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cherrixpie · 19 days ago

Text

NEMESIS

part five of six (surprise :3)

↬ you were supposed to steer clear of mattheo riddle. Shame that he was just so irrestible.

↬ sfw; wc: 10.0k (i saw this coming); cw: violence, blood, broken bones, swear words; tags: gryffindor!reader, muggleborn!reader, enemies to lovers

( masterlist )

Dorothy Dankworth had been a chatterbox even when she was alive. Since her portrait had adopted her most prominent trait, she was the main source of gossip and information for the portraits all over the castle. The moment she saw the Chosen One’s close, muggleborn friend and the Dark Lord’s son tucked away in her forgotten chamber, giggling like co-conspirators and the indecent kiss on the cheek they would have been publicly shunned for in Dorothy’s lifetime, she knew she'd stumbled upon something scandalous. As soon as the Riddle boy had closed the door behind him with a last look through the room, she sprung up from her seat and left her frame, her painted skirts swishing in her wake.

The next two dozen hours, she spent flitting through portrait after portrait, relaying the story to anyone willing to listen. From the stern witches of the Transfiguration corridor to the rowdy group of drunken monks down near the kitchens, Dorothy's story evolved with each telling, peppered with more detail and insinuation until it was less about a tutoring lessons and more about a scandalous romance. By the next evening, gossip had spread around the portraits until even up at the Gryffindor tower, a certain portrait caught wind of the story. And she'd never been one to keep news to herself either.

Blissfully unaware of the storm brewing, you left your shift at the Hospital Wing that evening, joining the crowds of students flooding towards the Great Hall for dinner. Your hands were still stinging from the way you'd poked yourself with the needle due to your lack of concentration. The previous night kept replaying in your mind, especially Mattheo’s kiss on your cheek, the sensation of his surprisingly soft lips. In your memory, it was a confused whirlwind of laughter, his infuriatingly beautiful eyes and the Smiths playing in the background.

As any time you'd find yourself in a crowd these days, you subtly turned your head, on the lookout for a certain Slytherin with brown curls. You did manage to spot him, strolling along with his friends and a toothpick dangling from his lips in place of the usual cigarette. He was staring straight ahead as Malfoy talked animatedly beside him. When you passed them, you distinctly made out the words “Potter with his perfect flying and his perfect scar-”.

Spontaneously, you flashed him a little smile over your shoulder, and for the split of a second, your eyes met and his crinkled with amusement. But before someone could detect your silent exchange, you hastened your step and left them behind, Malfoy's voice still drawling, but being drowned out more and more as you approached the hall alongside a wave of Ravenclaws.

When you stepped into the Entrance Hall, where students were steadily accumulating, you glanced around for your friends and caught sight of Harry, Ron and Hermoine walking down the stone stairs to Gryffindor tower, engaged in lively conversation. Hermoine seemed to be talking to Ron insistently as she gesticulated wildly, Harry’s gaze flickered from one to the other and Ron looked like he was plotting a murder, fists clenched and staring ahead darkly. His cheeks were almost as red as his hair, seemingly burning with indignation. Thinking it was just another petty argument between him and Hermoine, you waved at them and Ron spotted you first. But instead of lighting up or waving back, his gaze turned only more sinister. He nudged the others and then made a beeline towards you, Harry and Hermoine struggling to keep up and exchanging worried looks.

Clutching your book bag, you froze in place and watched them approach with widened eyes, students moving around you but you didn't really see them. What on earth could this be about? It couldn't be…? Ron pushed through a gaggle of third year Hufflepuffs before coming to a halt before you, breathing unevenly and outright furious. “Tell me it's a lie. Please, tell me it's not true,” he growled with balled fists and you stared up at him with wide eyes, completely perplexed, maybe because you didn't want to think, didn't want to imagine that they'd found out about you and their worst enemy sneaking off together in secret.

“Ron what are you even talking about?” You asked, nervously, and took a step back. Out of your peripheral vision, you could make out several heads near you turning towards the scene Ron was causing with his shouting. Ron's frown only deepened and he didn't reciprocate your anxious little smile. “We heard something from the fat lady- something I really, really don't want to believe about you.”

“What are you even saying?” You exclaimed, an edge of desperation in your tone, and you glanced around nervously. To your horror, you caught a glimpse of green near the doors, meaning that the first of the procession from the dungeons must've reached the entrance hall. You could only pray Mattheo was still trailing behind his friends.

“Don't act stupid!” Ron exclaimed angrily, throwing his hands into the air. You threw a helpless look at the other two, somehow still hoping this was some sort of prank. But Hermoine looked at you very seriously and Harry’s eyes had narrowed, and neither of them held Ron back when he roared: “Please tell me you're not fucking Mattheo Riddle!”

“What?!” you spluttered in indignation and glanced around nervously to see how many people had heard him. “What the hell, Ron, I’d never-” You fell silent. You would, probably. But, you reminded yourself stubbornly, you hadn't. “Where did you hear that? Who said I-?”

“The portrait of Dorothy Dankworth saw you together,” Ron pressed, carefully watching your reaction. “The fat lady told us some interesting things about your little meetup with Riddle.” He spat out the name as if it was poisonous and you felt a pinch of anger in your chest.

“You're going to trust the fat lady with information?” you bit back and folded your arms over your chest defiantly, but Ron was undeterred. “Well, then, deny it!”

That shut you up effectively. If you lied to them now and they'd find out anyway, you would lose their trust indefinitely. And you also didn't want to lie to your friends, but their reaction was just like you'd imagined. You let out a deep breath and squared your shoulders as if that would protect you against their scrutiny. It wasn't like you didn't understand why they were angry. They didn't know him like you did. They didn't know he could be funny, kind, caring, passionate and, most of all, nothing like his father.

“I did meet him,” you said, fighting to keep your voice composed as Ron did an indignant intake of air and Hermoine's frown deepened. “But it wasn't like that. I'm-,” you hesitated for a split second, but Harry's eyes narrowed further nonetheless, “I'm tutoring him in muggle studies.”

“You're tutoring him?” Ron roared as if you'd just confessed to killing his grandma, “Are you stupid?!” You recoiled slightly at his harsh tone and shame rose in you when you realized half the hall had stopped talking and was looking over at Ron, who was fuming with outrage. “Have you lost your bloody mind? Tutoring Riddle? You're cozying up to a death eater in the making!” As you opened your mouth to reply, Ron cut you off. “How long has this been going on? Huh? Weeks? Months?”

“He asked me after the quidditch game,” you replied with an honesty your friends couldn't appreciate. “You mean right after he tried to kill Harry with that bludger?” asked Hermoine, appalled, and you frowned defensively. “He didn't try to kill him, don't be ridiculous.”

“Don't you even think of defending him!” Ron called, oblivious to the turning heads. “Don't you get it? He knows that you're close to Harry, he's just planning to get closer to him and you're letting him! Just because he's pretty!” Hermoine tugged at his sleeve to get him to consider the crowd, but Ron's remedy to talking himself into a rage. You were frozen in place, unable to move or defend yourself. It was horrible, what he threw at you, so horrible you couldn't even find the words to reply. Though you knew they'd not take kindly and you understood them well, you'd never have thought you'd one day be scared of Ron. “He's you-know-who’s son,” he bellowed, “And you're throwing yourself at him!”

“I'm not!” you exclaimed, but it sounded more like a plea than anything else. “And he's not using me, I'm just tutoring him, I swear!” Remembering his words, a hint of anger finally crept into your tone. “And he's not his father, he's nothing like him!”

Suddenly, you caught a movement out of the corner of your eyes. It was so small, and should have disappeared into those of the crowd, but somehow, you were drawn to it, as if it had been highlighted by a stage light. Your heart sank. It was Mattheo, behind him his group of Slytherin friends. He was standing at the edge of the crowd, his dark eyes fixed on you with an intensity that made your stomach drop. His jaw was clenched so tight you thought it might snap, and his hands were balled into fists at his sides, barely restrained fury radiating off of him.

There was a dangerous edge to his stance, the kind of tension that promised violence if someone as much as breathed the wrong way. You could see the way his gaze now darted between Harry and Ron, as if calculating how quickly he could get to the latter and shut him up for good. And yet, beneath the storm of anger, you thought you could make out something else- something almost protective- that made your already racing heart pound only faster against your ribcage, though you couldn't decide whether it was in fear or something more … complicated.

When you locked eyes with him, you shook your head pleadingly, and to your utter surprise, the hand that had been wandering to his wand halted. You'd never seen him look so serious as when he now raised a brow at you, that had your breath caught up in your throat. He was waiting for your signal, your permission- even though Ron said all these horrible things about him. When you shook your head subtly, he took a small step back, though still glaring at Ron and vigilant.

“Can't you hear yourself?” Harry chimed in, hands balled into fists also. Hermoine, who seemed to get increasingly embarrassed by all the attention, tried to tug them towards the Great Hall, but he fended her off and looked at you angrily. “He's already manipulating you, you can't trust him!”

“His father’s you-know-who, for Merlin's sake,” Ron spat, “Do you need it spelled out for you? You're so naive if you think he's different. You're muggleborn, he'd probably kill you without even fucking blinking the moment he has the chance!” You threw a nervous glance back at Mattheo, but his features seemed set in stone, unmovable, as he stared at Ron. Berkshire’s hand hovered over his shoulder, as if he was just waiting for him to snap and to have to hold him back from launching at Ron, but Mattheo showed no signs of attack except for his predatory stance. His friend’s eyes flickered towards you quickly and you looked away. “You have no idea what you're talking about!” you said, glaring and holding onto your bag for support, as if his next words would roll over you and bring you down like a storm. And they did.

With a humorless laugh, Ron balled his fists and stepped closer to you. “You're smarter than this- or at least I thought you were. But clearly, you'll believe anything as long as he says it with that stupid smirk of his! You're so fucking naive, risking everything-our trust, your safety-for some slimy Slytherin who probably laughs about you behind your back!”

His words hit you like a gut punch. They were designed to hurt, by someone you trusted taking advantage of your insecurities. Your hands started to shake and you gripped your handle tighter, willing yourself not to cry, not now, not here, not with everyone watching. You opened your mouth to speak, to defend yourself or him, but only a broken little noise emerged from your throat. Your defense seemed to fall from your lips and shatter like glass on the cold stone of the floor, right between you and the friend you'd trusted to never hurt you like this.

When the tears came, they were inevitable, burning in your eyes and finally slipping past your crumbling barrier. Embarrassment washed over you and you tried to wipe them off with a shaky hand, but it was in vain as now, as if a dam had broken. More tears emerged from your eyes and streaked down your cheeks as you suppressed the sobs with all your might. In front of you, Ron's chest stopped heaving suddenly, as if he had just sobered up from a moment of drunken madness, and you saw a hint of regret in his eyes. But, when he stepped closer, you took an instinctive step back. However, Ron didn't get the chance to say anything further, because the sudden sound of someone clapping pierced through the dense, tension-heavy air like a knife.

Mattheo's entire body tensed when he saw the tears stream down your face, saw your lower lip wobble, your wide, vulnerable eyes and your shoulders trembling under the weight of Weasley’s cruel words. Everything but a stranger to rage and violence, he'd only ever felt it on his behalf, or towards himself. This was new. It was like a switch flipped in his mind, an overwhelming roar thrumming against his ears and drowning out everything except the image of you breaking right in front of him. Fury coursed through his veins, hot and all-consuming, but beneath the rage, there was something that caught him off guard- an ache he couldn't name, sharp and suffocating, digging into his chest like a knife.

He hated seeing you like this, hated the way your pain seemed to ripple through you, almost hated you for making him feel as if he was falling apart with you. But he was. Seeing you cry set his every nerve on fire. How fucking dare Weasley make you feel like this? His hands curled and uncurled to fists so hard his nails dug into his palms, the raw sting being the only thing grounding him just enough to keep from charging through the onlookers immediately. But with every second he watched you recoil into yourself with hurt and shame, it became harder to hold back. He didn't even realize he was already approaching you, a low growl rumbling in his throat as his fury trembled just below his breaking point. No one made you cry- especially not some self-righteous Gryffindor.

