#sabine the wounded healer

[im-yotsu]

Okok general Tales of the Empire thoughs:

• Don't really care about Morgan, sorry

• Grevious was really enjoying being so evil, love that

• They/them jedi, based

• Of course she's a healer 🥲

• Barriss is NOT dead you guys (I will choose to believe this, if you give me an ambiguous ending I'm allowed to) (plus if Sabine can survive that wound, I think a literal jedi healer can too)

• An old friend??? She met Ahsoka again, they're in contact. So, of course, they're in love. (Let me be delulu)

• Why didn't Lyn age at all?? Lol

• Loved seeing the Grand Inquisitor again, with him rooting for Barriss since he was inspired by her in the wrong jedi arc. Pretty underrated character, I'm glad they completely ignored his awful look from Kenobi and went with his rebels design.

[mateushonrado]

Possible ideas for more Star Wars: Tales

Status Post #11006: As you know, the fate of Star Wars in animation is now unclear outside Young Jedi Adventures since Lucasfilm has shut down their Singaporean animation studios, thus marking the end of an era that began with The Clone Wars nearly 16 years, which means an animated series focusing on Luke, Leia and Han doesn't seem likely for the time being but I do have ideas of where they could go with the Tales anthology series, having watched Tales of the Jedi and Tales of the Empire on Disney+ recently, especially with the latter in terms of the fate of Barriss Offee after becoming a fallen Jedi in the fifth season of The Clone Wars, in which she becomes an Inquisitor after Order 66 before it ended with her redeeming herself by betraying the Inquisitorius and becoming a healer though she would get stabbed in the stomach by Lyn Rakish aka the Fourth Sister, who ultimately becomes regretful at what she did, though I do think her wound is likely non-fatal, given that both Reva and Sabine have survived being stabbed by a lightsaber that leads to a future entry, either a comic book focusing on her recovering from her injuries or Ahsoka season 2 along with Lyn carrying her out of a cave by saying "I'm gonna get you of here", implying that she'll get medical help since I'm doubtful that we've seen the last of her and several reviewers said that the last scene is open ended, so until we get confirmation of her fate, I'm in the camp that she survived.

Tales of the Senate: I could see this focus on the likes of Riyo Chuchi, Mon Mothma and so on.

Tales of the Sith: Now this would be cool, as it could focus on Darth Maul and Asajj Ventress.

Tales of the Clones: Could see this focus on Hunter, Omega, Rex and Emerie.

Tales of the Mandalorians: This could focus on Bo-Katan and Djarin.

Tales of the Bounty Hunters: Could focus on Boba, Hondo Ohnaka, Cad Bane and Aurra Sing.

Tales of Project Necromancer: Could focus on the four alien children from the final season of The Bad Batch.

Tales of the Rebels: Could focus on Hera, Zeb, Kallus and Sabine as a midquel between Rebels and Ahsoka.

Tales of the Dark Side: Could serve as a prequel of Ahsoka involving Baylan and Shin.

[toxinsup]

@knifvd sent:

MAKE VIPER FEEL LOVED.

              this  is  gentle  sage  ,  so  quietly  approaching  the  other  from  behind  ,  hot  tea  in  mug  so  easily  NURSED  in  her  hands  ,  although  she's  never  to  have  tasted  it  herself  .  it's  reserved  for  CHEMIST  who  seems  so  AWFULLY  hard  at  work  .  "  sabine  ,  "  cool  tone  ,  but  not  crass  ,  as  if  afraid  to  break  the  thick  air  in  laboratory  .  "  you've  yet  to  eat  .  maybe  even  sleep  ,  "  she  muses  ,  before  placing  PORCELAIN  mug  next  to  viper  ,  chamomile  tag  from  tea  bag  ever  so  slightly  sticking  out  .  it's  not  a  command  ,  but  gentle  suggestion  as  it's  pushed  to  a  free  area   on  the  surface  ,  and  plated  sandwich  (  it's almost  childish  .  nutella  and  banana  on  toasted  bread  .  cut  into  diamonds  .  even  now  ,  traces  of  the  healer  linger  .  must've  made  it  herself  . )  set  next  to  it  .  leaves  ,  just  as  quietly  she  CAME  ;  her  voice  barely  above  a  whisper  ,  "  goodnight  ,  viper  .  "

*✧･ﾟ:*✧･ﾟ:  ───🧪        Mind  ponders  over  and  over  again  what  Reyna  has  requested.  Her  missions  increased  but  the  process  still  not  enough  to  aid  how  Sabine  wants.  On  top  of  this,  she  is  spending  hours  and  hours  learning  new  material  she  wishes  that  she  could  have  had  the  knowledge  for  before.  It's  consumed  her  in  the  same  way  her  rage,  her  quest  for  vengence  for  has.  In  a  way  she  has  even  looked  to  the  side  of  the  world  she  did  not  want  to,  Chamber.  It  was  a  pain  but  it  had  been  more  useful  than  she  had  thought,  he  did  have  connections  and  for  the  first  time  she  was  grateful  to  have  been  around  him.  

Time,  it  escaped  her  often.  Her  time  at  Kingdom  had  proved  that,  often  sought  after  hours  by  Brimstone  or  Sage  in  order  to  ensure  she  did  not  work  her  marrow  into  the  floor  and  become  nothingness.  But  this  was  different,  this  had  applications  past  Reyna's  sister,  it  could  help  Omen  and  any  like  him.  She  could  be  good.  It  was  a  fluke,  dream  but  the  only  good  piece  of  herself  she  had  left.

The  entrance  of  Sage  was  unexpected,  their  relationship  like  that  between  oil  and  water  now.  What  had  been  her  closest  friend  had  now  become  the  one  she  least  desired  to  spend  her  time  with.  Perhaps  time  would  heal  the  wound  but  she  did  not  believe  so,  for  Omen's  sake,  for  her  own  sake.  She  could  not  be  trusted,  she  had  failed  Sabine,  not  just  Viper  one  too  many  times.  At  the  drink,  the  childish  food  she  rolled  her  eyes,  but  a  small  tug  was  felt  inside.  

HUMANITY.

It  was  still  there.  It  still  lived  on  inside  of  her.  Somehow,  some  way.  They  may  not  be  friends  again,  Sabine  may  never  like  her  again  but,  she  could  be  helpful  and  one  thing  remained.  Sage  still  cared  for  her.  That  was  reassuring  maybe  not  the  best,  but  it  made  her  remember  who  she  was  before  and  that  could  be  all  it  took  to  turn  the  tides  on  this  project.

Perhaps,  maybe,  in  some  world  she  could  take  a  few  moments  of  her  time,  to  not  be  a  monster.

❝Hypothetically,  would  you  know  anything  about  life  energy?  Given  your  abilites.  I  have  been  pondering  and  in  a  loop  over  something  Chamber  presented  me  with  and  you  might  be  the  key.  ❞

[codynaomiswireart]

Gauze in the Wound - Part 23

“..Suddenly you lose your way and lose the thread Lose your cool then lose your head Every loss is harder to excuse Then you’ll see you’ll lose your way and lose your soul Till you lose complete control And realize there’s nothing left to lose Nothing left to lose…” ~ Nothing Left to Lose by Alan Menken and Glenn Slater

“Well, if I were ‘You Know Who,’ I’d want you to feel cutoff from everyone else. Because if it’s just you alone, you’re not as much of a threat.” ~ Luna Lovegood, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

----------------------------------------------------------------

Pontus slowed to a halt, setting the apple down gently on the ground beside him as he took a much-needed drink from the stream trickling before him. Raising his head to look up at the stars, the water dribbled down the stag’s chin, and the creature caught his breath as he listened for their guidance.

“…There,” he thought as he zeroed in on the location in his mind, took hold of the precious fruit again, and went bounding over the border into Corona’s thick woods.

“Just a little bit longer…” the stag thought as the trees whipped passed him.

 --------------------------------------------------------------

“Just a little bit longer,” he thought to himself, pausing to peer up at the steep slope silhouetted against the night sky before him. He grinned, relishing the feeling of being back in a physical body. Though it wasn’t enough, of course. That’s why they were heading to this old, familiar location. He needed more, and here was where they would get it. They just had to open the veil a bit further, and his return would be complete.

“Do not worry, Puer Lunae,” the voice purred, feeling the form on the other end of the coil shiver in response. “This will all be over soon.” He adjusting the pack on his back, and continued his hike towards their destination, grinning as he threw the next jab with his words. “I promise…”

---------------------------------------------------------------

“Try again!” the Captain shouted, as several of the guards attempted to form a human ladder, and tried to hoist themselves over the jagged wall of black rocks. But the tall, steep, smooth sides of the rocks made the attempt difficult, and they only succeeded in one of the guards getting stuck between the crux of two rocks before being pulled back by his comrades, all of them falling in a clattering heap.

“Blast it!” the Captain yelled angrily, kicking a patch of dirt. “Is there any other way out of here?” “Sabine?” King Frederic asked urgently, the healer now seated on the stoop of her home, holding a bag of ice to her aching face. “Is there any way you can warp us out of here to another checkpoint? From there we could-”

But Sabine shook her head. “Alas your highness,” she replied sadly, “that last jump took up all the magic the house had charged up for that purpose. It’ll be another day at least before the house could get us to the next closest point, and I fear we may not have that kind of time. Given what just happened, I highly doubt that Varian intends to just kindly follow through on his end of the agreement.”

“Surely, there must be some way!” Arianna exclaimed as she sat down beside the healer, setting a comforting hand on the woman’s shoulder, but also in clear distress. By now, thanks to Sabine’s smelling salts, the queen had largely recovered from the influence of the sleeping draught, and along with the others was now brainstorming about how best to figure out an escape plan to stop Varian from…whatever it was he was planning.

Xavier, meanwhile, sat off to the side, his brain reeling from the last fifteen minutes as everyone carried on around him. Varian had turned on them. Varian had betrayed them. Xavier had tried to help, and he had failed; made things even worse than they already had been. He knew from the moment Varian’s eyes met his that all rationality in the boy was gone, and only malice, pride, and hatred were there now.

What was he supposed to do…?

At least…at least he’d been able to help Varian forge a sword that could cut the amber, he supposed. If nothing else, perhaps there was a chance Varian really was just going to get Quirin back. Xavier regretted not being able to be there for Varian, especially if…if the worst outcome were to be true upon breaking open his father’s golden prison. If Quirin…if he were dead, that may indeed push Varian clear over the edge, and Corona may truly face a threat they were unable to stand up to. But if Quirin were alive, maybe there could be some hope for Varian after all. Varian may be an exile now, but perhaps he could finally find some closure and move on in peace. And perhaps Quirin would still be with him, and he wouldn’t be alone. Maybe he could find a new start in another place at another time, even if Xavier wasn’t to be a part of it.

…But if Quirin wasn’t all right…? If somehow things went badly…?

Xavier sighed, setting his head in his hands. He tried to think up ways of escape as well, and he had this horrible feeling like Sabine that they may not have much time. But it was so hard to think of anything right now. The blacksmith shut his eyes, laying his face in his hands, and silently praying for an answer. Just something – anything – to help would be ever so welcome right now.

…And then-

Xavier froze, his ears catching the sound of a sharp, muffled cry coming from somewhere nearby. Turning his head this way and that, Xavier tried hard to pinpoint the location of the sound.

“What the…?” Xavier thought, his heart pounding as he realized the sound was coming from inside the safehouse. Cautiously, Xavier went back inside, ignoring the confused looks of Donovan and Hilda as he skirted by them on the veranda; the two Saporians doing their best to stay out of all the drama unfolding around them. As Xavier got closer to the first-floor corridor, the cries became louder and clearer. Then, in a flash of recognition, Xavier ran as quick as he could for the door to Varian’s room, and stopped short when he found it locked up tight.

He could hear Ruddiger crying on the other side!

“Ruddiger!” Xavier shouted, hearing the raccoon go silent. “Ruddiger, get away from the door!”

After waiting a couple seconds, Xavier began shoving all of his weight into the door, the hinges creaking and the doorframe splintering a little as he did so.

“What in the-? Xavier!” the Captain called, having heard the commotion and coming to investigate. “What in the world do you think you’re do-!?”

The Captain’s words were cutoff as the door fell inward from its hinges with a crash, and Xavier knelt down as Ruddiger dashed over into the blacksmith’s arms, the little creature shivering and whimpering.

“What’s going on?” Frederic asked as he too came up from behind. “Xavier, what are you-?”

“It’s Ruddiger,” Xavier replied, trying to calm the quivering, distressed animal. “He was locked in Varian’s room.”

“Varian left him behind?” Arianna asked, surprised sadness in her voice as she came up behind her husband. “Oh, the poor thing!”

“For goodness sake Xavier!” Sabine managed to snap as she wove her way to the front of the increasingly crowded hallway, still holding the cold pack to her eye. “You could’ve just asked me for a key you know-!”

But Xavier tuned Sabine and the others out as Ruddiger began chittering frantically to him, and tugging on his sleeve for him to pay attention. Xavier’s heart began to pound hard again as he followed the raccoon back into Varian’s room. As Ruddiger got to the center of the room, the little creature sat down on his haunches, and began waving his paws about, and pointing at the ground in front of him.

Xavier frowned. “What is it Ruddiger? What’s wrong?”

Ruddiger repeated the motions, trying so hard to communicate. By now, the others also noticed the raccoon’s gestures, and everyone stared at him, confused. With a snort, Ruddiger then climbed up onto the dresser, pointing at the blank wall above it. Again, confused looks only met him.

Until-

“The mirror!” Arianna yelped, here eyes widening. “The mirror! It’s gone!”

The Captain looked at Arianna quizzically. “What are you talking about your highness?”

“Don’t you see?” Arianna said. “The outline bleeched on the wall by sunlight? A mirror used to be here! Sabine!” Arianna now turned to the healer. “Did you by chance do anything to the mirror in my room earlier this evening?”

“Certainly not!” Sabine replied. “Why do you ask?”

“Because earlier this evening a strange pattern was drawn in white on the mirror in my room. I would’ve asked you about it, but then…Well…”

Sabine blinked at Arianna with her one good eye, realization beginning to dawn upon her face. In a hurry, Sabine crossed the hallway to Arianna’s room and looked inside, pausing just in time before she stepped on the shards of reflective glass that covered the floor. Arianna’s mirror was shattered.

She had seen this magic before!

“Oh no…” Sabine whispered under her breath, and dashed towards the end of the hallway, dropping her cold pack as she went.

“What’s wrong Sabine?” Frederic asked as the healer pushed passed him. “What is-?” “Varian is here!” Sabine cried, reaching for a ring dangling down from a chord hanging from the ceiling. “Quick, Captain! If you could help me please!”

“Er, yes. Of course,” the Captain complied, though still clearly confused as a sturdy wooden ladder slid down from the opening to the attic, and Sabine scrambled up it and into the darkness beyond.

“Hurry!” Sabine called to him again over her shoulder, tossing aside an old tarp from a large, verticle mirror. Sabina grunted with exertion as she scooted it across the attic floor. “Help me get this to Varian’s room!”

“But, why?” the Captain asked, though continuing to do as Sabine asked as he helped lift one end.

“Varian is here!” Sabine repeated as they moved down the ladder. “Well, in a sort of way. But he may not be for much longer! We have to move fast!”

“What do you mean, Sabine?” Arianna asked, as she, Frederic, and Xavier all moved to help get the mirror over into the room. “We all saw Varian leave-”

“If my hunch is correct,” Sabine interrupted, directing them to set the mirror down at the far end of the room, “that wasn’t actually Varian that we saw.”

Frederic raised his eyebrows. “What do you mean by that Sabine? Who else could it have been?”

“Not who, your majesty,” Sabine said ominously. “But what.”

As everyone only stared at her in response, Sabine instructed them all to stand with her at the other end of the room, well away from the tall mirror. As Xavier felt Ruddiger scurry up his form and cling tightly to his shoulders, Sabine stretched a hand forward towards the mirror, and chanted another spell.

“Speculum speculum, alium se orbem terrarium ad ianuam, aperi!”

For a moment, various colors rippled across the mirror’s surface, and the reflection of the room in which they stood became distorted. Then, once it had settled down again, everyone stared at the dark reflection of the room that now greeted them…and gasped as they also saw something else there that shouldn’t have been.

“Varian!” Xavier cried, as he saw the boy laying in the center of the floor of the dark reflection, his face buried in his arms, glowing green vines coiled round his wrists and ankles like chains, and the tendrils extending back into the shape of a second mirror (the mirror that had been missing from Varian’s room in fact) that glowed ominously with the same eerie light. Varian didn’t appear to have heard Xavier, nor take any notice of the new gateway that had formed nearby him.

Xavier wasn’t sure if this was because Varian was asleep…or maybe dead.

“No no no, stop!” Sabine yelped, holding everyone back with outstretched arms as several of them made to move forward. “Everyone, keep away from the mirror!”

“What on earth is going on Sabine?” Xavier asked, feeling Ruddiger grip his shoulders even tighter as the creature let out a frightened trill. “What are we looking at? Is that really-?”

Sabine nodded. “I’m afraid so. Varian – the real Varian – has been trapped inside the world of the mirror.” “Trapped?” Arianna gasped. “In the mirror? But how?”

