#so yeah i'm so sorry baby

[charlie-rulerofhell]

Sed Proditionem || chapter I Proditores non laudo

{or read it here on AO3}

So I said fine, 'cause that's how my daddy raised me. If they strike once then you just hit them twice as hard.

* * *

It was cold. The kind of coldness that would not give a shit about the fact that April was almost over. The kind of coldness where one could easily sweat themselves to death at noon, only to be tortured with the ice-shaped fingers of a biting breeze as soon as the sun went down. The kind of coldness that made one wish themselves close to a crackling fireplace, wrapped in a heavy fur coat or a blanket of the thickest sheepskin, with a mug of hot wine in both hands.

Hans was shivering like a cobweb in a storm, and he would have killed to be at some fireplace and enjoy a mug of wine. His growing discomfort, however, had little to do with the coldness and more with this whole plan that was by far the stupidest he had heard in a long time.

When Henry had come back from Kuttenberg and told Hans about his meeting with Žižka, Hans had been overflowing with joy like a trough in the rain. Henry had beamed from the same happiness. There had been worry in his eyes, too, how could there not with the growing political instability in this country, and the two of them, once again, being pulled right into the middle of it? But his mouth had formed a bright smile when he talked about Žižka and Katherine, and the rest of the old pack, and Christ, how quickly that glee had spread over to Hans. The last time they had met up with Žižka must have been over a year ago. Katherine had paid her latest visit to Rattay even long before that, accompanying some trader that, apparently, her and Žižka were after at the time, for some reason only they under­stood. Samuel had stayed in Kolín for the past seven years do­ing God knew what, but Hans didn't doubt that it was highly important, or that at least Sam thought so. Henry had visited him occasionally when they passed by Kolín on their way to Podiebrad, but Hans had always been too tied up both in political and family affairs to join him for a meetup. And Kubyenka and Janosh? Shit, the last time he had seen these two must have been at his own wedding! They had all been there, blessed be their souls, even the Devil, lousily disguised as a fisherman, as half the land was still after him. And what a cele­bration it had been, with the lot of them! Hans couldn't remem­ber half of that night, and there could be no clearer indication that it had been a fantastic one. Žižka had started some philoso­phical debate about the shape of clouds, while the Devil had threatened to crush someone's skull in. Sausages had been men­tioned at some point, though not by Janosh, and then Sam had danced on a table, and Katherine was dressed in a nun's dress, and Kubyenka with two kittens? They had all gone down to the stream to take a naked bath in the moonlight, even Godwin, although he had found a horse somewhere that he had ridden through the water as if he was Saint George himself, and then Henry had almost drowned in that waist-high piss. Katherine had disappeared at some point, and when Hans had later re­turned to his chambers, he had found her there, together with Jitka. Doing girl things, they said.

He had missed these times. Had missed them dearly over the last seven fucking years. Had thanked God for his divine dis­pensation bringing them all back together now. And then Žižka had let them in on the current situation and on his brilliant plan, and Hans had craved nothing more than to return to Rattay right on the spot. To sit down in front of a fireplace with some hot wine. To forget all of this had ever happened.

The Devil was dead. That didn't come as a surprise, Hans had known for almost two years now. He had been a thorn in the flesh of the Kunštát family for a long while, fighting his battles against Sigismund's army and then against Albert IV of Austria, raiding both Austrian and Moravian land, then joining the troops of duke Albert's very own son, a boy hardly of age but already a strong supporter of King Sigismund. Nobody had shed a tear over Hynek of Kunštát's death, Jitka's father Bot­schek had even found it necessary to hold a small celebratory feast when he heard the news, and many toasts were spoken to Hynek's sudden demise. Hans hadn't said a word, because how could he have? To him there was no Hynek, no traitor in the family. The only man that existed for him was the Devil, and the Devil had been a fucking bastard, yes, a ruthless murderer, but also an ally by whose side Hans had fought, someone he had shared more drinks with than with any man at this feast, and certainly more laughs.

So the news about the Devil's death wasn't surprising in the slightest. What did surprise Hans, however, was that Žižka mentioned it at all. He hadn't even breathed a word of it when he last spoke to Henry a few days ago, or back then in Rattay when he had come to see them both, only a week after it had happened. “And what does it even matter?” he had said now, both hands pressed flat on the table, his brow deeply furrowed. “He had been fed up with the pack for a long time before, and he chose to fight his own battles, with or against us. We won't need him for this task, just as we haven't needed him for the last six years.”

Only that he lied. It did matter, to him just as much as to the rest of them, because this cursed affiliation of vagabonds had never been Žižka's, had never called itself Žižka's pack. It had been Dry Devil holding them all together like sticky honey, and now that he was gone, all the burden was tossed entirely on Žižka's shoulders, and he had fallen under the weight like Jesus under the cross. Of course Žižka knew that. It was evident from the way he had fixed his eyes on Henry as he tried to convince the two of them that he did in fact not need the Devil by his side. Christ's wounds, everyone in the room knew it! Janosh was fiddling around with the buckle of one of his belts as if he wanted to knead pastries out of it. Godwin had stared some­where into the distance, his mouth slightly agape, as if he was silently reciting some prayer. Katherine had her arms folded and her gaze on Žižka alone. No matter how hopeless every­thing seemed to become, at least she wouldn't go anywhere, she wouldn't leave Žižka's side.

Kubyenka's eyes had been on his feet that nervously tapped up and down, shifting his weight from one leg to the other, but when Žižka spoke these last words, the Fuck him, fuck the Devil, we will manage just as good without him, if not even better, Kubyenka had finally looked up and his expression was one of anger and pain. “Don't you dare shit on his name like that, Žižka. God knows I love you, like an estranged brother even, but if you speak one more word like that, I won't be hol­ding myself back.”

“What? Is it not true then? Have I lied?” Žižka's voice had been shaking from anger, too, but it wasn't directed at Kubyen­ka. “Has he not been leaving the pack alone, has he not been cuddling up with the very man we fought against lately?”

“So what? The Devil was doing what we all are doing! Ta­king his sword where it is best paid for. This is not about mo­rality, it never had been. And all your late travels to Prague to listen to that Jan Hus preaching won't change that. We are mer­cenaries, first and foremost, and you should understand that better than all of us. Or do you seriously believe we don't know what you were doing up there in our Polish neighbour's lands just some months ago? Cuddling up with the enemy.”

Hans had in fact not known about it, but it made everything a lot clearer. He had been right then. This was a desperate at­tempt of Žižka's to bring the pack back together. Driven by bro­ken pride and a failing search for his own path. And something else. Rejection.

Žižka had narrowed his eyes so much that the left one al­most disappeared completely behind the scar. “Well, the Ger­mans declined my offer.”

Kubyenka had laughed, and it had sounded all shallow, a taunting display of disdain. “Lucky for us then.”

They had exchanged a few more silent looks that were so heated the whole room had felt like the fire of Hell. Then Žižka had glanced over at Katherine, and she had nodded, and he had taken a deep sigh and returned to his explanations as if nothing had happened. With King Wenceslas's sovereignty still being questioned, not only by Sigismund now but by the church, too, and with Poland fighting for its lands in the north, Bohemia was in a delicate position. And in the midst of this chaos, Jan Hus had emerged as an opposing voice against the clergy and a friend of the common people like the Messiah on the third day. Hans had only nodded in agreement. This wasn't new to him at all, he had heard it before, in all different tones and harmonies. Had heard it from Henry, who was affected by Jan Hus's postulations directly as a peasant, and indirectly through his father's support of Hus's side, and through Godwin, who had moved to Prague for this specific cause while still trying to meet up with Henry as often as he could. Hans had heard it from all different noblemen around the country, some showing great interest in Hus's stance against the church, some fearing for their own status and power with the growing unrest of their people. He had also heard it from Hanush, who was more often than not travelling out on his own account these days. Visiting some lords whose territories had been pestered by the plague of war and upheaval. Kindly talking to them and offering help, was what he called it. Threatening and robbing might have de­scribed it better.

In Prague, Jan Hus was still holding his chair as the rector of the university, protected by King Wenceslas himself, but that position was fickle. After his continuing defiance of the arch­bishop's prohibition to preach, and with the growing pressure on the King by both the bishops and the Holy Father himself – one of God only knew how many there were at this point! – the King could not uphold his support much longer. The people, on the other hand, loved Jan Hus and his ideas. Of course they did. More freedom might have been the one principle every human in this world could agree on. And that love made Hus all the more hated by those in power.

“We need to point the way,” Žižka had said. “Make them understand that Hus's theories are the only sensible response to the church's superior power and this whole schism that we are currently stuck in. We need to light a metaphorical and literal beacon of reason in these times. So. The plan is simple.” And then he had proceeded to lay down in great detail a plan that was as far away from simplicity as it could possibly get.

Hans wrapped his arms tighter around his body, letting his gaze wander up and down the gorge that Žižka had selected for this scheme. It had become almost too dark to see, the trees up above them forming a wall of shadows against a clouded sky. Just a few moments ago, some church bells in the distance had tolled for the evening prayer. St. Matthew's church, Hans had thought in a touch of melancholy, and then quickly discarded the idea. The bells of the newly built church in Vranov more likely. If anything, they'd rather be able to hear the church bells of Rowna near Skalitz than those of Rattay.

His eyes wandered over to Henry whose face was now eerily illuminated by the light of a lantern he had lit. Hans had offered to avoid Skalitz on their way to the set place, but Henry had ba­nished the thought immediately. It was the fastest route, he had said, and even though they had used horses until reaching Jezo­nice, just a short walk away from here, they couldn't afford to dawdle. Besides, he had added with a weak smile, he didn't in­sist on spending any more time in this itchy priest's cassock than was absolutely necessary.

Still he had kept his eyes lowered for most of the road that led around the ruins of Skalitz. Him and Hans had visited the place around a dozen times over the past years. To have an eye on the reconstruction of the village that was only progressing at a painfully slow pace. It never got easier.

“So.” Sam's voice echoed through the clearing like a cannon shot. “Can we discuss the plan once more?”

“You want to make sure everyone knows his task?”

The look that Sam regarded his brother with was as dead as that of a corpse. It didn't help that it seemed like he hadn't got a single hour of sleep in the last three days, ever since his arrival in Kuttenberg. “Oh, I do not doubt that. I just wanted to hear it again because I am still certain I must have missed the part that made you agree to this whole stupidity in the first place.”

“It is far from stupid,” Godwin objected, and he sounded like he didn't believe a single word he said. “Playing with the gullibility of people is actually a fool-proof plan, if you ask me.”

“If you manage to lead the conversation to that crucial part where you can play your little magic trick.” Hans took a deep breath, shifting his weight so that he moved a little closer to Sam. It felt good having at least one sane person on his side. The feigned optimism of the others back in Kuttenberg had been unbearable! “And given that you can get this Father Tho­mas to stop and have a little chat with you.”

Henry smiled, and the shadows of the lantern's light turned it into the wicked grin of a mummer's mask. “We are two un­armed priests on a pilgrimage. What could possibly unsettle them about us?”

“I tell you what unsettles me.” Hans could feel the whole si­tuation slowly taking a toll on his patience. “The word un­armed in that sentence of yours.”

“Clearly a priest won't attack other men of the cloth.”

“Well, maybe not, until those men of the cloth start talking about this great Jan Hus fellow that they met in Prague the other day. And about how his words must clearly be guided by God, because he gave them this glass ball, you see, and it glows and explodes whenever someone is using the true words of God, so you can know that it is nothing but the word of God that Jan Hus is preaching!”

Henry and Godwin exchanged a silent look that screamed louder than Hans had. When he turned back to him, Godwin shrugged his shoulders. “Well, we might be able to phrase it a little bit more convincing.”

“What if they don't even show up here?”

“Then we haven't lost anything either.”

Hans shook his head in disbelief. “What if Father Thomas shows up with more than four armed men? What if that little explosion won't make them believe in some divine intervention but in a secret attack on them?” His eyes wandered up to a spot between the trees' shadows that he couldn't make out from down here, but he had seen it before in the fading sunlight, had inspected it closely and shaken his head over it. “What if I don't hit that tiny thing, at this time of night, from that dis­tance?” I know that this is not your battle to fight in, Žižka had told him back in the church attic in Kuttenberg, and I would prefer it if I didn't have to drag you into this. But I need you for this task. After all, you're the best marksman I have.

“You will be here with us,” Henry said, and his voice was so soft and calm that it might have convinced Hans of everything he could have said. “You two will be hiding up there with our weapons at the ready. And Kubyenka and Janosh will guard the other side of the gorge. Six skilled fighters will be more than enough against four mercenaries, and a priest who will be get­ting in their way more than he will actually help them. You might as well have killed them all with your crossbow before one of them even gets the chance to draw his sword.”

“And what if they come prepared?” Sam's fingers were wrapped tightly around the handle of his left dagger as if he was ready to draw it here and now. “What if this Schwarzfeld has guided us right into a trap?”

Godwin straightened the fabric of his priest's robe. He made it seem nonchalant, but the time he took to reply betrayed his whole act. “Katherine and Žižka have both talked to Schwarz­feld themselves, and very extensively, I might add. We know that he is a small German lord who has always enjoyed many privileges from our King, while he has a hard time with the church due to the high charges the bishop imposes on him. So it seems like he has a lot of reason to support our cause. Do I trust him?” He shrugged his shoulders again. It was strange, Hans thought, how little the priest robe he had worn for so long suited him these days, how much weaker and older it made him seem. “What do I know! But I trust Katherine and Žižka and both their judgments.”

Hans shook his head. He could feel the weight of the cross­bow that was tied to his belt and understood now why Sam had his hand placed firmly on his weapon. A little bit of comfort, a shelter in this thunderstorm. “The whole plan is still totally mad. More so than anything Žižka has come up with before.”

“Doesn't feel so mad to me.” Henry smiled again. His eyes were warm and honest. “After all, it's nothing but simple alche­my.”

