#lucy must be as close to my face as possible every night. if she’s not tucked against my pillow then she’s draped over my head

[peaches2217]

Oh, to be three tabbies getting all cuddly after a long day of screaming at God

[clarisse0o]

Camp Wiegman-Part 37

Lucy Bronze x Ona Batlle

Alternative Universe : Military School

Words : 5k

Masterlist

———————————————————————

Friday, January 15; 6:00 AM -  Lucy's Room.

Even though the ringtone is more pleasant than the alarm in our dorm, it doesn’t stop me from groaning and burying my head in the pillow when it echoes through the room. I hate waking up, no matter what sound comes out of the alarm. I feel a light pressure on my back, encouraging me to roll onto my stomach.

"Get up, Ona."

"No," I mumble.

We stay like this for a little while. I start to worry when her presence lingers on me longer than usual. This isn’t normal. I turn my head to the side to check on her. A smile creeps onto my face when I see her eyes are closed. My movement must have woken her up because she opens one eye, then the other.

"Is getting up tough, Miss Bronze?"

"Whose fault is that?"

"It’s not like I didn’t warn you..."

I clutch my pillow a bit tighter. Guilt washes over me when I see her like this. She hasn’t been spared during the last five nights I’ve spent here. She has as many dark circles under her beautiful eyes as I do.

"I don’t blame you, Ona. But get up now, or we’ll be late."

"Hmm... Don’t feel like it."

Instead of listening to her, I roll over in her bed, pulling the comforter over my head to escape her. Silence reigns until I feel a foot in my stomach, sending me tumbling off the bed. I open my eyes wide to see her grinning triumphantly. The shock leaves me speechless.

"I already let you sleep in my bed, even though I tell you every night it’s the last time... At least do me the honor of getting out when I tell you to, will you?"

I groan as she gets up and walks past me, but I smile when I’m sure she’s in the bathroom. This girl is completely crazy, yet I like her more and more every day. I didn’t think that was possible. Neither did I expect my episodes to worsen after coming to this room. Neither of us was prepared for it. Lucy even thought I had lied about the previous ones, but that wasn’t the case. In the end, we realized the only way for me to fall back asleep after an episode is to sleep in her arms until morning. If that doesn’t happen, I can’t get back to sleep for at least one or two hours.  Lucy kept telling me each time that it would be the last time and that we’d find another solution, but here we are, five nights in.

"Ona," she scolds as she comes out of the bathroom, standing in front of me with her arms crossed. "You’re really pushing it. Get up, now!"

"Alright, I’m getting up!"

"You better be! Hurry up, we’re leaving in ten minutes, max."

The one thing that hasn’t changed since coming here is her commanding nature. Sometimes I think it’s just a front to make her orders seem more fun. But deep down, I know that’s not the case. She wouldn’t hesitate to punish me if I didn’t listen. She has the authority, so she takes advantage of it. With these thoughts, I head to the bathroom, where my things are already set. Lucy has managed to change all my habits in less than a week. She makes me prepare my clothes the night before, and sometimes we even go to bed earlier than the imposed curfew to catch up on sleep. That’s unheard of for me. I quickly get dressed, brush my teeth, and apply some makeup. I barely have time to fix my hair when the door opens, and  Lucy walks in.

"Ready to go?"

"Yep, I just need to grab my jacket and bag."

 Lucy hands me my jacket with a small smile. In her other hand, I also see my bag.

"Thanks," I say, holding back an eye roll.

I’ve discovered that  Lucy is very particular about order. I thought I was meticulous, but she’s on another level. Her room is always impeccably tidy, and she’s incredibly organized. Case in point: our suitcases are already packed, just waiting for our return later this afternoon. Once everything is set, we leave her room. We greet an instructor who came out at the same time as us, then I follow  Lucy down the stairs. I still feel a bit strange being here, but I’m no longer afraid of what her colleagues think. All the educators were informed that I’ve been staying with Lucy ever since a teacher caught me in the hallways when I was heading to her room alone one night. I had been hanging out late with Alexia, not paying attention to the time. The teacher dragged me to the principal’s office without listening to a word I said. He felt pretty foolish when Wiegman explained the situation to him.

"Shall we meet up later?"  Lucy asks me.

"Yep, I’ll meet you at the car, then?"

"Around one o’clock, yes."

"Alright, have a good morning."

"Thanks, you too."

We’ve settled into a bit of a routine. I leave her to wait for her friend at the back door of my dorm while I head to the cafeteria to meet up with mine. Alexia always waits for me out front to ask how my night went. No one has noticed our routine yet because we always join them at the table anyway. Today, we’re the last ones to arrive. We sit in our usual spots with our full trays and join in on the discussions already happening during our absence. It’s the best part of the day. Since we wake up early, we always have time to chat until eight o’clock. Sometimes, there are exceptions where we leave the cafeteria early, like today. I don’t return to  Lucy’s room. I’m not allowed to. Besides, I know she needs to shower since she always goes for a run after breakfast. Since I live with her, I’ve started to learn her habits. We already spent a lot of time together, but now it’s even more. However, I’ve been trying to balance things since Alexia confessed that she misses me. I realized I was spending more time with  Lucy, so I decided to organize myself better. Now, I dedicate my classes and free time before meals to Alexia and my evenings to Lucy in her room. I’ll see how I manage once I’m swamped with homework again, as I’ve asked to work in Lucy’s office, and I know she won’t forget that. In the meantime, I head to class. The day goes relatively well. For a week now, we haven’t really been following the lessons since these are our last few weeks. We’re still working, but nothing important, so we end up laughing a lot with Alexia, making the most of our last two hours together. Maybe too much, as we get reprimanded by our teachers quite a bit. Today is no exception.

"Seriously, you should’ve seen her face when I told her," she giggles, talking about her girlfriend without any discretion. "It was hilarious!"

"Alright, enough!" shouts the teacher. "Out, both of you! Now!"

I widen my eyes at the tone our teacher suddenly took. I expected him to react again after his first warning, but not this harshly. He’s the only one who’s gone so far as to kick us out. We must have pushed him to his limit. Our teacher in the first class was more lenient with us.

"No, it’s fine, we’ll calm down," my neighbor replies.

"You’ve already told me that ten minutes ago," he retorts. "And the rest of the week too. This is the last straw. Out!"

To accompany his words, he points to the door. Alexia reluctantly packs up her things. She gives me a stern look to prompt me to do the same when she notices I’m not moving. The only problem is that I’m frozen. I’m going to be in so much trouble if I leave this room.

"Batlle, do you need a special invitation?"

"No, it’s fine..."

"Excuse me?!"

I don’t reply anymore, afraid of making things worse and getting written up too. It wouldn’t be the first time. I grab my bag and join Alexia, who is already at the door. As if that wasn’t enough, the teacher asks another student to escort us to Bronze' office. I’m in so much trouble. Ale is teasing me.

"Oh, come on, you shouldn’t be that scared! It’s been ages since Bronze punished you."

"You don’t get it. If I’m denied the weekend because of this, I’m a dead girl!"

"You’re overreacting," she laughs.

Oh no, I’m not. She doesn’t understand why I’m so scared. We arrive at my supervisor’s office quicker than I would’ve liked. Two pairs of eyes are on us as the student escorting us knocks on the door. My first instinct is to stare at my feet.

"Ooh... This doesn’t look good," Ingrid comments.

I bite my lip. If she caught on that fast, I have no doubt  Lucy will too. I hear the latter stand up from my peripheral vision. I fidget with my fingers, dreading making eye contact with her.

"What’s going on?"

"I—," my classmate tries to explain.

"I wasn’t talking to you," she interrupts. « Ona?"

- We-

- I said Ona, snaps Lucy harshly in response to Alexia’s attempt to speak.

I lift my head for the first time since I’ve been here. I realize that I’ve positioned myself behind Alexia without meaning to. To my surprise,  Lucy doesn’t look angry, or she’s hiding it very well. She raises an eyebrow when our eyes meet and crosses her arms.

- We got kicked out, I mumble.

- Excuse me? I don’t think I heard you correctly.

I swallow hard. She’s right about one thing—she’s a very good actress. She’s angry. I doubt her lack of sleep will help matters. I press myself against the wall as she approaches us. She sighs, ripping the paper from Megan’s hands violently.

- Alright. Go back to class.

She’s so terrified that she bumps into me as she leaves the room.  Lucy doesn’t take her eyes off me, which also tends to scare me.

- Reasons? she asks me.

- Talking...

- Talking? she repeats, raising her voice. Are you kidding me?!

- No...

- I can’t believe it, she says bitterly. You promised me you wouldn’t do it again! And here you are, as soon as I loosen the reins just a little, you do it again, she snaps at me.

- Luce-

- Oh no, no, she cuts me off. Shut up, will you!

- Whoa, calm down, Ingrid intervenes. Have you seen her face or what?! She was already terrified just walking through the door! she defends me. I think she’s learned her lesson, right Ona?

I nod timidly, thanking her with a look, unable to speak. I knew she would be mad at me. Even though she’s my friend, she’s always prioritized her role as supervisor. I turn my eyes back to her when she sighs again. Her hand rubs her forehead, as if she has a migraine.

- I’m sorry, she says. I’m sleep-deprived.

- Let’s look at the bright side. We can now finish our work faster, Ingrid says, trying to lighten the mood.

 Lucy doesn’t say anything else, just gestures for me to sit in my usual spot. Alexia, who still hasn’t said a word, simply gives me a sorry expression, realizing that I was completely right to be scared.

- Well, I guess I’ll team up with mini Putellas then, Ingrid says. Come sit with me, will you?

Alexia follows the orders she’s given. I smile slightly, noticing she’s not used to being here. I’m sure it’s the first time she’s been kicked out.

- Does this change anything about our weekend? I ask Lucy timidly, who’s now standing in front of me.

- No, but you won’t have the next one, and neither will I.

- Why not?

- Because that was part of the deal with Wiegman! she informs me. How can I go if you’re not sleeping at night?

Now I feel guilty. I should have negotiated to stay in class and asked for a different seat, for example. It’s too late to come up with solutions.  Lucy slides a sheet of paper in front of me. I don’t understand her intention until she asks me to read out the numbers to help her with her work.

- Can I go to the bathroom first?

- You’re kidding me, right?

I bite my lip, wanting to collect myself before diving into her work. Her bad mood makes me anxious. She grants me this favor but insists on coming with me. I say nothing, even though I made the request to get away from her. When we arrive at the bathroom, I only breathe when I’m locked in a stall.

- I’m sorry... I dare to say once I can no longer see her.

- I’m the one who should be sorry, she surprises me by replying. You could have held off for your last class at least.

Not knowing what to say, I stay silent. I come out of the stall after flushing and stand beside her to wash my hands. I look up into the mirror when a pair of lips touches my cheek. The contact lasts longer than it should. I remain speechless at this more-than-pleasant gesture.

- Do me a favor and don’t get kicked out again for the rest of the year. I won’t be as lenient next time, knowing what you’ve become. Got it?

- Yeah... Sorry again about your weekend... There’s no chance I’ll have it.

- I’ll make sure you don’t. That will be your punishment, she tells me. I had planned to offer you a weekend in the Alps with my friends. Now I’ll have to reschedule everything since I can’t go anymore, and I’m not sure if you’ll be invited then.

- What’s this about...?

- I wanted to surprise you since I’m forbidding you to go back to Barcelona.

- You would have taken me with you...?

- Of course.

- And now you don’t want to take me?

- Not until you prove you deserve it.

She winks at me before leaving the room. I quickly toss my paper towel and follow her. Damn it! I’ve messed everything up! I’m sure she’s trying to make me feel guilty, and it’s working perfectly. I try to convince her to change her mind on the way back, but it’s no use.

- Please, Luc-

She puts her finger on my mouth, making me stop so I don’t run into her. I look around and see that we’re back at the office, and our friends are laughing at us.

- That’s enough. I said no.

- So, are you two best friends again? Ingrid asks.

- No, she’s just trying to persuade me to take her on the weekend we planned.

- Oh... I forgot about that... Damn. Can’t we go now? Can’t you work something out?

- That’s what I’m trying to ask her! I reply.

- I said no. It’s your punishment. Now move your chair over here. You’re supposed to be helping me, remember?

She sits behind her desk with a determined look. I glance at Ingrid, who seems exasperated by her friend’s behavior. Without much enthusiasm, I follow the order and sit next to her. Alexia also sits next to Ingrid to work better. I retrieve the previous sheet and make myself comfortable, crossing my legs.

- First to finish wins? Ingrid challenges us. We’ve been waiting for you for this.

- Fine by me,  Lucy surprises me by agreeing. You’d better be efficient. I hate losing.

I chuckle and nod.  Lucy gives the signal to start our silly contest. I quickly give her the first eight-digit code to avoid getting scolded. We keep going like this for a good half hour until the bell rings in the hallway.

- Already? Ingrid exclaims. Do you have one or two hours of detention?

- Two, I respond instinctively at the same time as Lucy.

 Lucy gives me a dark look.

- What? It was my turn to answer.

- Hmm.

I sense amusement from Ingrid. It’s true, it’s pretty funny to see us connecting this way. Alexia is more discreet next to her, even though she’s probably thinking the same thing as us.

"Alright, give me the next one?" she reminds me.

Friday, January 15; 12:40 PM - Manchester Airport.

Ten minutes have passed since Lucy and I arrived at the airport. The morning had been tense since my dismissal, but  Lucy calmed down after we crushed the other team just before lunch. After that, we separated to eat, then I met her on the same side street as last time when it was time to leave. Now, I’m eagerly waiting for Mapi to arrive, and I think I’ve mentioned that enough already. I’m starting to get fed up with the tension between Lucy and me. It feels like it’s only getting worse. She’s been ignoring me since we got here, tapping away on her phone doing who knows what. I sigh in frustration. This situation is ridiculous. I was about to speak when she finally looks at me, but then she steps back, looking behind me. The next moment, something literally jumps on me. Lucy catches me to stop me from falling. I’m attacked by a wave of kisses, causing Lucy to step back.

"Mapi, cut it out," I laugh.

"I missed you so much! Oh my God, I thought I’d never land! Seriously, how do you manage to sleep through every flight?"

I laugh, recognizing my best friend and her way of complaining without mincing words. I turn around when she finally climbs off my back.

"Good to see you, Commander! Maybe not as much as my Ona, but still!"

"Good to see you too, Mapi."

Mapi sticks close to me until we retrieve her suitcase. Since I no longer have a phone to communicate, she catches me up on her crappy week in detail without paying any attention to Lucy beside us. She missed an important exam that she hopes to retake. She also tells me she ran into her ex with Feli. Judging by Lucy’s reaction to this news, I’m not holding my breath for her to change her mind about returning to Barcelona. She eventually talks about her casual flings, which I could have done without hearing next to my supervisor. I feel extremely embarrassed, unlike Mapi, who seems totally at ease. I get a brief break when she grabs her suitcase from the conveyor belt.

"Does she always talk this much?"  Lucy asks.

"It’s just the beginning..."

"Great. I thought no one could be worse than you."

"Hey!" I lightly punch her. "I’m not that bad! And I did warn you that you were taking a risk by picking her up."

She pinches my cheek when I pout. I give a victorious smile when she apologizes, saying she was joking. She quickly withdraws her hand when Mapi comes back. She resumes her monologue all the way to the parking lot.

"Wow, nice ride! An Audi? You didn’t mention that, Ona! Can I sit in the front?"

"No!"  Lucy and I reply in unison.

"Whoa, calm down, you two," she chuckles.

 Lucy avoids us by getting into her car. I help Mapi put her suitcase in the trunk before we get in too.  Lucy hasn’t let me drive her car since last week, but I was glad she let me do it at least once. The feeling of driving her car was magical, and I understand why when it purrs at startup.

"By the way, Ona?" Mapi asks.

"Can’t you just shut up for, like, five minutes?"  Lucy growls.

"Is she always this grumpy?"

I laugh as my best friend points at  Lucy with an indifferent look.  Lucy’s going to explode any second if she keeps pushing her buttons like this.

"If you don’t stop soon, I’ll leave you on the side of the road!"

This scene is truly hilarious. Mapi eventually cooperates by sinking into her seat and sulking. Now she knows what it’s like to be put in her place by  Lucy Bronze.

"What was your question?" I finally ask.

"Um, I’m not sure I’m allowed to talk..." she pouts.

"Don’t be upset. She was joking. Right, Lucia?"

"Mm," she responds.

"So?" I press.

"Did you sort out your phone problem? You said you would this week."

I sigh and shake my head, thinking about that issue.

"I called my mom. She gave me a hard time when I explained that mine was broken. We argued until she finally agreed to let me cancel the line and get a new one."

"And?"

"Well, I eventually got the green light."

"So it’s good? You can get a new phone?"

"Normally, yes."

"Then why don’t you already have one?"

"Because Lucy will take me when she feels like it."

I see Mapi flinch in her seat through the rearview mirror. I glance at  Lucy, who sighs heavily. I place my hand on her shoulder to try to calm her down. I think Mapi’s presence is irritating her. She was happy to host us last week, though. Maybe I’m wrong. Her mood has worsened since my dismissal. I feel responsible. We had started the day off well. I smile as I realize that my touch has an effect, against all expectations.

"Go ahead, Mapi, spit it out,"  Lucy encourages.

"Well... We could go get one now, right? But, you know, it’s up to you! You’re the driver, after all..."

"Alright, let’s go. I’ll have the opportunity to leave you there if you keep annoying me."

I laugh, removing my hand from Lucy. She changes direction towards a street I recognize. She’s actually heading downtown.

"Take out my phone and send a message to Ingrid asking her to meet us," she orders.

I don’t think twice and do what she asks. My best friend is here, so she can ask hers to join us too. Ten minutes later, we’re in the underground parking of the shopping mall. I’ve visited a lot of places, but I’ve never been here. We follow Lucy, who heads for the stairs. She’s tapping away on her phone, as if we’re not even there. We arrive in the middle of a dozen brand-name stores. I spin around to see if I spot any stores I might like. It only lasts a second, but when I stop, I don’t see anyone beside me anymore. I move forward a bit, hoping to spot  Lucy, Mapi, or maybe even Ingrid, but I don’t recognize any faces. There’s no one. I’m alone, and I start to panic like a little girl who’s lost her mother in the supermarket. I look around and even search my pockets, but I quickly remember that I haven’t had a phone for weeks. I stop when I start to feel overwhelmed. I’m beginning to think I’ll never find them with all these people around. I jump when a strong hand suddenly presses on my shoulder. I was ready to fight back, but I relax when I come face to face with  Lucy.

"Oh, thank God..."

Without thinking, I hug her. She chuckles softly, accepting the embrace. She doesn’t seem to notice my panicked state. Yet, I can feel my heart racing against her warm body. I pull away from her so she doesn’t realize how exaggerated my reaction was.

"Sorry, I... I didn’t see you leave, and I thought I’d never find you again."

"Calm down," she smiles. "I’m here now. Give me your hand so I don’t lose you again. Your wonderful best friend and Ingrid are waiting for us."

She knows exactly how to calm me down. I smile and happily take the hand she offers. She pulls me along in a direction I definitely wouldn’t have taken if I had gone looking for them.

" Lucy?" I call out to her.

« Mm?"

- "I'm sorry for ruining your mood... It's my fault, and I hate seeing you like this."

I bite my lip when our eyes meet. She smiles tenderly.

- "It's not your fault."

- "But—"

- "I promise, Ona," she interrupts, tightening her grip on my hand. "If you don't want things to get worse, don't stray from me again."

I smile at her, and she finally lets go of my hand when we reach Mapi and Ingrid, who are deep in debate. It almost seems like they've known each other for ages, even though they've only met twice.

- "Oh, there you are at last!" Mapi exclaims when she sees us. "Can we go now?"

- "Of course. Try not to get lost again."

Ingrid and Mapi walk ahead of us as if we weren't there. Well, they do glance back at us occasionally.  Lucy tells me that the mobile store is on the next floor when I ask her. We take the escalator to get there.  Lucy takes my hand again as I start to lag behind them. The other two girls decide to leave us to check out the store across from the mobile shop when we arrive. At least we'll have a little peace, and I'll have time to choose a phone without any pressure.

- "Hello," a salesman approaches us right away with a predatory smile. "Can I help you?"

- "We're fine, thanks,"  Lucy replies coldly. "We're just browsing for now."

I give the salesman an apologetic smile, realizing that he's unwittingly sparked my boss's ire. I hurry to join her when she calls me over a bit further away. I apologize and quickly catch up to her.

- "I guess you want an iPhone? Can you even afford it?"

- "Yes, yes! My mom sent me some money."

- "Do you want to look at anything else?"

- "Are you kidding?" I giggled. "I only have Apple products; I'm not going to look at Samsung!"

- "As you wish," she smiles. "So, which model? You had a 13, right?"

- "Yeah," I sighed. "Actually, I'm torn. I could get the latest model, but I think it's too expensive. What do you think?"

- "What I think? It's not up to me to decide."

- "I'm just asking for your opinion..."

- "There's not much difference between the latest models. It's up to you to decide what you want."

- "Do you need advice?"

 Lucy lets out a grumpy sigh towards the salesman who returns. I stifle a laugh and place my hand on her arm, which is holding one of the displayed phones.

- "We'll come to you when I've made my choice," I simply say.

He nods. I think he got the message now. I smile, seeing  Lucy glaring at him as he walks away. I call her to get her attention. She raises an eyebrow, noticing my amused expression.

- "You think this is funny?"

- "He's not doing anything wrong; he's just doing his job."

- "Yeah, well, if his job is to check out all the pretty girl in this store, I hope he gets a bonus considering how often he stares at you."

I look at her, stunned by that comment I didn't expect at all. A burst of laughter escapes me, causing her to frown. It's one of the last things I expected to hear from her. I wipe away the tears forming in the corners of my eyes.

- "Are you done?" she snaps coldly.

- "Sorry, Luce, but why are you reacting like this? Who cares? I won't ever see this guy again anyway."

- "Yeah. Well, are you done so we can leave? The last thing we need is for the others to show up, and that would be the icing on the cake."

- "Hey, are you done being like this? As long as those two are together, they leave us alone. It's pretty nice, isn't it?"

- "Which one are you choosing?"

I sighed, realizing that my words wouldn't change her mood. I hope it'll fade soon because I won't be able to put up with it for long. I give up and change the subject, pointing to a phone in front of us, the iPhone 15.

- "That one, then?"

- "Yeah."

- "You know it's really expensive?"

- "Let's just say my mom transferred me a generous amount," I giggled. "Might as well enjoy it, right?"

- "You could use it for something else."

I stare at the new iPhone for a moment. According to people, it's the phone to have. I'm so tempted, but  Lucy's eyes are much more compelling. I let out a defeated sigh.

- "Alright, alright, I’ll go for the other one then."

I settle for the iPhone 14 that was right next to it.  Lucy nods, as if she approves of the obvious choice.

- "So, black or white, Princess?"

- "White," I finally said without hesitation, crossing my arms.

- "Okay," she laughs. "Let's find a saleswoman."

- "The salesman was fine by me," I teased. "Especially since I told him we'd go back to him."

- "You really want to irritate me to the end?"

We lock eyes for a moment until I look away to find the salesman in the store. I’m not trying to annoy her, but I don’t want to give her the final say on everything either. I smile when I finally see him and waste no time going over to him.

- "Ona," she

 growls behind me.

- "Have you made your choice?" he asks warmly when I reach him.

- "Yes, I have. Can you take care of it?"

- "I'm not sure your girlfriend feels the same way..."

- "Oh, she’s not—"

- "If it were up to me, I would have gone to your colleague already," my boss retorts. "Just do your job."

- "R-right... If you would follow me..."

The poor salesman is almost running out of fear as he heads to his desk with a computer. I wait a moment before following him to turn back to  Lucy.

- "Are you serious? Why did you let him think we were together?!" I giggled.

8

"I’m saving you from his flirting tactics."

"Oh yeah? Who says I didn’t want to be flirted with?"

"Doesn’t matter," she rolls her eyes. "Come on, he’s waiting for us."

I smile unconsciously as I walk past her. This situation is actually quite funny. The poor salesperson doesn’t dare look at us when we sit on the stools in front of his desk. He prefers to focus on his screen to do his job. I suppress a smile when  Lucy continues her act by placing her hand on my knee. I have no idea what’s gotten into her, but I don’t mind it.

"So... uh, what would you like to do?" he finally looks at me.

"Open a new line."

"Alright... Are you already a customer with us?"

"Yes."

"She’d like a new no-contract plan,"  Lucy intervenes. "That’s what you wanted, right?" she asks me for confirmation.

I nod with a sly smile. The guy taps on the keyboard as I give him my line number. He accesses all the information my mom provided when setting it up. Fortunately, she had the sense to put it in my name, or else I wouldn’t have been able to change anything. He quickly switches the line when I tell him the plan I want with a new number.

"Uh... what model do you want?"

"iPhone 14 in white," I replied.

"Are you sure you don’t want to go for black, being undecided that you are?"  Lucy asks with an amused smile.

"Stop it," I giggle. "You’re really silly."

"Yet, I’m the one on top," she murmurs.

Her words were a whisper, but loud enough for the salesperson to hear. I can’t hide my surprise when I catch her smirking. I can’t believe she dared to say that! My cheeks flush with embarrassment, and I can’t think of anything to say in response. She’s taking this role-play way too far. The salesperson is so uncomfortable that he gets up, saying he’s going to get my phone from the stockroom.

"What were you thinking?" I spitied as soon as he left.

"Oh, it was just a joke. I’m not sure which of you was more uncomfortable," she teases.

"It wasn’t funny at all, you idiot!"

I can’t hold back my smile as she laughs even more. Goodness, I don’t understand what’s gotten into her all of a sudden. Just a few minutes ago, she was completely grumpy.

"We should play this game more often."

I turn my head to hide my embarrassment. I didn’t know she could be so teasing. I push her hand away when she tries to slide it up my thigh to provoke a reaction. I glare at her, but she’s not intimidated in the slightest. She just chuckles and places her hand back on my knee when the salesperson returns. He sets the box with my new phone on the counter after scanning the barcode.

