#rat columns

[bandcampsnoop]

3/1/24.

Jason Morgan (Bays) has been releasing excellent music as The Spires (Ventura, California) since the early 2000s. Seriously, this is some of the most consistently good pop I've heard over the past 20 years.

"Index" is the new 7" from The Spires. It comes hot on the heels of the CD/Cassette "Woke Up Strange" last June.

It's funny, I know the Velvet Underground and The Chills are among Jason's favorite bands. But his music doesn't really sound like either. And his vocals/melodies are unmistakably his own. I would say that Rat Columns, The Planes and Tam Vantage are the bands I listen to that most remind me of The Spires.

Artificial Light is releasing this extremely limited lathe cut 7".

[fictionadventurer]

Top 5 Arthur episodes?

D.W. Goes to Washington: It's a very close race between this one and #2, but I gave the edge to this one because almost every line here is classic. It's full of hilarious Imagine Spots and great D.W. zingers.

The Rat Who Came to Dinner: Another episode that's full of great jokes. The dynamic between Ratburn and Arthur's family is comedy gold.

The Contest: The pastiches of different animation styles alone puts this one in the top five, but it's also in service of some wonderfully absurd mini-stories with classic jokes. ("My brain was on cruise control" is the Arthur quote that gets the most use in daily life).

Buster Hits the Books: The pastiches of the different books are hilarious.

Arthur's Almost Boring Day: I had a very tough time choosing the fifth episode. I went with this one because the fighting between Arthur and D.W. reaches a hilarious fever pitch that goes beyond any other episode.

[twistedsamuraiadvice]

Advice for solving my rat problem. I hope this is the sort of advice you give.

Second Reader,

Rats are not an issue i commonly deal with, but were a real problem when I was in prison. Taka's presence helped greatly, though I begged her not to actually consume the things...I knew they put out poison out for the animals.

I would recommend ensuring every food you have be kept in air-tight containers. Rats can chew through much more then Mice can, but if they can't smell food, they'll be less likely to try. Metal cans are good for this, but not the only option. If they have already discovered where you keep yours, you may try moving your storage. Anything they have already gotten open must be disposed of immediately.

If you know of a way for rats to get in, do your best to seal it. an open crawl space is an invitation, even without their ability to chew a new entry point. You can not truly rat-proof your home, but you can insure they work for it.

Set out traps, and do not balk at the idea of lethal ones. It is well and good to respect the lives of animals, but if they stay you will be at risk for serious illness, and if you release them elsewhere then they will scourge another family instead. Releasing them far away from humans is merely turning them lose on an unsuspecting wild population-either they will die, or the animals they meet will. besides that, releasing rodentia is often illegal, for exactly the reasons I just listed. Better to give them a swift death then prolonging suffering-do not subject them to starvation and harsh weather. Kill them to start.

Now, for the other options...you may either get a ratter, or you may poison them. DO NOT UTILIZE BOTH. Taka made herself ill once eating rats that had been poisoned whilst I was in prison, and it was a bloody fucking nightmare. Thankfully, the likelihood of your hunter getting poisoned by the prey is rare, a dose low enough for a rat to survive is typically low enough for your hunter to manage, but it's not worth the risk.

On that note, if you do intend to get a ratter, be aware of possible symptoms. Rats carry illness, and while a Cat is designed to feed on meat, you need to be aware of possible parasites they may pick up. Keep a veterinarian posted of any change in behavior.

If all else fails, Call an exterminator. Stay somewhere else while they work, and return home, hopefully rat free.

Death is part of life, and your home is your castle. Feel no sympathy for the rats who care not for you.

-Simon Blackquill

[itstimetodrew]

Always wondering if I pick up traits from favorite characters or if they became my favorite because I already had those traits…

[ohbutwheresyourheart]

Monday work gripe of the week: my reasonably intelligent coworker who is the same age as me could not successfully copy/paste data from one excel sheet to another

[hotniatheron]

i love showing tornadoes to people who live in places that have never had them bc it never fails to freak them out

[qspades]

Exquisite oriental architecture at Swaminarayan Temple in Bhuj / India

[travelaroundtheworld82]

Exquisite oriental architecture at Swaminarayan Temple in Bhuj / India

[lyxthen-reblogs]

...Thank you for reminding me I should be writing essay about Ace Attorney (<-We were assigned to pick a form of "unconventional media" that relates to a relevant social problem, in this case corruption) for my aesthetics class.

You don't understand I need him to be a bitch...

Wanted to sorta further explore what Feen would have been as an art major and the type of behavior that goes alongside it. I have seen some discussions about his characterization and it made my gears turn.

Just, the idea of him being just as petty back then is hilarious to me. Most likely had much less of a filter than at the present. Bro would act like he knows everything and if you dared to question his sense of aesthetics, you'd be called a philistine.

He most likely was quite knowledgeable about dramatic literature and art, also eloquent too since its kinda needed in that department. Probs used fancy frou frou talk for art and drama analysis. Art majors be that way. He would be insufferable.

[petermorwood]

A day or so ago, @dduane reblogged a long post - a Canadian magazine article from 1966 - about the Americanisation of Winnie the Pooh.

It's an Impressive Tirade in which the writer (Sheila H. Kieran) says what she thinks about letting Walt Disney have a free hand with a foreign Children's Classic.

There's mention of the previous Adaptation Endeavour, "Mary Poppins" (1964) but it's very brief, perhaps with an eye to limited column space - or maybe because All Was Said Already in a previous review.

There is, however, rather a lot about the English characters being given American accents, and about the inclusion of a new character, an American gopher (which, the article suggests, looked vague enough to the Kieran children - its target audience - that it might as well have been a mole or a beaver).

*****

And that reminded me of another bit of American Animalisation done by Disney, in the 1949 short "The Wind and the Willows" - though in this instance it's visual since the voices are, for the most part, suitably British.

They include Basil Rathbone as narrator, and a horse who sounds like George Formby. In some scenes the horse actually looks like Formby, so this voice may not be entirely accidental.

Badger, however, sounds like a Scotsman - the worst kind of stage Scotsman at that - rather than how I used to "hear" him as a C. Aubrey Smith-voiced crusty retired colonel.

That, however, is just personal preference.

However, Disney's Badger is not a proper British (more correctly, European) badger, Meles meles. Here's one, which though not the most amiable of beasts in reality, still manages to look fairly affable ("I say, old chap, whatever are you looking at?")

Instead he's a North American badger, Taxidea taxus, which not only has a less affable expression ("Hey, bud, you. Yeah, you. You lookin' at me? You lookin' at ME?") but, more important, different stripes.

Here's Disney's version alongside mine. The correction took about five minutes of pixel-tweaking.

Disney's animators could have got it right from the outset just as easily, because I'm pretty sure the reference library which provided costume info for Rat's tweed Norfolk jacket and britches included picture-books of natural history.

Come to that, any "The Wind in the Willows" after the unillustrated first edition would have been enough, and there must have been at least one copy lying around for story adaptation and scene-description purposes.

The first illustrated edition came out in the UK in 1931, and its artist was, at author Kenneth Graham's request, the very same E.H. Shepard who had illustrated the Pooh books just a few years previously...

...while this Arthur Rackham colour plate is from an edition published in 1940 in New York.

So those books wouldn't have been impossible for Disney to get.

The problem, however, is that if a word ("badger", for instance) is well known to mean one thing here, it may be Too Much Trouble to find out if the same word means something else there, with the result that finding out can sometimes come as rather a surprise.

Check the UK / US meaning of "suspenders" to see what I mean... ;->

[cammys-imagines24]

°•Astarion Drinking Your Blood•°

Oh, Astarion never tires of your taste.

Whether it's his first time drinking from you or the hundredth.

You were his first human after all.

But even if he hadn't of lived centuries slaking his thirst with that of vermin...

Forcing their rotten, diseased blood down his hungry maw in sheer desperation...

The Vampire would still find your blood to be like ambrosia from the gods.

The sweetest thing to grace his tongue and warm his belly.

Sometimes it's hard to stop, if Astarion is being honest with himself.

But he loves you too, too much to put you in any mortal peril.

Though after a feeding you may feel dizzy and need to recuperate the next day.

It's just, after so long dining upon infected, squirming rats with mottled fur and yellowing buck teeth...

In the shadows of night, prowling the pests and repugnant riffraff.

He can't help himself and he's grateful you allow him to indulge a little.

But despite however ravenous he is, he's always gentle.

Pulling you close and kissing the moonlit column of your throat.

Tenderly wrapping his ivory arms around your waist, his tone sultry while whispering sweet nothings and gratitudes in your ear.

Astarion is so well versed in his ministrations that you've come to want him to feed off of you just as much as he wants, no, needs to be fed by you.

You relishing his hands leaving indents in the flesh of your hips and his breath upon your nape...

Often finding yourself tugging on strands of his curled silver locks to pull him closer.

Until no space is between you two. Until his mouth touches your neck.

And once it does, Astarion can't help but close his eyes, an involuntary shudder resounding through his whole body at the perfume of you.

Your essence a seductive potion which the Vampire would gladly, willingly lap up forever and ever.

No matter how gentle and inviting he makes the build up though, there's simply nothing to be done about the initial pain.

Astarion can't help the fact that once he bares his pearly, white fangs and sinks them into the sensitive flesh of your neck that it's unpleasant.

His fangs like two white hot pokers burrowing into your jugular vein, causing a muffled scream to leave you.

Your bottom lip plump from how hard you gnaw at it.

He does hate your scream. It revolts him that he's the cause of it.

But it is a momentary distress from you before you reassuringly comb through his hair again.

And after a few labored breaths, you ease into the pain. Getting used to it every single time.

By then he's drunk on you. Gorging himself on the nectar of your life. The crimson, pulsing river of your very being.

He's practically sent to heaven with each swallow and he never thought a spawn like him would get there.

Once you go slack in Astarion's arms he holds you tight, cradling your warm body. His fingers ghosting over your chest, hips, stomach...

And when your heartbeat begins to slow that's when he forces himself to pull away.

Licking the scarlet stream which drips down the two raw puncture wounds.

Cleaning up his mess all the way down to the start of your cleavage, exposed from your unlaced shirt.

Aftercare is incredibly important to Astarion and he is quick to sweep you up bridal style in his arms.

Tucking you safely into your shared bed and fetching you a glass of cool water.

You, weakened and tired, putting up little fuss but managing to smile at him and reach out to take his hand.

He wastes no time, falling into bed with you and pulling you close so your head is upon his chest.

He keeps you in a vice grip all night long so that any who would dare come to harm you in your diminished state would have to go through him first.

And he damn well would never let any harm come to you, save that of the wounds he assaults upon your neck.

And with you content but exhausted in Astarion's arms he licks his red stained lips and smiles in satisfaction.

He thinks you are a marvel really, to allow him to drink your blood in the first place.

To consent willingly and give him a taste of pure ecstasy.

And with his flushed cheeks and twinkling, enlivened crimson eyes, he places a kiss on your forehead.

Whispering how very much he loves you while you sleep soundly upon his chest.

[bandcampsnoop]

7/28/23.

I was flipping through my stacks and noticed that I've collected quite a few Rat Columns releases over the years. I've always enjoyed David West's work in Rat Columns (and other bands - especially Rank/Xerox)

Listening to "Thrift Store" from The Planes (Brooklyn, New York) upcoming LP "Dark Matter Recycling Co." really recalled the kind of indie pop peddled by Rat Columns. There's also a bit of The Suncharms, Constant Smiles and The Spires.

According to Austin Town Hall, this is a joint release between Totally Real Records (US) and Safe Suburban Homes (UK).

[mehiwilldoitlater]

"Get your dirty hands off me! LET GO OF ME!"

"Listen Brother! We must act with respect! We have a lady in our hands!"

The two yaoguais kept on laughing while they were dragging you somewhere, far away from your friend and protector.

Everything happened so fast that you couldn't register the events: the Destined One, and you had to head to the location of the second relic, which you knew was in this desert. It seems easy at first; you thought that you just needed to be as careful as the last time, but something went wrong!

How could you not notice those scouts?! Maybe they were more used to the state of the place; maybe the dust covered the smell for your friend; what you know Is that in a couple of minutes your monkey was now on the ground, his chest puerced with arrows, agonizing yes, but still alive? You tried to help him; take the gourd that you carried with you with your healing wine, but before that, those rats had already captured you. You kept on struggling and fighting as much as you could, but instead they have other plans for you.

"Our second prince will love this snack! I heard that this one is a really good catch."

"Ah! Please! Maybe he'll give us a bite!"

They were planning to give you fkr lunch to their prince. 

If it was them or him, you didn't care; what you did care was to survive and help your monkey out of that mess.

You were so focused on trying to break free from care where they were dragging you, but you started to think that it must have been an indoor when the scorching sun wasn't burning your head anymore.

