#my future husband did some good deeds in his last life

[shut-up-rabert]

virgin?

In every possible sense of the word, sir

[helenapsent]

Well I've finally gotten through the fifth installment of "Parables", this is part 5, entitled "The Final Cinderella"

And I mean, this part just took my heart and broke it, I'll tell you why

This time I will not describe the pros and cons, because first of all I pass games for the sake of the story, and I must share it with you all

OKAY! There is a local Maiden Goddess in this world. Alas, she cannot interfere in the fate of mortals directly, so she seeks helpers in the person of good girls with a pure heart, the so-called "Cinderellas", and through them brings her good into the world. She endows them with a magic wand that gives different girls random chips with which they perform good deeds. So they become "Godmothers" and search for new "Cinderellas" to become their successors in the future. At some point things didn't go according to plan and one of the Godmothers, Amelia, suddenly became evil! Why did that happen? Because she went mad because of the sudden death of her beloved husband (he was murdered). She decided to resurrect him with the help of the soul of the last "Cinderella" (and you thought there were fucking tons of them? No, it's a rare red-listed species of girl). And as always we can't let chaos ensue.

And her husband, btw, is no ordinary man, but the carver Gepetto himself. He traveled the world in search of a special wood from which he could create the world's best doll. His wife helped him, of course. But it didn't end well, she brought the cursed wood (used to be the worst thieves), and Gepetto literally soaked in this wood so much that he took it to live in the forest, from where his wife took a piece of bark. It got to the point where he became completely calloused, started bringing trouble and everything, and he was killed. And when Amelia managed to resurrect him, he started making a fierce debauch. Amelia died in the closet with grief, and we together with Pinocchio went to restore peace and calm down the bad "drunken" father. In the end, Pinocchio gave his life to restore the soul of our Cinderella and at the same time, so that the ordinary and fairy-tale worlds did not fall into oblivion. But the parents don't care, their souls intertwined and penetrated into the body of their dead son, thus turning him into a man. And Cinderella began to look after him.

Mind-blowing right?)) But it's also awesome!

[ourloveisforthelovely]

Best Friends Part 3

Regulus Black AU 

Link to Part 2

Request:  Regulus x Reader fic request: They are in their last year at Hogwarts. They always been best friends, she had a boyfriend and she ends up pregnant (like 3 months before graduating). Her boyfriend lives her cuz he doesn’t want a baby, but Regulus as her best friend (who has always had feelings towards her) steps up to help her, so when they graduate they got a house and live together and you know they fall in love and at the end, they agree to act as if the baby’s dad is Regulus. 💗

Pairings; Regulus Black x Reader

Rating: Mature

_____

Grimmauld Place…

Walburga stood glaring into the fireplace while Orion paced muttering to himself. His parents, Arcturus and Melania, sat watching them with matching frowns.

“So this is really happening and we are just supposed to sit here and be okay with it?”

Orion snapped.

“What choice do we have? The deed is done. I left Regulus a thirty-page essay on why teenagers having sex is stupid, stupid, STUPID!”

Walburga replied. Orion ran a hand through his hair before lightly saying “thirty-page essay?” He had high hopes for Regulus. Regulus wasn’t like Sirius. Orion, even though he wanted nothing to do with Regulus at his birth, now was convinced that his youngest son was the perfect heir. Orion knew that Regulus would do well at the job that awaited him in the ministry. Now that future was in jeopardy with a pregnant teenage bride-to-be.

“I say there is plenty to be done. Take the girl to a healer and deal with the pregnancy then forbid Regulus from seeing her ever again.”

“It won’t do any good.”

Melania commented. Orion stopped and looked at his mother as if she were insane.

“What are you talking about?”

Melania smirked. She wanted nothing more than to shake her son but also knew this wouldn't get them anywhere.

“If the two of you interfere with this, I guarantee you that you are ensuring that Regulus has a family of 5 by the time he is 25 years old.”

Orion frowned.

“Mother…”

Melania held a hand up instantly silencing her son.

“Orion, like it or not, that boy is exactly like you are. If this had happened to you, you would handle this exactly as Regulus is. Let the boy marry for love.”

“I didn’t get to marry for love.”

Orion commented. Walburga shot her husband a glare. She knew Orion didn’t love her when they married. Granted, she didn’t love him either but the union worked. It served its purpose. Walburga hoped for the same thing for Regulus. Happiness didn’t matter when it came to keeping the family line going.

Melania meanwhile, narrowed her eyes at her son. She wasn’t saying it but she wanted Regulus to be happy. Her youngest grandson had always been her favorite. Melania knew that Regulus wasn’t particularly happy with his life growing up. He was nothing like his older brother or cousins. Regulus had always been the sensitive one. He was the one that would let her cuddle him. Regulus wasn’t always on the move like Sirius was.

If some girl that Walburga made Regulus happy then that was just fine with Melania. She personally didn’t care if you came from the Potters or some other family. You were pureblood and that was enough for her.

“It isn’t my problem that the two of you didn’t find something to love each other for. Let Regulus have this one thing that he wants. It isn’t like you have let Regulus have anything that ever wanted in life.”

Orion felt his rage building at his mother.

“Mother, not all of us can have the idle marriage as you have. As far as Regulus goes, that boy hasn’t gone without. What I say for my son goes and I say…”

“It's time for you to shut up.”

Orion froze the moment his father spoke. Arcturus was a man of few words and when he did speak, one listened.

“Father…”

Arcturus held a hand up.

“No more from you. Regulus can marry the girl and neither of you will say anything further to him. Like it or not, son, I am still head of this family and until I die I will be such. Is this all understood?”

Orion glanced toward Walburga who groaned and threw her hands up in defeat before turning back to his parents.

“As you wish.”

(meanwhile)

You sat beside Regulus as Easter dinner wrapped up. James and Lily had gone off to the living room to relax. Sirius remained at his place at the table. He hadn’t stopped looking between Regulus and yourself suspiciously.

As far as your parents, both had been slightly quiet throughout dinner. You had a feeling that the reality of becoming grandparents was setting in. Neither had said anything cold or unsupportive but you could see the looks of realization setting in quickly. Both parents realized that you were soon to be a Black with Walburga and Orion as in-laws. The two people that both Euphemia and Fleamont despised the most would be their grandchild’s other grandparents.

Both realized that they would forever have to face Walburga and Orion anytime this child had some kind of event. Euphemia could see Walburga being the grandparent that would forever try to “one up” her. If Euphemia bought the child a stuffed horse then Walburga would go buy an actual horse.

Sirius elbowed Regulus in the side.

“Come outside with me.”

Regulus shook his head. He wasn’t about to leave your side. As far as Regulus was concerned, he wasn’t getting away from you until the two of you were safe in the hotel room that he had rented. Regulus didn’t think that your parents would try to talk you out of marrying him but he also wasn’t taking any chances.

“It's okay, Reg.”

You said, gently putting your hand on top of his. Regulus sighed before getting up and following Sirius outside.

Sirius lit a cigarette before turning to his younger brother. He took a drag before trying to decide how he would word his questions.

“So are you going to tell me what’s up?”

Regulus crossed his arms over his chest. Sirius knew that Regulus was trying to put his “walls” up…just as he knew it would.

“What do you mean?”

Regulus asked, softly. Sirius rolled his eyes resisting the urge to smack Regulus in the back of the head. For someone so brainy he was acting like a tool.

“You know what I mean, Regulus! With Y/n!”

Regulus tilted his head to the side.

“What part of I knocked her up do you not understand?”

Sirius raised an eyebrow.

“There is more to this. Come on, Reg. I’m your brother and like it or not this baby is going to be my niece or nephew. I deserve to know the truth. I also know there is something that you aren’t telling me. Face it, Regulus, I know you pretty damn well. I know when you are lying and your poker face is totally showing.”

Regulus groaned. He didn’t want to have this conversation. This was the last thing that he even wanted to talk about but it was eating at him.

“The baby isn’t mine. It’s Michael’s. He wanted nothing to do with it and I couldn’t let Y/n go through this alone. I have loved her for so long and…she needs me, Sirius. She loves me and I love her…that’s enough. This kid doesn’t deserve to be alone without a proper father. No one needs to know the truth.”

Sirius stood with his mouth open. This was the LAST thing that he expected coming. He honestly thought that Regulus knocked you up on some drunken night after a quidditch game or the two of you were just screwing around. Hearing the baby was Michael’s and Regulus was the one stepping up to the plate both made Sirius proud and also furious. Michael should be a man and take care of his responsibility but clearly, that wasn’t going to happen.

“Who are you?”

Sirius finally sputtered. Hearing Regulus care for someone other than himself and his reputation told Sirius that there was hope after all. Regulus raised an eyebrow before the haughty expression returned to his face.

“I’m Y/n’s fiancé and that is my baby.”

Sirius nodded, realizing that Regulus was going no further in this conversation.

“Looks like I’m going to be an uncle.”

(meanwhile)

You sat across from your mother after she put the remainder of the dishes away. She finally looked up and smiled.

“Are you Regulus is the one?”

“Without a doubt. Mum, I have loved him for so long but I never thought that I would be good enough, especially in his parent’s eyes…I don't think I ever will be but I know Regulus won’t let them keep us apart. I know that I’m young and it's reckless to be having a baby but it feels right. Regulus is happy…and I’m happy too.”

Euphemia sat quietly for a moment before getting up and coming to stand near you. She gently took your face in her hand.

“Pumpkin, you are more than good enough. You are beyond good enough for those people. I normally don’t speak ill about other people but you will be the best thing to ever grace the Black family. I also know that you, my stubborn princess, won’t let that horrible woman shake you. Walburga may think that she, in her eternal glory, is better than all but at the end of the day, she will go into a coffin just like the rest of us.”

You smiled and leaned into your mother’s touch. Euphemia always knew what to say. You were worried that she would be disappointed in you. Maybe in some ways, she was, but she would never say it.

“I will admit, mum, it did feel great watching her look as if she had been knocked from her high horse.”

Euphemia grinned.

“There is my baby girl”

She turned and walked back to the sink before being quiet for a moment.

“Y/n, like it or not Walburga and Orion will be a part of your and your baby’s lives. You will have to find some way to put your foot down. Hopefully, Regulus will keep up the footing that he showed today. I was very proud of him, I must say. It looks like I was right after all.”

You put your teacup down.

“About?”

Euphemia turned with a smile on her face.

“That there was something in your heart for Regulus other than friendship.”

You wanted to tell your mother the truth. Her liking for Regulus would go up tremendously if she knew how selfless he was actually being. Regulus didn’t have to “step up” when Michael stepped back. Regulus could have washed his hands of you and left you on your own…but he didn’t. He was the one that was checking on you every morning. Making excuses to professors on why you were suddenly so ill. Regulus took care of you better than Michael ever could.

“Yeah, you were right. Mum, I really love him.”

Euphemia walked back over to you and kissed your forehead.

“I know.”

The front door opened and closed signaling Regulus was back in the house. Euphemia went back to the sink as Regulus came into the room.

“Ready to go, love?”

You nodded and stood up. Regulus reached down for your head as your mother turned back. Your mother moved to kiss you goodbye. She stopped and looked down into your eyes.

“Sweetheart, as I mentioned before. The two of you really need to go see a healer soon. If you would like me to find a good one, I can look some up.”

“That would be nice, mom.”

Half an hour later…

Regulus tightened his hold on your hand as the two of you stepped into the hotel. He hadn’t let go of you the whole ride back.

“How are you feeling?”

He asked softly. You stopped walking. Looking around, you made sure that there were no eyes on the two of you. You stood on your tiptoes and wrapped your arms around his shoulders.

“I’m feeling wonderful. We’ll be alone…”

Regulus gave you a small smirk. He leaned down to press a kiss to your lips.

“Yes, and as I recall I promised that our first time would be special.”

The next few moments were silent as Regulus kissed you softly. Neither of you seemed to care that there were people around you. All of the noise of the day seemed to fade and you were, once again, at peace.

Regulus held you tightly against him as he deepened the kiss enjoying the moment. Before you, Regulus would never be caught dead snogging a girl in public. In fact, he would run at the thought. With you, he was a different man…

“Y/n?”

You pulled away from Regulus to see none other than Michael. He stood a few feet away watching you with an uncomfortable expression on his face. Regulus quickly pushed himself in front of you.

“Fuck off, four eyes.”

Michael frowned at Regulus.

“What did you say to me?”

Michael snapped. Regulus didn’t back down. The last thing that he would do was ever back down to that scum-sucking lowlife that ever thought about upsetting you.

“I said fuck off, four eyes…can you understand English?”

Regulus turned to you, trying to calm his rage.

“Love, go wait for me in the room.”

You didn’t wait to be told twice. Regulus, meanwhile, waited until you were gone before turning back to Michael.

“Did you forget what I said about fucking off? You have no business talking to my fiancé.”

Michael tried to appear tough but his resolve was fading. Like it or not, he was scared of Regulus.

“That…that’s my baby.”

Regulus stepped closer while giving Michael a death glare.

“No, twat. That is my baby along with my fiancé. Michael, I’m going to make sure you regret ever meeting me.”

_____

@amelie-black @acciosiriusblack @siriuslyceleste @hopeful-hufflepuff-peeves @knreidy1 @jessyballet @georgeweasleydumbhoe @justfinishthis @f4iryluvy @lostarc24 @daddyslittlevillain @panpride @regulusblackswhorecrux @missgorldafirst @saramaple @i-love-scott-mccall @s-we-e-t-t-ea @padf00ts-l0ver @readtomeregulus @goldensunshineshit @haroldpotterson @taylor-will-be-the-death-of-me @aurorasnape12 @eclipsejune @mentally-unstable-hoe @gugggu6gvai @jag9000 @quinis @buttercup-beeee @un-lovesherself @melaninnbarbie @mimisparkle12 @teletubiswszpilkach @dumybitch @play-more-led-zeppelin @ravenhood2792 @fific7 @rubyroscoe1 @bennyberry @criminalyetminimal @whymyparentscheckmyphone @lucasfilms77 @spideyxalmighty @moonythemilf @authoressskr @brokencasbutt67-writer @moldy-old-boot @hankypranky @summer-novak @emiwrites3reads @shaylybaby2032 @untoldshortsofthefandoms @deanwherescas @knight-of-gleefulness @shitfaceddaniel-blog @mycuddlycorner @tas898 @li0nh34rt @marichromatic @wontlookaway @sprnaturallover

[neesieiumz]

6 Months {Izuku Midoriya x Reader}

(Pro-hero!Izuku Midoriya x Former Pro-hero!Reader)

[PART ONE] [PART TWO]

L E A V E.

Summary: You were done. Done with everything. So what do you do? You move on. What's new? What's old? And who makes an even bigger space in your heart?

A/n: So this isn't based on another song, well technically it's still based on Sorry, but it's more like a part two to sorry than it being it's own separate part, you feel me? I know it took longer than expected, but there were so many paths I wanted to take and I didnt feel like rushing it. I really wanted to focus on flashbacks for this final part, your decision to leave the pro-hero scene, when Izuku and Melissa started to see each other... etc... I always made a gateway... in case I wanted to continue you and someone else's romance if I ever felt like it... So enjoy!

Support me on Kofi! Commissions are open!

Word Count: 8.0k

Warnings: Implied NFSW, but no deed is actually done, light drinking, (all in good fun)

___

Falling into your mother’s arms, you spilled everything from last night and this morning. On how you eavesdropped on his conversation, the confrontations from both this morning and at the brunch. Your father wasn’t home, left earlier this morning for his job. Both you and your brother moved out not too long after high school, him going on to college to become an engineer, and you moving into an apartment with Mina and Jirou while you worked for the same hero agency. Your mother was your closest confidant, she was the only one who could come to mind to tell her about what happened. She just held you, rocking you as you cried, cried about your broken marriage, and seeing the girl your husband abandoned you for. You cried about how both she, your dad, and your brother were right. How you should have never listened to him about giving up everything you worked so hard for. She held you in her loving arms, whispering sweet things in your ear.

“I should have listened to you,” you sobbed, holding one of the throw pillows close to you as you sat up on your couch, leaving her hold on you.

Your dress was bunched up to your knees so you pulled the wrinkled material out from under you as you shifted around on your mother’s leather couch. She pulled you into one last hug, the warm embrace making silent tears fall down your face. Your mom pushed the braids falling out of your now-loose bun from your tear-stricken face. Continuing to caress your face slowly, her slightly rough hands provided a familiar comfort from your childhood.

“This is not your fault, you can not blame yourself for his infidelity, nor can you blame yourself for sticking by your husband’s side and decisions. You did what you thought was right and absolutely no one can give you shit for believing in your marriage.” Her soft voice provides extra comfort to you.

“WHAT?!?”

You were in your family home, six years ago. You still had a couple of bandages around your face and arms. Recently, you just completed physical therapy, nearly regaining full control over your limbs. The fight you had was brutal, nearly leveled the entire city. However, you came out successful from it, even if it put you out of commission for over a year. However, since you’ve woken up, you and Izuku have been having intense conversations about the two of you and your futures together, which led you to the decision you’ve made today.

“YOU’RE RETIRING?!?!” Your brother yelled, standing up swiftly out of his chair.

You took a deep breath, keeping your head down as you nodded your head. It was just you, your parents, and your brother here, Izuku currently being in the top 25 heroes, had a lot of work to do so he could join you as you broke the news to them.

“Izuku and I have been talking and seeing how fast he’s going in the Hero Charts. This incident caused us to do some major thinking. The two of us worrying about each other on the job isn’t healthy. Having two heroes in a relationship, especially two who are going as high in the ranks as us as quickly as we are. Considering how there are a lot more people expecting Izuku to go higher since he’s All Might’s prodigy. So, I’ll be retiring and helping Izuku with his career from the sidelines.”

You let out another deep breath as you finished your monologue, your fingers twitching in your lap. You knew this was a decision your family wasn’t going to agree with, after all, it’s not like you don’t have your legacy to meet up with. Your mother, before Miruko, was the highest-ranked female pro hero in all of Japan. You had her legacy to go after since your brother decided to go into the family business with pro-hero gear.

“You can’t be serious!! After everything, you’ve worked for?!?! You’re just gonna give it up BECAUSE IZUKU SAID SO?!”

Your brother was the most pissed, after all, it was always both you and his plan that the two of you would live up to our parent’s legacy. He would become the best support gear inventor and you would become the best pro hero. So saying this puts a damper on the dreams you both had.

“You had one bad fight with a villain, but the doctors said you’re going to be cleared right?” You nodded your head at his question, “so why? Why would you need to retire after that one fight?!”

“Izuku proposed.”

Gasps of shock flew from heri mouths, you smiled sadly as you pulled your hand from under the other, revealing the small, silver ring with the pure cut diamond sitting perfectly in the middle of it.

“He’s the love of my life, and he’s the man who I want to spend the rest of my life with… to have kids with. We both understand how difficult this job is, and we both know how much I wanted to become a pro hero, but since he’s my endgame… something had to give. And so I did.”

Next was your father, having raised you since you were 3 years old. He saw how much you looked up to your mother, and to your grandmother as well. You come from a line from female pro heroes, and it was always your dream to continue that. He’s always supported you throughout the years, remembering all the times the two of you would work in his workshop on new hero gear, both with your brother and without as well.

“Y/n, don’t you think you’re rushing into this decision? This is everything you’ve been working for, and you’re gonna throw it away?”

“I know your concerns but this is for the best for me and him. I know being a pro hero was what I wanted, but…” you trailed off, looking away from your trembling hands.

Your mother, who was sitting beside you, could only stare at your trembling hands. Almost reminds her of the time she told her mother who she was marrying. How nervous she was, not because she was putting her career on the back burner, but because of what happened the last time she decided to pursue a romantic relationship with someone. She got you out of it, but it was still a painful journey. She took a deep breath, before shifting herself to where you were. She placed her hand on top of your own, making you look down at them before slowly turning your head to look at her.

“Are you happy?”

The question caught everyone off guard, their heads turning towards your mother. You slowly nodded your head, smiling at all the memories you’ve made with Izuku. When you first met as a transfer student, your first date and everything else.

“Yeah Mom, I’m happy.”

You took a deep breath, leaning forward as you shook the memory out of your head.

Meanwhile, your mom tried to lighten the mood, “Well, let’s hope your father doesn’t get to him… you know he doesn’t play about you… or your brother either.”

“He won’t be able to land a hit on him unless Izuku lets him.”

“Well, he better let him then!”

You laughed out loud at that, throwing your head back against the back of the couch. You could feel your mom get off the couch, leaning up as she headed to the dining table. Looking through the papers stacked on the wooden table, she pulled out a business card before walking back to where you were still seated on the couch. Your mom sat back down in her original seat, before handing you the same card of laminated cardboard paper.

Renai Miya, divorce attorney at law.

“Renai is a good friend of mine, she gave me that in case anyone I knew was getting advice soon. I’m sure she didn’t expect my daughter but I’m sure she’ll be able to help you out.”

You looked over at your mother, who just gave you another knowing smile. She just rubbed at your shoulders in comfort as you pulled out your phone.

---

Izuku was sitting at his office, ignoring the texts from both Shoto and Katsuki. After the argument and confrontation from this morning, he decided to stay in the office today and complete some overdue paperwork. Typing away on his computer, his mind began to shift from the email he was sent to the hero commission to the argument that happened between him, Kacchan, and Shoto.

“I’m sorry, YOUR WIFE JUST TRIED TO KILL YOU! We don’t know what would have happened if we hadn't come when we did!” Katsuki yelled, throwing his jacket off of his body.

“Izuku, this is a serious matter. We need to know what happened,” Shoto explained next, kneeling in front of Izuku’s crouching figure.

Izuku just shook his head, diving his head into the insides of his elbows. Shoto and Katsuki looked at each other, the concern shining in their eyes. They looked back at their trembling friend, who was now starting to rock back and forth while whispering “I fucked up.” over and over again.

“Izuku,” Katsuki started tentatively, “what did you do?”

Izuku stopped trembling and his rocking ceased as he raised his head slowly, locking eyes with his childhood friend. Katsuki’s leg began moving up and down in anticipation, waiting for him to say something.

“I don’t want to report this, trust me. So just pretend you never saw that.” That was all he said before standing up, pushing past them.

Izuku shook his head, focusing back on his emails. He sent the long paragraph he was typing, after making sure there were grammatical or spelling errors. He then leaned back against his office chair, throwing his head back. A gross, yet very familiar feeling was arising from his stomach, it was slimy, it was painful, it was guilt. He felt guilty, remembering how his wife looked at him at breakfast and right before she left. How the look in her eyes felt more painful than other villains could ever inflict on him.

Closing his eyes, his mind slowly drifted to a memory, a memory from three months ago.

It was dark, and Izuku was tired, so very tired from the shift he worked. However, he needed to do this. He needed to end whatever the hell he and Melissa had. The way they were conversing over private messages was getting too much. In a week would be his wedding Anniversary, and how his wife, Y/n, surprised him, reminded him about what he and Melissa had.

And how wrong it was.

He wore a black, sleeveless turtleneck, paired with a dark coat along with dark jeans. He had fake glasses on his face and his curly was positioned to cover his face so people wouldn’t recognize him. He kept his head forward as he approached the apartment complex Melissa mentioned she was moving into. After living on I-island for all of her life, she wanted a change of pace, especially since what happened with her father way back when. So she got a job as a top hero support inventor at the company where Izuku got his extra gear from. Since it’s also where Hatsume worked as well. He opened the door and walked into the lobby. He looked around the expensive-looking area, seeing the receptionist, and only one other person sitting on the complementary couch talking on the phone. He walked to the receptionist, who greeted him with a smile.

“Are you here to see someone?”

He nodded and gave his fake name, the one he told Melissa he’d be using, along with the apartment number that she gave him. The receptionist simply smiled before typing in her computer, before reaching over to the phone and pressing a couple of the buttons. Izuku could hear someone pick up, a muffled voice through the phone.

“Yes, Ms. Shield, A Iseada L/n is here to see you.”

Izuku took a deep breath, hearing the fake name he gave along with his wife’s maiden name. The receptionist gave off acknowledging hums to the person on the phone, who Izuku knew was Melissa. He rocked himself against his heels, feeling his fingers twitch around in his pockets.

“Alright, I’ll send him right up!” She ended the call, placing the phone back in its holder.

She then smiled at Izuku before pointing at the elevators behind him, “you can use an elevator. Ms. Shield lives on the fifth floor.”

Izuku nodded and thanked her before turning around to the elevators. He picked on towards the left and stepped inside of it, waiting for it to close before choosing the button that said “five.” The doors closed as generic elevator music played throughout the rising mechanical box. Izuku sighed, pulling off the fake glasses, before pushing his curls out of his face.

Third floor…

Fourth floor…

The elevator dinged as the door opened, revealing the fifth floor. Izuku stepped out of the elevator, using the signs on the walls to find his way to Melissa’s apartment. Walking past all the other doors, of the patrons of the apartment, who were currently sleeping to the world. Unaware that their number one hero was sneaking past them, claiming to be ending an illicit relationship.” Seeing the apartment number up ahead, Izuu could feel his heart beat faster. Taking another deep breath, he stopped right in front of the pitch-black door. Swallowing his spit, he closed his eyes before knocking on the door a couple of times. Almost immediately after he knocked, the door opened, causing Izuku’s eyes to shoot open, jumping back a little as Melissa stepped into the doorframe. Izuku was about to speak when his eyes drifted down to what she was wearing. It was a simple white t-shirt, ending right at her upper thigh. Izuku licked his dry lips, before looking back up at Melissa’s face who was giving him a knowing smile, that looked smug as well.

“Izuku,” her usually peachy tone came out a little subtle, silky and sultry, “I’m so happy to see you after so long. Come in.”

Izuku simply nodded as Messlia stepped to the side, allowing him to enter her expensive apartment, which could be classified as a penthouse. Izuku looked around, his eyes landing on all the decorations around her living room. He walked toward her wall, where she hung pictures. There were pictures of Melissa with her dad, her mom, All Might, and a couple of her friends from I-island. He continued looking around, before his eyes landing on a picture of the two of them, back when he was a first-year.

“You were so short back then,” Izuku heard Melissa say, as she came to stand next to him.

Izuku just nodded, continuing to look at the frames. He was enveloped in the nostalgia he was facing when he didn’t even notice Melissa coming up behind him. He only noticed her when he felt a hand coming up around his waist. He froze, his heart pounding away in his ears. She then stood right behind him, before pressing up against his back next, her hands now circling his waist.

“Melissa…” he started, feeling her fingers mess with his zipper and belt under his overcoat jacket.

God, was she wearing anything under that shirt? He could feel her breasts, her hardened nipples pressing against his back. He took another deep breath, licking his lips before moving his hands to where her own was and prying them off his belt, just as she was beginning to unbuckle it.

“Melissa, we can’t do this. I’m married. Happily married at that. I can’t keep doing this to her.”

Melissa only hummed, moving her body from behind his own, stepping in front of him. She was wet, her long wavy dripping down her face and body. The water from her wet hair dripped onto her shirt, her white, very thin shirt. Izuku’s breath hitched as he slowly glanced down her body, her nipples visibly being shown through the fabric.

“Yet, you can’t keep your eyes off me Izuku.” Hands grabbed at his jacket, pulling him closer to her.

Izuku gasped as Melissa brought her hand, cupping his face before bringing it down. Izuku gasped once again as he felt lips upon his own, feeling her other hand reach inside his jacket to pull him closer by the waist. Izuku was about to push her away, he needed to push her away. God, he was married for fucks sake, to someone who loved him dearly. But her lips, they felt so good to him. Glossed from the shower she took, they tasted of mint and strawberries. Izuku, taking a deep breath, went to push off his jacket, never letting go of the kiss. Mellissa, smirking into the kiss, helped him out of the jacket before squealing as Izuku scooped her up before slamming her on the wall.

“This is a one-time thing,” he mumbled against her lips, using his hips to hold her up against the wall as he took off his shirt next.

“Yeah…” Mellissa said with a skeptical tone, feeling his hands go under her wet shirt next.

“A one-time thing…”

Izuku groaned, throwing the papers in his hands across his desk. Taking a deep breath, he pushed himself out of his desk. He stood up from out of his chair, walking over to the wall which was replaced with windows, looking down upon the city of Mustafa. He could hear the faint sounds of cars driving and honking, he could see the civilians, everyone he protects. Looking across the street, he could see a cafe. It was one that he frequents since it’s so close. The door opened, and it revealed a couple. A laughing couple. The man was holding a medium-sized bag, with the logo of the cafe plastered across the bag. He was wearing a dark brown suede jacket that was buttoned shut. The woman was wearing a matching jacket, wearing as a dress, her curly hair pulled up in a bun. She held their coffees as they walked along the sidewalk. Izuku smiled sadly, before looking over to the couch in his office.

Laughter rang out inside the office, the sun had already gone down a long time ago and the night shift heroes were all out patrolling, leaving Izuku, a couple of sidekicks, and a couple of more janitors. It was your anniversary, but unfortunately, a string of villain attacks happened today. This pulled Deku out of his day off and kept him away. So, you decided to surprise me with dinner at his office. You cooked shrimp alfredo, packing it in pretty containers, before stopping by a couple of stores, buying a fancy cake that said “Happy Anniversary.” The last thing you bought was some expensive alcohol, a bottle of wine and champagne just in case. She then dressed up, a dark green silk dress paired with a matching coat and heeled shoes. She brought a few decorations before carrying all of that, using your clouds. Izuku smiled once he walked into the office with everything, abandoning his work and helped you set up the table.

The two of you enjoyed dinner together, talking about your day, specifically on how Izuku was swamped with back-to-back villain attacks. To the point where he was the same police officer twice in two different scenes. After dinner, the two of you move to the couch, still holding your wine glasses now filled with champagne.

“I have a gift for you,” Izuku mentioned, pushing himself up off the couch before going behind his desk, going through the drawers.

You giggled, shifting around the couch to get a little more comfortable, your jacket long discarded. Izuku hissed out a “here it is!”, before pulling out a neatly wrapped box, closing the drawer with his foot. You took another sip of your bubbly alcohol as Izuku skipped over to you with the box in hand.

“Here you go, darling!”

You smiled, placing your glass on the small lamp table to the right of you before sitting up and taking the box from your husband. He smiled at you as he sat beside you, seeing you begging to open up the carefully placed wrapping paper. Once all the wrapping paper was removed from the box, you gasped, seeing the logo on the box. BVLGARI. A smile slowly appeared on your face as you untied the golden silk ribbon. Slowly lifting the top of the box, you pulled out of the pure white tissue paper. This revealed one of the most beautiful necklaces and earrings you’ve ever seen. It was an emerald necklace, it had two emeralds, and also was decorated with mini diamonds along the border, and considering the brand, you knew it was real. The earrings were dangly and matched the way the smaller emerald looked on the necklace.

“Izuku… it’s beautiful…”

He smiled, taking the box out of your hands before taking the necklace out of the box. He whispered at you to turn around. Following his instructions, you swept your goddess braids to the side as he placed the necklace around your neck, the cool feeling of the metal tingly against your warm skin. Izuku then connected the chain, letting the necklace fall against your nape before leaning over your shoulder and placing a light kiss on top of her almost-bare shoulder. You shuddered, leaning into his touch as his hands moved from your shoulders, trailing down your body to rest them on your hips. You let out a moan, feeling him give your neck a nip, reaching up to grab him by his messy curls. You smirked, before sighing into the neck kisses he was leaving on your neck.

“You smell,” he inhaled slowly, “really fucking good.”

Giggling at his words, you placed your own hands on top of his own before turning around. You lifted yourself off the chair. Izuku lifted an eyebrow as you placed your hands behind your back.

“I have a gift for you too, it’s not a material gift but…” you trialed off as you reached up the straps of your dress, before beginning to slowly pull them down, revealing the thin straps of your expensive lingerie.

Izuku’s eyes sparkled as your dress trailed down your body, revealing the expensive material cut and crafted to fit your body perfectly. The way the emerald green clashed perfectly with your deeper skin. Your manicured hands trailed down your body as your dress pooled at your feet, leaving you in nothing but the sinful lingerie and the heels to match. Izuku licked his bottom lip as you slowly walked over to him, dragging your heels with each step. Lifting yourself, you slowly placed yourself on his lap, feeling Izuku’s hands immediately attach themselves to your hips. He gave you a sly smile, looking up at you.

“And you look so amazing,” he gave your body another glance, making you smirk and lean back, using your arms and hands to steady you.

You smiled, wrapping your arms around his neck before diving into a kiss. His lips tasted of mint and strawberries, it was a new taste but one you didn’t mind. Deepening the kiss, you gasped as you felt Izuku’s hard on all the way through his pants.

“I love you so much, Izuku Midoriya.”

A moment of silence went by.

“I love you too, Y/n Midoriya.”

Izuku took a deep breath and was about to open the next one when his phone, his personal one, started ringing. He reached in the drawer and pulled it out and looked at the screen. Sweetheart was calling, a picture of you and Izuku at your wedding anniversary plastered across the screen. Izuku was less blacked up back then, and you still had a crutch from your physical therapy from your incident. But god did you both look so beautiful and happy. Izuku was wearing his suit from the wedding but without the jacket and a couple of buttons unfastened. You, however, changed out of your wedding dress into a white velvet dress that was strapless and came with these long gloves in the similar fabric that you only wore for official pictures. Izuku was carrying you bridal style along with the rest of you and his family and his closest friends.