"Alright. Now we just need to set it up. We can do it together if you’d like."

"Yes, please."

He removes the plastic wrapping and pushes the box toward me.

"Do you know how to do it yourself?"

"Of course."

"I’ll let you handle it then. Is there anything else you need?"

"A screen protector,"  Lucy replies.

I hadn’t thought of that, but it’s a good idea considering how my last phone ended up. I nod, and he gets up again. Meanwhile, I take my new phone out of the box and insert my new SIM card under  Lucy’s watchful eye.

"This game is ridiculous," I say.

"I thought I was doing you a favor," she says, removing her hand.

"A little, yeah. But we both know he wouldn’t have tried anything more."

"That’s true. I don’t know what made me react that way, but it annoyed me to see him looking at you like prey."

A foolish smile spreads across my lips. I appreciate that she doesn’t let people disrespect me. I try to convince myself that there’s no hidden motive behind it. That’s probably the case anyway. I turn on my phone and start setting it up, syncing it with my account. I feel relieved when I see my home screen, as if I never broke my previous phone. I’m thrilled to find all my data intact.

"Did you manage?" the salesperson asks upon his return.

"Yes, everything’s working," I reply with a smile.

"Great, here’s the receipt," he hands me a sheet of paper. "You’ll find a one-year warranty, your new phone number, and of course, the price. Are you paying by card?"

"Yes," I confirm.

He hands me the machine once he’s inserted my card. I enter my code before handing it back.  Lucy takes the bag where the salesperson has put the empty phone box and the receipt. I thank the salesperson as he returns my card.

"Have a good day," he wishes us.

"Thank you, you too."

I put my phone in my pocket before anything can happen to it, and we head out to meet Mapi and Ingrid. It wasn’t difficult to find them. They were waiting on a bench across from the store. The first thing Mapi asks me for is my new number. I choose the simplest way: sending her a message. I do the same with  Lucy and end up getting Ingrid’s number, which she readily gives me. “Just in case,” she says. I’m not sure I’ll use it, but at least I’ll know who to contact if I can’t reach  Lucy one day.

"So, movie night at my place tonight?"  Lucy suggests.

"Really?" Mapi enthuses. "Like, all four of us?"

"I’d love to leave you behind, but Ona wouldn’t let me."

We all laugh except for Mapi. The girls get up, and we head back down to the parking lot. Mapi immediately agrees to Ingrid’s offer to ride with her. I stay with  Lucy, who seems pleased to get rid of my best friend. I know she likes her and that it’s just her bad mood talking, so I’m not worried about the rest of our weekend. I’m beaming when she hands me the car keys.

"You’re letting me drive?!"

"Mm-hmm."

"But I don’t know the way to your place..."

"I’ll guide you."

I don’t ask her a third time and take her keys. She makes sure I’m settled in and have my license with me before letting me go. I start the car, unable to hide my smile as I think about the evening ahead.

[vickyvicarious]

Today's entry is full of Lucy/Jonathan parallels. It's so many throughout... I can't possibly quote every single one, but here are a few big things.

I write this and leave it to be seen, so that no one may by any chance get into trouble through me. This is an exact record of what took place to-night. I feel I am dying of weakness, and have barely strength to write, but it must be done if I die in the doing.

vs

If this book should ever reach Mina before I do, let it bring my good-bye. (5 May)

+

These may be the last words I ever write in this diary. I slept till just before the dawn, and when I woke threw myself on my knees, for I determined that if Death came he should find me ready. (30 July)

Lucy is writing with the specific intent of keeping anyone else from getting into trouble through her - in other words, so none of the maids or her doctors or whoever will be blamed for her murder if she dies before the night is through. The first quote from Jonathan is not really a direct match to this sentiment, of course. But while I couldn't remember a perfect quote to compare, we see hints throughout his journal that Jonathan is writing in the hopes that someone else might someday see it. Perhaps Mina, perhaps some other guest to the castle... he hopes that the explanation of what happened to him, and detailing of what Dracula is, will prove useful. Perhaps it will help someone else protect themself - just like Lucy hopes here. (This is of course not his only reason for writing. Another major reason why is how it helps to keep him sane and helps him plan escapes. Still, it is one of his reasons.) And certainly, the sentiment that the record is important to keep even at risk to oneself, is a shared link between them. Both of them also show a determination to face their death directly.

This line is also an echo of the various times Jonathan (and, more recently, Jack) experienced something seemingly impossibly horrific, and made a big point that they were writing things down exactly as they happened.

The time did not seem long, but very, very awful, till I recovered consciousness again. Somewhere near, a passing bell was tolling; the dogs all round the neighbourhood were howling; and in our shrubbery, seemingly just outside, a nightingale was singing.

vs

Something made me start up, a low, piteous howling of dogs somewhere far below in the valley, which was hidden from my sight. Louder it seemed to ring in my ears, and the floating motes of dust to take new shapes to the sound as they danced in the moonlight. I felt myself struggling to awake to some call of my instincts; nay, my very soul was struggling, and my half-remembered sensibilities were striving to answer the call. I was becoming hypnotised! (24 June)

Lucy awakens after the first attack of the night to the sound of dogs howling (amongst other things). Jonathan too has been saved from a trance by this noise, though in his case it was a close call. Dracula certainly seems to have successfully hypnotized her and most likely did drink from her between his arrival in the room (the dust swirling in) and the maids'.

What am I to do? what am I to do? I am back in the room with mother. I cannot leave her, and I am alone, save for the sleeping servants, whom some one has drugged. Alone with the dead! I dare not go out, for I can hear the low howl of the wolf through the broken window.

vs

I fear I am myself the only living soul within the place. (8 May)

+

What shall I do? what can I do? How can I escape from this dreadful thing of night and gloom and fear? (24 June)

+

Suddenly it struck me that this might be the moment and means of my doom; I was to be given to the wolves, and at my own instigation. There was a diabolical wickedness in the idea great enough for the Count, and as a last chance I cried out:— "Shut the door; I shall wait till morning!" and covered my face with my hands to hide my tears of bitter disappointment. (29 June)

These are only a few of the lines that Lucy's quote reminds me of. This is the big one, there's so much to connect in it.

Like Jonathan, Lucy is alone with the dead. Dracula has sabotaged her only chance of reaching out to other people for aid (drugged maids = workers in the yard, people who saw Dracula dressed as Jonathan). She also feels duty-bound to stay by her mother's side, in a way which reminds me of Jonathan's feeling of obligation towards Mr. Hawkins (all the more as Mina's letter today emphasizes how familial their relationship has become). Like Jonathan, Lucy cannot see any options to escape from the living nightmare she is experiencing.

Like Jonathan, Lucy cannot leave because if she does, she fears a wolf will get her. (Much like Jonathan, she is earlier in her memorandum able to distinguish a wolf howl from a dog's, despite never hearing one before.) Even though she does not really expect to live through the night, she cannot make the choice to go out and face almost certain death. She's even recently seen the wolf kill a mother, to really drive the comparison with Jonathan's experiences home. (A contrast between the two is, of course, the mother he saw die was trying to rescue/avenge her dead child, but was too late. Mrs. Westenra seeks comfort from her daughter tonight, and as she dies unwittingly steals away Lucy's protection (garlic), thus holding true to her role of accidentally endangering her further.)

The air seems full of specks, floating and circling in the draught from the window, and the lights burn blue and dim. What am I to do? God shield me from harm this night! I shall hide this paper in my breast, where they shall find it when they come to lay me out. My dear mother gone! It is time that I go too. Good-bye, dear Arthur, if I should not survive this night. God keep you, dear, and God help me!

vs

Then I began to notice that there were some quaint little specks floating in the rays of the moonlight. They were like the tiniest grains of dust, and they whirled round and gathered in clusters in a nebulous sort of way. (24 June)

+

God help me in my task! Good-bye, Mina, if I fail; good-bye, my faithful friend and second father; good-bye, all, and last of all Mina! (25 June)

(I've run out of new colors and am recycling. These aren't meant to match to the above instances of these colors.)

Like Jonathan described his experience being hypnotized by the vampire ladies, Lucy too sees Dracula's form as circling specks (twice, in fact, the other quote being above). The lights going blue and dim are also reminiscent of the various times Jonathan describes moonlight at the Castle. I especially think of just before he meets the vampire women, when he muses about the powers that modernity cannot defeat, and his modern lighting is contrasted to the moonlit room. Here, Lucy's modern lighting is going out as the supernatural invades her bedroom.

Lucy bids her final farewells to her mother and her fiance. In the quote I gave, Jonathan does the same for his father figure and his fiancee. Both of them invoke God for help. Both of them end their entries with this thinking of the one they love most. Jonathan of course does this multiple times, but I'm only quoting this one instance as it feels like the closest match overall.

And once again, we also see multiple comparisons beyond what I directly quoted. Lucy reiterates her expectation of death as in the quote at the top, and even chooses to hide her memorandum in her clothes, much as Jonathan hid his diary on his person at all times. (The difference being, he wanted to hide it from Dracula; she wants to ensure hers is seen by someone.)

[morimess]

I just watched The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes and I have to rant about it real quick.

Spoilers under the cut for those who want to see it- I HIGHLY recommend the movie btw.

-So, first off THE MUSIC IS SPECTACULAR. The scene where Lucy Gray is covered in the snakes is *chef's kiss*. Apparently for every song, it was a live performance by Rachel Ziegler, and she fucking nailed it.

I've seen a couple people criticize some of the songs as taking melodies from other IRL folk songs- but honestly, I don't see this as a bad thing as a lot of those original songs have probably been forgotten as this is YEARS in the future. Music evolves, and certain chords and beats will stay long after words are forgotten.

-Her dress is gorgeous- all of the costumes are awesome. I think I made one comment on how the school uniform looks a bit weird, but I quickly got over it.

-Flickerman is actually really funny- I thought he would be annoying as a bit character- but he did get a couple laughs out of me. (Which makes me feel bad because people were dying in those scenes, but at the same time- I think that's a commentary for another time.)

-Arachne's death was absolutely deserved.

-Wovey's death was absolutely tragic

-The drones were *menaces* and I LOVED IT- it was so fucking funny to me to see them flying around and nailing people square in the chest- or knocking people tf over.

-I love how Lucy Gray immediately called bull on Snow's "the third person I killed was my old self."

-THE OLD HOB WAS AWESOME!! The mood in the tavern was so cozy and joyful, and it is EXACTLY what I imagined the Hadestown speakeasy looks like when Persephone is singing "Our Lady of the Underground"

-That being said- I wish we got the scene where they burn it down for being the heart of rebellion.

-I didn't like the change they made to Jessup's rabies. He was supposed to get it while at the capital. That bite was supposed to be after their first night in the zoo, where they thought a rat bit him (later speculated to be a raccoon). I don't like how it was changed to a bat bite while on the train.

The whole point of it in the book was supposed to emphasize the propaganda that's even being forced onto capital citizens- not just district citizens- that the capital is utopian.

"There is no rabies in the capital anymore- we got rid of it within *our* borders. It must have come from those *filthy* districts. Look at how it turns him even more *animalistic.*"

But instead, they change the bite to be from a bat while they were on the train. To me, that seems too close to "the rabies came from the districts." (Even if it was a capital train.)

Like, at the start of the movie, we are treated to an absolute rollercoaster as they try to set up everything that was going wrong in the capital during the war in the span of 5 minutes. One of these being a dog who's foaming at the mouth. I entirely expected that bite to happen within the zoo with that kind of set up.

There could have even been really interesting pay-off for it too. Other students seeing the foaming, freaking out, and almost panicking because "rabies is back." (Hell, even have Flickerman seem spooked by it). SELL HOW DANGEROUS THIS DISEASE IS/ SEEMS TO THEM. Because they lived through it. Most people in the capital probably have a horror story involved with a rabies encounter, because of how rampant it apparently was in the capital.

-The same can also be said about Dill- I don't like how blaise they were about her constant cough, and possible tuberculosis. That shit kills- they would not be casual about being near her. (Though the absolutely would make jokes in her expense)

-Reaper could have been more of a dick. In book, he actually says "I'm sorry I'm going to have to kill you all." (In response Jessup spits in his face- which causes Reaper to ALSO contract rabies, but that's neither here nor there). He honestly isn't too threatening other than a quick jump scare when his mentor is first talking to him.

He's honestly more of a gentle giant? In a way? Like, he pairs with Dill and after she dies, collects all the bodies around the arena in a row and covers them. He isn't the same threat that he was in the books.

-I would have preferred if we went in the arena with a count of how many tributes were left. I think 22 were still alive? But it was really hard to keep track. I know in the book between the rough handling, the Arachne incident, and the bombing- both the mentor and tribute pool slimmed significantly before the games even started. But in the movie I think only 2 tributes actually died before the games.

-As far as that rollercoaster at the beginning- it throws a LOT of information at you all at once- and not all of it is mentioned again. Especially not the cannibalism- which I feel could have been changed a bit?

-We didn't get much about Snow's peers, which is a shame since he has SO MUCH that he thinks about each one of them and their backgrounds in the books.

-Clemensia's poisoning should have been more colorful, and could have been WAY more grotesque. I'm talking a rainbow of mottled skin spreading up her arm until her face swells shut. We also should have gotten confirmation on whether or not she died.

It would have been more satisfying if during Snow's hospitalization, he tried to see her, only to find those golden scales covering her body and turning her eyes yellow like in the book.

-I wish Maude Ivory was more of a character- she's one of the main reasons it's theorized The Hanging Tree and other songs by Lucy Gray are remembered.

-In the book, in that last conversation with the doctor, she tells Snow that she will never replay the footage of the 10th games. There's too much rebellion attached to it. I wish that line has been kept- that way his thoughts of "People will forget her" actually have a bit more weight.

-I wish we had seen more of Sejanus' mom- just to see what costumes would have done with her dresses.

-I wish we saw more of Tigris' designs, or heard more of her struggles with her boss- just a mention of what she had to do to keep the House of Snow on top.

I think that's it for now? I just watched it last night, so some things need a bit longer to be thought about, but in general I just want MORE.

[theivorybilledwoodpecker]

So with today's Dracula Daily, does everyone understand why I find it so horrible that almost all adaptations, pastiches, or sequels ship Mina and Dracula?

Kneeling on the near edge of the bed facing outwards was the white-clad figure of his wife. By her side stood a tall, thin man, clad in black. His face was turned from us, but the instant we saw we all recognised the Count—in every way, even to the scar on his forehead. With his left hand he held both Mrs. Harker’s hands, keeping them away with her arms at full tension; his right hand gripped her by the back of the neck, forcing her face down on his bosom. Her white nightdress was smeared with blood, and a thin stream trickled down the man’s bare breast which was shown by his torn-open dress. The attitude of the two had a terrible resemblance to a child forcing a kitten’s nose into a saucer of milk to compel it to drink. .... I moved forward to Mrs. Harker, who by this time had drawn her breath and with it had given a scream so wild, so ear-piercing, so despairing that it seems to me now that it will ring in my ears till my dying day. For a few seconds she lay in her helpless attitude and disarray. Her face was ghastly, with a pallor which was accentuated by the blood which smeared her lips and cheeks and chin; from her throat trickled a thin stream of blood; her eyes were mad with terror. Then she put before her face her poor crushed hands, which bore on their whiteness the red mark of the Count’s terrible grip, and from behind them came a low desolate wail which made the terrible scream seem only the quick expression of an endless grief. Van Helsing stepped forward and drew the coverlet gently over her body, whilst Art, after looking at her face for an instant despairingly, ran out of the room. .... “No! no! Jonathan, you must not leave me. I have suffered enough tonight, God knows, without the dread of his harming you. You must stay with me. Stay with these friends who will watch over you!” Her expression became frantic as she spoke; and, he yielding to her, she pulled him down sitting on the bedside, and clung to him fiercely. Van Helsing and I tried to calm them both. The Professor held up his little golden crucifix, and said with wonderful calmness:— “Do not fear, my dear. We are here; and whilst this is close to you no foul thing can approach. You are safe for to-night; and we must be calm and take counsel together.” She shuddered and was silent, holding down her head on her husband’s breast. When she raised it, his white night-robe was stained with blood where her lips had touched, and where the thin open wound in her neck had sent forth drops. The instant she saw it she drew back, with a low wail, and whispered, amidst choking sobs:— “Unclean, unclean! I must touch him or kiss him no more. Oh, that it should be that it is I who am now his worst enemy, and whom he may have most cause to fear.”

This reads like a rape scene. The physical force Dracula uses and how Mina feels unclean afterward. I've seen writers try to account for it by saying Mina's acting/lying, is sexually repressed and confused, etc. But I feel like no explanation is believable.

To say she's lying, we would need to believe her entire character is different than the one we've come to know. Since the book is compiled by her, she could have significantly edited her diary entries...but why? The only possible reasons make her seem callous at best and evil at worst.

As for a panic due to sexual repression...again, I don't buy it. She willingly does stuff with the guy who murdered Lucy...but then goes crazy or into denial due to sex conflicting with Victorian values? Not the fact Dracula murdered Lucy? It seems to me that modern day writers seem to overestimate the effect of repression on a person's brain. Often this coincides with women being unable to handle emotions, (i.e. misogynistic views).

So it never sits right with me that the victim of what seems to be a metaphor for rape is shipped with her rapist. And that writers are willing to completely alter her character to do it.

I feel like even the kindest portrayals seem to be based more on previous adaptations than the book.

[sio-writes]

Witch's Gambit - Chapter 1

Hello everyone! I'd like to introduce you to my NaNoWriMo project, Witch's Gambit! It tells the story of Lucy Breban, a witch living in the magical city of Grayslate. After her good friend Elliot is murdered in cold blood, Lucy must employ the help of her reclusive, skeletal neighbor Weston when the answers the police provide aren't enough. As they get closer to the truth (as well as each other), the two begin to unravel an underground secret that could rock the very foundations of the place they call home.

I'm super excited to bring this to you guys! I actually have a buffer of about 10 chapters as opposed to...well none, lol, so hopefully that gives me enough time to make some proper edits and polish it even more for you all.

Tags for this chapter are: Heavy violence, and minor character death.

Elliot Forsythe died sometime between seven-thirty and midnight last night, decapitated and drained of his vampiric blood. He's tall and lanky, he had cropped black hair, and skin pale as marble. He was the first friend I made upon moving to Grayslate, my neighbor for close to five years. The winter cloak I'd been meaning to return to him still sits in my hallway closet. 

Reading his memories feels like a violation, but I try to tell myself that he'd want me to do this, he'd want me to confirm it. I'd been asked, begged really, by Alma to be here. My messaging stone had gone warm with all her calls, and when I'd finally answered she'd been frantic and out of sorts. The news hadn't had time to truly set in before I was being questioned by two white men in their late forties, then sat in front of my friend's body, tracing sigils on the floor around him in chalk.

I'm thrust into memories that aren't mine, taking his place as if I were there. His childhood in the countryside with two doting if slightly overprotective parents. The fling with a naga I recognize as owning the bakery down the street makes my heart flutter as his did. Adopting his golden retriever that he named Paul brings such a rush of joy I temporarily forget I'm reading the memories of a dead man. I can smell the apple crumble his mother would bake every year for his birthday, even bringing it out on a visit when he moved to the city. The breeze in my hair is refreshing as he rides his bike to the store. 

I've been on that bike, held my legs stiff on the back wheel as he pedaled, cutting a corner too quick and nearly throwing us into traffic. We went to dingy concerts together, celebrated holidays, drank tea on Sundays when all the attractive folk were exiting the yoga studio. 

And now I'm kneeling on the floor, touching his corpse, watching memories that aren't mine. 

Soul imprints start at the beginning, so I have to sift through half-remembered interactions with faces that shift like they're underwater. I see what he sees, and his emotions are my own. I'm seeing the world through his eyes, his recollection, his senses. Everything is laid bare like cards on a table. There's sections that're gone, repressed or more likely just forgotten because they were unimportant. But I don't mind pushing past years of his life. I want to be here as little as possible. To tell the detectives what they need to know and go back home to cry at the third crystal clear memory of him hugging Paul the dog.

"How long is this going to take?" I hear one of the detectives ask. His voice is the deep baritone of the taller gentleman I spoke with upon walking in, the one I'd never seen before today. 

"Give her a second," the other one says, Martinez. He's marginally more patient because he's been running homicide longer, but not by much. Every time I'm asked to come and consult in the morgue he offers me a coffee afterwards, giving me a look that says he wants to be there about as much as I do.

"Body's getting cold," the other one, not-Martinez, says under his breath. "She's gonna waste all the evidence."

"You know she can hear you, right?"

It's barely been five minutes and for the third time I have to resist rolling my eyes or break the imprint and start over.

I hit a patch in the imprint, something Elliot wouldn't want me to see. He didn't consciously block it out, but for being his last memories everything is faded like he wanted to forget.

I'm sprinting up the stairs leading to the office. That barricade at the door won't hold them long, and I need to get--

BAM!

The door flies open behind me but I'm too afraid to turn around. I need to get to the study, it's only a few steps more.

"Oh Elliot," a female voice mocks behind me. "Where ya goin, Ellie?"

Quickly, I need to act quickly. Barricading the door could work, so I start at that, slamming the door to the study shut, my eyes landing on the biggest, nearest object and dragging it over.

"He uh, he was in this room," I say, trying to breathe only through my mouth so I don't inhale Elliot's stench. The burning basil and essential oils only do so much. 

"Yes, we know that," the new detective says, and I can practically hear him rolling his eyes.

"He's breathing pretty heavy." I frown, concentrating. Everything becomes blurry, he's blinking a lot, and the whole world shakes. 

"I think he's crying," I say as the vision whips wildly back and forth--Elliot is looking for something. My heart flutters in my chest. "He's-- he's really scared." 

Elliot's emotions and thoughts slam into me like a train. If he had been more careful, kept his head down, they wouldn't have found him. He wouldn't be running from one of Donahue's pawns in his own damn home. He couldn't escape, there was no point in trying to run. Maybe if he let out Paul it could distract them enough that--no, what the fuck was wrong with him? Paul did nothing wrong, it was him. All of this was his fault. 

I nearly fall backwards as something grabs me by the collar and hauls me backwards. Elliot screams, desperately grasping for the hands on his back, before the vision rolls, blurring as he skids across the floor. 

"No, please," he breathes out, bringing his arms up as the assailant brings a fist up and knocks it across his face. I can make out the barest of features. This is what the detectives want.

"A half-orc woman. Green skin, dark brown hair."

She punches him again, the sickening crunch of his nose rattling my skull.

"Shouldn't'a left us, Ellie!" Another jab to the face. The image is still blurred, by tears and blood, but he manages to spit a tooth in her face. Good on you, Elliot.

I can only watch as Elliot tries to crawl away and is dragged back by the ankle and tossed into his desk like a dishrag. The vision goes black on impact, immediately followed by the crack of splintering wood. I wince in sympathy. That toss definitely broke some ribs. 

Elliot opens his eyes, blurry and blinking against the pain. It's like a slideshow of images, in each photo that half-orc woman moves closer. She kneels in front of Elliot, a hand reaching out to yank him by the hair and drag him across the floor. I hear her voice,  muffled like he has earmuffs on, and I hear her cackle. Elliot begs for his life, barely intelligible strings of words born of fear and desperation.

"No please, I'll double," "Make your dreams true," "Please, please, please don't hurt my dog."

Does he remember any magic from school? A basic defense spell, a ward against evil, anything? He raises his hand to cast a defensive spell, and his hand is slammed down against the ground for his effort. 

"You thought you could hide?" The boot on his hand grinds it into the ground. "You thought you could escape?"

I feel Elliot's panic rising, acid in the back of my throat. I want to scream, but the boot on my throat cuts off my air. 

"No--" He chokes out, begging over and over. 

They quickly draw a sigil with their index finger, a sigil I've never seen before. My stomach drops and I feel like I'm falling, the sheer depth of what's about to happen hitting me all at once. I'm going to die. She's going to kill me. I open my mouth to scream, but the woman sends the glyph with the flick of a finger and everything goes black. 

I come back to the world with a harsh inhale, grasping at my throat for the--no, that isn't me.

My head is spinning with memories I never experienced, sensations I've never felt. Coming out of soul imprints are always rough, but I've never had whiplash like this. It's hard to separate the vision from reality as the brain tries to consolidate the two. 

I squeeze my eyes shut against the headache forming under my temples, and blurt out the first thing that comes to mind. 

"Where's Paul?" 

The detectives look at each other, then to me. Martinez speaks up, "The dog has been taken to the pound."

The pound?! He'll never survive in--

No, wait. That's Elliot, still in my head. 

Okay, deep breath. In, then out. One more. Okay. The moment of silence stretches as I center myself again. I can feel both detectives staring at me, judging me. 

When I open my eyes, I'm blinded by the light streaming in through the far window. The early morning sun cuts the room into even thirds, and floods me in a sea of gold.  As my eyes adjust gradually to the light, I can make out the desk, nearly split in half. 

I relay Elliot's final moments to them, the more I talk the grimmer their faces become. Martinez takes notes as I speak, his heavy brow folding further and further inward as I go. 

Of the few cases I've consulted on, none have been a murder case. Memories are fickle things, easily manipulated or just flat out erased. It's why this ritual isn't taken seriously anymore, why it's not admissible in court. The brain is suggestible, temperamental. This assailant could wind up having the face of a dead relative, or transform into Paul the dog, it depends on the victim. But the face I see is the same one I saw in the back of the police car on the way here. The last moments of a soul can vary in presentation, depending on the manner of death, the memory of the passed, and a whole bunch of other things I don't have control over. 

As Martinez flips his notebook shut, the two of them share a look and then walk out of the room to talk, leaving me alone.

I stand, averting my gaze from the corpse of my friend, trying to look anywhere else. Elliot knew her, knew this woman, but he never mentioned any half-orc. Was she a vengeful ex, or maybe an old friend? The imprint didn't tell me much, but Elliot wasn't confused by her presence, he knew her from somewhere--but where?