As you whirled your head around, just like every single person in the hall, you saw Mattheo emerge from their midst, clapping his hands together. His fury was visible in his tense shoulder as and clenched jaw, barely contained and moments away from exploding. He sauntered towards Ron, a sly grin on his lips as he watched him up and down. Ron, reacting wisely, took a step back, his eyes flickering from Riddle’s wand-less hands to his face with hardly contained nervousness. “Congratulations, Weasley,” Mattheo grinned menacingly, his dark eyes glinting like ignited matches about to meet oil. “You just won yourself a prize.”

Then, Mattheo did the most curious thing- he stepped closer to Ron, so there was barely any room left, closing up on him as Ron inched back, and with an almost crazy, humorless grin, patted his cheek softly. Then, within the split of a second, he brought his arm back and his fist met Ron's jaw with a resounding crack. As Ron stumbled back, Mattheo grabbed his collar, kicked his shin and brought him to his knees. One hand held his head in place as he slammed his fist down on it again and again.

Drops of blood flew through the air and every hit produced a disgusting squelching sound as Ron roared in pain, grabbed Mattheo around the waist and attempted to slam him to the ground. But it was to no avail, as the latter spat in his face and launched himself towards Ron once more, making him feel every little bit of the hurt he'd caused you. Mattheo's head was thrumming with a mix of fury and the adrenaline-induced excitement of a good fight, but it was neither that made him ram his fists into every bit of Ron he could reach over and over again.

The image of you flashed before his eyes, of you crying, of you shaking. If he were the himself of a few months ago, he'd have scoffed at your weakness, called it pathetic. But now, nothing could equal the rage he felt seeing you hurt. When Weasley managed the occasional blow to his face, he didn't even register the pain, his mind taken over by a mindless need to punish him for making you cry. And any bit of pain he'd feel later as his knuckles cracked and bled, as Ron's fist met his jaw and nose and his own blood dropped down on the ginger beneath him, it would be deserved. Deep down, he knew it was his fault, maybe he even knew he was making it worse. But he didn't care, his mind overtaken by a sudden burst of hatred.

You stood, frozen, unable to move, as the crowd screamed, horrified, and the squelches of blood filled the air. Mattheo was punching Ron in silent concentration, it seemed, and he looked wild as a beast. His beautiful curls hung from his face as he caughed up blood and kicked and hit Ron without any care for defending himself, or shielding himself. You had to stop this, you were vaguely aware that this had to be your fault, but you couldn't, you were rooted to the spot as if you'd been hexed into immobilization.

Finally, the crowd burst apart as Professor McGonnagall and Professor Snape approached, alerted by the noisy onlookers. Nott, who hadn't moved in, either to help Mattheo or to break up the fight, now surged forward when he saw them and ripped Mattheo off of Ron forcefully, their fellow Slytherin's aiding him as they pulled Mattheo away from Ron, who was heaving and whimpering, his face a bloody mess. Mattheo, though looking far better off, had blood seeping down his face as well, struggling against his friend’s hold wildly.

Not even Theo’s harsh reminders of the Professor’s presence could clear the blood-red fog in Mattheo's head, clouding all reasonable thought. Oh, how ecstatic he felt when he could let someone pay for this fucking world, and how much better it felt to make someone pay for hurting you. But, unlike usual, his anger didn't subside when he saw the recipient of his wrath lay broken and bleeding on the ground. Hate pulsed through him in violent surges, even as Theo’s hands dug into his arms and his hissed warnings fell on deaf ears. Nothing could get through to him- until he saw you.

Still clutching your back, you stood rooted to your spot, eyes locked onto Ron’s coughing and bleeding figure. They were widened in horror, your shoulders raised in apprehension. Your shaken look washed over him like a tidal wave and sobered him up just as effectively. Mattheo stopped trashing against his friends’ hold, unable to do anything but stare at your widened eyes as dread and regret submerged him into their depths, making him unable to breathe or to think, suffocated by the weight of the realization what he'd done. He'd made you afraid of him. In your eyes, he had to have confirmed all your friends’ warnings.

Finally, you were able to tear your eyes away from Ron and frantically searched the crowd for Mattheo, spotting his bloody figure being dragged away by the combined efforts of his friends. When they emerged from the crowd, Mattheo seemed to snap out of some sort of fever and pushed Nott off of him. Without looking at you, he took off towards the entry gates and students burst out of his way, scrambling to not stand in his path. With a resounding pound, he pushed open the gates and slammed them shut behind him.

Mattheo had barely ever felt worse than he did right now. Scratch that, he had never felt worse. Not when he'd been tortured by his father, not when he'd almost suffered death at the hands of his mother. What did he have to lose then? The cold night air hit his skin and made his scratches sting aggressively, but he made no efforts to heal them. He knew he deserved the pain. A cruel sort of satisfaction pulsed through him as he pressed down on the cut near his jaw, until the image of you flashed through his mind, how you’d stitched up his wound after the quidditch game.

But you weren't here now, he reminded himself. He'd scared you away, he'd lost you, just like all the good he'd ever had in his life, he didn't deserve you. You were right to be horrified, yet, the bitterness consumed him. How could he ever have hoped to be worthy of you? He tried to drown out the memory of you frowning at his smoking after the quidditch game and drew a pack of cigarettes from his inside pocket. His hands were trembling, for some reason, covered in blood and barely managing to pull out a cigarette and lighting it with a flick of his wrist.

Putting the burning smoke between his lips, he took a drag of it and the momentary relief flooded his mind. Though his bleeding lip stung in protest, he took another drag and breathed in the smoke. With uneasy steps, he walked down the stairs to the entrance hall until its golden light had given way to nightly darkness and he slumped down on one of the steps, taking continuous drags out of the cigarette. Self-loathing burned through him as he stared into the darkness. Why did he have to destroy everything that was good and kind in his cruel world?

When the sound of steps met his ears, he could have growled in frustration, until he realized that the steps were far too light and hesitant to be Theo’s. For a second he considered Pansy, but he knew who it was, really. You'd come, and he wished you hadn't. He wished he wouldn't have to look you in the eye and see the inevitable accusation, consequence of his stupidity. You'd been right there. Why couldn't he have waited to get Weasley somewhere you wouldn't see? Somewhere you wouldn't be, so you'd never know what kind of monster you'd been defending. No, he truly didn't deserve you.

The footsteps came to a halt a step back, but Mattheo didn't turn his head. He was a coward. All he could do was stare at the burning ember between his fingers as you took another step and sat down next to him on the stairs. You didn't speak, but Mattheo wished you would scream at him, so that he could dismiss you as just another person who hated him. But your silent accusation was much, much worse. The longer it went on, the more Mattheo’s head thrummed with the added pain of the bruises and cuts against the cool night air, until he couldn't take it anymore.

“You don't have to say it,” Mattheo's voice cut through the cold air in between you, loaded up with simmering tension. “If you're just here to yell at me, know that I've heard it all and just go.” Surprised, you turned to look at him, taking him all in. His curls hung into his eyes in a way that made you want to brush them away. But even if it'd been appropriate, you wouldn't have wanted to hurt the bleeding cut on his temple further. A burning cigarette dangled off his lips and his hands, covered in blood, wrung in his lap.

“Why did you do it?” you asked quietly, not moving an inch. The scene that had just taken place seemed to cling to you both, making you unable to face each other. Your thoughts were scattered and unfocused, still hurting from Ron’s words and caught in a whirlwind of concern for both of the boys. McGonnagall had started dragging Ron, who was unable to walk, to the hospital wing, but Mattheo's injuries had stayed unattended to. You felt the strong desire to reach over, take his hands into yours and treat his cuts and bruises, but you knew he wouldn't let you. When you glanced over, you caught him pressing down on one of his cuts, making more blood seep from it, down, get caught up in his brow. Following the drop of blood with your eyes, they suddenly fell onto his.

Mattheo hadn't intended to defend himself. Attempting to defend himself would open him up to rejection of his desperate plea for you to understand, to forgive, to card your soft and unsullied hands through his hair and tell him that everything was going to be alright. Stupid daydreams, fucking delusions, yet he couldn't help the words that fell from his lips when he locked eyes with you and his self-loathing was overpowered by a sudden surge of fear, to see the same look of disgust and horror on your face that he had been getting ever since he set foot in the school. “I saw you cry and everything just… disappeared.”

Your eyes widened in surprise, but there was no malice in your expression. Of course there wasn't. Because you were a fucking angel. Next to you, he was a greedy demon. “Wait,” you said, your voice somewhat softer than before, and leaned closer. Mattheo wished you hadn't, because the way your eyes glinted up close reminded him of that fateful night in the kitchens. You looked just as pretty now, only that he was now willing to admit it to himself. “You beat him up for … me?”

Mattheo shrugged roughly and looked away from you to take another drag out of his cigarette. The smoke emerged from his lips in fascinating shapes that your eyes clung to as he answered. “‘Course, what did you think?” Your gaze dropped to your hands as you played with your fingers, deep in thought. You had just assumed it had been Ron’s comments about Mattheo that had set him off, but he sounded too blunt to be dishonest. Per usual.

“Well,” you said hesitantly and stealing another glance at him. “He said some pretty awful things about you as well.”

Mattheo looked up in surprise, but when he met your gaze, his jaw clenched. Of course, you'd think of him, even after what he'd done to Weasley. Your eyes were sharp and steady, but when you shifted closer to him, he could practically feel the warmth radiating off of your body. “But he was right,” he said roughly and squashed out his cigarette. Glowing embers floated towards the ground and melted the snow where they landed.

“What do you mean?” you asked softly, and he refused to look at you. “I didn't need tutoring in muggle studies. I just wanted to take advantage of your kindness and be able to have you to myself more often.” His monotone voice couldn't betray the storm brewing in his chest. You needed to know, for some reason, you needed to know. He had to come clean now, he wanted to watch your face fall as he tore apart the image you had of him so you'd finally stop looking at him with these wide, good eyes that looked so unfairly beautiful.

Your heart beat hard against your ribs as you processed his words. Why did he want you to himself more often? Had the kiss on the cheek last night meant anything more than friendship? Doubt and excitement curled in your stomach. Could Mattheo Riddle really like you like that? You'd never really been someone’s priority, yet, tonight, he'd fought Ron for you. Not that you condoned his behavior. “Why did you want me all to yourself?” you finally dared to ask, your voice shaking slightly.

Mattheo didn't answer, only taking another cigarette out of his pack and igniting it via wandless magic. You guessed it was the stress paired with the need to do something with his hands, the last one you could emphasize with. Because you didn't smoke, your fingers fiddled absentmindedly with your school skirt until they closed around the hem in a decisive manner. Thankfully, your voice was steady when you addressed him once more. “You do know, though, don't you?” you asked, attempting to meet his gaze. “That I don't see you like Ron does.”

A bitter chuckle left his lips, along with another curl of smoke that danced in the air between you, as if it was mocking you. When he spoke, his voice was hard and closed off, allowing no room for discussion. “Didn't I just prove him right?” It was technically a question, but he seemed to have decided the matter already, which made an unsuspected surge of anger flare up in you.

“No!” you said, louder than you'd intended, and your raised voice finally seemed to shake him up enough to bring himself to look at you. Your heart seized when you realized he'd averted his eyes because they were glistening traitorously. You reached over to grab his hand, it was slimy with blood, but you didn't care. To your relief, Mattheo seemed too stunned by your touch to say something. “You're nothing like your father,” you said, emphasizing each word in a desperate attempt to convey what you thought of him, to correct whatever he believed you to think. “You're nothing like him,” you said again, gaze never so much as wavering.

Another small, humorless laugh filled the air as he swayed his head lightly, a bitter smile on his bleeding lips. He took another drag off the cigarette before taking it out of his mouth and blowing the smoke out softly, so it mingled and curled between the two of you, like a wall, or a blanket to hide himself under. Through the fog, you could still see the light shimmer in his dark eyes. “Darling, you just watched me beat your friend half to death,” he drawled, ironically, and turned from you once more when the smoke had subsided.

