#tainted soil and water

[sl33py-g4m3r]

man... idk what led me down the rabbit hole of watching nuclear disasters on youtube....

but....

the more I watch these types of videos; the more I see the perils of nuclear bombs as well as nuclear power, and the fallout that it can create...

should we really be using something so very dangerous just to create electricity and power? is it really a cleaner source than solar/wind/water power?

what if nuclear bombs had never been created? or that we never used nuclear power in power plants?

it seems too dangerous and there's too much risk of fallout and long lasting problems, in people and the environment.....

this just makes me more anti nuclear anything honestly.....

[lovebugism]

✶ ┄ HOLY GRAIL !

part one | part two

summary: in ancient rome, where survival is determined by the whims of a mad ruler, the empire's beloved general gives you – his first and only love – to the crazed emperor to ensure your safety. (6k)

pairing: marcus acacius / fem!reader, emperor geta / fem!reader

contents: established relationship, strangers to lovers, angst, hurt/comfort cw for mentions of war and violence, mentions of sex work, swearing, smut 18+ (dubcon, m receiving oral, unprotected sex, cuckholding, exhibitionism) (this is a pretty dark fic so pls heed the warnings!!!)

Marcus Acacius was the name on the lips of a thousand fallen empires. His ledger ran a deep scarlet color, which dripped like proof from his sword. The war had destroyed the General over the years — had turned the man into an empty thing filled only by untamable ghosts. The relentless battle had wrung his boyhood from his body like a slow, merciless death. Any remaining innocence has since been replaced with violence.

Rome made a legacy of his grotesque evils, turned him into a saint. Marcus Acacius did not want to be a saint. He did not want to be angry; he did not want to be cruel. He only wanted to love and to be left alone with his tenderness. His mouth filled with blood instead.

You loved him like all doomed, grotesque things are meant to be loved. In the dark. In the shadows of war. In the depths of the soul.

“This is me,” he confesses, the great General Acacius, returning to you like a ghost to its haunt. “This is who I am.”

His golden armor is sullied from a victorious battle, tainted now with blotches of soil and dried blood that’s not his own. His dirtied, unholy fists tremble at his sides as he fights the urge to cross the threshold of your quarters to meet you. Marcus knows he doesn’t deserve to be held by you now. Not when he still wreaks of death.

He can still feel the breath of a fist on his bruised cheek, but the way his sword felt plunging through the beating heart of an enemy soldier plagues him most of all. 

“Love turned on me long ago— It is not a burden I compel you to carry.”

So, please, do not love me, he doesn’t say. I only know how to destroy you.

You smile at him, eyes soft with sympathy, and cross the threshold of longing with an admirable effortlessness. You cradle his weathered, war-torn face in your palms, willingly staining your delicate hands with the blood stained there.

“I love you despite. So I imagine I’ll carry it anyway,” you coo to him, gentle eyes locked firmly with his heavy ones. “And I’m certain you love me in return, regardless of what you think the siege has made of you.”

“There is naught I can do about it,” Marcus admits, words heavy with choked-back emotion. He melts into your touch but continues to deny himself the want to hold you back. “Not while I still oversee this campaign. Not while there is a war to be won—”

“We love each other, don’t we?” you interject, pleading eyes searching for emotion behind his dark, stoic gaze. Marcus swallows hard. His scruffy chin scrapes your palm as he nods once in response. You grin and say the unforgiving truth out loud. “So fuck the war.”

You pull him down by his face to press a kiss to his unclean lips. Marcus rests his shaking hands over your waist and lets you build cathedrals in his mouth with your tongue. The blood in his teeth turns to holy water. 

Marcus long understood that bringing you to the city would be his last act of love.

Keeping you in the heart of Rome was the only way he could ensure your safety, with the surrounding towns still under merciless siege. The people there were docile, and loyal most of all to the General who had won them a thousand wars. They would not hurt you because it was not in their kind too, and because they feared General Acacius’ wrath as much as they respected his mercy.

This was known to everyone in Rome except its Emperors.

Geta and Caracalla ruled together following their father’s untimely demise but shared not a brain between them. They were boys, after all, the oldest being hardly two-and-twenty –– it was in their nature to talk more than they listened, and to pretend as if they knew the world despite never leaving the city walls. 

They were as cruel and as stupid as anyone who wished to rule an empire would be.

But the two of them relied heavily on their General to keep the restless public at ease. It made it easier for Marcus to bring you with him, knowing he had the trust of the most powerful men in Rome. He knew Geta kept meticulous care of his most precious gifts — all Marcus had to do was get you there, really, and the Emperors would do the rest for him. 

It was simple, but it was not easy; though he imagines no war ever has been or would be. Both of you had survived, yes, but neither of you had been spared. Bringing you here was a testament to that, which you seemingly could not comprehend. You were as soft and green as the countryside he plucked you from, too naive for politics.

Marcus tells himself that this was the merciful decision, anyway, as he gives you a tour of Caracalla’s labyrinthine gardens — the place farthest from the feasting hall where the noblemen dined. Hidden behind climbing leaves, free from prying eyes.

“I can’t imagine why you would be so apprehensive in bringing me here. It’s beautiful,” you marvel aloud as you walk ahead of the man guiding you. 

Your sandals pad faintly along the cobbled trail as you skim your palm over the bed of blooming roses. The petals feel like silk against your skin. You pluck one from the soil, careful to avoid its thorns, and hold it up to your nose. You turn to face Marcus with the crimson flower resting on your cupid’s bow.

“And it smells better, too,” you quip softly, tilting your head to your shoulder as you smirk behind the budding rose.

Marcus just barely manages to bite back his own grin until you reach out for him, tapping the delicate flower against the bridge of his strong nose. He exhales hard through his nostrils in place of a laugh.

Your giggling comes carried on the breath of a warm summer breeze — a symphony of salty ocean, dainty florals, and the pretty oils you’d bathed in. The wind billows through your thin, white gown and creates music with rustling leaves. You squint one eye when the setting sun peeks through the swishing tree limbs, bathing you in a golden-hour aura. 

You’re as beautiful as sin. Sweeter than death. Smiling at him like this is the beginning of something that died the moment you entered the city walls.

Marcus clears throat and gently guides your hand away. His cautious eyes flit around the vacant garden. He’s constantly looking over his shoulder, you find, despite being the strongest man in all of Rome. You feel safest at his side, so you don’t know why he always looks so frightened.

“I know you are drunk on youth and immortality, petal, but we cannot get ahead of ourselves,” he advises, all stiff and stern, though the term of endearment spills effortlessly from his mouth. “We’re in the city now. So we must play the part. Like we discussed.”

He speaks to you with an unintentional sort of vagueness that makes you bow your head like a scolded child. Your arm falls limp at your side. A scarlet petal slips from its stem and hits the unforgiving stone.

“I know,” you murmur with a poorly hidden frown that conveys otherwise. Your sheepish gaze flits from the ground to Marcus’ unwavering stare and to the ground again. “I just thought— whenever we were alone, that we might—”

“We aren’t alone. We must behave as though the city is full of eyes. Understand?”

“I can’t,” you confess, peering up at the General from beneath your lashes. 

Marcus’ chest stings, like the fiery sun blazing his newly-fashioned armor. “What do you mean you can’t?” he bites emotionlessly.

He looks like a corrupt sort of angel in this light, unnaturally handsome and hopelessly wartorn. He was as hard as the earth below your feet — a statue made of clay, iron, and marble — cold to the touch and melting only for you. 

His heavy eyes were so brown they looked almost black, and they shone with a perpetual sort of gloom. His gaze swam with the prophetic darkness of a man who’s seen too much, though you often felt like you could drown in its void. For a man so adept at killing, he looked at you with a remarkable softness.

It wasn’t as shallow as physical desire. It was something far more cruel. You wanted Marcus Acacius the same way flesh wanted to knit itself together over a healing wound. It was simply in your nature to love him. 

“I mean, it’s impossible,” you ramble with a concerned furrow to your brow. Your grip on the flower’s papery stem tightens until the bulb rattles with the force. “How am I to be here with you but not touch you? That’s like asking the seasons not to change— It’s unnatural, and it’s cruel—”

Marcus swallows hard, adam’s apple bobbing in his throat. His hands begin to ache with the urge to touch you. He balls them into fists instead.

“It’s the only way I know to keep you safe!” he confesses, words sounding heavy in his mouth. His eyes flit across the garden in a paranoid search of something that isn’t there. “Emperor Geta will take care of you. I know he will. And his brother is a half-wit, but he is kind when he wishes. He’ll take a liking to you, I’m sure of it—”

You interject his anxious rambling with a stubborn shake of your head.

“I can’t be someone else’s,” you murmur, voice as wet as the tears glittering in your wide-eyed gaze. “I don’t know how.”

“You will learn,” Marcus tells you with an emotionless stare. Not because he’s sure you will, but because he knows you have to. “For me.”

Your pretty features swirl with anguish. “Marcus…” you whisper his name in a feeble whimper caught in your throat.

He does not soften at your emotion like you’re used to. He’s practiced apathy for so long that it comes naturally to him now. He bites his tongue to keep from kissing you and lets the blood stain his teeth all over again.

“If not for your own sake, then for mine. The Emperors would have my head if they understood the pretenses I brought you under.”

You flinch at his words, perhaps finally understanding the weight of the unforgiving world in which you live. The surest example of such cruelty stands before you now, in the only man you ever loved now using your purest devotion as a means to keep you pliant. But your anger for the merciless arrangement is long eclipsed by your yearning.

“Then I will,” you tell him, rigid with a glacial disposition Marcus hasn’t seen before now.

The choices here were few. Either you were slaughtered outside the city walls by soldiers and pillagers, or you were slaughtered within them — in the metaphorical sense that burns physically in your chest now. 

Being without Marcus feels like a fate worse than death, but you want him so desperately to live. So much so that you’ll fall on the sword of your longing and bleed out at his feet. Knowing that you’re under the same sky would have to be enough for you. 

You can’t tell which it is — sacrifice or self-slaughter — but Marcus knows it isn’t as poetic as all that. 

Death is death.

Emperor Geta staggers drunkenly down the spiral stone steps of the west wing of his castle. The path to his chambers is illuminated by several dwindling torches hung along the brick walls. The subtle squeaking of his leather sandals sounds much louder in the quiet — filled only by crackling flames, a distant dripping noise, and the song he slurs under his breath. 

The latter ceases suddenly when he stumbles to a stop at the sight of General Acacius. The man stands like a statue outside his bedroom door — arms crossed behind his back, old spine perfectly straight — like the obedient guard dog he is. 

The thought makes the Emperor’s lips curl into a crooked smile. “What are you doing here, dog?” he calls to the General as he approaches him, voice echoing down the soulless corridor.

“Your nameday present, your majesty—” Marcus answers and tries not to make a face when the Emperor stands before him. The bittersweet scent of wine stains his breath, overwhelmingly so. Geta was never one to practice temperance. “—I was told to see that you got it.”

The younger man hesitates. “From my uncle?” he wonders aloud.

Marcus nods wordlessly in response.

Geta pauses for a moment. His wide, glassy eyes flit over the General’s shoulder to the arched doorway behind him. His stomach swirls at the thought of what may lie inside. The last nameday present his uncle sent from overseas was a monkey his younger brother has grown much too attached to.

“Well… What is it?”

Marcus swallows hard and steps aside. “Look inside, your majesty.”

Geta takes a deep breath in and swings the creaking door open. His bedroom is lush with crimson silk and golden candlelight, familiarly fragranced with cinnamon and sweet myrrh. It’s accompanied by something foreignly floral, a feminine rosy-lavender that catches his attention before his eyes ever find you.

He steps through the threshold and finds a strange girl standing by the window, before a platter of fruit and wine — bathed half in the silver beams of a full moon, and half in flickering orange flames. 

White silk adorns your frame, so delicate it’s nearly see-through. One of your shoulders is mouthwateringly bare, and there’s a slit in the fabric that rises to your hip. You look as pure as a dove, though you’re so obviously built for sin.

The ground sways beneath Geta’s unsteady feet.

You crunch audibly into an apple before you realize anyone’s there. The juice runs down your chin before you swipe it away with the back of your hand. Only then do your eyes lock with the Emperor’s, who seems equally stunned to see you there. You tense and say nothing as you hide the bitten fruit behind your back.

“It’s a woman,” Geta observes to no one in particular, though his dark eyes have not yet wavered from yours.

Marcus stands behind him and nods — hands still clasped behind his back, heart still pounding against his ribcage. “Yes, your majesty. In plain terms.”

“Well,” the Emperor glances over his shoulder. “What does she do?”

“Whatever you want,” the General answers, though the words taste like vinegar on his tongue. He swallows the bitterness down like bile and leers at you, looking upon his lover as though she were a stranger. “You need only ask.”

Geta, satisfied by his answer, turns back to you. His initial surprise has ebbed into something more pleased, diabolically so. His pink lips curl into a sneer as he walks slowly towards you, eyeing you up and down with curious eyes — a predator stalking its prey.

“Is that true?” he asks you, voice ringing through the quiet room. “Or is he confusing you for a dutiful hound?”

“A dutiful whore, your majesty,” you correct with an acquiescent smile, following the story as Marcus intended. 

The half-truth comes easily to you. Not a lie exactly, but not the whole tale either. You’d spent many of your years working in a brothel on the outskirts of Rome. You were a young woman, unmarried, without family or viable prospects — whoring seemed the most obvious decision then, though it feels so long ago now. 

You’d waited your whole life for something, for Marcus, though you hadn’t expected it to kill you when you found it. You won’t die a saint if the crazed Emperor decides to take your head, but perhaps you could be a martyr. Perhaps that’ll be enough.

Fear beats through your body like a second heart, but your eyes never waver from the Emperor’s. It’s easiest to meet his gaze. He feels more like a human that way. 

There are flecks of gold in his dark eyes, and dark strands in his gold hair. He’s got stubble on his long neck, spots on his broad nose, and wrinkles on his forehead. Not quite as perfect as the pristine white-gold armor would let on.

His eyes flit down your form once more. Something sparks in the deep brown of them, a flicker of silent realization. He spins suddenly on the heel of his sandal to flash Marcus an accusatory glare.

“Is she your whore, General?” he lilts into the heavy silence. His brows raise when he receives no answer from the man across the room. “The question was not rhetorical, Acacius.”

“No, your majesty. She is not mine,” Marcus answers, then clears his throat when the words get stuck there. It’s like he’s plunging a knife through his own heart. He can feel the cold sting of the sharpened blade and the burn of the blood on his skin. “Though, I don’t believe whores belong to anyone.”