“I’m not entirely sure,” said Sabine. “But I can tell you this. Whoever or whatever has trapped Varian in there has replaced him with a shadow double; an evil doppelgänger created via his reflection in the dark mirror. I have seen this kind of magic once before, and it is a very evil thing to conjure. I suspect that the dark magic Pontus had sensed in Varian before has something to do with it. It’s also clear to me that this interloper somehow arranged to have all of the other sizable mirrors in the house shattered so we couldn’t access it ourselves, should we have figured out this trick. I’ll admit, it was well disguised; making it look like the mirrors shattered due to the magic of the house going haywire, as opposed to deliberately placed destruction circles. Fortunately, her majesty noticed the destruction circle drawn on her own mirror beforehand, which all but confirms this theory to me.” “Well thank goodness we still have this mirror,” Arianna said. “Then what are we waiting for?” the Captain asked, making another move as if to approach the mirror. “Let’s get him out!”

“Careful!” Sabine warned again, blocking the Captain’s way. “If you get too close to the mirror, your own reflection will spaun another evil doppelgänger. And we don’t want to have to face any more foes than we need to.” “So, what do we do?” Arianna asked. “How can we get him out without getting close?” “I’m not sure,” Sabine replied, now rubbing her forehead, hard in thought. “The only way I know of to breach the barrier is to swap places with your doppelgänger, but if we tried that- And with Varian’s own double now far away, he couldn’t even- Oh, kettles and cobblestones! Think Sabine! Think! There must be some way-!”

It was at this moment that Xavier noticed a crucial detail as he looked into the mirror again. While everyone’s reflections showed dimly in it (though not strong enough to spaun any evil twins)…there was one whose reflection was missing. Xavier had to look on his shoulder to make sure Ruddiger was indeed still there, as the creature’s reflection was somehow absent from the dark mirror. Xavier then had a wild, crazy, but not totally unfounded idea form in his mind. If Ruddiger could sense and hear Varian from beyond their world, and if his own reflection wasn’t present in the mirror, and if he’d been able to traverse such planes of existence not long before and bring Varian back…? “Hold on tight to me,” Xavier whispered to Ruddiger, and took a step forward. “Xavier!?” Sabine cried as the man suddenly strode by her, and she reached out to grab onto him. But as her hands closed before her, they closed not on the fibers of Xavier’s clothes, but around the wood of his walking stick as he held it out towards her. “What’re y-?” “Hold my cane,” Xavier said sternly, and then unfalteringly walked right up to the cursed mirror, and reached forward.

-------------------------------------------------

…He had been such an idiot…

Varian sniffed, curling in on himself tighter. Everything hurt. His head, his stomach, his eyes, his throat, his pride, his heart…Everything hurt. He was thirsty, but of course there was no water here. He would’ve been hungry too, if despair hadn’t engulfed his hunger pains with a pain all its own. He’d taken the devil’s poison, and it left him empty.

Varian thought he’d hit rock bottom before when he’d been down in the dungeons that night after his trial. Little did he know then. No, this was truly rock bottom now. He thought he felt helpless before? No, this was true helplessness. He was down a deep, dark hole now, with no way out…and he only had himself to blame.

Varian shuddered as he remembered it all. He remembered how quick he had been to trust the man who looked so much like his father, and who promised him a way to go back. To be fair, the man had shared with him theories and equations that made it all sound entirely possible. All they would have to do was harness the power of the Moon Drop in Varian, channel it under certain conditions, and they could cut a rift into time and space itself – make all that had caused Varian so much grief go away. Start over. Stop all disaster from ever happening, and all would be well again. All would be normal again. All would be happy again. “I dunno…” Varian had said, seated next to those rosy flames. “What…what would happen if we did that? I mean, what if we-? Could we…could we really go back and change things?” “But of course!” the man had said, having a helping of food and drink himself, then passing some over to Varian. “Why else would I be here in the first place, if not for a rift in time and space? Or don’t tell me you believe in ghosts. And you understand the physics, right? Is it not sound?” “I’ll admit that it’s theoretically possible,” Varian had said, slowly but surely picking up the vial handed to him. As his thoughts churned on the subject at hand, and under the gaze of such familiar features, Varian hardly thought about what he had been doing as he began to raise the vial to his lips. “But…that’s only if this…magic…does what you say it will. I mean, there’s no force on Earth that could have those kinds of effects without catastrophic consequences resulting from it.” “True,” the man had said, then gave Varian a smile that he supposed, in retrospect, was meant to give Varian that final jab of pride to throw all caution to the wind. “…But, then again, the Moon Stone is not of this Earth, is it? And you are the one who can wield it. If you’ll let me show you how…”

That was when Varian began to feel his inhibitions about the situation melt away. This was everything he had ever wanted. Or, at least, on the cusp of everything he wanted. It was the next closest thing to his father telling him that he was proud of him, and it was offering him a way out of everything. “Well, cheers to that idea!” Varian had thought, finally downing the first sip of what had been handed to him.

…Little did he realize what exactly had been handed to him, and by whom.

Varian knew he had begun to feel awful soon afterward. Those constant pains in his head and his gut – he had wanted to chalk it all up to the residual effects of his assertions during the battle with the Saporians. But no. While all that had certainly hurt him, these pains were something else in their own right, and had a different source spurring them on.

Too bad he had realized the truth too late.

Fear, anger, pride – all three could be awful drugs. They blurred one’s rationality, made you do things you would regret in your sober hours, and yet demand to be fed all the same. Somehow, despite knowing this deep down, you comply anyway. It feels good at first, Varian knew. It was a relief in a way. He would feel justified. Perhaps even a bit noble. Perhaps a bit cleansed as he felt at liberty to vent all the ugliness piling up in his soul on those he targeted with the blame. But once the rush was over, that dull ache would come back again, and he was left asking himself, again and again, “What have I done…? Why did I do that…? Why did I say that…?” What a fool he had been! Varian felt a fresh pang of shame as he thought about how he allowed that Shade to instruct him on making preparations, and drawing the circles on the mirrors. In one sense, the man hadn’t lied. He had told Varian that all this would allow him to cast a spell that would allow him to become more manifest, and thus be of more use when they arrived in Corona.

But despite the words not being exactly false, they were still meant to deceive.

Varian remembered the terror and confusion he had felt when he had reached forward to draw on his own mirror with the enchanted chalk (taken from Sabine’s own supplies of course), and found his own reflection grabbing him before he could even make the first mark. Varian would’ve cried out, but before he could do anything, he was pulled through the looking glass, and lay stunned as he looked up at the likeness to himself, sneering down at him with red, glowing eyes.

“Aaah!” Varian had cried, shuffling back away from the horrible apparition. Then, he felt himself bump up against another form at his back. “Oh, thank goodness!” he thought in momentary relief.

“D-Demanitus!” Varian exclaimed, scrambling to his feet, and then hiding partially behind the man’s form, still looking in terror at the thing standing before him. “Wh-what is that!? What did I-? I-I don’t understa-!” But Varian stopped, his voice dying in his throat. He staggered back, wide-eyed and pale, as he stared up at the face that looked down at him. The man – Demanitus – no longer wore a face like his father’s. The mask had now dropped. In its place, was the face of a demon.

In a flash, the demon shape lunged itself at the other Varian, appearing for a moment to be a shooting cloud of dark mist. As the mist collided into the false-Varian, Varian watched in horror as the creature twisted, writhed, and groaned as parasite merged with its host. Varian could only stand there, staring, heart pounding, and breath rapid. What was happening? “Rrraah,” the creature eventually moaned, stretching twitching limbs, and cracking the stiffness in its neck and wrists. Worst of all, as it began to speak, Varian heard it talk in his own voice. “Mmm…Yes, yes! Not ideal, clearly. But it’ll do. For now.” As the creature then turned to look at Varian, grinning wickedly, Varian felt a shock of horror surge through him. In a panic, Varian made a desperate rush for the mirror through which he’d been pulled into this place. The next thing Varian knew, he was sent flying flat onto his back, stunned. He’d crashed headlong into the mirror’s surface, and it did not give way.

“No…” Varian breathed, and sprang back up, shoving and pouding and scratching desperately at the mirror’s surface, but it would not yield. “NO! NO NO! L-LET ME OUT!” Varian screamed. “LET ME OUT! RUDDIGER! XAVIER! ANYONE! PLEASE! HELP ME!” “It’s too late, Puer Lunae.” Varian whirled round, coming face-to-face with the monster – his dark reflection. It then grabbed him by the front of his shirt, lifting him off the ground with inhuman strength. Varian tried to get it to let go of him, but it was no use. The monster then threw Varian across the dark room, slamming him into the opposite wall.

Varian lay there a moment, struggling to breathe after the air had been knocked out of him. As he tried to rise, Varian felt himself shoved back down by a heel between his shoulderblades, pinning him to the ground.

“Ah ah ah, not so fast,” the voice tutted him from above. “You wouldn’t want to hurt yourself more before the big event, now would you?”

It was at this moment that Varian’s “flight” instincts turned to “fight,” and before he could think to do anything else, Varian gripped at the floor hard with his fingers, causing several black rocks to spring up around him from the ground. Startled, the figure holding him down jumped away, allowing Varian the freedom to get up onto his knees. As he did so, Varian extended a hand forward, giving out a caterwaul as he sent a stream of black rocks at the monster. Unfortunately, his enemy seemed to be ready for this attack. As he dodged the oncoming spires, a twisting, slithering mass of glowing green shot forward, and coiled itself tightly around Varian’s wrist.

In alarm, Varian summoned more black rocks with his other hand, but that one too got entangled in the monster’s cursed tendrils. A moment later, Varian’s limbs were all bound, and he could only lay there helplessly as the creature again came and stood above him.

“Ah, good. You’ve been recovering nicely,” it said. “This will make things easier. We won’t have to wait as long as I had feared. We can begin immediately when we arrive!” “Wha-…wh-what are you talking about!?” Varian asked, his brain reeling. “I-I don’t understand! Demanitus, y-you said-! We were supposed to-!” “Oh, you really are a foolish child,” the un-man said, and Varian winced as its puppet body ragdolled forward at the torso, and the ghostly apparition of the demon emerged from its back. Now, it spoke in its own, gravely voice.

“I suppose in all his lessons your teacher neglected to tell you about my kind. Such a pity. In case it wasn’t obvious to you by now, I can take on any form that suits my needs. A warlock…” Here the form shifted back to its Demanitus appearance. “A demon, as you have seen. A child…” Now its form now shifted to that of a little girl. This form Varian found particularly unsettling, especially as the demon’s interpretation somehow resulted in the child having disturbingly large eyes and a long, twisted, Cheshire-cat grin. “And…even a blizzard.” Varian’s eyes went wide as those last words sank in. “Wait…Y-you!? You were-!?”

The creature giggled – though a haunting, deranged sort of child giggling which made Varian’s skin crawl – and resumed its position inside of the puppet body. As the creature snapped back to life, it knelt down by Varian, grabbing him by the hair with one hand, forcing Varian to look up at it.

“Zhan Tiri? Perhaps you’ve heard of me? Maybe your silly teacher mentioned me during one of your silly lessons.” For several seconds, Varian could only feel terror flood through him as it all began to sink in. Having grown up in Corona, Varian had of course heard the legends of Lord Demanitus, and his battles against the supposed dark creature from the netherworld that had tried to destroy the kingdom in its early days. Like most tales of such spectacular things, Varian had believed them to be mere myth. Or exaggerated tales of something that happened long ago at best. As such, the stories seemed to hold little to no relevance for his own personal life. He had no reason to give them much thought before.

But now-

“N-no!” Varian yelped. “I-I-it’s not true! It’s not true! You’re not real! You were just a- Aah!”

The monster chuckled as Varian’s face twisted in pain as it pulled harder on his hair. “Just a what? A fairytale? A myth? A legend?”

Varian didn’t respond back, only looking back at Zhan Tiri with frightened eyes as he remembered Xavier’s words. “All legends are born of truth.”

But it wasn’t fair! Where was the evidence? Where was the warning? How was he supposed to have known or prepared for a demon suddenly popping up out of nowhere!?

“No!” Varian insisted again. “It doesn’t make sense! Why would you be here, and why now?”

“Were you not paying attention?” the apparition said, finally releasing Varian, who continued to lay helpless on the floor as the un-man paced about in front of him. “Did you not agree with me that the power of the Moon Drop can cause rifts in time and space? I have been waiting centuries for it to finally be awakened enough for me to…slip through one of the cracks.” The creature stretched out an arm, twisting its wrist about, joints crackling. “Of course, I could only project a portion of my soul into the world with a warp that small. I would need something a bit more…substantial if I was to make any sort of progress.”

The creature eyed Varian with an evil, sideways glance. “Too bad you didn’t kill that Saporian spy when you had the chance. It wouldn’t have come to this if you had.”

Varian felt like he was going to be sick. Was this monster really talking about…?

And was he going to-…!?

“A-are you going to kill me?” Varian asked, not even trying to hide the squeakiness of his voice, nor the half-sob that escaped him as the idea passed through his mind.

“…No,” the un-man said, though Varian only felt minimal relief at this. Zhan Tiri had lied to him before after all. The monster smiled. “Fortunately for you – and your comrades as well – I was able to find another way around that problem, as you just witnessed yourself.”

Varian swallowed hard as he recalled what he had seen only moments before.

“I cannot take over a body that still contains a soul, and to kill you would also sever the powers within you. And I still have need of those powers. As I said, the Moon Drop can affect time and space, and as much as I would love to fool around with all of the idiotic citizens of Corona while wearing your face a while longer…” the creature snickered at its own thoughts. “I would very much like to be getting back my original body as soon as possible.” The un-man looked down at Varian. “And you will help me get it back. You will allow me to finally return to this world.”

Varian shook his head. “No! Y-y-you’re wrong!” he shouted. “What makes you think I’d ever help you? You can’t make me! I won’t do it!”

Zhan Tiri stared down at Varian, and for a moment, Varian thought he had actually pointed out a flaw in the demon’s plans. “Of course!” he thought. If it all depended on Varian’s cooperation, he could just say no, and that was it! Check mate! Zhan Tiri couldn’t go any further!

But-

“Oh, you won’t, will you?” the demon then asked, a purr returning to his voice as he raised a hand. “I’m afraid you already have,” and the monster clenched his hand into a tight fist.

“What-?”

Varian suddenly curled in on himself as he felt a sharp, aching pain wrap itself around his heart, and a low humming sound filled his brain. He cried out as it all came flooding out of him – anger, bitterness, grief, hatred, pride; all those feelings that had haunted him since that terrible day, and all the thoughts that came with them. At the same time, Varian felt magic prickle through his veins, and behind closed eyelids he could tell the air got brighter around him. He then heard the sound of the ground crunching nearby him a couple times, until finally the sensation let him go.

As Varian lay there panting, he opened his eyes, looking up to see several new black rocks protruding from the ground next to him. He also saw his shadow-self looking back at him with satisfaction, its own eyes and hair glowing a slight blue-silver.

“A bit of my own concoction, if you will recall” the creature replied smugly to Varian’s unspoken questions, and recalling to mind the vial and the food from before. “It is good fun to play on people’s hunger and thirst for anger, revenge, all that sort of thing. Easy too. So long as I’ve got you here…” The un-man’s glowing vines tightened harder around Varian’s limbs. “Combined with my bonding serum, you are my puppet on strings. I can use your powers as I please.”

Varian grit his teeth, struggling again for a moment. But he was getting so tired now, and helplessness began to weigh in on him.

“Oh, don’t look so down,” Zhan Tiri said mockingly, casually stepping over him to the mirror gateway. “You and I have similar goals, after all. We both want justice, do we not? We both want Corona to pay, right? We want her royals and all her useless citizens to hear us?”

Varian didn’t respond. He just lay there, still feeling the sticky-sweet sensation of his self-righteousness throbbing in his chest. Maybe…maybe Zhan Tiri was right. He remembered the rage that had burned within him when he’d been denied, ignored, abandoned, and locked away. He remembered the bitter glee of finally having the upper hand on those who had wronged him. He remembered the allure of the rush that came with lashing out at those who had wronged him, even to the point of violence. Surely, if it felt right…

And yet… And yet…

It wasn’t all so sweet anymore. It had been sweet when those whom he had hurt had been mere objects in his mind; just pawns in the grand game of good and bad that he had to win. But was he himself not offended at the idea of being seen as merely a pawn? And good and bad!? What did he know about them? At the very least, as Varian thought of the faces of Xavier, Friedborg, Arianna, the Captain, Pete and Stan, and all the rest – did he really think himself such a good person that he could place himself as their Judge?

…But it was too late. Zhan Tiri had a hold of him now.

“Mm. So be it,” the Shade finally said as Varian continued to remain silent. It stepped through the mirror gate to the other side, the glowing green vines continuing to extend through from its back, keeping Varian tethered to it. The monster took a deep breath as it came through, spreading its arms. “Ah, another step achieved!” it sighed, then spied Varian’s sword leaning against the fireplace. Picking it up, the un-man weighed the blade and scabbard in his hands, then strapped it around his waist. Finally, it picked up a nerby blanket, giving Varian one last, sneering, mocking look as it began to drape it over the mirror.

“Come now, Puer Lunae. Destiny awaits us!”