Izuku simply smiled sadly, before answering the call.

“Y/n?”

He heard nothing at first, nothing but the phone static so he called out your name again. This time he heard someone take a deep, trembling breath as if they had been crying for a long time.

“Izuku.” Your voice was scratchy, and hoars too. Izuku could feel his heartbreak and drop to his ass all at the same time. He did that.

God he was supposed to be a hero, save people and never let them down.

Now he may have just ruined his marriage.

“Y/n.” He said again, “how- how are you?”

“I’ve called a divorce lawyer.”

Oh. Straight to the bullet.

“We can’t- we can’t talk about this?”

“What’s there to talk about? You did this to me. You did this to us. Now face the fucking consequences of your actions.” Your voice was scratchy, the rasp appearing with each word you say.

“I know what I did.”

“And yet, you still did it.”

Izuku took a deep breath, leaning back into his chair. He looked up at the ceiling of his office, looking at the dazzling, overhanging chandelier in the middle of it.

“So there’s nothing I can say or do to convince you to stay?”

“You can have the house, as long as you pay me alimony for the next two-three years, for a reasonable price of course.”

You completely ignored his question, going straight into what was going to happen next. Izuku took another deep breath, this time leaning against his hand as he placed his elbow, pointed up, against his desk.

“So this is it?”

“This is it, Izuku. I told myself I would never lessen myself for a man, and I already broke that when I quit my job. I’m not gonna keep doing that to myself.”

“I-I love you.”

You gave off an airy chuckle as if you couldn't believe the words coming out of his mouth. And with that you ended the call, those being one of the last words you’ll be saying to him until the meetings between the two of you and your divorce lawyers.

---

“Y/n?” A muffled voice called out, pulling you out of your sleep along with knocks on your door

You pushed yourself off the bed, throwing the hotel blankets off your body. It was late at night, you went back home after your impromptu visit with your mother. You packed up what you could in one go before stuffing it in your car. You couldn’t see Izuku after that, so you tried your best to remove any trace of yourself from that house. You were just about to fall asleep, the tv playing a random 90s show for background noise. Digging through one of your suitcases, you found a robe to wrap around your body before moving towards the door.

You summoned lightning in one hand as you checked who was at the door. Seeing red-and-white hair, along with a bright blue eye and a dull grey eye, you took a deep sigh of relief before slowly opening the door. Standing there, wearing a raincoat and holding a closed umbrella was Shoto Todoroki. His hair that grew since high school was pulled back in a ponytail as he looked down upon with concerned eyes.

“Y/n…”

You took a deep breath, closing your eyes as he said your name. You then opened them back up before giving him a sad smile.

“Shoto… can I help you?” You leaned against the doorway, placing a hand in your waist.

“I heard from Izuku, the two of you are getting a divorce?”

You leaned into the hallway, looking to see if anyone saw him before pulling him into your hotel room. You closed the door and locked it behind you immediately before turning on the light. Shoto looked around the luxury rented room, seeing all of your suitcases and other items stacked up against a wall. Feeling your hands tremble, you sat on your bed, folding your hands underneath themselves.

“How did-“ your voice came out raspy and dry, so you cleared your throat before speaking again.

“How did you find me? I didn’t tell anyone where I was.”

Shoto simply smiled, “being the #3 hero has its perks. I figured you didn’t want a lot of people crowding around you so I said I’d talk to you.”

Hearing that, you lifted your head swiftly, “people already know about the divorce?”

Shot shrugged off his raincoat, revealing the long sleeve black turtleneck he was wearing. He placed his umbrella in a random corner before going to sit beside you on the bed.

“After what happened this morning, Izuku only told us that you’re leaving him… and wouldn’t tell us why. We called everyone, Uraraka, Iida, Kirishima, we even called his mom and All Might… all he said was that his marriage was over. No reason as to why…”

You let out a slight chuckle, your shoulders jumping slightly at the irony of the situation.

“So the only person you could come to was me, right?”

Shoto simply nodded his head, shifting his body closer to you.

“Y/n… I know you… you aren’t this rash person. You wouldn’t come to this decision on a whim. I thought you and Izuku were okay?”

Taking a deep breath, you spoke, “I thought we were okay too… Shoto I… he…”

Your body shuddered and shook as sobs flew out of your mouth. As tears fell, you covered your face and turned away from Shoto, hunching over yourself. That’s when you feel hands, one warm and the other cold, pull at you, grabbing at your waist before pulling you into a warm body. Shoto’s comforting hands and his placing you on the fireside of his body allowed him to let it all out once again. He didn’t say a word, only letting out soft shushes in your ear as you continued to cry.

You could hear nothing else other than the air conditioning and your cries echo throughout your room. It felt like an eternity before you slowly started to quiet down. Taking a deep breath, you slowly pushed yourself out of Shoto’s hold before getting up to get a water bottle. Shoto, his eyes still shining with concern, said nothing as you twisted the cap open and drank half the bottle.

As the pudding of your head slowly went away, you placed the bottle on the desk before sitting back on the bed.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to cry my eyes out all over you,” you apologized, grabbing one of the pillows to hold closer to your body.

Shoto shook his head, waving off your concerns, “it’s okay, it’s black anyways.”

You just nodded your head and looked away.

“Are you gonna tell me what’s wrong? Why are you and Izuku getting a divorce?”

You took a deep breath, your mind racing with everything you’ve been through… the day you met Izuku, the day you asked him out for the first time, the day he asked to be your girlfriend, the day he proposed… the day you two got married… everything.

“Izuku… he cheated on me…”

It was silent after that, the buzz of the air conditioning and the beeps of the cars below the two of you filling the tense air.

“He… he what?”

You bit your bottom lip as you spoke again, “he cheated on me, with Mellissa, you remember her right? Melissa Shield? All Might’s “niece”?”

Shoto nodded his head, shifting his body to face forward as he leaned forward, using his hands to steady himself. He lifted his head to the ceiling as he fully processed your words.

“Oh… oh wow… I never thought that he would do that.”

You scoffed, flopping back into the bed, “well me neither, and yet… here we are.”

You started to laugh, laugh at this situation, laugh at here you are now. God, everything was so fucked, wasn’t it? Feeling the bed shift, you could feel Shoto lay down on the bed beside you. He wrapped his arms around you before pulling you into him once again, this time leaving you on his right side so you could cool down. The feeling left sighing, leaning into his touch even more.

“Izuku is an absolute idiot, and I’m glad that you’re leaving him at the first sight of disrespect.”

Coming from Todoroki and his background, those meant a lot to you. You smiled before lifting your head to look at him.

“Thanks, Shoto, that means a lot.”

He smiled, before slowly removing his hands from your waist.

“I should let you sleep, I just wanted to come to check up on you.” He bent over to grab at his umbrella before turning around to grab his raincoat.

Sniffling, you nodded your head, wiping away your tears before getting up to see him off, “thanks for coming to check up on me… even though the way you found me was a little creepy.”

—-

You officially divorced three months after that day, Izuku tried to hold out as long as he could but soon enough even the number one hero couldn't hold out that long. The number of times you had to tell him you weren't going to come back to him was astounding, his stubbornness knew no bounds. You allowed Izuku to keep the house and he was to pay you a hefty amount of alimony along with the money he was to pay you for spousal distress.

When news came out that the number one hero and his wife would be divorcing, the media went into a frenzy. Even bigger than the one about your wedding. You had to rely on your family to help you out until the news and paparazzi left you alone. It was even worse on Deku, being the top hero and not even able to save his marriage? Talk about a blow to his reputation, it almost cost him the #1 spot. If it wasn't for the Incident at the Kasona Mall, where a villain decided to blow up a mall, where he saved over 50 people in one swoop, Bakugo would have finally been able to claim that #1 spot.

Speaking of pro-heroes.

H/n is back on the scene! Officially signing with The Todoroki Agency!!

You were a pro-hero again, stepping back into the spotlight after over six years. After not much deliberation, and encouragement from friends alike, you decided to come out of retirement once more. You had to retake the licensing process and test of course, but you passed with ease. Being a hero was almost like riding a bike, it was ingrained within you. After The Hero Commission reinstated you, you got so many offers. From Fatgum to LeMillion, and Gang Orca. However, you already promised a certain person that you would join up with him.

“You sure you want me Shoto?” You were sitting in his penthouse, visiting him after he got hurt in the Incident at Kasona mall.

The two of you had gotten closer ever since that day he found you in your hotel room. He helped you get back on your feet, helped you pick out a new house to live in, (since you left the house to Izuku), and helped you study to retake the test. He nodded, shifting his position on his couch. The movement however, caused him to wince as he had to move his arm, which slung into a cast. You immediately got up and helped him move into a more comfortable position without straining himself. He thanked you for the help as you sat back down, grabbing your glass of wine.

“Yeah, you were an amazing hero when you were active years ago. I know this is a decision I’ll lose no sleep over.”

You chuckled, sipping on the wine he put out for the two of you. He smiled softly at you, his intense stare causing your body to heat up slightly, or that could be from the alcohol, you honestly didn't know. You licked your lips, shifting your legs to help lessen that heated throb between your thighs.

“Alright, I guess I’m joining your agency.”

You grew out of your old outfit, so with the help of Hatsume and other designers, you got a whole new outfit. Instead of the original leotard/bodysuit you had when you were younger, along with the thigh boots, it all connected into all one large jumpsuit. It was black with purple accents adorning all across the outfit along with a brand new cape. You turned around, summoning clouds to lift you as you twirled around. Hatsume, the designer who made your new hero costume, Hokkaido, and Mina, who you also told about the true reason you and Izuku got divorced, all smiled as you felt out your new outfit.

“Well?” Mina asked, smiling as you landed on your feet.

You turned around, trailing your hands down your body, feeling the aft fabric and metal accents clash together on your body before smiling at yourself in the mirror.

“I love it.”

Your office was on the same floor as Shoto’s, him constantly relying on your knowledge and wisdom on other matters. The two of you were the leaders in the recent missions the two of you had taken together. This whole process was a lot like riding a bike, coming back easily. You had missed this, you had missed this so much, and you could tell the world and missed you too.

The media accepted your return with open arms, jumping right back to the top 20s. You were a very powerful hero after all.

After three months of coming back, making it six months since your divorce, your parents decided to throw a party for you. To celebrate you coming back, and ranking high on the Billboard Chart in so little time. You tried to get yourself out of it but they took no excuses. So you decided to make the most of it, you felt like a whole new woman. Placing your braids in a bun, you wore a strapless black velvet dress with matching long-sleeved gloves. You slipped on some ankle-strap, black stilettos, and pearl jewelry set to complete the look. The party was small but it was filled with life, all of your old classmates and even your old co-workers from your old agency even came. Mina, Jirou, Tsu, and even Yaomomo, as busy as she is, came. Kirishima even got Bakugou to come. Everyone was so excited to see you come out of retirement and take to the streets again. Some did try to pry into your broken relationship with Izuku, but you just ignored them and told them to enjoy themselves at the party.

“Y/n.”

You turned around to see Shoto standing there with two champagne flutes in his hands. You smiled and walked up to him, hands extended out for a hug. He wrapped his arms around the best he could with the two drinks in his hands. You giggled at his struggle as he tried to step back without spilling the drinks.

“I see your hands are full, Boss.” You winked as you took one of the flutes of champagne out of his hands.

He just chuckled as you guys cheered, clinking your glasses together before taking a sip. As the sweet liquid hit your tongue, your eyes trailed down his body at the suit he was wearing. All black suit with the jacket, with a white dress shirt, red tie and tailored to perfection. You licked your lips as he breathed in, seeing his chest press up against the white fabric. Clearing your throat, you pulled your eyes away from his chest as you looked up at him finishing his drink. You smiled at him and he returned it as he placed the glasses on an empty table.

“You seem so much happier.” You heard Shoto comment behind you.

You turned to face him and couldn’t help but raise an eyebrow.

“What do you mean?”

Shoto walked up to you, the proximity between you two making your heart pound this a little faster. He leaned down, using his right hand to make you look in his eyes.

“When you first announced your retirement, and when I saw you after that… I do not doubt that you were happy but…” he trailed, his grip on your chin tightening slightly.

“But… but what?” You let out a whisper, feeling his thumb softly move against your skin.

“There was still this sadness in your eyes, that I could never pinpoint but now… I can’t see it at all.” He let go of you after that, taking a couple of steps back.

You took another deep breath, pressing a hand against your chest to feel your beating heart.

Smiling at Shoto, “thank you, that means a lot.”

The two of you continued to drink together, whether it be champagne or something stronger. The more the drinks came around you two, the two of you drank, and the more you two drank, the more handsy the two of you got. Shoto’s arms never left your waist and would find themselves trailing lower and lower down your body. You would find ways and excuses to slowly caress his face or his chest. The two of you would just get closer and closer. Luckily, most everyone around was drunk so even if they did notice, it was unlikely that they would notice. Soon enough, people began to leave, wishing you the best of luck and congratulations.

Then it was just the two of you. Shoto, despite being as drunk as you are, helped carry you to your bed upstairs. As he laid you in the bed, you reached out to him, pulling him down onto you and your bed. You giggled as he flopped on his back, allowing you to quickly straddle him.

“Y/n,” he giggled, he was more emotional, happy drunk, “Y/n why are you doing?”

You smiled, licking and biting at your lips as your hands trailed down his body. Feeling at his chest, before trailing down his abs, your hands and fingers going ever ripple and ridge on his body before landing right in the top of his pelvic area, feeling his hard-on poke out through his slacks. You hissed slowly as you began to rock into him, your dress riding up with every movement you made. Your movements caused him to whisper curses under his breath, his hips buck as he grabbed onto your waist tightly. You gripped at his shoulders as he guided you up and down his waist, his touch leaving your skin electrified, the opposite temperatures causing trembles throughout your body. You then leaned down to plant light kisses against his neck

“You’re so fucking handsome,” you whispered against his skin, your fingers fumbling with the buttons on his dress shirt.

He just smirked before flipping you on your back, using his knee to spread your legs.

——

It was a week after the party and you had just gotten back from your shift of patrol. It was early in the morning, say almost 4 am, and you were ready to go home and get some sleep. Saying goodbye to your sidekick, you walked towards your office to get some final papers before going home. As you opened the door, you could feel dull light entering your vision. So you turned and followed where it was coming from only to find yourself right outside of Shoto’s door. That’s where you could hear the argument.

“Izuku I—”

“NO— I CAN’T BELIEVE YOU, YOU’RE SLEEPING WITH MY EX-WIFE!”

“I think you’re the last person to be concerned about what she does now!”

“You’re one of my closest friends, I’ve known you the longest! And you just stab me in the back like this!?”

“I think that you should leave Izuku before I make you. What Y/n and I have, it’s none of your business.”

You could hear a slam, and hear something break before hearing heavy stomps echo throughout the room. You hoped it didn’t come to them full-on fighting, you knew Shoto could handle himself against, however, when Izuku was mad, Lord did he get mad. You hope you won't have to face him again, after all this time.

“I don’t want to hear a word you have to say!! I should have known, you’ve ALWAYS been chasing after her! Since our time at U.A!

You tilted your head at that, confused at what he meant. Shoto has been chasing after you since high school? You thought that Shoto always had a thing for Yaomomo, despite her and Jirou getting engaged recently. It was because of that, you believed Shoto had shifted his focus onto you…

“So what? I thought I left her in good hands, out of all my friends, you were the ONLY one that I thought could give her a good life. I thought you could love her and only be with her! Now I see that I couldn’t even trust you with that! So you don’t get to decide how she spends her time and who she spends it with! Not after what you did to her!”

It went quiet after that, but you could still see the heavy breathing out of both of them. You bit your lip, heart pounding as you grasped at the wall, staring to hear to see if they speak under their breath.

“What… what are you talking about?”

“She told me… she told me what you did... How you cheated on her with Melissa. Don’t give me that look, I’m not gonna tell anyone. She asked me not to, it’ll do no one any good if it got all. They’ll just hound her for months for this.”

You could feel your body begin to rock back and forth, you could feel the tension rising all the way from the place where you would stand.

“So I say again, you have no right to have any say about what she does in her own time. Even when she was married to you, she was never yours! She’s her own woman, and after being suffocated by you, she deserves to do whatever she wants. I’ll be here, no matter what, and I’ll stick by her because that’s what people who truly love someone do!”

You couldn’t help but smile at his words, you could feel tears swell in your waterline. Taking a deep breath, you stood up slowly, brushing off any dirt or dust collected on your lap before walking towards the door. You gave a knock on the door, before slowly turning the doorknob to reveal a trashed office. Plants turning upside down, smaller tables flipped around, and books spread all across the floor. Your eyes then landed on the two of them, standing behind the bigger office desk. Izuku was holding Shoto by his shirt, and the two of them had intense looks on their faces. You took another deep breath, seeing the way Izuku looks after so long. He grew out his beard, despite him hating it so much. His already scruffy, curly hair grew even more unruly. His eyes turned towards you, the shock after seeing you so long causing him to lose his grip on Shoto.

“Y/n…”

You closed your eyes and rolled your neck before closing the door behind you.

“Shoto is correct, what I do with my time is absolutely none of your business Izuku. We’re done, we’ve been done for six months. If I’m going, to be honest, we’ve been done for a year… since you had an affair with Melissa for six months as well,” you stated, slowly walking up towards the two of them.

“So what I do with him, what I do with anyone… is no longer your business. Now get out!”

Izuku stood there, shocked at your words, slowly turning his body to face you.

“Y/n I…” You made a motion with your hands, quieting him.

“Izuku Midoriya, get out now!”

He jumped back, before turning back to Shoto, giving him one last glare before walking past you towards the door. You kept your back towards him, and the door as well, as he opened it before walking out, shutting it behind him. With that, you then turned to the last man standing in the room. You gave him a soft smile, slowly shaking your head as you amble across to him. You placed your hands on his biceps as he wrapped his arms around your waist. He smiled down at you, before leaning in for a soft kiss. You chuckled and smiled into the kiss, tightening your grip on his arms. You could feel the grip you had on you tighten with every second of the kiss. Once you let go, you slowly reached up to caress the side of his face with the scar with your hand.

“You look stressed… is it because of your day? Or because of the walking trash that just walked out?”

He chuckled softly at your words, shaking his head. You smiled as you walked towards his desk, moving some of the papers off before sitting on top of his desk. Shoto gave you an up and down glance, before walking towards you and standing in between your legs.

“So… why was Izuku here?” You asked him, rubbing at his shoulders and arms.

Shoto took a deep breath before leaning forward and laying his head on top of your shoulders.

“He came up here, accusing me of different things. I never found out he found out that the two of us were seeing each other… I was more focused on other things…”

Izuku was always so stubborn, that could be a good or bad thing depending on who side you were on. You sighed, nodding your head as you wrapped your arms around him.

“Let’s go to your place? I’m really tired and I honestly just want to get as much sleep as I can.”

You could feel Shoto smile into your shoulder, before nodding. You were about to push him off of you, so you could both get what you need and walk out together, a sudden force whooshed you off your feet, arms grabbing at you and carrying you in a bridal position.

“Shoto!” You squealed, holding on to his shoulders.

He just softly chuckled once more, as he carried you out of the office, nothing but smiles on the two of you’s faces.

___

Taglist: @tremendouswolfsaladranch @simi0603 @tanakasprayer @kirishimaisthatbitch @theadorkablezaza @katemocha @pineapplejuic3 @kehlaniwwe @honeylavender13 @p102ab @maybeisthemoon @dark-yuh @introvertatitsfinest @lazymooneye @yzviea @fan-girling-over-everything @@chscklvr @dragonsdreamoffire @superheros-and-others @gabbygibbsgirl

[rkived]

━ CHASING PAVEMENTS 04 │ JJK

↳ PAIRING: dad!jk/married!jk/bff!jk x reader 

↳ GENRE/TAGS: f2l, angst, unrequited feelings, cheating, future smut

↳ WARNINGS: (for this chapter) angst as per usual what’s new, jk is sad, reader is sad, sunhi is sad, everyone’s just SAD

↳ RATING: (for this chapter) PG

↳ WORD COUNT: 4k 

↳ SYNOPSIS: Jungkook’s been feeling a little weird lately. Maybe it’s got something to do with his crumbling marriage and the way you seem to care for his daughter more than his own wife.

↳ A/N: ehem let’s pretend like i didn’t ghost this story for like half a year aha i’ve written more than this for cp but i decided to just divide it and leave the juicy stuff for the last chapter !! sorry for making u wait so long </3 anyway hope u enjoy still n i’ll see u in a couple months for the final chapter of cp!! (i’m jking…..or am i?)

01 02 03 04 05 (coming soon)

Minji thinks you’re starting to get better. 

Well, she hopes you are because it’s been two months since you broke the news on her and anyone would think that’d it be long forgotten by now. She tries to stop as often as she can to check up on you, even though you assure her that you’re fine and that a simple text would suffice instead of having her come over every day in between. 

Which is why she’s unsure if giving you the invitation Jungkook had handed her about two weeks ago was a good idea, considering that it’s been a few days since you had last even mentioned him to her like you usually did before. In fact, today you look like you’re at peace for the very first time.

‘‘I did yoga!’’ You explain when she mentions that you look different, ‘‘I still can’t face going back to Namjoon’s class, but I remember a ton of positions he taught us!’’ 

Minji has to force herself to smile, her hand lingers inside the purse she’s carrying as her fingers fiddle with the cardstock paper waiting patiently to be handed. 

‘‘And then I stopped for some yogurt at the place down the─’’

‘‘I need to give this to you,’’ Minji stops your ramble and you’re taken aback by how urgent her voice sounds, very unlike her. ‘‘I promised I’d get this to you, so…’’ 

You’re about to ask her what she’s on about when she abruptly hands what you could make out to be a colorful piece of paper. Your eyebrows furrowed at the sight, completely confused until it suddenly hit you what it is that your friend’s talking about.

‘‘How did you─?’’ 

Minji gives you half a smile and shakes her hand so you can take the card instead of just staring at it, ‘‘Just─take it.’’

Your hand reaches out to grab it from her and your eyes quickly focus on the unicorn and sparkles themed birthday invite. It reads that it’s Sunhi’s birthday and that you are invited! You recognize the handwriting that filled the party’s information details, you always thought he had really nice penmanship. 

‘‘I think you should go,’’ Minji’s voice sounds like she’s faraway, but she’s just a few feet away from you, ‘‘for Sunhi.’’ 

You’re still staring at the invitation, memorizing every single detail. There’s so many unicorns, when did she start liking the mythical creature? She had never mentioned a liking towards them to you ever. You assume it must’ve happened during these few months of your absence.

How many moments have you missed? How many unanswered questions must Sunhi have by now? How many new toys has she had to wait to show you? How many kindergarten stories has she been saving to tell you? 

You’ve been counting. Sixty days have passed since you last saw Sunhi. It’s been seven Fridays since you last had her in your arms. 

Sixty days and seven Fridays since you kissed Jungkook. Fifty-nine days since you blocked him. 

Minji is still waiting for any sort of reaction from you. You’re stoically analyzing the piece of paper and she wonders what is it that you’re thinking or feeling. Is it good, bad or all in one? Whatever it is, her small deed is done. 

‘‘Y/N?’’ She calls out, you slowly nod and take your eyes from the invitation from the first time since she gave it to you. ‘‘Do you mind if I go? I have some stuff to─’’

A small gasp escapes your lips, ‘‘Yes Minji, of course!’’ Your friend smiles slightly and you proceed to escort her out your apartment. She actually doesn’t have anything to do, but she thinks it’s best if you get some space to take everything in. 

Minji notices how you’re still holding on to the birthday invite and she has to suppress a chuckle because she knows you’re most likely doing this absentmindedly. 

Before you’re able to thank her for coming, she stops you to say one last thing. ‘‘If you don’t want to go, then don’t,’’ she begins and your eyebrows raise at your friend’s comment. ‘‘Whatever it is that you decide on doing, I’ll support you either way,’’ Minji offers you a genuine smile and you can’t help but hug her tightly.

You’re alone again. Loneliness has come in waves as of lately. You’ve lived alone for years now, you’re used to being the only person present in your apartment ─ but that fact hasn’t felt more obvious than since you shunned Jungkook out. 

Good days eventually turn sour. The times where it seems like you can go on about your life without thinking about him and what he might be up to quickly change because your mind makes you feel bad about feeling good. 

Why did you cut him off knowing his daughter idolizes you like no other? Why did you selfishly decide to block him when you could’ve just talked it out? Why didn’t you stop him that night if you knew things would change between you two? Why did you let him kiss you knowing it was going to hurt in the end?

You know Sunhi’s fourth birthday is coming up. It’s one of those dates you can’t simply forget, it comes naturally to you. You had settled with the idea that you weren’t going to be invited this time around, it would’ve been okay since you think it’s what you deserve anyway. If Jungkook had taken you off the guest list, he was in his total right to do so. 

You want to be mad at him right now.

Why would he invite you? Why couldn’t he just leave things the way they were? You wish you were angry, but you’re not. You feel slightly comforted with the fact that he had decided to include you even with everything that went down. In fact, not inviting you would’ve been selfish knowing that Sunhi must want you there. 

And if the invitation wasn’t enough of a sign that you should go, two days ago you got an email that the gift you had preordered for Sunhi some time ago was on its way to your place. Just in time for her birthday party. 

That’s life for you. 

You’re quick to remind yourself of Minji’s last words to you. You’re not obligated to go and if you don’t want to, then you don’t have to. But you’d be lying if you said that because you really want to go, but there’s still some things that are holding you back. Your brain starts breaking down the pros and cons of going. 

The pros: You’d get to see Sunhi again, who you missed terribly and a tiny part of you was wishing that she didn’t hate you for suddenly leaving. It’s too much to ask for, but you do hope that Jungkook had come up with something instead of telling her upfront that you had left. 

The cons: You’d have to see Jungkook. Having to face the awkwardness of knowing you had blocked his number, prohibiting him from contacting you and discussing what happened like adults would do. 

Oh, and you’d see Jiwoo too and pretend like you didn’t have any romantic feelings for her husband. 

Whatever decision it is, you’d only have two days to decide.

Jungkook smiled warmly as he looked at Sunhi twirling in her green and purple dress in front of the long length mirror in his bedroom. Ever since he got the garment in the mail, he had to hide it from her curious hands because if it were up to her she’d be wearing it day and night. 

‘‘Daddy, I look so cute!’’ Sunhi said with an excited tone, hopping in her place. The tull of her skirt followed her movements, making the glittery details sparkle brightly caused by the natural sunlight slipping through the curtain cracks. 

He chuckled, ‘‘You do, Pumpkin, but you need to settle down.’’ Jungkook placed his hands on her tiny shoulders, making his daughter’s bouncing cease. ‘‘You gotta be fully energized for the party, alright?’’ She nodded quickly, but he could still feel the excitement radiate from her. 

‘‘Gramma will do my braid, daddy.’’ Sunhi let him know once she noticed her father take a brush in his hand. The little girl much rather have her hair tangled in knots than having him attempt to do any sort of hairstyles on her. 

Jungkook pouts, but nods understanding. He’s thankful that his parents had made the trip from Busan this year. He knows his mother knew he would have a hard time setting everything up by himself this time around. His parents would normally miss Sunhi’s parties due to the distance, but he’d make it up to them by visiting the following weekend and doing a smaller gathering at their house instead. 

Things feel different. One could say that this time, everything is exactly where it should be. Sunhi’s growing older, his parents are here and not far away like usual, Jiwoo’s no longer in the picture, he’s picking back up the things that used to make him happy. There’s just a missing piece that doesn’t allow him to declare the puzzle’s finished.

And his daughter hasn’t really been helpful in allowing him to forget about it either. 

‘‘Daddy, is Auntie Y/N going to come?’’ She asked for what seemed the thousandth time that week alone. The younger girl only wanted to make sure you’re coming even though her father had reassured her that you might be making an appearance. 

Jungkook hummed, pursing his lips together, ‘‘Well, I don’t know if Auntie Y/N will manage to catch her flight in time for your party, but hopefully she’ll come,’’ he painfully lied and Sunhi nodded with a pout, she was hoping she’d get a different answer this time around, but still settles with her father’s explanation. 

Ever since you left, it had been part of her daily routine to ask about you and your whereabouts. Jungkook hated lying to his daughter, but he knew that even if he were to explain the ending of your friendship, she wouldn’t be able to understand. He had foolishly hoped that after telling her, repeatedly, that you had been out of the country because of your job, Sunhi would get the clue that you showing up at her birthday party was very unlikely. 

He can’t blame her because he’s also been hoping that you’ll show up for whatever reason. Jungkook’s aware that Minji had made no promises of you attending, but that little bit of faith he still had, clung onto you tightly. 

He’s let go of so many things recently, but he refuses to add you to that painful list. 

‘‘I miss Auntie Y/N,’’ Sunhi mumbled to herself, but Jungkook heard her clearly and his heart shattered at the longing in his daughter’s voice.

That’s why he’s relieved that she’s now running around the yard with her friends from the kindergarten she attends, screaming in glee as they all chase each other around the grass. The PinkFong playlist he had put together earlier that week has been a hit with the children, who danced and sang along to the lyrics; although some parents might’ve gotten tired of hearing the infantile music after a while. Jungkook himself is part of the people who much rather listen to something else, but it’s worth it if it means he catches Sunhi humming along to the tunes every once in a while. 

Having to entertain the parents has taken his mind off of knowing you’re not there. The party started two hours ago and you’re never late for anything, especially his daughter’s birthday celebrations. He’s settling with the idea that you’re no longer coming while he dabbles in serving food and refilling drinks, all the while having to make conversation with the parents of the invited kids. 

He can feel just how bad they feel for him, the word’s gotten around the PTA committee that he’s in the process of divorcing while taking full custody of his daughter.

‘‘Jungkook, how are you doing?’’ One of the invited moms asked him with a tactful tone, accompanied by a gentle smile that made him feel like a child for a mere moment. With a smile that could put anyone’s worries at ease, Jungkook assured her ─and the rest of the worrying mothers─ that he was doing just fine. 

It’s Sunhi’s day, it’s her party, a few more hours and you can cry all about it when she’s sleeping, had become his mantra as the party goes on.

‘‘What’s with the long face?’’ His mother suddenly asks him after he finishes placing the candles on Sunhi’s unicorn themed cake. 

Jungkook furrows his brows, ‘‘The unicorn’s face looks pretty alright to me,’’ he comments looking at the fondant shaped mythical creature at the top of the cake. 

Mrs. Jeon rolls her eyes, shaking her head slightly at his son’s obliviousness, ‘‘I’m talking about your long face. Is everything alright?’’ She asks in genuine concern, making him sigh as he scratches the back of his neck. ‘‘It’s not because of Jiwoo, right?’’ The woman cautiously asks, afraid the mention of her son’s ex partner might be too sensitive.

The news of the divorce had surprised his parents, but they weren’t completely heartbroken about it. They had known her for years, but it had never been a close relationship at that. His mother had made a couple of comments here and there before concerning his ex partner’s behavior, but were always overlooked by Jungkook.  

Jungkook’s eyebrows raise in surprise and he quickly shakes his head no, ‘‘I’m fine, mom. I’m just kinda tired.’’ 

For someone who hates lying, he’s been doing it a lot recently. 

His mother doesn’t seem so sure about his answer, but decides not to interrogate him any further since she knows her son has been dealing with too much recently and she didn’t want to add her nagging to the list. 

Eventually the party guests all sing happy birthday to Sunhi as she sits behind her cake clapping alongside them, mumbling the famous song as she waits for everyone to finish so she can blow the four candles out and make a wish. She closes her eyes with force, putting her hands together as the guests watch her silently mouth words out. 

‘‘What did you wish for, Sunhi?’’ One of the kids excitedly asks her, fingers curling around her arm as he waits for her to answer. 

Sunhi hmphs and turns her face away from him, ‘‘If I say it out loud it won’t come true!’’ 

Jungkook can only hope his daughter had asked for something he’s able to buy. The newest Barbie doll, a trip to the zoo, that pretty tutu she saw at the store. Anything that is at arm’s reach from him to give her. But Jungkook knows his daughter all too well, those things don’t really matter to her right now. 

Sunhi’s wish is something he can’t obtain ─ someone that’s no longer a call away from him. His daughter doesn’t know, but he’s wished for the same thing too. 

You to come back. 

The small pieces of confetti on the ground, paper decorations pasted on the wall and hanging from the ceiling of the house are enough to give away that a party had happened the day before, and that someone had been too tired by the end of it to even attempt to clean up. 

Even the thought of having to deal with all of the mess that his living room currently looks like is already making Jungkook regret not accepting his mother’s willingness to help after the party had ended yesterday, assuring her that she had done enough that day and that it was only fair he took care of the cleaning. 

Sunhi’s birthday had gone smoothly for the most part.

And as Jungkook scrolls through his phone’s gallery, smiling warmly at the small clips he managed to capture of his gleeful daughter running around the yard with her friends and the multitude of pictures his mother took of her blowing the candles of the cake out, granted, majority of them blurry, he is reminded that, although the party had been a success, the aftermath hadn’t been as pretty.

The party was over when he started hearing the first goodbyes and thankful comments of the parents for inviting them over, wishing Sunhi a final happy birthday before they took their sleepy kids in their arms. He had hoped his daughter would be drained too, despite the amount of sugar she had a few hours before. 

