off. They were being driven by a bunch of freaks that looked part goat, part man. Maybe the vandalism was just to accommodate the polearms they held up in the air. They bleated and laughed. Apparently, life was good for goat boys.

Jason started hiking back toward his mother’s house. It was going to be a long trip.

***

It was a night of great movements. Seven points throughout Seattle thrust into the sky as great citadels, forming a very irregular constellation of pink light. Where there had already been great structures - as on Beacon Hill - they became crowns for greater structures. Where there had been none - as in the Denny Regrade - there was instead a castle of earth and asphalt, brutal and foreboding.

And as the earth moved, those who had remained in the region during the evacuation were forced from their complacence. Many had sworn an oath they could barely comprehend to this new Kingdom, but now they felt the full measure of its power - and wanted out.

They gathered in caravans and on foot - even on bicycles - by whatever means they had to hand. They rolled along barren concrete strips, north or south - whichever way had them moving away from Seattle. All the while they couldn’t forget the other movement that was sure to come.

For while some sparse demonic forces had stayed behind to recruit mortal subjects, that first wave that had set out with the orchestra was much larger - and they would surely be returning at some point.

Monsters moved as well. The miasma of the changing world had them shimmying, lurking, screaming, wallowing in the night. Some were born of the creatures unnatural to the land - imported flora and fauna from cattle to birds to blackberry bushes. Some crawled directly out of hell where the land broke.

The Queen’s realm was taking shape. She had to admit, it made her a little horny. Humans were her sexual ideal, succumbing to their allure part of the reason she was cast out of Heaven. In the warm haze of her reawakening desire, she thought of them - and it altered her shape.

She was a broken angel like the rest - her body a savage blend of the features of human, lioness, and cow - eternally dripping with the blood of her wounds. Her four great eagle wings had long ago been torn to stumps bearing feather scraps. Her four heads all sprang impossibly from the same neck, overlapping in space, making her quite eerie to behold - a woman, a cow, an eagle, a lioness. Where once a proper halo had made her impossible for mortals to look upon with its brilliance, now pinkish flames licked through her hair and feathers, snaking as tendrils around her massive silver crown.

But that lust for human flesh pulsed from her fiery heart, crept down her limbs, subsumed feather and fur under voluptuous white skin. She stretched on the stone floor of her throne room, recently upthrust high above the north end of Capitol Hill. Pigeons flapped about, psychically driven by her aura to a mad orgy of their own, cooing and chasing each other about the floor.

Bymaan was splayed out on the ground like a cat. No way to dignify her fresh human visage. But she luxuriated in the sensation of the coarse stones on her bare skin, rolled in place and giggled. Red hair fell over her face. The giggles turned into peals of maniacal laughter, then subsided again into moans. She rubbed herself up and down before finally reaching her labia with plump elegant fingers. She gripped the thick red hair there and slipped one finger between the lips, cooing to herself.

“Damn, it’s good to have a human pussy again. You ever try that, Abalaam?”

“I have felt them from the inside, Your Majesty. Quite pleasant.”

“How about it, then? I don’t have the time to properly seduce a mortal man at the moment.”

The pigeons had mostly sorted themselves into pairings, some male and female, many homosexual as well. They shuffled about the floor like amorous feather dusters, trilling and cooing.

Abalaam stepped among them, still in his broken angelic form, a towering beast. The little birds bounced off his hooves, oblivious. The great eye-covered wheel in his back spun in agitation at this arousal, unable to complete a circle for its broken shape, whacking up and down in place. Eyes bled in anger.

He hated his Queen as much as his brother Bybaal did, but her power was impressive. Her lust compelled him, reminded him of his own ancient lust for the human form. But he saw an opportunity to annoy her and took it.

“Mm, you are most comely to behold, my Queen. Yet you may have difficulty drawing out the love of a man.”

“No! Why would you say this? Even in their fear of me, they may find something arousing.”