It looked like a cave, maybe a temple inside the mountain based on the carvings on the walls. Columns made of pure stone, stalagmites, and stalactites decorated with sacred figures and prayers, commemorative candles near statues of Buddha and his disciples.

The ones that built the city must have used the caves in order to obtain more spaces, maybe?

You didn't get enough chance to ask since the two rats didn't show any kindness when they literally threw you on the ground.

"Shouldn't we... I don't know...cook her or something?"

"Ah! The prince and the king live their food fresh and squirmy! Now let's go; he doesn't like being seen while he eats."

And while you were Just pick up yourself from the ground, you Heard their soft and fast footsteps, leaving you in this new side of the cave. There were objects, quite a lot even, all of them around, like some small mountains of trinckets and stuff.

Furniture was around, but those were so damaged and old that you questioned if someone could even use it like that. On the walls of the cave, someone had put some decoration—canvases that had almost lost all of their colors, rusted weapons that were long lost—lost the care that they used to, for the exception of a scary giant Chui that was resting on the ground, ready to be picked.

Whoever was able to hold it must have been a quite herculean creature.

There was such a short source of light, coming from one hole in the ceiling of the wall and...from the way they took you in! There was no door, no bars, nothing! 

You didn't want to waste anymore time, and so you sprinted in the same direction that the two rats had left you, until a rumble on your feet almost tripped you for the second time.

There was another, then another one. 

Footstep, something big was walking towards you.

Two giant feet, covered in fur and some claws that you swear could rip apart your flesh, incased you. The armor was old and marred but still held some remembrance of his rank and position in his kingdom.

A large and long tail and a pointy mout... it was a rat, but it was grotesquely big. His yellow eyes scrutinized you, while his nose was sniffing the air in your direction.

Without thinking twice, you bolted so fast to escape from that thing, but you didn't get enough time since he was fast enough to grab you from your ankle and raise you up like an old ragged doll. You tried to kick it, scratch it, and try to punch it, but he didn't budge a little; it was like a mosquito bite for him.

"LET ME GO! STOP!"

Despite your plea, he just stood there, looking at you and sniffing more closely. A few of your hair sucked in his nostrils, and so I kept it up for a few more seconds. You couldn't see it, but it seemed... curious. He decided to change your position, holding you by your waist, trying to see you better from another angle.

You were beyond terrorized; from near, he was even worse! AND THAT SMELL! You shivered in his grasp, too afraid to move another punch or kick while he studied you. He finally stopped moving when your face hit a direct ray of sunlight from the hole in the ceiling. You gasped, tried to cover yourself, and then...the ground. 

He didn't tossed you at all; he just putted you down. It was incredible to notice that you didn't even feel any pain in your abdomen from where he had grasped you. At that point, he just started to emit something that reminded you of some kind of giggle, a few snorts, and he looked...excited? He trotted to one of the small trinkets stacked near the bed that you assumed was his own. starting to move things around.

He was distracted. That was your chance! You slowly start to pick it up from where you left it to get out from there, when you felt again his enormous hand on your back, grasping the back of your shirt from behind, rising you up again like a kitten.

"Stop it! I don't-"

And then, again, you were seated...in front of what once was maybe a nice tea set. His throat was emitting a strange sound while he started a small fire and put a big iron pot of water on it. He was...humming...while making tea? And there were two pairs of small cups, old and dusty, and one was for you?

You didn't muttered a word, preferring to stare at that strange creature that was now putting some dried herbs; you wondered if it was even tea in the pot, still very small for something of his size.

"Wha...what are...you doing?"

"Making tea...for the guest!"

Okay, now it was a really good moment to freak out; he thought you were a guest?! HIS GUEST?! 

"I thought you were supposed to..."

You held your tongue, reminding him about the fact that you were lunch for him; it may be quite a problem. You tried another time to move away, but suddlenly got back in place when some kind of conckut was versed in your cup. A few big drops spilled; he wasn't so versatile in this.

And then he looked at you. No, staring. He was there, staring at you, waiting for a response, and you looked at the staff in your cup. Imagine the food infection that it would cause. You kept on staring at it, trying to come up with every possible excuse to avoid the ingestion of the brooth, but three meters Yaogauis don't leave room for so many options. You gulped the content of the cup, trying to hold the near vomit coniate.

",..Gee...thanks...that was...so nice! .....Thanks..."

Oh was... please, like a lot. He started to clap, happy, drinking directly from the pot.

After that, he started again to act strangely. But this time it wasn't about taking care of the guest, but just...pile up staff...on you.

He made sure that you were comfortable, as much as you were, but his actions reminded you of a child that is showing you staff. At some point he even tried to put a necklace around your neck, but your sudden shriek made him desist, only for him to put the garmet in your hand. It was an old and broken jade pearl necklace; maybe there was a pendant in the middle since the space, but it was long gone. The small gems were broken or ruined, but it seemed to be once a really nice piece of jewelry.

At some point, your fear just became boredom and hassle, especially when he kept on showing you staff. At some point, what really caught your eye was a rectangular piece of wood that had previously fallen from one of the piles next to you. Covered in dust and mud, it must have seen better time, but, on the front, something was still visible: it was a piece of paper plastered with something on the wood, and, on it, three figures standing, one sitting in the center of it. The three standing figures seemed young, each of them with something to distinguish them from each other, the one sitting on a small chair wearing instead some regal robes.

"Ah, a painting...why did you keep it with you? Do you like drawing?"

The rat suddenly stopped, pointing his finger towards you and the draw.

"Me! Me and brothers! And my papa too! You found it, so good."

He seemed delighted, clapping his hands and making again those strange sounds. You, instead, cannot stop looking at the drawing confused. Him? Wait...one of them had a Chui next to him, and some traits, by using a lot of imagination, made him similar to your gaoler.

"Wait...this is you? You are him?!"

You pointed the figure, and he just...nodded, vigurusly.

"But," you continued, "how?! How it happened?! You were a man! How did you become a... Yaoguai?"

You said, avoiding using the word rat, opting to not make remarks on his looks further. 

"Master!" He just chirped "Master! He did it! Everyone rats now! Little brother left, searching for help for turning in rats...still missing...older brother...not so good...he acts violent...daddy like master! So I follow too! ....But not like, like, daddy."

"Master?...what master?"

"Sage! Wind sage!"

"Hold on, the...the yellow wind sage did this to you?" He kept on nodding; this time it was slower than before; maybe it was something that he wasn't proud of?

"Did it hurt you? I mean,. you didn't have a tail before. It was painful. I'm...sorry..." Your tone was softer this time, wondering how much pain that poor creature must have endured all this time. He seemed to be remembering his old life as a man; maybe, by having you in, he tried to recreate some old habits of him? Did you remind him of someone that he had lost? He didn't even try to eat you at all; he was just being nice.

He kept on looking at you, sensing the change in the room after this knowledge, and he just...poke you. You looked at him, raising an eyebrow. Was he trying to cheer you up?

"Even rat, help Daddy! Master will be back, Daddy happy, and finally Daddy will notice my work! Me protect people from tigers! Not many thanks, but still do!"

And now you felt worse! How could someone say so casually that their father doesn't give them enough credits?! He was just a big guy. Yaogaus truly were strange, from some friendly horses to a rat prince.

"I'm sorry to know that you have to endure all of this... But, you know, me and my friend, we're searching for AH!"

Trying to understand this creature, trying to get a chance to flee, and trying to not faint for fear made you forget the first reason why you were there in the first place. You rose from your spot, causing him to back away in surprise.

"The relic! The wind sage...MONKEY!"

You put down the cup; how could you stay here taking tea while your friend was somewhere pierced by who knows how many arrows?! You started to move away from there, trying not to fall from the various junk that he had put around you.

"I'm sorry! I need to leave! My friend needs me; I need to help him! I AGH!"

When he grabbed you, this time he was more scared and aprehensive, trying to stop you from your exit.

"No! You must stay! Other kill and eat, I protect and care! You too, nice! You stay!"

The fight that you left before restarted again, this time with much more vigor from you. You won't have let your friend die in that dump place!

"Put me down! I don't want to stay here with you! LET ME GO!"

His attempt to keep you in place resulted in both his giant hands holding you and trying to keep your kicking feet away from his face. He was starting to panic. Why did you have to leave?!

The struggle continued, and both of you did not notice a figure approaching fastly in your direction until you just heard a huge STOMP. The rat started to move around like a drunk man, then collapsed in a huge cloud of dust and sand. This time, you didn't have to taste the ground since two strong arms were ready to capture your fall.

"You look like you were in need of assistance, my Bián huá!"

"...Monkey!"

His furry face welcomed you once you opened your eyes from the fall with a smile and, instinctively, you launched your arms around his neck for an hug. But you remembered his wounds at the last moment.

"AH! I'm sorry! Your wounds!"

"I'm fine! See? Not a scratch!"

He showed you his chest, untouched and without trace of any wounds or arrows.

"But I saw it... Did the healing wine help you?"

"Not exactely. I've found a helping hand that...

Will let you lose your head!"

"...it's strangely specific."

He just laughed it off but regained his seriousness once he heard some moan of pain from the rat Yaogaui in front of him. He let you down, then took back his staff. 

"Wait!" He looked at you surprised. "Let's just leave him. You gave him a concussion already. I don't think he'll be a problem soon."

"All right, I don't know what happened here, but you look like you had a blast. Let's move now; more rats will come after the commotion!"

You nodded, but you still looked back at the prince with the same sorry expression from before.

"I'm sorry. It's an urgent matter. I promise to apologize better when we'll take the relic. Thank you!"

And so you and the Destined One left hand in hand the cave, noticing in a rush moment the look of pain in the prince's eyes. You wondered if the pain was for his head or something else.

@sleepingdramaqueen

@sun-jglim

@crimsonflameproxy

@everlastingmoonlightsworld

@biankanoir

@cromboloni

@miraclecherryblossomsblog

@masksandfeathers

@certifiedsimpinggalore

@cinnamonroll-anon

@justrandomlypassing

@cute-angi

@dressycobra7

@virtualexpertanchor

@szynkaaa

@sleepydang

[rayveneyed]

cw: sexually explicit content / blood / relatively light sadomasochism / age + experience gap (reader is older + more experienced) / sub!choso / vampires 🧛‍♀️ / sex and violence as two sides of the same coin /

choso kamo is 160 years old when he meets you.

in those years of walking the earth, undead, he believes he’s embraced his vampirism as much as he possibly can. the broiling self-hatred he had once found solace in has reduced to a simmer, strongest in those moments of blood and guts and weakening heartbeats; and although he often avoids crowds, and companionship, and light, he no longer believes himself to be a slave of his own nature.

to be true — in the grand scheme of immortality, of vampirism — he isn’t anywhere close to the level of control he’d wish to have. often, when indulging yuji’s desire to enjoy the world as he did before his death — boardwalks and arcades and cotton candy — he feels his canines aching in his gums, stretching until they dimple against his bottom lip.

it’s not comfortable. it’s not confident. but even despite the growing aches, he’s no longer cowering in alleyways; no longer drinking from poor stray cats and garbage-chewing rats to momentarily satiate that ever-growing, gnawing hunger. he has some sense of control—

“oh, you baby-bats. so adorable.”

control which he now flounders to grab.

a sharp, inky black nail scrapes up the column of his neck — he can’t help but arch into it, head tilting back until his wide, pupil-blown eyes find the ceiling, with its intricate coving and obsidian chandeliers. the music from the main hall is nothing but a buzzing in the back of his head; thoughts of his friends’ whereabouts, an afterthought. your fingernail crowds the underneath of his jaw and stops at where his pulse point would have thrummed, would he have been alive.

you’re a demon. a devil. a she-beast. a succubus. any horrid, terrible name he could call you, he will — dressed in blacks and burgundies and gold older than him, your lips painted an ox-blood red and your eyes as sharp and dark as any polished knife. in your hands he is small. weak. mortal.

“satoru usually keeps his strays away, after last time,” you say, pouting now, though it’s a crude approximation of sadness — even now, your eyes glint with devilment. “so mean, when he knows i have a weak spot for bats like you.”

that wretched finger stretches up; pokes at his bottom lip, scrapes against the fangs that had — embarrassingly — extended from his gums at the simple weight of you on top of him.

“look at that,” you coo, and your grin is something unsettling, something that curdles in the pit of his stomach and heats between his legs. “excited, pup?”

his answering breath comes ragged, and it’s always more embarrassing than it was when he was human. his heart doesn’t work, his lungs do not work, and he has no need to breathe — in fact, he lost the reflex to do so around 92 years ago — but his brain is scrambled, it seems, wilted neurons confusing signals from almost two centuries ago. “i’m — ahem — i’m okay, duchess.”