A glint of light catches my eye, right under the desk. Like a bit of exposed metal or a screw. The curious part of my soul wants to pick it up, to have something of Elliot's that I can cherish. The coat is going in the donation pile-- knowing I never returned it will be a boon on my soul.

It's almost completely jammed inside the wood, my nails just long enough to pry it out without breaking any. Upon inspection, the piece isn't a piece at all--it's a button, about the size of a dollar coin. On the face is a sigil, but one that looks corrupted. It's similar to the symbols on Elliot's body, chaotic, with no flow to it. I've never seen it before. There's a splash of blood on one face, dark red and dried. Could it be important? It's small enough to miss on an initial sweep of the premise, and logic dictates that I should give it to the police. 

I go to the door, hoping to provide some useful information, when the voices of the two men make me stop.

"Did we really need her here? We have our murderer."

"I don't like it either, but the boss asked for her specifically. When that magic shit actually works it helps a lot, apparently."

"Well it didn't help today. She looked around and told us what we already knew."

"At least we don't have to pay her," the new one says, and Martinez scoffs a laugh. 

I scoff under my breath. They think I'm useless? Well, I'm going to find out what this button means--without their help. It slips easily to the bottom of my pocket when the two walk back in and I'm pretending to examine the cracked desk.

"Please don't touch anything," not-Martinez drones. "This is an active crime scene."

I put on my cheeriest face, the one I use when grouchy customers try to call me a hack when my luck charm didn't win them the lottery. "Of course not, detectives. Did you need anything else?"

Martinez offers me a sympathetic expression. "Do you have anything else to tell us?"

For a split moment, I fear my thievery has been discovered. My hand falls to my dress pocket where the button is stored, but neither of the detectives are looking at me accusingly. They're just bored. They're not after me, they want me gone.

"I wish I had more to tell," I confess, gesturing down to Elliot, but still resolutely not looking at him. "He knew the murderer--"

"Alleged," the new one  mutters.

"And I don't recognize any of these sigils." I sweep my arm over the circle on his body and the floor. Bright orange, arranged in a circle, the center right where Elliot's head should be.

"Well, thanks for the help," he mutters sarcastically.

"This is a pretty open and shut case," Martinez says, looking down at Elliot. "We have the perp in custody. Think you could magic up a better confession?"

The two of them share a chuckle, and I try not to seem too indignant as I force a smile. I know Martinez isn't being cruel on purpose, he's just a callous guy. I'm glad I don't work with him.

I step out of the room and I feel like I can breathe. There's another room to the right of me, filled with officers. That's Elliot's bedroom. I can walk in there as easy as breathing, I know there's a sliding glass door that leads to a balcony that overlooks the yoga studio across the street. The wheel on the door squeaks when it opens. 

Elliot's shop is next to mine, but his home is a few blocks away, about a ten minute walk in the opposite direction. I wonder if the shop is closed, or if his brother Brenan is running it today.

"Lucy!" Alma's voice rings out from the bottom of the stairs. She pushes through her subordinates, flitting over to me on her translucent pink wings. At first she seems excited to see me, but her face falls as she gets closer. "You look like hell."

I rub my arm. I just want to go. "Been a long day."

She reads something in my face, her brows pinching in concern. "Did you know him?"

I can't lie my way out of a paper bag, so I nod.

Alma grimaces. "Shit, I'm sorry. I wouldn't have asked if--"

"It's fine," I say in a rush. "Honestly if I had heard it from somewhere else I would've broken."

She rubs her hands up and down my arms. "If you're sure…"

I swallow past the lump in my throat. "Yeah, yeah."

"Were Martinez and Becker nice?"

I shrug and offer her a smile. "They were just doing their jobs."

She looks past me, and glares. She's a full head shorter than me, nearly my opposite in appearance. Short blonde hair, pale white skin, petite frame and an angular face. We've been friends since grade school, and she always has my back. "I'll talk to them later."

I cringe. "You really don't have to." I'd hate for her to yell at them over me, they were just doing their jobs.

She turns those hard brown eyes to me. "I asked you here for a reason. If they don't respect that, they need an attitude adjustment."

I pull her into my chest in a hug. "Thanks, Alma."

Her tiny hands pat my back reassuringly. "Go home and get some rest. You need a ride?"

"I'll walk." I pull back and Alma eyes me skeptically. "I need the fresh air, promise."

She squeezes my arm. "Call if you need anything, and I'll stop by on Friday."

After another hug, I start down the stairs and out the front door. I don't get very far before I'm stopped by Carlos, another relatively new officer who doesn't look up from his laptop to hand me a business card.

"If you think of anything, give us a call," he drones, and I slip the card, which presumably has his number on it, in my pocket. It's going straight in the garbage.

After another lengthy questioning session, some papers to sign stating my silence on the subject, and more condescending glances I really don't need, I'm finally allowed to step out of Elliot's home and into the street.

A crowd has gathered, just past the barricade setup by the department. Police lights and their bright yellow border spells are like magnets to the general populace. There's a group of reporters with their cameras and flash bulbs, surrounding several officers already trying to get as much information as possible out of them. 

I slink by unnoticed, and for that I'm glad. I push through the sparse crowd on the sidewalk and into the freedom of the street. It's a clear day, blue skies, the wind in my hair would be nice on the bike--

No, I don't have a bike.

The street is full of cars, the sidewalk full of pedestrians. Human, fae, fiend, and everything in between crowd around me, commuting to work, or going home, or even just out for a stroll. All of them blithely unaware that just around the corner, on the second floor of the suite, lies a dead man. And the world just keeps turning. It doesn't feel fair.

Categorizing what I need to do in my head is a decent enough distraction. Mrs. Kinoko ordered a long-lasting protective charm for her daughter that's moving at the end of the month, and I can work on that in my lunch. The Dredsy twins need their weekly cleansing water which I have waiting for them in the back room. A gentleman named Leon asked for a bundle of lavender charms for his home to ward of thieves.

I round the corner and nearly stop walking. There's a line outside my shop that reaches the next shop over. I walk past the black marble and darkened windows of Mr. Engstrom's clock repair, also taking the chance to catch a glimpse inside. Nothing, as usual. 

I walk to the front door and dissolve the seal keeping the door locked. “Good afternoon everyone, thank you for waiting!”

“You in trouble, hun?” Ms. Garrett asks with a smile. “The cops finally caught ya?”

“You know it,” I reply with a wink, and a few people chuckle.

There's a lot to do, a lot of orders to fill, and I'm jittery. This morning threw me off, toppled my plans. I have charms to make and talismans to saturate. The wards around the shop to notify me of theft are starting to dim so I need to reset those, and the sprigs of lavender growing in my windowsill are starting to sag, so I probably need to water them with extra love. There's just so much to do my head is spinning as everyone outside rushes into my shop.

"Do you have any more of this cream?"

"How about my Polly--you know her, right?--any charms to make her schooling go well?"

"Did you see all the police down the street?"

"Oh yes, I've seen them! Nasty business, that."

Conversation and the buzz of a busy afternoon flows over me like water, I'm so overstimulated that nothing has any meaning anymore. The talk of Elliot feels like a thorn in my side, something I need to square away for later. That's an issue for after the shop has closed, after everyone has gone home and I go upstairs to mourn in silence.

"Here Mrs. Briggs, give three doses to your husband and his arthritis should start to feel better."

"No--! Please don't touch that! It's decoration only!"

"Yes, I'm so sorry about that, let me offer you a refund."

I don't get a chance to think about much of anything. It's all turned into noise, a pleasant fuzz that surrounds my head like a raincloud. By the time the day is over, I'm collapsing into a hot bath and nearly falling asleep in it.

Only when I fold my dress over a chair does that button fall out of my pocket. I pick it up off the floor, examining it in the low light of the room. Taking it to the sink, I scrub the dried blood off, watching it swirl down the sink in a red-brown haze.

The button glows, a soft silver light projecting onto my hand. The corrupted glyph on both faces is apparent, and when I angle it away from my face, I see the glyph almost takes on the image of a face. It's got an angry expression, with horns jutting out from the head and cheeks.

The button catches the light again, reflecting the yellow glow of the room, and reflects onto my hand. Suddenly, the button glows red-hot, the sigil burning into my palm like a brand. I drop the button with a yelp, the smell of burnt skin invading my nose. Rushing to turn on the sink I run my hand under cold water to assuage the pain, and it helps a little, but when I pat my hand dry, in the center of my palm sits that corrupted sigil.

From my bathroom, I grab a salve, rubbing it over the burn mark and leaving the button on the counter. Sigils don't…do that. At least, no sigil I've come across has ever burnt me. Eyeing it from the bathroom like the button will grow legs and charge at me, I step into my room and shut the door. Today has been chaos, absolute chaos, and I don't have time for demonic buttons. I can worry about it tomorrow.

Hand throbbing, I fall into a fitful sleep, hoping tomorrow brings less heartbreak.

Chapter 2 >>

[thepremedthatwrites]

Things Have Changed

request: Can you plsss do a Peter x reader relationship where the reader is a family friend and Peter has always had a crush on her and idk ends up admitting it to her at night or something and things get very heated like smutty or whatever.

Did I decide to edit this a day early because I'm procrastinating my school work? Perhaps. But anyways, I hope you all like this fic!

warning: smut below the cut

I could feel the beginning of sweat start to drip down the side of my face as I squinted my eyes trying to see the others in the water. The sand was at the border of being too hot to stand on in bare feet, causing me to walk closer to the water where the cold ocean had cooled the ground. “C’mon (y/n)!” Lucy shouted over the sound of the waves crashing into the shore. “The water isn’t even that cold!”

This was a lie and we both knew it. The icy water brushed the tip of my toes as I held back a shudder. At least the water would help me cool off from the unforgiving sun. As I stood contemplating what to do, I felt a hand graze my back. I turned to see Peter walking by me, a grin on his face. “Too scared to run in, (y/n)?” he asked. That was enough to kick me into action as I started to follow him into the water.

“Of course not,” I replied, holding back the instinct to let out a gasp as the cold water wrapped itself around my stomach. Both of our parents stayed by the towels and umbrellas, leaving the ocean to their children as they drank and talked about whatever it is that adults talked about. The blue house that our families had rented stood tall and proud behind our parents, overlooking the beach and whatever sat beyond what reaches of the ocean we could see.

Peter and I came to a halt as we reached where Lucy and Edmund were. “Where’s Susan?” Ed asked as Peter dunked his head under the water.

“I believe she said she was taking a nap,” I replied as Peter’s head reappeared from the dark water. His blond hair was now pressed against his forehead and had become a few shades darker from the weight of the water.

“Watch out! Big wave!” Lucy just managed to shout out the words before my vision was painted white as the wave crashed down on us. I lost control of my body as I let the current drag me around like a rag doll until I felt myself crash into something solid. At first, I thought it was a rock before I felt a pair of strong arms wrap around my chest.

“Don’t worry, I got you.” I heard Peter say as my head broke the surface. I gulped in a deep breath of air, the oxygen reaching my lungs as I wiped the salt water out of my burning eyes.

“Thanks,” I managed as the taste of salt water danced down my throat.

“I think some of the water went up my nose.” I heard Edmund say while Lucy was pushing her hair that had been plastered in front of her eyes out of her face. I turned my head to look at Peter whose arms were still around me. The sudden realization of the situation finally dawned on me and I felt my face warm at the close proximity. Suddenly his arms felt like iron chains around me and I couldn’t ignore the feeling of their weight on me. Peter seemed to have also become aware of the sensation of our bodies pressed against each other as he slowly removed his arms from me.

“Sorry,” he said softly, his face now also a light shade of pink.

“Yeah, no worries,” I said quickly. I was suddenly thankful for the large wave coming our way as I turned to face it, focusing my thoughts on not being drowned by the rushing water.

“I almost drowned!” Lucy exclaimed as we all sat around the dinner table. It had been my mom’s turn to cook dinner and so she had made us all steak. I started to cut into the meat as Lucy told Susan all about our adventures in the water. Peter and I had become a bit more quiet since the incident in the ocean. I felt myself stealing glances at him every now and then. Sometimes he had already been looking at me too.

“I’m so happy you guys decided to join us here in the states.” I heard my mom say to the Pevensies’ parents. “I feel like we haven’t seen each other since we moved to America.”

“I know, it seems the kids are having a lot of fun hanging out again,” Mrs. Pevensie replied. I turned back to the conversation but could feel the burning glances Peter occasionally threw at me throughout dinner. I was thankful when dinner was over, trying to wash the dishes as quickly as possible and avoiding being near Peter as much as the confines of the kitchen allowed. The parents had disappeared, most likely to the balcony that overlooked the water to drink some more and catch up on what they had missed in the past five years. As soon as the dishes were done, I excused myself blaming my exhaustion on the sun and went to my room.

I was surprised when I woke up to a dark room. I had expected myself to be unable to sleep and instead toss and turn until the rest of the lights went out in the house. I got up from my bed, checking my phone to see it was around three in the morning. My stomach growled as I turned on my lights. It seems that pushing the food around your plate does little to actually satisfy your hunger. I paused at my mirror before leaving. I brushed out my hair and checked to see that the pajamas I wore were acceptable to be seen by the public. I wasn’t sure if I would run into Peter, he was most likely still asleep, but I wanted to play it safe. I wasn’t sure why I was so concerned about my appearance around him. When we were younger, before my family moved to America, I could have cared less about what he thought of my appearance. But then again, we had been younger then. Five years younger to be exact. We had grown since then. His shoulders had broadened and he had become taller. My body had developed curves where it used to be straight and I had finally grown into myself. We weren’t how we were back in the UK. We were older and more mature.

I shook the thoughts from my mind and opened the door to my room. I walked as quietly as I could past my parents’ room and then past all of the Pevensies’ rooms before reaching the stairs that led to the living area that held the kitchen. I opened the fridge as my stomach automatically growled at the sight of all the food. The best part of being on vacation was the fact that the fridge was always filled with leftovers from dinner. I settled on some of the mac and cheese, spooning some into a bowl before putting it into the microwave. I stood patiently as the whir of the microwave filled the silence that had settled into the room.

“What are you doing up?” I jumped at the voice before turning to see Peter standing by the entrance of the kitchen.

“I was hungry,” I said while pointing my head to the microwave. He walked over to me and I was suddenly thankful I had spent the extra time on my appearance before leaving my room. He wore only a pair of grey sweatpants. I couldn’t help myself and let my eyes wander his exposed abs. He definitely did not have those five years ago.

“I missed seeing you,” he said, causing my eyes to jump from his abs to his ocean blue eyes which I could easily drown in if I weren’t careful.

“Me too,” I replied, my voice much softer than I expected it to be. I cleared my throat before speaking again. “I missed having someone I could annoy like an older brother.” Peter’s face scrunched as he shook his head.

“Please don’t call me an older brother. That’s weird.” I raised an eyebrow at this, my heart racing. All this time I had thought he saw me as another little sister. But if that wasn’t the case, what did he see me as?

“And why is that?” I questioned. Peter’s face seemed to have reddened. I wasn’t sure if it had already been red from the sun and I just hadn’t noticed or if he was blushing. Before he could answer the microwave went off causing me to jump. Peter opened the door, taking the bowl out as steam rose from the food.

He set the bowl down on the counter before turning back to me. His eyes seemed to be studying me. I subconsciously bit my bottom lip in anticipation. I watched as his eyes followed the movement. “You’ve grown a lot since I last saw you,” he finally said.

“And so have you.”

“The thoughts I have about you…” Peter started as he walked closer to me, stopping so that we were almost pressed against each other. “They are not thoughts a brother has about his sister.” He leaned down towards my ear, his hot breath brushing the bare skin behind my ear and sending a shiver down my spine. “That is why it’s weird for you to call me an older brother.” My face must have been the color of a lobster at this point, and I was no longer afflicted with hunger. Instead, lust coursed through my veins. He paused for a moment as if in thought before pressing his lips on the same skin his breath had just caressed. I let out a soft sigh allowing my hand to grasp onto his strong bicep. My other hand had crept around to his stomach, tracing the abs I had just moments before been admiring. He moved his lips, kissing down my neck as I moved my head back to give him more access.

His hands wrapped around my waist before he lifted me into the air. I let out a gasp in surprise before my ass met the cool counter. His eyes looked me up and down, filled with lust and desire. “Has anyone told you how beautiful you are?” he asked. His hands were by my hips as his thumb traced shapes on my thighs. I found myself blushing at his words. Many people had called me beautiful before but the way he spoke it was the same way people sing praises to the gods they worship. He stepped towards me and I opened my legs for him so that he was as close as physically possible.

He stopped for a moment, his eyes meeting mine. They seemed to be saying all the things that had been left unsaid since we had reunited. You’re different. I’m different. These emotions are different. I love you. I wrapped my legs around him, forcing him closer (something I had not thought possible). His hands moved so that they were on either side of me, resting on the counter. My own hands were on his shoulders. I moved one so that it caressed his face. My mac and cheese sat patiently on the counter next to us, expecting to be eaten soon. I had a feeling the bowl would be staying there until the morning. Peter brought his face closer to mine. He paused for a moment, his eyes moving from my lips to my eyes. I gave a slight nod. Then, he kissed me.

We kissed and suddenly I understood what the authors of the romance books I used to read were writing about. He was like a drug. With each touch I needed more. With each kiss I craved just one more moment of the taste of his lips. My hands traveled to his hair as we continued to kiss. His hands wandered my back, traveling beneath the fabric of my t-shirt. I didn’t want to pull away. I wanted to stay like this for eternity. On the other hand, I wanted more. I wanted to connect us even more. I wanted him to fuck me.

I pulled back just long enough for my shirt to be discarded. Then I immediately reconnected our lips. I kissed him hungrily, as if those few seconds apart had left me famished. His hands slipped between us, holding my breasts. A small shudder went down my spine as his thumbs brushed my nipples. His hands continuously moved, as if they weren’t sure what to do with all the newly exposed skin. He squeezed my breasts before letting his hands travel down my stomach, gripping my waist harshly as we continued to kiss.

I could feel a growing wetness between my legs. The feeling of something hard being pushed against my inner thigh informed me Peter was just as turned on. He disconnected our lips, tasting my chin and then neck and then collar bone until he reached my tits. I attempted to catch my breath as his tongue flicked across my nipple. I let out a soft gasp as my back arched in pleasure. He started to suck on my tits, making sure to show great care and attention to both of them. His grip on my waist tightened and I was sure there would be a slight bruise in the morning. I couldn’t bring myself to care at the moment as that slight pain was the only thing keeping me grounded as pure pleasure pulsed throughout my body as Peter continued to kiss and suck and bite on the sensitive areas.

He stopped abruptly, standing upright and looking me directly in the eye. His erection that had been increasing in size and hardness was now protruding from his pants and pressing into the soft skin of my thigh. “When I was younger, I had always felt an attraction to you, (y/n),” he said. His voice was lower than usual and he seemed to be slightly out of breath as he spoke. “I never knew whether it was a friendly attraction or something stronger than that. But the moment I saw you for the first time in five years, I knew the feelings I felt for you...it wasn’t something most people feel. It was something so strong it took everything in me to not fall to my knees in defeat. In a happy defeat where I surrendered my heart to you.” I felt as if my heart was going to burst from my chest as I listened. “My body burns with desire for you (y/n). Please. Let me show you how you make me feel. Let me love you.”

I licked my lips, suddenly aware of how dry my mouth felt. I took a deep breath, hoping some of the fresh night air would clear my lust-clouded mind for a moment. “Yes,” I said. “Yes, yes, yes, yes. Yes a million times.” I could feel a large grin growing on my face and Peter was wearing a matching one. He grabbed my face in his hands before bringing us together for a kiss. It didn’t take long for the kiss to deepen as his hands left my face and traveled down my bare top before playing with the band of my shorts. I inched towards the edge of the counter before sliding off, our lips parting for a moment as my feet hit the ground before immediately reuniting.

He roughly pulled down my shorts and panties in one motion, letting the clothes hit the ground. I followed suit, pulling down his sweatpants and boxers. We parted for a moment, the moonlight shining through the window that sat over the sink allowing enough light so that I could see the true length of him. I had only a few moments to admire him, the thickness of his cock was sure to stretch me out deliciously, before he turned me around. I bent over the counter, the cool stone pressing against my naked skin. His hands gripped my hips to hold me in place before he pushed into me.

I let out a loud moan, causing him to put a hand over my mouth. He stayed in place, leaning over so that his mouth was next to my ear. “We have to be quiet. Unless you want both our families to see what we’re doing.” I nodded in understandance as he stood up straight again. He started by moving slowly. He pulled out halfway before pushing in all the way to the base. I felt my pussy flutter around him. He continued this slow rhythm for a while, testing out the water while stretching me out to fit him completely.

Once I felt myself start to adjust he started to go faster. I could feel the edge of the counter dig into my stomach each time my body was thrusted forward. My breasts moved in rhythm with Peter, my weight being supported by my forearms which were propped on top of the counter. His fingers dug into my hips as he fucked me. The kitchen was filled with the sound of skin slapping skin and our muffled moans as we did our best to stay quiet. The smell of sweat and sex hovered in the room. The moon acted as a spotlight for our indecent act. My vision was obstructed by my hair which was now a mess, strands of it sitting in front of my face.

“Peter, please,” I moaned quietly. I could feel myself getting closer, my legs now weaker than before as my arms were the only thing holding me up. Peter sensed this, using his hands that were on my hips to lift me up. I felt my mouth open, but no noise came out as my mind became overtaken with pleasure. I could hear Peter let out a groan as I felt myself collapse around him. I let my head fall forward as I attempted to recover from my orgasm. The pleasure started to become more bearable as Peter continued to fuck me. His thrusts were becoming more desperate. Just as I started to think he couldn’t be any rougher, he pulled out.

“Get on your knees,” he commanded. The way he spoke brought butterflies to my stomach. He spoke much more forcefully than before, his voice laced with lust as he was too concerned with his own release to speak gently to me. I obeyed, opening my mouth for him unprompted. I started moving my head for him, wanting to make him feel just as good as he made me feel. His head fell back as his hip thrusted forward. I fought back the reflex to gag as his cock buried itself deep within my throat. His hand pushed on the back of my head, keeping me in place as I felt the beginning spurt of a warm and bitter liquid shooting down my throat. I swallowed all of it greedily, wanting to have as much of Peter as I could.

As the last drop of his cum slid down my throat, he slowly pulled away. I wiped away the small dribble of drool that had fallen down my chin. I looked up at him and he looked down at me, a smile on his face. His hand ran down the side of my head before caressing my face. I slowly got up, my legs still slightly weak. “Wow,” I said, slightly out of breath. Peter let out a soft chuckle before pulling me in for a kiss. We quietly got dressed. Peter grabbed my hand, leading me to his room. Our clothes didn’t stay on for too long as they quickly found their way to his bedroom floor. The night was filled with whispers of confessions of love, hands in hair, and lips pressed on naked skin. The next morning I would wake up, afraid that it had all been a dream before I turned to see Peter’s face on the pillow next to me. Then, a smile matching Peter’s sleepy one would form on my face.

[plutodetective]

Since this was missing from today’s e-mails...

Dr. Seward’s Diary.

18 September.—Just off for train to London. The arrival of Van Helsing’s telegram filled me with dismay. A whole night lost, and I know by bitter experience what may happen in a night. Of course it is possible that all may be well, but what may have happened? Surely there is some horrible doom hanging over us that every possible accident should thwart us in all we try to do. I shall take this cylinder with me, and then I can complete my entry on Lucy’s phonograph.

DR. SEWARD’S DIARY

18 September.—I drove at once to Hillingham and arrived early. Keeping my cab at the gate, I went up the avenue alone. I knocked gently and rang as quietly as possible, for I feared to disturb Lucy or her mother, and hoped to only bring a servant to the door. After a while, finding no response, I knocked and rang again; still no answer. I cursed the laziness of the servants that they should lie abed at such an hour—for it was now ten o’clock—and so rang and knocked again, but more impatiently, but still without response. Hitherto I had blamed only the servants, but now a terrible fear began to assail me. Was this desolation but another link in the chain of doom which seemed drawing tight around us? Was it indeed a house of death to which I had come, too late? I knew that minutes, even seconds of delay, might mean hours of danger to Lucy, if she had had again one of those frightful relapses; and I went round the house to try if I could find by chance an entry anywhere.

I could find no means of ingress. Every window and door was fastened and locked, and I returned baffled to the porch. As I did so, I heard the rapid pit-pat of a swiftly driven horse’s feet. They stopped at the gate, and a few seconds later I met Van Helsing running up the avenue. When he saw me, he gasped out:—

“Then it was you, and just arrived. How is she? Are we too late? Did you not get my telegram?”

I answered as quickly and coherently as I could that I had only got his telegram early in the morning, and had not lost a minute in coming here, and that I could not make any one in the house hear me. He paused and raised his hat as he said solemnly:—

“Then I fear we are too late. God’s will be done!” With his usual recuperative energy, he went on: “Come. If there be no way open to get in, we must make one. Time is all in all to us now.”

We went round to the back of the house, where there was a kitchen window. The Professor took a small surgical saw from his case, and handing it to me, pointed to the iron bars which guarded the window. I attacked them at once and had very soon cut through three of them. Then with a long, thin knife we pushed back the fastening of the sashes and opened the window. I helped the Professor in, and followed him. There was no one in the kitchen or in the servants’ rooms, which were close at hand. We tried all the rooms as we went along, and in the dining-room, dimly lit by rays of light through the shutters, found four servant-women lying on the floor. There was no need to think them dead, for their stertorous breathing and the acrid smell of laudanum in the room left no doubt as to their condition. Van Helsing and I looked at each other, and as we moved away he said: “We can attend to them later.” Then we ascended to Lucy’s room. For an instant or two we paused at the door to listen, but there was no sound that we could hear. With white faces and trembling hands, we opened the door gently, and entered the room.