‘‘Auntie Y/N didn’t come.’’ Sunhi had stated, a pout on her trembling lips as she looked up at her tired father. ‘‘Why didn’t she come?’’ She asked in genuine curiosity as her eyes started glossing with tears.

Jungkook sighed, ‘‘Pumpkin, I told you she’s not in town. I’m sorry she─’’ It didn’t matter what excuse he had given her, the waterworks had begun. He hadn’t seen his daughter cry like that in a long time and for a moment, he didn’t know what to do to get her to stop. 

Even if he tried to coax her with distractions, like the number of gifts she had received from the guests or telling her he’d let her have another slice of cake if she stopped crying. He knew that what his daughter wanted wasn’t toys or food. She wanted you. And as much as Jungkook wants you just as much, he’s lost on ways to make you come back. 

Sunhi cried for what seemed like hours, his parents had even tried to cheer the little girl up by promising to take her to their house the very next morning for the rest of the weekend, to which she merely nodded as she fell asleep from exhaustion on her father’s chest. 

He envied her as he remained awake for most of the night, tears streaming down his face as guilt ate him away for his daughter’s heartbreak. 

It’s his fault after all. 

Jungkook isn’t upset you didn’t show up, you didn’t have to. Not even Sunhi could make you come back. Selfishly kissing you that night had changed the course of your relationship forever and that meant that his daughter would have to pay for his wrongdoings. 

With the absence of Sunhi, he’s reminded of just how big his house feels when he’s by himself. Ever since Jiwoo moved out, the only company he’s had is that of his daughter and it’s more than enough. With her dancing around the hallways and singing songs to the top of her lungs, Jungkook doesn’t feel as lonely.

He must’ve missed the knocking at the door or the ringing doorbell ─if there even was one─ because of the earphones he had on while he swept the confetti paper scattered on the hardwood floor of his home because by the time he opens his door to get a run around the neighborhood, he notices there’s a gift placed in his front doorstep. 

Jungkook’s brows furrow with confusion, unsure of why it was there in the first place. He’s sure Sunhi had opened all of her gifts last night, lazily and not very excited about them after her big cry, but she had made sure to leave them all unwrapped.

The medium-sized box is wrapped with a white and pink polka-dot paper, a cute golden ribbon placed right in the middle of it. Jungkook picks it up, bringing it closer for better inspection. Maybe it was from one of the kids that couldn’t make it? Although, they could’ve just gave it to Sunhi when they saw her at school again.

His eyes widen and his heartbeat races up when he reads the sticker tag with the name of the person responsible for the gift. 

‘‘To: Sunhi ♡

From: Auntie Y/N’’

His eyes scan the tag over and over again, just to make sure he’s reading the name correctly. When he manages to take his attention away from it, he looks around the street in hopes that he’d find you. 

How long has this been out here? Could he have caught a glimpse of you had he been less distracted? 

Although it feels wrong to open his daughter’s gift without her consent, he feels the urgent need to peek at what’s inside. His mind even tries to reason with himself, telling him it’s probably only a doll or a clothing item, like the other gifts Sunhi had received from the birthday guests yesterday. 

With a click of his tongue, he forgoes doing the right thing and tells himself that he’ll just wrap the gift again before Sunhi comes back from his parent’s house. 

The cute wrapping paper is thrown over his shoulder carelessly as he quickly unveils a white cardboard box, tilting his head slightly at what could possibly be inside. When he takes the top off, a soft gasp escapes his lips. 

A pink and white digital camera aimed for children lies inside, there’s decorative paper placed around it and a note inside. Jungkook swallows the lump in his throat, taking it delicately in his hand as he reads the words written in the familiar handwriting that hasn’t changed from all those years back in college. 

‘‘Happy 4th birthday, Sunhi! Since you’re growing older, I wanted to gift you something different this year around. Your daddy loves taking videos and I thought you should start doing it too, maybe he’ll pick his camera back up again haha. I’m sorry I couldn’t be there to see you blow your candles out, I hope all your wishes come true! I love you and miss you so much, 

-Auntie Y/N’’

Jungkook blinks back the tears that had formed in the corners of his eyes. He places the note back inside the box and breathes in deeply, exhaling slowly as he stares at the gift. No one but you could come up with an idea like this. It hurts him, but he smiles slightly at your thoughtfulness. 

A different feeling arises inside him as he holds the gift in his hand, looking at it like this is the sign he had been sent from above. The last thread of his string of faith. He doesn’t even think twice, placing the gift gently inside and rushing to step outside to close the door. 

He’ll go on that run, just not around his neighborhood. 

As he runs past rows of houses and stores, the voice inside his head tries to tell him that he should think rationally. There’s a reason why you didn’t show up yesterday and another for you dropping the gift in front of his house without a sound. You don’t want to see him and yet he’s running straight towards you even if he knows this is hopeless. 

He manages to shut that voice off as he maintains his rapid pace, rushing past the rows of buildings he’s familiar with and the street names he’s memorized by now. It all feels so different when he’s not behind the wheel, he usually always has to depend on his GPS to help him reach places. Your address, though, is one he proudly knows by heart. 

As Jungkook stands outside your apartment building, he stares at it with the sound of his heart drumming inside his ears. Catching his breath, he’s reminded of the many times these past few months he’s been here, with Sunhi fast asleep in her car seat at the back. 

He always pictured going up, knocking at your door, and begging for forgiveness, all for you to turn him down in the end with a gut-wrenching I don’t want you in my life anymore and a door closing on his face. That’s why he always drove away, deciding that uncertainty is better than hearing you reject him.

This time, though, nervous and unsure as he usually is when he comes here, Jungkook breathes in deep and ignores the familiar knot formed inside his stomach. 

He decides that uncertainty isn’t a feeling he wishes upon you.

[ouyangzizhensdad]

Perhaps you'd like a an ask that's not discourse related? If so, then I wanted to ask you if you know what jin zixuan thought of jin guangyao?

Hi anon,

I appreciate your non-discourse-related ask 😉. Your question made me realise that the novel seems to explicitly avoid giving us any real sense of what Jin Zixuan thought of Jin Guangyao, or how he reacted to the ways other people treated JGY. It seems that JZX remained unaware at the time that Meng Yao came on his birthday--and literally got kicked out. At Phoenix Mountain, JZX stops being mentioned after JGY appears and while his mother mistreats him--he’s only brought back into the narration at the very end to scream at JYL. JZX is also absent the night that WWX goes to Jinlintai to confront the Jins about Qiongqi path and in the direct aftermath. But let’s dig for crumbs and make sense of gaps, and let’s see what we can infer from them.

We know that, originally, Jin Zixuan was the epitome of the proud Jin: “The ways of the Jin Sect were proud, and Jin Zixuan inherited every single drop of this. With his high standards, he had been unsatisfied with this engagement since a long time ago.“ We could wonder if the circumstances of JGY’s birth would have been something JZX would have judged him for. We know that he took offense to WWX’s persona, although it is not spelled out exactly what offended him specifically: “Because of this engagement, Jin Zixuan had no positive impressions of the YunmengJiang Sect, and had frowned upon Wei Wuxian’s behavior since some time ago.“ However, it’s unclear whether the circumstances of WWX’s birth influenced how he perceived his behaviour. All we know for sure is that two other Jin family members--his father and Jin Zixun--never forgot about it and brought it up. We also know that in the past, JZX felt comfortable ignoring people’s good will towards him if he felt he was motivated in his view of them, as he did with JYL in the past:

Jin-furen had brought him to Lotus Pier a couple of times. Neither Wei Wuxian nor Jiang Cheng liked to play with him; only Jiang Yanli wanted to feed him the food that she made. Jin Zixuan, however, didn’t really like to pay her any attention.

At the same time, we do know that JZX had a sense of righteousness, what with him standing up against Wen Chao at Dusk-Creek Mountain. Likewise, we see with the soup incident that at least when it comes to a low-level cultivator who is a servant, a good deed done towards him without trying to gain his gratitude is enough to earn his respect, and for JZX to take action to raise the standing of that person:

Cleverly, the woman never acknowledged anything, but instead denied it ambiguously, her cheeks flushed, making it sound as though she was the one who did it, but didn’t want Jin Zixuan to know how much trouble she went through. And thus, Jin Zixuan didn’t force her to admit it any longer. However, in action, he had began to respect the cultivator. He began to pay attention to her, even raising her from a servant to a guest cultivator.

JZX even tells JYL: “Don’t think that just because you come from a powerful sect that you can steal and trample other people’s feelings. Some people, even if they come from poor backgrounds, their character are much better than the former’s. Please watch your conduct.” This underlines that, regardless of his upbringing, and perhaps even views that he might have held at some point in his life, at this point JZX seemed to want to judge others based on their character rather than their background. Of course, we can wonder if that reserve of good will would have extended to his half-brother, especially one that could try to take his place as the heir. However, considering the circumstances, from JGY’s birth to JGS’s decision to give him a name that did not align him with the same generation as JZX, we can wonder if anyone ever perceived then JGY as someone who could potentially become the next sect leader, as seen in this exchange between WWX and JC:

Jiang Cheng smirked, “Don’t carry your sword, then. It doesn’t matter. But don’t provoke Jin Zixuan from now on. He’s Jin Guangshan’s only son, after all. The future leader of the LanlingJin Sect will be him. If you beat him up, what should I, the sect leader, do? Beat him up with you? Or punish you?”

Wei Wuxian, “Isn’t Jin Guangyao here now? Jin Guangyao seems so much better than him.”

Jiang Cheng finished wiping his sword. After he scrutinized it for a while, he finally put Sandu back into its sheath, “So what, if he’s better? No matter how much better he is, no matter how clever, he could only be a servant who greets the guests. That’s all there is to his life. He can’t compare with Jin Zixuan.”

At Phoenix Mountain, while we do not see JZX say anything out of line to JGY, he is present while his mother and Jin Zixun disrespect him: and we get no reaction written for him while that takes place--he’s mostly licking his wounded pride. We also know that this disrespect by his family towards JGY was the norm, so we have to assume that JZX would have been a witness to it in other situations. In the context of that specific scene, it’s difficult to to infer something concrete from that silence: is it agreement? complicity? a certain indifference to JGY’s situation? an unwillingness of rock the boat or to seem to publicly challenge his mother? or simply him just being too self-absorbed by his romantic woes?

The next scene that would have made for an interesting case study is the night WWX comes to confront the Jins about the camp at Qiongqi Path. However, JZX is absent that night. Conveniently, or as a means to maintain a sense of ambiguity between him and WWX, we thereby do not know how JZX feels about what happened. He is also absent during the aftermath:  “At midnight, in the Golden Pavilion on JinlinTai sat over fifty sect leaders from sects of all sizes. Jin Guangshan sat in the foremost seat. Jin Zixuan was away [...].” (interesting that CQL added JZX to that scene). Which means he is not there to react to the mistreatment of JGY by others or to react to the way JGY is clearly lying for the purposes of manipulating the general opinion on WWX and save the Jin’s reputation.

We also do not get to witness the conversation that leads JZX to come to Qiongqi Path to try to stop Jin Zixun. All we get is a sentence of dialogue from JZX explaining that he thought JGY looked strange which prompted JZX tp questioned him questions (we of course know that JGY was purposefully acting that way to get JZX to go to Qionqqi Path, so it’s hard to take that as a sign of clear familiarity between them that would have allowed JZX to read hidden emotions from him). Did JZX ask out of specific concern for or suspicions of JGY? We don’t know! It is interesting to note though that, in this scene, Jin Zixun refers to JGY as “A-Yao”, which the narration contextualises by telling us that Jin Zixun started calling him in a more intimate manner despite the original contemps he had held for him. However, when JZX mentions JGY to Jin Zixun, he calls him “Jin Guangyao” (for reference, Jin Zixun calls JZX “Zixuan”).

All in all, we get very little from looking at JZX. However, there is something to be said in the absence of any specific grievances expressed by JGY towards him in terms of framing how JZX may have acted towards him when they were both at Jinlintai. Indeed, when Jin Ling asks JGY why he arranged for his father to go to Qiongqi path, meeting his death, JGY mentions the unfairness of the situation of both sons, but never brings up anything JZX did specifically to him. And we know that JGY has a great memory which allows him to hold grudges.

Suddenly, Jin Ling screamed, “Why?!” He stood up from beside Jiang Cheng. Eyes red, he rushed toward Jin Guangyao as he shouted, “Why did you have to do this?!”

Nie Huaisang hurried to pull back Jin Ling, who seemed as though he wanted to fight with Jin Guangyao. Jin Guangyao returned the question, “Why?” He turned to Jin Ling, “A-Ling, then could you tell me why? Why is it that even if I face everyone with a smile, I might not even receive the lowest form of respect, while even though your father was extremely arrogant, people flocked to him? Could you tell me why we were born from the same person but your father could relax at home with the love of his life playing with his child, while I never even dared be alone for long with my wife, shivering out of fright at first glance of my son? And I was ordered to do such a thing by my father as if it was natural—to kill an extremely dangerous figure who could flip out and conjure up a bloody massacre with his corpses anytime!

“Why is it that even though we were born on the same day, Jin Guangshan could host a grand banquet for one son, and watch with his own eyes how his subordinate kicked his other son down Jinlintai, from the first stair to the last!”

He finally revealed the hatred hidden deep within him. It wasn’t directed at neither Jin Zixuan nor Wei Wuxian, but rather his own father.

As a result, we might infer that, at the very least, JZX never directly acted towards JGY in a way that reflected how JGS or Jin Zixun (at some point) treated him. At the same time, it’s difficult to suggest that he stood up for him when other people disrespected him, and we know that JZX’s mother disrespected JGY in lieu of directing her anger toward the real culprit, her awful husband. Little seems to suggest that they grew intimate after JGY came to Jinlintai. It’s really hard to divine, as a result, what JZX might have thought of JGY.

The most interesting thing to take away from this is that it seems absolutely deliberate on MXTX’s part to show us as little as possible in terms of interactions between JZX and JGY. We can speculate as to why that is: to separate JZX from the machinations of this sect? to avoid giving us more ammunition to guess that JGY was behind JZX’s death? to ensure that WWX remains ambiguous towards JZX? or just as a means to avoid having to figure out how to work this dynamic into already complicated scenes and character relationships? etc.

[hyperbali]

Agatha Harkness Was Right, And Here’s Why

Alright. Finally had to sit down and write my way out of this quiet, internal temper tantrum, and a few people were interested in seeing what I had to say, so I present to you:

Agatha Harkness Was Right, And Here’s Why

Disclaimer: MASSIVE spoilers for the entirety of WandaVision, and I am not nice about it.

I’ll start off by saying that, for all its foibles, WandaVision was genuinely a good example of a property within the MCU/Disney umbrella that stepped out of the usual ‘good guys fight bad guys action extravaganza’ in a way that pushed the envelope. The pseudo-horror aspect of the first few episodes is something I would really love to see engaged with on a more thoughtful basis in future projects.

I would say that it proved to be more than a vehicle to promote toys, but… well…

Yeah. Anyway.

I’ll assume that you watched WandaVision if you’re reading this, but quick recap: In the aftermath of ‘the Blip,’ Wanda is left broken and alone with no one in her corner. Her biggest mentor willingly abandoned his team to get his own ‘happy’ ending (do not get me started on Steve, that’s a document in and of itself), her other biggest mentor is probably off enjoying his family while ignoring the incredibly racist killing spree he’s been on for the past five years, and her lover is dead. When she goes to claim the body, she’s told nuh-uh, that’s government property, please leave.

So she goes to a plot of land in the middle of some nowhere town in New Jersey, which Vision apparently bought despite the fact they were living a pretty decently comfortable life in Scotland, where she looks at the deed that Vision drew a heart on and wrote ‘To Grow Old In’. Very sweet. Kind of weird, considering nothing of this caliber had ever been suggested for either of their characters and they’d been actively running from specifically the U.S. authorities? But sweet.

She has a breakdown and, in her grief, contains the entire town of Westview and all 3,892 of the people in it in her own personal paradise, where nothing bad ever happens beyond sitcom hijinks, no one dies, and every problem is tied up and neatly dealt with by the end of an ‘episode’. Except we learn that this is only paradise to Wanda, who apparently shares the aspect of having to relate everything to her favourite pop culture with Tony, because everyone else in Westview is more or less being psychologically tortured by the incredible amount of pain she’s in, forced to be puppeted actors to make her happy.

Bear in mind, Westview might have been bigger at some point - we have no idea how many people survived the Blip, or how many have been brought back to life within the past few weeks of the current setting. Either way, this is a town that has already dealt with a lot of trauma being dragged into yet another awful, much more specific kind of emotional damage, thanks to ‘the heroes’. Nice.

Agatha Harkness, a witch who’s been up to who-knows-what in the 340 years since she drained the coven that tried to kill her for getting a little too ambitious into jerky, feels the massive expenditure of magical power and decides to investigate. All the while, she carefully uses her own magic to try and peek into Wanda’s psyche, her motivations, all while keeping up appearances and not letting slip that anything is amiss.

I’ll point out that she’s no saint here, either - she specifically keeps one Westview resident at her mercy, and knows what’s happening to the rest of them, but doesn’t attempt to stop it. I’ll chalk that up to her pragmatism; their ‘sacrifice’ was fine to her as long as she could figure out how Wanda could have done something so unheard of in terms of power.

What we come to learn over the course of the show is that, given everything that happened, Wanda didn’t mean to take over an entire town and tool it into her own personal slice of heaven. She very quickly became aware of it; we know that she knows it’s her own personal bubble as soon as episode three, when she’s confronting Monica about how the latter could possibly know about Ultron. Wanda is made further aware of how much damage this is inflicting on others in episode five, when Vision himself tells her that these people are scared. But still, she has everything handled! It’s okay! The outside world is worse, trust her!

Her handling of the question, ‘where are all the children of Westview,’ is one that bears some thinking - and, y’know, kind of more than a little concern. They’re allowed to walk around as part of the ‘Halloween special,’ but as Vision walks further and further out towards the edges of town where Wanda doesn’t have as much full control, people are just frozen in place, or conducting the same few seconds of action over and over. And fully aware of being trapped.

How are they being sustained? Eating, sleeping? If someone isn’t part of her storyline, is she just locking them down into a coma? What made Wanda decide that keeping the children ‘out of the way’ was somehow kinder than involving them, especially given her later argument that she’s been trying to keep the entire town safe and happy?

The fact of the matter is, she only actually starts to feel remorse for any of this after she’s confronted with the fact that, after weeks of being at her mercy, the townspeople of Westview would rather be dead than endure another moment of having to play nice for her enjoyment. She finally opens the ‘bubble’ to let them out - which leads to the ‘epic’ finale of three different entities trying to take down Wanda and her happy family: the S.W.O.R.D. military led by Hayward, the White Vision, and Agatha.

Winding back to how we got here: after Agatha uses her own trapped resident, Ralph Bohner (who, given his casting and the props in place during the last episode, I’m willing to bet is actually the missing witness protection person Jimmy was looking for) in an attempt to lure out Wanda’s reasoning - and fails - she’s pretty much done pretending. She tricks Wanda into her basement, nullifies her powers, and makes her face her own past to get to the truth of the matter.

Not going to lie, favourite moment of the show. Kathryn Hahn killed Agatha’s slightly-amused-slightly-irritated observations about Wanda’s coping mechanisms, and the whole arrangement was extremely meta. I would have paid real money dollars to see her do the same thing to the likes of Tony, Strange, and Loki. Hell, even just having her meet the rest of the Avengers? Augh. If wishes were fishes.

When Agatha comes to the conclusion that Wanda is the vaunted, nigh-indestructible force of nature that she’s literally spent her entire life reading about is the ultimate source of chaos magic and will likely bring about the end of the world, she’s pretty understandably taken aback. To that matter, the fact that Wanda… has very little control over any of it, and is using what she does understand to play housemaker? After how long Agatha has spent learning control, hiding in plain sight, just to be child’s play compared to what Wanda has at her fingertips? I’d be pretty pissed off, too!

The way that WandaVision handled both of the major ‘fights’ - Vision versus White Vision ending in philosophy, and Wanda ending up beating Agatha at her own game of deception - is excellent. A little grating that they had to go with the beat down angle before they got there, but this is MCU; punches and thrown cars had to get shoved in somewhere. And, given that this series very much played with the idea of grey morality, I was sort of hopeful that Agatha would end up in a not-quite stalemate arrangement with Wanda. She’s not as powerful as the Scarlet Witch, but she has the know-how that Wanda sorely lacks; in recompense for her own deeds, she would be able to teach what she knows while also kind of scheming on her own time.

Y’know, like what they did with rehabilitating Loki?

Except that Wanda, who has just gone through the entire rigamarole of coming to terms with the fact that she trapped thousands of people into a nightmare scenario against their will, rendering them helpless to her mercy… traps Agatha into a nightmare scenario against her will, rendering her helpless to Wanda’s mercy.

That moment actually shook me. Oh, my god. We’re supposed to still look at Wanda as a good guy after this?

This isn’t even covering the incredibly awful confrontation with her and Vision where she tries to gaslight him into believing that everything is A-OK, or the fact that the person she gets most violent with (apart from Agatha) is Monica Rambeau, a black woman who spends most of the show bending over backwards trying to say that what Wanda is doing is understandable, justified, and just needs a gentle touch to be dealt with.

That could be its own document, too - how Monica, much as she’s incredible and definitely looks to be a really exciting addition to the MCU roster, more or less gets used as the Good One to absolve and enable Wanda’s actions. One of her last lines to Wanda, after seeing how the people of Westview (rightfully) look at Wanda like she’s monstrous, is “they’ll never know what you sacrificed.”

Sacrificed what? The fake husband and fake kids she made out of her own compulsion to pretend that everything is okay? None of that would have existed if she’d been given the proper resources to actually cope with how much loss she’s had to deal with. None of that would have existed if she hadn’t caused this problem in the first place.

In the end, Wanda flies off in her fancy new gear before the FBI shows up, avoiding any real consequences to her actions - which has pretty much been the running theme of her character ever since she was introduced to the MCU in Age of Ultron. The worst kind of direct consequence she’s ever gotten was being grounded to her room for a while, then kept in the Raft for, like, maybe a day - and both times, she was broken out post-haste.

Meanwhile, she worsened the issues in Sokovia (which, I will say upfront, was Tony’s fault to begin with), unleashed the Hulk on Johannesburg, got a pretty significant amount of civilians killed as bystanders in Lagos (hey, how come Wanda keeps turning a lot of black people into casualties?), and stood back in Wakanda to let their people try to fight off Thanos from getting to Vision until it was clear that there was no other option than for her to get involved.

Great Power Comes With No Responsibility At All, Actually.

Wanda, in the several years she has maintained her identity as an Avenger, has proven time and time again that she takes on innumerable risks without any full understanding of what they mean, allows others to take on the brunt of the fallout for her, and looks sad until she’s forgiven and moves on to the next problem. She has no business casually throwing around the kind of power that being the Scarlet Witch entails, not until she’s actually made any kind of headway into making reparations for what she’s done and tried, really tried, to get a handle on what she’s capable of.

Which she’s apparently doing in the last post-credits scene, astral reading the literal Book of the Damned on her lonesome in the mountains, but… without anyone to guide her, or give her any kind of boundary?

[I ran out of images I could post, but you know exactly what image I am referring to here]

Agatha Harkness was right. And that should terrify everybody that has to deal with Wanda in the future.

(P.S. Do we know if she actually even killed that dog? We never see her holding anything but a blanket, and characters go in and out of that show all the time. Granted, she wasn’t great with the cicada-turned-bird... hmm.)

Additional Notes:

“Well, you’re a Tony Stan, of course you think Wanda’s a villain”

I like Tony because he’s such an awful mess, and the narrative isn’t exactly kind about telling him what a piece of shit he can be! He reaped a lot of problems, created practically half the villains in the MCU, and ended up dying a martyred hero. Thanks to being the tent pole by which this franchise hoisted itself into a cultural powerhouse, he will always be their golden savior. If you want to read about how he’s the true villain of this entire affair, feel free to look up any number of takedown pieces about him that are out there. He’s a dick. I will never “uwu sad baby who did nothing wrong ever 🥺” him the way people do about Wanda.

“Why are you so pressed about this”

Because something as good in concept as WandaVision could and should have been about anyone other than the whitewashed, antisemitic take on Wanda Maximoff that MCU brought upon us. They put crucifixes on her wall in Civil War, for fuck’s sake!

“Weren’t you mad about them not including Aaron Taylor-Johnson”

At this point, I am almost kind of relieved the real Pietro wasn’t resurrected for this, because god knows they probably would have killed him all over again just to inflict that much more pain on his sister.

“Anything else you’d like to tell us, turbo nerd”

This was literally itching at me all weekend to write, so it’s more or less just to get it off my chest. If you powered your way through it, uh… thanks? Sorry if I yucked your yums, but I tried to be as clear with the disclaimer as I could. 🤷‍♂️

[ariainstars]

Will Din Djarin and Grogu Have to Part?

Since this question has been discussed quite controversially in the fandom since the second season of The Mandalorian, here are my two cents about it. 

Luke and Anakin

A subject my husband and I can’t agree upon 😉 is the character of Luke Skywalker. I always liked him, while my husband finds him annoying. But consider: Luke’s hotheadedness, his naivety, his obstinacy, are perfectly normal for a young man of nineteen or twenty. Given A New Hope’s roots in classic Western, Luke is the typical greenhorn, who tries to man it up but doesn’t know how to do it yet. Luke is a normal adolescent with dreams and ambitions. Remember how we see him playing with a toy skyhopper at his uncle’s homestead? He obviously feels safe there. His aunt and uncle later even sacrifice their lives rather than revealing to the Imperial stormtroopers where R2D2 is, because they know that Luke went in search of the droid, and they don’t want them to find him. Luke is a good boy though raw and green. In the end, his story is a success because he chooses to use his powers to save the ones he cares about, even when it’s a father who, except for saving his life at the last moment, never did anything good for him.

Now compare him to Anakin Skywalker, his father, at the same age: many fans define young Anakin as a whiny, arrogant brat and they’re not so wrong with that. Anakin comes over as an irritating person, much more so than his son, because he is emotionally stunted, having spent the last ten years being told to stifle his emotions and not to allow any personal attachment. Which blatantly failed: we see right away that his bond with Padmé is still intact although they didn’t meet in the meantime, and we witness him getting mad with fury and hatred when his mother has to die in that cruel, meaningless way when he could have saved her had he arrived just a little sooner. Young Anakin is unbalanced and frustrated because by now he knows his enormous powers but is not allowed to use them in a way that actually makes sense to him. Anakin is a family man: his instinct is to protect. But at age nineteen, thanks to the uncompassionate mindset of the oh-so wise Jedi, he already is a ticking bomb.

Now to Our New Heroes…

While the first season was about Mando’s redemption and hero’s journey, the second one thematizes the development of the child. Until now he hardly wielded the Force and most of the time he’s just being cute and getting into trouble, but that’s not simply bothersome, nor is it unfitting for the narrative: it’s normal. Grogu is being a child at last, because he can, and he can because someone is looking after him and genuinely caring for him.

Look at him: the little cookie monster is having a blast. He’s meeting people and making friends. He’s enjoying life (including food). He can let go, because he knows that “daddy” has his back. Literally!

Which is why I don’t believe that Grogu will choose to join some Jedi or other: it would be pointless for his story. Grogu has the chance to be the child he could not be until now, and since he thankfully ages slowly, he’s taking that chance. Like with his predecessor Yoda, there is more to Grogu than meets the eye: he understands more than he lets on. He’s making experiences, and he’s learning from these experiences. Instinctively, he wants Mando because he wants belonging. My take is that he will learn how to have healthy attachments, and that if he is to be the future Yoda in some distant new tv show or new trilogy, he will be very different from this one in that he won’t discourage Force-sensitive children from learning how to love other people in a proper way. Also, Yoda lived mostly at the Jedi temple, which from the outside reminded of an ivory tower and indeed did shield the Jedi from seeing many of the ugly things happening outside. Grogu is travelling: he witnesses the injustices in the galaxy with his own eyes. 

One of the crucial messages of the Star Wars saga always was how wrong it is to separate families. Palpatine’s greatest villainy was making people who belonged together mistrust one another until they resorted to violence. What’s worse, he enjoyed it.

To remain in balance, children need to grow up serene and protected. Anakin, the Dark Father, was the most blatant example for this: his mere existence was a living proof for the Jedi’s failure. Terrified of his former padawan’s turn to the Dark Side, Obi-Wan set the seal on his fate right when Padmé was succeeding into making him go away with her. The Jedi was aware that Anakin was a husband and future father at this point, but the convictions of the Jedi had been so deeply ingrained into his mind since he was small that he believed them to be more important than Anakin’s role not as a Jedi, but as a human being. Still twenty years later, he tried to trick Anakin’s own son into killing him. Anakin’s soul was saved, though only by a hair’s breadth, due to his son’s stubborn compassion. Anakin had been willing to sacrifice everything to save his wife; Luke chose to rather give up his life than his integrity, which is why the moment when he throws his light sabre away before Palpatine is so significant, setting him apart from Anakin.

None of the surviving Jedi would have lifted a finger for Anakin: to them, he was a damned man. Which he was, but that was largely also due to the Jedi’s sins and not only his own. They never showed regret or assumed that they might have wronged him. The aim of both the prequel and sequel trilogy was not to excuse Darth Vader’s / Anakin Skywalker’s or Kylo Ren’s / Ben Solo’s terrible deeds, but to demonstrate that their fate could have been avoided; that they were not alone with their guilt but had been for a large part pushed into their role by their environment, instead of being, as the cliché runs, “mad guys who choose to be evil because they want power”, like e.g. in a James Bond movie. (Except of course for Palpatine, but even he got a second chance through Rey, equally powerful but much more well-meaning than him.)

Conclusions

The message of Star Wars is not about the all-powerful Jedi and the significance of their order: they are not some kind of superheroes who will return and save the galaxy. I daresay that who hopes to see Luke Skywalker, e.g. instructing Grogu, will be bitterly disappointed. If Luke would enter the narrative, the story would become about him, making the show’s set-up and title pointless. His story, the Hero’s Journey, was accomplished with Return of the Jedi, which is why George Lucas never wrote a continuation. Luke himself developed his capacities instinctively, both Obi-Wan and Yoda had little time to train him. (So much also for Rey being “a Mary Sue who knows how to wield her power without training”.) It obviously does not take years and years of learning at a Jedi temple to learn to wield one’s Force powers: it appears that what padawans are taught there, more than anything else, is how to control their feelings. Which is unrealistic on the long run, because every living being wishes for personal fulfilment and even the greatest Jedi can’t live solely for others.

Will the child’s Force abilities fade in time without training, the way Ahsoka said? They won’t. The show is set some 25 years after the fall of the Jedi Temple, and yet Grogu managed to make a mudhorn float in the air with his power. He was exhausted afterwards, but he managed. In another episode he healed Greef Karga from a mortal wound and he is the first Force-sensitive whom we ever saw with this capacity. In the next episode he rejected a fireball with his bare hands. The Force is strong with this one. He does not need a Jedi master to train him. What he needs is to develop a good judgement about what he should use his powers for, and when he should not. 

The saga as a whole always showed a clear structure where the puzzle pieces fit together, adding up to one final picture: life is not about power but about love and belonging. Power can win, but that victory is always short-lived. Who chooses power over compassion in the end will always lose and have to look back on a destroyed world where there are only losses and bitter memories.

Ever from the first episode, The Mandalorian lived from the dynamics between the gruff but kind bounty-hunter and the innocent yet powerful child. At its core, it is a father-son relationship: tear them apart and the whole story ceases to make sense. By the beginning of season 2 Din Djarin and Grogu have grown so close that you could hardly fit a sheet of paper between them. Their story is not about rebuilding the Jedi order, it is about healing together, overcoming loneliness and trauma, starting a new life together. 

Maybe they will be separated at the end of the second season, e.g. by Moff Gideon who wants the child for his despicable experiments: but if that happens, I can foretell what the next season will be about: 

Mando will move heaven and hell to get “his” child back under his protection. Because contrarily to both Luke and Anakin, he is a father, and a good and devoted one at that.

[evehere]

I just wanted to say I am absolutely taken by your 2ha ficlet as well! I even started reading "The wife is first" per your recommendation, and every new chapter I read all I think about is "ooh, this would fit so well with ranwan, what an amazing idea!" I really can't wait to read the rest of what you have written, thanks for doing this

Hi! Omgsh, thanks so much for the nice! I felt that since people might not know the series this au is based in, they might not take an interest to it! I write for my own pleasure, but it feels good to post it and see some response.

I’m glad you’re enjoying QWS. It’s really a comfort novel, like, each chapter feels so warm and nice! I reread some chapters when I’m feeling in the mood for some comfort without the hurt part (／ω＼)  And the main characters are so similar as well, like JS is a bright boy on his way to take care of his hubby and JQ is the cold and aloof man who is like wtf every time JS does something for him. Besides, I really like the setting the author created for homosexual marriage.

I leave you here the main scene that was inspired in the novel, I hope you’ll like it!

Yearning willow masterpost ❤️

Mo Ran 2.0 (2)

Resurrection

Mo Ran snapped his eyes open.

Was he dead?

It was dark, a faint crimson undertone around him.

He was lying on something soft, something akin to a blanket covering him. He was warm and comfortable.