“how sweet. you don’t have to call me by my title, you know. my name will do just fine.” at his silence, you push yourself up from where you’d been laying low against his chest — looking far too excited when you say: “unless, of course, you like it.”

his hands tremble at his side. he can’t remember the last time he’s indulged in — in debauchery. the last time someone’s made him feel like they’re holding his heart in their hands. over the past hundred-odd years, he’s avoided it like the plague, and for good reason — most vampires aren’t known for their commitment, let’s just say. and now you’re on top of him looking like every sin he’s tried to avoid, and he’s straining so hard in his pants he fears he’ll cum before you even hint at removing a single article of clothing.

you press yourself flush again, nosing at his neck. he knows, for the first time in his long life, what it feels like to be prey. is this what his victims had felt when he ripped into their throats, young and inexperienced and bloodthirsty? did their vulnerability sit like a stone in their throats?

a groan comes from you, suddenly, and your tongue darts out to lave against his skin. choso’s answering moan is more of a whimper, broken and weak in his mouth, but you don’t seem to notice — or care. he flexes his glutes in an effort to stop himself from rutting up against you — not only would it be embarrassing, desperate, but it would be rude. this is your house, after all. your soirée. your gilded halls and bedazzled walls. your silk sheets against his back. your satin skirt bunched around your waist.

“tell me, pup,” you say, and he fights the instinctual reflex to shiver at the brush of your lips against his skin, “have you ever fed from our own?”

“hm?” it’s a sound of confusion brought half on by his simple lack of knowledge, and half on by his slow-processing brain. only seconds after does he fully register your question, and the eyes he hadn’t realised he had screwed shut flew open. “no. i — i didn’t know that was possible.”

all at once, you’re sitting up again — swinging your leg over his hips until you’re standing. it wouldn’t be right to call it clambering — you are impossibly graceful, even passed the agility and elegance that comes with the gift of the undead. his hands reach for you before he can stop them, a sound like a question on his tongue, and you send him the sweetest, most tooth-rotting, stomach-turning smile. he thinks he likes your biting, cruel grins more, though you’re lovely regardless.

you begin to reach for the ties of your corset at your spine — just another thing that makes his mouth water. people didn’t wear these sorts of clothes anymore, not in the human world. but he remembers the skirts and corsets from paintings of noblewomen hundreds of years ago, and how he’d admire the curve of their waists, the swell of their chests—

“of course, satoru wouldn’t tell you. why would he?”

his eyes snap up from your chest, caught with his hand in the cookie jar. but you don’t seem to mind. the corset is removed painfully slowly, for no other reason than to torture him; then, the outer dress, with its carmine satin and intricate embroidery. you throw it to the floor carelessly, as if the most knowledgeable museum curators wouldn’t prostrate themselves at your feet for the simple chance to display it for millions to see — a while his eyes drink up the sight of more skin, the whisper of form beneath your underdress and bloomers, you near him once more.

metal to a magnet, a moth to flame, he pulls himself to the edge of the bed. you find a place between his legs and grasp his chin, and choso can’t look away from you.

“i can take you apart and put you back together,” you say — promise — voice like crushed velvet, quiet and creeping like a choking vine. your thumb smooths over his cheek and ends at its apple, where you press the sharp tip of your nail into his flesh. “i can show you the pleasures of your eternal life, and its pains, and everything in between. i can bring you to every edge, and draw you back from them just as quick — and it will be painful, and you’ll enjoy it so much you won’t be able to go another day without it.”

he’s lost the ability to speak. his unmoving heart is in his throat — or in your hands, or between your sharp teeth. you tilt your head and regard him with knowing, twinkling eyes.

“all you have to say, pup, is yes.”

oh, it’s out of him so quick he can hardly keep up — a word so breathy you’d swear you’d already had your way with him. but embarrassment is a thing of the past when your smile stretches, and you murmur marvellous. you release him from your grasp, much to his chagrin, but when you begin pulling down your bloomers his attention shifts.

he can smell you. smell you. the musky, salty scent of between your legs — a smell that has his mouth watering and his fingers cramping from how hard he fists the sheets. your bloomers are damp when you discard them, sticky with your arousal, and pride glows in choso’s chest. he didn’t do much, but it seemed enough — if he had only let himself lose control, hump up against you harder, perhaps it would’ve stained his clothes; seeped through your layers and onto his lap. he’d go home and hold it over his nose until the scent faded, and perhaps after.

“new as you are,” you say, climbing onto your bed once more and reclining back against the numerous pillows — huffing a mean-sounding laugh when he crawls after you. “i’ll do you the mercy of taking it easy, just this once. oh, don’t make that face — you look like a kicked puppy. i promise you’ll enjoy what i have in store for you.”

and you hike up your underdress, and spread your legs. choso’s mouth waters — the thick smattering of hair on your mons, your flower-like labia, shiny with your arousal. and your clit, peeking out from its hood, pink and shiny and begging to have his mouth on it. but as if this wasn’t enough — as if he wasn’t already scrabbling to get between your legs — you take one of those long, sharp nails, and drag it against your inner thigh. the skin splits. blood trickles down from the wound like a river of gold, flowing into the crease between your thighs and your pussy, and it smells ambrosial. if his fangs were aching before, they’re screaming, now. this isn’t human blood; this is richer, sweeter, creamier. delectable. hedonistic. you’ll make a glutton of him.

“after all,” you say, grinning wickedly, “i’m treating you to a most delectable meal.”

[mooishbeam]

『♡』 Treasures of the Fraud

♡ featuring: pantalone x f!reader

♡ summary: it's been forever since you've seen your friend, and as the hero of liyue, a new interruption has arisen. you pursue it, only to find memories awaiting you. wc: 9.1k+ (D:)

♡ cw/tw: long lonnggg fic, obsession, mentions of murder, mention of suicide, mentions of blood, manipulation, toxic pantalone, mean pantalone, possessive, spanking, degradation, mild praise, fingering, thigh riding, missionary, overstim, begging, edging, comeshot, pet names (darling, slut)

notes: helloooo!! ive been slow to get stuff out college is kicking my ass rn so sorry. not proofread so i apologize for any mistakes. I can't wait to have more time :) art by yion_yi on ig! <3 comments and reblogs are appreciated!

12 years ago 

“Come get me!” 

The boy with inky curls spiraling down his back dips through trees, ducking under low hanging branches embellished with vibrant autumn foliage. Messy blends of pink and purple melt across the slowly bleeding sun carried into the night. His silhouette resembles that of a malevolent spirit peeking behind the boughs, leaping over tangled twigs and shallow ditches. His excited screeches signal you to chase after the leading direction. You’re both screaming and laughing down the undoubtedly dangerous shortcuts. If your mother knew about the adventurous risks you were taking at 13, you’d never leave the house again. Tag is a troubling game—despite the thousands of times you’ve played with him, you regularly end up being “it”. You don’t care about losing, though; having someone to call a friend is enough.  

You turn into a clearing with columns of trees overseeing your small presence, hundreds of them. The colder night is rising, not a celestial body to shield.�� In this deep blue void, the leaves seem to be aggrieved at your interruption of some secret meeting, angry and smiling faces crumpling in the whispering wind. You spin around frantically, looking for signs or laughter, but neither reveal themself. It’s quiet besides the downy linger of grass. Your shoulders are snatched back and shaken to a rattling shock. You scream, and he laughs. 

“Rahhh! Did I get you?” he jests. Your eyebrows narrow, and you push him lightly to a stumble. 

“You scared me!” 

“Hah, that’s the point. C’mon, it’s late. Let’s go.” He's scared too, swiftly grabbing your hand as you both brave the darkness back to the village. 

“We should’ve been home a while ago” you say quietly. You feel the chill in your bones and press yourself closer to him. 

“Yea.” He holds your hand tighter at the sound of a small rock bouncing down a steep hill. 

“I had fun today. Let’s do this again tomorrow.” 

“I have something to tell you.” 

“Okay.” 

“I’m moving in the morning” he states. It was nonchalant, but your stomach turns a churning sickness. One you can’t understand yet, it makes you uneasy. 

“Oh. Okay, then.” It isn't okay, not in the slightest. But it had to be. Your best friend of 8 years looks at you, aiming to register the gravity of the situation. You both say nothing, but tears start to brim in your eyes in the silence. You wipe them with your arm. 

“Will you miss me?” he asks. 

“A lot.” 

“I’ll miss you too. Lots and lots.” He sways your interlocking hands. You pass by vacant homes tattered and aged by abandonment, overgrown with invading ivy. Homeless reside, caring each other to warmth from the freezing draft. You were lucky to have a home in this little forgotten sector of Liyue. It's a small, unfortunate room, with holes in the roof that drips when it rains and bags over the windows to keep the heat in. The stove never works, and you share a bed with your mother, but every birthday she makes sure to save just enough for a slice of cake with one candle. There isn’t more you could ask for. Everyone in the village suffered from poverty but they made it work, sharing crops and dairy to persevere until the next year. That’s how you met him, sitting on a rock as your mother collected rations. You perform two pebbles in your hands, mumbling sea shanties while imagining voyage on a grueling journey—he sat next to you. 

“Those aren’t dolls. They’re rocks.” 

“You’re a rock” you retorted.  

“No, I’m not.” 

“Do you want to be a rock?” 

“...That’d be kinda cool.” You gave him a pile of pebbles, and he joined the trip. 

You’re getting closer to the village, still processing who you’ll play with once he’s gone. You glance at him, he’s spaced out in a faraway stare. You crave the power to read minds. 

“Can we talk about something? I’m getting sad” you sniffle. 

“What should be talk about?” 

“What are you going to do after you move?” 

“I’m gonna be super rich” he assures, looking up at the starless sky as if a meteor would shoot across and grant his wish. “What about you?” 

“I’m going to save the world” you proclaim.  

“Cool. I hope you do.” 

“Me too.” 

You arrive at your makeshift door drawn together with scraps of wood and twisted rope for hinges. A dim candle glimmers inside, most likely your vexed mother waiting for your tardily return. He makes space for your entry, and you undo your hands for the last time. Before you go, he snatches your wrist. His eyes are foggy, cheeks an anxious tinge of pink. He isn’t sure what he’s feeling, but the strings in his heart are tense. His mouth shapes to say something, but nothing returns. 

“Yeah?” 

“...I... I’ll really miss you a lot” he whispers with a lump in his throat.  

“Then don’t forget me, okay?” 

“I won’t.” 

“You promise?” you say and raise your pinky towards him. He curls around it. “I promise.” 

“Good. By the way, you’re it now.” 

“I’ll get you back when I see you again!” he chuckles. You bid your goodbyes, unaware that it would mark the unforeseen conclusion. 

Leaves crunch under your feet as you make your leisurely traverse to Liyue Harbor. It’s just before sunrise and you finished helping the elderly in Qingce Village carry copious amounts of heavy produce to their homes. The thankful candies from seniors' jingle in your pocket as you stretch your weary arms. Your mom offered to cook, but you're determined to locate the best commissions Katheryne had before afternoon. “Maybe I’ll pick up some rice buns” you think out loud at the rumble of your growing appetite. You still had a long way to go before you got to the harbor. 

This was your new normal. After your thundering battle with Ningguang and Keqing against Osial, you became an example of Liyue’s triumph. You also became more aware of Fatui tactics, wiping out their swarms with the raging fury of your pneuma and swinging vision. Days of grueling bloodshed resulted in your victory, cementing you as the lionheart of Liyue. Beat up and bruised, the only request you made after your fight was a hot meal and a place for your mom to retire. They delivered both, and you used your recent hero status to provide help to the villagers where needed, be it casual favors or ruthless assault on Fatui agents. You were neither rich nor poor, and lived off the land and kindness of the Liyue Qixing. They often suggested you focus on less mundane tasks, but to you, the most vulnerable age groups warranted priority. There was something about the lighthearted innocent squeals of children and mellow grandparents rocking in their wooden chairs that made you protective to an almost volatile extent. 

Bustling interactions of trade and commerce carry through the wind as you enter the harbor—a sound that’s brought you peace for years. The smell of food vendors has you drooling instantly. As you devour the complimentary rice bun, you feel the yank of a little hand on your skirt. You look down and a boy with brown hair searches for familiarity in your face. You recognize him, babysitting him numerous times. You kneel and pat his head, but he doesn’t react or move.  

“Hey, what’s up? Where are your parents?” you question, briefly scanning your immediate area for his family. He’s hesitant to speak, as if he can’t find the panicked words, and rushes into your arms. You hug him instinctively and let him sniffle into your shoulder. You pick him up in your grasp and raise his head with your other hand so that he’ll hopefully be open to your compassion.  

“Can you tell me what’s wrong?” The boy wipes his chubby tomato-red face. “Grandma is on the floor, what do I do?” You quell your rising nerves to suppress his alarm and speak calmly.  

“Where is she?” 

