#romance or the end

[goneandgoneandgonee]

i have heard it said that love turns people soft but i have never been more brutal

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

not "i ship these characters" or "i want them to bond platonically" but a secret 3rd thing (I want them to be forced to interact by the Narrative bc they would HATE that)

[sparemoon]

RELEASE THE DA2 VARRIC ROMANCE ENDING BIOWARE

[andaniellight]

they don't make this kind of thing anymore 😔

[sclappin]

Man whose definition of "monster" is extremely flexible.

[theswampghost]

what do you mean “long live”. the quotes. the way the lore implies that the black parade is being used as propoganda for an oppressive regime. the way the swarm tour seemed to be in the rubble of this regime, with the secretary character (/dictator’s wife?) being bashed over the head and bleeding out onstage, and the smouldering remains of the city as the backdrop…. brother i am connecting dots that aren’t even THERE

[tskva]

playing an evil character but u keep helping ppl anyway

[ellecdc]

The Bolter

Sirius Black x fem!reader who meet again [5.5k words]

prompt: poly!wolfstar or just Sirius x reader in which they were friends with benefits but it was obvious they loved each other even though they acted like they weren’t. Then, reader finds out shes pregnant and before telling them, they do something stupid. so reader runs away for a few months. When she comes back (only bc she had to for some reason) shes like 6-7 months pregnant

CW: secret pregnancy, angst, FWB to strangers to lovers, second chance fic, post war trauma, both Sirius and reader are meeesssssssssssyyyyy in this! I don't approve of what they've done but I understand it

“So…she’s coming back?” Sirius asked cautiously, focusing more on the condensation pooling on the coaster underneath his pint than the concerned gazes of his two best friends. 

“Well, I don’t know if she’s coming back, but she’ll be here for Harry’s birthday.” James mollified, sharing a nervous look with Remus.

“Right.” Sirius murmured around a swallow; throat tight and dry though neither the pint nor the pitcher of water in front of him looked as though they’d be able to help him with the matter. 

“Are you going to be alright?” Remus queried, and Sirius offered him the most arrogant scoff he could muster; he missed by a long shot.

“Of course I’m going to be alright.” He huffed. “Why? Can’t two friends see each other after five and a half months of silence?” 

“Sirius-” James started, but Sirius carried on. 

“She’s the only one who’s been silent, you know?” Though he knew that they did indeed both know. “I’ve tried. I’ve tried reaching out.” 

“Pads.” Remus offered consolingly, looking frustratingly like he was going to reach a hand out to Sirius as if he were some over tired toddler on the brink of a meltdown.

“Stop, no I- I’m fine, honest.” He insisted as he took a steadying breath. “I- you… talked to her, then?”

James and Remus shared another look before James allowed the segue. 

“Mostly by owl, but she has spoken on the phone with Lily a few times.” 

Sirius nodded as he considered this; considered the number of owls Sirius had sent that had gone unanswered - perhaps even unopened if the silence meant anything at all.

“She’s…okay?” 

Remus let out a sigh as he shot Sirius a tight smile that looked more like a grimace. “She’s…vague.”

“She doesn’t share a whole lot.” James agreed. “Says she’s fine, things are good. Mostly asks about…all of us, Harry.” 

“She’s still staying with that great aunt,” Remus added, “helping her with the property.” 

“She seeing anyone?” There was no point in pretending that wasn’t the most pressing matter in Sirius’ mind; of course it was. And as angry and bitter as the idea made Sirius, it would have been his own fault, his own doing. He had no one to blame but himself. 

And he’d have to live the rest of his life knowing he was the one who let you slip away - pushed you away - right into the arms of someone else. 

“Not that she’s mentioned.” Remus responded honestly; he couldn’t say for sure that you weren’t, but if you were, you clearly hadn’t said anything about it. 

“Right.” Sirius offered shortly. 

“Pads, I…we would understand if it's too hard for you to see her. If you can’t come-”

“Don’t be daft.” Sirius scoffed deploringly. “I’m not going to miss my godson’s birthday. If anyone should be missing it, it should be her; I’ve been here for the past four and a half months, she’s the one who fucked off for good.”

“Sirius-���

“I don’t understand why you had to invite her!” Sirius shouted then, startling even himself when he realised how breathless he sounded all of a sudden. 

James smiled at him sadly; Sirius wished he’d stop doing that. “We wanted all of Harry’s uncles and his aunt to be there, Sirius…it’s important, yeah? We…we almost didn’t get this chance.”

Sirius could feel a wicked migraine coming on; between talking about you, the close calls and the fact that the group of you were all alive following the war by nothing but chance, and the fact that the person Sirius was most angry with was himself, he downed the rest of his pint and flagged the server in favour of having to look at the pitiful gazes being shot at him by Remus and James.

Sirius couldn’t tell if he was eager for Harry’s second birthday or dreading it. But like it or not, Sirius was going to be seeing you again. 

It had felt like a good idea at the time.

It felt beyond foolish now, but it had felt like a good idea at the time. 

*ೃ༄.ೃ࿐

“Sirius, we just won. We just won, why do you have to leave now?” You practically begged as you followed Sirius through his flat. 

“Because if I don’t get out now, I’m going to be stuck here for eternity.” He all but spat at you as he shoved articles of clothing into his duffle rather haphazardly. You felt like grabbing the bag from him and folding them properly if the act wouldn’t leave you feeling like you were aiding and abetting his abandoning you.

“But what about James? And Remus? What about Harry? You fought this war for them, and they for you - we just got them back!”

“And they’ll be here when I’m ready to come home!” Sirius shouted; turning to look at you with wild, red rimmed eyes. 

“What about me?” You asked quietly, hating how small you sounded.

“What about you?” He asked; face falling painfully neutral. If you didn’t know better, you would have thought he was occluding. 

“I…I don’t know.” You started awkwardly, shrugging one shoulder. “I thought…maybe we’d have a chance now. To try?.”

“Y/N.” Sirius sighed as he rubbed harshly at his eyes; entire being oozed exhaustion at having to have this conversation with you. “Have I not been entirely clear about what this was between us?” 

“Right.” You agreed quickly, biting roughly on your lip and looking anywhere but at him as he let his hand fall away from his face. 

“It’s…it’s not you, doll-” but even your humourless scoff didn’t derail him “I’m not the kind to settle down and be content I- I wouldn’t be enough for you.”

“I’m not asking you for any more than what we have, Sirius-”

“Yes you are.”

“-I just want you to stay.”

“That’s too much for me.” He stated; his voice never raised though he may as well have screamed it at you. “I cannot sit here and play house, I cannot be that guy for you.”

“Cannot or will not?” You asked quietly, regretting the question the second it came out of your mouth and he looked at you with nothing but pity in his eyes. 

“Y/N…”

“I’m sorry I asked.” You let out with a chuckle as you harshly wiped tears from under your eyes. 

“It’s…it’s not forever, yeah? I just…I can’t see myself being happy here…not right now, at least; not for a while.” 

“Where will you go?” Your voice grated painfully as it came out, but you tried to keep an air of nonchalance about you. You wouldn’t look at him, but you could see his shoulders shrug helplessly. 

“I don’t know…everywhere. Anywhere.”

Anywhere was better than stuck here with you, apparently. 

“I hope it’s nice, wherever it is.” You offered, and you found that you meant it. As much as it hurt to say, you really, really meant it. Sirius had been fighting and running his entire life, and he finally won. If he wanted to celebrate his victory by taking off to be that rich, vague uncle who popped by with lavish gifts every so often, who were you to deny him? 

You loved him.

You were in love with him.

You loved him enough to let him go. 

*ೃ༄.ೃ࿐

He had sent James a postcard a few weeks later. Turns out he started in the South of France; his family had a home there that had been left untouched by the war, and Sirius was going to start by figuring out what to do with the property. 

And you? Well, you found out you were pregnant. 

You suppose it was a small mercy that Sirius wasn’t here to know; you’re sure it would have hurt more hearing him tell you he was leaving if there were two of you he couldn’t find it in him to love. You would have hated it even more if he felt trapped into staying with you just for this.

But all this meant was that you couldn’t stay, either. 

You supposed that was alright, though; the life you wanted to build here was with Sirius. You loved your friends, but you had a little one to think about now, too. 

You made up a story about a great aunt needing help tending to her property and wishing to be closer to your relatives now that you could be, now that it was safe. No one questioned it, likely because Remus had done the same following the war; moving back home to help his dad and ailing mother tend the property in whatever ways he could. 

You found yourself a little cottage, you wrote to the boys and had the occasional phone call with Lily, and you grew.

It had felt like a good idea at the time. 

But now you were almost six months pregnant and returning home for the first time since you moved to celebrate your nephew’s birthday with all of your closest friends, the love of your life whose child you were carrying, and none of them knew. 

You wondered if you should even go, but the thought of missing out on sweet Harry’s second birthday that the lot of you almost never got the chance to see made your throat constrict with tears you refused to shed since the war. 

You wondered if you should tell everyone before you arrived, but the thought of them all discussing you and your pregnancy without you being there left you feeling small and ashamed. 

You wondered if you should tell Sirius, but you looked over at the stack of unopened letters he had sent to you in the past four months - the first thin, perhaps a postcard, the second and third were thicker, the fourth was by far the thickest (like he had drafted an autobiography that he wanted you to proofread for him), the fifth was similar to the second, whilst the sixth (the last) couldn’t be more than one page - and wondered how the hell you’d even start that conversation after all this time.

Hey, remember me? Yeah, the bird who caught feelings during our friends with benefits situation that we both agreed would remain platonic amidst a battle for survival and then begged you to stay with no success? Well, whilst you’ve been off probably shagging every beautiful woman across the British Isles, I’ve been pregnant. Right, with your child. How was France, by the way? 

You swallowed around your gag reflex and groaned at your image in the mirror. You put on a pair of gingham pants with the baggiest band-tee you could find, planned on sucking in the best you could if anyone (when everyone) insisted on a hug and hoped to every deity that they all just assumed you’d been eating really well since the end of the war. 

You smoothed the fabric over your bump one last time before you left - looking at the proof that, if nothing else, you were protecting more than just yourself, and you let that be enough - before you grabbed Harry’s birthday present and called for Potter Manor, throwing a fistfull of floo powder into your fireplace and travelling by way of the flames. 

You could hear Harry squealing in delight in one of the adjacent rooms as you stepped into the floo reception room at Potter Manor; a smile taking over your face uninhibitedly at the sounds of the people you loved more than life itself, happy and celebrating.

How could you have gone so long without this? 

“Y/N!” Lily shrieked as she made for you, and you sucked in before returning her hug. “Merlin, you're glowing! Where’s your aunt's place again?” 

“Erm. Killarney.” You offered; not entirely untrue - you did have an aunt in Killarney. 

“Well,” she let out with a breath, eyes turning a touch glassy as they darted across your face, “it seems that Irish air’s been for you.” 

You smiled back at your friend before pulling her back in for another hug. “I’ve missed you, Lils.”

“Don’t let it go so long next time, yeah? We can come to you, too; I’m teaching James how to be a muggle, and Harry’s only had the odd burst of accidental magic yet. We could play the part in front of your aunt.” 

“I’d love that, Lily.” You responded earnestly. 

“Y/N!” James hollered then before you were being bodily tackled by the former quidditch chaser, a brief flash of anxiety at his hold around your stomach abating only when he relinquished his hold on you. “Where in the sodding hell have you been!?”