His bitterness and unwillingness to listen sparked defiance in you and you shuffled even closer to force him to look at you. “I never said you didn't have issues, darling,” you replied, matching his sarcasm. Mattheo laughed again, but this time, it was a genuine sort of chuckle he himself seemed surprised by. Suddenly, he winced lightly and another drop of blood emerged from his busted lip.

Almost instinctively, you reached over and wiped over his cheek to brush it away. One hand slipped into your inner jacket pocket as you pulled out the flask of murtlap juice you always carried around with you, just in case. Dabbing some onto your finger, you leaned even closer to him and softly ran your fingers over his lip, his cheek, his bruises and cuts. You felt him watching you when suddenly, he seized your waist and pulled you closer, making you gasp in surprise.

Mattheo couldn't believe it. Here you were, fretting over him, your brows furrowed in worry. Here you were, healing his scratches, when you should have been screaming, or crying, or coldly bidding him goodbye. As your hand ran over his cheek and threatened to reach the deepest gash, his hands seized either sides of your waist as if by instinct. The adorable little gasp it elicited to you was music to his undeserving ears, he hated the way he reveled in it. His thumbs brushed over your sides selfishly as he leaned closer and basked in the invisible light you spread. “Do you really think that?”

“I know it,” you said, softly now that you had finally reached him. You brushed off the remaining murtlap essence on your skirt and hesitantly cupped his cheeks with your hands. It felt strange to touch him, as if you were breaching museum guidelines by touching their marble statues. Statues higher than any living man who might have inspired them. “I used to think otherwise,” you confessed, unable to hide the tenderness in your voice, “but not anymore. I used to think you were all hard edges and cold ice, I once thought you couldn't feel pain, couldn't feel anything, really. But I know you now, and I know that I was wrong about you. Because the man I know can be kind and funny and so unlike what I thought he was.” A light frown adorned your face. “Mattheo, why do you keep pressing on that cut?”

He didn't have to say, because you knew, of course you did. Biting down on your lip, you searched his face for some sign to either stop or continue, but you couldn't find one. “Listen to me, Mattheo,” you said urgently, “you're not who they always told you you were.” You hadn't meant for your voice to drop to a murmur, and now it was like whispering secrets in class, unveiling hidden truths under the watchful eye of your worlds.

To your shock, you suddenly felt him tremble slightly under your touch and your eyes widened. Mattheo seemed to be suppressing the shaking of his shoulders, but his body twitched with suppressed emotion. Acting purely off of instinct, you surged forward and wrapped your arms around him.

The moment your arms wrapped around him, Mattheo froze, his breath catching as if all air had been knocked out of his lungs. He wasn't used to this- this kind of warmth, this kind of comfort, especially when he felt he didn't deserve it. For a good second, he didn't move, afraid that if he even breathed too hard, the fantasy would shatter, you'd pull away and leave him with the hollow ache he'd been carrying ever since he stormed out of the entrance hall. But then, as he felt your warm breath against his temple, as if it was living proof that he wasn't merely imagining things, or living through one of his fathers cruel nightmares, he caved in.

Slowly, Mattheo let himself sink into the embrace, his shoulders sagging as the tension seemed to bleed out of him. The blood from his face and hands tainted your white shirt, but you didn't seem to care, only softly stroking over his back in soothing patterns. You were good at this, too good. You surely had given, and had been given, many hugs in your life, you were an expert. His own hands hovered awkwardly at first as he became aware of the fact that he'd never actually been hugged like this. An irrational surge of panic flooded through him that he couldn't do it, didn't know how to return the gesture, that he couldn't hug you. But then, he hesitantly placed them on your back, suddenly clinging to you as if you were the only thing grounding him and keeping him from falling apart entirely.

Your touch softened the storm raging and roaring inside of him, but it also brought a lump to his throat that he couldn't swallow down. Because he couldn't help but think you deserved someone who knew how to give hugs.

“I'm not gonna go,” you said in a low voice, remembering how he’d dismissed you earlier, and felt him almost shudder under your touch. You couldn't quite grasp that you were hugging Mattheo Riddle, and he was hugging you back as if you were his lifeline, more so grabbing you than anything else, movements uncertain as if he wasn't quite sure what to do.

“You won't?” he suddenly whispered and you nodded your head as you ran a hand through his curls. God, how you had long dreamed of doing that. “Promise,” you said softly as you carded the strands through your fingers and drew patterns on his scalp.

He suddenly stirred, his hands fell from your back and down to your sides as they found your waist once more. With a careful but firm motion, he moved you onto the step next to him and turned to face you, a serious expression on his bloodied face. His dark eyes were almost glaring, though not at you, and he howered so close to you that you could feel his hot breath on your cheeks and, even in the dark, could see the golden sprinkles in his eyes. Your heart was beating so loudly you were surprised he didn't hear it, or maybe he did and didn't mention it. Was it the adrenaline of the fight acting, or just his usual flirtatiousness? Somehow, you thought it was neither.

“You know that I'd never hurt you, right?” he asked gravely, brows furrowed over his dark eyes. He'd never looked this beautiful before, in spite of the blood and the bruises.

“Yes,” you said, without hesitation, and some of the tension seemed to be leaving Mattheo as his shoulders relaxed slightly.

Encouraged by your words, he leaned even closer until his breath fanned your lips and your breath hitched slightly, making his lips and fingers twitch. “You know I'd fucking kill anyone who does?” he said, as if it were a vow. Both his voice and his eyes were steady and dead-serious, but his thumbs brushed over your sides tenderly.

“Mattheo, he didn't mean to,” you breathed, hardly knowing what you were saying anymore. His proximity made you dizzy, but you'd nothing to hold onto but him.

Mattheo groaned lightly, a sound of frustration, and dipped his head down to your neck. You prayed he couldn't hear how fast your pulse was going, would stock the goosebumps up to the cold night air that suddenly seemed so hot. “Don't you defend him,” he growled into your neck, nipping lightly at the skin there and eliciting a small squeak from you. Raising his head once more, he stared into your eyes with such intensity that your hands started to tremble under the weight of his gaze. “Fuck, I never want to see you cry again, princess.”

This was an irreversible breach of your previous platonicism, you knew there was no going back now, and, as always, your brain could scarcely keep up with him. He was a whirlwind, a force of nature, utterly destructive and terrifyingly beautiful, something you had admired from afar but always felt the pull towards. Now, you were too close, it was inevitable that you would be drawn to him completely, be pulled into his stormy midst, discover what lay behind his deadly armor. And God, how you didn't mind it one bit.

“Mattheo…,” you breathed, no words forming in your mind, just his name as you stared up into his dark eyes. They reflected the starry sky, and somehow, it was even more beautiful through his eyes than when you'd admired it from the grounds before your detention. The storm in them had subsided somewhat, or maybe, this was the eye of the storm, because in this moment, all there was in your world was him, his breathing, his voice, his touch and his serious eyes. Nothing else.

“I'd burn down the whole world for you,” he said heavily, and a nervous little chuckle fell from your lips. His eyes darted down to them. “There's six billion people in that world you want to burn down,” you reminded him, and his eyes snapped back up to yours as he frowned. Mattheos head swam as he leaned closer, his heart pounding hard against his ribs. He'd never wanted anything as much as he wanted this.

“I only care about one of them.”

As his lips met yours, it wasn't the reckless, impulsive kiss you'd half-expected. it was tender, almost hesitant, as if he was afraid you might pull away. But you didn’t. You couldn’t. Thoughts reduced to the memory of his eyes and words and the feeling of his slightly chapped lips on yours. The kiss wasn’t just a spark; it was a thread pulling you closer to him, unraveling every doubt you may have had left about him. The faint metallic taste in your mouth couldn't deter you from deepening the kiss and burying your hands in his dark curls once more.

Mattheo could have died, right here, right now, so he could never ruin this moment. When you slipped your soft fingers into his hair, he let out a low groan that you answered with a hitched breath before he got a hold of your neck and pulled you against him once more. He was in fucking heaven, or at least as close to it as was possible for a creature like him. The hand that didn't hold your neck circled your waist and pulled you towards him, making you gasp into his mouth and giving him the chance to slip his tongue past your lips. The soft sigh it elicited from you made his head spin.

For a moment, he had to restrain himself from seizing you, kissing you until you couldn't breathe, sneak his hands under your neatly tucked shirt and bury them in your soft flesh, drawing out more of these damn noises that drove him absolutely crazy.

But, alas, you pulled away to catch your breath. Mattheo's lips chased after yours, and when you evaded him, he dipped down to trail soft pecks along the side of your neck, making you shudder with excitement. His voice vibrated against your vulnerable throat as he spoke. “Look, I'm not great at this kind of thing, but…,” he looked up and you found yourself helplessly lost in his soft brown eyes. “Would it be completely insane if I asked you to be my girlfriend?”

“I think you've never been closer to sanity, Mattheo,” you managed to chuckle before he claimed your lips once more, bruised fingers carding into your hair to pull you close. His teeth grazed your bottom lip as he dipped your head expertly.

“And it's all gone again,” he whispered in between kisses, sighing into your mouth before teasingly biting down on your bottom lip. He chuckled when you slapped the back of his head tenderly and he wiped some blood away from your face that had dribbled there from one of his cuts. His suddenly pensive eyes found yours again, though a teasing smile tugged at his lips as his thumb brushed over your kiss-bitten lips. “Don't worry, your big secret is safe with me. Wouldn't want anyone to know you’re dating the Dark Lord’s son.”

“Actually,” you said, averting your eyes to your hands. Taking his into yours and resting them on your lap, you looked up at him hesitantly. “I'd like not to hide it. If it's okay with you, of course.”

Mattheo seemed to freeze, a frown adorning his beautiful features. “What, really?” he asked, completely taken aback. His thumb was still brushing over your chin, though you were quite sure there were no remnants of blood left.

“Yeah,” you said, somewhat embarrassed by the fervent look on his face. “I mean, why wouldn't I want people to know that I managed to pull Mattheo Riddle?”

With a bitter chuckle, he shook his head. “That's not a brag, princess.”

But the look you gave him was one of utmost earnestness as your digits closed around his bruised up hands and you leaned forward. “It is to me.”

For a moment, all Mattheo could do was stare at you, not quite able to believe what he'd just heard. Your words echoed in his mind, breaking through every wall he'd spend years building, dismantling the armor he wore so tightly around himself. He felt something tighten in his chest- raw and entirely unfamiliar. “Are you… sure?” he asked, his voice quieter than he intended, laced with disbelief. When you nodded your head, a slow, almost disbelieving smile curved his lips, but his eyes shimmered with something deeper, something more vulnerable.

He ran a hand through his hair, laughing softly under his breath as though trying to process that someone like you could actually want to be with someone like him. For once in his life, he didn’t feel like the monster everyone said he was. Mattheo had never felt this soft, and he knew whatever you'd ever ask of him, he'd do it without doubt or hesitation. Because, fuck, he was so in love with you.

When entering the Great Hall for breakfast the next morning, Mattheo almost doubted the events of the last evening had even taken place. If it hadn't been for the sting in his lip. And you. It didn't take him more than a couple of seconds to spot you, sitting on the Gryffindor table next to the red haired Weasley girl. To his great relief, you were smiling as you put jam on your toast and laughed at something she said. Wishing he was close enough to hear the sound, he didn't even realize he had stopped walking until Enzo shoved his shoulder. “What's wrong?”

Before he could dismiss him, you looked up from your toast and somehow, as if by a magnetic force, your gaze landed on him. He'd expected you to give him one of your sweet smiles, maybe, if he was in luck, but you didn't. Instead, you said something to the Weasley girl and rose from your seat, walking along the Gryffindor table and making a beeline for the entrance. For him. Mattheo saw your eyes flicker to Enzo and the rest of his friends, somewhat shyly, and he pushed Enzo away roughly. “Go sit down.” They did without protest.