How shall I describe what we saw? On the bed lay two women, Lucy and her mother. The latter lay farthest in, and she was covered with a white sheet, the edge of which had been blown back by the draught through the broken window, showing the drawn, white face, with a look of terror fixed upon it. By her side lay Lucy, with face white and still more drawn. The flowers which had been round her neck we found upon her mother’s bosom, and her throat was bare, showing the two little wounds which we had noticed before, but looking horribly white and mangled. Without a word the Professor bent over the bed, his head almost touching poor Lucy’s breast; then he gave a quick turn of his head, as of one who listens, and leaping to his feet, he cried out to me:—

“It is not yet too late! Quick! quick! Bring the brandy!”

I flew downstairs and returned with it, taking care to smell and taste it, lest it, too, were drugged like the decanter of sherry which I found on the table. The maids were still breathing, but more restlessly, and I fancied that the narcotic was wearing off. I did not stay to make sure, but returned to Van Helsing. He rubbed the brandy, as on another occasion, on her lips and gums and on her wrists and the palms of her hands. He said to me:—

“I can do this, all that can be at the present. You go wake those maids. Flick them in the face with a wet towel, and flick them hard. Make them get heat and fire and a warm bath. This poor soul is nearly as cold as that beside her. She will need be heated before we can do anything more.”

I went at once, and found little difficulty in waking three of the women. The fourth was only a young girl, and the drug had evidently affected her more strongly, so I lifted her on the sofa and let her sleep. The others were dazed at first, but as remembrance came back to them they cried and sobbed in a hysterical manner. I was stern with them, however, and would not let them talk. I told them that one life was bad enough to lose, and that if they delayed they would sacrifice Miss Lucy. So, sobbing and crying, they went about their way, half clad as they were, and prepared fire and water. Fortunately, the kitchen and boiler fires were still alive, and there was no lack of hot water. We got a bath and carried Lucy out as she was and placed her in it. Whilst we were busy chafing her limbs there was a knock at the hall door. One of the maids ran off, hurried on some more clothes, and opened it. Then she returned and whispered to us that there was a gentleman who had come with a message from Mr. Holmwood. I bade her simply tell him that he must wait, for we could see no one now. She went away with the message, and, engrossed with our work, I clean forgot all about him.

I never saw in all my experience the Professor work in such deadly earnest. I knew—as he knew—that it was a stand-up fight with death, and in a pause told him so. He answered me in a way that I did not understand, but with the sternest look that his face could wear:—

“If that were all, I would stop here where we are now, and let her fade away into peace, for I see no light in life over her horizon.” He went on with his work with, if possible, renewed and more frenzied vigour.

Presently we both began to be conscious that the heat was beginning to be of some effect. Lucy’s heart beat a trifle more audibly to the stethoscope, and her lungs had a perceptible movement. Van Helsing’s face almost beamed, and as we lifted her from the bath and rolled her in a hot sheet to dry her he said to me:—

“The first gain is ours! Check to the King!”

We took Lucy into another room, which had by now been prepared, and laid her in bed and forced a few drops of brandy down her throat. I noticed that Van Helsing tied a soft silk handkerchief round her throat. She was still unconscious, and was quite as bad as, if not worse than, we had ever seen her.

Van Helsing called in one of the women, and told her to stay with her and not to take her eyes off her till we returned, and then beckoned me out of the room.

“We must consult as to what is to be done,” he said as we descended the stairs. In the hall he opened the dining-room door, and we passed in, he closing the door carefully behind him. The shutters had been opened, but the blinds were already down, with that obedience to the etiquette of death which the British woman of the lower classes always rigidly observes. The room was, therefore, dimly dark. It was, however, light enough for our purposes. Van Helsing’s sternness was somewhat relieved by a look of perplexity. He was evidently torturing his mind about something, so I waited for an instant, and he spoke:—

“What are we to do now? Where are we to turn for help? We must have another transfusion of blood, and that soon, or that poor girl’s life won’t be worth an hour’s purchase. You are exhausted already; I am exhausted too. I fear to trust those women, even if they would have courage to submit. What are we to do for some one who will open his veins for her?”

“What’s the matter with me, anyhow?”

The voice came from the sofa across the room, and its tones brought relief and joy to my heart, for they were those of Quincey Morris. Van Helsing started angrily at the first sound, but his face softened and a glad look came into his eyes as I cried out: “Quincey Morris!” and rushed towards him with outstretched hands.

“What brought you here?” I cried as our hands met.

“I guess Art is the cause.”

He handed me a telegram:—

“Have not heard from Seward for three days, and am terribly anxious. Cannot leave. Father still in same condition. Send me word how Lucy is. Do not delay.—Holmwood.”

“I think I came just in the nick of time. You know you have only to tell me what to do.”

Van Helsing strode forward, and took his hand, looking him straight in the eyes as he said:—

“A brave man’s blood is the best thing on this earth when a woman is in trouble. You’re a man and no mistake. Well, the devil may work against us for all he’s worth, but God sends us men when we want them.”

Once again we went through that ghastly operation. I have not the heart to go through with the details. Lucy had got a terrible shock and it told on her more than before, for though plenty of blood went into her veins, her body did not respond to the treatment as well as on the other occasions. Her struggle back into life was something frightful to see and hear. However, the action of both heart and lungs improved, and Van Helsing made a subcutaneous injection of morphia, as before, and with good effect. Her faint became a profound slumber. The Professor watched whilst I went downstairs with Quincey Morris, and sent one of the maids to pay off one of the cabmen who were waiting. I left Quincey lying down after having a glass of wine, and told the cook to get ready a good breakfast. Then a thought struck me, and I went back to the room where Lucy now was. When I came softly in, I found Van Helsing with a sheet or two of note-paper in his hand. He had evidently read it, and was thinking it over as he sat with his hand to his brow. There was a look of grim satisfaction in his face, as of one who has had a doubt solved. He handed me the paper saying only: “It dropped from Lucy’s breast when we carried her to the bath.”

When I had read it, I stood looking at the Professor, and after a pause asked him: “In God’s name, what does it all mean? Was she, or is she, mad; or what sort of horrible danger is it?” I was so bewildered that I did not know what to say more. Van Helsing put out his hand and took the paper, saying:—

“Do not trouble about it now. Forget it for the present. You shall know and understand it all in good time; but it will be later. And now what is it that you came to me to say?” This brought me back to fact, and I was all myself again.

“I came to speak about the certificate of death. If we do not act properly and wisely, there may be an inquest, and that paper would have to be produced. I am in hopes that we need have no inquest, for if we had it would surely kill poor Lucy, if nothing else did. I know, and you know, and the other doctor who attended her knows, that Mrs. Westenra had disease of the heart, and we can certify that she died of it. Let us fill up the certificate at once, and I shall take it myself to the registrar and go on to the undertaker.”

“Good, oh my friend John! Well thought of! Truly Miss Lucy, if she be sad in the foes that beset her, is at least happy in the friends that love her. One, two, three, all open their veins for her, besides one old man. Ah yes, I know, friend John; I am not blind! I love you all the more for it! Now go.”

In the hall I met Quincey Morris, with a telegram for Arthur telling him that Mrs. Westenra was dead; that Lucy also had been ill, but was now going on better; and that Van Helsing and I were with her. I told him where I was going, and he hurried me out, but as I was going said:—

“When you come back, Jack, may I have two words with you all to ourselves?” I nodded in reply and went out. I found no difficulty about the registration, and arranged with the local undertaker to come up in the evening to measure for the coffin and to make arrangements.

When I got back Quincey was waiting for me. I told him I would see him as soon as I knew about Lucy, and went up to her room. She was still sleeping, and the Professor seemingly had not moved from his seat at her side. From his putting his finger to his lips, I gathered that he expected her to wake before long and was afraid of forestalling nature. So I went down to Quincey and took him into the breakfast-room, where the blinds were not drawn down, and which was a little more cheerful, or rather less cheerless, than the other rooms. When we were alone, he said to me:—

“Jack Seward, I don’t want to shove myself in anywhere where I’ve no right to be; but this is no ordinary case. You know I loved that girl and wanted to marry her; but, although that’s all past and gone, I can’t help feeling anxious about her all the same. What is it that’s wrong with her? The Dutchman—and a fine old fellow he is; I can see that—said, that time you two came into the room, that you must have another transfusion of blood, and that both you and he were exhausted. Now I know well that you medical men speak in camera, and that a man must not expect to know what they consult about in private. But this is no common matter, and, whatever it is, I have done my part. Is not that so?”

“That’s so,” I said, and he went on:—

“I take it that both you and Van Helsing had done already what I did to-day. Is not that so?”

“That’s so.”

“And I guess Art was in it too. When I saw him four days ago down at his own place he looked queer. I have not seen anything pulled down so quick since I was on the Pampas and had a mare that I was fond of go to grass all in a night. One of those big bats that they call vampires had got at her in the night, and what with his gorge and the vein left open, there wasn’t enough blood in her to let her stand up, and I had to put a bullet through her as she lay. Jack, if you may tell me without betraying confidence, Arthur was the first, is not that so?” As he spoke the poor fellow looked terribly anxious. He was in a torture of suspense regarding the woman he loved, and his utter ignorance of the terrible mystery which seemed to surround her intensified his pain. His very heart was bleeding, and it took all the manhood of him—and there was a royal lot of it, too—to keep him from breaking down. I paused before answering, for I felt that I must not betray anything which the Professor wished kept secret; but already he knew so much, and guessed so much, that there could be no reason for not answering, so I answered in the same phrase: “That’s so.”

“And how long has this been going on?”

“About ten days.”

“Ten days! Then I guess, Jack Seward, that that poor pretty creature that we all love has had put into her veins within that time the blood of four strong men. Man alive, her whole body wouldn’t hold it.” Then, coming close to me, he spoke in a fierce half-whisper: “What took it out?”

I shook my head. “That,” I said, “is the crux. Van Helsing is simply frantic about it, and I am at my wits’ end. I can’t even hazard a guess. There has been a series of little circumstances which have thrown out all our calculations as to Lucy being properly watched. But these shall not occur again. Here we stay until all be well—or ill.” Quincey held out his hand. “Count me in,” he said. “You and the Dutchman will tell me what to do, and I’ll do it.”

When she woke late in the afternoon, Lucy’s first movement was to feel in her breast, and, to my surprise, produced the paper which Van Helsing had given me to read. The careful Professor had replaced it where it had come from, lest on waking she should be alarmed. Her eye then lit on Van Helsing and on me too, and gladdened. Then she looked around the room, and seeing where she was, shuddered; she gave a loud cry, and put her poor thin hands before her pale face. We both understood what that meant—that she had realised to the full her mother’s death; so we tried what we could to comfort her. Doubtless sympathy eased her somewhat, but she was very low in thought and spirit, and wept silently and weakly for a long time. We told her that either or both of us would now remain with her all the time, and that seemed to comfort her. Towards dusk she fell into a doze. Here a very odd thing occurred. Whilst still asleep she took the paper from her breast and tore it in two. Van Helsing stepped over and took the pieces from her. All the same, however, she went on with the action of tearing, as though the material were still in her hands; finally she lifted her hands and opened them as though scattering the fragments. Van Helsing seemed surprised, and his brows gathered as if in thought, but he said nothing.

[cozy-the-overlord]

Happiness

Summary: A daughter of Thanos, Eija had grown accustomed to the isolated nature of life on the Sanctuary. Only when her father orders her to keep watch over an injured prisoner does she begin to realize how lonely it is.

Written for @lucywrites02′s Lucywrites19 Writing Challenge on prompt #6

Word Count: 4,078

Pairing: Loki (Marvel) x OFC

A/N: Lucy: *puts together a list of really nice, sweet, loving prompts that would make for some wonderful, fluffy fics* 

Me: And I took that personally

Honestly, this turned into more of a separate challenge for me to see if I could take a fluffy prompt and write an angst bomb. I can say I’m both pleased and thoroughly ashamed of myself.

Happy Birthday, Lucy! I hope you don’t hate me too much after this one ...

Warnings: Implied/referenced torture (it’s not super graphic, but it’s definitely there), blood/injury, character death

Tags: @lucywrites02 @gaitwae @whatafuckingdumbass @the-emo-asgardian @imnotrevealingmyname

If you want to be tagged, feel free to send an ask/message :)

Read it on Ao3!

“Are you happy, child?”

It wasn’t the type of thing Eija had expected the hulking warrior to ask a street urchin like her, especially not after catching her wrist in his pocket. Really, she should have known better than to try to steal from someone so clearly capable of crushing her skull within his fist, but his golden armor had glistened so temptingly in the sunlight and besides, she had never been caught before …

When he caught her wrist and yanked her in front of him, Eija was sure that this was the end. The penalty for stealing was steep to begin with, but stealing from a noble (and certainly this man must have been a noble) could lose you your head. But he said nothing of punishment. Instead, he curled his purple lips into a smile and asked her that question.

“Are you happy, child?”

No one had ever asked her that before. No one ever really asked her anything—the most Eija ever got were the curses spat at her on the street, on the luckless days when pickpocketing had brought her nothing and she was forced to beg for sustenance. No one cared enough to ask after her.

No, she told the warrior-noble, no, she wasn’t happy. She was hungry and tired and cold, and she didn’t have money to buy food.

The towering creature laughed, caressing the brilliant hilt that hung at his waist. “I thought not. Come,” he said, stepping forward and motioning her to follow. “I have something for you to eat on my ship.”

…

Eija tugged at the laces on her boot. She had tied and untied them three times already, but she could think of nothing else to do in this tiny room, so she went in for the fourth. Besides her, the Jotun sagged against his braces in the metal chair, his labored breathing the only sound to break the stillness. He didn’t look very Jotun. Lord Thanos had explained that it was some kind of enchantment—the AllFather had magicked away his blue skin when he was a baby to make him look more Asgardian. Eija didn’t really understand the reasoning behind such an action, but she didn’t need to. Her job was simply to make sure he survived the night.

It was a frustrating assignment. Eija wasn’t a healer—she had no idea what she was supposed to do if death came knocking for the prisoner. Unfortunately, she wasn’t exactly an assassin either, and so unlike the rest of her adoptive siblings her role on the Sanctuary wasn’t considered to be of critical importance.

So here she was. Babysitting.

The Jotun groaned. It was a soft noise, but it was enough to rip Eija’s attention away from her shoes. He shifted against his restraints, but there was no force behind the movements.

“Hey,” she called. “Are you awake?” She shouldn’t have been talking to the prisoner. Somehow, she knew Lord Thanos wouldn’t like it if he were to find out. Still, the metallic room housed a lonely existence, and Eija was desperate for any kind of distraction.

Although the prisoner didn’t exactly seem to be the ideal conversation partner. He flinched at the sound of her voice, his feeble movement falling still as abruptly as it began. Perhaps she should have gone back to her laces, but Eija was intrigued. She left her stool to stand before the Jotun, peering down at him through his shackles.

“Are you awake?” she asked again. He didn’t respond. His eyes were closed, his head hanging limply against his shoulders, as if he hadn’t just been rustling about. The thought of some grand Jotun (Asgardian?) prince trying to trick her by playing dead was so comical that Eija had to bite back her laugh.

“Hey,” she said instead, trying to add some of that Black Order sharpness to her voice as she tapped his arm. “Knock it off. I know you’re awake.”

He looked up at her then, his movement slow and labored. It almost made her wince, just looking at the way he struggled to open his bloodshot eyes. Lord Thanos had allowed Proxima charge of the Jotun today, and she had clearly made the most of it—his face was so swollen that she never would have recognized the man Corvus had pulled out of the depths of space only a week ago.

“What do you want?” he whispered, voice low and hoarse. He was making a valiant effort to control his breathing, but Eija knew the look of fear when she saw it. She had seen it in the faces of almost everyone who found themselves in the presence of Lord Thanos and his children, although those faces were never focused on her. This must have been the first time she was the cause of such terror.

It was an odd feeling. Eija wasn’t sure she liked it.

She shrugged, dropping the serious tone. “I just wanted to talk to someone. It gets very dull in here.”

The prisoner only stared at her.

No, not the ideal conversation partner at all.

Eija sighed. It seemed she’d be returning to her shoelaces in short time after all.

“Can you tell me your name at least?” she asked. No one had mentioned it yet, and Eija had been afraid to inquire. Lord Thanos hadn’t been particularly happy when he gave her this assignment—his anger had been more directed at Proxima, for nearly killing the prisoner, but Eija didn’t want to give him a reason to turn on her. She wasn’t often the target of the Mad Titan’s fury, but the few times she was were enough of a lesson for a lifetime.

But the Jotun made no response. “Is this a trick?” he asked finally.

“No. I’m just curious.” A strand of black hair had fallen into his eye. Eija was tempted to brush it away, but she held herself back. “I’ll tell you my name, if it makes you feel better,” she offered.

She waited a moment for him to give some kind of answer. He didn’t.

“Eija,” she said. “My name’s Eija.”

He inhaled. “Did he send you to kill me?”

The question caught her off guard, although perhaps it was fair. “What? No, no I’m just— no,” she stuttered. “I don’t … kill people.”

He eyed her, unconvinced. “Why are you here, then?”

“To make sure you don’t die,” she said. “They were worried, you know.” Proxima had been quite proud of herself. Eija had overheard her bragging to some of the others earlier in the day about how she had the little prince calling out for his mother by the end. They had been laughing about it, how quickly he had succumbed to childish instincts, but the thought intrigued Eija.

She had never known her mother. Before Lord Thanos had found her, she had had no one but herself, scrounging up what food she could from what she stole on the street. She never cried for anyone, no matter how frightened she was. She had no one to cry for.

She wondered what it was like.

“Are you truly not going to tell me your name?” she asked. It was a bit disappointing. She had hoped he’d be at least a little more interesting than this.

He swallowed slowly, painfully. Whereas before it seemed he was afraid to take his eyes off of her, now he seemed unable to meet her gaze.

“Loki,” he finally whispered.

“Loki,” Eija repeated. The name made her smile, although she wasn’t quite sure why it would. “It’s nice to meet you, Loki.”

She asked him more questions as the night went on—questions about his home, his family, his childhood memories. At first, he wouldn’t answer any of them. He’d just stare at her blankly as she posed her queries or whip his head away as if he couldn’t stand to be faced with the words.

So, she changed tactics. She told him about growing up on Knowhere, before Thanos found her, about how when she was not yet six years of age the man she had known as her father dumped her on the side of the road and flew away into permanent obscurity, and about how she taught herself how to reach into another’s pocket and pull out exactly what she was looking for by practicing on the other unsuspecting urchins who lived alongside her on the street. It was strange, to relieve those stories before an audience. Because he was an audience, like it or not. He was listening to every word she said, even more so, she suspected, than he wanted to let on.

When she left that morning, after Corvus came to take over for the day, her throat was so dry she could barely speak. It was a nice kind of dry, though. The Black Order never demanded her voice anyways, so it wasn’t a noticeable inconvenience.

It was worth it.

“You again,” Loki muttered when she slipped into the cell the following evening. “Eija.”

“Hey!” she exclaimed. “You remembered my name!”

“You talked a lot.” He blinked sleepily. “You had a nice voice.”

Eija stopped. She wasn’t certain she heard him incorrectly. “What?”

He yawned. “You had a nice voice.”

She felt a flush rising in her cheeks. It was quite possibly the kindest thing anyone had ever said to her, as ridiculous as it seemed. Eija doubted her siblings could even recognize the sound of her voice—if they did, it would have been to scold her for stepping so far out of line, certainly not to pay her a compliment.

“If you’d like,” she said eagerly, pulling the stool across the room so she could sit next to him. “I can tell you more stories?”

It became the part of the day Eija looked forward to most—the moments where she could talk for hours about anything she wanted, without the ever-present fear of her siblings’ mockery or the Mad Titan’s chastening. It felt … safe, in a way that she hadn’t felt safe before. Warm. She always felt so alone on this ship, wasting away whilst awaiting orders. There were points where even her own thoughts seemed to abandon her to the darkness.

But not here. Not with Loki.

He seemed to enjoy it as well. Of course, she held no illusions that he was quite literally a captive audience, but he listened. He remembered the things she said to him. On good days, he’d even ask her questions, add in thoughts and stories of his own.

“You said you don’t kill people,” he asked suddenly, on one such visit. “Did you mean that?”

Eija shifted uncomfortably. This had always been an awkward subject. “Yes,” she said. “I’m not an assassin. I don’t have the training.”

“What do you do here, then?”

She inhaled. “Steal things.”

“Steal things?” he repeated. “What kind of things?”

Eija shrugged. “Anything he wants,” she said. “Weapons, passkeys, precious gems—whatever.” She remembered that day, when Lord Thanos had taken her from the streets to his ship, what he had said as she devoured the soup his servant placed in front of her.

“I have more trained killers than I know what to do with,” he told her. “But perhaps I could use a sneak thief.”

Eija had agreed to everything he said— it wasn’t as if she was in any position to refuse him, and besides, anything had to be better than sleeping in a trash bin. And so, she became the Titan’s personal retriever, sneaking her way across the galaxy and returning with the treasures he coveted in her pockets. Her methods were straight and to the point. She was in and out before anyone even noticed her presence, and, unlike her adopted siblings, there wasn’t a trail of bodies left in her wake.

“But if your role is to steal things,” Loki asked. “Then what are you doing with me?”

Eija didn’t answer right away. Thanos had not ordered her to continue her night watch over the Jotun prisoner. He hadn’t said that she couldn’t, but she was fairly certain that he wouldn’t be pleased to find that she had. What was she doing here?

“I just like to talk to somebody, I guess,” she said. “Besides, somebody has to make sure you make it through the night.”

Although it became exceedingly clear with each passing day that such a task may be outside of her abilities. One night, she could hear his hacking all the way down the hall, rattling the walls as she rushed to his side. She found him sagging limply against his shackles, soaked in blood and sweat and goodness knows what else as he choked on his own breath.

Eija didn’t know what to do—she could only wipe the blood from his face and hold the bottle of water to his lips.

“What does he want from me?” he croaked, once he could finally speak. There were tears running down the creases of his face, although whether that was from emotion or pain Eija couldn’t be sure. “Why is he doing this to me?”

For once, she said nothing. She had no answer for him.

She tried asking Gamora once. It was no secret that the Zehoberei was Lord Thanos’ favorite—if he were to tell anyone his intentions for the prisoner, it would be her.

But the assassin gave her nothing. “He has a use in mind,” she said. “Don’t question him.”

“But,” Eija hesitated. “If that’s the case, why is he hurting him?” She gulped. “If he has a use for him, shouldn’t he be … using him?”

Gamora glared at her. “If he’s not strong enough to survive this, he’s not strong enough to do Thanos’ bidding.” Her tone lowered in warning. “Remember your place.”

Eija did remember her place. She was reminded of it with every passing moment—leashed to her lord’s beck and call, every day walking that delicate tightrope of anticipating his wishes without asserting herself too far in his eyes, living in fear of the day when the bottom finally fell through and he decided to unsheathe the blade at his waist.

Was this his plan for Loki as well? Torture him to death’s edge until it pleased him to make him yet another glorified slave? She thought of Loki, shackled to his chair, heaving and coughing up blood, sentenced to wither away until Thanos found use for him … for what? The mere crime of existence?

And here she was, letting it happen, watching as Thanos sucked the life out of him, simply using him as a receptacle to her own selfish need for attention.

She was just as awful.

But there was nothing she could do about it. Was there?

Unless …

The thought started as a hypothetical. Isn’t that how all treason began? A tiny what-if, buried under one’s daily worries? The hangers of the Sanctuary were hardly well-guarded. There was little reason to guard them, after all—few on this vessel had cause to sneak off of it, and those who did hadn’t the opportunity. And with the current position they had been holding the last few days, only a small way from the Krylor jump point, which could then take you down through one of the major galactical traffic-ways …

Stealing a ship would be almost too easy.

It wouldn’t work, she told herself as she stood amongst her siblings in Thanos’ court. The ship was one thing, the passenger was something else entirely. Loki’s chains were specifically designed by the Mad Titan to stifle the magic of that whom they held. They were the very definition of unbreakable. And the key—Thanos kept it on his person at all times, hooked to his belt alongside his blades. Any scheme was doomed to fail.

But sometimes, opportunities present themselves.

“And where are you going, child?”

Eija jumped out of her skin when she turned the corner and nearly collided with the lord himself. It took her a moment to find her voice.

“To watch over the prisoner, as you ordered, sir.”

He frowned. “That was weeks ago. You’re not still doing that now?”

She bit her tongue, so hard it hurt. “W-with all due respect sir, you never told me to stop.”

“Well, I’m telling you now. Such action is no longer necessary.”

“Yes sir.” She nodded. “Apologies, sir.”

Eija stood there shaking long after he had continued down the hall. Her heart felt as if it might pound its way out of her chest. He had to have noticed. In a moment, he’d come storming back up the corridor, grab her by her neck, and crush her skull against the wall.

But he never did.

It was just Eija, alone in the hallway, clutching the golden key between her trembling fingers.

There was little time. Her theft could only go overlooked for so long. She didn’t have the chance to question herself as she rushed to Loki’s cell—any moment spent in doubt was a moment wasted.

Loki seemed to be unconscious when she first arrived at his side, but he popped up with a start the moment she reached for his chains.

“What—" he gasped, eyes wild. “What’s happening?”

The key clicked in the lock. He heaved a breath, falling forward as the shackles fell open.

“You’re going home.” Eija’s mind was racing at a mile a minute. They couldn’t steal a Q-ship—it was too big; they’d would be noticed immediately … “Can you fly a pod?” she asked.

He gulped. “Possibly?”

“Good enough.” She pulled him to his feet. It was at this moment she became aware of the fact that she had only every seen him seated. Loki was tall. Much, much taller than her, and when he sagged against her it took all of her strength to keep him from tumbling to the metallic floor. For a moment she feared that he was too weak to even stand on his own and nearly panicked, because oh goodness how was she supposed to carry him all the way to the hanger—

But he managed to stabilize himself, gripping her shoulder so tightly that she lost feeling in it, but standing on his own. Slowly, she was able to walk him into the hallway.