“Killarney.” Lily answered for you. 

“I love Killarney!” 

“Have you ever been to Killarney, Prongs?” Remus asked then, appearing in the door as he leaned against the archway. 

“No! But I love it there! I just know it!” 

“Hey Moony.” You greeted, quickly accepting his open arms and breathing him in.

“We’ve missed you.” He murmured into your hair, and you couldn’t help the traitorous hitch in your heart that he might’ve meant-

“Uncle Pafoo!” Harry squealed, suddenly standing right underneath you. 

“That’s right, Haz!” The voice that haunts your dreams called out. “Auntie is here!”

“Hullo, Harry!” You cheered as you picked him up, sucking in before settling on your hip. “Happy birthday, little dude.” 

“Am two!” He announced as he held up four fingers. 

“You are two! Way to go!” You laughed. “Is everyone here?” You asked the room, shooting Sirius a tight smile so you couldn’t be accused of hostility when your heart stuttered for an entirely different reason. 

He looked tired - a bone deep tired that no amount of sleep could rectify - and the bags under his eyes seemed to be chronic. But he was still so beautiful; his hair had grown slightly longer since the last time you’d seen it, the last time you’d run your fingers through it, the last time you’d brought sheers to it, and he donned more than a few new tattoos if the few you could see were enough to go by. 

You had to look away.

“Reg’s going to be by after work; his part-time student called in sick so he needed to be there to close the shop himself. Thankfully, they’re only open in the morning on Sunday’s.” Remus explained kindly.

“Good, it’ll be nice to see him.” You offered, and the room fell slightly awkward.

“Uncle Pafoo, aeroplane?” Harry asked then, and whatever exhaustion seemed to be plaguing Sirius vanished as he beamed at his godson. 

“Absolutely, little man!” He agreed, holding his arms out and taking Harry’s weight from you.

“Do you want something to drink, Y/N? Wine? Beer, Cider? Juice? Water?” James rapid fire, causing Lily to groan. 

“We just got her back, Potter. Do try to control yourself.” 

“Water would be great, Jamie. Thank you.” You laughed, following the group into the open concept kitchen-to-living room. 

Save the fact that you and Sirius seemed to be doing acrobatics to avoid each other, you were almost stunned at how easy and natural being back here felt. Regulus returned and the two of you shared friendly jibes, Lily caught you up on all of the drama at the Ministry, James strong armed you into agreeing to join them for their next pub quiz night, and Remus said that your old professors all wished you well. 

You loved your cottage - the home you’d built for yourself and your little one - but you found yourself feeling homesick for here, and you hadn’t even left yet.

You were leaning on your elbows against the kitchen island, watching Sirius and Regulus pretend to be knights in shining armour as they fought off a fire breathing dragon (Harry) to save the princess (James) when Remus appeared beside you and mirrored your stance. 

“It’s not the same without you, you know?” He murmured then. 

“But they seem to be alright.” You responded simply, and Remus allowed the two of you to fall into silence for a few beats.

“How far along are you?” 

You stood up straight and turned to stare at him in horror, only to see him smiling kindly at you. 

“How do you-”

“Lycanthropy - I could smell it on you.” He said with an embarrassed wrinkle of his nose. “I knew Lily was pregnant before she did.”

You shushed him and looked over your shoulder to ensure no one else could hear you.

“Come.” He said with a sigh, gently taking you by the elbow and ushering you out of the sliding doors to the back yard and closing it behind the two of you. 

“Remus-”

“Is it his?” He cut you off; his face held no judgement though perhaps just a touch of concern. For you or his best friend/virtual brother-in-law, you weren’t sure.

“Yes.” You whispered, not bothering to clarify who he was talking about; you both knew. 

Remus simply nodded as he looked you over. “Is that why you left?”

“He left first.” You hissed petulantly.

“He left you, but you left all of us.” Remus countered somewhat sternly. “Besides, I didn’t ask about him; is this why you left?”

“Yes.”

“Why?” 

“Because, Remus!” You shouted, tears flooding your vision as you turned to look at him. “Because he didn’t want to be here. He didn’t want this, he didn’t want me. I wasn’t going to force him to come back just because… just because.” 

“Don’t you think he should have been able to make that choice for himself?” Remus asked gently.

“He chose! He did choose! He told me he couldn’t play house, he told me he couldn’t be this person for me. I loved him enough to accept that. I loved him enough to let him go.”

“Loved?” Remus asked with a tilt of his head. “Past tense?” 

“Remus.” You groaned. “Please.”

“He came back for you, you know.” Remus pointed out. “He left you, you left us, but he came back for you.” 

“Stop it.”

“It’s true, Y/N.”

“And so what if it is?” You nearly sobbed. “So what if he did, Remus? What can I do? I can’t go back in time and change my mind, I can’t go back and fix this. He made choices, I made choices, and here we are.” 

Remus heaved a sigh and looked at you sadly. “I don't think either of you realise that your choices don’t have to remain permanent; there can be an expiration date on them.” 

You were catching your breath from your mini temper tantrum when you heard the glass door slide open, both you and Remus turning to see Sirius standing there almost shy - far shier than you’d ever seen him before.  

“Just talk to him? Okay? You..don’t have to tell him now, just…talk to him.” Remus whispered before heading towards the door, clapping Sirius on the back before disappearing back into the house. 

“Hey.” Sirius offered cautiously after a few beats of silence, coming to stand beside you as the two of you looked over the railing of the patio to the rest of the manor grounds. 

“Hey.” You returned dumbly, clearing your throat before continuing. “You…you look good, Sirius.”

Sirius scoffed, and you could feel your shoulder rising before you saw him smirk at you - if not somewhat sadly - cutting you a playful glare from the corner of his eye. “Did you take up lying there in Ireland?” 

You let out a breathy half-laugh. “I’m not lying.” 

“Then you need glasses. I look like shite.”

“You look tired.” You amended. 

“I’m exhausted.” He agreed, and the two of you lapsed into silence. 

“You look good, though.” He continued. “Healthy.”

You hummed in agreement. “Funny what not having to run on rations and broken hours of sleep on military cots does for a person.”

“Why haven’t I heard from you, Y/N?” He blurted then, turning his entire body to face you. 

“Sirius, I-”

“Everyone else has. You’ve spoken to Lily on the phone. James and Remus have gotten letters. Even Reg got a postcard for his birthday.” 

“I’m sorry.” Was all you could manage to say.

“I wrote to you.” He continued. “Letters, a lot. Did you get them?”

You nodded your head yes shamefully.

“Did you read them?”

You felt your heart splinter at how hopeful and heartbroken he sounded over it. You felt like scum of the earth when you shook your head no, and he let out a sigh.

“I guess that makes me feel a little bit better, then.” He said as he lit a cigarette and took a deep drag. 

You found yourself taking a step away from him when you asked “why does that make you feel better?”

He let out a humourless laugh that forced smoke from his lips. “At least now I know that my begging for a second chance, begging you to come home, professing my love for you isn’t what kept you away.”

“Sirius-”

“I messed up, Y/N.” He declared earnestly. “I…I was fucking scared, terrified. I’d spent so much of my life living with one foot on the threshold of hell that after the war, I didn’t know how to live amongst the undead.”

He took a moment to catch his breath as if he’d run all the way here just to tell you something. “And I ran. I bolted, I…”

“You left.” You finished for him. 

“I left.” He agreed. “I… I didn’t know, Y/N.”

“Didn’t know what?” You asked as you choked back tears.

“Didn’t know what I had, or what I wanted. Or that I had everything that I wanted.”

“And you do, now? You know what you want?” You asked, and a look of determination painted his features as he met your gaze head on.

“For my entire life, I had never known what family meant, so I wasn’t even aware that I’d created my own with all of you until I’d risked it all. I was so sure I didn’t want to be like my parents that I never realised I may actually…want to be a parent someday. I was so sure I didn’t want to be my father that I never realised I actually did want to be a partner someday. I was so certain I’d never know what true love felt like that I didn’t even realise I had it right here all along with you.” 

“Sirius-”

“I messed up. I left. But what I don’t understand is why you did. Or why you stayed away.” He took a step towards you with his cigarette long forgotten in one of his hands, the ash threatening to burn his fingers before you plucked it and stubbed it out on the stone railing. He barely flinched. “Why’d you go?”

“I didn’t want to sit around and wait for you, Sirius. I- it hurt, I was hurt. And then-”

“I’m sorry.” He offered quickly, but you shook your head.

“I’m not telling you this for you to be sorry, I just-”

“I came back for you.”

“But it wasn’t just about me anymore, Sirius!” You shouted then, and you watched his brows furrow before his face fell in horror. 

“You’re seeing someone.” He asked, though he phrased it as more of a statement; like he’d been expecting it.

“I’m not seeing anyone, Sirius.” You sighed.

“Then why’d you leave? Why’d you stay away?”

“Because I’m pregnant.” You blurted, and Sirius fell silent. “I’m almost six months pregnant.”

“Six-” He started, eyes falling to your stomach still hidden behind the baggy article of clothing before you smoothed the fabric over your ever rounding bump. “Six months. Six…”

You let him do the maths in the head as he stared hard at your stomach like he was sitting in divination and it was a crystal ball that might just give him the answers if only he stared at it long enough.

“It’s mine?” He finally concluded.

“Yes.” You whispered.

“It’s mine. You’re pregnant, it’s mine.” He murmured, before his eyes met yours again. “You’re pregnant with my child?”

“Right.” You agreed, and he crumpled to a heap on the floor. 

“Sirius Orion Black,” Sirius heard Remus hiss, clearly hovering somewhere over him, “I swear to Godric if you do not wake up and eat some of this godsdamned vanilla cake you bought, your brother is going to skin you alive.” 

“It’s true.” James agreed from somewhere on Sirius’ other side. “He actually ran to the store when he found out you bought vanilla because he knew Remus wouldn’t eat any of it. Remus is going to get his chocolate cake, and you’re going to get egged.” 

“Shut up.” Sirius hissed as he scrunched his eyes closed. “Fuck.”

“How do you feel, mate?” James asked rather jovially as he clapped him roughy on the shoulder.

“Like hell.”

“Why’s that?” Remus joined in.

“Because I was in the middle of a dream and you sods woke me up going on about cake.” He muttered as he opened his eyes, realising then that he’d been propped up on a number of cushions in one of Lily and James’ spare rooms.

“S’he awake?” Lily whispered, and Sirius craned his neck to see you and Lily poke your heads into the room.

“Oh my gods.” Sirius breathed as he sat up, likely far too fast for someone who fell unconscious mere moments ago. “Oh my gods, you’re actually here?” 

“Did you hit your head, mate?” James asked as he prodded at Sirius’ head, causing Sirius to swat his arms away as he shifted towards the edge of the bed.

“You’re here.” He whispered as you slowly made your way into the room.

“I’m here.” You offered cautiously, eyes darting around at your oldest friends like there might be some secret threat lurking in the room.

“You’re pregnant…” He tried then, punching the air right out of Lily and James who both spun to stare at you in shock.

You smoothed the fabric of your shirt over your midsection again to expose a very obvious (now that everyone could actually see it) baby bump. 

“Oh my gods!” Lily and James chorused, causing Remus to snort.

“You knew, didn’t you!?” Lily accused Remus who held his hands up in surrender. 