“Given I can hit the glass, without it being noticed by the priest or his men, and that this paste you smeared on my bolts actually does something to this strange smoke inside that phial.”

“It's finest firedamp, gathered from the mines. And since Sam took care of it, I'm sure it will work.”

Sam let out a hiss through his teeth that sounded almost like he had just exploded himself. “This gas might be the only part of the plan that I am convinced of.”

“We don't need your conviction.” Godwin stepped forward, and his voice was loud, demanding. “All we need is for you both to do as you're told and fulfil your task. Of the rest we take care of. Understood?”

Hans rolled his eyes, shook his head, and answered with a mocking “Yes, commander”. There was nothing else to do. Godwin and Henry were all too adamant about this anyway.

The grass was wet and bitingly cold, as he crawled up the slope to where he was supposed to hide between the trees, with Sam by his side. There was a fallen tree up here, that had de­cayed during the cold winter days, crumbling under his weight as he sat down on it, but at least it would keep his arse dry. Sam seemed to have no need for that and rather stayed in a squatting position a few feet away, one hand still on his dagger, the other wrapped around a sheathed longsword. His father's sword, and Sam's only duty tonight. To throw it down to Henry as soon as the slightest form of trouble arose.

Sam looked like a cocked crossbow himself, Hans thought. Every muscle tightened, ready to snap and jump. Or perhaps not so much like a crossbow, actually, and rather like the very thing a crossbow would be pointed at. A hare, surrounded by the hunter and his hounds. Lips pressed together tightly, eyes squinted. His face was half covered by the shadows of trees and bushes, and the faint moonlight only enhanced the hollow­ness of his cheeks and the dark rings under his eyes. A hare perhaps, but a very tired one.

“This whole plan hasn't given you much rest either, eh?”

Sam kept his eyes solely on the road below them on the bottom of the gorge. He also looked like he was in no mood for a conversation, but that had never bothered Hans before, espe­cially not when his own nervousness made him seek out the comfort of talk more than ever. “What plan? This trickery that is entirely built on the trust in a man we barely know?”

“Well, from what I understand Schwarzfeld is closely tied to this Father Thomas, who is in turn a member of the Prague sy­nod, the very one who stands strongly against Jan Hus, so he seems to be a suitable candidate to perform our trickery on. And since Schwarzfeld knows this priest so well, he should be able to convince him of going through these woods late at night to avoid the robber bands in this area.”

“Or at least so he claims.”

The road below them was empty now, not even the light of the lantern could be seen. Henry and Godwin had disappeared somewhere to the left, where they would wait until the carriage of Father Thomas and his mercenaries would appear in front of them. Only then would they set themselves into motion and act as if they had been walking all this time, on a pilgrimage from Prague, where Thomas was supposed to be returning to. And what great wonders they encountered there in the presence of Hus! What Hans hadn't given to change positions with Godwin now and be down there in priest robes next to Henry. Partly, because he knew how convincing Henry could be, and he would have loved to experience his act up close. Partly too, however, because he hated seeing Henry walk right into danger while being too far away to intervene when it all went to shit.

Above them, bats were screeching on their hunt for the first harbingers of summer, gnats. The air felt more like winter though, so freezing cold by now, that it lifted Hans's breath to the sky in the form of glistening clouds of smoke.

There was no such cloud in front of Sam's face, Hans no­ticed. Maybe all his insides had cooled down to ice a long time ago. “You aren't so keen on trusting, eh?”

“Does it surprise you?” Sam still didn't give Hans the ho­nour of looking at him. If he just loosened up a little bit, it might help him to enjoy something in life for once! After all, the only times Hans could remember ever seeing Henry's bro­ther truly happy was when he was drunk. “I have lived through more deceits and betrayals than you can even imagine.”

“Believe me, betrayal isn't such a strange concept to me ei­ther.”

“I doubt that you can compare that.”

And there it was again, so suddenly that it made Hans's heart stop for a moment or two. A face he had forgotten, a love he had sworn to never feel again, because how fucking much could this love hurt. Only Henry had managed to make him break this oath. Only for Henry had he opened his chest to the threat of being stabbed again, and he hadn't regretted this deci­sion once in the past seven years. And Henry had helped him heal, had shown him that it was not only possible but worth the risk to take down the walls he had built. That it was worth to trust, back then at Suchdol during that damned siege after Hans had found Samuel breaking into his room, and now it was Sam again who dragged these memories out of the deepest pits of his chest so they could torment him once more. The same hol­low cheeks, but eyes like the night sky. It wasn't fair, Hans thought. Because back then Samuel had said something that had proven any comparison to him wrong, had given Hans en­couragement, the sweetest gift ever given to him. He had tra­ded that gift of encouragement for Henry's love. Trust wasn't an easy task, Hans knew that too well. But Sam had taught him a lesson Hans would never forget. Don't make the same mistake I made. As a lily among thorns, so is my love.

Hans shook his head. The distorted face didn't disappear. Maybe it was the moonlight, he thought, that made Sam's eyes seem darker and larger too. He looked away. It wasn't fair, he thought again. Not to Sam, and not to himself. “Let's just agree that we know each other too little to judge that properly.”

The bats were screeching. A breeze bent the tops of the trees above their heads, carrying the smell of wet grass and blosso­ming flowers. The breeze was warm. It felt nice for the mo­ment, until it left a more piercing coldness than before once it was over.

“Look.” Hans could hear Sam sigh in annoyance when he started to speak again, but he would not stay quiet now, not when his hand was shaking and his heart was racing. It was way too cold for a late April night. “I agree with you that we shouldn't put our lives in the hands of someone we haven't even shared a drink with. But it's not really this Schwarzfeld guy that we're trusting here. It's Katherine and Žižka. If they are certain he told the truth, then I am certain of it too. Besides, Henry was right. We're all here to help them. You have his sword ready, I have my crossbow, Janosh and Kubyenka will strike from the other side. There's really not that much risk about this part of the plan.”

“If they appear.”

Hans pulled his knees closer to his body, wrapped his arms around them, hoping it would help him warm up if he twisted himself into a pretzel in the oven. “Well, otherwise we just freeze our arses off for nothing, I suppose.”

“I'm not talking about that priest.”

Hans narrowed his eyes, examining the forest on the other side of the gorge. He had never seen the ocean before, but this was what the authors in his books used to describe it as. Huge and unfathomable, engulfing and dark. The air smelled of grass and flowers and frost. A shiver crept down his spine. “They're clearly there already. We just cannot see them from here, be­cause it's simply too fucking dark.”

“Hm,” Sam made, and it sounded as weak as the wind.

Hans looked over to him again, and now Matej was gone. Too much scepticism, too little hatred. “Where do you think they are? Still in Uzhitz, having had one drink too many against the nervousness?”

“There are many possibilities.”

“Hm.” A sound out of Hans's own throat this time, he could feel it, but the voice was unfamiliar to him.

They sat in silence for a while, watching the emptiness. The bats were dashing across the sky, the leaves were rustling. Down below, the road remained deserted.

“Farkakte drek!”

Hans winced at Sam's sudden jump to his feet. Above them, a bird rushed away from its resting spot in the branches with a protesting caw.

“And this is what I left my people in Kolín for?”

“Keep it a little quieter, will you!”

“Why?” Sam flipped around to him as quickly as a bow­string let loose. “There is no one else here! Not down on that road and not over there in the forest either.”

“They are there.” It was a strange feeling, Hans thought, to always be the sensible one when he was with Sam. And he couldn't help but notice how much this role annoyed him. “The priest will show up too, we haven't even waited all that long. And then …”

“And then what? Then Henry will walk up to this galach and his four men to perform some little magic trick, dressed in nothing but these woollen robes!”

“He is used to such robes, believe me. Did you know that he lived in a monastery once, as a monk?”

“It is not about the robes, Hans.” He took a step closer to him now, his eyes hidden from the moonlight, painting them pitch black. “Žižka is using him as bait. Seven years, and no­thing has changed!”

“Žižka knows,” Hans tried to keep his voice as calm as he possibly could, “that Henry is capable of carrying out this plan. Probably the only one of us who could.”

“Žižka was desperate.” Sam's voice was as sharp as a blade, his accent more clear than ever now, every word coming down like a hammer. “Because the Devil is dead, the Teutonic order has rejected him, and half of his men are on the risk of leaving. If they haven't already.”

Hans took a deep breath. His annoyance about being the voice of reason wasn't helped by Sam reflecting his very own thoughts back to him like a vicious mirror. “You are worried. I am, too. There is nothing wrong with that. But we should not forget that it is Henry we are talking about here.” He tried to smile. It must have looked little convincing. “You might not trust Schwarzfeld. You might not even trust Žižka. Fine. But I think we can both agree that we should trust Henry.”

Sam took a deep breath, shook his head, averted his gaze. The hand that he had wrapped around the sword's handle loo­sened a bit, even as the rest of his body remained tense. It was clear that he wanted to say more, had more doubts, more fears weighing down on his chest, but he kept them to himself. As usual. Sam was right, Hans thought. Seven years, and it almost felt as if nothing had changed. Yet everything has. And we have grown older, we have moved on. Perhaps that was what made all of this so damn hard. They weren't barely matured striplings anymore who would agree to every bold plan Žižka could come up with. There was a family to look after for Hans, a wife, a realm, three children. A home built anew from the ruins for Sam, stepping into his grandfather's shoes, guiding his flock. There was so much more to lose for both of them, as ex­citing as the prospect of new adventure felt. And then there was Žižka. Still a mercenary, still on the search for his purpose in life, still lost.

Maybe that was why Henry had been the first to agree to his proposition, and so eagerly as well. Because in this regard he wasn't all that different from Žižka. Always lost, always loo­king for his path. To Henry, stepping out of Rattay had been a relief, a breath of rediscovered freedom. He could swear as ma­ny oaths as he wanted, and perhaps they weren't even lies, per­haps he wanted to stay by Hans's side until his last day, Hans wanted just the same. But not as his knight, his advisor, not tied up in duties that would bind him to the Rattay court forever. Almost ironic, wasn't it, how Hans would be the one they called little bird, while Henry was right there next to him, al­ways on the search for new adventures and restless as if trapped in a cage when he couldn't find it for too long. And yet he had stayed.

“Believe me,” Hans began as softly as he could while his voice was shaking, “I care for him as much as you do. Ten years ago, I couldn't have dreamed of being where I am now, and I wouldn't even have wanted to. To be the patriarch of the family of Leipa, yes, the Lord of Rattay, that too. But being married, with three children? Delegated to rule over all these possessions, these people, so many problems to solve, so many hungry mouths to feed. My own family's and that of the whole land.” Something rustled in the undergrowth next to his feet, a mouse perhaps, somewhere on the other side a brown owl was calling. Once, Hans had longed for this with his whole heart, the silence, the serenity of nature. Now he couldn't even re­member when he had last set foot outside the Rattay city walls. “But I am happy. Because through all of this responsibility, I always have your brother by my side. To help me make deci­sions, to calm me down whenever I feel like I could never be suited for the role. To give me love, make me feel safe. I never thought I could have that.” He laughed. A sound almost as croaking as the owl's scream. “Much less with a man!”

Sam turned, looked at him. He didn't say a word, but there was a deep understanding in his expression, as if he knew. Maybe he remembered what Hans had said before, sensed what this was about even when he couldn't quite tell why he would be sharing it. Christ, Hans didn't even know himself! To calm them both down, perhaps, take their minds off the task ahead. To lift the weight of memory off his chest, more likely. As if taking parchment and a feather when another poem had been twirling through his thoughts a whole day long, writing it down, relieving his mind. They had come and settled down in his heart now anyway. His words, his eyes, his hatred.

“You know, Henry wasn't the first man I ever had such fee­lings for. Though I was much younger when it had last hap­pened. Fourteen, to be exact.” Hans shook his head at that rea­lisation alone. The ridiculousness, this passing of time. “Christ, I'm twice as old now!”

Sam still didn't say a word, maybe he wouldn't dare to, but he listened, and then he placed the sword on the ground and lowered himself to the tree trunk next to Hans. Not close enough to touch, but close enough to feel his presence, his warmth, smell his scent. Pungent leather and sweet herbs like the incense burned at mass, and something that reminded Hans all too much of Henry. Hot iron perhaps, straying sparks on wood, a smouldering fire.

“He was a stable boy in Rattay. I do not even remember his name.” Nor his face, Hans thought. His hair had been brown as chestnuts, almost red. Like a squirrel, Hans had liked to say and he had meant it as a compliment, and then the other one had laughed and called him straw head, because Hans's own hair had been fair as hay back then, had only darkened a little over the years. “He was much older than me. Past twenty already, although he didn't look like it. I thought he was beauti­ful. I liked him. But I didn't know what to do about this … li­king.” Neither his uncle nor his nurse Vjenka nor any other person he knew had ever taught him about it. He had looked for answers in the tales he knew and loved. Eneas and Pallas, Siegfried and Gunther, Lancelot and Galehaut. It didn't explain shit. “One night, I went to see him in the stables, and then I … I touched him. Carefully. And he returned the touch, and then he showed me … love. Well, it wasn't actually love, it was sex, and it wasn't very pleasant for me either. But it was new, and exciting, and I came back for more. He made me come back. Told me he needed to see me again, because of what he was feeling for me.”

Hans paused for a while. The lies one was so eager to be­lieve when young and in love. Or perhaps it had been entirely his own nature that was to blame. The gullibility of people was fool-proof, Godwin had said. It surely was when that priest they waited for was any bit like Hans. Still as naive as a child, Hanush would say. When will you ever grow up?