Mattheo turned back to you as you approached and came to a halt before him, almost indecisively. But then, without a word of greeting, you leaned up and placed your soft lips on his. Mattheo seemed to freeze for the split of a second, but then, both his hands cupped your face, pulled you impossibly closer and dipped you just right to devour you. His tongue slipped into your mouth before you could even register the sudden surge of intensity and you mewled slightly, completely helpless in his hold as his lips claimed yours again and again and again-

“Mr Riddle!”

You shot around violently and your cheeks flushed deep red when you saw Professor McGonnagall standing a few feet from you, hands on her hips and looking absolutely furious. Behind her, you could vaguely make out the gaping faces of students, and a whisper seemed to run through the hall, but Mattheo paid it no mind, nor did he your Transfiguration Professor. You felt his lips peppering kisses along your jaw and slapped the back of his head with a hiss. McGonnagall drew an indignant breath in through her nose, building herself up to her full height- which was quite considerable.

“This is a level of inappropriateness I do not accept from Hogwarts students,” she hissed at Mattheo, though refusing to look him in the eye properly. Mattheo had raised his brows, hands still around your neck as he hovered over you. “Now, really,” said Professor McGonnagall angrily. “Ten points off of Slytherin. And both of you, return to your house tables.”

You quickly pushed Mattheo off, who seemed reluctant to let you go. He gave McGonnagall a sinister glare before pressing one last kiss onto your cheek and smiling at you. “Good morning, princess.” Biting down on your bottom lip, you gave him a sheepish look that made it near impossible for him to walk away from you. But, alas, you turned to walk back to the Gryffindor table that had broken out into hushed whispers and pointed fingers.

As Mattheo strolled along the Slytherin table, he watched you sit down next to the Weasley girl who immediately jumped you with questions. There was an uncertain sensation in his stomach when he saw the way some of the Gryffindors gave you looks of disgust, the girls especially. As if half of them hadn't slept with him already, only for it to be their dirty little secret, and now they dared to point at you, who loved him openly. His jaw clenched when he saw Potter stand up from the table and brush past you without a word, but, as if you'd sensed his irritation, you glanced over and your lips twitched impossibly sweetly.

Sitting down in between Enzo and Theo, he held your gaze for a second before you looked away to address the Weasley girl. When he directed his attention to breakfast, he was instead faced with five sets of raised eyebrows. “So,” said Blaise, barely containing a smirk. “What the fuck happened last night? Must’ve really given her a good time of she's already forgotten that you beat Weasley into an infirmary bed.”

“Shut up,” growled Mattheo, twisting his knife between his fingers and glancing back at you, who seemed to get bombarded with questions by the Weasley girl. “I didn't.”

“Jeez, how’d you manage to soften little miss perfect up then?” said Pansy, also throwing a glance at you before turning back to them. “Can't have been your personality.” She ignored Mattheo's glare and dug into her scrambled eggs, still glancing behind herself every once in a while curiously. Mattheo didn't answer, only leaning back in his chair with the expression of someone who definitely wasn't in the mood for chatting. That couldn't deter his friends, though.

“I've got to know,” grinned Blaise teasingly and pointed his fork at his unwilling interlocutor. “Was this whole thing some sort of grand plan to mess with Weasley and Potter, or did you actually go soft for her?” Mattheo's eyes snapped up at him and his gaze darkened. “Don't you fucking say that to her.” “Oh, so you have!” cooed Blaise and Pansy started to giggle, causing Mattheo to roll his eyes at them.

But the platinum haired boy next to Blaise didn't seem very amused. A sour expression twisted his features as he watched his friend closely, the bacon long forgotten on his plate. “So you're just self-sabotaging for fun now?” Draco said through clenched teeth, his tone causing all heads but Mattheo's to turn. “How long do you think this will last, really? She’s a Gryffindor to her core, Mattheo. She’ll toss you aside the moment you show her who you really are.”

Enzo shot him a very firm look, but Mattheo didn't even bother acknowledging him. Frowning lightly, Enzo looked back at him, maybe to see whether he had spontaneously lost consciousness, but Mattheo only looked over to you, remembering how he'd promised you last night, before you'd slipped back into your common room: no fights tomorrow. He knew you were testing him, it only now became fully clear to him that you'd intentionally opened yourself up to public scrutiny. To get it over with, sure. Because you wanted people to know, fair. But also, because you knew it'd be a test of his restraint.

Not only Enzo stared at Mattheo when the latter chuckled lowly, eyes still locked on your figure as you finished your plate and rose from your seat to be perfectly on time for Arithmancy. He was glad to see that Granger joined you and seemed to strike up a hesitant conversation. Enzo’s eyes flickered between him and you. A slight smile played around his lips. “This was… unexpected. But good for you, mate, she's cute.” Draco scoffed and Mattheo clenched his fists, remembering your sweet smile and the promise he'd given to you.

The only one who’s opinion Mattheo cared about even slightly, as always, was Theo, but Theo did what he did best: silently staring into space and scowling. At any rate, he wasn't too keen to keep on talking about the matter, so he rose from the table. Pansy frowned when he grabbed his back. “You haven't eaten a thing.”

“Oh,” grinned Blaise, “my bet is he wants to be punctual to impress his girlfriend.” His girlfriend. His. The thought made Mattheo's lips twitch involuntarily, and Blaise slammed his hand into the table, grinning. “See? I was right! Look at that smile! Merlin, Mattheo, you're down so bad.”

He was, fucking hell, he was so down bad for you. But he left his friends without another word, approaching the stone steps as even more heads than usual turned after him. A sudden worry churned in his chest. Yes, you were his. But being his brought certain dangers. As long as his friends didn't let anything slip, and as long as you were at Hogwarts, anyway, you were safe from his father at least. But Mattheo knew his father wouldn't be the only one disapproving of your relationship.

Over the course of the next days, the topic of your unlikely relationship with Mattheo was the main issue of interest all around the castle. In the following week, you could barely pass someone in the halls without them sticking their heads together in hushed whispers. Everyone who had missed your kiss at breakfast was now greatly informed about it, in a level of detail you guessed most of them lacked in their exams. Curious, how your private business was more interesting to people than the goblin riots of the fifteenth century and their present implications on wizarding goblin relations, though you couldn't deny that this new gossip was the exact type of thing that would catch people's interest.

The whispering wasn't what bothered you, it was the assumptions made about you, and about Mattheo. Only that Mattheo was used to scrutiny and nasty rumors, which was new territory for you. Many students, for example, seemed to assume you to be in danger, especially those of Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff house. Not that their concern wouldn't have been sweet any other day, but it bothered you how people always assumed the worst about Mattheo, now that you had gotten to know the real him.

When you'd relayed these worries to Mattheo one warmer afternoon at the lake when the ice had melted and you could sit on the grass, he'd chuckled appreciatively, calling you his sweet girl for being outraged about how people treated him. He'd said he couldn't be bothered less how they thought of him, but you suspected it was more so that he had gotten used to the worst. You wished others would see him the way you did, but Mattheo didn't exactly make it easy for them either. Not when, anytime someone pointed at the two of you walking together in the halls, he cast them a threatening look and had to be held back by your soft touch.

With some, this had earned you the title of a monster tamer, which bothered you even more than the worried assumptions, but was a great source of amusement for Mattheo. When he'd first heard it from you as you recounted someone using the word with poised lips, he'd laughed outright and shuffled around so his head was in your lap. Getting a hold of your wrist, he'd guided your hand to his hair and practically purred how you'd managed to tame the beast with your incredible sweetness and brilliance. Embarrassingly, you'd blushed, only making his grin widen.

By far the most negative reception was that of your own house. Most Gryffindors considered your relationship with you-know-who’s son a betrayal of house honor. Some seemed to think you superficial, which in turn greatly troubled Mattheo while you only rolled your eyes at it, tugging him back whenever someone made a snide comment.

To your immense surprise, however, Mattheo hadn't gotten into a single fight since his promise, even though he had more material to work with than ever. And, last Tuesday, one of his friends, Lorenzo Berkshire, had even approached you panting as you came from your runes class to get you down to the Great Hall quickly to stop Mattheo from picking a fight with a mouthy Gryffindor sixth year.

Meanwhile, Mattheo had turned into more of a gentleman than you’d ever have imagined. He walked you to class whenever possible, interlocking your fingers, giving you sweet kisses before class, waiting for you afterwards and stealing small moments of affection all over the castle. You were sure you knew every broom cupboard in Hogwarts from the inside by now, as it was his preferred place to drag you in your breaks. As Berkshire snitched you as a thanks for keeping Mattheo in check, he was already planning your date for the following Hogsmeade weekend, sending you into a frenzy whether you even had anything to wear for such an occasion.

Ron had been released from the hospital wing two days after his fight with Mattheo, still littered with bruises and cuts and having incredible trouble chewing, since Mattheo had broken his jaw. When you'd told him, he'd smiled smugly into your hair, you couldn't see it but hear it in his voice as he murmured “too fucking bad for him, then.” Ron wasn't talking to you, and you made no efforts to approach him either, following Hermoine's advice and waiting until he came around to the idea at least a little. Even though you were frustrated at how long even that took.

Harry had been a little more forgiving. After a few days of awkward silent treatment, you'd talked as the last two people in the common room. And after you'd practically written his whole charms homework for him, he found it in himself to forgive you, though he was still disapproving and highly distrustful of your relationship. You, who hadn't expected much more, were merely relieved that you were on speaking terms again and did your best to avoid the topic of Mattheo with him around, trying not to set him off. You hadn't forgotten the confrontation in the Entrance Hall.

Hermoine was easily the most forgiving out of the three. Though she, too, did neither trust nor like Mattheo and was worried for you, she still recognized that it was your decision and trusted your judgement on whether he was a danger to you or not. After countless reassurances, she'd finally stopped awkwardly standing beside you when Mattheo kissed you before and after class, and you were glad about it. Now, as you were walking down the steps on Saturday evening for dinner, she talked to you in a tone that didn't even indicate your previous argument in the slightest.

“And so I told him that goblins have contributed a lot to the field of magical science, at least three times, mind you. And in the test, when asked about the accomplishments of goblins in the wizarding world, he writes about their creative name giving!” Hermoine scoffed incensedly and shook her head as you ascended towards the Entrance Hall. “Seriously, he never listens!”

But before you could answer, Luna Lovegood approached you up the steps against the wave of Gryffindors walking in the opposite direction. Slightly out of breath, she came to a halt before the two of you and directed her large eyes at you. “Professor Dumbledore wants to see you in his office.”

You exchanged an incredulous look with Hermoine and frowned. “Why?”

Luna shrugged, her voice dreamy. “I think your new boyfriend got into a fight.” Seemingly unaware about your sudden intake of breath, she smiled, as if all was said, and turned around to follow the string of students approaching the Great Hall, leaving you shocked. You'd known the peace wouldn't last forever. But Mattheo could handle himself. How could the fight have been so bad that you were called to Dumbledore’s office? Was he hurt badly?

Just when you were about to start hyperventilating, you felt Hermoine's hand on your shoulder. She looked serious, but not angry. “Dumbledore’s office, remember?” You nodded, bidded Hermoine goodbye and sifted through the students, heart leaping to your chest in worry as you hurried to the headmaster’s office. What on earth could he have done this time?

taglist: @aespaslut @kricketwritesstories @catching-fire-in-the-wind @a-little-funny @thejediprincess56 @polireader @voidangxls @artsyle @nkvgt @ashrocker123 @chimchoom @onlytenkos @yvonne-dump @alwayslatetothefandoms @ravisinghs-wife @eneywey @viylikecats @darksss5516 @cocosparkel @stereading @helendeath @workof-a-rr-t

#harry potter #harry potter x reader #slytherin boys #slytherin boys x reader #mattheo x you #mattheoxreader #mattheo x y/n #mattheo riddle x y/n #mattheo riddle x you #mattheo x reader #mattheo riddle #mattheo #mattheo riddle x reader #mattheo fluff #mattheo imagine #mattheo angst #mattheo series

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thereforepizza · 2 years ago

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(Below is a very sad take on/analysis of his character development. If you don’t want the sad vibes, feel free to ignore)

Ok but in all seriousness

I was rewatching the introductory episodes for the Boys in TCW and the Energy that Cross brings to the team is insane. There is so much more banter and casual talk when he’s around. In later episodes of tbb we see the guys a lot more chill, but if you rewatch the ones in S7 of TCW, you’ll notice they’re much more talkative. This could be bc it’s before the traumatic events of order 66 or they were showing off for Rex and Cody or whatever, but I really think Crosshair’s leaving made everything unbearably quiet and serious

The worst part?

