#tales as old as time collab

[yinyuedijun]

NIGHT FLOWER: part i

Your place in the world was one of a tool. This was true of every slave: you were all things to be used. Kakavasha understood this about you, and he understood this about himself. It was how he survived all those years ago, and it’s how he survives now. And so, when Aventurine goes into his first heat in years and decides to suffer it alone, you can only think of one way to get him to accept your help: You offer to let him use you.

written for @/lorelune's spring fever collab & @ficsforgaza

13.5k words of omegaverse, mutual pining, hurt/comfort, angst with an eventual happy ending. gn alpha reader + omega aventurine (they each have both amab and afab genitalia). explicit piv sex, reader bottoms, the sex is consensual but emotionally complicated and deeply sad. cw slavery, racism, gendered violence, including very brief and non-graphic (but direct) references to sexual abuse during slavery. the sa and slavery are not eroticized. dead dove do not eat, mdni.

thank you to @acerathia, @minnaci, @owlespresso for all your help with beta reading and to @kosmiccarma for brainstorming omega aventurine hcs!

“I’ve alw███ l█ved ███, Ka██v█s███”

You knew it from the moment you met him.

Gaunt, pallid, weighed down by heavy chains. Irises that glowed like the auroras back in your world. Delicate features that made every passerby in the market stop to read the description on the placard. (Sigonian, it said, although you couldn’t read at the time. Avgin. Male. Omega. Sixteen years old. Sixty Tanba, no tax.) He had an all-consuming scent that was impossible to ignore—one that possessed you, made your heels dig into the dirt, every atom in your body resisting the impatient jerk of the chains at your wrist. Even through your muzzle, through the perpetual stench of carbon-steel and blood, you could smell it: honey and wildflowers. A fragrance that settled deep within you, flooded you with a warmth that felt like home.

Aventurine is not a spiritual person. He once told you this, his smile cold in the glow of an artificial moon. He'd been deeply religious as a child, but hasn’t since cared for fairy tales about fortune and fate, three-eyed goddesses or merciful rainfalls. Hasn't thought about anything like a destined love. He thinks the idea of a true mate is laughable, that no such bond could ever be forged between an omega and an alpha. That nothing so unconditional could ever exist.

You know differently, of course. You've known it from the moment you met him, from the second you laid eyes on him and thought, I need to help you, and I need to protect you, and I need you to be safe, and you’d never once heard the word ‘love’ in your life—slaves are never loved by their masters, after all, and you'd always been nothing but a slave—but every atom of your being knew that you loved him, that you'd always love him.

And when your master cradled your face that night and crooned that he owned you, that you'd always be his obedient, alpha pet—for the first time in your life, you knew that he was wrong.

You didn't belong to your slaver.

You belonged to him.

To Kakavasha.

These days, Aventurine does not smell like honey, and your jaw is not restrained.

Your muzzle was one of the first things that Aventurine threw away when he bought your freedom. According to the Amber Era system, it had been several months since the murder of your shared master. Ninety-five Star Calendar days after the Interastral Peace Corps had arrested Kakavasha. An entire rotation around the black hole at the centre of your wretched galaxy, all of which had been spent in the captivity of some new mistress. She picked you out because she liked your calming scent and the look of your face, but mostly she used you for the fighting pits just like your old master.

Aventurine had been sitting in the audience of your final match, then bought you out right after you won. “I’m in need of a fighter,” he’d said, smiling in his thick furs and jewels. He played the part of a slavemaster perfectly, his gloved hands wandering the span of your aching shoulders, touching the bloodied maw of your mask. “And I’d be willing to pay top credit for yours.”

She protested. You were her most prized possession, one of her greatest investments. Slaves from your planet were hard enough to come by—alphas capable of reproduction, nearly impossible. And you were so well-behaved, so poised, so endearing in a way that was rare for alphas. She was fond of you. Her omega slaves were fond of you too. They would be distraught if you left, and that would complicate her household affairs—and surely Aventurine, as a respectable owner of human capital like herself, could understand how inconvenient that would be?

Aventurine bared his teeth in a gracious smile. (You’d never seen Kakavasha make such an expression before—so disarming, so cunning, a crescent moon beneath snake eyes. He’d never smelt like this either, like an expensive cologne layered with bleach, and it left you feeling nauseous, wondering if he was ill.) He flirted his way into her good graces, made her an offer she couldn’t refuse, and then he brought you into the first-class ship on which he’d arrived. You were so stunned by its luxury—the handwoven carpets, the crushed velvet seats, the imported tea from several galaxies away and the custom-ordered outfit he had bought for you—that you nearly missed the tremble in his hands as he punched numbers into the remote control lock for your chains.

He had regained his composure by the time he pulled away your muzzle, though. He threw it carelessly to the ground—your titanium chains, too. Then kicked both away with his shined leather shoes.

“There,” Aventurine said, smiling cheerfully. “Much better, don’t you think?”

“Vasha—” you started, voice thick with wasted grief, and all you wanted to was reach for him, to double check that he was real, but he placed a finger to your lips and stopped you. You stiffened at the satin touch, but he seemed unbothered.

“‘Aventurine’,” he corrected.

You stared blankly. “What?”

“‘Aventurine’. Like the gemstone. That’s my name now.”

“You—” Your voice caught in your throat. You realized that you’d been holding your breath. You always had the habit of holding your breath in the luxurious, private rooms of very rich men, because you never liked what happened in them. Forcing yourself to breathe, you asked, “You gave yourself a new name?”

“No. The IPC gave me a new name. They gave me a job, too.”

“A job?” you asked, voice faint. Now that you were breathing again, you were noticing once more just how bizarre he smelled. Sterile and expensive and completely foreign. “You’re free now?”

“Well, I’m a freedman, but I don’t know if I’d call myself free. I’m a bit… indebted to the IPC, let’s say. But that’s fine. I can’t complain. I mean—look around. This beats the fighting pits, doesn’t it?” He gestured lazily at your surroundings, and you nodded.

“It’s nice here,” you replied, feeling absurd but not knowing what else to say. Once Kakavasha got talking, it was impossible to get a word in edgewise.

“You like it here? Good. This room’s yours. Mine is the next one over. You’ll live and work here, with me. I’ll make sure you’re paid well. Full benefits, vacation, salary, and overtime. The standard pay for your role is seventy-thousand credits per month, but I’ll see if I can get you more. HR is pretty strict about their hiring policies, but—”

“You’re hiring me?”

Aventurine went very still, his smile tightly controlled. His eyes remained fixed on you, but they seemed less snake-like, now. They looked more familiar. More afraid.

“I’m offering, yes,” he said neatly. “You’ll be part of my personal security detail. I don’t have the contract for you to review yet, unfortunately. I didn’t arrange one ahead of time because, well”—he laughed, as if this were polite conversation and he were making a joke about the weather—“I didn’t know if I’d find you alive. But things worked out in my favour. They always work out in my favour. I’ll make sure they’ll work out in your favour too, so long as you’re with me. So you’ll consider it, won’t you? Staying with—working for me, I mean.”

Your eyes went soft. Beneath the artificial fragrance, you finally caught a hint of his familiar scent—more wildflower than honey at that moment, the way it always is when he’s scared.

“Kakavasha—”

“Name your price,” he said loudly, “and I’ll match it.”

You sighed. “Vasha,” you said more gently, and his shoulders relaxed at the subvocal shift in your timbre, at the famed alpha Voice that necessitated your muzzle, “I don’t care about the money. Of course I’ll stay here. But—what happened? Why did you kill him yourself? Why didn't you let me do it? That was the plan. It was always supposed to be me.”

It was my job, you thought then, just as you had thought to yourself every night, curled up in your bed and trying to recall the scent of fresh honey, to keep you safe.

He shrugged and said, “It would have been too risky to involve you.”

“You were caught and sentenced to death. The risk was already too high.”

“But the stakes weren’t,” he replied simply, and before you could ask what he meant by that, he continued, “and it worked out, didn’t it? I work for the IPC. You work for me. We’re freedmen now. Whatever I've lost, it doesn't matter. Our gains far outweigh it.”

“And what have you lost, Vasha?”

He smiled at you, charming and distracting. A crescent moon beneath snake eyes. “Nothing of value,” he reassured you, and even though you could feel the calm of an omega’s voice washing over you, even though it released all the tension in your body, all you could smell was cologne and wildflowers, and you knew that he was lying.

Vasha once told you, curled up and quiet on the basement floor, that he despised his eyes. They were supposed to be a sign of blessing from Gaiathra Triclops, but they'd never brought him anything but trouble. They were the first thing that the slavers always noticed about him, the feature that made him such an alluring commodity. Their aurora glow, their strange beauty, their promise of a rare opportunity: a chance at owning a specimen of an exotic, endangered species, possibly the last of its kind. These are all things that you've heard in the parlour of your master’s house as he entertained rich company, the crowd of them gawking at his human curios.

Avgin are said to make the most beautiful slaves, he'd often say. And Avgin omegas are said to be the most beautiful among them. What do you all think? They'd all hum, peering closely at Kakavasha’s features, and inevitably someone would joke, I think I'd like to borrow him sometime, and then they would all laugh while your pulse ticked up and you imagined tearing at their throats. Vasha would search for your gaze in these moments, giving you a long, pointed look: Don't do anything stupid.

He’d always been so blasé about it, the way people fixated on his Avgin blood. You'll never understand how. He didn't react to any of the comments, the groping, the innuendos. He was, however, distinctly unimpressed at the way that your master liked to play him up as a rare and expensive acquisition, as a sign of his own status. It's embarrassing to watch, Kakavasha had remarked. Everyone knows that Sigonian slaves are uncommon but cheap—people always think we’ll bring them more trouble than our worth. This was how Kakavasha had ended up in the market in the first place: because his last master had been robbed, and he'd been wrongly blamed for it.

The blame, to this day, has never stopped. People—powerful people, politicians, businessmen, socialites—look at Aventurine’s eyes and immediately reach for their pockets. You've seen it for yourself, these spineless despots and scammers feeling for their wallets. Sigonian, you know they're thinking. Liar, cheat, thief, whore, worthless, worthless, worthless. Your hands tighten around your blade each time, a loaded gun with a finger on the trigger.

Alphas are said to be violent by nature. Aventurine has often called you the one exception to this rule: the most docile, good-hearted alpha he's ever met. But this is a lie. You do have a predator instinct, and it comes out in full-force whenever you’re around these particular types of men. These types who notice Aventurine’s eyes and see a thief; these monsters who see his irises and imagine what it would be like to bed him. You’d kill them if you could. It would be so easy, especially now that you are an IPC dog. The Company is already such a violent force; what would be one more murder?

But Aventurine has never ordered you to punish anyone. (Don't do anything stupid, he always tells you with a glance, smiling through every humiliation.) Nor has he ever seemed bothered enough by these meetings to try concealing his heritage.

A fellow Asset Liquidation Specialist once asked why he didn't just hide his eye colour—it would likely be better for fostering relationships, negotiating deals—but Aventurine had shrugged it off. I'm a gambler working with the IPC, he'd said. Do you really think a pair of coloured contacts would make anyone trust me? He'd laughed, and his voice had carried a threatening edge, and his coworker had shifted visibly at it. Being an Avgin is the least threatening thing about me, wouldn't you say?

You think that Aventurine likes being seen as a threat. Sometimes you wonder if this is why he doesn't mind wearing his eyes so much, but abhors keeping his scent. He washes his clothes until they're free of his disarming sweetness and then masks himself with an unsettling blend of ambergris, jasmine, and wood. And he is on suppressants all the time—hasn’t had a single heat since the day he killed his master. Hasn't smelled like himself, either.

At the end of the day, it’s manageable being an Avgin in this business, he often comments, spraying half a bottle of masking cologne on himself, but you can't be an Avgin and an omega. Wouldn’t you agree?

You'd know better than me, you reply, noncommittally—and truthfully.

But you're an alpha, he observes. Don't you have an opinion?

You don't pay me to have opinions, you always remind him, stone-faced. You pay me to stand here and look scary. And Aventurine always laughs at this, and he always wires you money and calls it a bonus as he pesters you for an answer, and he always gets distracted and starts scrolling through all his shopping wishlists instead. I saw this thing the other day and thought of you. And this too. Would you like either of them? Would you like them both? I’m a very generous manager, you know. I'll buy you anything you like.

But even though he always gets distracted, Aventurine never forgets. Sooner or later, he inevitably circles back to these questions—these anxieties about his scent, about his eyes, about his blood. He never cares for anyone else’s opinions, but he's always been curious about yours. Even when he was Vasha, he wanted to know what you thought.

He’d been sixteen years old and delirious with heat the first time he asked you, face wrinkling with pain as he spilled his thoughts. It was so incoherent, so sad, you thought it must have been about a fever dream. Mama Fenge, he kept saying. Mama Fenge blessed me, She blessed me, I'm blessed, it rained when I was born—did you know that? My luck, I was lucky. The Katicans, they never caught me. They got everyone else, but not me. I was blessed by Her. I'm going to save my people. I will. I'll save my sister. My eyes are proof. My mistress liked them. Said they're beautiful. Worth sixty whole coppers. A blessing. He pulled you close, pressed his scalding face to your scent gland, and his whole body shuddered with relief. This was the first and only time he'd allowed you to hold him, and it was only out of desperation, out of his mind. Do you like them, alpha? Do you like my eyes? Why? Is it because they're beautiful? Because they're from Gaiathra?

“I like them because they're yours,” you'd replied, and Kakavasha had laughed deliriously.

This is when he told you he hated them: I'd close them forever, if I could.

When you were younger—dumber—you had a habit of squirrelling away every spare coin you came across. You collected them in a little purse that one of the omega slaves had sewn for you—a thank-you for always keeping the other alphas away from her—and you hid it underneath a loose floorboard. By the time that Kakavasha was arrested, you'd saved up twenty-nine Tanba. You’d wanted enough to buy Kakavasha’s freedom and then to set him up for a comfortable life.

It had been a stupid plan. An embarrassing one. If you ever confessed it to Aventurine, he'd laugh at you. Slaves can't buy other slaves, he'd say. Leave the schemes to me next time. You’re too good-hearted for it.

You’d already known that, of course. You knew that you didn't have the status to buy him or mate him or even just provide for him, but you wanted to. God, did you want to—you spent every waking moment thinking about it, every sleeping moment dreaming of it. It wasn't even that you desired him, though he was beautiful and fragrant and more delicate than anything that had ever touched you in your life, which was only your master’s hands and your muzzle and your chains. Aventurine would feel so soft in comparison, you’d always figured. It made your heart ache, thinking about getting to hold something so lovely.

But really—that desire came second. What came first was how mated omegas feel safe around their alphas, and you so desperately wanted him to be safe. Kakavasha had looked so frail, so grim, as your master took his chains and led him home from the market, and you could smell the fear coming off him in waves. And you could do nothing to stop it. You had nothing you could use to stop it—nothing other than your hands that could kill for him and your pheromones that could soothe him and your useless heart that wanted to collect sixty Tanba for him. That was all you had.

So you failed in the end. Of course you did. You didn't have the status to buy him or mate him or even just provide for him. You couldn't even do for him the one thing you could have done—which was to kill. And Kakavasha suffered for your incompetence. He had to dirty his hands with blood and gamble his way into wealth and then suddenly he was freeing you, not the other way around.

And now you are comfortable. You'll lead an easy life from now, Aventurine reassured you when he brought you onto his ship all those years ago, and he's kept that promise. What about you? you'd asked him then. Will you lead an easy life with me, if you're working for the IPC? And he had smiled and lied to you: Yes.

It had been a painfully obvious lie. If you were a smarter person, you'd have never believed it in the first place. Aventurine has no interest in leading an easy life, because an easy life would be less profitable, and less profit would mean less safety. And he is always, always worried about being unsafe. It is indiscernible to everyone but you—an alpha (his alpha, always his, even if he doesn't want you) who has watched over him for so long that you can detect every shift in his scent. No matter how much cologne he drowns himself in and no matter how strong his suppressants are, you know when he is afraid.

And here is the bitter truth, the ultimate proof of your shortcomings:

Aventurine is always afraid.

It is a beautiful day on Agnisahr, and you can tell that Aventurine is about to throw up from worry.

You're sitting in the middle of stunning wealth—Aventurine in his feathers and jewellery, you in your tailored jacket—in a lobby made from marble and pale sandstone, with a view of palm trees and rolling, scarlet sand dunes beyond the window. The waitstaff addresses him as Honoured Guest and they keep his crystal chalice filled constantly with water—one of the most expensive commodities on the planet. Aventurine has been drinking from it religiously, which is strange as he typically has the habit of forgetting to hydrate. A faint wildflower scent is drifting from his slender form. These are the only giveaway to his mood: he's otherwise as pokerfaced as ever, smiling calmly as he discusses his plans to sabotage the local government and acquire the planet for the IPC.

“This is a very dangerous mission,” you state flatly.

“All my missions are dangerous.” He takes a sip, one pinky up. “The IPC pays me well for a reason. As they say—”

“‘High risk, high reward.’ I know.” You try not to sound bitter, though you allow yourself to sound tired. “I still do not think the risk is worth the reward in this case.”

“I think over 5.6 million in credits is a great reward, actually. We could do a lot with that kind of money.”

You raise a brow. “What could an extra 5.6 million get you that you can't already buy?” It is—as Topaz would say—‘chump change’ in comparison to his current wealth, which sums to a number so vast that you can't wrap your head around it.

Aventurine pretends to miss the point. “Tons! We could buy a new spacecraft. Get another mansion. Or—we could take a vacation to Penacony. I hear it's quite nice there.” A playful smile. “I could get us a penthouse unit. With a featherbed.”

You frown. Sometimes Aventurine likes to flirt when you're being stubborn—not out of interest, but as a ploy to distract you. He’d developed the habit after he joined the IPC. It used to fluster you, but now it only makes you cross your arms.

“You could die,” you point out.

“You'll protect me.”

“No, I won't. You always find a way to get rid of me when things are most dangerous.” You give him an accusatory stare. “You never let me do my job.”

He's too shameless to deny it. “And it's worked out fine, hasn't it? I haven't died so far.”

“Yes. Just by dumb luck.”

“I beg to differ. My luck is quite reliable.” He sets down his glass. Glances back outside. A microexpression, brows knotting for the briefest second as he studies the sky. “I'm not worried.”

“You're a shit liar.”

That gets him to look at you, letting a small frown pass over his face. “No, I'm actually a great liar. You're just too good at reading me. It's very inconvenient, you know.”

“I can't help it.” You lean toward him, making a show of it as you sniff. An orchid-like scent—faint but unmistakable—has seeped into artificial ambergris and wood. “It's hard to ignore.”

He hums. He isn't frowning anymore—but doesn't look happy, either. “I should change suppressants.” He taps the side of his empty glass, fidgeting. Aventurine never fidgets: it's an amateur giveaway. “These ones clearly don't work well enough.”

“That won't help. I know you too well.” Your eyes soften. He's looking outside again, the blues of his irises distant. “You're worried, Aventurine. More than usual. Let’s back out of this—let Jade handle it.”

“The mission isn't what's bothering me,” he says patiently. “I just don't like this planet.”

“Because you can tell it's dangerous.”

“No. Well—it is, but nothing I can't handle.” He leans back. “I just dislike the weather here.”

You arch a brow. “...the weather?”

“Yes,” he says neatly, “it's too dry here. I'll break out.”

You open your mouth. Close it. It is possibly the most absurd thing you've ever heard, and certainly the worst lie that's ever come from him. For as long as you've known him, Aventurine has had flawless skin, marble-smooth, and ever since being freed, he’s never really cared much for looking handsome so much as looking rich. But he maintains his serious expression: all-in on the farce. “Did you know that outside the capital, this planet hasn't had any natural rain in a quarter of an Amber Era? And the stellar winds are terrible. I don't know how people live on a planet like this.” His eyes narrow at the cloudless sky. “The IPC is going to need to do a lot of terraforming if they want to make this into a merchant hub.”

“Aventurine.”

“It'll be a pain crossing the desert—the elements will ruin my clothes, you know,” he continues. “It won't be so bad while we're on the ships, but we’ve got to go outside from time to time. Can't make any friends otherwise.”

“Aventurine.”

“And there's nothing to do for fun when we’re not working.” He sighs dramatically. “I can't wait to get our 5.6 billion and leave for someplace else. I'm being serious about Penacony, by the way—”

“Aventurine.”

“—though not about the featherbed. I'll get you your own room, obviously. And I'll buy whatever dream experience you’d like. What kind would you want?”

Finally allowed a chance to speak, you say, “One where you retire.”

“Retire? Why would I ever do that?”

“I don't know. Maybe you decide you've made enough money.”

“No such thing.”

“Then you can settle down with someone.”

That makes him smile. It feels mocking. “Me? Settling down? With who?”

“Who knows. Someone who will treat you better than the IPC, I hope.”

“Anyone that nice would run in the other direction. But never mind me. This would be your dream experience. What happens to you in it?”

“I stop chasing after you and get to live out the rest of my days in peace,” you say dryly, and Aventurine blinks. “Please stop deflecting. The IPC gave you a suicide mission. We will both die if we stay here.”

He looks serious now. “I wouldn't let you die.”

“You can't know that.”

“Well, I do. And I've got decent chances at surviving too—at least one in ten.”

You feel like sighing—a deep, aggravated noise is heavy in your throat—but Aventurine doesn't enjoy it when you show anger around him. It's the one omega instinct that he can't ignore, you suppose: unease around an aggressive alpha. Voice tightly controlled, you say, “You’re going to bet your life on one in ten?”

  “Sure. My chances were worse on the last planet, and things worked out great. It'll be the same on Agnisahr.” Aventurine raises a hand, calls for the bill. The conversation is over. You lean back in your seat, watching sourly as he pays tens of thousands of credits just for water.

“You know, they say the royal family is backed by an Aeon,” you can't help but point out, once the waiter is gone. A last-ditch effort. Aventurine smiles at it, amused. Like you're a child.

“So what?” He glances outside, at the desolate landscape beyond the oasis—nothing but red sand, a blue, rainless sky, and two radiant suns shining above it all. “The protection of a god is nothing compared to the schemes of human beings. And gods abandon their people all the time, anyway.”

During your tenth day on Agnisahr, you realise that something is deeply wrong.

It takes you some time to understand what’s happening. At first you think that whatever political danger you’ve intuited is much worse than you thought, and that’s why Aventurine has been so pale, so discomforted, so exhausted. Then his scent starts changing—he switches clothes two, three times a day (because of all this heat during Agnisahran days, he tells his new business associates) and spritzes his nape with his cologne almost religiously—and you wonder if he is sick with something. If the food in this planet has something that disagrees with his Sigonian biology, or if he has picked up one of the local filoviruses, or if someone’s poisoned one of his meals because they’ve correctly identified him as a threat. Aventurine dismisses every single one of these theories when you bring it up, and—as if in denial—only attributes it to the weather. (I’ve never done well in deserts, he tells you, his eyes on his phone screen. I'm not used to them. It is above 300 Kelvin, and you do not see a single bead of sweat on his neck, and his cheeks are not even a little flushed.)

You only figure it out when he is too ill to get out of bed one morning and forbids all the IPC staff from coming near his hotel room. It sets off alarms immediately—Aventurine, no matter how sick, will work and see through meetings as long as he is mentally capable of it—and so you naturally ignore his orders and check on him, using the spare key to his sleeping quarters that you're given as a policy. And as soon as the door cracks open—as soon as you step inside only to be hit with a violent, cloying sweetness—you realise what’s happening and slam the door shut behind you.

“You’re in heat,” you blurt out, and Aventurine—a shivering, panting mess on the bed—groans in response.

“Why are you here?” He turns toward you, still lucid enough to glare at you through the tangled mess of his hair. His voice is weak, but no less self-possessed: “I was very clear—no company today.”

“I am your personal bodyguard,” you remind him mildly. Your voice is calm—both non-threatening and non-condescending. “Those orders don’t apply to me. If things feel suspicious, I look into it. And they felt very suspicious.” Your brow knits as you study his clothes. Mulberry silk clings to his form, soaked through with sweat. Thin, eucalyptus sheets are tangled up around him. There are only two pillows. No water bottles. No knotting toys.

Nothing.

“You didn't know you'd be in heat,” you realise. “What happened to your suppressants?”

“I don't know.” There’s a quiet, frustrated edge to his voice. Vulnerable too. It makes you think of when you were both still slaves, and Aventurine was confined to the basement of the manor—the one that all omega slaves were made to ride out their heats in. Either they would do it alone or were ordered to spend it with some alpha, usually either a friend of the master or an alpha slave he wished to reward. That's when they're most pliable, he'd tell his guests, or sometimes even you. They get so desperate they'll present themselves to anyone. Then amused laughter from the other party—How obscene!—as you looked away, blood hammering in your ears.

You had been your master’s favourite. His most obedient, most profitable pet—striking enough for his guests to admire, deadly enough for his audiences to bet on, docile enough for him to enjoy. Good enough for him to reward, and he often rewarded you with his most beautiful slave: his Avgin omega. Just don't mark him, he’d said, fastening the muzzle around your mouth. It'll ruin his market value. Who knows if someday he'd sell Kakavasha off to some alpha master who wished to claim him, he said. Though I don't think there's anyone in this star system who'd want a Sigonian for a mate, let alone a Sigonian slave. Then he’d paused, eyes scanning over you. As if contemplating. But maybe they'd try to get Avgin whelps out of him, he added, and you felt like throwing up.

You'd never mate him in those moments, your muzzle always prevented you from saying. You didn't even want to think about touching him, and he didn't want to think about it either. Even in the cruel grip of his heats, with nothing but the thin mat beneath him and his slave’s rags around him, Kakavasha hadn't wanted any kind of contact from you, rejecting any chance of solace. Don't, don't—not again, not again, he'd begged. Then as the nights marched on and his mind grew hazier, he’d start whimpering too: It hurts, alpha. It hurts. Help me. It hurts. Don't touch me. Not again. It hurts. It hurts. Stop it, please stop it.

It gutted you.

It went against every instinct, not to touch him. To let him lie there, in scorching, lonely pain, when all you wanted to do was to dispel it. It would be so easy to press yourself against him and let his skin cool against yours, do the one thing that your body was good at other than killing. But not again, not again, I can't anymore, I don't want it, I never wanted it, and all you could do was sit there, unmoving. Watch as the most delicate, precious thing you had in your life shatter.

And standing here now, watching Aventurine shatter before you once more—it is unbearable. He needs a nest, you keep thinking. He needs a nest and some water and some kind of touch, some kind of relief, but not again, not again, and you’re still a slave, still a worthless and stupid slave, and Kakavasha is still crying on a basement floor and you can't do anything for him.

“You need help, Aventurine,” you say, voice soft, and his whole body tenses. His scent dips, and the scent of florals overwhelms you.

“No,” he breathes, “I don't.”

“You do. You're sick.” You bite your lip. Your heart splits as you suggest it, but you say, “I can call a professional.”

“No,” he spits. The facade is gone. The poker face has cracked. The anger and the pain and the fear are all on full display, and his voice sharpens: “No strangers.”

No foreign scents, you realise he's demanding. A new scent would probably make him feel unsafe.

Then let me help you, you think of pleading, but not again, not again, and you're filled with so much shame at the thought that all you can do is look away.

“Then—can I do anything?” He goes still. “Not—not that, but something to make you more comfortable. I can build you a nest, at least—”

“No.” He takes a deep, shaking breath. “No nests. I don't need one—”

“Yes, you do.”

“No, I don't,” he says. His voice is wavering now, on the verge of crumbling with fever and pain. “I've never—I’ve never needed a nest, I don't—I don't want to—” He presses his face into his pillow. “I need—I need to be alone, fuck—”

He doesn't mean to whine. The cry for distress is instinct, something that all omegas are programmed to do in heat. You’ve heard that they’ve evolved to make this noise as a way of appealing to nearby alphas for help, but you think this must be a lie as you never once saw your alpha master giving mercy to any of his omega slaves. Still, whether it is your biology or not—the noise that Aventurine makes has your heart aching so much you can't help but step forward. But he shakes his head and inches away, shuddering violently, and then his voice echoes again in that cold basement—not again, not again, and don't touch it anymore, don't use it anymore, don't use me anymore, not again, and it's all you can do to back away until your spine is pressed against the door.

“I'm sorry, Vasha,” you say, strained. “I’m sorry. I'll leave you now.”

As the door shuts behind you, you catch a final glimpse him—face pressed into the pillows, shivering.

If you didn't know better, you'd think he was crying.

When you were both slaves, Aventurine hated seeing you during his heats.

Kakavasha was normally calm around you. Most of the time, he was even friendly (he was friendly to everyone whom he thought could be useful), but he was different during his heats. Sometimes he was vicious; mostly he was withdrawn. Nearly always, he wanted to be left alone. In those moments, all he could register was your alpha scent and his memories of what other people had done to him during his heats. And while you'd have hated to leave him, despised the idea of him being offered to another alpha—even more than that, you hated violating this boundary of his. Hated that you were allowed to do whatever you wanted to him. Hated being the reason he felt so unsafe.

Hated being an alpha.

Now that you no longer have the orders of your slavemaster hanging over you, it is the least you can do to respect Aventurine’s wish of being left alone. He has every right to privacy, and you have every obligation to give it to him. But instead you have been standing here, outside his door, for a full system-hour.