A light appeared below on a road, silver in colour, crawling through the gorge like the water of a stream. Just the moon­light. Hans wrapped his arms tighter around his knees. “Our secret meetings went on for quite a while. And then finally, he revealed what it was exactly he was feeling for me. He asked me for a promotion. He wanted to become a knight.” There was a sound to his left, but Hans couldn't quite tell if it had been produced by Sam's throat or some animal or the wind in the branches. “I told him that he was only a stable boy, that he could never be a knight, and that even if it was possible, I was in no position to grant that to him.” Hans swallowed. He had reached a point where the memories were starting to hurt. Sam didn't push him, didn't urge him to continue. He just waited. Understood. “All of a sudden, his touches grew painful. And he began to threaten me. Promised that he would tell the whole of Rattay about us, if I didn't go and convince my uncle some­how.”

Bare, naked, helpless, pressed into the hay in the far corner of the stables. Fingers on his arms bruising. What, you wanna scream? Want them to find you like this? You have any idea what they do to filth like you?

“Of course he could have never actually told anyone. The consequences for him would have been much graver than those for me, I was a noble after all. The worst thing that could hap­pen to me was a slap on the wrist and a scolding from my un­cle, while he would at least end up in the stocks, if not be ba­nished or hanged for defiling me. But I couldn't see that at the time. I was scared. I was only fourteen!”

Hans fell silent again, and for a while he wasn't certain whe­ther he wanted to continue. The shadows of the trees on the other side formed the outline of an enormous wall that seemed to be getting closer now with every other word he spoke, and he felt locked in, despite the cold breeze on his skin, despite the birds and bats and mice, despite the dampness of the wood and the grass. He closed his eyes. The smell. The smell was what he could hold on to. Incense and leather. Hot iron. Familiar. “In my desperation, I went to someone who I believed was close to me. Close enough to confide in. Other than the stable boy's, his name I do remember very well. Matej.” Black hair, black eyes, always narrowed, always wary. He must have been sixteen or seventeen at the time, not quite a man yet, but just as broad as all the other soldiers that he trained with. “He was a squire un­der Sir Bernard. Of course, I couldn't tell him what exactly had happened between me and that stable boy, not at first anyway. I just said that he had threatened me. And Matej didn't hesitate. Went straight to him and threatened him back. Told him that he would make his life a living hell if he didn't leave Rattay at once. Matej could be quite intimidating, you know. The stable boy never stood a chance.”

Drinks and talks and laughter, even though it was rare to get a laugh from Matej. It always sounded wrong. Like a parasiti­cal insect that had clawed its way out of his throat. An occa­sional touch, after enough tankards of wine. A hand on Matej's arms, his neck, in his black curls, Hans's skin burning as if the squire's body was made of flames.

“We got closer after that, Matej and me. So close that it made me start to see things that … just weren't real. And one day, I told him everything. We were a little too drunk and we were all alone, and I felt safe. So I talked about what I had shared with the stable boy. And I talked about my own feelings for him. For Matej.” The black eyes widened for once. In sur­prise and disbelief, that Hans had been able to tell. The hatred and disgust he couldn't see. Too much wine, too much childish naivety. “He was taken aback, of course, that wasn't surprising to me. It also didn't come much to a surprise that he stood up and left. How could he not after hearing such news? But it did surprise me then, how he came back to me the next day. And how he asked me if we could meet up later that night, alone, down by the river.”

Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Sam's hands clen­ching into fists, and his jaw twitched as he pressed his lips to­gether more tightly. This wasn't a happy tale, Sam knew that. Wasn't a stranger to betrayal himself.

Hans turned away, faced the darkness next to them instead, hiding the shame that Sam wouldn't care for, but what would it matter, as Hans himself cared. “I was a fool, yes, but please bear in mind that I was still a child. Naive and hurt from what had happened before and hopeful that this time it could be different. But well, that doesn't change anything, eh?” A dark forest just like here. A short walk away from the city, east­wards, where Hans liked to ride out to every now and then. It had been summer time, Hans could remember that because of how shallow the Sasau had been. Matej had stood there like the dark knight out of Hans's books, but his face had shown no signs of chivalry and love. He also hadn't come alone as pro­mised. “Matej had his dog with him. A huge, black hunting dog. He … Well …” It was too dreadful to say it out loud.

“Farshittn mamzer.”

Hans understood these words without actually knowing them, and the fact that Sam had finally opened his mouth just to growl this curse, made him laugh, despite everything. It was a short laugh, but a welcome, healing one, and it finally lifted the weight of shame and fear off him and allowed him to breathe. He noticed how Sam looked over at him in confusion, and shook his head to him softly, and Hans nodded, with a ge­nuine smile playing with his lips. “True that.”

“What did you do to him?”

Hans had to chuckle again, and Sam lowered his brows sceptically, couldn't understand how good his blunt remarks felt to Hans. “Nothing really. I was too ashamed to tell my un­cle the truth, and I didn't have to anyway. It took me a while to recover from the injuries his dog had inflicted on me. And the ones he had caused afterwards, before he had left me there, bleeding and barely conscious. When I was finally allowed to leave my sickbed, he was gone. Sir Bernard told me he had asked to leave for Sasau, but he didn't stay there for long either. God knows where he went.”

“A kind zol nokh im heysn.”

“A child should …?”

Sam shrugged his shoulders, his face blank. “I hope he died.”

“Ah. Yes, perhaps.” He hated the thought of wishing death upon anyone really. But there was no denying it, some people had it coming. “In any case,” Hans looked up to the trees again, and they seemed much less threatening now, like a rain cloud maybe, or not even that, “all of this taught me a valuable les­son, you see? That I should never trust that easily.” A few of the trees on the left stood out above the others like a bell tower. An outstretched hand, ready to catch those that might fall from heaven. “Then, a few years later, you came along. Back then in Suchdol. I don't know if you remember. But I do. I remember your words very well, because this time it was you who taught me yet another and perhaps even more valuable lesson. That some people are worth the trust. Like a lily among thorns, so is my love.” Hans only caught the last traces of the change in expression on Sam's face when he turned back to him. The faint remnants in his tired eyes. Grief and pain and regret. “Thank you, Sam. From the bottom of my heart.”

* * *

They had sat next to each other in silence for a while after these words, both lost in thought. How cruel people could be to one another. They act out of fear and ignorance, his mame would have said. In the end, it is the heart of those who stain it with such actions that suffers most. But what good would that do? What good would it do to know of the suffering of the trai­tor when his actions led to the pain or death of someone else? Besides, more often than not these words would prove to be nothing more than a nice saying, because these mamzers didn't actually suffer. Málek clearly hadn't suffered. Not until Samuel had taken fate into his own hands and gutted him like a sheep.

Samuel couldn't tell for how long they sat there. An hour at least, two or three more likely. The sky had become even dar­ker, almost as dark as the row of trees, melting into them to form a parchment covered in ink all over, a wall of nothing­ness. The dampness of the trunk had long crept through the cotton of his trousers, and he tried to move as little as he could to not make the feeling more uncomfortable. Then all of a sudden, Hans Capon did something that complicated move­ment even more. He tipped over to the side as if all strength had left his body at once, and rested his head on Samuel's shoulder.

“A rose of Sharon,” he mumbled. His tongue sounded heavy as if he was drunk, but he had only taken a few sips of wine during their wait. Tiredness. Samuel felt it, too. Tired and ex­hausted and scared, and he hated it all. Wanted this to move on, wanted to act, wanted to prove his own doubts wrong. “You never told me the whole poem. A shame, because you made up something so pretty there.”

“I did not make it up.” Hans could barely hold his eyes open. Damn it, Samuel's own eyes burned too, and he wanted to do nothing more than close them, get some rest, but he knew he wouldn't find it, and one of them had to stay awake anyway. “It is a poem of my people. And I only learned of it through,” his lips formed silent words that his heart didn't dare to speak, “someone else.”

“Well, then this someone has a great taste in poetry.”

“She had, yes.”

“Oh.”

Too much, he had said too much. And it hurt, and he wanted to take it back, because already he could feel the cracks ripping into the wall, the blood streaming from them. He had buried it all, and it was for the best. Had left it behind like he had left her grave, never to return. How could he possibly have re­turned after what he had done?

“What was her name?”

“Hannah.” Neyn, his own voice screamed helplessly inside his head. Nit an ander vort!

“A beautiful name. Was she just as beautiful?”

“Even more so.” The cracks tore open, some of the bricks had crumbled to dust, he could feel it in his heart, and if it hadn't been for Hans's head on his shoulder, he might as well have jumped up and ran. Ran where? Back to Kolín? Back to Kuttenberg? To her? There was no back to run to and nothing to run from but his own soul. And he had already succumbed to that chase.

“Was she …” Hans's words were barely intelligible now, but Samuel doubted he noticed. “… the poem …”

“One of her favourite poems. I think she felt that it was able to say things she couldn't. Or wouldn't. Because I wouldn't have listened anyway.” Esthera's hand shaking as she handed him the paper. Some of the words had been slurred, Hannah had never been the most careful when it came to writing. “Ir­responsible was what she often called me. And she was right. I cared more for childish ideas of revolution than for her, and for us. And in trying to do justice to both, I failed both. All my great schemes to stifle the support for Sigismund in Kuttenberg went to shit.”

He had known as soon as he had climbed through that window that something was wrong. That fucking custodian wasn't in his bed where he was supposed to be. And he hadn't heard Hannah's hands and feet on the scaffolding either. The soldiers hadn't worn any armour and they had moved as quietly as rats, he hadn't even noticed them storming the alleyway below him. But then Hannah had screamed and coughed and vomited blood and died. And all that had been left to do for him was to run. “I never got to tell her that I loved her. And in turn, she took her own secret to the grave with her. She only told me with that poem and with the lines she herself had added to it.” And Esthera had confirmed it with nothing more than a silent nod because as Hannah's closest friend she at least had known. I am a rose of Sharon, a lily of the valleys. As a lily among thorns, so is my love among the daughters. As an apple tree among the trees of the wood, so is my beloved among the sons. Under its shadow I delighted to sit, and its fruit was sweet to my taste. He has brought me to the banqueting house, and his banner over me is love. And then Hannah had painted two small ornaments under the words, a flower and a tree, and in her scrawled handwriting she had added: And from my beloved's fruit new seeds have fallen, and the ground where they landed was rich and welcoming. They will bring forth a lily or an apple tree, and me and my loved one shall stand by its side to water it and watch it flourish. “She had been with child.”

His words faded away in nothingness. Hans had fallen a­sleep. No one had heard them, except Samuel himself and the one who always listened. Who knew it all.

Samuel closed his eyes. They burned too much. A single tear broke its way through his lashes and ran down his cheek into Hans's golden hair. Hannah had been a good climber, and sometimes they had found their way up to the roofs of Kutten­berg, had sat there for a while, watching the sunset, dreaming of better times. He had dreamed, that was, she had listened. Had placed her head on his shoulder, just like Hans did now, her fingers entangled in his.

He tilted his head, rested his cheek on Hans's hair, dried his tears. I'm sorry, he wanted to say, but it would have been foo­lish. Hans wasn't her. And he wouldn't have heard the words anyway, just as Hannah would never hear them.

They had bought her body free from the city guards. Samuel hadn't been with the other shomrim, hadn't watched over her body and soul as he should have, hadn't been there when they lowered her into the ground. Hadn't wanted to think about the second soul that he needed to keep watch over. Instead, he had sought out Málek. Málek had begged and whined like a dog, down on his knees to Samuel's feet, his hands reaching out as if he was praying. Samuel hadn't wanted to hear him beg and whine and pray. Had only wanted one answer from him. “Sil­ver or freedom?” he had asked. “What have they offered you?”

“Freedom,” Málek had croaked out. “Please, Samuel, I am telling the truth, you have to believe me!”

Samuel had nodded. Not because he believed, but because it didn't matter anyway. Then he had pulled the moser to his feet to cut him open from pubic bone to navel. He thought it only just.

Esthera had been at Hannah's grave when Samuel had got there later that night. She had seen Málek's blood on him. “Oh, Samuel,” she had breathed out, “what have you done?”

There had been no need to explain himself. She understood, better than anyone else could. She had left, and once he had been alone, Samuel had finally broken down. His knees hitting the heaped up earth, choking on tears and screams, fingers star­ting to hurt, it had taken a while until he noticed why, had only dawned on him when he fell down in exhaustion. Maybe if I stay here, he had thought. How long may it take? And the words from Hannah's poem had echoed through his mind like a prayer, sung in her own voice, a lullaby so that time could pass faster. And the ground where they landed was rich and welco­ming. They will bring forth a lily or an apple tree, and me and my loved one shall stand by its side to water it and watch it flourish.

His wish had not been granted. The sun of a new day had al­ready painted the sky in blood red when Samuel stood up from the grave and never returned. Esthera had waited for him at the mikveh as if she had already expected him, and not a single word of horror or condemnation was uttered, even as she no­ticed the earth underneath his fingernails. This time, she hadn't left him alone. She had stood outside the mikveh while he bathed and cleansed his body of blood and soil, stood watch as if she herself wanted to perform shemira on him. But she was standing guard at the wrong place. The graveyard was where he had left his soul.

A light on the road below, and Samuel straightened his back so suddenly that Hans almost slipped off him. “Oy, shvoger!Wake up! Something is happening!”

“Huh?” Hans blinked a few times, leaving the realm of sleep slowly, way too slowly for someone who was supposed to exe­cute a masterful shot every moment now. Samuel gave him an additional blow with the elbow for good measure. “Ouch! How dare you! I am awake, alright?”

He lifted his hand, pointed down to the road, and to the fli­ckering, orange light, approaching from the left. A few more moments passed, and then two figures appeared, bodies wrapped in black and white robes of wool, their heads bowed down as if exhausted from a full day's walk. Henry's dark hair was covering his forehead, it was dishevelled, making him seem more innocent and harmless. Godwin's head reflected the light of the lantern in his hands like a piece of molten iron.