A boyish chuckle spills from the Emperor’s mouth. “No. They don’t,” he says with an airy giddiness. “Not before now, anyway—”

Geta spins back again, pleated skirt fanning around his pale thighs. His smile fades with an eerie swiftness. “What are you waiting for? Undress,” he commands with a wave of his ringed hand.

Your wide eyes flit instinctively past him to Marcus, who still idles in the doorway. Only then does he realize how long he’s been staring at you. He forces himself to glance off in another direction, but his gaze keeps finding yours — like a magnet, or a planet with its own gravitational pull.

Your eyes lock, and the only thing you hear is each other, though neither of you has spoken a word. This is the only way, you hear his voice in your head as clearly as your own. This is the only way to stay together. The only way to survive.

Geta mistakes your fear.

“Don’t worry about him, little dove,” he coos, and taps the bottom of your chin with his fingers — as soft and petaled as your own. He smiles when your attention turns to him again, speaking loud enough for the General to hear. “He’s only the guard dog. And good boys get scraps, don’t they, Acacius?”

Marcus’ face screws like he’s tasted something sour. He’s grateful the Emperor isn’t looking at him to see it. “They do, your majesty,” he monotones.

“So you will watch. And report to my uncle how his lovely present fared,” he calls to the older man, though his eyes remain locked with yours. You tense when his pale hand reaches suddenly for your face. He holds your cheeks in his fingers until your lips jut in a soft pout. “Let’s hope I don’t have to send him back your head, little dove.”

He says it with an absentminded effortlessness, as though it’s something he’s done before. 

Still, you manage a small smile and blink up at him with innocent eyes. “What good is a dead whore, your majesty?” you quip.

Geta’s grin widens.  “Precisely. Now undress.”

You reach for the singular sleeve of your slip with trembling fingers. Your right hand sweeps across your left shoulder, skin blazing with fear and anticipation. The fabric trails down down down your arm before falling to your feet in a puddle of milky white silk. Your bare body glows silver and gold between moonlight and flame. 

Goosebumps pebble over your skin despite the humid summer night as Geta circles you like prey. His eyes trail slowly down your form in time with his rhythmic steps. The sound of his sandals scrapping the stone floor, crackling candlelight, and subdued breathing are the only sounds in the quiet room for several long moments.

The Emperor disappears behind you, and you forget how to breathe. Your wide, wet eyes find Marcus once more — pleading, though for what, you cannot say. His face reveals nothing but wrath burns in his gaze.

Geta reappears at your right side. You smell grape wine on his breath when he nears you, breathing heavily through his mouth as he reaches out to touch you. His ringed hands smooth over your collarbone. Your breath catches in your throat. He smiles as though your fright pleases him.

“You’re skittish for a whore,” he muses, playful in a way that makes your stomach wrench. “Are you sure the General didn’t bring me a virgin?”

You swallow hard as his hand trails down your body. Over the swell of your breast, skimming his thumb over your taut nipple, before tracing the expanse of your ribs. His fingers run down your stomach and past the thatch of hair between your legs. They dip finally between your thighs. 

Geta hums a faint moan at the velvet feeling of your pussy. The way your lips part for his fingers, silky skin warm and wet to the touch. 

“I’m whatever you want me to be, your majesty,” you answer, breathing hard through your nose when he pulls his hand away — a warmth you find yourself begrudgingly grieving.

“I need only ask…” the Emperor coos, running his middle and pointer finger over your bottom lip. They shine with the honey you leak despite yourself. Your mouth parts, and he rests the pads of them on your tongue. “…Do I not?”

You nod wordlessly through the salty fingers in your mouth, trying to imagine their Marcus’.

Geta smiles when he parts from you. “Undress me,” he demands. 

You work at his tricky armor with nervous hands and bated breath. 

You unclasp his cape first. The white fabric, now free from its chain, falls heavily to the floor behind him. Your fingers have gone noticeably clammy as they struggle with the sleeves of his tunic. It takes you a beat too long to loosen the laces at his shoulders. The cloth falls finally and puddles around his feet, leaving his lean body on display before you.

His torso is lean and mostly hairless, save for splotches of chestnut on his sternum and stomach. His skin is smooth and flushed from the alcohol. His stomach is slim but noticeably full. The Emperor is well-taken care of, though his subjects outside the keep suffer from the consequences of war.

Your trembling fingers curl around the hem of his loincloth. His pale skin is warm to the touch, boiling with desire while you freeze over with fear. You crouch before him as you drag the garment down his scruffy thighs. You hear Geta sigh above you when his half-hard cock meets the cool summer night air. 

He’s paler there compared to the rest of his golden body, though the mushroom tip glows a faint strawberry-red color. A vein trails in jagged lines to the base of his heavy cock, fading as it reaches the thatch of dark blonde hair at his pubic bone. He’s not nearly as thick as Marcus, though not many people could hope to be — but he is long and thin and soft like velvet.

“How do I look?” Geta wonders as he steps out of his loincloth. He tilts his chin to his chest to peer down at you, on your knees to untie the intricate laces of his sandals. You blink up at him with wide, uncertain eyes. “Without my armor,” he adds, then repeats. “How do I look?”

You realize, then, that he wants your praise. Though you’re unsure why, you’re not in any position to deny him of it. “You’re a— a very handsome man, your majesty,” you respond cautiously, with a wavering smile.

You hear his breath catch at the compliment. The corner of his mouth flickers upward, and his nostril flares as he takes a deep breath in. 

“Well, go on, then,” he insists suddenly, nodding his head to egg you onward. “Good whores don’t keep their masters waiting, do they? You don’t want to see me impatient, little dove.”

You wrap his stiff cock in a tentative fist, averting your gaze as you give an experimental kitten lick to the bulbous, strawberry tip. Your tongue swipes away the pearlescent pre-cum beading there. The salty tang is foreign on your tongue, sweeter and thicker than you’re used to.

You imagine your lover when you take the Emperor’s cock in your mouth. A practiced form of dissociation that comes naturally to you now. 

You focus on the way the stone floor digs into your knees as you cup his balls in your hand — a desperate attempt to finish him quickly. Geta shudders when you swallow him whole, burying your nose in the coarse thatch of hair at the base of his cock. His head tips back as he groans at the ceiling.

“You are a proper whore…” the Emperor moans with a delirious smile. He tilts his flushed cheek to his freckled shoulder to sneer at Marcus, then frowns when his eyes meet the back of him. “Are you distracted, General?”

The man keeps his back turned and his eyes trained on the wall, counting the bricks there to distract his racing mind. His mouth snarls at the Emperor’s words. His hands ball into fists as he fights to keep his composure.

“Just giving you your privacy, your majesty.”

“Nonsense!” Geta laughs, loud. “You should watch! You should observe— so you know what to tell my uncle.”

Marcus can hear the mischievous lilt in the younger boy’s voice. Like it’s all just a game to him. Like you’re just a whore to be played with, and like Marcus’ only hope of companionship is warfare. Both might’ve been true once, but not since you find each other.

The general smacks his lips against his teeth. “As you wish,” he deadpans and spins on the heel of his sandal.

He’s strangely grateful to find the Emperor’s body obscuring your own. Geta’s lean, pale form towers over your kneeling one — back muscles flexing, hips thrusting, fingers knitting in your hair.

But Marcus can still hear the sounds of your mouth on the other man’s cock. The room fills with heavy breathing, wet noises, and the Emperor’s unabashed whines. Embers of envy burn in the General’s empty chest. A wildfire of want and wrath rages behind his ribcage.

You swallow with Geta’s cock in your throat and squeeze softly at his balls. You hear his breath hitch just before a lengthy moan spills from his parted mouth. Several loads of salty cum spit down your throat a second later. The man shows you little mercy as he holds you by your hair, keeping your nose pressed to his pubic bone. You take shallow breaths through your nose and try not to choke.

You pull off of him when he lets you go. A string of saliva threatens to keep you connected. You take a deep breath in and swipe at your swollen mouth with the back of your hand, staying on your knees while the Emperor tilts his head back. He exhales a breathy laugh of relief at the ceiling. You peer up at him with wide, wet eyes, still so uncertain of your fate.

“Proper whore, indeed,” Geta muses, almost to himself, as he drops his heavy head once more. 

His flushed chest sparkles with a foreign feeling at the sight of you beneath him — eyes teary and fearful, lips swollen and rosy, features flushed with sweat and sex. His cock jerks, still sensitive but threatening to harden again. He grips himself with a loose fist.

“On the bed,” he instructs suddenly, then grins madly at your shock. “You didn’t think I was done with you, surely. Not until I mount you like a mare, anyway— Treat you like the bitch in heat you are…”

Geta cups your warm cheek in his free hand. His touch is strangely gentle as he cradles you there, right before he smacks gently at your jaw to urge you upward. 

Your bare feet pad towards the bed, then. Geta swats your ass as you go and laughs when you squeak in response. You fight the urge to look at Marcus, lest you see the rage burning in his eyes — lest he see the heartbreak swimming in yours. 

Marcus watches you crawl over the silken sheets, both of you sporting similar far-off gazes. He feels a bit like a ghost now. An empty, invisible thing, doomed to watch the rest of the world go on without ever being able to live in it. It’s dreadfully symbolic of how he’s lived most of his life, and how he’s spent the years loving you. Because even if a ghost is full of love, the only thing it knows to do is haunt.

The silk pillow feels cool under your burning cheek. The mattress dips under the Emperor’s weight when he kneels behind you. His ringed fingers smooth over your ass and down the arch of your back. He treats you with an uncharacteristic sort of tenderness, as though he were molding you out of clay.

“You are a pretty thing, aren’t you?” he whispers under his breath. “And timid, too… I like that…” 

Your pussy clenches at his words despite yourself. Geta’s chest swells with pride accordingly. “You don’t have to be scared, little dove. I’m going to take such good care of you.”

Despite his words, he does not bother to ready you for his cock when he positions himself at your pulsing entrance. You hadn’t expected him to, of course — not many men were as kind as Marcus in that way, who often treated your pleasure as if it were his own. But the slick sticking to your thighs has made your pussy more than pliant. Your velvet walls swallow Geta’s cock with a pulsing vigor.

The Emperor groans as he fucks into you, savoring every inch as he buries himself to the hilt. His ringed fingers dig into the plush of your waist, as though you were a toy he didn’t want getting snatched away.

“Look at the hound!” Geta giggles boyishly to himself. “He’s itching for a feel of you— I just know it.”

Marcus remains as still and stoic as the battalion trained him to be. He reveals nothing on his face, though his skin prickles with flames of envy beneath his armor. 

Marcus Acacius was not a jealous man. His love for you was a testament to that. He visited the brothel you boarded in and spared the same coins as every man in the establishment did. But it was different now. Because the Emperor does not deserve you, and he forces Marcus to watch as if he knows it, too.

Something within him seethes, like a feral animal trapped behind his ribcage, desperately clawing its way out.

“Look at him,” Geta snaps when he sees you staring at the wall, eyes glassy and glazed over. He’s grinning all over again when your gaze snaps to Marcus’. 

The soldier’s weathered eyes burn with tears then. General Acacius has faced death a thousand times over, but it wasn’t quite as heartwrenching as this. His wrath simmers to a boil. He swallows it down like fire.

This is her salvation, he tells himself. This is how she survives.

Your features twist with the anguish of being seen as the Emperor lays himself over your back. His slick chest sits flush with your spine, pinning you to the mattress. “I bet he can taste you now. Smell you,” he murmurs in your ear, chapped mouth brushing the shell of it. “His mouth is salivating at the thought of putting his tongue on you— Isn’t it, dog?”

Marcus swallows through the emotion threatening to strangle him. He blinks away stinging tears and feigns an air of nonchalance. “It would be… impolite to talk so brashly about something that doesn’t belong to me, your majesty,” the General responds. Obedient. Loyal like a hound.

Geta grins wide. “Good answer, Acacius.”

When the Emperor finally fucks into you, it’s with a sloppy sort of precision. There is no rhythm or care to his thrusts. He is led only by his blinding pleasure, like a man who has only ever fucked playthings and his own fist. He props himself on one forearm and curls the other beneath you, holding your breast in his ringed hand.

Geta’s flushed cheek presses against your own while he slides in and out and into you again. You hear his groaning as you feel it rumbling in his chest, still laid against your back. You stare at a framed portrait on the wall across the room and wait for it to be over, even as your body refuses to dismiss its simmering orgasm.

Your swollen clit ruts against the silk sheets with each of the Emperor’s sloppy thrusts. You can feel a wet spot forming beneath you, and your stomach twists at the thought of seeing proof of your own pleasure. 

His balls smack your leaking cunt, creating a symphony of lewd noises — moaning, whimpering, clapping, smacking. Marcus thinks the sounds of war were more merciful than this.

“Do you understand what that means, little dove?” Geta croons into your ear, words choppy through his labored breaths and irregular thrusts. “You belong— to me now… So whatever you used to be— whoever’s you used to be— no longer matters.”

He thrusts once, hard, and shudders above you with a choked-back groan. You grit your teeth to swallow down your own noises of pleasure. The assault on your clit, though unintentional, is still yet relentless. You feel the distant white-hot burning feeling begin to swell in the pit of your stomach. A coil about to snap.

“Fucking me— Making me feel good—” the Emperor pants, punctuated by his hips against your ass. “—Is your only duty now. Understand?”

You nod, cheek running over the silk cushion as you grip it in your fists. “Yes, your majesty,” you gasp.

Geta presses his smile to the apple of your cheek. He can feel you leaking around him. You’re enjoying this just as much as he is, to be sure. A proper whore, indeed.

“Now… Take my spend like a good bitch, and thank me for it—”

He fucks you harder, and your face twists with a pleasure you’re too weak to fight away. 

Your gaze falls instinctively to Marcus as your orgasm threatens to swallow you whole. Your eyes squeeze shut in a feeble attempt to hide. Your mouth parts with a silent moan as you cum around the Emperor’s cock.

“Thank you, your majesty,” you whimper obediently into the pillow as you tremble beneath him. “Thank you.”

Geta buries a whine in your neck when he cums again. He gives you only two pitiful, warm loads but still possesses more stamina than your Marcus. He stills, then shudders, then rests his unforgiving bodyweight on top of you when pleasure makes a puddle of him. And of you, you assume, as a mixture of your spend leaks out of your cunt and onto the sheets.

“Write to my uncle, Acacius—” Geta slurs into your skin, heavy through labored pants. “—A thank you for my nameday present.”