--------------------------------------------------

“Destiny,” Varian thought with absolute misery as his thoughts came back to the present. He’d heard people talk about destiny before, mostly Xavier and Rapunzel – a wisened blacksmith and a magical princess. Of course, destiny would be an appealing prospect for them. Their kind were always the heros in all the stories, always the ones to break through to the light of day.

But for someone like Varian? Perhaps “moon child” was a fitting title for him. Destined to always be in the dark no matter what he did. To never be free from it. To never break out and see the sun.

“…It’s all over now…” was all Varian could think to himself as he buried his face further into his arms, feeling utterly defeated.

He had failed… Again…

…Then-

Varian’s head shot up as out of nowhere he suddenly heard the sounds of fighting. For a moment, Varian thought he was hallucinating or dreaming as he saw a large, moving shape in silhouette against a large, oval light that had somehow appeared a few feet away. Then, as he continued to look, Varian realized it wasn’t one large shape, but two. And they were men! Two men, wrestling and fighting with one another! And not just any men, but Xavier! Two of him! And…Ruddiger!? Was Ruddiger clinging to the shoulders of one of them??

Varian had no idea how to respond as the two Xavier’s grappled with one another. He could only watch wide-eyed as they pushed, tugged, grabbed, and even threw a punch at one another here and there. Had he gone insane? Or was Zhan Tiri feeding him more illusions to mess with him?

After a minute or two, one of the Xavier’s appeared to gain the upper hand (the one with Ruddiger on his shoulder), and after getting a firm grip on the other, sent his opponent sprawling back out into the light. Varian then heard him shout something after the fallen Xavier, something that sounded like, “Keep him down! I’ll get him!”

What in the name of Herz der Sonne was going on??

Varian then froze, frightened as the Xavier on this side of the light turned towards him, then went running at him (or, at least, running as well as his clear limp would allow).

“X-Xav-?” Varian barely managed to say before he found himself scooped up into a tight hug in those strong, familiar arms, and heard a familiar chattering noise at his side.

“Oh Varian, thank heavens!” Xavier voice thundered in his ear. “It’s ok! It’s going to be ok! Are you hurt? I’m here now! I’ve got you! You’re going to be all right!”

[consumeconstantly]

Lady Cross (first aid)

Summary: Somehow, Marinette always ends up biting off more than she can chew. It started off with a kid and a nasty gash on their knee. The sudden escalation to treating the new head of Gotham’s underworld? It can only be explained by the fact that she’s catnip for trouble. 

_____________________________________________

Marinette supposed she should have expected something like this to happen eventually.

Really, she patches up a few street kids and offers a meal and some resources and suddenly she's made a name for herself in the slums of Gotham. It’s not like she’s doing anything revolutionary. Well, okay, maybe she does cheat a little bit and uses her healing powers on a few of the tougher cases that really should have been out of her realm of expertise, but she’s living near the slums of Gotham for a reason. That reason being Marinette is just a little broke and can’t really afford to send everyone she comes across to the hospital, and the people who are injured certainly can’t. It’s not like she can leave them to die. That would be heartless.

When she stopped treating scrapes and cuts for kids on the streets as she came across them and instead found her apartment balcony frequented by families who needed her help, she couldn’t just say no. And so, more and more serious wounds started coming in. Kids brought their parents and friends. The parents and friends brought... well, if the police stopped by her apartment any time soon, she’s fairly certain they’d have a field day.

But again, it’s not like she’s going to turn these people into the police when they’ve come to her for help and have a small army of people who swear up and down that they’re good people and only doing what they have to do in order to get by.

Morality comes in such a variety of shades, who was she to judge? Ladybug and Marinette have both certainly had their fair share of mistakes that they’d gladly go back in time to rectify, and her hands weren’t clean of blood either. Sure, the Miraculous Cure may have brought people back, but their deaths were still on her. And Hawkmoth? Yeah, he’s alive now, but she hammered him into the pavement after dropping him from the top of the Eiffel tower, and she’s not going to pretend that she didn’t take a bit of morbid joy in that moment.

But back to the matter at hand. Which was, the notorious Red Hood—responsible for a coup amongst Gotham’s drug dealers and responsible for taking down a man whose morality truly vanished with the wind, Black Mask himself— was currently bleeding out on her second floor balcony, smoking a cigarette and lounging against the rail like he owned the place. 

“Lady Cross,” he inclined his head.

“Red Hood,” Marinette returned his greeting.

God, she really didn’t want to get involved with Red Hood. She wasn’t opposed to helping out street thugs and criminals, but Red Hood was a different league. He seemed to be a fairly decent guy, ensuring that kids weren’t dealt drugs and tried to keep them out of the circuit as much as possible. He took down plenty of worse criminals while he was at it. In fact, Marinette would go so far to say the Red Hood as one the good guys.

But the issue was, once she started treating people of a certain level, she’d be open game. And that didn’t seem very enticing to her. Not at all. Everyone knew that Red Hood had beef with the Bat Family for some reason or other, and also made enemies with almost every single rogue in Gotham, and a good number of enemies outside of it as well. Basically, Red Hood was a universal enemy of both the vigilantes and rogues. Someone she shouldn’t get involved with while she was trying to investigate the darkness surrounding Gotham whole running her online boutique and going to college at Gotham University.

Unfortunately, Tom and Sabine and her own stint as Ladybug taught her that she could never ignore someone in need. Marinette sighed and slid the mesh open, leading Red Hood to her living room. “Let’s get this over with, shall we?”

“Real nice place you got here,” he said.

With the mask covering the whole of his face, Marinette had no facial expressions to figure out whether he was poking fun at her current living situation or not. His voice sounded genuine, but vocal emotions were easy to fake.

The apartment she was living in was not on the nice side of town. There were three bullet holes in the wall between her living room and bedroom that she just didn’t have time to patch up, some pretty nasty looking stains on the ceiling near her kitchen, and a huge, spray painted red cross on one of her walls, which was where her street name derived from. Her floor and coffee table were also in states of disarray; she hadn’t gotten the opportunity to clean up after working on two commissions and the last guest whose wounds were heavy enough to warrant several rolls of gauze, which was now half stuffed into a garbage can sitting next to rolls of fabric. Perhaps not the neatest or most sanitary situation, but she didn’t have time to clean up before every single one of her unexpected guests came in.

Look, it wasn’t her fault that she didn’t have time to fix things up real nice and neat. She’d only been living in the apartment for a month and a half, and most times, she barely spent any time in it other than to sleep, cram last minute projects for her design course, or to help heal people. Her living situation wasn’t the biggest of worries.

“Sit,” Marinette gestured to the one of the few pieces of furniture that she specifically bought for the apartment. She didn’t mind the stained, half broken, and extremely creaky couch the last owners left behind for the first week, but after she started bringing back her first… visitors, it seemed important that the couch was comfortable, sturdy, and most crucially, cleanable.

Rummaging through a cabinet, she pulled out a tattered briefcase she thrifted a while back to keep all of her medical supplies in. Not the prettiest of things, but she tried not to keep expensive looking items in her apartment because she wasn’t a fan of getting mugged. The medicine she kept was already expensive enough, she didn’t need to attract everyone’s attention by owning one of those metal containers used in hospitals. Even though most of the people who dropped by her apartment were thankful to be treated, she had a few instances where people tried to steal things from her.

“What’s the damage, doc?” Red Hood’s voice came through rather tinny through his helmet. 

Marinette grimaced. The helmet must have awful air circulation. It looked like some sort of metal, and wet and metal never smelled good together. “I don’t know, you tell me.”

“Thought you were supposed to be some mystic healer who came from the far east.”

She paused and looked at the man, trying to judge whether he was racist as well as rude. “That’s rather insulting.” 

Red Hood shrugged. Marinette applauded the man for showing no outward sign of pain at that, even though there was a bullet embedded in his shoulder, and shrugging had to bite. “That’s what the word on the street is, though you sound French to me. Thought I’d come and check out who’s healing Gotham’s criminals. What’re you planning?”

“Sorry to foil your plans, but I’m not planning anything other than getting my college degree and not pissing off the people I live near.” She paused, flipping the lock on the briefcase upwards. “I’d appreciate it if you didn’t use me as your go to healer from now on. You’re going to bring trouble my way.”

“Trouble? Me? Perish the thought.” His hand rested comfortably on the holister of his gun, ready to shoot if the girl pulled out a weapon from the briefcase. “We’ll talk about repeat appearances after I see how you do today.”

Marinette rolled her eyes. “Any wounds other than the obvious?”

“Just need the bullet out, and some stitches on the gash.” His shoulder and his abdomen, respectively. The gash looked nastier than the bullet; no shrapnel, but the cut on his stomach was jagged and wide. Not a normal, sharp blade. Probably needed a good cleaning.

She grabbed the tweezers, a sterilized needle, and medical thread. “That’s fine. Now are you going to undress, or am I going to have to cut your… costume… up?”

“Getting me naked already? We haven’t even had our first date yet.”

“Very funny, little Red Riding Hood. Now hop to it. I have class at 9 tomorrow and projects to finish tonight.” Somehow, trouble always seemed to find her when she least wanted it to. Not that she wanted to have trouble find her at all, but luck was a two way street, and for all that being Ladybug granted her good luck, she attracted criminals like catnip. 

“And here my informants had me thinking you were a regular Florence Nightingale.”

Marinette snorted. “They wish. I’ve got to ask who told you, because everybody should know the rules. You know, the ones where they don’t speak of my existence to their higher ups?”

“I’m not a rat,” Red Hood said, taking the top part of his outfit off. “And it’s not like you would have gone unnoticed anyways. You might be treating small timers now, but people catch on to healers pretty easy.”

“Because some gauze and sewing skills make me such a prime target.”

“No, your magic does.”

Shit. Marinette never told anyone she was using magic, and she rarely used it unless it was a dire situation. If she could patch them up using regular skills, she did. 

“Yeah right, if I had magic healing powers, do you think I’d be shoving my fingers into your shoulder to get a bullet out?”

“Not a very good liar, Lady Cross. You have this deer-caught-in-the-headlights look about you.”

“Thanks for the compliment. I’m also the deer that tramples through your windshield and takes a dump on the driver’s seat.” She maneuvered the tweezers a little rougher, hoping to make Red Hood hiss in pain. He just chuckled, amused. His high pain tolerance was getting rather annoying. She had half a mind to pour hydrogen peroxide over the wound just to see if that would make him show he was in pain, but thought better of it. Even though she didn’t like the man, she also didn’t want to piss him off. Or worse, have him come back and make her fix him up again. 

Threading the needle, she made quick, small stitches on his shoulder, sewing the bullet hole up, then put some petroleum jelly to speed up the healing process and reduce scarring. At least the wound was in a position that didn’t require a lot of gauze. She needed to go out and buy some more soon. She barely had enough to wrap around Red Hood’s waist.

“So, the magic,” Red Hood started. “Is it a conditional thing? Can you not use it all the time?”

“Again, I don’t have magic.” Marinette did have to use some antibacterial on the knife wound. He would need to take good care of that one to make sure it didn’t get infected. 

“So a meta, then. What are you doing in Gotham? Everybody knows Batman hates metas.”

“Not a meta, either, sorry to disappoint.” She tied off the gauze, then stood to wash her hands. “Make sure to clean the stomach wound well. Hope you have your tetanus shot, otherwise you should look into getting one.”

“Surprisingly, I’m inclined to believe you on the not-a-meta thing. Back to the first thing, then. Magic. Why don’t you show me the old razzle dazzle? Do you have to say one of those weird spells like the godmother in Cinderella? Bibbity bobbity boo?”

“You’re hilarious,” Marinette dead panned. 

“How’s this for magic? Bibbity bobbity boo, kindly leave. Shoo.” She followed his suggestion, made a show of jazz hands as well. “Pity I don’t use magic otherwise you’d be gone now. Anyways, it’s time for you to make your exit. It would be great if you didn't visit me again. Ever. Thanks.”

She ushered him out onto her patio, then slammed the sliding door. He saluted her before dropping off the side of the building. She could imagine the man under the helmet smirking.

Marinette ran a hand through her loose hair. “He’s going to come back, isn’t he.”

@jasonette-july-2k20

[bunathebunny]

late blooming

Based on this

Read on AO3

@blue-peach14 @ira-sairain @wannajointhecrabcult @indecisive-mess-named-me @incredulous-reader @iloveitwhen

The little girl seems to belong anywhere but here.

She is the beloved daughter of a baker and an assassin. She is the sweet child that walks among the bumbling heathens that know nothing of true hardship. She, unfortunately, is his betrothed.

-

Marinette Dupain-Cheng is a name no one has ever heard before: a blank slate that speaks of nothing and everything. It is, according to his mother, the name of his betrothed.

“There is nothing about her,” he hisses, stalking the perimeters of his room. Agitation is visible in every line of his body, displeasure pouring out in every step.

There have been hundreds of reports, sent in by the scouts tasked with digging up whatever they could about this girl who somehow wounded up in a betrothal with the heir of the League of Shadows. All of them have little to none details about this so-called Dupain-Cheng.

His mother regards him with cold eyes, head tilting to the side. Fingers twisting a lock of hair, her smile is a thing of danger.

“Beloved,” she purrs, amusement coloring her tone, coiling and coiling like the most asphyxiating vice. “Get to know her and form your own opinions about her.”

“Just like you did with my father?” he huffs, wrinkling his nose at the idea of going in without a shred of information.

The reply comes in the form of bared teeth and lidded eyes: a love story born in the shadows and in there, it shall remain, soaked in the warmth of blood and reflected in the blade of his mother’s favorite dagger.

-

It is frustrating to be engaged to someone he knows nothing about. There is nothing but aggravation when he realizes that no, he cannot just off his so-called betrothed without any consequences.

“Do play nice,” his mother warns. “While Sabine and I are good acquaintances and Tom is a generous man, I cannot promise that no harm would come to you should a hair on their daughter’s head is harmed.”

Apparently, Sabine Cheng comes from a long line of mercenaries and her words alone can topple any medium to small business. And Tom Dupain is a somewhat influential baker in Paris, known for his delicious pastries and love for his wife and daughter.

“Imagine a war on two fronts,” says his mother. “Fending against those from Sabine’s side of the family, wishing to avenge their beloved family member and calming down the mob that Tom rallies to see justice for their daughter.”

So no, he cannot just off her like he would anyone else.

Well, there are always servants who are willing to do his bidding and make sure whatever they do would not be traced back to him. If all fails, there are always more refined ways to make someone disappear.

This is the League of Assassins. How hard can it be to off someone here?

-

Apparently, it is hard to off someone in the heart of the League of Assassins. Specifically, it is hard to make one Marinette Dupain-Cheng disappear.

“Young Master, Madame Cheng and her daughter have arrived,” one of his mother’s men announces from outside. “The Mistress requires your presence.”

He does not swear because why should he utter such crass words. It, however, takes much restraint to not do so.

“Tell my mother that I will be there shortly,” he replies and tosses a small package to one of his own waiting for directions in the corner of the study, “Go make some tea for our guests.”

-

The girl is soft-hearted like the disillusioned fools thinking they could change the world with their insignificant presence and form the world to their black and white ideals.

She smiles at the servants and thanks them. She flinches at loud noises and wrinkles her nose at the smell of freshly spilled blood.

What is more aggravating is that she is still standing there and not in the infirmary being looked over by one of the healers.

“It is nice to finally meet you,” she inclines her head, her words flowing like honey down sore throats, soothing and refreshing all the same. “You are my betrothed, I presume?”

There is something in that smile that infuriates him. It seems innocent enough, kind in its own way but the way those gray eyes sparkle? It is almost as if she is laughing at him.

He never backs down from a challenge.

“I believe,” he lets the chuckle color his tone with amusement. “The one asking that question should be me.”

Rising on steady legs, he looms over her. Those steely eyes stare back, never relinquish an inch, steady like his mother’s hand when she guided him through his very first kill.

“Oh,” her lips part in mocked surprise, lashes fluttering delicately like a fragile doll. “Whatever do you mean?”

“But of course,” he laughs, channeling his father’s public persona into his words. “My apologize, miss, but I was expecting something… different.”

A split second and those eyes absolutely ablaze like pools of mercury reflecting the light of the sun. And just as quick as it arrives, the fury in those eyes smooths over, fading as if it has never been there.

“I understand,” she laughs and there is something in that tone, is it not? “After all, the different in class quite a shock to the system, is it?”

A bolt of thunder strikes and fire lights up along his spines, spreading and spreading until he is hot all over. His blood thrums under his skin, singing the familiar demand for spilled blood, burning and coiling like fire in his guts.

“You! The tea-” his vision sways, words slur and faintly, he can hear the sharp intake of breath from his mother when his knees buckle and he hits the ground with shaky breaths, thinking back about the tea she handed him while they were dining earlier. “Poisoned-“

She grins, teeth bared like a predator in front of a downed prey. Standing tall, she stares down at him, gray eyes glittering like pools of mercury.

“All is fair in love and war,” she sings, “Why, did you not expecting that, love?”

Perhaps, he shall enjoy this.

-

His betrothed handles the blade delicately like she has no idea how to do so. An incredible feat, really, when her dame is one of the best of the best when it comes to a sweet voice and a steady blade.

"Every time we meet," he starts, twirling his down blade, waiting to a strike that is sure to come. "It seems like you just get worse and worse."