There was, however, had a faint pressure in his head, as a light hangover, and a frantic feeling in his chest, his heart beating hard and his breathing picking up. Did the spirits have the same sensations as the living? Mo Ran asked himself. Tentatively, he curled lightly his fingers. His fingers answered at his slightest order, with no difference to when he was alive.

Excruciatingly slow, Mo Ran moved his hand up his chest, and placed his hand over his heart.

It was beating.

Was he really dead? Or had Xue-bofu come up with something at the last moment, saving him? But he would swear that he had felt the knife in his neck, and the blood flowing out like a fountain.

Mo Ran glided his hand over the spot of his chest where the executioner had made the second cut. The skin was intact, no sign of a knife cut. Mo Ran frowned slightly, feeling that something was amiss.

His eyes were adjusting to the dark. Those were… curtains? Like a canopy?

As a thunderstruck, he realised what was amiss. He couldn’t feel his ribs. Instead, there was supple muscle under his hand, like he had before he entered the prison. In prison, the prolonged lack of food had led him to lose almost all muscle mass.

Startled, he sat on the bed. He felt… good, despite the headache. Better than he had in the last months. But it was more like… normal.

He was wearing a cosy night robe, partially open at his chest. Mo Ran opened his lapels, noticing dumbfounded that the blade scar he had got in a battle a couple of years before his imprisonment was nowhere to be seen. In fact, he had no injury other than some old scars. He was… intact. Whole.

Mo Ran was alive. Not just alive, but his body was in the state it was in several years back.

There was a huff of breath next to him.

Startled, Mo Ran looked to his side. A body lied next to him, with his back facing Mo Ran. There was another huff of breath as they stirred, apparently deep in sleep. They had long, silky hair extended over the pillow. He couldn’t determine if they were a man or a woman.

He was in a bed. Someone was lying next to him.

This wasn’t unknown to him. Quite the opposite, Mo Ran was very familiar with this setting. Also, he was recognising the place, his heart threatening to get out of his chest as his hand trembled from the force with which he clenched his night robe.

There was only one way to check it.

Putting a hand on the pillow to support himself, he reached over and peered at the face of the sleeping person next to him.

Rong Jiu.

Rong Jiu’s young, graceful face, with his tender and androgynous features.

They were lying in the canopy bed in Rong Jiu’s old rooms in his Nanping manor. He recognised now the crimson drapes with embroidered mandarin ducks. Now that he saw them again, the deep red colour still vibrant and new, he felt the same need to tear them down.

As he had before his imprisonment.

He threw another look at the man lying beside him, noticing the lovebites and the handprints on the skin that peeked out of the blankets. What’s more, there were fine rope marks on Rong Jiu’s wrists.

Weren’t those remarkably similar to his own handiwork!?

Mo Ran couldn’t bear to stay in there anymore, so he got up from the bed, letting the bed curtains fall closed. He was indeed in Rong Jiu’s old room, with the same red and gold decorations and rich fabrics with detailed embroidery. However, last year Mo Ran had made some renovations to make the room more spacious. The room looked as if he had never made them.

It was cold, and it was still dark outside, but he could see faint sun rays from the paper windows. The room was silent—not even birds were singing yet.

There was a mirror in a corner, and Mo Ran watched his own reflection.

Strong. Muscular. Tanned. Traits he lost when he was imprisoned. Yet the white hairs he had got when Chu Wanning got ill in prison had disappeared altogether.

Had he… had he gone back in time?

Mo Ran was confident that he had died at the execution grounds. But he had heard stories before. Stories of people who died under serious grievances, with the blessings of the gods, going back in time so they can start over with the knowledge of the future.

The realisation hit Mo Ran like a sack of stones, and he staggered, dizzy.

“Fuck!”

Gods hadn’t abandoned him after all. He had another opportunity.

Another opportunity.

His voice, however, finally rose the sleeping beauty resting in the bed.

“Hum… Houye… You woke up so early today.”

Mo Ran’s gaze was icy when he looked back at the man sitting up on the bed. Years ago, he had received Rong Jiu as a gift from Viscount Chang. He had liked him and took him in as a concubine. In the end, Rong Jiu proved to be an internal spy all along, and provided the court with more evidence of Mo Ran’s wrongdoings to expiate himself with good deeds. Viscount Chang had brought him back when Mo Ran was imprisoned and got himself some merits from the emperor.

How he had fallen for the tricks of this little vixen!

He had been so blind to find attractive an androgynous and seductive beauty like Rong Jiu. It was nothing like the beauty of his husband, his Wanning…

Chu Wanning. If Mo Ran was back, that meant that Chu Wanning was back too?

Rong Jiu noticed that Mo Ran looked gloomy and unwilling to talk to him, but merely thought that he might be in a foul mood.

“Houye, did you not sleep well last night? Did you have a bad dream?”

I died, moron. That’s a bad dream in its own right.

Since Mo Ran still showed no signs of talking or approaching him, Rong Jiu raised, draping a robe on his shoulders, and hugged him from behind.

Mo Ran fought his first instinct to shake the treacherous man from his back. He wanted nothing more than to shake him off and slap him until he vented his anger. Yet, for the time being, it would be best if he were careful and treated everyone as if they knew nothing—at least until he got more information about his own situation.

Besides, he should care about his marquis reputation, just in case. His reputation as an immoral who did anything he pleased was the reason people had been so ready to believe that Mo Ran had tried to dethrone the emperor in his past life.

In his past life, Chu Wanning used to advise him to be humbler and keep a low profile, but he hadn’t heeded his advice. Later, he’d realise the kindness behind his words.

“How about I ask servants to prepare breakfast for you? Congee and fried buns sound good?”

Finding himself unable to talk, Mo Ran simply nodded his head.

Rong Jiu called a servant and went on his well-practiced routine with Mo Ran, preparing boiling water and clean clothes. Mo Ran merely observed him. The man really hadn’t changed in the past years.

If everything was real, if Mo Ran was back in the past, then everything had yet to happen. Mo Ran had yet to lose his title and his estate, he had yet to die, and Chu Wanning… Chu Wanning was still alive. He could still fix things with him before it was too late.

Rong Jiu had been taken into the manor in his second year after his marriage with Chu Wanning, so he knew he was already married to him.

“What day is it?” Mo Ran asked Rong Jiu as he approached him with his thick outer robes in dark blue and lined with grey rabbit fur.

Judging by the cold, it was around winter, but that alone wasn’t enough information.

“Third day of the tenth month, houye. Today’s the beginning of the winter.”

“Dingyou year?” He guessed it should be around that time.

“Yes, houye,” Rong Jiu answered with a hint of amusement. “Did houye had too much to drink last night, that he has to ask about the year?”

Dingyou year. He was twenty-six years old, and he had been married to Chu Wanning for almost five years. He was back from his last big military campaign, earning the title of Taxian general from the emperor. The campaign had taken him barely a year and ended around… The Lantern Festival? Mo Ran remembered he had been back for that one. He had been back in Nanping-fu for almost a year then.

After his campaign against the north, everything had gone downhill. Mo Ran had been drunk on praises and riches, taking in five or six concubines every year, and allowing himself to do as he pleased. He had gotten into many fights, both private and in court, and he had estranged himself from the Xue family and Nangong Si.

He remembered how he had gone out of his way to make Chu Wanning miserable as well.

The servants brought in the breakfast and set the dishes on the table. Mo Ran took a seat on the low table and let Rong Jiu serve him a bowl of congee. He extended his hand to take the bowl and chopsticks, but Rong Jiu batted his hand away with a teasing gesture.

“I’ll serve houye his meal,” he said with a flirtatious smile.

Mo Ran merely stared at him, incapable to react at first. The wish to slap a few teeth out of that smile was so strong that Mo Ran almost acted on it. Then he remembered he should act normal, to avoid raising suspicion.

A slow, boyish smile appeared on his face, and opened his mouth when Rong Jiu approached the spoon to his lips. He used to fish out sputum from their prison’s meals, so no matter how disgusting he found to let the boy feed him, he had no trouble acting his role.

There were worse things.

He let the young man feed him three bowls and a half, alternating with bites of the fried pork buns, and then stopped him. It had been so long since he last had a full meal, that the need to finish every bit of food in sight was strong.

From what he remembered, he usually had two bowls of congee and a couple of buns for breakfast, but, in his mind, it had been half a year since he last ate to his heart content. His belly didn’t agree with him, feeling overstuffed, and Mo Ran stopped Rong Jiu before he got sick. He would get used to eating regularly again, he supposed.

He couldn’t help to scoff internally. Rong Jiu would give him whatever he asked, with no regard to what was actually good for him.

Mo Ran wanted nothing more than to ask about Chu Wanning (where was his husband?), but another manservant got into the room with his official robes, a heavy garment in deep purple and a tall, black hat.

Fuck. Of course, if he was back, he’d have to go to morning court.

“Take it away and call a doctor. I’m not feeling well,” he told the servant.

If he had to attend morning court, he should at least familiarise again with the current situation. To be safe, he should avoid it for a few days.

Rong Jiu looked at him with alarm.

“Why didn’t houye say anything earlier? Quick, go call a doctor!” Then he fretted around Mo Ran, pulling him to lie back in the bed.

Mo Ran batted Rong Jiu’s hands away—he was getting throughly fed up with Rong Jiu’s act, knowing that he fretted around him now, but news of his “illness” would spread to Viscount Chang before noon. Ignoring the look of incredulity in his concubine’s face, he wrote a leave of absence and gave it to the servant, telling him to take it to the palace.

“Tell the doctor to come to my office.”

He had no patience left to deal with Rong Jiu.

Nanping-fu was a siheyuan, a courtyard house, divided in a front courtyard and a backyard. The main door, Mo Ran’s office, guest parlour and the library were all in the front courtyard, open to guests, while everyone’s bedchambers, the family shrine, the kitchens, storage rooms and guest rooms were in the backyard.

All the chambers were arranged around an elegant inner garden in a square. The one positioned in the north stood among them as the main house, where was Mo Ran and Chu Wanning’s room.

The same room he had shared with Shi Mei. Mo Ran frowned, uncomfortable with the thought. He’d have to do something about it.

Mo Ran walked through the beautifully decorated pathways with slow, lingering steps. The last time he had seen the place, some servants had even turned the flowerpots upside down, some taking the valuable flowers and others taking the hand-carved pots.

On his way to his office, he passed the guest parlour. The mere sight of it brought bad memories to Mo Ran. It was there where he received the imperial edict ordering his imprisonment. With it, any woman in Nanping-fu could be enslaved and sold as a servant, and any man left in there was to be exiled. Though few fools were still there when the sentence reached it.

Fools like Chu Wanning, his stubborn husband.

“For his father’s past achievements, and his own contributions and military merits towards the empire, Chu Wanning, husband of the criminal Mo Ran, is granted a pardon. By the grace of the Son of Heaven, this marriage is rescinded. He is hereby allowed to return to his old post in the Censorate, retaining the goods he brought into the marriage!” The imperial eunuch had announced.

At the time, Mo Ran had thrown a hateful glance towards his husband. Had he stayed just to show off his pardon? Or did he stay to laugh at Mo Ran’s expenses? Or maybe it was both of them. At the time, it wouldn’t have surprised him; Mo Ran had made his life mission to make Chu Wanning’s life as uncomfortable as possible in the eight years they had been married.

Chu Wanning should be happy that the marriage was over.

That’s why the words Chu Wanning had said after kowtowing three times had utterly surprised him. His thin figure looked as if a strong current of wind could blow him away.

“I’m grateful for bixia’s magnanimous graces. But since this marriage was meant to unite the old and new nobility, nothing more would serve this purpose than letting the both of us get the same sentence as husbands. Husbands should be as of one body; we shall share both glory and failure.”

“What are you doing?” Mo Ran asked, absolutely bewildered. He was signing his own death sentence!

Chu Wanning hadn’t even looked at him, his head bowed to the floor—only the tips of his ears reddened as a sign of his fluster. Mo Ran’s eyes were red as well, his frustration and his pain long past the point of trying to fight for himself.

“I won’t leave Nanping-fu,” Chu Wanning had said.

At first, Mo Ran still thought it was a trick. That some imperial eunuch would come to the prison and announce that the joke was over and Chu Wanning could go and take back his post at the Censorate. But the imperial edict that came was instead that Chu Wanning was stripped of his titles and his possessions. Later, all doubts were erased when the prison guards interrogated him.

The need to see Chu Wanning was so enormous that Mo Ran could hardly breathe. It filled everything and grasped his heart, constricting it painfully. He had to see him and make sure… make sure that Chu Wanning was still alive. That this wasn’t a nightmare conjured by his dying mind, in which he came back to life only to find that Chu Wanning wasn’t there.

Or worse. A punishment set out by the hell judges, to let him live an eternal life in this nightmare.

A servant passed next to him carrying a basin of water, bowing to Mo Ran when he was a few steps away.

“Greetings, houye.”

“Hum,” Mo Ran said in all answer. The servant was about to go away, when he cleared his throat and asked off-handed, “where is furen?”

The servant merely looked at him, his eyes wide as plates. The fear pricked his heart hard, cold sweat forming on his back, and Mo Ran made a tight fist, waiting for an answer.

“F-furen?”

“Yes, where is he?” He asked, trying to conceal his anxiousness under his mask.

“H-he’s still kneeling in the shrine, houye, as you ordered him yesterday.”

Fuck.

***

Houye (侯爷): a respectful way to address a marquis (hou, 侯). It can be used by his spouse, concubines, servants, all those whose ranks are below him. People of his same rank and above may address him as “Mo-hou”.

Dingyou year （丁酉）: 34th year of the sexagenary cycle. It’s just a way to keep track of the time, because I don’t know in which emperor’s reign would this be based on XD

Nanping-fu (府): fu means “manor”. There was a distinction between what one could call their own house, and only nobles of certain level could call their homes “fu”. A lower level would be “zhai” 宅, while the higher level would be “gong” (宫，palace).

Furen (夫人): literally, “madam”. BUT, furen is made up of the characters 夫 (fu, husband) and 人 (ren, person). Being as nouns are only gendered because they’re historically tied to a certain gender, I think it’s fine to think that a furen can be a man, but in a position of deference towards their spouse.

***

If you liked it, please consider supporting me with a rb!

[niteshade925]

Hello, hello! I'm kinda new in Genshin fandom... And to be honest, I don't even play the game (though it's more because I can't). I just got very, very interested in the lore of this game. I've read almost every character stories and voicelines on wikipedia, and watched people play the storyline. Can't wait for more content! But - cough cough, I'm just here to ask, what did you think about Zhongli's story quest? I was a little bit sad that there was no mention about Guizhong, but that makes me hope she'll be more important in the future. Even so, I found his story quest deep in its own way, although in a different way when compared to Venti's. And about Guizhong, what do you think about her, from what we know about her until now? 😊 Thank you for replying my silly questions and I hope your day has been good! 😉

Yea Zhongli's quest is rather interesting, and *may* be easier for people who know a bit of Chinese history to grasp. What Zhongli said at the very end of the last cutscene ("my legacy shall be left to those who come after to debate"; the Chinese line is a little different, in that it wasn't just "his" legacy up for debate, but everything from the past) very much reminds me of the only female emperor in Chinese history, Wu Zetian. Being an emperor and all, she shares a lavish tomb (called Qianling/乾陵; I believe it's still sealed to this day and has not been explored by archaeologists) with her husband, but her stele/碑 (basically a gigantic luxury tombstone, usually detailing the person's accomplishments in life) is curiously...blank. So speculation ensues. Of the many speculations, the one most widely accepted by modern people says that she intended for her stele to be blank, because she knew her deeds were not all good, so she wanted her legacy to be up for debate. The less "profound" speculation says that because her son (whose surname is Li and should've been the rightful heir) who was emperor after her and was therefore tasked with constructing her tomb, didn't know what to write for her; after all, she did kill many of his family in her way to power, but she also did some good things during her reign, and was his biological mother (filial piety dictates that one should respect one's parents). But whatever was the case, the stele has accomplished its goal: people now hold vastly differing opinions about her. Some believe she was benevolent, some believe she was cunning and violent, some believe she was ruthless and a tyrant, and some believe she was great solely because she managed to climb to the very top as a woman in a very misogynistic society.

But of course that is just a little connection I've made, and coming back to Zhongli of the Genshin universe: the story itself generally portrays Zhongli in a positive light, and although him being ruthless in the archon wars was mentioned, we were never given any examples of what he did except what he said himself, that the gods he defeated must have broken contracts made with him in some way, and so we cannot really judge him like we can do for a real life historical figure like Wu Zetian (and tbh no one can really judge her either because after all, she lived way over a millenia ago, and innumerable records have been lost to time since then). Nevertheless, the varying opinions of Rex Lapis among different npcs is pretty interesting, and rather telling of his complexity. Ultimately, I think Zhongli/Morax's story is one about letting go. So many famous and powerful people throughout history have tried to take control of how they would be thought of in the future, but how many of them can truly let go and just let others debate their legacy? Not many. And this is part of why I like Zhongli. He understands that he has to let go of certain things, now that the era of gods is ending. Some things are inevitable for all of us, like biological death or the final death-death of finally fading into oblivion, but there's some comfort in accepting this and letting go.

[zeetasposts]

I saw your post about the IkeSen lords and their NoMo MC and thought it was beautifully done! But it got me thinking... What if the lords' mc COULDN'T have kids, not necessarily that she didn't want them. How do you think Hideyoshi, Ieyasu and Masamune would react? Or even Sasuke, Yukimura and Shingen (or any three Lord combo you want... I'm curious about all all of them.)

Hi, hi, dear. ❤🌻🥰Thank you so much for the request love! 🦊Awww, thank you so much for the kind words, dear!❤❤❤❤😳 Hehe, so I didn’t add Sasuke and Yuki cause I was lazy, hope that is okay❤🌻🦋! Anyways so, this one really hit close to home!🙈😱 So I hope I did this justice! I hope you have a super good day and I hope you are keeping safe!  ❤❤🌻🦋

Headcanon: MC that can’t have children feat: Hideyoshi, Ieyasu, Masamune and Shingen 

Ieyasu

The two of you had been married for quite some time now

And naturally, you started trying for children to expand your little porcupine army ^̮^

It had been a few years of trying yet still nothing ≧☉_☉≦

Ieyasu had given both of you, various concoctions of herb mixes to aid in fertility and the two of you practically tried every wives tale in the book, from honey and cinnamon drinks to acupuncture

Yet still nothing (¬_¬)

You decided to go and speak to one of the midwives while Ieyasu was away to war

She did a quick evaluation and after some time she looked you in the eyes, sad look crossing her face ⚆ _ ⚆

She didn’t have to say anything for you to know that you couldn’t have children  ಥ ͜ʖಥ

You offered her a smile and thanked her for the evaluation 

However, the second she left you crumpled to the floor and cried

‧º·(˚ ˃̣̣̥⌓˂̣̣̥ )‧º·˚

Ieyasu came back early that night and was greeted by the sight of you curled up in a ball sobbing  ๐·°(৹˃̵﹏˂̵৹)°·๐

He was by your side in a matter of seconds picking your up and cradling you in his arms, as he moved you to sit in his lap

His heart broke as you refused to look him in the eyes 

All sorts of things had been going through your mind when the midwife left, like would he take up another wife at the news, would he leave you

Long fingers gently wiped away your tears and made their way to hook under your chin so that you were now looking at him ༼☯﹏☯༽

“Tell me what happened, did that stupid Mitsunari make you some horrible tea and force you to drink it.” (◕⍸ ◕✿)

You chuckled through the sobs as he tried to lighten the mood with a joke

His fingertips danced across your cheek as he lovingly caressed your face while wiping away every tear that fell  ( ‘́⌣’̀)/(˘̩̩ε˘̩ƪ)

Finally, through hiccuped sobs, you managed to get out what the midwife had told you

He couldn’t help but shed a tear of his own at how heartbroken you were at the news  (╥_╥)

He simply wrapped you in his arms and tucked your head so that it was now comfortably resting in the crook of his neck. He gently rubs small circles on your back as you spent the night crying in his arms 

He kissed your nose and your cheek, “It’s alright silly girl, there is more than one way to start a family. It’s not your fault so don’t stress about it.” He tried his best to reassure you knowing that you were beating yourself up  (｡◕‿◕｡)

He smiled kissing your forehead, “Besides we already do have a baby we are looking after, I’m pretty sure Mitsunari would die without our care, especially during times when Hideyoshi goes to war.”(｡◕‿◕｡)

At the end of the day, the two of you did have children, albeit not your biological children. 

You adopted two wonderful little boys who were sent to the Oda clan as hostages after their parents died. 

The second, you saw the look on Ieyasu face when he saw the two little scamps you knew that he wanted to rescue them so that they didn’t suffer the same fate he had as a child.

(ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧(ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧

Masamune

Masamune already knew you couldn’t have children

Or rather he suspected 

Every time the two of you would do the deed, you would always joke about, him not having to worry about you getting pregnant (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧

He never thought much of it, shrugging it off thinking you had some fancy futuristic contraception

The two of you never really sat down and had a conversation about it 

Although the more serious Masamune Date got about you, the more you dreaded having to have that convo with the man ಠ╭╮ಠ

After all, he was the leader of his clan and as wife to the future leader certain duties and expectations had to be met

Well not that you were at that point yet, or so you thought

Unbeknown to you Masamune had gone behind your back and consulted with your enemy ninja fiend and his fellow warlords to plan the perfect evening to propose to you (✿◠‿◠)

Masamune knew you were the perfect woman for him, and tbh after having met you, you were the only woman he could ever look at

You taught him how to love and healed him from all his traumas and for that, he will be eternally grateful (◕‿◕✿)

He knew you were never one for grand gestures so he decided to keep it small, besides this way the proposal would genuinely be a surprise

He cooked the two of you dinner like any other night 

After dinner, you made your way outside together to sit and have a nightcap under the stars 

That's when he pulled out a ring and proposed ( ° ᴗ°)~ð (/❛o❛\)

You were so happy you could cry, yet the tears you shed weren’t from happiness  ಥʖ̯ಥ

“Masamune I have to tell you something?” you said in a rather serious tone

He froze up thinking you were going to tell him you didn’t love him, that his feelings had been one-sided, he swallowed the lump in his throat as he spoke, “What is it kitten, don’t tell me you’re afraid of commitment”

You shook your head tears still falling, “Remember all those jokes I made about not having to worry about getting pregnant, well those weren’t jokes, I really can’t.”  （>﹏<）

Everything seemed to move in slow motion, as he was faced with a decision between happiness and duty 

He made up his mind and looked you square in the eyes, “And the problem is what exactly kitten, I love you and you love me right, so say yes” he gave you the broadest smile (˶◕‿◕˶✿)

You couldn’t help but jump into his arms in a tight embrace showering his face in small kisses

In truth, you had received a proposal once before, years ago yet, that man was not able to accept you as you were. Looking back you were thankful he had rejected you, as it had led you onto the path of true love and happiness 

Masamune did eventually get a son and a successor, as the two of you had come across a poor orphaned boy barely surviving on the streets and decided to take him in and raise him as your own. | (• ◡•)| (❍ᴥ❍ʋ)

Shingen

You and Shingen had been married for quite some time now

He was still busy recovering from his lung disease and it was time for the two of you to go back to the future with Sasuke to get him checked out and restock up on meds

 (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧

The two of you, would go back to the future every five years or so just to check up on his lungs, to make sure everything was still good (¬‿¬)

While Shingen was at the doctors, you decided to go to your gynaecologist to check up on your lady bits (¬‿¬)(¬‿¬)

Usually, the two of you would chill in the future for a few months until the next wormhole opened up, which suited you perfectly as it gave you an opportunity to catch up with your family (◕‿◕✿)

One day while you and Shingen were chilling on the couch the gyno called and asked you to come in so she could discuss your results

Shingen looked over at you, “Is everything alright, my goddess.” (◕‸ ◕✿)

You wore a concerned expression as you put down the phone, “I’m not sure, she asked me to come and see her as soon as possible.” (◕__◕✿)

The next day you and Shingen were sitting in the consultation room as the gynaecologist broke the news to you, that you had cervical cancer

Shingen grabbed your shaking hands and squeezed it. 

As the doctor explained your options, Shingen helped keep you calm by rubbing soothing circle on the back of your hand (〃‿〃✿)

The two of you decided to start the treatment immediately as that was the best way to ensure that both of you would be in tip top shape to return to the past

To be honest when the doctor broke the news that after the procedure, you would never be able to have biological children of your own, your heart broke  ( ´•̥̥̥ω•̥̥̥` )

You and Shingen had finally decided to try for children and now that dream seemed to be coming to a crashing end  (つ﹏⊂)

Shingen was there for you every step of the way, just as you were for him when he was sick and in the hospital (づ￣ ³￣)づ

The two of you went through the list of options in terms of children, and being in the future, there were quite a few options 

The two of you finally settled on adoption and quickly approached an agency to fast track it before you had to return back home ~(˘▾˘~)

The two of you landed up adopting four children at once. 

They had been in the system for so long, as they came as a package deal. Neither of them wanting to be separated from the others 

Shingen smiled as the social worker warned him about the 13-year-old’s tendency to run away.┗(＾0＾)┓

The two of you returned back to the past with your four children. You had gone from an empty nest to a full house in less than a year

You were slightly worried about the children having to adapt to a new life in the past, but those worries were for nothing as they were absolutely thriving ヾ(⌐■_■)ノ♪

Even the angsty 13-year old that was rumoured to have run away from his last 10 homes loved every bit of the past

He especially had taken a liking to Yukimura who would train with him

Finally, the four children who had never known love their whole entire lives were now surrounded by it from all sides

Hideyoshi

Oh you had loved your doting husband to bits ( ͡ᵔ ͜ʖ ͡ᵔ )

He was everything you could have ever asked for in a potential partner, kind, loving, caring, need I go on \ (•◡•) /

Hideyoshi had found out very early on that you were unable to have children

In fact, you had actually confided in him way back when he had still sister zoned you ◉_◉

He never judged you for it and honestly never cared whether you could have children or not, all he knew was that he loved you ♥‿♥

He often jokes that the two of you couldn’t possibly raise a child as you already had your hands full with the warlords (｡◕‿‿◕｡)

If the two of you weren’t controlling Nobunaga’s candy binges, you were caring for Mitsunari, heck the two of you even had to break up small fights between bickering warlords

Although all that changed one day when there was a knock on your door in the middle of the night (；一_一)

Naturally, you kicked Hideyoshi out of bed to investigate, as you were to comfortable in the warm cocoon of your bed (｡v_v｡)

Hideyoshi kissed the top of your head as he got up to investigate. 

As he approached the door, he wondered who dare would wake them up so late into the evening ¬_¬

He was already cursing under his breath thinking he might find an injured Mitsuhide on his doorstep in need of medical assistance.

He opened the door and peered into the darkness, no one was there. He frowned thinking it might have been some children pulling a prank ب_ب

Just as he was closing the door, he heard a small sneeze, he looked down to the find out the source of the sound was a baby, that couldn’t have even been more than a few hours old ≧☉_☉≦

He gently picked up the tiny thing and cradled it in his arm. 

He could feel his blood boiling as he felt how cold the little baby’s hand were

(╯=▃=)╯︵┻━┻

He rushed to get a soft blanket to wrap the poor child in and then made his way to your shared room where he relit the fireplace ლ(･ω･*ლ)

At this point, you were sitting up in your futon wondering if Mitsuhide had gotten himself injured again (＾＾；)

Before you could even get up, your eyes widened in shock as you spotted the little bundled in Hideyoshi’s arms as he lit the fireplace ʘ‿ʘ

The second he handed the child to you, you were in love, in fact, both of you were in love  ♡｡ﾟ.(*♡´‿` 人´‿` ♡*)ﾟ♡ °・

You raised the little girl as your own, the two of you could never track down her biological parents, not that you cared as you loved her to bits and would never be able to give her up  (◍•ᴗ•◍)♡ ✧*。

I hope you enjoyed this love🦋🌻! And I hope you are keeping safe and well.❤❤🥰🌻

[conaionaru]

Woman’s game (Ivar the Boneless/Hvitserk)

Does that make me crazy

Synopsis: Skuld is alone with herself and reflects back on her past. Passes the time thinking about murder (as we all do) 

Warnings: insanity, slow descent into madness, toxic relationship, prisoner, flashbacks

Tags: 

@youbloodymadgenius​

Sometimes, time passed slowly; other times, Skuld felt like she had been inside the room for years. She floated above the feeling of consciousness, thinking about everything and nothing at once. She lived her life the best she could, enjoying men, women, money, and alcohol.

In her eyes, there was nothing wrong with her lifestyle. Mother always said to do who and what you love. Being someone's pretty little wife and housewife wasn't for her. She was to be worshipped like a queen and live the happiest life. With Ivar, she could have it all. He looked at her as if she hung the moon and ate out of the palm of her hand.

Give it time, and they would become the most powerful couple alive—Ivar's anger and mind, combined with Skuld's ability to manipulate and flatter. She felt the smile pulling at her lips when she imagined their future—the King and Queen of the World. "All Hail Queen Skuld Ylvasdottir. The most beautiful and powerful of them all." She giggled and brushed through her greasy birdnest of blonde hair.

The grime and dirt were sickening to her, her own waste not that far and no food or water in sight. If they wanted to starve her or were waiting for something, she had no idea. When she wasn't thinking about her future, she planned out Lagertha's downfall, how Skuld would kill her, if she would drag it out or not.

Death and murder were such easy things if you were surrounded by them your whole life. While her brothers were trained in the bolder approach of battle and war, Skuld was taught how to wage war in secrecy. Undermining people, whispering things into their ears, and making them believe it was their idea all along. Her mother taught her five brothers, and life taught Skuld.

The first time she killed, she was not even eleven. Balancing between childhood and womanhood, the girl ran around with the other children. Haldor ran after her like a loyal puppy, the pink-cheeked boy hacking at everything with his wooden sword, saying he will protect her from everything.

The truth was, Skuld didn't need protecting even then. She found out that if you glare at a boy long enough, they will get intimidated and leave. Pretend to be better than them, and their egos make them stutter and curse. Afterward, they are easy prey to ridicule and leave you alone. If not, just threaten them. Years later, the more persistent ones were disposed of during the black of the night and ruled off as an accident.

So at eleven, she ran around carefree, the other shrieking children playing ball. Skuld loved to throw the ball further than the kids could reach or with full force. The stunned face of the child that got hit was always fun, but the crying was annoying. So when the third child broke down crying and run off home, she stopped playing and looked around instead.

The faint chirping of a baby bird could be heard from her left, so she followed the sound till she found the culprit. A baby bird laid under the tree, its wing broken. The mother wouldn't come back for the birdie.

Skuld leaned down to the little thing and cradled it in her palms. It peered up at her, making wounded noises as she looked the wing over. The bone was out, and some feathers were gone. It would survive, but what was it worth if it can't fly. That all a bird is meant for.

It would slowly starve to death and die. What a cruel fate that would be. "Skuld, come on!!! I don't want to play alone." Haldor yelled at her exited, the ball in his hands. The girl's blue eyes watched the distressed animal in her hands. There was no way to help him. She can't just raise it till it dies of old age. 

"Skuld!" She could hear footsteps approaching and her mother's voice calling them for dinner. So Skuld tutted at the small bird in a soothing voice and closed it in her palms. The bird pecked at her soft hands, trying to get free. She tightened her hold and slowly squeezed the life out of it. "Skuld, come eat!"

When her mother found her and looked into her hands, she found the bird with its snapped neck. Her daughter looked at the animal with empty eyes. "Why did you do that?"

"Mercy. It would die anyway. Why let it suffer?"

Skuld chuckled at the memory and looked down at her arms; bloody scratches ran down her arms. She doesn't really remember giving them to herself. She recalls hugging herself from the cold and then the blood running down her arms. 

Maybe she was as broken as the bird she killed. Mercy, that's what she called it. Who would show her the same favor? Would they let her slowly lose her mind before she starved to death? Putting her out of her misery would be nicer. What did she ever do to deserve this treatment? She was a royal guest to Aslaug. What reason does Lagertha have to lock her up and slowly kill her?

Skuld was like a crippled bird trapped and doomed. She killed him, and he got a proper Viking burial. Would they do the same to her? 

"Don't you ever laugh as the hearse goes by,

For you may be the next to die." 

She giggled at the song that she heard when she was small. It was sung by some slave that was sacrificed in her father's honor. The old woman seemed at peace with death, so serene as they cut her throat. Would Skuld die the same way? Without putting up a fight when her body was too weak to save her? She doubted it, all the conflict in her way too stubborn to let go. Fuck them all; they won't take her dignity and sanity. She won't let them win. 

Revenge was something her mother despised. Maybe that's why Ragnar Lothbrok survived, or perhaps Ylva gained more than she lost. After all, an Earldom for a husband was a fair trade. Even if it left you with six children, you have to raise on your own. But no matter who wronged Ylva, she gave them a quick death and never mentioned it again. 

The faster it was over, the better. She would gather her warriors, wage war, and win the battle. Quick revenge, expected, but easily won. Skuld wasn't like that. When someone wronged her, no matter how dire, she would wait and then strike. 

When she was a child, not younger than ten, a boy made fun of her for not having a father. Carefully she made her plan and waited for her moment. Within the year it came. The next winter, the boy was an outcast, ridiculed for his destroyed reputation. 