Speed walking towards the destination, the commotion of a small crowd surrounds a kneeling woman in the distance. She’s on her sun-spotted hands and knees, wailing for some bygone Archon. “Grandma!” he yells and jumps out of your arms. You run after him, relieved that the worst case scenario hadn’t occurred. You push through the group and get eye level with her, forehead pressed to the ground spouting religious scripture. 

“Are you okay? Do you need medical assistance?” Wise sunken eyes wrinkled with age and torn by tragedy stick to your heart. Her feeble hands encapsulate yours, and tears stream down her cheeks. “They took my baby!” she rasps, rocking back and forth. “Who did?” you ask, and she weeps harder. “They took her memory...my baby, my daughter!” You support her weight and lift her hunched figure off the pavement. “What did they look like, ma’am?” 

“A black hood...red mask” she recalls shakily. Instantly miscellaneous chatter ensues. They whisper nervously in each other's ears, he who shall not be named steals their voices. “Fatui probably got ‘er” you hear the mumble of one. Fatui. Your blood boils at the word, and you direct your view to the shrinking man with hands in his pockets. “‘He’ got all of us” he scoffs. “Did they hurt you guys, too?” you ask, and they stare. They’re pained but accepting.  

“500,000 mora.”  

“194,000 for me.” 

They list off their debt one by one, and you’re horrified at the accumulating number. They seem to endure, however; no longer phased by the incurable tally haunting their lives. “H-how are you paying any of this?” 

“We can’t. It adds up. Interest, late payments, it always does. So, we give everything, and ‘he’ takes everything, until we have nothing left. We die poor without a possession to our name” a woman sighs. As a child, you heard of the loan sharks that purposely fed false promises to the poor, and once they were reeled in, charged insurmountable payments to blackmail—it was the origin story of most people in your birthplace. Your soul aches for them, but is there anything you can do? 

“...I’ll help you, all of you. I’m sure I can-” 

Ningguang arrives. She's a nurturing figure to you, the kind that asks if you’ve been eating well and politely scolds you.  “What happened?” You lead the tired elder to the Jade Chamber, and she tells her story through choked sobs. You didn’t expect Keqing to already be there, arms folded and turned away from the situation. Ningguang can barely glance at the woman. 

“They stormed my home and took my jewelry and belongings. They took the pendant my daughter gave me; it had her face in it. Archons give me strength, my baby! I can’t afford it; I have nothing!” she quakes. You rub her back and Ningguang nods, listening—you can’t help but notice the anxiety blooming on her abstracted face. They take her through the process and once she leaves, Ningguang and Keqing look at each other with a silent understanding. The room is eerily quiet, and Ningguang paces back and forth in front of the intel wall contemplating an uncertain danger. You fumble with your thumbs. 

“What are we going to do about this?” you wonder. Keqing clears her throat loudly, attracting the attention of Ningguang. She looks at you, and sighs deeply. “We already know about this issue.” 

Your ears perk up. “Great, so how can I help?” 

“By doing nothing, (Y/N)” Keqing says. 

“...What?” 

“I have eyes everywhere; I’ve known for a long time. The Fatui are not people to be taken lightly, especially the harbingers. A few of their skirmishers were caught trading exotic goods and taxing medicine at high prices, on top of extorting the impoverished regions.” Ningguang points to one of the many Fatui exclusive headquarters on the wall. “Pantalone is the richest man in Teyvat, he has more political influence than anyone can imagine, and they answer to him. We can’t risk getting involved with this. They’ve brought this upon themselves, and unfortunately, they must deal with the consequences.” 

You can’t accept this response. How can they just desert them? It doesn’t comprehend in your naïvity—you scold yourself for not spotting the signs sooner, furrowing your brows and looking at them with distaste. “I expected this. You shouldn’t have said anything” Keqing chides. “...Why didn’t you tell me? I could’ve helped before-” 

“You’re the last person I wanted to know about this” Ningguang interrupts. Your anger feels misplaced, and you bite your lip in restraint. She sits next to you and offers fleeting comfort with a graceful hand on yours. “You’re quite the reactionary type. In due time, this will be sorted. But right now, I need you to calm down, and trust me.” It sounds desperate, you know you shouldn’t go looking for answers, but a snagging thread pulls at the back of your consciousness, all too convincing. You bounce your leg. “You should want revenge just as much as me. Where we came from, where they end up, it isn’t fair.”  

“You know I do, more than anything. But we must handle this with care, before too many people get hurt. I’m doing this for the betterment of Liyue as a whole. It’s not easy to make these decisions.” 

“We can’t just go around serving justice, there’s laws we have to act with” Keqing adds. You don’t reply and stand up abruptly to leave. The worried Tianquan grabs your wrist one last time. “Promise me you won’t make a mistake, (Y/N). I’m trying to protect you” she pleads. 

“I promise. Thank you.” You flash a half genuine smile, already planning to rebel against her wishes. 

Who exactly is ‘he’—Pantalone. You don’t even know where to start looking. Too many headquarters, infinite possibilities. The best way you have to find him is through Fatui agents.  

You start taking up odd jobs late in the evening, scouring for the possibility that a fatui agent might fall into your hands. Though you considered playing the part of an impoverished villager taking out a loan at Northland Bank, it didn’t guarantee that you’d meet Pantalone in the flesh—it’s more likely that would raise unnecessary suspicion in the process. It’s awkward at first, seeing the hero of Liyue fish on the dock for petty change throughout the night. As you do, the malicious fire in your eyes burns bright at the occasional voice in chill silence. Your vision glows as you toss the hunting knife between your nimble digits. Listening closely to conversations, hoping that one might be unguarded enough to slip up, but nothing of the sort appears—not even the boldness of Fatui skirmishers enables them to divulge secrets under the baleful existence of Celestia.  

The moon illuminates sweetly on the tranquil waters lulling you to drowse. You hadn’t heard much since the start of your escapade. A fishing pole is weak in your resistless hold, and you’ve evidently given up on the idea of portraying the hardworking fisherman tonight. You vowed to help the people of Liyue, but justice was seemingly unfeasible. Maybe a direct approach? Should I ambush their headquarters? More so a suicide mission, you’d have no luck achieving that. Just as you’re about to leave, the crunch of withering grass straightens your posture. You make yourself hidden with a burst of energy and slouch behind the bushes as a Fatui pyro agent charges along the route. Through the glutted leaves obstructing your vision, you can just make out the heavy bag on his shoulder and jagged blade waiting restlessly on the other. His stride points towards Qingce Village. You hold your breath disguising yourself with the scenery and allow him to take a few feet between you before you begin following him. He’s rather shifty, those veiled eyes darting back and forth at the lightest noise. You’re careful to glide behind trees, moving with the heartbeat of the wind and taking advantage of the various melody's nature offers. You suck in a breath and duck behind a boulder a few inches too close, and his head snaps in your direction. The feeling of being watched besets him, but with no way to prove it and time running out, he secures his knife for the hypothetical ambush, and makes haste towards the target. Turning a tree, you watch as the pyro wielder knocks on the house of a small worn cottage. A short stocky man appears, shading half his body behind the door. 

“H-hello...” you hear faintly. The Fatui keeps his hand firm on the door, one boot propped under the hinge. He presents the flaming knife loosely as he towers over the man. “We’ve given you time.” You were sure now that he's working for Pantalone.  

“I don’t have it. P-please, if you could just give me some more-” He slams his fist against the wood, a resounding thump shakes the home. The man cowers. “Give me everything you have. The Regrator won’t wait any long-” 

A small rock flies past his mask, skidding on the ground until it comes to a stop. He glares in the direction of the tree you’re hiding behind. You have no plan, nothing but the distracting impulse to stop the assailant from attacking. “Stay here” he commands, and stalks towards you. His slow footsteps get increasingly louder, playful stomps toying with your obvious whereabouts. He twirls the razor-sharp knife, and as he sharply peeks around the corner, you’re nowhere to be found. “Here, kitty kitty” he taunts, spinning towards the lake, then the village grounds for footprints. He severs the air aimlessly in mirth, believing some amateur fighter came to challenge him. As he monitors the tracks under you, you drop down from the wiry branches. Legs wrap tight around his neck, and you catch hold of his hood trying to pull his mask off. He gags but he’s too quick, throwing off your steadiness as he slams your spine on the grass. He whips around to take a stab at your chest, but you roll away guarding the vital arteries. You kick him in the crotch, and he recoils giving you ample time to stand.  

You can’t feel the wet laceration dripping down your abdomen as you take a slash at his throat with your weapon, infused with elemental energy. He leans back and meets your strike. You trade blows, the strength of your smite bursting sparks of light above the scratches and bruises. Your wrist burns with the unmoving knives stumbling you. He begins to manifest blazing knives circling his figure, and you jump back from the singing cut melting the cloth. You wipe the dried blood from your mouth, and in the blink of an eye, he disappears. Suddenly, red auras similar to the pyro agent surround you. One by one, the clones charge at you, and you parry their overhead onslaught. Something is different about the last clone, your vision revealing a brighter outline than the others. When the next clone attacks, as you counter you pretend to fall for his trick. With your eyes on the other, he immediately passes through the black fog to deal the killing blow. You’re quicker this time and heave a heavy tear into his chest. Crimson splatters the grass, it shatters his element and rips open the robe. You tackle him on the dirt and wrestle until you kick his weapon away. Your knee digs into his back, and he can barely breathe with his arm locked behind him and knife rigid against his neck. He ttempts to swing at you, but you wrench his arm tighter and slice into his skin just enough to draw blood. 

“Fuck. Okay!” he wheezes. “Where is Pantalone?”  

“I don’t know what you’re- shit!” You’ve lost patience long ago and twist his arm to dislocate the shoulder. He lets out a blood curdling scream thrashing in pain—you tug hard and focus him. “Shut up and answer my question. Where is Pantalone?” you demand. He hisses in pain and coughs up phlegm mixing with reddening soil. “Kill me.” 

“Just tell me and I’ll let you go.” 

“I’m a dead man, either way.” he rasps and hangs his head waiting for the execution. You grit your teeth; a drop of guilt leaves a bad taste as you thwack the pressure point on his neck that forces him unconscious. You glance at the bag he left and limp over to rummage through the contents. Useless papers crumple under stolen items, but one note catches your eye. Presumably a to-do list, you read to the bottom. A list of homes, goods on standby exchanges—at the bottom of those, a rendezvous point: 

Report back- Yilong Bank, Liyue 

You rest in a plot of prickly bushes and leave in the morning after patching yourself up. You couldn’t stop now, not when you were this close to facing him. You soothe your body from the twigs prodding you all night, and check the wound suppressed by gauze. It’s a light scar now, apparent after bathing in the warm water on the outskirts of Qingce. You contemplated telling Ningguang about what occurred, but imagining the look on her face once she knew kept you moving. 

Tucking your vision where it can’t be viewed, you take a waverider to Yilong Port into the afternoon. You concoct a half-baked scheme, one that relies on every scenario being perfect to a tee. Unreliable, but probably your only chance. The plan amounts to scaling the building and breaking in through the office window, snatching everything owned by the villagers and breaking out before anyone notices. Easy in your capabilities, but you have no idea what the building looks like, nor do you know where the office is. The man driving wears all black, an outfit that stands out from the rest of the region. He stares at you blankly, and once you’re aware, you meet eyes. His smile is uncanny, stretching across his face with an abnormal friendliness. 

“Is this your first time at the port?” he asks, finger tapping the wheel. Be it sleep deprivation or ignorance; you don’t recognize red flags in his behavior.  You smile at the courteous face. “Yeah, the weather’s beautiful out here.” 

“Mhm, hot weather up here. On vacation?” 

“Nah, I have business here.” The minuscule edge of your vision catches in the light. He homes in on the passing twinkle. You wonder why his eyes widen momentarily, and his finger starts to tap methodically, as if memorizing a coded pattern. 

“Business...what kind?” 

“Oh...I have some items to trade.” You close off your answers feeling that you’ve said too much. He subsides with a stale expression. “If you’re looking to trade, you might find luck at Yilong Bank” he utters monotonously.  

“And where is that?” You feign disinterest, but victory is too loud on your tongue. 

“Up the mountain.” The waverider halts at the harbor, and he turns his head away from you unusually cold, akin to a mechanical bot shutting down. “Welcome to Yilong Port.” 

You make yourself invisible in the crowd and wait for nightfall. People still roam the port along with Fatui monitoring the front of the bank, which gives you leeway to blend in as you find passage around the back of the mountain. It’s a steep, dark incline jutted with irregular jagged stones. The imposing size of the climb tangles knots in your stomach, and you wipe the persistent sweat on your top. In one huge leap, you latch onto a craggy indent, and begin your ascension. 

