#the sea shall yet give up her dead

[mydearlybeloathed]

── 𝐎𝐍𝐂𝐄 𝐔𝐏𝐎𝐍 𝐀 𝐃𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐌

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: Long ago, you were cursed to one day sleep for an eternity—unless you’re presented with true love. You thought destiny couldn’t find you on the high seas, but when you're sorely mistaken, it's up to a certain swordsman to get his act together and rescue you from eternal sleep.

𝐩𝐚𝐢𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠: zoro x princess!reader

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 8.4k

𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐧𝐭: tw blood, sleeping beauty au, meddling faeries here and there, stubborn swordsmen and lovelorn princesses, no use of Y/N, light angst, major fluff

𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐤𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭: falling - timothy cole

𝐎𝐏 𝐌𝐀𝐒𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐋𝐈𝐒𝐓

𝔒𝔫𝔠𝔢 𝔲𝔭𝔬𝔫 𝔞 𝔱𝔦𝔪𝔢,

a very many years ago, twelve Wise Women from the Isle of Perminion—faeries was a more precise term, but they felt the label struck too much fear into their mortal fellows, and in this economy, faeries need willing clientele—were invited to the presentation of a young princess from an old kingdom. Each bestowed upon her gifts coveted by all. Beauty, grace, love, and the like. 

It was the thirteenth Wise Woman who took it all back.

“You dare not invite me to this celebration of life? Fine. Forget me. But not before I give the princess my own gift. She’ll grow beautiful, wise, and loved, as my fellow Wise Women decreed—but one day she’ll lose all that to the prick of a spinning wheel and fall dead to my power!”

Your life had just begun, and had already gone to shit (forgive such undignified language, unfit for a princess, but really, you felt you deserved some leeway).

The whole of the kingdom knew the witch’s speech by heart, saying a prayer each night in the hope that their princess would be fortunate enough to never cross a spinning wheel in all her life. And from the rail of her tower’s terrace, the princess dreamed of someday joining them. Not in their prayers, but in celebration that even the worst curses are no match for the blessed princess of their kingdom. Blessed, as she once was, before the outrage of Carabose found her.

But that was only the dream of a foolish child.

Foolish dreams. You were cursed not only in the very literal sense but also by the paranoia of your parents, the king and queen of your revered nation. Not a soul outside the castle walls had seen their princess since the day of her introduction—the day you were cursed to one day cross the spindle of a spinning wheel, and die.

Well, not die. Your godmother, Rosalie—the twelfth Wise Woman and the only one that mattered in your opinion—had gifted you a chance at survival. 

“The princess will not die upon pricking the spinning wheel. She shall only sleep till… till she receives a display of true, compassionate, unbridled love.”

It was the first thing Rosalie could think of that would lessen the blow of the witch’s spell. 

And yet despite this security, your parents locked you away, terrified of what would happen to their little princess should she cross that fated hunk of wood. Honestly, it was beyond embarrassing being destined to be bested by a hunk of wood, but that’s just your luck, you supposed.

It was also just your luck that one day when you’d just barely given up all hope of living a fulfilling life, a certain crew of pirates found your kingdom, caused the uproar of the century, and managed to help you escape all in just two days. 

With the wind in your face some months later, it seemed all your dreams of grandeur were coming true; far away from your castle, you sailed the seas with real friends at your side. You never worried about your curse, for why would you ever find a spinning wheel at sea? It was silly to fear the fate set before you. 

Rosalie always told you that destiny cannot be fought, but look at you now, proving her wrong. 

(It’s like you were asking for things to go wrong).

The day was windy and bright, with sparse clouds high above and cool grass underfoot. The Going Merry rest at the docks of the little coastal city, Usopp making repairs in record time. You couldn’t help but wish to go out and explore, taking full advantage of your freedom.

You took Zoro with you, of course. You’d never leave the ship without your loyal guard at your side. 

Zoro. What to say about Zoro? In your opinion, he was probably the love of your life, if he ever got over himself and admitted he loved you too. Either way, you would never picture life without him by your side, even if he brushed off all your teasing advances with a roll of his eyes.

“Here,” you motioned him to your side, feeling warm inside with the familiar bump of his shoulder against yours. You picked up one of the ornate golden rings displayed at the market stall before you, grinning like a devil as you lifted your hand to measure it up against your skin. “What do you think? I prefer silver, but gold would match your earrings.”

Zoro, lovely and clueless Zoro, only tilted his head, aforementioned earrings chiming against one another. “I think it's nice, but why d’ya wanna match?”

By the time you slipped the ring on your fourth finger, he saw where this was going. “Hmm, no reason.” You handed the ring back to the seller and smiled up at Zoro’s perturbed, blushing face. 

“Sorry, you’re just so easy to tease.” He grunted in reply, drawing another smile out of you. Your eyes got all misty, like they always did when you looked at Zoro, and the words escaped your lips before you could stop them. “Go out with me.”

Zoro kept his gaze firmly on the sky, his shoulders far too stiff to be comfortable. “We’re… too busy for stuff like that.”

It all felt like a mildly disappointing routine at this point; you asked, he dodged around giving you an explicit no. Perhaps if he actually got the nerve to deny you, you’d have given up, but Zoro always left you with that small hope that one day his answer might change.

Still, something in you held the strong consideration to give up. Lovelorn and yet hopelessly deep, it was a tempting option. Surely, pursuing someone so adamantly disinterested was a lost cause. But what if, you dared to call back, silencing your doubts.

“C’mon,” you relented. “I need some new fabrics.”

You scooped up his hand and he let you drag him down the street to a little boutique on the corner. The door rang when you entered, and Zoro tried to ignore how your hand still clung to his even as the door clicked shut behind you.

“I wanted to make Nami a new dress,” you said as you beelined for the shelf of various fabrics. “You know, to make up for the one I ripped.”

He didn’t try to pull back, only standing at your side as you skimmed your free hand over a set of pinks. “Still don’t get how you ruined it that badly. It was practically in two pieces.”

“You were there. I was in a tree.”

“But why?”

Your silly smile rose to meet his gentle grin. “Because I wanted to? You could have joined me, but no, you stayed all alone on the ground like a loser.”

“If I was in the tree, who would catch ya’ when you fell like an idiot?”

With a scoff, you let go of his hand and picked up some pink and blue fabric, failing to see him watch you longingly. “Touche.”

Zoro was never sure what to make of you—you were like nothing he’d ever faced before. The day you waltzed into his life and started up your little flirtation game was the day Zoro found his most formidable opponent in the love you shared so willingly.

There was your habit of getting into trouble too—trouble he often dragged you out of—which didn’t help much either.

Zoro thought princesses were meant to be graceful and poised, as Vivi was, but you toppled those expectations at the very foundation. At this point, it wasn’t really a question of if he returned your feelings, but if he was able to voice it. As far as Zoro was concerned, the answer would always be a firm no.

As you started to stack the pink and blue on your arm Zoro reached to take them from you, draping the fabric over his shoulder. He returned your appreciative smile with a slight nod, heart warm at how you doted on him with your eyes alone.

Yeah, it was better this way—you waiting for something that would never happen, and him standing stoic at your side, nothing but a loyal companion.

“Miss.” Your voice, calling to the cashier, broke him from his less-than-happy thoughts. “Have you got any purple?” You swiftly turned back to Zoro with a brief, “Robin said she likes purple.”

The cashier looked up from her book, pushing her glasses up her nose. “I just finished some this morning,” she said with a grin, getting up to lift the gate in the counter and motioning for you to follow her into the back of the shop. “I’ll show you.”

Zoro’s skin prickled as you glided after the cashier, shooting him a smile as you disappeared through the door. He was left standing with the odd sense that something was wrong. 

Maybe it was the way a sudden draft hit his back despite there being no ventilation, or maybe it was the fact that you walked under a ladder earlier just to piss him off. Or, perhaps, it was the flash of green in the cashier’s eyes as she passed by a mirror.

Whatever it was, he stayed put, trusting he would be there to help you the moment you needed him. Zoro was always there when you needed him. Neither he nor you had reason to doubt this fact.

You felt completely at ease as you entered a small, dim room full of messy shelves, half-knit sweaters, and heaps of yarn. “Here,” the cashier pointed to a table at the center of the room. “Is this the shade you had in mind?”

A grin split your face as you felt the fabric, marveling at its softness. It was high-quality stuff, definitely not cheap. But you thought of Robin, who had done so much for you, and felt it was worth the possible loan from Nami.

“It’s perfect,” you replied. “How much?”

“Oh, it’s on the house.”

You startled instantly, eyes darting up to find the cashier absent from your side despite her voice being right in your ear. “Come again?”

“You can have it.” Turning slowly, you found the woman sorting through a surplus fo purple fabrics. “I have plenty.”

A gentle laugh escaped you. “Thank you so much. My friend will love it.”

The cashier swiveled on her heel and leaned against the table, head cocked to the side. Had her eyes always been so vibrant an emerald? They almost seemed to glow. “No, thank you, Your Highness.”

Chills ran up your spine at the formal address, all air expelled from your body as you choked out, “Pardon me?”

Caught up in the green of the woman’s eyes, you didn’t notice a misty tendril swirling up your body till it clouded your vision, directing your captured attention to the corner of the room. There in the shadows was a contraption you’d never seen before, yet you knew its purpose instantly. 

The purple string being woven gave it away. How had you not noticed the spinning wheel before? 

The fabric slipped from your fingers and fell to the floor in a lump. You darted for the door, yet your feet never moved an inch, cemented in place. Was that a tear on your cheek? No, it couldn’t be. You never cried. And yet, a salty streak ran from your eye to your jaw now, as if your body knew what your mind denied: your fate had caught you.

“Stop.” You weren’t sure who you spoke to. Your feet that started to creep toward the spindle? The husk of a woman, possessed by some evil spirit of a bitter sorceress? Destiny herself? Whoever you ordered refused to listen as you closed in on the wheel and raised a steady hand.

A half-lived life flashed before your eyes. A princess sat alone in a room, loneliness her only companion. A girl stood on a ship, tasting freedom for the very first time. A woman stared at a man, knowing this was what love felt like. 