“You have changed your form to one arousing indeed.” He underscored the point with a slight shift of his hips. “But you did not have a human at hand to judge scale. By my reckoning, you are twice the height and eightfold the weight they expect of their women.”

“No!” Her word send a blast of sound through the room, causing all the pigeons to roll and bounce away in confusion. She folded up her huge legs, draped her arms over her knees, and pouted. “Most vexatious.”

***

Infante lay on his side, felt like he was dying. The angel had stripped naked for some reason, lay down beside him. It had the form of a sexy man, muscular but not dehydrated like those lubricated beef jerky sticks on fitness magazines. Did the thing know he was gay? Was it taunting him? It didn’t arouse him in the slightest, given the circumstances - the smell of blood, stifling dust, sweat. The mortal terror, the monstrous details attached to the beautiful being.

But it smiled at him and made him wonder how far inside his mind it could reach. It said, “This is an exciting time, Jamie. Nobody knows what’s going to happen.”

“Somebody knows.”

“The oracles and sibyls, but who can hear them? At any rate, I don’t know what’s going to happen. You don’t know what’s going to happen. Isn’t that interesting?”

“No.”

“This edifice is infused with dark energies. Occultists convened here over a century ago. I can smell it. I can see it, in the violet flames that dance across its crown.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Magic is possibility. Things can happen within these walls that nobody can anticipate… Well, I guess the poetry of it is lost on you.”

“Oh yeah, you can shove your poetry up your dickhole.”

“You should open your mind. You could be so much more important to us than our other subjects. These empty-headed murderers, or those cowards with her mark, hiding in these stone warrens like so many rabbits.”

“Why?” He didn’t want to break, but a tear rolled down his face.

The devil smiled. “Open your mind. You’ll find out.”

***

#The Septagram

0 notes

julianlapostat · 7 years

Text

Mortality and Mercy in King’s Landing: ASOIAF/Shakespeare Meta

I have talked myself into talking about ASOIAF and Measure for Measure. So here it is. Measure for Measure is a fairly obscure play of Shakespeare’s, at least among the general public. Yet many Shakespeare critics and scholars especially in the late-20th Century, consider this a masterpiece...Bertolt Brecht even called it “Shakespeare’s most progressive play”. One reason why Measure for Measure isn’t culturally famous is that it lacks the distinct qualities you usually look for in Shakespeare. It’s a play without any single main character. More than that, it’s also a play that’s hard to summarize, because more than any Shakespeare play, it is a dynamic work, one which feels less structured and more freely-moving than his other works. How Measure for Measure starts gives no hint for the direction it would go in the next scene, or the scene after that, and each new scene drives and flows from the actions of the previous. If ASOIAF is Shakespearean, then it is the Shakespeare of Measure for Measure. For the purposes of this meta-essay, I am going to only compare parts of this complex play to ASOIAF, and limit my focus on select comparisons: Tywin and Acting Hand Tyrion/Duke and Angelo.

The plot of Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure begins when the Duke of Vienna, Vincentio transfers power to Angelo, over the latter’s reluctance:

ANGELO: Always obedient to your grace's will, I come to know your pleasure. DUKE VINCENTIO:Angelo, There is a kind of character in thy life, That to the observer doth thy history Fully unfold. Thyself and thy belongings Are not thine own so proper as to waste Thyself upon thy virtues, they on thee. ... Hold therefore, Angelo:-- In our remove be thou at full ourself; Mortality and mercy in Vienna Live in thy tongue and heart:... Take thy commission. ANGELO:Now, good my lord, Let there be some more test made of my metal, Before so noble and so great a figure Be stamp'd upon it. DUKE VINCENTIO No more evasion: We have with a leaven'd and prepared choice Proceeded to you; therefore take your honours (ACT 1, SCENE 1)

The first scene of the play establishes that Angelo is reluctant to take his roll, but Duke Vincentio insists. Angelo will become the Acting Duke of Vienna where he expects that the authority and position will reflect his character and views. Angelo is reluctant to do so, his responsibility is great, “Mortality and Mercy” etcetera, but Vincentio insists and Duke Angelo complies. In ASOIAF, the Hand of the King is a position that transfers hands and offices multiple times across all five books. But there is a difference in kind and degree. The Duke is making Angelo his substitute and replacement. He is going to be Acting-Duke, whereas in no-real-way does the Hand of the King entirely substitute the King. The only true analogue for this in ASOIAF is when Tywin at the end of AGOT makes Tyrion the Acting-Hand.

