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nathanbatemanfucker · 1 year ago

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SPRITE: Savior

summary: the one where nikini knowingly saves marc’s life, and marc unknowingly saves hers.

pairing: marc spector x forest nymph!oc (nikini)

contents: 18+/NSFW/MATURE, mental health struggles, suicidal ideation/contemplation

wc: 2.6k

an: posted in honor of my favorite person to smoosh’s birthday <33! tough stuff here in the beginning so make a wise decision on if you want to/should read! this is so so so self indulgent and i’m not sorry.

series masterlist | moonknight masterlist | requests open

There’s the smell of moss and dirt in the air, a hint of salt from the lake. Marc sits dangerously on a cliff, feet dangling off the edge as he stares down into the water.

Contemplating.

It’s so loud today. That voice that sounds like his mother rings in his ears, bouncing off the walls of his skull. Most days he can endure it. Steven can talk it away but today Marc’s shut him out. It’s been a long time since he’s so forcefully taken control, but he’s tired. Life is not worth living even with the truths he and his therapist rehearse and rehearse. Even with Steven by his side, the loneliness he’d endured for so long cut like a knife by his companionship.

Their mother, her voice, and her actions are just so loud. She’s dead– lost to illness and addiction just a year ago. She’s dead and she was wrong and Marc was just a child. But, the memory of her deafens any rational line of thought.

So he sits here under the shining sun, staring into reflective water that churns. It beckons to him. A siren’s call of no more. Of peace. If he would just push off and slip away this could all be over. There would be nothing more to fight for.

His breath grows shaky, and shallow as he continues to contemplate. He can feel himself succumbing to that wretched fog, the one that wants him dead. His mother is in it, her voice floating through the mist but he can’t stop. He wants this with or without her. There is always torment. He’s almost done this once, he could do it again. He leans forward, peering harder at the water, unknowing of the presence behind him.

She watches him, perched high up in the tree that she calls home, its trunk hollow and spacious. He frequents this stretch of forest often, and every time as if something in him calls to her, she’s here waiting for him.

Sadness radiates off of him. It seeps from his pores and oozes into the soft forest floor beneath him that is now crying for help, begging to be set free from such melancholy. She is about to step off the branch to go to him when a hand reaches out, wrapping around her wrist.

“Don’t, Nikini. It’s not safe, you don’t know him,” A voice comes from beside her, and she turns to see her friend Lunette. The redhead looks at her with concern, her brow set in firm disapproval.

“He is gentle. And so very sad, the grass can feel it,” Nikini turns back to look at him, seeing him lean forward to look further over the edge. “He wants to die, I must stop him.”

“He is human and not our responsibility. We care for the forest and all it holds. You of all should…know,” The last word comes in a scared whisper when Nikini glowers at her.

Ignoring Lunette’s upsetting words she says, “And right now it holds him.”

“The elders won’t be happy about this. Neither will Kiko.”

“Kiko is pleased with nothing I do, I don’t know why we were paired together.” When Lunette stays quiet, Nikini raises a brow at her, “Will you tell them?”

“No.”

“Then perhaps they will never know,” Nikini suggests.

“Nikini—“

“I will make sure he is safe and then I’ll join you at the waterhole. Tell no one. Promise?”

“Promise,” Lunette sighs reluctantly before materializing in a flurry of leaves.

Despite her eagerness, she is cautious, knowing that Lunette’s warnings could be true. He could be dangerous. He could know of them and want to hurt them. But this sadness he exudes? There’s no way a sadness this deep could be faked.

She closes her eyes and focuses on him, on his aura, and begins to extend her own to him. Marc feels something strange happening to him immediately. The soft but intense smell of jasmine wraps around him, and he leans back, eyes growing heavy. That demeaning voice in his head is smaller, and his brow knits in confusion.

Is Steven fighting? Is he trying to break into the headspace to stop him?

He shakes his head, taking in several deep breaths as if it will clear his head, unknowing that her power isn’t something he can will away. His eyes return to the deep water, to the task at hand and she frowns.

His will must be stronger than she’d hoped it be. This will take more than simple control, it will take companionship and convincing. She steps off of the branch and into the air, floating down to the ground.

Her steps behind her are undetectable, so delicate in the earth beneath her feet.

“Don’t,” She calls out to him.

Marc flinches, letting out a soft shout as he turns around and stands. His stance is defensive, fists raised until his eyes land on her. A woman? His head tilts as he squints at her, fists falling to his sides.