Your legs feel like jelly with each contact of the unforgiving breeze. You sway alongside the spirit of anemo and swallow your anxiety before leaping to the next rock. Shoes plant into rock and nails excavate fresh cobble on the next jump. By the time you’ve realized, you’re already up most of the mountain. You tug yourself even with the land as a barreling gust of wind goads your glance to the ground, kilometers beneath you. Your breath stills, and for a second dizziness overtakes your nerves at the thought of slipping. I could die, one mistake and I’m dead. You focus, and spring to the next piece. Without warning, rock gives way into pebbles at the weight of your foot. You nearly plunge, but anchor onto the small bump out with one hand. You’re dangling off the edge, playing with death while you fortify your body. Hyperventilation makes your heartbeat thrum incessantly and stress palpitates tired muscles; If you didn't have your vision, you would’ve fainted to your demise. You bite the bullet, push your heels in and persevere through the hurdles. The next thing you clutch is malleable in your palm. You vault over the cliff, the smell of dew is overwhelming. The back of the bank—the end goal—is visible.  

One Fatui member remains in the front. You scale up the building effortlessly, nothing compared to the hell you just went through. Shifting window to window, your eyes land on the pitch-black darkness of the room at the top of the building. An ideal glow casts on the fraction of precious gold resting on a coffee table. This has to be it. You slink through the window soundlessly, and land on the balls of your feet. Analyzing the dish, you don’t discern the pendant. You can faintly identify some bookshelves near the dish, and tiptoe further inside. You creep around luxury sofas, and squint at the embellished glass case next to the door, containing all manner of jewelry and valuable possessions. You won; this was it. You scurry to it, moving with abrupt carelessness. One more step. 

Click 

The fireplace you didn’t heed is set aflame. It flickers sneering shadows on the opposite wall and brightens the case. You pause and hope. There’s a confining silence stirring in the room, like someone is with you. The case is visible now, and so is the key to opening it. 

You fell into a trap. 

“Looks like I have a little thief on my hands.”  

A bittersweet voice in the sable, reminiscent of rich dark chocolate, rolls off the room. He steps out obscurity behind his desk and your eyes adjust, revealing the tight black turtleneck compressing his willowy torso and gloves adorned with silver rings. You can’t see the upper part of his face, but the chains of his glasses hang in front of that duping smile. You expected the Fatui harbinger to be on the stronger side, physically intimidating. It’s not physical, but you feel a certain fear boiling in your body. He’s not terrifying, but you tremble. His presence makes your hair stand and sends waves of goosebumps up your arms. You can’t find the will to move your wobbly legs. His charmed laugh rings in your ears and causes you to hold your breath. He has no vision; you shouldn’t be afraid. You could take him on easily, why can’t you fight? 

“Hello, honored hero of Liyue” the headless man taunts. It makes it worse that he knows who you are. How long had he known you were coming? Was your plan doomed from the beginning? Your feet are stuck in molasses as your fight or flight shuts down at the man before you.  

“Now, tell me. What is the little thief doing, barging into my office to take the possessions I worked so hard for? Not very heroic of you, If I may say.” There’s power in his stature—you forget how to speak. He holds his palm out to you. Tangled between his fingers, is the ornate golden pendant you’d been searching for, a woman’s face in the frame. Your eyes widen, and the sweet familiar curve of his lips stretches in amusement. 

“Is this what you’re looking for?” The plod of low-heeled boots accompanies unveiled darkness, and you can observe his entirety. Amethyst eyes drunk with an orchid hue pool into your being. Lazy curls brush against his glasses and kiss his porcelain skin. He’s beautiful, a calm enticing rip current that sweeps you with immeasurable pressure before you can pull yourself out. He leans on the desk, observing the chain halfheartedly. If you weren’t careful, you’d mistake the look on his face for genuine kindness; you’d drown, just like he craved. Nonetheless, you can’t shake the emotion his smile grants. 

“Yes. That’s all I need, and I won’t bother you again” you whisper meekly, hoping that he’d let you go with the pendant in a spur of forgiveness. The jest in his eyes says something different. 

“Come get it.”  

Come get it. Your mind begins to piece the man into a stage of your life you’d forgotten. It can’t be him. Memory tells intrusive truth in short flashes. Inky curls spiraling in front of you as you chase. He was consistently miles ahead of you. It was irrelevant how far apart you were; he’d always find you. That big, curving smile for every match he won. Purple eyes glancing back at yours; the same ones that withheld tears when you said goodbye. 

“Come get me!” 

Tears stream down your eyes for the friend you thought you’d never see again. Childhood laughter bleeds into his current cat-like conniving snicker, and you gaze at his face. 

“I... remember you” you choke. He looks up without a smile, perceiving an unexpected thought, and meets your eyes. There’s a hint of affection in the warm smile beaming on his face. “My my, (Y/N). You have quite the memory.” 

You’re motionless, full of something that catches in your lungs. This isn’t the triumph you wanted, and now that you’re face to face you feel powerless. He must’ve known the entire time. Watching you fight and work alone, sending Fatui to roam in Liyue, all done to toy with you. Your lip quivers, swelling in your already deafening heartbeat.  

“How long...” you utter. He inquires with the tilt of his head. 

“How long have you been messing with me?” Your eyes adhere to the floor, pride that won’t permit you to shed misery for Pantalone. He drinks in your resistant frame, the kind he desires to break; perhaps this game of cat and mouse isn’t done, after all. 

“This hurts me too, (Y/N). I wouldn’t be doing this if you weren’t so…persistent.” Your confusion spills over in shaky, weak huffs. You can’t maintain your composure, and make yourself first to oppose the authoritative man on his own territory. 

“How could you do this to anyone? We grew up poor!” You shout with balling fists. 

“It’s inefficient to dwell on the past” he replies with gentle cadence and languid grace unrepresentative of his cruel tactics. You nearly regret raising your voice. 

“These people are at their wits end and you’re taking advantage of them” you chide. He slowly paces towards you. Pantalone looks down on you from height disparity, but the royal glower pities you, judges worth you can’t see. 

“Driven by emotions, are you that simple? You presumed that if you stormed in here, and professed a touching story, that I would suddenly see the error in my methods?” You’re not sure what you’re here for anymore or why you haven’t left yet. Subconscious urges can't determine if they should slap or hug the man inching towards you. “I simply enforce contracts and exchanges. No one can be swindled by a debt accreted on their own.” 

“No one asks to be poor either” you interject. Pantalone’s a foot away from you now, analyzing your reactions to his personal entertainment. He recalls the blurry past—the pranks you pulled together that ultimately failed from your loud hurried sneakiness tripping to alert the farmers, helping out for loose change so that you’d split a snack between each other that wasn’t big enough to share, gazing at the twinkling night imagining a distant future—you changed and stayed the same, but he keeps wanting more.  

“Weigh the odds. They either die impoverished or live by passage of loans. I merely provide a service. Does that make me so cruel?” You can’t find an answer. 

“You’ll always be my friend, but I need it back. It can’t be much to forgive someone’s debt” you plead.  

“You still consider me a friend?” 

“I think…you’re hurt. And you’re trying to heal. We all are. I know I’ve dealt with a lot as I’ve gotten older and I think you have, too. Power corrupts even the best people in this world, so maybe you’re not a bad person. But you’re doing bad things, and this isn’t the right way to get better.” 

Pantalone is quiet for a few long moments. His hands web his face, but you can clearly see the pearly fangs in his open-mouthed smirk. Then he laughs—dulcet and mocking, it lingers for too long as he throws his head back and relishes the obtuse notion. He gazes with insulting compassion and stalks towards you. 

“Incredibly…. gullible. Mora is the pathway to all endeavors. Devoid of gnosis or divine knowledge, wealth has rendered me impervious to control. Suffering and destitution only manifest if I will it. I am the guise of a false god, an emblem of achievement.” It’s borderline delusional the way he regards himself, arms moving in theatric grandeur, the star of his own opera. 

“Does that make you feel good? Stepping on the backs of the community that raised you, and abandoning them because they chose not to be influenced by greed?” Pantalone towers over you. His fingers brush light against your sensitive ears, trail to your clenched jaw, and finally cup your frustrated cheeks with the cradle of a long-lost lover. 

“It does, in fact. I’m not easily swayed by ridiculous optimism, that’s why I’m at the top. You’ve devoted your blood and tears to a region that will succumb to adversity in your absence. Is that not a pointless feat?” 

“So what? That doesn’t mean we just don’t help people. You have nothing without the Fatui, you’re a pawn just like the others” you retort. He brings his lips close to the shell of your ear, and his breath hot on the untouched skin drags a tingle up your spine. 

“And what do you know about the Fatui?” he whispers. 

“I know enough. You’re all disgusting.” He huffs out his nose. 

“Disgusting isn’t the right word. I’d say...opportunists.” Pantalone backs up, sliding his hand up your chin and tilting your attention to the intense glint. “But you’re clever, I’ll give you that. If only you were clever enough to know your place.” You'd forgotten you were acting out of line. You refocus your mindset to negotiation. 

“I’ll do anything you ask for the debt. Please, just give it back.” The word “anything” evokes a malicious yearning—so forthcoming without understanding the implications of “anything”, of eternity. He caresses your cheek. 

“Anything, hm? Even if I said to give up being a hero for good? Would you still call yourself a heroic traveler if you weren’t allowed to travel or adventure as you please?” he teases. Your mouth opens to refute, but you bite your bottom lip instead. Pantalone walks back to his desk and leans while dangling the golden chain. Now that he’s far, the invading space between you two shows how insignificant you are in this luxury palace. 

“Your resolve moves me. Consider this; make an exchange with me, and I’ll guarantee not only her debt, but the debt of all residents in Liyue forgiven” Your face instantly lights up, ready to accept it without thinking. 

“What is it?” you ask. 

“In exchange for regional loan forgiveness, I want you.” 

“...What?” 

“I want everything you have. It’s the fairest exchange I can make. Your obedience, your loyalty, and your body.”  

The choice turns in your frontal lobe. You can’t fathom giving yourself to a man, let alone a Fatui harbinger. It’s unbecoming of a hero to lie with the enemy. 

“Absolutely not” you assure. 

“Alright. Then allow their village to be reduced to nothing.” No, wait. “You may leave. However, if you do, you’ll cause great misfortune to that woman and her struggling family” You play into his covet so smoothly as you stand in the center of the room, reluctant to leave.  

“I’m not a complete monster, so I’ll give you 5 seconds to make a choice.” He sways the pendant in his hand like the transient time of an hourglass. 5 seconds, all you have to sign your life away. 

“4.”  

What if no one ever sees you again? What’s the point of sacrificing your happiness and freedom, are the people of Liyue truly worth it? 

“3.” 

You could threaten him, take him hostage so that a harbinger might bow to your demands. That, or they kill you, and the village suffers anyway. 

“2.” 

You think of your graying mom, the sweet boy with his chubby red face who cries over the smallest things, the grateful elders that give you candy after every good deed, Ningguang and Keqing stressing over the next financial impact. 

“1.” 

“I’ll do it.”  

Pantalone swings the chain into his palm, an undefeated smug overbearing as he sets it on the desk. There was never a point in resisting; he always got what he wanted, no matter how long it took to achieve it. He waited months—no, years—to get you in this exact moment. There’s a daunting beguiling charm in the way he closes the gap between you two. You glare at him; a temper common people would dread shooting. He assesses the pending punishment and lowers himself eye-level. He grins, but the smile doesn’t reach his eyes. 

“I can see the defiance in your eyes. Do you want to talk back? Go ahead, challenge me.” You don’t test this scenario and turn your head. “Don’t patronize me. Get it over with, ‘Pantalone’.” 

He quirks an eyebrow, and pliable flesh strains your teeth as your face is gripped rough by satiny leather. You’re twisted sharply to the calm expression—it humbles you. 

“That’s not how you address your superior. What should you call me?” You don’t answer promptly to his liking, and he tightens his grip. “Answer me properly, darling.” 

“...Sir.” Pantalone plants a sickly sugary kiss on your forehead, the kind that makes you forget how petrifying he can be, and lets you go.  

“Good.” He walks back to the desk and sits in the onyx chair embellished with silver jewels fit for a king. His chin rests on bridging hands. “Strip.” 

You don’t move, your heart hammers in your chest at the request and you stir uncomfortably. You have no experience with sexual gratification, let alone exposing yourself to an old friend.  