A light pinch shocked your whole body, and you finally broke from the spell to find your index finger pierced into the sharpest of spindles. A cackle echoed from every corner of the room as the cashier collapsed on the spot. 

One thought broke through your slowly fading mind. Traitorous, wobbly feet took you to the door, flinging it open and leaning you against the doorframe. Your heavy eyes ached, Zoro’s voice so far away. You didn’t feel his hands on your arms as you sank to the floor.

Your labored, panicked breathing matched your flickering, terrified eyes. “Spindle.”

And you lay fast asleep in Zoro’s arms a moment later, peace written in your features. Your chest rose and fell gently. Zoro gazed down at the sleeping beauty, uttering your name over and over, practically paralyzed… Until he noticed the tiny bit of blood dripping from your fingertip, and he looked into the ajar room. A spinning wheel stood right in his line of sight, the wheel creaking as it spun slowly.

✧ ˚ 　· 　　 .

You had never told any of your friends about the curse, too embarrassed to do so. Was that a lapse in judgment? Perhaps, but you were too asleep to know.

Now Chopper stood at your side, holding his stethoscope over your heart. He set the scope around his neck a moment later, putting his hooves together nervously. Chopper felt the whole crew staring at his back like a brand. “I think—Well, I think she’s sleeping.”

Luffy had been deathly silent through the whole ordeal, not taking his eyes off you since Zoro carried you back to the ship in a hurry. “Then let’s wake her up.”

Sanji slapped a hand over his mouth before Luffy could start yelling, shoving out a sigh. “We tried that, didn’t we? Marimo shook her for five minutes before we could pry him off her.”

Everyone waited for when the swordsman would quip back his own insult, but the usual pattern was thrown off by a strange silence. Even Sanji looked around, confused to find Zoro nowhere in sight. 

Sanji blinked a few times before he placed his hands on his hips. “Now where the fuck is he?”

From the corner, seated in a chair, one leg crossed over the other, Robin spoke up for the first time all evening. Her thoughtful eyes stared into the space ahead of her. “I saw him leave a moment ago. Said he had to get something.”

Not even a second later did Zoro barge down into the galley. In one hand he held a spinning wheel of all things. In the other, he held a woman’s arm in a vice. 

Nami jumped to her feet, aghast. “Zoro, what—?”

He nearly threw the woman before them all, his brows drawn into an expression of ruthlessness. “Well? What did you do to her?!”

With her eyes wide and breaths short, the woman violently shook her head. “I don’t know what you mean!”

Sanji stepped forth intending to sock Zoro in the face for scaring the woman, when Zoro turned on him and spat, “This woman’s the reason she’s—she’s sick!”

That was all it took for Sanji, somehow still poised, to face the terrified woman now encircled by a crowd of frowning pirates. Sanji grabbed the woman’s arm, not as harshly as Zoro had, but just as firmly. “What did you do to her?”

“Nothing,” she sputtered, gazing over at where you laid limply on the table. “I… I remember her. She wanted purple fabric.”

Zoro nearly had the mind to throttle the woman. “You led her into the back room and minutes later she stumbles out and—and sleeps!” He slammed the spinning wheel on the ground, startling everyone around. “She said spindle. What’s this? Some sort of… torture device?”

The woman did nothing but blink at him. “It’s a spinning wheel.”

“What’s it do?”

“It spins.” Suddenly the woman had the nerve of a warrior, righting herself to face Zoro’s glare. “I don’t know what you think I did, but I didn’t. All I know is I led her to the fabric and…” 

All her words fell short as she stuttered to find them, her brows screwing together. “And I don’t remember. I—I don’t remember what happened.”

Sanji seized her shoulders and leveled her with a look. “I need you to remember, madam. It means that girl’s life or death.”

The woman stood frozen, stunned as she stared into Sanji’s eyes, her cheeks turning a concerning shade of pink. Nami rolled her eyes and promptly shoved him out of the way, snapping in the woman’s face. 

“What do you mean you don’t remember?” Nami asked sharply.

“I mean I don’t remember.” Their captive grew increasingly frustrated, and maybe a bit nervous as well. “I walk that bitch into the back, I black out, and I wake up to this guy dragging me out of my home!”

Just as Zoro gasped (“Bitch, huh?”), Robin stood and slowly made her way toward the spinning wheel, running her hand over the wood and grazing a finger over the sharp needle. Inspecting the spindle close, she found a bit of dried blood there. She hummed, keeping everyone on edge, and went toward your sleeping form, grabbing your hands and turning them over. “Ah-ha…”

Zoro stepped forward, anxious. “What?”

“I think she poked herself on the spindle.” Robin made it sound so simple.

Nami tapped her finger to her nose as she pondered. “But why would that make her… sick?”

“Poison?” Chopper offered at the same time Robin answered, “Magic.”

“We don’t have time for speculation,” Sanji gritted as he fished around his pockets for his lighter, cigarette between his teeth. “Can we test for what poison it could be?”

As Chopper started to ramble about some tests he could run, Zoro stared daggers at the spinning wheel. Now, he wasn’t superstitious, but perhaps he was a little stitious, because the longer he stared at the wheel the more he remembered about what transpired in that shop.

“Why would it be magic?” Zoro asked suddenly, silencing the room. 

All eyes found Robin, who was now sitting on your bedside holding your hand. “She’s a princess, right? The princesses in the stories I’ve read dealt with a lot of bad magic.”

Nami shook her head. “This isn’t a story, Robin.”

The debate went on like that, really going nowhere at all, the cashier woman tentatively slinking away during the rabble and inevitably going forgotten. Luffy ignored them all, approaching you and lifting your hand to inspect as if he’d find some kind of sign in your pierced fingertip. 

And just maybe, he did find something. “Hey, Nami?”

She ran a hand over her face as Sanji and Zoro took jab after jab at one another, the stress of your condition getting to the both of them. “Yeah, Luffy?”

He followed a very excited thought bunny here and there, after princesses and stories until it hopped to a stop in front of a certain royal friend of theirs. You appeared next, smiling like he wished you would now. “Vivi? Yeah, I know her. We go way back.”

“Call Vivi,” he ordered, closing the discussion as he too sat at your side and started to poke at your sides, as if tickling you would be enough to break this spell.

✧ ˚ 　· 　　 .

Often, your dreams gave way to the most horrible nightmares, and always, you would find refuge in the realm of day. Until now. No matter where you ran a firm sheet of black blocked you in. Air as frigid as the Arctic enveloped you. No friend in sight, no solace from the cold. 

Finally falling still, you blinked, and you stood in the middle of your tower, back in your kingdom. The high-reaching walls created that familiar dome painted with the long-forgotten stories of your people. The marble floors chilled your bare feet. Your bed leered at you from the far wall, whispers inviting you back into its clutches that would send you spiraling further into this forever sleep.

Panic surged up your chest till you gasped for air, losing your grip quicker than you could keep up with. Laughter taunted you from every corner till you started to scream and shout and call out for anyone to help you. But the door held fast against your pulling and thick briar thorns wrapped all around the balcony. 

Still, you clawed at the spiraling thorns, prying to see through, blistering your palms on their heated stalks. Your whimpers were followed by a loud, echoed roar, a harsh gust of wind cast down from the wings of a soaring lizard you’d only ever dreamed of. 

You whirled around to catch a better view of the creature’s mass, clutching at your heart as those gargantuan claws settled down on the tower of your bedroom. Two nostrils blew smoke that encroached the balcony and the depths of your room. The dragon’s eyes held no mercy as she gazed down with malice. 

This curse played a cruel joke, trapping you within the bars of your own mind, turning your fantasies against you. Your every turn showed you more wonders turned horrors the longer you searched for them; the clouds formed words you wouldn’t dare to repeat, the grass down below burned in confusing patterns, and the voices of those you held dear echoed from somewhere nearby.

Your fretful mother. Your paranoid father. The gossiping handmaidens. The superstitious priest. All lamented your fate, screaming how they knew it was a matter of time before the curse finally found you, tearing into you for ever even dreaming of leaving. You really should have stayed. This wouldn’t have happened if you’d piped down and stayed.

Then it was Luffy, Nami, and Usopp. “Why did you ever ask her to join us?” “Not sure. I thought she was something she wasn’t.” “She’s just a liar.” “A dead weight.” “A curse.”

Robin’s voice pierced her eardrums as your knees hit the ground. Why had she ever given you the time of day? Some sheltered little princess without enough common sense to know a spinning wheel when she saw one. And Chopper, his sweet voice turned sour. How pathetic. Beaten by a piece of wood.

The worst of it all was when his voice broke through all the rest despite how she tried to ignore that rumbling tone she once learned to crave. Zoro’s words were direct and clear. She’s finally gone. God, I was this close to just silencing her stupid mouth myself.

To think he would ever actually love her? How foolish of you.

The walls of your dreams closed in swiftly, caging you in and suffocating your hopes till you were left a husk, floating amidst the torment. 

✧ ˚ 　· 　　 .

Vivi had been silent for so long Luffy wondered if she’s gotten distracted and walked off. Nami shuffled closer to the snail transponder. “Vivi?”

“Sorry,” her voice reappeared, a slight crack to it. “I just… you said she pricked a spindle?” Nami hummed in agreement, and Vivi expelled a long sigh. “She’s been asleep since? You can’t wake her?”

“That’s what we said,” Zoro snapped, shutting up at Nami’s sharp glare.

“It’s just… I mean, I’ve only heard stories. She only talked about it once, in a letter she wrote to me. That’s the only way we could talk since her parents locked her away—”

“Stories about what, Vivi?” Nami guided the tense princess back as Zoro started to pace back and forth, his hands raking at his hair.

She was silent for two whole seconds, and then, “The curse.”

The whole room fell still.

“They say a dark Wise Woman cursed her when she was baby, so that one day, she would prick her finger on a spinning wheel’s spindle… and die.” She rushed to amend herself, “But then another Wise Woman fixed it. She won’t die, but fall asleep… until someone shows her an act of true, unconditional love.”

For a long while the whole room is held captive by silence, eyes flickering to where you snoozed nearby. Zoro couldn’t look away. The way you looked so peaceful pained him in a way, knowing you were trapped in a place he couldn’t save you from. At least the tiny grin on your face gave him confidence your everlasting dreams were nice.