Every time you try to leave, your body is wracked with anxiety. The thought of other people—other alphas—coming near him in this state makes you seethe, your hands flexing at your side. The predator instinct comes out, and the people around you notice it. Every person unlucky enough to walk down this hall scurries away under your glare, even the other IPC staff wandering about to look for Aventurine: Must be their mate on the other side, they remark to one another, and then they're gone.

It is a hard thing to hear. You are not his mate. You are not even a heat partner. If you were, then he wouldn't be in so much pain. Not now, and not back then.

Aventurine has never had easy heats. You keep replaying your memories of all his past ones, each one a wound in your heart: the aching sweetness of nectar and honey; his withering body as he clutched his abdomen and curled up; the tears and sweat staining the mat beneath him. And above all: the fear. The scent of it, the sight of it, the sound of it in his voice. Stronger today than any other day.

By instinct, you know that he cannot persist like this. That this time is somehow worse than all those other times, and that he will become seriously ill if left alone.

After nearly an hour and a half, you finally open the door, fearing the worst.

“Aventurine?” you say quietly, but there's no response, and your stomach drops as you see him.

His body is pale, listless. If it weren't for the fragrance washing over you or the sweat on his temple, you'd worry that he was dead.

Tentatively, you reach out. Rest a hand on his forehead, and it scorches you. He stirs at the touch, doesn't open his eyes—but the quiet sigh of relief is unmistakable. His fingers twitch, as if wanting to reach for you.

“Aventurine,” you say gently. “Aventurine, I'm going to take care of you. Is that alright?”

He doesn't respond. You grimace, pulling away to fetch things for him: several spare pillows from the closet, an extra blanket too. From his suitcase, you grab a few of his sweaters, all thick cotton and fleece. He’d had a sense that Agnisahr would be cold at night. Deserts always get cold after sundown, since sand doesn’t retain heat, he'd told you while he was packing. Or I think so, anyway. Don't know why. Must have read it somewhere. Then he’d given you a long, unreadable look before saying, Make sure to bring a jacket. The warmest one you have. The elements on a planet like Agnisahr can kill a person—even a person like you.

I’m sure I’ll be fine, you’d dismissed him. I can survive anything. Any kind of weather, any kind of illness, any kind of pain: these are all things your species is known for being able to endure, the trait that made you such a prized slave in your master’s eyes, such a useful agent at the IPC. You hadn’t given Aventurine’s warning any thought and hardly paid attention to what you’d thrown into your own suitcase.

It surprises you, then, that you find one of your sweaters in his luggage. Made from Sedanian cashmere and heat tech designed by the Intelligentsia Guild. Cloud-soft and warm to the touch. Aventurine had bought it for you before you were deployed to Jarilo-IV to collect intelligence for Topaz. Warmest thing in the known universe, he’d commented. One of a kind, too. Remember to wear it, alright? Don't let my money go to waste, now.

You stare at it, kneading the fleece between your fingers. You hadn’t mentioned wanting to bring this sweater. You’d lost it in your closet some months ago and forgot about it. Aventurine must have remembered and gone looking for it, because—why? You aren't sure. Probably because it’s warmer and softer than anything he owns, you guess. Of course he’d want to wear it.

You throw it into the pile of things you’ve collected for him.

You take it all to his bed, the mattress dipping as you sit next to Aventurine. One by one, you scent each item with your wrist, watching him carefully the whole time. You’re quiet as you lay them out around him, leaving him undisturbed as you build a nest. You order water and electrolyte drinks too, and you’re quick about going to the door when you hear room service knocking—with how feverish he is, he probably badly needs it.

Aventurine is awake when you come back. His breathing is still laboured, pained—but calm.

“I said I didn’t need a nest,” Aventurine says, though he doesn’t sound angry. You wonder if he’s too weak to be. His voice is faint, and his eyes are barely open—focused on the pile of blankets and clothing around him.

“You’re welcome.” You open a bottle of water, hold it out to him. “Drink.”

Aventurine pauses, stares at the offering like it's some kind of foreign object. But he accepts it eventually, sitting up and taking it from you. He winces with the movement, which he tries to hide. He ignores your frown as he drinks, and he doesn't stop until the bottle is empty.

“There are more,” you say, pointing at the several additional bottles on the nightstand. “And some food and some painkillers. I don't know how well they’ll work. This isn't a normal heat. If you're alright with it, I'll call a doctor and—”

“Everything smells like you,” he says quietly, and you stop.

“...yes. Unless they’re mated, nests usually feel most comforting to an omega when they smell like an alpha.” You swallow, looking away. “...you don't have a mate, and you didn't want a professional, so this was the only option I could think of. I'm sorry.”

“It’s fine,” he says. He picks out one of the sweaters that have made its way into the nest, the Sedanian one. “I don't mind it.”

“Oh.” You let out a breath. “Then—can I call a doctor?”

His grip on the sweater tightens. “No.”

You frown. “Aventurine—”

“I’ve never needed a doctor before,” he says. He sounds unbothered, but he's fidgeting with the sweater now. “I don't need one now.”

A lie. He almost certainly needed a doctor in some of his prior heats, but you don't push the matter. “Maybe you don't need one,” you say instead, “but it would help.”

“I don't need help,” he says, and you look at him in disbelief. He catches your expression, and the corner of his mouth lifts. “Not more than you've already done, I mean.”

“I’ve barely—”

“Contact Topaz. Tell her I'm incapacitated. Tell her…” He hums. “Tell her I have food poisoning. The personnel too. It's not time-sensitive, our business on Agnisahr, so it shouldn't matter if I need a few days off.”

“You really need—”

“Give my regrets to our Agnisahran friends. Deliver it in person. They see you as my right hand, so they’ll most appreciate it coming from you. Topaz can help you with the verbiage. And—try to socialise with them a little, won't you? I think that little omega princess of theirs likes you. Some of the courtesans too, and they have surprising influence.”

“I do not want to be around any omega other than you right now,” you say before you can stop yourself, and Aventurine stops, blinking. His expression is blank, if perhaps a little curious—but his scent shifts. You can't identify how. You add quickly, “I’m not leaving you alone when you’re this sick.”

“Ah. Right.” Aventurine looks away. His voice sounds strange, and his heat must be getting to him again, because it carries a hint of pain. “But you have to. The IPC’s goals take priority.”

You frown. “Your life is more important than the IPC,” you say, and he laughs. Loudly.

“What? This is just a heat. I’m not going to die.”

“You don’t know that without seeing a doctor.”

“I do. I’m willing to bet money that I won’t die.” He cuts you off before you can reply: yes, you're always willing to bet on your life. “And even if I do, that would still be less important than Agnisahr. Do you know how many resources are on this lifeless rock?” His mouth slants. “If we mess up here, I’m dead anyway.”

“I wouldn’t let them touch you.”

“Yes, you would—because they would kill you too.” Aventurine sighs. His eyes close, and his brow creases—a sign that whatever reprieve he was lucky enough to get is about to end. “Go do what I asked. Don’t do anything stupid. I’ll… see a doctor if you do.”

You stand immediately. “Alright. I’ll be back to check on you.”

“I know.”

You stop at the door, giving him a long look. Seeing him like this—lying on a proper bed, cradled in a warm nest, with water and food and medicine nearby—you feel a little better. This is leagues beyond what he’d been afforded in his days as a slave, at the very least. Even if he isn’t free, at least he isn’t trapped.

But it still doesn’t feel good, having to step away. The last thing you want to do is talk to other people, pretend to have interest in other omegas. There are an astonishing number of them who are interested in you on this planet—that princess, and some baron’s son, and one of the prince’s favourite paramours—but you can’t bring yourself to care even for business purposes when Aventurine is like this. You can't act as if you are enjoying yourself when you know he is in pain.

You wonder about telling Topaz the truth. You wonder if she’d be worried enough about Aventurine to let you neglect this mission and cover for you instead, without letting Jade or Diamond or anyone else dangerous know. Not that you think that anyone at the Company particularly cares about Kakavasha—it’s only that he’s valuable. Aventurine of Stratagems is valuable. How many worlds have fallen because of him?

But he seemed unwilling to bet on his worth to them. Which is startling, given how often he's bet on it in the past.

“What’s so important about this planet,” you can’t help but ask, “that the IPC would rather you die than lose it?”

He’s silent for a long moment. His eyes are closed—hidden—but you can see his knuckles whiten as he clutches the Sedanian sweater.

“Copper,” he says. “They want it for the copper.”

When Kakavasha first suggested a friendship to you, it had felt like something in between a proposition and a threat:

Go ahead, he'd said. Use me as you wish. You can even stab me in the back if you want. Just be mindful of this: I don't make deals that don't pay off.

It might have been a strange way of making friends in any other circumstance, but in a house of slaves, it was a natural one. You had not been a clever person—still aren't—but you understood that your place in the world was one of a tool. This was the place of all slaves: you were all things to be used. Your body was a thing to be used. It was valuable for its strength, for its hardiness, for its threat in the arena and for its convenience in your master’s bed (or in a dark basement, or within a heat house, or inside whichever omega your mistress ordered you to calm down). It did not surprise you that Kakavasha wanted to use it as well. It did not surprise you that Kakavasha expected you to use him in return.

You never would have, of course. Kakavasha was not a thing to be used—he had always been a mate. Though you were happy to let him use you, because all you were was a tool anyway, so it was really all you could offer him: to be used.

None of this has changed for you. You don't think any of this has changed for Aventurine, either. With each new friendship he makes, he repeats those familiar words: Use me as you wish. And with each person who accepts, this is exactly what they do: they use him, and they use him, and they use him until suddenly they notice he's tricked them and they've got the losing hand.

You damned gambler, they always spit. You Sigonian wretch. All you know is how to manipulate people. Thief, liar, cheat, whore. Despite all these insults, Aventurine always smiles at them. Cry as they might, he’s won his bet and has their world in his palms.

Winner takes all, he sometimes gloats.

Winning and losing. Using and being used. Exploitation and treachery. This is all Aventurine knows; these are his great guiding principles in life. (He's told you this point blank, stacking up chips in his favourite gambling dens with a self-satisfied grin.) You often find yourself coming back to these conversations, particularly when you need to convince him of something.

And right now, you very badly need to convince him of something.

Aventurine is ignoring his doctor’s advice. His suppressants are unstable in extreme temperatures, he's been told. During travel on Agnisahr, they'd degraded, and now he’s experiencing his first heat in several years. Of course it's going to be painful, his doctor had said. I can prescribe you some medication to ease the symptoms, but really—nothing will work better than a heat partner. It doesn't need to be a mate. Any alpha will do.

The doctor had been an alpha. You had asked for a beta or omega, but alphas tend to dominate in Interastral Medical Schools, so they're in short supply. Aventurine had been still the whole time, face unreadable, but you could tell he wanted to throw up at the stench of an unfamiliar alpha. You had stepped between the two of them, not bothering to hide the animosity in your voice. We’ll take the medication, you had said, and the doctor had sniffed the air and nodded at you in approval.

Probably won't need it. An alpha like you could sort him out with just a few rounds, he told you, and both of you stayed quiet as he left.

You still aren't talking, or even looking at each other. Aventurine has lay down in his nest again, closing his eyes, while you stand as far away as physically possible—at the door where you'd just shown the doctor out. With the room shut off again, windows closed and door locked, Aventurine’s scent is starting to flood your senses once more. Out of the corner of your eye, you catch him shivering.

“What do you want to do?” you ask.

“Nothing.” He swallows. “I'll be fine.”

He's afraid. You can tell he's afraid. And you can tell he’ll be more afraid if you take even a single step closer to him, so you nod and say, “I'll go pick up your medication, then,” and Aventurine doesn't stop you. You can see him curling up in his nest, face pressed into the cashmere sweater.

But he still doesn't stop you.

After a few more days, Aventurine finally breaks.

There is a rare sag to his shoulders when he calls you to the room, along with a taste of dread in the air. You haven't seen him so vulnerable in years. Aventurine is not an open person, so cunning and self-possessed in his wealth—but Kakavasha was more brittle, more powerless, flayed raw and open even though he didn't often get the whip. (It would ruin his value if he ever scarred—his looks were his greatest selling point, your master said.) He was especially defeated when forced to spend his heats with an alpha he didn't want. You wonder, a vice grip of pain around your heart, whether this entire situation is simply an extension of that. Whether he is calling you here against his will, this time compelled by his pain, rather than his master. Whether this luxury suite feels like that wretched basement to him.

He doesn't look at you when he talks, nor does he sit up. He remains curled in his nest, nearly clinging onto the blankets and clothes.

“That stupid medication,” he pants out, sharp even in his heat, “isn't working.”

“I can tell.” Your brow knots. He’s in so much pain, it is palpable. “I”—you hesitate, voice dropping. “Can I help you?”

He goes quiet. As both Aventurine and Kakavasha, he has always been disinclined to accept help from other people. There is no such thing as unconditional help in his mind—only leverage and weakness. He hates it when people have leverage over him, and he hates being weak. Both are things that can be exploited, and Aventurine always needs to be the one doing the exploiting. He always needs to be in control.

Even like this, the last threads of his sanity about to snap, with every circuit of his omega biology trying to drag him into insensible lust, he fights viciously to be in control.

Winning and losing. Using and being used. Exploitation and treachery. Control and being controlled. This is how he's always lived. This is how he's always survived.

This is the only way to let him maintain control when he is most afraid of losing it.

“I don't mind,” you say quietly, “if you use me.”

Even through the haze of heat, Aventurine’s eyes sharpen. “What?”

“I don't mind if you use me,” you repeat, voice neutral. Unfeeling. The proposal might sound cruel to someone else, but not you. After all—your place in the world is one of a tool, and this is what you've always done as an alpha and a slave: sleeping with people to take care of their needs, or sometimes just their desires. It did always make you feel strangely hollow, but you think it will feel just fine with Aventurine. All you've ever wanted to do is keep him safe, and surely, this will do that, but—

“I'll only help if you want. I don't want to force it.” You lower your eyes. “But if you do want it, I'll be careful with you. You can lead. I promise.”

“...I know.” Aventurine’s voice is weak, cracks with pain, but you can tell he's speaking with clarity. “I know you will be.”

You look up. “Then you'll let me help?”

Aventurine looks away—a sign that he cannot adopt his usual smile. He’s clutching that sweater again, pressed close to his chest.

“Just your wrist,” he says quietly.

You listen carefully. “What?”

“I just—I just want your wrist.” He looks away. “Your—your scent gland. Only that.”

“Okay.”

You get up, then falter. When it was your job to comfort your mistress’ omega slaves, you were told to enter their nests—no permission needed from them, no permission needed from you, because only her permission ever mattered for anything. The omegas were usually too delirious to care, often had even begged for it with the state of mind that they were in. But Aventurine is different. He's not like you, and he's not like them. He's never bent to any of his masters’ wills. And even if he did, you wouldn't want to have him bend to yours.

Instead of climbing into his nest, you ask, “Can I sit on the bed?” He doesn't answer. “Just the edge of it,” you add, and you hear him exhale.

“Fine,” he says, breathing measured.

“Thank you,” you say, and he gives you a confused look. But then you're reaching out with a hand, offering it, and he is quickly distracted.

Aventurine drops the sweater, grabs your hand almost immediately. He turns over your palms, fingers tracing your heartlines—as if testing you, as if mapping out territory. He runs his thumbs along the veins of your wrists, too, right over your scent gland, and you have to force yourself not to shudder at the feeling. You only stay still, letting him explore the contours of your hands, letting him acclimate to the feeling of your skin. He laces his fingers with your own, a latticework trap, and he finally drags his wrist along yours.

Both of you inhale sharply.

You can't react. You know it'll scare him if you do, but it's hard to keep still. The way his scent blossoms, the way it mingles with yours, the way it all washes over you—what you're doing can hardly be called touching, but you feel like you're going mad. Especially when he flushes like that, his vibrant eyes fluttering shut. Especially when the sweetness of honey overtakes your senses. Especially when you can smell the way his body is reacting, all that wetness and heat and slick dripping between his legs. You don't miss the way his thighs rub together, nor the hard outline of his cock straining against his pants.

Aventurine shudders. He brings your hand up to his face, rests his cheek in your palm. His skin is flushed and burning with fever, and it's no wonder that he's sighing with relief at your touch. You try not to stare at the way his mouth falls open. He looks at you for a moment, his gaze a hazy violet and blue—before he closes his eyes again and presses his lips into your wrist.

Fuck.

“Aventurine—” You have to stop, voice strangled, when you feel the full softness of his lips working against your skin. He’s panting now, laboured breaths sweeping over your veins. Then you feel his teeth catch, a gentle nip on your flesh, and when he groans into your racing pulse—deep, relieved, desperate, a noise that makes your gut flare with heat—you realise you can't do this.

You pull back your hand, and Aventurine startles.

“Aventurine,” you say, voice strained. Maybe we should stop, you want to say, but he cuts you off.

“I need”—a shaky breath—“I need more.”

You watch Aventurine carefully. His pupils are dilated, blue irises nearly eclipsed. His cheeks are rosy, and he can't stop panting. You can fully smell his arousal now, even through his silk clothes. He's desperate, needing to be filled.

But he also looks torn. His brows are knotted, and you can taste a faint hint of fear in the air now. His knuckles clutch at the sheets, almost white, and he stares at them. He can't look up. He can't look at you. His whole body is tense, like he wants to bolt—and if he weren't so weak, you think he might actually.

“Are you sure?” you ask.

He doesn't nod. He also doesn't shake his head. His arms clutch at his midsection as he winces. He doesn't look like Aventurine. He looks like Kakavasha. It makes your heart ache as you watch him give into his body’s demands, wearing the same expression he did on the day your master bought him.

“...don't use your Voice on me,” Aventurine—Kakavasha—says quietly.

It takes you a moment to realise what he's asking. “I won't.”

“And”—his eyes somehow grow even more evasive, hidden by his long lashes— “don’t touch my commodity code.”

His commodity code. His commodity code that is seared into his scent gland. His code that, if you kiss, will ease his agony instantly. His code that, if you bite—will chain him to you irreversibly.

“Of course I won't,” you say instantly.

He closes his eyes. Takes a deep breath.

“And—” Aventurine looks away, jaw tight. His voice is quiet but wrought with tension: “—I don't like when people put things inside me.”

Something claws the walls of your heart.

“That's fine too,” you reply. “I don't mind doing it the other way.”

Aventurine’s sigh is nearly inaudible, but unmistakable. His scent shifts a little bit, the wildflower fragrance fading ever so slightly. But he doesn't come to you. He merely sits there—waiting. Expecting. Maybe dreading. Even in the senseless daze of heat, he’s too anxious to move.

You approach slowly. Though you're overwhelmed by the bouquet of his scent, though you feel a curl of heat in your belly in response to it—you are slow. Alphas are supposedly victims of insatiable lust whenever around an omega in heat, absolved of every action they take, but you are convinced this is a lie. You have never once wanted to handle Aventurine with such cruelty. You think that inflicting violence on him, more than anything else, would go against your biology. Every molecule in your body would reject putting him in such pain or inciting such fear. So you are careful when you approach him, slow as you inch up to him—but you do not think it helps.

Aventurine lies down, his face turned away from yours. His eyes squeeze shut, like he's expecting this to hurt. Uncertainty gnaws at your gut as you lean over him, draping your body over his—the only position you've ever taken an omega in, other than mounting them from behind.

(You do not want to mount Aventurine. You never have. It is an impersonal position, a position that omega biology supposedly would force him to enjoy, a position that alphas have likely dictated him to enjoy. You think there is nothing you would hate more. In your weakest, most selfish moments, in your worst ruts, when you’ve allowed yourself to fantasise about mating Kakavasha—you are always facing each other, and he is always looking at you with his eyes you've always loved, and it always feels intimate. Never impersonal. Never dictated. Never forced.)

Aventurine is so honeysweet beneath you. More fragrant than any omega you’ve ever been with. You glance at his commodity code, trying to ignore the scent of his branded skin, then lean down to press your face against the other side of his neck, where a faint scar mars the otherwise flawless slope of his nape. Like every other omega slave you've ever slept with, the scent gland there has been excised: a precautionary measure to reduce the risk of an unwanted mating bite.

(Not unwanted by them—the wants of a slave never matter—but unwanted by their owners. A mating bite would ruin the code seared into their neck, claim an omega more deeply and permanently than any titanium collar or carbon steel chain. It would hurt their resale value. Only owners are allowed to claim slaves in such a permanent way—and the wants of a slave have no relevance there, either.)

It's a funny thing, this surgical scar. Even with their gland missing, you've noticed that most omegas like having their neck scented by you anyway, probably from some vestigial instinct. You guess that Aventurine won't be any different, that maybe it will comfort him. But when your lips skim the scar left on him by his owner, his entire body stiffens beneath you. His fragrance cuts into your lungs, sharp.

You recoil, as if burned by the touch of him.

“Sorry,” Aventurine is quick to say. He tries to glance at you, but his diamond pupils quickly avoid you again. “Don’t worry about me. Just do whatever you need to do.”

“But you're scared,” you point out, and you see his brow twitch. “You’re scared when I touch you.”

“Not scared,” he lies. “Just…”

When his eyes finally look at you—land on your lips—you understand.

A bite would claim an omega more deeply and permanently than any titanium collar or carbon steel chain. If you lost your mind—give into the insatiable lust of an alpha whenever around an omega in heat—you might bite him, and then you would own Aventurine.

And Aventurine would rather die than be owned by anyone again.

He doesn't need to finish his sentence. You already know what you need to do.

“It's okay,” you say gently, and his brow knots. “I have an idea.”

Aventurine is always afraid.

This is a fact that has haunted you since the day you met him. You've wondered about how to fix it—the bare minimum as his mate (always his, even if he doesn't want you)—and you’ve never quite pinned down how. Because when someone has spent their life in perpetual fear, how do you make them feel safe? When their life is constantly at risk, how do you ever make them feel calm?

You still aren't sure of the answer. But after seeing Kakavasha become Aventurine, you now have a good guess.

It is clear from his scent that Aventurine does not feel remotely safe right now. Not when you leave to fetch something from your own room, and not when you return. The anxiety thickens when he sees, in your hands, a very familiar muzzle.

Aventurine stares. He is not smiling, but he also does not reveal his discomfort on his face, even as beads of sweat line his temple. But his voice is too controlled, too calm, when he asks, “You kept the mask.”

You nod.

“I told you to throw it out,” he points out, “when I freed you.”

“I know. Sorry. I don't know why I kept it.” You remember how tightly you clutched it before the incinerator, thinking about how strange it would feel, discarding something that you'd worn everyday since you presented—but you don't tell him this. Instead, you say, “But it’s convenient.”

Before Aventurine can say anything, you toss him the remote.

“You’re afraid of my bite and my Voice, but you don't have to be with this,” you explain. Your tone is gentle, soothing. Probably disarming coming from an alpha, with how he is in heat. Perhaps that's why he’s studying the remote rather than chucking it away. “You'll be in full control if I wear this.”

Control. Mere seconds after you say it, you can smell his fragrance change again, mellowing. It's only a brief moment of calm that fades when you latch the mask onto your face, but he doesn't smell as nearly as stressed before.

Aventurine watches you carefully as the carbon steel swallows your maw, its old and familiar edges biting into you. For the first time in years, you cannot tell what he is thinking—truly poker-faced even to you.

“You aren't bothered by wearing that thing while we do this,” he says—asks?—and you shake your head. The muzzle was part of you for years. You were wearing it when you killed someone for the first time. You were wearing it when you went into rut for the first time. You were wearing it when your master had sex with you for the first time. It doesn't bother you that you’ll wear it when you have sex with Aventurine.

If you could speak, you would ask him, Why do you think it would bother me? But all you do is gesture for him to sit up. To switch places with you. You lie down—something you've never done with an omega—and wait for him to get on top.

Aventurine stares at you for a long, quiet moment. It's followed by a sigh of relief. Disarmed, he—for the first time in any heat you've witnessed—finally relaxes. His scent wafts over you as he climbs between your legs, and you can feel the heat radiating from his hands as he parts your thighs, almost scalding.

He doesn't bother getting you ready, too needy to think rationally, but he doesn't have to anyway. You've been wet ever since you felt his mouth touch your wrist, hard ever since you heard him groan into it. You're equally desperate to get some relief as you feel his cockhead sliding against your opening, leaking all over your entrance as his slick drips onto your thighs. His breath shakes as he enters you, and he can't hear it with how you're muzzled—but you groan just as deeply as him at the tight stretch.

You hear him swear when you clench around him, watch him lean over you. His arms shake as he supports himself, refusing to succumb to his heat even as he chases his relief. You seek out his gaze (just as in your dreams, facing each other, intimate), and his neon eyes catch on your eyes for a brief, breathtaking second—

—before he looks away.

There's a flash of—you don't know what, maybe pain? Or fear?—in his irises as he does. A twitch of the brow, a tell he'd normally rather die than let slip. You have the realisation, as Aventurine moves inside you, that even while you're muzzled, even while he has complete control over you—he still can't stand having sex with you. Probably because he can't stand being in heat in general, you tell yourself. Don't touch me, don't touch me, don't use it anymore, don't use me anymore. He'd have this reaction to anyone.

Still—you didn't expect him to have this reaction to you.

Your hands twitch, possessed by an old instinct to cover your eyes. But you'd probably scare Aventurine if you moved your arms, so all you do is dig your fingers into the sheets and squeeze them shut. You tell yourself again and again that he'd hate having sex with anyone in these circumstances—not just you. And then you tell yourself, as a desperate, broken moan leaves his branded throat, that he would also come inside anyone in these circumstances, caught within the cruel grip of his heat.

Aventurine stills inside you as he finishes. He pants, sweat dripping down his temple as he shudders in his ecstasy, his spend hot and thick inside you. You can feel his fever break as he comes down from his high, the heat coming off his body easing into a manageable warmth.

Do you feel better, you try to say, but you can't move your mouth while your mask is on. So you wait patiently for Aventurine to come back to himself, watching him carefully as he pulls out and rolls onto the mattress beside you. He finally glances at you then. His eyes narrow once they land on you, confusion flicking through them. Then displeasure. He reaches for the remote.

To your surprise, he immediately punches in the code to unlock your muzzle. Aventurine has apparently remembered the numbers after all these years, as if the moment he freed you has been since seared into his memory.

“Are you okay?” is the first thing you say, and Aventurine gives you a confused look. He’s still panting, dazed, so you ask, “Can I check your temperature?” And when he nods, you confirm your suspicion: he's still much too warm.

There is an ache between your legs and a strange hollow in your gut (because you aren't very experienced with receiving, you think—your body likely just isn't used to the feeling of it), but you quickly forget them. All you can think of is Aventurine, and how he’s still unwell, and how you need to comfort him. The instinct is so strong that you don't even say anything as you get up, straightening out your clothes.

“Are you leaving?” Aventurine asks. His voice is neutral, completely unbothered, but the thought is so horrific to you that you turn back to him with wide eyes.

“Of course not. I'm going to get you water and medicine.” A beat. You stare at Aventurine’s eyes, then think about how he hid them from you during sex. The hollow feeling comes back, but it's mostly eclipsed by your anxiety at the next thought: “...do you want me to leave?”

“Do you want to?”

“I—” I'd rather die, you think. Being forced to leave him right now would feel like tearing out a piece of yourself. You don't know if there's an alpha in this world who could leave their mate in the middle of a heat. And even if he is unmarked, unattached to you—you still think of yourself as his mate. (His, always his, even if he doesn't want you.) “I would prefer not to. I am your heat partner. I'm supposed to take care of you.”

You hear a quiet breath. “Right. Of course. You're always so conscientious.” Aventurine nods, as if convincing himself of something. “Try not to take too long.”

“I’ll come back soon,” you promise, and the air sweetens. Encouraged, you add, voice gentle: “I’ll bring that medication, and then we can have sex as many times as you need after I come back. I'll make sure you're not in any pain anymore.” You pause, studying him. “Is there anything else you need to feel better?”

His fragrance changes once more, this time in a way you don't totally recognize. “No.” His voice sounds strange. His scent is still foreign, fluctuating, possibly hinting at some kind of pain. The heat must be getting to him again—and of course it wasn't enough, what you just did, what you can provide. He likely needs to be filled to get any kind of lasting relief, but you left him empty. “No, that's all I want.”

You nod, forcing yourself to look calm. Ignoring the emptiness in your gut. It didn't feel bad, but you hope it'll feel better next time you have sex. You think it will. Alphas are supposed to be filled with an insatiable lust near omegas in heat, after all. And even though you’ve never felt that before—never felt anything sleeping with all those omegas in your mistress’ house—you are sure you'll eventually feel it around Aventurine.

But the feeling never comes. Even though you can tell that his heat has returned by the time you're back—sweat beading his temples, laboured breaths at his lips, his bottoms now discarded, with full evidence of arousal between his legs—you don't feel much of anything as you reach for your mask again.

“Don't,” Aventurine says, before it can clasp around your face. You give him a curious look. He explains, “Don't. I don't want to have sex again. Not yet.”

You stare at him, shifting. Uncomfortable. Uncertain. Not knowing how he wants to use you. “What can I do?”

He gives you a long look. “Come here. I… I want your scent gland.”