“(Y/N). Don’t make me say it again.” Keen agitation in his voice serves as a final warning. He eats you with his eyes, homed in on your hands clumsily snaking the top over your head. A glimpse of the scar you received during your fight with the Fatui captures him. He takes a mental entry, for an explanation that might justify why the agent suddenly goes missing. You were generally too busy to look in the mirror or analyze your assets, and pleasure was a removed afterthought—so the hungry fervor warming your skin and permeating the room clamped your thighs shut. You’re visibly flustered and nervous fumbling with the clasps on your bra while stabilizing your anxiety, and he delights in every second of the accidental strip tease. It feels like fresh meat introduced to a savage animal, and the instant your bra omes off, a new vulnerability coils in your gut. You move to your bottoms; the sheen of sweat polishes your plush thighs to wiggle out of them. You’re left in nothing but tantalizing panties hugging you in the right places. His eyes undress and redress you, tracing up and down the perk of your nipples, tempting fullness of your thighs, each unseen curve and perfect imperfect mark on your glistening body. He lets out a deep breath to stop himself from jumping over the table and taking you right there. 

“The underwear. Take it off” he says, an undertone of lust. You shimmy the fabric off and fully expose yourself. You impulsively cover your intimate parts and avert your eyes, but you can still feel Pantalone on you, ravaging you. He doesn’t bother telling you to put your arms at your sides, your bashfulness combined with an attempt at stoicism is comical. 

“Ah, the little thief is trying to act tough. That's cute” Pantalone teases and leans back in the chair. Manspreading, he pats his thigh. “Crawl.”  

He’s hellbent on shaming the defiance out of you. It’s a vile command, but you begrudgingly drop to your hands and knees. You drag your chaffed knees on wood, balancing like a newborn fawn adjusting to its legs. It’s humiliating and downright degrading; the cold floor fails at cooling your burning fever. You’re on the verge of tears, but Pantalone can’t help but smile. You get around the desk and look up at him, waiting for the next horrible thing he’ll have you do. “Unfortunately, the stunt you pulled impeded my paperwork. Be a good thing and sit on my lap until I’m done.” A “thing”—that’s all you were now, a shiny trophy meant to be ogled at but never taken seriously, used and thrown away. You stand off your scraped raw knees and straddle his thigh, hands balancing the leg so you don’t fall. 

And Pantalone starts to work. Working as if you’re not there, filling in the spaces on his documents. For some reason, it’s more demeaning this way, you truly are just a prize. One hand dances beautiful penmanship in masterful motions on embossed paper, the other fondles and explores your being. The gloves brush down your delicate spine, nonsensical shapes drawn on your lower back that make you shiver and pool heat in places you’ve never thought of. You’ve never been touched like this, it’s needles light on your skin. They move to your stomach, pleasant circles above the pelvis that threaten to go lower. He’s careful to trail his hand up your cleavage and behind your neck, neglect your hardening nipples and repeat the process over and over. He’s painstakingly slow, savoring the dazed arch of your back, massaging your inner thighs and dragging the sleek material over your rear.

Middle and index sweep across your lips, pulling your bottom lip to reveal teeth, and prods your mouth. Pantalone’s fingers are invasive, they exploit your gums and twirl around the squishy tongue molding to his appetite. He plays with the pink mass, and it fills you like a kiss. He’s everywhere and he hasn’t looked at you once. You hate it, the kind elegance and refinement of his technique that makes every calculated word and action reek of opulence. Yet, arousal pools on the surface, sticking to your labia and clouding your drowsy mind. It’s an extreme ache that doesn’t go away from cold showers or shrugging off like you usually would. You can’t remember what you did today, yesterday, or the day before that. The sensation of him consumes you and persists in spots he left. He smells of expensive cologne, hints of heady wood and sage. You’re lucky his fingers are in your mouth, or piteous moans would spill out of you. Flat on his thigh, the subtle jolts of his leg rub against your hypersensitive clit and set your nerves on fire. Throbbing swells in your core, and you struggle to stay stiff as your hips stutter.  

Pantalone knows exactly what he’s doing. Your labored pants sound like saintly melody while you writhe on his lap. The fabric goads your pulsing pussy, and you hang your head in embarrassment of the juices soaking your thighs and his. He’s surprised you have strength left to withstand the itch. You do your best to hover above it, trailing thick strings of slick. “There’s no need to pretend you don’t like this. Just give yourself to me” he whispers. And it’s so enticing, an invitation that might let you come if you ask. However, remnants of pride cling to your melting resolve, you can’t give in yet. He takes the fingers out and presses on your nipple, flicking the bud. You can’t hold the mewl, and he snickers.  

“So indignant for the hero of Liyue, to be on a harbingers lap, reduced to a pretty pet.” Your ears tune out the insults. The damp gloves pull and pinch your puffy nipples, then knead to soothe the pain. He does the same to the other, switching between both as he feels you squirm.  

He works on the last few pages. Piles upon piles of reports and records—they detail the deaths, or “suicides”, of clients who’d disappeared mysteriously after extended absence of payments for millions of mora, people who dared go against the Regrator. Unruly, uncooperative clients that take advantage of fair exchange, and pay the price for it. 

Your arms get tired, and you settle on him again. Pantalone starts to softly bounce his leg, enough for you to notice the friction on your clit. It’s too much, you can’t take it anymore, and start to rut your hips on his thigh. You look messy, smearing your essence on those overpriced slacks and biting back your moans. Pleasure flows in your veins, and you give up. His cock throbs nonstop, print stealing space in his pants. “Did you believe I wouldn’t catch you? You’re not sneaky enough. You’re not good enough," he taunts from the corner of his eye. You hump his leg like a desperate bunny, chasing the addictive high.  

“Nasty slut, fucking your hips on a man you barely remember.” He moves his hands to your clit and replaces the slacks with slippery leather. You grind on it harder and hold your moans. More, more, more. He coats it in the mess and finally diverts his attention to you. He teases your entrance gliding vertically on your vulva before pushing one finger in. It hurts at first, but your walls hug him eagerly, pulling it deeper. He coaxes it to take another and starts scissoring your gushy walls.  

“I’ll devour you. I’ll inscribe my name upon every surface of your physique until it adorns your lips, and I’m the only thing that remains.” Pantalone starts pumping rhythmically, tormenting, poking everywhere but your g-spot. Gloss drips down his knuckles and glazes his rings. 

“S-sir please, s’too much” you whimper, mustering up an ineffective stable voice. “Hmm? Can you hear the lewd sounds you’re making?” Loud squelches sing from him fucking your insides. Each time you try to speak, he elicits another moan. 

“M-my sto-mach hurtss” you whine. He holds your waist in place with the other hand and continues the assault. “I know, it hurts? Would you like me to alleviate the pain?” he coos. You nod fast. 

“Hold it in. You ask for permission every time you’re close, do you understand?” You don’t reply and try to angle your body to get more contact. You make the mistake of guiding yourself to your clit and earn a harsh stinging slap on your hand. “Don’t touch what’s mine” he orders. You’re frustrated and he’s doing it on purpose, it’s entirely too hot where pleasure and pain blur. “N-not yours” you stammer, and he stops. He pulls out your warmth and you whine from loss of pressure. Looking at him, there's no smile, and the irritation on his face makes your heart drop. You're really in for it. 

Without delay, your stomach flies over one of the chair arms, and you hold onto it for dear life. It presses firm on your ribs, and he slants your ass to the air. “You have courage, speaking back to me” he says. He pulls his gloves off and hurls them. They’re lovely, the silken soft hands of a man who hadn't lifted a finger through combat a day in his life. They sink into your sex, and you moan out for him. The other winds back, and you feel the palm hit brutally on your unsuspecting backside. Crack. It echoes in the room, and you almost fly forward. 

“Disrespectful.” Crack. He keeps pumping through it, and tears collect in your lashes. 

“Disobedient.” Crack. There’s blood rushing to your head, and violent smacks make your pussy flutter and ass ripple; his control won’t give you adequate touch.  

“Little.” Crack. Every time he feels you getting there, he pauses. A masochistic pleasure whirls innermost. 

“Brat.” Crack. Both cheeks are a sore fiery color and beginning to welt, but he resumes. You’re drenching his palm, sobbing from prolonged edging and Pantalone laughs. “Pfft, you’re crying? Too embarrassed to beg? Perhaps I’ll give you what you want, if you grovel hard enough, darling.” An incoherent orchestra of please’s mesh with broken moans. “Sir m’sorry. Wan’ it so bad, p-please!” you mumble. There’s no dignity on your lips, no residue of the hero you once were. Drunken ardor floods your short-circuiting brain. 

“Oh, what do you say? You want it? Is that it? I'll let you have it... but only if you say it loud and clear for me” he croons. He winds his fingers in a come-hither gesture that licks your core. 

“Please...I won’t misbehave again!” He spreads your ass apart and watches your hole pucker from lining the brink. 

“I’m not sure I want to give it to you now. It's a lot more enjoyable watching you squirm and beg.” 

“’M yours, sir. Please give it to me. I’ll be s’good, promise!” you mewl. You’re so pathetic, it’s endearing. He simpers and maneuvers impossibly fast while gyrating your clit. “How humiliating. You’ve satisfied me.” Your eyes roll back, and you dissolve in pure euphoria. There’s black dots in your vision, and it doesn’t stop as he starts torturing your overstimulated clit with the pad of his thumb. Your tears only encourage him. You jerk and spasm, but he moves where you move with insistent skill. “T-too m-” 

“Aww, what’s wrong? Isn’t this what you wanted, where are your manners?” Pantalone pulls out and delivers staggering mean swats to your pussy, and you recoil. “Say thank you” he demands. 

“Thank you, sir.” He hums and picks you up in his arms. Before color can return to your numb cells, he lays you on the desk. You watch him pull his shirt up to his pecs with haste and uncover the lean skinny midsection. Unzipping his pants, he unsheathes his leaking thumping erection. Even his dick is pretty, it curves upwards and shades a starving dusty pink past the thin strip of tissue on the underside of his bulbous tip. Composure thinning, a bead of pre come runs down his tip at the sight of provocation sluicing your ass and thighs. His glasses plunge down his neck, body blushed wildly, but he doesn’t care. Pantalone slides between your labia and groans at the sound. Engulfing the tip in awaiting velvet warmth, “You’re so good for me, hm?” he sighs. You embrace him, delicious searing stretch of your walls forming to his cock. Your orgasm builds just from your body accommodating the size. He places your hands on your calves and holds them at your sides. He slips out, and in one swoop, drives into you. His heavy balls smack against your ass as he thrusts frenetically in the gooey grip he’d been waiting for, stalking and spying for. He digs crescent shapes in your waist and uses you to his abundance. The desk base creaks and grinds on abrading wood and obituaries float to the floor with overturned calligraphy ink from the unrelenting momentum. You throw your head back and indulge the carnal lust washing over you both. 

“You’ll never see anyone ever again. Fuck- you’re mine, and mine alone. You’re nothing but a come dump, your purpose is to please me, hah, until I say it’s over” his voice is unexpectedly deprived and weighty with vulgar whimpers. Pantalone eyes your neck and encapsulates it in his slender hand. He clenches tight and releases in sporadic bursts that have you seizing around him. For a split second there’s the image of you—exorbitant pearled collar wrapped around your throat, with “Pantalone” inscribed in bedazzled letters—and he loses it. He swipes your clit rapidly and feeds you deep strokes; you’ll definitely die. You speak, but it’s unintelligible rambling. 

“Use your words” he lilts, squeezing your airflow taut. “C-can I, sir, please?” 

“You’ll do it on my command.” Pantalone thrusts frenetically, you can feel him bucking, twitching and quickly approaching his climax. His hips sputter, chanting some mixture of your name and curses under his breath. “You’re so obedient for me, aren’t you? F-fuck, darling, go ahead. Come on my cock.” You permit yourself to surrender, white noise streams in and time slows as you come down his shaft. A creamy ring forms at the hilt of his slaps. You recite “thank you” through wails with the semblance of a follower at the altar of their savior. Then he grabs your face and goes in for a kiss.  

It’s sloppy and misses half your lip, but its doughy attachment mellows your blissed out head. His lips taste like the bitter excess of green tea, and you crane for a better sample. His tongue does things his fingers couldn’t, and swirls around yours in a passionate bruising waltz. Pantalone breaks away, a string of saliva when he frees himself. “Mm, coming. Gonna claim you everywhere” he whimpers. Sweat on his lustered abdomen, he pumps his tender cock before spurting thick hot ropes across your tits and stomach. He paints your vulva with the rest and plunges the tip in your entry so as to not waste the endless globs of white. He tremors inside you until soft, and when some dribbles out he fingers it back inside.  

Afterwards, Pantalone opens one of the drawers on the desk and takes out an embossed loan dismissal form. You can’t read the finer details through hazy eyesight. “It’s already signed, so don’t worry. I won’t deceive you.” He caresses your face in his normal sing-song attitude. “We depart in the morning.” You don’t have a clue where you’re going or how you’ll get there as you drift unconscious. Once you’re asleep, Pantalone shuffles in a different locked drawer. He twiddles the stunning purple geode in his hand, a crystal lined mineral you gave to him years prior. He looks at you, then the druse, and cackles. 

“Mine. Always.” 