Those eyes snap to his face, holding his own green ones in challenge. They ablaze with the rare fury, lighting up like mercury in the sun: exquisite and deadly all the same.

"I would not be so cocky if I were you," she hisses a warning, teeth bared like a wild animal. And is that not the best sight?

He does not deign an answer. Instead, he tilts his head to the side and lets the barest hint of a smirk graces his face.

The red that bleeds into her face is refreshing. Gone are the sweet smiles and the lilting words, fury hisses through her teeth and fire dancing in her eyes.

“Beloved,” he purrs, watching as those eyes are absolutely ablaze – a nice change from all the demureness that seems so ill-fitted on her. “Your hands are not meant for a blade, it seems.”

Like a switch, she closes her eyes, breaths and the fire, suddenly, is gone like it has never been there. Those eyes, when they open, are glacial, piercing like the sharpest icicles.

“Little prince,” she croons, like the honey on the tongue, soothing and sweet. “You say the sweetest things.”

It is insulting, really when she speaks in that saccharine tone. He knows that she knows that he has never been fooled by that sweet façade that she carefully carves for herself.

But if she wants to play like that… Well, he can certainly entertain her.

“Whatever do you mean?” he tilts his head, eyes settling on that uplift at the corner of her lips like it holds all the answers in the world. “If my memory serves me right, you did compare me to a fish in a small pond, did you not? Perhaps you should be more forthcoming, beloved.”

“It is as you said,” she grins and gods, he can vaguely imagine freshly spilled blood staining those lips. “My hands are not meant to wield blades. However, there are more weapons than just swords and knives.”

Her blade never comes. Instead, his vision swims, that beautiful victorious grin is blurry to his eyes and what he would not give to see that in all of its glory.

“Little prince,” she coos and his blade hits the ground with a clang. “Sleep well.”

-

There are rumors of a formless voice: mellifluent words and dulcet murmurs. It arrives on the wings of tiny but resilient butterflies, fluttering and fluttering, gliding and gliding through the city of lights.

“You are far away from home, little prince,” it chuckles into his ear, the swallowtail squirming between his fingers. “Did you lose your way?”

The night is cool against his bare skin. The wind is violent up on the very top of the tower but that does nothing to tamper with the amusement curling in his gut.

A mystery worthy for the heir to the greatest detective to ever walked the lands. Or it would be had he not been so familiar with the brilliant mind of his beloved.

“I wonder,” he muses, studying the fragile wings. “Are you always this kind to those who are lost?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” the voice laughs, tingling like little bells of the wind chime before a gentle breeze.

He grins, anticipation coiling and twisting and something hot bubbles underneath his skin, addictive and dangerous.

"We shall meet again," he murmurs and lets go of the swallowtail, watching it fluttering toward the familiar direction of that small bakery. "Beloved."

The promise tastes absolutely divine on his tongue.

[mainviper]

heeeey! can you do a hc of viper being jealous of sova and sage friendship?

Okay,

Green Eyed Viper for you, my dear anon!

°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°

"Rest, Sabine"

He said as he walked supported by Sage towards the infirmary. It was a difficult mission, she didn't want to use him as a bait but it was necessary to disarm the spike. Many things went on in her head on the way to headquarters, she wanted to take care of him and explain what happened but he closed himself off. The most irritating thing was to hear from the healer that the risks were big, that he needed to be careful ...

Sage calmed him down and held him, talked all the time asking him to stay awake and not move much.

He smiled at the monk, saying he was fine and that he would do it again if necessary, but in that moment he didn’t want to think about the risks.

Viper hated every second of that drive home. She had no reason to feel that way, after all, Sage was also dating. And Reyna showed no sign of discomfort on the other side of the car.

That wasn’t the problem.

Viper couldn't put into words what she felt at that moment. Perhaps out of shock, but also out of her growing anger at the realization that Sova could have died. Everything Sage said seemed to have been stolen from her mind, taken unfairly out of her concern for her lover and spat out by someone who didn’t understand the seriousness of what she was talking about.

The last straw was not being able to be beside him when he needed to stay in the recovery wing. Not being able to examine, seeing with her own eyes that it was just a fright.

"Rest, Sabine ... she will take good care of me."

Sage would do that. It was her nature to take care of others and Sova was always a great friend ... But the monk didn’t love him like she did, she had no tears in her eyes and she had not lost her voice in anguish.

Viper was exhausted, she also had her battle wounds to look after and really needed rest. Sova's eyes were impatient and carried a certain pain, he needed to be examined because he could have broken something ...

"I'm sorry ... but I’ve had to..."

"I know."

For the first time he smiled at her. His eyes passing all the security she needed, understanding and supporting her attitudes. After all, the couple was known for their strategies and victories.

"Let me at least take you to..."

"If you insist ..."

It was better not to upset her. Not when her eyes were an intense green, different from what he was used to. Viper took Sage's place and supported him on top of her. Unlike the monk, she put her hand on his chest (Sabine was always a little bit possessive) and was visibly shaken talking to anyone in the hall to get out of the way. When she arrived on the bed and laid him down, she had a frightened and worried look on her face.

"Take care of him..."

"I will..."

"Until I get back."

Her voice was breathless, tired and harsh. Still, she would stay there, ignoring his requests not to worry. She sat down next to him, took off her glove and stroked the archer's face. Sova didn't protest, didn't want to hurt her, and just took a deep breath at the answer. Sage understood what was going on, she understood the feelings of both Sova and her old friend. If Reyna was in the same situation she doesn't know what she would be capable of, protesting against Sabine was useless and so she didn't bother when she heard:

"Rest, darling. I'll take care of you."

Viper said taking the blond strands out of Sova's eyes and kissing him softly.

[livingprophecy]

@arrowedhunter​​​  asked:      “  let  me  see  the  wound.  ”      /      memes  from  sage.

          𝐒𝐇𝐄  𝐌𝐀𝐊𝐄𝐒  𝐀  frustrated  noise,  resisting  the  urge  to  roll  her  eyes  —  she  won’t  take  her  eyes  off  her  work.  sage  is  tapped  out  of  healing:      this  has  been  one  of  the  most  exhausting  missions,  and  they’re  alone  with  no  ability  to  contact  the  commander  or  anyone  else  on  the  team,  but  she’s  still  a  trained  medic.  stitching  the  wound  up  on  sova’s  arm  was  light  work,  but  it  didn’t  change  that  there  was  a  half  healed  bullet  wound  in  her  leg.      (she  tried  hiding  the  limp,  covering  the  wound  with  her  robes,  but  HE’D  STILL  NOTICED).            “stop  moving,  or  i  am  going  to  mess  these  stitches  up  on  purpose.”      she  mutters,  refusing  to  look  at  the  blue  eyes  that  are  piercing  into  her  right  now.  it  still  hurts;      she’d  barely  managed  to  stop  the  bleeding  before  they  had  to  keep  moving,  and  her  body  aches  more  than  she  can  describe.      but  she  is  never  her  first  priority.      /      ANDRESSA  WILL  ALWAYS  BE  HER  PRIORITY.      fingers  trace  over  her  work  as  she  ties  the  knot,  still  refusing  to  look  up  at  him  as  she  moves  to  the  one  on  his  chest.      “not  only  am  i  fully  capable  of  taking  care  of  myself,  but  i  am  also  fine.”      she’ll  tell  herself  the  reason  she  feels  faint  is  that  sova  is  shirtless  under  her  fingertips,  closer  than  they  should  be  on  the  field,  and  not  from  bloodloss.

          𝐆𝐑𝐈𝐓𝐓𝐈𝐍𝐆  𝐇𝐄𝐑  𝐓𝐄𝐄𝐓𝐇,  sage  cleans  the  blood  away  from  the  stab  wound,  wishing  they  could  simply  be  in  the  compound,  sound  asleep.      (instead,  they’ll  be  sleeping  in  an  open  area,  in  shifts,  FAR  FROM  RESTFUL).      the  healer  finally  glances  up,  wincing  at  his  gaze.      “i  will  take  care  of  it.  you  should  be  focused  on  a  way  to  contact  omen.”      looking  back  down,  a  smile  creeps  on  to  her  face.      “i  would  even  take  delilah  or  sabine  at  this  point.”

[anathtsurugi]

A Rose Upon a Thorn (Chapter 3 Teaser)

"Why do you wear a blindfold?"

Chirrut chuckled quietly at the child's question. Despite everything the little one had been through, despite being kidnapped and tortured, he was still just a boy, and little boys tended to be curious about such things.

"Ezra!" the older child scolded him. "You can't just ask people things like that!"

"But how else am I gonna find out if I don't ask? I wanna know!" he insisted petulantly.

"The child is right, you know," Chirrut told Ezra's self-appointed guardian, Sabine. "Knowledge must be sought."

"But...it's rude, isn't it?" Sabine asked, her voice uncertain. "You'll have to excuse him. He's only six."

"No need for excuses, young ones. The answer is simple enough. I wear a blindfold because I have no eyes. The sight of such a blank face tends to unnerve most people."

The blind warrior smiled knowingly into the ensuing silence, waiting for the moment when Ezra finally broke it with a quickly muttered, "Can I see?"

"Ezra!"

Chirrut just laughed in response, offering no admonishment as he untied the blindfold, allowing the strip of cloth to fall into his lap. He was no more surprised when he felt small fingers reach out to press against the bare stretch of skin where eyes would be in a human. It was one of his stranger Fey characteristics, not having eyes. The one that tended to raise more questions than he typically cared to answer. So he didn't. But he didn't mind answering them for the little boy. His questions were asked out of curiosity, a true desire to know; not out of fear or ignorance.

"But...how do you see? How do you look to walk around?" Ezra asked him, sounding almost worried.

"I cannot see. I have no eyes, after all. I never have. This is the way I was born. But there are senses other than sight, Ezra," he said, reaching out to lay a hand on the boy's shoulder. "After all, how did I 'see' to know where your shoulder was?"

"How?"

Laying his staff to the side on his cot, he tapped at his ear, then at Ezra's. "I can hear you. That tells me more than you might think. Perhaps you ought to give it a try."

"How?" the boy asked again.

Picking up his blindfold and tying it carefully around Ezra's own eyes, he slowly spun the boy about. "All right, Ezra, I want you to listen carefully, then walk toward the first sound you hear."

"O- okay."

Ezra stood still for several moments, the infirmary almost eerily silent, neither of its other two occupants making any noise. Hera had set Bodhi the task of minding the two children while she found food for all of them, and he was taking to the task with gusto. But for now, it seemed that both he and Sabine wanted to see what Ezra might do.

The sound in question wound up being Hera as she entered the room, the sound of a basket bumping against her leg indicating to Chirrut that she'd been successful in her quest, and the sound of Chopper’s caw at her shoulder telling that the bird had already taken his dues.

"Breakfast!" she called out. Ezra immediately started moving toward her. "Oh? What's this?" she asked with a light laugh as the little boy fumbled his way over to her.

"Bit of an impromptu lesson," Chirrut answered with a chuckle of his own. He heard Ezra half crash into the woman, arms quickly wrapping around her legs to keep himself from falling. Hera laughed as she removed the blindfold.

"And was the lesson a success?" she asked.

"I found you!" Ezra declared, pleased with himself.

"Rousing success, I would say."

"Think you could do me a favor and take Chirrut his breakfast?" Hera asked the little boy, who agreed enthusiastically. In another few moments, Chirrut found his blindfold being laid back in his lap, along with the scent of fresh bread and a hint of apple filling his nose. This was followed by the feel of a warm loaf being pressed into his hands and an apple being laid beside the blindfold.

"Do you understand, little one?"

"Ah fink so," the six-year-old answered through a mouthful of apple. "You can see stuff wiff fings 'sides yo' eyes."

"Something like that, yes," the blind warrior said before biting into the fresh-baked loaf of bread. In truth, his own senses were a bit more complex than that, but it was a good starting point to learn from. And he could tell that the boy had a long ways yet to go.

"Well, that's Chirrut all over. A lesson before breakfast, lunch, and dinner," Hera said as she carried the basket over to Sabine and Bodhi.

"Miss Hera?" the girl started to ask. "Is there anything I can help with?"

"You don't need to help at all, Sabine. You'll be here until your wounds heal a little better. I just want you to focus on healing right now."

"But I- I should be earning our keep...shouldn't I?"

"I promise you, dear heart, you don't need to worry about a thing. If you end up staying with us, things like that can come later. But for now, you and Ezra are our guests. We'll take care of you until you're feeling better."

"Oh. I...okay."

"But if you'd like something to keep yourself occupied in the meantime, I can give you that."

"Yeah?" Sabine asked, immediately perking up.

"I'm sure Bodhi's worn out from this latest round of healing. He can only do so much at once, after all. We have an audience with Prince Orrelios later today and I'm sure he'd like to freshen up a bit. You can help him rebraid his hair if you'd like."

Chirrut felt excitement radiating off of the girl like rays of sunshine. Turning to Bodhi for permission, she asked him, "C- can I?"

"Of course, little one," the young man agreed with a warm laugh of his own. It wasn't long before Chirrut heard the sound of a brush being run through Bodhi's long hair.

"So how are you holding up, old owl?" Hera asked as she came to sit beside him on his cot, beginning to munch on an apple herself.

"Just fine, really. I know the healers wanted to keep me here another day to be certain, but I truly don't think it will be necessary. The wound seems to have mostly healed."

"And that of itself is something worth noting. You- really ought to be dead now," she said, voice heavy with both exhaustion and relief.

"That is what people keep telling me, and yet they always seem to be wrong."

"And you've honestly never been hit with cold iron before?"

"Never," he said, voice dropping lower to avoid rousing the interest of the other three, hoping to leave them to their own devices. A sense of peace pervaded the three that he knew couldn't last forever and he wanted them to have as much time as they could. "But I've no more answer to offer than anyone else. I have experienced my fair share of oddities in my time, but this is something entirely new to me."

It didn't bode well, he knew. Not that he wasn't pleased to still be drawing breath or anything of that nature. It was just- a power like this...he had never known its like before. The fact that he had been killed, but still lived...it spoke to something off in the very dimensions of reality itself. It was a danger, both to himself and to everyone he cared for, but as of this moment, he had no help for it. He would just have to wait.

"In the meantime, though," he continued, a different sort of warning sparking at the edges of his awareness, "I believe someone who is actually in need of a healer's aid is on the approach."

"Hmm?" Hera started, shifting to look toward the entrance to the infirmary. Almost immediately, Zeb's heavy footfalls entered the space, along with the whisper of booted feet being dragged over stone. Hera was quickly back on her feet. "My Gods, what happened?"

"Nothing," Kanan's weakened voice answered. "I just- couldn't quite make it all the way back on my own. Zeb helped me out."

Hera groaned in frustration. "You know, I told you not to go down there for a reason. I hope what you learned was worth risking your health over."

"That remains to be seen," Baze's voice joined in, and while Zeb helped Kanan over to a cot, Chirrut's husband came to sit beside him on his.

"What did you learn, then?" Chirrut asked him, breaking off a hunk of his loaf and passing it to the larger man.

"Lady Orrelios knows the man. He's under some kind of geas of the Fey king's, so we won't get anything from him. She's going to try and work through it, but it will take time. Also seems that Zeb's young man is among the faeries."

"Ah. The Alexsandr we've heard so much about."

"The same. The story just keeps getting more and more complicated."

"And will continue to do so, I have little doubt. You can tell me all about it later. For now, I would like to enjoy my breakfast in relative peace."

"You are all right?" his husband asked in his typical gruff voice, but the tone was undercut by the gentle hand he rested on his knee.

"Perfectly fine. I simply feel that...we are very near an edge. I couldn't say what, but...it seems to me we ought to take moments like this where we may," he said, smiling faintly as he listened to Hera fuss over Kanan and Zeb, listened to Ezra begin to ask the green knight about his trick with the trees, and listened to Sabine and Bodhi laugh together as she braided his hair, talking about finding feathers and beads to add in.

It was a tender moment. Close as they all were, it was the sort of thing that happened rarely in their lives, so the blind warrior sat basking in it, with the taste of warm food in his mouth and laughter in the air and his love by his side.

They would all need this later.

The ongoing story’s available right here.

This is just a preview of the third chapter, which will be out next week, but is available right now on my Patreon, if you’d like to check that out.

[pulveremcomedesligulas]

Do 87 from the second one (stay awake)! GIVE ME MY ANGST, BITCH

Just remember you asked for this. Also shoutout to my awesome coauthor/bff @toinfinityandisengard who gave me the idea of what to do with this prompt.

Drabble Challenge 

87. “Stay Awake.”

Maegyn had known what to expect in a battle at this point. They had been in plenty, so in theory she should’ve been prepared by this point.

But the sad truth was that she hadn’t been prepared. The Konna had taken her and Sabin by surprise. One minute they had been fighting side-by-side, the next, she heard Sabin shouting her name before being shoved out of the way. A huge explosion, like the sound of lightning crashing, sounded behind her as she fell to the ground, rolling a few feet with her impact. 

It took her a moment to gather herself, coughing as she pushed herself up to her knees. Ozone still permeated the air, similar to how it was when Layne used her powers, but… different. Darker. 

Maegyn lifted her head to take in her surroundings, trying to reorient herself. The section of battlefield surrounding her had fallen quiet, with everyone either lying injured or dead on the ground or moved on to where the fighting was heavier. 