“Only when she walked in, and not a second sooner.” 

“With my child.” Sirius continued, and you nodded at him. 

“Y/N.” Lily winced. “You-”

“You sodding scared me!” You shrilled then, grabbing one of the throw pillows James had dumped onto the ground to make room for Sirius and swinging it at him.

“I scared you!?” Sirius shrieked right back, much to the delight of Harry who started banging on the throw pillow that had landed beside him. 

“I thought I killed you!”

“Oh, well I’m terribly sorry that finding out the woman I’ve been in love with for years and pining hopelessly over for months - who was missing for all intents and purposes, may I remind you - is pregnant with my child happened to be a little shocking.” Sirius sneered sarcastically. 

“Well I only went ‘missing’ because the man I’ve been hopelessly in love with for years and pining hopelessly over for months took off an-” The abrupt end of your statement nearly gave the room whiplash as you cut yourself off mid sentence and stared at Sirius like you’d never seen him before. 

“What…what just happened?” James whispered carefully.

“Years?” You whispered then, and Sirius hated every version of himself that deigned to let you go without knowing just how loved you were.

“Probably when we were still just cosmic dust.” Sirius smiled sadly. “I’m sorry I didn’t always realise, I’m sorry I didn’t make sure that you knew.”

“I take it to guess there isn’t an aunt in Killarney?” Lily offered then, smiling kindly at you when you turned your attention towards her.

“No, I- I think there actually is an aunt in Killarney, I just don’t live with her.”

“Where do you live?” Sirius asked eagerly, wondering if you could hear it in his voice or even see on his face just how desperate he was to know everything about you.

“Near Tintagel.” You offered abashedly as Remus slapped his hand on his thigh.

“You minx!” He scolded you. “You lived basically across the channel from me this whole time!”

“I hope it’s nice, wherever it is” You offered him then, smiling through your tears as Sirius swallowed around his bile threatening its way up his oesophagus.

“I hope it’s nice.” Sirius blurted suddenly, and Sirius thanked the heavens for Remus John Lupin who seemed to understand that the conversation delved beyond the need of an audience, scooping Harry up and closing the door behind Lily, James, and himself to give you two some privacy. 

“It’s nice.” You offered wetly. “It’s quiet.”

Sirius hummed in acknowledgement. “In Tintagel, near Merlin’s cave?”

You laughed, which saw Sirius smiling. “I’m not right in Tintagel, just outside. My neighbours are mostly sheep.” 

“Does it have a picket fence?”

“To keep the sheep out of my garden.” You nodded with a smile.

“Flowers; lots of them.” Sirius deduced, you nodded again though Sirius watched your smile falter.

“You’d probably hate it.”

“Are you there?” He asked quickly.

“Well, usually, yes.” You offered, and Sirius shrugged easily.

“Sounds as though it might be my favourite place in the world, then.” 

The next breath that left you shuddered on its way out, and Sirius finally stood and met you in the middle of the room; close enough to touch but not daring to. He hadn’t earned that right yet. 

“Take me with you?” He all but begged then, and your face crumpled in misery.

“Sirius, I don’t want you to follow me because you have to, I-”

“I don’t have to though, I know I don’t; I know you’d never make me.” He assured you then, lifting a hand but pausing to wait for you to nod at him before he placed it on your upper arm. “The letters, Y/N, I- I’ve been looking for you for months.”

A sob tore through you as you lowered your head, and Sirius allowed himself to catch it in his free hand. 

“I don’t want you to feel bad; I’m not telling you so that you feel bad, love.” The endearment falling off his tongue so easily now that he had you in his arms. “But I need you to know that I want you - any of you, all of you - and have for a very long time.” 

“It’s just…you said-” and Sirius knew exactly what he said; he had played that conversation over and over and over in his mind until he found himself sick over it more than once. But we waited for you to tell him anyhow; he’d always wait for you. “You couldn’t settle down and be content, you couldn’t play house; you weren’t that kind of guy.” 

“I know, doll. I know.” He whispered. “I…I didn’t think I was capable of it. I didn’t think I deserved everything I wanted and I knew that you deserved better. That you deserve better.”

“But?”

“But I’d be happy to spend the rest of my life trying to prove you otherwise; trying to give you everything you deserve.”

“Sirius…” You sighed, and Sirius could see your walls cracking. “I…I’m-”

“Take me home? Please?” He begged then, words interrupted by a sob of his own. “To Tintagel, to Killarney, to bloody fucking Azkaban or the bottom of the sodding ocean, I don’t care where it is just as long as it’s with you, please. Please.”

Your hands landed on Sirius’ chest and he was sure you could feel his hummingbird heart beating under your fingertips. He only hoped you knew how it beat for you. 

“Please bring me home?”

James didn’t know if he could consider this a success or not. 

His motivation was not singular; it was a ‘hit two fairies with one gobstone’ sort of scenario, so to speak. Was his son turning two? Indeed he was! Was James throwing a party for said son’s birthday? You’re damned right he was. But was it also a really good excuse to force two of his idiot best friends into the same room again? Absolutely.

Except James seems to have gotten slightly more than he bargained for; Sirius falling unconscious in his childhood backyard, you sobbing into Lily’s shoulder out in the hallway as he and Remus tried to bring him back from the dead, Remus sneering at a slice of birthday cake like it personally offended him and Regulus threatening to defend his boyfriend’s honour, and - apparently - a new niece or nephew coming in the next three-ish months. 

But when he looked over to see you and Sirius emerging from the spare room - both of your faces tear stained and puffy from the grief and torment you no doubt put yourselves through - hands intertwined between your bodies and your hand resting protectively over your growing bump, and a spark in Sirius’ eyes James had thought he lost in the war but now realised he only lost when he lost you…

…yeah, James figured he could probably consider this a success.

[sashthesloth]

My original playthrough girls

[petewentzwombtattoo]

[midydoof]

I think about the shuggy wedding gatcha card at least once a week

[celestie0]

gojo satoru x reader | oneshot angst [18+]

title. let me be free of you

He would live in this lifetime of hell over and over again if it meant that in some other one, there exists a world where he never hurts you.

ᰔ pairing. friends to strangers au - best friend!gojo x reader (f)

ᰔ summary. gojo satoru, your love of a lifetime, tells you he’s engaged to another woman. inspired by the novel & netflix series “one day” created by david nicholls

ᰔ warnings/tags. 18+, fem!reader, angst, mentions of sex/explicit content, coming of age themes, reader & gojo are in their 30s, mentions of pregnancy, mentions of alcohol, cheating, lots of mutual pining & longing, bittersweet ending

ᰔ word count. 4.8k

a/n. hellooo! i've had this finished in my wips folder for a long time but never got around to posting it sooo just wanted to let it see the light of day haha. hope you enjoyyy <33

➸ masterlist

“I’m engaged.”

The words leave Gojo’s lips as much less of a confession and more like a blabber, like a toddler desperate to keep conversation going in the face of a disinterested adult. Wasn’t how he expected to share the news of a lifetime to the love of his lifetime, but he hopes it breaks your heart to hear it. 

He watches your eyebrows flatten from the crease that was bothering them before, and then slowly raise into soft arches above your eyes–those damn beautiful eyes that, even when they twinkle with hurt, still make his heart skip a beat in his chest.

He recalls for a moment the night the two of you met, drunk and dizzy from drinking out of a shared bottle of Prosecco, which only had half of the liquor left in it to start when he had first found it bleeding out to dry on the grassy lawn at the front of your university. It was graduation night, the last day to celebrate finishing four years of hell, and he had nothing to his name other than a rolled up diploma shoved in the pocket of his suit pants and the charm left in the youth of his smile. He wanted to spend the night with Aiko Rei, which was not a unique desire as most men on campus did, and he had a fair shot of getting into bed with her just like all those times before. But instead he was sitting at the top of a staircase inside the campus’s English literature building, making history in the crisp year of 1986 by being the first man of the robust age of twenty-three to pass up sex with the school’s lady heartthrob for–well, conversation with a sort of ditsy girl that he just met a half hour ago.

“What do you plan to do with your life?” he heard you ask him, a hard enough question to stomach when one is sober, and an impossible question to stomach when one is already trying not to puke flat Prosecco.

“Pardon?” he asked, in hopes to dissuade you from the question. In hopes that you’d get the hint. But you don’t. And he’d soon learn throughout the years of your friendship to come that you never did.

“Your life!” you exclaim, “we’re graduates now! What do you want to do with it?” You pat harshly at his thigh, closer to his groin than to his pocket, most likely because you’re tipsy too, but he realizes you’re referring to the rolled up paper protruding at the pocket. 

Truthfully, Gojo had never thought much about what he wanted to do after graduation. Hell, he didn’t even think he’d make it this far. Not once since he got here, not once since he flunked out of first-year history, not once since his father passed away during his third-year final examinations, and most certainly not after he got caught having “unethical affairs” with his communications professor just two months ago. And yet the esteemed board of scholars decided he was fit for a diploma anyway, and now he’s answering to, effectively, a stranger what he plans to do with said piece of paper.

“I don’t know,” he says to you, “I’ll do whatever.” 

Gojo Satoru could get by with doing whatever. He was good at everything he did. But his teachers and mentors and his own father would always warn him– son, it’s better to be an expert at one than a half-assed show-off in all. Well, they wouldn’t use the expletives, but that’s what it had sounded like in his head.

His dad would’ve liked you. He was always telling him to find a girl that challenges him, asks him the right questions, and pushes him to become a better man, the kind of woman his mother was to his father. Much opposed to the airheaded girls of Gojo’s college campus he would sneak into the house and forget to shoo off before sunrise, an occurrence that happened enough times for the respect in his father’s eyes to dwindle with each woman he’d watch his son dispel from their residence. Until eventually, Gojo started paying rent as punishment.

So, twenty-three year old Gojo, what do you plan to do with your life? Or do you have no idea of anything that extends beyond where you are right now, sitting across this strange girl you’ve just met on the death of your educational youth, at the top of a stairwell lined with passed out, drunk newly grads at nearly 4 in the morning? Right now, he’s eyeing the hem of your dress, the way it’s ridden up slightly but the mesh overskirt still tickles the skin of your thigh. He’s certainly able to picture what’s beyond that fabric, and maybe imagine the color of your panties, but what’s to come for his life? No. As previously mentioned, he never thought he’d get this far.

Gojo is thirty-four now, eleven years since that night the two of you met. And he sits next to you on a garden bench under a pitch black sky with stars speckled across, but only dimly visible. 

It’s been years since he’s seen you. You two had a “falling out” at the cusp of thirty, almost a decade of friendship fizzled away, because of his selfish actions. He couldn’t let you go, but he couldn’t want you the way you wanted him either. He didn’t feel like he deserved to have you. You were too good for him, and he knew it. So he wasted a decade chasing after other women, and in return, he lost the one he knew he was supposed to spend the rest of his life with.

It’s the night of your college roommate‘s wedding, all gathered here today to celebrate their love, and he knew he’d run into you here. You were the bride’s maiden of honor, and you looked beautiful. With your hair half tied up, a pretty clip twinkling with every movement of your head, and with strands falling down over the smooth curve of your neck, bare skin of your chest tightly covered by the nude fabric of your dress. He was fully lusting after you, and he has been all night, the picture of beauty and grace, and it was wrong. Because, again, he’s–

“You’re engaged?” you finally break through his thoughts, break through the trance that he was lost in by the sea of your eyes. Forever pulling him in like you were a wicked siren for his soul, when all you’ve ever wanted from him was his love.