[morgana-ren]

Throwing out the idea that Astarion furiously masturbates over your sleeping body while he drinks your blood. Your blood is the first he’s ever drank in 200 years, it also dosn’t help that you keep being so nice to him. He can’t help it.

I am sorta back after months of medical troubles and I am announcing it in my normal fashion: with a reprehensible smut piece.

Warning: Extreme sexual content, vulgar language, thoughts of noncon, references to noncon, semi-dark Astarion, things that could be interpreted as sexual violence and regular violence, blood and the works.

The skulking has him feeling like more of a lowly rat than usual. He slinks quietly through the fauna like a cat stalking a canary, sneaking across the camp where he has made his own nest, his eyes darting about at every slight flicker of light and every unexpected noise. His comrades-in-arms sleep peacefully, strewn about the ground and various makeshift tents, blissfully unaware that a monster lurks within their midsts, and he fully intends to keep it that way.

As dastardly and lowly as he feels, an unknown feeling courses through him. Something that leaves him feeling strong– predatory. The weak blood of rodents and livestock thrums through his veins, every synapse sparking alive, the string and sinew of his body singing to his limbs in anticipation. Anxiety sends his thoughts racing, and yet, he is giddy as a child with mischief on the mind.

A long-denied truth demands acknowledgement, and so he finally acknowledges it. He is vampire. And he is hunting. 

Even a spawn possesses fangs sharp enough to rend flesh from bone and claws of steel, honed to a fine point. His senses so keen that he is aware of the deer that scamper in the forest and the birds coupled away in the branches of trees on the outskirts of the meadow. The pulsing of blood that rings a siren’s song in his ears, awakening the long-dead glands nestled alongside his teeth.

He finds that, for once, he is not the victim in the arrangement. No, he isn't. In fact, he is the horror, looming over his vulnerable and slumbering mark, their body entirely at his mercy— His right to his to sink deep fang and claw and anything else he might deem fit, helpless to stop him. For once, his true self shines through in the dim firelight of camp, and he is not the Astarion he has been browbeaten into seeing himself as. He is not unmolded clay, ready to be shaped at will by clutching hands and eager thoughts. He is not malleable and he shall not bend. 

He is not Astarion the spawn; Astarion the mongrel; Astarion the Honeypot; Astarion the tool to be used and discarded. He is not the meek, or the charming, or whatever else his prey finds need of. He is power and gluttonous greed incarnate. He is the prowling shadow over the unsuspecting sweet and he will take what he needs. 

He is Astarion the Vampire– and he is ravenous.

The gentle toe-tip-toe through the grass to where his prey lies ignorant, sleeping so terribly peacefully, his silken shoes making nary a sound as he creeps ever closer. Feet light as air, graceful as a swan. Even the wind seems to disregard his presence, passing over him with hardly a fuss through his silver curls.

They suspect not a thing. Even the warrioress Lae’zel, her sharpened senses whetted like a blade, keeps her eyes sheathed shut, her breath even and her body unmoving. There is no cry of anger or protest as he approaches the clutch of blankets where you have made your rest, leering over your slumbering form, feeling all parts pure need as he observes.

Saliva slicks his ivory teeth like a slavering mutt, his hands almost shaking as he kneels on bended knee to witness the gently pulsing column of your exposed throat. It calls to him, sings to his senses, and every ounce of his being begs him to shred hungrily into his meal like a carnivore– like a beaten animal starved of nourishment. Like a dog offered scraps of offal.

But he is not an animal, and you are useful to him yet. He is dignified, but more than that, he is in control of himself. He is in control of his words and actions, and for one time in his all-too-long life, he will not yield to the whims of another, even the dark voice in the back of his mind that urges him to rip and tear and maul like the wretched thing he is. 

No, his first meal will not be one of viscera and terror and screaming, even as the idea appeals to the baser parts of him. It shall be quiet and quick as a rogue in the night, and though he would expect disappointment from the revelation, he finds that this moment shared privately with himself and only himself is something he intends to treasure. 

He has named you for his mark for this most special of occasions. Even as he knows you likely wouldn’t feel honored by such a thing, he feels a quiet sense of pride on your behalf. You are his first taste of true life. A place of high honor in the triumvirate of freedom:

His first glimpse of the sun; his first venture into the world; his first true meal. 

Gentle as a lover, he kneels over you, teeth bared, scarlet eyes flashing in the firelight. A calm hand on your shoulder to steady you, the other splayed across the grass to anchor himself. His fingers quake in both eagerness and anxiety, his hearing hypersensitive to every rustle and sigh that does not belong to the chorus of nature in the evening hours. He has committed himself to this, but to be caught is to condemn himself red-handed to the stake– a fate he’d rather avoid. 

As he leans, his teeth gliding gently across delicate, slightly dampened skin, he believes it worth the risk. 

The tang of sweat and flesh hits his taste buds as he softly glides his tongue across the pulse-point of your throat. He licks where he intends to find his feast, savoring the flavor of his intended prey. Many times he had caught himself staring, wondering what it might be like; what you might be like, and he fully intends to satiate the curiosity that had been building in his brain for weeks on end.

As he indulges himself in the thought, he finds he can no longer wait. He tells himself he cannot stall– cannot draw this out as he might’ve liked to– but the nagging churning in his gut rings above all else. He is starved and he must sate it. He does not join in the argument between the two warring forces in his mind, and instead resorts to pure instinct to settle the matter. 

His fangs dimple tender flesh at first, and then, soft as a whisper, sink inside. Lifeblood floods his mouth like a symphony of rapture, the taste of ecstasy on his tongue, and his lips clamp like a viper on your throat, eager and yearning for more. It is as liquid fire as it slides down his throat, your soft whimpering spurring in tandem with the  glory that branches through his every quivering limb and sets his mind alight. His eyes, vigilant at first, now flutter shut, allowing himself to fall into the velvet-cloaked abyss.

The thousand-year fog lifts from his brain as he drinks and for the first time since breath still filled his lungs, he feels right. 

Raw strength almost seems to inflate his lean muscle, plucking a harpsichord on his tendons. The pounding drum of your rabbiting heart beneath your ribs plays in tandem with the rush of blood in his ears. The deafening cacophony of the cold, miserable years is blasted away and finally stitches together in unison with an ethereal orchestra of utter intoxication. A preternaturally beautiful song that lulls him into the first sense of peace he has felt in years– perhaps that he has ever felt. A tune he shall never forget for as long as he lives.

His senses soar so high that he swears, beneath the deafening chorus of euphoria, he can hear the revelry as far as Baldur’s Gate. In his mind’s eye, the unsuspecting citizens of the Jewel are celebrating the birth of a new man born under the silvery spears of moonlight miles away. These many long years, he has been truly dead, and only now, he is resurrected in the swaddling shroud of blood and dark. He has been truly reborn. At one with himself at last, he thinks. At one with you. 

The blood falls easily down his throat, pooling warmly in his gut in glorious fulfillment. The delirium tendrils outward, gently coaxing bliss and promise where it caresses. His legs buckle, pale cheeks hot and flushed, some unknown sensation taking hold like a fist as he suckles and refusing to relinquish the iron grip. The low of his abdomen tingles, drawing in life like a vacuum to a place once desolate and lifeless. 

It is a feeling he cannot place at first. Something dusted and forgotten and placed far and away in his mind, out of reach. And yet, as the delectable warmth floods every inch of his body anew, he experiences it as plainly as when his heart still beat in his chest and youth was as inevitable as the rising sun. The needle-thin hairs of his body stand on end, palms beginning to sweat against your shoulder. A primal need swells in his stomach, a gentle throbbing between his thighs that translates into pain as he strains against the leather of his breeches. 

Arousal. 

Desire bleeds into itself, separate colors swirling together to become one enthralling splash on the rapacious canvas of his brain. The scalding hot bliss of the feed and the tiny, breathy mewls of your still-sleeping form. You have given him what he so desperately coveted, and now, it seems, his nature demands he take more– everything you hold dear in its entirety offered up at the altar of his superior strength and cunning and existence. 

The inherent eroticism of feeding is not lost on him, but it has never held any meaning until this moment. Lust is a cruel stranger that he has opted to spurn. Something wielded against him as a weapon– a barbed whip that has flogged and scarred him into conditioned disgust. It is unfamiliar at first, and yet it screams now with the same familiarity as every other function and twice as demanding. 

Pale lashes flutter open, doubled vision focusing in almost too sharply on your strained features: the soft furrow of your brow, the scrunch of your still-closed eyes, the soft pout of your petal-pink lips, slick with moisture from your unconscious whines of pain. He has noticed you, yes, in the way another might notice a dagger or a halberd or a stocky shield to wield. Your appearance is just one in a long line of defenses he intended to harvest for his own gain, and yet now, as he hazily stares at the shadow of your profile that flickers in the flames, he feels the unmistakable curl and coil of a different kind of need. 

Something steely clamps onto his consciousness beyond the haze of unreason. He cannot. That is too far, and something distant and shrill in his mind knows it. As desperate as he is to crawl atop and mount you, leaving you breathless and hoarse in his wake, he cannot. Some things can never be forgiven, and he has already crossed that line for his own well-being. Ravaging you as you lie vulnerable and helpless– trusting– serves no purpose in keeping him alive.

He tells himself this, his suckling receding to a temperate drawl, laving tongue and teeth across the puncture wounds. The baser parts of him cry protest, the pulsing becoming more insistent with each passing second, until it leaves him knock-kneed and clutching at the grass for purchase against the cresting tide of want. All variety of debased scenarios fly through his mind, each one more debauched than the last. 

Control and lust, two things unfamiliar with each other before now due to the cruel nature of his existence, fold in perfectly as one and sharpen into a vengeful blade he craves to use. How he longs to leave a wound as deep as the one he carries day after day, unrelenting and open as the day it was wrought. He wants to lash out, to strike, to take as he pleases as the world has taken so from him–

A wound not meant for you, he must remind himself through the hot-pink haze, even as it defies him. 

No. It is a line he will not cross. He is a monster, but he is a monster of a different breed. You have given him everything, even as you do not know it. More pragmatically, he will not give his life for one brief, violent encounter of forcefully obliged desire. He is worth more than such vile things, he tells himself, and strangely, he finds as he ponders it, so too are you. 

He repeats it in his head as a mantra, over and over, practically yelling it over the tidal wave of instinctual impulse that threatens to drag him undertow. He is his own man, and he shall not be controlled ever again; not by Cazador, and certainly not by the more wretched pieces of himself, even as they screech and claw at the cell where he has locked them away, howling their dreadful, unspeakable demands.

It does not abate. The insistent pulse of blood that brings long forgotten life to his appetite, the mortifyingly genuine urge that begs him to touch you, feel you, taste you in the ways he has not craved in eons. It frightens him, and yet, even as he longs to pull himself away, to run and run and run into the darkness where neither you nor this horrible need can find him, he does not. He sits still as a marble statue, almost as if carved in some grotesque form of this heinous moment captured in one rotten, eternal exhibit: half atop your sleeping body, clutching and panting in need, and half splayed absurdly in the dirt, straining and desperately trying to conceal his shame from some invisible force that mocks him.

He cannot have you. Even as he yearns and craves it with a fire that singes and burns his overactive nerves and imagination, he cannot. Yet, his body will not relent, demanding release from the torment that plagues both his mind and his nethers in equal form, paralyzing him in a dangerous inactivity. You won’t awaken– he has taken too much and your weakness is apparent– but the others might and he must act. Compromise is a risk he cannot take–

And still he must. 

And so, even as he should withdraw and return to the pitiful, empty loneliness of his tent, he does not. Instead, he realigns himself, as quiet and swift as the wind, still half-perched over you, but with a newly freed hand to his disposal for a contemptible purpose. It snakes the length of his torso to the waist of his breeches, his dexterous fingers undoing the laces with desperate speed and agility, his expression equal parts humiliation, shame, and anxious desire. He slides the waistband down enough that his long-neglected cock springs free, his muscles bracing and tensed as his newly blood-warmed flesh is chilled in the cool night air. Pinprick pores betray his discomfort at the crisp evening gale, but the rest of himself is otherwise occupied, consumed by his present task. 

One of his sharply tipped fangs worries at the swell of his plush lower lip as he wiggles his pants further down, both internally cursing and praising the newly unlocked spectrum of his vampiric grace that make such conspicuous actions effortless and reticent. Even as he is agile and practiced, each urgent movement feels fluid and natural. Silent as the grave and insignificant against the sounds of nature that envelop their surroundings. He does not fumble or falter, smooth as satin and with steely resolve as his palm finds his shaft and a shiver runs the length of his spine, settling readily in his abdomen.