She could sense most of her friends over a nearby rise, close to the thick of it. But closer, she could sense…

A gasping breath pulled struck through Maegyn’s senses. 

Sabin. 

Despite being shaky on her legs, Maegyn rushed to her fallen friend’s side. The shapeshifter was laying on his back, gasping for breath as he clutched at his stomach. 

Immediately, Maegyn felt her own stomach flip at bright crimson stain slowly growing on Sabin’s shirt. 

“Sabin!” she cried. “Sabin, you…”

“Mo…” Sabin struggled to get out. “…okay?”

“I’m fine, I’m fine, you stupid idiot,” Maegyn said. She tore strips off her shirt and wadded them together, quickly working to apply pressure to Sabin’s wound. She knew she should probably inspect it, but she didn’t have any of her medical supplies with her, and he was bleeding out too quickly. 

Stop the bleeding. Worry about what happened later.

Maegyn!

Her head shot up at the sound of Fletch’s voice in her mind. 

Fletch, she thought back. Where…

We saw the explosion, Alia’s voice said. We’re coming.

What’s going on Mo? Fletch asked. Your thoughts…

It’s… Sabin.

Sabin? 

Maegyn tried not to flinch away from the sound of both of their mental voices crying out to her at once. She didn’t attempt words, just sent a mental image back of what she remembered, of seeing Sabin’s bleeding wound. Of trying so hard to stop the bleeding even it was starting to seep through the fabric in her hands…

Her thoughts overwhelmed her, and she didn’t hear Fletch and Alia’s voices anymore until…

MAEGYN! Fletch’s thought pierced through her mind. We’re coming. We… we’re almost there. Just… have him hold on. Tell him to hold on. Please Maegyn. 

Please, Alia said, her mental voice no more than a whisper. Healers are on the way. Please just… keep him awake. 

Maegyn could hear the emotion in both of their voices. They were desperate. They were scared. The person that both of them loved so dearly was dying, and they weren’t here to do anything about it. 

There wasn’t much Maegyn could do either, at this point. But she was going to try. She needed to try. 

“You can’t die on us, Sabin,” she said softly. “You can’t die on them.”

She put all of her emotions into her words. Slowly, she pulled on the last remnants of her powers as she spoke her next words.

“So you have to do this, Sabin,” she said. “You have to stay awake.”

[a-shakespearean-in-paris]

Glad the storm didn't give you trouble! Also: #23 for the 200 word prompts, in an AU maybe?

Wow. I loved this one more than I thought I would initially. Thanks for it! Prompt 23 ahead: “Why did you spare me?” Surprise surprise ahead ;p

The morning before everything changed, he woke up, and everything made sense. Everything was all right in the world.Everything was where it should be.

It was anightmare that drew him from the fade, though that was to be expected. Theywould never allude him. At the very least his rank allowed him privatequarters, and only the walls of his room in the Gallows bore witness to hiscries. Yet he shook the nightmare of Uldred and Kinloch away, washed, anddonned his uniform as ceremoniously as he always did. He did so because it waswhat he had to do. What he would always have to do, to make the world safe. Hecaught a glimpse of the insignia engraved in his breastplate before he left.

This was his sacred duty.

Meredith hadcalled him into her office as well. Nothing unusual. There’s word of an apostate in the Wounded Coast. If they resist, kill them.Take Samson with you.

They alwaysresist, Samson said before they departed, though Cullen knew it was what Samsonalways told Meredith when he came back from a mission.

They arrivedat the Coast to the cave. Samson went one way, Cullen the other. Itwasn’t wise to split up but Samson had insisted. There was only one, he said. One would be easy enough. So Cullen traversed throughthe darkness, sword and shield in hand. Someone was there, that was abundantlyclear. The torches lit the way, and when he turned, he saw the light of a fire.It seemed whoever this apostate was, they wanted to be found.  He heard voices, whispers of templars thatmay find them, coming from a voice distinctly feminine. More than one, he realized, and she didn’tknow how right she was about that fact.

He woulddispel the area and tell them to surrender. It was the least he could do beforeSamson came, he knew that man wouldn’t be as merciful.

Later, bitterly he would laugh as he remembered, because he wokeup that morning and everything was as it should be. It was right. He knew hisduty. He knew. Yet when he saw this woman, this mage appear for the first time, fire pooling in her palm, he forgot everything until there was only her.

Dumbstruckhe stared. It couldn’t…it couldn’t really be…

Cliodna?

It wasimpossible. The woman from the book of stories his mother used to put him tobed with couldn’t really come to life from the page, be this woman no less.Not her, not this mage…

But Maker’sbreath she was looking at him with all the same determination as Cliodna, thewoman who had searched the lowlands, looking for her lover.What did thiswoman search for? Freedom perhaps, it was what all apostates wanted, andexactly what they couldn’t have.

They stared,neither one so much as breathing in this space that they created, the spacewhere the apostate and templar lay in wait, something more than distrust and blind hatred tangible in the air. Perhaps, he thought, it was fascination, or at least a mutual unwillingness to strike. However, just as Cullen kept his sword drawn and shield ready, the fire kept pulling in her hands, though the glow was growing dimmer anddimmer.

The fire mayhave dimmed in her palm, but in her eyes, blue as the deepest sea, grewbrighter. Such a contradiction that shouldn’t even have been possible: fire inthe sea of blue. Yet there it was.

Her hair wasa dark brown, long and to her back, loose and unruly. She wore the standardcircle robe, blue and unshapely as it was, though upon further inspectionCullen could see she filled out the robe rather well. She was rather tall, andher hips were well defined, as was her…

What was hedoing? Maker what was he doing? He should have dispelled her. If Samson hadfound her first he would have killed her for daring to draw fire upon him.

Yet Cullenwas struck with something. Something that made his heart pound a million beats. He woke upthat morning, and he knew his duty. He knew that if a mage ever dared to reignfire upon him, even so much as have it in their palms, ready to attack, thewould have to slay them. When Cullenwoke up that morning, he would have never known he would see this woman, mage,being that so perfectly emulated Cliodna, and allow his sacred duty to fall tothe wayside.

He would not strike her.

Slowly, hesheathed his sword. Slowly in turn, the fire in the woman’s hand died. Thetorch nearby illuminated her face however, the curve of her jawline, the upward flex ofher right eyebrow, the quizzical expression.

“Who areyou?” she breathed, her voice a deep contralto.

“My name isCullen,” he said, surprising himself. “I’m…I’m a templar.”

A lookcrossed her face, one that distinctly said, Really stupid? At least shegave him the curtesy not to say anything. Instead she crossed her arms, andoffered him her name. 

Her name wasLydia.

“Lydia,” herepeated, the name sounding strange on his tongue. “It…you should…”

Dammit, whatwas he doing? What was he…?

“Listen, Idon’t know why you didn’t strike, but—"

“Just go.”

Once he saidit he could not take it back. What surprised him though, was how much he didn’twant to take it back.

To the Makerand Andraste he did not wish to take it back.

She stared,mouth agape. “What? You’re not…”

“Go,” hecommanded. “Go before my companion arrives. If you flee now he won’t find youand you’ll live.”

She blinked,unbelieving. “I don’t—why are you sparing me?”

“Go!”

Shedisappeared to the back, and before he could shout at her she was going thewrong way she emerged with two others, a man and a female elf, the two of thembarely so much as glancing at him as they darted out.

Sheremained, staring into his soul.

“Thank you,”she said, and then as quickly as his eyes met the sea blue of hers, shewas gone again.

Cullenwaited for Samson to find him. “Well?” the other templar demanded.

Cullenmotioned to the dying embers of the fire. “Gone,” he said, and as Cullen walkedthe Wounded Coast, he prayed he would not find her.

Meredith told him not to fail again when they returned, and when she left him, Cullen laughed bitterly. 

He neverwould have suspected, when he woke up that morning, how that woman, Lydia, thewoman who reminded him of Cliodna would…

No, he didn’t actually…

Did he?

He prayed that night.He prayed the Maker would forgive him.

He was atHaven, scanning the requisition requests when he saw her, the woman with long,dark hair and blue eyes. The woman that reminded him of Cliodna.

He felt hisheart beat a million beats, he felt the world disappear until there was onlyher.

She wasworking with Sabine and the other healers, and he wondered how long it wouldtake her to recognize him. Maybe it was ridiculous of him, self-centered evento think she would recognize him.

She came tohim, soon after though. She was the one they sent to deliver the potions to histent. Mouth agape, she stared wide eyed.

Well, she did remember.

“You’re…Iremember you,” she stated, almost dropping the elfroot potions to the floor. “Youwere the templar in the cave in Kirkwall.”

“I’m not atemplar anymore,” he replied, feeling the reddening of his cheeks.

“I…I can seethat,” she replied, assessing his new attire, raising her eyebrows in approval. “That day. Why did you spare me?”

He wondered if she would bring that up again. A thousandreasons he admitted to himself, though not to her, and perhaps a thousand more he didn’t dare to admit even to himself. In truth he only knew the biggest reason. It was because she madehim remember. For once, he looked at someone and didn’t remember the bad fromhis past. Only the good. He didn’t think that would ever be possible. 

She made it possible, this woman, radiant, and almost like the sun as she stood in his tent. He felt himself smile, for the first time since this all began. 

Did he save her that day, he found her beautiful?

Skin kissedby the sun. Luxuriant dark hair. Eyes the deepest blue. Earnest and real.Perhaps the realest thing he had ever seen.

The morninghe woke up, the morning he met her, he didn’t know she would never leave his thoughts. 

He knew the answer to his previous question.

“I…I don’tknow,” he said instead. “I just thought…”

“Did youthink I was pretty?”

“I…no,” he stammered, feeling caught.  “Imean…Oh maker, it’s not that you aren’t, but—”

She laughed,and he thought that was the most adorable sound he had ever heard. “I’m onlyteasing,” she said.

“Why didn’t you attack me?” he asked in turn. “You had a ball of fire ready.” 

“I guess I didn’t want to,” she replied. “You looked…you looked sad that day. I don’t know. you didn’t even look like you wanted to attack.”

Maker’s breath, was she going to see right through him? “I guess I was sad,” he admitted, scratching the back of his neck. 

The silence that came between them was comfortable, as the two shared the same space. Not as a mage and templar this time. This time, they were only a man and a woman.

“You’re not a templaranymore,” she eventually said, breaking the silence. “Even though I’m still a mage. But here at least,in the Inquisition, I can help. I promiseI won’t tease you anymore. I mean, only if you want it. Oh Maker…” she blushed an angry red, and he was struck by how sweet the pop of pink looked on her cheeks. “I should go now anyway,” she garbled. “Sabine needs help. I’ll seeyou soon Commander Cullen.”

She leftafter that, leaving the smell of jasmine in his tent. And as he smiled like a great full, Cullen found himself thinking, that maybe, just perhaps, he would allow her to tease him anytime she wanted.

Whew. Okay guys I have to take a writing break for a bit now. Thanks for all the prompts again, and I’ll be back at it Wednesday evening when the GRE is DONE and DONE. Then I’ll be writing some giveaway prizes :) 

Likes and reblogs are the fuzzies of warmth :)

[anewbiegm]

Tales from Saturday RP

With a break in our usual A Song of Ice and Fire game, R, who plays Ser Percy ‘Big Train’ Clearwater, offered to run an Arcanis one-shot using their 5th Ed D&D version. Only N - Anthor ‘Shit-Heel’ Waterman - and R had ever played any Arcanis before and that was the older version using their own rulset, so we weren’t sure what to expect. At this point, @thewenglishwarlock has been running 5th Ed. longer than time itself has existed and would have probably chewed off her own arm to get a game of it, even if it was a F.A.T.A.L 5th Ed. conversion. Ok, maybe not, but you never know. 

Anyway, I’ve no idea what pre-written adventure it was that R ran, but there will be spoilers ahead.

The group is quite a diverse group Race-wise, Class-wise we’re fairly typical for a D&D party. 

Ai'konu'tlax-Ga ‘Lash’ - my Ss’ressen male Barbarian. I didn’t know too much about the setting so used a Warhammer Fantasy lizardman name generator for him, giving him a slightly Aztec sounding name. He wears very little clothing - Natural Armour + moderate Dex is always fun - and fights mostly with his tail. He carries a khopesh, but has only used that for clearing vines and plants, machete style. I was talked into Barbarian as it’s not something I ever really think of playing in games. Although I had GRAM in Shadow of the Demonlord who had some similarities here - they’re both 7+ feet tall, hulking brutes - I chose this guy to offset the amount of talking Garrick is doing in ASoIaF, whilst avoiding my usual roles of Magic, Stealth, or Magic/Stealth.

Sabine - @usmelinuk‘s Val’Sheem Bard. The Val are basically the settings equivalent of Aasimar. She wanted a character that was a bit more talky, and Bard is great for talky, lots of Skills, and has the added bonus of magic abilities. To top it all off, being a Val noble, she has access to the flintlock weaponry, so is running around with a fancy little pistol. 

Gwella - @thewenglishwarlock‘s Dwarf - I want to say Solani(?) enclave - Cleric of the Grave Domain. A tiny, and somewhat naive, healer off out exploring the wider world. Servant to the Goddess of the Underworld, yadda-yadda. 

Khangir - human Rogue, part swashbuckler, part duel-wielding mercenary. A northerner out for adventure and coin.

Theren - a Kelekene elorri wizard- NotElves! although they are more ‘Primal’ in their heritage. The two elorri in the Quickstart are Life and Fire, the Kelekene being the latter of the two. Seems knowledgeable about many things, although perhaps not quite so well travelled as others in the group. 

We’re introduced to each other - although Lash has been serving as Sabine’s bodyguard and retainer for some time - inside the yurt of the leader of the Ying-hir - NotMongols! of the setting - who believes his son has been killed during a coming-of-age ceremony in the wastes to the west. He had sacrificed himself, apparently in an attempt to distract marauding beasts that had attacked the group of boys, allowing the others to flee to safety, returning to the Ying-hir to tell the tale.

Supplied with travelling rations, the group heads out on the trail of his son. The journey is uneventful to begin with, the group slowly getting to know each other during the travel. On the horizon, several days out, a single dead tree sits in the wasteland, an iron cage hanging from one of the boughs. 

Suspicious, Lash and Khangir scouted ahead, allowing the others to hang back, their ranged weapons drawn and at the ready. Satisfied there are no immediate dangers, everyone regrouped at the cage. Inside, a robed, unconscious human, his hands cut off and the stumps crudely cauterised. Lowering the cage to the floor allowed Gwella the chance to tend to his wounds, calling on her Goddess - Beltine, the Goddess of Afterlife - she managed to rouse the human, many of his wounds healing before our eyes.

Waking, he explained he was an etzara - a spirit talker. In lands that are aggressively patrolled by the servants of Ymandragore, the Sorcerer-King, seeking out Arcane spellcasters, he took a great risk. Sadly, whilst it was not the harvesters who encountered him, he had still run afoul of those that took offence to his practices. Witch hunters, of which faith he didn’t seem to know, but he remembered vividly their pure white armour. They had demanded he renounce his heresy, and turn away from it. Refusing repeatedly, the pair of white-armoured witch hunters, hacked his hands off, and locked him into the iron cage, leaving him to die in the arid hinterlands. 

Angry at this act, we made sure the etzara was loaded with supplies and sent him on his way, whilst we continued on our hunt for the missing Ying-hir boy.

Sometime later, sounds of growling and chattering could be heard of a nearby rise. Charging over the low-rise, a bunch of hyena headed creatures are chattering to themselves, beside them and buried up to his neck is a man, his white armour scattered around the area/. The body of another man, clad in white armour lies dead a short distance away. 

The battle is short, and painful for Lash, taking several painful blows from a pair of the hyena beasts, thankfully the Dwarfen Cleric of of Beltine ensures he doesn’t visit her Halls before his time, and the group free the buried man.

A lot of arguing occurs, Sabine and Lash both think he should be put to death, Lash because he views him as a coward, and torturer, and Sabine for justice for his actions to the etzara. Ultimately, the group allows him to go free, burying his comrade. Glares, and dark thoughts plague the group as we all agree to rescue the missing boy before deciding whether we should part ways.

Eventually, we find the cave the boy was last seen running towards, it is marked by tattered strips of cloth and other decoration, the symbolism lost on our ignorant group. Clambering up the rocky slope, we venture in.

Inside, a small living space has been created, another robed man and a Ying-hir boy waiting for us. The man, another etzara explains the boy took shelter here after being chased by giant panthers. The boy, is the Ying-hir tribal leader’s son, but explains how he is ‘dead’, crossing the tattered banners a huge taboo for his people. The boy is given a choice, remain with the etzara as an apprentice - he seems quite keen on it - or flee into exile. Unsurprisingly he chooses the apprenticeship route, giving the group his familial ring, he asks us to pass it to his father as proof of ‘death’.

Heading outside, we’re confronted by a trio of panthers, one significantly larger than the others. Although some way off, they’re clearly waiting for us to descend, something about the ave an the banners keeping them away. 

A ferocious battle ensues, slashes, pounces and tail-whips abound. Inevitably, we triumph, Lash taking the head of the largest panther as a token for the Ying-hir leader, small recompense for the ‘death’ of his son at the paws of the beast. 