The hanger was only a few floors above them, but the elevator ride felt like an eternity.

Don’t stop, don’t stop, don’t stop …

If it stopped before they reached their destination, they were both dead.

Besides her, Loki’s breathing was labored. He hadn’t said anything since she had come to get him.

She squeezed his forearm, hoping he couldn’t feel how she was trembling like a leaf. “You alright?”

He nodded weakly. “I assume you have a plan?”

“The pods are lined on the far wall of the hanger.” She inhaled. “When the door opens, we run like mad and get you on one. And then you take off for the jump point, and don’t stop until you’ve hit traffic.”

Loki turned to her, brow furrowed. “What about you?”

She raised her eyebrows. “Me?”

“Yes. Surely you’ll not stay here?”

Eija gulped. There wasn’t time to think about that now.

The elevator doors clicked open to reveal a thicket of barbed shadows and twisted metal. The hanger was lifeless and barren this time of night, lit only by the glow of the cosmos streaming in through the glass. They made their way in perfect silence, the only sound being the pounding of her heartbeat behind her eardrums. Every dark shape seemed like a waiting figure. Now, it was Eija that clung to him too tightly, terrified that at any moment someone would jump out and rip him from her grasp. By the time they reached their destination, they were both wildly out of breath.

The pods were small, thin one-man transports. Calling them ships was really being too generous. They weren’t really meant for long term travel, but they could work for a few jumps—long enough to get to civilized airspace, which was all he needed. She helped Loki into the compartment, careful to keep him from hitting his head on the low ceiling. This damn ship had caused him enough pain already.

He sighed, leaning against the seat in one short moment of rest before turning back to her. “You still haven’t said what you plan to do.”

Eija hesitated. What could she plan to do? She had nothing waiting for her beyond this ship. As with all of his children, Thanos held a piece of her that he would never relinquish, no matter how far she flew.

“I’ll stay here,” she murmured. “For now, at least. They might pick up on something if too much is out of place.”

“But—"

“Please,” Eija hissed. “You remember what I said, right? Take the Krylor jump, and just keep towards Xandar.” She inhaled so deeply it hurt, trying to bury the aching dread building in her chest. “Stay with the crowds whenever you can—he won’t bother with you if it means he has to go through heavy populations.”

Loki nodded, but she wasn’t certain he was listening. There was a sadness behind his eyes that seemed to pierce her very soul. He squeezed her hand, pressing her knuckles to his lips in the lightest of kisses.

“Thank you, Eija,” he whispered. “May fate be kind to you.”

…

The alarm went off some hours later, when morning dawned upon an empty cell. They came for her only minutes after. Eija hadn’t been certain of what she would do—would she scream when they broke down her door? Cry for help? Fight for her life? But as the Black Order filed into her room with their weapons drawn, Eija felt only an overwhelming calm. It was good that they were here. The longer they spent with her, the more of a chance Loki had of getting away.

She went with her adoptive siblings willingly.

They took her to the same tiny room where this had all begun, shackled her to the same chair she had watched over so diligently. Eija barely registered it.

Surely, Loki was hundreds of star systems away from here now.

Surely he was safe.

When the pain did come, it filled every fiber of her being, burning through her body as if she were nothing but dry kindling. Her vision bled white. Her screams ripped her throat raw.

They asked no questions. She was relieved for that at least, because her every coherent thought shattered to pieces long before it could reach her lips.

She understood now why Loki had cried for his mother. She would have too, had she a mother to cry for. Instead, she just cried.

Eija wasn’t certain how much time had passed before he arrived. It could have been hours, it could have been months, but at some point when she dragged her aching head to look up she found Lord Thanos staring down at her, the stony weight of disappointment heavy on his features.

Gamora stood next to him. She spared a glance at her former sister, softer, sadder, almost sympathetic, before she turned back to her father.

“Sir, the Jotun is out of tracking range. There’s nothing we can do at this point.”

Out of range.

Eija thought of Loki, raven hair streaming in the breeze behind him as he pulled himself out of the craft, safe on some green, luscious, faraway planet that the Black Order could never reach. She smiled, blood dripping from her lips.

Thanos’ expression remained immovable.

“Well, child,” he finally said, looking down at her as he caressed the glinting hilt at his waist. “Look upon this mess. See what you have done. Are you happy now?” He reached out with his other hand, tipping her chin up towards him with a single finger, as if the mere thought of touching her disgusted him. “You look happy.”

Eija felt a laugh tickle her throat. It came out as more of a cough, blood and bile staining her tongue. Still, she could not bring herself to stop smiling.

“I am happy, sir.”

It was true. A beautiful warmth flooded her aching chest. She laughed again, closing her eyes and letting the feeling wash over her.

She was still laughing when the blade severed her throat. 

[rare-spirit]

```

I nearly jump out of my skin. Enté barks and jumps off the bed to the window and starts licking it. I see a shadow outside my window and roll my eyes. Once my heart falls out of my throat back into my chest, I walk to the window and unlatch it. “You son of a bitch! You scared me.”

Keaton climbs through the window and into my room, just like he’s done hundreds of times before. He’s wearing a white t-shirt he always sleeps in and flannel pajama bottoms that are green and blue. “Hey boy!” He greets Enté by rubbing both of his ears rapidly. You never would have guessed Enté was knocked out for a solid three hours just before this. “I can’t sleep.”

I lock the window again, not sure why I locked it in the first place. Keaton was always crawling through it at least three nights a week. We still acted like we were kids. “The idea of your sister getting married and flying off keeping you awake?”

Keaton shot me a look and sat on my bed with his back against the wall. Enté collapsed in his lap. “She’s not flying off, AJ. She’s going on a honeymoon, not running away. She still has a kid.”

I sat with my back against the headboard and pull the covers over my legs. I look at the other side of the room and see the outline of my desk and my computer in the shadows. The void was gone. I rubbed my face and groaned. “Fucking pills.”

Keaton kept scrubbing behind Enté’s ear, making his leg kick in the air. “I take it you can’t sleep, either?”

“When have you ever known me to get a solid night’s sleep?”

“There was that one time in junior year when you-”

“Fuck, Keaton.” I knew where he was going with that. I don’t need to recall the night I mixed a number of substances to dull whatever rioting teenage emotions I was experiencing. I couldn’t even if I had wanted too. But Keaton, for some reason, loves to bring it up. Probably because he was as sober as a priest the night. I can’t remember why I was the only one who wanted to get that fucked up. But that’s been my signature move. If I can have fun while forgetting every stupid thing I do or say while doing it, then why not?

“You must have slept for fourteen hours straight.” There it was, Keaton’s smile that I was thinking about just before that void showed up again. It pulled his whole face up and dimpled his cheeks. He was always outstandingly attractive, even by model standards. He looked like he was crafted with care and precision to be a Greek god. Lucy was the same, always out-of-this-world beautiful. Every time she saw me, her brows came together like two magnets and her pink pout turned into a frown. But she was still gorgeous.

I hummed and brushed Enté’s tail on my lap. “Where can I get Jäger and drugs at 4am?”

It was a joke, but Keaton shook his head with partial disappointment. He didn’t like that part of me. As if that were even possible. But if it were, he would like me less when I’m not sober. I don’t know if it was because he was so straight edge (he grew up with strict Christian parents, church every Sunday, bible study every Wednesday), or if it was because he genuinely didn’t like seeing how I can get. “You can’t show up to the wedding tomorrow hungover.”

“I can’t show up at all because I’ll be sleeping for fourteen hours.” Keaton punched my leg through the covers, and I snorted. It wasn’t abnormal for Keaton to be awake this late before a big event. He used to climb through my window every night before a test. The poor thing had crippling test anxiety and couldn’t do anything but study through the night. He always made perfect scores. Mom told me once if I put in half the effort, that could be me, too. No, thanks. I have enough anxiety already. Is what I told her. “How are you holding up?”

The smile on Keaton’s face had faded. It was still there, but in ghost form. He continued to pat Enté’s head, who had his mouth closed and was nodding off again. “It’s weird. I know she’s not going anywhere. But it’s still weird. Knowing that she’s committing herself to some guy for the rest of her life.”

“Some guy?”

Keaton shook his head. “I take that back. That’s not fair. Shino is a really good guy. He takes care of her, and he wants nothing for the best for her like I do. I just can’t help but feel like she won’t need me anymore because she’ll have him.”

I nodded and listened. It’s what I did best. If I opened my mouth, I would just end up saying stupid shit. This is how we do things. Keaton vents to me, I keep my mouth shut, and he talks out his problems on his own.

```

[antique-symbolism]

My Writing vs. The Inspiration

It isn’t often that I can identify the direct inspiration for a passage I wrote, so on this rare occasion that I can, I thought it would be fun to put my writing right next to the passage that inspired it!

Here’s an excerpt of my current WIP, Miniature Roses, side by side with Olivia Waite’s The Lady’s Guide to Celestial Mechanics:

Miniature Roses:

“Must you go immediately?” Ruzena asks. “I do have something for you.” 

Could this be the surprise she spoke of last week? Overcome by the desire to know what such a surprise could be, I say, “I can stay a few minutes longer.”

With a small smile, she opens the right drawer of the desk and pulls out a small cloth bundle, setting it into my hands. I temper my excitement with every possible effort to open it slowly and appreciatively, pulling the folds of the cloth out to reveal a small hoop face down, holding its own taut piece of fabric. When I turn it over my breath is stolen from my chest. 

What I hold before me may as well be a painting for all its gorgeous detail, the way so many shades of similar colours fold in on each other to create shadow and depth. Laid meticulously out in fine thread is the soft yellow glow of my lantern illuminating the wildflowers in infinite variations of pink and white. They spread out in swirls, the green grass that surrounds them fading slowly into the grey shadows of the treeline as the floss stitches itself further and further from the light. 

I am speechless, almost afraid to touch the shimmering, blended lines for fear that I might somehow pull one loose. “Ruzena, this is…” What word could possibly do such a piece justice? “Magnificent.” Though it does not come close, it is the only word my lips can find. 

I had no idea embroidery could be so complex, so beautifully realistic, but it is more than that that sends butterflies in flight to my stomach. She put her immeasurable talent and untold hours into this, and she chose not just any subject as her muse, but a moment we shared together as I taught her something new. “This is the most wonderful thing anybody has ever given to me.”

The Lady’s Guide to Celestial Mechanics, by Olivia Waite:

"A little something I've made," the countess said. She smiled, not without some anxiety. "A gift." 

Lucy sat straight up in astonishment. "A gift for me?" 

Lady Moth's laugh was always soft, as if it had been packed away in an attic for too long, unused. "Who else?" 

Lucy shook her head, feeling silly, and reached out a hand. The fabric unrolled and revealed itself to be a generous shawl, and Lucy choked back a gasp. 

She'd thought at first it was an ocean blue, but there in front of her was spread the whole night's sky. 

Each edge of the shawl glittered with comets, icy silver spheres made of spiking stitches, a few with long wispy tails of single strands stretching out towards the center of the fabric. Arranged in a line, they formed shapes like classical columns, or arches on some Palladian monument. Between these edges was a vast, starry expanse, tiny glass spangles scattered across the blue like diamonds on velvet. Lucy's trained eye picked out the familiar patterns at once - there was the boxy bulk of Ursa Major, and spiky Cassiopeia the jealous queen, and the broad shoulders of Orion the hunter. She looked back again in wonder at the comet border, marveling at the subtle color variation in the silk theads. Silver and white and gold and even a hint of palest green, each thread as precisely placed as a brushstroke on a portraitist's masterpiece, giving the impression that each comet was still somehow streaking across the nighttime sky on its impossible journey. 

She wanted to wrap the whole thing around herself like armor - and oh, wouldn't it make the most of all her gowns in their simple lines and mourning colors? Her lavenders and grays would look restrained and mature, rather than simply undecorated.

"Do you like it?" Lady Moth asked.

Lucy looked up, English and French and the language of astronomy spinning madly together in her brain. "I am trying very hard not to cry on you again," she stammered, "but it's difficult - because this may be the single loveliest thing I have ever seen."

[sgtbradfords]

If you have the time, could you do a Tucy fic where Lucy freaks out and Tim is the only one able to calm her down please?

Well this one turned out different... Thanks for the request anon and I hope you enjoy!

“Any available unit, 7900 block of Oceanside Boulevard.”

Lucy Chen let out a sigh, reaching for the mic attached to the dash. “7-Adam-21 dispatch, go ahead.”

“21, took a call about a possible 459 in the area of 7906 Oceanside Boulevard. Caller was unable to give a description but did advise that someone had entered the building.”

“7-Adam-21, show me en-route.” She responded, placing the mic back onto the dash as her right hand flipped the switch for the lights of the shop before hitting the button for the sirens.

“7-Adam-19, show me en-route as well.” Came the voice of her former training officer, Tim Bradford through the speaker of the handheld.

Lucy arrived on scene six minutes later, pulling the shop to a stop in front of what looked to be an abandoned building, opening the door of the car as Tim’s shop pulled in beside hers.

“Hey, you see anything?” Tim asked as he walked to her side, keeping his right hand on the butt of his holstered gun.

“No.” she shook her head, queuing the radio on her shoulder. “21 to dispatch. Show myself and 19 on scene.” She said before releasing the small black button as her hand went to her hip, undoing the clasp on her own holster, drawing her weapon. Tim moved first, his fingers undoing the clasp of his holster with ease, removing the weapon.

The approached the door on the corner of the building, finding the metal entry slightly ajar.  Lucy held a fist up, undoing the clasp on her holster, drawing her weapon as Tim quickly followed suit, his fingers undoing the clasp of his own holster with ease, removing the weapon. She clicked the button for the flashlight on her gun, emitting a bright glow in stark contrast to the night as Tim done the same.

Tim nodded, as Lucy grasped the metal door, pulling it back and open. “LAPD!” she yelled as they breeched, the light being casted from their weapons making the place glow, specks of dust floating in the beams.

Lucy moved down the right side of the room they were in, Tim on her left as they approached the back wall, a closed door was off centered to the right, a large windowpane on the left.

Tim caught the movement on the other side before Lucy could move, neither able to speak as the glass splintered and shattered in front of them, bullets whizzing by.

“Lucy!” He yelled as he moved, tackling her to the ground, her back landing hard on the floor as his weight landed on top of her. He rolled off quickly, scrambling to crouch on the floor as Lucy recovered, kneeling beside him.

Tim glanced at Lucy, his heart pounding in his chest as the last few bullets in the magazine was fired by the suspect into the space they had previously harbored.

Tim planted his back on the wall, near the handle of the door as Lucy placed herself on the opposite side of the doorframe.

Lucy could feel her heart rate increase as she chanced a glance at Tim beside her. Tim looked out at the scene laid out in front of him. Evidence of what had occurred moments ago littered the ground, shards of glass were spread out, vast and plenty. He glanced a Lucy, both their weapons held steady in front of their waists.

Tim placed a hand on the knob, nodding at Lucy as he pulled the entry open.

The man before them was taken by surprise, his right hand gripping the gun as his left was in the process of pulling back the slide as Tim stood before him, the officer aiming his gun center mass.

“Drop it.” Tim ordered as Lucy stood by his side, glancing around the enclosed room for any abnormalities and all possible exits, making mental note of the window on the back wall.

The man smirked, “You think I won’t go down without a fight?”

“No, but life is full of second chances and I think you need to rethink what your about to do. Put the gun down.” Tim ordered once again.

“What makes you think I’m by myself?” said the man as he gestured behind them.

Lucy whipped around, her back to Tim as she shinned her flashlight and gun into the dark of night for someone that may be lurking in the shadows.

“And, are you?”

The scene played out in slow motion before him, the gun was aimed at Lucy’s turned back and the man’s finger pulling the trigger as the bullet was forced out of the barrel.

Tim fired without hesitation, hitting the man in the chest as a shot sounded from behind. He didn’t have the chance to check on his partner, moving to the man that was laying on the floor, securing the weapon that had fallen out of the suspects hand as another shot sounded.

“Chen!” he yelled looking up as the air around him became distorted from the bullet that whizzed by. Tim placed two fingers to the neck of the man on the floor. “Damn.” He cursed, standing as another bullet flew by, his back rapidly hitting the wall next to the open door.

“Tim.” Lucy sighed from beside him, her back planted on the wall in between the door and the indoor window as she lowly spoke. “I think there’s only the one shooter.”

“Let’s not find out.” Tim whispered back to her, grabbing the radio from his shoulder. “7-Adam-19 to Dispatch. Shots fired at our location. Requesting backup, airship, and EMS to our location. One suspect is down, not breathing. Myself and 21 are currently barricaded in the building with the other suspect.” He advised before glancing out the open door towards the other suspect.

Tim mentally weighed his options, watching as the person paced back and forth.

“Why are they not leaving? They have every opportunity to get the hell out of here.” He wondered aloud. “I’m not sure what you were after.” He called out through the doorway. “But I don’t think your going to get it.”

Lucy snorted at his words. “What are you doing?”

“Building a rapport.” He whispered with a shrug before glancing back out into the room behind them. “Why don’t you put the gun down and we can talk?”

“Nah.”

“Can you tell me what you came here after?” He asked.

“Man, shut the fuck up.” Spoke the suspect as multiple rounds being fired flew by before planting themselves into the back wall.

“Good plan Tim.” she glared, her back still planted on the wall.

“It was better than nothing!” He whisper-yelled as his hearing began coming back to him, the sounds of sirens echoing off the buildings in the distance coming closer. The window on the back wall was shattered, allowing the chill of the night to seep through causing goosebumps to run up their arms and down their spines, neither one having the chance to grab their jackets from their cars beforehand.

“We can’t slip out, not without him noticing.” Lucy said, noticing his stare.

“No, but we can do this.” Tim moved his body forward slowly, moving out of the way as he placed a hand on the wood of the door. “Get down.”

Tim slammed the door closed, turning his body away as two bullets splintered the wood.  

“He should have a round or two left.”

Lucy stood, “Unless it’s an extended mag.” She said holstering the weapon in her hand as her pulse slowed down with every minute that passed without the suspect charging the room. She turned her head to the left, glancing out of the shattered glass window at the man still pacing. “I don’t have a clean shot.”

“Damn.” Tim cursed. “Not the best plan, but that should have bought us a few minutes till SWAT can get here.” He told her as he twisted his upper body, re-holstering his gun as just enough light from the street outside allowed Lucy sight of the crimson staining his uniform.

She could feel her heart rate increase once again as she reached a handout, grabbing onto the wrist handing by his side.  “Tim.” She said with fear lacing her voice. She pulled his body towards hers, gaining a better grasp on the blood staining his shirt. The spatter was low, low enough for the hit to have happened just at the bottom of the Kevlar vest that was underneath his uniform. Her small hands moved quickly.

“Lucy. What the hell?” He breathed, unclear on what she was doing as she pulled the tucked in shirt of his uniform out of his pants, jerking the fabric up as her eyes frantically searched for the injury.  

She ignored him, her shaking hands skimming across the thick vest as she felt for any nicks and holes that may have punctured the material, her search coming up empty. Her eyes zeroed in on the undershirt peeking out from under his vest, finding that it too was clean and free of any crimson ‘The bullet must have gone through the vest.’ She thought. As good as the bulletproof material was, it was not impossible for the rounds to pierce the material.

Her breaths were panicked and uneven, a rouge tear streaming down her cheek as he called her name again. “Lucy, it’s not my blood.” He said as his right hand moved to her cheek, forcing her to lift her head up to look at him. “Hey, look at me. I’m ok boot, it’s not mine.”

“I thought-“

“I know.” He whispered as the sound of breaks from the speeding cars outside, echoed off the empty walls.

Lucy pulled back, away from his touch. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have-“

“Lucy.” He said, causing her worry to stop as he used both hands to tuck the shirt of his uniform back into place.

“This is the LAPD. We have the place surrounded. Put the weapon down.”

“Harper to the rescue.” Tim said rolling his eyes. “Let’s go.”

Tim walked over to the window, using a nearby paper to scrape away the broken glass into the floor before undoing the latch and lifting the broken metal up.

“Come on boot.” He gestured.

Lucy looked out, spotting a familiar face on the ground.

“Jackson?” She said as she threw her right leg over the windowsill. “What are you doing here? Never mind.” She told him after a second thought.

Jackson raised his hands, reaching for his friend, helping her to the ground as her left leg came out of the window. “You just had to get into trouble tonight Luce.”

Lucy rolled her eyes as the sound of boots hit the ground behind her. “It’s not like I plan for this to happen.”

“But it does, almost every shift.” Jackson pointed out.

“He’s right boot. Keep that up and you’ll earn yourself a nickname.” Tim said walking by her as he reached for the mic on his shoulder. “7-Adam-19 to dispatch. Show myself and 21 safely out of the building.” He spoke into the mic before turning back around. “Let’s go dark cloud, we’ve got a lot of talking to do and reports to write.”

“Dark cloud?” she asked as she caught up to him.

Tim shrugged. “Wherever you go, trouble follows, like a dark cloud.”

Lucy grudgingly sighed. “He’s never going to stop calling me that is he?”

“Nope.” Tim said as they made their way towards the growing group of officers, their suspect now in cuffs and being led to a waiting shop.

“What can you say Luce,” Jackson smiled sympathetically as Tim made his way over towards Sergeant Grey. “you earned it.”

Lucy whined. “Damn it, I didn’t want a nickname.”

“You already had one.”

“Boot doesn’t count,” she told him offhandedly. “it means something different.”

Jackson raised an eyebrow, but before he could speak another word, Lucy was being called over by Sergeant Grey. “You may have gotten out of it now Chen, but we are so going to talk about this later.”

[inthedayswhenlandswerefew]

Eccentricity [Chapter 14: Love Keeps The Monsters From Our Door] [Series Finale]

A/N: Thank you for your encouragement, enthusiasm, laughter, rants, screeches of anguish, and unapologetic thirsting for “sexy undead Italian man” Joseph Francis Mazzello. I hope you love this conclusion more than Baby Swan loves pineapple pizza. 💜

Series Summary: Potentially a better love story than Twilight?

Chapter Title Is A Lyric From: “Til I Die” by Parsonsfield. (The #1 song I associate with this fic!)

Chapter Warnings: Language.

Word Count: 7.7k.

Other Chapters (And All My Writing) Available: HERE

Taglist: @queen-turtle-boiii @bramblesforbreakfast @maggieroseevans @culturefiendtrashqueen @imnotvibingveryguccimrstark @escabell @im-an-adult-ish @queenlover05 @someforeigntragedy @imtheinvisiblequeen @seven-seas-of-ham-on-rhyee @deacyblues @tensecondvacation @brianssixpence @some-major-ishues @haileymorelikestupid @youngpastafanmug @simonedk @rhapsodyrecs​

Mercy

We have to stay in the Vladivostok palace until her transformation is complete, and I hate it.

The floors are cold and sterile and every clang of noise ricochets off them like a bullet. The earth outside is stripped bare and hibernal. There is no green to interrupt the bleakness of the sky, the cruel absence of color: no spruces or hemlocks or bigleaf maples, no evergreen forests, no verdant fields, only a grey that bleeds from the sky in sheets of hail and driving rain. This land is a stranger. So many of the faces, too, are strangers, although they try. Honora sits with me—her large dark eyes, like mirrors of mine, polished and wet with aching pity—and braids my hair. Morana invites me to bake homemade bread with her. Austin tries to make me smile. Cato visits me as much as he can, because he feels responsible; or maybe he would do it anyway, maybe lessening suffering is as instinctual to him as bloodshed is to so many of our kind. And when Cato is with me, I do feel a little better, like my story might belong to somebody else, like it’s a name I can’t quite remember, like it’s a transitory moment of déjà vu I can catch glimpses of but never touch. And yet, still, I send him away.  

I don’t want to be with Cato. It’s painful for him to be around me, I can see that. It’s painful for Rami, and for Ben, and for Joe, and for Lucy and Scarlett. It’s even painful for the Irish Wolfhounds that Cato found locked up for safekeeping in Larkin’s study; they skulk around the palace vigilantly but leave great swaths of uninterrupted space around me like open water. So I conjure up a mask of brave, hopeful acceptance and wear it everywhere I go.

Joe says very little, never leaves the girl he calls Baby Swan’s side, dabs her scorching skin with washcloths soaked in ice water and murmurs in sympathy when she screams through the unconsciousness, from beneath the ocean of fire we all know so well. He nods off sometimes, snatching minutes of sleep like fireflies in a jar, before jolting awake to make sure her heart is still beating. When Ben isn’t checking on them, he’s with Cato, helping to draw up plans for the future, reminiscing about the past with slick eyes and clinking midnight glasses of whiskey. Scarlett sprawls across the desk in what was once Larkin’s study and spends hours on the phone with Archer as she gazes up at the ceiling, telling him how to care for the farm animals and the garden, reassuring him that we’ll be home soon, whispering things to him that I try not to hear; and I know she wouldn’t want me to anyway. Lucy weeps delicate, ceaseless tears as she perches on the staircase landing and Rami entombs her in his arms, never having to ask what she needs from him. And I wander meaninglessly through the echoing, unfamiliar hallways like a moon without a planet.

I know what they all think about me, perhaps even Rami, for I keep it buried as deep as all skeletons should be: that I’m irrevocably kind, effortlessly forgiving. That I’m as incapable of bitterness as I am of aging. But they’re wrong. It’s a choice, and it always has been, ever since a late-November dusk in 1864 when madness eclipsed mercy. Every day I choose whether to surrender to the beckoning, malignant hatred that lurks in the back of my bedroom closet, in the dusty and ill-lit loft of the barn roped with cobwebs, in the twilight tree line of the western hemlocks crawling with shadows that whisper through fanged teeth. Every day I decide whether to become a monster. And it has never been harder to remember why I don’t.

My future is unimaginable. The nights are endless. I feel black, razored seeds of what I am horrified must be bitterness burrowing beneath my skin and taking root there. I am consumed by infected, fruitless questions that I can’t silence: Why Gwilym? Why Arthur? Why Eliza and Charlotte? Why is it always fire?