Even if Cross comes home, it’ll never be the same again. He unlocked a level of darkness in himself that no one can return from. He betrayed the trust of his brothers. There’s now a kid on the team. They no longer serve a singular power (aside from Cid). The things that changed them all will never let them be the same lighthearted group of brothers they once were.

So yeah, I miss Crosshair too. But Crosshair is gone. At least the one we first met a while ago is. The new one… he won’t hit the same if the writer’s do their job well. Crosshair’s never coming back, but the new person he is could. Perhaps the things he’s gone through with the empire will deepen his character and give us a more interesting version of the playful, sassy sniper.

I suppose we can only hope

I miss Crosshair. I miss his big ol' grouchy face. I miss his snarky comments. I miss his silver hair. I miss his trickshots. I miss his confidence. I miss him

#tbb crosshair #the bad batch #tl dr: Crosshair won’t return the same #I’m so sorry to bring it to this conversation #it probably didn’t help your missing him at all #if you don’t wanna read this you don’t have to #freaking miss murder toothpick #now that I think about it… has he had any toothpicks this season?

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reader-wandering18 · 6 months ago

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Yuu Professor

In the staff room, Yuu leaned back in his chair as he sighed deeply.

—I see you’re too tired, Professor Yuu.

— Professor Trein.

— He’s the youngest of us all, try not to intimidate him, Professor Trein.

— What are you trying to say, Professor Crewel?

Yuu felt like he was in the middle of a clash between two mountains. He was afraid his life would end before he even started at that school.

— Come on, get along, we have to make a good impression on the new teacher!

Professor Vargas had arrived, grabbing Yuu by the collar of his shirt and pulling him into a tight hug as if they were old classmates. Although with his large muscles, Yuu felt suffocated.

— If you need anything, you’re more than welcome to come to the Mystery Shop. We have great promotions this year.

Sam handed him a business card.

Professor Crewel was right when he said he was younger than all of them, he was only 27 years old and to top it off… he had no experience in being a teacher.

“It was all because of that incident”

While he was undercover due to his previous job, he was caught in the crossfire between two strangers. Both of them were apparently killed and to top it off, one of them was the new teacher at Night Raven College that year who was mistaken for him.

He had no intention of entering that school and taking that teacher’s place.

When he was ready to escape, he found himself in the school surrounded by a magical field with no way out unless he asked the headmaster for permission.

If he speaks now, he would get into big trouble and have charges like identity theft, possible murder (when he didn’t) and if they were to investigate further…

“Two years, my contract period is only for two years”

Nothing bad could happen.

He would like to kill his past self.

— RIDDLE!

A case of Blot had appeared in front of him.

And soon, a series of them in that prestigious school.

“What the hell have I gotten myself into?!”

Yuu activated a magic shield to protect himself and the students.

Riddle’s blows were fierce, clearly aggravating his anger at the moment, causing the earth to tremble… But the shield showed no signs of breaking.

“That damn crow had said he would bring more teachers, but he hasn’t returned for a while now!”

All the students had evacuated, except for four stubborn young men.

— WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR? Get out of the dorm immediately!

— I can’t do it, Professor. I can’t leave Riddle as he is now.

— I refuse, he still hasn’t apologized to me!

“These damn proud brats.”

— Worrying about you shortens my life,— he said in a whisper.

— Don’t leave the shield or I will punish you!

— Professor!

Yuu stepped forward, holding his staff firmly, the wood looked ancient, there was also a design made of pure silver with complicated runes, the magic gem was on top with an exquisite crimson hue.

The moment he stepped out of the magic shield, air bullets pierced the rose bushes leaving nothing but small pieces resembling toothpicks.

It had all happened in the blink of an eye.

Riddle was shocked by the speed at which the master had released the magic. He hadn’t uttered a single word or seemed to have hesitated when it came to making projectiles with the air element!

The strength of the magic power they released could be compared to the cannons of a warship.

— It’s incredible.

Yuu walked towards Riddle with his head held high and only one thought in his head.

“ You are too young to waste your life”

Riddle came back to his senses, thanks to Professor Yuu's intervention. He was taken to the school infirmary after waking up and talking to everyone.

Though Ace, seeing him cry, could only behave as Ace would.

Seeing that moment of conviviality between students, Yuu decided to take a step back and leave that dorm. His rush to flee was also to avoid cleaning Heartslabyul's dorm, which had practically been left in ruins because of him.

"I'm really tired, let the students take care of it."

After a week, in a lonely classroom, Yuu found himself grading his students' homework.

"How can this guy be in charge of teaching him at three years old?!"

The identity he had accidentally taken was not only that of a teacher, but also that of a high-level magician. If anyone else who hadn't studied magic as exhaustively as he had, they would be in serious trouble.

But this coincidence sent shivers down his spine.

That guy, despite being a high-level magician, has no family or friends who can get him into trouble if they see him. Also his age and appearance.

It was as if the role was made for him.

Knock knock

Yuu was startled but didn't show it, his eyes went to the classroom door where he found three students from Heartslabyul. One of them was holding a strawberry cake.

— Teacher, may I come in?

— Clover, Diamond, and Rosehearts. Come in.

With magic, Yuu arranged all his documents and before he could ask the reason for his visit, Riddle put that strawberry cake in its place.

— This is a thank you for helping me.

Seeing the shiny cake in front of him, Yuu couldn't speak for a moment.

— As an educator, I must take care of my students. You don't need to give me a strawberry cake.

— Come on, teacher, the dorm leader made it with so much effort for you!

— Carter!

Riddle scolded the blonde haired boy, though seeing the blush on his face was not something he could hide.

—This is a cake I made as an apology for the trouble I caused. Before the no unbirthday party, I want you to be the first to taste the cake.

Hearing those words, Yuu couldn’t help but look at Riddle tenderly. The overstain is caused by the negative feelings of wizards. It’s something that simply can’t be controlled and he was burdened by his past.

“I still feel a little uneasy knowing that I was able to see his past. It’s really strange.”

He cut the first piece of cake and as he brought it to his mouth.

“This is really salty!”

Hahahaha here I leave you another part of Master Yuu living with heartslabyul, there will be more interactions with the other students, I hope it is to your liking.

PD information: In order not to make Riddle feel bad, Yuu did not tell him that his strawberry cake was too salty. So that was how Ace along with Deuce, Trey and Carter ate the other cakes that he had made beforehand. Yuu couldn't throw away the cake so he endured having to eat it.

One more thing, I probably won't upload anything in the next few weeks, more than anything unfortunately I'm a student so right now I'm full of projects. I already have the two chapters of Darkness ready as well as more ideas of Yuu from other worlds but honestly they don't convince me so I haven't been able to upload them and I also don't have time to edit them but in my free time I plan to move forward.

Slowly but surely.

#twisted wonderland #twisted wonderland x reader #twst x reader #twst yuu #twst x male reader #twisted wonderland x male reader #twisted wonderland yuu

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wxxpingangxls · 5 months ago

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WET

+synopsis; the hottest criminal solicitor is in town and she’s ready to fight tooth and nail to prove her new clients innocence. I wonder how he’ll thank her…

+content/warnings; black reader but little to no explicit detail, taboo relationships, stalking, peeping tom, death threats, begging, mentions of murder, graphic details, angst, cheating, reader smokes, semi public, oil massage, nasty and messy sex, squirting, brief toe sucking, running from him, pussy drunk Toji, mr munch, ass eating, Toji is grown and got stubble, face sitting, 69, mating press, doggy style, overstimulation

+pairings; Felon Toji x Lawyer!Fem Black Reader

+a/n; ending is rushed idk why 😞😞 but i hope you enjoy lovely’s!!!🩷

“So, Mr Fushi… Uh, so what exactly are we here to discuss today?” you stated, papers on the table and pen in your hand ready to note down.

He raised an eyebrow as his eyes wandered down to the bright diamond ring blinking at him on your finger. You were used to this behaviour. Felons and criminals acting cold and calloused as if you weren’t the one thing between them and their freedom.

“Look, I don’t want to be here either. But we have got to work together. There’s no point in you sitting on your arse, acting as if I don’t have better places to be. I could be on a trip to Barbados right now but I’m stuck here saving your arse-“

“You done?” he interrupted slyly.

“No, I’m not done. You’re wasting everybody’s time. It’s not my fault you decided to kill that guy at the bar. The court appointed me as your attorney and so I’m going to try my best to help you win this case but I can only do so much.” you huffed at the end of the long speech watching his eyes close in annoyance.

“Look lady, I’ve got a child to go back home to, I don’t have time for this. Can you get my case dismissed or not?”

“I was getting to that,” you stated with venom laced on your tongue. “We can always claim self defence. Given your history there’s not much else,” The question of whether he had a mental illness crossed your mind but quite frankly, you weren’t in the mood to converse with this fiend any longer.

“That’s a pretty ring ya got there… You married?” he questioned. His cuffed hands were lying in his lap. This man had stressed you so damn much that you hadn’t realised how, handsome, he was. Despite the ugly and completely unflattering appearance of the orange jumpsuit, you could see the tattoos that encapsulated his large biceps, big enough to crush your skull with. The man you were defending - or rather attempting to - had the meanest mug written all over his face. But you were a woman before you were a lawyer, and your heart was with another.

“Not yet, I’m engaged,” you huffed.

Toji scoffed before turning to face the large mirror. “Is that all Mr Fushiguro? If so, I’ll be on my way,” and without another word, you swiftly left the room, closing the door on the way out. The correctional officer walked out towards you. “Did he tell ya what ‘appened? Ya know with the guy?” You eyed the officer down, observing his hands that were stationed on his belt. “Exuse me? I’m not entitled to disclose that information,” you rolled your eyes as the click clacking of your heels echoed across the hallway.

“Hi baby, how was your day?” your fiancé kissed your temple as you looked down at the plate of food in front of you.

“It was okay,” you shrugged indifferently.

Your fiancé was the executive marketer of a large company. “I’m sorry to here that, I’ll be upstairs if you need me,”

You didn’t say a word as he walked away. In spite of the disturbing scene unfolding in front of your eyes on the TV whilst watching “The Perfection”, you couldn’t help but wonder how Mr Fushiguro was going. Sure he had a nasty mouth and the patience of a toothpick but there was something so intriguing about him. Maybe it’s because you were tired of you boring and plain life. You’ve always been like that.

It wasn’t anything new for you to leave something that was perfectly good to something subpar purely out of boredom and this was no exception.

The next few weeks consisted of you mostly signing papers, talking with your client, viewing crime scene photos and talking to detectives on the case.

The old Bailey loomed large and imposing, its grandeur echoing centuries of justice. Inside, the air was thick with anticipation and tension. You were a sharp and tenacious criminal lawyer, and this was no new information as you adjusted your barrister's wig, your eyes scanning the courtroom. Your reputation for winning impossible cases was well-earned, and today, your skills would be put to the test.

Toji Fushiguro, your client, sat at the defendant’s table. His presence was both magnetic and menacing, a dangerous mix that had everyone on edge. Accused of a brutal murder, his piercing green eyes betrayed no emotion as he watched the proceedings unfold.

Your first meeting had been fraught with silent judgments and unspoken words. You had read his file meticulously, aware of the gravity of the crime he was accused of. A single father found dead in at the bar, after a fight had broke out, all evidence pointing towards Toji. Yet, something about the case felt off to you, an instinct you couldn’t ignore.

You spent countless hours pouring over the evidence, every piece scrutinized under your critical gaze. Late nights at the office became routine, the flickering desk lamp being your only companion. Toji's file lay open before you, his eyes in the mugshot staring back with a challenge and scar in menacing smirk.