Marcus forgets, until then, that he can still be seen. He felt more akin to a corpse hidden in the walls, forced to spend his afterlife in a merciless purgatory. His heart has stopped beating, frozen over, and now sits dead in his chest. He will never be as gentle as he was with you. He will be bloodied knuckles and pulsing wounds. Rough and cruel and angry.

“Yes, your majesty,” the General nods, thankful that it’s over now.

Geta rolls off of your body and onto the empty spot beside you — not shy about his nude form or yours. The sudden lack of warmth makes you shiver. 

“And tell him to send another— To keep the General’s bed warm, too,” he says, patting your ass with his palm before smoothing tenderly over the skin. “One whore’s as good as any other, I’m sure.”

Marcus flinches at the thought of being with anyone other than you. He couldn’t hide the look of disgust if he tried. It makes the Emperor laugh loudly in response.

“Oh, did you— Did you want to try this one?” Geta muses knowingly, pointing to your limp body, still trembling beside him with the aftershocks of your orgasm.

“No. No, no, no— See, this one’s mine,” he corrects the General as if he were a child. “And it would be impolite to touch something that belongs to me, would it not? It would be treasonous, even.”

“Yes, your majesty,” Marcus nods, lip flickering in a mere hint of a smirk as his plan finally comes to fruition. “It would be.”

The Emperor sees you now as his property, and no one hurts what belongs to him without meeting a certain death. Marcus is comforted only by the thought that nothing can touch you now. Not even him. But perhaps that’s the price he pays for love. Perhaps, in the end, love is grief.

“So best tread lightly, Acacius,” Geta warns with a crooked smile, petting you like a dog. “I’d hate for someone to get hurt.”

[urlovebot]

cw: perv!sunghoon. sunghoon does your laundry so: panty sniffing.. and licking, possessiveness, exhibitionism, praise, overstim, hands free orgasm again (?), dry humping but solo (???), sunghoon creams his pants twice lmfaoooo what a loser.

a/n: nastiest thing i've ever written so if it isn't for you, i get it 😭

── ⋅ ⋅ ── ✩ ── ⋅ ⋅ ──

── ⋅ ⋅ ── ✩ ── ⋅ ⋅ ──

sunghoon knows its wrong. he knows its gross, a little fucked up but he can't help it. especially not when you ask him to wash your laundry with his to save on some money.

he couldnt help but dig through your pile, searching desperately for it and- oh! he's found it.

a worn pair of your panties. they're different than he imagined. he's spent hours thinking about it before. he thought they'd be plain, no lace, no pattern. multiple pairs but not alot of difference in color. mainly ones that match your skin tone. you wear alot of light clothing and he sees nothing when his eyes scan your body, spending more time on your ass than anything else. he knows that you dont wear low rise anything so they must be high cut? maybe hipsters? he's sure its nothing out of vanilla for you.

so why would you own a pair of white, bikini shaped, lace trim panties? this soils the picture he had of you in his head. all of his research- all of this knowledge he had of you.

he inspects the garment in his hand. this can't be yours right? sunghoon brings the thin, thin piece of clothing to his nose. it's definitely yours. he can smell the faint scent of your body wash on them.

now he's upset; nearly distraught. why would you own a pair of panties like this? who would you need to impress-

were you fucking other men? were you- sunghoons stomach drops- were you letting them taint you? a different, even more devastating thought springs forward and sunghoon is nauseous. are you not a virgin?

the sadness fades and is replaced by wild, unadulterated anger. his fist closes around the flimsy cloth. god hes upset, frustrated nearly to tears but never at you. never at you. you could never do wrong, his perfect angel. his pretty princess would never do wrong. he knows this, but he's got to take action. do something to solve this issue, make you clean again.

sunghoon brings the panties up to his nose and lets out a whimper at the scent, its tangy but theres a hint of sweetness. fuck, he's hard now. he palms the outline of his cock through his sweats; you smell so good. he knew it, knew that you'd smell good. he tracks what you eat, when you eat it, how you eat it. he makes sure to prepare good, balanced meals for you. he buys you all of your multi-vitamins, tracks the amount of water you drink to make sure you're never dehydrated. he knew you'd smell good, he made it that way.

he feels his cock leak into his underwear. he knows its wrong, knows its fucked up and dirty, but he does it anyway. his tongue pokes out to lick the center of your panties- oh. oh. his eyes roll to the back of his head. it tastes- no, no. you taste good. he feels precum dribble out of his cock and now he feels his underwear get a little damp.

he presses his palm harder against his crotch and takes another, more confident lick at the spot where your pretty pussy would've laid and now he's whining and humping into his hand like a fucking dog. he stumbles at the sensation and catches himself on a washer and he's reminded that this is a public laundromat on campus. a more secluded one, but public nonetheless. the thought of someone catching him makes his head spin.

everyone knew you were roommates. you were so, so popular amongst your peers. so sweet and kind, a smile that lights up a room, an infectious, contagious giggle. and sunghoon, who was so, so handsome but as much as he was handsome, he was shy. didn't talk much to anyone. except for you. he'd stroll with you as you bounced next to him, talking about your day as you both walked back to your dorm.

what better way to claim you than for someone to walk in and see him fucking himself and holding your panties up to his face. the thought turns him on so much that he squeezes his eyes shut and lets out a strangled moan.

god he needs it. he needs to fuck you in front of the whole campus. all of those men that violated your princess parts- he needs them to watch as he stuffs his girthy length into your pussy. he wants them to watch as he stretches you out. he's sure you'd struggle against him as what he had in girth he also had in length, but he knows you'd like it. he knows you'd love being filled up by him. by him.

he's so fucking mad. how could they? he slams the fist holding your panties on the washer as he continues to fuck and grind into his hand.

fuck those men that defiled you. fuck them for touching you that way, putting their filthy hands on your precious body. he'd fix that. cleanse you. cum all over your pretty frame, cover you in it. your face, your tits, cum on and in your tight little cunt. he prays you'd let him fuck your ass too so he could fill that up as well- shit.

he feels it coming. he feels the onslaught of pleasure start to pour into his body. he wants to hold off- wants to hold his cum until he can spill it inside of you but he cant. he's gonna cream his pants like hes a teenager again.

he laps at your panties again and he cant wait to taste your pussy. he can't wait until he can eat you out for hours, have you cum on his tongue over and over and- oh-

his eyes squeeze shut again and he bites his lip to try and conceal his moans. he can't tell if its working though, his ears are ringing and the only thing he can think of is roughly humping his hand to get off.

he whines and whines and whines as he feels himself let go, ropes of cum seeping through his underwear. its spurt after spurt and now his hand is wet and its starting to stain his sweats but he cant stop. his cock has a mind of its own, twitching and jumping and fuck- he's so sensitive.

he stops cumming, stops shooting his load into his underwear. he whimpers and removes his hand from his pants but his hips are still stuttering against nothing.

god he wants to feel it. he wants to know how it'll feel when he slides his cock into your warm, tight, wet cunt. he wants to feel his balls slap against your ass from how hard he's fucking you. he wants to feel your pussy gush around him, cover his cock and balls in your juices. he hopes he can make you squirt so you can drench him in you and- no. no no no-

sunghoons knees knock together as he feels himself cum in his pants again and he might actually pass out this time. its dry, nothings coming out but he feels euphoric. his hips fuck into the air and its so fucking gross, he feels so gross and so dirty but its only for you. only for his pretty princess.

[florencemtrash]

The Shadowsinger & The Inkbird: Chapter Twenty

Summary: Y/n's clairvoyance is a gift from the Mother, but it feels more like a curse. With the power to gain knowledge through touch alone, Y/n holes herself up in The Alcove and hopes her powers and parentage will remain a secret. But things will change after the Summer Solstice ball and a chance encounter with a certain Shadowsinger.

Warnings: Canon typical graphic depictions

The Shadowsinger & The Inkbird: Masterlist

Masterlist of Masterlists

You were running on coffee and willpower, and both were in short supply. You cradled what you promised would be your last cup in your hands, feeling your fried nerves inch closer to bursting into flames with every bitter sip. 

Azriel had one arm looped protectively around your waist, propping you up against his side like an overworked bookend. You both sat huddled over the map you’d spent the last day and night laboring over until you could picture every stark line pressed behind shuttered eyelids like an afterimage. Until your cramped hands shook while clutching the mug like a vice. 

Feyre, Rhys, Mor, Nesta, Lucien, and Cassian similarly hovered over the innocuous sheet of paper. Pale parchment glow flickering over expressions of intense thought. 

You traced the outline of the lake, its form vaguely star shaped and pointing abstractly towards the north, south, east, and west.

“Here.” You tapped the northeast edge where a greyed out huddle of shapes formed the forest and a collection of scribbles marked the Death god’s home close to the waters. The lines swirled in your mind like a thousand snakes locked in battle, swallowing each other whole and getting eaten alive in an endless, vicious cycle. 

Koschei’s portion of the continent lay flat and unassuming, seemingly vulnerable with the flatlands peering at his back with limitless entry points for enemies from the Continent. But the seductive ease of access through that region was a guise. Koschei was a death god, and a powerful one at that. Magic grew in and out of the soil there and what walked those woods had a strange habit of toeing the line between life and death.

The western corners swam in seas of grasslands, flat and open and unprotected save for the expanse of water a mile wide. 

And the lake. The lake was the most curious thing of all. A black shape on paper, still and foreboding. 

You knew from Andrian’s memories that enchanted swans flocked there — women layered with curses that kept them bound to the region in animal form — but nothing else. No creatures floundered in the salty dark. No animals came to drink from it as if they could sense the power that tainted it with decay. 

“The boundaries of the Koschei’s power lie somewhere along here.” You pointed to the lazy line sketched down. “But I wouldn’t trust it. When Andrian was first sent off from the lake he crossed the plains towards one of the harbor towns on the coast and he felt that Koschei’s influence scaled with the distance away from the source of his power.” 

“Any weak points? Places we could slip in unnoticed?” Feyre’s eyes scanned the page, reimagining your weak swirls of ink into something more layered. Something with more meaning that could only come about from the mind of an artist and a warrior. 

You pointed to one of the star points and then to another toward the south. “Here and here. Don’t ask me how and don’t ask me why but these are the only two blind spots. Andrian used to sneak away from Koschei’s house to these two places.”

“To do what?” Cassian asked. He lumbered towards the back of the war room, easily peering over everyone’s shoulders to the flattened parchment and eyeing the wooden pieces strewn across the map, his own piece being tipped with a glistening red stone. 

“To plan his escape.” 

A hush fell over the room, thick and suffocating. 

The boy had never succeeded.

Feyre’s lips flattened to a pale line, the air around her reverberating with heat as the temperature in the room rose — a drop of Autumn’s power magnified. She nodded to the second map, this one gathered from Azriel’s contacts on the Continent. Whereas your map had laid out Koschei’s land in detail, Azriel’s was suspiciously empty where the lake was concerned. The two fit together like puzzle pieces. “What’s the nearest harbor town?”

“Tournnes.” Azriel replied without needing to look down. You’d memorized one map, he’d memorized the other. “It’s a small fishing village located twenty-three miles to the southwest. Most of the inhabitants are men that come and go with the season and travel west from Slairn and Friesieg. It will be empty this time of year.” The fish would have gone south in search of warmer waters. Even here the Sidra had turned frigid, crusts of ice lapping up against grey sand shores. 

Cassian shook his head, examining the map with a scowl. “There’s poor coverage getting from Tournnes to Koschei. And an abandoned town’s too obvious a place to hide any soldiers. It’d be better to come in from the east, through the woods.”

“Then we’d need to take the long way around Koschei’s territory.” Lucien argued back, “Our soldiers would need to trek through foreign lands for weeks and we’d lose any advantage Tarquin could give us by staying close to the coast.” 

“You can’t trust those woods,” you gasped, your eyes flashing with fear that didn’t wholly belong to you. 

Never enter those woods. Henna had once warned her Andrian. Never. Do you understand me?

Azriel tightened his hold on you, pressing his lips into your hair to brush against your ear. “Breathe, my love. Breathe.” 

You hadn’t realized you’d stopped. 

It was a heavy burden carrying the memories of others. Like a weight tied around your belly that hadn’t been properly woven into flesh. Something both part and apart from you. And you’d been feeling too many of Andrian’s memories in the past week since his death. 

Silence flung itself over growing irritation and anxiety as everyone circled back to the same conclusion. 

They wouldn’t be able to bring their armies abroad. And with limited numbers, brute strength would only go so far when forced to bring a fight to a foreign land against a foreign god. This would be decided by few. It would be as intimate as lovers. As ruthless as enemies. 

“There’s still the other plan.” Nesta reminded them, glancing first at Feyre and you with the faintest of nods. 

“I hate that plan, Nes.” Cassian gripped the back of her wing-backed chair and she reached up to take his hand in her own. She looked like a queen in her own right — harsh, pragmatic, unwavering. And he her mirror — a roguish knight, rough and wild and raw. 

“I know. Unfortunately for you, it’s the best one we’ve got.” 

“It’s the only one we’ve got.” Mor said with a sigh, rubbing her temples to alleviate the ache there. “We’re asking for a blood bath one way or the other.” 

“Ione is still with us.” Rhys squeezed his cousin’s knee. “Without her, he can be killed.” 

“But for how long, Rhys? How long until he finds someone else? Some other way?”

The question hung in the air like an ax ready to fall. An invisible clock ticking its way towards doom. Koschei had read the book’s contents. He had to know the secret to freeing himself was sheltered in Ione’s veins. So long as she was alive and breathing she was a threat as much as she was a tantalizing prize for him to tear his teeth into. 

Feyre’s fingernails clicked on the glossy tabletop, eyes narrowed in on that splash of black on paper. Through the golden string tied to her lower ribs, she felt the tug of her mate’s silent agreement. Her eyes flickered upward for a brief moment, as if she could see through the layers of the House to the skies above. “For as long as we have Ione, we have the upper hand. But we can’t rely on it forever.” She looked at you, “ We go with the first plan. It will have to be enough.” 

You shivered. 

Four years ago, when the Day Court had first opened its borders to foreigners from other Courts, you’d encountered a male in the market. He’d been young and reckless and glamoured himself to live amongst the humans for six months. In that time, he’d learned their version of magic — the sleight of hand tricks and elaborate games of misdirection humans played on one another. Caped entertainers bedazzling crowds with obvious moves, while the real work happened just out of frame. 

You thought of him now. You pictured him in the marketplace as he made a hand-painted playing card disappear from his hand into the fold of his suit jacket, only to reappear under an overturned teacup. 

Yes. 

It would have to be enough. 

The crisp blade flashed in the dull light as you moved your feet back and forth in a practiced dance. 