He’s not sure that she is a woman, but something more. He can’t dismiss it, what with Khonshu and his biddings as his avatar. There’s more to this world than he thought, and the sight of her reinforces that for him.

Her hair is short, a stark ashy blonde in comparison to brown skin, and adorned with a crown made of ferns. Her skin is freckled and looks painfully soft under the streams of sunlight— she is wrapped in a white dress that is more akin to a sheet, though it is opaque. She smiles at him, and his eyes zero in on her fangs; they make his heart race. She makes his heart race. She is exquisite. Incomparable.

What is she? Who is she? Something otherworldly for sure.

“Who are you?”

Her throat goes dry when their gazes meet. His eyes are guarded but not unkind. She has seen him time and time again but never this close. She blinks slowly as she tries to take in every detail about him; the furrow of his brow, the slope of his nose, the softness of his lips. There’s the worn sadness on his face— despite it, she finds him captivating.

She clears her throat, chin tilting up, “Nikini.”

“What are you?” He asks, voice full of wonder. His eyes can’t leave her, getting lost in every detail of her.

There are rules. She’s not supposed to discuss anything about herself with humans. She wasn’t supposed to tell him her name. Her gaze falters.

“I— I am…Nikini,” She repeats again cautiously.

His mouth raises in one corner at her answer. He nods, taking a step towards and something warm spreads through his chest when she doesn’t step away. She isn’t afraid of him, isn’t put off by his large stature or furrowed brow despite her small stature.

“I’m Marc. I didn’t mean to disturb you,” He gestures around as if there’s something that had he’d interrupted. But, there’s just them. Them and the forest.

“You come here often.”

“You’ve been watching me?”

“Protecting you,” She amends. “You should stay away from the edge. It is dangerous.”

He snorts a humorless laugh, “That’s the point.”

“The grass, it says you are very sad.”

“The grass?” Marc asks, confused. He feels like he’s going insane…it doesn’t feel so bad with her standing here in front of him.

She points to where he sat, “The grass, it absorbs the aura around it. Yours is…I’m sorry. For whatever happened, I am sorry.”

Marc swallows, looking down at the grass, clearing his throat, “It’s fine. I have it under control.”

She blinks at him, confused by his words. It’s clear he doesn’t have it under control. “But you were going to…I stopped you. The feeling you felt, it was me.”

“Why? Why would you stop me if you know how much I wanted to—,” He cuts himself off, letting out a sigh of frustration. How he feels so entitled to speak to her this way he doesn’t understand, shame bubbles in his belly. “Why?”

She opens her mouth to answer his question and promptly closes it because she is not sure. She doesn’t understand why she’s so drawn to him. In all her years, she's been curious about humans and the way that they live. But she’s never been fascinated by one. So protective. Everything she’s done since seeing him for the first time has been instinct— as if she had to. That’s what she’ll say.

“Because I had to.”

She had to? Maybe it was part of her life, to save pathetic humans like him in her forest. She looks as if she could be the queen of it.

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” She says with a smile.” “Come back here. Anytime that you feel this way, come back to me. Yes?”

Seeing her again? This feels like a dream, his head filled with sweet fog. Or maybe he’s already dead. Maybe he’d slipped off the cliff and this was his afterlife. Maybe she’s stationed in the field of reeds— but would an unworthy man like him have made it to a place like that? To a…being like her?

“Alright,” He says mildly.

“Now that I have appeared to you, the forest will try to confuse you to protect me and the others. But this will help.”

The others? Marc thinks to himself. There are more of her?

She holds out her hand, and right before his eye, a piece of gold appears in the cup of her palm. Engraved into it a flower he’s unfamiliar with. He looks up at her in disbelief and then back at the charm. Yes, she is certainly not human but he can’t bring himself to be afraid.

“What is it?” He looks at it skeptically.

She takes his hand and places the charm into it, curling his fingers around it, “A talisman. It will guide you to me. That is my symbol, Jasminum, the flower. It’s what you could smell.”

Marc bites back the sigh that raises in his throat when she touches him. Her skin is like cool, soothing water against his warmth. And so incredibly soft.

“Guide me to you?”

“Just listen to it. It will work. I must go, they will come looking for me. But, will you come back?”

“I’ll come back,” He reassures her before he can think better of it. He shouldn’t come back here, he doesn’t know what she is or what she’ll do to him. But he wants to. He yearns to.