The interviews were intense. Toji, ever the enigma, offered little help. His answers were curt, often cloaked in sarcasm. But there was something beneath the surface, a flicker of vulnerability that intrigued you.

A ghost of a smile played on Toji’s lips. “You’re different from the others. They’ve all looked at me like I’m already convicted.”

"So? Why would you think I'm different? Let’s not forget why I’m here,” you stated.

Days turned into weeks, and your professional relationship took on a different hue. There was a dangerous allure in Toji’s defiance, a charisma that drew you in despite your better judgment. You guys would often find yourselves locked in heated debates, the air between you crackling with unspoken tension.

One evening, after a particularly grueling day in court, you found yourself in a dimly lit pub, nursing a bourbon. The door creaked open, and Toji walked in, flanked by the ever-present guards. Their eyes met across the room, a silent understanding passing between them.

“What the hell are you doing here, Fushiguro?,” you said as he approached the table, your voice low.

“I needed a drink,” Toji shrugged, sitting opposite you. The guards stood discreetly nearby, giving them a semblance of privacy.

You arched an eyebrow. “Well then, get your damn drink and leave me be?”

Toji leaned forward, his eyes darkening. “I think you’re the only person who sees me as more than just a murderer.”

“Oh please, that’s my job as a defendant. You’re onto nothing,”

Your heart pounded in your chest. The line between right and wrong blurred, your connection undeniable and perilous. you knew you were treading dangerous waters, but something about Toji made it impossible to walk away.

As the trial progressed, your determination to uncover the truth deepened. You successfully discovered inconsistencies in the evidence, hidden motives that pointed towards another suspect. Each revelation brought you closer, your late-night strategy sessions charged with a mix of frustration and undeniable chemistry.

The day of the verdict arrived, tension palpable in the courtroom. You stood tall, closing arguments a masterclass in legal brilliance. You had laid out the evidence meticulously, casting doubt on the prosecution’s case.

As the jury filed back in, the room held its breath. The foreman stood, the verdict hanging in the balance.

“Not guilty.”

The words echoed, a collective sigh of relief from your team. Toji turned to you, a mixture of gratitude and something deeper in his eyes. You couldn’t show your true feelings, not here, not now. But the promise of something more lingered between the energy in the air.

As the two of you continued to stare, a bright blinding bling brought his attention back to the engagement right adorning your right finger.

A few weeks after the trial, life starts to return to normal. Your fiancé working hard to make you happy, however your client still plagued your mind.

Your routine became his script. He knew when you left for work, the route you took, where you got your morning coffee. You would catch glimpses of him sometimes—at least you think you do—a flash of his face in a crowd, the shape of his shoulders disappearing around a corner.

One evening, as you leave your office, you feel it again—that sensation of being watched. You quickened your pace, glancing over your shoulder, but the street is empty. You told yourself it’s just your imagination, but the fear lingers.

Toji followed at a distance, his footsteps silent. He knows how to blend into the shadows, how to remain unseen. Every time you turn around, he steps just out of sight, watching you with a predatory intensity. His mind races with thoughts of you, dark fantasies that he can't shake.

Despite the ever growing suspicion of a potential stalker, you decide to treat yourself to a massage at your favorite spa, hoping to find some peace. The soft music and dim lighting work their magic as you settle onto the table, your mind beginning to unwind. An all too familiar and soft female voice tickles your ear, “Hey honey, just give me five and I’ll be back to give you the massage of your life,”

“Hurry Tina, my back hurts,”

A few moments pass before the masseur enters. You hear the door close softly and the click of bottles being opened. Hands begin to work on your tense muscles, and you let out a sigh of relief. The touch is skilled, firm yet gentle, but there is something vaguely unfamiliar about it.

A whisper brushes against your ear. “Did you miss me?”

Your eyes snap open in shock. Toji’s voice is unmistakable. Your heart races as you realize the hands on your body belong to him.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” you hiss, trying to keep your voice steady.

Toji’s hands continue their work, his touch sending shivers down your spine. “I needed to see you. To feel you.”

“What the fuck does that even mean, you bastard? I thought you had a kid to go home to. Instead you’re here feeling me up. Have you no shame?” you whisper, torn between fear and a forbidden thrill.

“I know,” he murmurs, his lips grazing your ear. “But I can’t stay away from you. You’re in my blood, Y/N.”

“Bullshit, you bum,” you spit.

His words are intoxicating, and you find yourself caught in a web of desire and danger. Every stroke of his hands ignites a fire within you, a fire you thought you had extinguished.

You know this is wrong, that you should stop him, but your body betrays you, melting under his touch. The line between right and wrong, sanity and madness, blurs once more.

As Toji’s hands explore your body, you realize that you are no longer just in the shadow of doubt. You are in the shadow of obsession, and there is no turning back. Your mean words did nothing but further push him to make you his.

“If you want me to stop, you know the word,” he carefully caresses the skin of your lower back. You weighed out your options. You were going to be married soon, if you were going to live life you’d might as well do it now before it was too late.

You hummed in acknowledgment, before finally agreeing to his lingering touches. It was going to be a one time thing after all. He gently flipped you over so that you were lying on your back. “Just so you know, Toji, this is a one time thing. After all I’m engaged.” he ignored you as he grabbed your thighs so that they were touching your chest.

He watched as your cunt leaked out before he’d even touch you. His hands weren’t even that good. He figured it must’ve been a long while since you’ve been dicked down good.

He wasted no time before sucking on your bud, your moans being loudly ripped from your chest. “Fuck!” you knew it’d been a while since he’d had some pussy, but damn it couldn’t have been that long. He groaned out from your sweet taste. “My God, I didn’t think you’d taste this good…” he whined out.

He spat on your clit making sure his saliva ran down to your puckered hole, ultimately making a mess out of you. “Oh yes!” you moaned out before cupping your mouth. You had momentarily forgotten you were in public, but the shame of being too loud quickly left your soul as Toji continued to suck on your pussy.

His tongue entered your tight hole, expanding the tight rim. “You ever had your ass ate before?”

“Excuse me?” you sat up utterly shocked.

“N…No? What kind of question is that?”

“Huh…No wonder you’re such a tight ass…Literally…” he scoffed.

He continued his ministrations on your sweet cunt. “If we had some privacy I’d eat your ass out so good,”

You couldn’t even keep your legs up anymore, your orgasm was coming closer. Toji knew this well and started sucking and pulling on your clit. Your face scrunched up in pure bliss. Bliss you hadn’t felt in ages. “Mphm! Toji!”

“Yeah, that’s what I like to hear.” he groaned out in the response.

“Right there Toji! M’ so close!”

A harsh knock interrupted his actions as your abruptly sat up. “Y/N? Oh my Goodness? Are you ok?” Tina asked from the other-side of the door. She shook the door handle multiple times before banging on the door again. “Did you lock the door? Open it please!”

“Did you seriously lock the damn door?” you knocked the upside of Toji’s head.

“I wanted us to have some privacy,” he shrugged indifferently.

You rolled your eyes before groaning, “Hello? Who are you talking to because I know it’s not me,” Tina huffed out annoyed.

“No one, give me a minute I’m coming.” You ushered Toji out to hide behind the cupboard door. The plan was when Tina wasn’t looking, you’d have Toji sneak out then back to the front door. From the minute you met your client you count tell he was a fool. Did you think he was that much of a fool? No. No one could’ve predicted this amount of foolishness. You silently scolded the man as he stood behind the door, waiting for the right moment to sneak out.

One night, after a long bath, you slipped into your favorite silk bathrobe, its softness a comforting embrace. The moonlight filtered through the curtains as you stood by your bedroom window, looking out into the night, wine glass in hand. The city lights twinkled in the distance, but your mind was far away, consumed by thoughts of Toji.

Unbeknownst to you, Toji was there, hidden in the shadows outside your window. His eyes were locked on you, a hunger burning within them. He watched the way the silk clings to your body, every movement a tantalizing tease.

You sighed, running a hand through your damp hair, oblivious to his presence. Toji’s heart raced as he imagined what it would be like to touch you again, to feel your warmth against him. The memory of your pussy haunts him, a forbidden pleasure that he craves more than anything.

He knew this was wrong, that he should stay away, but the pull is irresistible. You were in his blood, an obsession that consumed him. His eyes traced the curve of your neck, the way your robe parts slightly, revealing a glimpse of the cleavage beneath.

Inside, you closed your eyes, lost in thought. Your fiancé was a good man, but he didn’t ignite the same fire in you that Toji does. You tried to push the thoughts away, but they keep returning, relentless and unforgiving.

Toji’s breath hitched as you loosened the belt of your robe, letting it fall open slightly. He gripped the windowsill, fighting the urge to break in, to take what he so desperately desires. His mind raced with dark fantasies, each one more intoxicating than the last.

You stepped away from the window, the cool air brushing against your exposed skin. Toji watched every movement, his body tense with longing. He knew he should leave, but he couldn’t tear himself away. You were his obsession, a forbidden fruit that he was determined to possess.

As you disappeared from view, Toji lingered a moment longer, the image of you burned into his mind. He will find a way to have you, to make you his. In the shadow of obsession, he waits, his desire growing stronger with each passing night.

Your ever growing need for Toji’s mysteriousness pulled you further into a dark pit you knew it’ll be hard to get out of. And if your fiancé was to find out, you’d surely be casted away as a harlot. You had to choose between your pussy and your head, and you had to choose wisely. Will you do the right thing and stay true to your fiance, rejecting Toji’s advances and promises to eat you out so good or will you go behind your husband to be’s back and sleep with the same murderer you helped avoid jail time?

For a minute, one might’ve compared your mental turmoil to that of Hamlets distain and hesitation upon hearing that his father was killed and now he was set to avenge him by killing his uncle but these were two very different situations.

But alas, you believed that you could have many men in your head but as long as you had your true love in your heart then you’re a loyal woman.

That’s exactly how you found yourself with your mouth full of his thick and slimy cock whilst smothering his face with your cunt. Sucks and slurps filled the room as the two of you got on with such harshness of enemies. The gargling of his dick filled the room while he moved his head back momentarily to watch as you clenched on his fingers, holes begging to be filled. He smirked as a glimmer of an idea flicked in his eyes, as they peered up to your winking hole.

His tounge slowly lols out before giving the tight hole a small lick. He let out a boisterous laugh as he watched you shudder and mumble to no avail. His deft fingers moved to your clit as he found a rhythm for his tongue to moaned against your puckered hole. You grind your pussy against his face, moans muffled by his thick cock.

Your clit throbbed as his fingers moved faster, never loosing their grip and his tongue keeping its rhythm. You groaned loudly and clearly this time, his dick was now limp and his cum was scattered all over his thighs and your mouth. You squealed out his name and his onslaught on your slick pussy only got more overwhelming for you and you had no where to move.

Your back arched from the overstimulation and your hands clenched at the pleasure he was feeding you. What you had done to deserve such a treat, you had no idea, but you weren’t complaining. Toji’s hands came down on your cheeks, rubbing and massaging the muscle as he did.

Tears welled up in your eyes and your belly tightened and without a word, he knew you were about to cum. He quickly swapped his tongue and hands, sliding a finger into your asshole and placing his lips around your sweet clit. The spiky stubble of his hair added to your stimulation , adding to your pleasure.

There was no holding back with Toji . He was here to show you how to feel good. “Move,” without warning he turned his head to the side, tapping your arse twice. You blinked your confusion away as his hands guided you so that he was looming over you. You couldn’t say a single thing before you felt that familiar burning of his girth stretching you out. Drool seeped from your mouth as he reached deeper.

“Ah ha ha. Feels good, doesn’t it baby?” he boasted.

Nothing but babbles left your mouth as he gently lulled you to silence. With a firm grip on your hand, and his duck fully sheathed into your deep pussy, he began his rough thrust. Fap. Fap. Fap. Fast paced thrusting in and out, knocking the wind from you. He had rendered you completely speechless which was almost impossible given the type of person you were.

“Lights are on but no one’s home…” he chuckled to himself as he continued to slip in and out.