In his previous encounters, he could put himself into working order, but nothing like this. It was a job– something that must be done, no matter how distasteful or degrading. What he feels now, it’s almost foreign to him; his cock strangely hot and pulsing with a heartbeat of its own. Heavy as sin in his hand and just as demanding, just as cruel in its insistence. Stiff and throbbing, a compass point dogged and unrelenting as it seeks to nestle between your wet, silky thighs and burrow there. It shrieks in his head, unsatisfied and wailing at his refusal to acquiesce. 

He ignores it, testing with one brusque stroke with his palm. It twitches, pleasure blooming upward through his gut even at the slightest of contact. Again, he tightens his fingers around his girth, pumping slowly as the sepulcher where he had locked away all dead semblance of lustful craving and fervor comes to life once more. As he thumbs the top, he feels the thin, sticky fluid leak from the tip, betraying his eagerness even as he pretends composure– as much composure as he can pretend in this unbelievably humiliating debacle. 

He will have to worry about that later. 

His eyes sweep over your face once more, peaceful now that his teeth no longer injure your tender neck. Your lips slightly agape, eyelashes fluttering softly as you sweetly dream once more. He imagines how different it might look if he were to uncage his urges– to allow himself the forbidden pleasure of sinking himself inside of you twice in one night. How your eyes might fly open in horror, your lips ready to shriek, little fists balled in defense, only to gasp as he pushes his length between your splayed thighs, enveloping himself in your tight, wet heat. White-hot. Exquisite. Immaculate.

The companions are gone– no, they don’t exist. It is only you and him now, you sprawled beneath him, half shock and half horror, and he– the predator that has stalked you from the shadows, the vampire in the night– taking as he pleases, as is his right. He feels your velvet walls flutter around him, trying to adjust to the cruel new thickness bullying inside them, squeezing him in the most delicious way. Your mouth is still open in a wordless cry as he plunges his tongue between your teeth, tasting a different part of you now, swallowing the desperate sounds you begin to make. 

His cock throbs against the calloused flesh of his palm as he strokes himself, teeth gritting to quiet the noise that bubbles in his throat from the blossoming pleasure that takes root and begins to grow rapidly out of control. The fantasy plays in perfect form in his head, and it almost feels real as he gathers the precum in the crook of his thumb and slicks it over the shaft with firm fingers, pretending it’s your body that wets and grips him.

You would fight and struggle– he knows you would– but you are nothing in the face of his sheer strength and dominance. Pinned by the deceptively strong muscle of his lean body, you have no choice but to follow his lead, thighs forced wider to accommodate his narrow hips, back pressed firmly against the ground by his weight. Your tits, warm and soft beneath the thin fabric of your nightshirt and begging to be squeezed, squashed against him with the frantic rise and fall of your chest.

The squeal his first thrust would rip from you would be heavenly. High-pitched and pathetic, and yet almost drowned out by the equally sweet clench of your body around his. So tight that it almost aches him, unaccustomed to the intrusion and compelled to yield to him, moulding itself to the shape of him inside of you. He slides out slow, almost callous and so terribly casual in his malice, making you feel every inch of him drag against the supple walls of your cunt before slamming in again, vicious in his impact. Your body jumps beneath him from the force, whining into his mouth. Your blunt nails digging into his arms and tearing at his frigid, stone flesh. It is futile– he can barely even feel it, and the slight sting he can is laced with pleasure and the reminder that you are at his mercy now.

He is panting, breath coming in ragged staccato bursts even as it is unnecessary to him. Pure instinct has a hold of him now, his hand working in unfailing rhythm between his thighs as he loses himself in the vision. Your injury weeps ever so slightly, and he cannot help the flick of his tongue along the twin-pocked bitemarks, leaving a thinly shining trail of blood-streaked saliva in his wake. He aches to touch you; to slip the delicate sleeve of your nightwear down and indulge himself in the softness of your body. 

He is not so subtle in his mind. He simply tears the garment, ripping it from your body with terrible ease. One hand busies itself with containing yours above your head, squeezing at the wrist to keep you captive even as you thrash, the other luckier still as it gropes and pinches your breast. Warm in his hand, he can feel your pulse skyrocketing in fear or perhaps excitement– whichever suits him most– as he reels back and cants his hips forward again. 

His hips slap against your thighs with bruising strength, your body beginning to respond to his in kind. He feels your wetness slick over his cock and lubricate his next few thrusts, heightening his pleasure. You mewl against his tongue, body arching into his, perhaps against your own will, fingers flexing and furling fruitlessly in his grasp. He settles into rhythm, cruel but precise, hips grinding with every punctuating impetus. It takes an absurd amount of mental discipline not to simply take you in furious, animalistic fashion as he longs, but he manages through the impulse, lower body moving in circular rhythm, his pelvic bone stimulating you with each contact. 

Your panicked breaths become heaving pants, flittering eyes glazing over and becoming heavy, the muscles that are pulled so tautly in defense waver and eventually flop, accepting your defeat at his hands. Perhaps you are betrayed and hurt and hateful, but you desire him. He is beautiful in the moonlight, pale as a ghost but alive and burning with unhinged need and that same fire kindles between your legs and winds and winds tighter like a top before the spin. He releases your swollen, puffy lips only for his fangs to find your throat and your cry is desperate and howling, your blood sweeter than the finest wine as it touches his tongue. 

You cannot formulate words– neither of encouragement nor protest– as he fucks you relentlessly into the ground, helping himself to your body and your blood. Only nasally, frantic cries can make it past your throat, your hands grasping at him, pleading and desperate. He hooks your thigh around his waist, fingers digging into the flesh with bruising strength, and you clamp it there, almost as if clinging to him for purchase as he bucks and snaps, snarling like a beast perched to pounce.

You are helpless and small and defenseless and vulnerable in the face of him, and he is strong and virile and predatory and fearsome. He has no need of your protection; he is the ruthless power of the night and the fear the lurks in the dark. He ravages you with no regard to the future, knowing only that he holds it in his palm, and if he wants you, he shall take you. He does not walk in shadow and skulk in fear, but boldly in the open, the world and you ripe for the plucking. 

He cannot help it. His hand is not enough. Ecstasy builds in his apex, building and bubbling at his fantasy, but he needs to feel. The hand not currently stroking himself in frantic need finds a way under the loose opening of your shirt, defying his mental mantra. The curve of your breast coaxes his skin, swelling and warm against his flesh as his insubordinate fingers find their way lower and lower under your blouse. Your nipple peaks as he gently rolls it in his careful, ghostlike fingertips, squeezing at your chest with an inhuman tenderness that only has him craving harder, more– 

Your cries would come in unison with his own, yours wailing and pathetic and squealing, and his rugged and husky and snarling. You would bare yourself to him– all of you– acquiescing to his unrelenting power. He would take you there, on the ground like an animal how he pleased and for as long as he pleased. Now you are the clay for him to shape and play with and use as he pleases, existing only for him and his wants. Your blood is in no short supply, and he sups and dines as he pleases while he uses your body to pleasure his cock and the baser parts of himself that have reignited inside of your core. You are powerless to fight him, so you give yourself over completely to him, debasing yourself for him, crawling for him, needing him. 

You’d beg for him, body and soul, so eager and ready. Desperate and pathetic. He’d fuck you until your whines became higher and higher, eventually spilling into the night in humiliating urgency as you came undone beneath him. Your legs quivering and shaking, senses gone and inhibition nonexistent. Your fluttering walls would tighten and squeeze and damn near strangle him, the absurd sound of your wetness utterly mortifying if you had your wits about you, but music to his ears. 

Harder and faster with no regard for your overstimulated crooning, he’d take you, working himself to his peak, almost rabid in his unhinged, disjointed movements. His rhythm would fail, becoming more convulsive and urgent with every plunge of his hips. He’d chase his end inside of you, the blissful heat of your body, the cadence of your moans, and snug, velveteen swaddling of your sopping cunt the closest taste of the divines he’ll ever have– that he’ll ever want. 

He’d cum inside of you, burying himself so deep that he’d be certain you could taste it. It would spill out of you as he milked himself to completion with your pliant body, heaving against your bloody neck, a hand in your hair to rip your head back and drag down against him. Bruised inside and out in the shape of him, his hands, his teeth, his cock all leaving their permanent mark. It won’t heal, it won’t ever heal, he’ll make sure of it–

It’s his– it’s his– it’s all for him and no one else. Not even the Gods could wrestle this away from him. There isn’t a force in the planes that could pry him from atop you– you belong to him, your body, your mind, your tongue, your taste, your cunt–

His cock throbs furiously in his hand, gritted pants and strangled noises escaping his throat. It is only through sheer supernatural ability that he is able to withdraw his hand from your shirt and catch himself before he slumps completely atop you, no doubt waking you with the force of it. The ecstasy spills over, unfettered bliss exploding outward from his core and sparking fire throughout every inch of his body. His eyes roll backward, head slooping forward as he works his pulsing cock, every last ounce of self-control in his ancient body holding back a howling cry. 

He spills into his palm, carelessly covering his shaft in the sticky, gossamer fluid as he milks clean the very last remnants of pleasure from himself with the fervor of a man starved of it. His toes curl in his shoes, teeth gritting to the point of pain as he withholds a sigh of euphoria. His extremities tingle as his body sags, muscles exhausted and screaming from the exertion, and he almost collapses as it fades from him as quickly as it approached, still singing beautiful contentment somewhere deep inside of him.

Sagging completely into the dirt, he lies there, bare and open to the sky: Hand defiled and dripping with the seed of his shame, sweat wetting the delicate white curls behind his ears, breeches pulled cleanly to his akimbo knees. It takes a moment for the world to settle into his foggy brain once more, but shame cuts as cleanly as a knife as the clouds of desire split and the light of reality once again illuminates the situation. 

Frantic fear takes hold of his stomach, and his head swivels towards where you sleep, calmed only by the fact that you still sleep soundly with no inkling or inclination as to what he has just done. As he glances around, the rest of the camp is equally unaware, each person neatly in their place, unmoving and unalert. His secret is his and no one elses.

He allows himself a few moments to catch the breath he does not need, wiping the evidence of the encounter into the grass with a sense of disgust and indignity as he does. He feels remarkable– alive for the first time in centuries– and yet it is marred by the yoke of scandal he feels having been bested by such an absurd thing. Overwhelming desire he has not felt since he was a young, handsome elf brimming with potential and swarming with suitors, back when his chest still beat with blood and his skin was flushed and warm rather than pale and pallor. 

It’s unfamiliar to him, and he bares his teeth at the thought. Sex is something filthy and cursed– and yet it didn’t feel so in the moment. Even now, his fingertips tingle at the thought of your puckered peak gently caressed, the soft sound of your sighs, the vulnerability you show him. He’d barely touched you and yet you sent his senses alight like a bonfire. The taste of you still lingers on his tongue, and he cannot help but savor it. As he hikes the band of his pants back up his hips, he feels shame, yes, but also something different. Something oceans away from the helpless misery he usually feels after the degrading act. 

He feels at peace. He feels satisfaction. He feels right. He does not feel debased, but empowered– almost giggly as a schoolboy at the wrongness of it all.

He chose this. For the first time he can remember, he chose this. He took control and his pleasure did not come at his own expense. It came at yours, yes, but he doesn’t like to make a habit of grappling with fragile, banal things such as morality. He is a libertine, and where he finds pleasure, he shall take it, because he knows all too well what it is to be starved of it and all that makes life worth living. 

Besides, you seem fine. Sleeping deep as a babe in the cradle, none the wiser. As he sits right and dabs potion at the wounds at your neck so as to not leave a trace of his crime, he allows himself one quiet, satisfied sigh. It disconcerts him that as he studies your slumbering body and slack face, he feels pinpricks in his core once again, whispering remnants of that desire that had unhinged him so before, but he will have to unpack that later. 

He is no fool. Something has changed, and it isn’t the strength that flows through him free as a fountain that was once clogged and stunted, nor the heightened attunement of his mind to damn near everything around him to the point of absurdity. He feels right for the first time with the blood he has stolen away with, and smug at getting away with something so risky as he often does, but more than that. 

He is a vampire fully satisfied in more ways than one, and the fulfillment and delight he feels overrides the shame and wrestles it into the quiet. 

You are something to him, though he isn’t sure what. He had not questioned why he’d picked you before, but the question begs itself now. He does not allow himself the indulgence of touching you once more. He doesn’t taste you or feel your skin. He only withdraws as silently as he came, backing off and away from the light of the fire that burns low, dying embers spitting against charred, ashen logs, his shadow stretching long before disappearing into the dark of the night. 

As he moves back to his tent, he stalks the shadows, but he does so with head held high, back straight as a bow, graceful and the very picture of pride. There’s an unmistakable grin on his reddened lips and a flush to his face not wholly attributed to the blood that now courses through him. Pieces of himself unlocked after so many years of servitude. He feels himself again, and the world feels his oyster once more. What your role is in that world, he doesn’t know yet. 

But he has a feeling he’ll figure it out soon enough.