“They must have seen them then.” Hans removed the cross­bow from his belt, taking one of the prepared bolts out of the leather bag Sam had brought him earlier. “Which means that Father Thomas and his men should …”

Another light, this time on the other side of the road, and the rumbling sound of carriage wheels. Armour chattered, but they had been expecting that, and when the group of men finally ap­peared in their vision, Samuel counted only four men in total, the priest on his carriage and three mercenaries by foot, one less than Schwarzfeld had predicted. They were well-equipped, with swords and maces and bows on their hips, but then again one of them wasn't even wearing a helmet, perhaps thinking himself safe from the previous lack of dangerous encounters on their way so far. Should things stray from the plan, he would be the first to die.

The priest steadied his horses and brought the armed men to a halt with a single raise of his hand. Henry and Godwin stopped as well, eyeing the group in front of them as if they were surprised to meet them here, then they bowed and greeted each other. A warm and cheerful tone, but their voices were too quiet to understand them.

“Can you hear what they're saying?”

Hans shook his head, squinting his eyes, keeping them on the road, even as he placed the crossbow on the ground so he could cock it. “Not a word.”

A lower mumbling as one of the mercenaries chimed in on the conversation. The priest seemed to grasp the reins more tightly as he bowed forward. Godwin laughed, but it sounded strained. Not good.

“They are talking for way too long already.”

“They need to get Father Thomas to a point where he would actually believe them when they show him a Jan Hus inspired magic trick.” Hans breathed out a quiet laughter, probably due to the ridiculousness of it all. “Of course it's gonna take some time!”

Samuel narrowed his eyes to improve his vision against the darkness, but the trees on the other side of the gorge stood too close together to let any light through. Still, there should have been something, should there not? A movement of the bushes, the flash of moonlight on steel.

He grabbed his father's sword, lifted himself off the trunk.

“Sam!” Hans was whispering, but it was high and sharp. He felt it, too. “Where are you going?”

Samuel took a few steps along the edge of the slope, never letting his gaze leave the opposite side, so that he couldn't miss the slightest sign of them. Nothing. No shadow, no flicker of light, no matter how much he changed his angle. “Did you ever see Kubyenka and the Hungarian show up?”

“Well, they are supposed to hide. They'd do something wrong if we were able to see them.”

Below on the road, Henry had opened his bag, pulling a glass ball out of it, then a stick, placing the ball on top of it by a designated recess on the bottom, then he raised the apparatus to the sky. The lamplight made it glow as if he was holding the sun itself on a leash. The fire of God, the spark of his words.

Hans took a deep breath, lifted the crossbow.

Eight pairs of eyes, all waiting for a miracle.

“Something isn't right here,” Samuel hissed.

Then a bolt shot through the air like a lightning. The priest let out a gurgling sound, trembling hands raised to his throat, where the bolt had pierced right through. It didn't take long for him to die, and even less for two of his men to draw their wea­pons while another one ran off immediately. The one conve­niently not dressed in full armour.

Henry took a step back to dodge the swing of a mace, raised his face to the mountain top. Samuel followed his eyes, saw Hans kneeling next to him, crossbow raised, bolt still nocked, his eyes widened in shock. “That wasn't me!”

“That mamzer has betrayed us!” He didn't hesitate for ano­ther moment, stormed over to where the slope was flat enough to get down without falling. “I will go to them!” he shouted back at Hans. “But be careful, there must be another archer …”

A hit against his back, and Samuel got pushed forward, crashed down on the ground, with someone else weighing down on his back, pressing all air out of his lungs. Father's sword was still sheathed and the man sitting on top of him didn't give him enough room to pull it out, but he managed to slide the other hand under his body, grasping the dagger and bringing it back, slicing through flesh. The man died on top of him, screaming pain and fright into Samuel's ear, until it was finally over.

It took some effort to crawl out from underneath the body, and when he had finally freed himself and turned on his back, he saw that the space around them, where Hans and him had thought themselves alone just moments before, was now filled with men, two of them already lying on the ground, the one whose belly Samuel had cut open and another one with a bolt in his eye socket. They weren't heavily armoured thankfully, hadn't dared to it seemed as not to give their ambush away through sounds, but from the way they moved Samuel could tell that each of them was skilled. Hans had thrown his cross­bow down, now occupied with fighting one of the men by sword, while another one rushed forward with an axe, swinging it for Samuel's head. He turned quickly, unsheathing the sword in the same motion, before he got up on his feet. Another turn, a swing with father's sword, parried by the axe with such strength that Samuel felt the impact all the way up to his shoul­der. He went for another blow, got parried again, but this time he was prepared, raised the dagger. He didn't even get the time to watch the fucker choke on his own blood, before two more attackers came for him, wild as hounds, and before he could react, one of them had his short sword lifted, bringing the pom­mel down on Samuel's wrist. A biting pain in his arm, a flash of light blurring his sight, then a gloved hand hit his face, sending him to his knees.

“Hold on, Vojtěch!” someone screamed to his left. “One of them is a nobleman!”

The man called Vojtěch, who had his weapon raised above Samuel's head like an executioner's sword, examined him closely with a tilted head, as if he was looking for the word no­bility being written somewhere on Samuel's skin. Given he could read.

Another, familiar voice cut through the air, using this short moment of hesitation. “This is your chance, Hans! Flee! I will distract them!”

Hans didn't have to tell him twice. Samuel threw his body forward, running his dagger into the man's upper thigh, just be­low the crotch, two, three, four times, then he let it fall, twirled around and grabbed father's sword. Someone's mace got dan­gerously close to his legs, but he dodged the blow, started run­ning without turning back.

“Hans, he said,” the leader of the pack exclaimed behind him. “That one is the noble then. Don't shoot him!”

“What about the other guy?”

“Just some Jew, I think. He won't be missed.”

A few hasty steps down the slope, and his right knee gave in, but Samuel was quick in catching his balance again, kept on running. Some more steps, and he was close enough to throw the sword safely, even with his left hand. “Bruder!”

Henry gave the man in front of him a kick against the shin, looked up. He caught the sword by the handle firmly, twirled around, gutted his closest enemy. Good.

Samuel turned back, climbed up to the top of the mountain again, where Hans was on the ground now, surrounded by the four remaining men, a fawn circled by hawks. One of them was injured on the back of his head and had taken his skullcap off. A mistake. Samuel pulled the second, shorter dagger from his belt and threw it with one single, precise motion. The blade hit him right in the neck, and he crashed down like a felled tree.

“Oy!” Samuel shouted at them. “Khazerim!”

They turned around in confusion. That was all Hans needed. One swing sliding through two pairs of legs, the third man got a blow straight to his back. He gave them no rest when they lay on the ground, ended it quickly. Then he stumbled forward, fell to his hands and knees, and coughed. It was over. Time for the pain to set in.

Samuel made his way across the bodies over to Hans, rea­ching out his left hand for him. Better not to waste any thoughts on the smell of blood and intestines, on the lives ta­ken, not yet anyway. “Are you alright?”

Hans took his hand, pulled himself up. “Yes.” His eyes quickly wandered across Samuel's body, settling on his right wrist that was already starting to swell, painted in the darkest violet, a stark contrast against his pale skin. “What about you?”

“I'll survive.”

Hans nodded. His expression revealed that he knew too well that Samuel made it seem better than it actually was, but he ac­cepted the reply for now.

They didn't have to hurry as they climbed down the moun­tain side this time. Henry and Godwin had long got rid of their two opponents, and without any major injuries, too, by the looks of it.

It still didn't keep Hans from rushing forward and throwing his arms around Henry's neck. “Henry!”

“I'm fine.” Henry returned the embrace and for the briefest moment his lips found Hans's neck.

Godwin didn't seem like he was in the mood for tenderness. “What the fuck happened here?”

“It wasn't his fault.” Samuel nodded at Hans. “Someone else shot the priest.”

“Yes,” Henry agreed, letting go off Hans, but staying close enough for their hands to touch, “we could see that it wasn't one of your bolts.”

“They were hiding up there between the trees close to us. I counted ten of them.”

“Ten?” Henry's eyes widened. “And you didn't notice them?”

“We were more focused on the things going on down here,” Hans hurried to say, leaving a big part of the truth out, and Sa­muel nodded in silent acknowledgement. The things shared be­tween them had not been meant for anyone else to hear. “Be­sides, most of them didn't even wear any steel.”

“No steel.” It wasn't a question. Godwin had already expec­ted this. “So they were confident enough to fight us without much armour.” His gaze wandered over to the carriage, from which the priest hung down, his limbs twisted from agony like the threads of a rope. His left hand was still dripping from blood, as he had tried to tear the bolt out of his neck, but in vain. “Making it all the more unlikely that this shot was a miss.”

“And they were well-informed,” Samuel added. “They knew about Hans, and took good care not to kill him.” Or me, for that matter. He would have to thank Hans later in a proper way, once this here was settled.

“While they didn't even hesitate to sacrifice a priest.”

“You think this was all planned?” Hans broke away from Henry to better look at him. “Including the killing of Farther Thomas?”

“One of them ran off as soon as the bolt hit, we didn't even get a chance to go after him. And he was prepared for it too, just barely armoured.”

“Making sure he would live to tell the tale,” Godwin con­cluded. “He won't even have to make anything up, we gave him all he would need. Two disciples of Jan Hus, stopping them in the woods and killing the man who was just on his way to Prague to speak out against said Jan Hus fella.”

“But sacrificing a priest for that cause?” Hans asked again, as if his mind still had trouble believing it. “Don't they have any honour?”

“It seems to be more important to them to let everyone know that we don't have any honour. More food for their wild accusa­tions of dismembering and slaughtering clergymen.” Godwin's eyes found Samuel's, and his mouth twisted into a pained smile. “A kind of defamation that your people are already fami­liar with.”

“All too well.” Especially since they started to understand Wenceslas as a friend of the Jews, Samuel thought bitterly. And the Hussites too, people didn't like to differentiate much. They are pouring hot pitch over the tonsures of our priests, and just the other week I heard of a young monk whose cock and balls they squashed with metal plates until he died from the torture! And most of them didn't even bother to ask whether they was supposed to mean the Hussites or the Jews. It was all the same these days. Religious deviants. Rebels against the divine might of the church.

Henry turned around, pointing up the mountains. “What about Janosh and Kubyenka? Did you see them?”

“No,” Samuel replied. “And there were no attackers on that side either. So they cannot have ambushed them as they have done to us, at least not here.”

“You think they may have been stopped on their way?” Hans bit his bottom lip as the thought settled in, his eyes widened in horror. “Fuck.”

Henry nodded. Then he turned, picked the glass ball off the ground and slammed it against the carriage with a loud curse. The biting stench of the firedamp filled the air. Just some fric­tion, Samuel pondered, or a single spark and the carriage and that damned priest would go up in flames. But what good would that do now? “We need to report what happened here to Žižka. And then find a way to clean up this whole mess.”

It was already morning, when they arrived in Žižka's hideout in that Kuttenberg church. The sun had risen, piercing through the beams of the roof like arrows of silver smoke, dancing in the air. The new day was warmer than the last one, not a single cloud darkened the sky, birds that nested in the corners of the church roof celebrated that warmer times were to come.

The sweet caress of spring didn't seem to have passed by Katherine and Žižka either. When the others climbed up the ladder to the church attic, they were sitting together at the table that Žižka used to store all his documents on, each of them on opposite sides, but leaning over the books and parchments to­wards each other. A little too close.

“A whole house?” Katherine whispered in feigned surprise.

“An estate.” Another gasp of Katherine, and Žižka smiled with an audible hum. “A castle.”

“What on earth would I need a castle for?”

“You won't. But if I have the means to, I would not hesitate to give it to you. I'd give you all I have.”

“All of it, really?”

Samuel pushed himself over the edge onto the floor of the attic, struggling, with only one hand and an elbow to use. Ka­therine passed him a quick glance, and nodded, then she leaned back on her chair with crossed arms. “Before you have ac­quired enough money to buy me a castle, you may as well have died of old age. Time is running, Žižka.”

He let out a laugh that sounded more like air being squeezed out of a bellows. Then he turned around, looked at Samuel and at the others who had followed right behind him, and all the ease and joy vanished from his face at once. “One look at you, and I know that the whole plan went to shit.”

Henry was the first to step forward, of course he was. Other than Samuel and Hans, he had been behind the plan with all his heart. He hadn't spoken much on their ride back to Kuttenberg, but it was clear he felt just as responsible as Žižka must feel, if not more so. “You can say that out loud! We were betrayed. Ambushed by almost a dozen more soldiers. The whole thing was set up.”

“One of them got away before we could stop him.” God­win's voice was as clear and strong as it could get, a soldier re­porting back on his mission. “He clearly went to tell everyone about what happened.”

“And what did happen?” Žižka moved up from his chair now, his eyes wandering from one to the other. Samuel felt as if he looked right through their souls with that blind, pale one. “What about the priest?”

“Dead,” Henry answered plainly. Žižka's gaze shot over to Hans in shock, and Henry raised a pacifying hand. “It was one of the attackers up in the woods. And it didn't happen by acci­dent.”

“They created a martyr.” Katherine's voice was as weak as the spring air whistling through the roof above them.

Žižka let himself sink back against the table, breathing in and out a few times. It was more than that, he knew it. Creating a martyr was only the start. Rumours would spread quickly, and the rumours would ask for consequences. Banishments, prohibitions, death sentences, persecutions. Žižka had wanted to help. Had wanted nothing more than to find a cause they could all agree on, igniting their fire again, including the spark in his own heart. He had navigated them right into disaster. “The one who got away, where did he go?”

“North,” Henry answered. “To Prague.”

“Yes, but unless he had a horse hidden somewhere close, it would take him almost a whole day to get there. I reckon he rather went for a meeting point that was more in his immediate vicinity. A place, perhaps, that is in control of another conspira­tor of all this.”

“The Zlenice castle is close by,” Katherine suggested.

“Ondřej Dubá? Well, he serves as the highest judge in the re­gion, but he is loyal to Wenceslas.”

“Only that Wenceslas isn't all too loyal to Jan Hus anymore. Besides, wasn't Dubá a member of the League of Lords once?”