“How do we do that?” he heard himself asking.

“I—I don’t know. I thought it was a story to justify her isolation—”

“Well, obviously not.”

“Zoro,” Nami’s words cut sharply. “Take a walk.”

“But—”

“Walk.”

He stood with as much noise as he could, knocking his chair back and stomping out of the room. Zoro stopped just at the door to cast a look at you, highly aware of the eyes of everyone on him. His hand closed around the doorframe, his heart tightening, and he left without another word. 

Letting the others see how much he cared for you would just make everything infinitely worse. Zoro couldn’t handle that level of teasing on top of your sickness.

Zoro stepped out onto the deck, now basked in moonlight, and rushed to lean against the railing. His skin felt feverish in contrast to the cold dread coursing through his veins. Why hadn’t you said anything? Sure, he probably wouldn’t have believed you, but maybe… maybe he wouldn’t have let you leave his side so quickly.

And now this? This formidable task would supposedly save you. An act of true love? What could that even mean?

With his eyes on the sky, Zoro let out a shaken sigh. He would tear every one of those stars down if it meant you would be okay. Would that be enough for this curse? Or would he have to take down the moon as well and lay it at your feet?

No… no, certainly nothing he could do would ever be strong enough to save you. For so long he’d put off your advances, too stubborn to face the emotions building up in his heart… Zoro doubted he held the strength to perform such an act, and that notion threatened to crush him. 

He too had read the stories Robin spoke of; stories of princes who swooped in and saved the princess with a kiss. You needed one of them—those princes—and Zoro was far from royalty.

If anything, he was the knight in rusted armor who failed.

But, an idea crept out of the depths of his mind, crawling to the surface till his heart pumped at the possibility. He was no prince, no knight, and no cursebreaker—but Zoro was a hunter.

He burst back into the galley with a crazed look in his eyes. “Vivi?”

Her voice crackled out from the startled snail. “Yes?”

“Where do we find this Wise Woman?”

Not even a day later, the crew set out on the sea once more, a new destination in mind: the secluded island of the so-called wise and elusive faeries. 

Zoro stood at your bedside, too afraid to reach out and take your hand, making a solemn oath.

“I will find a way to save you if it is the last thing I do.”

If only the swordsman would have known—the strongest of magic lies in promises. If only Zoro had the eye to see the tendrils of magic curling around your sleeping body, tightening around you as the curse shivered away from his declaration. Spirits hissed from the corners fo the room and shied away from the mere passion behind his eyes. Somewhere distant a sorceress coiled her fists around nothing as her hold on the slumbering princess slipped through, little by little. Could he have fathomed it, he would have known he held more honor than the mightiest of princes. 

But he couldn’t fathom it, so he failed to notice the magic encircling his heart, seeking out any cracks in his steel-strong pride. There were none to find. The magic had nowhere to go, and until the hunter’s pride wore down, nothing would change. 

✧ ˚ 　· 　　 .

Your godmother turned out to be a real bitch, by Zoro’s standards. First off, she was waiting for them on the shore, like a creep. In her witchy get-up, Zoro could have mistaken her for the one he meant to run through with his sword. 

“What’re you supposed to be,” he sneered as she made her way up the gangway, practically making herself on home on the deck. 

She met his glare equally. “I’m your only hope, dear. Now wipe that look off your face. You’ll get stuck like that.”

Rosalie took control of the situation in her stride, heading down to the galley and acting as if she owned the place. Only Nami seemed to be put off by this, standing at Zoro’s side with her arms folded as the rest of the crew gathered around the Wise Woman.

“She was always too stubborn for her own good,” said Rosalie fondly, a tiny grin on her lips. “Luckily for you, Carabose never strays far from the island. It’s the source of our power, and the poor, scaly, greedy thing would just die if she lost her magic.”

The radiant faerie pulled her dark curls forth, scrunching up her angular nose as she thought of the witch to blame for her dear princess’s condition. She sucked in a breath and released it harshly, suddenly appearing much older than before. “I must thank you. My princess deserves so much more, and you managed to give it to her, if only for a little while.”

“You talk as if she’s dead,” Nami grumbled. The look Rosalie gave her then was far less than comforting.

“Well, unless you have a source for true love nearby, she’s as good as it.” Zoro’s hand closed around the hilt of his sword, his eyes slamming shut as that grief washed over him again. Rosalie’s eyes flickered to him, an unnoticeable shine in her eye and a tilt in her lips. 

(Wise Women see much more than the normal eye, and just now Rosalie spotted the remarkable fuchsia tendrils of a very special kind of magic, so rare many thought it mere myth… yet it was swirling around the swordsman’s heart).

She turned to face the crew in their entirety, her expression grave. “Only the caster may raise a curse unless it is broken according to certain parameters. I may be able to deal with Carabose through negotiation. We… have a history.” Rosalie ruffled slightly. “She might have mercy and relinquish the curse herself.”

Zoro scoffed, drawing the faerie’s attention. “And if she doesn’t?”

Rosalie���s eyes flashed. “Then I’ll cut her down and hope that is enough.”

Sanji shook his head, blinking like he was forcing himself to deny Rosalie’s beauty. “And what will we do?”

“You’ll be with me. If Carabose dies and she does not wake… one of you will have to make a sacrifice.” Rosalie assessed them all with cool eyes, reveling in their discomfort, till she cracked a smile and tossed her head back. “I jest, I jest! However, we will need to come up with a display of true love after the deed is done and our princess has not woken.”

Zoro continued to bristle at the faerie’s coolness, grinding his teeth as she floated about the room, mumbling to herself. He dropped his swords on the table with a clang, startling Rosalie. “I can kill the witch myself. Give me ten minutes, and it’ll be done.”

“I know you are desperate to save your friend, Swordsman,” Rosalie simpered. “But you’ll be staying here.”

His blood was boiling at this point. The plan at hand was hardly what he’d had in mind. Zoro shook his head firmly and grasped his composure tightly. “I need to do something.”

“And you will! You’ll be guarding our princess.” Rosalie dared to set a hand on Zoro’s shoulder, making him go all stiff till he caught her steely gaze. “Carabose controls many of the spirits of the island. I wouldn’t put it past her to send one of them to whisk the princess away. You perhaps have the most important job of all.”

Yeah, right. Zoro locked eyes with Nami over the faerie’s shoulder, sharing a silent agreement as he shrugged the woman off. “Nami can stay behind—”

“No.” Rosalie’s grip tightened around his shoulder as the temperature dropped instantly. “You will stay, and Nami will come along.” Her smile felt sinister. “I am Rosalie of the Wise Women, and you are just a man with a sword. I have conquered kingdoms in the name of her parents. What have you done?” 

“I’ll kill the witch,” he said weakly. “And I’ll save her.”

“Kill the witch,” she mocked him. “You mean to tell me that’s an act of true love, swordsman?” Rosalie leaned in close, her voice as soft as wind. “How can you say you love her when you let her go, Roronoa Zoro. Now stay put and don’t make the same mistakes twice.”

She swept away as swiftly as she’d closed in, leaving Zoro breathless and unsteady. Rosalie clapped her hands together and faced Luffy with a grin. “Now, Captain. You understand the plan?”

Luffy looked all around, making eye contact with each of his crewmates, till he found Zoro, who leaned against the wall having some sort of crisis. Words rose up to his tongue, ready to lash out and tear the faerie to bits when he saw it. The tendrils were growing brighter. Slowly, he turned to Rosalie, who met his gaze unblinkingly. “Yeah, I got it.”

Usopp shifted uncomfortably. “Uh, Luffy, I don’t think—”

“I trust her,” he declared, and that was that. Usopp nodded, followed by the reluctant rest. Zoro’s eyes flashed up to meet his captains, unsure about how confident Luffy was, but not willing to ever doubt his friend. 

“Splendid,” Rosalie simpered. “I’ve no doubt Carabose is waiting for us, so we’d do best to keep up our guards.”

As she rounded everyone up and led them out of the galley and off the ship, Nami brought Zoro aside, her brows furrowed. “I don’t like this,” she murmured. “But I trust Luffy.” Zoro grunted as if to agree, his eyes unfocused. Nami gave his shoulder a pat as she passed him. “Just stay with her. Who knows, maybe she’ll know you’re there.”

And Zoro found himself all alone, the ship a deathly quiet he had never witnessed before. He could hear his every breath and feel the rock of the ship. A creak came from somewhere nearby, pinching at a sensitive part of his mind. Zoro took a few weightless, shallow steps down the hall, his hand running against the wall, until he came face to face with the door of your bedroom. 

Too long he stared at the door before he shoved at it, swinging it open wide. Zoro surged inside with so much gusto his muscle memory urged him to reach for his swords, but he’d left them in the galley. Instead, his hand grasped at air whilst he vacantly stared about the room. 

You lay soundlessly atop your bed, hands crossed over your chest like a corpse. Zoro instantly moved to adjust your arms, laying them instead at your sides. There, that was better.

His brows screwed together; where a smile had earlier been gracing your lips, a firm frown now replaced it. Your face contorted, your mind plagued by an enemy Zoro couldn’t fight. Ensuring he didn’t make a sound, Zoro took a knee and drew close to your face, folding his arms on the edge of your bed and resting his head there.

Sweat beaded along your forehead, distress clear on your face. Without thinking Zoro reached to wipe it away with the back of his hand, initiating a kind of intimate contact only you had ever thrust upon him. He shocked himself, frozen with his hand on your cheek before he cleared his throat and returned to his original position.

Hours he stayed like that, eyes dutifully watching over your face, pulse spiking at every sign of distress caught in your features. Your brows pinched together, lips parting as a strangled sigh left you.

Perhaps… Zoro threw caution to the wind and reached for your hand. You didn’t budge, but—and maybe he was seeing things—it looked like your face softened up a little bit. So he stayed just like that, rubbing circles into the back of your hand.

He lifted his gaze to the window, where the sun was beginning to set once again. “Wonder if the others found that witch yet…” They could be fighting for their lives, if Rosalie’s dumb plan fell through. He should be out there. Zoro’s eyes flickered all around the blue sky, worry eating at him, till he finally rose to his feet and dropped your hand. 