He shifts a little, the thick fabric of his navy blue suit stretching with the movement as he fidgets with his hands in his lap. He’s sitting close to you, his shoulder brushing against yours, the contrast of his broad masculinity so evident against the feminine curve of your bare arm, the thin strap holding up your dress threatening to fall down the hill. His thumb twitches, because he wants to pull it back up into place for you like a gentleman, but he’s not sure if that’s what his hand would actually do. Because all he really wants to do is peel the dress off of you. 

“Yes,” he says, still tantalized by the glow of your skin under pale moonlight, “engaged.”

“To be married?”

“Well, what other kind of engaged is there?”

“You’re not allowed to get married.”

He snorts. “Says who?”

“Says me!” you exclaim, sitting up straighter, "I turn my back for one moment, and you've gone an got engaged? You're awful!" The strap of your dress falls down over your shoulder, his eyes immediately darting to it. He sees you pull the strap up back into place, and a flit of his eyes to your face reveals to him the slight dusting of an embarrassed pink to your cheeks. 

There’s a silence that settles between the two of you. Distant commotion is heard, likely from the wedding venue as people engage in reception activities and dances and cheers, while the two of you remain in this garden escape, the wall of primly trimmed bushes sheltering you two from having to pretend to be people you’re not amongst a crowd.

“Aiko…” he hears you say beside him, and although the name of the woman that has rolled off your tongue is the name of the woman he’s supposed to love, it only makes him feel sick to his stomach to hear you say her name. “She seems lovely.”

“She is,” is all he can manage to say. And he also knows this seemingly lovely woman is probably drunk off her face back at the reception hall, giggling at all the men that approach her from the sight of her flushed face, and he should feel some sort of jealousy or possessiveness over that, but he can’t seem to muster any. Unlike the grit he had to his jaw an hour ago when he saw you dancing with a man he heard you introduce to your friends as just an “old friend” of yours from college. He felt more anger in that moment than he’d ever felt watching his soon-to-be-wife getting talked up to by the sleazy men twice her age. 

“She must be very rich,” you say. “She looks it.”

“Oh. Yeah. Her family’s very well off,” Gojo says.

“So will you become rich too?” you ask him, “when you marry her.”

His eyes flit to the sky briefly. “Doubt it.”

“How come?”

“The old man doesn’t like me very much. I imagine he’ll cut ties after the wedding.”

“Her father?”

“Yes.”

“And why is that?”

“Well. I guess it’s not every father’s dream to find out his prim and proper daughter’s been knocked up by the good-for-nothing boyfriend he’s been threatening her to say good riddance to for months now.”

The silence finds the two of you again, but this time haunting and gutting. That was a blabber, if anything. So nonchalantly said, with no emotion or spirit, to the one person in this world who he’s always felt like he can be himself around.

“She’s pregnant?” you say beside him, voice breaking slightly at the end, and he can’t bear to look at you for some reason. Some sort of admission of guilt, but what for? What exactly was he repenting for?

He lets out a small laugh, like the absurdity of the situation finds him all the same. “Yeah.” 

“That–” you start, stiff next to him, before he feels the tension relax but only rigidly, “that’s wonderful, Satoru. I’m–...I’m really happy for you.” You turn your torso to wrap your arms around him, and his lips brush the sweet skin on your forehead as you bury your face in the crook of his neck. He wraps one arm around you, a sort of friendly hug as he rubs the skin of your arm soothingly, and his heart aches from the emptiness when you release him. 

“Wow…” you say, looking up at him with pretty eyes, eyelashes fluttering as you blink rapidly to process the information, and he wonders if you really are happy for him. He doesn’t want you to be. He wants you to be furious, to tell him off for getting another woman pregnant after leading you on for so many years, maybe he wants you to slap him, or grab him by the collar of his shirt and shake him until all he sees is a million of you through dizzy vision like some paradise. He wants you to be mad, because it’d mean that you still care. It’d mean that you still think there’s something here to salvage between the two of you. 

But he’s engaged. And he’s having a baby. What was more final than that?

“So…are you marrying her because of–”

“The wedding is in four weeks,” he cuts you off, but he knows the statement answers your question regardless.

“Satoru…”

He leans off to the side a little to reach into the pocket of his suit pants, and he pulls out what is now a slightly bent envelope and he hands it to you. You take it from him gently, holding it weakly like it was something beyond you. Like something distant and foreign and strange. When all it was, is a wedding invitation. 

“Listen…” he starts.

He sees your eyes dazed as you stare at the lettering on the outside of the envelope.

“We’ve been friends for a long time, y/n. And I know the last time we saw each other was–” Hostile. Angry. Disappointing. Ended with you cussing him out on the street and then saying you never want to see him again. “...not ideal, but I still care a lot about you, and, uh, so, it would mean a lot to me if you came to the wedding.” For fucks sake, even on the brink of losing you forever, he still can’t find the right words to say. “Aiko, she–” He tastes bitter in his mouth, “well, I’ve told her a lot about you, and she’d really love it if you came as well.”

You’re silent as you gently peel back the opening of the letter and then pull out the small card stock invitation. The gold printed letters shine as you inspect it, fingers tracing the patterns of words that profess the Rei family’s intent to wed their daughter to Gojo Satoru. Your Gojo Satoru. Your best friend in this whole wide world. He watches your eyes carefully, but he can’t discern what he finds in them.

“Gojo Satoru…” you drone off, “to be wed. And to be a father.” Years of late night talks of the future, of kids and Christmas and love, with reality seemingly sly on the horizon only to have crept up so abruptly. It was pinched between your fingers right now. That reality.

His shoulders sulk slightly. And when you look up at him again, there’s a sheen of tears in your eyes.

“I can’t come to this,” you whisper, “and you know that, Satoru.”

His heart breaks. A physical pain that twists in his chest so tight at just the sight of seeing you sad. Sad again over the actions of his own. They say you always hurt the one you love, and he had always wondered what sort of evil person would do such a thing, only to find out he’s only ever hurt you this entire time. 

He should’ve kissed you that night the two of you met at graduation. Should’ve shut you up and all your existential questions by pinning you to a wall and pressing his lips against yours. He should’ve taken you to bed and fucked you, and then held you in his arms until you woke up in the morning. Should’ve listened to you talk his ear off about how he’s just like all the other guys, who pretend to care, but only want to have sex and then never to speak to the girl ever again. And he should’ve laid there in bed, nose nuzzled in your hair, taking all the scolding despite having no intent to ever leave you.

Instead, he wasted so much time. Sure, he had your friendship. His best friend for years, but the two of you could’ve been something more. Could’ve spent the years together, instead of writing stained letters or leaving messages on answering machines while the two of you were miles away. He could’ve been waking up with you every morning with the scent of your shampoo on his sheets, instead of clinging to pillows in foreign motel rooms. He could’ve been engaged to you, and he could be whispering sweet nothings in your ear of how much he wishes the baby will have your eyes. 

But his thoughts are lost in fantasy. He is what he’s done, nothing more and nothing less. His eyes fall to your lap, the invitation still held loosely in your hand, and then a droplet of water falls onto it.

“I–” you stutter, wiping at the tears spilling down your cheeks with a hesitant swipe of your hand, “I need to go.”

You stand up off the bench and he quickly stands up with you, grabbing your wrist to keep you here with him, and you halt but only with you facing away from him. He yanks at your wrist harshly, pulling you into him so his chest is flush to your back, his arms wrapping strongly around you and his nose nuzzling into your hair, breathing you in greedily like it’s the last time he’ll ever get the chance.

“Satoru–” you gasp, your hands immediately grabbing at his forearms that are tightly crossed across your collarbone. “What are you doing–” 

“Say it,” he whispers, gruff and impatient, “tell me to do it, and I will.”

“T-Tell you to do what?” you stutter, struggling a little in his hold but he only holds you tighter.

“Tell me to leave her, and I will,” he says, his lips brushing at your ear now, the scent of your perfume maddening to his senses, and one of his hands slowly trails down and the knuckle of his thumb presses into the softness of your breast.

You squirm, a small and soft moan leaving your lips.

“T–” you breathe in harshly, “this is wrong.” 

“I don’t care,” he growls, arms sliding lower to hold you under your breasts, so tightly that your heels lift off the ground. “Just say the word, and I’ll leave everything behind for you. I promise,” he breathes in deep, the desperation making his head hazy, “that I’ll do things right this time. Just you and me–” 

“You’re going to be a father,” you remind him, and he shuts his eyes closed tightly, the responsibility of the word bearing on his shoulders but his desire for you overshadows every shred of sense or dignity or integrity he has left in him, because he felt like he was losing his mind after wanting you for years just to never have you. 

He turns you around in his hold so that you face him, and he crashes his lips to yours, muffling the surprised mmf! that dies in your throat in surprise as his hands hold your waist, relishing in the feeling of satin fabric pulled taut over your curves.

Forbidden, yet a taste that he’ll risk because there was no curse that was worse than the fate of having to pine after you for years.

Ah.

But.

But it was all fantasy, this moment in his head, where he takes you on the freshly cut grass of this garden. 

Something that only briefly flashes through his mind as his warm hand wraps around your wrist, from where he was still seated on the stone bench, and not on his feet holding you like he dreamed for. Like he longed for.

He feels the weight of his arm so heavily, as if it weren’t his own, and he slowly lets go of your wrist.

When he looks up at you, there’s longing in your eyes. A hurt that he didn’t even know he was capable of causing, just for him to realize that you’ve always looked at him that way, and he’s never been keen enough to know it until now. He grew up too late. He took too long.

His phone starts buzzing in his pocket, and he reaches in for it, then flips it open and sees his soon-to-be-wife’s name on it. He feels nothing at the sight.

“Hello?” he speaks into the device when he holds it to his ear, and he sees you take a couple steps away, rubbing anxiously at your elbow as you pretend to busy yourself with the study of the lamp. “Yes, I’ll be there soon. I, uh, I’m just with a friend. A couple of friends, actually. We’re having drinks by the pond. Mhm. Yes. I will. Okay, see you soon. I—…I love you too. Bye.” And then he snaps the phone shut. 

“Heading back?” he hears you ask.

He stands. “I’ve got to.”

“Okay.” 

You two walk down the shrubbery of the garden that was arranged like a maze, him a few paces behind you, and he watches the delicate line of your posture as your hand brushes against the green walls of foliage that encase the two of you, the feeling of wanting to touch you and hold you almost suffocating. 

“Hey,” he calls out to you, and he shoves his hands in his suit pockets. You turn around immediately to face him, like his voice was permission to do so.

“Yes?” you ask.

He blinks up at the starry sky, and then looks at you again. The soft cast of distant warm lighting falls over your face, making you appear like a renaissance painting, similar to those that you would point out to him at museums when you two would see each other on holiday back in your early twenties. He could never understand the charm of those paintings, no matter how many times you tried to explain it to him, but seeing you in this light right now, he finally understands the beauty that you saw. 

“I’m, uh,” he rubs at the back of his neck, and then scoffs out a small laugh, “I’m a little drunk right now, but–” He stops himself. What was he trying to say? And was it of conscious mind? “I just need to tell you that…I really regret…not speaking to you. I mean, for letting the silence drag on for years. You’re my–...my best friend. We’re a pair, you know? The two of us. For years, people would ask me where you were. And why they haven’t seen us together at all recently. And it was hard to admit that we hadn’t spoken in years.”