Žižka nodded without looking at her, thinking it through. Sa­muel could feel his own patience slowly flying off to the sky, together with the swallows under the gable. “He was, but not for long. And the man is ninety, Kat. What reason would he have to get himself tangled up in political strives at his age?”

“You should know that better than most.”

Samuel took a step forward now, his heart pounding almost as heavily as his head and wrist. “What does it matter where they went? Wherever they fled to, they must have reached it by now, and soon the word will spread.”

“Sam is right.” It was a relief that Henry didn't seem to be any more interested in this game of guessing than Samuel was. “The best thing we can do now is to clean up this mess we made as quickly as possible.”

There is one particular mess to clean up first, Samuel thought. That fucker Schwarzfeld who must still be in the room they offered him, only one floor below. Sleeping the sleep of the just. “And take care of that traitor who ratted us out.”

He felt Žižka stare him down for a long time, brows pulled together tightly, the pale eye tearing open his soul. Samuel defied his gaze. There was nothing for Žižka to see that he had to be ashamed of. Žižka's eyes were still fixed on him, when he asked them all with a harsher voice than before: “Where are Kubyenka and Janosh?”

“They never arrived at our meeting place,” Henry answered.

“Did you search the area for them?”

“We did, but only the surroundings, and it was still dark. Though I suppose they must have been stopped before ever getting there.”

“Dear God!” Katherine raised a hand to her mouth.

“Hm.” Žižka's half-empty stare was still buried in Samuel's soul as if that sound was supposed to have carried some other hidden meaning just for him. Samuel couldn't care less.

“We must search for them again,” Hans stepped forward un­til he stood right next to Henry, hands and voice raised, “and we should do it now that it is daytime! Track down the whole way they must have taken, from Uzhitz to Jezonice!”

“We will. And we won't stop until we haven't at least found some trace of them. Dead or alive.”

“Alive?” Henry shook his head in surprise. A string of silver morning light hit his hair, painting it grey where it touched him. “You think someone could have taken them hostage?”

“I doubt it.” Žižka's voice was cold as ice.

Samuel had lost all interest in this fucking staring competi­tion. “You can go look for them.” His fingers had found their way to the handle of his dagger, he hadn't even noticed it but now he felt all to eager to take it and slit someone's throat. “I will have a word with this farreter Schwarzfeld.”

He barely got time to turn on his heel. Žižka jumped forward so quickly that there was little room to react, and he had his mace at hand all of a sudden, putting the heavy metal head to Samuel's chest. No, he thought. Not this time. He pushed the mace away with his right arm, used the left hand to draw the dagger. Žižka was quicker, and he had the advantage of kno­wing that Samuel would not actually hurt him. He closed the distance between them with another firm step, and grabbed his broken wrist with the free hand, squeezing it tightly. Samuel let out a sharp hiss, his vision exploded in blinding light from the pain.

“Not so fast, youngster.”

“Take your hand off me.”

“I cannot do that,” Žižka's voice was low and rumbling like thunder, “unless I am fully certain that you won't do anything foolish.”

“What are you protecting Schwarzfeld for?” Henry came closer to them, but he didn't intervene, even as Samuel could hear in his voice that every fibre of his body wanted to. “He is a traitor! He led us straight into a trap, risking all our lives, sullying the reputation of Hus, he may even have Kubyenka and Janosh on his conscience!”

“I won't deny that he might have played a role in all this. But he is not responsible for what happened with these two.”

“What?”

One more deep breath, one more piercing glare with that cursed dead eye, and then Žižka finally let go off Samuel's wrist, stepping back to the table. Another wave of pain rolled over him, so vigorously he almost fainted. “Schwarzfeld knew which road the priest and his men would take. But neither Ka­therine nor I told him a single word about where exactly you would meet with him, let alone where Janosh and Kubyenka would be staying during the day.”

“So what?” Hans's voice got so high that it cracked. “He knew about the plan, that was more than enough. Those armed men he set on us might have just followed us all the way!”

“From Kuttenberg to Uzhitz? A dozen men, without any of you noticing them? No, they clearly waited there the whole time. They have received their information from a very reliable source.”

“What are you hinting on here, Žižka?” Henry's voice was a strong contrast to Hans's, deep and growling, a dog that had sensed his prey.

Žižka took his time to reply. The silence was filled with an­ger and fear, the lowered looks from Katherine and Godwin who both didn't seem so surprised about Žižka's assumptions, the singing of the swallows who didn't care for the pain of the humans underneath them. “Look. I don't like this any more than you do. But Kubyenka has expressed his concerns about all of this many times over the past few days. So the idea of betrayal is one that we have to entertain.”

Samuel took a step back to the ladder, but he lifted both his hands reassuringly, only a weak attempt with his right one. “All the more reason then to entertain this Schwarzfeld a little.” His grin was all teeth, and he assumed that it looked just as vicious as it felt. “To talk to him, friendly of course.”

This time, Žižka didn't stop him, but Samuel could still see him nod in Hans's direction, before he turned to walk back over to the ladder. “Go with him.” Footsteps behind him, one pair, then another one. “Not you, Henry. I need you here.”

[autism-swagger]

HEAD IN MY HANDS OOOOHH MY SHAYLA

[internetgiraffekid1673]

KittyBella AU: Revamping the Magic System/Lore

It's no secret that the lore in miraculous is kind of all over the place, and is pretty frustrating to deal with. If I ever did a rewrite that keeps the same general plot and main characters, I'd completely overhaul it. But for KittyBella, that feels like a lot of work when I'm also having to write the changes to character dynamics and general setup from the kwami swap.

Unfortunately, there are a lot of writer unfriendly elements to the Miraculous Lore and Magic System that are both difficult to work with and that I personally dislike so much that I simply won't have fun working with them at all, so I'll still be changing some things.

This does leave me with an awkward gray area though of "things I would 100% change if this were a canon rewrite but that I don't know if I want to add to KittyBella."

I'm hoping writing them all out will help me decide, but I'm also opening this to you all, the potential audience for this fic to discuss. Any lore changes you think would be appropriate in a KittyBella AU, I'd LOVE to hear, and if you have opinions on what to add and what to save for a different AU, it would be much appreciated.

So without further ado, here are the changes!

Things that 100% WILL be in KittyBella:

The black cat is now required for the World Healing Wave/Miraculous Cure power

One of the most frustrating aspects of canon for me is that the Ladybug and the Black Cat are pitched as Equals: Ying and Yang, Creation and Destruction, Bad Luck and Good Luck. They're both required for the big wish and they're supposed to be equal partners.

But in practice, Ladybug is the only one who actually seems to be more powerful: between the akuma purification, the miraculous cure, and the magical anti-akuma charms that work for like one episode, Ladybug effectively has 4 powers to Chat Noir's one. Add that into the fact that the writers tend to overfocus on Marinette, to the point that she was made the sole guardian of the Miraculous and that Adrien actually got BENCHED FROM THE FINAL FIGHT in season 5, and it tends to look MUCH less like Ying and Yang and more like Chat Noir is relegated to. . .well. . .

I'm aware that Season 6 declares Miraculous Chat Noir is a power used to destroy memories or something, but this is a total ret-con, since that's not how it worked back in Oblivio. And even besides that, there are a lot of things the cure can do that should really be the black cat's job anyway, like destroying bread monsters or desubmerging Paris. So now, both the Ladybug and the Cat wielders have to be present for Miraculous Cure---it's a joint power.

All miraculous users can now purify akumas

Instead of making this a super dumb power that comes from the LADYBUG'S YO-YO IN PARTICULAR of all things, we're going to make this power available to ANY miraculous holders. Evil magic corrupts the akumas, miraculous magic purifies them/restores them to their natural state or whatever. We're gonna say it works just by catching it in your hands and doing the reverse of whatever the hell Hawkmoth is doing to them. Having something to catch them in like a yo yo is certainly helpful, but Chat's extension stick is nothing to sneeze at---you can stand on that and keep your hands free while zipping around.

Usual fanon changes to the 5 minutes and you detransform unless you "grow up" rule

Can. . . can we all collectively agree that part where Marinette and Adrien just suddenly "grew up" in the season 5 finale felt like a fever dream and ignore it? Cool, thanks.

Anyways, I'm just gonna use the familiar fanon rule that I think most of us thought was canon until. . .whatever that was: Your time limit slowly increases as you get more used to wielding a miraculous, increase your tolerance to magic, and finish growing.

So, like. If you gave an 8 year old, a 15 year old, a 21 year old, and a 35 year old a miraculous on the same day and none of them had any exposure to magic before and they were all naturally normal magic tolerance: the 8 year old would only be able to stay transformed for like 2 hours and would only have one minute after using their power. The 15 year old can stay transformed for like 8 hours and gets 5ish minutes. the 21 year old can stay transformed for 48 hours and gets a whole hour to use their power. The 35 year old can stay transformed for around a week and gets a day to use their powers.

However, having more magic tolerance increases your time limit, more experience with your miraculous increases your time limit, and if you start practicing when you're in adolescence, your tolerance when you reach adulthood will actually be BETTER because magic had time to adjust to your body when it was already making major adjustments. So if you had a 17 year old who'd been practicing since they were 13, they'd probably be able to stay transformed for up to two weeks and would have like 2 hours to use their powers---double the limit of a completely inexperienced adult.

Everyone in the Miracuclass is notable for having an unusually high natural magic inclination (Gabe also has high tolerance, Nathalie has regular tolerance, and Emilie has low tolerance which CERTAINLY didn't help). This allows all users to stay transformed as long as they don't use their powers for a full two days without any practice. If any akuma runs longer than that, they'll have to detransform, but nothing's taken that long so far.

The Peacock cannot create sentient life

This NEVER should have been a thing tbh. It just makes so many things on so many levels seem so questionable and needlessly complicates a lot. I do have tiers of how far I want to revamp the peacock's power since it's writer-unfriendly all around, but this is a must-have every time. Even if nothing else changes, this at least will.

Emily instead used the peacock to create a fertilized egg, which she could grow within herself and give birth the normal way. Basically magical in-vitro with a 100% success rate. Adrien's just a designer baby, not magically enslaved. Sentimonsters like the senti-Ladybug have no more autonomy than a robot, and have to be actively puppeted around by the Peacock holder to create convincing reactions. They can be told to do a specific thing, and will be stuck doing ONLY that thing until they're given new orders. They are barely a convincing simulation of life, say nothing about sentience and autonomy.

Guardian Order Re-Write

The Guardian Order seems INSANELY stupid and morally ambiguous the way it's written in canon. What do you MEAN you just left the six year old you kidnapped and starved all alone with a box full of magic nukes???? Why did you think that would ever work???? What do you mean all of your members are unwillingly trained from childhood??? What do you mean this stinky Su-Han man who just hates everyone is actually Fu's boss??? No wonder Fu is so incompetent bro, you all suck on every possible level! WHAT DO YOU MEAN THERE USED TO BE HUNDREDS OF OTHER BOXES OF MAGICAL NUKES BEFORE THE HUNGRY SIX YEAR OLD BLEW THEM ALL UP?!?!?!?!?

If I was revamping ALL the lore, I'd nix the ENTIRE guardian order and probably Fu too, but that's, again, a bit much for a kwami swap AU. So for the purposes of this one, I'll probably just rewrite them.

In my AU, there is only one Miracle Box, and it was created by mystical sages who called upon the power of the gods and stored the magic of the ones they were able to contact in the jewels during a time of MAJOR MAGICAL CRISIS. Think like, they were regularly getting attacked by Kaiju and monsters from other dimensions and crud. There are more magic forces in the world than just the miraculous, and they were created with the express purpose of keeping that magic in check.

While there were initially anywhere from 3 to 12 sages, most of em were killed in the initial struggle, and it's become the responsibility of a singular sage and their apprentice to keep these Miraculous jewels safe and to hand them to chosen heroes during times of magical crisis. We're working by Sith rules here, there are only ever two at a time, and their hero flunkies.

The sages are necessary in case any of the holders ever get too power hungry or start behaving dangerously. They're very carefully selected from master to apprentice to be people that will not want to use the miraculous for themselves, and are very intensely trained in intuition and people reading to only choose good holders and a good apprentice. They're very secretive too, and do their absolute darndest to keep knowledge of the miraculous from spreading too far, since they know it would be catastrophic if world governments got their hands on it.

An evil sage has happened exactly once. They started idealistic, as someone who wanted to hand out the miraculous during times of peace and use their extraordinary powers to help people. When their master refused, saying that the Miraculous were created to combat dangerous magical forces and are too powerful to use mundanely, they betrayed their master.

They stole the miracle box and tried to wield a bunch of miraculous all on their own. The power made them crazy and they just about destroyed the whole world with the crazy overuse of the power. They eventually tore themselves apart from the magical overload, and the master was able to recover the miraculous and use their power to set things to right, but it came at a great cost. I haven't figured out what this is yet, if anyone has ideas yeet em at me!

Fu is in an unusual situation, because while he's been the full master of the miraculous for quite some time, the world has been unusually magically quiet as of late, which means he's having trouble finding someone magically in tune enough to be his apprentice. I debate on whether I want to give him one or not, I'll cover that in the "questionable" section. If he has one, it'll be someone the Miracuclass' age or a little older, to act as their more direct mentor.

The "lack of magically in tune people" issue is also going to be used to explain why our heroes are teenagers instead of adults, and why the apprentice, if I pick one, is going to weild a miraculous sometimes too.

In any case, it's been 4 or 5 guardians now since there's been a major magical conflict that would merit handing out the miraculous, so Fu is flying a little blind here. Which makes it very unfortunate that HE'S the guy that gets stuck dealing with the Butterfly and the Peacock resurfacing. Suffice it to say, Miraculous and the modern world interact quite strangly, and he's making some things up as he goes.

Kwamis are more actively involved in using their powers

In canon, Kwamis are something of a slave to their miraculous holder. They're magically forced to obey their holder's orders, they get no say in who uses their powers even if it's someone they would never choose, and they become completely silent and null once the user transforms.