“I’ll be back—” Your instant whine had Zoro practically jumping out of his skin and descending back to your side all at once. “I mean, they can probably handle it. I’m still here.”

Your face returned to a state of calm as if you’d never moved at all. He scoffed out a laugh, murmuring fondly, “You little shit.” Again, little shifts in your expression hinted at a nightmare. “What’s goin’ on in there, huh?”

(Your dreams had taken a drastic turn. Dragon fire shot past your head, close enough to singe your eyelashes. The broom you’d taken up as a weapon splintered against the scaly back of your guard. The serpent burned away at the roof of your room, circling like a vulture, taunting echoes slipping off her forked tongue. As your eyes continued to flutter, sleep beckoning like a long-lost friend, you didn’t dare to succumb to the call. Should you sleep, you felt certain you would never, ever wake up. 

Yet, you were so tired. It couldn’t hurt… if you rested your eyes… if only to escape the taunting of his voice. He’s glad you’re good as dead. He never had to deal with your pining ever again. 

Every echo of doubt had you believing that just maybe, it might be true, sending you deeper into this eternal insanity).

“Zoro.”

The swordsman didn’t breathe. He couldn’t. “I’m here.” If his words had any effect on the state of you, it didn’t show. You only rustled sharply, eyes flickering all around behind your eyelids… until you fell deadly still. “Hey now. Don’t slip away just yet.”

Again, he took up your hand, willing you to keep giving him signs that you weren’t too deep into slumber. “An act of true love. Sanji could probably pull one of those out of his ass.” That thought sent him on a tangent, pictures of your effervescent smile flashing across his mind. 

Days ago, he’d been so secure on never revealing his feelings to you. The pair of you would have lived all your lives revolving around one another until you inevitably gave up, and it would be for the best. Right then and there, though, Zoro felt certain if he never looked into your eyes again he would never forgive himself for every time he turned you away. 

“I’ve always wondered,” he whispered. “Why you don’t just go after the lovecook. It’d be a hell of a lot easier than dealing with me.” 

Zoro made himself comfortable, leaning his head on the bed. “If… when you wake up, let’s go do something, like you wanted. You like painting, right? We’ll go painting. I’ll probably offend the very act of art, but maybe you’ll laugh at me, and it’ll be okay. I’ll throw paint in your hair and you’ll punch me, and it’ll be a real good time.”

Nothing. Your chest rose and fell at a concerningly slow pace. “When we get you back… I’ll apologize. For being an idiot.” Had your lips always been so dry? “But you have to wake up to hear it.”

Your condition remained unchanged… save for the stark silence coming from your nose, and the eerie stillness of your chest. Zoro’s gut churned. You were only meant to sleep, so why weren’t you breathing?

(The sleeping beauty dared to lie down, the tower burning all around her, at ease among the encroaching flames).

His hand felt at you heart, his own stuttering at how faint yours was beating. You looked so blank. Not a flaw in your void expression. Zoro, on the verge of pleading to gods he didn’t believe in, again reached for a sword that wasn’t there as a bone-chilling chuckle echoed from every corner. 

“You can’t save her~” sang a ghostly voice, right into his ear. 

Zoro slammed his ear down on his shoulder to rid himself of the shiver running down his spine. Whipping around, he ground his jaw enough to hear the chip in his teeth. “Watch me, witch.”

Her laughter mocked him. “How? You’re no prince. No knight. What’re you going to do, warrior? Kiss her and hope your honor is enough?” Carabose appeared in a misty shadow behind him, surging through his body like a specter, sending him keeling to the floor. “The princess’ soul has long belonged to me. True love doesn’t exist. Rosalie should’ve known that.”

“You’re wrong!” Zoro bellowed, something deep in his heart constricting, building up a fire in his bones. 

“Oh,” the witch hummed darkly. “I’m sure. This isn’t a fairytale, boy. Kisses don’t wake princesses… and simple swordsmen don’t save them.”

The witch’s cackle faded even as he slashed at the air with his arm, wild eyes searching till they landed back on you, unnervingly calm. If Carabose’s intention was to have her spirits discourage Zoro, she fairly succeeded; but she also succeeded in something else—giving him something to prove.  

His shoulders sunk as he just stared, taking in the hopeless sight before him. It was much too late to confess to his sleeping beauty. Even if they did find a way to wake her, who was to say she would still want him? What if some hero swoops in and takes her away?

He would be deserving of that fate, Zoro thinks, his foolishness crashing down on him even as he falls to his knees at your side once more. 

Make a note that Roronoa Zoro doesn’t believe in magic. It’s all make-believe to help children see the good in the world. He knew that full and well, deep in his heart. But something he knew with far greater certainty is that he would do anything to have the chance to love you as you loved him. 

Magic wasn’t real. But what if? Zoro felt silly for daring to think it, but even then his hand reached to cup your cheek. Wasn’t there truth to every story? Kissing princesses didn’t make the world all right. Fairytales don’t come true. 

But the sun was setting on another day with you held down by this curse, and Zoro felt pathetic and weak and he had no other plan at hand. 

“I’m an idiot,” he confessed the obvious. “I never choose what’s easy except when it comes to you. Which made it difficult, which defeated the purpose and—Never mind.” Peaceful despite the circumstances, you never stirred an inch. “Please wake up. Please… Or I’ll look really, really stupid.”

One hand on your cheek, the other bracing himself against the bed, Zoro pressed the most delicate of kisses atop your cold lips, a horrifying shiver shooting through him at how it felt like kissing a corpse. Lingering, he drew back, breath staggered at how nothing happened. You didn’t shoot awake. Not a muscle in your body twitched. Your eyes didn’t move.

“Please,” he mumbled over your lips, his forehead colliding with yours in a desperate plea. “Wake up. Wake up so I can tell you I love you.”

Unseen magic exploded around the room, wrapping around the swordsman and the princess as pride and honor were laid down at the feet of a curse that died with the far-off scream of a thwarted witch.

(The sleeping princess blinked awake, squinting from the blinding light filtering in through the open ceiling. The dragon faded to mist and the fires blew out with a hush. Words the princess had only ever dreamed of hearing echoed down to her ears, and everything went white).

You awoke from the most horrible sleep, your bones and body aching as something like a cold fever washed over you. A shallow breath fizzled out of you right before your lungs brought in as much air as they could take. Eyes flinging open, your surroundings came into focus in an instant, and you found a figure looming over you with the funniest expression.

Zoro’s face was white as a sheet, eyes wide and brows vaulted, his lips parted. He looked as if he’d seen a ghost, and a laugh left you before you could stop it. You smiled with no abandon as Zoro’s hand traced your jaw. “What’s this about?”

And it all came rushing back like a punch to your gut as Zoro’s eyes bore into you. Your lips fell into a shocked gape. “You kissed me?”

“I… uhm…” 

You slowly sat upright, hands in your lap, head tilted as you admired the man before you in a light like never before. “You love me?”

His eyes pinched shut, and you feared he regretted his confession. Perhaps it was a heat-of-the-moment thing. Maybe he didn’t mean it and you’re stupid for ever thinking he might—

“I do.” He looked as breathless as you felt. “I do love you.”

An eternity could have passed and you wouldn’t have known nor cared, all too caught up in etching his face into your memory. Hesitant, you rose to your knees, bed covers shoved aside, and your hands went to cup his face tenderly. “Tell me again.”

Warmth flooded his cheeks as your thumbs ran over his cheekbones, drawing his eyes back to yours every time they dared to flicker away. He melted into you, one hand falling to your waist and the other cupping behind your thigh. “I love you.”

Another smile burst across your face. “I love you too.” You leaned in close, nudging your nose at his cheek. “I’m gonna kiss you.”

Zoro cracked a grin, his eyes fluttering. “Okay.”

“And kiss you.” 

“Fine by me.”

“I’ll never sleep again. I’m only going to kiss you until they pry me off you, my handsome, lovely, cursebreaker swordsman—Mmph!”

His lips cut you off, surging forth to catch you unguarded. Zoro’s arms pulled you in quickly as you pushed in just as firmly, hands raking through his hair. Years you waited and years you longed. Countless nights you laid awake intending to give up come morning, only to fall back into his eyes. 

All for this. The day your soul knew would come even when your heart was doubting. 

“I love you,” you broke away to say, simply because you could.

And no witch, no curse, no destiny would ever keep you from telling him. 

Giggling at nothing at all, you leaned into him and wrapped him up in your arms, head falling to his shoulder. Your eyes drifted behind him, your whole body freezing at the sight in the corner. “What the fuck is that doing here?”

Zoro nearly broke his neck whipping it around only to choke on a laugh. The spinning wheel sat humbly to the side, purple string still running through it. “Probably was a bad idea to keep it in here.”

“You think!” You lightly flicked his nose and got a little grunt out of him. “Let’s burn it.”

A bonfire awaited the crew as they returned, their egos bruised and spirits low despite their defeat of the Wise Woman Carabose. Every last one of them nearly screamed when they saw you stoking the pillar of fire with the brightest smile on your face, Zoro’s arm round your shoulder.

You teetered this way and that, tossed around as they hugged the life out of you. Laughter came easy and the night drew long, stories of their victory recounted and certain questions about your recovery proposed.

“You needed an act of true love,” Chopper wondered, never straying far from your side as he clung to your arm. “So what happened?”

You weren’t at all subtle in your direct look at Zoro, who coughed and averted his eyes to the suddenly very interesting ground. “Someone got off their high horse and—”

“All right!” Zoro laughed awkwardly. “Cook, where’d you put the extra sake?”

Nami silently awed as she dragged you and Robin aside, begging to know exactly what happened. Somewhere through the night, Usopp looked around, lowering his glass from his lips. “What happened to Rosalie?”

You tripped over nothing at that name. “What? My godmother?”

“Yeah,” he nodded. “She helped us find Cara-bitch, or whatever… When did she disappear?”

Everyone took a moment to think, blinking quickly as a single answer was formed: they didn’t know.

“That sounds like her. I just wish I could’ve said hello,” you said. 

Zoro hovered at your side, his hand ghosting over yours. “She was weird anyway.”

“Hey!”

The fire fizzled out somewhere close to dawn, though the celebration seemed far from over. Your eyes felt heavy and your body too, but every time you fell too much into drowsiness, cold terror tore through you. You weren’t joking when you declared you’d never sleep again; the prospect petrified you.