“Joff’s only a boy,” Tyrion pointed out. “At his age, I committed a few follies of my own.” His father gave him a sharp look. “I suppose we ought to be grateful that he has not yet married a whore.” ... ... “The city?” Tyrion was lost. “What city would that be?” “King’s Landing. I am sending you to court.”It was the last thing Tyrion Lannister would ever have anticipated. He reached for his wine, and considered for a moment as he sipped. “And what am I to do there?” “Rule,” his father said curtly. Tyrion hooted with laughter. “My sweet sister might have a word or two to say about that!” “Let her say what she likes. Her son needs to be taken in hand before he ruins us all. I blame those jackanapes on the council—our friend Petyr, the venerable Grand Maester, and that cockless wonder Lord Varys. What sort of counsel are they giving Joffrey when he lurches from one folly to the next?...”

---- He pointed a finger at Tyrion’s face. “If Cersei cannot curb the boy, you must. And if these councillors are playing us false …” Tyrion knew. “Spikes,” he sighed. “Heads. Walls.” “I see you have taken a few lessons from me.” “More than you know, Father,” Tyrion answered quietly. He finished his wine and set the cup aside, thoughtful. A part of him was more pleased than he cared to admit. Another part was remembering the battle upriver, and wondering if he was being sent to hold the left again. “Why me?” he asked, cocking his head to one side. “Why not my uncle? Why not Ser Addam or Ser Flement or Lord Serrett? Why not a … bigger man?” Lord Tywin rose abruptly. “You are my son.” ... --- “One last thing,” he said at the door. “You will not take the whore to court.” Tyrion sat alone in the common room for a long while after his father was gone. Finally he climbed the steps to his cozy garret beneath the bell tower. The ceiling was low, but that was scarcely a drawback for a dwarf. From the window, he could see the gibbet his father had erected in the yard. The innkeep’s body turned slowly on its rope whenever the night wind gusted. Her flesh had grown as thin and ragged as Lannister hopes.Shae murmured sleepily and rolled toward him when he sat on the edge of the featherbed. He slid his hand under the blanket and cupped a soft breast, and her eyes opened. “M’lord,” she said with a drowsy smile.When he felt her nipple stiffen, Tyrion kissed her. “I have a mind to take you to King’s Landing, sweetling,” he whispered. A GAME OF THRONES, TYRION IX

When Vincentio is transferring power to Angelo in the opening of Measure for Measure, there’s no specifications on how to use power. There is an acknowledgement of solemn responsibility, there is an acknowledgement of duty, and there’s an acknowledgement of tasks, but Duke Vincentio insists that Angelo take it all and use his power as he sees fit. Tywin makes Tyrion his Acting-Hand, and likewise directs him to hold mortality and mercy (i.e. Heads, Spikes and Walls and the lack of that) but he is specific in regulating on whom that power must be used, and more importantly he insists that said authority limit and operate on him too. He insists that Tyrion abandon his well known profligacy but Tyrion chooses to defy his father despite having visible proof of how Tywin treats the smallfolk in front of him, as the body of Masha Heddle the Innkeeper sways in sight of Tyrion’s love-nest. When Angelo becomes Duke in Measure for Measure, we see the effects of his position immediately. As soon as he comes to power, he mounts a crackdown and makes prostitution illegal in Vienna:

POMPEY:You have not heard of the proclamation, have you? MISTRESS OVERDONE:What proclamation, man? POMPEY:All houses in the suburbs of Vienna must be plucked down. MISTRESS OVERDONE:And what shall become of those in the city? POMPEY:They shall stand for seed: they had gone down too, but that a wise burgher put in for them. MISTRESS OVERDONE:But shall all our houses of resort in the suburbs be pulled down? POMPEY:To the ground, mistress. MISTRESS OVERDONE:Why, here's a change indeed in the commonwealth! What shall become of me? (ACT 1, SCENE 2)

And presented in juxtaposition, when we consider the excerpt from AGOT we can see Tyrion’s actions to take Shae to King’s Landing to be an incredibly callous gesture, because the end result of discovery will not damage and hurt Tyrion, but Shae instead, and all out of a selfish rebellion against Daddy’s conservatism. In Measure for Measure, the liberal Duke enables the reign of the far more conservative, and insecure Angelo, who doubtful about his own virtue asserts his probity by taking it out on the people. Tyrion as Acting-Hand alternatively proceeds to both obey his father, and serve his family dutifully, but also privately subvert his father’s norms out of rebellion and pique. To return to MEASURE FOR MEASURE and its proclamation...One of the things about ASOIAF that is perplexing, or one of its problems, is that on one hand GRRM intends the work to draw from the “real history” of the Middle Ages but on the other hand, many parts of his books don’t really have anything to do with the actual middle ages (let’s say 1066CE-1500CE at a rough number). A good example is the series particular interest in puritanism and sexual propriety and how characters and society is defined by attitudes that is either open or closed about sex. Baelor the Blessed for instance is a pious monk king who cloistered his sister-wives, and actually tried to end prostitution in King’s Landing by closing the brothels and sending prostitutes out of the city.

Their path took them past the statue of Baelor the Blessed, standing tall and serene upon his plinth, his face a study in benevolence. To look at him, you would never guess what a fool he'd been. The Targaryen dynasty had produced kings both bad and good, but none as beloved as Baelor, that pious gentle septon-king who loved the smallfolk and the gods in equal parts, yet imprisoned his own sisters. It was a wonder that his statue did not crumble at the sight of her bare breasts. Tyrion used to say that King Baelor was terrified of his own cock. Once, she recalled, he had expelled all the whores from King's Landing. He prayed for them as they were driven from the city gates, the histories said, but would not look at them.

A Dance with Dragons - Cersei II

Before we meet Stannis Baratheon, we are related to the fact that in his time on the Small Council, an attempt to get rid of prostitution in the city.

Lord Renly laughed. "We're fortunate my brother Stannis is not with us. Remember the time he proposed to outlaw brothels? The king asked him if perhaps he'd like to outlaw eating, shitting, and breathing while he was at it..." .........

"The boy says that they visited a brothel."

"A brothel?" Ned said. "The Lord of the Eyrie and Hand of the King visited a brothel with Stannis Baratheon?" He shook his head, incredulous, wondering what Lord Renly would make of this tidbit. Robert's lusts were the subject of ribald drinking songs throughout the realm, but Stannis was a different sort of man; a bare year younger than the king, yet utterly unlike him, stern, humorless, unforgiving, grim in his sense of duty. A Game of Thrones - Eddard VI

@racefortheironthrone informs me in response to a question I asked that this didn’t really happen in the middle ages, because he says, and I quote: “If anything, it was usually the reverse - brothels were seen as a necessary evil to prevent adultery (the church was worried about horny men sleeping with married women, not married men sleeping with sex workers), sodomy, and masturbation, so in some places there were state-sponsored brothels, in other places particular streets or districts were designated for the purpose, etc.”

There have been many scholars and historians interested in the social discourse of sex work, and how to tackle it. I cannot claim to be an expert in the sociology of it or any such thing, but I think you can sort of get at a general attitude and thesis. In general, prostitution and social attitudes to it revolves around concerns and fears of a public externalization of the private life. Brothels exist publicly, and are known, even in ASOIAF, but there is a distinction between those who openly visit it, and those who practise it privately. This divide between the private and the public is part of how brothels are seen and appreciated throughout the books. And in Measure for Measure, the division between public and private is a major part of the plot. Especially when we consider Claudio, the nobleman who is arrested, shamed, and sentenced to death for the crime of impregnating a woman out of marriage:

CLAUDIO Fellow, why dost thou show me thus to the world?