I dislike this for a lot of reasons. They're gods! Do we really think they'd be that subservient? And if you're going to use magically merging two sentient individuals as part of your magic system, AT LEAST BOTHER TO EXPLORE IT! That is such a cool concept that is SO wasted with the way miraculous handles it.

In my lore, a Kwami has to sort of gel with their holder for their powers to work properly. While canon writes it so that any holder can pretty much use any miraculous, we're not doing that here. Certain personalities work better with certain powers, and certain kwamis also work better with certain personalities. If you're butting heads with your kwami, your powers will not only be weakened by circumstance (think Max the linear thinker trying to use Lucky Charm and it's unintuitive logic), but it will also cause the actual magic to deteriorate. People who are on the outs with their kwamis will have shorter time limits on their transformation, smaller ranges on their powers, and just generally weakened effects. Additionally, using a kwami that doesn't get along with you can be outright DANGEROUS, since their thought processes will merge with your own a little bit while transformed (this is how I'm choosing to explain Marinette's Ladybug Vision. I'm interpreting it as diegetic and as Tikki's thought patterns merging with hers. Everybody has some version of this). If you're radically different from each other, you'll feel yourself being pulled apart at the seams as your brains try to solve problems in different ways. Also also, not all the kwamis get along or work well together. Trying to dual wield Plagg and Tikki wouldn't be pretty for you. Neither would trying to dual wield a serious Kwami like Kaalki or Sass with a chaotic kwami like Xuppu or Daizzi. This is a big reason why using multiple miraculous at once can be dangerous. Having multiple Kwamis personalities affecting your brain in ways that oppose each other makes you go insane. Add that into the magical overload slowly eating away at and corrupting your body (especially if you're not particularly tolerant to magic in the first place), and you will literally and figuratively explode if you try to use too many at once.

I mentioned in my Alya Analysis post that I want her and Tikki to schism and butt heads a little bit. They're both very confident and sure of themselves, but while Tikki lives up to her Sugarcube nickname, Alya has a little more feistiness and bite to her that makes them disagree on how to deal with injustice in the world. This will have the consequence of weakening Alya's capabilities until she and Tikki can come to a compromise. But agreeing with your kwami ALL the time is a major no-no too. Imagine if your black-cat holder had just as much of a devil-may-care attitude as Plagg. They'd encourage each other to the point of dangerous negligence and break something very important. The ideal holder for a kwami is someone who is both able to work with their personality and keep their less savory traits in check. Just as examples: the ideal holder for Tikki is someone who's creative like her. They're chaotic and tend to think in bursts of inspiration that help them navigate her oddball lucky charms. They're a little impulsive and never hesitate, which helps them enact their lucky charm plan even if it's a little nuts. But, they're also someone who's got an intense sense of justice and some bite behind them. Tikki is all sugar, so their holder needs to be a little spicy to properly utilize her powers as a fighting force. Someone who was exactly like Tikki wouldn't ever bother fighting, they'd try to talk everything out and forgive and forgive and forgive and compromise and compromise and compromise. That's not super effective either. This can be seen in both Marinette and Alya, it's what makes them good Ladybug holders. The ideal holder for Plagg is someone who's. . . for lack of a better term, a bit of a little shit. Destruction is a power that works best when you know how to cause damage and like doing it at least to some degree. Good black cats are also a bit lazy. They prefer to watch and wait until they can take the problem down with a single strike, not micromanage it into submission. Black Cats also need to show the upsides to being selfish. Someone who takes a detour to help every single person and is constantly sacrificing themselves for the good of others will clash HARD with Plagg's style of helping others by taking care of himself. Someone who's too busy trying to save everyone else to think about what they want lacks the focus needed to wield destruction. But unlike Plagg, Black Cats can't be reckless with their powers. Destruction is simply too dangerous to have someone who uses it freely, so his best holders always have a lot of restraint compared to his own willingness to use his powers even when he's not attached to a holder.

You may notice, this leaves us with a major issue: how are Gabe and Nathalie using their kwami for evil if you have to be in tune with them for the powers to work? That leads in nicely to the next change:

The butterfly and the peacock are not miraculous.

I was gonna put this in the gray area section, but I changed my mind writing it. It's more work to keep them as miraculous. The butterfly and the peacock both work completely differently from any of the other miraculous: you're not really supposed to fight with them at all, you make champions to fight for you and they both have the freaky evil-izing power thing. They're supposed to create minions that lets you operate from a distance. They do not fit with the magical girl up close and personal fighting squad.

Now they're both dark corruptive gems from The Shadow Realm or something that let you manipulate others emotions into evil powers and force your influence onto things. It is the fastest simplest way to keep the same powers and to keep them as villains without having to rewrite things to make the miraculous powers consistent with each other. You can even keep Nooroo and Dusuu as their stewards but now they're evil corruptive entities or something.

This even lets you go ham on sending Gabe and Nathalie off the deep end by making these things eeeeeevvviiiiiillll magic that makes you eeeeevvviiiiillll the more you use them, but Gabe and Nathalie don't KNOW that when they start using them. Or hell, maybe they do and they're desperate enough not to care!

Like, I haven't hammered out the full Backstory TM for what these things are, but they sure as hell ain't miracles!

Some of the miraculous powers need to be changed

Having powers like the goat and the ladybug exist at the same time is really really bad for trying to understand the lore and the worldbuilding. If the Ladybug is creation, how come the goat is just better creation, (and how come the Peacock is even BETTER creation, down to being able to create sentient life)? Why is the rooster so ridiculously busted? You can just have (basically) any power you want? Why is Sass time travel, but then Fluff is just Extremely Broken time travel, and how come the Butterfly can just Give People Miraculous Powers?

If I was doing a full rewrite, I'd also massively pare down the amount of Miraculous there are. There are a whopping NINETEEN of them currently, which is way too much to juggle. I don't know if I'm going to get rid of any for the kwami swap, but SOME of them certainly need their powers changed if they stay. Which ones? It's a bit up in the air.

The ones I will for sure be changing are the goat and the rooster. Their powers are actively contradict established lore. There is no way I will be able to tolerate giving them their canon powers and write a narrative that feels cohesive at the same time. @princess-of-the-corner (sorry for the ping) has my favorite existing rewrite for their powers by giving them a Night and Day motif which I like. They give the rooster light manipulation that can range from lighting up a room to a flashbang to a concentrated beacon, which I'm stealing. They also give the goat dreamwalking, but I'm going to just give them the straight inverse with shadow manipulation. They can swallow an area in darkness, manipulate shadows, and hide people in them. This works for me with goats being a symbol of demons/evil. I am also probably going to straight up GET RID of the rabbit. Fluff's power is simply too broken and overlaps way too much with Sass for me to be comfortable. Sass's power is a good example of how you can make time travel work without it completely breaking everything. Fluff's is not. So now Sass is the miraculous of time. Unlike with a lot of these other miraculous, I don't even want to keep the rabbit for character focus reasons. Being the omni-universal steward of time who lives separated from The Now and has to be responsible for making sure nobody acts outside the way their supposed to is a very depressing and terrible power for anyone, but especially Alix. Alix is very aggressive, in-the-moment, and vivacious. She would NOT be just kicking around in the timeline and correcting people when they act in universe-altering ways. With my established lore, you could argue that it works to keep her sane (a user who's a bit less present would get easily lost in the many timelines and lose their anchor), but I'd honestly rather not have to deal with time travel. Just give her the snake if you have to.

That wraps up all the definite changes I think. onto the next category!

Changes that the lorehead in me would really like to make, but might be too confusing for what's supposed to just be a kwami swap

The thing about kwami swap AUs is that they're supposed to be mostly similar to canon and are not about fixing the magic-system, but are instead about how the character dynamics change when the roles and powers are shuffled around. Changing too much lore can get really confusing for both the audience and the writer.

For example, I won't be doing a deep-dive into the horror potential miraculous lore has in KittyBella (Sentimonsters being enslaved to their amok and also easily destroyable, Hawkmoth's presence creating a scenario where you have to supress all negative emotions and can't even deal with them healthily lest you risk becoming a raging supervillain, Guardian Amnesia, ramifications of kwamis using their powers without holders, etc.) because that has enough Implications that it deserves it's own AU and would be better explored in the context of our familiar setup and character dynamics, otherwise, much like Miraculous itself, I think there would be too much going on.

But, Miraculous Lore is deeply frustrating and inconsistent to me, so there are some things that I'd really REALLY like to change anyway. I need someone to either push me over the edge or reel me back in on these. I am screaming my need for assistance to the heavens and the void. I am about to mis-tag this post with the tags I might use on the fic so I can reach the potential audience so ya'll will tell me what you want because I am INCREDIBLY indecisive here.

More Miraculous Powers overhaul

Carrying on from the last point, I would probably change other kwamis powers to have more internal consistency and match better to real world mythology (probably everybody's powers except the fox, the turtle, and perhaps the bee), as well as massively pare down how many of them there were if I were doing a full lore rewrite---no more than 10, probably no more than 7.

That's too many differences for me to write effectively in this kwami swap, so now the question becomes: how far can I go?

If I were going to remove anyone other than Fluff for this AU, this is probably the order I'd do it in: the ox, the mouse, the dog, the pig, maybe the monkey, and maybe the tiger. If I hadn't rewritten the goat and the rooster's powers, then they would be the first to go, even before Fluff probably because I think they're THAT stupid. If I were doing a full show rewrite, I'd also probably remove the peacock completely, since it's powers completely overlap with either the butterfly or the ladybug, but I'm almost positive that will change too much for KittyBella. The peacock being damaged and Nathalie's role as Mayura take up far too much of the plot as-is for me to be comfortable axing it. If I do decide to keep everything though, I feel like I want to change some of their powers up, simply because I don't like the way a lot of them work. Take the dog for example: that's a really weird and hyper-specific power that doesn't fit well with concepts as broad as creation and destruction and time. The mouse and the tiger both have fine(ish) powers, but those are still really hyper-specific concepts when compared to elements or illusion. The pig miraculous representing joy fits lore-wise, but the way the power works is really weird and is either completely useless or completely broken depending on when and how you utilize it. The ox's power is literally just a "nuh-uh you can't beat me when I put up my everything-proof shield," and the monkey seems like it was created solely for fighting other miraculous users.

Here's my crack at just editing their powers:

Xuppu's power can stay the same, although I might choose to make his concept Reality/Truth instead of Disruption (I am 100% axing the -ion suffix rule because it's needlessly limiting). We just have to ever so slightly tweak it to say it extends to disrupting all magic and powers, not just miraculous ones. This means that any other hypothetical enemies I want to throw at these guys like a vampire or a shadow demon would also have their magic cancelled. This is a dangerous all-or-nothing type power though, because it also cancels out the abilities of your allies, and cancels out any sort of magical weaknesses somebody might have had (a vampire can't turn into a bat, but also no longer burns in the sun and probably still knows how to use a shotgun). It's a miraculous that's very situational in it's uses, and since one of the powers it cancels is the all-powerful Miraculous Cure, it's usually not helpful for the show. I also know that the show has a thing going where the different layers of the miracle box represent Ying and Yang and then the five Chinese elements, then the Chinese zodiac, but since I already killed off Fluff and that theme with her, I'm instead going to try to make it so every Kwami kind of has an opposite/comes in pairs. As I mentioned in the first section, Ziggy and Orikko represent night/shadows and day/light, while Tikki and Plagg are obviously creation and destruction. Trixx and Xuppu are going to be a pair with one representing illusions and the other representing stark reality. The ox is going to instead gain the power of strictly physical invulnerability. You can't be hurt by physical attacks, but you can still be brainwashed or hypnotized or subjected to good old fashioned taunts and emotional manipulation just like anybody else. It's domain is now strength. It's opposite is the dog. The dog now has the domain of loyalty. It's power is basically the ox but for your brain. You can't be brainwashed, hypnotized, tricked by illusions, or otherwise swayed from aiding your allies. In addition, you gain an innate sense of where all your allies are even if they're separated from you by magical means and even if you didn't know where they were before using the ability. The name of the power is now Pack Bond. The dog and the ox are both good support miraculous' but dogs struggle to deal with mostly physical opponents, oxen struggle to deal with mental ones, and both struggle with some of the more extreme magical abilities. The pig still has the domain of joy/jubilation, but now instead of the weird heart's desire vision thing, it fills all willing targets within a certain radius with joy, energy, courage, and willpower. It's a really helpful ability that's great for boosting team morale, but it's not great if you need to be sober and careful, since it tends to make people reckless and a little too chipper to be super focused and task oriented. It also can't be used to just break an akuma out of brainwashing unless their motive for getting akumatized was "I just wanna be happy/I don't wanna feel sad anymore," since the target has to be willing. Also, I'm changing the name of the power to Celebrate. I would have gone for Rejoice, but that's the transformation phrase lol. It's opposite is the tiger. The tiger now has the power of intimidation. You can target an individual and fill them with crippling, paralyzing fear. This miraculous is incredibly effective, but it is single target so it's not great if you're dealing with a large group of opponents, and sometimes particularly strong-willed or aggressive individuals react with fight instead of flight or freeze. The name of the power is now Ambush. It's opposite is the pig. The mouse gets the domain of the body and can shrink and grow ala antman. Power is now named Minimize or Maximize depending on which one you're using. It's opposite is the dragon.

Speak of the devil, the dragon's domain is the elements/natural forces. It's powers are all exactly the same except now it gets the five Chinese elements (Wind, Water, Fire, Earth, and Wood). It's opposite is the mouse, as one represents a creature's impact on nature and the other represents nature's impact on creatures.

The snake and the horse are the same, and I'm choosing to justify it as Space and Time simply being the two opposing forces that control the universe. They both warp the universe, just in opposite ways.

Bee and turtle are also the same, opposite each other (one is aggression/offense/attack the other is protection/defense).