Left, left, right, duck, keep your wrist straight and slice up. Just like Azriel had instructed you. He stood off the narrow mat, hazel eyes tracing every slow movement of yours with a critical gaze. 

“Practice makes permanence.” He’d reminded you earlier. “Get it right first, then we’ll worry about speed.” 

Magic hovered over the House of Wind’s training gym, warping the air like a soap bubble as it shielded you from the frigid rain. Even so, the scent of petrichor and the cleanliness of frosted wind hung close to warn of the storm churning its way down from the north, carrying with it the promise of rainfall or the first true flakes of snow. 

How poetic that winter should come with death chasing its heels while you were learning a dozen ways to kill a man. 

“Here.” Azriel took your wrist in a loose grip, arching your arm and sticking the point of the knife into the training dummy’s jugular. Hay crinkled and burst out from the burlap covering instead of blood and you stepped away, locating the points in the liver, the lungs, the heart, the throat, under the arms, and more. Gruesome things made digestible by the motionless, fake body propped up on wooden poles. 

You didn’t need to imagine what it would feel like for your blade to meet flesh. 

Your arms ached. Hot, unfamiliar stretches of muscle trembling while slick with sweat. You could taste salt on your tongue as Azriel repeated himself. 

“Be precise. Be quick if you can. Then run like hell.” 

Incapacitation and speed. Those were the only two things you could rely on if things went south on the Continent. 

Precise. Quick. Run.

“Emphasis on run,” You muttered beneath your breath. You adjusted your feet to match Azriel’s stance, feeling the strength of his muscles close to your body and imagining some of that power seeping into the ground for you to drink up. 

The corner of his mouth twitched, then rose in a smile. “Exactly.” He stepped in, hands twisting your hips to be straight and then drifting up to your wrist. “Too much.” He corrected your bones with a feather-light touch. He wasn’t smiling anymore. 

It should have been romantic. Him touching you like this with his front pressed against your back and his breath sliding over your skin as he taught you to wield a knife. Instead his insides churned relentlessly. Visions of you, blood-splattered and motionless on the ground, flashed through his mind. He’d be damned if he let that happen again. 

You practiced on him next. Blunt, stone knife gripped in your hands as he moved in slow-motion. Azriel must have had everything custom made for you. The balance felt right in your hands, the movement as fluid as your awkward limbs could manage. 

You clasped a hand around the back of his neck, dragging him forward as you swung up. 

Where the head goes, the body will follow.

He didn’t so much as grunt as the stone wedged itself into his ribs. 

You locked eyes with him and saw his pupils blown wide as a doe’s. “Good.” He murmured. “Again.” 

On and on you went for hours, Azriel’s panic fueling the training he put you through, as if he could fit a hundred years of combat into a handful of hours. 

You grunted when Azriel easily flipped you over onto your back, a scarred hand catching the nape of your neck so your head wouldn’t slam into the floor. The knife slipped out from your sweaty fingers, skittering away and disappearing beneath one of the weapons racks along the wall. You breathed heavily beneath him, feeling the grit of the ground and the sweat sliding into your hair and the leather brushing your chest with every breath he took. 

In a real fight, Azriel would have killed you a thousand times over and he knew it. There was not a single moment where you could have saved yourself. 

You saw the tell tale flicker in his eyes, the tensing of his jaw before he gritted his teeth and swore beneath his breath. 

You felt shame seep into your stomach again. “Az—”

“I want you to take my memories,” he said. “Everything I’ve learned over 500 years.” 

Metal whispered against leather as a tendril of shadow retrieved the knife and slid it into the thigh sheath Azriel had tied around your legs only hours ago. It felt strange to have such an unfamiliar weight against your thighs. To know that only leather kept the wicked blade from slicing you to the bone. 

“We’ve been over this before, Azriel. I can take however many memories I want from you until I can picture every way to take down an enemy in my mind’s eye. But that doesn’t mean my body will obey or follow through correctly. Knowing things mentally isn’t the same thing as knowing things physically.”

Azriel huffed in frustration, dropping one hand to your waist like he often did and gripping the flesh there to ground him. 

“If we had more time—”

“When this is over we’ll have more time.” 

If I make it. 

Because if there was anyone who would survive what was to come. It was Azriel. And you could find a great deal of comfort in that.

Azriel must have read your doubt because his eyes hardened and his hands came up to cup your jaw. “We will have more time. We’ll have time for everything, do you understand me?”

“Like what?”

“Whatever you want. We’ll travel the Courts. I’ll take you dancing and—”

“You’ll teach me a dozen new ways to kill someone?” 

“Exactly.”

“Should I start keeping a tally?” 

“If that would help, then yes.” He dipped his head down, kissing you firmly on the lips, the taste salty and warm to the touch. Kissing you came easy now. Touches were a comforting drug he craved daily. 

“If things go wrong—” He whispered, flicking a strand of hair out of your eyes. “Promise me you’ll find me.” 

You blinked up at him, tracing fragments of gold in his eyes. 

“Find you,” you echoed, your voice tinged with sadness. “You’re not going to convince me to run?”

He laughed bitterly. “I know you too well, my love. You wouldn’t listen even if I did. If anything, it would make you want to stay and fight even more, just to prove me wrong.“ “Then is this some reverse psychology? You tell me the opposite of what you want, so I end up doing what you intended all along?”

“You’re thinking too deeply about this.” He slid his arms around the small of your back, dropping his weight until you were flush against him. Until you could feel his heart beating beneath his skin in time to yours. “Find me, so I can protect you. And so if anything happens, we won’t be alone. I want you to promise me.” 

You caressed his cheek, the coarse bandages he’d wound around your wrists and knuckles scratching the skin of his jaw and the faint stubble that had grown there over sleepless nights. “I promise I’ll find you, Azriel. We’re better together anyways.” 

He could never disagree with you. He lifted you back onto your feet, kissing your forehead. “Three more drills, then we’ll be done for the day.” 

He made you run five. The bastard.

You’d dreamed of what might come. Nightmares filled with glassy-eyed children and skeletal forests where the dead roamed free. A black lake with stones of bleached bone to fill your lungs and choke the life out of you. 

You wanted to make Azriel proud. You wanted to be the kind of warrior who could match him physically, not just mentally. The kind of female he’d never have to worry about protecting in that way. But violence had never been beaten into your bones and you could only hope that the skills you did possess would see you through to the end. 

You and Azriel would make it. You’d all make it. 

Some way. 

Somehow. 

Then there would be time for everything you had ever wanted and everything you’d never had the courage to ask for.

You woke up to a world shivering beneath a dusting of snow. Frost creeped up the windowsill, trying to slither inside before the House’s magic burned it away. A grey, ashen sky hung low over the mountains, mist blowing over and gathering in valleys until they were transformed into pools of smoke. 

So this is it. You thought wearily, tasting the change in the air. Winter’s finally here to choke the world into submission. 

You burrowed further under Azriel’s wings, chasing the heat that rolled off his skin. When you looked up at his eyes they were already trained on the weather, some similar tangle of thoughts running through his mind that had his grip around your waist tightening. 

“The other death gods. Have you met any of them, Az?” You whispered your question into the hollow of his neck, feeling the blood rushing beneath your lips until he answered.

“I’ve met a fair few. The Bone Carver, Stryga, and Bryaxis joined our side in the final battle against Hybern and Nesta was equivalent in power when she first emerged from the Cauldron.” 

“Nesta?” You asked questionably. 

She was a collection of sharp edges wrapped in silk and cunning, but a death god? 

Azriel smiled ever so slightly. “You didn’t know her then, but she was a terror to behold. You could feel her presence in a room like a knife in your back or a flame licking at your heels so hold it starts to freeze. Only Cassian was foolish and lovestruck enough to approach her at the time.” 

You tried to imagine it — Cassian’s wild, borderline arrogant mannerisms going toe-to-toe against Nesta’s magnified sharp grace. “That sounds about right.” 

“Feyre knows the most about the death gods. Has come face to face with the most. Rhys sent her into the Weaver’s cabin to retrieve her engagement ring — don’t give me that look, my love, I don’t understand it either — and she’s the one who convinced The Bone Carver and Bryaxis to fight for us.” 

“Feyre has a penchant for endearing herself to monsters.” 

Azriel smirked, pearly teeth flashing. “You have no idea.” Then he said something that stuck with you. “The Bone Carver was especially close to her.” 

Anytime the Bone Carver — Thanatos — was mentioned, you could only think of Bethsevah. The one person who had ever looked upon his true face and never flinched.

“How so?” 

Shadows swarmed around his ears, as much a sign of his thinking as it was a sign that whispers beyond your own understanding were reaching him. 

“When Feyre met with the Bone Carver, he made a bargain that he’d only fight for her if she could descend into the Court of Nightmares and bring back an enchanted mirror without going mad. Feyre said she saw her true form when she looked into her reflection, and that it was only by accepting this form that she was able to keep the madness at bay. The Bone Carver was impressed with her and pledged his loyalty to her from then on.” Azriel shook his head, wings flaring out in another sign of his thinking. “It never made sense to me why a being like him would even make that bargain to begin with.” 

“Even death gods can be surprised. We should consider ourselves lucky.” 

“It wasn’t just that though. I was watching when he died. He… he turned his face up to the field at Feyre and he smiled at her. It felt like a bittersweet ending to a story I didn’t know. Like he was saying goodbye to more than just this world.” 

You draped your arm over his chest, tracing the black ink swirling across his chest and over his shoulders like ocean waves. The Bone Carver was more myth than legend to the few fae that had known of his existence and you knew with each passing century his story would be steadily wiped from the earth like wind shaving down stone. His name would become a whisper. His story, and Beth’s, a tragedy for no one but the stars to weep to. 

But you were still here, and your time with Bethsevah’s book had left you with no small amount of fondness for him. For now you would still be able to whisper his true name. 

“Thanatos.” You said. “He loved this world and the people in it. He sacrificed his life for it. I think he had many things he wanted to say goodbye to.” 

“To Thanatos then.” Azriel raised an invisible cup towards the ceiling of his bedroom, silk sheets sliding down his arms.

“To Thanatos,” you echoed. 

You eventually went through the morning motions together —Azriel helped lace up the back of your dress, and you buttoned up his shirts, careful to avoid the fragile membrane of his wings as you stood at his back.

He tugged you away from the bedroom door at the last moment, your questioning eyes softening when he cradled your face in his hands and stole one last kiss in the privacy of your room, murmuring "Beautiful," against the crown of your freshly brushed hair.

"Do the others know you're such a hopeless romantic?" You asked, finally opening the door and breaking the spell of privacy.

Before Azriel could answer, Cassian blew past the room, shockingly quiet for his mountainous size. "Yes, we all know," he shouted before disappearing down the hall.

Ione stood proud and tall in front of the windows, grey eyes narrowed at the Sidra as it wound through the valley like a snake. Cassian slid into the space beside her and handed her her cane. She knew instinctively where the warrior stood and where his hand reached out towards her. She took the cane without the second glance. A golden lion’s head roared from atop its wooden post, Ione’s fingers resting squarely between its glistening teeth as she leaned experimentally on the new device. Cassian had ordered it custom for her and she knew that hidden within the sleeve of glistening redwood was an iron rod forged in enchanted flames that rendered it near unbreakable. 

“Careful.” She reminded Cassian when she caught him staring for too long. “This body may be different, but I can still bring you to your knees.” 

Cassian chuckled, “I don’t doubt that.”

She slammed the cane against the ground once. Twice. Testing its strength and finding it worthy. “Do you think it will happen soon?” 

This waiting — it was beginning to grate on her nerves. This foreboding calm that threatened to fall away into chaos and bloodshed. She almost wished she were living three years into the future, when she was finally done healing from her wounds and the future had faded into the background of her life once more.

“If I could see into the future, I would not be here right now waiting.”

“And yet here we are.” Ione sighed, shoulders rising and falling elegantly beneath a wrinkled but slender neck.  

Cassian would have said more had Feyre and Rhys not entered the room together, bruises layered beneath their eyes as they plastered on bright smiles for their family, tension visible through the cracks in their porcelain teeth. 

The Inner Circle had assembled in their entirety at the request of their High Lord and High Lady. There was no holiday to be celebrated. No birthdays or anniversaries or special occasions. The fare that had been laid out on the table was simple and everyone filled their plates before spilling out across the sofas and the armchairs or carving out a space on one of Rhysand’s expensive hand-woven rugs. There would be no special meal around the new table devoid of scratches and watermarks and the passage of time and love. This was their family, and for their family it was the company that put finery to shame. 

Elain was a flutter of movement in and out of the kitchen, shepherding pots of tea and fruit tarts before Lucien finally caught her around the waist and made her rest. The House was equally restless. The lights strung above the fireplace mantle flickered like lantern flies. 

Mor sat with Emerie’s wings draped around her shoulders like a cape and Gwyn sat on the floor, hugging her knees close to her chest as she rested her head against the Illyrian female’s knee. To no one’s surprise, you and Azriel clung to the corner of the room, content to watch everyone’s laughter with your arm subtly looped around his. 

He still hasn’t told her, I see. Emerie noted, watching your smile stretch into place when Azriel leaned close to whisper in your ear. 

Does it matter? Mor teased, kissing Emerie’s nose reverently. The Illyrian’s cheeks turned warm. Emerie had not been granted the freedom to explore romance to the same degree as Mor, something she’d worried about when they first started their courtship. But if anyone asked the blonde, she’d tell them it drove her wild to see how such simple gestures could reduce the fearsome warrior to a puddle, even now. Mor tucked herself into Emerie’s side, throwing her long legs over the armrest. It’s probably a good thing. If they could speak to each other like this, we’d never hear from them again.

Emerie laughed into Mor’s golden hair. 

Conversations rose and fell. Plates emptied and clicked as they were laid out on the coffee table.

It was a simple peace they welcomed with open arms. 

They didn’t hear the faintest thud coming from above their heads. 

You smiled when one of Azriel’s shadows wove themselves into your hair, tickling the sensitive skin behind your ear and along your neck. 

“Sorry,” Azriel whispered, trying and failing to draw them back to him for the nth time that day. “I don’t know what’s gotten into them.” They’d been especially touchy as of late, nipping at your heels like a litter of puppies vying for attention or hiding in your pockets. It was a mixture of Azriel’s own feelings that spurred them on and their own desire to protect what they’d claimed as theirs. 

“It’s alright, Azriel. I like having them around.” 

They hummed amongst themselves, happy to see you so pleased. Sometimes, Azriel wondered if you’d be able to learn to listen to them as well. To tease apart that secret language he couldn’t begin to describe. 