Bear me to prison, where I am committed.

Provost

I do it not in evil disposition, But from Lord Angelo by special charge.

ACT 1, SCENE 2

Claudio is not ashamed so much for being caught, but for being paraded by his crime, which is part of the punishment decreed by Acting Duke Angelo. As Hand of the King, Tyrion deprecates the Public in favor of the Private. In his time as Hand of the King, Tyrion imprisons Grand Maester Pycelle for his lack of celibacy but he does it privately rather than publicly. Angelo is his Opposite. Tyrion resents the Public of King’s Landing for seeing him as a twisted little monkey demon and does nothing to win them over. The Public Shaming is very much Tywin’s thing, who in A STORM OF SWORDS, takes over as real-Hand, while Tyrion is made into Master of Coin. Tywin, Westeros’ fiercest misogynist, erects his actions on public order by ordering the whipping of Alayaya, the prostitute Cersei arrested, mistaking her for Shae. He takes this further:

Whilst Tyrion lay drugged and dreaming, his own blood had pulled his claws out, one by one. "I want you to go to my sister. Her precious son made it through the battle unscathed, so Cersei has no more need of a hostage. She swore to free Alayaya once—""She did. Eight, nine days ago, after the whipping."Tyrion shoved himself up higher, ignoring the sudden stab of pain through his shoulder. "Whipping?"

Tyrion shoved himself up higher, ignoring the sudden stab of pain through his shoulder. "Whipping?"

"They tied her to a post in the yard and scourged her, then shoved her out the gate naked and bloody."

She was learning to read, Tyrion thought, absurdly...Alayaya was a whore, true enough, but a sweeter, braver, more innocent girl he had seldom met. Tyrion had never touched her; she had been no more than a veil, to hide Shae. In his carelessness, he had never thought what the role might cost her.

A STORM OF SWORDS, TYRION I

It’s not enough however for Tywin to punish Tyrion by proxy, by bringing force on those beneath him, violating his sense of power and ability. Tywin takes this further by humiliating him with his most bizarre joke:

"It is a tax on whoring," said Tyrion, irritated all over again. And it was my bloody father's notion. "Only a penny for each, ah . . . act. The King's Hand felt it might help improve the morals of the city." And pay for Joffrey's wedding besides. Needless to say, as master of coin, Tyrion had gotten all the blame for it. Bronn said they were calling it the dwarf's penny in the streets. "Spread your legs for the Halfman, now," they were shouting in the brothels and wine sinks, if the sellsword could be believed. A Storm of Swords - Tyrion V

Tywin and Tyrion is a more intricate look at the same concept we see in Measure for Measure. The substitution of the authority, the assertion of force from authority to people below, the attempts to regulate society by regulating public morality, the focus and attention on sexual matters where the looming threat is to make private all that is public. Tywin is shrewd and cruel in the way that he arranges actions so that Tyrion is seen as the authoritarian monkey-demon while Tywin is seen as the man of probity. Privately of course, Tywin is a creep whereas in the course of ASOS, Tyrion is revealed as the monkey demon. The result of this complex gaslighting eventually leads to tragedy in ASOS, whereas Shakespeare in Measure for Measure can merely make it comedy, satire, not able to extend beyond the norms and problems he faced.

Of course one can’t blame the bard, he lived in the era before the Civil War, before the Puritan regime banned the playhouses, the brothels, the sporting houses and other places. George RR Martin writing in the late 20th Century, remembers the McCarthy era, the puritanism of the 50s, the counter-revolution of the ‘80s in America. To Shakespeare and his audiences, the situtation he was describing did not seem likely yet, seemed to exist on the level of satire rather than the real.

#ASOIAF IS NOT SHAKESPEAREAN #shakespeare #measure for measure #tyrion #tywin #shae #varys #asoiaf meta

8 notes · View notes