You whined and squealed as you felt his curved dick rub against your g-spot. It was far too much for you, your cheeks were hot and throbbing, lips bitten and bruised and your throat dry and sore. Tears flew from your eyes and his fast thrusting never faulted but instead intensified as he realised where he was hitting.

“I know you didn’t try to fucking run from me,” he comments sternly. For a second you feel yourself go numb. All you needed was a moment to collect yourself. It was far too much is what you tried telling him, begging for a semblance of a break.

“You ever try that shit on me again, I’ll tie you up,” He flips you over with a firm grip on your hip, pushing your legs up your ears. “Toji? Toji!” you whine in estxasy and his dick reach’s deep. “Wait! Toji, Please!”

“Please what, girl?”

You opened your mouth to speak , but before you could, he started moving again, impaling you on the hefty limb. He watched as your expressions contorted from bliss to shock, upon feeling a wet and slimy tongue between your toes. This man was nasty, downright sick, and you loved every second of it.

A fat thumb lingered down to the small bud, before rubbing vigorously, He watched as your moaning became high pitched and your hips bucked. Your stomach sucked itself in as you tried escaping his grasp, squirming in his nearly painful grips. “Oh my- Toji, Wait! I’m going to to-!”

Your loud plea was interrupted by an obscene squelch and a splashing ad a stream of juices left your sore cunt and aimed right for the mans chest. He jeers as he saw your o-face falling inlove even further. It didn’t take a while for him to pump you full of his thick hot cum, and it certainly didn’t take long for your fiance to get the picture Toji sent of him eating your used up and stuffed cunt out.

It also didn’t take long for Toji to send a video of him stuffing you again in full nelson this time, making you hold the phone.

It also didn’t take long for Toji to get in trouble again with the law. You too hadn’t seen each other since that eventful night and he couldn’t help but be grateful, for if you knew just how nasty he was, you would’ve killed him yourself and he wouldn’t blame you.

After the whole debacle was dealt with, he found himself yet again being arrested, and on the other side of the conjugal line was you. Sitting prettily in your work attire, brand new engagement ring sitting on your finger as you discussed his charges. “I miss you Y/N” he’d say. “I wonder what you’re up to these days,” he’d enquire, knowing full well, if he was free he wouldn’t have to.

And whether Toji turned himself in on purpose after everything he’s done just to see your bright face again, or whether it was a pure coincidence that he’d just so happened to be arrested for something he had gotten away with for so long, you had no idea.

All you knew is that you regretted that night.

Well, not entirely.

251 notes · View notes

dilatorywriting · 2 years ago

Text

Monster Mayhem: Siren's Song [Part 2]

Gender Neutral Reader x Vil Schoenheit Word Count: 4.6k

Summary: Fish are friends (?). You are not food.

[PART 1] [PART 1.5] [PART 2] [PART 3] [PART 4] [PART 5]

The Siren wasn’t leaving.

Which a part of you had been expecting. Because surely if there had been a snowball’s chance in Hell of him making it out into the open ocean alive before you’d cut through the ropes, he would have taken it and left you stranded without a second thought. And his odds weren’t that much better now—his fins were still a mangled mess and the wounds all along his scales and dainty featherings were still raw and oozing. It only made sense that he’d take at least a few days to try and recover.

But… But still.

Did he have to make it so obvious that he was sticking around?

The glint of the light off his tail was a constant distraction—always bright and eye-catching even at the cloudiest points of the day. Always flashing just out of the corner of your eye as a perpetual reminder that there was something in the water that would very happily gobble you up if you bothered making a swim for safety.

He’d also taken to sunning himself. Like some kind of overgrown mer-cat. Stretched out languidly on a flat rock with the tips of his violet fins hanging over the edge—just enough for the gauzy edges to play along the surf and avoid drying out entirely. His pale hair splayed out in a halo around him as he snoozed softly in the heat of the afternoon.

Which! No fair! This wasn’t a vacation! This was a stranding! An SOS! A Rose Queen Procedural Rule Four-Hundred-and-Four! And him taking up the whole of the cove to, I don’t know, tan, felt like another intentional slap in the face. The sun rose over the bay, which meant this stretch of shore was facing East. Which was the direction your vessel had been coming from. Which meant that this was the place on the little islet where you needed to be. Subsection Three of Procedural Four-O’-Four. ‘In the case of Crew Overboard, we will always travel the same route as planned. In order to give the Strandee a chance to map out a reconnection point.’ Riddle always had been so smart about these kinds of things.

‘It’s just until he’s better,’ you reassured yourself for the umpteenth time that morning. ‘Then he’ll leave and I can get rescued or die here alone and in peace.’

A fin flicked up from the shallows to spray you with saltwater splatters and you spluttered indignantly when it ran down into your eyes. You glared at the Siren’s retreating back, musing bitterly about how you’d never thought it was possible for someone to make the tuck of their shoulders look smug.

‘Alone and in peace,’ you repeated hopefully. And it sounded like such far off dream.

On the second day post-rope-removal, the Siren waved you down with a sharp flick of his wrist.

You approached the waterline hesitantly, still mostly waiting for him to turn on you and make toothpicks out of your bones. But instead of murdering you and getting crafty with your corpse, he just pointed to some scribbles in the sand. You squinted at the loop-de-loops suspiciously. It almost looked like an illustration of dancing bubbles—the lot of them curling and popping along the ground in a line like a limerick.

“Uhm, very nice,” you tried, and the fins flattened pissilly all along the side of his head.

He jabbed his claw towards the mess again. Then firmly at your eyes (hopefully not as a threat that he’d be happy to take them right out of your head if you continued to be obtuse). And then back again. He made a point to move the tip of his sharp nail from one swirl to the next in a little hop-hop-hop. It reminded you a bit deliriously of Riddle trying to teach some of the more socially bereft members of the crew their letters, and—

“You want me to read that?” you gaped, staring at the elegant curls of nonsense in the sand.

The Siren crossed his arms across his lean chest with a scoff that puffed past his lips hard enough to fluff out some of the paler, purple-tipped, hair hanging by his chin. He rolled his eyes at you and muttered something thin and spicy under his breath that you just knew had to be some sort of insult.

“I can read!” you defended, because it felt like it needed defending.

He leveled you with an entirely unimpressed ‘Oh, I’m sure you can’ sneer and you dropped to your knees, incensed. You dug your fingers into the sand and started sculpting out your own very cheery message into the muck.

When you were done, you waved a hand towards your proclamation and watched his brows pull together at the center into a teeny, pinched sort of expression. He let himself roll forward with the seafoam to lay more fully on the shore, and stared down at the mess you’d made like it was some strange code. Even reaching out to poke softly at the straight edge of a ‘T’ with one of his knife-sharp talons.

After a long moment of contemplation, he looked back up at you with an arched brow that was so unintentionally poised and not full of spite that it almost took your breath away. Who knew how pretty an already stunning face could become when it wasn’t twisted up in absolute vitriol? You shook away that absolutely damning thought in horror. That’s exactly what he’d want you to think. Siren, and all. Using his hotness to lure people onto his dinner table. Not you, baby. Because you were smart. And so gross from being stranded under island sunshine for a week that surely you’d taste like some absolutely rancid jerky at this point.

“Oh no,” you droned, and immediately that subtle curiosity of his ticked right back into irritation. “Two creatures from entirely different species and ecosystems have somehow managed to develop unique alphabets. What a completely unpredictable complication.”

The Siren puffed up like an angry lionfish and turned with a snarl to dive back into the shallows—making sure to whip his tail in your face and slam into the water with a huge splash as he went. The salt spray pelted down like rain and you snickered as it sloughed off your cheeks in rivulets, content to sit merrily in the wet sand beside your hastily scribbled: ‘Mermen Are Vicious Bitches. Hit Me if You Agree :)’

The next morning, there were more fish on the shoreline. Though these ones looked a bit less like they’d been dragged up by their souls and left to writhe in the wake of Siren-Screaming-Agony and more just like the unfortunate victims of a pair of too sharp claws.

You frowned down at a brown, sad-looking flounder that had clearly found itself at the very wrong end of a certain merman still swanning about in the bay not fifty feet away. It was mostly intact, and pleasantly plump for a flat, pancake-looking blob of muck. Your stomach gurgled and the thought of a nice, coal-charred, fillet really seemed quite nice. You chanced another peek at your resident Asshole, debating if it was worth swiping his snack. Another ominous rumble from your abdomen and you reached down to steal your prize and scuttle off deeper inland like a troll returning to its layer.

It didn’t take very long to get a small fire going, and within the hour you’d been fed and were more than ready for a cozy, full-bellied nap in the soft sand.

By the time you began to make your way back to the cove, the sun was high in the sky and you were already dreading sitting beneath its weighted rays for another afternoon. So you slowed your pace to a near snail crawl, dragging your feet as you went.

The little octopus from earlier was still swaying contentedly around the tide pool you’d shoved it into. It probably needed to be carried back out to the bay at some point so that it could swim back into the depths of the ocean, but the poor thing was just so small and round. Surely it’d get devoured by the first sharp-toothed thing that caught sight of it. Especially with your merman apparently being out for the blood of whatever other scaly things were swimming about in his temporary home. So for now you slipped it some small bits of leftover fish instead. You sat, crouched at the pool’s edge, and watched raptly as it grabbed the shredded bits of pale meat with its chubby tentacles to shove towards an eager beak.

“You’re the only friend I have left in the whole world,” you told the octopus miserably, wiping the greasy remnants of your lunch off your chin with a sigh.

The traitor hurriedly moved to snatch up the treat you’d offered it and hide itself away between some rocky crevices. You sighed louder. Rejected. What a time to be alive.

The next morning, the Siren was singing again.

That familiar prickle danced its way up your arms, leaving pinpricks of goosebumps in its wake. Some pirates told tales of storms leaving their mark in such a way—that seasoned sailors could feel the tickle of thunder against their skin long before they could spot dark clouds on the horizon. You’d have to amend that little legend whenever you found your way back to The Rose Queen. Siren Sense was a lot cooler, anyways. Any idiot with arthritis could tell you when rain was due.

But either way, Mister Merman was back to idly circling the bay and calling into the distance. At least it wasn’t as miserable as it had been the other day—more of a leisurely pacing than the frantic, near-feral caterwauling that had soured your gut so terribly.

There was another fat fish on the shore. A bright, red snapper so brilliantly crimson that it was almost impossible to make out the garish wounds in its side. Almost. And even if it hadn’t been, the drooping, rust colored, rivulets dug into the sand would have been enough of a clue.

Why the Siren was bothering to leave his clawed-up kills at your feet like some overgrown cat dragging in mice, you had no idea. Maybe he was poisoning them, and subsequently you. Maybe he was bored and it was some sort of fishy enrichment. Maybe he just didn’t want to bother leaving dead things around to contaminate his favorite sunning spots, and tossing his leftovers in your vicinity was as close to a reliable dumpster as he could find on a remote island. Who’s to say.

Either way, you dutifully ignored the magical tingles racing up your shoulders and brought the newest fish back to your makeshift firepit. You grilled the snapper in silence, debating. Then you fed your octopus friend and returned to the beach, cooked fillets in tow.

You waited in awkward silence for a few moments, fish burning your palms, before raising your fingers to your lips and whistling loud enough to make your teeth ache. The mystical static faded from the air and you watched in pleasant (?) surprise as the Siren made his way back to where you’d set up camp. He rolled in with the tide, cresting on a gentle bit of surf and coming to rest neatly in the shallows—fins splayed out beneath him like a lord lying amidst his many silken robes. He propped himself up on his elbows and looked at you with an arched brow and slanted frown.

You awkwardly extended a hand—roasted snapper still resting in your open palm and burning the absolute fuck out of your fingers.

“Uhm,” you said, feeling a bit too much like the local idiot trying to feed one of the rabid, wandering, strays around town. “Food?”

He scoffed and rolled his eyes at you.

“Do you want food?” you tried.

The other brow joined the first, nearly rising all the way into his hairline. It wasn’t a pleasant sort of surprise.

“It’s better cooked?” you coaxed in the face of his outright constipated scowl. Be fed and full, you thought hopefully. Maybe then you won’t fucking look at me like I’m a boxed lunch.