Maybe you were listening to them now without even realizing it.

Maybe that’s why you and Azriel were the only ones whose eyes snapped towards the hallway before the first creak of wood sounded throughout the House.

The shuffling of a new, unfamiliar set of feet down the stairs had the hair on the back of your neck rising and crackling with energy.

It wasn’t Jurian. It wasn’t loud enough to be Jurian. He so rarely descended from the attic that he made a habit of making his presence known, tired feet shuffling along the rugged staircase with measured drags. 

You walked over to your brother and tugged on the back of his shirt. “Jurian—”

“That’s not Jurian.” Lucien said with bated breath. He was the third person in the room to hear the sound.

He’d checked on his friends less than a handful of hours ago. Jurian had been as he always was — weary but hopeful as one hand had clenched the bundle of morphine and the other had leaned against the food cart Lucien had carried up to the top floor. 

And Vassa… Vassa had been uncharacteristically quiet, slouching against the wall of her gilded cage, raw skin and thin feathers trembling with her haggard breath as she slept. 

“You should come down.” Lucien had said. “You deserve a break.” 

But Jurian had only shook his head and flashed a tight smile. “As much as I would love to bless you with my presence, I won’t leave her like this. But one day, my friend, we’ll both walk down those steps together and have a proper celebration. I promise you.” 

Vassa came down the steps. 

Alone. 

Naked.

Shivering.

You eyed the window where the mid-afternoon sun beat down on a frosted city. 

It was the middle of the day… and Vassa was human. 

You clutched Lucien’s arm, fingernails digging through his cotton shirt before he could take another step forward. Silence suffocated the room. There was something deeply wrong with the cursed queen. She trembled like a newborn fawn unceremoniously dumped into the world, her skin puckered and pock-marked from where she’d picked at old scabs and opened new wounds. The whole array hung from bones so thin they may as well have belonged to a bird. 

“Vassa…” Lucien’s voice broke on her name. 

A path of bloody feathers trailed behind her.

She grasped at strands of her fiery red hair and tugged. Hard. You focused all your energy on keeping the food in your stomach when strands fell through her bloody fingers and saliva rose in your mouth. 

“I’m so sorry, Lucien. I can’t… It won’t stop.” Her voice, which had once been beautiful, grated your ears. “My skin. It feels like I’m crawling out of it.” 

“Vassa.” Lucien held out his hands, showing her they were empty. “Where’s Jurian?” He would come down. He would help her in ways only he was capable of. 

“I don’t… I don’t know…”

“Where’s Jurian?”

At the second mention of her lover’s name, Vassa broke down crying. Fat, ugly tears streaking down tan cheeks that had turned sallow and grey. She wiped them away, fingers dripping. There was a deep, unyielding hunger evident in every stutter of her body as her eyes raked across the room. You flinched when those milky, teal eyes passed over you… and landed on Ione. 

Elderly, painfully human, Ione.

Vassa’s left eye twitched and Azriel had only enough time to tackle you to the ground and cover your body with his own before the mortal queen burst into flames.

<- Previous Chapter Next Chapter ->

______________

Author's Note:

^^ Visual depiction of how I've felt the last week like what in the world? I'm getting enough sleep I swear but every morning I feel like I'm dragging a two ton boulder behind me until I get a sip of that bitter goodness. Ugh. Hope y'all are resting better than I am.

Anyways, I know it's been a while since I posted, but the chapter is here! Whoop! And I hope you enjoyed :) As always, feedback is appreciated and welcome if you have burning things you need to get off your chest (doesn't even have to be SSIB-related honestly my inbox is there).

[mindblowingscience]

Seawater will infiltrate underground freshwater supplies in about three of every four coastal areas around the world by the year 2100, according to a recent study led by researchers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. In addition to making water in some coastal aquifers undrinkable and unusable for irrigation, these changes can harm ecosystems and corrode infrastructure. Called saltwater intrusion, the phenomenon happens below coastlines, where two masses of water naturally hold each other at bay. Rainfall on land replenishes, or recharges, fresh water in coastal aquifers (underground rock and soil that hold water), which tends to flow below ground toward the ocean.

Continue Reading.

[lymericslimerick]

The Night, She calls Me | 𝖭𝖾𝗎𝗏𝗂𝗅𝗅𝖾𝗍𝗍𝖾 𝗑 𝗋𝖾𝖺𝖽𝖾𝗋

The Iudex of Fontaine had never been known to stoop to lowly "human" desires, up until now.

warnings .ᐟ smut(?), making out, Neuvillette gets stabbed, blood drinking, descriptions of a knife being pushed out of a wound, Neuvillette's very much insane, reader is vaguely vampiric, yandere-esque

1.4k words | she/her pronouns. the aftermath can be seen here

The moonlight shone through the radius window looming over the alcove, shining a spotlight on the two bodies intertwined under its glow. Clothes were scattered on the floor, a mechanic’s jacket and dress shirt haphazardly thrown to the wayside and a coat, adorned with elegantly drapes pieces of fabric befitting of only the highest authority thrown across the room like it was shot out of someone’s hand in a flurry. Two pairs of hair clips, ornate and sharp thrown at the foot of the nook as one body pulled the other impossibly closer, arms wrapped around the other in a vice grip.

They’re kissing, one side restrained and fragile as she halfheartedly matched the crazed, animalistic need of the other who’s all fangs and tongue, kissing like he wants to consume after years of starvation. Two vibrant blue antennae glow and stand on their own on his head, almost covered by the waterfall of formerly proper long hair, now an unkempt mess of spiky pieces and interrupted cascades.

A dance of the tongue for a beat, and the more human other speaks. “Chief Justice.”

Immediately, “Dearest, sweetest, please call me by my name.”

She ignores it, pulling him closer by his cravat. He makes a noise of childish excitement, bordering on a whimper as eyes older than the soil of the earth stare at her with an intensity that could rip the skin of the bones of any other being. “Monsieur.” His lips tremble as he captures her in another kiss, hands coming up to clasp the sides of her face as if to goad her into melting like he was, urge her to fall like he has.

Her hands go up and touch the sides of his neck and Oh, he is on fire. The skin she touched is singed and burnt with her, a drop of hell on the pristine landscape of heaven as he struggles to gasp and pant at the feeling. O’ light, O’ void, the feeling. The feeling was consuming, numbing his brain further as she kept her hands there, fingers kneading and prodding like she wanted to feel the raw flesh and blood and power of his person on her hands. He can’t help it, he bares his fangs and tries to bite into her kiss, consume her like she consumes him.

She pulls her hands away and he fully whines, antennae rigid as it sticks close to his head much like an angry animal. She brings her hands to clasp over his own and he feels like they have mangled them, tainted them so only her touch would form them back to what they once were. He lets out a shaky exhale, “My joy, My beloved, My life’s queen…” He wants to wail and thrash as his lips chase the feeling of hers. She is cruel, depraved.

“Quiet,” She mumbles into mouth and he keens, ducking his head into her shoulder. “Be still, let me do this.” He takes a laboured breath into her as he feels her hand separate from his, feels as it reaches into the pocket of her pants. He can’t bring himself to care as she opens her mouth wider, giving him an anchor to latch onto, an outlet to express his carnal desire. He eats and eats at her mouth like he’s a man shackled by earthly desires, like he isn’t the Iudex of Fontaine, the supreme authority of all waters but a weak, puny little thing single minded in his pleasure.

So good. So good. Sogoodsogoodsogoodsogoodsogoodsogoodsogoodso goodsogoodsogoodsogoodsogoodso-

He feels the blade’s presence before he sees it, and he sees the blade before he feels it. He stills while he feels the blade around archaic flesh, feels his entire being bloom and settle around the blade held in the hands of his beloved. He lets his mouth open around hers in surprise as she looks at him with a beautifully deep gaze, beautifully cold eyes, and the most beautiful smile he’s ever seen in his entire life. A small, lithe little thing that didn’t even look like it was wholly directed at him, instead directed at the blue blood coursing down the wound in his chest. But Oh, the joy of seeing her like this. The joy that she’s smiling at him.

She’s looking at him, she’s looking at him, she’s smiling, she’s happy. He feels himself smile, shaky and full of fangs. “H-hah.. Hah..” He throws his head back onto the alcove with wide eyes, draconic pupils crazed and shaking. He feels himself be consumed by her fire, the need coursing through his veins bringing him to a higher plane. “…Hah..!”

“I hope you don’t mind this too much, Monsieur.” He feels her voice in his veins, and she feasts. Her tongue licks at the dripping blood from his wound, trailing up to the source. His mouth opens and a silent scream escapes him, not from pain or from fear, from a primal instinct he hadn’t felt in all of his rebirth. This instinct feels like he’s been returned home, returned to a place where he’s one of everyone, a single drop in a vast ocean instead of a tsunami approaching a small sea settlement. His eyes roll up into his head as he feels his dearly beloved lap up more of him with the fervor of someone dying, someone starved. Might this mean he and his beloved were feeling the same things? He shudders at the thought. How wonderful it was that he was brought to heaven by being defiled and his beloved by consuming the water that coursed through his veins.

Regrettably, he feels himself running dry. His primordially sculpted body wasn’t as keen on becoming a feast for his other as he was, skin stitching together and muscles flexing to reject the blade lodged in his chest as it slowly pulls out of him. The squelching noises coming from his chest made him whine, biting his lip so hard he draws more blue blood. He desperately wants his love to drink from the would he’s currently chewing deeper into. He hears her ‘tsk’.

“I should’ve known you wouldn’t bleed as much as I wanted you to,” She mutters. “Your body isn’t like others, is it .. Neuvillette?”

The door rattles with the might of Neuvillette’s scream. His eyes roll back into his head , his antennae glowing blue and vibrant as he comes untouched in his pants. Faintly, He hears the pipes in the bathroom burst and the faint yell of a guard, followed by exclamations of confusion and fear both outside and inside the Palais Mermonia. In his peripheral view he sees lights switch on around the buildings surrounded the Palais, his divine hearing flooding with exclamations of “The pipes burst!” “Get the food off the table! it’s flooding!”. Above him, his beloved chuckles. “How cute.”

Neuvillette feels himself laugh alongside her, euphoric and trite. So unbecoming. The knife is completely removed from his chest and safely pocketed into her pants, the tight imprint of them against her thigh almost making Neuvillette come again. She brings a hand up to her own mouth to wipe the blue ichor off her lip, licking the residue off it. He faintly registers how she looks more full of life, formerly lifeless (s/c) skin looking more vibrant and warm and her (e/c) eyes looking bright.

Neuvillette can’t bring himself to care at all, instead marvelling at her beauty against the moonlight. His life, his love, full of him. He shudders as he feels the waters temper, murmurs of citizens grateful that their water had stopped flowing with such fervour ringing in his head. Little did they know, they needed to thank his beloved for it, thank her for every divine thing that happened tonight. She extracts gloves from her pocket and sheathes her hands, muttering under her breath about “Feeling bad” or “regretting she had to get relief like this” and “This should be enough.. I swear I won’t bother you again, Monsieur.”

What?..

He feels dread creep into him as she continues on, reclothing herself with a sense of urgency she does not need. Doesn’t she know this Palais belongs to her now? Doesn’t she know He belongs to Her now? He feels himself sputter and babble while she looks back at him, the worst sort of look in her eyes. The look of leaving.

“Thank you so much for letting me get some relief, Monsieur. Have a good evening.”

On her way back, the storm that had formed almost instantaneously threatened to flood Fontaine once more. The roads of Fontaine filled with water cloying at her ankles as if it were alive, as if it was begging her to come with them. She paid them no mind.

[gemissleeping]

Angel of Small Death | Part Two

Theodore Nott x Fem!Reader

Mattheo Riddle x Fem!Reader

Summary: It’s Seventh Year and you’re one of the ones who stayed. Reeling from the loss of your family in the midst of the war, you find a twisted sense of comfort in Mattheo. But your best friend Theo can’t help but feel you’re slipping away from him in more ways than one.

Read Part One here.

Length: 1.4k

Warnings: Haha... heyyyyyy (I feel really awkward rn, I feel I should beg forgiveness) so I might've been away for like... the whole year. But Merry Christmas?? I missed you guys and I missed writing sm. I heard you in the replies and I heard you in my inbox... so here it is!! I loved writing this as I'm easing back in. I love that so many of you loved it! Working on another part :) anyway drug use mentioned!! Toxic relationships!! Mature audiences! I love you all <3

“Where were you?” Mattheo asked as he threw his bag to the sun bleached grass beside you. It was the turn of Autumn, and the last thing you wanted was to be stuck inside doing arithmancy. The endless flood of numbers and charts made your head spin. 

“Here.” You answered simply, giving him a lazed smile from where you laid back in the grass. Matt sat down with a weighted sigh beside you, the skeletons of old leaves crunching beneath him. You looked to him for a moment, zoning in on the harsh set of his brow; the uncharacteristic tension he seemed to be carrying. 

“Well you shouldn’t be.” He wouldn’t look at you, perhaps just couldn’t. He was turned instead to the Black Lake, sprawling before you both like a mirror. The illusion only broken by the thin freckling of light rain upon its surface. It was all so easily disturbed. 

“It’s one class,” you sighed, feeling a creeping sense of guilt. “I don’t understand why you’ve got your knickers so twisted. As though you haven’t done worse.” You gave him an airy smile, which of course he didn’t return, still falsely captivated by the lake.

“I haven’t seen you since second. I just left Potions.” He looked at you then, the edge in his tone doing little to conceal the worry in his eyes. For the first time since you’d gotten to the lake, the dread you’d been so desperately trying to bury began to scratch at your chest again. The acute awareness that you had no concept of how long you had actually been down here setting in. Time was running past you like water, but you didn’t seem to be moving with it. 

“You’re high.”

Too late you remembered the remnants of the joint beside you, amongst the dead grass and weeds. The rough skin of Mattheo’s fingers now tainted with soil and ash. The betrayal in his voice made your stomach churn, now it was you who couldn’t look to him. 

“Only when we’re together, that was the deal.” He was upset with you, and somehow it felt unexpected. Your fingertips found the edge of your skirt, toying with it like a chastised child. He’d never been disappointed with you before, or perhaps you just hadn’t cared. You weren’t too sure which was the truth. 

“One class you might’ve gotten away with, but three?” His hands met his face mercilessly, the brunt of his frustration meeting there as he ran them across it. “Fuck, I mean what were you thinking?” Eyes on the ground, you continued attacking your skirt’s hem with a frown. The gentleness had returned, seeping into his tone. This was the part of him you needed. Whatever it was that was inside of you, this supposed grief, couldn’t be consumed. But at least he made it feel like something you could navigate; somewhere where you could find someone close to who you had been.