You take the smallest of steps towards him, and look up at him with empty eyes. 

“What I’m trying to say is, is that, well,” he finds himself tripping over his words, “I miss you. And I miss our friendship. And–...I miss having you around.” He glances down at his shoes, polished and reflecting off the moonlight directly above him. He rocks back and forth on his heels ever so slightly. “I know you said that I piss you off to lengths unimaginable to my tiny pea-sized brain, but I can’t help myself, y/n,” he admits, “I think you and I, we’re just meant to always be. In some how, or some way…”

You purse your lips together, gaze shifting lower to eye at the silk of his tie. 

“Can we be friends again?” he asks, the words feeling juvenile on his tongue. Like whispered apologies between children on a playground after shoving one another onto wooden chips, except the wounds he’s left on you run much deeper than a superficial scrape. 

You blink slowly, tilting your head up at him. “Friends?”

“Friends.”

You wipe your palm off on the satin of your dress. “I missed you too, you know.”

His eyes widened slightly.

Your hand finds its way up your arm, until you weakly cup your elbow with your palm and look off to the side, avoiding eye contact with him. “There were so many years where I thought that there was something between us. And maybe I was foolish for thinking that way, that you would ever see me that way–”

“y/n,” he tries to interrupt you. 

“But…the pain of not having you the way I wanted to was much less worse than the pain of not having you at all,” you say, your gaze finally shifting towards him. “But, the thing is, I needed to feel that pain to get over you. I had to.”

His heart stills at those words.

You glance down at the ground now. “I missed being able to tell you things. To laugh, and cry, and argue. I miss humbling your stupid ego. I miss being able to call you at any time, knowing you’d pick up when I needed you.”

His heart aches so much he wants to reach into his chest and hold it.

“The thing is,” you continue, “you would’ve been the first person I would’ve run to to tell them that I lost my best friend.” There were tears shining in your eyes. “But what could I do when you were the one that I had lost? Who could I have turned to then?”

He lets out a shaky breath, and in a swift motion, his arm wraps around your waist and he pulls you to him in an embrace.

You’re stiff in his hold, mechanical and rigid, so contrary to the soft tears you leave behind on the fabric of his sleeve, but slowly and surely, you warm and thaw. Your hands slide up past his shoulders, linking behind his neck. And his head drops to the curve of your neck, swaying you with him slowly as if it were a first dance.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers, “for hurting you.”

You breathe out slowly. “Just let me go, Satoru. Let me be free. Let me be free of you.”

He feels the air knock out of his lungs, and the two of you slowly pull your heads away from the embrace to look at one another, although your hands still find a place on his shoulders, and he still holds you close to him by a delicate hold of your waist. 

He wonders if in another life, you two were happy. He wonders if he could ever take back all the decisions he made, and start all over again. On that day the two of you met on that staircase in the west wing of the literature building, he would make a different choice. If he could, he would live in this lifetime of hell over and over again if it meant that in some other one, there exists a world where he never hurts you. 

“It’s time for me to go,” you whisper, eyes darting across the features of his face, studying them but with a familiarity that only you know, because you held his entire life in your palm. Your gaze meets his again, faces just inches apart, and the sweet curl of your eyelashes makes him weak in the knees. “It’s time.”

He nods slowly, his own eyes studying your face as well, except it looks foreign to him now. 

It’s all been said and done. There was nothing he could do to right the wrongs, or undo all the pain. He was to be a father now, and his duties were now towards his wife and unborn child. And no longer to the woman he holds in his arms, one he’s sure he will never stop loving for as long as he lives. 

It’s a sweet moment, the two of you gazing at one another. You look so pretty from this angle, looking up at him with the smallest tilt to your head and round searching eyes. His head subconsciously dips down towards yours in the second that he glances at your lips, but he stops himself. And when you make no move to create distance, he finds himself closing it again, until his lips brush against yours ever so softly. And then he captures them in a kiss, firm and unmistaken, finding solace in the way your lips move against his too, unsure yet passionately at the same time. Your fingers ever so slightly dig into his shoulders while his thumbs soothe at the skin of your waist, the two of you savoring the last moments of a kiss that’ll be the sweetest one you’ll ever know.

You pull away first, a small puff of air leaving your lips as you glance downwards. He rests his forehead against yours, never once looking away from your face. And you both breathe slowly, the soul of the chaste kiss entirely vanishing into the air along with all the hope that the two of you had left to make anything of the way you feel about one another. It was a kiss that almost disqualified any level of sin or guilt or wrong, because it was like one you two owed each other, after years of familiarity and longing. It was the goodbye that the two of you deserved.

His hands slowly let go of your waist, and he takes a step back away from you, softly clearing his throat. The distance feels like a galaxy away, and he briefly runs his thumb along his bottom lip, because the ghostly feeling of your lips on his still remains. 

“Shall we head back?” you ask him, prim and proper in posture and eyes widened in a formal gaze.

His lips are parted, and he finds that he’s panting slightly. And then he slowly nods his head. “Yes.”

.

.

.

[the end] 

a/n. i am sooooo freaking obsessed w "one day" by david nicholls and really wanted to write something inspired by it!! the book literally ripped my heart out and stomped on it like there were so many scenes where i just longingly stared out the window because of how shattering it was but dear god i really enjoyed it, and the show was also so dfkjhsfkhs i had sm feels watching it. so yea this was fun to write!! i hope you enjoyedd n thanks so much for reading :)

➸ masterlist

[bucketsofmonsters]

A Diplomatic Error

cw: enemies to lovers, kidnapping, being tied up, manhandling, size difference, non-human genitalia, oral sex, vaginal sex, unprotected sex

male orc x fem reader

Word count: 9k

You were headed to another counsel meeting. You never really stopped attending them, despite the fact that they never listened to a word you had to say. 

Your father said it was good for morale. You didn’t understand how watching someone sit around and not help was good for anyone’s morale, but you knew better than to question him. 

The halls of the palace were quieter than you were used to. Almost everyone had been called to the front lines, even your closest guards had gone. You weren’t used to walking alone, nor were you accustomed to the typically lively castle looking like a ghost town. 

So now you walked through the castle halls, more alone than you’d ever been before, no one there to wait on you, to protect you, to watch over you. Something in you said it should have felt freeing. 

It didn’t. It just felt lonely. 

As you walked, moving slowly as you wallowed in self-indulgent pity between war meetings, a pair of hands reached out of nowhere, one snaking around your waist to pull you back into the shadows while the other clamped firmly over your mouth. 

When the guards had been sent away, you’d been assured that you’d be safe. It wouldn’t exactly be easy for a hulking orc to sneak in undetected. At least that's what you'd been told. With a massive hand that dwarfed your face locked over your mouth, suddenly the idea didn’t seem so ridiculous.

You thrashed under the figure's unwavering grip to no avail. He easily held you in place, barely needing to put any effort in to stop your desperate bid for an escape. 

You weren’t one for swooning but suddenly a faintness came over you. You reached up to grab at the only stable thing in reach, hands wrapping around the figure’s arm, trying to keep yourself upright. 

Your knees began to buckle and only then, mind slowed by whatever he’d dosed you with, did you begin to suspect foul play. Maybe something on his skin that humans were weak to, maybe something in the air. Was he holding a cloth? You didn’t think so. But then again, he seemed so far away not, even pressed up against you as he was.

You blinked your heavy eyes and when you opened them, you were thrown over a large shoulder. You watched the road behind you as the creature holding you strode along, still blind to what was ahead. His hand was wrapped around your waist, keeping you firmly in place, jostling you only slightly with each step. 

It took you a second to gather your bearings enough to start struggling. Once you did, you started pounding on his back. It was a futile gesture but you were nothing if not persistent. At the very least, he knew you were awake now. 

His shoulder shook under you as he chuckled. “Good morning, princess,” he said, his gravelly voice carrying across the road.

“Put me down, you brute!” you shouted, trying your best to kick your feet under heavy skirts. If you'd known you'd be getting kidnapped today, you'd have worn something lighter. 

He paused and for a moment you thought maybe he'd listen to you. But you knew better than that, knew you'd have no say in any of this.

“As you wish.”

Your feet were planted on the ground, although he still had a heavy arm on your shoulder, holding you in place. A silent promise: you weren't going anywhere. 

You whipped around, eager to see what was in front of you instead of the increasingly distant road you'd been traveling on. 

You got your first look at the front of your captor, no longer flung over his shoulder. 

Despite it being part of the little information you already knew about him, the first thing you noticed was that he was massive. He towered over you, with a broad frame to match. Tusks stuck out of his mouth as he sneered down at you, marring an almost handsome face. 

You’d never actually seen an orc in person and despite years of being at war with them, it struck you suddenly that they were real. They were real and in front of you, no longer threatening figures discussed in crowded rooms you weren’t supposed to speak in but instead a real man in front of you with his hand on your arm. It radiated warmth, applying a firm pressure that told you if he wanted to he could crush you underhand. 

In front of you, next to your very real captor, was a camp. The sort of camp you imagined soldiers slept in. You had no idea which side of the border you were on, disputed or otherwise. You hoped you were still in your own kingdom, but you had no way to know. It all looked the same from here. 

Amidst the massive canvas tents milled a dozen or so orcs. At your sudden appearance, they’d stopped what they were doing, all peering at their new guest. 

As they all stared at you, you panicked. Your feet started moving before your brain did. You managed to slip out from under your captor's grasp just in time to feel his hand dart forward, pushing you into the mud before you had a chance to get anywhere.

As you lay in the dirt, you heard something that sounded like orders being barked in a foreign tongue. 

And then you were being hauled to your feet. You didn’t have the presence of mind to be upset at the manhandling as you looked down at your body, the front of you almost completely covered in mud.  

You didn’t even have time to protest that before he cut you off. “Come on, m’lady. We have much to discuss.”

You crossed your arms, about to demand more respect from him before you were being lifted again and all you could manage was a surprised little squeak.

You watched helplessly as you were hauled into a nearby tent, all of the towering soldiers staring at you as you went. 

You were deposited less than graciously on the floor of the tent, left to flounder and find your bearing on your own as your captor moved to look at you. 

The tents were incredibly spacious, at least for someone of your size, the roof towering above you. 

He leaned down in front of you, tone condescending as he spoke. “Here’s what's going to happen. You’re a bargaining chip for us. We’ll get you home as soon as your father allows it, princess.” He said your title like an insult, spat it at you in a way that made you flinch. 

“And in the meantime?” you asked, trying your best not to look afraid. You'd make your way out of this with your pride intact. Well, as much of your pride as you could still manage to salvage as you stood there, covered in mud. 

You could barely see the deep red of your dress under the grime. You didn’t even know how much of it was from your fall and how much you’d picked up on the road. 

“In the meantime,” he said, “you will sit around until we need you.”

“Perfect.” You stood, futilely attempting to brush off your skirts as you did and taking a step towards the entrance of the tent. “Well, I should go find a place to rest until I am needed.” It was a long shot but you at least had to try.   

Your captor followed you as you backed slowly out of the tent. “I don’t think you understand what’s going on here.”