It's a sensible request. If there's a way to seek relief without fucking someone—without fucking you, which he clearly hated doing—you're sure Aventurine would prefer it. So you climb into his nest, holding your wrist out for him, and—

“No.” His voice is quiet. “I want the one on your neck.”

“...oh.”

You stand there, not sure where to move. If he wants you in his nest again, or if he’d rather do this standing. You’re relieved when he demands, “Lie down.”

You expect him to get on top of you when you do. Assume that he wants complete control—but he instead lies down beside you. Presses his body into yours, and then his face into your neck. His nose and lips brush against your scent gland, a full-body shudder running through him, and—

—and now you know for a fact that it is a lie that alphas want nothing other than to fuck an omega when they're in heat. Because even like this, with his lips sweet on your neck, with the sheets soaked with his slick, with his spend leaking out of you—you do not want to have sex with Aventurine. You only want to hold him. You only want him to keep scenting you. You only want to scent him back.

You only want him to feel safe.

You breathe in deeply, lungs flooded by honey. You think of what it felt like to hold him in that cold basement, when he was delirious with fever and pain, and you think about how different his scent is now. How much sweeter it is. How much calmer he feels.

“Do you feel better?” you ask, and he doesn't respond, but you know the answer. His hands come up to dig into your shirt, and he presses into you like you're a sweater in his nest. Silence blankets over you both, calm and warm. His laboured breath starts to improve.

He does eventually speak.

“Has anyone ever told you,” he says, “what you smell like?”

You stare at him. Your master used to say that you smelled good, but he'd never elaborated, and you hadn't wanted him to. “No.”

Aventurine breathes in.

“You smell like—” A little sigh, shaking and feverish, leaves him. “You smell like rain.”

Your eyebrows tick up. “Rain?”

“Yes. Or not just rain, but”—he pauses, next words quiet—“more Iike after it rains. You smell like the desert after a rainfall.”

“Oh.” You don't know what to say to that. Feeling distinctly like it's a silly question, you ask, “Is that a good scent?”

“Some would think so. Especially to people from the desert. You probably smell like a blessing to them. Although…”

Aventurine goes quiet again. You stare at the chandelier above you, all crystal and white gold, and wait.

“Although?” you prompt.

“...although I wouldn't really know,” he says. “It’s just a hunch. I bet it's why so many omegas on this planet like you.”

You couldn't care less about those other omegas. All you care about is Aventurine. “And?” you say. “Do you like my scent?”

His reply never comes. He just breathes deeply again, seeking relief from your neck—not intimacy. Any alpha’s scent would work; that doctor told you so. Any alpha’s touch would work, too. There are no special feelings involved here. Your place in the world is one of a tool, and tools are never especially liked nor disliked. Their value exists only in how they can be used.

You don't know why you even bothered to ask the question.

But then something strange happens: Aventurine curls against you, pressing even further into you. His lashes flutter against your pulse again; it ticks up in response, beating fast against his lips.

“I do,” he says quietly. “I do like it.”

You swallow. “But I guess that's because you're in heat. Any alpha would smell good to you, wouldn’t they?”

“No.” His fingers dig into the fabric of your shirt. “No, I like it because it's yours.”

You know better than to read too much into his response. Aventurine had already said it earlier: No foreign scents. He's only tolerating this whole arrangement because you don't smell unfamiliar to him. Only able to use you because you are the least threatening option.

But the words break something in you—break the thing that made you unable to throw out that little pouch of copper coins that you were saving up for Kakavasha’s freedom, the part of you that made you wear that carbon-steel mask for him. It is this part of you that has your eyes squeezing shut and your arms wrapping around him. You know he’ll recoil, reject you, but just this once—you need to try.

Aventurine doesn't push you away.

He melts into you instead, inhaling deeply. Your scent gland tingles with the warmth of his breath, the feeling of his lips. He seems—comfortable.

You can't fathom why he’s staying in your arms. Perhaps he's simply desperate for some kind of relief from his heat, just like when you held him in the basement while he was delirious from pain. But Aventurine had spoken to you with clarity just now, and his skin doesn't feel scalding so much as warm, and his scent is so different than from that moment. So sweet and so gentle, without a trace of fear. It makes your heart squeeze. As much as you've always wanted Aventurine to feel safe, you'd never imagined that his scent would be so beautiful when he is.

It makes your heart ache. You've never held anything so lovely before, and you’ve never felt so warm before, and it all makes up for how badly it hurt to let Aventurine inside you. How hollow it made you feel to let him use you. How none of that matters as long as you can keep him safe like this, because you belong to Kakavasha. You'll always belong to Kakavasha, in a fate that was chosen for you on the day you met him.

You're his, always his—even if he’ll never want you.

end part i

thank you so much to lore for hosting a fantastic collab and to my sponsors who funded this fic and got it over the finish line! please go check out @ficsforgaza to find other amazing hsr writers you can sponsor in order to help fundraise! here is my own wip list, if you are interested in seeing more from me!

and thank you most of all to YOU! I appreciate you so much for reading this chapter. thank you so much for sticking it through.

additional end notes

[mixtape-timeout]

Hi Stays, this is a post to warn everyone to be wary of a SKZ author here on Stayblr with the username @/gimmeurtmi

I followed them not too long ago, but they suddenly blocked me. I was confused why because I have my age in my account and followed all of their rules. However, I have some reasons to suspect that this user is a Zionist. As you can see I am very Pro-Palestine, it’s in my blog title and bio, and I think this is why they blocked me.

They made a post showing anger about Stays educating Felix on his live about Coca-Cola (For people who don’t know, Coca-Cola is on the BDS boycott list, they support Israel and built an R&D center in occupied Palestinian territory of Atarot) In their post they said it’s “pathetic” for Stays to inform Felix about this and that he wasn’t doing anything wrong. Felix made the effort to read about the issue on his live and chose to apologize to Stay for it, but this user thinks that boycotting a brand tied to a genocidal state is the same as bullying.

((Screenshots are not mine))

They also showed strong support for the new SKZ collab with Charlie Puth. Many Stays are boycotting this collab because Charlie Puth is a raging Zionist, and the track also has an Israeli producer, Johnny Goldstein who is also a proud Zionist. gimmeurtmi even made a whole tag for this collab on their blog to show how much they’re excited for it, even though two Zionists worked on it and will be receiving royalties for it. You can also see the tags in the third post showing them speaking of Tommy Hilfiger, yet another Zionist, in a friendly manner.

Furthermore, I talked to other Stays in the community about this because I don’t want to jump to conclusions and gimmeurtmi blocked other users who are showing support for Palestine, not just me. From reading their posts on their other blog (@/stuckonspidey) you can also see how far their beliefs about this go. That’s not to say them being Jewish means they must be a Zionist, because that’s a completely false idea. There are plenty of Jewish people who are not Zionist and support Palestinian liberation because we recognize that what Palestinians are suffering through is a history repeat of what our people went through. But this added with all the other questionable evidence makes me suspicious that this user is a Zionist, or at least an Israeli sympathizer who treats support for Palestine as an inconvenience.

From these posts on their main blog, you can see them refuse to condemn Israel or even say anything about their crimes when they got asked about it. Instead, they just talk about how this genocide has personally affected them. There are no posts (that I could find) of them showing any sympathy or support for Palestine, all their posts about the subject are just self-victimizing posts about how they feel. Yes, it’s a scary time to be a Jewish person as well, I know this as a person of Jewish ancestry, too. But fighting anti-semitism AND fighting for Palestine can and SHOULD co-exist. It’s a huge red flag that the only thing they have to say about the genocide is how Jewish people are the victims in this. They also made another post where they claim that “Zionist” is just a word people use to be anti-semitic. This is a tale as old as time that Zionists have used to excuse, deny, and even justify Israel’s war crimes. I was once told that a genocide of Palestinians doesn’t exist and is just an “anti-semitic blood libel”. This is the exact same rhetoric that Zionists in my community and Zionist news outlets use (which, I add, almost ALL news outlets are strongly biased to Israel because of America’s ties to it. Israel is heavily backed in support from some of the richest and most powerful countries in the world, it is not the victim and never was).

I am not making this for drama. I made this post just to tell fellow Stays to be cautious of which writers you’re reading from and supporting. If you are against the genocide that has been happening to Palestinians for 75 years now, I suggest not supporting this person’s work, because at best they don’t care about what’s happening in Palestine, and at worst, they actually endorse it. There should be no place in our Stay community for this hateful ideology.

[ts19009]

Seventeen Fic Rec's Part 3

(CONTAINS SMUT AND MATURE SUBJECT MATTER)

(Bold title means favorite)

(UPDATED: September 22nd, 2024)

OT13

seventeen as teachers @fairyhaos

seventeen as dads headcanons @bbyobbyo

Back to School with Seventeen (Seventeen TA Collab! Take a look at our Course Options collated by your favourite writers, taught by your favourite members!) @camandemstudios

Seventeen's reaction to you asking them for a baby @j0shuasw1fey

Tales from Camp Masterlist (Thirteen friends reconnect on a camping trip, reminiscing about their times as camp counselors when they were in college.) @kwanisms

✤ Losing It. (masterpost) ✤ (A series of having virginities given to you. Sometimes they throw said virginity at you with full force, other times, they lovingly hold your hand, bat their lashes, and say some of the dumbest shit you’ve ever heard a man say in regards to getting laid for the first time. ) @ncteez

Kim Mingyu

kmg x reader: healing comes in small doses masterlist (husband! dad! kim mingyu x afab! mom!reader) @tomodachiii

Food Wars pt. 1 (You and Mingyu are rival but friendly chefs competing for a spot to be an executive chef at a new location in Madrid. This position would change your life; no matter how attractive he is, you WILL get that spot) @beomcoups

Crossing the Finish Line (Winning is the only thing that matters, except if you're raising money for a charity event with an infuriatingly good-looking swimmer.) @mr-cha-n

Statistically Speaking... (TA! mingyu, fluff, smut [minors DNI], angst, statistics, ur honour they're stupid for one another, descriptions of stress exhaustion and burnout, academic burden, disagreements, mingyu is smart as hell, shitting on bad professors, smut but its a surprise) @gyuswhore

Always // oneshot (Sometimes, one man's burden is everything another man has ever wished for.) @spamgyu

When I Kissed the Teacher (science teacher mingyu, grammar teacher reader, meddling students, crushes, flirting, lots of candy and coffee) @highvern

Read All About It (Anonymous Life and Sex writer, Not Carrie Bradshaw, takes on a 30-day challenge with her boyfriend, Min. How wild fans would go to find out they're none other than Kim Mingyu and his girlfriend?) @highvern

Hot Wheels [M] (Co-Workers to Lovers, Fluff, Humor, Smut 18+) @milfgyu

𝖳𝗁𝖾 𝖶𝖺𝗒 𝗈𝖿 𝖳𝗁𝖾 𝖧𝗈𝗎𝗌𝖾 𝖧𝗎𝗌𝖻𝖺𝗇𝖽 (fake marriage au!, fluff, angst, smut (18+ mdni) @wonustars

There's a snake in my pants (Crack/humour. Some fluff. Established relationship. Himbo Mingyu! [I love himbo Gyu]) @whipped-for-kpop-fics

Cross My Heart (Your crush Mingyu wants (to eat) you.) @minisugakoobies

Like A Cowboy Part 2 of 4 (Mingyu only needs to wake up with you once to decide he'll do whatever is necessary to do it every day; even if it means letting you help him outside and figuring out how to help you inside, it's worth it.) @sluttywoozi

Let our lips lock, baby (Friends to lovers smut. Fluff. They are in LOVE okay. Birthday boy Gyu <3) @whipped-for-kpop-fics

I can do it for you (After years dealing with everything alone, you stumble upon an old wishbook from your past. And you jokingly writes down your ideal boyfriend, Mingyu. To your surprise, Mingyu magically appears in your couch.) @hoshifighting

here and now. (secret!agent!mingyu x secret!agent!reader, established relationship) @writingmeraki

Jeon Wonwoo

into the night | jeon wonwoo (when you call wonwoo late at night telling him you're stranded, he drops everything to make his way to you (and bring you home safe)) @etherealyoungk

CLOSER (f2l!wonwoo, softdom!wonwo) @hannieehaee

HER | part six (m). (wonwoo, a heartbroken and burnt out writer nearing the end of his math degree, wants nothing to do with the seemingly perfect, intimidating girl who has everyone under her thumb. you. unfortunately, his literary talent has got him shoved him between a rock and a hard place when you want to write a book and require his expertise. you two are the furthest from compatible. wonwoo can’t see this going well. at all.) @chocosvt (HOLY SHIT, THIS SERIES HAD ME CRYING. SNAPS TO THIS AMAZING WRITER!)

𝐝𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐬 𝐭𝐨 𝐢𝐦𝐩𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐬 (though it didn’t bother wonwoo that his girl wasn’t a gamer like him, he was over the moon when one day she proudly declared she started gaming. one thing he forgot to ask - what kind of games she was playing.) @babyleostuff

knight in shining armor (non-idol! wonwoo x f!reader) @heartsfromia

endpoint (Senior year of college is meant to be full of celebration and smooth sailing. Years of work culminating in the final semesters that will send you off into the real world where clubs, sports, and weekends packed with hungover volunteering to pad your resume no longer mattered. It’d be a piece of cake if it wasn’t for your fuck buddy turned coworker having the same plan. But only one of you can get the department’s most coveted recommendation that all but guarantees your acceptance. Tension rises and the nearly four year thing you’ve had with Wonwoo approaches its endpoint.) @highvern

heads up! stardew. they r gaming. @nonranghaes

Cookies and Cream (academic rivals to lovers, smut, heart wrenching and tooth rotting fluff (wonwoo is down bad bad)) @seokgyuu

April Shower (Wonwoo meets a lot of people through his career as a travel photographer. Not one of them has ever made him want to stay in one place, until he met you.) @sluttywoozi

HEAVEN (wonwoo has a reputation for being distant, quiet and a bit mysterious. once you get to know him better, though, you come to find the sweet, shy boy underneath the surface.) @sanakiras

Patterns (Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. Three times is a pattern. So what does it mean when you find yourself in Wonwoo's bed over and over again?) @highvern

Daylight (between the endless flirty banter or secret looks of longing, the line between you and your boss had always been slightly blurred. But when a night out with friends has you and your boss meeting for the first time outside of the workplace, that line starts to become nonexistent as mutual feelings are brought to light.) @moonscriptsx

✦ sugar & spice (bodyguard!wonwoo x celebrity!reader) @etherealyoungk

Hong Jisoo

New in the Suburbs – New Neighboor! Joshua @hoshifighting

distracted (husband&dad!joshua, wife&mom!reader, established relationship) @eomayas

SUMMER KISSES (joshua coming home is a pleasant surprise) @arafilez

richhusband!joshua headcannons (just some headcons, but i'm obsessed with them) @number1mingyustan

still the one (5 years after your break up, Joshua tries his best to get your attention. May it be creating a new instagram to get you to notice him, making your brother (Seungkwan) secretly invite him to his birthday party, and his latest act: begging you on his knees in front of your door to get him back. He just never gives up!) @bratzkoo

city lights series | joshua hong (M) [ongoing] (rock singer joshua, neighbours with benefits) @hannieween

best friend’s brother (This had me crying ugly tears. its my fav) (imestep, romance, angsty angst, major feels abt having a crush, lots of flirting, smut, drama, happy tears.) @chocosvt

not according to plan | hjs (fake dating, strangers to friends to ?? | fluff, slight angst, smut) @the-boy-meets-evil

Expiration Date (2/2) (artist!joshua x model!fem!reader) @number1mingyustan

Birds of a Feather ( joshua hong x f reader) @onlymingyus

Timestamp! Aquamarine Au! @mysafehaneul

on second thought (where your roommate, wonwoo, has an interesting solution to all your bad dates. nothing can go wrong with two friends crossing a line, can it?) @the-boy-meets-evil

Yoon Jeonghan

BITE (idol!jeonghan x hybeidol!reader, f2l, meet-cute, very unrealistic schedules for idols lol, jeonghan is a menace, a lot of will they wont they, reader plays hard to get, afab reader, small age gap implied, one mention of the word oppa as a honorific (sorry</3), reader is mentioned to be international (no specific race, just not born in korea), smut, dry humping, penetrative sex, etc.) @hannieehaee

building blocks | yjh (agreeing to be the teaching assistant is the last thing you want in a semester where you're already swamped with work. but, you need a letter of recommendation from the professor and you're out of other options. enter jeonghan, the menace who signs up for the class seemingly on a whim and disrupts your entire routine.) @the-boy-meets-evil (OBSESSED WITH THESE TA SERIES)

"lovie" (all the ways jeonghan uses your nickname) @cherryredcheol

Titty-Shirt! (18+) (pervert!rollercoaster operator!jeonghan x bigtiddie!fem!reader) @beefboyandbabygirl

love café (while you’ve spent the last few months pretending the love café doesn’t exist, you realize you need its services now more than ever. this brings you face to face with jeonghan, the son of a luxury fashion designer who’s got money to burn. your exchanges are strictly business. until they’re not) @chocosvt

five ways to say "i love you" - jeonghan (how jeonghan shows his love to you, through all five love languages) @p0ckykiss

Xu Minghao

Meet Me In Amsterdam (Artist!Minghao x Artist!Fem!Reader) @okiedokrie

GOODNIGHT N GO (idol!minghao x hybeidol!reader) @hannieehaee

To all the love letters I wrote but never sent (fluff, best friends to lovers) @welcometomyoasis

Birthday Gift l Xu Minghao (It's your birthday and Minghao wants to give you your present!) @jenoslutie

Lee Seokmin

through a different lens — l.sm (meet cute, strangers to something) @miniseokminnies

after dessert (just pure smut lol, but it was good XD) @xurengu0

behind the stands (Seokmin, Gryffindor's star chaser, is widely known as your rival. What everyone doesn't know is that before every game, his lips are always on yours.) @xurengu0

Beautiful Liar (mafia au, dark romance? angst, smut.) @starlightx

Epistolary Yearning (epistolary form, historical fantasy, romance | smut) @himbocoups

Nice Guys Finish First (After a first date with the sweetest man you've ever met, thanks to a mutual friend, you're more than willing to silence his doubts and show him how sexy he was to you.) @celestiababie

midnight rain | lsm (after seven years away, you finally return home. meeting seokmin again wasn't in your plans, but life wasn't willing to let you have it your way.) @wongyuuu

[emeryhall]

Thank you @run-for-chamo-miles for the tag!

In 2024, I posted 9 fics totaling 339,207 words, which is fucking batshit even if some of those words were written in 2023. My most popular fic in terms of kudos is arsonist Baz and firefighter Simon 🔥. But in terms of bookmarks, it's Blood Sugar Sex Moony (wolfstar), which includes my favorite bookmark ever ⬇️

Fics listed below the cut, plus a heartfelt PSA ❤️

January

Blood Sugar Sex Moony (wolfstar, E, 63.6K)

A vengeance-fueled, Buffy-inspired, 90s high school AU with a 17-person body count, featuring amazing art by @spikesteaseasalt.

A Little Bit Deadly (snowbaz, E, 48.9K)

New York City firefighter Simon Snow mistakenly downloads Grindr instead of Tinder and falls for British arsonist Baz Pitch. Featuring DEREK JETER and the most heart-warming art by @letraspal.

March

The Tale of a Magic-Sucking Hoover and a Rat-Drinking Monster (snowbaz, E, 38.7K)

Ghost mums, sentient buildings, and sex toys. Oh my!

June

Only Creatures (snowbaz, E, 88K)

Sad poet Baz Pitch and dragon camboy Simon Snow. Featuring Baz's beard, the hybrid-creatures camming site, OnlyCreatures, and a cameo by Taylor Swift, as well as absolutely gorgeous art by @artsyunderstudy.

October

Sidney Snow Grimm-Pitch (snowbaz, M, 43.7K)

My delightful collaboration with @artsyunderstudy, and a gift for @cutestkilla whose fic What's Left inspired this getting together later in life mpreg. Yes, mpreg.

whatever beats beneath (firstprince, E, 5.1K)

My foray into the RWRB fandom, when I thought I was writing an omarashi fic for a Kinktober prompt, but instead wrote an exploration of grief.

November

Pink Salt (Saltburn, E, 23.1K)

Sometimes the greatest love story is between an undead baker and the man who didn't realize he was a necromancer when he fucked his grave.

Bound Together in Five Dimensions (snowbaz, E, WIP, 4.7K and growing)

My CORB collab with @stardustasincocaine! I won't say anymore because we're posting the next chapter very, very soon 🩷

December

Out of the Game (firstprince, E, WIP, 23.9K and growing)

Another RWRB, this time scratching my itch to write in the detective/spy thriller genre. In the spirit of the Will Darling Adventures, and featuring truly inspired literary works by Henry, and an Alex who is perhaps not to be trusted. But then again, maybe Henry needs a little chaos in his life.

And finally, a PSA, written as much as a reminder to myself, as to anyone else who feels like their writing doesn't quite fit anywhere:

When I posted my first fanfic (wolfstar), no one read me. We’re talking like four kudos in a fandom where fics go viral. And at some point I thought, maybe I should attempt to write things that people actually want to read? 

I love writing deeply romantic stories, but I love stories like True Romance or The Shape of Water. Two people who are perfect for each other, but one is mute and the other is a fish god from Brazil. One stabs Tony Soprano in the foot with a corkscrew and the other communicates with an hallucination of Elvis. 

Finally, I found the Carry On fandom who enthusiastically embraced my Baz who excelled "at both deep-throating cock and scorching motherfuckers like a vengeance demon in floral Tom Ford." And then finally, finally, almost a year after it posted, people in the wolfstar fandom started reading Blood Sugar Sex Moony. Now, almost every day, I get kudos and (sometimes delightfully unhinged) comments on my wolfstar too. 

I don’t imagine I’ll ever be really, really popular, but I’ve found a group of readers — or they’ve found me — who appreciate the way my brain works, and little old high school me, who always believed that the best love stories are the strangest ones, knows that they are not alone. 

So my PSA to everyone out there who feels like Nora Ephron trapped in David Lynch trapped in Wes Craven — or whatever your unmarketable combo may be — keep on doing you. One day you will find your people 🩷

Also, thank you to everyone who read, kudos-ed, and commented on my fics, and a special shout out to all of the wonderful friends I've made in the Carry On fandom. Y'all have brightened my 2024.

And now, tags!

@bookish-bogwitch @monbons @roomwithanopenfire @fiend-for-culture @you-remind-me-of-the-babe

@thewholelemon @mooncello @iamamythologicalcreature @rimeswithpurple @orange-peony

@messofthejess @alexalexinii @best--dress @ileadacharmedlife @ic3que3n

@hushed-chorus @rbkzz @noblecorgi @facewithoutheart @larkral

@euripidestrousers @r33sespieces @artsyunderstudy @cutestkilla @letraspal

Plus anyone who wants to play. (I imagine this can be done for art too. Or dolls!)

[baddestbittyontheblock]

hong jisoo (joshua) fic recs

you are responsible for the content you consume‼️

✧*:·˚ hi everyone!! here is a list of all the fics that are my favs with tagged writers/authors ✧*:·˚

✧*:·˚ remember to like and reblog the works you enjoy in order to support each writer!! ✧*:·˚

✧*:·˚ however, make sure you read the information on each story themselves such as triggers & warnings ✧*:·˚

✧*:·˚ also, if you'd like me to remove your fic from this list, message me! ✧*:·˚

°。°。°。°。°。°。°。°。°。°。°。°。°。°。

ꈍᴗꈍ vanilla by @milfgyuu  joshua hong x fem!reader | 11.2k words, friends to lovers, smut, 18+

-joshua has a secret but perhaps it’s not really a secret at all. maybe you’ve just refused to see it in an effort to keep your feelings at bay.

ꈍᴗꈍ vanilla II by @milfgyuu  joshua hong x fem!reader | 8.7k words, friends to lovers, romance, smut 18+

-joshua has you on edge all evening and you’re not sure if you’ll survive dinner with your families. you, however, have him dealing with feelings he’s never had to war with, especially in the bedroom and it throws him into a tailspin. 

ꈍᴗꈍ something more by @sluttywonwoo joshua hong x reader | swearing, smut (18+), masturbation, unprotected sex, choking, degradation, lowkey spit play, 4.5k

-it’s a tale as old as time- your roommate walks in on you masturbating and things escalate from there

ꈍᴗꈍ studio session by @sluttywonwoo joshua hong x reader | swearing, smut (18+), edging, sex toys, fingering, exhibitionism, degradation, 2.8k

-you and your boyfriend decide to try something new- aka letting other members watch him edge you (ft. seungcheol, jeonghan, wonwoo, seokmin, and vernon)

ꈍᴗꈍ your gentleman by @wonwussy joshua hong x afab!reader | smut, (minors dni), camboy!shua, voyeurism, exhibitionism, broadcasted oral (m), swallowing cum, pet names (for reader and viewers), very soft dom!shua if you squint and turn your head to the side 27 degrees, use of “sir”, TALK OF CONSENT (BECAUSE CONSENT IS SEXY Y’ALL); this is part of the collab with svthub, 2.2k

-“do you want to join me on stream this weekend?”

ꈍᴗꈍ honey lemon ginger by @seokmingiggles joshua hong x gn!reader | fluff, established relationship, the reader is sick (with the common cold)

-you’ve unexpectedly come down with a mild cold, yet your boyfriend doesn’t hesitate to leap in and take care of you.

ꈍᴗꈍ joshua blurb by @bbugyu joshua hong x reader

-bf joshua doting his girl

ꈍᴗꈍ lazy nights by @pileofwords joshua hong x reader | floofy fluff, 1.2k

-joshua comes home after a long day to find you in the middle of a beading project.

ꈍᴗꈍ title by @leejungchans joshua hong x fem!reader | fluff, established relationship au, ceo au, brief alcohol mentions and consumption

-in which your husband is all too happy to remind people of your new title.

ꈍᴗꈍ all my love by @jaestrz idol!joshua x idol!reader | fluff, angst

-the sound of soft background music was ringing in your ears as the room was filled with family relatives who knows if you knew them or not.

ꈍᴗꈍ love on air masterlist by @suhnshinehaos joshua hong x gn!reader | non-idol au, university au, childhood friends to ???, so much pining, fluff, a bit of angst, honestly so corny and cheesy

-joshua hong wants you to know how he feels about you, but god forbid he actually say it out loud. instead, he settles on the next best thing : dedicating a song to you every week on the campus radio. too bad you’re too dense to actually figure out it’s all for you.

ꈍᴗꈍ oceans and engines by @renjunphile hong jisoo x female!reader | exes to lovers!au, fluff, angst-ish, idol!au. fluff central. just thousands of words of self-indulgent fluff with little to no plot

-when hong jisoo left his beloved hometown at 18 years old, he also left you, his proclaimed great love. it takes another 7 years for you to catch up to him again and close the oceans in between you.

ꈍᴗꈍ impulsive by @leejungchans joshua hong x gn!reader | food mentions, kissing, fluff, humour(ish), university au, established relationship au, joshua’s flirty in this

-in which you help your boyfriend with yet another one of his 2am impulse decisions.

ꈍᴗꈍ non-flat by @venerex joshua hong x gn!reader | sex descriptions (but no actual sex), reader has some unspecified medical conditions and body insecurities, descriptions of body shape and stretch-marks (might be a trigger for someone with weight-related insecurities), 1.2k

-“something wrong?”

ꈍᴗꈍ smut blurb by @venerex joshua hong x fem!reader | oral (f receiving), head....pushing?

-"it's okay sweetheart, you can do it"

ꈍᴗꈍ forget with joshua by @venerex joshua hong x reader | orgasm denial, cockwarming, intercourse

-imagine coming home after a horrible day to a concerned joshua, who takes it upon himself to make you feel better - orders your favorite food, offers to ready a bath for you, offers cuddles etc.

ꈍᴗꈍ domino by @universecorp softdom!joshua hong x sub!afab!reader | fluff, crack, smut, standoffish reader (only for a bit), protected sex, slow burn, frat parties, Joshua is a butt when he's drunk/hungover, joshua is also bad at feelings, Throwing up (from drinking), past fling with jihoon(so y'all are pretty close), jealous joshua

-after a one night stand on your birthday, you never expected to meet the stranger again. you also never expected him to enter your life permanently.

ꈍᴗꈍ routine by @neonun-au joshua hong x reader | fluff, slice-of-life, established relationship

-domestic bliss

ꈍᴗꈍ simp by @horanghoe husband!josh hong x wife!reader | semi-sfw simping, mention of alcohol consumption, swearing, generally sfw

-joshua being a simp for his wife on a date while a babysitter watches the kiddos

ꈍᴗꈍ late to the party by @sluttywoozi  husband!josh hong x reader | no specified pronouns or gendered terms; wears a dress, makeup, heels, lingerie, has breasts and a vagina, horny and in love husband!joshua, swearing, kissing, dirty thoughts, spanking mention

-joshua would be so extremely down bad for his partner

ꈍᴗꈍ cute blurb by @husbandhoshi  joshua hong x reader

-joshua who, after making sweet love to you, wraps you up in blankets like a cloak so you stay warm before getting up to grab all the aftercare necessities

[ljubimaya]

𝐆𝐑𝐈𝐌𝐌'𝐒 𝐍𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓𝐌𝐀𝐑𝐄𝐒

With the weather getting colder, you might find yourself cuddled up in blankets and sipping on some hot chocolate. Perhaps you would have an old, rugged looking book right on your coffee table waiting to be picked up. With fairytale season being in full swing, perhaps you would like to indulge in some nostalgic stories of enchanted forests, wicked witches, cursed princesses and bloodhungry beasts?