Destroying a man's reputation was essentially harder than a woman's. Call her a whore, pay off a few people to say she did bad deeds, or was a witch, and she was done for. With men, it was more difficult. Loose morals were, for some reason, praised in boys and men. The more women he slept with, the better. But if he has no honor and no fighting skill, then he is shunned.

So she set him against Haldor, dressed as a commoner. The twelve-year-old boy believed he lost against a smaller thin farmer's child. Haldor had better training and thought the fight to be a game. A good excuse to be as dirty as he wanted. 

The other boy was laughed at, and when news came out to the young girls of Yugar, he couldn't charm any girl for years after. The other men and boys ridiculed him, and the rumors grew worse. Now he fights alongside Skuld's brothers in the shield wall. Sometimes she still wonders if he ever found out it was Haldor who beat him and not a farmer. 

Skuld's revenge on Lagertha would take time as well. She had all the time in the world to plan it. Undermining the bitch and killing off her shieldmaidens was a good start. Make her doubt her security and allies till she went grey from worry. Skuld giggled at the thought and hid her face in her hands.

The door to the hut opened, and the sun burned her eyes. She hissed at the bright light and shielded her eyes with her hand, till a figure did the job instead. Lagertha stood before her in a red gown, surrounded by her shieldmaidens. "Lady Skuld of Yugar. The little lion cub. I am sorry for the lack of hospitality. I had a lot to do."

"I am sure overtaking a kingdom is a lot of work. You could have spared yourself the responsibility and stayed Earl Ingstad." Skuld mussed with a shrug, looking up at the Queen from her spot on the ground. She shakily stood up and glared at the shieldmaiden.

"I took what was rightfully mine."

"And what do I have to do with it? I didn't take your kingdom or husband. All I did was fuck his son. Not yours, of course. I do have boundaries." Skuld chuckled and watched Torvi glare at her. What's her problem? I said I didn't fuck Bjorn. 

Lagertha smiled at her and signaled with her hand. Two shieldmaidens walked in, one holding a dress and another a tray with food and drink. Neither was fitting for someone of Skuld's status or hunger. "It is simply a precaution. Your mother may be on good grounds with Bjorn, but she hated Ragnar. I do not know how she stands with me. Keeping you safe is my priority now."

Skuld chuckled and stepped closer, the shieldmaidens moving to protect Lagertha. What do they think I would do? Throw shit? Now that's a thought she could save for desperate times. "Ah yes, and starving me in a dark room with no chamber pot or water is so nice of you. If you think this will help your relationship with my mother, you are an utter fool."

"You haven't been exactly compliant either. You killed my shieldmaidens. Two, to be exact." Astrid answered for Lagertha. Skuld scoffed and shifted on her feet to seem less threatening.

"I come from a line of warriors. So I tend to attack and kill those who try to kidnap me. Sorry." Skuld obviously meant the last word to be mocking as she wasn't sorry at all. 

"You were close to Aslaug and her sons. Keeping you secluded is the safest option, especially with you acting out. It is better for everybody. With your history." She sat down in her old spot and raised the cup of water to her cracked lips.

She looked at Lagertha with a raised eyebrow. "My history? Are you calling me a whore?"

"I am calling you a dangerous woman with love for violence and death. My actions didn't warm your heart to me either. So it is best to keep you in here till your mother returns."

"That could be months."

"So you better get used to your new home." Astrid mocked, causing Skuld to smirk and sip at the water. 

"I hope you will mention my actions to your mother. After all, I could have had you executed."

Skuld chuckled and leaned back against the wall. In a fast movement, she threw the cup at Lagertha. "Get out, you hateful bitch! I hope you rot in Hel for eternity!"

The Queen turned on her heel, offended, and left with some of her warriors. The door closing behind them. Skuld sat there for a while, breathing heavily. Astrid looked at the girl with soft eyes, frowning at the dirty state she was in. "If you do as you are told and reign your temper in, you will get out of here faster."

Skuld chuckled and looked at the female with disdain clear in her eyes. "Manipulating me into liking you isn't going to work, Astrid. It wouldn't work either. It isn't my mother, Lagertha fears. She fears me." Skuld hissed, leaning forward, spit flying out of her mouth as her blue eyes grew wild. She looked like a rabid animal about to pounce.

"Nonsense."

"I fucked Aslaug's favorite son; I won her favor and Ivar's interest. I got my claws into Kattegat's population, the very people that your precious Queen wants to rule over. If I willed it, I could make them overthrow her. Which is no intention of mine, but Lagertha can't be certain of that. So she locks me up, maybe to starve me till my mother returns. Until then, she will gather a big enough force to beat an Earl."

Astrid smirked at her deduction and turned on her heel to leave. "You would have never been a hostage if you just didn't sleep with Ivar. Lagertha would have never noticed you if you didn't strive so high." She laughed, and Skuld shared her amusement.

With a creepy smile on her dirty face, the Earl's daughter sung the verse that gave her hope. 

"Don't you ever laugh as the hearse goes by,

For you may be the next to die." 

Astrid frowned at the threat and left the room, closing Skuld in the darkness again. She sighed and looked up at the ceiling to calm her racing heart. "Since when had getting laid such a high price? I should have gone to bed instead." She groaned and collapsed back on the floor to catch some sleep.

[thelioncourts]

title: into the trees with empty hands fandom: captive prince pairing: damen/laurent rating: not rated words: 22k tags: Witch!Laurent, Witchcraft, Minor Damen/Jokaste, Discussion of Abortion, Don't go into this expecting spoopy, Kingdom Politics, Minor Violence, Kastor/Jokaste

Summary: Crown Prince Damianos of Akielos' betrothed has gone missing. The Northern Steppes call to him with promise. The Witch of Vere calls to him with answers.

_____________________________________________________________

As far as Damianos was aware, everyone across the continent knew of the Witch of Vere. But not everyone agreed on what was truth and what was fiction regarding his existence.

Some would say that the Witch is a kind soul, a wielder of magic who uses his potions to heal and his enchantments to bring luck. Some would say that the Witch was colder than a Kemptian winter, a sorcerer who casts curses with a wicked tongue and communicates with the dead through the act of the seance.

A Veretian woman living in the now-Akielon, and rightfully Akielon, province of Delpha had once told a story of the Witch helping mothers and children after the loss of a husband or father in battle. A Patran warrior relayed a tale of the Witch not only stitching up and preventing infection to a wound, but also teaching how one could further patch themselves up should they not have the time or means to travel to him. An Akielon man from the north told of the Witch charming the lands of poor farmers, leading their farms to provide produce enough to feed their families and other people of the land whilst also making plenty a profit for themselves to guarantee their future.

There were other stories of the Witch of Vere, however. There were stories of the Witch eviscerating men with more than just his spells. There were tales of him cursing entire families, damning their line for all of eternity. There were tales of him creating poisons with his books and knowledge, poisons that killed people, animals, that may have killed an entire village. There were tales of young boys coming into his home and never coming back out.

There were even darker, more whispered tales that the Witch had murdered his own father, mother, brother, and uncle, the only family he had ever had.

The Crown Prince of Akielos found many of these stories, these rumors, to be outlandish. Even if it were all true, no one, not even a witch, would be allowed to continue living undisturbed, unhunted, if they had committed such heinous acts. If anything, Damianos had often found the stories to be a great form of entertainment around a fire. But even he was aware how the stories impacted most, how each story, however small, was enough to incite fear in the hearts of those who listened.

Only two things ever spoken of the Witch remained consistent in every story told. The first was of his beauty, which according to all, was such a sight to behold that he could bring any and all to their knees with a blink of his eyes underneath the fan of his lashes. Some rumors went as far to say that he was so beautiful that his own blood was used to make the most effective love potions the world had ever seen.

Some rumors said that he was so beautiful that it was dangerous to be in his presence as he could tempt one to do anything he wished.

But the second thing, the thing that made Damianos wish to believe that this enigmatic being was as real as people said, was that he was powerful. Damianos could desperately use that right now.

***

Never in his life had Crown Prince Damianos of Akielos intended on pursuing a witch. The hunting of evil and magical creatures had been a fun game to play as a child, subjecting one poor friend to chase all the others in order to turn them all into fellow witches. But it was just that: a child’s game. No one would willingly put themselves at the mercy of a true witch.

But, as fate would have it, Damianos found himself with no other choice.

It had been difficult, at first, finding someone who had supposedly met the Witch of Vere. Good or bad, people were often reluctant to admit to having been in contact with a witch. It was even harder in Akielos as the Witch of Vere was an outsider, already considered evil by many due to his proximity to Vere, let alone his deeds. Eventually people talked, they always did, and after asking in the rural lands of Sicyon and Thrace, Damianos had a place to begin.

As the Crown Prince, sneaking out of the palace took some navigating, but once out, his getting around and across the border proved easier than he could have imagined. As a lone traveler, all he had needed was passageway in a merchant’s cart — something provided with gratitude because of the half pound of gold Damianos put in the man’s hand — and he was in Alier where the mountains gave way to jagged land not two days later.

Briefly he worried of Vaskian mountain raiders, but even they would not see much purpose in attacking a man covered in a ragged cloak and owning nothing but a large bag filled with traveling essentials and the sandals on his feet.

His entire journey along the mountain border was rough. For days and for nights he walked, occasionally stealing away in unsuspecting carts at night, roaming a land that was unforgiving. But he had gone this way for a reason, the reason being that unforgiving meant uninhabited.

Even with the sloped and rocky ground that gave way into frigid and frozen soil, Damianos walked quickly and before he knew it, he was in Lys, then Toutaine, and lastly Varenne. And at long last, a five days’ hike to be exact, the Northern Steppes were laid out before him.

With only minor trepidation, he entered the Great Northern Forest.

[Continue on AO3]

Unlike his arrival in Alier days earlier, Damianos did not immediately begin walking. First he sat his bag on the ground and retrieved a multitude of things he had packed along for the fear of the bitter cold. Not familiar with winter personally, but knowing of it, Damianos had packed a second cloak that had a hood to cover his head and that fell down to the middle of his calves. It was lined with fur, the same kind of fur that made up the inside of his packed gloves and boots. A quick test showed Damen that he had underestimated the winter for this wasn’t enough. But it would have to do. He was so close.

There were creatures in the Steppes that Damianos had never seen before. During the day, as he trekked along, he came across tiny, thick-furred animals. Some of them were so small that they created shelter in packed snow banks or underground in tiny burrows. All the small ones were white, a camouflage to protect them from the bigger, more dangerous beasts. On Damianos’ first night, he felt lucky to not see one of those beasts. Not knowing them, he had no inkling as to how they would appear, but once, when the moon was highest, he heard them, howling and growling in the distance.

The next morning, after ten days total of travel, he at long last came across the cabin.

The first thing he noticed was the fire roaring inside. It was a proof of life, of someone’s existence, but it also brought forth to Damianos a great rush of envy. What he would give to feel his hands and feet again. There were other things he noticed about it afterward, things like how normal it looked on the outside, like the branches with live blooms hanging by the door, the plants magically living in the snow, or like the well-worn pathway leading up to it, or like the lack of movement inside.

For a moment, Damianos contemplated what would be his best move; he could leave now, set up his own camp in a nearby clearing and rest in order to regain some of his strength, or he could attempt to make contact with the Witch now. His eagerness to see if the stories were true in any capacity took over him though, and he shucked his bag to the ground and took a deep breath.

A village woman in Thrace had told Damianos of what to do once he reached the cabin, should he find it. He felt a bit foolish, but he went about it with as much confidence as he could muster, which, in truth, was quite a lot. Determined steps brought him to the door where he knocked four times before immediately retreating back to the stones that marked the path like a gateway. Once there, he waited a beat before announcing loudly into the air, “My name is Damianos. I have traveled here from Akielos seeking the Witch of Vere. I require assistance and answers only he can provide.” From there he bent down to fish through his forgotten bag in order to pull out handfuls of gold. “I have brought gold.”

Damianos waited, fully expecting the door of the cabin to open wide, fully expecting to be face-to-face with the Witch of Vere. But nothing happened. Nothing happened at all.

For an entire hour, Damianos waited patiently for the Witch to come and greet him. For another hour, Damianos waited less patiently.

Unsure of what was going on, Damianos repeated his earlier actions and walked up to the door to knock four times.

“My name is Damianos,” he said once more after retreating back to the stones. “I have traveled here from Akielos seeking the Witch of Vere. I require assistance and answers only he can provide. I have brought gold.”

Nothing.

“I have brought much gold,” Damianos continued. “Enough gold to satisfy any Kyros in Akielos and certainly any council member in Vere.”

Still, nothing.

For one more hour, Damianos waited between the stones. He was half-tempted to go and try to open the door anyway, but instinct told him nothing good would come from that. But three hours of standing in the cold was too much and Damianos was weary from his travels. With one last look at the cabin windows which had shown no movement in the time Damianos had stood, he finally left, finding the clearing he had spotted earlier and beginning to set up a makeshift camp.

His own fire started surprisingly easy, and the tent he had manufactured wasn’t pretty but it did its job, and when night came and went, he awoke without answers and a noticeably dwindled food supply from his nearly two weeks of travel.

So he tried again.

“My name is Damianos. I have traveled here from Akielos seeking the Witch of Vere. I require assistance and answers only he can provide. I have brought gold, and much of it.”

For three more days he repeated this ritual, knocking and retreating and announcing and waiting. By the fifth day of standing outside the Witch’s cabin, Damianos’ patience was nearing its end and he was beginning to think he was quite idiotic for believing in such a fairytale.

“My name is Damianos. I have traveled here from Akielos seeking the Witch of Vere. I require assistance and answers only he can provide. I have brought gold, and much of it.”

This time, he said it with clear frustration in his tone, frustration that had him half-heartedly kicking at the stones.

“I have heard your announcement many a time,” a voice sounded out suddenly from nowhere and everywhere all at once. Damianos jumped back from the gate, eyes searching the cabin and the skies, and the voice continued. “Though I find it all quite redundant, I do admire your relentlessness.”

Fumbling, Damianos tossed his bag to the ground and fell to his knees beside it, scrambling inside of it for his gold that he had days earlier quit bringing out. His bare knees were bitten numb by the snow. With his arms outstretched and his eyes still searching, he repeated, “I have brought gold in my request for your assistance.”

“So you have said,” the voice drolled. “I fear, Damianos of Akielos, that you lack understanding of my demands.”

It was easy to get lost listening to the Witch’s voice, honing intently on the clear tone of it, honing intently to its pitch and control.

“You have not made any demands of me,” Damianos said. His arms fell to his sides.

“Do not play a fool. All who find me know of my demands. They are very simple, too: approach, knock four times, return to the gateway, and make an offering of value.”

“I have done all that,” Damianos said after a beat, his eyebrows furrowed in confusion. “I have done all that repeatedly.”

“I know who you are, Damianos. You are no mere Akielon citizen. You are the Prince. Of what value is gold to you?” the voice asked him. It sounded genuinely curious.

“Gold is of value to all.”

“If you can casually give to me as much as you are offering, gold is of little importance to your life. Bring to me something of value.”

Every part of Damianos wanted to argue, but with patience he had demonstrated thus far, he waited to see if the Witch would speak again. When there was no noise beyond the rustling of dead leaves in the trees to accompany Damianos’ loud heartbeat, he made the familiar journey back to his camp to think.

After a restless night of deep contemplation, he had a solution.

It took almost two full days to fashion together his offering. Gold didn’t melt easily and finding something to shape it around proved near impossible. By the time it was completed and cooled with the abundance of snow, Damianos slipped it on.

It wasn’t beautiful, not in any way, but its purpose would be evident.

His seventh day in the forest, Damianos once again approached the unchanged Witch’s cabin. Inside he could see that the very same fire was going strong and it burned within him a necessary conviction. Repeating the ritual for what was hopefully the last time, Damianos walked to the door, knocked four times, went back to the stones, and announced, “My name is Damianos. I have traveled here from Akielos seeking the Witch of Vere. I require assistance and answers only he can provide. I have brought, in offering, my freedom.”

Outstretching his arms from the warm cocoon of his cloak, Damianos bared the cuff shackled to his right wrist.

He had not been certain in the last two days if the Witch was familiar with slave practices across the continent, but with his reputation for knowledge Damianos assumed the message would be clear.

The voice laughed, an unkind laugh that felt mocking. “You liken to extremes, do you not, Prince Damianos?”

“I am desperate,” Damianos answered.

When nothing happened, Damianos felt his patience lose its last hold all the way in his fingertips. “Do you accept or not?”

The door to the cabin opened wide.

***

Inside, the cabin was unnervingly dark.

It was the first thing Damianos noticed, though secondly was the stifling heat. The fire, which had been roaring high the entire time Damianos had stood outside was suddenly nothing but smoldering embers, yet the remaining heat was almost painful in its relief on Damianos’ skin, stinging like a burn that seeped all the way into his bones.

Damianos had never given thought to what a witch’s cabin should look like, but if he ever would have he definitely would not have imagined this. The entire room smelt of lavender and cinnamon, and fresh herbs were gathered in clay pots that sat on the sills of the windows, drowning the blue hue of the streaming moonlight in greenery. Rugs lined the rough wooden floors and books of all kinds littered the tables and shelves, the only clutter in an area otherwise so organized.

But the cabin’s almost welcoming appearance didn’t take away that there was something to be fearful of in here. Damianos startled when the cabin door slammed shut from somewhere behind him, done so with no force from another physical person. Then came the unmistakable click of the lock.

“How desperate are you?” the voice of the Witch asked, and it sounded as though it was only inches behind Damianos. Damianos whipped around, eyes searching even though they hadn’t quite adjusted to the dark, but all he found was the blank slate of wood that made the door from which he had entered. “You have offered me yourself. Is the significance of that lost on you? It is near the equivalent of offering the devil your soul.”

“Near the equivalent, but not exact in its likeness,” Damianos said. The voice hummed thoughtfully.

“If it is not exact, then you must have only heard the good things about me.”

“I have heard many things about you,” said Damianos, “but I am to be King one day. To rush into a decision based upon only the words of others could be detrimental. I would much rather make decisions upon my own observances.”

“But if you are here then you must believe the words of someone, yes? After all, my ego is not so large to assume that knowledge of my being has crossed into the barbaric lands of Akielos unscathed.”

Movement caught Damianos’ eye, but it was an animal of some sort, one that scurried underneath a table by the far wall.

“For how long are we to speak in circles?” Damianos asked instead. His finger was tapping incessantly at his thigh.

“However long I wish. You offered me your freedom.”

There was silence, and Damianos took it as opportunity to continue to observe. The animal that he had spotted emerged its head from underneath the table it had disappeared under. It was a white darling cat with brown marbled in its fur. It had large blue eyes.

“Tell me what you have heard of me. Then tell me what you believe. Should your answers be adequate, we will continue on to the answers you seek.”

Damianos turned from where the cat was still sitting, watching him, and faced instead the emptiness of the room.

“I have heard many things about you, Witch of Vere. I have heard praises sung of your good deeds and your kindness. I have also heard awful things. I have heard stories of young boys walking into this very cabin and never leaving it again. I have heard of girls cut open on your dining table, their children taken violently from their wombs. I have heard you were cold enough to murder your own family without regret. I have heard many things about you.”

The words were honest as they tore themselves from Damianos’ throat. When the voice did not speak after a moment though, he continued.

“Only two things have remained consistent in all the accounts I have heard, and those are the two things I choose to believe. The first is that you are beautiful. There are stories, implications, that have followed that, however. Stories that you bathe in the blood of virgins to maintain your youthfulness. But it is the second as to why I am here, for I have heard from all that you are the most powerful witch to have walked the continent since Agnesot of the Artisan Empire nearly four hundred years ago.”

For the first time since entering the cabin, Damianos heard a noise that was not the voice speaking nor the crackling of the embers burning hot in the hearth. He heard the creak of wood from a singular staircase that ascended near the very hearth and he watched with bated breath as a figure approached.

Immaculate boots caught the moonlight with their shine and it was something that took Damianos aback for it was not what he expected from a witch, or anyone this secluded from the rest of society. Up, Damianos took in the fine material of the pants, the intricate laces, winding their way up and down the lean body’s torso and arms, and the collar of the shirt and the length of the sleeves, both of which covered nearly all skin in a shield to protect it from onlookers’ eyes. Finally, facing forward, Damianos set sight on the Witch’s face.

Tales of the Witch’s beauty were true. Damianos felt horribly aware of his own shaky intake of breath, of the slackness of his own mouth, but he was impossible to stop it. The Witch’s skin was a near match to the unblemished porcelain of the snow surrounding them outside. It was accompanied by ice colored eyes that were unreadable in expression, yet framed with curled lashes that brushed the tops of cold-flushed cheeks whenever the Witch blinked. The flush matched the color of the pink fullness of his mouth, and both things were the only contrast to his otherwise cool-toned, sharp features. In fact, those two things softened him into something almost precious. Or perhaps it was the halo of gold surrounding his head, his hair shining like the sun on the waters near Isthima.

Damianos took an involuntary step forward before catching himself.

“Well?” the Witch mused, blue eyes never leaving the Prince’s face.

“You must bathe in the blood of virgins,” Damianos managed to mutter. He swore the Witch’s eyes gleamed at that.

“I am not concerned with one’s number of sexual encounters,” said the Witch. “My concerns lie in other matters, such as the Prince of Akielos’ presence so very far from home.”

“Yes, it has been a long journey,” Damianos agreed, still searching that beautiful face.

“How are you taking to the cold?” the Witch asked. He was speaking as though they were friends, as though there was not a strangeness to this all so present it was palpable in the air surrounding them both.

“The snow is beautiful. I am not sure I enjoy the freezing of my limbs, however.”

The Witch made a noise and he walked toward the cat. “I do suppose the snow is beautiful. I am quite accustomed to it. But it brings with it a peace, does it not? I do not know what I would do if I were to be surrounded by the warmth of sunshine instead.”

“Akielos will be void of sunshine if I do not receive answers soon,” said Damianos. The feeling shifted as the conversation returned to its proper track.

The Witch circled him and Damianos stood very still. Briefly, he thought the Witch was akin to the nameless beasts he heard growling in the forest at night, and Damianos was one of those small white creatures in the vulnerability of an open clearing.

“Void of sunshine? My, what cynicism. Do tell me why. Do tell me how. Such a thing cannot happen in as short a time as the turning of the moon.”

“But it can and it shall,” Damianos started. “My betrothed has gone missing. If she is not found, if she is not returned, I fear Akielos will face terrible hardship. I fear, worst of all, its entire structure could fall apart beneath us.”

“You put quite a value of importance on one woman.”

Damianos interrupted the conversation he had started. “Please allow me to call you something. I cannot address you as the Witch, but it is all I know. What is your name?” He was dizzy with the conversation already, dizzy with the weight of his own tongue in his mouth.

“Unlike you, Prince, I know the power of gifting things away. I am not so quick to make a deal with a devil,” the Witch chastised, but he was smiling. It was a cold smile. It was cruel. “Continue.”

“The wedding has been scheduled since the week of her birth. As it was written and as it was signed, our wedding was to be on the day of Midsummer, when the sun spent longest in the sky, and in the year in which the five planets aligned. That day is in two months. But she is not in Akielos. She is not anywhere. She vanished in the daylight three months ago and her father is ready to begin a war for her.”

“A war against Akielos?” asked the Witch.

“Not as of now. The man is a great noble from Aegina. It is one of our farming provinces. But should he wish to go to war, my father will support him. He has been raging about Vere and the Vaskian tribes for weeks.” Damianos started to pace. The Witch was watching him. He allowed Damianos to continue on. “There are many things that could have happened, but I need to know the truth. I cannot, will not, engage my armies in a war over one woman unless I have absolute proof she has been taken, as some of the nefarious rumors have implied. But should I refuse, I fear something even worse than a war with Vere or Vask; I fear civil war. Her father is popular in the north and if there was ever such an area to begin unrest with the capital...” Damianos looked pointedly at the Witch. “I must figure out the truth or I will have no kingdom to rule.”

“You sound far more invested in the welfare of your kingdom than in your betrothed,” the Witch said. “Is she such a hideous prospect?”

“She is beautiful. But her beauty does not matter. Our betrothal was political and she is political. I once thought…” Damianos trailed again, but he shook himself out of going down that path.

“She is political,” the Witch started curiously, “and you are more a romantic. You wanted to love her, and her love you in turn, when you got married.”

“Yes.”

“Why would you think I have answers about your betrothed?” the Witch then asked with a different kind of curiosity.

“Initially I believed such a thing for there were rumors she came to you. Each was different in its reasoning for why she would come here, but it was something I heard from several of my people,” Damianos admitted. “But upon questioning those people further, and finding more people to question along my journey here, I no longer believe that. There are many that confirm she traveled by the Ellosean Sea. She could not have gotten here traveling in such a way.”

“That’s not true, Prince,” the Witch said. “If she took the sea, she could have landed in the province of Marches in Vere before traveling innocuously along Vere’s border, by the palace in Arles, and into the Great Northern Forest. She very much could have been one of the many virgins I bathed in the blood of.”

“She is no virgin.”

“You said she was political, however. By what do you mean?” the Witch asked.

“She seeks power. It is the only reason I believe she would not abandon our betrothal willingly. To be wed to me, to be the Queen of Akielos, would be too much for her to pass up on. And yet…” Damianos trailed one last time, “I am uncertain of everything.”

“Prince Damianos of Akielos,” the Witch said, his tone indicating to Damianos’ ears that this conversation was coming to a close. “We will begin the process of trying to answer your questions at another time. But until then, I suppose I shall give you menial tasks to complete.”

“Tasks?”

“You are mine, are you not”

***

Crown Prince Damianos of Akielos had worked hard for many years on all things related to battle. But never in his life had he had to do basic chores for a household. The next morning, upon awakening in his campsite in the forest, Damianos had stood outside the Witch’s cabin for some time contemplating if he was to still knock. The Witch answered that query for him, opening the cabin door as he had yesterday to bid Damianos inside. From there he had given the Prince a list to complete; tend to the plants, gather and chop firewood from the forest, feed the cat (which Damianos had deemed to be the devil the Witch kept bringing up in conversation).

While Damianos completed such tasks, the Witch was nowhere in sight. In fact, Damianos was certain the Witch was not in the cabin at all. Still, Damianos worked and when evening came about, the Witch reappeared with two gifts for Damianos.

“You may sleep here,” the Witch told him as he began preparing a hot meal for the two of them. “I know this is not your normal standard of accommodation, but I truly cannot have a future king dying of starvation or frostbite whilst owned by me. It would be dreadful for that to get about.”

Damianos could not tell if he was joking or not, but he was grateful nonetheless.

The sofa near the hearth was surprisingly comfortable, though Damianos wondered if that was due to his weeks of sleeping on the cold forest floor, but when he awoke he was startled by two things. The first was the feeling of waking and not knowing where one was, and it rocketed his heartrate until memory returned. The second was the feeling of weight on his chest, just above his ribcage, that made it difficult to take a deep breath. That was resolved quickly, however, as Damianos opened his eyes and found the cat sitting on him and staring unblinkingly at the subtle expansion of his breaths leaving his open mouth. Damianos jolted awake and the cat meowed as it was forced to move, to jump away and onto the ground.

Damianos stumbled as he tried to stand to full attention with dignity, and that’s when he saw something that threw him into a near panic. In the hearth was a pot and in the pot was a ladle that was stirring the pot’s contents all on its own. Damianos turned his head like a dog trying to make sense of a human’s incomprehensible jabbering.

“This trick was not intended to evoke fear,” the Witch said from the table near the window. Damianos turned to give the Witch his attention and found him with a book whose writing was gibberish to Damianos’ eyes and a steaming cup with a spoon doing the same trick as the pot with the ladle.

“I am not afraid,” said Damianos. His voice was gruff.

The Witch gestured to the empty seat across from and it was only with minor hesitancy that Damianos accepted. Then nothing happened.

“Do you suppose your drink will simply appear before you?” the Witch asked, his eyes never leaving his book.

“I thought,” Damianos fumbled, “I thought that —”

“That I would get it for you as you have never had to do such a thing on your own? Oh, my dear brute, you are forgetting your position here already. You may fetch it yourself.”

So Damianos did. And when the Witch tasked him with getting more wood, Damianos did that as well. After another day of doing work, the sun set and the Witch began supper. It was then that Damianos asked, “What of my betrothed?”

“In time,” said the Witch.

The next morning, Damianos’ third day since entering the cabin, began much as the day before. He made it to noon before the lack of communication wore thin each of his fried nerves. He couldn’t stop thinking of Akielos.

“I do not understand you,” Damianos said loudly after having ground up spices for nearly an hour. “I have done all you have asked with no complaint. I have offered you my very self and yet all you have done is require me to clean and fetch us both hot tea. I am beginning to believe your magic does not extend beyond stirring stews and reading in languages others cannot understand.”

The Witch looked at him steadily from where he was rifling through a stack of unrecognizable papers.

Then it started.

It started slowly, crept in like a storm front. He felt it first in the center of his chest. It was the same feeling he had felt when the cat had sat on him that first morning, like a weight preventing a deep breath. Then he felt it in his head, an ache behind his eyeballs. The feeling in his chest swelled, moving until it took over his entire body. Blackness blurred the edges of his vision and it was without fault that he fell to his knees, hands grasping at his throat as if he could pull the blockage from himself, as if he could push air back into his lungs.

He was going to die.

Horrible noises were leaving him, wounded sounds, and he could barely make sense of the Witch’s figure looming over him, his blond hair hanging like the invisible rope tight around Damianos’ neck as he lost his ability to breathe.

Then, like nothing ever happened, the feeling stopped and Damianos fell forward even more, gasping in broken sounds as air returned to his body.

“You would do best not to insult me, Prince,” the Witch spat. The last word left his mouth as though the action was venomous. “Now finish with your tasks.”

The Witch disappeared, exiting the cabin, the electricity of his power still lingering in the air, and it took Damianos several minutes to pull himself up to his feet. When he did, he saw that while proving his power the Witch destroyed several items in his own home. Books and papers were strewn haphazardly, all far from where they had been sitting, and several pots that the plants sat in were shattered, the soil all over the floor and other surfaces on which they rested.

Hours later, when the Witch returned, Damianos’ head was still somewhat fuzzy.

While the Witch had been gone, Damianos had done his best to restore everything back to its place as well as begin on his tasks should the Witch wish to direct his rage once again. But when the Witch came back he barely glanced at the room or at Damianos. He went straight for the table by the window instead and, with a sweep of his hand, pushed everything to the edge where the table met the wall.

“Sit,” he demanded.

Though each part of him screamed to keep distance between himself and the Witch, Damianos listened and sat himself across from the Witch at the table. He reminded himself silently and none-too-gently to hold his tongue. He watched raptly as the Witch gently untied the strings of a black velvet bag. From it he drew out a deck of cards. The cards were blue, the kind of blue Damianos had only ever seen in the meadows of Karthas, or perhaps the very blue of the Witch’s eyes. On the cards’ backs was a symbol, but of what Damianos could not tell. He could only see golden spikes.

With an elegance, the Witch placed the deck of cards on the far left end of the table. Then, with his magic, he spread them out in an arch until the cards were just overlapping at the edges.

The symbol became clear to Damianos in that moment: a starburst.

“What are these?” he asked.

“These are cards,” the Witch answered simply.

Damianos had to bite down on his tongue so as to not reply to that. He left himself with an achingly familiar twitch of annoyance at the Witch’s evasive nonanswers instead. “Yes, I can see that. But what is their significance?”

“These are cards about you.”

Fast as lightning, Damianos’ eyes went to the Witch’s face. For his part, however, the Witch was not paying him any mind. His blue eyes were focused solely on the display of cards, on the closeness of their edges to Damianos’ own fingertips.

“How could you have cards about me?”

“I have cards about all peoples,” the Witch said. “Even myself.”

“And what do your cards say?” Damianos could not resist asking.

“Telling you would mean nothing. Not yet. You do not even know which cards are yours.”

“Then pick them out or let me pick them so you can tell me.” His fingertips that were only inches away from the cards went to snatch at them, but the Witch physically slapped them away. It did not hurt, but it brought on a kind of shock. It was the first time they had touched and Damianos wasn’t surprised the Witch’s hands were cold.

“You cannot just pick the cards,” the Witch said. “They pick you, Prince.”

The two of them stared at once another. Again, Damianos’ chest began to feel tight and he almost began to yell out at the Witch, to ask what he did to warrant a repeat performance, but he realized quickly it was a nervousness and not the Witch at all.

“Now,” the Witch began again, “there are three cards lying here about you and your betrothed. One card is about your past, one about your present, and one about your future. You need to think hard about your betrothed. Think about everything you know about her, think of everything she has done, think of every feeling she has ever evoked from you. Think about everything about her and hold your hands above the cards. Yes, like that. Listen to them. There are three and they will find you.”

At first Damianos felt absurd, both hands floating aimlessly over the blue and gold of the cards, but, suddenly, a sense of calm overtook him, washed over him and unwound the tightness of his chest. Through his palms he could feel something radiating, calling for his touch. With as gentle a hand as he could find, he extracted one card, then another, then one more.

“Listen to them before you hand them to me,” the Witch said, whispered as to not break the magic in the air. “The order matters. The direction matters. The cards will tell you.”

When Damianos finally handed the cards over, the calm rushed away from him in the same way his air had earlier left his lungs, and Damianos held his breath as the Witch flipped the three cards over so that the starbursts were tableside.