The first words that Gwilym ever spoke to me, as I unraveled from unconsciousness under a grove of sycamore trees with smoke still clinging to my unscarred skin, rattle around in my skull like windchimes beneath thunderous skies. His voice was colored with an accent I couldn’t place, and yet it sounded like home: You’re in a dark place right now. But you don’t have to stay there.

That might have been true once. That might have been true in the ruinous autumn of 1864. But now I can’t find my way out.

Seventy-three hours after our arrival in this barren corner of the world, Charlie Swan’s daughter  wakes up as a vampire. Her heart is perfectly still, her skin faultless, her senses sharp, her mind as impenetrable as ever; at least, that’s what Lucy says when she finds me. And Lucy tugs at my hand, wearing her first smile in days, insisting that I have to come meet the newest member of our coven, to welcome her. I don’t know how to tell Lucy that I’m afraid I don’t have it in me to love this girl, that I don’t have it in me to love anyone but ghosts. And yet—compliantly, yieldingly, expecting nothing but disappointment in the monster I have become—I follow her.

The door is already open to the Swan girl’s room; chattering, beaming vampires flood in and out like the tides. I step inside. And I see the way that Joe looks at her, the way that Ben does; and all those seeds that I had feared might be bitterness blossom into nothing but open air.

It’s Not A Fucking Wedding (A.K.A. 13.5 Months Later)

The ocean is a universe. Its arms are not ever-expanding, spiraling galaxies of suns and planets and nebulae and black holes, this is true; its belly is not a vacuum of inhospitable oblivion, its bones are not invisible strings of gravity, its language is not a silence older than starlight, older than eternity. But the ocean is a universe nonetheless, its borders tucked neatly around the seven continents, slumbering there until the next hurricane or tsunami or ice age comes conquering; and inevitably equilibrium is restored—like defibrillator paddles to a heart, like naloxone to an addict’s blood—and our two worlds can coexist side by side once again.  

The ocean’s arms are sighing waves, bubbling and brisk, grasping and retreating in the same breath. Its belly is swollen with life from immense blue whales down to swarming clouds of single-celled, sun-hungry phytoplankton. Its language is ancient whispers; not parched and blistering and brittle sounds like the desert’s but cool, serene, supple, engulfing. And I can hear them all, if I listen closely enough. I can hear the sentient whistling of orcas, the breaking of waves against rocks, the scrabbling of sand crabs beneath the earth, the gruff distant barks of sea lions, the rustling of evergreen pine needles in the breeze. And I understand now why it was always so easy for vampires to be introspective, to lapse into thoughtful, unhurried silences. I could imagine spending decades just sitting here with my knees tucked to my chest and my hair whipping in the brackish wind, watching the seasons roll by like a wheel.

Joe was coming back from the gravel parking lot. I turned to watch him: red U Chicago hoodie, messy dark auburn-ish hair, a pizza box clasped in his hands. The GrubHub delivery driver was returning to his car with the toothiest of grins.

“Buon appetito!” Joe announced, dramatically presenting me with the pizza box. It had become our post-finals tradition each semester: pizza at La Push beach, half-pepperoni, half-pineapple.

“Grazie, sexy undead Italian man. Your accent is getting so good!”

“I know, right?! I’m on a twelve-day Duolingo streak. I can’t let that little green owl dude down.”

“I’m impressed, I’ll admit it. I gotta brush up on my Welsh. Why’s the GrubHub driver so cheery?”

“I tipped him $500.”

I smiled, opening the box and lifting out a semi-warm slice of pineapple pizza. Elastic strands of mozzarella cheese stretched like rubber bands until they snapped. “Aww, really?”

Joe plopped down onto the cool, damp sand beside me. “No. I lied. We’re actually having a torrid love affair.”

I laughed, shaking my head. “How could you possibly have time for all that?” Between school, business ventures, family activities, and me, Joe was very rarely unoccupied. And he preferred it that way.

“I’m so glad you asked. I’m very speedy, if you recall. And that’s just one of the exclusive services I offer. I am a man of many talents. I make people’s wildest dreams come true. Who am I to deny the GrubHub delivery man the wonderland that is my spindly, annoying body?”  

“You are the fastest,” I said, winking.

“Oh shut up! I mean, uh, uhhh, silenzio!” He pointed his slice of pepperoni pizza at me reproachfully. “That’s not what I meant. I’m not the fastest at everything.”

“Whatever you say, mob guy.”

He lunged for me, pinned me down in the crumbling sand, both of us laughing wildly as the crusts of our pizza slices bounded off and were snatched up by diving, screeching seagulls. He growled with mock savagery, braced his hips against mine, kissed his way from the corner of my jaw to my lips. That oh-so-familiar commanding, craving ache for him came roaring to the surface; and now there was no bittersweet edge to it, no inescapable backdrop of lambent numbers ticking down from five or ten or fifteen years to zero. Now there was only the calm, unurgent promise of forever.

“Joe—!”

“You have besmirched my honor, Baby Swan. I am left with no recourse but to refresh your clearly flawed memory and prove you wrong.”

“Public indecency? That’s illegal, sir.”

“Okay, you gotta stop stealing my catchphrases. It’s extremely difficult for me to come up with new ones. I’m almost a hundred years old, you know.”

“Alright, I guess you’re not bad in bed for a basically-centenarian.”

He smiled down at me, his dark eyes alight, the wind tearing through his hair, one palm resting on my forehead, uncharacteristically quiet.

“What?” I asked, worried.

“Nothing,” he said. “I’m just really glad we’re a thing.”

“You better be. You’re kind of stuck with me now. You’ve stolen my virtue, you’ve made me fall in love with your entire demented family, you’ve forced your torturous immortality upon me. I’m not going anywhere. Unless you ever stop funding my pineapple pizza addiction, of course.”

Joe chuckled as he climbed off me and took my hand in his, pulling me upright. “It’s absolutely ridiculous, by the way. Your insistence on being a sort-of vegetarian. It’s embarrassing. You’re the wimpiest vampire ever. You’re a disgrace to the coven.”

“I eat animals!” I objected.

“Yeah, when you have to.” And Joe was right: I steered clear of flesh outside of the two or three times a week when I hunted. For environmental sustainability reasons, I mostly consumed deer or rabbits; although the very occasional shark was my guilty pleasure. Joe gnawed on his second slice of pizza and peered out into the overcast, dusky horizon, wiping crumbs from his stubbled chin with the back of his hand. “We only have one more of these left,” he said at last, a little sadly. “One more finals season at Calawah University. One more celebratory dinner at La Push.”

“We’ll just have to get used to a new view. Pizza by the Chicago River, maybe.”

Joe looked over at me, thoughtful again, smiling. He had received his acceptance letter to the University of Chicago three weeks ago. I got mine eight days later. “It won’t be hard for you to leave Forks?”

“It will be. Once upon a time I didn’t think that was possible, but I will miss Forks. And not just because of Charlie and Archer and Jessica and Angela and all the Lees. But it was hard to leave Phoenix, and I’m sure one day it will be hard to leave Chicago. Just because change is hard doesn’t mean it’s not the right thing to do.”

Joe nodded introspectively. “Every new beginning comes from some other beginning’s end.”

“Don’t quote classic rock songs at me, mixtapes boy.”

“You love my mixtapes,” he teased, circling his left arm around my waist, pulling me in closer, touching his lips to my forehead. Mint and pine and starlight sank into my lungs like an anchor through the surf. “And that saying actually goes all the way back to Seneca, my dear.”

“Don’t tell me he’s still philosophizing in some cloudy corner of the world somewhere.”

“Not to my knowledge. Although that’s an intriguing thought. We need more famous vampires. Caligula would have made for very interesting conversation. Lincoln, Napoleon, Cleopatra, Shakespeare, Dante...I guess it’s possible that anyone is still around. Maybe we should turn Meat Loaf. You know, for the good of posterity.”

“Is it not enough that they’re already cursed with student debt and global warming?”

Joe cackled, took my face in his palms, kissed each of my cheeks one after the other, then nudged my nose with his. “You ready to go, Baby Swan? I suspect we’re expected to participate in some holiday festivities tonight.”

“I’m ready,” I agreed. We threw our leftover pizza to the seagulls, disposed of the grease-spotted cardboard box, and walked back to my 1999 Honda Accord with our pulseless hands intertwined.

The evergreen trees along Routh 110 fled by beneath a sky freckling with stars. Sharp winter air poured in through the open windows. And I could feel that it was cold, in the same way that I could feel the warmth on Forks’ rare sweltering days; but there was no discomfort that accompanied that knowledge. Pain only came when the sky was unincumbered by thick clouds churning in off the Pacific, and then it felt something like staring into the sun had as a human. Sunglasses helped, but the surest remedy was avoidance, was surrender. And what an inconsequential price to pay for forever.

“Wait,” I said, spying the mailbox that marked the start of the Lees’ driveway. “They still deliver mail on Christmas Eve, right?”

“Uh, I think so, why...?” And then he remembered. “Oh, yeah, let’s check!”

I pulled up beside the mailbox and Joe leaned out, returning to his seat with a mountain of Christmas cards and business correspondence and advertisements from Costco and Sephora. He sifted through them until he found a single white envelope from the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine. It was addressed to a Mr. Benjamin August Hardy. Joe held it up to show me as we drove down the driveway, the Lee house coming into view and ornamented with a frankly excessive amount of multicolored string lights and inflatable reindeer.

“Oh my god!” I squealed, drumming the steering wheel.

“You want to be the one to give it to him?”

“Are you serious?! Yeah, can I?”

Joe passed the envelope to me as I parked my geriatric Honda, which Archer had pledged to keep alive as long as physically possible. In return, Ben let him and Scarlett borrow the Aston Martin Vantage no less than once a week. I dashed out of the car, up the steps of the front porch, and into the house that bubbled over with the sounds of metallic kitchen clashes and frenetic voices and Wham!’s Last Christmas.

“Ben?!” I shouted.

“Hi, honey!” Mercy called from the living room, where she and Lucy were putting the final touches on Scarlett’s gown. Scarlett was playing the part of semi-willing victim, wearing gold heels and an impatient smirk and her hair out of the way in a milkmaid braid; her train of vivid red lace billowed across the hardwood floor. From the couch, Archer and Rami were playing Mario Kart on the big-screen tv and nibbling their way through a tray of homemade gingerbread cookies.

“Oh wow,” I said, clutching the envelope to my chest, mesmerized. I kept waiting for Scarlett to start looking like a normal person to me, and it never happened. Tonight, in the glow of the flameless candles and kaleidoscopic Christmas lights and draped in lace the color of pomegranate seeds, she was Persephone: a goddess of resurrection, a face that death himself could not pass by unscathed. “You’ve outdone yourself, Lucy. Seriously.”

“One day I’m going to get you out of those thrift shop sweaters,” Lucy threatened me, placing a pin in the fabric at Scarlett’s waist.

“Yeah, okay. Let me know when that shows up in one of your visions.”

“Bitch,” Lucy flung back, snickering, knowing how improbable that was. I still appeared in her visions extremely infrequently, and then only when I happened to be standing next to whoever the premonition was actually about.

“Language, dear,” Mercy tutted, inspecting the hem of Scarlett’s gown.

Joe arrived beside me, his arms still full of mail. “ScarJo, I almost didn’t recognize you! Why do you have, like, no cleavage or fishnets or thigh slits?”

“Why do you have like no eyelashes?” Scarlett replied. “See, I can ask unnecessary and invasive questions too.”

Joe frowned, wounded. “What’s wrong with my eyelashes?”

“Lucy, darling, I think it’s just a tad uneven on this side,” Mercy said, showing her. “Maybe by half an inch...?”

“No, seriously, what’s wrong with my eyelashes?!”

Mercy replied distractedly: “Nothing, honey, you’re perfect just the way you are.”

“Mom!” Joe groaned.

“It really is gorgeous,” Mercy marveled as Lucy flitted around her to investigate the hem situation. “And so Christmasy. So perfect for the season. Scarlett, dear, you were right after all, and I’m so sorry for doubting you. I’d just never heard of a red wedding dress before.”

“Mom, it’s not a fucking wedding!” Scarlett exclaimed, for probably the thirtieth time since Thanksgiving. “It’s a nonbinding, informal celebration of an egalitarian romantic partnership. Will somebody please inform this woman that it’s not a wedding?!”

“Yes, yes, of course, whatever you want, sweetheart,” Mercy conceded dreamily.

Joe pointed to Archer. “Isn’t he supposed to not see the dress until the day of or something?”

“What a great question!” Archer replied, still deeply invested in Mario Kart. “You see, that would be the case if this was a wedding. However, I’ve been informed in no uncertain terms that it is most definitely not.”

Scarlett grinned triumphantly at Joe. “There you have it.”

She might snap petulantly, and she might complain, but Scarlett wouldn’t be doing this if she didn’t want to; we were all intimately familiar with the futility of trying to force Scarlett into anything. The not-wedding, as improbable as it seemed, had been her idea from the start. And she wasn’t doing it for herself. She wasn’t even doing it for Archer. Scarlett was doing it for her mother.

The first six months had been hell for Mercy. She didn’t resent me, as I had feared she might; Mercy made that clear, and Rami confirmed it. But she was gutted. She wouldn’t speak of Gwil, wouldn’t listen to us talk about him, locked every photograph of him away in dark drawers, wandered around with a remote, uncanny, unseeing smile until she walked straight into walls; and then she would blink inanely up at them, as if they had dropped out of the sky rather than been built by her own hands. She baked hundreds of cakes and almost never slept. She told us she was fine every time we asked, which was more or less constantly. But on the very rare occasions when she was left alone, Mercy would unfailingly end up in the field behind the Lee house, gazing out into the forest of western hemlock trees with tears snaking silently down her cheeks, the muted light of the cloud-covered setting sun flickering red and furious on her face like wildfire.

And then one afternoon, a package had arrived from Arviat, Canada, where Cato and the rest of the surviving Draghi had relocated shortly after the rebellion at Vladivostok. It was five feet tall and another three wide, and what we found after carefully peeling away all those layers of foam padding and packing tape was a portrait of Gwilym so skillfully painted that it could have been mistaken for a photograph. Mercy had stared at it for a long time—ignoring Lucy’s attempts to guide her away, deaf to any of our concerns—until she at last picked up the portrait herself and said, quite evenly: “I think we should hang it in the living room, don’t you?”

Things had been better since then—very, very gradually, and yet unmistakably—and Gwil’s portrait remained mounted above the living room couch like a watchman, his eyes sparkling and blue, his faint smile stoic and fond and omniscient. But even in the wake of Mercy’s continued improvement, none of us kids were about to risk another agonizingly despondent Christmas. So the solution was obvious. We would keep Mercy preoccupied with what thrilled her more than absolutely anything else: the pseudo-weddings of her children. Rami and Lucy had already secretly volunteered to go next year...and after that, who knew? And there was one other thing that was making Mercy’s burden a little lighter these days.

Charlie sauntered into the living room, wearing an apron covered in cartwheeling Santas and wiping white dust like snow—powdered sugar? flour? baking soda?—from his ungainly hands. He was palpably proud. “The sugar cookies are officially in the oven. And I managed to fit them all on one baking sheet, isn’t that great?! Cuts down on dishes!”

“Why, yes, I suppose it does!” Mercy said, alarm dawning in her eyes. Had my beloved father placed the globs of dough too close together? Would we end up with one hideous, giant monster-cookie? Only time would tell. Providentially, Archer and Joe could be counted on to eat just about anything.

Joe sniffed the air, his forehead crinkling. “What’s burning?”

“Nothing should be burning,” Mercy replied, almost defensive, forever protective of Charlie and all of his profound, incurably human imperfections. Sometimes I thought that she preferred him that way, that he was a link to a simpler world in the same way I had once been, that he was a puddle of memory she could drop into, that maybe he wasn’t so unlike her first husband Arthur. “Not yet, anyway. The cookies need at least ten to twelve minutes at 350.”

“Wait, 350?!” Charlie exclaimed, horrorstruck. “I thought you said 450!”

“Oh, this is tragic,” Scarlett said.  

“I can fix it!” Mercy trilled buoyantly, breezing off to the kitchen as Charlie followed after her with a fountain of apologies. She shushed them away affectionately, patting his chest with her soft plump hands, chuckling about how luckily they had fire extinguishers stowed away in almost every closet just in case. And there were other reasons for that besides Charlie’s perilous baking attempts, but he didn’t know them. Now the record player was belting out Queen’s Thank God It’s Christmas.  

Archer lost another round in Mario Kart and exhaled a great, mournful sigh. “Hey, Baby Swanpire, can you do something about this guy?” He nodded to Rami. “This is criminal. It’s nowhere near a fair fight. He knows every freaking time I’m about to toss a banana peel.”

Rami smirked guiltily up at me from the couch, not bothering to deny it.

“Do you mind?” I asked him.

“Not at all,” Rami replied. “I want to show this loser I can beat him even without the benefit of mega-cool extrasensory superpowers.”

“Rude!” Archer cried.

“So rude,” Scarlett agreed, smiling.

“Okay, here we go.” I sat down beside Rami, still holding Ben’s envelope in my right hand, and laid my left against Rami’s cheek. And I felt a fistful of numbness—like instant peace, like milk-white Novocain—pass from my skin into his, rolling into his skull, deadening whatever telepathic livewires had been ignited there in the August of 1916. The effect would last anywhere from thirty minutes to a few hours; and it worked on every vampire I’d met so far.

“Whoa, trippy,” Rami murmured. “It’s still weird, every single time.” He peered drowsily around the room. “It’s...so...quiet?! You guys really live like this? No one is constantly bombarding you with sexual fantasies or romantic pining or depressive inner monologues? How do you function?! Now I’m alone with my own thoughts, that’s actually worse!”

“Hurry up and beat him while he’s all freaked out and vulnerable,” Scarlett told Archer.

Archer laughed, picking up his Nintendo 64 controller, radiant with the promise of vengeance. “Yes ma’am.”

“Any good mail?” Lucy asked Joe.

“Yeah. Coupons and a ton of Christmas cards from random people. The vet sent us one with alpacas on it, so that’s cute. Oh, and here’s one from our favorite Canadians.”

Joe held up the card so we could all see. The picture on the front showed Cato and Honora sitting on a large velvet, forest green couch with a hulking Christmas tree illuminated in the background. The others were arranged around them: Austin, Max, Ksenia, Charity, Araminta, Akari, Morana, Phelan, Aruna, Adair, Zora, Sahel, and a few new faces I couldn’t name yet. They were all wearing matching turtleneck sweaters. And every single one of them was smiling.

Joe cleared his throat theatrically and read the text on the inside of the card:

“Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

(Oh, and Scarlett, congratulations on your not-marriage.)

- Cato Douglass Freeman”

“That bastard,” Scarlett muttered.

Rami offered me his controller. He had just slipped on a banana peel and rocketed off a cliff. “You want a turn?”

“No, thanks though. I have to talk to Ben. Is he around?”

Rami shrugged ruefully. “I would help, but my brain is temporarily broken.”

Scarlett rolled her eyes, taking a gingerbread cookie from the tray and biting into it as Lucy batted crumbs from the red lace dress, exasperated. “I think he’s out in the hot tub.”

“Cool. I shall return.”

Joe took my spot on the couch as I departed, shoveling cookies into his mouth, seizing Rami’s controller and kicking his feet up on the coffee table.

I opened the door to the back porch, and frigid December air rushed in like an uninvited guest. The field was coated with a thin layer of snow, the animals safe and warm in the barn, the garden slumbering. And in the spring and summer, when blossoms of a dozen different varieties came open beneath the drizzling grey skies, Mercy’s calla lilies didn’t bother my allergies at all. Nothing did anymore. Ben was indeed in the hot tub, puffing on his vape pen, wearing only a beanie hat and swim trunks.

“What flavor is that cartridge?” I asked as I approached. “Gummy bear?”

“Close. Strawberry doughnut.”

“Ohhhh, yum!” Ben passed me the vape pen, and I took a drag as I kicked off my boots and sat near him on the rim of the hot tub, slipping my bare feet beneath the steaming, roiling water. Then I handed his vape pen back. “So. Guess what I have for you.”

“Uh.” He glanced at the envelope. “Jury duty.”

“Better.”

“Someone I hate has jury duty.”

I flipped the envelope around so he could see the University of Chicago logo on the front.

“Oh god,” Ben moaned.

“Don’t you want to see what it says?”

“Not really,” he admitted, grimacing.

“Come on, Ben. Open it.”

“Nah.”

“Why not?!”

Ben sighed. “Look, if I open it and it’s bad news, it’s gonna make Christmas weird. Rami will know. They’ll all know. They’ll all feel bad for me and it’ll be pathetic and depressing and awkward. You can look if you want to, just don’t tell anyone else yet.”

“It’s not going to be bad news,” I said, tugging at the floppy top of his beanie hat. He swatted my hand away, but he was smiling grudgingly.

“You have positively no way of knowing that. Unless Lucy’s had a vision I’m unaware of.”

“She hasn’t. You know she never sees anything important.”

“She saw you coming,” Ben countered.

“She saw human-me and Joe in love and gobbling down pretzels at a Cubs game. So I’d say there were at least a few minor details missing.”

“There’s no way I got in,” Ben said, his green eyes slick and fearful and now fixed on the envelope. “We can’t all be geniuses like you.”

“That’s an unfair accusation. I’m far from genius. I’m just obsessed with the ocean.” I’d written my senior thesis on the feeding habits of Pacific angelsharks, and my advisor was still trying to figure out how I, an amateur scuba diver at best, had managed to get so many quality photographs with my underwater camera. The secret, of course, was superhuman agility and not needing to breathe.

“I fucking hate calculus. The MCAT wrecked me. I got a 517.”

“And their median score is a 519, so I’d say you still have a fighting chance. Plus you have like eight million volunteer hours.” Ben had spent the vast majority of the past year either in class or at the hospital. The psychiatrist-in-chief, Dr. Siegel, had been more than happy to take one of Gwil’s foster children under her wing. Every human in Forks except Archer believed that Dr. Gwilym Lee had drowned in a tragic boating accident while he and Mercy were on vacation in Southern California, and that his body had never been recovered. The town had held a wonderful remembrance ceremony and dedicated a free clinic at the hospital in his honor. “Now open it.”

“You do it,” Ben relented finally. “My hands are wet. Go ahead, open it up and tell me what it says. And then kindly euthanize me to end my immortal shame.”

“That wouldn’t work,” I pointed out, tearing open the envelope. I pulled out the tri-folded piece of paper inside, flattened it against my thighs, and read the typed black text.

“...Well?” Ben pressed, vaping frantically.

I looked up and smiled at him.

“No way,” he whispered.

“I hope you like pretzels and bear-themed baseball teams, grandpa.”

And for a second, I thought he might bolt up out of the hot tub, hooting victoriously, splashing water all over the back porch as he danced around bellowing that he’d gotten into one of the best medical schools in the world, that he would be following me and Joe to Chicago. But that wasn’t Ben. Instead, a slow smile rippled across his face: it was small, but perfectly genuine. Pure, even.

“Goddamn,” he said, watching me. Venom doesn’t just resurrect or ruin; it forms a bond that is simultaneously intangible and yet immense. It’s an evolutionary adaptation, a way to facilitate stability and the building of covens in an often violent and ruleless world. And now that he had turned me, Ben had family here in Forks in more ways than one.

“Gwil would be so proud of you, Ben.”

“I hope so. I really do.”

The back door of the house opened, and Joe stepped outside. He studied Ben for a moment, and that was all it took for him to know. “Benny!” he shouted, elated.

“I know, I know. Fortunately, I look amazing in red. Thanks, supermodel genes.”

“This is going to be so fun!” Joe said, sprinting over to wrap Ben—who was characteristically lukewarm on this whole physical displays of affection business—in a hug from just outside the hot tub. “We’re going to go furniture shopping, and eat deep-dish pizza, and find apartments right next to each other, and mail home Chicago-themed care packages, and get you hooked up with some gorgeous Italian woman...or whatever you like, I guess I shouldn’t assume. Women. Men. Gang members. Marine mammals. Jessicas. Whatever. There are options.”

Ben laughed as he playfully shoved Joe away. “Sounds like a plan, pagliaccio.”

“Oh my god, stop learning Italian without me! You realize you have to tell Mom now.”

“I will,” Ben agreed, with some trepidation. “I’ll wait until after Christmas.”

“It’ll be hard for her,” I said. “But she knows it’s what you want. She knows it’s what’s best for you. So she’ll get through it. I think it would be worse for her if you didn’t get in, if she had to see you unhappy.”

Ben nodded, exhaling strawberry-doughnut-flavored vapor, gazing up at the stars, Orion and Auriga and Lynx and Perseus reflected in his thoughtful jade eyes. “She’ll still have Rami and Lucy and Scarlett here with her. And Archer. And Charlie.”

“Especially Charlie,” Joe said, grinning.

Mercy would have to leave Forks eventually, of course. The Lees had already been here for nearly four years; they could stay another ten, perhaps fifteen at the absolute maximum. And there had been a time when ten or fifteen years seemed like quite a while to me, but now it felt like I could doze off one afternoon and wake up on the other side of it, like swimming a lap in the sun-drenched public pool back in Phoenix. We would find a new home somewhere after Joe and I finished our PhDs, after Ben finished medical school, maybe Vancouver or Buffalo or Amsterdam or Edinburgh or Dublin or Reykjavik. Wherever we went, I hoped it wouldn’t be far from the sea. But Mercy couldn’t bear to leave Forks yet. It was the last home she had shared with Gwil, the last house they would ever build together, and leaving it would make his loss all the more irrevocable. She would be ready to leave someday, but not today.