“C’mon,” Zoro muttered when your head fell to his shoulder and shot back up for the sixth time. “You need to rest.”

“I’ve slept enough—”

“That’s not what I said.” Zoro stood and offered you a hand, a gentle smile warming you from the inside out. You shoved your hand into his and started the trek below deck, departure unnoticed.

As you passed your bedroom, you stopped and stared at your bed just three seconds before you bee-lined to Zoro’s door, leading him along behind you. Dazedly, you waltzed around each other, preparing for sleep even as your heart pounded in your head. 

“What if I don’t wake up?” you wondered aloud as Zoro sunk into bed.

His eyes found yours and you swore you fell even deeper. “You will.”

“How do you know?”

“Because I love you.”

That fact was one of the only real things either of you knew, and for now, it was enough. 

𝐭𝐚𝐠𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭: @100520s

[musicalfan78]

Every saga in a mf78 nutshell (pt 9, finale)

Warning: This contains some uncomfy mentions of violence, SA, and a bit of gore. Read this at your own risk. 🙏

pt 1, pt 2, pt 3, pt 4, pt 5, pt 6, pt 7, pt 8, pt 9

*THE CHALLENGE*

Penelope: ....the suitors have lost their patience, Telemachus is out. But hey, they don't even know that every night I unthread the work I did. From the storm, it was very harsh-

Penelope: Wait. That could mean something! I gotta announce that damn challenge!

[Penelope gets out of her room, and to the hallway where the suitors are]

Suitors: TIME'S RUNNING OUT! TIME TO CHOOSE A KING! TIME'S RUNNING OUT! TIME TO CHOOSE A KING!

Penelope: Alright! Whoever can string my husband's old bow, shoot through twelve axes cleanly, will be the one who rules with me! Now go on!

[The suitors all go off with the bow]

Penelope: Oh Odysseus, please hurry...I would never live without you, and I'd rather go away than love someone else..

*HOLD THEM DOWN*

[Each suitor tries to string the bow, but as they can see, they're unable to. Antinous moves away from the wall]

Antinous: Enough is enough. We all can't do it, lets face it.

Suitor: He's right!

Antinous: We're being played! A distraction! Where the fuck is our rage and our strongness? We gotta take em out so we'll rule!

Antinous: Oh, and I hear that a weak bitch of a prince was away on a mission, and he comes back today..

Eurymachus: So you're saying you got a plan?

Antinous: Hell yeah I do! We'll go by the beaches, wait till he arrives, then kill him! Chop him up into pieces, and drop them into the sea, the ocean and I's little secret..the birthday boy shall have his last birthday yet..

Suitors: FUCK YEAH!

Antinous: Then, the poor unfortunate queen won't have anyone left to protect her and breaking down that damn door. And I'll ..... get to see the end of the rainbow....feel her gold...and taste the JOYOUS sweetness.... And don't worry boys, im making sure we all get a chance, she'll be helpless at us once we're finished with her!

[All the suitors cheer with pride, all talking and adding onto the plan]

???: ...

Antinous: SO LET'S STAND UP BROTHERS! TAKE CHARGE, AND GET PAST THE LIMIT! NOW WHO'S WITH-

[An arrow is struck right into his throat, he coughs loudly]

Antinous: COUGH..! ..damn....well, im dead. *family guy death pose*

[All the suitors turn around to see who drew the arrow, it was no other than...]

ODYSSEUS

[The old king of Ithaca. He looks at all the suitors, not playing Mr nice guy anymore]

Odysseus: Well, well, well. Twenty years of suffering, pain, and wrath of gods, I come back to see every suitor go against me. It reminds me of troy.

Odysseus: But hearing you going to touch my wife and attack my son? Oh then you have crossed the fucking line. Say your prayers motherfuckers..

[Odysseus goes into the darkness, all of the suitors go and split up into different areas]

Suitor: I still can't question how he's still alive!

Suitor #2: He's been out for so long, he looks like he's been through hell, and more fierce!

Suitor #3: Oh, who gives a shit? We know how to fight back, we'll outnumber him!

The suitors: NO!

Suitor #4: You don't get it man, this king prepares for any fight! AND HOLY MOTHER OF GO-

[A arrow stabs right through the suitor, the rest look down in horror. As they try to run away, Odysseus kills them all, from the neck, to the chest, to the throat]

Suitor #5: WHERE ARE YOU, YOU BASTARD?!

Suitor #6: SHUT THE FUCK UP! HE SEARCHING FOR US THROUGH THE TORCHES.

Suitor #7: UH GUYS? WE GOT A PROBLEM

Suitor #8: THE FUCKING WEAPONS ARE GONE, PERHAPS HE'S TOOK THEM AND NOW IS USING THE DARKNESS TO STRIKE US.

Suitor #9: Well fuck. We're empty handed, he's got his bow. We'll have to kill him in the dark!

Suitor #10: Well that'll be a breeze! We know these halls, it won't be-

[A arrow stabs that suitor in the head as he falls down]

Odysseus: Are yall dumbasses? I BUILT THIS PLACE, IDIOTS!

[Another kill count happens to the rest that were found. Meanwhile, Eurymachus is in the middle of the hall, looking around]

Eurymachus: Hey king! We didn't mean all that shit! We were just playing around!

Odysseus: Are you sure about that...?

Eurymachus: Yes, yes! Ever since you killed the leader we're nothing but innocent now!

Odysseus: ... *Raises the bow*

Eurymachus: WA-WA-WAIT! How about you put that down, and like, relax. Let's hug with open arms!

Odysseus: Hmm, alright.

Eurymachus: REALLY?

[Before eurymachus could reply more, he was bolted down from the arrow towards his throat]

Odysseus: No one says the stuff my best friend says..

Ghost polites: GO KICK THEIR FUCKING ASSES!

[He walks off, feeling the support of every friend that died, away killing suitors left and right]

[Meanwhile, a group of suitors find the weapons room, Amphinomus opens the door..]

Amphinomus: Wow, for one king, he hid our weapons in the room where they usually are placed..no lock at all.

Melanthius: It's a bit fishy that the king who is tough leaves a room of weapons unlocked don't you think?

Amphinomus: That's bullshit. But now we got our stuff back, let's find that shitful king and kill him..

Melanthius: WATCH OUT!

[Out of nowhere, a double spear is stabbed into Amphinomus's stomach, he takes his last breath as the spear is out of him. From the shadows reveals someone, in new armor, and is somewhat looking like Athena....wait, it's-]

TELEMACHUS!

Telemachus: If you want to be spared, then put down the weapons, I ensure it!

Melanthius: So, the prince arrives! Well, unfortunately for you kid, we ain't doing shit, now that we know what the king is up to..

Telemachus: I really don't wanna hurt you, but if I have to, then I will...

Melanthius: Ha! You've doomed the king now, cause now that you're here, we'll make sure it's your last moment here in this world..

Telemachus: NO YOU WONT!

Melanthius: HEY BOYS! LOOK WHO WE FOUND, THE POOR PRINCE OF ITHACA! GRAB THOSE WEAPONS! ITS OUR TIME TO STRIKE!

Telemachus: DONT YOU DO THIS!

Melanthius: Oh we will, ONCE WE DEFEAT YOU, WE'LL KEEP YOU HOSTAGE! NOW ATTACK, BROTHERS!

[The suitors go and surround telemachus and try to attack him, Telemachus stabs them and follows Athena's instructions to make it and defeat them.]

Telemachus: STOP! GET OFF! GET THE FUCK OFF OF ME!

Melanthius: FIGHT TILL HE CANT FIGHT NO MORE! THE KING WILL HAVE NO CHOICE!

[Telemachus keeps killing, and killing, and looks around for more incase they're behind or nearby]

Melanthius: Because if he doesn't arrive, this kid will be like a dead animal...in half.

[After a while, Melanthius smacks telemachus to the ground, the double spear dropped. Melanthius points the sword at Telemachus's neck]

Melanthius: Say goodbye..

Odysseus(from behind): Goodbye..

[Melanthius is stabbed in the back by an arrow,, the sword dropped away from Telemachus. Melanthius was unable to make words]

Telemachus: OH FUCK!

[Telemachus has ran off as he got the chance]

Melanthius: Mer....merc...ple...

Odysseus: You? You beg for mercy?

[The arrow was out, Melanthius falls to his knees]

Odysseus: Your time for mercy has expired...

[He shoots at a suitor]

Odysseus: Mine has died so I could get back..

[He shoots another]

Odysseus: And as long as you're all living, my family's in danger..

[He keeps shooting, not stopping]

Melanthius: B..

Odysseus: Says the one who AGREED to slaughter my son..

Melanthius: WE-

Odysseus: SAYS THE ONE WHO AGREED TO RAPE MY FUCKING WIFE!

Odysseus: I HEARD YOUR SCHEMES, AND WHAT YOU WERE GOING TO DO TO MY FAMILY. YOU SHALL RECEIVE NO DAMN MERCY! YOU ALL ARE GOING TO DIE! HERE AND NOW!

[He shoots more, and more, and more...he then grabs Melanthius by the shirt]

Odysseus: You all lost my trust, every single one of you, and now that you've shown me your true selves, THIS IS YOUR FATE!

[Odysseus uses the exact arrow, and slashes Melanthius's head off, the rest of his body collapses towards the floor as he drops the corpse]

The rest or the suitors: OH MY FUCKING GOD!

[Odysseus turns the palace into nothing but a red, gushy, bodies, bloody, and smeared up place... All the suitors were dead, Tiresias's prophecy was true, he got home alive, but he was no longer himself]

*I CANT HELP BUT WONDER*

[Telemachus comes out, looking at odysseus, lost at words]

Telemachus: ....father? Is that you?

Odysseus: ...son...

Telemachus: You- and right here-?! Oh my-

Telemachus: ...I've been wondering, thinking, and imagining how I would be like you, rule in your honor, but I'm happy you're back....and to finally meet you, I haven't seen you in a looong while..

Odysseus: ...my son, my boy, you've grown so much, you even look like a soldier, warrior....20 years I held you in my arms, now I get to see you in person...