Of the three cards, one was upside down, its figure facing the Witch and not Damianos. It was on Damianos’ right and it showed a man on a throne. The graying beard on his face reminded Damianos of his own father and the scepter in his hand gleamed gold in the light. Its text said ‘The Emperor’ in shimmering letters. Next to it, in the middle, was a card with an Ektoryn. In myth, Ektoryns were said to be the speakers of the gods. In the case of this card, the Ektoryn appeared to be Gilead, the one that announced fate with the declaration of a trumpet. The card said ‘Judgement.’ It was the final card, or the first card, though that made Damianos suck in a breath. Typhon, the Devil, could never be a good sign. With horns and fire decorating the intimidating figure, Damianos could not see how.

“Do not fret so heavily over the Devil,” the Witch told him with such ease that Damianos’ shoulders relaxed without his acknowledgement. “He is not what concerns me here.”

“What do they all mean?”

It felt as if these cards suddenly held the entire future of his kingdom and Damianos felt such a horrid feeling that he desperately needed alleviated with the Witch’s words.

“We shall start with the Devil to ease your mind, Prince,” the Witch said, delicate hands pushing the card and its figure closer to Damianos. “The Devil, when facing you, is often there to signify entrapment. You two were betrothed at birth, were you not?” Damianos nodded. “This betrothal, paired with her political motivation and your more romantic inclination, have led the two of you to feel in such a way. The Devil, here to your left, is the past, showing you how the two of you came to be.”

With the same delicate hand, the Witch pulled the Devil back toward himself and pushed forward instead the Ektoryn, Gilead.

“Facing you, the card of Judgement is the signifier of self-reflection. Similarly to the Devil, Judgement shows a changing point you both had at a very recent time in your lives. You trailed off once about how you perhaps thought a romantic attraction was possible with the two of you, but something changed that, didn’t it?” Damianos nodded again. “Something of the same significance must have occurred within her as well.” Then, almost as a warning, the Witch continued. “Make no mistake of the implication of this card. While self-reflection sounds like a good thing, it does not always have to be about bettering oneself. In some cases, it could be a way of finding how to get ahead with what one has.”

Damianos took in the open and simple face of the Ektoryn, and he took in its outstretched hands that were searching for answers. He saw himself in that image and thought, yes, he could see what the Witch meant.

“But this card,” the Witch interrupted his thoughts, pushing the last card to Damianos, “this card brings me great trepidation, Prince.”

Looking at the Witch with concern, Damianos asked, “Why? What does it mean?”

“Upside down like this, the Emperor is tyrannical. With a position in royalty such as your own, Damianos, you can understand the fear of tyranny.”

The two of them fell quiet. Damianos waited for the Witch to continue to explain the Emperor as he had explained the Devil and the Ektoryn, but the Witch was only staring at the cards. His blond brows were furrowed together, his blue eyes scanning, when suddenly he sat up straight with rigid shoulders and shuffled the cards together as though that could hide what he had just realized or seen.

“What is it? What did you find?” Damianos asked quickly. His hands were gripping the edge of the table.

“You will know,” the Witch mumbled. “You will know in time. Probably faster than you’d like.”

Fury filled Damianos’ veins then. In time, in time, he thought bitterly to himself, wanting desperately to lash out, to sweep all the cards onto the floor, but he didn’t. When he finally felt as though he wouldn’t throw a punch in his anger, Damianos looked up only to find the Witch watching him, looking amused.

“You do quite well at reeling in your most volatile of emotions,” the Witch said, and Damianos wanted to hit him all over again. “But there is one more card for you. Think of yourself as this one finds you. Think of yourself and no other creature.”

There was an ache in Damianos’ jaw from clenching it so tight. The muscle was twitching, a striking feeling, and it was then Damianos realized his fingernails were biting half-moons into his palms. He watched with dark eyes as the Witch finished shuffling the deck of cards and once again placed them in a gentle arch for Damianos’ eyes.

“There is one for you,” the Witch repeated, “and only one.”

Concentrating on what lay before him, Damianos focused on his breathing, focused on settling it, focused on the rhythmic boom ba-boom boom of his heart in his ears. Then, like before, he lifted his hands and waited for the card to call to him.

When it found him, he handed the Witch his card and the Witch flipped it over. Damianos laughed acridly and almost expectantly at the image it beheld.

“What does this mean for me? Beyond the obvious, that is.”

“What is the obvious?” the Witch asked him. Damianos had expected the Witch to laugh, had expected that cruel smile he had seen more than once to appear, but the Witch looked at him with a kind of curiosity instead, something entirely new on his face. It made Damianos’ stomach flip.

“The Fool,” Damianos said, gesturing somewhat wildly at it. “What else could it mean but I am unfit for my position? That my journey here was useless and unnecessary?”

“So that is what you believe it to mean? That is not what it means at all.” The Witch held the card between two long fingers an examined it with a light behind his eyes. “People so often become obsessed with the names of these cards that they do not take into consideration the meaning at all. The Devil, as example, emits such a fear that it sends people into a panic before they come to the realization that it is not an inherently evil card. The Fool, facing you as he is now, is a lovely card to draw.”

“What does it mean?” Damianos asked, softer this time.

“The Fool means innocence. It means you are to start on a new journey. Whatever that may be.”

***

After the reading of the cards, the Witch went about making more tea and hot broth for dinner. It was silent in the cabin, at least between Damianos and the Witch, and as the Witch busied himself Damianos petted absently at the cat that liked to nestle into the crook of his elbow.

As he ate, Damianos couldn’t get the images of the cards out of his mind. Like a nightmare, the Devil, the Ektoryn, the Emperor, and the Fool all flashed behind his eyelids like some unstoppable force couldn’t help but replay them over and over again

“You’re aware I realized something whilst looking at your card of the Emperor, yes?” the Witch asked after hours of quiet. The question brought Damianos out of his own head and, just like earlier, he nodded. “I have a confession, Prince.”

Expectantly, Damianos waited, wanting to know what had the Witch so visibly uncomfortable after having read the Emperor. What he said brought on the most conflicting set of feelings Damianos had ever experienced at one time.

“Your initial assumptions of your betrothed’s disappearance were correct for she was here but just over a month ago.”

The confession startled Damianos so much that he almost fell forward, words tearing themselves out of his mouth before he could stop them. But the Witch only talked over him, beckoning him for silence.

“I did not realize it was her, not until I was looking at your cards. She did not offer her place of origin and I did not ask, only assuming by her coloring and conduct that she was Veretian. It appears now, however, that she was Akielon.”

“Start from the beginning,” Damianos said. “Please.”

“Yes, yes. But you need to sit down. I fear you are not prepared for what I am about to say.”

They both sat on the sofa in front of the hearth and momentarily Damianos got lost in how the warm glow of the fire changed the Witch’s appearance so.

“Your betrothed, Jokaste, arrived outside of my cabin early in the day. She was quiet, offering me no extra information and asking none of me. It appeared at first as though this was going to be like any other exchange of services and goods, but it was when the pain settled in that she began to ramble. She damned herself, she said she was not careful enough. After several minutes of going on in such a fashion, she began to shake as she said she was afraid she would lose everything with such a mistake.”

“When the pain settled in?” Damianos repeated, wide-eyed. “Why was she in pain?”

“Some of the stories you have heard of me are true, Prince. When asked, I do rid women of children they cannot bring into this world, whatever their reason. That is why your betrothed was here.”

The ground crumbled underneath Damianos’ feet.

It didn’t literally, of course, but his entire being felt like it was impossibly falling into an abyss of uncertainty. Words escaped him in his fall.

“I came to the understanding that her soon-to-be was powerful, but I never would have jumped to the conclusion that they were a prince. Was the child yours?”

Damianos looked into the fire. “No. My father ordered her out of my bed a year ago, for propriety’s sake. He did not want us siring a bastard, even with the intention of wedding. Best to avoid any kind of scandal.”

“I fear she did not seem to have the same kind of preservation in mind,” the Witch said.

The room grew quiet, Damianos processing and the Witch allowing him to do so. It wasn’t a hurt Damianos was feeling, he concluded quite quickly. Jokaste was beautiful, was intelligent, but the draw of it all was that she was to be his Queen. They had melded together, carnally, in those earliest of days, seeing each other only when the moon was high, and by morning she’d be gone and Damianos would think nothing of it. Yet, this was a betrayal. It wasn’t as though this was the situation of his father and mother, where they were loyal to one another for a decade before it became evident Egeria would not be able to bring to life an heir. Only then did his father begin his relationship with his mistress, resulting in the birth of Kastor. No, this wasn’t that; Jokaste didn’t even give their marriage a chance.

“Do you know where she is now?” Damianos asked after minutes of that quiet.

“I offered for her stay here as she needed to recover. She declined, citing a place she knew she could seek refuge as she rested. I know not where that place is.”

“Can you find out?” Damianos asked.

The Witch sighed. “I can. It will take but an hour. However, I must advise against it.”

“Why?”

“Nothing good ever rises from emotions such as your current own,” the Witch said, sounding almost as though speaking from experience.

“Finding her is not about me. It is about preventing war. If I can bring her back to Akielos, show to her father that her leaving was of her own doing and not of Patras, Vask, Vere, and most definitely anyone in Akielos, he will have no reason to continue his push for violence. I will not have to lose any of my men.”

The Witch stared at Damianos’ face. Up close like this, Damianos could see the reflection of the fire in the Witch’s blue eyes. Damianos could see that the Witch had recently wetted his lips for they shined.

“What will come of her in her return to Akielos?”

“She will probably be exiled. My father will not take her conceiving with another man, not after the signing of our betrothal since birth, lightly.”

The Witch stared a minute more. “Come. This will take some time.”

It was fascinating, watching the Witch prepare to use his power. The first thing he did was gather ingredients. He plucked leaves off of a rowan tree twig and crushed them, the mortor and pestle granites meticulously rasping against one another. From the leaves green leaked and it was only when the leaves were but a mush of wetness that the Witch added a red powder from a jar on the desk. Together the two created a paste, a muck of sorts that the Witch scraped off to one pile in the mortor.

Then, with expert fingers, the Witch snipped off a line of twine from a roll and began a new preparation of leaves and herbs. Damianos didn’t recognize most of them. Some were long, predominantly stems with tiny buds or leaves decorating their length, while others were shorter, fuller plants with large leaves and even some flowers. One flower was gold. If slipped behind an ear, or if tucked into a plait of braids, the flower would blend perfectly with the Witch’s hair.

When the twine was tied, the plants secured, the Witch stood and opened a cabinet above the desk. Inside, Damianos spotted a large stack of papers, so large it nearly touched the top of the cabinet, and stuffed in beside it was a book. Damianos assumed the Witch would reach for the book, but he didn’t; instead he pulled at one of the papers lowest in the pile.

It was a map of the continent.

It was written in Veretian, its Achelos almost startling on the page. The Witch spread it out flat on the table in front of both himself and Damianos. Raptly, Damianos watched as the Witch scooped the paste from the mortor into his hand and began to spread it all around the border of the map. The Witch then grabbed the bundle he had created and stood.

“Descendre.”

The bundle burst into flames. Damianos jumped back, the chair he was sitting in raking loudly on the rough wooden floors. He went to look at the Witch, to ask what was happening, what this would do, but when he looked the Witch’s beautiful blue eyes were entirely black from the pupils to the once-whites. Damianos stayed silent.

Gently and unhurriedly, the Witch placed the fiery bundle at one of the corners of the map. When he did so, the map also began to burn, but it did not burn as paper often does, the flame climbing to consume from the point of first touch. No, instead the map began to burn solely along the border where the paste was smeared.

Lowly, the Witch began to speak in a language both familiar and not. Damianos recognized some of the words and in turn recognized the language. It was the language of the Artisan Empire, a language dead for three hundred years. Yet here, in this cabin, the language was alive, and it brought magic with it. The flames that were controlled to dance the path of the border began to move across the map’s entire surface. But it wasn’t burning it all into ash. It was simply moving toward something.

When the Witch was done speaking and the flames were done crawling, all that was left of the map was a tiny section of the northern part of the province of Ver-Vassel in Vask.

“She is here.”

It made sense. The Vaskian tribes were predominantly women, warriors that would welcome a woman into their midst without much apprehension. It also was one of the most difficult places for Damianos to go to. Still, the certainty, the knowledge of it all had Damianos immediately eager. He wanted to deliver peace to his kingdom and that meant delivering Jokaste to both of their fathers.

“You truly must be descended from the gods,” Damianos said to the Witch. “I do not know how to repay you.”

“You have done all that was asked of you,” the Witch said.

“It does not feel like enough. This solves everything. This prevents war. Will you take coin or gold? Do you need coin or gold?”

“I will not and do not. You offered me your freedom and I took it. Now it is restored to you alongside this knowledge. All I ask of you now is to be wise. Should this take a turn, I fear for the entire continent.”

Damianos’ eagerness faded some at those words, his face taking on an open display of confusion. “Should this take a turn? What do you mean?”

“I mean that I believe you are looking at this too simply. The Emperor. I think there is more to this than what you’re seeing,” the Witch said.

“What else could it be?”

“That, Prince, not even a spell could tell me.”

There wasn’t much to say or do after that. The Witch seemed content to speak in circles and riddles and Damianos was more than ready to trudge out into the snow to begin his second journey, this time across the mountains before going back to Akielos. Though it was dark out, the sun would be rising in a few hours and Damianos didn’t have time to wait. He packed together his bag, donned his warm cloak and boots, and went to the cabin door. Before opening it to the snowy exterior he turned to the Witch and found him watching with a look of contemplation.

“I ask one last thing of you,” Damianos said. The Witch raised one delicate brow.

“It may cost you.”

Damianos couldn’t help but smile. “Since you won’t allow me to thank you with anything tangible, let me thank you personally.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“What is your name?” Damianos asked back in response. “If I know it I can then thank you personally.”

The Witch smiled too, not a cruel smile this time, but a smile that did something wonderful to his mouth. But even with that smile, Damianos thought for a moment that the Witch wouldn’t give away that secret still. He was wrong though.

“Laurent.”

***

War had been prevented upon Damianos’ return to Akielos with Jokaste in tow, yet the kingdom had still fallen into shambles.

Theomedes, Damianos’ father, had been furious and his furiousness caused a domino effect of fury across every province of Akielos. As Damianos had expected with a civil war, the south was filled with rage at Jokaste’s infidelity and the north believed the south to be unjust in that rage. That feeling from the north only intensified when Theomedes immediately cancelled the wedding and ordered Jokaste into the cells of the palace of Ios to await trial for her exile.

“There’s not even going to be a trial!” Jokaste’s father had screamed. “Her fate was sealed the moment your son forcibly dragged her to you, crying over his broken heart.”

“Her fate was sealed the moment she spread her legs for another man,” Theomedes said calmly. His hands had clenched the arm rests of the throne.

Tension only had gotten worse when the southern provinces of Kesus and Mellos brought forth the daughters of nobles, vying for a new betrothal contract.

There were other problems beyond the obvious, however, problems Damianos hadn’t anticipated in any regard. The first was his father’s repeated fury aimed at him upon confessing he did not want a betrothed at all. Though the betrothal to Jokaste had been planned, it had never been a topic of conversation among the household of the palace. Damianos had always assumed his father arranged the betrothal because it was what he was expected to do. Yet Damianos’ innocuous profession of “I would like to wait to marry until my time to be king draws nearer,” had been met with near-contempt. The second thing was his father’s illness which had began in the weeks Damianos had been away from home. The King was weak, fatigued and coughing and unable to keep more than bone broth and tea in his stomach for an extended period of time.

“Now is not the time I need your strong head rammed down to defy me,” Theomedes had told him on the second day since his return, just after Damianos had said what he needed to about another betrothal. “Your time as king may be but around the corner, my son. We must prepare for the future now.”

“Let us focus on you, and the you in the present instead of the maybes of the future,” Damianos had pleaded. “You will recover.”

“You are now speaking of maybes.”

As of today, Damianos had now been back in Akielos for over a week and the chaos continued around him at a more settled pace. He decided he was finally ready to face Jokaste.

Their duel journey back to Akielos had been silent. Jokaste hadn’t appeared surprised when he turned up at the outskirts of the Vaskian tribe she had taken refuge with, and she came willingly, hands bound and everything, and not bothering to even ask how he had found her. On the evening of their return, Theomedes had her taken to the cells and she had been there since, left alone except for the guards at the cell’s entrance.

As he descended the steps, Damianos was struck by how little time he had spent in the cells of his own palace. All in all, he guessed that was probably a good thing, but it meant he couldn’t take his eyes off of the damp stone walls and floors, of the slivers of light peering in at odd places, for it was all new. The guards at the entrance bowed deeply at Damianos’ approach before moving out of the way in a soldier’s march.

There, alone on a bench in a cell, was Jokaste.

Her hair was tied up out of her face and her dress was wet at the hem. Still, she looked effortless and she smiled warmly at Damianos’ presence. Then, with an appreciative gaze, she looked him up and down.

“I am quite the damned fool, aren’t I?” she asked.

Instead of bringing to the surface a kind of regret, her words only brought with them a memory of what the Witch — what Laurent — had said: “It appeared at first as though this was going to be like any other exchange of services and goods, but it was when the pain settled in that she began to ramble. She damned herself, she said she was not careful enough. After several minutes of going on in such a fashion, she began to shake as she said she was afraid she would lose everything with such a mistake.”

“Why did you do it?” Damianos asked her. “It’s not like you to be so careless, and especially but months away from the wedding.”

Jokaste kept her smile as she leaned back on the bench, palms flat behind her, legs extended in front of her, and breasts purposefully lifted, making her figure all the more alluring. “You not in my bed made me restless.”

Damianos ran his tongue across his teeth. “I don’t quite believe that. You’ve never had any difficulty entertaining yourself through other pursuits in the past.”

“I don’t think entertainment, or a lack thereof, was the problem, Damianos. Only perhaps that my entertainment got away from me. For what it’s worth, none of this was ever my intent.”

Neither of them had much more to say.

That night, Damianos dreamed of Jokaste’s hands reaching beyond the bars of the cell and grabbing him. He was certain the dream would have continued, would have grown into a nightmare no matter the direction the struggle took, but he was awakened by the feeling of a presence in his room. His eyes opened, immediately looking to find his sword, its blade sheathed and its handle shining, but a voice spoke out, “Don’t think about,” and Damianos turned over in a hurry to peer at the figure.

“Laurent,” he breathed, heart beating fast in his chest. He willed it to slow down. “What are you doing here?”

In a way with which Damianos was somewhat familiar, Laurent stayed silent. He was bathed in the moon from Damianos’ open balcony that overlooked the sea, and its light from behind him shadowed his face. Unlike how the fire of the hearth had made his hair golden, the light from the moon made it appear white, looking much like the enigmatic figure the stories of him made him to be. He was still dressed in the same tight-laced clothes he had worn in the cabin and the salty wind from the ocean made his hair and the ends of his laces dance. For the smallest of moments Damianos wondered if he was still dreaming.

He was going to ask, in the silence, how Laurent had gotten by his guards, but, las though Laurent was reading his mind, he beat him to it. “Your guards are useless.”

Damianos pushed himself to sit up. “What are you doing here?”

“The entire continent has caught news of Akielos’ current predicament. They’re all looking for the weak spot to strike.”

His words and his presence still confused Damianos. “What of it? Akielos is plenty strong to take on the armies of Vere, Vask, or Patras. A war is not ideal, it is why I came to you in the first place, but if it happens, Akielos can handle it.”

“Oh, I don’t doubt that. But it’s not just Vere, Vask, and Patras looking. I hadn’t been lying when I said that I believed there was more to this than what you were seeing. Things are not alright in your kingdom, Damianos. Bringing Jokaste back may have only brought the war on faster.”

Laurent turned and walked out onto the balcony overlooking the sea and when nothing else happened Damianos knew he was intended to follow. He swung his legs over the side of his bed and held the sheet tight around his waist as he walked out onto the balcony as well. The night air felt refreshing on his skin, cooling it from its sleep-warmed state. Laurent was waiting for him, sitting on the stone railing. Now Damianos could see his face and he swore the Witch’s cheeks were flushed red. He wondered if it was from the Akielon heat.

“Do as you did the first time and find three cards about you and Jokaste,” Laurent said, getting out a familiar blue and gold starburst deck of cards.

“Would it be any different than it had been weeks ago?”

“It can change always. Now that your past is known, it is time for what’s next. Three cards.”

After a deep breath, Damianos did just as he had last time and, like then, he felt his three cards call out to him, their energy tangible, their powerful intention clear. He plucked them from the pile and handed them to Laurent slowly. The Witch kept his eyes trained on the reflective gold and he himself took in a deep breath before flipping over the first card.

To Damianos’ left he began and the card was achingly familiar for no one could forget the face of Gilead. The second card, the one in the middle, was also achingly familiar. The Emperor kept his tyrannical position on the throne strong. But it was the last card that brought great fear into Damianos’ heart for when the Witch flipped it over he gasped, a quiet and pained sound. The Tower, climbing high into the sky.

“It is as I feared,” Laurent breathed.

“The Tower? Why the Tower?” Damianos asked, impatiently.

With a sweep of magic that made the hairs on Damianos’ arms stand up, Laurent vanished the cards away and turned to face the wine dark waters of the sea.

“What do you know about your brother?” the Witch asked instead of answering Damianos’ question.

It definitely had not been what Damianos had been expecting to be asked.

As far as he knew, the Witch — Laurent — had no reason to truly know anything about Damianos’ brother, Kastor. He may have known Kastor existed, but Kastor hadn’t been brought up once in the days Damianos was at the cabin.

“He’s my brother,” he said simply instead of trying to fake anything else. “What is it you wish to know about him?”

“Has your brother paid visit to Jokaste in her cell since your return?”

“What? No. Of course not. Why would he?” Damianos asked, taken aback. Every question of the Witch’s brought forth more questions on Damianos’ end.

“Ask your guards,” Laurent told him, turning away from the sea. “Ask them how many times he has traveled down the staircase to the cells in the week since Jokaste was sent to be held there.”

“Why?” Damianos asked. He felt like a child constantly repeating the question of ‘Why?’.

“Do you not find it odd that your father’s health is worsening each day?”

Like at the cabin, Damianos was angry and frustrated at Laurent’s speaking in riddles. He voiced those feelings yet again. “Speak plainly, Laurent. I cannot make sense of anything when you answer each of my questions with a question of your own or in an indirect, unspecified way.”

“You wish for me to speak plainly? Fine,” Laurent said, sounding as depleted as Damianos felt and standing up off of the stone balcony to dust off his pants. “Jokaste was pregnant with your brother’s child and the two of them are planning on murdering both you and your father. They have almost succeeded in the latter.”

A physical strike to Damianos’ body would have hurt far less, would have been less jarring in every way.

“Leave.”

Laurent didn’t move.

“Go back to your forest, to your seclusion, to where people can seek you out if they want your opinion. Leave me and my kingdom be, we have more than plenty to deal with right now. No one in Akielos needs your guesses.”

“Are you truly ready to be king so soon? Your father only has weeks to live, Damianos,” Laurent responded.

“Leave,” Damianos repeated, voice hard.

Laurent looked like he wanted to say so much more. His expression almost looked like pity and it angered Damianos even more. They stood, at a stalemate, for moments, but Laurent finally turned toward the room and walked. Just at the threshold of where the moonlight turned into darkness, Laurent turned back and said, “Talk to the guards,” before he vanished, the act of it sending a rush of electricity through Damianos’ being.

Damianos spent the entire rest of the evening tossing and turning in his bed. He didn’t want to dwell on all Laurent had said, but it was impossible not to. Jokaste and Kastor? Murdering his — their — father? No. Jokaste would have been a bit more understandable as an outsider, but even then it seemed impossible; why would she risk execution? But Kastor...no, that couldn’t be true. Kastor wouldn’t betray him, them, in such a way; Kastor wouldn’t kill their father.

And yet…

When the sun was finally over the horizon, Damianos got out of bed. Tiredness had escaped him for he had so much to think on, but he had only gotten three or four hours of sleep.

At this early of an hour, the only people awake in the palace were slaves, guards, and cooks, all preparing for the day in different ways. It was unusual for a prince to be awake at such a time and so many fell to their knees in surprise as Damianos walked by. He paid them no mind. Instead he walked until he was at the staircase that winded down to the cells. The guards there moved with respect, but Damianos stayed put, not yet descending.

“Has my brother been down to these cells to visit the prisoner Jokaste?” Damianos asked, addressing both guards.

“On the first day of her being brought here Prince Kastor did go to the cells, but he was only there for a handful of minutes at most,” the guard on the left said, eyes never looking directly at Damianos.

“And the rest of the week?”

“No, Crown Prince, he did not come back to the cells during the rest of the week.”

The words brought such relief with them that Damianos almost fell over in his sudden exhaustion. The Witch had been wrong. Kastor and Jokaste knew each other as they always had, in passing through interactions related to Damianos and Jokaste’s arranged marriage, and Kastor would never hurt their father, wouldn’t --

The guards were not inconspicuous as they shared worried glances back and forth.

“What is it?” Damianos asked them.

The guard that hadn’t spoken yet swallowed, the act of it audible in his nervousness.

“Well?”

“Prince Kastor came down the first day for only a handful of minutes and was not here the rest of the week,” the second guard said, repeating knowledge already known. “Until yesterday, that is. Yesterday he came down as soon as you had left, Crown Prince, and he was down there for almost an hour. Then he came back. He came back five more times, the last time being just this morning after midnight.”

Impulsivity drove him immediately to Kastor’s chambers.

He should have waited, waited to collect his thoughts, but Kastor’s chambers were nearby and Damianos’ head had been spinning for hours.

He didn’t bother to knock because he was Damianos and Kastor was his brother, and inside Kastor was being dressed by slaves. One was tying and pinning his crisp chiton around both his waist and his shoulders and the other was knelt on the ground, buckling his sandals with precision.

“When you are finished, leave us,” Damianos demanded of the slaves promptly. Their movements hurried and they both prostrated themselves on the ground in front of him before scurrying away.

“Commanding my slaves, brother?” Kastor asked, looking questioningly at him.

“Why have you been paying Jokaste visits in the cells?”

If Kastor was surprised by the question, he didn’t show it. Instead he adjusted his chiton where it draped across his chest and said with utmost sincerity in his voice, “I’m trying to understand why she would betray you in such a way. Any good brother would wish to make sense of why their own blood must suffer as she has made you suffer.”

It would have been easy, in that moment, to take Kastor’s words as truth, to walk forward and slap him on the shoulder for an embrace, to go back to his own chambers and get actual rest. But Laurent’s words were ever present in his mind and, like before, he heard in clarity, “I hadn’t been lying when I said that I believed there was more to this than what you were seeing. Things are not alright in your kingdom, Damianos. Bringing Jokaste back may have only brought the war on faster.”

“The guards say you went down once the very first day she was brought there, and that you went down six times not but yesterday. That seems like an excessive amount of times to visit a person for that reason alone.”

Kastor laughed. His laugh was booming like their father’s. “I’m afraid you’ve become paranoid, brother. It’s understandable, of course, given the current situation, but you need not be afraid of me. We are blood, Damianos. Now, I’m off to get breakfast. Would you care to join me?”

“I cannot,” Damianos told him, his stomach still turned despite Kastor’s attempt at comfort. “I did not sleep well last night and —”

“Then go rest. I will see you at dinner.”

There was no time to rest, not when things were getting stranger and stranger and there was something Damianos wasn’t seeing. Kastor was no help, none at all, and that left Damianos with one person. Like she had been for the last seven days, Jokaste was in her cell, smiling warmly once more at Damianos’ entrance

“Again? Do you miss me that much?”

“I know everything,” Damianos said, not sure of anything at all.

“Oh?”

“I know you rid yourself of child. I know that’s why you were gone. We didn’t talk about it, we never have talked much about anything, but I know this to be true.”

“It was not his information to tell you,” Jokaste said, her features changing for the first time in all the days Damianos had seen her.

“The Witch is not obligated to keep your secrets, especially from me.”

“The Witch?” Jokasted asked, blonde hair tumbling forward as she leaned toward him from the bench.

“The Witch told me everything I needed to know when I first found him, but so much is still unclear. You must tell me why my brother has been to see you. I don’t believe the words out of his mouth,” Damianos said.

“Who said your brother has been to visit me? The Witch?” Jokaste asked, almost mocking. Damianos’ jaw clenched.

“Yes.”

“Witch’s can lie, Damianos,” Jokaste said. “How do you know he is not?”

“Because he has been right in every way thus far.”

“Well, if he is telling you truth then my word means nothing. Your decision is already made, after all.”

“So you won’t speak?”

“I won’t.”

Damianos nodded. “Then I will make sure your exile is further away from all civilization than you could ever imagine.”

***

The next two mornings went by uneventfully. Kastor was anywhere but the places Damianos found himself, Jokaste was remaining silent in her cell, Theomedes was bedridden and beginning to cough up blood (the physicians feared consumption but said nothing to the poor stressed princes, not yet), and Damianos was restless. He spent the previous two evenings staring blankly at the high ceiling or out at the balcony, wishing he could summon Laurent back. He had been rash in sending the Witch away, allowing his emotions to consume him in that moment and not thinking rationally. Now he was left with more questions than ever before and no one to answer them.

By the third evening, sleep deprivation won in the battle and, though it was not a peaceful sleep Damianos fell into, he slept. He was terribly groggy when he awoke to the feeling of a presence in his room and as he did all he could to pry open his eyes. He expected Laurent at the balcony once more, silver and blue in the moonlight. But there was no one at the balcony. The presence was at his bedchamber door.

There stood Kastor, his features strong in the torchlight that the group of guards around him were carrying. Damianos pushed himself up onto one elbow, rubbed at his eyes too hard, and asked, “Kastor? What’s going on?”

“Seize him,” Kastor commanded of the guards and they all rushed forward.

Adrenaline spiked in Damianos’ blood immediately at the action and he sprang up as to not get overwhelmed in such vulnerability. The first guard to reach him lunged too early and Damianos dodged the grab before lashing out with a fist in the guard’s left side, no doubt breaking a rib or three. The fall of the guard’s body gave Damianos enough time to reach his sword and unsheath it. The second guard never even saw the blade before it plunged into the open expanse of the inside of his thigh, cutting through an artery that would bleed out in mere minutes. The third guard came from behind and Damianos was skilled enough to twist his sword in his grip and stab it backwards underneath his own arm and into the guard’s chest. But then the fourth and fifth guard were on him at the same time, followed without delay by the seventh, eighth, and ninth guards that eventually all took Damianos down onto his knees and lashed his arms tightly behind his back.

Above him, Kastor stood, intimidating at such an angle.

“Kastor,” Damianos struggled out, a guard’s arm wound around his neck, “what is the meaning of this Kastor?”

“You have committed treason, Damianos,” Kastor began, sounding almost sad. “You have committed treason through your conspiring with the evil Witch of Vere to kill our father and take his crown.”

“What?” Damianos asked. “You know that’s not true.”

“It pains me to do this to you. You are my brother. Yet,” Kastor paused to sigh, “we may lose our father because of your selfishness and greed. Such an act cannot be overlooked. The Akielon people will not be able to stomach it.”

“Kastor, you’re lying,” Damianos yelled.

“Take him to the cells,” Kastor said, ignoring Damianos on his knees. The guards began to drag the Crown Prince away, his skin scraping unkindly on the floor.

“Kastor! Kastor!”

Hours went by in darkness. The fragments of light within the cells seemed even less today, tonight. Damianos had forgone the bench, opting to sit on the dirty floor right by the cell’s entrance. His head rested between his bent knees and his hands were bloodied from his fights. His mind was blank for the first time in days. That’s when he heard footsteps.

There was first the unmistakable click of loose sandals, the kind women wore when they did not have to be working. Damianos looked up to find Jokaste staring at him in a strange turn of events. She had recently bathed for her shampoos and oils that smelled like jasmine blossoms wafted through the cell bars.

“I must thank you for my freedom,” Jokaste said.

“I didn’t free you,” Damianos said back. His voice was hoarse.

“You did though,” she said, beginning to walk the length of the cell door and back. “Without your own indiscretion against your kingdom, I may have never stepped foot outside of these cells again.”

“I’ve done nothing wrong.”

“You conspired with a witch,” Jokaste said. “You discovered I was pregnant and forced me there with threats. When I didn’t return out of fear for my life, you went to the Witch and bought his assistance with promise of a position of power here in Akielos. You returned with me in tow, guaranteed exile where I couldn’t speak of your heinous acts and your father slowly began to die.”

“None of that is true. And none of it would make sense even if it were true. Why would I force you to the Witch?” Damianos asked, baffled.

“Why, because it was Kastor’s child. He took me in when you began your descent toward all things evil and depraved.”

“My father demanded you out of my bed lest we did end up with you pregnant before the wedding and caused a scandal.”

“Your father will be dead soon. No one will know the truth.”

“You have no proof about any of it,” Damianos said, pushing himself to stand. Jokaste didn’t budge from her close proximity to the cell.

“I don’t need proof.”

***

The trial against Crown Prince Damianos of Akielos was rushed.