“Are you trying to torture me?” His words cut through the stillness of the water, the absence of a leaf adorned breeze.

“What?” The words tumbled out of you, feeble - flat. 

“Are you,” he repeated gently, your eyes locking as you turned to him, “trying to torture me?” His eyes held, earnest. The kind of vulnerability you’d only seen from him when you were alone at the end of the night and a bottle. “I just want to help. It’s the least I could-” Something within him cracked, made its way up his throat. Matt held his breath, looking away for a moment as though for privacy. You waited, not daring to do so much as move. His palms had returned to shield his eyes, but they would do nothing for his thoughts. After a sharp breath he rested an arm atop a bent knee. Head still hung low as the other moved to the ground, fingers sinking into the sharp needles of dry grass. “And you just- you keep throwing yourself into it. How am I supposed to keep you out of detention if you keep doing this shit?”

Of course. Of course he had been. You felt a fool for taking his admission to realise. Unlike you, the Carrows were not fools. It had not been your attempts at slipping away unseen or making yourself unnoticed that had saved you this past month. It had been him. What he had done in order to save your skin, you did not want to know. Your cheeks burned.

“I’m- I’m sorry. I didn’t realise that you… I’m sorry.” You had been foolish, and you had hurt him. Cost him God knows what. Your cheeks felt wet when you looked to him again, the cold air drying the salt of tears against the skin. There was nothing harsh about him, not the way people seemed to believe. He was so unlike the life that had been passed to him. Gentle, and kind, and somehow whole. Patched together with all of the pieces of himself still accounted for. It shouldn’t have been possible, yet he sat before you.

He reached out, his palms covering your cheeks, thumbs running beneath your eyes to wipe the salt away. He didn’t blame you, or anyone. He should have, but he didn’t. He tucked you into his side, wrapping his green tartan scarf snug around you as you both leant back against the large oak. 

“Do you at least have any left?” Mattheo whispered against your ear with a grin. Looking down to you, eyes alight with his usual mischief once more. You couldn’t help but grin back as you nodded, his lips moving to capture yours. He lingered against you, gentle and unassuming. There was nothing he wanted from you, no longer anything he wanted you to fix. You’d known it for a while now. Everything else; the drinks and powder and pills - their rush held no light to him. What had once been intertwined was starting to untangle. It would take time, but you would become whole again, and then you could be with him - without the rest of it.

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝

Theo’s eyes were on Mattheo as soon as he had entered the dorm. As though he had purposely left dinner early so that he might get Matt in private. Theo didn’t have to speak, it all lay there; he’d been looking at Matt that same way all evening. And in fairness, Mattheo supposed, they hadn’t done much to cover the smell. But that wasn’t what this was about, not exactly.

“I didn’t give it to her.” Matt spoke plainly, throwing his potions textbook down on his bedside table without a care “She gave it to me this time, actually.” He didn’t know why he had said it. He knew it would only anger Theo, more than he already was.

“Bullshit.” Theo glowered from where he leaned upon his desk, “It’s always you.” Matt would have been more hurt if it hadn’t have been true.

“That’s not fucking fair man.” Mattheo sighed, sitting on the edge of his bed to face his friend. He began lazily untying his laces, having heard these sentiments from Theo before. Quite frankly he was growing tired of it; the constant overstepping. “Things aren’t good right now-”

“You made them that way.” There was a weight to Theo’s words; an implication. One that held Matt implicit in beliefs that he had buried; that chained him to his Father. Theo didn’t notice the set of his jaw change, didn’t notice him stop untying his laces - only decided to cut deeper. “You got her hooked when you should have helped her.”

“I am helping her.” Matt stiffened, eyes alight as the words left him. He knew where the lines rested; what was his fault and what wasn’t. He spent half his life trying to figure them out. He had a plan, to fix this. 

“She looks like shit.” Theo spat, coming to stand before him. The air in the room seemed to drop in temperature, a chill slicing through Mattheo as he met Theo’s gaze, unwavering. 

“We’re getting through this together.” He tried not to doubt it as he said it. They would clean up, together. They just needed time, he was sure they were close. They had to be.

“No. You’re driving each other into the ground.” Theo stated plainly, his voice low. “And when she gets too far down, it will be your fault.” Theo stepped back, eyes burning into Mattheo. He took a few steps back, before turning away. “Clean your shit up,” Theo mused as a bag of powder landed before Mattheo’s feet, “it’s getting all over everything.”

Taglist: @theodorenottswifeyy @obsessedwithceleste @lenoraslament @mayamonroem @simp-for-fantasy @bruisedbbby

Thank you for your love and patience, getting back to inboxes now. You are all incredible <3

[kaylynnshh]

This Is Not A Love Story. Pt.1

Dick Grayson X Reader

PART 2

꧂𐬼𐬽𐬼𐬽𐬼𐬽𐬼𐬽𐬼𐬽𐬼𐬽𐬼𐬽𐬼𐬽𐬼𐬽𐬼꧁

Friendship. That was what held him and I together. Friendship, though I’m not even sure if such a word could be used to describe what it is we have. What it is we have made.

I had known Dick for many years, our childhoods spent playing together as I visited my grandfather Alfred often during summer break. We were attached at the hip as children, and always speaking at every hour of the day as we grew older. We chose the same college, chose similar majors, chose the same friends and hobbies.

Everything and anything we could exchange and share with the other was done willingly and with an air of excitement that I hadn’t really felt with anyone else. He was my person, and I was his. At least that was what I had thought until he introduced me to his first girlfriend.

She was kind, smart, and funny. I hadn’t really seen him act like that before, smiling so brightly when in the presence of anyone, not even myself. I think it was then I figured out just how I truly saw him. He was my friend, yes, but in my heart I wanted him to be more. I wanted him to smile like that when I was near, to have his lingering touches on my hips or shoulders as he pulled me closer, to know just how it felt to have him whisper something to me that no one would ever truly know aside from the 2 of us.

But I didn’t tell him, not after the first girlfriend, or the second, or the third, not even after the fourth or fifth or any casual hook up that took place afterwards. No. I kept my head down, and my thoughts and feelings to myself because you don’t just tell your friend of over 10 years that you love them. You don’t taint or soil something that was built so firmly and strongly with time with 3 stupid little words that held so much meaning to them and were said so freely by others, but never us.

It was late when he came back to the apartment. A nice 2 bedroom and 2 bathroom place we had been renting together for the past 6 years or so, and had grown comfortable living in. My bedroom door was crack slightly as I laid in bed scrolling through my phone with the lights turned off, and my covers pulled over me.

My king size mattress sinks in behind me and it doesn’t take long for a pair of arms to wrap around me tightly as a new source of warmth is left pressed firmly against my back. He had stripped himself of his jeans, and shoes leaving only his shirt and boxers in place. “Rough night?,” I ask softly as I continue to scroll on my phone as the man pulls me towards him.

A soft grunt escaping him in response to my question, but he says nothing as he lays there. The exhaustion in his body can be felt as he lays there behind me, his face buried into my hair and his head taking up a little too much space on my pillow for my liking. I wouldn’t say anything however, my space was his, and he knew as much leading to him invading it as much as he pleased.

“You stink, you should go take a shower,” I mumble as I catch the lingering smell of something floral, something fresh that was clearly perfume on his skin. Whoever this recent date was had poor taste in perfume, and he smelt like an old lady as a result.

He grumbles a little, “Really? Can’t I just pass out here?,” He ask with a tired tone remaining relaxed under the covers as he speaks, “Yes really, you smell like an old lady and I don’t want my bed smelling like that,” I retort as I shift under the comforter and move away from him.

A small scoff and huff of offense leaves him at my words and actions, his arm that had been resting over me yanking me back towards him, “You’re so rude…fine, I’ll go take a shower, but I’m sleeping in here tonight,” He mumbles. I don’t really respond as he finally crawls out of my bed and makes his way out of my room and towards his.

The silence that follows afterwards is only interrupted by the sound of water turning on, and I sigh as I turn my phone off before rolling over and lying on my back. My eyes landing on my open door, and the darkness that lays past it in the hallway. He wouldn’t take long, he never did when he showered. And yet I had kind of hoped he would simply stay away tonight. Sleep in his own bed, in his own room, away from me and my thick and feverish dreams.

His recent few dates had seemingly left him clingy and drained. He would often come home and cling to me like a child would to their mother or father when they sought comfort, or reassurance in their actions or choices. It was crippling having him crawl into my bed nearly every night seeking out my presence in hope of soothing whatever irritation or discomfort he faced for the day.

The door to his room can be heard opening and closing softly before foot steps make their way down the hall and soon his large silhouettes appears in the darkness of my doorway before he steps inside and closes the door behind him. The smell of his bodywash and deodorant moving through the cool air in the room as he approaches the bed and quickly crawls back under the covers.

His arm wrapping loosely around my waist, and his head moving to rest on my chest as a deep sigh leaves him. One of my hands reaching up to gently rub his arm as I close my eyes and try to hold onto this feeling while pushing my thoughts aside.

His hot breath gently fans out across my skin, the lingering smell of his peppermint toothpaste hitting my nose for a moment before I force my mind elsewhere…or at least try. My mind always had a tendency to wander, to explore ideas and wants that it knew it could never have.

And here I was with him lying next to me with the only thought to enter my mind being that of the warmth that now enveloped me and made my already tired mind slip further away.

I had read a quote recently that left me frozen with an emotion I couldn’t place and sat in for hours. ‘I feel tenderness for him. Hopeless tenderness’, it was in the newspaper, something I had seen while mindlessly looking it over while I waited for an appointment to start and for my name to be called.

The quote often crossing my mind now whenever he would seek me out like this, whenever he would place himself in my personal space and refuse to leave even if my heart begged him to.

“I missed you,” He mumble tiredly, and I found my eyes squeezing shut tightly for a second. “I missed you too,” I whisper softly, though I hoped my tone wouldn’t be heard over the sound of the fan in the corner. A tone of want and desire that his voice lacked in all manners.

‘This isn’t a love story’ I remind myself, it isn’t something you read about in books or watch in shows. This was real, he was real, and I was being selfish thinking like this. “We should stay in tomorrow, I’ll make us breakfast and we can order in lunch and dinner while watching movies,” He mumbles as he tilts his head upwards, and his face is pressed softly into my neck.

“Yeah…okay,” I whisper, as I feel his warm breath hit my neck. His body melting into my side as I agree to his wants for tomorrow, and his usually heavy body seems to grow heavier as he relaxes fully.

A soft silence falling over us as we start to drift off to sleep. I knew tonight’s dreams were going to be just as restless and exhausting as they had been for the last couple of nights, but I still allowed myself to relax into this warm feeling surrounding me and it doesn’t take me long to fall asleep.

꧂𐬼𐬽𐬼𐬽𐬼𐬽𐬼𐬽𐬼𐬽𐬼𐬽𐬼𐬽𐬼𐬽𐬼𐬽꧁

Thank you for reading, second part coming soon.

-Mrs. Grayson.

[cherie-doll]

hiii!!! can you please make a fic about keegan having a nightmare and accidentally waking up the reader who is sleeping next to him? I adore your work so much!!!!

experimented with this one a little bit, also im counting this as prompt day uhh 8? except i skipped idk how many days

The road Keegan walked was long and seemingly endless; nothing but gravel ahead and the surrounding forest on both sides. When he glanced up, far ahead, he could see a valley. The air was muggy; suffocating. His throat was dry and thirsting for water, and he trembled as he continued walking. He tried counting how many yards he had left ahead, but he couldn't make out a number. He heard a trickle of water and turned, looking for a stream. And surely, he found it; he neared the riverbed and sank to his knees in gratitude and relief. He lowered his head, placing a hand on either side, fingernails digging into the earth, the soil soft and miry. He lapped and drank from the streamlet like a dog, feeling the cool water running over his face. Then the smell... Oh, the smell! It was strong and pungent. The river reeked of blood. It was seeping into his skin, staining and tainting. It was revolting and repulsive. He felt sick yet, he couldn't pull his head out of the water.

Keegan opened his eyes to the darkness of the bedroom, the cool air coming from the AC, and yet, he still felt the tightness in his chest, the desperation of gasping for air. The hands that had been buried deep within the soil now clutched the bedsheets.

In the stillness of the night, you had been woken up to find Keegan like this. It was one of many firsts you've seen his eyes wide with horror. Keegan's eyes couldn't focus, he swear he could feel bad things under his skin until he felt a warm touch. A warming touch that jarred him like the spark of electricity in contrast to the cold, cutting-like water from the stream. You called out to him, repeating his name over and over like a prayer you've said too many times in church. Your fingernails pried on the skin of his wrists, feeling the pulsating sensation of blood running through his veins. He swore it was his father's blood he had been drinking, how he could still taste the brininess of it on his tongue.

You pressed your lips to his, letting him taste you. Pushing his tongue into your mouth, hoping to wash away the blood, he tasted the cheap beer you'd been drinking earlier that night. He closed his eyes whilst you opened yours, sliding your finger under his cheek and caressing his skin. Parting from your lips, his body slumped, relaxed and rested his head on your shoulder. He got rid of the taste, and now he smelled your scent hoping to get rid of the rotting stench of a decomposing corpse.

He counted his blessings and reflected on his curse. You cleansed him, purified him, sucked the sin right out of his body.

[slashersdaddy]

Hi!

i was Wondering if you can make writing about Slasher x S/O that Accidentally Kill The Slasher Victim Or Target?

like, in Self-Defense or Wanting to Protect The Slasher from The Intruder, but ending up killing them?

Of course!! This is such a cute idea! >< I chose to do Billy Loomis (Ghostface) because it was cute, but i will probably do a bunch of snips of random slashers!

(Not proof read)

CW: death, Bl00d, mvrder, guilt, depictions of a panic attack (only the start of one) MDNI 18+ GN READER X BILLY LOOMIS

As you stood, huffing and panting over the now bloodied corpse, hands shaking in fear, or was it excitement? you'd dint know anymore, all you knew was it was agony.

You looked up to see your boyfriend, his imposing form frozen as he stared at the blood covering your shaking form.

Gently, and slowly he set down the knife he held, wrapping you into his arms, shushing you as he moved off the Ghostface mask, stroking your cheek tenderly.