[The two continue to look at each other, on the verge of crying. After a while, telemachus hugs odysseus, holding onto him]

Telemachus: I MISSED YOU DAD! ;-;

Odysseus: I MISSED YOU TOO SON! IM FINALLY HOME!

[The two emotionally cry their hearts out as they embrace]

Odysseus: ....Telemachus? Do me one favor, and let your mother know I'm home, ill go see her in a few...

Telemachus: ...alright..

[He lets go of the embrace and starts walk off]

Odysseus: ...wait.

Telemachus: ...?

Odysseus: ...Happy birthday.

Telemachus: ....thanks dad. 🥹

[A few seconds later, Odysseus can feel Athena's quick thought signal]

Odysseus: I can feel your sense...something like, an old friend....

[A quick glance to the hour glass, athena is sitting near an edge of it, turned away from odysseus]

Odysseus: You were never the one to say hellos.

Athena: ....sometimes I feel like there was a fucked up moment I did, how this world crumbled down on you once I left.

Athena: If there's a world where everything would be just how it was planned, and not this way, would it be possible?

Odysseus: It'd be far away then. But, hey, your a goddess, and since you're immortal, maybe my son will learn from you more as he's becoming what you wanted, from generation to the next.

Odysseus: I never asked though, could you turn around for a second?

[She does turn around, her right eye has been struck blind, and blue]

Odysseus: Oh, it was zeus wasn't it?

Athena: Yeep..

Odysseus: ...wait, you were the one who fought for me?

Athena: I sure fucking was.....

Odysseus: Wow, I'd like to say thank you then. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have someone I have to see.

Athena: ...alright then, good luck, friend...

[Odysseus gets out of the quick thought, he then walks over to the room where he and her spent nights with..]

*WOULD YOU FALL IN LOVE WITH ME AGAIN*

Odysseus: ...My love, you won't have to wait fot me a moment longer...

[Odysseus opens the door, Penelope turns around]

Penelope: ...is it you? My husband? Am I blessed? You're actually here....but you look different.

Odysseus: ...I'm not the one you first knew, I was through hell and horror, and i had to do some consequences to pay the price...

Penelope: What did you do this time?

Odysseus: I killed all the suitors, stabbed a god, and had to lose the crew because of my stupid decisions....sorry I kept you waiting for a long time. Would...you fall in love with me again? Even if it's been a huge while?

Penelope: Hmm, well, if that's true, may I ask if you move our wedding bed and take it far away?

Odysseus: ...are you kidding me?

Penelope: What?

Odysseus: You're telling me to move our wedding bed, that was made from the tree we first met at! The only way to do that is...TO CUT IT FROM ITS ROOTS-

[Penelope raises her eyebrow, smiling while crying]

Odysseus: Oh...so it's a yes?

Penelope: Yes, Ody, I will fall in love with you, every single damn time. Don't tell me you're different, or something else. You're my husband! And I've been...waiting for you, but now we'll love each other just like how we were back then..

Odysseus: ...Penelope..

[Penelope and Odysseus give each other a loving hug, holding onto each.other so save time for who knows what.]

Penelope: I love you, Odysseus...

Odysseus: ....I love you too, Penelope...

[The two look at each other, and they share a soft passionate kiss. Telemachus comes by and sniffles with tears of joy as Athena pats his back. All is right with the world]

.. . .

*BONUS*

[Everything pauses, the screen zooms away, the camera switches to Odysseus. He closes a book]

Odysseus: Well, and that folks, was my story. I went through war, fought a cyclops, went through a storm, defeated a goddess, went to the underworld, defeated sirens...maybe sacrificing 6 men to scylla, sacrificing my crew to Zeus, had to survive 7 years with the bad lady, stabbed a god, Slayed some naughty suitors, and got the girl.

Odysseus: And so..

[Jorge Rivera Herrans comes by and puts an arm around Odysseus, smiling]

Odysseus/Jorge: Was our journessy.

*THE END*

[wisteriasymphony]

Pulcinelle - Fragmentation

“Victory is still within my grasp, Nathalie! I have no need for the minor miraculous! Victory is mine, victory is mine!” Gabriel shouted through his phone, tearing his atelier apart while he paced like a caged tiger. 

The man had not rested for the slightest moment since the Chinese Miracle Box had been stolen from him, and his face wore the exhaustion like a coat of warpaint. Silvery gray hair fell over his brows in the haphazard manner of a battle-torn settlement, white banners of surrender tainted with ash as his eyes burned with a conqueror’s fury. And yet, he had conquered nothing. Monarch had crowned himself king with a power he no longer possessed. 

Raising up a crumpled diagram to the air, Gabriel continued to roar and howl. “I know the frequencies of each Kwami’s power! With the traces of their energy recorded within me, I shall be able to replicate them!” The ruined king burst into a manic laughter, shaking the paper like an empty chalice as its brothers swirled across tables and laid in dead heaps on the floor. “With the immense power of Embodied Transmission, all of the minor miraculous will be recreated and under my control! Do you understand, Nathalie? I’ve won! I have won!” 

Monarch Renatus - Alliance Rings

Alliance Rings shall be constructed of an alloy (hereby designated Alliance Alloy) of 50% Silver, 39.9999% Lutetium, 10% Scandium, and 0.0001% Miraculum. Miraculum powder shall be harvested independently and combined with Lutetium before the Alliance Alloy is synthesized. Miraculum powder will display properties similar to mica, giving Alliance Rings a faint purple sparkle that may be used as a marketable feature. 

Miraculum charged Alliance Rings -> Instantaneous Akumatization -> Potent Transmission? 

“Gabriel.“ 

“All I need is to convince Tomoe of this plan, and I’ll be—“ 

“Gabriel!” Nathalie was pinching her nose so hard she was half worried she would snap it off. “You had the Rabbit Miraculous with you, the first thing you should’ve done is gone back to save Emilie. We can’t keep helping you if you can’t help yourself!” 

“This isn’t just about Emilie anymore!” 

Gabriel began to choke at the sound of his own words, letting the phone drop to the floor. All at once, the room began to spin, the papers and charts around him like a sea of parchment with an ever-shifting gravity, no up nor down. He had to grasp the edge of the table to prevent himself from collapsing and remember, remember that it was all about Emilie and it would only ever be about Emilie. He had to remember the ghost she had become, picture his love slipping away and resolve beyond all means and measure to bring her back. It was about Emilie, and ergo everything was justified, nothing was his fault! Gabriel could swear he had never been at fault!

“Yeah,” Nathalie barked back. “I can tell.” 

And so she ended the call. 

—— Hours later, in another office… ——

“Where are they?” 

Gabriel was not at all comfortable with the idea of admitting failure to Tsurugi Tomoe. “Where is what?” He stammered out, loosening his collar with a finger. 

“The collection of minor miraculous,” she repeated herself. “You said you had them.” 

“When did I ever say that? You must, uh… You must be mistaken, Tomoe.” 

“At 21:08 last night exactly, I was greeted with an email in my personal inbox. Its contents were:” 

Madam Tsurugi,

 I am pleased to inform you that I have acquired the possession of fifteen minor miraculous this evening. I feel as though this may be beneficial to our plans for the Perfect Alliance Initiative, and would like to discuss alterations to our plans in the morning. As you know, these artifacts are highly powerful (albeit not what I am currently searching for), and I believe you will know the best course of action moving forward. 

An earlier meeting later on this evening would also suit me, although I do plan on following this sudden turn of events up with a grand speech to Paris as a whole to highlight Ladybug’s catastrophic blunder. Please refrain from contacting me until after I have concluded this. 

Signed, Gabriel Agreste 

“…That must have been an automated message.” 

“Do you take me for an idiot, Agreste?” 

Gabriel swallowed hard, bringing his face into a taut closed smile that pushed his glasses further up his face. The cocktail of drugs he’d taken to restore himself was only making Tomoe’s face swim before him, her features blending into a blurry blobfish mush that he couldn’t stay still long enough to focus on. The sweat rolled down his face with the tempo of his twitching cheek. 

“I can say with utmost certainty that—“ 

“That you take me for an idiot?” 

“No!” Gabriel blurted out. “…That what transpired last night was due to circumstances beyond my control. I believe the culprit we should turn our attentions towards is my nephew, Felix.“ 

“The fourteen year old boy?” 

Gabriel swallowed again, following the action up with a quiet, nervous laughter. Of course it had to be the most ridiculous thing, for a boy less than a third Gabriel’s age to defeat him, but there was simply no other leads! Gabriel could picture that twerp now, cackling to himself as he sifted through the jewels rightfully stolen for Gabriel, crying to his mother about how innocent he was and how his uncle deserved to be robbed like this! But Gabriel Agreste would not take this slight standing down, not for a moment. Just as Tomoe had put it, Felix was but a small defenseless child. 

“…Yes.” 

“I see no reason in working with you any longer if teenagers can surpass you in competence,” Tomoe stated coldly, rising from her chair. 

Gabriel slammed his hand down on the desk, the sweat from his palm graying the slick white sheen on the white wood. 

“One last gamble, Tomoe. I have one last gamble.” 

Gabriel fished out his brooch from underneath his jacket lapel, holding it up to the light. To the untrained eye, the center of the brooch was a cabochon of charoite, dark streaks clouding the surface of the gem. From its back shot out four spokes, the top two longer than the bottom: Pearlescent, shimmering nacre reflecting tones of lilac and blush pink. Silver veins ran up each wing tenderly, so thin they were hard to even notice. Perfect, invisible segments, tapering off at the ends of each wing into immaculate points. 

“Feel its power, Tomoe,” Gabriel panted, leaning onto the desk. “This is all we have ever needed! Imagine even an ember of this power flowing through the alloy in every ring! Even the smallest pinch of this brooch as a component, and I will have every customer of yours as my minions.” 

Tomoe slowly sat herself back down, keeping a hand on the table to steady herself. 

“And how do you plan on accomplishing this?” 

Gabriel’s laugh was hoarse and already sickly, his grasp on the brooch so tight the lower wings began to poke into the flesh of his hand. 