The very night of his detention, riders were sent out to all the provinces of Akielos, sending for each Kyros to venture to the kingdom’s capital of Ios to be judges. Quickly the Kyroi began to file into the palace, all at a loss as what to think, all except for Nikandros, the Kyros of Delpha and Damianos’ best childhood friend. Nikandros was vocal from the moment he entered the gate of the city as to what he thought of such a farce, but all the others looked at the palace with its almost-dead King, its Crown Prince in chains, and its other Prince somber and broad shouldered, comforting the visibly upset woman that had once been the crown prince’s betrothed and wondered if this was just as it appeared to be.

Formally, the first day of the trial was spent with each Kyros taking an oath to uphold their kingdom’s wellbeing before all other things, followed by an introduction of those testifying and then the reading of the charges against Crown Prince Damianos.

Damianos felt like a gladiator being told to fight to the death, only he was given no weapons and his hands were tied behind his back; the Kyroi were all seated in the spectator seats of the throne room, their seats elevated so their wide-eyed stares were turned downward to face where Damianos was dragged center on the floor, his shackles clanging behind him with each step. Like a blur the days went by. Jokaste testified first on the second day of the trial, weaving together a weeping tale of Damianos telling her he had grown bored with her, a tale of Damianos threatening her should she run to her father about that. She then told of Kastor listening to her when she felt alone, building safeness for her in a palace so unwelcoming. She talked of falling pregnant with his child, knowing it was wrong due to her betrothal, but how it felt right, and of Damianos finding out and forcing her to the infamous Witch of Vere who could rip from her the would-be grandchild of the King. Kastor testified the next day, Damianos sitting there through it all in shock, as Kastor talked of Jokaste’s fear and of their excitement to be parents. Kastor talked of the terror he had experienced as Jokaste vanished and how that terror worsened as Damianos went after her, but not before their father came down with a sickness. Kastor remained steady, but the emotion was there as he talked of losing his child and of almost losing his love and his father.

It was hard to figure out which was worse, the idea that Damianos’ own brother could lie about him so easily or the fact that the Kyroi seemed to be buying it all. Their belief in these lies only intensified as, on the fourth day, witnesses were brought forth to continue to destroy Damianos’ name and reputation.

“Never have I witnessed such a cruelty,” Adrastus, the Keeper of Slaves, spoke, “as the cruelty that lies within the heart of Prince Damianos.”

“The things Prince Damianos has said about his own brother and his betrothed haunt my sleep each night,” Mykara, one of the royal cooks, said with a hand over her heaving bosom.

“His behavior has had Exalted concerned over the last several months,” Timon, one of his father’s advisors, began. “In fact, Exalted has been so concerned he had been working out a date to meet with the Kyroi about removing Prince Damianos as the next in line purely for the kingdom’s wellbeing.”

“This slave has been at a loss,” said one of the slave attendants that often served at dinners, tears shining in his eyes. “Prince Damianos handed this slave the vial of deadly poison and said to put it in Exalted’s wine over the next few evenings or he would have this slave beaten beyond recognition.”

In that moment, Damianos realized he was hanging by his fingernails to the ledge of the daunting tower.

On the seventh day of the trial, Damianos was to be sentenced. He wasn’t quite certain why they had dragged it out as long as they had, for by day three over half of the Kyroi believed what they were hearing, and by day five all of the rest, all but Nikandros, believed too. Perhaps it was for the humiliation of it all, perhaps it was to make it seem more legitimate when they inevitably had him, the crown prince, executed for treason.

Damianos had no defense. All he could say was the truth which he had no proof of, and even if he had it was his word against the synchronised fabrications of a dozen others.

“Today is a sad day in Akielos,” began the Kyros from Thrace, Ignion. “Never had anyone suspected such evil could live behind these palace walls. To do to your family what Prince Damianos has been accused of is unthinkable. Do you have any words for yourself?” he then asked, turning to where Damianos was still chained in the center of the room.

“None that would change the opinions of this senate,” Damianos said, voice unused for days.

Ignion looked at him sadly. “Then it is time to take a vote. We, the Kyroi of Akielos, stand in this room to —”

“Stop!”

The voice was not a pleading voice, but a commanding one instead. Almost as though they had seen a ghost, everyone in the room stopped, stood completely still as they watched their king, Theomedes, walk into the throne room.

It seemed like an eternity, though it was truly only a minute, before the whispers started and all fell to their knees, all except for Damianos, Kastor, and Jokaste, who each looked as though such a revelation could have them keel over in an instant.

“Father,” Damianos breathed, the sound so quiet he almost didn’t hear it over the beat of his own heart, over the sudden rush of blood in his ears.

Tall, King Theomedes walked toward the front of the room where his still-empty throne sat. He walked head high and eyes straight ahead as though the piercing stares of all in the room didn’t bother him. Watching him, it was hard to think that this was the man that had fallen into coughing fits but three weeks ago, who had gotten worse each passing day, paler and thinner and frailer, all until the blood began to seep into his handkerchiefs, for now he was full of color and life. Yes, he was still a little thinner than he had been in the months past, but that could be amended. He looked like the King he had always been.

Once at his throne, Theomedes turned to address his people. “I am here to speak on my own behalf, for none know the truth. I am here to say that you have shackled to these great floors the wrong son. Damianos is innocent in all that he is accused. It has been Kastor who has tainted the land. It is him who began to poison me.”

All those on their knees began to rise, gasps and wide-eyes taking over their expressions. Across the room, Kastor had long visibly whitened and he stared unblinkingly at their father in fear.

“I will provide proof, something that has been greatly lacking in this mockery of a trial, but I must iterate to you all first, my people, that Kastor did not act alone. The idea was planted into his head by true evil and he believed it because of his own greed. Kastor and the Lady Jokaste are responsible for my near death and the planned death of my son, Damianos.” Theomedes turned his body from facing toward the very ‘all’ he had been speaking directly to so as to now face Kastor, Jokaste, and their flock of witnesses that hadn’t witnessed anything at all. “Kastor, my oldest son, I cannot begin to atone for the deeds you have committed. Such a thing is unthinkable and yet it has happened. Lady Jokaste, why you could not be content with the guaranteed position as future queen is truly a mystery. I regret in all ways the day I signed the betrothal agreement with your father. And the rest of you, I know you did what you did because of threats or promises, and I shall deal accordingly with each of you dependent on such things soon. But other matters are more imperative now.”

“Father, you don’t understand,” Kastor said, trying to move forward but Jokaste’s hand was holding him back by the arm.

“I don’t have anything to hear from you,” Theomedes said coldly. “Now unshackle the Crown Prince of Akielos.”

“Exalted” began the Kyros of Ios, an old man named Stavos, “my heart leaps at your recovery and it aches at your words. I very much want to hear it all, for your wisdom and leadership were beyond missed in this troubled time, but I believe we all have to know, before anything else, how you have recovered in such a manner if Kastor has been poisoning you.”

“The Witch of Vere has healed me.”

If the gasps of surprise had seemed loud when Theomedes had walked in, it was nothing compared to the gasps heard now.

“The Witch of Vere!”

“Exalted!”

“The Witch is real?”

“The Witch is here?”

This time it was Jokaste that visibly whitened.

Damianos, for his part, found himself almost weak at the words, weak as what they truly meant washed over him.

“How did this happen?” asked a Kyros from somewhere in the massed throng of people now on their feet.

“The Witch came to me in disguise,” began Theomedes. “He disguised himself as a slave and began tending to me. It was only when left alone, when he had been tasked with feeding me the broth, that he whispered his truth. At first I was disbelieving for I had no reason to assume different, but when he revealed to me his true form and his power I could not deny. I expected death then, but it never came, and as I went to yell for help, the Witch stopped me and said he only wished to help. He said my kingdom was in great danger and it would only be my survival and my word that could save it. As the days went by, he began to heal me and tell me of the horrible things that had happened.”

“The Witch of Vere has cursed the king!” cried out one of the other Kyros, voice enraged.

“The Witch will control the entirety of Akielos!” cried out yet another.

Uproar.

None of them had truly listened to what the King had to say. They took it as a confession of the Witch’s meddling only. Damianos watched, helpless, as fear overtook the throne room. Like animals sent for slaughter, the Kyroi began to venture forward in a wretched herd of panic, eyes scouring every inch of the palace walls and floors as though waiting for a hellish witch to appear from the cracks in the stone. Then Damianos’ own panic settled when he felt hands on his shackled wrists.

“Hold on,” said Nikandros directly into his ear so he could hear him and Damianos could have cried with relief. He didn’t, of course, and instead kept his eyes on the chaos ensuing. It took a moment and there was a scraping of metal on metal, but Damianos quickly realized Nikandros was using the dagger Damianos had gifted him with in congratulations for being honored the title of Kyros of Delpha to unpick the locks.

Just as Nikandros was helping Damianos step out of the shackles around his feet did Theomedes’ yell reverberate off of the walls, bringing the crowd to yet again another halt.

“Enough! Do you dare call me liar? Do you dare defy my order? I am your King. Has that changed in the weeks since I had fallen ill?” Fire filled Theomedes’ eyes and his voice. Damianos rubbed at his raw wrists.

“You were so quick,” Theomedes started once more, “to believe a story brought to life through endless lies, a story made extraordinary with tears and tales of heroics. But I told you, I have proof.”

“Then bring it forward.”

With a steady hand, Theomedes motioned for someone in the crowd. It was a slave boy, his brown eyes big and dark hair cropped short, but he walked unlike any slave and did not look down out of Theomedes’ stare. Once the boy was at the king’s side, the room fell into a dead kind of silence, the kind so quiet the sound of a pin dropping could be heard like a shout. Then, like magic, the boy transformed.

It was a fast transformation, so fluid in its movement that the intricacies of it could not be kept straight with the human eye. But all anyone in the crowd knew was that at one moment the boy had been a young Akielon slave and now he was tall, blond, and staring at them all with unreadable blue eyes.

“Laurent.”

Damianos had earlier whispered “Father” and it had gone unnoticed for there was so much happening in the room. But now he had whispered a single name and it was heard by all.

The Witch of Vere was standing next to the King of Akielos in the throne room of the palace in Ios and wearing still a traditional slave chiton, one stark white that fell mid-thigh in youthful fashion. Damianos could look nowhere else.

“The Witch has all the proof you will need to see what has happened, to see the injustice that was almost sentenced.”

“This is ridiculous,” Jokaste said, her first words since Theomedes’ unexpected entrance.

“You will be silent or you will spend an eternity in the cells, left to rot into nothing. No death, just permanent incarceration,” Theomedes told her. He didn’t even spare her a glance. “Witch, tell us everything you know.”

***

Hours later, Damianos fell face first into his cushioned bed, wearing still the chiton he had been captured in. The exhaustion he felt was not just physical from the standing he had done during the weeklong trial nor even the result of sleeping restlessly on the cold, damp floor of the cell. No, the exhaustion he felt was bone deep, the conclusion of physical, mental, and emotional exhaustion.

Damianos slept for nearly an entire day. In his long sleep he dreamed, flashes of what had occurred but yesterday. He dreamed of his father walking into the throne room, strong and steady as Damianos had always known him. He dreamed of his father’s commanding voice ordering him unshackled. He dreamed of Nikandros’ never-wavering loyalty in him, in Nikandros’ quick work of the locks on his wrists and ankles. He dreamed of Laurent adorned in white, of his skin dropped against a background of white pillars, of his blue eyes that looked once, twice, three times at Damianos with what he would almost call concern or relief or both.

He dreamed of Laurent’s surety as he provided his proof to the Kyroi. He dreamed of the deathly silence that fell over after Jokaste’s father tried to interject, screaming that the Witch hadn’t taken any child, and Laurent said calmly he could show the man the bloody clump of cells if he wished. He dreamed of Laurent’s explanation of Jokaste’s visit that inevitably led to Damianos’ own, of the way in which he realized the doom Akielos would face in the days to come. He dreamed of Laurent bringing forth letters written in both Kastor and Jokaste’s hands, letters that, once put together, told of their plan to rule together. He dreamed of Laurent’s telling of how he had to heal the King slowly for the amount of potion needed to heal him would have put him in a week long sleep of recovery if given at one time. He dreamed mostly of Laurent, the Witch of Vere, standing in the land of Akielos where he was hated and defending it still.

It wasn’t a surprise when he then first woke up to see Laurent sitting on his bed for he thought he was still dreaming. When he realized he wasn’t though, he scrambled up, breathing once again, “Laurent,” and halting altogether at Laurent’s gentle touch to his shoulder.

“Stay still,” Laurent said, voice barely above a whisper.

“Laurent,” Damianos breathed again. “You’re still here.”

“I am.”

Damianos couldn’t take his eyes off of the Witch, even as he went to settle back into the pillows and blankets. “I have so many questions.”

“Then ask. I’m afraid, however, your cards cannot assist this time,” Laurent said. Damianos smiled, a small and sleepy upturn of his mouth.

“Why did you help me?” he began. “You did all I asked in first helping me locate Jokaste. You didn’t have to come to Akielos and stop this, yet you did.”

The Witch trailed a finger down one of the prominent lines of stitching in the blanket as he contemplated his answer. “You remember my cat, yes?” he asked. Damianos nodded. “For witches, animals are not merely animals. They are part of our magic in a way, in tune with the elements. Often they are called familiars. When you were in the cabin, my familiar took quite kindly to you. He slept on your chest, he allowed you to provide him with food, he sought out your pets. When your once-betrothed was paying her visit, my familiar was horribly on edge. He hissed when she walked too close and his hair was always up in defense. It might sound silly, but I trust that judgement greatly. It made me nervous once I realized who she was to you, once I realized the connection between the two of you. I couldn’t not let that go unchecked. You were — you are — good.”

“Why did you stay after I told you to go?”

“Because your father was dying and only he could clear your name. I had to help you, even if you wouldn’t help yourself.”

“But what did this do to benefit you at all? Akielos must be far from your mind.”

“The four kingdoms are currently surviving in harmony. Yes, Vaskian mountain raiders cause problems here and there, and yes, Vere and Akielos continue their feud over the land of Delfeur —”

“Delpha.”

“But there is no war. No war is good for all, even witches living in the Northern Steppes,” Laurent told him. “Believe me when I say this wasn’t purely out of any goodness, but out of necessity.”

“I believe some of it must have been out of goodness though,” Damianos said. “What you did was good, Laurent. You saved not just me and my father, but our entire kingdom.”

If the Witch heard him, he didn’t acknowledge it. His blue eyes were focused elsewhere, looking anywhere but at Damianos, and the two of them eventually fell into silence. It was a comfortable silence. The air outside was warm and the breeze was strong, bringing with it the salt of the ocean and a cooling air. Quietly, as not to disrupt the peace more than necessary, Damianos began to speak again.

“I still don’t know why Jokaste went to the lengths she did,” he confessed. “It wasn’t love between us, no, but we got along I believed. We could have made being wed such an easy thing, especially when compared to other arranged marriages I have known of in the past.”

“Jokaste is a kingmaker,” Laurent said as though that explained everything.

“I am to be King,” Damianos said, confused. “I don’t —”

“In her time away from you, following your father’s orders, it began to become evident to her that she may be Queen married to you, but she would never rule. You were proving with each passing day that you would not be controlled and she couldn’t stand by that. Your brother, on the other hand, was easy. All she had to do was whisper praises into his ear, telling him he was better than you, then she would tempt him into her bed, in action which he followed with eagerness. She could marry you, kill you, and be established as Queen and face no opposition when she proposed your brother as her new husband for, though he is a bastard, he would be the last surviving son of the King.”

“Oh. How do you know that?”

“Kastor told all. It was after you left. He was begging for his life.” Laurent paused to let Damianos take that in. “She did make a mistake in falling pregnant with his child though. It was the thing that ruined them both.”

The breeze picked up in strength. Not by much, but enough that it began to play with the golden ends of Laurent’s hair. It moved some of the strands out of his face and bared to Damianos the clearness of the Witch’s eyes, bared to him his flushed cheeks from Akielon heat.

“Akielos has some recovering to do, but we can come out of this stronger than before. I can’t thank you enough,” Damianos said, catching his breath. “You have done more for me than I could ever repay. What can I give you? I’ll give you anything you ask for.”

“You do enjoy playing dangerous games,” Laurent told him, looking amused like he often did when Damianos made offerings. “Offering witches your freedom and offering to grant them anything they desire could truly be your downfall.”

“Not with you.”

“You didn’t know that when you offered to me your freedom.”

“No, but I know that now. What can I give you?”

Introspection overtook Laurent’s expression and his mouth opened once and quickly closed again, as though he had thought of something then thought better of it. “Give me one more opportunity to read to you a card,” he said finally. Magically, the cards were sweeping and present and Damianos almost rolled his eyes.

“But —”

“Find your one. Just one. Think of anything you wish and find your card,” the Witch told him. Damianos sighed.

The card came to him quickly. Before it was flipped over, he couldn’t resist saying, “I don’t seem to have great luck with these. What if the card says I am to die tomorrow?”

“Then you die tomorrow,” Laurent said, taking the card from him. “But I doubt that’s the case.”

Gently, Laurent turned the card over in the same direction Damianos had handed it to him. There, in gold and blue, was a pair of people, their hands clasped together, a heart floating above them like a beacon. The Lovers.

“You truly are a romantic.” Laurent started. “It appears, Damianos, your betrothal was not necessary at all. Love is near, a love of balance and unity. Hopefully this time it is with someone who does not try to kill you.”

Damianos couldn’t quit staring at the card. When he finally did manage to tear his gaze away, it immediately found Laurent who was looking back at him with something akin to curiosity.

“Would you like to keep the card?” Laurent asked him after a moment.

“But then your set will be incomplete.”

“Believe me when I say I have plenty of cards at my cabin. Often they are lost or appear in the strangest of places. The Lovers exist elsewhere. Keep it.”

Like Laurent, Damianos grabbed the card with a gentle touch. Then he watched with a feeling like despair as Laurent stood up from his bed. “Finding a card for myself surely can’t be equal repayment for all you’ve done,” Damianos said, moving closer to the side of the bed the Witch had just stood from. “What else can I give you?”

“Let’s not change the tone; one kiss and we’ll call it even,” Laurent said, laughing almost as though he thought he was quite funny, pointedly casting a glance at the card still in Damianos’ hand.

It hadn’t been said seriously because it couldn’t be, which is why Laurent was turned away when Damianos’ hand not holding the card enclosed tenderly around his fine-boned wrist and tugged the Witch back towards him. Immediately Laurent’s knees hit the edge of the bed and his hands found Damianos’ shoulders for balance. Though the breeze was still sifting through from the balcony and the air was cool, the atmosphere around them changed, got heavy with heat.

Laurent’s lips were parted ever so, out of surprise or anticipation or with the death of something to say, and Damianos couldn’t not flick his gaze toward them, couldn’t not lean in until his own lips were but a breath away. “Tell me no,” he whispered, the words warm against Laurent’s mouth, and the longest of seconds passed with nothing said, with not a breath taken. Damianos closed the distance.

Laurent’s lips were warm and his fingers, still resting on Damianos’ shoulders, clenched almost painfully on the skin there as though afraid he would fall. Damianos made no sudden movement, relished in the weight of Laurent now half atop his thighs, relished in the heat of him surrounding all of Damianos’ senses. After a minute, the fingers on his shoulders lessened their grip and, in turn, the rigidness of Laurent’s spine eased away until he was putting all of his weight on Damianos, until one of his hands moved into the curls at the nape of Damianos’ neck.

Only then did Damianos move, his own hands instinctively finding Laurent’s hips, steadying him there until the Witch was straddling his lap, his bare legs on either side of Damianos’ own. Softly Damianos went to deepen the kiss, bringing forth an involuntary gasp from Laurent who tensed ever briefly before melting into it, his mouth opening, his hips shifting.

At the cabin, all those weeks ago now, Laurent had, quite literally, taken the air out of Damianos’ lungs. Now he was doing so again, only this time Damianos would willingly lose it all if it meant Laurent would stay right here forever.

Damianos moved in a miniscule way, just enough away to worry Laurent’s bottom lip between his teeth before soothing it with the gentlest of touch. Laurent shuddered against him, full body movements that ended with them pressed so tightly together it was impossible to tell who began where. A sound escaped Laurent then, so quietly, and Damianos wanted to hear it over and over and over again.

But things end. They always do.

Laurent pulled away, chest heaving against Damianos’. He could feel their individual heartbeats through their skin. Damianos almost didn’t open his eyes, afraid of breaking the magic of the room, but he was grateful when he did for he got to see Laurent’s heavily lidded eyes, he got to see the redness of his mouth, he got to see the haze of his expression as though unable to pull himself out of a spell.

“Goodbye, Prince Damianos,” Laurent said, still breathless. His voice was lower than Damianos had ever heard it before.

“Goodbye, Laurent.”

In an instant, Damianos almost staggered forward off the bed for Laurent disappeared. Somehow, in the fervor of it all, the Lovers had fallen onto the floor in the same direction they had found Damianos.

***

The executions of both Kastor and Jokaste were done quickly in the days following the trial. Their official sentencing had found them guilty of attempted murder of King Theomedes and conspiracy to murder Crown Prince Damianos.

Though it had been hell, the false accusations Damianos had faced from his brother and betrothed, there was still mourning that he had to wade through. All of Akielos was quiet with it, actually, a feeling of disbelief long given way to an unnamable kind of grief.

Weeks went by like this, Damianos wary of almost all that came near him or his father, and his vivid dreams had him sometimes thinking of Kastor’s hand shooting out of the ground to pull him down.

Eventually his father couldn’t keep silent on it all. “I think you need to get out of Ios,” Theomedes told him one day after breakfast. “Go clear your head someplace else.”

“I don’t want to leave you alone again,” Damianos had said back.

Theomedes had smiled indulgently and placed a hand on top of Damianos’ head like his son was a young child once more. “I think we are safe once again in our palace walls. Visit Nikandros in Delpha for a week, for two weeks. Train with the men, strategize, drink. It will do you good.”

After a little more convincing, Damianos finally gave in to his father’s request and prepared for travel to the land of Delpha. He wrote ahead a letter as to not surprise Nikandros too suddenly before he ventured off with a single guard. They rode at a leisurely pace, taking in as much of the fresh air as Damianos wished, and after several days they finally found themselves but another day’s ride away from Delpha’s gate.

It was only when they were strolling through said gate that Damianos realized that this was not at all where he wanted to be. He told Nikandros such a thing that night over a cup of General Makedon’s griva.

“It is not that I am not thrilled to see you, friend,” he said, making a slight face as he swallowed yet another mouthful of the drink. “But I believe I need to get out of Akielos entirely. For only a while.”

Nikandros looked concerned. “Where will you go? Patras would maybe be agreeable, but neither Vask or Vere would be safe for you as the man you are.”

The answer was so simple that Damianos almost laughed at himself, wondering how he was unaware where his body wanted to take him the entire time. He looked at Nikandros, still almost laughing. “You wouldn’t happen to own a cloak and boots meant for snow, would you?”

He left in the dead of night to avoid his guard escort who was still long asleep. Damianos made sure to leave a letter for when his father inevitably panicked and sent people after him in Delpha. No one needed to get in trouble for Damianos’ exigency to get away.

It was easy to take almost the exact same path he had taken the first time. He stowed away in multiple merchants’ carts, sometimes with permission and a gift of gold, and sometimes sneakily whilst the merchants slept in inns. He made it to the Northern Steppes a little faster this time because of it, and when his boots first touched snow he felt invigorated; two more days of travel.

Those two days went by quickly and uneventfully. Then the cabin was in front of him.

There was a fire roaring inside, its flames visible through the window. Nothing had changed in the weeks, months now, since Damianos had first paid visit. He didn’t know why anything would have changed, but there was something comforting at the unchanged appearance. The stones marking the spot for a gateway almost seemed to glitter with Damianos’ arrival.

Damianos walked forward, knocked on the cabin door four times, retreated back to stand between the two stone markers and said, “My name is Damianos. I have traveled here from Akielos seeking the Witch of Vere. I offer to him my undying loyalty.”

The door opened wide.

In the threshold stood Laurent, arms crossed over his chest. He was back to wearing his laced up clothing that covered him neck to foot and Damianos hadn’t ever seen someone look so beautiful and annoyed all at once. A smile fought its way onto his face as he began to walk the pathway again, toward the Witch giving him a stormy look.

“You can’t just show up here each time you have a question you need me to answer,” Laurent said.

“I have no questions that need answered,” Damianos said. He was now inches in front of Laurent, the two of them nearly toe to toe.

“Then why are you here? Need a love potion to pair with your card?” Laurent asked looking up at him.

“I only wish to talk to you,” Damianos said.

“And you just casually offered undying loyalty?” It was impossible to miss Laurent’s delicately raised brow.

“I suppose that wasn’t a good enough offering,” Damianos said after pretending to think about it for a moment. “After all, I can’t offer you something you already had.”

Laurent looked at him. “Are you going to come inside?”

“If you’ll allow me.”

It was blazing hot inside the cabin, just as it had been when Damianos had entered here the first time. The cat, the very same white darling, immediately found Damianos’ feet and curled around his legs, purring and warm where it pressed. Laurent looked down at it helpless.

“What do you want, Damianos?” Laurent asked of him again.

“I told you. I wish to talk to you.”

“About what?”

“About you.” Damianos invited himself to sit down at the familiar table and the cat followed, jumping up on the table’s flat surface. “I realized in the days since you left that you left knowing so much about us, about my family and myself, and yet I left knowing only the same things I arrived here knowing.”

“And what were those things?”

“That you are powerful and heartstoppingly beautiful,” Damianos said truthfully. Laurent flushed under his steady gaze. “But I want to know about you.”

“You didn’t have to come all the way here,” Laurent said after a beat.

“Oh, was I supposed to send a letter? With what carrier?” Laurent’s flush turned into a glare. Damianos smiled again. “Tell me about you. Tell me anything, tell me everything.”

Laurent’s gaze turned to the ceiling as though it would give him answers. “Why?”

“Because everything you have done has been more than I thought possible in this world. Is it so strange that I would wish to know better the man that did all you have done?”

“It will probably take time,” Laurent said.

“That’s fine,” Damianos said, getting comfortable in the chair. “That is my true offer to you then: time. Take all my time if you like.”

“You’re so —” Laurent began, looking at Damianos as though he had never seen anyone quite like him before. “Fine.”

Laurent’s life hadn’t been what Damianos expected. He hadn’t expected a story of a witch from the northernmost part of Kempt journeying south to the Veretian province of Belloy to retrieve ingredients for a healing spell and whilst there falling for a noble named Aleron who proposed to her, knowing her truth and all within a week. He hadn’t expected a story of the two of them, Aleron and the witch Hennike, to have had two children, the oldest child having no magic in him at all and the youngest being full of it. He hadn’t expected Aleron’s brother to have been a predator that waited impatiently to be left alone with Laurent, who was but the mere age of eleven, and he hadn’t expected Laurent to tell how his magic had protected him, lashing out to hurt his uncle quite severely. He hadn’t expected the tragedy that began to befall then, of Laurent’s brother, Auguste, asking about their uncle’s injury, of Laurent clumsily explaining what their uncle had tried to do. He hadn’t expected Auguste to go after their uncle with intent to kill, hadn’t expected their uncle to come out alive instead, Auguste murdered by his hand. He hadn’t expected Laurent’s powers to flounder out of control with his grief, killing their uncle in turn, and he hadn’t expected the townspeople to go after Hennike and Laurent with such rage that Aleron and Hennike both died trying to protect their son who was run out, forced to survive orphaned in the Northern Steppes, relying on magic to keep him alive those first months.

“Don’t look at me with pity,” Laurent told him after he finished. “I don’t need it.”

“I’m not,” Damianos lied. “But, Laurent —”

“Yes, it was all quite traumatizing. But it is long in the past now.”

“It can’t be that long in the past,” Damianos said. “You have to only be but twenty-one years of age.”

Laurent smiled. “I’m turning twenty come spring.”

“Twenty? Laurent,” Damianos said with a sigh this time.

“Is that all you wanted? I’ve told you about myself. It wasn’t fun so I very much assume you regret your long journey out here just to hear such sadness, but it is my life.”

The wind was howling outside, blowing snow off of the cabin roof, blowing it off of the trees to join the piles already on the ground.

“You must be lonely,” Damianos said, his eyes trained outside.

“I’ve managed.”

“Laurent,” Damianos repeated for what seemed to be the hundredth time since he learned the Witch’s name. “Laurent, why do you stay here?”

“Magic has a bad name everywhere. I know what they say about me, about those like me, across the continent. What should I do? Try to fit in with society only to eventually be outed and ran out once more or, worse, killed?”

“People say what they think they know to be true. If you show them otherwise by —”

“By healing? By performing good deeds? What is it you think I’ve been doing the last odd something years? I’m still hated. I’m still feared.”

“Then come back with me,” Damianos said, leaning forward in the chair. “Come with me to Ios. Be part of Akielos. Live in the palace, I can ensure nothing bad comes of you.”

“Your people will not take kindly to a witch living alongside the King and Prince,” Laurent rebuffed.

“My people will listen to my father and I, the two people you saved. We are indebted to you. Let us, let me, do this for you.”

“Other kingdoms may look at me as a weapon of war,” Laurent said. “That war you’ve worked so desperately to avoid may occur anyway.”

“You will never see a battlefield. We may ask you to heal if you could should we ever go to war, but I would never ask of you to use your power to benefit us unfairly. We Akielons are not like that.”

“What about —”

“Laurent! Please. Selfishly I ask this of you. Come back to Ios. Live in Ios. Live surrounded by people and life and experience once again what it is like to be with those that adore you, not fear you.”

“Damianos,” Laurent said, standing. “This makes no sense. None at all.”

“Why not?”

“I am a witch, a being of misunderstood magic. You are a prince, set on path to be King. Please look at the picture we make. This is silly. This is the unchecked notion of jubilation for I have assisted you and your kingdom. I understand you’re appreciative and I don’t regret what I’ve done. But you must see this doesn’t make sense.”

Damianos stood too, walked to stand behind Laurent who had turned to stare at the dancing flames in the hearth.

“None of your cards have been wrong before. Not for me, and I doubt for anyone else. It was not a coincidence the card of the Lovers was meant to fall into my hands as I found myself falling for you.” He put a hand on the subtle curve of Laurent’s hip, felt him melt a little. “Allow me this. Allow yourself this if you want it. If you don’t, that’s a different story, and tell me now and I’ll —”

Laurent turned into the circle of his arms.

The fire was behind him now and Damianos knew its flames were reflected in his own brown eyes. It was too much and not enough at once, having Laurent so close again, and he found himself in familiar fashion waiting for the right time to breathe.

“If you mean this, I ask one thing of you.” Laurent’s hands were fisted in Damianos’ cloak as though fearful the Prince would disappear at any moment.

“Anything.”

“Actually, two things.”

“Anything.”

“They’re two things you have already given me before.”

“Of course.”

“I need time. Time to figure out what to do with my cabin, time to create a schedule for I will have to return here at times, and time to come up with a plan to escape Ios, Akielos, and the continent if I need to ever.” Damianos opened his mouth, but Laurent cut him off. “I must do this, and you must not know of it. It is the only way I will be comfortable in guaranteeing my own survival. Perhaps one day…” he trailed. “But not now.”

“And the second thing?

“One kiss,” Laurent answered with his own smile.

“Oh,” Damianos said, voice low, “I’m afraid I won’t be able to do that for you.”

Laurent immediately went to pull back, confusion evident on his face. Damianos held on a little tighter.

“I can’t just give you one kiss. Perhaps a million instead.”

***

Over a year had gone by since the end of the infamous trial in Ios.

Akielos was in the crux of summer, its temperatures high and the sun always blazing. Crown Prince Damianos was dripping in sweat. He’d been out in the always-blazing sun since the early hours of the morning, training with his men. It felt good, truly, the bone deep exhaustion of many days of hard work, and the men were in better shape than ever, their lines steady and their form impeccable.

It was good for the soldiers to have their Prince train with them. It made them feel as though their hard work was not for the sole protection of the royals, but for the kingdom, a place that they all wished to keep safe. Damianos knew this, and had made it a point to train with the men more in the last years. But it wasn’t the main reason he was training today; actually, it wasn’t the main reason he was training at all this week.

Selfishly, the Crown Prince was training to keep his mind from wandering to Laurent who was currently back in the Northern Steppes, collecting ingredients, retrieving more of his books, and escaping the summer heat if only for a while.

Yes, the Witch had become part of Akielos in such a way that it still seemed surreal. The citizens were nervous at first as word that the Witch would be living in the palace got out to them all, but the people of Akielos were not near as hard-set as the Vaskians nor as twisted as the Veretians; when King Theomedes stood before the city of Ios to explain in detail how Laurent had saved them all, they welcomed him into their kingdom with the most open of arms.

Laurent could not walknow around Ios without being stopped by a hundred people. Children ran to him, begging to see magic tricks and delighting as coins vanished and reappeared, as apples turned to butterflies, as his blue eyes changed hue to green to purple to brown and to yellow. Those working booths at the markets asked about potion ingredients, asked if they had anything he would ever need, and made certain he knew to come to him should he ever find himself searching for a particular plant or herb. Some of the older women, who had came quickly to the conclusion Laurent was here alone for he had no family, had taken to mothering the Witch who didn’t quite know what to do with such an outpouring of affection.