But oh, were your favorite fairytales always this 𝔡𝔞𝔯𝔨?

𝐀𝐁𝐎𝐔𝐓

GRIMM'S NIGHTMARES is an exclusively dark content collab inspired by the dark fairytales collected and written down by the Grimm brothers.The central theme of the collab are dark fairytales, but you are more than free to enter the collab with mythical figures (werewolves, vampires, ghosts, etc) without any fairytale in mind. Despite being inspired by the Grimm brothers, you are more than free to be inspired by other classic tales from around the world. 

𝐑𝐔𝐋𝐄𝐒

𓆩𓆪 You have to be over the age of 18 to enter

𓆩𓆪 This collab is strictly a x reader collab

𓆩𓆪 All fandoms are welcome to enter

𓆩𓆪 Aged up characters are allowed, but please don’t age them down 

𓆩𓆪 Your entry has to be a minimum of 500 words long, otherwise the sky’s the limit

𓆩𓆪 Be aware that this is a dark content collab first and foremost. You are allowed to go as crazy as you would like, but make sure to tag all the trigger warnings accordingly

𓆩𓆪 As mentioned previously, you are free to enter with a mythical figure instead of a fairytale

𓆩𓆪 To enter, you need to send me an ask or message with the character(s) and the mythical figure/fairytale you wanna base your fic on

𓆩𓆪 You are allowed to submit up to two entries

𓆩𓆪 You are allowed ro write one fic with up to three characters (character x reader x character x character)

𓆩𓆪 No double entries!Meaning I won’t allow the same character in the same fairytale au (for example, I won’t allow two people to write about vampire Toji). First come, first serve

𓆩𓆪 I take the right of not accepting your entry. To ensure the best possible experience for me as the host, and you as the writer, I will have to make sure you don’t fit my dni criteria 

𓆩𓆪 Make sure to tag me and use the tag 𝐆𝐑𝐈𝐌𝐌'𝐒 𝐍𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓𝐌𝐀𝐑𝐄𝐒 𝐂𝐎𝐋𝐋𝐀𝐁 so I can reblog and add your fic to the masterlist

𓆩𓆪  The soft deadline for the collab is the 1th of April 2025. Please notify me if you need more time or if you would like to opt out of the collab  

𝐅𝐀𝐍𝐃𝐎𝐌𝐒

TOKYO REVENGERS

Werewolf! Baji Keisuke x Fem! Reader (Inspired by The little red riding hood) by @/ljubimaya

Mad hatter! Hanma Shuji x Reader (inspired by Alice in Wonderland) by @6ronze

LOVE AND DEEPSPACE

Demon King! Sylus x Reader by @aztecbrujeria

JUJUTSU KAISEN

Vampire! Gojo Satoru x Reader by @avatarofstars

Death! Geto Suguru x Reader by @sugurouge (Inspired by Death's messengers)

ARCANE

Warwick/Vander x Reader by @fortluocha (Inspired by Beauty and the Beast)

MY HERO ACADEMIA

WHO HAVE I REMEMBERED? Dabi x Reader by @amalainse (Inspired by The Frog Prince)

HAIKYUU

Oikawa Tooru x Reader by @amalainse (Inspired by The Little Mermaid)

[kwanisms]

Stranded for the Holidays Collab

➮ a stray kids & ateez writer collaboration

The holidays are typically about family, friends, and gatherings but sometimes it also means inclimate weather and forces beyond our control running amok and ruining what's meant to be a joyous time. So here are 16 stories about being stranded during the holidays brought to you by 9 amazing writers; @anyamaris , @millennial-fangirl , @twisted-tales-of-all , @yoonguurt , @kpop-stories-21 , @staytinyville , @skyechild , @stardragongalaxy , & myself.

index

❅ Swiss Holiday by Booki

➮ best friend's brother!Yunho × f!Reader

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 21.4k

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: All throughout her formative years, Y/N has always harbored a bit of a crush on her best friend’s brother, Yunho. Having not seen him for years, she doesn’t expect those feelings to come back when she joins the Jeong’s on a family trip to a cabin in the Alps for the holiday. When she meets Yunho and his girlfriend, she’s hopeful that she can finally move on.

❅ Read Now

❅ Purrfect Company by Anya

➮ cafe owner!Minho × reader

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 6.7k

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: Working at a cat cafe has its perks, but your sarcastic boss Minho is definitely not one of them. Despite it being the holidays, you have no one to spend it with so you’ve volunteered to take the shift at the cafe on Christmas eve. A power outage and a surprise visit from your seemingly rigid boss has you discovering things you’d never have known otherwise. Maybe Minho has a softer side than you’d realized.

❅ Read Now

❅ Room 25: a Christmas Love Story by Liz

➮ idol!Changbin × reader

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 1.6k

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: Changbin is enjoying his Christmas break from Stray Kids and life. He checks into a ski resort. He runs to an old hometown friend. Who is working at the resort. One can surmise it turns into a Christmas romance.

❅ Read Now

❅ Bittersweet Holiday by Sar

➮ Hongjoong × reader

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 1.7k

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: Christmas has always been yours and Hongjoong's favorite holiday. After all, it was on Devember 24th four years ago that the two of you became husband and wife. But this year is different; not only will it be the last one you celebrate with Hongjoong, it will be the last one you celebrate period. And you can't think of a better place to be when things happen than snowed in with your husband at your family's mountain cabin.

❅ Read Now

❅ Just as the Kids Predicted by Jay

➮ Jeongin × reader

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 6k

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: When the new student mentor catches first-grade teacher Mr. Yang's eyes, he tries to keep his crush to a minimum. However, then they get too drunk at the annual holiday party and confess their feels for him as he drives them home, he begins making moves, and a snowstorm during a staff-only workday helps them move things along even faster.

❅ Read Now

❅ This Isn't Grey's Anatomy by Kay

➮ Seungmin × reader

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 4.8k

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: Working the night shift at the hospital has always been easy for Y/N because most often than not, everyone eas asleep and there wasn't much she needed to do. However, when she gets Seungmin as a patient because he has bronchitis, her chill nights were anything but chill. With the heating system working slowly, there was only so much blankets could do to heat up the body.

❅ Read Now

❅ Crafting Christmas by Sky

➮ single dad!San × f!Reader

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 15.2k

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: a failed relationship and an ailing mother forces Y/N to move back to her hometown, despite not wanting to. She knows in her heart that everything will be the same as the day she left. Nothing ever changes in a small town... except when it does. A new neighbor, a new hardware store, and two new additions to two will bring the holiday magic into Y/N's life. The question is, will the magic stay or will the Ghost of Christmas Past ruin everything?

❅ Read Now

❅ Home for the Holidays by Mio

➮ Seonghwa × reader

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 4.7

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: Seonghwa comes gome early the day before Christmas Eve to surprise you, and with the roads being closed to all the snow you were not expecting anyone at your door at 9pm.

❅ Read Now

❅ Naughty or Nice: a Complicated Christmas Story by Liz

➮ Mingi × reader

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 1.5k

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: Mingi and you broke off a week before Christmas and was due to get the rest of his stuff on Christmas Eve. Was he being cruel in picking it up on that day, both his and your favorite holiday. Or was he trying to get back together? Either way, you would get your answer since you're now snowed in.

❅ Read Now

❅ Snow Stars by Haru

➮ Wooyoung × reader

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 1k

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: On vacation for the holidays, a break from all the busy times have left you feeling under the weather. What better way to warm you up and get better than the brightest star in your heart?

❅ Read Now

❅ A Boyfriend for Christmas by Sar

➮ Jisung × reader

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 2.6

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: Telling your parents you had a boyfriend always kept them off your back about settling down. Now that they're coming up for Christmas, your lie is about to be exposed and you begin to panic. Luckily, Fate takes pity on you and has you running into a cute barista who captures your heart immediately.

❅ Read Now

❅ Frauds and Festivities by Jay

➮ Jongho × reader

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 5.3k

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: You and your boyfriend have been drifting away for the past couple of weeks. It's god-awful timing though, as the planned holiday trip with your friends creeps around the corner. After deciding to stick it out through the holidays, you manage to get on each other's nerves more than ever before, but you must keep up the act.

❅ Read Now

❅ Less Than Perfect by Anya

➮ boyfriend!Yeosang × reader

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 10.5k

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: Your boyfriend Yeosang has planned the most amazing vacation for the two of you over the Christmas holiday. While the journey starts out fine, you both find yourselves in a small town with car troubles and no mechanic to fix it because of the holiday.  What should have been a perfectly planned vacation turns into everything going wrong, or so your boyfriend thinks.  It could just be that perfect isn’t what you’re looking for.

❅ Read Now

❅ the Most Wonderful Time of the Year by Sky

➮ Chris × f!Reader

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 9.6k

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: Christmas this, Christmas that. The "most wonderful time of the year" is not how Y/N would describe it. Sure, it used to be a magical time full of happiness and love, but she let that belief go years ago. Christmas is all about how much money you spend on someone and making yourself look good to outsiders. Snow is wet and everything is cold during this time of year; makes everything gross. Her best friend is tired of have the Grinch as a roommate, especially when he remembers what it was like when she loved Christmas. This year he finally decides that it's time to bring the magic back into her life. And maybe that magic will bring a little love with it.

❅ Read Now

❅ Ghost of the Past by Booki

➮ ex!Hyunjin × f!Reader

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 20.1k

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: Y/N never expected to run into her ex again, especially not at a holiday party of all places. Nor did she expect for him to offer to drive her home when her ride bails on her. She definitely did not expect Hyunjin’s car to get stuck in the snow and for them to have to spend the night at an elderly couple’s house where they, unsurprisingly, have to share a room and even more unsurprisingly, there’s only one bed.

❅ Read Now

❅ Holiday Warmth by Haru

➮ Felix × reader

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 1.1k

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: after bring snowed in from the winter storm and your friends in neighboring cabins, what better way to pass the time as the countdown to Christmas is near.

❅ Read Now

[forest-hashira]

Biblically Accurate

hi guys!!! i wrote this as an entry for my anniversary/200 follower milestone collab event! i have at least one more entry planned for myself, and a few other people are writing/drawing things as entries as well! you can find the event masterlist here. anyways, i hope you guys enjoy this silly goofy little thing 💜

read on ao3 | wc: ~3.1k | cw: gender neutral reader (no pronouns, reader is dressed as a female character for halloween), bickering/banter/teasing, slight hint of jealous gojo, can be interpreted as pre-relationship or fully platonic

“You’re really not putting any more effort into your costume?” you asked, looking Shoko over and eyeing the white sheet draped over her arm as you passed her your hand mirror to hold. You were in the common area of the dorms with her, Nanami, and Haibara, the three of you putting the finishing touches on your costumes.

“Nope,” Shoko confirmed, accepting the mirror and holding it in her lap as you sat down, pulling out your small set of face paints. “Gojo told me my only options were a ghost or a sexy nun.”

“Not even a regular nun?”

She shook her head. “He said if I showed up dressed like a “musty old lady” nun he would refuse to be seen with me.” The way she used air quotes and an exaggerated expression of disgust around the description made you roll your eyes, despite your smile; that sounded just like your senpai. 

“I don’t blame you for picking the ghost, then.”

“Thank you.” Shoko smiled at you, popping a piece of gum into her mouth with her free hand; she’d been trying to quit smoking – on campus, at least – since she’d gotten busted by Yaga so many times already this school year. 

Setting your face paints and brushes down on the table beside Shoko, you stood again, grabbing a few paper towels and filling a small glass with water to clean off your brushes when you were finished. You glanced over at your classmates as you walked back to your seat, smiling a bit to yourself as you saw Haibara gushing over Nanami’s costume.

Doing group costumes by year had been Gojo’s idea, though he insisted the themes needed to be kept secret for each group. Hearing Shoko say what her options apparently were gave you some idea what your upperclassmen had chosen as their theme, but you wouldn’t know until the other boys arrived; you just hoped they weren’t too late, since you knew Gojo was the only way any of you would be able to get into the party he had insisted you all needed to attend. You didn’t have a lot of particular feelings about going to the party, but the idea of getting to spend time with everyone was really nice, since it was rare that all six of you were in Tokyo at the same time and not occupied by other things. 

“What theme did you guys go with, anyway?” Shoko asked, as you sat back down and gestured for her to hold the mirror up for you. “You can’t possibly all be from the same movie or something.”

“We’re not,” you confirmed, wetting your brush and lightly tapping off the excess water before dipping into the red paint. “We’re all from different Ghibli movies.”

“That’s your theme?”

You carefully traced the outline of the first triangle under your eye. “All of our characters are royalty.” You paused, considering for a moment, then added, “Well, sort of.”

“Sort of?” Shoko arched a brow at your words. 

“Yeah, sort of,” you said, filling in the first triangle and outlining the second. “Haibara is actually royalty. He’s Prince Arren, from Tales from Earthsea. The movie came out this year, it’s what made him suggest the theme in the first place.” The brush was dipped back in the red paint, then the second triangle filled in. “I’m San from Princess Mononoke.” You went quiet for a moment, moving your hair apart a bit on your forehead to give yourself space to paint the final triangle. “And Nanami is Howl from Howl’s Moving Castle. He’s not technically royalty, but he has a castle.” 

Glancing over your shoulder at your classmates to make sure they weren’t listening, you leaned in closer to Shoko. “It was Haibara’s suggestion,” you said, much quieter than before. “I think he just wanted to see Nanami with earrings on and his hair down.”

She grinned at your words, both of you only managing to stifle a laugh because right then was when Gojo and Geto decided to make their grand entrance. Geto wore a pair of comfortable looking red pants, a simple black long sleeve shirt, and a red jacket on top. There was a headband with two small red horns atop his head, and a little plastic pitchfork in his hand, and when you glanced down, you saw a red, pointed tail hanging off the back of his pants; clearly he was going as a – the? – devil.

Even without the context of Geto’s costume, it would’ve been hard to mistake what Gojo was supposed to be. The flowy white shirt, white jeans, feathery white wings – which were larger than they really had the right to be – fixed to his back, and the silver halo headband atop his fluffy white hair making it obvious that he was an angel. He was without his dark sunglasses for once, presumably because they didn’t go with the rest of the ensemble he wore.

“No need to worry everyone, your favorite Tokyo Jujutsu High students have arrived!” Gojo announced with a wide, mischievous grin. Behind him, you saw Geto roll his eyes, even if there was a faint hint of a smile on his lips, too. 

“You are not my favorite student,” Shoko and Nanami said in unison, completely by accident. You bit your lip to keep from chuckling at the coincidence, but you lost that battle when you saw the indignant look on Gojo’s face.

The sound of your laughter pulled his attention from your friends, and he scowled as he looked at you, though really it looked more like a pout. “What are you laughing at?” he groused.

“You,” you answered simply, grinning at him. “It’s funny how bent out of shape you get when someone tells you you’re not their favorite.”

He jutted out his bottom lip, crossing his arms over his chest. You could tell he wanted to argue, but was apparently having a hard time coming up with any sort of witty retort. “Whatever,” he said eventually. “What are you supposed to be, anyway? You’ve got red all over your face.”

You just rolled your eyes at him. “I’m San,” you told him, turning back to face the mirror Shoko still held for you, putting the final touches on your face paint. 

“Who?”

“The wolf girl from the movie that came out a while back, right?” Geto asked. “Princess of something, I think…”

“Princess Mononoke, yeah!” Haibara chirped, grinning. “I’m surprised you knew, it feels like not a lot of people have seen it.”

“Because they haven’t,” Gojo said, rolling his eyes. “People only see the good Ghibli movies.”

Irritated, you dropped the paintbrush in the glass of water you’d gotten to clean it off. You turned back to face him, a scowl deep on your face. “All Studio Ghibli movies are good ones,” you snapped, barely refraining from calling him names. “If you can’t understand or appreciate the deeper themes in the movies, you can just say that.”

“What themes?” he asked, looking a bit more genuinely, less snippy. “I haven’t seen it, I wouldn’t know what they are.”

“Environmentalism, animism, disability, true love, cycles of violence—” Geto began, but Gojo waved him off.

“Ok, some heavy hitters, I get it. It doesn’t sound very entertaining, though.”

“There’s a curse that develops from the negative energy imbued in a weapon,” Nanami cut in, expression unchanged and seemingly unenthused by the conversation, but that wasn’t unusual; Haibara was really the only one who could ever seem to get him to smile even a little bit.

There was a brief moment of silence, punctuated by a curious “Really?” from Gojo; it would’ve been funnier if you weren’t irritated over him dissing your favorite Ghibli movie.

Seeming to register the other boys’ costumes then, Gojo grinned. “Haibara, you make an amazing Arren! And Nanamin, you do kind of look the part with the hair and all, but… you know Howl is supposed to be charming, right?”

Your classmate’s expression went from unaffected to irked in less time than it took you to blink, though when Haibara jumped in with a defensive, “I think he’s very charming, in his own way,” he went red almost to the tips of his ears. 

The mischievous flash in Gojo’s eyes was impossible to miss, but Geto smacked him in the back of the head before he could say anything. The white haired sorcerer glared at his best friend, then stalked off with a huff, crossing the room until he stood beside the couch you sat on. Without saying anything, he plucked the mirror from Shoko’s hand and began fussing with his hair. 

“What do you think of my costume, hm?” he asked you, straightening his halo before shooting you a grin. “Pretty great, huh?”

You just shrugged. “It looks like any other angel costume.”

His eyes widened, and he stared at you, open-mouthed, looking deeply offended. “What do you mean ‘just like any other angel costume’?” he demanded.

“White clothes, white wings, halo headband. It’s pretty basic, Gojo-senpai.”

“But nobody else has eyes like mine,” he pointed out.

“No,” you conceded, “but you’re also not showing them all off.”

“…All my what?”

“Your eyes. You’ve got six of them, don’t you?”

Though you fought hard to conceal your grin, the sound of Shoko’s snicker made it impossible, and you barely bit back a laugh.

Finally catching up to your joke, Gojo laughed too. “I think even if I could show all six eyes at the same time it would scare the normies too bad.”

“Yaga-sensei would probably have your ass for it, too,” Shoko added.

“Like how he has your ass for smoking on campus?” Geto asked her, dropping down to sit in the armchair adjacent to the couch, looking smug.

“You smoke on campus too,” she retorted.

He smirked. “Yes, but I don’t get caught like you do.”

“I’m gonna start ratting you out.”

“Sure you will.”

Rolling your eyes as the two upperclassmen bickered with each other, you turned your attention back to Gojo, and you were more than a little surprised to see how much closer to you he’d gotten, leaning down to look you in the eye, despite how he towered over your seated form.

“So,” he asked, “you gonna help me show off my Six Eyes or what?” 

You blinked dumbly at him for a moment. “…What?”

He rolled his eyes, but there was still a smile on his face. “You’ve got paints right here—” he gestured to the table in front of you “— how else are the normies supposed to see all six of my eyes?”

Once you finally processed what he was suggesting, you bit back a grin. The idea was more than a little funny, but you couldn’t let him know you thought that. If he knew, it would go straight to his head, which was big enough already; you’d joked with Nanami more than once that if Gojo’s head got any bigger, he’d have a hard time walking upright. 

“Well?” Gojo prodded, when you didn’t answer fast enough for his liking.

“Fine,” you sighed, “but only if you’ll sit down and shut up long enough for me to do it.”

He stood up straight, saluted you, then mimed zipping his lips shut and throwing away the key. Geto pretended to catch said key, and you shook your head at them, smiling slightly to yourself. As he settled himself on the floor in front of you, you thoroughly rinsed your brush, making sure none of the red paint still lingered in the bristles, then dipped it into the white paint on your palette. 

When you turned your attention back to your senpai, you were somewhat startled to see him staring at you with wide, earnest eyes, though he’d stopped smiling for the time being. It unsettled you a bit, having his full, unimpeded focus on you like that, but… it wasn’t entirely unpleasant, if you were being honest with yourself. “Ready?”

He nodded eagerly, fulfilling your request for him to sit down and shut up. You wondered briefly if your wording had been too harsh, but decided there was no use dwelling on it anymore. You nodded back, then carefully began to make an outline of two more sets of eyes on his face: two extra eyes on each cheek, side by side under his real, already very striking eyes. 

Your lines were far from perfect, but they were steady enough, so you were happy with them. You dipped your brush back in the paint whenever you started to run out, making sure the white covered everything inside each of the outlines. Giving all four spaces a chance to dry, you once again cleaned your brush as thoroughly as you could, then switched to the blue paint. It wasn’t an exact match for Gojo’s eyes, but you figured it was close enough that it wouldn’t matter in low lighting.

“You’re pretty good at this!” Haibara praised, dropping to sit beside you on the couch.

You felt your cheeks heat at his words. “Oh, uh. Thank you, but I’m not a professional, I’m just trying my best.”

“Well I think you’re doing a wonderful job,” your classmate insisted, practically beaming at you. You offered him a smile, then turned your attention to Gojo once again and— was he glaring at Haibara?

Gojo’s expression changed so quickly once he had your attention again that you couldn’t tell if you’d imagined him glaring or not, but you decided not to push it, since that would just wind up being awkward for everyone. 

Just as carefully as you’d painted the whites of each of the eyes, you added the blue irises, trying to make the circles as perfect as you could, though trying to work on such a small space made that rather difficult. You did your best, and the end result was not as terrible as it could have been, you supposed.

Another thorough cleaning of your brush between colors, this time with the sounds of your classmates and upperclassmen chatting to each other as you worked, which came as a relief; when it was silent before, it had felt like everyone was staring at you, and it made you nervous. 

It was still a bit unnerving to have Gojo staring at you the way he was, but there wasn’t really a way around that, so you chose to ignore the way it made your stomach flutter. 

You dipped your brush into the black paint this time, placing pupils in the center of each eye. After getting a bit more paint on the brush, you added the faintest hint of an outline to the underside of each eye, wanting them to stand out a bit more against his already pale skin. 

Once you finished, you sat back a bit, looking over your handiwork. The eyes looked fine, but it felt like something was missing, you just couldn’t figure out what.

“Eyelashes,” came Nanami’s voice from behind the couch.

“Huh?” you asked, turning your head to look at your classmate, your brows furrowed slightly with confusion.

“Eyelashes,” he repeated, voice just as disinterested as before. “That’s what they’re missing.” His eyes left Gojo’s face and met yours as he shrugged. “You were staring at them really hard, I figured you thought something was missing.”

“Thanks,” you said, a bit sheepishly. “I was trying to figure out what I was forgetting. I’ll add the lashes.”

Nanami just nodded, his expression unchanged, though you were pretty sure he was glad to have been of help. You nodded back, then turned back to Gojo once again. 

After cleaning your brush in the now-murky glass of water, you switched back to the white paint, adding delicate lashes to each of the four eyes with light flicks of the brush, and even adding a few little touches to the irises to give them a bit more dimension.

The last few additions didn’t take long at all, and when you leaned back to look at your work again, you smiled. Nanami was right, they did look a lot better now that you’d added lashes to them. “Okay,” you said, dropping the brush back into the water now that you were satisfied with your work. “All done. You ready to see?”

Gojo’s expression lit up, and he nodded enthusiastically. Then, remembering he held the mirror in his lap, he picked it up, turning his head back and forth to get a good look at all four eyes. He looked absolutely giddy as he put the mirror down in his lap again to look up at you, but he said nothing. You were confused for a moment, then remembered.

“You can speak now, Gojo-senpai. I’m finished.”

He turned towards Geto then, snapping to get the other boy’s attention, then making grabby hands and pointing at his mouth. Geto also looked confused for a moment, then remembered that he had “stolen” the fake key that kept his classmate’s mouth locked shut. The raven haired boy rolled his eyes, then mimed tossing the key back to his friend. “You’re so weird.”

After “catching” the key, the frosty haired boy was quick to unlock his mouth, then stick his tongue out at his friend. “You’re just jealous that you’re not getting all the attention for once,” he retorted, but Geto just rolled his eyes again.

Turning back to you, Gojo was practically beaming. “You made me look so cool!” he exclaimed, then added, “Well, cooler, because I already looked cool, like always.”

“Oh yeah,” Shoko drawled. “You’re soooo cool, Gojo.”

“I am cool!” he insisted, pushing himself up off the floor as he scowled at her. “Your costume is just a sheet, you don’t get to talk to me about what’s cool.”

“Where did you say this party was again?” Haibara cut in, quickly dispelling the budding argument between the two upperclassmen. 

Gojo beamed down at the younger boy. “It’s a surprise!” he said, a hint of mischief in his eyes. “But we need to get going if we wanna get there before it gets too crowded. C’mon!” He herded everyone up from their seats and towards the door of the common room, hyping up the party as much as he could. You brought up the rear of the group, but you paused when he turned back to face you.

“Thanks for painting these on for me,” he said, gesturing towards his face. “I appreciate it.”

He turned away again before you could say anything, but it took you a moment before you caught up with everyone again; Gojo had never thanked you for anything before, but you were glad that he did, even if it made your cheeks burn a little bit.

taglist: @mitsuristoleme @redlikerozez @oceaneyesinla @pixelcafe-network @peachsukii 

@lemonloaves @lu-dao-writes @roselleviennesstuff

@dr-runs-with-scissors @entirelysein-e @teddybeartoji @sugurei @whatthefucksatan

@witchbybirth @gods-landing @iesbiangojo @ambiguouslady42 @hayatoseyepatch

join my taglist!

[fairytalesfromthesmp]

Settle into your seats, folks, we’ve got some new stories to tell. We are proud to present…

Fairytales from the SMP: Volume II

This year’s storybook consists of twelve incredible fairytales reimagined by a few wonderful minds of the dsmp fandom! Follow some of your favorites through tales of family, friendship, romance, and more as we dive into this spellbinding collection.

Thank you to everyone who made this possible! To all the writers, artists, betas, and backups, this wouldn’t have been possible without you. Thank you to the mods, new and old, and thank you to all who joined us in this journey, come and gone. You’ve all made this worthwhile!

Be sure to give lots of love to all these people because without them, this collab would be nothing more than a dream!

Little Red Riding Hood - Written by Ocean ( @bottleofchaos ), Illustrated by Taizi ( @rebelwithoutabroom ) and Yumi ( @mahikamihan )

Snow White & The Seven Dwarves - Written by Stardust ( @chasing-stardust-22 ), Illustrated by Ocean

Hansel and Gretel - Written by Day ( @day-time-dream ), Illustrated by Zuzu ( @zuzypiia ) and Orange ( @fresh-flames )

Jack and the Beanstalk - Written by Lupine ( @iced-sweet-dt ), Illustrated by Michy ( @michygranger23 )

The Tortoise and the Hare - Written by Blank ( @blankerthought ), Illustrated by Calder ( @day-mark ) and Curo ( @curoopeez )

Robin Hood - Written by Scoops ( @scoops404 ), Illustrated by Thal ( @thal-chandra ) and Root ( @rutadales )

Prince and the Pauper - Written by Cadence ( @dwtdog ), Illustrated by Blank

The Seal Catcher - Written by Chelsey ( @czargasm ), Illustrated by Bicho ( @bicho-callejero ) and VoidPidgeon ( @voidpidgeon )

The Three Musketeers - Written by Amie/Bagel ( @bagelrites ), Illustrated by Litchi ( @llitchilitchi ) and Vi ( @icecreamvi )

Beauty and the Beast - Written by Taizi, Illustrated by VoidPidgeon and Wolflyn ( @wolflyndraws )

The Unwilling Mermaid - Written by Sword ( @swordfright ), Illustrated by Root and Kenjo ( @kenjo-arts )

Rapunzel - Written by Crow ( @mello-when-hi ), Illustrated by Calder and Shishi ( @shishi-neraoiba )

Beta Readers: Echo ( @timetravelkoolaid ), Luna ( @milktearosethorn ), Scrims ( @scrimblyprimbly ), Lobelia ( @unholy-virtue ), Vee ( @twirlybumblevee ), Spri ( @showcontrols ), and Jinx ( @nyxcandie )

Backups: Backup Writer Rav ( @raviolihailstorm ), Backup Writer Lobelia, and Backup Artist Harmony ( @harmingharmony )

[lovetaroandtaemin]

Incomparable Beauty

Bae Joohyun x Reader

Word Count: 12,965

Genre: Angst, fluff, smut, fantasy AU

Rating: Explicit, MINORS DNI!

Summary: Y/N is a princess of the Galestorm Empire that's engaged to Prince Arthur of Eledath. She bonds with Prince Arthur quickly, but his mother, Queen Irene, immediately dislikes her. After disaster strikes, however, Y/N and the queen grow closer, resulting in a night neither of them will forget.

Warnings: DEAD DOVE, DO NOT EAT. Arranged marriage, jealousy, terrible revenge plots, unwanted suggestive flirting, generally unsettling men, murder (poison), mentions of war but no details, major character death (not Irene or the reader), detailed descriptions of grief, religious themes, age gap relationship (Reader is written to be in her early 20s and Irene is written to be in her mid 40s), infidelity, NSFW content (making out, unprotected sex, dom!Irene, some breast play, oral (f. recieving), use of a strap-on, some degradation and praise, a little bit of biting). If you think I missed a warning, please let me know!