In the meantime, there would still be visits for breaks and holidays. Scarlett and Archer had the shop to keep them busy, a brand new eight-car garage that held a virtual monopoly on both the Forks and Quileute communities. Lucy had opened a bohemian-style clothing boutique downtown, which confounded most of the locals but attracted more adventurous customers from as far away as Seattle. Rami was interning for a local immigration lawyer and entertaining the possibility of applying to U Chicago’s law school in another few years. And Mercy had the farm; and she had Charlie. He had asked her for cooking lessons to try to help rouse her a few months after Gwil’s death, and it had grown from there. If it wasn’t romantic just yet, I believed it would be soon. And there were moments when I thought my father might have figured something out, when his eyes narrowed and lingered on me just a little too long, when his brow knitted into suspicious, searching lines, when the hairs rose on the back of his neck and some innate insight whispered that we weren’t like him and never could be again. But then he would chuckle, shake his head, and say: “You’ve gotten weird, my gorgeous, brilliant progeny. But Forks looks pretty good on you.”

“Can I talk to you upstairs?” Joe asked me suddenly; and did I see restless nerves flicker in his dark eyes? I thought I did.

“Sure,” I replied, climbing down from the hot tub. “Ben, are you coming inside? My dad is trying to bake Christmas cookies and failing miserably. It’s pretty hilarious. Not that you should be the one to critique other people’s kitchen-related accidents.”

“I do enjoy your company a lot more now that I don’t want to murder you and slurp you down like a Chick-fil-A milkshake,” Ben said. “Yeah, give me a few minutes and I’ll be there.” And as Joe and I headed into the house, I saw Ben pick up the acceptance letter that I’d left on the rim of the hot tub and read it for himself with incredulous eyes, grappling with the irrefutable fact that it was his name on the opening line, that he had somewhere along the way become the sort of man who dedicated his immortality to saving lives rather than ending them.

In the living room, Scarlett was back in her yoga pants and absolutely brutalizing Archer in Mario Kart. Rami and Lucy were entwined together on the loveseat, murmuring, giggling, feeding each other pieces of gingerbread cookies. In the kitchen, Charlie was leading Mercy in a clumsy waltz to Meat Loaf’s I’d Do Anything For Love, and each time he fumbled his steps or mortifyingly trod on her feet she would cry out in a peal of laughter brighter than the sun she had learned to live without. Joe spirited me up the staircase, into his bedroom—which, honestly, was more like our bedroom now, in the same way that my room in Charlie’s house had become Joe’s as well—and closed the door.

“You’re in luck,” he said. “Your dad totally ruined our song. Now I can’t hear it without thinking about some moustached guy in plaid trying to seduce my mom.”

“It’s the best Christmas gift I could ever ask for. Meat Loaf is vanquished. Oh, just so you’re aware, Renee and Paul are getting an Airbnb and coming up for New Years.”

“Cool. Do they still think I have a super embarrassing sunlight allergy and will break into hives and asphyxiate and that’s why we can’t visit them in Florida?”

“Yup.”

“Spectacular. Also, can you please tell me what’s wrong with my eyelashes?”

“They’re just a little sparse, amore. But I still like you.”

“Well, I am only moderately attractive, you know.” Then Joe steeled himself, taking a deep breath. Uh oh. He was definitely nervous. I still couldn’t believe I had the power to make him that way, but here we were. “So I get that we’re doing presents with the whole family tomorrow morning, and you do have some under the tree, so don’t worry about that. But there’s one I wanted to give to you alone. You know. With just us. Without an audience. Or whatever.”

“...Okay...?” A secret gift? A naughty gift? “I hope it’s a new vibrator.”

“Shut up,” Joe begged, laughing. “Here.” He reached into the drawer of his nightstand—our nightstand—and produced a small blue box topped with a turquoise bow. It wasn’t a ring, I was sure of that; I didn’t feel especially attached to the idea of marriage, and neither did Joe to my knowledge. How could rings or papers seal commitment when you already had eternity? I was right: the mysterious present was not a ring. When I removed the lid and emptied the box into my palm, what appeared there was a small plastic airplane.

“What is this?” I asked, amused but puzzled.

“Are you not college educated? It’s a plane.”

“Well, yeah, I can see that. But it’s also like two inches long.” I scrutinized the plane. “Are you magically transforming me into a tiny, tiny, little plastic person? Is that my gift? Because I actually got you something good.” And I really did: there was a collection of vintage Chicago Cubs photographs from the 1910s and 20s downstairs under the Christmas tree, packaged in Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer wrapping paper.

“We’re going on a trip,” Joe said, grinning. “The day after Christmas. It’s just a short trip, nothing huge, don’t get too excited, we’re not going to Mt. Everest or Antarctica or anything. I think you’ll still like it. But I don’t want you to know where we’re going until we’re there.”

“How will that work? Considering the tickets and signage and pilot announcements and obnoxiously noisy other passengers and all.”

“ScarJo’s going to fly us.”

“Really?!” We were taking the jet. We almost never used the jet. “What’s in it for Scarlett?”

“She found out that Archer’s never had In-N-Out Burger before and is very much looking forward to initiating him into the cult of deliciousness.”

“Oh nice. I could go for a vanilla milkshake myself, now that Ben mentioned them.”  

“Obviously I’m gonna buy you all the milkshakes and animal-style fries you want. Bankrupt me, bitch. But we have to get one other thing taken care of first.”

“So it’s somewhere they have In-N-Out Burger...” I pondered aloud. California? Texas? Las Vegas? I felt a brief but unambiguous pang of homesickness for Phoenix. But there was nothing there for me anymore.

“Stop,” Joe pleaded. “I’m sorry. I’ve already said too much. Please forget that. Get a traumatic brain injury or oxygen deprivation or something.”

“I hate to disappoint you, but I’m rather indestructible at the moment.”

He smiled wistfully. “I wouldn’t want you to be any other way.”

There was laughter downstairs in the living room. I could detect the aroma of a fresh batch of sugar cookies baking in the kitchen, mingling with the cold night air and pine trees and peppermint candy canes. I loved Christmas. The entire world smelled like Joe. The U Chicago décor, classic rock posters, and Italian flag were now interspersed with National Geographic pages and photos of the two of us together. The Official Whatever You Want Pass hung in a small, square picture frame on the wall above Joe’s bed. Our bed.

“How real is it, Joe?” I asked quietly. I climbed onto my tiptoes, linking my hands around the back of his neck with the tiny plane still tucked between my fingers. “Seriously. The wishes thing.”

“The world may never know. Akari never met me as a human, so she wouldn’t be able to say. But if I had to place a bet...” He shrugged, grinning craftily. “Kinda real. Kinda not real. Just like vampires, I guess.”

“I am alarmingly glad that you’re real, mob guy,” I said, abruptly somber. “I never thought I’d meet someone who saw me as remarkable, who could make me see myself that way. And it’s miraculous. And it’s terrifying too, honestly. Being a thing with you. Falling for someone you could have for centuries and lose in a second.”

“It’s the scariest thing there is,” Joe concurred, taking my hand to lead me back downstairs.

Joseph

Scarlett looks like a goddess, and she knows it. But she’s not one of those magnanimous, fragile, harp-plucking, pastel-colored goddesses. She’s ferocity and wildness and crimson like blood, and that’s exactly why Archer loves her. And as they stand in front of the Christmas tree with their hands clasped together—ivory on bronze, snow on sun—with matching sprigs of holly in Scarlett’s hair and pinned to the jacket of Archer’s suit, reciting truths but no promises, I can’t help but watch the other faces in the room: Rami, Lucy, Ben, Charlie, Mom with her beaming smile and shining eyes, the woman I met sixteen months ago and now can’t fathom life without. And it occurs to me for the first time that love, in its cleanest form, isn’t something that changes people as much as it allows them to become who they truly are.

On the evening of December 26th, as soon as the sun dips beneath the western horizon, we board the jet in the Forks Airport hangar. It’s much easier for Scarlett to fly at night; otherwise she has to wear two or three pairs of sunglasses on top of each other, and even then it’s still painful, it still feels like blinding needles burrowing into the jelly of her retinas. That’s not a wrench in my plans or anything. It needs to be night where we’re going, too.

Vampire hyper-acuity notwithstanding, FAA regulations require Scarlett to have a copilot, so Archer joins her in the flight deck with his newly-minted license and spends most of the journey flipping through the latest issue of Motor Trend. As we begin our descent, he peeks back at us and teases: “It’ll be your turn eventually, guys. Scarlett and I did our time. Rami and Lucy can go next year. And after that...unless Ben happens to find someone worthy of a not-wedding...” He wiggles his black eyebrows.

“Bring it on,” I reply casually. “Fake wedding are my jam. It’ll be ocean themed. Or Roaring ‘20s themed. And we’ll all do the Cha-Cha Slide in the living room and shame Ben as a bonding activity.”

“Mercy can set up a mashed potatoes bar,” Baby Swan adds.

“Yeah. With pineapple.”

“No. Not on potatoes.”

“Yes on potatoes.”

“Over my dead body.”

“Too late,” I tell her, touching my lips to the knuckles of her cool, steady hand.

We touch down at a small noncommercial airport just outside the city, and Scarlett and Archer stay back to secure the plane as Baby Swan follows me outside. And she realizes where we are as soon as the wind hits her, as soon as her eyes soak up the sand and cacti and cloudless night sky like rain swallowed up by parched earth.

“Phoenix,” she whispers, smiling like a child.

“But wait, there’s more!” I announce in my best Billy Mays voice. I take the little glass bottle from my pocket, walk across the runway to the naked desert, crouch down when I find a suitable spot, and fill the bottle with dry, sandy earth that crumbles in my palms. Then I seal the bottle with a tiny cork and bring it back to give it to her.

“I know what it’s like to have to leave home,” I say. “You’ve had to say goodbye to Phoenix, and soon you’ll have to say goodbye to Forks, and next will be Chicago, on and on forever. You’ll always be leaving the places you learn to call home. Every five or ten or fifteen years, we start over again. Like a snake shedding its skin, like a hermit crab swapping shells. Like the water that travels from rain to seawater to mist and then back again. But now you can always have a little piece of home with you, and maybe that will make it easier.”

She takes the glass bottle and shakes her head in disbelief, in wonder. Because this is exactly what she wanted, what she needed, even if she didn’t know it yet. “Joe...how did you...?”

“What’d I tell ya? I’m a talented guy. Now you have to dance with me.”

She laughs. “Oh no. Hard pass. I don’t dance.”

“When we’re alone in my bedroom you do. So just pretend we’re alone now. In, like, a really really spacious, sandy bedroom. With probably some lizards.”

“Fine. But only because I’m willing to degrade myself for milkshakes.”

She slides the glass bottle of Arizona earth into her pocket and takes my hands. She’s still a pretty terrible dancer, honestly. She hasn’t lost that. And I love that about her. I love damn near everything about her. And it took me a long time to figure out what exactly her subtle yet peerless cocktail of fragrance is, because it wasn’t somewhere I’d ever been. The scent that drifts from her pores—the scent that now lives in my bedsheets like a shadow or a ghost—is sunlight and heat and clarity and resilience and wisdom older than the pyramids. Her scent is the desert.

Now she’s mischievous, her eyes gleaming with the reflections of the Milky Way and the full moon and the stars that are dead and yet eternal, just like us. “So what, you think you’re Vampire Boyfriend Of The Year material now or what? Some dirt and In-N-Out Burger? That’s the height of your game? Is this what I have to look forward to for the rest of my perpetual existence? I totally should have pursued that polyamorous triad with Scarlett and Archer when I had the chance—”

“Yeah,” I say, very softly, smiling, tilting up her chin to kiss her beneath the universe and all its eccentricities. “I love you too.”

[jemmahazelnut]

Motorcycle flight - Chapter one

Summary: Laxus is a biker, and as soon as he discovers that in the city there's a motorcycle track for enthusiasts where races are organized every month, he decides to go. As soon as he arrives, he will fall in love with that wonderful place, and will meet the handsome green-haired owner. [Freed/Laxus]

Link: AO3

This is my first mini-long of five chapters, I hope someone likes it. If you like let me know what you think with a comment. Enjoy the reading :)

P.S. English is not my first language, so certainly there are many mistakes that I don't even realize. So, I accept constructive criticism on how I can improve.

Chapter one, The motorcycle track

“Go Gajeel, go!” Lucy yelled from the stands of the Raijinshuu track. Cana next to her was drinking a beer and had her gaze was fixed on the competition, but at the name that her friend spoke she looked up confused.

“I thought you bet on Natsu,” she commented.

“No, last time I lost 20,000 jewels because of him. Gajeel will win, I'm sure,” the blonde said with her hands clasped on the railing and her eyes fixed on the competition. Cana didn’t object and turned to the track again, noting how there was a nice stalemate. Damn, that big blonde she had met a few nights before had told her he was going to win, she hoped she wasn't wrong to bet on him.

“Who did you bet on?” asked Mirajane next to her, who wasn't competing because her bike was currently at the mechanic.

“You'll see it,” said the brunette, narrowing her eyes and watching the blue bike pass Gajeel's. It was the last lap, in a few seconds the race would be over. She felt the tension in her arms as she hoped she hadn't lost her money. The bike made the last corner, a moment later straightened up and crossed the line. Cana jumped to her feet in exultation, while Lucy beside her took her head in her hands.

“Yeah! Fuck yeah! Yeahhhh!” Cana exulted, almost breaking the eardrums of the two girls next to her. Mirajane leaned over the railing to see who had won, sure she had never seen that bike there before. And actually, as soon as the other bikes reached the finish line and the race was finally over, the winner took off his helmet revealing a blond-haired man.

“Who is he?” she asked.

“My savior!” Cana shouted enthusiastically “I’ve won 100,000 jewels!” she screamed still excited as never before, she frantically printed a kiss on Mira's lips and then ran down the steps with the bottle of beer still in her hand that spilled everything everywhere. Mirajane watched dazedly as the girl entered the track and ran towards the blonde. “That was great!” she screamed loudly.

Laxus as soon as he heard that voice turned to the girl, still excited for his victory with a grin on his face. He saw Cana running towards him as she passed the other motorcyclists.

“You won!”.

“She’s more excited than me” Laxus thought and the grin widened. Oh yes, he was really satisfied. It was the first time he had competed on that fantastic track, and he had already made it clear to everyone who would be the next top rider for that year. It was thanks to that girl that he had discovered the place, and he really couldn’t but be happier. He didn't even know there was such a club when he moved to Magnolia, and when he went to the Raijinshuu Motorcycle Track for the first time and saw the races as a spectator, he immediately fell in love with that place.

In addition to the fantastic track, there was the nearby bar frequented only by motorcyclists or motorcycle enthusiasts. The beer was good and they made great sandwiches well filled the way he liked it. It would become his second home, he already knew it. In addition, he had also discovered that there was a mechanical workshop not far from there, and even if Laxus had already found a job and an apartment on the other side of the city, he would have been damned if he hadn’t at least taken a look. The ideal would have been to work nearby, but he had time to think about it. Meanwhile, he could enjoy his victories which, he was already sure, would be many.

“I told you to bet on me” was his arrogant reply as he ran a hand through his hair and Cana laughed.

“I'll buy you a beer, you definitely deserve it!” she exclaimed enthusiastically and then waved her arms to attract the attention of the two girls still on the bleachers. As Mirajane looked at her in perplexity, Lucy was about to cry over the money she had just lost.

“Okay,” the blond said as he set off with his bike towards the exit of the track. He certainly wouldn't have turned down a free beer. A few motorcyclists joined him, someone to compliment him, someone to find out who he was, since no one seemed to know him. And indeed, it was, Laxus had been to see the races only twice before deciding to register, so it was logical that no one remembered his face. A pink-haired boy was enthusiastic and kept asking him for life, death and miracles, too bad that Laxus didn't have time to answer because the boy kept talking and laughing like a machine.

“Next time I'll beat you!”.

“You’ve to beat me first,” retorted a biker full of piercings, and Laxus grinned but didn't answer, as a lot of people, boys and girls craned their necks to see who was that blond-haired stranger who had beaten their strongest bikers.

***

Freed kept tapping his pen nervously on the table, while he read the papers that the lawyer had just sent him. He was nervous, especially after his father had called him. Freed regretted having answered him, because hearing him had worsened his mood even more, and he really didn't believe it was possible given how he got up that morning. With bad news and a war on the way. But if his father believed that he would give up and that he would close the Raijinshuu, he was very wrong. He felt the phone vibrate and with pursed lips looked at who it was: his mother. Even more nervous he closed the call without even answering her. Maybe he should have blocked his parents directly so they wouldn't call him again.

A glass was placed in front of his eyes and Freed looked at Evergreen, who had just brought him a beer.

“You know, soon the race will be over and you’ll find yourself surrounded by a lot of people who just want to celebrate. Time to put the papers away,” she said plainly as she pushed the glass of beer towards him. Freed looked down at the reddish liquid and sighed wearily. He knew his friend was right, but he couldn't really feel comfortable.

“I have to finish seeing...”.

“Freed, everything’s in order. Your father can't do anything to get you shut down, you know that better than anyone,” she reminded him. Freed was silent for a moment and then shook his head.

“He’ll find something, he always does” he retorted irritably “And there are a lot of checks next week, tomorrow the ones on food, Thursday those on the safety of the track, then they’ll check the stands, then...”.

“Freed, look, checking those cards won't change anything anyway. And for today you should just relax,” Evergreen insisted and pushed the glass even more towards him. “Come on, now drink and close those files,” she ordered. Freed sighed but didn’t reply, knowing full well that her friend could become really stubborn. He put the papers away and then leaned back in the chair, taking the glass and trying to free himself from the thoughts that were making him nervous.

“Damn, the blondie really won!” Bickslow suddenly exclaimed from behind the counter. More than making beers, however, he was watching the race in progress on the television. Not that it was a problem, at the moment all the customers were out enjoying the race.

“Then he wasn't lying when he said he was going to win,” Evergreen commented in surprise looking up at the TV. Freed kept thinking about his father, those checks and the fact that he should call him back, sooner or later. He couldn't ignore him indefinitely, even though he’d have preferred to do so.

“Listen Freed, how about buying a bigger TV? It's unfair that we’ve to settle for a tiny screen when the people out there can enjoy the race properly,” Bickslow said, rousing him from his thoughts.

“Seems to be just fine to me,” he objected.

“I assure you it doesn't,” the bartender retorted with conviction. “In any case, people are coming. Ever, move your ass. I'm not going to do the work all by myself now that the crowd’s coming,” he said.

“But if I do everything myself” objected the girl going back behind the counter. Freed smiled slightly, thinking it would probably be useful to have another bartender. A little later people started coming in and Freed thanked that he was already seated with his beer so he didn't have to queue among all those people. Not that he should have done it anyway, since he was the boss of that place and at best, he would have taken it on his own.

A couple of guys greeted him and Freed smiled at them with a brief wave of his hand, until an angry blonde came to him. As soon as Lucy was in front of him, she slammed a hand on the table in irritation.

“You must prevent Cana from setting foot in here for the rest of the year,” she snapped. Freed raised an eyebrow, he was about to ask why but it wasn’t necessary, because the girl continued to speak. “It's not fair that she wins every bet, every time. Every most holy time. How is it possible? And why am I always losing? I was hoping to get back what I lost the last few times, but instead I find myself with 20,000 jewels less, and they all went into Cana’s hands!” she exclaimed irritably.

“Have you ever considered the idea of not placing bets anymore?” Freed asked.

“Of course not, it's a matter of principle,” Lucy objected. “And the worst part is that she keeps throwing it at me, you should throw her out. Oh, here she comes,” she moaned.

“Two great beers for the winners!” screamed the brunette as soon as she walked into the club. Freed found himself giggling as Lucy moaned over the lost money.

“I'm sorry Lucy, if it were someone else, I could consider the idea, but Cana makes me earn a lot” he said and the blonde moaned again but resigned she sat down in front of him, taking her head in her hands.

“At least offer me the beer for consolation,” she pleaded. Freed giggled again but took pity on her and stood up. Since Evergreen and Bickslow were already quite busy with all the people who had entered, he went after the counter and got by on his own.

“Lucy lost a bet?” Bickslow guessed as he placed sandwiches to warm.

“Apparently,” Freed replied filling his glass and glancing at the mass of people who had entered. “Who’s the winner?” he asked curiously.

“The blond next to Gajeel,” he replied, nodding his head to the table where the two boys were sitting. Freed followed his gaze and paused a moment longer to observe the handsome boy with broad shoulders and blond hair. He had never seen him there, and he knew all the boys who frequented that place. Well, that meant he'd have one more client, he had nothing to complain about.

As Bickslow walked away to the other side of the counter, Freed turned and took a small saucer filling it with chips. If he was going to console Lucy, he would do it right, and then he was starting to feel a bit hungry. Nobody disturbed him until he heard a low voice behind him.

“Hey, can you make me a beer?”

Freed turned surprised and noticed that it was the blond who had won the race. Now that he was closer, Freed could observe him better, and if already from a distance he had considered him handsome, now he couldn’t help but confirm his initial thoughts and also consider him fascinating. Piercing eyes of intense blue, a dark shirt that fit him perfectly and a smirk on his face. Normally Freed would have called Bickslow or Evergreen to serve him, but ultimately that guy would have been a new customer, better keep him good.

“What you want?” he asked with a slight smile. Laxus scanned the menu on the wall behind Freed and then picked one. Freed hurried to give it to him. “Winner of the day, right?” he asked and the blond smiled broadly, obviously pleased.

“I'll probably be the winner for the next few months,” he commented arrogantly and Freed found himself giggling as he put the glass down on the counter.

“Well, for today the bar offers the winner, but don't get used to it,” he told with an amused smile. The blonde laughed and thanked him, taking the glass and walking away from the counter to sit next to Gajeel. Eh, a new client was still a new client, and if in that case he was handsome, tall and with a nice ass, then Freed just had one more reason to hold him tight.

***

Laxus walked through the doors of what had become his favorite club and walked over to the counter and Bickslow. It had been a while now that he frequented that place, and as he had thought from the first time he had set foot in it, it was becoming his second home. It was normal for someone who loved motorcycles like him to be comfortable in such a place. The people who frequented it were all easygoing, the beer was good, he could ride the track and drool behind bikes that he could never afford.

Not that Laxus complained about his little gem, he loved his bike and if and when he decided to change it, his heart would cry, given how fond he was of it. But every now and then even rich people came to that place just to show off their vehicles and, well, gazing with the eyes was allowed.

He was in a particularly good mood that day. All thanks to a scratch card that he had taken to try his luck and which had made him win 700 jewels. It was little money since he would pay a dinner at most, but it was enough to put Laxus in a good mood. And since luck seemed to be running that day, he hoped to be able to ride a bike even though he knew the track was closing at that time.

“Beer?” Bickslow asked.

“Nah, I want to go for a ride on the track first,” Laxus said. Bickslow glanced at the clock.

“I'm sorry, I just can't leave you at this time,” he replied. Laxus snorted lightly. Well, he tried.

“Don't worry, get me a beer then”.

Bickslow gave it to him and Laxus sat down at the counter. Of all the guys who were there, he got along particularly well with that strange blue-haired bartender, despite the fact that he was a talkative type. Right from the start he had introduced him to the top bikers, and he had gossip about everyone. One of his favorites was Evergreen, the other bartender in the place. Apparently, the girl had some kind of friendly relationship with benefits with one of the bikers. Speaking of which, the aforementioned biker was right there chatting with the brunette while he ate a sandwich. Bickslow grinned amused, glancing at his friend, who in response glared at him.

“When can I sign up for the next race?” Laxus asked as he looked around the bar, but at that time there was hardly anyone. Lucy and Natsu were sitting dining at a small table in the corner, but luckily the pink-haired boy hadn't noticed him. He had this crazy mania to challenge anyone and after a while Laxus was annoyed at hearing his voice.

“Next week registration will be open” replied Bickslow “Are you sure you don't want to eat something?” he then asked. Laxus at that point decided to eat a nice sandwich there and also ordered some French fries. He spent an hour there having dinner and chatting with Bickslow. Since there were not too many customers, the bartender could keep him company. Once he finished Laxus paid and greeted him, nodded to Evergreen who was still arguing with her friend, and left the club.

He walked towards his bike but as he passed in front of the track something caught his attention. A boy was entering, and Laxus had already seen him. He was that long green-haired bartender who had offered him beer on his victory day. Looking at the vehicle he was taking into the track, Laxus noticed that he had a beautiful motorcycle, a lady motorcycle. Damn, he must have been rich. That was a bike that Laxus would jump through hoops, one of the latest releases. He didn't know if the reason he stopped was the handsome bartender, the beautiful bike or the fact that the boy was entering the track when clearly Bickslow had told him it was closed at that time, but Laxus did.

“Hey, is it an employee benefit to enter the track even at these times?” he asked. The boy turned to him clearly surprised and for a moment looked at him in silence blinking confused.

“Excuses me?” he asked. Laxus smiled slightly and took a couple of steps closer.

“Bickslow told me the track is closed at this time. I'd like to take a ride too,” he explained. The boy smiled slightly, finally understanding what he meant.

“Well, Bickslow actually told you right. The track is closed at this time, no one can enter” he said in a calm voice.

“Well, apparently you do,” he replied.

“It would be weird if I couldn't, since I'm the owner,” the boy chuckled and it was Laxus' time to be stunned. He must have had an eloquent expression on his face because the motorcyclist laughed slightly. “Freed, nice to meet you,” he said extending his hand. Laxus held his still a little stunned.

“Laxus,” he just said. He had thought he was just a bartender, on the other hand it was he who served him without batting an eye the first time he had been there. “Are you… really the owner of this place?” he asked still surprised. He was young for having opened such a place, probably a few years younger than him. How the hell had he done it?

“Yeah,” Freed replied simply. “Actually, I thought Bickslow with that wide mouth told you,” he added. Laxus recovered and laughed lightly.

“He told me life, death and miracles of everyone but he didn't say anything about... no, he actually said something, but I didn't know you were Freed,” he recalled at that point, frowning.

“I hope he didn't badmouth about me,” Freed joked.

“Nah,” Laxus replied with a smile. “He just complained that he wants a bigger television,” he said with a shrug. Freed rolled his eyes.