The smile on her face makes Marc’s heart flutter. And then she’s gone, disappearing in a gust of white flowers. From the scent of them, he can tell it’s jasmine.

—

Nikini appears just on the edge of the waterhole. She’s late, the elders have already started their talk about the upcoming summer solstice. She slips behind trees and through branches to where Lunette is with her mate— Riffie— and Kiko. She lets out a silent sigh as she comes to stand beside her. Kiko, taller than both Lunette and Riffie looks over them at her with a disapproving look.

All nymphs are assigned a mate, usually a satyr that belongs to a different faction with different responsibilities. There is no love, no practical compatibility, just an elder who claims that each pair is meant to be together. Nikini couldn’t be more sure that this elder has lost their touch or perhaps they never quite had it. Kiko is in the faction of human control and extermination. She and Kiko…well it will be difficult to lead their lives together with such differences— especially now that she has had contact with Marc.

“You’re late,” Kiko whispers, his hooves shifting in the mud.

“There was an injured fawn, I couldn’t just leave her,” She lies easily, looking away from him and to the elders as she tries to listen.

Lunette and Riffie share a look but say nothing, taking a step inward toward each other. They’ve been privy to many of Nikini and Kiko’s disagreements and prepare for the blowout to come after the elders are finished.

It’s the same talk they give every single year. Except this time, pollution has risen to an all-time high, and with the summer solstice, humans will be their most active in these woods.

“Nature is shifting. The warmth and abundance of summer will be upon us soon and so will droves of them who claim to love the earth and destroy it with their best interests. More than ever we must be dedicated to nourishing and protecting our land.”

“Hear that? I was being dedicated,” She quips to Kiko.

Nymphs, fairies, and satyrs alike scatter once the elders are done speaking, off to do their part for the forest and it’s longevity. Nikini decides to walk home, to see if she can’t run into Marc before he is gone but Kiko has other plans.He calls for her, and when she doesn’t stop for him, he follows after her.

He bends so that his mouth is near her ear, able to whisper, “You smell of human.”

“I know not what you speak of,” She says cooly.

“Do not lie, Nikini. For once, please do not lie to me,” He begs, and though his face is set into a frown she can see how tender his eyes are when she looks over at him.

Sometimes, she wonders if she’s too hard on him. There are times when she finds herself considering giving him a real chance at courting her. She knows that her heart could never truly belong to him. Especially not now.

“The fawn, she was a little girl. She was lost, I simply guided her back to her parents,” She lies again.

“Her scent is intense for a little girl,” Kiko suggests.

“Perhaps she has a strong spirit.”

“You know that it’s against the rules to do something like that.”

“She was a child, Kiko.”

“It does not matter. You heard the speech of the elders, and the humans have become more and more careless. I have seen it with my own eyes.”

Yes, sometimes she sees herself giving him a chance, and then words like those leave his mouth.

She glares up at him, pointing her dainty finger into his chest, “We are eventually supposed to raise children together and you do not even hold empathy for them.”

“They are not our children, they’re the children of a species who seek to destroy themselves.”

“And who are we if we don’t try to save younglings regardless of their species?

“Your head is in the clouds, Nikini. One day you will learn that given the chance to save us, they would pillage and use us for all we have. Every single one of them.”

Marc’s existence, his wonder and sadness sit on the tip of her tongue. If Kiko could just see him. Understand him. If they all could, maybe they wouldn’t be so afraid.

“Do not follow me any longer.”

“Please, Nikini, I’m just trying to open your eyes.”

“My eyes are open and sadly they are faced with the sight of you. Let me amend my statement, do not follow me, and do not talk to me.”

Kiko tries to reach for her, to attempt his best try at an apology but it is too late. His hand is met with white flowers, his nose with her telltale scent. He sighs and heads back towards his faction, heart sinking into his stomach.

She didn’t need this to go so poorly to know that Kiko can never know about Marc. But now more than ever she is concerned if he ever does return. Though it causes her heartache and goes against her want to see him again, that night she lays in a soft pile of moss and prays to the gods that he never returns.

moonknight taglist: @angelfxllcm, @honeybrowne, @ninebluehearts, @rmoonstoner, @hotchs-bitch, @later-gators12, @foreverinwanderlustt-blog, @aleeb, @whatthefishh, @eyelessfaces, @marc-spectorr, @missdictatorme, @toracainz, @mccn-bcys, @minigirl87, @campingwiththecharmings, @juneknight, @pastelbabygirl19 (and @inklore bc this a woods au)

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