A/N: This fic is part of the "Once Upon A Time" collab hosted by the amazing @nothoughtsjustfic!!! The fairy tale I chose as my inspiration was Snow White. I hope you guys like it! If you do, be sure to check out the collab masterlist, which is linked here. So many incredible writers are involved with this collab, and I definitely recommend showing them some support!

I also want to take a second and acknowledge the absolutely incredible @diamonddaze01, who made the banner for this fic. Thank you so much, Tara! If y'all like the banner as much as I do, definitely go show her blog some love!

Taglist: @xomakara

Fic is under the cut.

You knew exactly how your life would go from the moment you were old enough to understand your status as princess of the Galestorm Empire. From the time you were a young girl, your parents told you in no uncertain terms that you would be married off to a prince of whichever nearby kingdom your father wanted an alliance with, produce an heir, and live the rest of your days as a dutiful wife, loving mother, and dedicated queen. It was the life that you were born into, and though there were times that you desperately wanted to live your life on your own terms, you were determined to play your role to the best of your ability.

After your twenty-first birthday passed, you knew it was a matter of time before you would be engaged. So, when your mother came to you a few days after your birthday and told you that you were to be married to the Crown Prince Arthur of Eledath, you weren’t exactly surprised. You couldn’t really say that you liked your now-fiancé, considering that you’d never even met him before, but you still hoped that you could grow to love him one day.

As soon as your engagement was made official, you spent months learning as much as you could about Eledath, from its history and geography to cultural customs and court etiquette. In all honesty, you found the lessons boring, with none of the information you learned making the hours-long lectures worth it. However, you knew that they were necessary. After all, what kind of future queen would you be if you just showed up in a new country and made no effort to fit in or treat others with respect?

Once the team of tutors that had traveled from Eledath for your lessons deemed you ready, you packed all that you could and made the journey to your new home. Goldmyst Palace was said to be the home of fashion in Eledath, with everyone in the kingdom looking to Queen Irene and the rest of the ladies in court as icons of culture. Even outside of Eledath, neighboring kingdoms took inspiration from Queen Irene and her brilliant approach to personal style.

You had to admit, you were incredibly nervous to meet your now-fiancé’s parents. King John and Queen Irene had a well-earned reputation for being intimidating, and even the citizens of the Galestorm Empire knew that it was a bad idea to get on the Eledath royal family’s bad side.

When you arrived at Goldmyst, it seemed like the entire kingdom was at the palace’s gates to welcome their prince’s new fiancée. The crowd was a little bit overwhelming, to be honest, but it was nothing you hadn’t experienced before. After all, you’d made more than your fair share of public appearances at various meetings and festivals as princess of the Galestorm Empire. As you actually got past the gates, however, you realized that you were in over your head.

Goldmyst was easily twice as big as Sunrider Castle, where you grew up, and there wasn’t a doubt in your mind that there were three times as many people going about their business inside. As you waited to find out what the next step of starting your new life would be, you couldn’t help but wonder why there were so many people and what they possibly could have been doing. Some of them were carrying tools of their trades, so you could easily identify the cooks, blacksmiths, and cleaning staff, but others you couldn’t quite figure out.

You were distracted from your observations by an unfamiliar voice calling your name. You turned around to see who it was, and you saw one of the most beautiful women you’d ever seen. She wore an opulent gown that was made with the most luxurious-looking fabric you’d ever seen and covered with the finest pearls that money could buy. Every single thing about her made you stop and stare in complete awe, from the delicate crown on her head to her features that looked like they were sculpted by the goddess of beauty herself.

You knew before she even introduced herself that you were standing in front of Queen Irene.

“Your majesty,” you said with a curtsy, “I apologize if I kept you waiting.”

“It’s alright. Welcome to Goldmyst Palace, my dear. Would you like me to show you around and introduce you to my son?”

“That would be lovely, your majesty.”

“Then come with me.”

The queen showed you the location of every room in the palace that you had permission to enter, telling you about the history and purpose of each room as she went. As you looked around the vast and elegant spaces and watched people moving through them like they were meant to be there, not a single person looking out of place, you couldn’t help but hope that you could fit into this world one day, too.

The tour ended with Prince Arthur’s quarters, which were adjacent to the area of the palace that you would be staying in. It was there that you finally met your fiancé. He was conventionally attractive, something that you were embarrassed to admit you’d hoped for, and he looked to be very athletic, with a slim and muscular build. You couldn’t help but notice the way he avoided your eyes as you entered, however.

“Hello,” you said with yet another curtsy, “My name is (Y/N). It’s an honor to be your fiancée.”

“It’s an honor to be yours as well, my lady,” Arthur replied before kissing your hand, clearly more nervous than he wanted to admit. “Would you like to stay and play cards?”

“That sounds lovely.”

“I’ll give you two some privacy, then,” Irene said, turning toward the door.

“Wait, your majesty, please.”

The queen turned back to you with a look of confusion on her face and asked, “What is it, dear?”

“Thank you for the tour. I appreciate that you took time out of your busy schedule to show me around and make me feel welcome here.”

“You’re welcome, dear. Have fun with Arthur,” she said before she left the room.

From the moment Irene laid eyes on you, she didn’t like you. Every word that left your mouth sounded like you were reading from a script, you looked like a mess, and you were simply too naïve for your own good. Still, the queen knew better than to make snap judgements, so she decided that she would wait and see what you were like after you adjusted to life in court.

After Irene left the room, and you were alone with Arthur, an awkward silence filled the room. You wanted to say something, but you really didn’t know what. Based on the way he opened his mouth to speak and stopped himself, it seemed like Arthur wasn’t quite sure either. In the end, hoping to cut through the tension that had started to build, you decided to utilize some advice that your mother gave you before you left: when you want someone to open up to you, start by asking them about what makes them happy and really listen to what they have to say.

“So, Arthur, what makes you happiest in life?”

Your fiancée thought for a moment before he answered, “Art.”

“Why do you like it?”

“I think I’ve just always enjoyed making things. When I was a boy, I gravitated toward woodworking, but I lost interest as I got older. Now, I spend as much of my free time as I can painting and composing songs. Those aren’t exactly considered suitable hobbies for a future king, though, so my parents always try their best to steer me toward something else whenever they see me doing them.”

You softened as you heard Arthur speak about his hobbies. With a smile, you responded, “Can I see your paintings?”

He hesitated for a moment before he said, “Sure. I’ve converted one of the smaller rooms that’s attached to this one to a small gallery. I can show you, if you’d like.”

“That sounds lovely.”

“Follow me,” he said, a mischievous grin forming on his face.

You followed Arthur to a corner of the room that you wouldn’t have noticed if he hadn’t pointed it out to you. He started to search the wall for something, which you found odd at first. It all started to make sense, however, when you heard a click as he touched a certain part of the wall. You had to admit that you were a bit startled by the bookshelf on the adjacent wall starting to move when he pushed the button, though.

You were hesitant to go through the newly opened passage at first, but when Arthur turned back toward you with the same mischievous smile as before, you were inclined to trust him. Sure, it probably wasn’t wise to trust a man that you just met, especially when he tried to lead you through a secret passage, but the man that you’d just met was your fiancé, after all. You would have to trust him if you were going to marry him.

You followed Arthur through the cramped passage into a small room filled with the most beautiful paintings that you’d ever seen. He had a unique ability to capture the essence of every subject, from human to animal or even plant, and make them look as if they were about to jump right off of the canvas. His attention to detail was astonishing, and you couldn’t help but feel grateful that he already trusted you enough to let you see the things that he created.

“Thank you for showing me this,” you said.

“Thank you for caring to see it.”

There was a short moment of silence after he spoke, though it wasn’t as awkward as it was before he started to open up to you. You were the first one to break the silence once again when you said, “I seem to remember being promised a card game,” a soft smile gracing your features.

“That you were. Shall we?”

“We shall.”

You and Arthur made your way back through the secret passage, and he closed the door by pressing the same button that had opened it. You wanted to ask him more about the passage, but you figured that it was a bad time. Besides, you were actually quite excited to play a game with him.

While Arthur taught you to play his favorite card game, the two of you got to know each other far better. He promised to play you some of his compositions next time the two of you were alone together, and you told him a bit more about your own hobbies.

“What do you like to do for fun, (Y/N)?” he asked, hoping to get you to open up the same way he’d opened up to you.

“I love to sew. I learned from my governess as a child. I took to it like a fish to water, as she would say.”

“Why do you like it?”

“The quiet time spent creating is good for my mood, and I enjoy being able to make things for myself instead of relying on others. I actually made most of the clothes that I brought with me here.”

“That’s amazing. You’re quite talented.”

“So are you.”

As the game went on, you no longer viewed Arthur as a stranger. You wouldn’t necessarily say that you were in love with him like you’d hoped, but you were definitely beginning to consider him a friend. When you saw the way he smiled at you after you beat him at the game, you felt safe in the assumption that he was starting to view you the same way.

Life in Goldmyst Palace was vastly different from your upbringing at Sunrider Castle, so it took you quite some time to adjust to your new home. While the etiquette wasn’t necessarily stricter than back home, it was quite different. For example, when you had meals at Sunrider, it was customary to wait until everyone at your table was finished eating to leave. At Goldmyst, you had to get used to the fact that you were permitted to go back to your quarters as soon as you were done eating. You tried to remember all the rules right away, but it would have been a lie to say that you didn’t struggle at first.

Irene saw the way you struggled over the course of your first few weeks at Goldmyst and desperately tried to convince her husband that you weren’t a good enough match for Arthur. John tended to wave her off, however, citing how powerful the Galestorm Empire was and how beneficial the match would be for Eledath. What the king didn’t know, however, was that there was another reason for Irene’s dislike of you. It made sense that he didn’t know, though. After all, how could he know about the things that his wife did while he slept if she didn’t tell him?

When the queen disappeared into her private chambers after her husband went to bed, she consulted her closest advisor: an enchanted mirror that she received as a wedding gift from her mother. It was charmed to always give a truthful answer when asked a question, no matter what it was, and she treasured its advice.

When Irene was certain that no one else would hear her whispers, she asked the mirror for advice in maintaining her appearance, as well as asking who the most beautiful woman in the kingdom was. Every night, without fail, the mirror would respond that she was the most beautiful and help her keep it that way. Since you’d arrived at Goldmyst Palace, however, the mirror had begun to give her a different answer.

“Magic mirror in my hand, who is the most beautiful woman in the land?” Irene asked, desperate for a different answer than the night before.

“As much as I wish I could say that it is you, my queen,” the voice within the mirror began, “it is not. You know as well as I that the answer to your question is (Y/N).”

“Isn’t there something that you could tell me that could help me surpass her once again?”

“I am afraid there is not.”

Already growing frustrated with its lack of assistance, she said, “I should smash you to bits,” and put the mirror away.

Once the mirror was tucked away, Irene went to bed in hopes of getting some beauty rest. She spent hours trying to sleep before giving up and thinking about the things that she could do to restore her position as the most beautiful woman in the kingdom. However, since the mirror decided not to give her any actual advice this time, she decided to just handle the situation herself.

What Irene really wanted to do was send you back to the Galestorm Empire and call off the engagement entirely. Her husband would never allow that, however, considering how important their allyship would be in times of war. The next thing that Irene thought about doing was disposing of you the old-fashioned way. The moment the thought crossed her mind; however, she decided against it, considering it too drastic. In the end, she settled on something much more satisfying, anyway: simple revenge.

While Irene was planning her revenge over the mirror’s declaration, you were finding yourself growing closer to Arthur than you originally thought that you would. As you became more comfortable at Goldmyst Palace, you found yourself spending as much time as possible with your fiancé and actually enjoying his company.

Your favorite way to spend time with Arthur was to watch him paint while you attended to garments that needed to be mended. As each of you worked on your respective projects, you would ask each other questions about them, as well as discussing whatever came to mind, like your upcoming wedding.

“Can I ask you something?” Arthur inquired as he painted a flower.

“Of course. What is it?”

“What kind of wedding do you want?”

The question made you stop and think for longer than you would have liked. Truthfully, you’d never really thought about the matter. Until Arthur asked, you assumed that you wouldn’t really get to have a say. The more you thought about it, however, the more you realized that you did have a few ideas for what you wanted your wedding to be like.

“I think I’d like to have lots of flowers. A large bouquet, flowers decorating the entire hall, just, flowers everywhere. I’d also like to make my own dress, if possible.”

“Are you sure? That seems like a difficult job.”

“It will be, but that’s why I want to do it.”

“I admire your persistence, (Y/N).”

“Thank you.”

“I admire you.” Arthur’s voice was softer as he spoke this time, as if he was nervous about your response.

“I admire you as well.”

There was a moment of silence after that, since both of you were unsure of how to continue the conversation. Arthur was the first to break it this time, however, by asking, “May I kiss you?”

You nodded, placing the stockings that you were mending to the side, and Arthur carefully placed his brush in a cup that was set up by his easel. He seemed hesitant at first, but the moment his lips met yours, he melted into you. Your arms wrapped around his neck, and he let out a soft sigh.

Your intimate moment with Arthur was interrupted by a knock on your door and Irene’s voice saying, “(Y/N)! I need to speak with you about something!”

You quickly pulled away, picking up your mending to appear like you weren’t just doing something that your fiancé’s mother may not approve of. “Come in!” you called.

Irene opened the door and found an empty chair to sit in before she said, “We need to discuss your wardrobe,” holding back a smile as she set her plan to make you look bad into motion.

“Is something that I’ve worn inappropriate?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact.”

Irene then went on to explain that some of your gowns were a bit too extravagant to wear out and about in the palace. When you asked why, she didn’t exactly give you a solid answer, though. Regardless, you agreed to hide the gowns that she said you couldn’t wear in the back of your closet.

The first part of Irene’s plan to make you look bad backfired spectacularly.

Instead of your lack of opulent bejeweled gowns like the other women in the palace making you look frumpy and uninspired, like she’d hoped, you were the talk of the palace. Everyone that saw you spoke of how you didn’t need to rely on elaborate gowns to make yourself look good, since you were so naturally beautiful already, and how they loved your creativity when it came to simple yet dazzling accessories.

Irene was enraged the failure of step one of her plan, but she still had hope for step two. Step two of her plan was to give you the worst makeup in her personal collection. There was a lot in Irene’s extensive makeup selection that she had wanted to get rid of for some time, since they were of atrocious quality, but she didn’t really have a means to do so in a manner that wasn’t wasteful. At least, she didn’t until you came along.

You had no idea that when Irene gave you her old makeup, she was trying to sabotage you. You honestly thought that she was trying to help you fit in, and you greatly appreciated the gesture. While you’d gotten better at remembering the rules of the court, you still felt out of place in most situations, and a friendly face was exactly what you needed. Sure, you had Arthur, and you appreciated his companionship, but having another woman looking out for you helped your spirits immensely.

The old makeup also did nothing to make you appear any less beautiful according to the nobles of Goldmyst Palace. In fact, you were praised for your skills in applying it, and it was yet another reason for you to be the talk of the palace. Your fiancé was especially vocal about your beauty, spending every moment that the two of you were together complimenting you. The compliments you received from Arthur as well as everyone else at court greatly improved your mood, and you finally started to feel like you belonged.

The fact that nothing was working only got more and more frustrating for Irene. In the end, desperate and unsure of what else to do, she decided to consult her mirror again. Once again, it wasn’t helpful in the slightest. It gave her the same answers as before, and she was angry, to say the least. She was also desperate though, and that meant that she was willing to try anything. Even the drastic measures that the mirror was about to suggest.

The suggestion came when she was just about to put the mirror away for the night. With an exasperated sigh, she said, “God, I just don’t know what to do. I can’t get rid of her, and-”

“You could, my queen.”

“What do you mean? I can’t send her back to the Galestorm Empire.”

“That’s not the only way to get rid of her,” the mirror replied matter-of-factly.

Irene let out a frustrated groan and responded, “Don’t you think that’s too drastic?”

“It would solidify your place as the most beautiful woman in the kingdom once again. Isn’t that what you want? Isn’t that what your mother always taught you to strive to be?”

“You do have a point,” Irene mumbled. From the moment she was old enough to understand speech, her mother instilled one core philosophy: maintain your beauty, and the world will give you everything that you could ever want. She was also taught from an early age to never settle for second place, and she was growing increasingly desperate, so she couldn’t help but consider what the mirror was implying that she should do.

“Very well,” Irene said with another reluctant sigh. “How do you suggest I do it?”

“Poison. If you do it right, it will look like an accident, and there will be no ugly wounds on her corpse.”

“I suppose you’re right. I’ll figure everything out tomorrow. Thank you for your help, mirror.”

“You’re welcome, my queen.”

With that, Irene put the mirror back in its rightful place and went to bed. For the first time in far too long, she didn’t struggle to fall asleep. Instead, she dreamt of being the most beautiful woman in the Kingdom of Eledath again.

The next morning came, and as soon as her official duties for the day were done, Irene went directly to the royal library to search for a book about poisons. As she began to wander and examine each shelf, however, she realized that it would probably be much harder to find than she originally anticipated. Of course, she knew that it wouldn’t be right out in the open, but she’d started out hopeful that she wouldn’t have to spend an eternity searching for the book that she needed. As time went on, however, and she didn’t find anything even close to what she was looking for, she started to lose that hope.

Just when Irene was about to give up and find some other way to get rid of you, she found exactly what she needed. It was in the furthest corner of the library, covered in dust that indicated that it hadn’t been touched in years.

The title of the book was in a language that Irene didn’t quite understand, but something in her gut told her that it would prove to be useful. As she flipped through its pages, her gut instinct was proven correct. There were detailed instructions for a variety of poisons. Some of them caused slow, painful deaths, while others were for quick “mercy killings” that could easily be mistaken for something else.

After what felt like hours of looking through the book, Irene decided on a tasteless, odorless potion that could mimic the symptoms of a heart attack if made correctly. Since she had a plan, the next thing she did was start to gather ingredients. The palace had everything needed to make the potion somewhere on the grounds, which she was incredibly grateful for. After all, it would have been difficult to explain why she needed to travel if she couldn’t tell anyone what she was using the ingredients for.

A few courtiers and members of the palace staff asked Irene what she was gathering supplies for, but all she had to do to get them off her back was tell them that she was making an experimental beauty treatment that she’d heard about. Even the most beauty-conscious noblewomen in the palace left her alone, considering they didn’t want to be involved if the “experimental treatment” was a failure.

Once she had all of the ingredients, she carefully combined them, following the instructions in the book to the letter. Every step was completed with precision as she thought about potential explanations for your sudden passing, like the stress of adjusting to living in a different country getting to you or some kind of freak accident.

Irene’s plan was absolutely perfect. She mixed the potion into an otherwise ordinary glass of wine before bringing it to your chambers. With a fake smile plastered onto her face, she said, “I’ve noticed that you’ve been a bit stressed since your arrival here. I thought that some wine and company would help ease some of that stress.”

“Thank you, your majesty. You’ve been very kind to me since I arrived, and I greatly appreciate it.”

“Of course, dear. It’s clear that Arthur cares for you very deeply, and if he’s happy, I’m happy.”

“I care for him very deeply as well.”

The realization that you weren’t lying anymore when you said that you cared for Arthur caught you by surprise, in all honesty. From the moment you arrived, you were certain that your fiancé would be an acquaintance to you and nothing else, at least behind closed doors. Your preconceived notions fell apart, however, as you actually spent more time with him. After all, he was kind and intelligent, never failing to amaze you with the way he cared for other people or seemed to always know the answer when someone at court asked him a question.

Your thoughts of Arthur were interrupted by Irene calling your name.

“I’m sorry, your majesty. What were you saying?”

“Please, call me Irene. There’s no need to be so formal when it’s just us, dear. I just asked if you and Arthur have discussed wedding plans at all.”

“Well, truthfully, we haven’t talked about it much. I was actually hoping to arrange a meeting with you and your husband to discuss it.”

“I’ll discuss it with John when he’s done with his meetings for the day.”

“Thank y-”

Your conversation with Irene was cut short by the king arriving and requesting his wife’s presence. “Irene, my love, will you join me for a moment?” he inquired, “There’s an urgent matter that I need to discuss with you.”

“Of course, darling,” Irene began. Then, she turned to you and said, “I’ll come back as soon as I can, dear. Please, enjoy your wine.”

“Thank you, your majesty.”

Irene left with her husband, and you were just about to take a sip of the wine that Irene brought you when someone knocked on your door. Not expecting company, you opened it cautiously. Upon opening the door, you saw a man that you didn’t recognize. All you really knew for sure was that he was older, at least sixty years old based on his physical appearance, and rich (or at least faking it), based on the expensive suit that he wore.

With an unsettling smile, he said, “Greetings, princess. I’m Lord Edward. May I come in?”

Every bone in your body screamed to tell him to leave you alone, but you worried for your safety if he didn’t like your answer. So, you quietly said, “Of course. It’s nice to meet you, Lord Edward.”

You moved out of the way to let Lord Edward into your chambers, and he strolled in like they were his own. He even took a drink of the wine that Irene had brought to your room earlier, which was incredibly upsetting. The man in your room seemed to have no concept of politeness and common decency, and every moment alone with him made you uncomfortable. You were nothing if not polite to everyone that you met, however, so, you suffered through it. Hopefully, the end of your time with him would end sooner rather than later.

After a few minutes of uncomfortable silence, Lord Edward cleared his throat. “So, young lady,” he began, “would you like to spend some time in the garden with me? There’s a special seed that was recently imported that I’d very much like to show you.”

At that point, you decided that you’d had enough, politeness be damned. You felt unsafe in his presence, and you were already growing tired of hiding behind false kindness. So, you firmly said, “No thank you, sir. I’d like to stay here.

“Come on, princess. You don’t want me to show you a good time before your wedding?”

“No, I don’t. Please leave now.”

“I really would like to stay. We just met, after all, so we should get to know each other a little bit.”

“I said, leave!” you yelled, fear and anger evident in your voice.

Almost immediately after you shouted at Lord Edward to leave, he clutched his chest and groaned, a look of pain etched onto his features. Unsure of what was happening or how to help, you swiftly left your room to find the royal physician. It took you longer than you’d hoped, since he wasn’t in his room, but you did eventually find him.

By the time you got back to your chambers with the royal physician, however, it was too late for Lord Edward. He was motionless on your floor, and the royal physician said, “I think he’s gone, your grace.”

What happened next was a blur. The royal physician called for the coroner, and the king and queen were notified of Lord Edward’s death. At one point you were pretty sure that you were asked questions by the coroner, but you couldn’t remember any of them. Everything was moving too fast for you to keep up, and you were riddled with guilt over the fact that you didn’t get the royal physician back to your chambers in time.

Irene was livid that the tea meant for you had taken Lord Edward’s life instead. Once again, her plan of getting rid of you had failed. Feeling defeated, she interpreted the event as a sign that she had to give up. After all, she’d tried everything that she could possibly think of, and everything she tried went horribly wrong in some way. So, in an attempt to avoid further casualties, she finally began to accept that she would just have to deal with you.

The fact that she had to deal with you being around didn’t mean that she had to like you, however. So, while she would be kind to your face for her son’s sake, she would not do more for you than she absolutely had to.

After Lord Edward’s passing, you noticed that Irene was far colder with you than usual, never paying attention to you or speaking to you beyond basic greetings or one-worded answers. You wanted to just ask her what you did wrong, why she wasn’t as warm to you as she had been, but it never seemed to be the right time.

The only thing you could possibly think of was that she blamed you for Lord Edward’s death. You couldn’t wrap your mind around why she could possibly think that, however. The royal coroner had declared the cause of death to be a heart attack, something that it would have been impossible for you to have a hand in. Still, Irene’s behavior only started to shift after his death, and you couldn’t think of any other reason for the change.

After spending a week wracking your brain for answers, you decided to try again to ask Irene what you did to change how she felt about you. You asked Arthur if he could ask his mother to meet with you on a day that you knew she wouldn’t be busy, and he happily agreed. About an hour later, he came back to you with a time that she would come to see you in your quarters.

The agreed-upon time came and went, and Irene was nowhere to be seen. As you waited for her to arrive, the frustration caused by the initial change in her behavior shifted to fully blown anger. You were livid that she couldn’t even show you enough basic decency to tell you what you’d done to upset her, and you were livid that she was nowhere to be seen at the time that she willingly agreed to see you.

After another few hours of waiting, you realized that you would probably just have to accept that she was treating you differently and hope that someday she would warm up to you again. You weren’t exactly sure if that would actually happen, but you had to let yourself have a little bit of hope that everything would be ok.

Your hope of palace life getting any better was quickly shattered the next morning when John, Irene, and Arthur all came to your chambers shortly after you woke up. You had a feeling that something was wrong based on the solemn expressions on their faces, and your suspicions were only confirmed when Arthur said, “Honey, there’s something that we need to speak to you about.”

“What is it?”

There was a brief silence as everyone tried to find the words to explain what had happened the day before. John was the first to break it, saying, “The kingdom of Terenassus has declared war, so Arthur and I will be leaving for the nearest military base shortly. We’re just here to say goodbye.”

“I’m sorry, (Y/N), but our wedding will have to wait until the war ends,” Arthur added sorrowfully.

With tears in your eyes, you said, “I understand,” and stood to hug Arthur. He embraced you like he never would again, and you leaned closer to his ear and whispered, “I expect you to come home safely, Arthur.”

“I will, I assure you. I love you.”

Your eyes started to water as you realized that this was the first time he’d told you that he loved you. With a deep breath, you replied, “I love you, too.”

You let go of your fiancé, and it was John’s turn to pull you into a hug. As he pulled away, he made eye contact with you and said, “I expect you to take care of my wife while I’m gone, (Y/N).”

“I will, your highness. I swear.”

“Thank you.”

John kissed Irene one more time, and he and Arthur left.

There was a moment of uncomfortable silence before you took yet another deep breath and said, “Are you ok, your majesty?”

Your question was all it took for the dam to break. Irene started to cry like you’d never seen her cry before, ruining her carefully applied makeup. You were sure that she would be upset when she realized, but this was definitely not the time to point it out. Regardless, you felt like you had to say something. Not knowing what else to do, you gave her a hug and said, “Would you like to come in?”

Through her tears, she replied, “That would be nice. Thank you, dear.”

You let go of Irene and moved out of the doorway to your chambers so that she could enter. Once she was inside, you carefully shut the door and asked, “Do you want to talk about how you’re feeling, or would you rather talk about something else to get your mind off of things?”

“I think I’d like to talk about something else, if that’s alright.”

“Of course. What would you like to talk about?”

“Well, how do you feel about life in the palace?”

With a sigh, you said, “It is quite different from what I expected. The way people interact is so different from the way I’m used to interacting with people back home. And, truthfully, I had a very specific picture of what I thought engaged life would be like that is very different from what actually happened.”

“Am I correct in assuming that means that you didn’t expect to enjoy Arthur’s company as much as you do?”

“If I’m being completely honest, yes. When I first arrived, I thought that we would be roommates that hardly spoke unless it was necessary. Now, I find myself missing him when he’s away and wanting to spend time with him even when we aren’t discussing wedding plans or attending official events together.”

“I had the same experience when John and I first met. I arrived certain that we would be acquaintances at best, and now I love him more than I’ve ever loved anyone else. Except Arthur, of course, but the love a mother has for her son is different than the love a wife has for her husband.”

“What was Goldmyst Palace like when you first arrived?”

“Well, it was much smaller than it is now,” Irene recalled with a soft laugh. “John had a number of new wings built to show off when the kingdom first started to prosper. You know how kings are.”

“Yes, I do,” you laughed. “My father was always adding new things to various rooms in the castle back home.”

“What is it like in the Galestorm Empire?”

“It’s wonderful. The court etiquette is vastly different than it is here, and Sunrider Castle was very different than Goldmyst, but I loved it.” After a moment of silence, you asked, “Can I ask where you grew up?”

“I’m from Caerrowe. I was actually about your age when I moved here to marry John.”

“How long have you been married?”

“Our twenty-five-year anniversary is this summer.”

As you processed everything that Irene had told you, you couldn’t help but hope that your relationship with Arthur could be similar to the one that his parents had. If the way that John and Irene looked at each other when they thought that no one was watching them was any indication, they loved each other dearly. John also constantly surprised Irene with beautiful gifts from his travels outside of the kingdom, and Irene spent a significant amount of her free time with John, provided that he wasn’t busy with other things. They had a marriage that everyone in the kingdom wished that they had, and now you included yourself in that, too.

You and Irene continued to talk about your lives before moving to Eledath for what felt like hours after that, and by the end of your conversation, Irene looked noticeably lighter than when she first entered your chambers. You couldn’t help but feel a bit of pride at the fact that you’d been able to provide some comfort in a difficult time, and you hoped that the solace you’d found in each other after Arthur and John left was a sign of a closer bond in the future.

Just like you’d hoped, you only grew closer to Irene as the war with Terenassus raged on. In the months since your fiancé and his father left to fight, your future mother-in-law had become your closest confidant. You shared stories from your childhood with her that you hadn’t even told your own parents, and you were immensely grateful to have someone to talk to that understood just how much you missed Arthur.