So yeah my major dilemma is, do I alter everyone's powers this way? Can I get rid of the dog, the pig, and the ox? The monkey and the tiger? I'm not removing any of the main 5 and I don't think I plan to drag KittyBella out for all 5 and then some seasons. I kind of want to end after 3-ish seasons, so it's not like most of these extras will play major roles anyways. If they do, I'm seriously debating just having an existing team of 5-7 dual weild instead of dragging everyone else in, cuz that seems a little excessive.

Five Charges of Your Power

The miraculous all have a very cool, cohesive five-segmented design that gets totally wasted with the way I rewrite the timers, and tbh they're still kinda obsolete with the way canon writes the timers. You're telling me these things that are less powerful when minors use them and are therefore not to be used by minors most of the time are specifically designed to indicate when a minor's using them?

So, to preserve this cool design element, I like to make it so you can have multiple charges of your power the more experienced you get. At full power, you have five uses of your power before transforming back. But again, I'm stuck on if I actually want to add this or not, since it might make my power system too complicated to follow when we're also trying to keep track of the kwami swap.

Alternatively, I could also make it so you DON'T have a detransformation timer when you use your power, you merely have charges of how many times you can use them, and the kids only get one charge until they get more experience. But I feel like that takes a lot of the tension out of some of our identity shenanigan scenes, since they're basically never gonna be under threat of detransformation, so I don't know that I wanna write it like that.

Adjusting the peacock's powers

Even after we've removed the peacock from the miraculous framework, it's STILL stupid! It's basically just a knockoff butterfly that manages to be more powerful since your sentimonster is under your direct command and doesn't have emotions or goals of it's own.

So we gotta fix that. If I didn't need to care about the Mayura plotline and only needed to care about the Emilie one, I would just say Emilie used the butterfly to get herself pregnant (or akumatized gabe and gave him the power or vice versa) and the magical overload put her in the coma, but since I do need to care about Nathalie, I do need to keep the peacock around.

We've got two options for this. The first one is that the peacock is designed to work in tandem with the butterfly. Since they're no longer miraculous, I can make it so that they don't have to be capable of independent operation. Sentimonsters can only be created for Akuma villains. You can't just make one and have it do what you want. While this solution allows for the least amount of changes to the canon powerset, it does require me to put in some extra legwork in their backstory to explain why the malevolent emotional manipulation magical entity also has a sidekick that lets you make constructs, and I don't know that I wanna do that.

So instead, my thought was to change the peacock's powers the same way I did for the other miraculous. Now, it lets you create constructs you can project your conciousness into and puppet them around. This means that our heroes are PERSONALLY fighting against Mayura instead of fighting a proxy she's empowering the way Hawkmoth is. I like this better, it lets Mayura be a more effective second in command and lets her do the usual Villain's Right Hand Man job of personally screwing with the heroes while the villain schemes.

The constructs can't have any power you want: they can be any shape you want but they're basically just puppets at that point, so you usually wanna make it something that's small enough to move around but big enough to be threatening. You can puppet multiple constructs at once, but you only have so much awareness, so they start to get less effective if you're trying to control too many. A sentimonster possessed by Mayura is basically the default sidekick/babysitter to any akumatized villain when she shows up, and she makes fights much harder.

While the powerset is certainly better for story writing, it might be too big for KittyBella, so which route are we thinking would be better?

That took less rambling than I thought it would to be honest. I just would really like to hear people's thoughts on what kinds of changes they'd prefer to see, since I genuinely don't know which I'd rather do: make internally consistent lore at the risk of making it too complex to follow in a kwami swap as well, or compromise on some of the lore to spend more time on character dynamics.

And if you all have thoughts on lore changes you'd like that I DIDN'T include here, feel free to chime in! I'd love to know, as well as anything else miraculous/KittyBella related (or literally anything else I like being yapped at).

[witchinatree]

making a list of my favorite quote/ones that stuck with me from each season 1 episode because i feel like it

(i'm starting this after episode 4 but it will be a WHILE before i post it)

episode 1: "bones are a lie peddled by Big Milk" - alice

i love this one because it's a great introduction to alice i think. also it radiates spiral so i hope we get avatar alice not dead alice (isnt there a podcast called alice isnt dead?)

episode 2: "If I wanted to clear the canvas, I would have used turpentine." - statement

this one was just fucking powerful and caught me so off guard like 😶

episode 3: "What would I do without her?" - statement

the norris statement <3 it feels like martin asking what he would do without jon which makes mag200 a lot sadder and i love them

episode 4: "Perhaps you shall prove a stronger will than I, and will yet find it within yourself to destroy this hungry thing of wood and cat-gut." - statement

augustus sighting #1 and we immediately get jonah magnus expressing that it may be possible for gwen bouchard unknown family member to overcome the eye's hunger spooky violin

episode 5: "Voyeur needs to be seen to be believed." - statement

i feel like this one is pretty reflective of how the seasons gonna go? like if you explain the events of tma (mag200 specifically) no one's gonna believe you, it must be seen to be believed!! and also seen!! like the eye!!!

episode 6: "Not sca- This isn’t some poxy blood test, some little pinprick, this is hundreds, thousands of razor sharp points pushing into your flesh." - needles

i love needles so much and i thought this was really funny because it was like "you dont find me scary!! what the fuck!!!" just kind of toddler michael energy

episode 7: "It’s not like we’re wrestling with tape recorders and manila folders." - celia

STOP IT. celia you can't say that you just cannot!!!!!! you Know™ too much maam i cant with you

episode 8: "Pleasure to meet you both. I’m Gerry!"

RAGHHHHH OH MY GOD GERRY!!!! i love him so much and idk how to handle him being alive in the tmagp universe!! gertrude too but idk we got so much of her in tma and not nearly enough of gerry

episode 9: "And honestly, it’s kind of compelling by this point." - sam

they got him 😔😔 the horrors got sam 😔😔 also i found this to be an interesting contrast to jon's heavy resistance in season 1 like he was being compelled but he wasn't going to let anyone know that vs sam "its kinda compelling to trauma dump on this paperwork :]" how is he somehow even more victim material

episode 10: "Gosh you’re sexy, here’s a twenty for your trouble.” - alice

does this count as a quote if shes also quoting what she thinks sam should say? idk anyway i love her i would say that to her if given the chance and it was very silly. i will not be addressing bonzo i am scared.

episode 11: "...Thank you, Alice" - gwen

dyhard dyhard dyhard dyhard dyhard. okay also, the way she CRUMBLED at the idea of anyone doing anything nice for her please someone give her a hug and let it be ME. this series is tossing me back and forth between sam & alice (what is their ship name) and dyhard but this put me back to dyhard

episode 12: "You know it's rude to have absolutely no game?" - alice

she's so fucking funny i need her to be okay so badly!!!! i don't think even tim made me laugh as much as she makes me chuckle and this one really got me. it's hard to write such a comedic character in a podcast since you only have the voice but they really nailed it i adore her

episode 13: "Is it my fault?" - gwen

each of these episodes just reveal a little bit more about how loving and soft gwen is and idk i love her so unbelievably much so seeing that she felt guilt about the bonzo stuff just made her so much more real :(

episode 14: "Christ, they’re in the walls…" - statement

theyre in the walls!!! theyre in the goddamn walls!!!!! anyway that got me because i realized the hole before the statement said it. made more sad than scared tbh

episode 15: "Babies are cool!" - alice this entire interaction between her and sam & celia was so awkward, she is so obvious and i love her anyway

episode 16: "It’s not like I was holding doors open for Mr Bonzo or anything." - gwen my wife is so so so stupid but i adore her AND this gives room for character development. i wish she did not do that though. i love when characters are flawed and have depth but i struggled to get past THIS flaw of hers

episode 17: "Thanks, I guess. Not exactly the same, though, is it?" - celia shes talking TO JON IN THE COMPUTER. SHE KNOWS. i lost my damn mind i love her i love her. get the gay people out of the puter please queen

episode 18: "Why would I need to talk to you? Your work is satisfactory. Unless you have a work-related issue I could assist you with?" - lena solidified my opinion that lena is the best boss to ever have, i adore her and i would want to work for her if she wasn't the boss of Creepy Establishment #1

episode 19: "You’re going to throw it in the fishtank, aren’t you?" - alice colin's behavior is like really worrying BUT i'm glad he's back. i was not convinced he was still alive

episode 20: "I suppose it’s too late for remorse, isn’t it? And why should I be sorry? This is what I deserve!" - ink5oul/statement they reminded me of jon a lot, like especially his season 3/4 transformation when he doesn't quite know everything but he knows he isn't who he was in season 1 anymore, i hope we see more of their life and they can be helped :(

episode 21: [Tape Recorder Bites Ink5oul] - audio description i know it's not technically a quote but this is just so fucking funny. why does it have teeth. what does this mean for the lore. holy shit.

episode 22: "Jonathan Sims and Martin Blackwood" - celia. knawing at the walls of my enclosure i am so not okay. i'm not okay. wtf. wtf. wtf. they're real. wtf.

episode 23: "I had a favorite mug. It said “love you, bitch” and had a picture of a drunk dog on it." - alice. okay i just love this entire interaction because gwen got to open up a little bit and my dyhard heart is so full

episode 24: "I am told that children like me, and I’ve always held the opinion that the world would be a better place if everyone just thought more." - basira. once again this whole interaction was so fun but like idk i loved hearing basira somewhat happy and in a safe place :] my wife <3

episode 25: " I am trying to help, to save us from this goddamned fucking nightmare machine!" - colin. MAN I REALLY WAS ROOTING FOR YOU!!! I WAS SO CONFIDENT YOU WEREN'T GONNA DIE!!!! it's over

episode 26: "I was worrying for a moment that you were Magnussing." - alice. MAGNUSSING BEING CANON MADE ME SAY IT EVEN MORE I'VE SAID IT LIKE TWICE ALREADY

episode 27: "You didn’t tell me the room was labelled, “Archivist.”" - celia. oooooh somebody's got TRAUMAAAAA LMAO

episode 28: "So you’re telling me you know nothing about an OIAR external contract being found with the bodies of two tattooed thugs who met rather grisly ends?" - TREVOR HERBERT???? anyway. ink5oul mention!!!!! i hope they stop killing people it's really rude

episode 29: "Alice, er… we’ve got to talk. It’s important." - teddy. i knew it was over for him but i didn't think it was gonna be THIS bad??? bye babe i guess??? 😭

episode 30: how do i even pick. the whole fucking episode. i can't. i am in a state of shock. i need to lay down for 30 years.

[sailfish-serum]

EEEEHEHEHEHEHEHEEE JOY AND WHIMSY REACTIVATED OHHHOHOOO WHIPPIE YAHOO!!!!!!!!!!!!

[wusopiejung25]

Shadows of London's companion live action (AI face swapper)

nobody asked for this but here we go:

Edward Grey

Vincent Saville

Roger Evans

I HAVEN'T GOT PRISCILLA BECAUSE MY FREE CREDIT IS RUN OUT SO LET'S SEE TOMORROW IF I CAN MAKE HER.

[norriszn]

post quali interview | lando on what happened in q3 (guys i feel so bad so if the video looks weird idgaf)

lb: what happened in that final part of quali. ln: i was just slow. i was slow and i've been slow this whole weekend, to be honest. nothing too surprising, honestly. i've just been off it. i don't know. i feel like i've just never driven a f1 car before. so struggling a lot. don't know why. i need to try and find some answers. lb: what do you think you can do tomorrow? you're always stronger at races. ln: yeah, i mean, i think we have a great, i mean, the car's amazing. i have nothing to complain about you know, the car, the team are doing an amazing job. oscar's on pole by a good chunk, so no, i'm thankful for the team they're doing an amazing job, just so i'm letting them down. lb: best luck tomorrow.

[echoes-in-echoclan]

How tall is Kiki next to the other cats? can we get like- a scale of how tall each cat is?-

So my biggest problem is that my cat's heights aren't the most consistent :") If they aren't a kit/apprentice or a special case (like Kiki) then they're all relatively the same height, which isn't any specific number or anything

But this is Kiki in comparison to Raggedghost, who is average height

[memento-morri-writes]

More dnd writing because it's all I have but I here's a snippet from a vignette I did of Rook's past (from Zara's POV), because Rook and his mentors never fails to make me sick (/pos).

[transcript under the cut]

Taking a coin out of her pocket, she rolled it across her knuckles, back and forth. It gave her hands something to do, and prevented the urge to bite her nails, something she hadn’t done in years. Ten minutes passed, then twenty. Zara began to pace as Rook’s breathing grew shakier and the color drained from his skin. Where the hells is Jay? she wondered. The room was so quiet that she could hear every tick of the small clock on her bedside table, and each one echoed in her head. How many ticks does he have left? She didn’t want to think about it.  She’d had crew members die before, of course. You don’t go as many years as a captain as she had and never lose a soul. But all the others who had died had died quickly, in combat. She’d mourned for all of them, even shed tears in private, but there was something different about watching the life drain out of a person right in front of your eyes.

[tiddiesoutwhenthetisout]

me: i'm quitting my music career fr this time

someone: hey so, big stage, and we want you on this--

me: say no more give me the details here are my dealbreakers and i won't be available until my allergies pass because i'm rawdogging them

[soft--dogs]

aaaaa i'm really excited about these pride chibis, i hope everyone likes them :3c i'm always worried about how long my queue is, and if it takes me longer than june to finish these, but i really wanted to do them. hopefully people don't mind if they end up going into july to complete, but i also might just be over-worrying as usual and i'll get them done on time xD

[sugarsnappeases]

microfic - marytunia!!!!! | 1.7k words | i don’t think there’s anything to warn?? so enjoy <3

“Smoke?” Mary asked, shaking the pack in her hand, an eyebrow raised. 

Petunia was already halfway out of her seat, picking up her jacket and leading the way out to the alleyway beside the building where they worked. She’d been waiting for Mary to ask for the last half an hour, fidgeting in her seat and staring blankly at her computer screen. 