“What’s the harm in it? Where do you think I’m going to go?” you shouted, gesturing around you at the thick woods. “If I had a death wish, there are far better ways to satisfy it than getting lost in the forest. Attempting to kill you, perhaps.”

He nodded. “It would be more honorable, to die in combat against me.”

You groaned. “Yeah, sure, that’s what I meant. It’d be so honorable of me. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go find somewhere to rest, maybe even clean myself.”

You managed to make it about two steps before his arm wrapped around your waist, lifting you as if you were a ragdoll.

“You’re not going anywhere.”

The words were hissed into your ear as he walked. You thrashed in his grip but it didn’t matter, he hauled you along just as easily. 

You were thrown into a new tent next to a massive wooden pole, staked into the ground in the center. 

He leaned down next to you, grabbing your arm, easily resisting your attempt to pull it away from him. As he easily held your wrists in one hand, the other reached back to pull out a length of rope. His hands were surprisingly nimble, threading rope around your wrists and securing you to the pole at the center of the tent with little difficulty. 

When he let his hands get a little too close to your face, you bit them as hard as you could, locking your jaw down on him. There wasn’t any strategy behind it, you couldn’t escape or go anywhere, but the way he hissed and yanked his arm back filled you with a little bit of self-satisfaction. That had to be worth something. 

He didn’t stick around long after. It seemed you had managed to piss him off at some stage in the kidnapping process. You couldn’t imagine when. 

Your first night in the orc camp was spent restlessly, pulling futilely at your bindings as you sat there on the floor. You tried not to wallow in your misery. This wouldn’t be forever. Your father would get you out of here, one way or another. Until then, you could put on a brave face. 

As the sun began to rise, the orcs’ curiosity in you seemed to reawaken. 

Occasionally a soldier would peek in the entrance of the tent, never for more than a few seconds, or you would see them silhouetted against the canvas, hovering nearby. When you got particularly frustrated you’d shout at them, the snorts of laughter your yelling drew from them only making you angrier. 

But anger was good. At least anger felt productive. 

You’d become accustomed enough to the curiosity of the soldiers that at first, when your captor returned, you didn’t notice it was him. It was only when he strode towards you and began to undo your bindings that you realized who he was. 

The second your bindings were undone, you made a break for it. You didn’t make it far. Your captor held you by your ankle, dangling you upside down, your various muddied skirt layers falling to cover your face as you struggled. 

“This will be easier for you if you behave,” he said, and you could hear a layer of irritation in his voice. 

You would've spat in his face if there weren't layers of fabric hanging in front of you. 

His attempts to right you were thwarted by your thrashing until you figured out what he was trying to do and attempted to still yourself as much as you could, if only to get your feet on the ground again. 

“We’re moving,” he said as you steadied yourself when returned back to solid ground. “I can carry you or you can walk.”

You opted to walk, both to preserve your dignity and to attempt to plan an escape. 

The soldiers were shockingly efficient, completely packing up the camp faster than you’d imagined possible. 

And then you were on the move. 

You had to move swiftly to keep up with them, none of the soldiers willing to slow for you. 

Your captor stayed diligently by your side, occasionally shooting you looks that seemed intended to tell you you had no chance of escape. You ignored him.

After about an hour of moving quietly, out of breath from all the walking, he was the one to break the silence. 

“You’re slow.”

“Your legs are longer than mine. Besides, it's hard to walk when you’re covered in filth” you said, struggling under stiff, heavy skirts. 

“And who is to blame for that?”

You gave him a pointed look. “In fact, I think you’ll find that you are.”

“You shouldn’t have run,” he said with a grunt. 

“You shouldn’t have pushed me!”

He rolled his eyes and then you were being hauled off the ground again. You yelped in protest but were quietly a little grateful as he sat you on his shoulder. If you had to keep moving at their pace all day, dressed as you were, you might’ve passed out. 

It wasn’t your fault you couldn’t keep up with a well-trained group of soliders. If anything, they should be impressed you managed to keep pace as long as you did. 

Your hand rested on his other shoulder as he moved, trying to keep yourself steady, but realistically, you knew he wouldn’t let you fall, his arm holding you easily in place. You were just glad you were being allowed to sit this time instead of being thrown around like a sack of potatoes. 

You spent the rest of the day like that, sitting on his shoulder as they traveled. As the sun began to set and the others began to set up camp, you expected to be set down. 

It seemed you were wrong. 

Instead of placing you on the ground or even tying you up again, he began to pace off in the opposite direction of the rest of the camp. 

Nerves began to take over you. He may have said nothing would happen to you, but you did not relish in the thought of being alone with him, let alone him intentionally dragging you away from the rest of his compatriots. 

You began to squirm again and his arm tightened, holding you in place. “Settle,” he said, his voice low and calm. 

You did not listen. 

Eventually, he did set you down, although you did not think your thrashing encouraged him to do so. 

As he did, you noticed the sound of a swift-moving river just behind you. 

He nudged you towards the river. “Clean. You’re too slow.”

“What?”

“You wanted to be clean,” he said, nudging you again. "You should clean”

“It’s a river.”

He looked at you like he was worried you’d hit your head. “It is.”

“And you expect me to wash in there? It’s full of dirt!”

He chuckled and you considered biting him again. “You’ll survive, princess.”

You groaned but decided that anything was better than the mud you were caked in. It was running water, at the very least. You weren’t certain why, but it did feel a little cleaner that way. 

You considered bathing fully clothed but you’d heard too many stories of women drowning, weighed down by layers of dresses. 

You began to pull at your dress, stripping off some of the upper layers, glaring at your captor as you did. It was too much to ask to be left alone, you knew that much, but it was still humiliating to get undressed in front of him like this. 

You only took off as many layers as you needed to ensure you wouldn’t drown. You were almost fully covered but still, you felt exposed. 

At the very least, he seemed largely disinterested in what you were doing, only sparing you the occasional glance. 

You covered your chest as you moved towards the water. He looked down at you as you did, head cocked to the side. “What are you doing?”

“The skirts are heavy, I can’t wear them in the water or I could drown.”

He scoffed. “Little weakling. That’s not what I asked though, why do you hide? You’re covered.”

“I’m being forced to strip to my underwear, of course I’m covering myself.”

He stared back, clearly still confused, and you realized as you looked at him that the idea of being properly dressed was probably not the same for him. He was covered, but largely in leathers and furs, with far more skin exposed than you would ever have, even now in your underskirts. 

“Listen,” you said, trying not to be too antagonistic, as it seemed he was truly trying to understand. “It’s different for us. Especially for me, I’m supposed to be covered perfectly at all times. Maybe you should give me new clothes.”

“Why would I do that?” he asked dismissively. 

Any patience you’d been trying to put on for him snapped. “Sorry, I forgot you’re a heartless brute, I don’t know why I asked.”

And with that, you stormed off into freezing cold water. 

The mud caking your skin began to wash off as soon as you touched the water and you let out a sigh of relief. The river looked to be snow runoff from a nearby mountain, it certainly felt cold enough for it, but for now all you wanted was to be clean. 

You looked down as you scrubbed at your skin and your skirts and as you did, you realized the whites of your underthings had become translucent in the freezing water. 

You turned and caught him staring, both looking away as soon as your eyes met. You turned your back to him immediately, feeling tears pricking at your eyes, trying to cover it up with the water that was rushing over you. It felt like you had nothing left, like this was the ultimate humiliation.

When you turned back to look at him once more, he was gone, not making so much as a sound as he left. 

You weren’t foolish enough to think he’d truly left you alone, but you appreciated having at least the pretense of privacy. It was shockingly… kind? 

No. You pushed the thought out of your mind as quickly as it occurred to you. You would not start thinking like that, not about the man who had kidnapped you. 

You finished bathing quickly, the chill starting to set into your bones. 

As you waded out of the river, he was still missing. It was evident where he’d been, massive orcs weren’t exactly built for stealth, but still he was nowhere to be found. 

In his stead, you found a pile of clothes lying on the bank of the river. As you lifted them, the first thing you noticed was while they were far too big for you, they were too big by human standards. It was an old shirt, well worn, and a pair of pants you’d have to find some way to tie to keep up properly. They were slightly torn and upon closer inspection, you found speckles of a dark rusty substance splattered across the shirt. 

Someone’s blood. From who’s side, you’d never know. 

You tried not to dwell on what had happened to the owner of these clothes to leave them in the orc’s possession. They were yours now. 

They were far more practical than your fine skirts had been, even if they didn’t quite fit properly. 

As you pulled them on, you hesitated, holding your skirts. You didn’t need them any longer, but it felt like a waste to just leave them here. 

But you had no time for sentimentality right now. You cast them aside, opting to forgo your shoes, despite the lack of new ones. Your shoes from the palace were not exactly built for forests and rough terrain. They’d only slow you down. 

As you finished dressing, situating yourself in the unfamiliar clothes as best you could, you looked around nervously. You could find no sign of your captor amidst the unfamiliar foliage, but you had more than enough reason to doubt yourself. You felt lost amidst the thick trees surrounding you, it was hard to tell where you stood. You didn’t know what to look for or how to orient yourself, trapped in a foreign landscape. 

You did what you could, checking for any onlookers, peeking through the trees, and once you’d made your decision, taking off. 

You had no idea where you were, or where you were running to, but anywhere was better than here. There were surely search parties looking for you and even if you were on the other side of the border, orc civilians or soldiers who were unfamiliar with your status were a better bet than your current captors. 

As your bare feet pounded down on a floor of sticks and rocks, you tried to ignore how cut up they were getting. 

You were faster this way. That was what counted. 

You focused on moving as fast as you could, the determination drowning out the pain until suddenly, the sharp rocks and twigs were underfoot no longer. Your brain took a second to catch up, feet still moving down to try and push off of a ground that was being pulled further and further away.

“Predictable little thing,” said a familiar voice beside you. “What happened to attempting to best me in combat? I didn’t take you for a coward, princess.”

A frustrated scream escaped you, cutting through the peaceful quiet of the forest. 

Despite your protests, he continued to haul you back towards the camp, tying you up as soon as you reached your tent, a practiced routine for the two of you by now. 

You had the night to sleep off your anger before morning came and you were on the move again. 

Your captor did not wait before lifting you onto his shoulder and this time, you did not fight him. It was preferable to running to keep up with them, especially on newly damaged feet. 

It felt strange to sit there, without struggling or screaming, just moving in silence. So instead, you spoke. 

“Do you have a name?”

“Drakar,” he said. His voice was low but with your position atop his shoulder, it was easy to hear him, even over the bustle of moving soldiers. 

“Thank you for the clothes,” you tried again, wanting to start up any sort of conversation to break the silence.

He didn’t even grace you with words this time, giving you a simple acknowledging grunt in return. 

His answers remained brief, with no apparent interest in engaging in conversation. Eventually, you stopped trying. 

When you came to a stop and the soldiers began to set up camp around you, you waited for your chance. 

The second Drakar turned his back to you, you were off. 

Another orc caught you in a heartbeat, hoisting you off the ground until Drakar could come fetch you. 

He dragged you off with a huff, scowling at you as he set you down. “Why do you continue to fight and run? I’ve told you of our plans to trade you, you’ll fare better with us than on your own in the wilds.”

“I have no desire to be a bargaining chip against my own people. Besides, I’m no fool. I know good things don’t often happen to soldier’s prisoners.”

He scoffed. “Your soldiers, maybe. We have honor, unlike them. And you call us the monsters.”