His dark eyes seeming to stare into your very soul

"shush, hush now love, its okay. You are safe now"

His voice was silky smooth and kind, tearing down the walls of fright and anxiety that had built up as you tried to speak "I-I didn't mean it Billy! Th-they were going to hu-hurt you and I just..." you trailed off, disgust picking at your bones, you killed someone and you were acting like it was okay. Of course Billy killed people but it was different! He was Everything to you. As you lost yourself in the thoughts, you were shaken out by Billy wiping blood off your cheek and licking it off his thumb "Its okay love, next time let me watch ok?" He joked, or you thought? But the smile on his face eased your nerves and caused you to relax, falling into his arms still trembling. Kicking aside the body he carried you up to the bathroom, setting you on the toilet to run the bath, making sure it was warm but not to hot. Once he was satisfied with the temperature he put bubbles into the bath, before turning to you, gently stripping you of your blood soiled clothes with a low hum "Its alright now my love" His voice was like silk, a sweet sirens call as you sank into the clear water, the blood staining you tainting the water a light red, then as he scrubbed it all off a deep crimson. Before you could begin to pick yourself apart for what you had done he pulled you out, wrapping you in a fluffy white towel and carrying you to your joint room, setting you on the bed and grabbing some underwear for you and one of his shirts. He dressed you, kissing up your arms and stomach as he dressed you, soft and loving touches as he held you, and the soft comforting beat of his heart lulling you to sleep "Goodnight my sweet one"

[insomniac-dot-ink]

2025 Anticipated Book Releases

My reading goal for this year is the same for last year in that I want to read 70 books! And hopefully a few more nonfiction, as always. BUT my main 2025 New Years Resolution for reading is to read less broadly. I read very broadly last year which was good, but it kind of made me sad in the sense I wasn't reading as many books that are "for me." So! More fantasy this year.

January

Water Moon by Samantha Sotto Yambao (Jan 14th): Set in a pawnshop where people can sell their regrets and past choices. I am always a sucker for a slower magical realism story when done well.

Breath of the Dragon by Fonda Lee and Shannon Lee (Jan 7th): I usually strictly avoid YA at this point but adore Fonda Lee so I'll be reading everything she writes. This is an Asian-inspired fantasy work with dragons.

The Good Mother Myth: Unlearning Our Bad Ideas About How to Be a Good Mom by Nancy Reddy (Jan 25): I am always drawn to gender dynamics that are a little more invisible and have thought there is some absurdity to the idea it's "always the mother's fault." A nonfiction on socially constructed motherhood.

February

A Drop of Corruption by Robert Jackson Bennett (Feb 6th): !!! Probably my most anticipated read. The Tainted Cup was such a breath of fresh air in fantasy last year and the combination of epic fantasy and fun characters was perfect for me personally. This should me another murder mystery and I can't wait.

Emily Wilde's Compendium of Lost Tales (Emily Wilde 3) by Heather Fawcett (Feb 11th): I have already read this since I got an ARC but I did adore the ending! This installment started quiet slowly but ended on a much more high fantasy note than I expected in a good way.

March

Everything is Tuberculosis by John Green (March 18): I was surprised by how much I enjoyed John Green's nonfiction essay collection since I found his fiction a little rote. But his essay collection had a bittersweet thoughtfulness I really appreciated. As such, I am very interested in his next nonfiction work.

April

Great Big Beautiful Life by Emily Henry (April 25th): I am among the masses that have followed Emily Henry ever since I read "Book Lovers" and discovered her dialogue. Her work can get a little repetitive after a point, but this had such an interesting premise of two writers competing to write the biography of a reclusive famous author. I'm seated.

Authority by Andrea Long Chu (April 8th): An essay collection on the nature of authority in a world where "everyone thinks they know everything." I am fascinated by this topic.

May

My Friends by Fredrik Backman

Fredrik Backman is one of my authors. I read A Man Called Ove at such a challenging time in my life that it hit like a freight train and I've been following Backman's work ever since. I love when things hurt nicely--and a book about friendship from Backman? I am ready to hurt nicely.

OTHERS

Hemlock and Silver by T Kingfisher, a Snow White retelling (!!! another one of my authors, I adore Kingfisher)

Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil by Victoria E. Schwab (I've always been lukewarm on Schwab, but toxic lesbian vampires has my damn ears perked)

You Didn't Hear This From Me: (Mostly) True Notes on Gossip by Kelsey McKinney (I LOVE the Normal Gossip podcast and will be here for this)

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

If there are any books you think I'll like, lmk! I'm always on the look out for stuff like Jade City or Naomi Novik's work.

[bell-swamp-fitzjames]

oops all lieutenants! playlists for the terror (2018)

What an auspicious day! Not only did the davechella playlist post early enough for me to enjoy it as usual, I get the joy of sharing my Edward Little playlist. Along with the other lieutenants of my fav show, minus Jopson who I know could & should be on here, but he got dropped with the doctors in honor of DJ Doll Eyes Sunday. Below will be all the playlists linked & every playlist made thus far can be found on the pinned post in my blog. Check it out, I got a lot of guys so far. Thanks to all who listen to me yap (or check out the playlists), as always this is a lot of fun. And without further ado...

Edward Little [LINK]

пачка сигарет by Kino || Angel by Massive Attack, Horace Andy || Tom's Diner by Vega, DNA || Ladies of the Canyon by Joni Mitchell || She's Lost Control by Joy Division || Cherry Came Too by Jesus and the Mary Chain || Don't Know Why by Slowdive || A Forest by The Cure, Mark Saunders || Ana by Pixies || Deep Water by Strawberry Switchblade || My Evil by Palehound || Deep Water by Vundabar || Ghost by Neutral Milk Hotel || Under Ice- 2018 Remastered by Kate Bush || The River Song by Donovan || Sea, Swallow Me- 2024 Remastered by Cocteau Twins, Harold Budd || Static Shape by Chad VanGaalen || There Is a Light That Never Goes Out- 2011 Remaster by The Smiths || Tibetan Pop Stars by Hop Along || Tainted Love by Soft Cell

John Irving [LINK]

Sun Bleached Flies by Ethel Cain || Losing My Religion by Hootie & The Blowfish || Little Big Mistakes by Tom Rosenthal || God Only Knows by The Langley Schools Music Project || Goodnight Bad Morning by The Kills || Everyman Needs a Companion by Father John Misty || Oh Holy Night by Andrew Bird || Troubled Waters by Cat Power || Divine Loser by Clem Turner || Monkey Gone To Heaven by Pixies || Dissonance- Demo by AJJ || O Come O Come Emmanuel by Sufjan Stevens || Jesus Wants Me For A Sunbeam by The Vaselines || This Night Has Opened My Eyes- 2011 Remaster by The Smiths || First Love / Late Spring by Mitski || Don't Get Lost in Heaven by Gorillaz || Knife Going In- Demo by Tegan and Sara || Your Silent Face - 2015 Remaster by New Order || Picture Of My Dress by The Mountain Goats || Unfucktheworld by Angel Olsen

George Hodgson [LINK]

Shangri-La by Electric Light Orchestra || POOR GEORGE by James Supercave || Erreur 404 by L'Imperatrice || Let's Get Lost by Chet Baker || Adoro te devote by Stirps lesse, Enrico De Capitani || Postcards from Italy by Beirut || Theme From New York, New York- 2008 Remaster by Frank Sinatra || Tried And True by Ween || Soil, Soil by Tegan and Sara || Dreamer by Supertramp || Oh l'amour - Edit by Erasure || Heatwave by Martha Reeves & The Vandellas || Radio Ga Ga- Remastered 2011 by Queen || Boys Don't Cry by The Sure || Waterloo Sunset by The Kinks || Send Me An Angel by Real Life || We Three (My Echo, My Shadow, And Me) by The Ink Spots || Love & Pride by King || It's My Life - 1997 Remaster by Talk Talk || Girlfriend In A Coma by The Smiths

Graham Gore [LINK]

Glow In The Dark by Lil Pump || Lucid Dreams by Juice WRLD || EARFQUAKE by Tyle, The Creator || Doomsday by NERO || The Blonde Leading the Blond by Wax Fang || Outsiders by Franz Ferdinand || Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger by Daft Punk || Hit the Ground by No Mana, Bertie Scott || Alien Boy by Oliver Tree || 3005 Childish Gambino || Fade Out by Seether || Pursuit of Happiness by Kid Cudi, MGMT, Ratatat || Hay Ya! by Outkast || Party and Bullshit by The Notorious B.I.G. || Oblivion by Grimes || Dammit by blink-182 || 4th Dimension by KIDS SEE GHOSTS || Feel Good Inc. by Gorillaz || Beast of Burden - Remastered 1994 by The Rolling Stones || All Caps by Madvillain, Madlib, MF DOOM

Henry Le Vesconte [LINK]

Cold Cold Cold by Cage The Elephant || Frostbiter by Saintseneca || Hopscotch by Pinc Louds || Electric Funeral by Slothrust || General Discomfort by Serpent Cobra || Rainbow in the Dark by Dio || Gouge Away by JEFF The Brotherhood || Guts- 2013 Remaster by Budgie || Mansion of Misery by Miniature Tigers || If I Stay (Awake) by The Worn Flints || Feel the Heat by Me Like Bees || Polly's God by Perfekt Square || Don't Forget the Sun by Wailin' Storms || Codeine by Welles || Sick Day by Fountains of Wayne || Keep in Mind by Breakneck Flow || Sick Shit- Live from Lincoln Hall by Together Pangea || What's Done Is Done by Madde || Black Cat Heaven by Dan Luke and the Raid || Grapefruit High by French Thyme

James Fairholme [LINK]

Frostbite by punkett || Beheaded by The Offspring || Barcelone by Tommy Hools || Eleanor by Cake Bake Betty || Surchin 4 U by Naked Giants || The Party's Crashing Us by of Montreal || There Is No God by Mrs. Magician || I Still Love My Body by Yabadum || Shut Me Down by Godflesh || Jazzhole by Free the Robots || Out Of Gas by Modest Mouse || Fuck Off by The Frogs || Winter's Going by DJ Signify, Buck 65 || Bitin' the Bullet by GROUPLOVE || Like a Star by Mike Krol || Cold Cadaver by King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard || Angel Eyes and Basketball by Foot Ox || Fell Down a Hole by Wolfmother || Hello Cruel World by Dent May || Woof Woof by ARTHUR

[drivinmeinsane]

K + touching + 34

※ Prompt: Touches // 34. Washing the other's body // K x GN!Reader ※ Word count: 1168 ※ Author's Note: I threw my 400 word limit right out of the window with this one, but that's alright.

A knock on the front door rouses you from the couch. Leaving the television playing, you cross the small studio apartment and cautiously peer through the peephole. You can make out the blurred shape of your neighbor from down the hall through the aged glass.

Surprised, you immediately flip the lock and open the door. Whatever reasoning has led him to your doorstep must be important. He never makes social calls.

“Hey, wh—” the words die in your mouth once you catch proper sight of your unexpected visitor.

You’re no stranger to seeing K at his worst—filthy with gore and oil tainted, barren soil—but the state of him now gives you pause. He is hunched over, clearly favoring one side. The replicant has had a rough night. Most of them are.

They run him hard at the precinct, you know. The whole damn city is aware of what the LAPD gets up to with their skinners. You’ve lost count of how many times you’ve accompanied him up the stairs after crossing paths with him on the streets when you both are off work, patiently taking the ascent step by step while he struggles to not let on how severely his job weighs both on his mind and his body. He pays the toll for his existence every moment he’s alive, but doesn’t everyone who has been left behind on this spinning rock?

K doesn’t make an attempt to smile. He merely stares at you with tired eyes.

“My shower is broken. I…” he pauses, rolls the words over his tongue like a broken marble, considers how much he can ask for, “was hoping I could use yours. Please.”

“Of course,” you agree immediately.

Stepping back to give him space, you gesture for him to come in. As he passes by, you realize that he is not wearing his jacket, only a grimy t-shirt and pants. His boots look hastily tied, sloppy. He must have redressed in his dirty clothes once he realized he wasn’t going to get clean at his place. His hands are empty. The replicant must have expected to be turned down.

You turn. K is clearly waiting for permission to move around the small unit. The overhead light catches an abrasion on the side of his cheek, gleaming off the fresh blood. It draws attention to the battered state of him.

It makes your heart ache.

“Won’t the water pressure hurt? It’ll take a few cycles to get all of that off.”

His response to your concern is to shrug. He is too used to the expectation of pain to give it more than a passing thought. A flash of discomfort tightens the corners of his eyes with the casual movement. Barely aware of your own actions, worry overtakes you and you move into his space. Your hand hovers over the slope of his shoulder, not quite resting on the dark mess soaked into the fabric of his shirt. It doesn’t all look to be industrial grime. K doesn’t sway away from your closeness, even as you hear his breath catch once before settling back in its steady pattern.

“I can do it,” you offer, unthinkingly.

“You can do what?” His voice is soft in that characteristic way of his, hard edges smoothed off into something helplessly vulnerable. It reminds you that he was created to be broken.

“Wash you.” At his non-response, you add, “It’ll hurt less.”

A sigh. The shift of his boots on the tile floor. He is careful to not step on your rug lest he mark it. You’re sure he can sense how badly you want to help him. K was made to pick up on human cues. Finally—

“Alright.”

As you lead the officer into the cramped space of the bathroom, you try to not feel like he’s the one doing you a favor. You drag a threadbare towel off the shelf and drape it in the bottom of the shower to pad the inhospitable plastic before gathering a battered bucket. The handle has long since been lost to time.

At your side, K strips with a resignedly methodical practice you don’t want to think about. He is not shy about exposing his body to you, giving the air of this being a familiar request. It makes something nameless and acidic coat your mouth. He is careful to fold his removed clothing and set it neatly aside.

Naked, the replicant lowers himself to his knees onto the thinly padded shower floor. Once seated, he interlaces his fingers and bows his head. He waits patiently for you to finish filling the bucket at the sink and gather a scrap of towel to use a rag. The ‘9 is the picture of practiced supplication. Someone really has trained him for more than just killing his own kind.

You find your own place on the floor outside of the shower. You wet the cloth and rub a bar of soap over it to form a lather. With nothing else left to do but swallow down your nervousness, you start the process of getting him clean.

He lets out a sharp exhale, as if punched, when the first contact between you is made. Steeling yourself, you pass the cloth over his uninjured shoulder. You’re careful to keep your touch gentle. Grime slicks down his arm in soap-swirled trails.

“You don’t have to do this,” K offers. His eyes are squeezed shut and he’s trembling. His knuckles are going white from how tightly he’s gripping onto his own fingers.

“I don’t,” you agree. “I’ll stop if you want me to.”

The replicant shakes his head. “I don’t.”