A far cry from when she had first started working there, four months ago, trying to stand dead in the centre of the ring of boundaries she had built around herself and making herself as small as possible so that she wouldn’t have to press up against them any more than she already had just by being there, by working in that call centre. 

(D’you wanna come for a smoke?” Mary leaning against her desk, their first day on the job.)

She had been so sure that this job would be temporary, that she would do it for a month at most before she found something better, something that was an actual career, something that paid more than minimum wage and would make her parents proud.  

(Petunia frowning up at her from her chair, “I don’t smoke.”)

They were always proud of Lily, the youngest child, the special one, now in her second term at Oxford, always smarter and prettier and funnier and better than Petunia in every conceivable way, a prodigy, the perfect daughter, the one who had potential. Petunia who didn’t, always average and trying to be satisfied with that, the afterthought, never mind how she had been born first, not bad, not a complete failure but disappointing nevertheless in how she didn’t excel, the sister who was left behind.

(“Will you come anyway?” Mary insisting, those big brown eyes, something nearly desperate in them, and Petunia reluctantly acquiescing.)

Mary had been left behind too, Lily’s best friend all throughout secondary school. Petunia used to think they were more than friends even, but she’d never had any proof and she didn’t like to think about it all that much. Mary wasn’t going to university either, but at least she had actual dreams - Lily may have left them both behind, heading for greener pastures, a new group of friends with summer houses in Tuscany, a new best friend in all her instagram pictures, one that she called a sister, but at least Mary knew what she wanted from the world. Had plans beyond the four walls of the call centre and memories of when a girl with red hair used to smile at her. 

Petunia’s plan had always been to get married, to have a child or two, to spend her time tidying the house and cooking and being unexciting and uneventful, average and disappointing but enough, maybe it would be enough. 

Then Vernon, her long-term boyfriend, had found someone newer and shinier and more interesting and Petunia hadn’t even had the self-respect to leave him, no, he’d had to break up with her after three months of cheating on her and two months of her knowing about it. It was a bit pathetic really, because it wasn’t like Vernon was anything special anyway, in fact, he was fairly awful, but he was security and Petunia always liked to play it safe, no potential, no risks, no surprises. 

She had been surprised to find Mary there, on that first day four months ago, sat at the desk next to hers, friendly as always even as Petunia tried to ignore her, tried to focus on the job (which was mind-numbingly boring and also quite possibly her least favourite thing in the world, calling people up and trying to get them to buy things). It was familiar now though, nice even, especially when they went out to smoke. 

Petunia leant carefully against the brick wall, holding out a hand for one of Mary’s cigarettes. They’d been doing this every day that they’d been at work together for the last four months and she still refused to buy her own pack, she didn’t smoke, you see, but if Mary was offering, then who was she to say no? There probably weren’t many things that she would say no to if it was Mary who was asking.  

Mary huffed as she always did, settling in next to her against the wall and fishing her lighter out of her pocket, placing a cig between Petunia’s waiting fingers.

Once it was lit, Petunia took a long drag, tipping her head back against the wall, eyes closed and breathing out slowly as Mary took it from her so she could take her own, their fingers brushing.

“Lily texted me last night.” she said after a few quiet moments, passing the cig back again. 

Petunia cracked one eye open. So, it was going to be that kind of smoke break, “Oh?”

“She said she wanted me to go and visit her,” Mary continued, “In two weeks.”

Petunia frowned. Two weeks was Mary’s birthday. They had both booked the day off work so they could go into town, do something to celebrate together. 

“Oh.” she said, taking another drag from the cigarette, trying to ease the tension she could suddenly feel in her shoulders.

“Yeah.” said Mary. Then she laughed, a little bitter, a little sad. “Silly, really. All the times I’ve asked her if I could come up and she’s said that she’s too busy, but the first time that she asks me - I’m the one who already has plans.”

Petunia felt herself slump further against the wall, relieved, pleased maybe. Mary nudged her with an elbow, “Hey. Did you think I was gonna just cancel our plans?”

“I don���t know,” Petunia sighed, letting Mary take the cig again, “It’s Lily.”

And really, that could mean any number of things. 

It’s Lily and Lily always gets what she wants. 

It’s Lily and everyone always picks Lily over me. 

It’s Lily and if Lily wanted me to visit, I think I might’ve cancelled our plans.

“Yeah,” Mary replied, blowing smoke out into the crisp February air, “It’s Lily. And of course, I would love to see her. But you’re Petunia.”

“I’m Petunia,” she echoed blankly.

“You’re Petunia,” Mary agreed, a smile in her voice that she could hear now, “and I’ve been looking forward to our little outing for ages,”

Petunia turned her head to look at her, met with those brown eyes much closer than she was expecting, that warm smile, shoulder to shoulder out in the bleak cold. And there was something in the air, more than just cigarette smoke and the intermingling scents of their perfumes, something that made Petunia want to take a risk. 

“And it’s not just because you’re pissed at her?” she asked, because that would be worse maybe, Mary just using her to get back at Lily in some way, even if that was somewhat how Petunia had rationalised their… friendship, at first, or maybe it wouldn’t really make much of a difference, she didn’t know.  

“No,” Mary rolled her eyes, taking another drag before handing the cigarette back to Petunia, “It’s not because I’m pissed at her. Not everything is about Lily. Even if she had replied to every single message I’d ever sent her, I would still wanna go with you.”

Petunia paused, lips pursing around the end of the cig in her mouth, because she was sure there used to be a time when not everything was about Lily, back before she was born maybe, red hair and bright green eyes and immediately special, immediately the centre of attention (not that Petunia was jealous, she didn’t want to be special, she didn’t want the hot heat of the spotlight, but, it would be nice to have something, maybe, she didn’t know, maybe she was a little jealous). Now, and for as long as she could remember, everything had always been about Lily, it felt strange that Mary should say something like that, refute that absolute intrinsic truth of the universe, so casually, as if it wasn’t an earth-shattering revelation. 

Because Mary wanted to go with her. 

Not Lily. 

Her. 

Petunia Evans. 

Mary was still smiling a little, blinking up at her, earnest, honest, brown eyes that Petunia would probably follow anywhere, brown eyes that were making her brave, making her want to burn down the boundaries she had placed around herself, or at least climb through the hole that Mary had been steadily cutting into them over the course of the last four months. 

They were standing close, and Mary’s shoulder was warm against hers, and Mary wanted to go with her. 

And Petunia wanted to go too. Wanted to float off into this alternate reality where not everything was about Lily, and people chose Petunia because they wanted to, and maybe Petunia didn’t play it safe, maybe she took a risk. 

Maybe she watched as those big brown eyes flicked down to look at her lips for a moment, still wrapped around the end of their cigarette.

Maybe she brought up a hand and tossed the butt onto the floor.

Maybe she moved that hand to Mary’s cheek, soft skin, cold in the winter air.

Maybe she leaned in and pressed their lips together, something far out of the bounds of what she had thought she was or could be, something exciting and eventful, and maybe still disappointing to her parents but maybe that didn’t matter as much as she had always thought it did. 

Maybe what mattered was Mary.

Mary who was kissing her back, a hand on Petunia’s waist and pulling her so they were properly facing each other. 

Mary who wanted to go out with her on her birthday and probably get drunk and come into work hungover the next day and spend an excessive amount of time on smoke breaks. 

Mary who Petunia shouldn’t want, had tried and failed to convince herself that she didn’t want, but who had a smile that could melt glaciers and a gaze that felt like a spotlight and a way of working her way into your life until you looked forward to seeing her more than you had ever looked forward to anything. 

Mary who was there, in the alleyway beside the call centre with Petunia, kissing her in a way that she had never been kissed before, like she was the most precious thing in this universe, like she had potential.

[waitineedaname]

Do you know if it was ever confirmed that Binghe was working with demons in Jinlian city era? We learn Zhuzhi-lang was responsible for the Sowers later and Binghe was only trying to be a righteous cultivator at Huan Hua during that time. I assumed that SQQ only thought he was building an empire in the demon realm because it happened in the original PIDW, and Binghe didn’t actually start that until after SQQ died. However, I see scenarios in fandom where Binghe is already established in the demon realm at the same time as the Jinlian city arc all the time. It’s a fun premise, and the fics are always good, but I was just wondering if it had a basis in canon or was just widely accepted fanon.

you know, that's a good question!! i'm really not sure?? I'd have to reread with a closer eye, but I think it's just widely accepted fanon on the basis of SQQ's assumptions based on what happened in PIDW! what we know for sure: three years pass between Binghe being thrown in the Abyss and him reuniting with SQQ in Jin Lan City (which is less time than in PIDW) and after the five years of SQQ's death, he has become established within the Demon Realm as a powerful demon lord (I think emperor by this point? can't remember). so that means either he was really busy after SQQ died, or he had some connections already due to his time in the Abyss!

it does raise a lot of questions about the timeline of events from Binghe's perspective! the pov being tied so tightly to SQQ means we miss out on a lot of what's going on with Binghe when he's not around. when did he fight and beat Mobei-Jun? when did Sha Hualing start working for him? when did he become established in his underground palace? he's so focused on SQQ that it's hard to imagine when he had the time to do a lot of this stuff. especially since in the five years of SQQ's death, he's making dinner every day and feeding the corpse spiritual energy. I have trouble imagining a man wracked with so much grief taking the time to kick Mobei-Jun's ass, but also he's the protagonist, he can do anything, so maybe I shouldn't be doubting his ability to multitask lol

[flamebloom]

seasonal witch hat atelier charms!

[dostyaak]

please yap about hinako king 🙏

Ough... What have you done?

Oh God... This is going to be loooong.

The fake Hinako was always an interesting character to me, I've always liked how she acted, and I mean EVERYTHING.

Her personality, her plot, her character development (Even though it was pretty short, I still loved it), her design HECK, EVERYTHING I don't know what happened, she's one of my favorite dummies, I just really love her character, she's funny, she's interesting and she's an asshole, my favorite tropes <3 /j

With that, I started craving more content about her, eventually looking for fanfics about her, I was just curious to see what the fandom was doing with my fav I found some cool fanfics, some pretty good, some mid, some I didn't even dare to read just because of the tags, every kind of thing

Until. I found a fanfic about Real!Hinako.

(This fanfic to be specific: https://archiveofourown.org/works/45710128/chapters/115030948)

I know this post isn't a fanfic review but I gotta say, I didn't finish the fanfic... It was an OK fanfic, not extremely good but not horrible, just... Fine

Anyway, something on that fanfic sparkled in my heart, something about reading about a suicidal girl surviving a Death Game and slowly regaining will to live was incredible.

I started to think about the stuff I didn't enjoy the fanfic, Real!Hinako is a character that we have NO INFORMATION about, so the author did whatever he wanted, giving Hinako a backstory about how her father killed her only and best friend, hence why she's suicidal

It was an good lore but I didn't liked it that much, something about it didn't sat me right, so I thought "What would I do if I wrote a fanfic about her? That was my mistake.

I started to think about what would I do, how would I do, what events would happen, what wouldn't, who would she trust, who she wouldn't, how would her suicidal tendencies effect her, how would she regain her will to live, etc etc

I wrote a whole ass backstory about her, I started writing a first chapter for a possible fanfic about Hinako surviving the Death Game, about how she would become friends with Ranmaru and Anzu and that would help her feel alive again, I wrote and drew A LOT. (I lost most of those drawings because my computer broke, but I had like THREE WHOLE 2500X2500 PIXELS CANVAS JUST FILLED WITH DOODLES OF HER)

Also about her backstory that I created: Basically, Hinako had a normal family with a mom and a dad, the classic "butter advertisement family", y'know? Her dad worked for a well-know pharmacy bussines... ASU-NARO, did he know about how inhuman ASU-NARO was? Kind of, but he gained enough money to protect and give a good life to the people he loved the most, his wife and his daughter, so he could overlook wha they did, besides he didn't know everything, he just knew the tip of the iceberg, if he knew everything he probably would've stopped... Right? That doesn't matter, eventually he started to notice that ASU-NARO was looking throught his family, investigating and stalking his wife and daughter, and on a desperate move to protect them, he asked for a divorce, which left Hinako's mom in shambles, she started to develop a hatred for her husband, he never told her what went wrong, why he was going away, what could she do to be better, he was just... Gone As for Hinako, she also didn't knew anything, but she couldn't hate her father, he was such a good person, such a good father, her only friend, the person she trusted the most... How could she hate him? They would meet up during the weekends, and every time Hinako asked why he went away, he would alway say the name thing "It's for your own safety, dearie..." He became more and more distant each time, eventually he stopped meating up with Hinako, stopped answering his wife's calls, stopped calling Hinako's mom, completely fed up with his cold shoulders, decided to go to his house to settle things up with him The scene she saw... Her ex-husband... Hanged... Dead. Hinako never saw his body, thankfully, but that didn't mean his death didn't affected her family Her mom became even more distante and angry, angry at her husband, angry at Hinako, she couldn't help but feel angry at her, she just... Looked so much like him, looking at Hinako reminded her of her husband, that made her so annoyed About Hinako, she became more distant of her friends, she didn't felt like talking with anyone, she missed her father so much, she tried to hate him hoping that hate would made her feel something different, but nothing, she just felt so... Miserable "One day... I'll be with you, dad..."

GRRRRRRRRRRRR I FUCKING LOVE THIS BACKSTORY I GAVE HER, I CAN'T EVEN EXPRESS ENOUGH

I think what made me love her more was making this backstory, it just made me feel so connected with her, creating a story and carefully putting stuff together just so I can make sense of her character is so... Amazing, I loved it

Will I write that fanfic I said I started? Probably, I really want to, I have a lot of stuff planned to it, I just need to start writing

Anyway, have some HinaDoodles

My daughter :]

[banditblvd]

Trying out this whole "animation" thing, it's kind of a small niche community though so idk