“Monsters? Maybe. Uncivilized at the very least.”

“I assure you, your soldiers in my country are living in no more luxury than we are here.”

So you were still in your country, not yet over the border. If you could just get away, your chances were good. “Well, then they’re uncivilized dogs just like you,” you spat. 

He never seemed to find your outbursts anything other than vaguely annoying or passively amusing. Right now, he seemed inclined towards amusement, despite your latest escape attempt. It was for the best, that tended to work out better for you. It was irritating nonetheless. “Perhaps.”

Your enlightening conversation was cut short as a horn sounded, a familiar announcing horn. The sound of one of your people. Drakar’s head perked up and before you understood what was happening, your legs were being bound together, untethered but severely limiting your movement. You might be able to move like this, but you couldn’t get far. 

He did not feel the need to explain this to you or threaten you with hunting you down, trusting you to come to your own conclusions as he strode off in the direction of the horn. 

You might not be able to run, but that didn’t mean you couldn’t do anything. The least you could do was try to gather information, so you could be useful when you were saved.

If you were saved.  

You managed to scoot your way towards the back of the tent Drakar had retreated to, out of sight of any of the soldiers, just close enough that you could peek under the thick fabric of the walls. 

Drakar’s back was to you. You could barely see the messenger from your spot on the floor, his body blocking your vision. You could just see the tip of a feather, presumably stuck in a hat, bobbing as the messenger spoke. 

As you got close enough to listen in, you caught Drakar mid-sentence. “- does your king think about our terms for his precious daughter?”

You held your breath, trying not to get your hopes up. This was a war. They couldn’t just be giving in to the first demands given. This could be a long, arduous process. You understood that, would never blame him for it. The country came first. 

“The king rejects your terms.” You tried not to let it get to you. You knew this would probably happen, could understand exactly where your father was coming from. The messenger continued on, unaware of your quiet heartbreak. “Furthermore, he would like to close negotiations on this matter.”

You could not hold in the gasp that came at his words. You saw Drakar stiffen and knew he’d heard you, knew he’d figured out exactly what you’d been doing. A moment passed and he untensed his shoulders and continued on. You silently thanked him. You were in no state to face anyone right now. 

“What do you mean close negotiations?” he asked, and you choked back tears. 

You cursed yourself for putting yourself in such a tight spot. You didn’t think you could manage a quiet escape, at least not without being noticed, not in your current state, so instead you sat, a captive audience to a discussion of why your family had given up on you. 

The messenger cleared his throat. “We do not negotiate with beasts.”

“So he chooses instead to abandon his daughter with them?”

The messenger disregarded his words entirely, his voice squeaking as he cried out, “You creatures will pay for the loss of his daughter.”

“She is not lost yet. He is choosing that fate for her, not I,” he hissed out.

“I have said all I was bidden to say. Do you have a message for the king?”

“Tell him if I see him or any of his scrawny little messengers again, I’ll rip them in two.”

With a little yelp, the messenger retreated. Drakar stood for a moment, the sound of his heavy breathing filling the tent. 

After a moment, the canvas of the tent was lifted and your hiding place was revealed. You sat, crumpled, on the ground, bile rising in your throat. 

That was it. There was no one coming. 

He hauled you to your feet, undoing your bindings. 

“What did you ask for me?” you asked as he undid the ropes, keeping you propped up on him as he worked. 

“It doesn’t matter.”

“It does!” you snapped. You needed to know what was so much more important than you, what you’d been given up for. “You will tell me. I’ve earned that much.”

“A full retreat. It never would have been taken, it was just supposed to be a start to the negotiations.”

“Hmm.” It was a ridiculous ask, obviously so. But to dismiss you completely? To not even try?

Drakar pulled you out of your thoughts with a question. “Would you even want to go back now? If I let you go?”

Your brows furrowed. “You can’t let me go. It would show weakness, show you’ll roll over if your terms aren’t met.”

“I know, it was just a question. So what do I do with you now?”

You shrugged. “You could kill me.”

“No. We won’t be doing that. I should have killed him, though. The audacity of them sending a little snot-nosed fool to tell me negotiations were over. I should’ve gutted him.”

“Why didn’t you?”

He spared you a look that said more than you were sure he wanted it to, rage and concern both written across his face. “I had other things on my mind.”

He tried to speak to you again but you’d begun to shut down. It was all too much, you could do no more. 

It didn’t seem too unreasonable a reaction. Your life had just ended, severed by your father without even a real rescue attempt. 

But even if you’d shut down, the world had not. 

And so it continued. Drakar seemed to have decided you were still useful somehow because every day you were hauled along with his troops, and every day you were given your own little tent. 

He didn’t keep you tied up anymore. It wasn’t because you’d become docile, you’d attempted many escapes and he’d found you and brought you back every time. You weren’t entirely sure why you were no longer being tied up. Maybe it was because you weren’t valuable anymore. 

You didn’t fully understand why you hadn’t been killed yet. What more could you do for them? 

As days passed, the grief lessened to more practical thoughts, thoughts about your future. What was there for you now? Why were you still here? What else could they want from you?

You wanted answers. 

You stood and stormed off. Several of the soldiers around you went to grab you until they realized that you were not headed out, but instead towards Drakar’s tent, letting you continue on your warpath. 

You started to shout as soon as you entered the tent and he whipped around to face you. “You should kill me. Why won’t you kill me? What do you want from me? Whatever it is, I won’t give it. I have nothing to give. I don’t understand what’s wrong with you.”

He watched your outburst with a level of amusement on his face that made you want to attack him. “Are you done?”

You ran at him, trying to claw at him, bite him, anything. He restrained you easily, pinning you against him, but still, it fed something in you, trying to do something.

You felt him chuckle behind you and if you weren’t pinned down, you would have attacked him again. 

“See,” he asked, and you felt the rumble of his voice through his chest. “You’ll be fine. You’re a fighter.”

“I will not fight for you,” you spat.

“I don’t expect you to. But you will fight for you. Nothing is over.”

He released you from his grip and before you could decide what to do with your newfound freedom, someone came crashing into the tent, armor shining a bright silver. He stood, ready to attack, sword in hand, but the second he saw you he froze. “You’re dead,” he choked out, words muffled through the metal of the armor. 

You didn’t have a chance to respond before Drakar had thrown him halfway across the camp, orc soldiers rushing over to finish him off. He didn't stand a chance.  

You stared at the spot he had just been in, processing his words, before slowly turning to Drakar. 

“What was that?”

“An attacker. A foolish little man.”

You shook your head. “No not… why did he think I was dead?’

“Princess, the whole world thinks you’re dead.”

You head snapped up to look at him. “Why?”

“Because I told them.”

You reeled back. “Why would you do that? I didn’t ask you to say that.”

“Your people didn’t seem to care.”

“Oh, thank you so much then. As long as they didn’t care, then it’s fine. You speak of honor and then do this. Why? To torture me? Make sure I have nowhere to go and ensure that I know I am not loved?”

You’d had enough of this conversation, turning heel and storming off without another word, set on putting as much distance as possible between you and them. 

You vaguely heard orders being barked to follow you, but that didn't stop you from running. 

It didn’t change anything. No matter how far you ran, you had nowhere to go. 

Drakar didn’t follow you himself, instead sending someone else to do his dirty work. A few orcs stood behind you, easily able to keep track of you and match your pace. 

You weren’t even given a full hour of feigned freedom before one of them had picked you up and started pulling you back towards camp. You fought them the whole way. 

You were set down in front of him, the whole process embarrassing. You straightened your ill-fitted pants as you desperately tried to regain any ounce of dignity. 

Despite your appearance, he didn’t seem amused. “You shouldn’t run.”

“So you saw fit to have me kidnapped? Again?”

“I had to tell them you were dead,” he said, pushing past your outburst.

You scoffed. “You didn’t have to do anything.”

“I have orders to kill you. The negotiations failed, my people wanted you dead. It was the only way out of this for you.”

Oh. There was no reprieve for you on either side. You’d known your father had signed your death warrant with his refusal to negotiate but now the orders had been given. 

“Then why am I still here?” you asked, your voice smaller than you would’ve liked. 

“It is not just. I will not kill you.”

“So what now?”

“No one knows what you look like,” he said, his voice soft and low. “It doesn’t have to be over.”

It didn’t matter. Both sides had condemned you. You had your life, but nowhere you could live it. “I have nowhere to go,” you said, sounding braver than you felt.  

“You’ll find somewhere. Until then, there’s always room for you in my camp. I displaced you, the burden of this wrong falls to me.”

You rolled your eyes. “And none of your men will send word that you’ve kept me here?”

“As long as they get to keep staring at you, I can’t imagine they’d mind.”

Your nose wrinkled at his words. “These are your honorable men? Letting me stay for the right to keep ogling me?”

“It’s not so odd. They’re fascinated by you, such a strange little thing.”

You supposed you were strange and foreign to them, as they were to you. But surely you weren’t the first, not with the combat they must’ve seen. “You’ve seen humans before.”

“Some of them haven’t. At least, not living ones that aren’t trying to kill us.”

“Who said I’m not trying to kill you.”

He snorted. “Well, you’re doing a piss poor job of it.”

“And if I stay? I won’t fight my own people, even if I was trained in combat. You’ll just carry around dead weight?”

“You’re hardly dead weight. I don’t even notice you up on my shoulder half the time.”

“You know that’d not what I mean.”

“I do. There are towns over the border where you could stay.”

You looked up, curiosity gleaming in your eyes. “They’ll take me? A random human?”

He nodded solemnly. “They will, if you wish to depart. If not… I am the reason your people forsook you. I do not regret it, I did what needed to be done, but I regret what has come to pass to you because of it. You’ve faced this better than I ever thought a human would. They’re cowards to have cast you out, I will not follow in their steps. It may not be what you’re used to, I am no prince and we are no humans, but you’re welcome to stay at my home. You will never be a princess again, that was taken from you. I took that from you. It is only fair to give what I can in return. It is not much, but it is what I have.”

You smiled, swallowing down the lump in your throat and willing away the misty feeling in your eyes. “Thank you. I’d love to stay, if you’ll have me.”

It was no great concession from you, you weren’t exactly drowning in options, but it felt like choosing it all the same. It was no less of a choice than your last home had been, born into it and forbidden to ever really leave. 

This was being offered to you. You were being given the opportunity to say no. To run. 

As much as Drakar had angered and frustrated you in the past week or so, you weren’t sure you’d ever been given this much respect. Real respect, not the fake respect of being placed in war rooms and told to be silent. 

You gave him a final nod and a smile, adding a curtsy that you pulled yourself out of halfway through when you thought better of it, tripping over your feet a little as you did. 

His eyes crinkled as he smiled at you and you wondered how you’d never noticed it before. 

You went to bed that night feeling lighter, freer than you were used to. 

As you left your tent the next morning, you almost tripped over a deer carcass left in your doorway. 

You backed away slowly, rushing over to Drakar’s tent. 

He was barely dressed for the day, the sun having only half risen past the horizon, and gave you a smile and a nod as he saw you rush into his tent. “Good morning, princess.”

You barely let him finish his sentence before you blurted out, “Someone left a dead animal outside my tent.”

He froze, his shoulders tensing.

You watched, waiting for a response and getting none, before adding, “Should I be concerned? It felt like a threat. Maybe they don’t like that you lied for me, that you're protecting me. Maybe they don’t like me like you think they do.”