“If there’s anything I know intimately, Tomoe, it is that a miraculous can break,” he replied. “And if I can even shatter a single wing of this brooch, I can redistribute its power as I see fit.” 

taglist: @notchocostrwberry @beezonia @silliersiluriforme @lemons-taste @pyrusinc @wuhuislandconspiracy

[see-arcane]

But as yet you are to be punished for what you have done. You have aided in thwarting me; now you shall come to my call. When my brain says “Come!” to you, you shall cross land or sea to do my bidding; and to that end this!

He hates her so much like he's never been madder before. Who else ever cornered him this badly? And the thing is, this is also pure intimidation to make her submit to her fate. Just give up, my mind is in your mind, and I can use it to control you, possess you, violate you, and see all through you. I'm inside you forever and ever. For daring to oppose me.

It's a move that's simultaneously hideous, petty, and calculating in the same blow.

Mina was instrumental in pointing the group toward him and having the foundations of his plans chopped at the knees. An enemy. A smart enemy. Mina is worth both punishing and keeping for his own ends.

Mina is the heart of his adversaries' little party. The one they want most to shield, the one they have held up as both a precious thing to guard in her own right, and a belated (foolish) attempt to do right by the last damsel they lost to him. Sweeter still that she is Jonathan's beloved--another defiant party that must be brought to heel. Mina is therefore someone worth snatching away as a matter of insult and personal attack.

Mina is appalled by the thought of joining him, of being part of his undead cadre. So like her husband. All the more reason to not only take her, but force her to be wide awake and aware of every. Single. Second. As he both drinks her and forces her to drink from him--a move that forces her headfirst into the transformation of a vampire whether she is exsanguinated/dead or not. This version of turning means there's not only no escape if Dracula isn't slain in time, it means even if she stays alive, she is already in the process of converting.

(It is already over, wine-press, I've won.)

[richincolor]

New Releases - Week of June 25, 2024

We have four books that we're watching for this week. This week will bring us a romance and a whole lot of fantasy. 

Sleep Like Death by Kalynn Bayron Bloomsbury YA

Only the truly desperate – and foolish – seek out the Knight, an ancient monster who twists wishes into curses. Eve knows this first-hand: one of her mothers was cursed by the Knight and trapped in the body of a songbird. With the unique abilities to communicate with animals and conjure weapons from nature, Eve has trained all her life to defeat him.

With more and more villagers harmed by the Knight’s corrupt deals, Eve believes she’s finally ready to face him. But when Queen Regina begins acting strangely – talking to seemingly no one, isolating herself, and lashing out at the slightest provocation – Eve must question if her powers are enough to save her family and her kingdom.

Crashing Into You by Rocky Callen Henry Holt & Co.

In this fiercely moving YA romance novel, Leti Rivera’s love of street racing is put to the test when tragedy strikes her family and threatens to tear her apart from the boy she’s falling for.

Seventeen-year-old Leti Rivera dreams of becoming a famous female street racer. Her brother taught her how to drive so fast that nothing can catch her.

But when Jacob Fleckenstein crashes into her life, Leti starts to think that running isn’t always the answer. Together, inside her car, they both feel like they’re flying, and Jacob’s gentleness and honesty threaten Leti’s vow to keep her heart tight in her fist and her grief locked away.

Yet after tragedy strikes following a race, Leti blames herself and swears an oath, a juramento, to give up driving. But will she be able to keep her promise when racing could be the very thing that saves Jacob . . . and herself? Perfect for fans of Netflix’s Atypical and I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter.

We Shall Be Monsters by Tara Sim Nancy Paulsen Books

After her sister Lasya’s sudden death, Kajal vows to do whatever it takes to bring her back. No cost is too great, even if it means preventing Lasya’s soul from joining the cycle of reincarnation. But as Kajal prepares for the resurrection, her sister’s trapped soul warps into a bhuta—a violent, wraith-like spirit hell-bent on murdering those who wronged it in life. With each kill, the bhuta becomes stronger and fiercer, and Kajal’s chances of resurrecting Lasya with her soul intact grow slimmer.

Blamed for Lasya’s rampage and condemned as a witch, Kajal is locked away with little hope of escape. That is, until two strangers who label themselves rebels arrive and offer to free her. The catch: She must resurrect the kingdom’s fallen crown prince, aiding their coup to overthrow the usurper who sits the throne. Desperate to return to Lasya’s body, Kajal rushes to revive the crown prince . . . only to discover that she’s resurrected another boy entirely.

All her life, Kajal has trusted no one but her sister. But with Lasya dead and rebels ready to turn her over to the usurper’s ruthless soldiers, Kajal is forced to work with the boy she mistakenly revived. Together, they must find the crown prince before the rebels discover her mistake, or the bhuta finally turns its murderous fury on the person truly responsible for Lasya’s death: Kajal.

Children of Anguish and Anarchy (Legacy of Orïsha #3) by Tomi Adeyemi Henry Holt & Co.

New allies rise. The Blood Moon nears. Zélie faces her final enemy. The king who hunts her heart.

When Zelie seized the royal palace that fateful night, she thought her battles had come to an end. The monarchy had finally fallen. The maji had risen again. Zélie never expected to find herself locked in a cage and trapped on a foreign ship. Now warriors with iron skulls traffic her and her people across the seas, far from their homeland.

Then everything changes when Zélie meets King Baldyr, her true captor, the ruler of the Skulls, and the man who has ravaged entire civilizations to find her. Baldyr’s quest to harness Zélie’s strength sends Zélie, Amari, and Tzain searching for allies in unknown lands.

But as Baldyr closes in, catastrophe charges Orïsha’s shores. It will take everything Zélie has to face her final enemy and save her people before the Skulls annihilate them for good.

[humanpurposes]

Karma is a God

Chapter 14: The God's Eye

The Dance of the Dragons begins on a lie, and Aemond owes a debt, one Lucerra will see repaid in Fire and Blood // Series Masterlist // Main Masterlist

Aemond x Lucerra Velaryon (fem!Lucerys)

Warnings for this chapter: spoilers for F&B and future seasons of HotD, canon divergence, descriptions of violence, angst, grief, death

Words: 3.5k

A/n: Also available to read on AO3.

It comes to him in a dream first; the ghost. Faceless, colourless and shapeless, he knows it is coming for him. It follows him wherever he goes, until he can hardly tell the difference between waking and dreaming.

He can scarcely remember his burning of Pinkmaiden. He remembers heat, screams of terror and then agony, the light of Vhagar’s fire, burning as bright as the sun and banishing the darkness of night. He was reminded of how his brother had sounded in the aftermath of Rook’s Rest, his raw, throaty screams as his flesh mingled with his melted armour. Which would be a worse fate, dying or surviving to endure the pain for so long?

Where Aegon’s suffering had made Aemond the equivalent of a King, Pinkmaiden had only made him more of the monster that he is.

He feels it, settled on the edge of a cliff overlooking Ironman’s Bay, the empty feeling in his chest, as though the Gods are withholding fragments of his soul.

He doesn’t know where his brother is now. Perhaps Aegon had found some sense after all and crossed the Narrow Sea to seek refuge in the type of life he always wanted, far from the Keep, far from the crown. He doesn’t know why their men fight for a King who could be dead, or who could have abandoned them altogether. And yet he knows his role in this war has been set out for him, one which he follows mindlessly. He is his family’s terror, the only one who can give Daeron and Cole enough time to rally their forces.

He hears so little as of late. He hasn’t seen another person’s face for weeks. For a time he allowed himself refuge in a tavern with his hood over his hair and his sapphire eye hidden in shadow but eventually he decided comfort was not worth the risk.

Daemon is in the Riverlands, he knows that much, hunting him but never able to catch up to him. So far his uncle has not thought to look this far north, where he can see the Iron Islands clustered in the west and Seaguard to the east. Ships pass the sea before him but he remains unnoticed, as does Vhagar, buried on the shoreline amongst dirt, sand and rocks. If she is hungry she will find a flock of sheep or a herd of cows, but for now she is content to lull herself into a long slumber, occasionally letting out a low grumble as she breathes.

He hunts rabbits and does little to shelter himself from the harsh sea air, the rain and the spray of the sea when there is a storm. He is numb to the cold and the discomfort, retreating into his dreams in the hopes he might find some comfort in a vision of his mother or his sister.

More than that, he prays the Gods will show him an image of Lucerra. He would take anything. The small, stubborn girl disturbing him in the library, grinning as she presented him with a winged pig. Her furious little face when he held her by the throat in the cave below Hightide. He would take the tears she shed in the Hall of Nine, her silent, wide-eyed pleas for forgiveness. He would take the woman who stood before him at the Red Keep, at Storm’s End, the feeling of her skin, the sound of her breath.

Her voice is less than an echo in his head after so many moons. The memory is elusive, he fears he will never picture it clearly, but he can remember her words. My blood is precious, uncle, if you want it you shall have to earn it. 

In Rainwood, they say a ghost circled Shipbreaker Bay in the days after his niece’s apparent demise.

When the dragon with pale grey scales finally comes to him, he knows what it means. Not a ghost, not the one he had been imagining. Grey Ghost, the wild dragon, the beast that attacked Daeron and Tessarion in the Reach, now the second mount of Princess Lucerra.

He mounts Vhagar as the sun sets, its light bleeding across the sky like an open wound, spurred on by desperation and something hungry, like bloodlust. Grey Ghost is quick, flying out of his view but he can guess where the dragon is leading him, southeast, towards Harrenhal. Aemond does not know if they fly to death or salvation.

There is hardly any blue left in the sky when the five towers of Harrenhal fade into view. The setting sun burns in the west like dragonfire, licking at the darkened clouds and shining down onto the surface of the God’s Eye.

The black banners of the pretender, Rhaenyra, hang over the gates to the castle. Below its walls, by the lakeshore, is not the opponent he had expected to meet.

Caraxes rears his head to the sky and lets out a shrieking roar, teeth bared and eyes ablaze. He can feel Vhagar lurch in anticipation. All of her battles, save for Rook’s Rest, have been like bloodsport to her. She wants to fight, wants to rip her talons into flesh, sink her teeth around something larger than a farm animal. But he feels something else, a slight hesitation, a sad sort of growl sounding in her throat, 

Daemon has donned his riding leathers and stands beside his dragon. He holds Dark Sister before him, resting his hands on the hilt.