He jabbed a sharpened, black talon in your direction, and then pointedly again angled up towards your mouth. Then back to the fish still roasting your poor cuticles straight off your fingers.

You blinked, a bit thrown.

“What? It’s supposed to be for me?”

He nodded, throwing in another one of those bombastically snarky eyerolls for good measure. ‘Obviously,’ that sneer said.

“Well,” you huffed, plopping down to sit cross-legged in the sand and offering up one of the fillets. “There’s plenty for both of us.” When he stared at you like you were attempting to serve him up a choice pile of literal dog shit, you wiggled your hand and entreated, “Please just take it before my skin melts off.”

The Siren huffed and reached out, plucking up the fish with the tips of his claws. He observed your meager meal as one might a particularly unappealing cockroach, and after a long moment, his nose scrunched (cute, you thought absently before immediately suffocating every wayward braincell that would dare call your murderous shore-neighbor anything of the sort) and he leaned forward to nip at a crisped, pink corner with the barest edge of one canine.

When your culinary creation didn’t immediately strike him dead on the spot, he took another, equally dainty bite. And then another. The tight pucker of his mouth eased as he chewed, and you watched as the harsh cut of his purple irises warmed with that same intrigue as they had when you’d first scribbled your foreign letters into the sand.

He readjusted his grip on the fish between his claws to get a better angle and took a proper bite, chewing thoughtfully. Before you knew it, you were watching him nip at the pads of his fingers, his gaze going a bit round and shocked when he realized that he’d devoured the entirety of it.

“See?” you hummed, tucking into your own portion with gusto. “Not all things humans come up with are terrible.” He harumphed and turned to glare back out over the bay, slouching into the surf with an expression that was most certainly not a pout. “But maybe you’d know that if you bothered to do anything other than murder and devour us on sight,” you chirped.

To which you were immediately doused with an armful of water for your troubles. The Siren glowered petulantly from where he’d just wave-bombed you, and then dove back into the deeper waters of the sandbar. He immediately started up his stupid singing all over again—pointedly keeping his chin high above the surface and splashing brine into your face anytime he looped close enough to shore.

“I don’t know why I bother,” you huffed, and ate your sopping snapper in grumpy silence.

There was a ship wrecked off the coast.

Nothing overly cool, and definitely only a small chunk of what had probably at one point been a rather impressive vessel. But it was something. The first change in pace you’d had in days and oozing with possibilities.

The only problem was that the great, rotting, hull of the thing was dug up into a jagged skerry about a hundred yards off the shore—wedged into the pointed rocks with no chance of any wave or breeze sending it adrift. You could swim perfectly well. I mean, living your life on a ship surrounded by tumultuous, depthless, ocean would have been a hugely stupid career move otherwise. The issue, naturally, was the thing currently making its home in these waters. Sharks and barracudas, blablabla. They were just animals, no matter how many teeth they had. The Siren had a grudge. And just as many teeth.

Right now, said spiky pain in your ass was lounging in the shallows like the froth was an elegant daybed made just for him—shredded fins swaying in the soft tides and his hair floating about him that same, white-gold halo that made him look far too peaceful for anyone’s good sense. He wasn’t singing today, which was great for the local wildlife population but terrible for your Siren Sense. Once you waded into the waves, you’d have no real way to keep track of him. Hope, maybe, that he didn’t think fucking with you was worth messing up whatever tan-line he had going on. But nothing concrete that you’d be willing to bet the safety of your limbs on.

You wiggled your toes in the sand and stared longingly out at the stupid, wrecked ship that was so stupidly close. If you swam your fastest you could probably make it there in under two minutes—less than that, even. But that was still more than enough time for the Siren to rake those dark claws of his across your throat and drag you down into the depths to drown.

Riddle’s angry, red face swam through your thoughts, and you could practically see him shoving that beloved law tome of his under your nose for the umpteenth time.

‘Rule 32, never make dangerous bets that you’re certain you won’t win, particularly if you are betting against a Blue Nosed Beetle.’

‘Rule 15, do not needlessly sacrifice your life in the name of curiosity, excluding—of course—if you hail from Cheshire or are a Cat.’

‘It’s only a dumb shipwreck,’ you thought miserably, if rationally. ‘It’s probably not even that cool.’

Your captain would be so proud.

The next morning you were rolling up the cuffs on your pants and wading into the cool shallows, silently lighting a candle in your heart for your beloved, steam-faced leader and promising that you would at the very least cover the costs of your own funeral so as not to inconvenience him further.

The waves lapped against your ankles and the waters themselves were shockingly clear and blue. You could practically see each grain of sand beneath your heels—make out each pointy rock and the little, red crabs that scuttled away from your tromping like civilians fleeing from the shadow of a leviathan. The Siren was back to singing today. Perhaps his poor, overworked throat simply needed a break every now and again. But either way, your Merman Magic Missive was working in full force. The hairs on your arms stood at full attention and you liked to imagine you could see them twitching in circles to follow his long, looping arcs through the bay.

You made it up to your knees and waited, eyes scanning the open water and nose twitching like maybe you could smell the fucker. There was nothing but a familiar prickle along your shoulders and that deep sense of ‘tug tug tug’ with no answer, so you took a deep breath and pushed further, the water sloshing up to your hips, your chest, and finally you were floating—paddling slow and cautious towards the wreckage.

It really was insanely close. Even moving at your most cautious, sneakiest crawl, you’d made it nearly three-quarters of the way there within perhaps five minutes. And no signs of a vengeful, hungry Siren circling the waters beneath you either. More rules that perhaps that you’d have to tell Riddle might need some amending once you finally made it back home to your crew. ‘Dangerous bets,’ who? ‘Needless sacrifice,’ what? You might as well have outsmarted the whole ocean.

As you moved closer, you could make out a strange coat of arms on the side of the hull that you didn’t recognize. Twining, silver songbirds soaring against the sparkly backdrop of an otherwise plain faced crest, which honestly looked far too delicate to be heading the broken remains of what was no doubt at one point an absolute monster of a vessel. You reached out to brush your fingers against the shining plaque and then you were underwater.

You fought the immediate impulse to gasp in surprise, because expediting the process of your inevitable drowning just seemed stupid even by your standards. There was a clawed hand wrapped around your calf yanking you down, and you squinted through a stream of panicked bubbles to see your terrible, horrible, completely thankless co-strandee snarling up at you with sharp teeth and a sharper flail of his delicate gills. Thankfully the water wasn’t all that deep, so by the time you’d been dragged to the bottom you were maybe only ten feet under. But still. It was the goddamn principle! And besides, you’d heard about enough drunks drowning in puddles to know that this was more than enough Liquid Death to put you in an early grave.

The Siren looped around you in tight circles, and you could feel the brush of his tattered fins against your skin like the ghostly fingers of a reaper trailing down your spine. You’d known he was big—giant, even. Long, and impressive, and built to rule the very depths he’d dragged you into. Large enough to wrestle with sharks and capsize lifeboats. Big enough, no doubt, to eat you whole and still be hungry enough for seconds.

The salt stung your eyes and you blinked hard to keep his vibrant, amethyst tail in focus. Would he strike from the back, where you couldn’t see? Or would he go right for your throat—a direct, full frontal, ‘fuck you, human’ if there ever was one. And honestly, what were you expecting? That a good deed and a few pieces of cooked fish would sway him from devouring you whole? Maybe the island sun had fried whatever remained of your rattled brain.

He stopped in front of you and hissed—a stream of tight, tiny, bubbles jetting past his canines. You glared in petulant confusion, absolutely refusing to give your would-be murderer whatever reaction he was hoping for. His brow pinched into a tight, angry, v and he snarled again. You snarled back, and with that, the last breath in your lungs swooped out of you in a tight squeak. You choked, and struggled, and kicked at the claws holding you down. The Siren reared back, eyes widening in something that looked insultingly like genuine surprise, and you used his moment of hesitation to propel yourself off the sandbar and back to the choppy surface.

You gasped in a hasty breath, expecting to immediately be dragged back under. But when you weren’t pulled back down to your watery grave, you took in another and another. Gasping, and hacking, and spitting up seafoam. The Siren’s head crested the surface beside you and you flailed away, nearly pushing yourself under all over again. You paddled frantically, trying to keep your nose above the tide, and then suddenly there was something under you. You squawked and kicked it on instinct. The Siren snapped his pointy teeth in your face and you realized with a start that oh. That was him, wasn’t it? The long, winding, scaled muscles of his tail curled beneath your toes in what almost seemed like an attempt to keep you upright.

He stared at you with those unnervingly bright eyes of his—blonde hair curling softly at the edges where it plastered elegantly along his finned ears, and those too-long lashes dripping with small, sparkly, drops of salt water.

“What the hell is this bullshit?” you choked, coughing up more bubbly froth. “You don’t get to look so—so put together after trying to murder me!”

The Siren huffed out something that the delusional, still half-drowned, part of you wanted to classify as a laugh. And then he organized that bemused expression back into its usual, haughty, iciness and began to carefully make his way back towards the shore—towing you along like a poor, little, lost buoy with nowhere else to go.

You let him drag you up into the sand and only flopped around a little. He flicked his tail at you and your dramatics and you turned on him with a fierce, waterlogged scowl—a bit more confident now that he didn’t have the home field advantage.

“What was that for! I just wanted to look at the ship! I wasn’t even doing anything to you!” you wailed. “I haven’t done anything to you at all! Ever! Why do you keep—" you collapsed back into the sand with a miserable whine that rattled all the teeth in your head, and ground the heels of your palms into your eyes until you saw stars.

After a long moment of nothing, you felt a gentle tap at your shoulder.

You looked back up with a start to see Mister Merman looking nearly sheepish.Or as much of an equivalent that his aloof mask of a face was capable of pulling off. The clawed finger resting at your collarbone dropped to the sand by your hip, and he carefully began to draw more of those squiggles. No, scratch that. Not the dancing, popping, ones from the other day. These actually looked sort of like the silver songbirds from that shipwreck. More jagged, certainly. But similar enough that you felt something a bit too coldly cautious to be confusion seep through your guts.

Once he was finished, he looked up and met your gaze—sharp, pointed. And then he reached back out and smeared the birds into nothing and shook his head, firm. His red lips moved slowly, exaggerated, again and again. And you could make out the vague shape of words you’d had shouted at you a hundred times over.

‘Not safe.’

That same, shivery, nervous feeling bit at your limbs.

“…okay,” you said after a moment. And then leaned forward to dig your own fingers into the sand, dutifully ignoring how your elbows knocked against his own.

‘Not safe,’ you wrote, and watched his eyes trace each letter like a treasure map.

There was another tap at your shoulder. And then he pointed to the words in the muck, then to himself.

You rolled your eyes. “Yes, yes. You’re not safe either.”

He sighed dramatically enough to ruffle the ends of your still soaked hair. And then pointed to the words again, tapping at the ‘N’ with the curved tip of a claw.

“Nnnn?” you mouthed, confused.

He moved to the ‘o’ next and it clicked.

“You want me to teach you how to read my letters?” you asked, flabbergasted. Another sigh, like you’d dropped the weight of all the world on his pale shoulders. Or perhaps that your idiocy was enough to put that hearty mass to shame. You decided that you were still feeling a bit too much like you’d only just barely escaped a brush with death, dismemberment, and dinner plans to push your luck with sassing him back too harshly, and just blinked owlishly in dazed surprise. “But why?”

His purple eyes trailed in the direction of the shipwreck and something cutting and poisonous clouded his expression. He pointed to the words again.

‘Not safe.’

“Alright,” you said, looking out over the water with a strange sort of sinking feeling in your gut. You leaned forward and began to draw the alphabet at your feet. His tail twitched by your fingers and you ignored the soft brush of his still-healing fins. “This one’s an ‘A’, like in ‘Asshole’—"

Whomp went the tail as he cracked it across your knuckles like a school matron with a ruler. And you couldn’t help the startled burst of genuine, tinkling laughter that bubbled past your lips for the first time since you’d been dragged overboard.

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