While your fiancé was away, you wrote him letters as often as you could. Sure, you knew that he probably wouldn’t receive them right away, but you still wanted to take the time to let him know that you loved him and that you were thinking of him. He responded to every letter that he received telling you the same, as well as sharing stories of the war and lamenting the fact that he had to wait longer than anticipated to marry you. Reading his desperation to finally marry you only made you want him to return sooner.

Things took a turn for the worse when you suddenly stopped receiving letters from Arthur with no explanation. You asked Irene if she’d heard from him, and she said that she hadn’t. She assured you that she would ask John for news of Arthur’s health, however, and it made you feel slightly better.

Weeks went by, and you still didn’t hear from Arthur. There was no news of him in John’s letters to Irene, either. You tried to reason with yourself, reminding yourself that men at war are often busy, which makes them forgetful, but it did nothing for your anxiety.

As the weeks turned to months, it got harder and harder to avoid thinking about the worst possible outcome. You tried desperately to suppress the thought that he had gotten hurt, or worse, but your mind loved to play tricks on you by letting your fears get the better of you. Despite your fear, however, you constantly reminded yourself to hold on to that little bit of hope that got you through the day, the hope that your fiancé would come home to you soon.

The next day, your hope was shattered. You woke up to a blood-curdling scream, followed by devastated sobs. When you realized that the sobs sounded like Irene’s, you ran to her chambers to find out what was going on, though deep down, you had a feeling that you knew exactly what had happened. Still, when you arrived, you asked, “What’s wrong, your majesty?”

“Arthur is gone.”

And just like that, your world collapsed.

“Depressed” did not even begin to describe the utter despair that filled every corner of your heart as you tried to process that you would never get to see your fiancé again. All you could do was collapse to the floor and shriek just as Irene had, too overcome by grief to even hold yourself upright.

This wasn’t how your life was supposed to go. Arthur was meant to come home safe and sound when the war ended, and the two of you were meant to go back to planning your wedding. You were meant to marry him and spend the rest of your life in the palace, helping Arthur take care of the citizens of Eledath with the same diligence his parents had. You were meant to have his children and spend your days that weren’t filled with meetings and official events caring for miniature manifestations of the love that the two of you had for each other.

You loved him, and you had no idea how to go on now that the life you were supposed to have with him was cut short.

A week after your world was turned upside down, John returned home with news that the war was over. When you saw him, you were relieved that he came home in one piece, even though he definitely had some new scars, both physical and emotional. A small part of you, however, resented him for coming home when Arthur never would. You hated yourself for even acknowledging the ugly emotions that sprung forward when you saw John and Irene for the first time after his return, but the envy and pain that you felt was all too real, and you knew that you’d never heal if you couldn’t admit that you felt the way you did.

After the king let go of his wife, he turned to you with tears in his eyes and a look of guilt on his face and said, “I’m so sorry.”

All you could do in response was sob.

Irene immediately pulled you into a hug, rubbing your back as you cried into her shoulder. You found some comfort in the gesture, despite the despair still threatening to swallow you whole. Once you felt like you couldn’t cry anymore, you let go of Irene and said, “I’m grateful that you returned home safely, your highness,” and left for your chambers so that you could be alone with your thoughts.

A few days after John returned to the palace, you requested a meeting with him and Irene at their earliest convenience. Their earliest convenience turned out to be immediately, and you couldn’t help but feel relief that you would get to share your new idea with them sooner rather than later. As you entered the meeting room, the advisors and other government officials left, citing some “official business” they had to attend to. You knew that they were probably just trying to give you privacy, though, most likely at John and Irene’s request.

Once you were alone with the king and queen, you began, “Your highness, your majesty,” curtsying as you spoke, “I have an idea that I’d like to discuss with you both regarding a memorial for Arthur.”

There was a moment of silence at the mention of the one thing no one in the room wanted to think about. Irene was the first to break it, urging, “(Y/N), dear, you don’t have to address us so formally. Especially when we’re speaking in private.”

“What’s your idea?” John chimed in.

“What if we organize a memorial gallery? I know where Arthur stored his paintings. I could display some of them in the grand hall during his funeral.”

Irene softened when she heard your idea and said, “That sounds wonderful. Thank you.”

“Thank you, (Y/N). I’m sure that he would love that,” John added, his voice breaking as he thought about his son. “Was there anything else that you wanted to discuss?”

“That was all. Thank you for listening.”

Another silence fell over the room as everyone got lost in their own thoughts. You didn’t know the specifics of what Irene and John were thinking about, but you had a strong feeling that their thoughts revolved around the same person that yours did. Not wanting to pry or bother them any further, you said, “I need to go. Thank you again for listening. I’ll let you know when I decide which paintings to display.”

“Thank you, dear,” Irene said, clearly trying not to cry.

You left the meeting room after that, desperate to be alone with your thoughts. When you got back to your chambers, you collapsed onto your bed and let yourself bawl until you couldn’t anymore as you found yourself once again thinking about the life that you should have had with Arthur.

Once your tears had run dry, at least for the day, you found yourself too exhausted to even begin to think about doing anything but sleeping. So, you allowed yourself to drift off, dreaming of the happy reunion that you wished that you could have.

When you woke up the next morning, you felt at least somewhat refreshed by the pleasant dream you’d had. So, you went right to Arthur’s chambers to decide which of his paintings to display at the funeral that was rapidly approaching. A fresh wave of pain crashed over you as you entered the room and started to think about the fact that you would never get to spend time with him there again, but you still tried to focus on the task at hand.

You made your way to the seemingly forgotten corner of Arthur’s bedroom that housed the secret passage and fumbled for the button the same way that your forever fiancé did the day that you arrived. The bookcase shifted, and instead of frightening you, the noises it made as it shifted into place were comforting.

You entered the gallery that Arthur kept his paintings in, and at first, you struggled to decide which of his paintings to display for the funeral. As you wandered around the room and carefully examined each one, however, there was one that caught your eye.

It was a painting of a vase of sunflowers and roses, which you’d told him were your favorite flowers. He’d started it shortly before the war began, so while it was clear what the painting was depicting, it was still largely unfinished. The moment you saw it; however, you thought that it was perfect for the display. As you continued to look through Arthur’s gallery, you found a few others that you thought would be fitting as well: a portrait of his parents that he’d painted for their anniversary and a self-portrait that he’d painted shortly before you arrived.

With the paintings chosen, you took them out of the private gallery and into the grand hall, which had everything that was needed for the funeral. Seeing so many people put in so much work to plan a memorial for the man that you loved moved you to tears, and you could only hope that Arthur knew just how many people cared for him when he was alive.

The day of the funeral came, and you spent the entire morning feeling like you were going to throw up. Everything necessary for the memorial was in the grand hall, but there was still so much to do to actually prepare. You did as much as you could, but there were moments when you had to step away because you were on the verge of tears. Whenever that happened, Irene was right by your side, comforting you however you needed her to.

“I don’t know if I’ve told you this before, but he told me that he was in love with you right before he said it to you as he was saying goodbye,” she said.

“Really?” you asked through your tears.

Irene nodded before she continued, “He told me how excited he was for the wedding and how happy he was that you were the woman he was gonna marry.” There was a moment of silence before she added, “He was so happy to have you.”

“I was happy to have him, too.”

Irene pulled you into a tight hug as you started to cry again, whispering words of reassurance as you tried desperately to calm down. Once you felt like you could breathe again, you thanked her and went back to preparations.

Arthur’s funeral was a blur of heartache as you sat in the grand hall and listened to the priest that lived on the palace grounds deliver a sermon on the healing power of God in times of grief. You’d never really considered yourself religious before, but you had to admit that the priest’s words moved you. Especially when you thought about the idea of seeing Arthur again in the afterlife.

After the sermon, several people spoke about their memories of Arthur in a beautiful celebration of his life. You were invited to share stories about your relationship with him as well, but you declined, unsure if you would be able to maintain your composure long enough to deliver a coherent speech.

Irene, however, as she shared stories from Arthur’s childhood and spoke about how much she loved her son, was the epitome of grace under pressure. You could see from the look in her eyes that she was probably going to break as soon as she was out of the kingdom’s view, but while she stood at the front of the grand hall telling a story about how Arthur fell in love with art as a child, she held herself together in a way that you could only hope to. If you were being completely honest with yourself, you envied how composed she was. You were determined not to think about that, however, instead choosing to focus on thoughts of the time that you did have with Arthur, no matter how limited it was.

As you left the grand hall, you heard Irene call your name. You turned around to see tears in her eyes and asked, “Yes, your majesty?”

“Thank you. The gallery was beautiful.”

“I’m just happy that we gave Arthur the best sendoff that we could. Thank you for being there for me as I’ve grieved.”

“I should thank you for the same. Your company has brought me more comfort and peace in these difficult times than you will ever know.”

Irene pulled you into a hug as you started to cry, and a few stray tears fell from her eyes as well. As the two of you sobbed in each other’s arms, you couldn’t help but feel grateful that you’d met someone like Irene that cared about you enough to be there for you as you experienced what had to be the worst pain of your life.

About a month after the funeral, your world was turned upside down again by a knock on your door. You opened it, and Irene stood before you. She looked like she’d been crying, but you decided not to bring attention to it. With a dejected sigh, she asked, “Would you please come with me? My husband has something that he’d like to discuss with you.”

“Of course.”

You followed Irene to the same meeting room where you’d proposed the memorial gallery, and when you arrived, John was waiting inside. As your eyes met, you noticed that he looked guilty, just like he had the day that he returned home from the war. You wanted to just ask him what was wrong, why he looked at you like he knew he was going to hurt you with what he had to say, but you decided not to make a scene. After all, you would find out soon enough.

You took a seat as Irene took her place next to John, and the first words out of the king’s mouth were, “I’m sorry, (Y/N).”

“What’s going on, your highness?”

John didn’t have the heart to ask you to drop the formalities this time. Instead, he simply continued, “We’ve contacted your mother and father. They believe, as I do, that it would be best if you returned home to the Galestorm Empire, since you’re no longer marrying Arthur.”

You were truly at a loss for words.

Sure, you weren’t exactly thrilled to be in Eledath when you first arrived, but as time went on, you found yourself feeling at home in Goldmyst Palace, and you wanted to stay. It was kind of funny, really. Now that you didn’t actually want to leave, you had to.

Fighting back tears, you finally said, “I’ll start packing my things as soon as possible.”

“I’m sorry that it’s come to this, (Y/N),” John said with a sigh.

“It’s alright, really. I understand,” you replied.

After that, you turned away from the king and queen and made your way toward the door, hoping that they didn’t notice the tears in your eyes that were threatening to fall at any moment. Once you were out of the meeting room, you returned to your chambers to begin packing in hopes it would distract you from your sorrow.

Packing everything that you brought with you when you first came to Eledath was difficult and time-consuming, but you did manage to do it on your own. You definitely didn’t enjoy doing it, though. Regardless, you knew that it had to be done, and you were proud of yourself for maintaining your composure long enough to actually do it.

As soon as you were done packing, however, you laid down on your bed and finally let the tears that you’d spent hours fighting back fall freely. You cried like you hadn’t in a long time, desperate to finally find some catharsis as all of the emotions that you’d been bottling up bubbled over and threatened to consume you. While you sobbed, you thought about your time with Arthur that you still wished hadn’t been cut short, your growing closeness to Irene that you would miss when you went home, and your overwhelming desire to stay in the home that you’d found in what was once an unfamiliar kingdom until you fell asleep.

You woke up the next morning to yet another knock on your door. You wanted to pretend that you were still sleeping and ignore it, but when you once again heard Irene’s voice calling your name on the other side, you knew that you couldn’t.

With a sigh, you got out of bed and answered the door. Irene appeared to be in a much better mood this time, however, smiling as she asked, “Can I speak to you about something?”

“Of course, your majesty. What is it?” you asked, allowing her into your chambers.

“Please, drop the formalities, dear,” Irene gently scolded as she entered. “I have exciting news!”

“What is it?”

“I spoke to John, and we may have a solution for what was discussed yesterday.”

“Do you mean going home?”

“Yes. What would you say if I asked you to stay here as a royal companion?” You were speechless, so she continued, “You wouldn’t have to do anything. You could just spend time with me as I go about my duties and attend events.”

You thought for a moment before you said, “What about my parents? Didn’t they want me to come home?”

“Well, yes, but John agreed to send them a letter and request their permission to let you stay if you want to. If we send it today, we should receive a response from them by the end of this week. What do you think?”

“I think it’s an incredibly generous offer. Are you sure?”

“Yes, I am.”

A smile graced your face for the first time since the meeting about your return home, and you said, “I think that sounds lovely.”

“Wonderful! I’ll tell John, and he can write the letter to your parents. I’m so happy you’re staying,” Irene replied as she pulled you into a hug that you were certain would have crushed your bones if it had been any tighter.

With a smile on her face and a spring in her step, Irene left your chambers, presumably to tell John about your decision. As you thought about the conversation you just had, you were touched by the queen’s request to keep you in Eledath. Despite her explanation, you weren’t exactly sure what being a royal companion would be like, but you were excited to find out, especially since you got to stay in your new home with the woman you considered your closest friend.

The week that you waited for your parents to respond to John’s letter was one of the most agonizing of your life. You were certain that they would allow you to stay, but sometimes you wondered if it was actual certainty or false hope that fueled your thoughts. Regardless, it was exactly what you needed to get through the almost unbearable waiting period.

When a letter from your mother and father finally arrived, Irene called you to her chambers to read it. Now that the letter had actually arrived, however, you were more nervous than you’d been all week. What if they didn’t let you stay? What if they’d already found some other prince to marry you off to? The possibilities were endless.

Irene smiled as she opened the letter, and with a deep breath, she read:

“Our dear (Y/N),

We were surprised to hear from King John that you’d like to stay in Eledath. However, after careful consideration, we’ve decided to give you our blessing to stay in Goldmyst Palace as a companion to Queen Irene. We fully trust her majesty and her husband to take care of you, and we trust you to make responsible decisions. All we ask is that you visit us here from time to time. We miss our little girl.

Warmest regards, Mom and Dad.”

You were ecstatic that your parents were permitting you to stay, to say the least. The moment Irene set the letter down, you pulled her into a hug, tears of relief streaming down your face. Once you regained your composure, you let go and said, “Thank you. Truly, thank you.”

“You are so welcome, my dear. I have to admit, however, that my motives weren’t entirely selfless.”

“What do you mean?”

“Truthfully, having you here has been a source of great joy and comfort for me, especially since losing Arthur. I didn’t want to let go of your companionship.”

With a soft smile, you hugged Irene yet again. Neither of you spoke, but you didn’t have to. The comfort of each other’s presence was all that you needed.

Adjusting to your new life as a royal companion took far less time than you thought it would. You and Irene settled into a routine surprisingly quickly, spending basically all of your free time together. Sure, you accompanied her to meetings with John and his advisors and occasionally acted as an assistant when she had to attend official events, but for the most part, you basically just kept her company.

Irene was immensely grateful that you stayed in the palace. You made her laugh on her darkest days, and you were always there to listen when she needed to talk. As time went on, and the two of you settled into your new routine, she found herself trusting you more than she trusted even her own husband in some matters.

Irene also found herself worrying less and less about beauty as she spent more time with you. After all, the people she cared about most still loved her, even if she wasn’t the most beautiful woman in the kingdom anymore. That had to count for something, right? So, she hid her magical mirror in a locked drawer, no longer feeling the need to ask it for advice or hear it tell her that she was the most beautiful woman in the kingdom.

As you spent more time with Irene, you found yourself dealing with new feelings that you didn’t quite understand. Whenever you were alone with her, you got butterflies in your stomach, and you felt giddy whenever she said your name. It was a textbook description of a crush, but that only left you more confused. After all, you’d never had romantic feelings for another woman before.

Regardless of your confusion, however, you really liked the way that being around Irene made you feel, as well as the things that she did that made you feel that way. She smiled every time she saw you, she made you laugh when you were feeling down, and she never let a day go by without telling you how much she cared about you and appreciated having you around.

Sometimes, you felt guilty for feeling the way that you did, though. After all, Irene was your dead fiancé’s mother. Plus, she was still happily married to her husband of twenty-five years. Sure, you couldn’t necessarily control how you felt, but you were still ashamed of yourself for allowing yourself to fall for a woman that you knew you could never have. So, you decided that you wouldn’t say a word, and you tried to meet other people in the palace that could distract you from your feelings.

Your attempts at distracting yourself weren’t nearly as successful as you were hoping they would be. Sure, you had fun meeting and hooking up with various men and women that lived in the palace, but none of them could take your mind off of Irene once the sex was over. That didn’t stop you from spending months continuing to try, though.

Irene noticed your pattern of behavior, and honestly, she was troubled. It wasn’t because she thought what you did was wrong, though. Absolutely not. She had no problem with you taking a different person to bed most nights, as long as you were safe once they were in your chambers. There was no reason for her to be concerned that it was something deeper, either. She truly didn’t understand why she was upset. Not at first, at least.

The reason that Irene was troubled by your behavior revealed itself at a ball to celebrate her husband’s birthday. Everyone in the palace was dancing, the finest wine in the kingdom flowed freely, and for one night, no one had to worry about anything.

Irene was very worried, however. At least, she thought it was worry at first. You were on the dance floor with Lord Vernon, a son of the late Lord Edward, and she could tell that he was interested in going to your quarters with you after the ball ended. Based on the way you looked at him as you said something to him that only he could hear, you were just as interested as he was.

Watching you dance with Lord Vernon made an ugly feeling settle in the pit of Irene’s stomach, and she hated herself for it. She knew that it wasn’t anxiety, since she trusted Lord Vernon and knew that the two of you wouldn’t do anything unsafe, but she still felt uncomfortable as she watched the way he held you close while you danced. As she thought about it more, she realized what was really going on.

The feeling she was experiencing was jealousy. She wanted to be the one that you were dancing with, not Lord Vernon.

The realization that Irene was jealous of Lord Vernon was a startling one, to say the least. After all, she’d been happily married for twenty-five years, and in that time she’d never experienced attraction to anyone that wasn’t her husband. Still, as she watched the way your body moved, and the wine she’d spent the evening drinking coursed through her veins, she found herself unable to think about anything but how badly she wanted to be the one to take you to bed after the ball was done. Disgusted with herself, Irene left the ballroom for some time to herself, hoping it would help her forget about wanting you the way that she did.

As you danced with Lord Vernon, you noticed movement out of the corner of your eye. When you turned to look, you saw Irene leaving the ballroom in a hurry. Concerned that something was wrong, you turned back to Lord Vernon and said, “I have to go.”

“Will you be back?” he asked.

“I don’t know. I’m sorry,” you replied as you left to follow Irene.

When you caught up with Irene, she was in the hallway in front of her chambers. She stood in front of the door, seeming to debate whether she should actually go in. As you stepped closer to where she stood, you asked, “Are you alright?”

With a defeated sigh, she turned to you and responded, “No, I’m not.”

“What’s wrong?”

“I’ve had far too much wine, and it’s making me feel things that I shouldn’t.”

“Would you like to talk about them?”

“Thank you, dear, but I don’t want to burden you. You do enough for me already.”

“Are you sure? I don’t mind-”

“For fuck’s sake, can you stop being so goddamn perfect?” she snapped.

A stunned silence filled the space as you processed what she said. You knew that you should say something, but you had no idea where to start. So, you chose to start simple by asking, “What do you mean?”

“You’re so fucking perfect, it’s sickening. I hate how perfect you are, and I hate that I want your perfect self as much as I do,” she ranted, not thinking about the words that left her lips.

After another brief stunned silence, you asked, “You want me?”

“Of course! Who wouldn’t? You’re smart, you’re kind, you’re funny, and you’re so unbelievably beautiful. I know it’s wrong for me to want you, but how could I not when you’re so fucking perfect?” she continued, tears starting to form in her eyes as she acknowledged her feelings out loud.

Whether it was the way Irene looked in the gown she’d chosen to wear to the ball, the alcohol coursing through your veins, your desperation, or some sick combination of all three, you decided to see what would happen next if you told her the truth. A small smile formed on your face as you said, “You know, I think you’re absolutely beautiful, too.”

“Don’t say that, dear. I know that you don’t mean it. At least, not the same way I do when I say it to you.”

“No, you don’t.”

“Yes, I think I-”

Irene didn’t even get to finish her sentence before your lips were on hers. She let out a small noise of surprise at the sudden contact, but it didn’t take long at all for her to melt into the kiss just like you did.

As your lips moved against Irene’s, you couldn’t help but think that you could stay right there, kissing her right outside her bedroom door, for eternity. As she pulled away from the kiss, however, and looked at you with what could only be described as hunger in her eyes, you realized that she had other plans. A mischievous grin formed on her face, and she said, “Come with me.”

You nodded in response, and she opened the door to her chambers and practically dragged you inside. Once the door was shut, she turned to you with the same mischievous smile on her face and said, “Strip for me, baby.”

You scrambled to follow her instructions, watching as she removed her own garments. When both of you were completely bare, she grabbed your hand and led you to her bed before pinning you to the soft mattress. Her lips immediately found yours again, and a soft moan slipped out as you felt her hand make its way to your breast and squeeze lightly.

Irene pulled away to give you a chance to breathe before she asked, “Are you ok with this, baby?” You nodded and opened your mouth to speak but decided against it. With a smile, she added, “What is it? Talk to me, love.”

“Want more.”

“Oh really?” she asked with a teasing tone in her voice. You nodded, and she continued, “What is it that you want, baby?”

“Wanna taste you. Please? I promise I’ll be good, just wanna make you come on my tongue.”

“Fuck, baby, get up,” she commanded, climbing off of you.

You did as you were told, and Irene took your spot on the bed before spreading her legs. You immediately settled between them and started to gently suck on her clit. She moaned loudly at the stimulation, and that only made you want to continue.

While you continued to lick and suck Irene’s clit, you carefully inserted two fingers into her pussy. You groaned softly when you felt how wet she was, sending shockwaves of pleasure through her as she felt the vibrations around her clit. She let out a loud moan and tangled her hands in your hair as you pleasured her, pulling slightly. It was a simple gesture, but it still left you more aroused than you already were, if that was even possible.

“Fuck! Feels so good baby. Just like that,” she whined, bucking her hips up to meet your face.

You found yourself falling more and more in love with Irene with every moan and whine that left her lips. She clearly loved the situation you’d found yourselves in just as much as you did, crying out as you continued to fuck her with your fingers and tease her clit with your tongue.

It didn’t take much longer for her release to start to build, the tension in the pit of her stomach threatening to snap at any moment. As she got closer to the brink, she tried desperately to force the words out to warn you. She just didn’t get them out in time, though. Instead, she came undone around you with a loud moan of your name. You continued to gently fuck her through her release until she pushed you away, trying desperately to catch her breath.

After Irene came down from her high, she carefully stood up and said, “You did such a good job for me, baby. What would you like as a reward? Do you want my fingers, my tongue, or my strap?”

“Strap, please?” you begged, desperate to relieve the arousal that had been building between your legs for what felt like an eternity.

“Of course, baby. Lie down for me, ok?”

You nodded and moved to lie down on Irene’s bed while she took the toy she was planning to use out of her drawer. You wanted to ask why she had it but decided against it. Instead, while you waited, you carefully moved your hand between your legs and started to play with your clit, growing impatient and desperate. A soft moan slipped out, letting Irene know that you were up to something. She turned toward you, and when she noticed what you were doing, she sighed and said, “Really? I’m disappointed, baby. I thought you were my good girl, but right now, you’re acting like a desperate slut. Is that what you are?”

You shook your head and replied, “No, ma’am.”

“Then why were you touching yourself when I was literally five feet away looking for the toy I was planning to use to fuck you?”

You whined at the question and answered, “Got impatient. ‘m sorry, ma’am. It won’t happen again” as you moved your hand away from your pussy.

“Good girl. Still want me to fuck you, or was your hand enough?”

“Wasn’t enough. Please fuck me, ma’am,” you begged.

“That’s what I thought.”

Irene attached the harness to her hips before carefully climbing on top of you. Once she aligned the tip of the dildo with your entrance, she grabbed your chin to make you look at her and asked, “Before I continue, are you sure?”

“I’m sure. Please just fuck me.”

That was all Irene needed to hear to slowly move her hips forward. A loud cry left your lips as you felt her enter you, and you already found yourself starting to feel overwhelmed. Once she actually started thrusting, the feeling only intensified.

Irene started slowly at first, not wanting to do too much right away. As she thrusted in and out, you wrapped your arms around her and dug your nails into her back. She groaned at the sensation, loving the way that it hurt.

“Harder, please,” you whined, bucking your hips up to meet hers in a desperate attempt for more stimulation.

As Irene started fucking you harder, neither one of you spoke much, too focused on what you were doing. Occasionally, though, a soft “Fuck” or “Feels so good” would slip out of your mouth, and your lover for the night found herself wanting to draw those sweet words out of you again and again. You were the most beautiful woman she’d ever seen, and all she could think about as she continued to thrust into you was how badly she wanted to show you just how beautiful she thought you were every night for the rest of her life.

One of the many things that Irene already loved about intimacy with you was watching the way your tits bounced as she fucked you. She could hardly tear her eyes away from the sight, and you had to admit that when you noticed, you were incredibly flattered.

As your high started to build, you found yourself growing increasingly desperate. With a whine, you asked, “Can I please play with my clit, ma’am?”

After a particularly harsh thrust, she said, “Go ahead, baby.”

That was all you needed to hear to bring your hand to your pussy, circling your clit as Irene continued to pound into you. When your whines started to get more frequent and higher in pitch, she realized that you were getting close. Wanting nothing more than to watch you come undone, she moved her head down to your neck, kissing and biting every bit of you that she could comfortably reach.

Between the dildo moving in and out of you, your hand on your clit, and Irene’s mouth on your neck, it was only a matter of time before you tumbled over the edge into overwhelming pleasure. With a loud cry, you came undone around the toy, moaning your lover’s name as she continued to fuck you through your release.

Once you came down from your high, Irene carefully pulled out of you and removed the harness, setting it aside to be dealt with in the morning. Then, she carefully helped you out of bed and into the bathroom that was connected to her bedroom so that the two of you could get cleaned up.

Once both of you were clean and comfortable, Irene carefully helped you back into her bed. After the two of you were settled, she wrapped her arms around you, holding you close as you truly relaxed for the first time in months. While she held you close, you talked to her about whatever came to mind until you fell asleep. Once she was certain that you were sleeping, she allowed herself to relax too, silently admiring your beauty as she fell asleep.

Thank you so much for reading! If you liked this one, please like and reblog, and make sure to check out the other fics in this collab! The masterlist can be found here. If you'd like to read more of my work, you can find my personal masterlist here. If you wanna see what else I have in the works, my upcoming works list is here. If none of that catches your attention, or there's something specific that you want to see, send a request via my asks or dms! If you want to be tagged in my new fics, the form to join my taglist is here!

Thank you again for reading, and thank you again to Tara for the banner!

[yoonia]

The Bedroom Hymns | myg ● fic teaser

⟶ Summary | Being the only daughter of the Wicked King has kept you living in a sheltered life. Never once were you given the chance to see the world beyond the walls of your father’s old castle, and yet, it had never stopped you from hearing all the dark rumours of your father’s indiscretions which had left you to continue living in the shadows.

When the day comes for your father to send you to live in his castle by the sea, he leaves you with a new rule set in place. You are left with a set of keys, one which would lead you to travel through the thousand magical doors inside his castle, but you are to never leave through the front door or to step foot through the golden door at the end of the hall. The magical doors become your escape, giving you the chance to see the world that you had never seen before. Until one day, your life changes as one of the magical doors leads you to the Fairy Prince.

⟶ Title | The Bedroom Hymns; a Bluebeard Retelling ⟶ Pairings | Min Yoongi x female reader ⟶ Genre | Fairy Prince!Yoongi, Princess!reader, Strangers to Lovers au, Fantasy au, Fairy Tale Retelling au ⟶ Ratings & Warnings | +18 / M for Mature; nothing yet for this teaser, but I will add warnings as I continue writing this ⟶ Estimated word count | 40k words ⟶ Teaser word count | 2,1k words

⏤ Written for the Once Upon A Fantasy collab

⟶ Author’s note | As the result of my latest poll, you have chosen for me to finish this story first out of the rest of my April WIPs. Thank you so much for everyone who voted! If you are interested to join my fic taglist, please enter your information here. If you are only interested to be tagged on this fic, please only enter your url in the replies.

𝕺𝖓𝖈𝖊 𝖚𝖕𝖔𝖓 𝖆 𝖙𝖎𝖒𝖊, 𝖎𝖓 𝖙𝖍𝖊 𝖑𝖆𝖓𝖉 𝖔𝖋 𝕱𝖆𝖗 𝕱𝖆𝖗 𝕬𝖜𝖆𝖞…

Stargrave castle.

The castle with 1000 doors which was built right on the top of the Earthpeak cliff, the ocean edge of the Nythelean Empire’s territory. You have learned a little about this castle on the morning you first arrived, under the guidance of Lord Gordan, the royal advisor working for your father, King Aneas.

You have only been here for less than a week, and you know for sure that you still have much to learn about this castle. The place that is to become your new home. It still feels foreign to roam through the hallways, and you constantly find yourself being amazed at how expansive this place is compared to the manor you have been residing in since your childhood.

No, this castle was said to be your real home.