Our return is uneventful, the ring and head are received gratefully, and a reward of a Ying-hir riding horse - a princely gift - is provided to each of us. 

With little reason to remain in the Hinterlands, we head south, although not necessarily as a group, to Milandir, Lash’s birthplace, and more civilised lands. 

A quick introduction into Arcanis, it was ok. I had overestimated how good 18 A.C. was going to be at level 1, and as I’m the kind of player who gets to final section of a CRPG toting more potions than any 35,000 people could carry, I’d heavily rationed by Barbarian Rages, this lead to the slightly embarrassing situation of being taken down to 0 H.P. in our first fight. On the plus side, I’ve learnt from my mistakes and will be a bit less stingy with Rages in future. 

The issue with the Witchhunter did lead to some serious IC arguing and some OOC wondering about whether this party had the cohesion most of our RP groups do, but thankfully we’re still all adventuring together, at least for now. 

[sabinemorans]

Sabine had stifled a gasp of shock when she’d moved the hair from his face and saw the wound. He precious prince....that someone could do this to her fiancé, the man she was falling for and the PRINCE of this PLANET....it filled her with a fire that nothing could quench except the punishment of the perpetrators. But that was later. Now he needed her, he needed the healer, not the destroyer. Straddling him in the chair he was sitting on she leaned forward and licked at a little bead of blood that had escaped his hasty touch of dabbing with a cloth. She could taste him...practically his very soul and she hummed before summoning some alcohol and taking the cloth from his hands.

“I do but you don’t need to go collecting them for me,” she teased back and smiled. “But even you do I’ll be here to clean you up and kiss them. Every single one.” Her words spoken for her. She would always take care of him, she promised this with her eyes as she dabbed sogently at his shift.”

[shift and stroke] (Sab)

He blinked, feeling her soft fingers run up against his flesh. “I heard you like men with scars.” He joked, though couldn’t fully meat her eye. His hair covered most of the wound, but it did not erase the more than likely terrible scar that would be there to replace it.

Cassander swallowed, knowing how Sabine was… a picture of beauty in his mind. She had once thought that of him- would this change her feelings? Would this… this…

[taintedmagick]

@anderstheapostate​ ♥’d for a starter !

Slaying an archdemon was no easy feat, but that didn’t mean that the Grey Warden of legend was invulnerable to injury or pain. Sabine was seated backwards on a chair, biting down on her bottom lip as her fellow Grey Warden treated a wound she had received on her back. Every second Anders spent on the injury felt like an eternity and it wasn’t very long before she finally spoke through gritted teeth.

“Andraste’s pyre, Anders! from one healer to another, you are not very good at making the pain easy to deal with.”

[codynaomiswireart]

“Gauze in the Wound” - Part 22

Prepare for a bunch of confusing magic shenanigans. xP Just keep in mind: things are not always what they seem.

--------------------

Sabine frowned as her eyes scanned over her guests currently seated at the dinner table. While Donovan and Hilda swapped jokes loudly between each other, and dug into their meals like hungry foxes, Xavier and Queen Arianna looked miserable as they slowly ate away at their bowls of stew. The seat next to Xavier – the one that had been meant for Varian – was vacant, as the alchemist had refused to join everyone that evening, and instead had settled for a small cup of soup and a hunk of bread by the fireside in his room.

Sabine sighed, again glancing out the window to see if Pontus had returned from whatever errand he had rushed to take care of. But the only movement outside was the swaying of branches in the breeze, and a few clouds lazily making their way across the sunset sky.

“And then,” Hilda’s loud voice giggled as it crashed into Sabine’s wandering thoughts. “And then- Hehe! The parrot said, ‘No, I didn’t see a thing. I got so excited I fell off my perch!’”

Arianna glared at the two Saporians as they both began busting a gut at Hilda’s punch line. It seemed Xavier was also getting very tired of their company, as his fingers twitched from where they had curled themselves around the handle of his cane in clear irritation.

Sabine sighed again. The sooner the house was ready to return to Corona and everyone able go their separate ways, the better. Morning couldn’t come soon enough to the tense atmosphere of that house.

“I just hope Pontus is able to find us again,” Sabine thought as the mystery of his absence continued to nag at ther. “Whatever he’s up to.”

-----------------

Meanwhile, Ruddiger stirred from where he had been asleep in one of the armchairs next to the fireplace. After eating his own dinner, the raccoon had settled down to nap, listening to the sounds of the crackling fire and the clink of Varian’s spoon as he continued to slurp down his soup. But now, several minutes later, the raccoon peered around the room, and felt his senses struggle to wake up as he realized Varian was no longer there.

“Varian?” the raccoon chittered as he hopped down to the floor, and began to head towards the bedroom door. “Varian? Where did you-?”

Just then, Ruddiger had to leap back out of the way as the door to the bedroom flew open, and Varian came swiftly back inside, latching the door quietly behind him. Ruddiger blinked up at him, puzzled. Varian was no longer wearing his recovery clothes. Instead, he had on some traveling clothes (which he must’ve found somewhere in the house), and Ruddiger also noted that Varian’s bandages had all been removed. Also, if Ruddiger hadn’t known any better, he would’ve assumed Varian was acting like someone who had just been sneaking around.

But why would he do that?

“Varian?” Ruddiger chittered from behind, and Varian whirled round in alarm at the unexpected sound. As he turned, the boy also dropped something to the floor, and scrambled to pick it back up again before Ruddiger could get to it.

“Oh, Ruddiger,” Varian breathed as his hands closed around what appeared to be a hunk of chalk, or some other white material that Ruddiger was unfamiliar with. “Y-you scared me! You weren’t supposed to be-!”

Varian suddenly stopped himself, and Ruddiger cocked his head to one side as his eyes met his master’s. Again, something about them didn’t seem quite right, and Varian was acting very suspicious now.

“Varian,” Ruddiger tried to say, despite knowing that his boy couldn’t understand him. “You’re worrying me. What’s wrong? What were you doing?”

Varian shifted uncomfortably beneath Ruddiger’s gaze, biting his bottom lip, and wincing. He then walked back over to where some of their dinner scraps still were, and seemed to shuffle about with them a bit before sitting down in one of the chairs again, his plate in his lap.

“Ruddiger,” Varian then called softly, patting his lap for Ruddiger to sit with him.

Time seemed to slow down for Ruddiger as he found himself hesitating, and even having to resist the urge to take a step back as Varian beckoned him come. Something wasn’t right. Something was wrong. But Ruddiger couldn’t figure out what it was.

“Ruddiger?” Varian repeated, now with a hurt questioning in his voice. “C-c’mere boy, please?”

Ruddiger had once been warned by the other raccoons of the forest; about becoming too attached to a human. Once that happened, it would make you do things that no animal in their right mind would ever do. Any whiff of suspense, and any sensible creature would hightail it out of there to save their own skin. But humans seemed to have the strange effect of bringing out the unnatural in natural things (for good or for ill). Ruddiger had already felt it multiple times before now, and here, again, it was no exception. Ruddiger wanted to duck into a dark corner and hide, but he could tell that Varian was in some sort of inner distress, and apparently needed him. So, though a bit falteringly at first, Ruddiger shuffled his way across the floor, and leapt up onto Varian’s lap.

“Good boy Rudy,” Varian murmured as he began stroking his companion’s fur, and Ruddiger snuggled into him in return. A little while later, Varian began nibbling on the remainders of the hunk of bread on his plate, and then broke off bits of it for Ruddiger to tuck into as well. Ruddiger ate up the pieces gratefully, despite just having a full dinner only a little while before. Whether wild or tamed, his raccoon appetite always seemed to be ready for more, no matter how much he had eaten.

…That was when it dawned on him.

Ruddiger let out a startled sound as he felt his eyelids begin to droop, and his limbs grew sluggish and heavy. He now realized it was no coincidence that he had been napping shortly after supper before, and it wasn’t due to a food coma!

“NO!” Ruddiger thought through the fog that began to envelop his mind. “NO NO NO! VARIAN WOULDN’T! HE DIDN’T! WHY WOULD HE-!?”

“I’m sorry,” Ruddiger heard Varian whimper from above as the alchemist hugged him close to his chest. “I’m sorry Ruddiger! I’m sorry for everything!”

Ruddiger was so confused. What was happening? Why had Varian drugged him? What was going on!?

“Varian!” Ruddiger tried to cry out, but only a small, distressed squeal escaped his throat before he felt his voice fading away into oblivion as well.

“Shh! Shh, it’s ok Ruddiger,” Varian cooed as he stroked a hand down the raccoon’s back. “It’s ok boy. I know, I-I’m sorry. But I couldn’t risk…” Varian swallowed. “You’ve done so much for me already boy. It’s my turn now. I’ll make it right, ok? I promise. You just rest now, ok? I’ll…I’ll meet up again with you soon, all right?”

Ruddiger wanted to protest. Something was wrong! Varian was rushing into something again, and it was wrong! But it was getting harder and harder to think now, and Ruddiger knew it was a losing battle as he felt his eyes close, and he could hear Varian continue to mutter to him.

“It’s gonna be ok Ruddiger. It’s gonna be ok boy…It’s ok…good boy…I love you…”

-------------------

“You did the right thing, Puer Lunae” Varian heard the voice say to him reassuringly as he gently set Ruddiger down on the chair, the raccoon’s side rising and falling with deep, slow, sleeping breaths. Varian clenched his teeth together, refusing to let himself cry anymore. He hated tricking Ruddiger like this, but he didn’t want to risk him getting in the way of what he needed to do. And after all, if they succeeded, this whole incident wouldn’t matter either in the end.

But time right now was of the essence. Clearly, Ruddiger’s new powers made him recover from things like a drugged sleep much quicker than when he had been normal. But soon, if the plan went through, Ruddiger would be back to normal again. Everything would be normal again.

Varian sniffed, swiping a wrist across his nose, and after giving one last look at the sleeping Ruddiger, went over to the mirror hanging above his dresser. With tired, steely eyes, Varian gazed back into it, hating the reflection of the exhausted, injured boy that greeted him there.

“Well then?” the voice came again, and Varian saw Demanitus’s reflection join his own as it materialized beside it. “Shall we get started?”

Taking a deep breath to calm himself, Varian pulled the piece of enchanted chalk from his pocket, and reached a hand forward to draw upon the mirror’s surface.

-----------------------

Arianna stopped, raising an eyebrow as she looked at the mirror attached to the dresser in her room. By now, the sun had well set, and for a moment Arianna thought her eyes were playing tricks on her in the dim light as her reflection appeared to be in fragments upon it. But as she lit the nearby lamp and looked again, she now saw that the mirror was not fractured, but instead had some sort of white circular pattern drawn onto it. Arianna didn’t remember that being there before she had gone to dinner.

“What in the world?” Arianna thought as she began to extend a hand out towards it, but something about it made her pull back quickly in caution, and she felt a sense of dread and fear settle in her stomach. A moment later, a soft knock sounded at her door.

“Um…your majesty?”

It was Varian!

In haste, Arianna opened the door, and there stood Varian. Arianna was very confused when she saw him. Instead of being in his recovery clothes, Varian was dressed in ordinary traveling attire, with his goggles back upon his head, and his bandages removed to expose the dark burn marks beneath. Not only that, but he also had a fairly large, oddly shaped pack strapped across his back, and his sword hanging from his side in its scabbard.

“What is it Varian?” Arianna asked nervously. “What’s wrong? Why are you-?”

“Shh, your majesty, please,” Varian whispered, and looking up and down the hall to make sure they were alone. “Listen,” the boy began nervously, keeping his eyes downcast, “I…I’m sorry about being so rude to you earlier. But…I need your help now. Ruddiger…” Varian swallowed. “Ruddiger went running out into the woods a few minutes ago, and I think he wanted me to follow him. It might have something to do with Pontus or the moon stone or something. I don’t want to worry anyone else, and Xavier can’t walk very well yet, so I was wondering if…Well, if-if you would come with me? Please? I think Sabine went to the nearby pond to get water for the evening, so we can catch her there and let her know where we’re going. We can be back before we have to leave for Corona in the morning. But this really can’t wait. I…I think this is important.”

Arianna frowned. It really felt like something strange was going on, and of course she hadn’t forgotten the odd symbol on the mirror. But…this did sound like it was important, and if Ruddiger was guiding the boy along, they should probably take his instincts seriously. Ruddiger had, after all, been very reliable up to now.

“All right Varian,” Arianna said, stepping out further into the hallway. “I’ll come with you.”

Varian let out a breath of relief. “Thank you, your majesty.”

Quietly, the two of them made their way towards the front door of the house, with Varian poking his head into the living room to make sure no one was there.

“Right then,” Varian said, and grabbed Arianna by the wrist as he led her up to the front door.

“V-Varian, would you please-?” Arianna began, not entirely liking having him grasp her like this. But her words were cut off as, suddenly, Varian whirled about so that before Arianna could react, he had her pinned against the wall next to the door, and she could feel the edge of his sword settle at the side of her neck.

“Oh, don’t worry, your majesty,” Varian whispered behind her, and his now cool, confident tone making a cold chill run down her spine, and her brain reel as the situation began to sink in. “You know the drill. Just cooperate, and no one has to get hurt, right?”

Arianna took in a breath to scream, to yell, to shout; to do something to sound an alert. But as she did so, she got a whiff of a sickly-sweet smell that was beginning to grow stronger. In a panic, and not heeding for a moment the sword at her neck, Arianna tried to fight back at Varian before the sleeping draught could take hold, like the last time. But Varian was ready for her, and with reflexes quicker than Arianna had ever seen come from him before, Varian had knocked her down, yet somehow had also been able to catch her before she could hit the floor with a thud.

As he set her down quickly, Arianna could feel Varian tie a gag around her mouth, and tie her hands behind her back.

“Get up,” he now commanded her, hauling her up onto wobbly legs with one hand, and sheething his sword with the other. The drugs were not yet strong enough to make Arianna succumb to complete unconsciousness, but it did make her woozy, and though she tried to struggle against Varian, he now somehow seemed too strong for her.

“Now,” Varian said with a grin, as with his free hand he reached for the astrolabe mounted to the back of the front door. “Let’s get you home, shall we?”

--------------------------------

The first thing to come was a slight rumbling through the whole house. Xavier had been staring pensively into the fireplace of his room, but had been snapped out of his thoughts as he felt the house begin to vibrate and creak around him, the noise crescendoing rapidly. Then, Xavier heard someone in the house scream in agony, and then he found himself ducking out of reflex, nearly falling out of his chair as later he mirror above the fireplace suddenly shattered into a million pieces. Xavier sat there, panting, hardly daring to move as his mind scrambled to take in what just happened. The house continued to groan and vibrate around him, and somewhere someone was still screaming in pain. Very carefully, Xavier got up from his chair, his heart pounding as he stepped carefully over the bits of broken mirror now scattered about the floor, and giving his head, arms, shoulders, and legs a quick inspection as he made his way to the bedroom door.

Fortunately, it didn’t look like any shards of glass had lodged themselves into him, and he didn’t appear to be bleeding from any scratches. This did little to calm Xavier, however, as he could still hear the cries coming from somewhere in the building, and his going was unsteady as the floorboards shook beneath him.

As Xavier managed to open the door and burst into the hallway, he found himself coming face to face with Hilda, who was pale as a ghost and clearly as frightened as he was.

“What’s going on?” Xavier asked her.

“I-I don’t know,” Hilda said, and pointed with a quivering hand up the hall, “But Sabine, she-”

Xavier looked to where Hilda pointed, and saw Donovan kneeling beside Sabine, who lay whimpering in the corridor.

“Sabine!” Xavier cried, and rushed over to see what was wrong. As he gently turned her over so that he could see her face, Sabine had both hands clasped above her damaged eye, and tears were streaming down from her good one.

“What happened, Sabine?” Xavier asked, distressed at seeing Sabine in such pain. “What’s wrong? Why-?”

“Y-you have to stop him!” Sabine managed to yell through her sobs. “Xavier, it’s-it’s Varian, he’s-”

Xavier didn’t need any further prompting. Somehow, despite the chaos, and ignoring the pain in his leg, Xavier began to run as fast as he could to the safehouse’s front door.

“Varian!” Xavier shouted, trying to shove back the slew of fears that came crowding in on him. “Varian! Whatever you’re doing, stop! You have to-!”

But as Xavier rounded the bend in the hallway to the living room, the blacksmith stopped dead in his tracks as he saw Varian standing out on the veranda, the blue streak in his hair glowing a dull, threateneing hue, holding a bound Queen Arianna firmly in one hand, and holding his sword to her throat with the other. Beyond the veranda, in the dark, Xavier could see figures holding torches, and hear the soft snorting of horses and gasps of men in alarm.

“Hello, your majesty,” Varian shouted across the way to King Frederic. “I have a request I would like to make, if you don’t mind.”

 ----------------------------------

It took everything within Frederic to not lunge forward from where he stood behind Pete and the Captain as he saw Varian emerge from the safehouse with his sword at Arianna’s throat. The king felt his face flush with both rage and embarrassment as his fingers gripped tighter around the handle of his sword. They had all been tricked! They had all been fools! Of course Varian had been up to no good this whole time! He should’ve taken a company of men with him into Equis the moment they got word from Arianna. To heck with international diplomacy! He would’ve risked another confrontation with Trevor if it meant it could’ve prevented this.