Several — and several meant far more than several — men had taken to Laurent as well, trying their best to woo over the striking being now walking their sandy streets. One man, a merchant, had proposed with a cart full of silks and gold-printed fabrics only to be left quite disappointed when Laurent magicked his own silks and gold-printed fabrics of much richer color. Another man, a blacksmith, had made an impressive sapphire-stoned scepter to hone tangible magic through. The man’s gift was welcome and Laurent was polite as he declined, but offered to buy the gift still for it was very beautiful. Yet another man, a drunk, had been less polite in his soliciting and found himself instead dangling over the palace cliffs that overlooked the ocean.

Luckily for the Prince and the Witch, the two of them only had eyes for one another. Since Laurent’s arrival in Ios, they had been near inseparable, taking time apart only for duties the other simply could not attend, such as some of Damianos’ court meetings and Laurent’s witchly activities of incantations, readings, and other still unknown things to Damianos.

Despite their inseparability, the romance did not begin right away. Attraction had clearly been present, had been something Damianos couldn’t help but think about as he thought of the blond but a hallway away at night, but Laurent had initially had a hard enough time accepting that his presence in Akielos wasn’t just a trick to put him in chains or kill him, let alone accepting that he was wanted in ways that extended far beyond that. Damianos was patient, did all he could to show Laurent how much both he and his people wanted him there, to show Laurent how much he wanted him, and Laurent, when finally ready to believe that, crawled into Damianos’ bed and pressed against him to sleep.

Now though, Damianos was impatient in his want. He wanted Laurent in his — it was theirs now, but Laurent hadn’t quite gotten around to calling it that — bed right now, wanted to lie there with the breeze rolling over them, wanted to talk about nothing and everything, wanted to watch Laurent create light from his fingertips and trace the patterns of the constellations right above their heads. But Laurent wasn’t here, wouldn’t be back until sometime late next week, and —

Damianos stopped at the entrance of the palace.

Laurent was leaning on one of the stone pillars, back in a crisp white chiton, all of which lately seemed to be shorter and shorter, and smiling at him with a flushed face.

“It’s getting harder to leave and even harder to stay from here,” Laurent said.

“You weren’t supposed to be back until next week.”

“Am I disrupting your plans?” Laurent asked, eyebrow raised. Damianos grinned, wiped at the sweat spilling down his temple.

“You’re quite lucky I’m a considerate person,” he started, “for in any other moment I would pull you to me in a horribly embarrassing public display. But I need to bathe, so you’re free from such a thing. For now.”

“Bathe? I’ll join you.”

At the baths, Laurent sent away the servants who listened truly with the nod of Damianos’ head. In the summer, the water was kept cool, with a warmer spring off to the side, and Damianos watched, enraptured as Laurent unpinned his chiton before pulling at the string on the side. The white fell to the floor in a puddle, leaving the Witch in nothing. When he felt Damianos’ stare, he walked toward the Prince almost predatorily.

“Do you require assistance?” he asked. His fingers were already toying with the pin at Damianos’ shoulder.

“I was mostly admiring the view.”

Laurent never broke eye contact as he undid Damianos’ chiton in the same fashion he had undone his own. Only when both were on the ground, second thoughts to anything else anymore, did Laurent link their fingers and walk into the water. Immediately Damianos felt some of the heat trapped in his body from the sun’s rays disappear. He wouldn’t be surprised if the water had absorbed it and warmed a degree.

“How was your journey? How was the cabin?” Damianos asked after they had settled.

“It was good. It was all good. Gus loved being back in the snow,” Laurent said, referring to his cat that had, of course, taken over the palace since arriving. Even Theomedes bowed to the cat as he passed it in the halls doing whatever it pleased. “But. It’s lonely there. It is only nice for but a day or so. After that --”

“You miss me?” Damianos teased.

“Yes.”

The confession was so serious and vulnerable that Damianos couldn’t not look down at Laurent’s face, only to find him already looking up.

“I still find it unbelievable to be in this place. To not fear the person that knocks on my door. To feel wanted. In a multitude of ways too.” The flush on his face was still there, but now it was from speaking and not from the heat. “I don’t tell you enough how grateful I am for your invitation to bring me here. I also don’t tell you enough how stupid that was because you definitely should not make a habit of inviting witches into your home. But I am grateful. I wake up everyday feeling as though this could vanish at any moment for it’s so perfect, like a dream.”

“Laurent.”

Damianos couldn’t not put both hands on Laurent’s face, couldn’t not brush his blond hair from in front of his eyes, couldn’t not sweep his thumbs underneath the spot where eyelashes fell, couldn’t not press a kiss to his forehead, his nose, ever so gently on his mouth. Laurent’s hands came up to cover Damianos’ own, turning his head to press his own ever so gentle kiss on Damianos’ palm.

“I promise you I came out with the better deal when I met you than the other way around,” Damianos said. Laurent laughed, leaned further into Damianos’ warm touch.

“You’re quite wrong. You have offered to me priceless things since the day we met.”

“Laurent.”

“Damianos.”

“You are the most priceless thing.”

“That’s so mawkish. Beyond mawkish actually.”

“I can top that.”

“Oh, can you?”

“Yeah. Are you ready?”

“Most definitely.”

“I offer to you one last thing in hopes to entice you to stay here forever.”

“If you say your heart, I’m leaving. Going back to the cabin and burying myself in the snow.”

“No, not that.”

“Then what?”

“Laurent. The Witch of Vere. I offer you everything.”

“Damianos.”

“Yes.”

“Quit talking and finish bathing so you can take me to bed.”

That night, Laurent drew constellations above their heads, his right leg thrown over Damianos’ waist.

Everyone across the continent knew of the Witch of Vere. But not everyone agreed on what was truth and what was fiction regarding his existence. Now though, Damianos didn’t care any longer what was agreed upon for now he knew the truth. He tightened his hold around Laurent just a little more and Laurent, almost as if sensing what Damianos was thinking about, intertwined their fingers.

With his free hand, Laurent, with magic kissing his fingertips, drew above them a heart.

[rosethornewrites]

T and G rated fics I read this weekend!

This is all The Untamed/MDZS fics.

So I learned last week that I can only add 100 links. And I read over 100 fics 😬 so now this is gonna be two posts. Additionally, I’ll likely start posting these daily from now on. It just gets to be a lot.

Finished:

Tumblr Fics:

BEETOBER 2021 DAY 2 - EARRING, by @bloody-bee-tea

Rated T:

find a home in him, by makebelieveanything and nerdzeword

“Come on a-Cheng, let’s go,” she prodded, gently ushering him out the door as she handed off jackets to both boys.

“Why the fuck is he always doing stupid shit and making us run after him for?” Jiang Cheng complained as he shrugged into his jacket, Lan Wangji donning his own in silence.

“Wangji?” Yanli prodded gently. “Are you alright?”

“... what if we never find him?”

“We will,” Yanli said confidently.

or Modern AU where Wei Wuxian runs away from his foster home when he turns 18, and it doesn't end the way he planned.

My Brother's Keeper - Purple Years (The first stage of grief), by ArchiveWriter

Set after WWX plunges from the cliff after the battle at Nightless City. The ramblings of Jiang Cheng's mind in the first stage of grief, flicking back and forth between the past and then.

thank you, drunk me, by carmiemaybe (glazedlilies)

Or where Lan Zhan is confused at Wei Ying's behaviour after the previous, drunken night's events.

This Grave Will Not Be Mine, by Rana Eros (ranalore)

The Burial Mounds' claim to Wei Wuxian has been superceded.

Qinghe Jue, by Merinnan

Nie Mingjue promised to protect his brother. He wasn't going to let qi deviating and dying at Jinlintai stop him from keeping that promise.

With What Proof, by Preludian_Staves

"I know he did it!"

"What proof do you have?"

Meeting the Family, by sami (part of a series)

Wei Wuxian has a secret.

I’ll stick to my single-log bridge till it’s dark, by autumncolour

Can’t anyone give me a nice, favorable road to walk on?

Lan Wangji leaves the Burial Mounds. Wei Wuxian gets drunk. The night in Yiling is clear and dark, and full of thick, half-understood longing.

Love Me on the Sunlit Grass, by Eliza (second in a series)

Zizhen will always be there when Jin Ling calls in a panic about his uncle.

the mutability of survival, by tunnelOFdawn

All the ways Lan Zhan, Wei Ying, and Jiang Cheng could have died in canon.

i'll keep walking, by justdoityoufucker

Wen Qing died.

This, she knows; from the painful lick of flames to the unavoidable choking that came with the smoke to the wickedly satisfied grin on Jin Guangshan’s face before she closed her eyes the last time. She hoped, those last few moments, that it would be the end. Wei Wuxian would be free, and the last remnants of their family would be safe. She hoped that Wen Ning wouldn’t feel any pain, when the time came for him to follow her.

-

Or, the one where Wen Qing ends up in the past and fixes the future.

Rated G:

天涯之外 / beyond the world's end, by yuer (vintageblueskies)

"Wei Ying," Lan Wangji says, his voice cracks open in a way Wei Wuxian has never heard before. He crosses over to where Wei Wuxian is still sitting; Wei Wuxian starts to scramble up, but Lan Wangji just shakes his head, gets to his knees next to him. And isn't that something? The untouchable Hanguang-jun on his knees in the Burial Mounds, dirtying his pristine robes to sit next to Wei Wuxian.

-

or, lan wangji returns to the burial mounds

Song of My Heart, Mate of My Soul, by SakuraKage

The Gusu Lan are said to have an innate connection with music. The Gusu Lan are also said to love deeply – with their whole soul – so deeply that they seem to only be able to fall in love once.

Lan Wangji knows these rumours. He also knows the truth, or close to it, as it has been handed down through the generations. Their connection to music runs far deeper than the other sects could dream. Every Lan heart contains a song, a musical piece that encapsulates the very fiber of their being, and it only comes to life under a specific set of circumstances. The parameters to unlock your heartsong are highly disputed, but the generally accepted condition to fill is … to meet your soulmate.

see your face, hear my voice in the dark, by arypls

Wei Wuxian is having trouble falling asleep but Lan Wangji is there with gentle words and soothing touches to show his husband he's no longer alone.

If I knew what safety looked like, by askanis

Beautiful, brave Wei Ying is waiting for Lan Zhan to tell her she cannot be all of who she is. She will listen, if Lan Zhan says this. If Lan Zhan even looks uncomfortable, Wei Ying will take this back and never mention it again. Will pretend that this is not her truth, perhaps until she believes it herself.

And Lan Zhan will never get to fully see Wei Ying for who Wei Ying is.

underneath the magnolias, by krizzlesandblues

Summer in Cloud Recesses means iced fruits sent by merchants, more practical trainings for juniors, with some of them catching up on their lessons.

But for the youngest members of GusuLan Sect, summer means classes under the big magnolia tree.

Word Up, Talk the Talk, by Larryissocute

It wouldn’t have been a problem (it really wouldn’t) if they weren’t best friends. Wei Wuxian doesn’t know what good deeds he did in his past life to be blessed with Lan Wangji as a friend nor does he know what evil things he did to be cursed with being only a friend to Lan Wangji.

Or the one where Wei Wuxian kisses Lan Wangji and then runs away.

Hai Shi — Sleeping Hours, by Saint Er (wwxsays_er)

It's right before bedtime, when a drunk Wei Wuxian shows up on Lan Wangji's door, and suddenly, this has now become Lan Wangji's problem.

In the Silence, by XianleDianxia

With his husband and son on a night hunt, Wei Wuxian is left to his own thoughts. His temperament is not as calm as Lan Wangji would like it to be.

intervention (how to convince your very gay brother that he, is in fact, gay), by okok29

"You guys hold hands all the time around campus and he takes you out to brunch every Saturday. He even brings you roses," Jiang Cheng emphasizes.

"Yeah, as bros do!" Wei Ying says cheerfully.

jiang cheng tries to forcibly drag wei ying out of the closet.

No Regrets, by Sarehz

Lan Zhan gives his forehead ribbon to Wei Wuxian as a sign of his love.

Look Down to Reminisce About My Hometown, by Nadat (one-shot series)

A collection of short stories following a Promptember list; will add tags and alter the rating as appropriate. It will be mostly live action show canon but I may borrow here and there from the book if something strikes me.

jin ling's uncles and aunts, by saheeli

jin zixuan invites all of jin ling's uncles and aunts to his birthday party. there are more than he even thought possible.

Helianthus, by tinykira

"Say, Lan Zhan. Do you know that when people die, they become plants?"

~

The Jingshi, which was formerly called as The Gentian House, is now also full of sunflowers.

Magical Marriage Ribbons, by starandrea

But consider this: the Lan forehead ribbons are magical, and the mountain knows it. (It takes Wei Ying less than a day after Lan Yi’s cave to realize more than just her wards consider him family.)

Or: If you’re accidentally betrothed to your classmate in a mostly legitimate life or death situation, how long can you wait to tell him before he finds out by accident?

their mothers sons, by silversshadow

In one world Jiang Fengmian gave Wei Ying more attention than he did either of his own children. In this world he can barely look at the child.

A series of short looks into a different timeline.

You blow me away, by silverclaw

Lan Zhan’s neighbour is playing a song that has been stuck in his head for ages. The neighbour just so happens to be the singer of said song and he’s supposedly laying low.

Echo Of My Heart, by ColdBloodedReptile

A short insight of Lan Wangji's thoughts during Dafan Mountain, CQL version.

And the scene in Jingshi before Wei Wuxian wakes ft Lan Sizhui.

A new score, by Lhaewiel

Wei Wuxian does not know this new score. It is evening, Gusu looks like a painting during this time of the year, with snow slowly falling down and covering the court outside.

Parallel Lines, by Sarehz

Wei Ying: Lan Zhan is going to break up with me!

Nie Huaisang: No, he's not. But please tell me in great detail why you think that.

Jiang Cheng: [Unfortunately sharing an apartment with Nie Huaisang and therefore has no choice but to listen] Please leave me out of this.

Why Wei Ying Shouldn’t Matchmake, by PrinceJakeFireCake

Lan Wangji is NOT jealous of Jiang Cheng. He’s just trying to figure out why Wei Ying likes him so much. Wei Ying thinks it’s great that Lan Zhan has a crush on his brother. (Hint: he does not)

to home, by Guinny (4 chapters)

'My Wei Ying,

It seems that we are winning the war. Wait for me. I will come home. I will come home to you. We will spend the rest of our lives in peace. Far from all of this. In a place that is quiet and there's only us.

Yours,

Lan Zhan.’

if you love him, never let go, by cloud_wanderer

three times lan wangji let go, and the one time he swore to never do it again

Hard to forget, by Lucky_Moonly

“Aiya sorry for interrupting what must be a very interesting read,” a boy who seemed to be a first year as well, cheekily exclaimed, before he smiled widely at Lan Wangji and he stepped inside the compartment. “But did you perchance see my pet axolotl? He’s black and he’s missing one of his front legs!”

in sickness & in flames, by talesfromthecryptid (2 chapters)

the one in which lan wangji has a cold and wei wuxian fusses over him and falls even more in love with him, something he didn't even know was possible but oh, it really is.

learning and the dead, by northofallmusic (tofsla)

In a small house of his own, after everything, Wen Ning works with his hands.

Unpredictable, by canis_m

If Lan Wangji had said a few more things while drunk in Qinghe.

Waited For Precious Moments Such As This, by Preludian_Staves

He would not trade these precious moments away for anything in the world.

Unfinished:

Rated T:

No Regrets, by AluraRose

Lan Wangji took a deep breath, centered himself, and swallowed his pride.

“I apologize.” He bowed low to Jiang Wanyin and held it. “I wish only to help your brother. I humbly request access, and give my word that I will touch nothing and speak to no one of what I see.”

“I can’t just let you in there!”

“Even to save Wei Ying?”

And suddenly the wind seemed to go out of the sails of Jiang Wanyin’s anger. “I can’t” he repeated more quietly.

In order to save Wei Wuxian, Lan Wangji must first convince Jiang Wanyin to trust him.

Your Name On My Chest, by Director_XuanWu

Lan Wangji is the president, at the beginning of his second year on his first term.

Wei Wuxian, his ex fiancé, was dishonorably discharged from the military because of a well hidden scandal.

They meet again after 13 years. Lan Wangji will drop everything for him. Wei Wuxian will sacrifice himself for him again. What does it take to finally be together? Too many goodbyes, too many heartaches. Yet they conquer all.

Whatever it takes, by Moonlit_dewdrops

Jiang Cheng and Wei WuXian are sent back to the past. This time, they can save everyone they love. They can make the right choices. They can learn to trust one another. However, everything comes with a price.

underneath your skin, by tardigradeschool

Wei Wuxian falls into the Burial Mounds. His body walks out.

White Flames in a Red Sky, by ZipZapZop

Maybe it hadn’t been a good idea to run away in the middle of a snowstorm.

OR

Wei Wuxian needs help, but he can’t understand that for the life of him.

and so it goes, by doyeorem (pomellogranate)

"While a person is dead in one particular moment, they are still alive and well in all of the other moments of their life, because all of time exists at once."

-

In which Hanguang-jun is at Qiongqi Path, and instead of Jin Zixuan's death, he witnesses Wei Ying throw himself in the way of a punch from the Ghost General, and three swords - one of which is Bichen.

The Burial Mounds is enraged and offended, and many suffer for it.

Purgatory Divinity, by sinfulempire

"Your third and final mission is to rewrite history, Wei Wuxian."

In which Wei Wuxian, the son of the Heavenly Demon Empress, Cangse Sanren and the Celestial, Wei Changze has to rewrite history in order to prove himself worthy of the throne, however, this was a mission that he did not sign himself up for.

[WARNING!! WARNING!! System error, system erro-]

"What-"

Upon accepting the mission, Wei Wuxian found himself back in the past. He had returned to his 6 year old body accompanied by the system at the dingy streets of Yiling- far before Jiang Fengmian had found him and took him in.

Wei Wuxian was alone and surrounded by numerous hound dogs.

Rated G:

Coil Tightly, by Thunderstruck (Blueyed_Impala)

When Wei Wuxian stumbles across a shady pet store in the back alley of his new town he ends up leaving with a companion for life, and more than he bargained for.

Forced apologies, by Io_Palladium

Jiang Cheng confronts Lan Zhan after Wei Yings punishment and it changes everything.

[ask-runaan-anything]

Hi Runaan! Btw it's my birthday on Dec 15 and a birthday wish from my fav assassin would make my day - but anyway I was wondering if we could have a story? I love the stories on these blogs and I've been wondering about right before you left for your mission. I know Ethari told you Rayla shouldn't go, but I'd like the full story. Like, did Ethari approve of the motives? The targets? What did the assassin team think? I basically just want to hear about the preparation.

Happy birthday, little shadow. I wish you a day of peace and joy, and may you be most content.

Will you truly find contentment in these dark and angsty details? *shakes head* Humans have very strange birthday traditions, indeed. But very well. Rayla has patiently instructed me that birthday wishes are very important, so if this is your wish, then you should have it.

Enjoy your extra helping of angst, then.

The news of the humans’ vile attack at the Storm Spire reached the Silvergrove with hurricane force and took us all by storm. We were all angry, sorrowful, and ashamed that two of our most honorable elves had apparently fled, abandoning their precious duty. I had to stand before the Queen of the Dragons and let her rage and shout at my friends, at my choices, at my faulty judgment in sending them to her. My eardrums nearly burst under the force of her fury. I knew she would get to her point eventually, and I knew what that point would be, but the leader of the Moonshadow assassins does not interrupt the Queen of the Dragons, even on a good day. And that was not a good day. So I let her continue, and I took her thunderous words with an agonized heart and stubborn silence.

I didn’t realize Rayla had followed me out into the forest until she shouted--shouted--at Queen Zubeia to stop tangling my hair with her fury. I nearly had a heart attack when the queen whipped her head toward Rayla and growled. I knew what she was seeing: the living child of her egg’s failed defenders. And in her state of mind--her grief and fury--she might’ve done something we would all would regret.

I did the only thing I could think of to distract the angry dragon from taking tragic revenge. I drew my swords on her and called her out. “Justice belongs to the Moonshadow elves, Queen Zubeia, not to you. If you take one innocent life in revenge for another, that is not justice.”

She glanced back at me, and I could feel the volcano of emotions seething in her eyes. Rayla froze across the clearing. 

Queen Zubeia’s tail lashed out, a lazy whip of deadly muscle. I did my best to avoid its full strike, but even the most agile of assassins will have a hard time defending against an adult arch-dragon. For my backtalk, I ended up tumbled in a heap, feeling my shirt soak through. Before I could even think about getting back to my feet, Rayla was standing over me, her hands in fists, staring up at the enraged dragon.

I held one of Rayla’s ankles, in case this was the end. I wanted her to know that I was still with her. Queen Zubeia roared down at us, but Rayla didn’t flinch. I barely heard her words over the ringing in my ears as she said, “I’ll go with him. I’m an assassin, too. Let me prove myself, to both of you.”

“Rayla, no....”

Rayla knelt by my side and pulled off her hoodie, pressing it against my wounds. I was proud and relieved to see that she wasn’t scared, only handling things as best she could.

“This idea has merit,” the queen said. “Runaan, your expert opinion?”

Rayla was well trained. I’d seen to it myself. And taking her on a mission of revenge was slightly safer than letting Queen Zubeia bite her in half right in front of me. I’d managed to finagle a second option. I’d get no chance to force a third. “She is worthy.”

The queen’s toothy smile was the darkest thing I’d ever seen. “Then you will take this dishonored assassin with you. You will travel to Katolis and take its king, in retribution for his murder of my husband.” Her great blue eyes flickered toward Rayla and back to me again. “And you will take its crown prince as well, in retribution for the murder of my son.”

I felt her words burn into me. The deed was done, the mission given.

Rayla gasped. “But he just said that taking one innocent life in revenge for another isn’t justice,” she blurted.

“Perhaps not for the Queen of the Dragons,” Zubeia purred. “But you are assassins. You are Justice. If Runaan wishes to play at merciful compromises, then he had better bring his best game, little elfling. Now, you’d best tend to him before he bleeds out. I fear this mission will fail if his chosen successor has to lead it.... considering...”

Zubeia departed in a thunderous rush of wind, and Rayla used all her years of training to patch me up. She hadn’t even gotten me back to the village before my assassins rushed over to help.

All was chaos for some while, and I admit I don’t remember all of it. But I woke safe at home in my bed, with Ethari bending worriedly over me. He kissed my forehead, and then my hands, and he murmured, “What have you done, my heart?”

I had to tell him. Rayla didn’t understand enough of the subtleties. I had to save Rayla, and the cost of that was bringing her to Katolis with me--and taking an innocent prince, in her place. It was the best I could do, but Ethari was devastated.

He asked me to explain it again and again, hoping for a different story, a loophole. But the binding ribbon is smooth and has no loops. I was tied down, and so was Rayla. There is no way to release one’s duty as an assassin, save for death itself.

Ethari is a gentle elf. He drapes his workshop in pretty stones and drenches it with light. He plays music, and he dances, and he laughs freely. He is pure and precious, and I’ve worked hard to help him remain as soft and gentle as possible, despite his ardent fondness for an unlucky assassin leader. But this... this chaos burst through his workshop door and slapped him across the face. Neither of us could hide or disguise it anymore. Death was always present in the Silvergrove. It has always shadowed me. But after that it moved into the tree house with us, and it brought its friends: Shame, Sorrow, and Heartbreak.

I healed up, on the outside. But none of us truly healed within, not with the mission looming over us all. I was bound to Queen Zubeia’s will, and through me, my assassins... and my craftsman... and my newest squad member, Rayla. Binding ribbons for us all, ghosts of promises past, of loyalty and trust tightening in the face of disaster.

Ethari set to work making Rayla the best swords he could. He worked for weeks to make them perfect, and he hid in his workshop and hammered away his bone-deep fears for her future.

Rayla trained endlessly, eager to prove herself even more than she had in the past, and I had to encourage that. I had no intention of letting her anywhere near Prince Ezran, and I knew I’d have to take King Harrow myself, for Queen Zubeia’s satisfaction. But Rayla still needed to come with us, and that meant she had to be as ready as the rest of us were--on the outside, at least.

My assassins accepted the mission to Katolis readily. They accepted Rayla’s presence as a complex part of the arrangement, as well. Balancing one life with another is very Moonshadow, and so is balancing one death with another. The Moon is never afraid to go dark. It does so every month. For the sake of the murdered Dragon Prince, they understood the heavy balance in taking the prince of Katolis. And all the Silvergrove agreed that it was better to take an innocent human life than an innocent elven one. A distant life instead of Rayla’s, whom they all knew. They believed that I’d chosen well in sparing her.

I did not think so. I had only done my best to save Rayla’s life. But that only shifted the queen’s rage. Someone innocent was still going to die. And I was going to be the one to take that life. That was the price I was going to pay to save Rayla. 

I was relieved beyond words to find a way to avoid paying that price. Ezran himself showing me the egg of the Dragon Prince was a clear sign that several things were dangerously out of alignment. But the binding ribbons were on by then.

The last few weeks before my team left for Katolis seemed to take years. Ethari thought he was hiding his tears better than he truly was. I had no time for tears at all. Rayla and my assassins were in mission prep. And the Silvergrove woke each morning under a heavy fog of dark anticipation. 

The loss of the egg of the Dragon Prince lay at Lain and Tiadrin’s feet. My assassins, my best friends. I’d sent them to the Storm Spire. I needed to remedy their mistake myself. As an assassin, as a Moonshadow elf, as their friend, and as the soft-hearted fool who’d taken in their daughter when they left, their supposed failure was my mistake to fix.

The weight of all of Xadia’s expectations--their sorrow, rage, and thirst for vengeance--rested on my shoulders, every morning, every day, until that mission was complete. I became the linchpin in the mechanism that would deliver justice to a sorrowing land. I could not fail, I could not falter, not for an instant, not by a hairsbreadth. Not in the five months before we left Xadia, not when Rayla let Marcos live, not when she tried to stall me from the tower, and not when my assassins fell around me.

Xadia was waiting. The Silvergrove was waiting. Ethari was waiting. Everyone needed it to be over.

It’s a good thing my hair is already white.

[whitherliliesbloom]

hope for the future

[ ffxivwrite2020 ] ★ [ masterlist ] ★ [ prompt #25 - wish ]

[ wol/alphinaud ]  ★ [ 1,595 words ]  ★ [ post-canon ]

illya skawi & alphinaud leveilleur ♡ occurs an undefined amount of years after canon. 

and we will build bridges up to the sky. and heavenly lights surrounding you and i

"They say a prayer upon a shooting star grants any wish."

The navy of his eyes glisten with sanguine as they tilt up to gaze out the window upon the midnight sky. And while he had momentarily been captivated by the brilliance that was the shimmering gems of stars hung upon a majestic pitch black curtain, his eyes were quickly stolen away by the luster he found his fingers threading through. Each strand like the milky way, its pure white hue as radiant as the sun and moon combined. He'd run his hands through her hair from the roots of her silken diamond like hair down to her back, watching as the other half of its length cascaded and pooled around her on the bed.

He'd brush her hair with his own hands in search for a single knot he could gently tug apart - a husband's service to the woman who was his entire world.. and yet even as he'd find none, he continued to stroke her head, pulling the lalafell closer to his chest as he does. He likes this excuse to stay close to her - knew he’s already missed out on a thousand lifetimes of getting to touch her and hear her. He wishes not to miss any more. 

The woman on his lap hums, shifting ever so gently to turn her head up and poke the tip of his pointed nose with the supple pad of her finger tip.

"I think I of all people should know if that saying is true or not, Alphinaud." There's a hint of red mischief glimmering in the midst of tranquil violet in her eyes, but he's long learned to not think any differently of her regardless what hue her eyes shone. "I'm an astrologer. The constellations are meant for divining the future."

"Ah, yes. And you are also, among other things, a non-padjali white mage. AND the most dangerous sorceress I've ever had the fortune to meet." Alphinaud's grin widens, and he reflects the mischief in her eyes twicefold as he dips his head down to nudge his head against hers in a manner that reminded her starkly of a needy puppy. "Need I mention an accomplished artisan?"

Sometimes Alphinaud found the mood to tease her - listing the many and more talents she possessed that he'd looked up to as she'd scurry away and shrink herself into a flustered, blushing mess. It had been his foolproof way of eliciting that adorable reaction out of his eternally bonded, and a way to help her curb with her less than ideal self-esteem both.

"Oh, and your singing of course.. how could I forget the voice of the most captivating songbird in all of Eorzea?"

"A-alphinauddd pleaseee..." Darling Warrior of Light is thoroughly flushed in the face now, and she's resorted to burying herself into his chest to hide her embarrassment while he it was all he could but to laugh heartily, and the boyish glee in his voice that rose in volume stirs at her pounding heart even more.

There were many things he loved about his lady, the woman he'd been so blessed to reunite with - so utterly undeserving of her gaze as he was. Even their past lives aside, he was a flawed man who so nearly saw the last grains of sands that was his second chance slip through his fingers and wash away into the sea of souls for good. If Illya had not been courted by a taller, darker, stronger and more gifted person, fate surely would have stolen her light from him. 

She bloomed like a rose, beautiful yet laced with thorns. Her spirit was like the ocean, tranquil and still on a calm night, yet her might amidst a midnight storm was dangerous and unparalleled. And more than anything, he saw an angel in her, selfless and ever boundless in her blessings to others. 

And in the midst of reflecting back on her many deeds, a finger gently tracing the discolored scars that lined her skin across her collar bone and shoulder, he wondered silently with some amount of melancholy what exactly the world has done in return for their savior. Certainly not enough - not even close.. and he, of all people, has the most to repay her for, a debt he owes her across the span of countless stars.

If she could wish upon a shooting star - just what kind of deepest desires did her heart hold?

“Make a wish, Illya.” Alphinaud whispers, as he leans back against the headboard of the bed and moves his hand to gently clasp hers. His wife moves back ever so slightly to look at him with wide, curious eyes. 

“A wish?”

“Aye.. if you could have any wish in the world granted, what would it be?”

The lalafell pauses, pursing her lips as she thought in silence, and glances out the window upon the myriad of glittering stars. She contemplates for a moment, before furrowing her brows and looking back up at the elezen.

“I would wish for eternal world peace.” 

Oh, typical. The answer had entirely been predictable, but Alphinaud was no less disappointed after hearing it. Ever the sacrificial hero, a girl who would sooner give her life than to forsake the world even in an imaginary scenario. 

But it was odd to hear that whilst she wore her dainty little night gown, feet in woolen slippers and her body held close in the safety of his arms. The room was warmly lit by a mixture of golden light fixtures and glowing pink lily lamps, the scent of lavender and chamomile drifting through the air. And atop their bedside table left a pair of matching aetheryte rings, and a silver locket bearing a glowing amethyst gemstone whose shine was only second to Illya’s eyes. 

This was their home - their safe haven.. a place he made doubly sure would keep them safe, and most importantly - make Illya feel at ease.

He didn’t want to hear the wishes of the Warrior of Light - the front of a hero she has to wear every waking moment of her life and the bravery she’s proven many times over to already possess. He wanted to hear the wishes of Illya Skawi - the woman whose smile he swore to preserve for the rest of eternity. 

“That’s.. very valiant. But I want to hear your own wish.. a wish you have for yourself.”

Illya tilts her head with a slight frown.

“Wishing something for myself when the world is ever in desperate need somehow.. isn’t that selfish?”

“Illya.. I think you’ve earned every right to be selfish. You more than any other person in the world.” His hand raises to gently nudge her chin up, and he tilts his own head down to plant a gentle kiss upon her forehead before exhaling heavily. His breath tickles her, and he smiles at her singsong giggle. 

“But for the sake of easing your constant need for philanthropy.. Let’s say your wish for world peace comes true. What then?”

Her silence is lengthier this time as she contemplates his question, turning to obscure her eyes beneath the shadow of her bangs as she rummaged through a hundred different thoughts in her mind at once, searching for any glimpses of selfishness she has had to bury under a mountain of responsibilities. 

She finally thinks of one - a simple and basic wish.. but one she never dared hoped she could attain so many summers ago. And that fear still lingers even in the present, for as ideal of a scenario as Alphinaud proposed, she and he knew that the world will never truly be at peace for long. 

But the world was ever wanting for heroes such as they, fighting through as many presents of chaos as it takes - hoping and wishing for a happier, brighter future - much like her own selfish desire.

“I wish we’ll be together forever..” Her voice is soft, sheepish from her embarrassing words, and she presses her face against his neck as she murmurs her remaining words against the warmth of his skin. “To be happy.. and.. for you to be as well.”

It takes a good amount of his will for Alphinaud to not crush her in a tight embrace then and there, and he so nearly does as his arms circle around her waist to pull her closer. His eyes blur for a moment, lips parting in an effort to speak against his speechlessness at her pure, honest wish. But he fights against his own habit of speaking excessively to let the peaceful silence hang in the air, and only when Illya finally looks up at him in a silent request for a response does he finally reply in a whisper.

“Of course we will be... I’ll make sure of that.”

Illya beams up at him, her effervescent smile stealing his breath away again, and Alphinaud finds the corners of his lips curling upwards in turn.

“And what of you? What would your wish be, Alphinaud? In the event of um... world peace, that is.”

“Me?” 

The man hums, narrowing his eyes for a moment.. but it doesn’t take long for him to grin brightly once more, before slipping his hand down to rest against Illya’s tummy. 

“I already have my wish.” His heart soars as he hears Illya laugh heartily, and he leans forward to speak to his future with a gentle stroke of his hand. “Isn’t that right, little one?”