Your father himself had said so. This is the place where you were born. The place where you had once lived peacefully and happily with your father and mother together, before the Queen tragically passed and you were taken away while you were still a young, helpless child. This is the place that holds the old scars and the wounds that your father must carry with him for many years until he lost all of his happiness and his warm smile.

No wonder he kept you away from this place for so long.

The darkness terrifies you when you try to step out of your bed chamber at nightfall. The long corridors feel like a maze, with numerous doors and several open galleries welcoming you whenever you get lost on your way. Oftentimes, you only feel safe when you are in your private chamber, or when you are having your high tea with Nanny Abigail in the garden, where you would find yourself wasting time until the sun sets each day. There is never a day passed when you didn’t miss your old home, the Seacrest Manor. But as days continued to progress, you soon realise that if this is where you are to spend the rest of your life, you must soon make it your mission to make this place home.

Surely, it wouldn’t be such a hard task to do, would it?

Not with Lord Gordan and Nanny Abigail by your side to guide you through it. And now that you are finally back at the home castle, you will also have more time to spend together with your father compared to how it used to be before. That would certainly help you learn more about this place, about the home territory that you were never allowed to see, and maybe help fix the fragile bond you have between you and your father.

Or so you thought.

“I have to be away for at least six weeks. There are matters needed to be dealt with and it would be too taxing of a journey if you should join me,” your father suddenly announces on the first day of your second week of being home. “Make this castle your home the best you possibly can while I am away and enjoy yourself. You might need help to go around the castle in my absence, so here—”

You barely find the words to respond to him with when he suddenly grabs your hand and places a heavy set of keys right at the center of your palm.

“Here are the keys to various rooms within the castle. As you may have noticed, we have many doors right here at the home castle that has been kept locked because I am always away and you haven’t been back home, and I am the only person who has the access to each of them. Now, you will have the ability to open them all by using these keys.”

You keep your eyes on the keys in your hand, studying them closely with pure interest as your father explains this. Varied in colours, sizes, and materials, they look nothing at all like any set of keys that you would normally see for regular houses or manors. Not even your old home. Your father falls silent for a moment before he continues to explain what the keys are for, his small smile is hidden while you are not paying attention to his face, but simply to his voice.

“These are the keys to the storerooms; where I keep my best furniture and gifts from the many Kingdoms I have visited,” he says as he picks the ones made of brass from the bunch. “Make use of them as much as you need. You can also bring some of them to fancy your bed chamber should you need any changes to be done and make your stay comfortable.”

Hearing this only excites you. For days, you have been thinking of how plain and boring your new bed chamber is, and have been wishing that you were able to take some of your old belongings to fill your room with. Your father seems to be pleased to see your reaction, and continues by pointing at the slightly smaller-looking keys which seem to be made of bronze.

“These are the keys to the treasure rooms; where you can find all the silver and gold plates that I have gathered through my journeys, the casket of jewels which are part of our family treasure, and the safe where I keep all the money which belongs to the family,” he explains, while you are left speechless at how easy he is to hand over such a huge responsibility onto you. As if sensing your doubt, your father raises your chin so he can look at you straight in the eyes and say, “You are free to use them all to fill your needs, as long as you use them wisely while I am gone.”

You swallow hard and nod. There is something in his stern voice that demands your attention, letting you know that there is an underlying threat hidden in his warning, that you have no other choice but to pledge, “I will be responsible for them, Father. I promise.”

“Good. I have faith in you, Princess,” he says, sounding relieved but still cautious, and then he looks down at the keys to point at the pair that looks slightly bigger than the rest. “Now, this is the master key to all the private chambers, including yours and mine. You can use my room or my study should you need them. And this one will take you to the main library. I know that you love your books, and you shall find everything you may ever need to learn more about this land.”

Hearing about the library, all of the disappointment you felt about your father being gone begins to shift, and you start feeling a semblance of hope. If you cannot earn the information that you needed from your own father, perhaps you would be able to find your answers among the books in the library. Maybe you can also learn more about this realm, and how your father’s empire somehow exists between the two realms—the human realm, and the magical realm within the land Far Far Away.

Still with your eyes on the keys, your attention is drawn towards a pair of keys that seem to sparkle brighter from the others, calling for your attention. You look at them both with awe, amused by how magic seems to appear even in the smallest things you can find in this realm. Just like the keys you are holding in your hand.

You study those keys closely without saying a word, marvelling at each detail. One key is made of silver, while the other from gold. Both of them are glowing brightly and are nearly humming with an enticing aura as if they are made with enchantment. It makes it hard for you to look away, as if you are completely drawn to them, unable to ignore their presence and their calling.

“What about these keys, Father?” you question your father when your curiosity gets the best of you.

King Aneas leans closer just to have a better look, even if it is quite obvious that he could already tell which keys you were referring to. With gentle fingers, he pulls the silver one from its bunch. “This silver key will take you through the doors with the silver embellishments. Those doors you may enter, but only under a few specific rules.”

For some reason, his voice sounds ominous as he explains this. You look at him curiously, wondering why this key demands certain rules to be followed, unlike the others. Looking at your father’s face helps only a little to reassure you, as his face is completely stern when he begins to explain,

“Beyond the silver doors lies a strong kind of magic. One that has been so demanding of our family’s powers, and also the type of magic that should be kept secret, no matter what. Once you go through them, you will understand why it is important for me to defend this castle and our home territory.”

As you listen to his explanation about the silver doors and the magic behind them, your curiosity grows stronger. Living in the Seacrest Manor has kept you from learning anything about magic, and now that you are suddenly thrust into the place where magic seems to thrive, you feel eager to learn and experience them yourself to understand everything better. And that curiosity strengthens once your father continues to give you the rules that you must follow,

“You are free to visit each of these silver doors only for one visit each day. You must make sure that you will never remain on the other side of the door of your choice for more than six hours and you must always, always, only return home by going through that very same door you came from. Can you remember this?”

Suppressing your eagerness so as not to make him worry, you simply nod and promise, “Yes, I will remember,” while making sure to remember every detail, every warning, so you wouldn’t make any mistake to disappoint him in the future.

Just as your hope of learning new magic arises, the golden key begins to vibrate in your hand, calling for your attention. Noticing where your eyes are drawn towards, your father’s expression turns grim.

“This golden key—” he says, gently lifting the key from the bundle as he tells you more about it, “—will allow you to open the twin doors at the end of the great gallery on the top floor of the South tower.”

Your eyes grow wide with interest, recalling the night you first arrived at the castle and how the South Tower seemed to be calling your name. You feel the curiosity building, your eagerness to venture to the hidden parts of the castle rising, only to deflate when your father says,

“This one, I must forbid you to use.”

You stifle a gasp and question him. “But why, Father?”

Your father’s expression grows even darker once he takes notice of your interest in the golden door. He places both of his hands on your shoulders before you can ask more. “Never open the golden doors. Never walk past it, and never look what is inside,” he demands with a voice that comes out as a warning, before he softens and begs you, “Princess, I need you to promise me.”

Once again, you are left speechless. Baffled by his demands, yet his voice leaves you no chance to argue that you can only give in and say, “Yes, I promise.”

The King remains silent for a brief moment, as if he is trying to read your thoughts, wondering if you are hiding any intentions of defying him. But then he sighs, and your father finally lets you go with a reassuring nod.

“Good. Make sure never to forget this. Oh, and there is one more thing that you must always remember—” he quickly adds before you can say anything. “You are free to roam about through these doors — of course, except for the golden doors — but you are not to leave this castle by stepping out through the great door at the front gate. Not when I am not around, and never without a guard.”

You find this instruction quite odd. Just as odd as his rules and warnings regarding the magic doors, but you dare not to question him, understanding how little your knowledge of magic is to begin with to help you argue against his demands. So you put all of your curiosity aside, choosing to gain his trust and confidence as you promise him,

“I’ll remember.”

⟶ Estimated posting date | TBA; (hopefully) by the end of April 2023

— © 2023 @yoonia​, all rights reserved. reposting/modifying of any kind, translations, unsanctioned adaptations are not allowed.

[amethystsoda]

What is time princess about? I've been seeing it on the Play store but I have no idea if to download it

hello anon! I'd be glad to give you an overview and some tips for starting out! :D

Time Princess is what happens when all your childhood dreams of getting transported into a book come true.

At heart, the game is a set of continual isekai stories, transporting you to different "books" with the help of a magic desk and giving you "create your own adventure" options to see how the story plays out.

Your fairy companion Isabelle helps you learn the ropes, and you have to go through one mandatory book (a Marie Antoinette themed story) to get access to your room and the larger bookstore

(I'll put the rest under a read more bc it'll get long)

For each chapter you complete, you earn 1-3 tickets. With these tickets, you can unlock new books! The more you play, the more you earn towards new stories.

The game currency works on a coins and diamonds system--you don't NEED to purchase anything to play (though it may make the game a bit easier in some areas)

You get free stamina to access books and crafting materials every 11 hours and the Time Princess discord server has codes pretty frequently for diamonds, tickets, etc.

I personally splurge for the Fashion Booster every 2 months because I know it helps support the game and the artists! I try not to use real money on the random outfits unless I REALLY want one bc it can get addictive.

One of my favorite parts of the game is that, as you play, you unlock "album" art (full color illustrations that tie into the story!!)

One other thing I love is that the game is very targeted towards Bisexuals, as there are TONS of queer wlw story lines (though because of the games' popularity overseas and censorship, often gets called "best friends" etc)

Another fun part is the variety of stories!!!! There's art history!! There's stuff based on old fairy tales like Swan Lake. There's fantasy stories like The Apothecary. There's a Pirate story!!! There's Chinese, Japanese, and Korean stories. There's a western cowboy story! There's futuristic scifi!!! There's a victorian flavored horror story!!!

Most, if not all, of the stories are with adult characters and have adult storylines!! (the books will also give you a content warning before downloading)

On top of the stories, there's plenty of other fun aspects--mini games, fashion challenges, checking in with your companions every day to earn crafting materials, joining a society, playing events, and just playing dress up with your outfits and taking pics for fun.

The discord community is great too, and there's often interview nights with some of the book authors and giveaways of materials and prizes (I actually ended up winning a plushie Lafayette one time!)

The discord server also has game guides and walkthroughs for everything!

Everyone who plays the game gets really into the stories and characters, so even though the tumblr presence of fans may be smaller, you have an immediate bond with the other players!!!

They've also done some really cool collabs with museums like The Louvre and the Flamenco museum. You get to earn clothes from famous paintings or historical ones during that event period!

Finally, don't forget to save your big clothing crafting for Saturdays! You get double the materials!!

[mynahx3]

For Her, His Heart Yearns

Hello everyone!  This is Part 1 out of 2 of my Knight! Nanami x Queen!Female! Reader at 4.2k words (0-0) This is done in collaboration with @kentopedia collab, Love Through the Ages Hope you like Part 1, Part 2 will be done shortly! I haven’t written in a bit so any feedback is welcomed. Enjoy lovelies <;3 Will have mature themes such as violence and death. Lowkey a slowburn x mutual pining. Different ruling structure cause it's fantasy lol. Reader is aged around 25-30 Nanami is aged around 30-35

Chapter 1

In your life, duty was something you had to always uphold. Sacrifice anything and everything for it. This is what you were taught; the very essence of it is ingrained in your brain. Things were the way they were for hundreds of years, with the women in your position always completing what needed to be done. As the queen, you made it your purpose to be a person worthy of the throne. Nothing less than perfection was expected of you by your family and peers. The entire kingdom praises the very ground you stood upon. A heavy weight was on your shoulders, one you carried with dignity and grace. 

In spite of your attempts to delay it, it was time for marriage. One to build political relationships and strengthen the kingdom. Known across the land as a beauty, kind yet stern when needed, blessed with a brilliant mind along with your looks. It was no surprise you had many courting options, suitors from far and wide came to court you. You knew that your choice would have far-reaching consequences. The future of the kingdom rested on your decision and you were determined to choose wisely. Even so, every suitor had been rejected, much to the dismay of your father. From the elves to the dwarves, no one was deemed worthy, for your eye has already been caught by someone. 

Sitting on your throne next to your father, you frowned, looking at yet another asking for your hand. This one is old enough to be your grandfather. An expression of boredom is clear on your face; your eyes are looking over the court in front of you. Nobles looked upon the royal family with gleaming eyes, each interested in your decision. The grand halls of the throne room are littered with marble, gold, and paintings that line the walls. Paintings that depicted the history of your kingdom. 

Tales of the dragons who hoarded treasures and of knights saving the land. The most known tale of the white robed mage and first king at the center, the very start of your kingdom. The two had found the legendary Stone of Laztierite, a stone of which not much is known other than its ability to give powerful magic abilities. That was when humanity gained an upper hand over the evil magical beings that reigned over them. Together, with the mage’s magic and the king’s mighty army, they used the stone to effectively seal the evil beings into the dark world. This resulted in the stone disappearing to be found once more, as the rumor goes.

After the war, the white robed mage and first king married, founding the Aitrerus Kingdom, which has reigned over the land for centuries, unifying humanity and magical beings together. At times, the evil still escaped, but it was rare. When it did, it corrupted the minds of anyone it touched. The most affected were dragons and their worshippers, who still ruled over some lands. Lands to which no one ventured due to their heinous actions and beliefs. They were forsaken, no other kingdom interacted with them. Centuries later, humans and magical beings lived in peace, now only fighting over land and politics. The stone lost to time; not one soul knew of its whereabouts now.

Twirling a strand of your hair around your finger, a sigh came from your lips at your thoughts. Those tales were surely false, no magic pebble saved the day you thought with a yawn. Today was yet another day of failed proposals, and your father was equally frustrated. You couldn’t wait to end the day; your back was sore from sitting for so long. The plush, comfortable bed and sheets are calling to you, eager to be done with the uncomfortable corset digging into your ribs. While you no doubt looked exquisite, as your handmaidens always made sure you do, you yearned to be in your simple nightgown with your hair cleaned. Now you were dressed in the finest of silks, a deep blue dress with white lacing, and jewels around your neck and ears. An armored chest plate over your dress, dipped in silver and encrusted with more gems, is a good combination of fashion and protection. You couldn't wait to remove your heavy armor and relax in the comfort of your own room

As the suitors continued to plead their cases, you couldn't help but wonder if you would ever find someone who truly understood you. The weight of your father's expectations and the pressure of finding a suitable match weighed heavily on your shoulders. You couldn't shake the feeling that maybe true love was just a fairy tale. Getting lost in thought, you didn’t realize your father dismissed everyone early, seeing the exhaustion in you. Your father turns to you from his seat next to the throne, a sulk on his usually joyful face, footsteps sounding off as everyone left. 

"You need to start taking this seriously," he said sternly. "Your older brother is off in the gods'  know where, doing what he pleases. I won't be around forever to help make these decisions for you." The weight of his words settled in your chest, and you knew that the pressure to find a suitable match was only going to increase. He had only stepped down from the throne due to the sudden passing of your mother when you were fifthteen. It happened during the birth of their next daughter who was stillborn.  She was the love of his life, the grief of losing both at the same time caused him too much pain to continue ruling. 

"I understand, father." You replied, your voice meek, a far cry from the back talk you gave him constantly over the years. Reaching out, he lovingly rubs your hand, eyes just like yours but sadder, dimmer. His hands are slightly wrinkled now from his age, another reminder to you of the importance of your future marriage. 

"You are my only daughter, and I want to see you happy and successful," he said softly. "I will support you in finding the right partner, but ultimately, the decision is yours to make, my sweet flower." With a heavy heart, you nodded in agreement, knowing that the future of your family's legacy rested on your shoulders.

With that, he takes his leave, sending a warm smile to you. Alone in the vast room you lose yourself in your mind once more as you gaze off at nothing in particular. A light tap on your shoulder jolts you to attention. Looking to the side where it came from, you see your knight, Kento Nanami.

He is from a loyal noble family that guarded the royals for hundreds of years, sworn at your birth to protect you when he was only five years old. He stood broad and tall with blonde hair; it was styled neatly, framing his face with warm chocolate eyes, stern like always. It was a wonder he wasn't married yet. The stained glass windows behind him cast him in a soft, ethereal light, adding to his aura of strength and nobility.

"You're going to make your face stay like that, Sir Nanami." You smiled in a teasing tone at him, leaning up to poke his nose. The two of you are quite fond of each other.

He chuckled softly, a rare sight from the stoic knight. "I cannot help but be serious when it comes to your safety, my lady," he replied with a hint of warmth in his voice. The bond between you two was unbreakable, built on years of trust and companionship. 

Getting up, you pat your dress down, taming the wrinkles that have set into the fabric. Without a hitch, Nanami walks by your side, making your way to your room. Going through the many halls, the windows were open to let in the spring air. Smells of honeysuckle and jasmine were flowing with the light breeze. Your little cousins and other children of servants chasing each other with laughs of joy.

The castle was immaculate, with servants running around to maintain it. Each sent you a small smile as they ran by. Normally they would have to curtsey, but you didn’t care for the formalities all that much. Something you got from your father as he is a kind man—too kind at times. He always made sure the servants were treated with respect and fairness, setting an example for you to follow as you grew up. As you reached your room, Nanami waited at your door like normal. Rolling your eyes, you pull him by the collar of his chest plate and into your room. 

"Come have tea with me!" You demand, letting go of him, moving to sit at your table set on the balcony. The sunset casts a golden glow over your room, and the sky is painted in hues of blue, pink, and orange. “I had them bring your favorite tonight.”

Sitting across from you, he poured the drinks into the fine cups. The silence was enjoyed between the two of you with the calming tea. Your balcony gave a beautiful kingdom view from your room always gives you joy. Hills and valleys were filled with flowers that were blooming. The town within the walls is as lively as ever; sounds of laughter and happiness are normal occurrences. Your kingdom was a peaceful one for centuries. As the night grew darker, the sound of the crickets filled the air, creating a peaceful atmosphere. Nanami's presence always brought a sense of calm and comfort to your evenings.

“Your father was awfully restless today.” He broke the silence, looking over at you with soft eyes, recognizing the stress you had over today. 

“He wants grandbabies in his old age.” You laugh, finishing the tea, rubbing your temple. “He wants to go live off the coast, away from this drama, but it may be years before I find someone."

"You'll find someone you think is right when the time comes." He assured, leaning over to take your hand, squeezing it gently. Your smile growing at his kind action, squeezing his hand back; his soft moments were only for your eyes to see. “You deserve to find love, my lady. Be loved just as you give it . Everything you do is for your kingdom and loved ones. Is there a reason you think you do not deserve it?”

Your breath halts in your throat, and words stick as you try to speak. The look in his eyes clearly asks for more; it makes your stomach have butterflies. Looking at Nanami, you thought the moonlight made him look even more handsome. His chiseled jaw and cheekbones were accentuated. With a tint on your cheeks, you turn from his gaze. Taking your hand from his, you miss the way he winces a little. 

"Yes, yes. I'll surely find true love, just as my parents did." You laugh, dismissing his question with a wave of your hand, sarcasm dripping from your voice. Ignoring the pain in your own heart you felt at the action, the two of you knew there were feelings growing; neither of you felt it was right to confess. Teetering on the edge of something more each day but both of you were too scared to take the plunge into the unknown. Too scared to get hurt more than anything. 

“Your majesty. You are more than worthy; any man or woman would be lucky.” He tells you, taking his hand back, his eyes unwavering as he keeps eye contact. The tension between you two was palpable, the unspoken words hanging heavy in the air. It was clear that neither of you was ready to confront the truth of your feelings. You smile meekly, shaking your head to get up from your chair. 

“I appreciate your kind words, but I should head to bed. The hour is awfully late.” You dismiss, moving to ring the bell for your maids to help you change. 

“As you wish, please rest well tonight.” He gets up, taking your hand to kiss the back of it before he leaves. A twinkle in his dark eyes at your flushed face.

Now comfortable, you lay in your plush bed, free of the tight corset and suffocating layers. As tired as you were earlier, you couldn't help but stay awake, thoughts of him flooding your mind. The moonlight filtering through the curtains illuminated the room, casting a soft glow on your face. The weight of unspoken words lingered, creating a bittersweet ache in your chest. Sleep eventually comes to you as you drift off into dreams filled with his presence, a smile tugging at your lips. The night passes slowly, the memories of the evening replaying in your mind like a cherished melody.

Nanami retreats to his chambers after checking everything is in order, trying to stay busy while his mind races. Images of you run through his mind—how you admired the flowers in the gardens and when you sit upon the throne with your subjects. How you acted was like day and night at times: rigid with people you weren't fond of but then sweet to those you cherished. Your beauty glowed even when you didn't know someone was watching. He found it funny how you would puff your cheeks out in frustration when struggling with a new hobby or when your book turned sour. How kind and playful you were to your cousins and nephews, always playing with them when you could. Not caring when they dirtied your expensive dresses.

Changing for bed, he settled down, expressing a slight regret at his actions tonight with a sigh. His heart is torn between his duty to protect you and his own desires, unsure of how to navigate the complexities of his emotions. As he laid in bed, the soft glow of the moonlight illuminates his conflicted expression, a silent witness to the inner turmoil he grapples with.  

The peace of the night is broken by the sound of shrill screams that wakes you with a shock. The sound of fighting is going on outside your door. Sitting up in bed, you shake in fear, moving quickly for your sword displayed over your fireplace. You pause, listening intently for any clue as to what is happening outside. With a racing heart, you steel yourself for whatever danger may come your way. With your sword pointed at the door, you quickly slip on a pair of riding boots you happened to have out and prepare yourself for the fight to come. Breathe halted as the fighting died down and you heard footsteps approaching your door. 

With adrenaline coursing through your veins, you brace yourself for the unknown threat that awaits on the other side, your hands shaking as you hold the blade. While trained, you were rarely put in real danger thanks to Nanami at your side constantly. Taking a deep breath to calm your nerves, ready to strike down whoever it may be, raising it up just as they open the door. Relief filled your veins as you recognized the blonde head of hair entering your room. Blood was painted across his white dress shirt, dripping down his own sword. He wore casual clothes, black slacks, and a white shirt with a ruffled collar, having just woken up as well.

"Kento?" You called out in confusion, stepping closer to him and pointing your sword down. He didn't respond, making his way to you with haste, looking over your form for any wounds. Seeing him seemed to have broken down any walls you made, the stress of the situation coming down. You dropped your sword, wrapping your arms around him in relief, feeling the tension leave your body as he held you close. 

"I'm here." His voice was smooth and calm. He hugged you tightly, minding his sword as he did. More screams come from the hallway, making him go back to attention. Letting you go, he grabbed your black cloak nearby from the coat post. Putting it over you, he cupped your shaking face gently with one warm, calloused hand, looking into your eyes with urgency. Thumb rubbing your cheekbone comfortingly, trying to ease the fear he saw in your teary eyes. His face was firm as always, with a level head on his shoulders from his experience. 

"We need to go. We don't have much time," Nanami urged. Without waiting for a response, he led you out of the room and into the night, his grip firm and reassuring. The seriousness in his eyes told you that whatever lay ahead was not to be taken lightly.

Going through the halls, you saw bodies of servants and knights alike, walls painted with their blood and viscera. Men who were not of your kingdom laid with them in black armor. This was clear from the red sigil on their chest, the sign of evil dragon worshipers. Hurriedly, he pulled you through the halls, passing the windows to the courtyard. Down below, it was pure disarray. Fires are going with more bodies on the ground. The knights of the kingdom were defending the castle with their lives. Luckily no one found you two as you made it to the stables safely. Tears welled in your eyes, stinging as they went down your face while he went to his horse. The smell of smoke and blood was overwhelming.

“Where’s my father?” You questioned him, pleading with him for answers. His silence only provided the answer you needed, knowing there was a slim chance of him making it. He was old and had his own faults, but he didn’t deserve this end. 

"I could only make it to you first. I'm sorry." He simply said, moving swiftly to get his white horse, helping you onto him. Getting on behind you, he grabbed the reins, snapping them sharply to ride off.

You both only made it over the hill before an arrow shot into his shoulder from behind. Making a grunt of pain, he looked over his shoulder at a group of men chasing on horseback. Ripping it out, he urged the horse to run faster. More arrows shot around before someone yelled at them to stop, saying they wanted the queen alive. Holding him tighter, you pressed your face against his back. He rode towards the dense forest ahead, wishing to lose them there. Just as you were near the forest line, a fireball was sent nearby, sending the horse flying. 

Coughing, you weakly propped yourself up on your hands, your vision blurry from hitting the ground so rough. Just over you was a dragon, smoke escaping from its sharp teeth, ruby-red eyes looking down. Its vast, inky black body blocks out the moon behind it. Worshippers move to surround you, whispering to each other in glee. Nanami lay nearby, attempting to stand. Blood came from his temple, dripping onto his face. His sword was on the ground in front of you. Grabbing it, you pointed it up with a sharp glare, ready to defend yourself to the last moment, standing in front of Nanami. The dragon looked down at you in interest, with more of its goons surrounding you two.

“Run!” Nanami commanded, barking your name with such a harsh tone. It would've made you shake if it was different circumstances. His hair falling over his face as his eyes scanned over everyone. 

Making the first move, you strike down the closest assailant. Knowing how to fight was a skill every royal was taught. Swiftly move between them, dodging their attacks while sending your own. It helped that they wanted you alive; most of them were trying to grab you over kill you. Standing, Nanami defended you, grabbing a sword from a fallen worshiper nearby. As you both continued to fight off the dragon's goons, you felt a surge of adrenaline fueling your movements. Each strike and parry was executed with precision and determination. The odds may have been against you, but you were not going down without a fight.

Exhaustion soon caught up to you. Being unused to fighting this long, you panted for air. A few bodies lay at your feet dead. One of them saw an opportunity, striking you over the head while taking your blade from you, tossing it away. Falling to the ground with a grunt, you see the dragon land before you. It's sulfur smelling breath hitting your form. The heat of it makes you squint, struggling to stay awake. Nanami screamed your name and tried to run to you but was quickly stabbed through in his distraction, blood seeping from his mouth at the gaping wound in his abdomen. They pulled the blade out, making him fall to his knees. He could only watch as they gathered around you. His vision filled with black dots before passing out, the gushing blood made a pool in the grass under him. 

"Sleep, little queen." It grumbles, its voice is deep and ominous. The last thing you see before succumbing to unconsciousness is the dragon's red glowing eyes, filled with a mix of curiosity and malice. The world fades to black as you drift into a dreamless slumber, unsure of what fate awaits you next.

Later on, you awaken in a plush bed. Still wearing the blood splattered clothes from before, thankfully. Daylight came through the barred windows nearby. The chambers are warm, filled with fur along the floor and silk sheets. Dark reddish stone with almost black hardwood floors. The room is opulently decorated, intricate tapestries adorning the walls and a flickering blue fire in the hearth. Your head had a sharp pain from being hit from behind, making you move idly to sit up. Getting off the bed, you walk towards the door tentatively. As you reach for the doorknob, someone new opens the door, making you jump back. They wore a red cloak, their hood obscuring their faces from view.

“Master is glad you’ve awoken, he hopes the room pleases you.” They say, voice with a slight rasp to it, hands clasped together.

Not giving them a chance to talk further, you try to run past them, only to be slammed into the stone wall by an unseen force. Pain spikes from your head at the impact as you drop to the floor. You struggle to regain your balance, realizing that there is something unnatural about the servant. They walk towards you, shaking their head at that attempt. 

“That’s awfully rude.” They laugh cruelly. "Master doesn't like it when his guests try to leave."

"What do you want, mage?" You ask, glaring at them harshly, anger rushing through you as you bare your teeth to them. Their eyes gleam down at you, laughing a bit at the sight. “Where’s my knight?”

"You'll know soon enough," they say, harshly pulling you up by the arm and dragging you towards the door. Their sharp nails are almost piercing your flesh from their grip. Moving through the dark halls, several red cloaked people roamed about, none sparing either of you a glance. Their snake-like language is foreign to your ears. Moving deeper into the fortress, you go down many stairs, the smell of sulfur and rotten eggs only getting worse. Opening a door, they throw you in which almost makes you fall over. Catching yourself, you turn to hit the door. Letting out a frustrated yell, you kick at it, pounding it with your fist.

"Little queen has a bite to her." A deep voice calls out, a deep laugh from its throat, a voice you knew. Turning, you stood still, the very dragon laying in a giant heap of gold before you. The treasures of the world surround the beast in the cave structure.

"Surprised to see me, little one?" The dragon's red eyes glinted mischievously as it slowly rose to its feet, towering over you with a smirk. You realized then that escaping this fortress would be much more difficult than you had anticipated.

"What do you want?" You ask, voice firm. Surprising yourself at how you acted put together. Your blood rushing in your ears from your heart pounding.

The dragon's smirk widened, revealing sharp teeth as it replied, "Nothing big, dear. I just want to rule the lands."

You felt a chill run down your spine at his words, a cruel laugh coming from them. It vibrated your entire being from his size. 

"You see, little queen, I require something to do that." He continues, moving closer. "The blood of a white robed mage, to be exact."

A laugh slipped from your lips, your hand covering it from the outburst. It was unexpected for the dragon to believe in such fables. The dragon's eyes narrowed at your reaction, sensing your disbelief.

"Believe what you will, but the power of the white robed mage is real inside you," he growled, his tone deadly serious. Your heart raced as you realized the gravity of the situation, knowing that you must find a way to stop him before it's too late.