But no, this was certainly not the time to kick himself about the “what could/would/should’ve been.” Frederic forced himself to take a steadying breath. He had to focus on the here and now.

In front of him, the Captain growled with outrage. “Varian!” he barked at him, raising his crossbow. “That’s enough! You’re outnumbered, and we’ve got you surrounded! Put down your weapon and put your hands in the air! NOW!”

“Excuse me,” Varian said cooly, not at all shaken by the Captain’s warnings. “But I was talking to the king, not to you.”

The Captain opened his mouth to give a retort, but was stopped as Frederic said from behind, “Easy, Captain,” and cautiously stepped forward between him and Stan. “What do you want Varian?”

“No need to be so tense, your highness,” Varian replied with a smug look. “I have a much more simple request than last time, I assure you. I only-”

“Varian, please!”

Varian stopped, rolling his eyes in irritation, as he looked over his shoulder to where Xavier stood in the doorway behind him, his eyes glistening with the tears he was struggling to hold back.

“Varian, listen to me,” Xavier pleaded with him, keeping his voice surprisingly calm despite the situation. “Whatever you’re doing, you need to stop. I know you’re hurt. I know you’re scared. I know you feel trapped and…and betrayed. But this isn’t right. This won’t help you. But it’s not too late to stop. You don’t have to do this. You can still come back from this. Whatever is wrong, we can figure it out, together. Just let me –”

Xavier’s words were suddenly cut off as Varian mumbled something under his breath, the streak of blue in his hair glowed a bit brighter, and a black rock erupted through the floorboards of the veranda, causing Xavier to stagger back into the house just before it could hit him.

Xavier stood in shock, mouth agape, and heart pounding hard in his chest. Varian had just tried to hurt him!

“Stay out of this old man!” Varian snapped at him, pinning Xavier beneath his cold gaze. “I don’t need your help!”

Frederic, Pete, the Captain, and even Arianna in her foggy state of mind all froze as they witnessed such a cold response from Varian towards Xavier. It seemed that he really had snapped again, and not even Xavier could reach him.

“Now, about my request,” Varian continued, as if nothing had happened. “It’s simple, your majesty, I assure you. All I want is your decree for my safe passage to Old Corona, where I will free my father, and then have safe passage out of the kingdom of Corona. Your spoken and written word on that in exchange for the queen. That’s all I ask.”

Frederic paused, both he and the Captain exchanging looks of uncertainty between them. This seemed too easy. Something had to be amiss. After all, this was Varian they were dealing with. They had to be missing some detail, but what?

“Ugh,” Varian sighed in exasperation at the silence that followed. “You all really are so suspicious, aren’t you? But,” Varian shrugged, “can’t say I blame you. Though perhaps though, this will help you make up your mind a bit quicker.”

At these words, Varian muttered under his breath again, and as his hair glowed again, several black rocks erupted from the ground nearer to the line of men, and Varian’s sword pressed further into Arianna’s neck.

“STOP VARIAN!” the king shouted. “All right, all right, I’ll-I’ll give you the decree!”

“Very good,” Varian purred, the light dimming from his hair, and the black rocks receding back into the ground.

With shaky hands, Frederic reached into his saddlebag for pen and paper, with the Captain remaining close at his side.

“Sire!” the Captain whispered urgently. “I don’t like this! Perhaps we should try to stall for a while and see if-”

“No, Captain!” Frederic hissed back, though brought his tone back down as he continued. “I don’t doubt that something could be amiss here. But if this is indeed all that Varian wants, this may be our only chance of getting out of this without Arianna or anyone else getting hurt. We’ll have time to figure out more later.”

The Captain frowned, though conceded with a reluctant nod as Frederic began to draft his decree. Something was missing, but what? The Captain couldn’t figure it out.

“Varian,” Xavier tried again as Varian waited for the king to finish his draft. “Why are you doing this? We would’ve gone to Old Corona anyway if you-”

“I don’t want to hear it,” Varian growled, shooting Xavier a threatening glare over his shoulder. “Just back off you, you hear?”

“But Varian-” Xavier tried to argue, but Varian only responded with yet another threatening glow from his hair.

…And, Xavier thought he saw, a glimmer of green also showing from somewhere within odd bundle on his back.

“Here you are, Varian,” Frederic said before Xavier could think on this further. “Signed by both myself and the Captain, and in the presence of the surrounding witnesses, I decree by royal authority that you have safe passage to Old Corona, and from there to the eastern border of Corona. Trying to go elsewhere within our borders will result in your immediate arrest, and at the crossing of our borders, you will immediately be considered an exile of Corona. Any attempt at unauthorized reentry will result in your immediate arrest.”

There was a full silence as Frederic finished his degree. “Do you have any questions, Varian?”

Varian smiled, “None at all, your majesty.”

“Then let Arianna go!”

With another shrug, Varian pulled Arianna to her feet, and lead her across the yard to where he, the Captain, and the king met in the middle. It was a tense moment as the exchange was made, but, indeed, Varian cut Arianna’s bonds, and released her as Frederic handed the sealed decree over to Varian.

“Arianna, darling!” Frederic breathed as he held her close. “Are you ok? Are you hurt?”

Arianna shook her head, burying her face into her husband’s chest as the whole ordeal left her shaken.

“Right,” Varian said, and striding confidently towards the edge of the Molson’s Grove. “I’ll be off then.”

“Hey!” the Captain snapped, again pointing his crossbow at Varian. “Stop right there! We promised you safe passage, Varian! We said nothing about letting you go on your own!”

“You didn’t say I couldn’t either, did you?” Varian asked with a smirk, raising his sword skyward.

“GET HIM!” the Captain shouted, and the closest of the soldiers bravely charged towards Varian. However, before anyone could reach him, Varian again chanted to himself (this time Arianna and Xavier recognizing it as the awaking spell from before), and Varian’s hair glowed, his sword burst into moonlight, and then he smashed it into the ground, causing a whole wall of black rocks to spring forth around the grove, completely fensing everyone inside.

“VARIAN!” Xavier cried, as he dashed over to the wall of rocks, knowing that pounding against it was useless, but he did so anyway, with many of the guards also joining him in the attempt.

“VARIAN, STOP, PLEASE!” Xavier shouted, managing to catch sight of Varian through one of the tiny gaps in the rocks. The boy made eye contact with Xavier briefly before narrowing his eyes, grinning wickedly, and then making his way into the dark forest beyond towards Old Corona.

“Varian…”

-----------------------------

For the second time that night, Ruddiger opened his bleary eyes as his senses came back to him.

“Varian!” Ruddiger immediately remembered as he returned to the waking world, and the raccoon rushed over to the door to the bedroom to run after his boy, wherever he had gone.

Ruddiger’s paws twisted at the handle, but it wouldn’t budge. He had been locked in!

“No…” Ruddiger thought, panic beginning to seize him as he frantically went from window to window, finding all of those locked as well.

“Varian, you idiot!” Ruddiger screamed, bristling with fury and worry. Frantically, Ruddiger, began looking around for anything that might help him shatter one of the windows, and as he looked, he stopped as he noticed something odd.

The mirror above Varian’s dresser was gone.

“But, why would…?” Ruddiger thought in confusion.

…And that was when he heard it.

“HELP ME!” Ruddiger heard a voice call to him, and Ruddiger flinched as it sounded behind him. Whirrling round, Ruddiger looked all around, but couldn’t see anyone.

“PLEASE!” the voice repeated. “SOMEONE! HELP ME!”

Ruddiger immediately began calling back, sniffing and spinning in circles where he could hear the voice coming from in the middle of the room, trying to get to its unseen source. For now – though he could not entirely understand how – Ruddiger knew.

He knew it was Varian. He knew he was in trouble. And he knew, somehow, that Varian was here!

[codynaomiswireart]

“Gauze in the Wound” - Part 21

Thank you all SO much for your patience as this chapter has taken a long time to come out! I know it was a long wait, and I'm hoping that I can update things more regularly in the future. However, irl matters take priority, so things may not be totally smooth, but I am determined to continue this story and bring it to a conclusion. Thank you all again for the patience, and I hope you enjoy this next portion!

A special thanks also to everyone who has encouraged me over the last few months, and to @celestialspoon who helped proofread a portion of this chapter. Thank you!

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“As long as what you are afraid of is something evil, you may still hope that the good may come to your rescue. But suppose you struggle through to the good and find that it is also dreadful? How if food turns out to be the very thing you can’t eat and home the very place you can’t live, and your very comforter the person who makes you uncomfortable? Then, indeed, there is no rescue possible: the last card has been played.”

~ Perelanda by C. S. Lewis

“For in grief nothing ‘stays put.’ One keeps on emerging from a phase, but it always recurs. Round and round. Everything repeats. Am I going in circles, or dare I hope I am on a spiral?” ~ C. S. Lewis, A Grief Observed

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After some seconds of tense stillness between them, with Varian’s eyes still fixed firmly on his lap, Xavier finally moved at the edge of the boy’s peripheral vision.  A second later, this movement was followed by the familiar sound of tea being poured into a teacup.  What had once been a sound of comfort to Varian now only served to make his stomach tighten uneasily due to how disjointed and wrong it all felt now.  Hardly knowing why, Varian responded to this by reaching forward with tense fingers to grab hold of the paper napkin that had been placed next to his plate of pastries, and drew it back into his lap.  Instead of laying it open across his lap, however, Varian crinkled the napkin in his fists, and his fingertips began twisting it with slow, deliberate movements.

After hearing his cup and saucer placed before him with a delicate clink, Varian at last made to speak.

“Are you hurt?” Varian asked, in a tone somehow simultaneously flat yet also with a hint of concern in it as his eyes darted briefly to Xavier’s cane.

“I’m…a bit sore,” Xavier replied, shifting in his seat a little.  “It was due to all the walking though, not…not to you.  Don’t worry.  I’m just not as good on my feet as I used to be. Especially with my bad leg.”

“Hmm,” Varian hummed, and Xavier felt himself tense up inside as he detected a hint of sarcasm creeping into his apprentice’s voice now.

“I didn’t know you had a bad leg,” Varian stated as one hand left his lap in order to pick up one of the pawn pieces on the chessboard. Varian seemed to study it with a detached coolness as he turned it over and over in his gloved fingers, and his napkin fluttered off his lap onto the floor, forgotten.  “There’s a lot I don’t know about you, apparently.  Though you seem to know plenty about me – even more so than I do.  So, when was ‘black rocks conjuring’ supposed to become part of the curriculum you had in mind, huh?  Or maybe you’d like to tell me about how you knew in the first place?  You did know after all, right?”

Here Varian gave Xavier a piercing sideways look as he waited for his mentor to answer.

“I…had a hunch-” Xavier began hesitantly, but his words were cutoff as Varian suddenly stood up from his chair, and with a frustrated grunt chucked the pawn piece he had been holding out into the line of trees next to the safehouse.  After hearing the piece land somewhere in the foliage, Varian overturned the chessboard with a crash, and the remaining pieces upon it went spilling out onto the lawn. By now, Ruddiger had leapt down from his perch on the back of Varian’s chair, and had taken shelter underneath the table – hiding behind the long tablecloth that hung down to just above the wood floor.  Xavier, meanwhile, didn’t move the whole time as Varian flipped the board, and then paced around for a moment as he combed his fingers through his hair, clearly livid.

“A hunch!?” Varian hissed as he came to a stop in front of Xavier, now looking his mentor in the face as he yelled.  “No!  Don’t play games with me!  I’m sick of it already!  A. Hunch!?  Oh ho!  Ooooh no no no no no!  You mean like how you just happened to have a ‘hunch’ about the hummingbird, or about Demanitus steel, or-or about…about everything!?  And what about the books, huh? Yeah, don’t think I didn’t notice!  Corona history, legends, folklore, brewing, Newton’s laws about the moon’s orbital variance, and the other planets-?”  Varian had been counting out on his fingers harshly as he rattled off the different subjects Xavier had given him to read over the last couple of months, and now the boy clenched his hands into fists again as he thought aloud.  “I knew there was a pattern!  I knew it!  It wasn’t just random was it!? From day one – DAY. ONE. – you knew something was up about me!  You knew!  And you didn’t tell me!  Just like Rapunzel, just like the king, just like Dad-…”  Varian swallowed hard at those words, but then managed to choke out bitterly, “Nobody tells me anything!”

To punctuate it all, Varian turned away and kicked over his empty chair, his chest heaving with hard, angry breaths as it clattered to the floor.  Varian leaned against the veranda’s railing, not heading for the moment the pain it caused his burned hands as he gripped it tight, and his eyes fixed angrily on the chess pieces strewn about on the grass below him.

“Do you have any idea Xavier?”  Varian asked, his voice suddenly dropping to almost a whisper, though still maintaining an ice-cold edge.  “Do you have any idea what it’s like?  To just be a pawn in the game to everyone?  To be used?  Do you have any idea what it’s like to hear…?”  Varian shuddered at the memory.  “…To hear them?  Hundreds- no, billions of songs?  Out there?  And-and in here?  All at once?”  Varian clasped a hand tight around the fabric of his shirt, right above his heart.  “Trying to sift through them?  Trying to hear that resonance and to feel like…l-like you’re…”

Varian’s voice trailed off.  Words failed him now.  How could he put into words what he had experienced that night?  How could he make anyone know?  How could he make them understand?

“You can’t,” a voice seemed to tell him in his thoughts.  “None of them can understand.  Not even him.  You are all alone.  Just like before.”

“…How could you?” Varian asked Xavier bitterly over his shoulder, peeling off a glove as he said it, exposing the bandages and gauze beneath, and holding it up for them both to see.  “How could you do this to me…?”

A cool breeze wafted through the glade in the silence that followed, and Varian wasn’t sure if it was the cold edge of the air or of his words that made a shudder run down his spine. He felt sick. He felt tired. He just wanted his dad. He just wanted to go home. He didn’t want any magic. He didn’t want to be burned. He didn’t want to be pulled along on a string by others in the name of “destiny.” But here he was. And it was those whom he had trusted the most in his life who had brought him here.

“…I’m sorry…” Varian heard Xavier murmer behind him. Varian thought he had detected a hitch in the blacksmith’s voice as he spoke, but that made very little difference to the alchemist in that moment. While just saying those two words already brought Xavier further than most anyone else who had wronged Varian so far, it still didn’t feel like nearly enough to make up for anything. Despite whatever emotion may have been behind them, those words felt like nothing compared to the words Xavier had uttered the other night, and that had changed Varian’s life forever. Two words, three simple syllables, like the puff of wind that they were – there one moment and then gone the next. Meanwhile, the scars from before remained, and continued to ache and sting.

Varian’s mouth formed a tight line as he flexed his bandaged fingers, and then gingerly slid his glove back over them.

“‘Sorry’ doesn’t cut it,” Varian hissed as his eyebrows pinched together, and he hunched his shoulders defiantly as he looked out at the dark forest around them with a steely gaze.

“…I know,” Xavier said, feeling Ruddiger brush up against his shin reassuringly from underneath the table…and also remembering the sight of Mila holding up her own bandaged hand for him to see all those years ago. Xavier winced at the memory, and felt a rock of guilt settle in his gut again at how history had repeated itself in such a dreadful way.

“I…I hurt you, Varian,” Xavier continued, as Varian’s form went rigid in response to his words. But Xavier forced himself to keep talking as he swallowed passed a lump in his throat. “Y-you have every right to be angry with me. While they were only suspicions that I had and not certainties, I should’ve been more honest with you about them, and I shouldn’t have thrust such a burden on you without warning. I did not know that the magic would react the way it did, but I know that doesn’t excuse my actions or make things any less painful. I wasn’t sure how to tell you, and I had thought that such a thing could wait to be addressed until after…until after we had forged the sword and freed your father from the amber. But then the Saporians had us captured, and I figured if my hunch was right, it would give us our best chance of escape. I never wanted-”

“Tch!” Varian chuffed. “Yeah, you didn’t want something. Well, guess what? Maybe I didn’t want any of this.” Here Varian turned around, and gestured again to the bandages and also the blue streak running through his ebony hair. “Did you ever think about that?”

Xavier kept eye contact with his apprentice for a moment longer, before gently turning his face away to stare into his teacup. “I am sorry, Varian,” Xavier repeated. “I…I know you wouldn’t have chosen to have this happen to you, and I know those are just words, but…I don’t know what else to say. You did not choose for things to be this way, but very few heroes ever really choose-”

“Whoa, wait wait wait, excuse me!?” Varian snapped, causing Xavier to look up again sharply as the boy’s temper took over once again. “Heroes? Really!? Are you-? Oh, come on old man!” Varian hardly flinched as he addressed Xavier in such a disrespectful manner. He was too angry to care about that now. “Did you seriously think-? This isn’t one of your dumb story books you know! This is real life! And-and were you seriously just play-acting with me this whole time? Trying to bring one of your stupid legends to life? You told me that you thought I could bring Demanitus steel ‘back from legend!’ Ha! Well, congratulations Xavier, you got your wish! I fulfilled the purpose you had in mind for me, and your project is complete! Because that’s all that I ever was to you, right? You knew, and that’s why you asked me to be your apprentice! I was just-just your project, right? A way to bring your dreams to life!? To be a pawn in your game!?”

For the first time now in the conversation, Xavier began to look stern himself as he looked Varian straight in the eyes. “Varian, that’s not true.”