“It’s not a threat,” he said with a swift shake of his head. 

“How could you know?”

He explained it through barred teeth. “It’s an orchish courting gift. You’ve caught someone’s interest.”

Your breath caught in your chest. “Oh.”

“Oh indeed.” None of the tension had left him and he made no attempt to hide his irritation. “It’s odd, an orc taking an interest in such a frail little thing.”

You rolled your eyes. He was clearly upset that one of his soldiers had become distracted with you, maybe even disgusted at the prospect of one of them taking interest in a human of all things. Clearly your bonding the day before hadn’t taken you that far. 

“I don’t know, I’ve heard I can be quite charming.”

He ignored your statement completely, shifting closer to you as he spoke. “You should stay close to me until I can find out who left it and tell them off.” He was being strangely protective almost, the disgust you’d assumed would be there instead entirely absent. 

“Why would you tell off my suitor? Surely I should do that myself. Besides, why do you even ca-”

Oh. 

The reality of why someone courting you would make him protective set in and you looked up at him with wide eyes

You couldn’t help the shit-eating grin that plastered itself across your face. “Well, maybe I’ll accept it. I’ve got no future now, it couldn’t hurt to have a big, strong orc husband.” 

He stood a little straighter as he understood the implication. “You seek protection?”

“Hm, I do, thank goodness I’ve finally found a suitable option, I was really starting to worry.”

Frustration flashed through his eyes as he realized what you were doing. “Fine, we should go find this suitor so we can tell him how graciously you’re accepting this courtship. I, for one, will be glad to be rid of you. Now you’ll be someone else’s problem.” 

“We should. Unless there’s something you’d like to say?”

His nostrils flared as he glared down at you. “Nothing.”

“Are you sure? Nothing on your mind? Nothing like, I don’t know, having feelings for the, what is it you keep calling me? The weakling you kidnapped?”

He avoided meeting your eyes as he spoke. “Your force of will is admirable. The odds were against you but still you fought.”

You fought the urge to coo at him, at how flustered he looked and how it seemed like he was forcing out every word. You had no doubt he would rather have left you an animal carcass. You preferred it this way. 

“I’m going to need you to be more direct than that.” Your voice was patient and kind and you could tell it was making things a hundred times worse for him. 

“I had intentions to look into human courting, to find something familiar for you amidst so many new things you’ve been forced into. But given the situation, I suppose I can just tell you.”

“Tell me what?” you asked. You were going to make him say it, you didn’t care how long it took.

“About my intention to court you.” 

You giggled at his pained face and he relaxed a little, looking down at you with fondness in his eyes. You wondered when that had begun. You wished you’d been paying attention enough to notice. 

“What now?” he asked. “How do your human courtships go? I will do what I must.”

You thought about it, amusement flickering through you at the thought of Drakar trying to uphold the proper etiquette required while courting a princess. But the courting process was long and strained and if you were being honest, you preferred the brutal honesty you’d been given here at camp. “Frankly, I’ve had just about enough of how humans do it. What about you? We can skip the dead animal bit, but what comes next?”

He looked you up and down, some gears turning in his head that you were not privy to.

“I will have to be gentle,” he said, before hauling you over his shoulder and bringing you over to his bed of furs on the floor. 

Your eyes widened as the implication set in. You’d been far from the perfect princess, having your fair share of trysts with guards and servants over the years, but this was a different beast. 

And then he kissed you and you stopped thinking altogether. 

It was desperate and urgent, his lips figuring out how to move against your smaller ones and you reached up, pulling his face closer as he set you below him on his makeshift bed. 

He ground down on you, clothed hips moving to meet yours. Your disparate sizes meant to do so while kissing you he was contorted at a strange angle but he certainly wasn’t complaining. 

He stopped kissing you, rushing to pull off his off pants, and his cock slapped against your stomach, thick and hard and hot and you wanted him inside you now.

But when it fell against you, it hit just above your belly button and you thought that perhaps your eyes were a bit bigger than your stomach.

He seemed to realize the impracticality of it at the same time you did, a hearty laugh escaping him. “Don't worry, princess, I'll get you nice and stretched out.”

You chuckled nervously. “I don’t know if stretching will be enough.”

He slid down, hitching your shirt up and pressing a gentle kiss on your stomach. “I won’t hurt you. If you’re not ready, that’s fine. There are other things we can do.”

He shifted both of you with ease, pulling you to sit on his chest as he laid back on his bed. You looked down at him, brows furrowed. “What about your traditional orc courtship.”

That pulled another laugh from him. “What part of this do you think has been traditional? The closest we got to traditional was when you bit me.”

You flushed red, recontextualizing the memory and wondering how many of the things you’d been doing to anger him had also been part of traditional orc courtship. 

While you were busy blushing, he’d set to work on your pants, wrestling them off of you as he easily manhandled you. You barely helped, halfheartedly kicking them off. You remembered how much you hated being picked up by him when this had begun and how much that had changed. You were loathe to admit it but every time he lifted and moved you so easily, something stirred inside you. 

As soon as he got your pants off you were pulled roughly forward, his hands wrapping around your thighs as he pulled you onto his mouth. 

He ate you out with just as much urgency as he kissed you with, wasting no time before sliding his tongue through your folds. 

His grip was unforgiving, pulling you down so all of your weight was on him. 

His tusks dug into your inner thighs and he seemed to pull you impossibly closer as his tongue thrusted up inside of you. 

Even his tongue was almost too thick, you walls stretching to accommodate it. You hands grasped at his hair, needing something to hold onto. 

His mouth locked over your clit, sucking hard before moving back to thrust inside of you again, hands rising to play with your sensitive bud of nerves as he did. 

As you began to fall apart above him, writhing against the onslaught of sensation, he only doubled his efforts. 

You arched your back, your thighs clamping down on either side of his head, hips shifting with the waves of your orgasm that suddenly overcame you. He was content to let you ride it out, grip loosening to let you have your control as you moans filled the tent. 

You came down slowly and it took a few moments to realize you were still sitting on his face. 

You moved to sit beside him on the furs as soon as you did, your face warming. 

You shifted your head to rest against him, staring down at his cock as you did. It was impossibly hard and practically pulsing with need, and you made a decision you hoped you wouldn’t regret. 

“You know, it can’t hurt to try.”

He sat up immediately, eagerness evident in his face. “You’ll stop me if it’s too much.” It wasn’t a question but a statement. 

You gave him a knowing look. “Of course I will.”

He shifted you, lifting you over him and you were happy to give over control. You trusted him.

It felt even bigger pressed up against your entrance than it had on your stomach and you took a deep breath. You waited but as nothing happened, you realized that Drakar was waiting for your signal. 

No nodded and he began to lower you, incredibly slowly. As it pushed inside, you knew the girth was more than anything you’d taken before, but it was manageable. The stretch bordered on painful but it was slow and careful enough that you had time to adjust. 

And then, as it went further and further, it became too much, 

You winced long before he’d bottomed out, about half of it inside you. It was bordering on too painful and you pressed your hands against his chest, shaking your head. “No more,” you said quietly, already weak from your last orgasm. 

He didn’t seem to mind, holding you steady as he pressed you close to him, muttering quiet praises to you. 

You slowly adjusted, not ready to take more but more than happy with what was already inside of you. 

You shifted your hips a little, pushing it against a perfect spot inside of you, letting out a quiet moan as you did. 

He put a stop to it fairly quickly, holding you still. “I think I’ll just keep you there. You’re perfect, taking me so well.”

You writhed, trying to get the stimulation you were becoming desperate for but he held you steady easily. 

So you tried a new tactic. “Want more,” you said, voice soft and sweet. If that didn’t work you’d try yelling at him, see how that fared. 

“Careful, I promised I wouldn’t hurt you. You damn humans, so fragile.”

“I’m not fragile, you’re just too big.”

“Excuses, excuses.” Despite his words, he began to slowly move, shifting out of you before pushing in again, careful to not push past the point where you’d stopped him. 

He moved you up and down like it was nothing, careful even as he began to speed up, hips shifting a little to meet you, chasing after your warm cunt as he pulled you back up.

His breathing grew shaky as he did and despite feeling overwhelmed with sensation, you fought to keep your eyes open, to watch him come undone. 

As his grunts became more and more unruly, your walls clenched around him at the sight. 

He immediately pulled you up, leaving just the head of his cock inside of you as he filled you with thick ropes of come. 

His breathing was ragged and his grip on you tightened slightly, pulling you even closer to him. 

He looked down at you, eyes softer than you’d ever seen them, before pulling you off of him and settling back with you resting on his chest. 

You made an absolute mess of him as he did, with no chance of keeping the frankly absurd amount of come inside of you. 

He didn’t seem to care at all.

“We’re making a mess,” you said, despite suspecting the objection would fall on uncaring ears. 

“You said you wanted an orcish courting, the mess is traditional.”

You weren’t sure if you were cut out for a traditional orc courting, already squirming as your thighs were coated in his spend. 

But his chest was warm and his breathing steady and you couldn’t help but settle into the comfort of it. 

“I'm gonna fit all of it someday,” you said, meaning it fully.

He laughed. “Brave little thing, aren’t you? Dreaming big.”

You snorted. 

“What happens now?” you asked as you snuggled further into him. 

“You reject that fool's advances.”

You hummed happily. “I will. I guess I’m lucky I caught your eye, don’t know if I would've survived this if I hadn’t”

“I meant what I said. I wouldn’t have let them kill you. It wouldn't be right. And you would’ve managed even without me. You wouldn't be the first human to sneak away to our side.”

That surprised you. “I wouldn't?”

He chucked, hands running through your hair. “You wouldn't. We're a more accepting group, I've found. Although you are a weak little species, we don’t have much use for you. You’re lucky you're pretty or I don't know if we'd put up with you.”

You scrunched up your nose. “You didn’t decide to court me because you thought I was pretty though.”

“No,” he said, like you both already knew the answer. “I decided to court you because no matter how many times we stopped you, you never stopped trying to run, to fight.”

You sat up with a sudden urgency. “If I said I wanted to go home, to my father, would you let me?” 

You watched the panic flash across his face and some selfish part of you hoped it was panic over losing you and not panic over the consequences that could come if you showed up alive after his order to kill you.

He sat with it for a while and you let him, in no rush to pull an answer from him.

Finally, he seemed to find whatever he'd been searching for. “I would.”

“Good,” you said, a smug feeling welling up in your chest, right beside the warmth that had begun to fill you at his answer. “Then I'll stay.”

He tried and failed to hide his smile. “Good. Does that mean you’re done running from me?”

You grinned, knowing full well it didn’t. What would be the fun in that? “We’ll see.”

“I’m sure,” he said as he shifted the two of you, wrapping you up in furs to protect your modesty before picking you up once more, with one arm under your knees and the other below your back, keeping you close to his chest. “Now, let’s get you cleaned up, princess.”

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

MDZS x Brazil (1985)

(Yes. Real movie dialogue)

[biancadavri]

my inquisitor watching my da4 protagonist romancing scout harding

[caffichai]

"Alright then, Cowgirl, show me you know how to ride.”

A piece for my friend @fishing-lesbian-catgirl 's story: Coldshot's Called Shot

It's spicy! If you like it spicy, give it a read! Bonus extra spicy artwork by yours truly featured in the story too