"What do you plan to do with me, beast?" You asked, standing your ground as it wrapped a tail around you. Not yet squeezing, but the threat was apparent. Leaning closer, you felt the hot breath of the dragon breathe down on you, its red eyes watching you.

"To devour you, my dear little queen," he explained, closing its eyes and pausing to take a whiff of you. "With you, I'll have all the power needed. No one can stop me as I gorge down on humanity. The blood of innocents will run down my throat."

You shivered at the thought of being devoured by the dragon, but you refused to show fear. With a defiant glare, you whispered, "You may have power over others, but you will never have power over me." The dragon's eyes narrowed in response, a hint of respect in its gaze as it considered your words.

"Oh? No groveling? No begging for mercy?" He chuckled. "Careful now. I may like you, little queen."

Hope you liked this! hehehehehe can't wait for the next chapter

ALSO dont fuck the dragon!!!!

[zombocomme]

Please, interact with us, our music cues will be highlighted for your convenience

[Midnight Special Theme plays:]

Zombocomme: Well, well, well, we are back on the air and we thank our audience for their patience. Mental health vacations should be taken by everyone, and loving yourself is so important, no? As this episode airs we have a little bet going on behind the scenes. You see, this story was originally selected from the BTL Lore vault and it's central characters and true ending have since been left on the cutting room floor, in favor of lending it's spirit to this collaboration project. Half our crew believes the original ending for the AU should make a debut, (ending A.), whereas the other half believe that leaving the episode resolution a mystery is perfect as is (ending B.) I've seen both of course, but I find that every rendition of the story means something new. I could go on forever re writing it, but the spirit of the tale is the same. And yes. It is time to move on from this Collab project to our next exciting slot, even if we do wish we saw a different end. I'll hope our audience enjoys this theatrical cut... And once again, this program is brought to you by contributions and collaborations from audience members like you, thank you.

And Now, Ministry 📺TV presents.

Featuring @frjimdefroque and @ask-miasma-ghoul in

RBRG/ FRJD and AMG:

✨️🐦‍🔥Combiverse🦋✨️

Spin off Episode: part 4 (ending B.)

Between The Lines, Episode 7 PART 4 of 4: “So help you god…you're set free”

Enjoy

NFW: MDNI : Rated-R: (Mature themes) *mentions death and dead bodies, bugs, gore and frontier diseases and violence, guns, religious interpretation of trauma, consumption of body and blood, allusions to murder/self and description macabre, and ghosts of the espooky kind.

“Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me” KJV- Mathew 25:37-40

🌌🗻🍂🐑🐾💀❄️🫲🙂‍↕️🫱❄️💀🐾🕊🍃🗻🌄

[Midnight Special Theme continues to play:]

God… The temptation made Miasma shiver  and his stomach pool a hot coil tightening from within…Jim shivered, but for a completely different reason…

Jim’s eyes clouded milky white. As he stood at the edge of the sunken sacred earth, it became more and more like a pit at the bottom of a gentle slope. They had dug into  the brick and when they had looked  up, the world around them seemed like a whiteout. Nothing. Only the distant row of the trees, the line circling them like a black fingered noose, that while it lay in wait, seemed somehow to tighten all around them all at once.

Jim stood up and threw the shovel, “The Captain wrote it, all but confessed it, ‘The Game had moved on’, he said! There were no ‘bucks’,” Jim seethed, desperately aching,  “Only desperate people.”

Miasma tilted his head away as if in mild disgust beholding the long since charred remains. Remnants of their time, discovered in the horrifying aftermath of ‘The end’, preserved like a stony fossil, cold and forever dead, until it hardened and became known… became the truth…concrete, and indifferent.

“They must have been starving” Miasma said, his tongue flicking out to wet his lips, voice barely above a whisper.

“Like the Donner Party. They burned everything they could.  But left the main place standing, the places most damnable. All this evidence left behind… like someone wanted this to be found” Jim said through his trance like state, rocking on his heels, vulnerable and icy. “Whoever wrote that Diary probably.” Jim swallowed, feeling like a blue ice cube had been swallowed, frosting through  a hole in his stomach. He felt sick. Brittle old bones and a few scraps of rotted cloth, trinkets and tokens that had somehow in the heat, collapsed the kilns, trapping the mass grave of bones with saw marks and serrations.

Miasma’s face hardened, his nose catching whiffs of torn tender flesh, festered like that of a blackening fruit, zinging in the putrid of the juice, flies buzzing daintily, “My god… They really dead eat each other, didn't they. and that line, 'to the brick with their kin', hell it condemns the captain as well. Seems it is true...Mankind cannot help themselves can they, when it comes to their baser desires," he swallowed, "I suppose all mortals face this in the end… the judgement day of their wretchedness.

It’s, almost as if no matter what, under the eyes of god, it is true, all mankind is created equal.. That is…” Miasma paused, “...that is because, all men must die… funny… that a God who demands everlasting faith, is also a God that creates its faithful out of such perishable vessels... It’s a shame really” Miasma said, feeling his stomach clamp shut, trapping his insides. Jim eyes were white, his voice echoing almost as if he was speaking aloud where he stood loudly, but softly in a more intimate voice, as if moist in his ears, Miasma heard Jim speak to him.

“And if people are in a kiln, it is because they are dead, or fated to die. Grace means nothing, when the moment comes when the living envy the dead. The true crash of the human psyche, the end of humanity, the end of one’s self, “If the living envy the dead, it’s because the living have something they wish they were dead over, but didn’t die for. If such people willingly went to the fire.”

Was it what they deserved?

Was such a hellish scene of people walking into the fire meant to be the door to their hell, or their purifying baptism in that lake of fire, to get their ticket punched for heaven? 

[Don Abandons Alice plays:]

Miasma dropped his shovel letting it clatter on the icy ground. “A willing Lamb for slaughter.” he whispered. He watched as despair for the wretchedness of the world sank Jim to his knees crying milky white tears, that glowed white like the snow around them, “If only they could have saved them from themselves.” Jim wept. 

Miasma watched as his vision swayed and all sound hollowed to a numbness like he felt on his body from the unusual coldness of the world. “I am nothing special to god, am I...” Miasma said softly.

Jim shook his head, rubbing at his stinging tears, “Intercessor, hear our prayer”. Jim Wept. 

And as Miasma watched on, Jim began to sob, saying the prayers of Last Rites, and the Apostles creed.

…As the dead around them at last began to rise…

“O my God, I am heartily sorry for having offended Thee,

Dust curled around them “ashes, ashes, we all fall, up?” Miasma sang softly to himself, a lilt, as the rising debris began to slope up, taking shape, bone and soot, ice and charred things that began to warm and fowl under the sudden humidity and heat that melted away the snow. the immediate Area encircled with Fire.

and I detest all my sins because of thy just punishments,

Miasma’s breath sucked into his chest, it was like being in the pits, all over again!

"No, no, no, no!" Miasma panicked, pacing like a wild thing, looking for escape.

but most of all because they offend Thee, my God,

who art all good and deserving of all my love.

“Father! Father Jim!” Miasma began shouting, his voice raggedly higher in his panicking call, trying to climb over the brick as a corpse groped for his blackened boots, the others approaching, rising, clawing, teeth gnashing. One even tore his crucifix off. 

Jim whirled and saw the hellish scene, his eyes watering, in a voice not his own, but that of the captain of that camp mourned, “Oh what have we done, what has the world done to us!”, lamenting and wailing.

Jim could feel it, like empathic fire searing his veins as he felt the dead in their personal hell that was this goddamned oven, boiling over with a cacophony of cries for absolution. Seeing Miasma on the ground as he tried to scurry away from the dead thing lurching forward, chasing after him, Jim grit his teeth.

He grabbed a shovel and swung, a nauseating squelching noise as the blade of the shovel bisected a purple and grey corpse… “Miasma, Miasma I’m coming!” Ice chipped, bones snapped and shattered, ashes swiftly swept away, charred remains crumbling, there were too many closing in, every single one of them blocking all hope of leaving this circle of hell alive.

As Jim swung the blade, he could see the exact moment each person had died, like a snap of an old timey photograph flashing in his mind, how they had died, the white smoke around him distorting his vision, seeing human faces in place of the skeletal, every stage of decay and remains, portraying the humanity of their souls; The human experience all share at that moment where life ends and death begins, the fading light, and not every time had the eyes gone dark. before their breaths drew their last .

Miasma saw it too, and said what Jim couldn’t say, or else it would mess up the narrative, Oh yes. not only cannibals... but *MURDERERS*

I firmly resolve with the help of Thy grace

to sin no more

and to avoid the near occasion of sin. 

Amen.”

[The Walking Dead Theme plays:]

Jim grunted, kicking back another clawing corpse that kept re-rising, like everything else. The suffering just would not die. And the living wished it was over, but their night had only just barely just begun…

Miasma felt like he was unable, incapable, inconceivably broken, that Jim had to come to his rescue, him? A Ghoul born from the fiery scapes of hell, why was it so hard to move, to run, or rush to defend. He felt like he was a helpless thing, marooned on an island surrounded by the sulfuric seas, boiling and acidic, toxic air stinging his every pore, bleeding from every hair”

“Jim help me, please!" He cried, seeing these beings the way humanity surely saw him, a murderer, a consumer, a black wolf preying on the living. "I can’t I can't go back! Please Jimmy! Help- I” Miasma began to cry. He knew, if they were dragged under by the suffering souls fondling the earth to rear up and claw their way back down with the living, sinking more and more souls with them, they would surely be lost.

Jim gripped Miasma by the shoulders, “Shut the fuck up! I’m getting us out of here!”

“Jim if we get caught and we die-”, “Then suddenly this is not our problem anymore” Jim said, brows knitted in pain from the feeling he had, the empathy of feeling the suffering and fear of his friend. 

[The Last of Us plays:]

“Miasma, We came to fight, even though we didn’t ask to. We came to find a way to set things right, and we came to find that peace. Please,” He said standing, panting. The dead were closing in as well as the greenish hellfire that was now all around them, as if they were trapped in a circle at the heart of the darkness where the deepest pain and regret could go. “Take my hand Miasma” Jim said softly, as if the dance macabre all around them were but nothing.

Green flames looked like blades of green grass soft in the sun like silk through the fingers.

“Though I walk through the valley….” Miasma thought as he looked up.

“Miasma, please. What is higher power than what we are inspired to follow as a light in times of darkness.” Jim said, his tone soft and yet gracious, begging his friend to heed his words.

“Pray with me Miasma” Jim said, lifting Miasma up. “This is  the lord’s fight…and we are on a mission from God” he said, a defiant tone as he faced the crowding undead. He held Miasmas hand in his, turning to dig his heels, a shovel in hand, ready to cut down whatever stood in their path.

“I never thought I'd fight beside a hell-spawn against hell.” Jim chuckled as they circled back to back, eying the massing wall of bodies, the weight of their work, heavy. Miasma looked down and saw his shovel, ready, calling out to him like one crying from the dust, ‘get to work’.

“What about dying beside a friend?” Miasma said, feeling a renewed strength in him as he brandished the broken shovel where blood was already painting it like a splattered crown.

Jim chuckled, “Well hell, guess I'd call a man pretty lucky if’n you can count him amongst your friends."

As shovel blades thwacked and spun, slicing as they ducked to move away from the grapples of the corpses haunting their every footstep, as they danced around, trying to clear a path with the force of their wills, but finding the action wasted, the dead were rising as soon as they were brought down, unending. Unyielding. and all around them...

"You'd call me your friend?" Miasma huffed, dodging around a small group.

"Friend, follower, whatever the fuck you call someone like you!" Jim shouted with a crooked grin, taking a large bloated corps down at the knees, trying to avoid its grasp as it crawled towards him.

"SINNER! how 'bout that!" Miasma said angrily, roaring as he cut a corpse down, black blood spewing from it's gut and flying to fleck his face. He bared his fangs as he faced off another skeleton, this one more agile than the last.

Jim frowned, "You act like ain't no sinner has a chance at seeing heaven's light! Don't be a doubting Thomas when you are so close!"

"Close?! Hah!" Miasma swung, bashing the skull into pieces and watching it mend over, but for being momentarily disabled, he moved to his next target, trying to force his way out of their circle of suffering.

"You know what I mean, I'll tell you every story under the sun if it will help you see the light! Even if I have to drag you over them pearly gates myself!" Jim winced, a shattered rotten ulna cutting him deep as he pivoted to break free of another hands grasp. "If'n we make it out alive! But I'll keep fighting till I'm dead!" He almost laughed.

“Yeah well, what the fuck about Judas then! If I’m gonna fucking die, I want to hear you preach to me about that story!” Miasma shouted as he was hauled backwards towards the ground. Jim bounded over to the offending body, bringing the blade to sever the head from the neck, the corpse clattering to the ground, the icicles of it’s skin shattering, peppering the white and black snow with meaty shards of putrid chunks.

“Ya know, if that ain't THE most perfect story for this” Jim said, an idea touching his brain like the light of god, burning in a bushel behind his eyes. “Miasma, corale them!” “The fuck you mean coral them” 

“Just shut up and gather your flock, look at them, going after you like you’re going to give them what they want, round them up!” “Like a fucking sheep dog?!” “Exactly!” Jim said, a gleam in his eye, as he made his way towards the dilapidated chimney, the flames closing in. “Use the time you have, and it ain't much, look!” Jim pointed as he scrambled on the dirt, ripping up icy clods that stung his fingers with the freezing cold bricks.

[Earth plays:]

Miasma managed to peek behind his shoulder, shovel up in two hands as he used it to try and push the herd of corpses back, his tail flicking back and forth to avoid being singed by the hellfire.

No. he didn’t envy the dead. That wasn’t his purpose. It wasn't what his dreams and yearnings meant. It was a hunger for something more, something beyond the toxic sludge of desecrated flesh. His consumption wasn't of bodies, or people, he wasn't trying to quench something in him over humanity and its hopes and dreams. No…. He craved what came of something higher, that which is granted from above...

*purpose*.

And now, now he had it. It didn’t matter how. What mattered was that it was. And with a great heavy groan, he pushed the group back, inch by inch as the fire closed in, circling them, getting them to move in hopeless circles, for their own good, he knew. You can only break curses when you set the offending souls to rest. They rest only when they can be reached. be understood. finding peace in compassion.

Jim climbed the highest mound he could, he could feel the green flames surrounding them like a sphere closing in. and it was his purpose to fight, by pushing back.

Holding out his arms to the green light at the end of what would be his mortal life, his voice rang out, catching the ears of all who could hear, and the eyes of those who got turned around by the likes of Miasma to see. Beginning his sermon on the mound of detritus and dust of self destruction. Feet wedged in the brick, rooted unmoving, and yet bowing in and around as the dead tried to drag him down but failed in their graspings, he began to preach...

“SINNERS!” Jim shouted above the chaos, “Even Ye are worthy of redemption, an absolution…an end to SUFFERING! I call on you to listen! Suffering is but a means to a grateful end. And for what considerations do ye call yourselves devils!” he said, the wretched word pulled like toxic ooze from his mouth, tongue lolling out as the black bile in his stomach rose, and vomited out of his stomach. It felt like it was tearing at everything on its way up, but there was a relief in the regurgitation, of finally letting the words he should have said before, at last coming out to reach the sinners in his current care. Truly, Jim really was speaking to those that called themselves damned for their actions. 

“If ye believe in God, as whatever you call divine, that grants swift justice that now gnashes your teeth, then you must also believe that as exists justice, so too does there exist MERCY beyond!"

Miasma shouldered several corpses causing them to crumble and hiss, but as Jim’s voice rang out clear and true, his conviction became theirs, and spellbound like rats to the piper, they slowly turned, and gathered around him. Heeding his words.

One by one, brainless, heartless, things turned toward the voice that was preaching about the possibility of redemption. And Even Miasma was listening...

As the ghoul swiped and prodded the masses of corpses stumbling to face Jim , they swayed and stuttered in their cries, as if halted in their footsteps… looking almost human, in the clarity behind their once cloudy eyes. Blinking even. The dead and things forming from the earth, wove in and around the ones who listened, and their features began to change. Taut leathery skin slacked and sagged but lay more supple upon their gaunt features.

Shattered bones and cracked fissures separating one bone from another healed and came together, bones and flesh began to mend, and even as Miasma still had to fight hard, ever on his toes, there was a rhythm to the movements he made. He found a sure footedness he could confidently maintain. And the unexpected shove and grappling attempts made, he would handle one foe at a time.

Funny how in the moment he realized the noble way of fighting for himself, was what nobly fought for the people stumbling around, lashing out and being turned to words of comfort, and repentance.

*you can't pour from an empty cup*

Miasma thought.

Jim continued, “If you believe in miracles, in the divine, then believe in me when I say, if god so rests on the seventh day, then surely, in god’s image, you must also have your end, and at an end is there not rest?!”

Miasma could feel the shifting crowd as he continued his circling, trying to keep the group's edges from fraying. The hell fire was still closing around them but it was slowing, as if it too, was listening.

“I beseech you, right here, right now, look beyond the guilt, the blame, Your God knows of them and has clearly made you suffer for it. But there is more to God than just, justice. There is also MERCY. Deliverance, Salvation. Forgiveness. Absolution. 

[Bonnie Choses to Stay plays:]

Jim felt the white smoke and mist around him settle, as one by one the faces as he saw them at the time of their deaths began to appear. And he recognized each one, and because someone had the talent to preserve it, knew them by name. 

And as Jim recited the words of psalms from memory, every syllable uttered gained in power and conviction. As he spoke, a great tree sprung from the earth behind the congregation, and Miasma jumped, the hellfire that had been around them shoot past and into the tree, whirling and and brimming with the green light that no longer burned around them with heat infernal, but rather swayed and danced like the leaves of summer tresses, a weeping willow sighing in the breeze...

“If you would find your God now, would his cleansing fire scorch you, or warm you of the coldness settled in your hearts.” He could see the fullness of their faces, where in their eyes a prayer of hope had remained in each one. 

Jim’s voice that had been booming now took on a softer tone, gesturing to the ground he stood on, “Can a monument to the cruelties of time not also be the ebenezer  raised, the miracle that comes at the end of all  suffering?

The animated remains yearned for hope. To Miasma and his sight, all he saw were hellish beings, poor devils, in rapt attention to the sound of Jim’s voice, hanging onto every word.

While Miasma was breathless, a sense of pride and accomplishment at being an author of such a bizarre and touching scene, made him almost chuckle. As Jim preached, the words he had heard so often said at the rituals and from the pulpit, came swimming to him, floating, haunting his thoughts as time moved onwards, and yet seemed to also stand still.

“The memory of your suffering will not define you, but the hope and promise of renewal, FAITH, is your salvation…Even the likes of Judas can find their way to heaven... You are but on the long road to Damascus, and struck blind to see... for without suffering how can one know peace. I call on you, for it is time now, to know of that peace...”

Miasma stood his ground, panting, his purpose, stood before him, the herd of corpses corralled around Jim, who spoke to them with such grace and compassion, reaching a hand out for their humanity to reach back.

1 LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth! You have set your glory in the heavens.

*From the pinnacle to the pit*

2 Through the praise of children and infants you have established a stronghold against your enemies, to silence the foe and the avenger.

*Her acts of cruelty and her lust for blood

Makes her one of us*

3 When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place,

*You shine like the sun and the moon and the stars in the sky*

4 What is mankind that you are mindful of them, human beings that you care for them?

*Holy Mother, you washeth the sin from our feet*

5 You have made them a little lower than the angels and crowned them with glory and honor.

*Under a monolith, her likeness

Marble white*

6 You made them rulers over the works of your hands; you put everything under their feet:

7 all flocks and herds, and the animals of the wild,

*An' piercing eyes emotionless

A heart so black and cold*

8 the birds in the sky, and the fish in the sea, all that swim the paths of the seas.

*Winds come on strong so help you, God

Come unleashed,*

9 LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth! 

 *you're set free*

And suddenly Miasma realized why the number of the flock was off. Why there was a presence in and around every story told. There had been one last member of this flock that needed finding. That needed saving.

*Himself*

He prayed, pleading for the green fire in the tree to call out to the lost, and as he backed away from the congregation gathered at Jim's feet he heard the soft bleating sounds of the Lost. the one’s whose stories were never told…

Coming forward, drifting towards the tree line where Miasma was running was a spectre of a young woman. The opaque figure was heavy with child. Even as Jim held the attention of the crowd he too saw the visage in the shadows. The implications not lost on him. 

[Farewell plays:]

He motioned, gently parting the sea of faces as he too made his way to where the woman went no further. Miasma looked at Jim. “We have no choice, if we want to break this curse, all the troubled souls must be put to rest. Even this one..." his tone almost tender, as he saw himself in her- eyes moistened.

*Jim always came back for him. Couldn't he do the same for her?*

Jim looked at his friend, a verse in his head that repeated over and over…

*Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me*

Jim nodded and gently clapped his hands together, snapping the white smoke and mist away, the congregation paused, no longer animated, still as statues. The mist swirled ahead as they watched the woman drift off into the trees the mist following her, like a guide-rope to her every step. While they followed her, they reverently pondered on her presence in these woods...

“Of course… her name would never be in the ledger, or the photograph. Most women weren't so acknowledged at the time, and certainly not a preacher's wife. It was seen as vain." Jim muttered, shaking his head. "Such a shame it is that such stories were often left so unknown, trapped in time. Stories want to be heard, and if it curses something to achieve it then so be it...even if the story was not a happy one, it deserves to see the light..." Jim turned, putting a hand on Miasma's shoulder, stopping a moment. Miasma laid his own on top. The two companions sharing a quiet look, one filled with understanding and compassion. It was a moment that even if lost to the known world in those woods, would forever stand the test of time, in the peace it gave to each of those beating hearts.

*She considered herself damned though at her death she was harboring the life in her belly… there was a restlessness in the tense air around them..  Stemming not only from that burden, but also, that they had never been known at all.*

“Were you the one who kept the ledger” Jim called out. He had noticed the crucifix on her visage as being the same as  the one Miasma had worn and subsequently lost. The very same...

The woman sobbed softly in response, her mournful cries echoing around the trees unnerving and heartbreakingly hollow.

*... at its heart, that bloodstone…they had found it. They had found her. At last...*

Miasma thought aloud, “It makes sense doesn't it… Father Evight Vanhassel, and his wife, the  civilizing influence together as they tended the flock of sinners that worked in these woods. When the camp lost them, they lost their reason to hold on to their humanity, The Captain, The Doctor, Father Evight, and the Missing, Lady Van Hassel...such a tragedy...such a loss...But if she, her remains, I mean, are not with the other bones then-” 

“What happened to her?” Jim finished. They took a breath of the cold pre-dawn air, and strode to follow the spectre into the dark wood.

Braving the unknown, to seek the truth…

The specter led them on, floating, as if walking, stepping on stone long since worn smooth, over dips that no longer existed, through thick trees that had been thinner when she had once wandered the paths of these woods, her mournful cries and trembling voice bouncing all around them.

Their stomachs felt uneasy, like something sad and horrible awaited them. So very much like the dreams they had been having except this time, someone was leading them to the pit in which the lost had fallen…except, even the horror they knew they would face, was as valid and important to know. If it meant giving the young woman peace, who were they to deny her story to be known...

Yet, step by step, the eerie stillness surrounding them abated, giving way to the common sounds of a sleepy winter wood. The spectre appeared almost tangible now, and though the air was growing colder as she lead them farther into the wood, towards a deep fissure in the earth where a frozen creek lay still now, where the truth lay buried, and scattered, the companions felt an ease in the tension. A lift of their burdens, in carrying them together. The broken things inside them would mend, they knew. The pieces would fall into place. And soon, both Miasma and Jim stood at the edge of their triumph, facing a chasm where a ravine gaped at their approach.

The night was clear and the air rushed around them as time all at once stood still. They found themselves surrounded  in the events that lead to the curse of that wretched blood stone… carefully they descended into the ravine and trotted together through it's shallow waters that and been lost to the passage of time, following the bend until they arrive to their destination...

The woman almost seemed to sigh in relief, as they approached her lovely bones, and learned of her demise. For at last her story would be told. And all that had been lost, every last sheep of that flock, would be found again... and non would ever be left behind again...

Daylight was breaking, and as they gazed upon a conspicuous spot where she had fallen so long ago, they had tears in their eyes. The sun was once again rising in that lonely valley, dappling through the trees over this spot where the scene almost felt Holy.

A sapling had sprouted so long ago in that very place, and as the mysterious passage of time faded from view and Jim's eyes lost their powerful sight, they stood before a magnificent Willow tree, miraculously untouched by the surrounding white snow, green spring grass under it's umbrella of care.

This is what they were meant to see. A corner of the world where goodness and love remained untouched by that which corrupts it. A Holy place in the heart where faith in those one loves, and in those whom one cares, lives on forever.

Jim pulled the crucifix from his pocket.

"I, thought it was lost" Miasma said softly, admiring how it shined in the dawn light.

"Oh ye of little faith" Jim chuckled softly, his voice thick with emotion, "Despise not the small things..."

He lay the cross at the foot of the tree and a gust of wind blew through, that sigh of relief washing over them like a warm blanket, enveloping them in a grateful embrace.

"Do you think we did it? Do you think we did the right thing?"

Miasma asked, taking Jim's Hand, they stood back and watched the willow shiver and shake gently, swaying in the breeze like any other ol' tree.

Jim removed his shoes. Miasma did the same.

Feet on the hallowed earth they stood hand in hand.

"Yes," Jim replied, giving the ghoul's hand a squeeze. He turned to see his friend, face upturned to the sunlight, eyes closed, a soft smile playing on his features as he basked in the feeling all around them.

"Yes angel," Jim said once more, "I suppose we did."

"Hm." Miasma smiled, feeling as if in the glow of the morning, he had wings.

*... he was free...*

[immortaljailor]

1, 3, 15, 23!

hehehehe hello hello! I already hit 3 and 23 with sleepymccoy's ask so here's 1 and 15:

1. favorite fic you wrote this year

Our "Snapshots" for the Sponeszine of course...! 😤😤 Out of all the fics I've worked on this year, this was the most fun to write—it felt good doing something new, I just loved throwing ideas at the wall rapidfire to see what stuck best for which song, and also it was lovely working with you and seeing what you came up with! 💙💙

For fics that were not collabs...hmm...I'm going back and forth between my domestic old married Spones fic "i've seen time tell tales" and my fluffy Spones omegaverse fic "So Hold Me Close and Say Three Words", but I think I have to give it to "i've seen time tell tales", because even though it's by far my least popular Spones fic by basically every metric, it's super close to my heart...! Here's hoping I can write more old married Spones this year too~

15. something you learned this year

Big one is always always back up your files regularly—with proper maintenance, one can avoid some very regrettable situations 💀💀 if it's hard to remember to do manually, dropbox's automatic syncing is amazing 😭

Also, attempting to clean and typeset manga while squished into the window seat during a 12+ hr long economy flight will give you a crick in your neck like you wouldn't believe... 😔 (excited to finish working on these Spones doujins though~)

[the-forsaken-bell-tolls]

"Let the flames take you."

Welcome to your own personal Hell.

Spawn won't save you. It's the reason you're here.

And you can forget those Devs. They care not for you anymore. No more sword slashes to evade danger. No dispensers to heal your wounds.

Be on the lookout for eyes. Flaming sigils on the ground. And, of course, a sword conveniently thrown your way while you're grouped up.

Three names are feared, in this place. And lucky you, you've found an outlet to speak with one of them.

Tease her, torment her, make her suffer or falter.

Daisy Bell is yours to pester.

- OOC NAVI -

Greetings, one and all! Phantom here, of @building-starlight and @splatting-stampede infamy! If you follow the first of the aforementioned blogs, you know what this is!

Daisy Bell- or, Avarice- is an OC originally made for Block Tales. Over time, she has developed into a rounded OC and been thrown into two other games; The Robloxia: Until Dawn, and Forsaken.

This blog is dedicated to an AU of Avarice for Forsaken in particular: Fates Inverted, an AU made in collaboration with the absolutely wonderful @fandomandangstlover! You can find Daisy Bell's informational post here.

Let's lay down some ground rules!

▪︎You may be suggestive and/or flirtatious towards Daisy Bell. She is 38 years old, and I- the mod- am 18. Explicit NSFW, however, is prohibited.

▪︎Racist, anti-LGBTQ, zionist, xenophobic, etc. folk are NOT welcome here. Nor are transmysogynists or transandrophobes.

▪︎MAP/NOMAP/pedophiles are NOT allowed under any circumstances. Nor are zoophiles, or necrophiles, or anything like that. This rule, and the one prior, are NON-NEGOTIABLE.

▪︎Fates Inverted is still being developed. Info may be retconned later, but please note: IF PARTICULAR SKINS CATCH OUR EYE FOR A GIVEN CHARACTER, THEY MAY BECOME THEIR OWN CHARACTERS IN THIS AU.

▪︎The above already applies to: MAFIOSO, BLUDUUD

▪︎This AU features OC X CANON content.

I'll try to draw replies every so often! I'm just here to have fun with my silly collab AU, man.

TAGS:

#the bell tolls for thee🔔 - general posts

#daisy daisy🗡 - drawn responses

#burnt memorial🔥 - asks

#hacked purgatory👁 - posts with and/or about BLOXWATCH

#sfoth synergy⚔️ - posts with and/or about TELAMON

#the skybox calls🌟 - mod/ooc posts