“Oh, isn’t it?” Varian retorted with a hollow chuckle in his voice. “Then why else would you offer to take me on as an apprentice, huh? I’ll tell you why! It wasn’t because I ‘needed help’ as you told me before! No! It was because you needed me stable enough to get the job done, right? Your ‘hunch’ told you I could do it, and you made sure I could! That was really it, right? Why else would you offer to help someone like me!?”

Xavier paused, clearly thinking over his words carefully. He then swallowed hard, and spoke. “…Because I cared about you, Varian, and my own actions had become intertwined in your life. I had a hun- …I thought that it may be possible for me to do something to help you. I am sorry for my mistakes, Varian. I know I have not been a perfect mentor to you. But I did want to help you. Powers or not, the ability to create Demanitus steel or not – I…I wanted you to be my apprentice. And I-”

But Varian had heard enough. Though Xavier couldn’t see it as Varian’s back was towards him, Varian had winced harder and harder as Xavier went on, and now he couldn’t bear anymore. It made no sense! Why should Xavier care about him? They had hardly even seen each other at all before the catastrophe with the mood elixir or his trial and all the rest of it, and most of what little time that was had hardly been Varian’s best moments. Xavier must have been lying! What other rational motiviation could there have been for the man to help him and care about him beyond what Varian had just reasoned himself?

…He must’ve been right after all. And with what Lord Demanitus had told him…

“It doesn’t matter anyway,” Varian murmured to himself, thinking aloud. Varian could practically feel Xavier’s eyes boring into his back as the blacksmith caught Varian’s words, causing his voice to die in his throat. Varian sighed as he said a bit louder, “None of it will matter soon.”

Varian didn’t dare look behind him to see Xavier’s expression, but he felt he detected first a moment of hurt on the part of the blacksmith…and then suspicion, as Xavier asked cautiously, “...What do you mean by that, Varian?”

Varian gave Xavier as blank a look as he could muster over his shoulder, trying to ignore the aching inside him as he saw the hurt clearly glistening in his mentor’s eyes. “What?” Varian found himself asking in a dry taunt. “I’d have thought you’d have a hunch about that, too, right?”

Xavier felt his heart turn cold at these words, and as he looked into Varian’s eyes. Something about them in that moment didn’t seem quite right. And had Varian just given him a threat? Xavier wasn’t sure. Though now, for the first time ever since he had met him, Xavier couldn’t help but feel afraid of Varian for a split second as his words sank in, and his apprentice blinked back with tired yet angry eyes.

After what felt like an eternity, Varian broke the moment of tension as he turned on his heel and stormed his way off the veranda, and headed off into the woods at the edge of the clearing – never looking back as he headed for the deer trail that snaked its way into the shadows beyond. Behind him, Ruddiger peered out from beneath the white tablecloth, and then mustered up the courage to follow his master into the forest, but not before giving a sad look up at Xavier as he scurried off through the tall grass. Xavier, meanwhile, furrowed his brow in concern and sorrow as he watched Varian’s back disappear in among the trees, and their tea and pastries were left cold and untouched where they left them on the table.

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Sabine knew that Varian wouldn’t go far. Even if he had wanted to, his condition wouldn’t have allowed it. Of course, Sabine couldn’t help but overhear portions of Xavier and Varian’s conversation with one another (well, more like a tirade on Varian’s part). Everyone in the cottage had heard Varian’s shouts and the sounds of the chess board and chair being flipped over. Now, as things quieted down and Varian had stolen himself away, Sabine ventured back out to where Xavier sat alone on the veranda. Wordlessly at first, Sabine began cleaning up the mess that Varian left – setting the chair back upright, and collecting the chess pieces scattered about on the grass.

“Oh, I-I’m sorry Sabine-” the healer heard Xavier begin, and noted the sound of a chair being pushed back as the blacksmith made to rise and help. But Sabine cut him off.

“Now now, don’t you fret, Xavier,” Sabine said with a wave of her hand, gesturing for him to remain seated. “This isn’t the first time this old chess set has taken a bit of a beating. Will be all set in just a moment.”

As Sabine gathered up the pieces strewn about the lawn, she gave Xavier a quick glance before asking, “So, do you then?”

Xavier stared at the healer, confused by her question. “What?”

“Do you indeed have a hunch about what Varian meant just now?”

Xavier blinked, and then frowned. He honestly felt too miserable and guilt-ridden to try to think too hard about anything Varian had just said. And really, Varian’s statement may not have meant anything beyond telling Xavier to get lost, and that once Quirin was free, that would be the end of Varian associating with him anymore. Yes, that was most likely what it was.

Xavier told Sabine as much, and the magician pursed her lips as she pondered this idea. “I suppose that’s possible,” Sabine replied as she packed the chess set back into its box. “But I can’t help but wonder if there’s more to it than that. I still don’t like how Pontus encountered that presence of dark magic within him, and while I haven’t been able to detect anything else like that in him since, I don’t think we’re out of the woods on that yet. Er, so to speak,” she said, glesturing with a nod to where Varian had gone in among the trees.

Xavier gasped. “Sabine, do you think Varian is in danger?” he asked worriedly. Sabine paused before she answered carefully, “The Moon Drop holds mysterious powers, Xavier. It’s not like the Sun Drop. The moon itself has both a light and a dark side. The same may perhaps be said of the Moon Drop. I’m not certain, for like you, my knowledge about this particular magic is sparse at best. What I do believe though is that Varian is potentially very dangerous, and so we must be viligent around him. Especially with Pontus running off to who-knows-where, and leaving some of his power with Ruddiger in his stead, I get the feeling that there may be something deeply amiss here, and so we must be ready.”

Xavier made to stand up again, grabbing his cane. “Then why are we standing here? We must go after him!”

“I wouldn’t if I were you,” Sabine said calmly as she began to gather up the tea things again.

“But you just said-!”

“Please, calm yourself Xavier,” Sabine said gently, and giving a sad smile. “I don’t believe anything will befall us just now. Varian would be lucky to conjure even a single black rock right now, let alone a whole swathe of them. He still needs to recover, and by this time tomorrow we’ll be back in Corona anyway where he can be put under secure conditions to keep him and everyone else safe.”

Xavier’s eyebrows scrunched together, then he said with clear distain, “He’ll be back in chains you mean.”

“Not if I can help it,” Sabine said as she picked up a tray. “While he’s under my roof, Varian is in neutral territory. I can assure you Xavier that, before I let him leave here, I’ll do all that I can to make sure we negotiate the best possible conditions for him to be returned under once we arrive at Molson’s Grove. I can’t guarantee an ideal outcome, but I’ll do my best. With your help of course.”

Xavier sighed deeply. “My help?” he asked with a hollow laugh. “What help have I been able to give? I’ve only made more of a mess of everything.”

Sabine stood silently for second, looking back at the line of trees where Varian had vanished, and then back at the old blacksmith. “Perhaps,” she said, “you may have done more good than you think, old friend. You may not see it now Xavier, but give it time. Varian needs to be alone right now, and he needs time to heal, to think, and to forgive. And honestly…” Sabine gave another sad smile. “I think before he can forgive anyone else, he needs to learn how to forgive himself, too.”

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“Are you certain about this my lord?” the little bat asked as she hung down and began loosening one of the silver apples from the great tree. “Creatures like him aren’t usually known for their loyalty or dependability.”

“Now now, Idun,” Pontus replied. “It’s not fair to generalize like that, now is it?”

Idun shrugged. “I’m just saying, I’m surprised you’re opting to chose him to wield such abilities as opposed to another. Raccoons can be quite mischievous beasties, and can be quite selfish by nature.”

“Oh, I don’t know about that,” Pontus said. “But even if that were true, this one is different, I can assure you.”

Idun sighed. “Being diplomatic I see. As usual.”

Pontus snorted playfully, causing Idun to flutter her wings in annoyance, much to Pontus’s amusement. He knew he mustn’t tease her too much though. Like Sabine, Idun could be quite intense about her work, but it was only because she really cared and took her job seriously. As one of the guardians of the enchanted silver apples, it was only natural that she would want to make absolutely sure that they were being used for the right purposes. The other bats who guarded the glade fluttered to and frow in the sky above them – some zipping into the nearby caves to tend to their young, while the others worked busily to keep away any unwanted pests from the fruit trees, and others to pollinate those that were in bloom.

After a moment, the branch jerked as Idun managed to pluck the apple from its place on the tree, and the little fruit fell to the ground with a soft thud.

“Thank you Idun,” Pontus said with a nod, and bent down to pick up the fruit by the stem.

“I just hope you know what you’re doing my lord,” Idun said from where she hung upside down, looking at Pontus with her deep, black eyes, and with concern creeping into her high-pitched chirpings. “Something dark is coming, isn’t it?”

Pontus paused, not saying anything.

Idun’s ears twitched. “I see…Then all speed and good fortune to you, friend. Be sure to let us know if we can be of any further assistance. And…be careful, alright?”

Pontus nodded, and after making sure he had a firm grip on the invaluable piece of fruit, he went bounding off again into the thick woods.

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Ruddiger found Varian a few yards up the trail where the boy had stopped to sit beside a small pool, which bubbled with a gently flowing waterfall at the opposite side. With a small coo of greeting, Ruddiger nosed his way beside Varian, and settled himself down next to his friend. Ruddiger had remembered what Pontus had told him about not leaving Varian’s side, and Ruddiger didn’t want to let the wise stag down. Varian didn’t push Ruddiger away, though he also didn’t acknowledge him as he kept his eyes firmly fixed on the ripples spreading across the water’s surface, and kept his arms wrapped around his knees which he had pulled up to his chest.

Ruddiger’s ears drooped down as he looked up at Varian’s face. He didn’t know what Varian was thinking, but it was clear that whatever it was wasn’t good. For a while, Varian looked angry, then he looked simply bewildered, and then sad. Ruddiger turned to look across the pool before them. A few dragon flies flitted among the water lilies, and a frog made a droning, croking noise before diving into the water. Ruddiger felt his spirit lighten a little. It was a pretty little nook in the woods. No wonder Varian wanted to stop here a while. Ruddiger rubbed himself affectionately against Varian’s side, and turned to peer up at him with an encouraging expression.

But Ruddiger’s mouth fell open as he saw Varian’s eyes glistening with tears. Varian took a shaky sigh. “I didn’t mean it…” Varian whispered, before burying his face into his knees.

“Oh dear,” Ruddiger thought with dismay as he gently climbed up onto Varian’s shoulders, and lay his head atop Varian’s as he stroked his paws comfortingly through the boy’s hair, trying to be gentle and not cause further pain to the burns along Varian’s scalp.

Varian didn’t sob, but he did sniffle a little. He was angry. He was hurt. But he was also sad. “I didn’t mean it,” he thought again to himself. About what exactly he wasn’t sure. About what he had told Xavier – about how nothing that happened between them mattered anymore? Or about what he did to the queen? Or to Corona? Or to Ruddiger? Or to Dad? All of the above?

No. It couldn’t be all of the above. He had meant some of it at least. He had meant to kidnap the queen, he had meant to transform Ruddiger into a monster on that dreadful night, and he had been honest with Xavier about his doubts concerning the blacksmith’s sincerity in taking him on as his apprentice. And, if what Demanitus said was true…he had also meant how none of what happened had mattered. Well, at least, how it wouldn’t matter.

Still, Varian couldn’t help but feel a twinge of regret as he thought back on his words. He hated being kept in the dark. He felt justified in being angry. But…did Xavier have a point? After all, the magic did get them out of a pretty tight jam. It really had been a last resort option. And even if Xavier had tried to tell Varian about it all before, would he have even believed him?

Varian sighed, bringing his face up to wipe away his tears…and then stopping, with his heart leaping into his throat, as he saw the face of Lord Demanitus staring back up at him from the shallows of the pool. Varian froze, unsure of what to do, as the man’s reflection stood side-by-side with his own, and Varian began to “hear” a humming sound just on the edges of his perception. Ruddiger also noted Varian’s sudden change in demeanor, and began to chitter inquisitively to him.

“Varian…” Varian thought he heard someone call to him. But who, and from where? He did not know.

“Varian…Varian…”

“Varian?”

Varian started, whipping round as he felt a hand lay on his shoulder, and raised a hand in reflex, with his fingers spread in a gesture as if to summon one of the black rocks. But only the slightest glow flickered from the blue streak in his hair as he went through the motion, and no black rocks appeared. Which was fortunate, as the one who would’ve been right in the way of them was Queen Arianna herself, who had knelt down beside Varian, and now raised a hand as if to shield herself from a potential strike.

For a poignant moment, both Varian and the queen sat there frozen in their respective positions. Varian wasn’t sure he liked it – the feeling of having someone shield themselves from you like that. The fact that it was Arianna also made him think of other terrible things, but Varian shoved those away as he scooted himself away from her a little, and curled himself into a ball again, looking away from Arianna and at the ground.

“What are you doing here?” Varian asked tersely, still feeling his heart beating hard against his breastbone.

“I just wanted to see if you were alright,” the queen answered, settling herself down in a sitting position next to him. Varian snorted. He knew everyone and their dog must’ve heard the argument he and Xavier just had, but he did wish that everyone would leave him alone about it right now. But he couldn’t muster up the gumption to tell the queen to go away. Nor did he acknowledge her presence further either as he picked at a few blades of grass at his feet.

A long, awkward silence passed between them.

“Um, Varian?” the queen then began again from beside him, her tone sounding unsure of herself for once. “Do you…know what day it is today?”

The question was so unexpected that for a moment Varian forgot to be surly, and turned to look at the queen in clear puzzlement. “No. Why?”

Arianna shifted uneasily, and it was now that Varian noticed that Arianna held in her hands a small box. Arianna bit her bottom lip for a moment before continuing. “Well, it’s not today exactly that I mean. Rather, it was the other day, when you and Xavier finished the sword, and you.... Anyway, it occurred to me as I looked at the calendar in Sabine’s house. I just remembered that…well…”

Arianna’s voice trailed off, then she took a deep breath and said gently. “It had been your birthday, Varian. You’re fifteen years old now.”

Varian couldn’t help but give a look of utter surprise. He was fifteen years old now! And he never even noticed when his birthday came and went. Varian supposed that Arianna had hoped this reminder would serve to cheer Varian up a little – to take his mind off of other things. But it only made him feel yet another sting in his gut as – yet again – it made everything feel more off balance again. Varian was getting to be too old for birthday parties, but even then, if life were normal, he would’ve been home celebrating with his dad. Not desperately crafting fairytale blades and summoning moon-powered rocks.

Varian turned away again. “So?” he asked bitterly.

“W-well,” Arianna stammered, her fingers tightening around the box as she saw that her approach was not going according to plan. “I…I didn’t think it right for it to go by unnoticed, and you were so brave the other day. I wanted to thank you for what you did. So…I wanted to bring you a gift.”

Arianna gently held out the box towards Varian, who looked at it with a raised eyebrow. Was the queen really trying to do this now? …It made him think of Princess Rapunzel, and Varian didn’t like that. Despite his sour thoughts though, Varian could feel Ruddiger give him a gentle pat on the head, encouraging him to take the parcel that the queen held out to him. “Go on,” Ruddiger tried to convey with soft chitters. “Take it.”

With a small huff, Varian took the box from Arianna’s hands. It wasn’t wrapped. It didn’t even have a ribbon on it. Varian was relieved though. Such things would’ve made this all feel even more forced than it already did. Varian supposed that Arianna got the box from Sabine and, very likely, whatever the present was as well. As Varian lifted the lid, he was immediately struck by the faint scent of chamomile tea. A small pouch inside – about the size of a pocketful – undoubtedly contained the blend inside it. The second object inside the box was a small leatherbound notebook. Opening the notebook, Varian found all of the pages to be blank, save for one – the title page. Though instead of bearing a title, the page contained the words:

“Plus est en vous”

“There is more in you,” Varian translated in his head.

“I…I hope the tea is alright,” Arianna began as Varian stared at his gifts. “I wasn’t quite sure which blend you liked best, but Sabine said you could trade it for another if you wished.”

Varian sat silently for a moment; his expression unreadable. Then he put both the tea and the notebook back in the box, set it beside him, and buried his face in his knees. For a moment, Arianna and Ruddiger were worried that Varian would start crying again, but the boy only remained still.

“Varian-” Arianna tried again.

“Just go, your majesty” Varian hissed tersely, keeping his face buried. “Please.”

Wincing sadly, Arianna got up quietly. For a moment, she felt like she ought to try to say more. She opened her mouth, but any words died in her throat. Feeling very contrite, Arianna simply gave a soft, “I understand. I’m sorry,” and then made her way along the path back towards the safehouse.

After Varian heard her footsteps fade to silence behind him, Varian lifted his head, and looked at the box with a furrowed brow. “None of this will matter either,” Varian thought to himself, as again he remembered Demanitus’s words. Solemnly, bitterly, Varian got up, and without giving the box another glance, he left it lying in the turf beside the pool as he walked back to the safehouse, with Ruddiger giving a sad sound at his shoulder as he went.

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I know that, "Plus est en vous," doesn't translate to, "There is more in you," but I kept it in there since it's such a key phrase and idea as it's presented in the show.

Also, fun fact: The character Idun in this story was named after the Norse goddess who tended to the apples of youth in Asgard.