“I had to figure it out,” he commented. Laxus stopped for a moment to look at him, from the first time he had seen him he had found him attractive but he hadn't given it too much weight. There were many attractive men, yet now that he knew he was the boss of that place he felt a little in awe. Which didn't happen often. But knowing that such a young boy had opened such a place was strange, and he honestly didn't know what to think of that boy.

“So, you wanted to ride a motorcycle, right? How about a challenge?” Freed asked suddenly. Laxus frowned.

“Do you want to challenge now?” he asked fearing he hadn't understood correctly. He understood that at that time no one could enter the track. Well, Freed on the other hand was the boss, he could probably do what he wanted there.

“Of course, after how sure you were to win all the races, I really want to see if it was luck or skill” Freed instigated him with a smirk. Laxus partly out of pride, partly because he really wanted to ride the motorcycle, he found his grin again.

“Okay,” he said. Freed smiled in response and entered the track, while Laxus went to get his bike and then join him. Eh, luck that day turned just in favor of him.

***

Laxus stopped with the bike still enthusiastic about the ride he had done. Damn, it had been liberating and even challenging. Even if he had lost. He didn't expect it, but at least he could justify himself by saying it was only thanks to Freed's bike. And so he did when the boy brought up the victory.

“I would have been surprised, given the bike you ride,” he then commented. Freed raised an eyebrow with a pleased and amused grin on his face.

“Are you trying to find justifications for not admitting that you were beaten fairly?” he asked.

“At all. But your bike’s more powerful than mine, there's little to do,” Laxus said with a shrug. Freed shook his head in resignation.

“I should really race with another bike so as to prove otherwise,” he commented in a low voice, more to himself than to Laxus. The blond gave him a curious look, they hadn't talked much, only competed, and he was starting to be really curious to know more about him. Like he had the idea of opening such a place, a real paradise for Laxus. “Would you like to get a beer? Since you lost you owe me one,” Freed said. Laxus looked at him at the same time surprised but also a little amused.

“Really?” he asked him in a half laugh “Are you the boss of this place and Ishould buy you a beer?” he asked. Freed smiled.

“Well, considering that the last time I offered it to you, I'd say it's not that strange. But if you want, we can do another race and I’ll use a bike with the exact same power as yours, and if I win, you’ll offer me the whole dinner” he said.

“Only if you promise to give me a bike when I win,” Laxus said with a grin. Freed raised his eyebrows but smiled.

“Gone,” he replied and Laxus chuckled, following the boy to the bar. The two entered and went to the counter. Bickslow looked at them in surprise.

“Laxus, still here?” he asked.

“Yes, in the end I did the lap around the track as I wanted. He let me,” he said pointing to Freed.

“Don't tell me you made a challenge,” Bickslow commented as if he were expecting it, as if it were normal. Laxus would have lied to say that he was not left in a bit of bad. That meant that Freed often did it with other clients.

“Yes, and I won. Not that I'm surprised,” Freed said as he sat down in the chair. Bickslow rolled his eyes.

“Sooner or later someone will beat you and I'll make you remember it forever,” the bartender said. Freed smiled.

“The person who will beat me on my track has not yet been born,” he retorted arrogantly. Laxus would have smiled at his conceit, but something caught his attention.

“Wait, you’ve never been beaten by anyone?” he asked surprised.

“No,” Freed smiled smugly. “Since I opened this place, I’m the absolute champion, which means that I haven't lost a single race in four years,” he said.

“Yes, and you’re also unbearable,” Evergreen interjected annoyed.

“I agree,” Bickslow said. “And when somebody beats you, I'll throw a huge party and I'll put up posters with a giant picture of your pissed face and place it for all the bleachers.” Freed smiled.

“I doubt that will ever happen, but if you do, I'll make sure I fire you first,” he said. Laxus didn't know if he was joking or not, but Bickslow didn't seem in the least affected by the threat.

“I hoped you beat him,” the bartender told Laxus.

“Well, we still have to have a fair competition,” the blond pointed out. Freed nodded.

“Right. I just want to see how you justify yourself when I beat you,” he said.

“It won't be necessary, because you won't win.”

“We all cheer for you, Laxus,” Bickslow said and Evergreen nodded vigorously.

“If you win, we will offer you beer for a whole week,” said the serious girl.

“What great friends,” Freed said sarcastically. “So, can we have two beers or do we have to stay here and talk with nothing to drink?” he asked. Bickslow turned and prepared both glasses while Freed asked Ever for a toast to eat. In a short time Laxus found himself again with a glass under his nose and in the company of three boys who dragged him into a pleasant and fun conversation.

[ohnotoomanyfandoms]

If you wrote a quick lil Jordelia snippet in the style of one of Cassie's Chain of Iron excerpts (like write a tiny bit of a prediction of a scene that could happen between them) I would love you forever 🙏🙏🙏❤❤❤

My dear Jordelia Nation, I bring you a little Christmas present! 

I am nowhere near satisfied of this ficlet (which is why I’m not even putting it on my AO3 page), but I wrote it and I can’t take it back now. Based on THREE snippets (you’ll find those in bold), I present you THAT confession scene under the cut. 

I just want to point out one thing: I don’t think this is how the scene is going to go in the books. At all. I just had fun imagining James and Cordelia’s conversation on that Most Important Topic and tried to keep it as in character as possible, but I also know my Edwardian English is not the best. 

Without further ado, here are 2k words of Jordelia angst for you all <3 

Cordelia rang Risa for some tea. The boys would certainly require scones. As they settled around her drawing room’s table, Cordelia couldn’t help but notice they were starting this meeting without a key member.

“Where’s Lucie?” She asked no one in particular. She turned to James and he shrugged.

“Probably with Anna,” Matthew suggested. Hopefully with Anna, Cordelia thought. She knew Lucie had a secret. Now that James was out of the Institute, there was no way of knowing where her future parabatai was. If anything, Cordelia reprimanded herself silently, she was supposed to know.

“We should start without her,” James said. “Let’s get to it.”

“Grace will never talk to us. Not after last week,” Matthew declared. “We have to find another way.”

“I still don’t see why you think she won’t,” interrupted Christopher. “I am sure she will speak to Jamie, if he asks nicely. She was entirely amicable with me last month.”

“That was before what happened last week, Kit,” Thomas pointed out.

“Jamie can’t go. There is no point in even trying. It will be a waste of our time, time we don’t have. We need a different plan,” Matthew said.

“Why can’t Jamie go?” asked Kit innocently.

“We’ll never find a better—“ Tom was saying, but Cordelia cut him off.

“It’s of no consequence. James is free to go see Grace if he wishes to.”

She didn’t miss the furtive glance Matthew sent her way.

“I can accompany him,” Kit offered.

But James was shaking his head. “Daisy…”

She swallowed hard. “It would be beneath me to try and stop you.”

She would not be remembered as the villain in this story. Her husband, by the Angel, Cordelia still couldn’t believe it after a whole month of marriage… if staying away from Grace was so painful for James, as it was clear from his ghost-like pallor and his hollow eyes, Cordelia couldn’t very well ignore it. She would swallow whatever was left of her pride and her shattered honor and let him go. The mission was more important.

“I made you a promise. I told you I would keep it, and I am.”

If Cordelia hadn’t already been in love with him then, the intensity of his gaze as he delivered those words would’ve done it, surely.

“And I meant what I just said, James. I free you from that promise.”

Mathew, the only other person in the room who knew her secret and pitied her for it, was quick to intervene, to spare her the embarrassment of further discussion on the topic in front of their friends. “Then it’s settled. Jamie and Kit will both go. Tomorrow night, then we will need to regroup here.”

Lucie had never shown up, Cordelia thought after the Merry Thieves had gone. She would need to send her a message. Pondering where her friend had gotten herself, she didn’t notice James cornering her on the way to the master bedchamber, the room they both occupied as far as the Enclave was concerned. James had been courteous enough to let her take it since they wouldn’t need to share one.

“Daisy, we must speak.”

His golden eyes were fixed on her, fierce as a hawk’s gaze. She said, "It doesn’t matter what I said. I wanted them to leave you alone —"

"I don’t believe you," he said. She could feel the slight tremors running through his body — tremors of stress, that meant he was holding himself very still. Holding himself back. "You don’t say things you don’t mean, Daisy —“

“Oh, James. The Angel knows I do.” She took a deep breath and pointed to the Herondale ring on her finger. “Every day of my life I say things I don’t mean.”

“Yes, but not to me,” James said. “You are entirely honest with me, and that’s what I treasure the most about us. About this time. When we are here together, we don’t have to pretend.”

Cordelia’s heart broke. She averted her eyes for a second to focus on her feet, then met his again.

“James, you do not know how much it means to me that you try and pretend like you’re not sacrificing yourself for my sake in all this.”

There was nothing but honesty in his face. “What are you talking about, Daisy, if anything, it was you who did this for me, to save me from the Clave—“

“I am not referring to our marriage,” she said loudly. “I am referring to our promise. I am referring to the fact that you are doing your best to shield me from how much it pains you to keep it. Yet you are determined to keep it, because you are a man of honor, the best of men, no matter the consequences to your own heart.”

His voice softened. “Daisy, cariad—“

A part of her registered he’d never called her that before. It was a term she was used to hearing his parents use. But she had no time to ponder on its meaning at present.

“I can see that you have trouble sleeping at night. How miserable you’ve been. You’re a shadow of yourself, and it has nothing to do with your grandfather. If you miss her this much, you should go see her.”

“Cordelia,” he said, his tone suddenly serious, angry even. The change in name was not lost on her either. “What on earth are you talking about?”

“If you need to see—“ she forced herself to pronounce that name, “Grace, you should go see her.”

“Are you truly encouraging me to commit adultery?”

Internally, she laughed. “Do you believe me such a masochist? I am merely suggesting that you see her, instead of convincing yourself that you don’t want to.”

James dropped on the settee by the window. Cordelia remained standing, despite his silent request that she join him. He was so much taller than her that his head was at level with her chest. She tried not to think about it. James kept his hand on her arm. She was glad for its anchoring presence.

“I am your husband, Daisy,” he started.

“In name only,” she promptly reminded him.

James shook his head. “I placed marriage runes on you and my ring on your finger.” His own fingers touched the shape of the rune on her left arm.

“Rune,” she corrected again. “Just one.” Because you didn’t want the other.

“Cordelia.”

The intensity of his voice made her turn. His eyes were molten gold.

“We are married,” James continued. “You giving me permission to see Grace doesn’t mean I will go see her. I won’t betray your trust.”

“But the mission—“

“I’ll find another way. I would ask that you cease assuming what I am feeling or not feeling, I beg of you. It’s not being married to you that’s making me miserable. On the contrary.”

“Then what is?” She asked boldly. “James, you are wasting away. No one who loved you would want you to sacrifice your own happiness. I certainly don’t.”

“No, Daisy.” He shook his head again, more fervently this time.

“One of us should be happy, James.”

His fingers traced her arm. “By the Angel, Daisy, I am not unhappy with you. Please do not suggest the contrary. And besides, what do you think would happen? You may bless an adulterous union, but Grace is also engaged, and I doubt that dear Charles would be as magnanimous as you.”

Oh, but he would, Cordelia thought bitterly. No one was keeping James and Grace separated if not their own oaths. But she couldn’t tell James that, because she would need to expose Charles’ secret, and she wasn’t ready to do that as much as she was to expose her brother’s.

“Charles doesn’t need to know,” she lied quickly, although he appeared suddenly lost in thought. “You two could meet in secret tomorrow as per the plan.”

“What did you say?”

“That Charles doesn’t—“

“No, forget Charles. What did you say before? One of us should… gods, Daisy, are you miserable? Is that it? If so, tell me what I am doing wrong and I will do everything in my power and beyond to amend, bach.”

Another Welsh term she’d heard his family use. She shook her head. “There is nothing you can do. Seeing you happy will make me happy.” Only saying it felt like placing a dagger in her own chest.

“I know you dreamt of finding true love and this has shattered those dreams. But you can still have those things. You just need to find the right man and in a year you’ll be with him. I promise I will help.”

She was silent for a moment. Then she took a leap. “What if I’ve already found him?”

That took him by surprise. His eyes widened, he took his hand off her arm. “You… have? This must be even harder for you then. Who is it? If you wish to confide in me, of course.”

“You don’t wish to know, trust me.”

“No, I do. Am I not your friend, Daisy, before I am your husband? And did I not swear to fight your battles and to keep your secrets?”

“This one is better kept unsaid, for both our peace of mind.”

He seemed to consider their words carefully. After a minute of silence, he spoke, his voice calm. “I don’t want to push you. So you are determined not to share this with anyone else? Does Lucie know, at least?”

“No, she doesn’t. Matthew does, but that’s beside the point.”

“Matthew— why would you confide in Math and not me? Daisy, am I such a terrible friend to you?”

“I don’t want to talk about it. But don’t hold your breath, he doesn’t love me back, his affections lay elsewhere.”

“Nonsense. How can a man be indifferent to you?”

She was tired of this conversation, tired of lying to him… “James, can you close the door on your way out?”

“Of course.” He understood at once and instantly stood up from the settee. He towered over her for a moment. “If you wish to speak later, or play some chess before dinner, I’ll be in the other room.”

He made to leave, then turned back to her and before she knew what was happening, he cupped her cheek and kissed her there. His eyes were melancholy. “You mean the world to me, Daisy. I wish I could show you how much.”

He closed the door behind him as she had requested, but she was still frozen in place where he had left her. Her arm and her cheek where he had touched her felt like they were on fire. She was suddenly reminded of the passionate kiss they’d shared in the Whispering Room, and for the first time in a long time, Cordelia questioned her assumption. She freed her hair from their complicated ‘do. Her mind was racing.

She jumped toward her desk, where Lucie’s latest chapter of The Beautiful Cordelia lay half-unread. She gripped the pages and scanned them for a single word. She could swear she’d read it just two days ago… there it was. Characters who were so clearly based on Will and Tessa filled the pages of this chapter. “Cariad” the hero kept calling his long-lost love. “Bach,” she had exclaimed once they were reunited. Cordelia had never paid as much attention as she should have when the Herondales communicated in Welsh, but she wished she had.

Before she could think this through, she sprinted for the door. James was in their drawing room, a worn-out copy of Ovid’s Heroides in his hands.

“Had a change of heart?” he asked without looking up from his book.

“Hardly,” Cordelia said breathlessly.

“Mittor ad Alciden a coniuge conscia mentis / littera si coniunx Deianira tua est,” he read aloud, which slightly annoyed Cordelia. She wasn’t here for a lesson in mythology. And it was beneath James to flaunt his Latin unnecessarily. She remembered he’d made her promise to teach him Farsi, once they were married, but they hadn’t delved down that road so far.

“You know I don’t speak Latin, bach,” she said slowly, doing her best not to mispronounce the last word.

That undoubtedly got his attention and made him meet her eyes. “How fortunate that this text also offers a translation, then. It’s Deianira writing to Hercules after he abandoned her to be with another woman: A letter, that shares her feelings, sent to Alcides / By your wife, if Deianira is still your wife.”

“James, can we not discuss mythology at present?”

“What mythology?” he grinned as he pushed the book aside.

“I have a confession to make.” She walked toward him this time.

His eyes were gentle. “Only if you truly want to, Daisy.”

“I haven’t been entirely forthcoming with you all these months. That’s what’s making me miserable. I don’t want to lie to you, James, and I’m tired of doing so.”

“I’m listening.”

“I said I’d met the right man, and that at least wasn’t a lie. Do you know what it’s like, to have everything you’ve ever wanted but it’s just pretend?”

“Yes,” he said calmly. “I do.”

Grace, she thought, because they’d been together in secret for years, had almost run away together.

“No,” she replied, “You don’t. Not this way.”

James suddenly stood. “Will you quit saying what you think I feel or don’t feel? It’s the third time today, Daisy. If you wish to know something, just ask, do not assume.”

“But I already know. You’ve told me.”

James, you don’t love me, she had said. No, I don’t, he had replied after his haste proposal.

“You feel what you feel and I cannot fault you for it. I can hardly fault my own heart.”

“Daisy,” he said then. “What are you saying?”

She took another deep breath and jumped into the abyss. “It’s you, James. It’s always been you.” The earth beneath her threatened to swallow her whole. “I’ve loved you all my life.”

“You can’t mean—”

"I know it’s not what you want, but it won’t change anything between us. I’ve tried to stop, but I have been unsuccessful. This is my predicament and there is nothing either of us can do about it. We can stay friends and companions, the way we have these months. What if I just love you? What if I love you but I never touch you or talk about it, what would happen then?"

Cordelia wasn’t sure he was breathing. After an interminable time, his lips finally parted to say something.

She never knew what, because one moment he was there, his hand on her arm, and the next he was gone.

It appeared they hadn’t destroyed the shadow realm after all.

/// There you have it. Sorry for the cliffhanger. Sorry if you hated the entire story. Again, I kind of hate it too. If you enjoyed it, that makes me happy <3 I’ll go back to writing meta and speculation now. 

[anidealiveson]

Thanksvember Master Post

Day 1 - Like Coming Home - It has a super rare “wholesome plot twist”! Without spoiling anything too huge, I really like that @julesherondalex took the time to talk about how important it is to take care of yourself first. You can’t love someone else properly, the way they deserve, if you don’t have that same love for yourself. I wasn’t expecting the heartbreaking scene, but the beautiful way in which that topic was was approached neither took away from the story or the joy.

Day 2 - Must Love Dogs - An incredibly fluffy (literally) fic that I loved reading. @rosehallshadowsinger did a really great job weaving Azriel and Elain’s canon personalities into this adorable AU scenario. It is obvious @rosehallshadowsinger took care to create believable personalities for two characters that didn’t get POVs in the books.

Day 3 - Striking Matches -  I have to say that I wasn’t at all attracted to an AU fic about firefighters. I was also not a big Rowaelin fan before that, but I was work procrastinating so I gave it a try. Wellll, 30 parts later, I found myself delighted at the writing and sad it was over. I couldn’t believe how well @shyvioletcat cat was able to entirely re-characterize these two into such a different setting, yet still retaining what made them popular in the books. Aelin was perfect in her role as a snarky schoolteacher irritating the stoic firefighter Rowan. And the descriptions of the kids lining up at the firehouse demonstration and Jake’s adorable prodding was icing on the cake.

Day 4 - Close Quarters -  I really loved the way @lady-therion wrote Nesta in this modern AU. I particularly like how she equates Nesta’s sometimes standoffish attitude as a very relatable personality trait. She has trouble reading people and gauging situations. It’s well written and the dialogue is unique for a plot that is common in ff!

Day 5 - Like A Lonely House - It’s got a colossal I love Lucy level misunderstanding mixed in with a lot of tension and angst. This Nesta that is full of sacrifice and duty and fire is how I imagine the Nesta who feels that she has a stake in the Fae world would be like. @featherymalignancy wove such a captivating new world in Macar, that it felt a lot like being introduced to the 8th court in the ACOTAR world.

Day 6 - Death Dance - There are several takes out there that touch on Nesta in the Ilyrian camps, but I love how @thewayshedreamed interpreted Nesta’s skills on the battlefield as a calculated dance. Nesta has always been a raging storm, but I love how @thewayshedreamed took care to show us a Nesta that channeled that storm into discipline. If SJM never intended to release a Nessian focused book, I would have considered this a satisfying end to their story.

Day 7 - One Night Standards - I love the way @sassyhobbits writes Aelin with her typical extremely sassy exterior, but also made sure to saddle her with a vulnerable side that runs deep. I normally don’t care for slow burns, but I like the pace of her relationship with Rowan here, and that they had to work hard at it. I also like the plot lines that involved their PR stunts and how the public grew to love them as well.

Day 8 - Goose Chasing - Its the most absurd plot of any fanfic I’ve read! The title is not figurative. Its really does involve chasing a goose. @rhysismydaddy did a fantastic job encapsulating the spirit of silly Cassian and grumpy Nesta in a situation they’d likely never find themselves in, yet making it entirely believable. 

Day 9 - Manon Chooses The Worst Babysitter Possible - It’s such a casual and fluffy and hilarious read. It was fun to read about a softer and more delicate Manon. Through this absurd mistake, @sarah-bae-maas did an excellent job really humanizing Manon and postulating a fun in-world domestic scenario. 

Day 10 - My Hunger Knows No Bounds -  @perseusannabeth manages to take a simple concept and weave a sweet narrative. I particularly love how @perseusannabeth incorporated her personal details into it and took the time to share her lovely culture with us.

Day 11 - Knowing me, Knowing you - We never got to actually see Aelin rule Terrasen (well we got a tinyyy bit) in the books. Though this was modern day, @nalgenewhore tells a fun story of what that could have been like.

Day 12 -  Forever (is a long time) - @noodlecatposts takes Elide and Lorcan’s completely polar opposite personalities and spins an interesting (and frankly quite adorable) story. All the rules crack me up. My favorite Lorcan is the one that reminds me of Luke Danes from Gilmore Girls. Currently, he is in the middle of grumpily fixing up her flooded room, so I am sure that my favorite parts are yet to come.

Day 13 - Go Your Own Way - I appreciate @tomtenadia for putting to words a scene that I desperately wanted in ACOWAR or even ACOFAS. A lovely parallel to an equally lovely Fleetwood mac song.

Day 14 - In Which She Makes A Friend - It is no surprise that the fandom wants Nesta to find her place in the Illyrian mountains and even bring about some social change with the female warriors. But the way @bookstantrash got there was such a wonderful and endearing journey. Big fan of the callbacks to how Kaelin was treated and the similarities to a certain Illyrian warrior was when he was younger. We got to see a sweet Nesta, who I’d like to think was attempting to make up for some of her regrets through taking care of Kaelin.

Day 15 - The Ranch - As a huge fan of Sweet Home Alabama, its should be no surprise that I loved this fic by @tacmc . I enjoyed the slow change that we saw in a stubborn Nesta as she opened up to this new way of life and reconnected with her sisters and found a home with Cassian.

Day 16 - Felons - Such a unique interpretation of Nesta and Cassian. I really like the self-sacrificing Nesta angle and @rhysismydaddy did a great job weaving intrigue into the unraveling of what we knew to be a her innocence. I never read The Witness, but this really made me want to.

Day 17 - Of Books and Timber - Cassian offers to build a shelf for Nesta. The way @duskandstarlight goes through the entire range of emotions through Nesta is brilliant. She starts out with cold indifference, but by the end, we get from her a sweet and tender gesture of gratitude. Showing that meeting each other halfway with small gestures is all they ever needed.

Day 18 - You Should Sleep In My Bed More Often - I absolutely loved this quick exchange between Nesta and Cassian after she accidentally injures him. I can’t believe how much I laughed out loud when Cassian said “I need you to protect me closer”. @charincharge​ perfectly captured the teasing childish essence of Cassian and Nesta’s hilarious victim-blaming was so on the nose that I might have thought this was taken right out of ACOSAF.

Day 19 - The Right Swipe - I really enjoyed this take on the inner circle mixed with the super modern online dating plot. I especially love that @redisriding created genuinely realistic characters (body issues, social anxiety etc). Great read!

Day 20 - Goldfish Prompt - What a fun read. I love how frantic and much personality Feyre had here. I love how dedicated to her fish she was, and how that made her super endearing. Cute read from @azrielsiphons

Day 21 - The One With The Snowstorm -  What I really like is that Cassian actually says that he is sorry for his part in Nesta’s exile. I am not bitter about it, but it was an interesting turn. They need to meet halfway here and I rarely see it so well written as @joysbell has done here!

Day 22 - Prompt - A lovely and cute and sweet prompt written by @crowsvalentine​! I love the ramp up of suspense just to get to the hilarious payoff. Its adorable and worth the quick read.

Day 23 - Fix It -  is one by @thewayshedreamed​ that I love in its simplicity. It’s a small little argument Cassian and Nesta get into, but its still compelling. It’s sweet and super endearing the way the two of them are written and the subtle way they work through it. Great read!

Day 24 - I Do Bad Things To You - The mob angle may have been done before, but I don’t think with as much care and regard that @tswaney17​ has been giving it. I how the canon personalities of the characters translate so well into this modern AU. Its very obvious that @tswaney17​ has done her research. I especially love all the details around Elain as a surgeon. The story is compelling and well written and every chapter has me wanting more.

Day 25 - Love Her Like She should Be Loved - This is an excellent fic that I really loved. @julemmaes did such a great job translating some of the canon tension from ACOFAS into a modern world. It’s ripe with emotion, drama and quite a bit of heart. I love how earnestly Cassian comes to Nesta’s defense even in the face of going against his entire family. I like the reference to some very real psychological struggles. I think a lot of people can relate to it.

Day 26 - Literally In Love - I really enjoy the subtle mystery that follows this entire journey. I enjoy that @julesherondalex keeps us guessing, while simultaneously weaving a sweet and tender story about two shy teachers and just a slew of mishaps worthy of a Shakespearian drama.

Day 27 - The Shadow Bond - I love Azriel, and this is such a wonderful fic by @radientwings​ focusing on how his shadows might work. His shadows are the one thing that I am most curious about him in the series, so it was lovely to read such a well written interpretation of them.

Day 28 - Exes and Oh’s - Just a shout out to @highqueenofelfhame​ for this lovely story about rekindling past love. I like that even though the plot was uncomplicated, the emotions were not. I love that Aelin didn’t have a perfect reason for what she did, but sometimes that is just how things are. This is a story about taking a second chance, whether it’s deserved or not.

Day 29 - Fever - I really love this fic called Fever. I enjoyed how @lady-therion​ portrayed Nesta. She hit the entire gammut of characteristics (snarky, worried, vulnerable, caring, short-tempered, flirty, you name it!) but it really worked here. I found this nurse Nesta to be endearing and relatable and the dynamic between her and Cassian was very sweet. Just go read the damned thing.

Day 30 - Baby Steps - I really really love this fic. @runesandfaes did such a great job in just so few words to show a really sweet moment between Chaol, Yrene and their daughter learning to walk. I love the parallel back to when Chaol was learning to walk and the cameo of the golden couch. So sweet.