And so you continue, careful around his bruises and scrapes. You gently work the rag over his short hair, soaping it. Chasing the cloth with your hand, you work your fingers through the strands. Your fingertips brush over his scalp. Unconsciously, you’re sure, the replicant is pressing into your touch. It makes you wonder when he’s last been handled with kindness untainted by any other motive.

Has he ever? you think, disquieted.

Your chain of thought is interrupted by a sudden, heaving shudder. K attempts to smother a desperate noise behind his clenched jaw, curling in on himself even further. You realize then that he is crying. Tears are escaping from behind his closed eyelids and joining the water speckled across his upper thighs. This had been too much. At the realization, you drop the washcloth. It lands on the floor with a wet thud. It’s loud over the muffled sounds of the replicant in front of you.

Not caring about how wet your shirt gets, you lean forward and wrap your arms around him. He turns in towards you as if he were a plant in one of the Wallace greenhouses reaching towards the glow of the artificial light. K allows himself to accept the comfort.

Neither of you speak while he sobs himself ragged in the freely offered shelter of your body.

[crguang]

RAHHHHHHHHH *ahem*

Fluffy Prompts 54, 44, & 8 w/kafka?

i have another req with #8 for kafka as well so i used the first two! also, im now realizing that this might not be as fluffy as you meant it im sorry hfejbfkf i feel like there are certain things kafka would only say in serious-ish situations

There’s blood on your hands. It stains your skin with a red that makes you uneasy, and you stare at your open palms for what feels like a lifetime; the seconds stretch into years spent immobile and helpless, rooted in a soil where nothing else will ever grow. A veil of near silence covers you and in the dim streetlight, only the unnerving dripping of water can be heard. Drip, drip, drip— each droplet falls in tandem with each beat of your heart and their synchronized melody disorientates you completely. You don’t know where you are, why you are here or what you’re meant to do. You don’t feel the cold despite the fine layer of snow blanketing the deserted street you stand in. You look up at the night sky and see no stars. Your tongue is numb and heavy with a sense of doom that you can’t place and your mouth stays shut in uncertainty. 

You look around in search of anything remotely familiar and in your peripheral vision, another streetlight flickers to life. Your steps are measured as you make your way to it like a moth to a flame. It stands in front of a narrow and dark alley that seemingly extends for miles. You can’t see the end of it, and the uncomfortable feeling that looms over you at the thought is amplified by the sight of a shadowed figure slumped against the bricked wall. You hesitate to get closer but your gut forces you forward, one foot after the other, until you’re planted in front of the black mass. It moves, the shape of its head slowly tilting up to meet your horrified eyes, and the breath is sucked out of your lungs at once. Even without a reliable light source, you recognize the soft color gradient of pink and lilac, dulled with the allure of death. The figure reveals itself to you; its shredded over-shoulder coat, ripped shirt, torn high-waisted shorts and distinct custom-made gloves as tainted as your hands slowly unravel under your nose to form what you instantly know is your biggest fear. A steady amount of blood seeps from a wound near the abdomen and stains what is left of the white shirt. Broken sunglasses lay on dirty magenta hair, and you are unable to look away. The figure— Kafka’s— mouth moves, murmuring words you can’t hear as there is only blood and water in your ears. Your eyes, frozen and unblinking, sting with the weight of unshed tears and your chest burns from the lack of oxygen. You don’t register your trembling hands or the world that spins beyond the two of you, you can only stare at Kafka’s dying body in dizzying terror.

A thick layer of sweat clings to your forehead as you awake with a sharp gasp, sitting up on the bed with a hand on your chest to make sure that your inability to breathe was only an effect of the nightmare you woke up from. Your breathing is heavy and labored, warm tears wet your cheeks with every quick blink of your eyes adjusting to the darkness of your bedroom and you sit there for long minutes just regaining your bearings. The glowing numbers of your digital clocks show that it’s only a little past midnight. Panic lingers in your tense muscles and your shaky fingers desperately reach for the phone atop your nightstand. The light hurts your eyes but your hazy mind can’t focus on the feeling, you fumble with unlocking it and opening your contacts, scrolling down the list of names until you find the one you’re looking for. 

A shuddering breath parts your lips, weak sniffles occasionally escape you, and the line rings and rings before the call goes to an automated voicemail. A pitiful sound leaves you. You redial. If you had all of your senses, you would have recalled that you had not heard from Kafka in almost three weeks. She does this sometimes, she disappears for weeks at a time due to the high stakes and stealthy missions she’s given. Depending on the risk, she can’t afford communications with you. Every so often, she tells you how long she’ll be away so you don’t miss her too much— her words. However, you presently cannot think straight, still haunted by the gory sight of her injuries. The call goes to voicemail. You redial. Voicemail. Redial. You start picturing the worst, the same constricting feeling of fear from earlier curling around your limbs until your knees are to your chest and your ragged breathing makes no sense to your ears. 

The line rings and your tears dampen your collar. After the third ring, someone picks up.

“What’s wrong?”

You hear commotion on the other end but the sound of Kafka’s raspy voice brings you relief so intense your whole body shakes with your next exhale. No doubt your labored breaths can be heard through the phone, and there’s a pause amidst some distant, unintelligible shouting.

“What happened?” Your eyes shut as you concentrate on the way Kafka’s words soften a touch.  

“When… When can you be back?” Your voice sounds weak and pleading, quiet in contrast to the racket of the other line. 

“I’m a little busy. Why?”

You don’t know how to explain your state of mind. Your brain needs to perceive her in front of you, in the flesh, to appease its morbid concerns and fully register the fact that she is alive. 

You sniffle. “I need to see you.”

More muffled shouting, an insistent alarm going off in the background, and Kafka’s annoyed sigh. You think she’s irritated by your demand but, like her previous ones, her next sentence is underlined with concern. 

“I’m wrapping something up, right now. I can be there tomorrow.”

You feel fresh tears well up in your eyes at the idea of waiting half a day to have her near. You try to steady your breathing and fail. You’re crying softly into the phone, now.

“No… Please come home, this doesn’t feel right…”

There’s another pause, and then, multiple gunshots ring out in succession. You squeeze your eyes tightly shut, the noise worsening the rising panic in your chest. You don’t want to think about what she’s doing and the chaos happening around her, anxiety nips at you with each bullet being fired because it reminds you of the dangerous life she lives and that your worries are not entirely unfounded. The shots keep coming until the shouting dies down to complete silence. It seems the blaring alarm has also been dealt with during the ruckus; you can’t hear a thing save for what Kafka says next.

“It’ll take three hours. Sit tight, alright?” Her tone lifts at the end, meant to be reassuring in her own subtle way. 

You nod even though she can’t see you. “Okay.”

“Bye, bye~!”

Kafka ends the call. You inhale slowly and find that breathing comes a little easier. 

By the time the second hour passes by, you can barely bear the weight of your eyelids, but sleeping isn’t an option. Your mind is still restless and you dread the possibility of your nightmare coming back, so you distract yourself by playing games on your phone. You check the time regularly, anxiously, and when the clock announces exactly three hours after your call, two firm knocks resonate through your apartment. You practically jump to your feet to open the front door. 

Kafka stand on the other side with her usual, easygoing smile. It widens an inch as she sees you and it takes everything you have not to throw yourself at her immediately. A quiver runs through your hands. You step aside to let her in, fiddling with the handle, and quickly close the door behind her. 

“So, what was— Oof!”

Her sentence is cut off by your arm around her waist pulling her flushed against you. Your nose burrow into the crook of her neck, amidst her soft strands of hair, and you embrace her tightly to convince your brain that she’s here, alive and with you. You breathe in the faint scent of tobacco on her skin as her steady heart beats against yours and gently encourages your pulse to follow her lead. Kafka brings a hand up to pat your back somewhat hesitantly, then eases into the hug enough to rub along your spine when you don’t let her go. You both stand in the entrance of your apartment for some time, the soothing sound of your heater in the background. The remnants of fear your nightmare left you with are squashed by Kafka’s arm around you and her body pressed to yours. 

“...Better?” Kafka speaks up after a while, voice soft in the quiet of the room. 

You reluctantly loosen your hold on her and lean back slightly. Her bare fingers rest under your chin and tilt it upwards so you can meet her eyes. There’s a hint of concern in them that she lets you see despite the small smile on her lips. 

“Are you going to tell me what this was about? Or do I have to guess?” Her playful words mean to ease any lingering trace of turmoil. 

Now that you’ve fully calmed down, you start to feel the effects of your interrupted sleep. You blink slowly to keep your eyes open a bit longer. 

“Can we lay down first?” You ask quietly, rubbing your eye withh one hand while the other searches Kafka’s limp one at her side. 

She looks at you for a few seconds, thinking thoughts you’re not privy to, before replying, “Of course.”

You lead her to your bedroom and prompt her to lie on the bed, uncaring of having her outside clothes on your clean sheets. Kafka settles against the pillows and you follow suit, half of your weight on her as an arm snakes around her waist to keep her pressed to you. In the dim yellow light, with your face on her chest, you notice some blood spatter on her shirt. The sight brings you back to the tattered clothes soaked in her blood that you dreamed of a few hours prior. You close your eyes, willing the mental image to fade away. Kafka’s fingers brush the back of your neck and trail down your spine in repeated motions. You’re much more relaxed in her embrace and can talk about what happened without being gripped by emotion. 

“...I had a nightmare that you were dying in an alley,” saying the words out loud makes you feel ridiculous in hindsight, but she shows no sign of amusement or mockery. “It felt real. And I had no idea what you were up to these past weeks, so I… It felt real.”

Kafka doesn’t say anything for a long time, you wonder what she could be thinking about. Her touch doesn’t falter on your back, the only indication that she heard you at all. Exhaustion creeps up on you, but you’re getting a little nervous at her lack of response. You feel the need to explain yourself further. 

“Sorry if I pulled you from something important… All I could think about was your— your body laying there, bloody and alone, and I got so scared because your work is dangerous and I never have any way of knowing if you’re okay until you come back. I wasn’t thinking straight, I thought—”

“Don’t think about anything. Just tell me that you love me and hold me tighter.”

The rest of your excuses die in your throat. She pulls you impossibly closer and you mutter low confessions into her chest until your speech slows and sleep claims you completely. Kafka holds you through the night, fingers playing with the hairs on the back of your neck, staring at the still shadows on your bedroom ceiling. She doesn’t tell you that no one has ever worried about her death before and that it’s a strange feeling to know that this primal instinct to fear finality is born out of your genuine love for her. She sits in that thought for hours. When the sun begins its ascension in the sky and her consciousness is starting to slip, her lips brush the top of your head as she murmurs her own well-kept love confession.

[mist-the-wannabe-linguist]

Coruscant makes me. so unwell.

A planet-wide city with trillions of inhabitants in place of a planet that used to have plains, forests, oceans. As a seat of the galaxy-spanning Republic, just the Federal District has to be the size of a small country to house all the government officials and administrative workers, some of who would never even see the other end of the District in their entire lives. All the power required to keep the city lit because only the uppermost levels ever get any sunlight. Night sky on Coruscant would be entirely devoid of stars due to intense light pollution, the only sparks permeating the constant orange hue being the lights of aerial traffic and satellites. Places where the clocks determining day/night have broken down, leading to places that are always lit or always in darkness. With the entire planet covered in buildings, there is nothing of natural processes left, there is no rain cycles or seasons. No forests and no oceans with phytoplankton to produce oxygen, necessitating machines to maintain an artificial atmosphere just to make the planet habitable. Constant supplies of freight ships with food from off-world farms because there is no way any roof gardens could feed a population of several trillions. Constant filtering of water and extra water brought in from off-world sources for the same reasons. All that would cost insane amounts of money. The entire planet basically exists on life support and has existed in such state for over 90,000 years. And that entire time they just kept stacking buildings on top of one another to the point they have reached the cloud layer. Most of the planet's layers lying abandoned as their inhabitants moved upwards toward the light whenever possible. All those buildings made out of off-world materials because all of the planet's natural sources have been long-depleted, only adding extra mass to the planet. How does that affect the planet's axis and rotation? And Coruscant wasn't a planet of flatlands before it got built over, so what happened to the oceans? Did they first start with dams eating away from the coasts like the Netherlands, then moving on to oil rig-like structures that eventually became interconnected, their mass eventually making the sea levels rise and flooding them, so they'd keep building on top of them, leaving the old buildings in that forever tainted water?

And what happens with the city's dead? On Earth with 8 billion inhabitants, about 107 people die every minute. On a planet with a population of trillions, that number might very well reach a million. A million of dead every second, with no soil left to bury them in, and the thousands of crematoria running nonstop would produce literal tons of ashes. And that's just in cases where a family can afford to have their loved ones cremated. What about all those who die in the lower levels where the law doesn't reach?

[thesummerestsolstice]

Part Three of "Earendil Drank the Silmaril" AU- Kidnap Fam edition

M&M do not know that the light of the Silmaril is now part of Earendil, or that his children inherited some of it. Not consciously, anyway. But there is something oddly familiar about the children, when Maglor finds them, alone in the woods.

(The escort Elwing sent them away with hadn't been the most trustworthy, and unfortunately, two frightened children had slowed their progress towards Gil-Galad's camp too much.)

Maglor sees the shining eyes and the light that springs to their fingertips, and assumes that part-Maia children are just like that– he's certainly heard far stranger about Luthien. Maglor was always going to take them in– he'd at least like to think that leaving two defenseless children to die is still beyond him– but there's also something odd. Before he can really think about whether it would be possible to send them to Gil-Galad, he's already dismissed the idea. It slips from his mind like water. He doesn't connect that to the Oath– normally, it's compulsions are violent and impossible to ignore.

(But of course, the Oath knows the truth about Elrond and Elros. M&M always say that it would be impossible to return them to Gil-Galad's camp. They're only right most of the time.)

Still, the story goes on, as it must, and love does grow between Elrond, Elros, and the monsters who care for them. Actually, things do look up for the Feanorians after E&E come to Amon Ereb. The plants grow much more easily, even in the tainted soil. They run into orc patrols less and less. Injuries heal, even when they really shouldn't. Some of the Feanorians speak of divine intervention on behalf of the children, others think that it's the twins' Mairin magic at work. Even the Oath seems to fall silent. M&M put it down to parental love.

(Elrond and Elros are, if not exactly required for the Oath to be fulfilled, then at least close enough to a Silmaril to quiet it for a time.)

None of them ever figure it out. Eventually, Maedhros and Maglor do send their children away, when it's become clear that all that's left for the Feanorians is death and grief.

Maglor watches as they leave, tears in his eyes, and thinks he finally understands what it means to be condemned to eternal darkness, now that his precious little stars are gone.