He sees no sign of Grey Ghost, nor his rider. 

He lands Vhagar along the lakeshore, keeping Caraxes out of reach to avoid premature violence. He is determined this will be done properly. His boots land with a crash against the pebbles once he climbs down, his hand lingering on Vhagar’s saddle.

He remembers the night of the dinner, Viserys’ final hours, as his uncle had stood between him and Jace, eyeing him like a parent stares down a petulant child, a faint smile on his lips. It had amused him, watching the bickering of boys.

Now there is no amusement in Daemon’s eyes, no sense of excitement. They have all suffered too many losses for anything other than pure hatred.

Jaehaerys and Jaehaera were slaughtered at his order, Helaena left to rot in her grief, to leave her last living child motherless. What were the children to Daemon Targaryen? They were his kin, his brother’s grandchildren. Their deaths didn’t put him closer to the throne, didn’t win him any allies, but it wasn’t about strategy, was it? It was about pain.

Aemond doesn’t care to count the seconds or minutes they spent in a silence, broken only by the rush of the waves and the hisses and growls of their dragons.

It is like standing face to face with a wild animal, anticipating what he may do, which move he may make.

He sees Daemon’s eyes flicker momentarily to the sapphire that sits in his left socket, and smirks. In some cruel twist of fate, a dull pain blooms at the base of his skull, but he endures it.

“You’ve come out of hiding at last,” Daemon says.

An unease pools in his stomach. For a moment he thinks he sees movement in the sky above him, but when he looks, there is nothing. 

“I was under the impression I was being hunted,” Aemond retorts.

Daemon laughs. He means to mock him but it’s not quite careless enough to be convincing. “Do not flatter yourself, boy,” he says. “Your whore said you would come.”

An unsettling feeling washes through him, like he is being watched.

Alys. He had left her in a cell with the bloody remains of the rest of House Strong, evidently not long enough for her to starve before Daemon’s return to Harrenhal. “Did she care to say why?”

Daemon’s lips curl into a sneer. “Do you still believe you are owed a debt?”

He recalls a cold thrill that had come with killing Rhaenys. It hadn’t been enough to justify the anguish he had seen his family suffer, how they have continued to suffer. He wonders if killing Daemon will satisfy him. 

Still, his uncle is not the reason he followed Grey Ghost to the God’s Eye.

She must be here somewhere and he doesn’t want to wait any longer. He hungers for her like a man starved. He wants to feel her, her heat, her blood, his hand around her throat and her heartbeat under her skin. He wants to see her eyes again, full of fire and fury. 

He can feel Vhagar’s urge to fight beginning to boilin his blood. He welcomes it, lets it fuel his anger and his grief, pounding in his chest like a war drum. “You have lived too long, uncle,” he says.

Daemon sheathes Dark Sister and reaches up to grab at Caraxes’ saddle, ready to mount. His voice is solemn but his eyes are dark with vicious intent. “On that much we agree.”

And so Aemond mounts his own dragon, fastening the chains that secure him to the saddle. He looks to the sky, then to the castle, waiting for a flash of pale grey scales, a dragon’s cry or a girl with dark hair. He finds nothing. Grey Ghost must be here and yet there is no trace of him or his rider. He clenches his fists around Vhagar’s reins and digs his teeth into his lip. His patience is wearing thin.

Caraxes moves first, leaping from the ground with an ear splitting screech, breathing a stream of fire into the air as he flies.

Vhagar is slower to follow, scrambling over the pebbles to push off from the ground. He feels the force of her wings against her own body, hauling her to ascend, pursuing Caraxes into clouds of grey and red, the sea of flame.

He braces against the fire, roaring in his ears as they break through the clouds and come into the vastness of the sky. Daemon and Caraxes are nowhere to be found. Through the spaces in the clouds and the fire below them, the God’s Eye watches, bathed in red by the setting sun. Soon enough it will all be black.

Vhagar roars, deeply and furiously. A bait, a call to battle.

As suddenly as a thunderbolt, the red dragon breaks through the clouds. Caraxes surges towards Vhagar with eager teeth and talons. She breathes a plume fire unlike anything Aemond has ever seen. Caraxes avoids the stream as he goes for her side, slashing at her belly with his claws and screeches as he rears his head, ready to strike her neck.

But Vhagar gets there first. Aemond’s jaw clenches instinctively, the taste of blood pooling on his tongue as Vhagar sinks her teeth into Caraxes’ shoulder. The dragons writhe and thrash in a deadlock, unrelenting in their attacks but determined to escape each other.

They start to fall. It is a chaotic struggle, beating their wings, screaming in agony and rage, pulling away and ripping at each other.

There’s nothing Aemond can do. He tries to urge Vhagar with the reins, tries to scream at her to let go, to obey, but his efforts are all lost to the wind, the spurts of dragon’s blood rushing through the air, desperate bursts of flame.

Until Caraxes wrenches his claws away from Vhagar’s side. His wings struggle as they fall but he scratches at Vhagar’s head, urging her to release the grip on his shoulder. She does, only to close her jaw around his neck with another snap of her jaws.

The lake is getting closer.

For a moment he wonders if he could jump before the dragons hit the surface of the water. He probably wouldn’t survive the fall, and even if he did, his riding leathers and the chains that keep him fixed to Vhagar’s saddle would weigh him down.

They will die with their dragons then.

He hears the call of a dragon, not the aged roar of Vhagar, not the piercing cry of Caraxes.

Through the haze of blood and fire, his eye finds a pale figure on the lakeshore, another dragon.

His heart stops.

Grey Ghost darts into the air, and glides around Vhagar and Caraxes, coming clearly into view.

And he sees her.

He can hardly make out the details of her face and he feels all the more deprived of her. A silver breastplate glimmers on her chest like dragon scales, catching the final crimson glow of the sunset. Dark hair flies behind her with the force of the wind.

Her hands aren’t on the reins, her arms are outstretched. At first he thinks she is reaching for something, until he realises she’s holding a bow when she reaches for an arrow from a quiver strapped to her back. 

He feels frozen, helpless as he watches her position the arrow and pull back the bow string. It would be a quicker death than drowning, and it would be by her hand. He might find peace in it, if only he could see her face on final time.

It is just, surely. He threatened her, demanded she repay her debt with her body and then her eye, pursued her through a storm and watched as she fell through the clouds with the pieces of her dragon.

He tells himself he deserves it, for the way his mother looked at him when he returned from Storm’s End, the way Helaena couldn’t stand to be near him, the screams echoing in his memories, for all the pain he has caused.

The anticipation doesn’t have a chance to set in. He feels himself knocked back by something lodging itself in his shoulder and even then he cannot take his eye from her.

Vhagar lurches, screaming in pain as something hot and wet seeps through his leathers and the shirt underneath.

The shock takes a matter of seconds to wear off, then there is just a searing pain.

His dragon releases her jaws from Caraxes’ neck. Caraxes’ claws continue their assault on her head, aiming for her eyes, but she is almost indifferent to it as she turns her attention to Grey Ghost.

Vhagar can hardly move from underneath Caraxes, but she can drag him with her. Grey Ghost seems to be larger than Arrax was, but it will only take Vhagar a single snap of her jaws to claim both dragon and rider.

He can’t watch Luke die again. He will not.

He can scarcely breathe, can hardly think straight or see anything clearly, but he musters all the force his lungs can manage and wrenches on the reins. “Daor, Vhagar!” he commands. “Ziry daor!” Not her.

Against her desire for blood and her own stubbornness, Vhagar obeys. She turns her head once more to Caraxes. With a slash of her talons, she makes another tear in his belly. Blood gushes from the wound like a river, streaming through the air as the black surface of the God’s Eye comes closer, and closer. 

This will be a battle with no victor. As Vhagar delivers her blow, Caraxes twists his neck and sinks his teeth into her throat. She tries to cry in pain, but it is muffled as she gargles on the blood that floods her gullet.

Aemond tries to look for Luke and Grey Ghost again, but he cannot find them. He sees blood, he sees flames, he sees the colours of sunset in the sky and the lake.

He has to get out of the chains, but he does not know if he has the strength.

He looks up, or what he thinks is up, following along Vhagar’s neck, to where Caraxes’ jaws are clenched around her flesh, along his red hide, to his back.

Daemon is standing in the saddle, Dark Sister unsheathed and poised before him. He should be falling– in fact he is, falling with the dragons, down, down, down, his sword ready to strike.

Daemon means to kill him, before they can meet the water.

He would give his life to Luke, but he will not allow his uncle the satisfaction. 

He doesn’t stop to consider if he has the time, he knows he has to act. First he takes hold of the arrow in his shoulder, snapping off as much as he can of it, bearing his teeth through the pain. Then he heaves the heavy chains to unhook them from the saddle.

As the point of Daemon’s sword comes to meet him, Aemond hauls his body out of its path. With his left hand he reaches for the hilt, and clasps his fingers around it.

With the force of Daemon’s falling, the Princes are dragged from Vhagar’s back.

Aemond has one final chance and seconds in which to take it.

He grips the hilt of Dark Sister as harshly as he can, crushing Daemon’s hand under his grip. He twists his uncle’s wrist, driving the point of the sword into his stomach and driving it forward into his flesh, as far as it will go.

He doesn’t hear a cry of pain, a final grunt or an exhale of breath before the treacherous waters of the God’s Eye consume them.

The noise of their battle, of screaming dragons and roaring fires, are engulfed in a cold, black void. Everything drags him down, his leathers, the force of two dragons hitting the water, and the weight of the limp body run through on Dark Sister. 

Aemond does not fight it. He feels the sting of cold water against his skin and in his nose and throat. On his tongue he tastes blood but cannot decide where it is from, torn between icy numbness and pain. It is everywhere, his shoulder, his limbs, his chest…

Vhagar is gone. For the first time in so long he feels incomplete. 

But even then the thought of grief fades into the cruel quiet of the lake.

Perhaps his end will be peaceful after all. He is not sure he deserves it, but he wants it all the same.

He hears his heart now, pulsing in his ears, echoing through his veins. 

He thinks of Helaena and his mother and wonders if they are being kept together or apart. He thinks of Daeron, fierce, young, vulnerable, the only dragon rider their family will have left. He thinks of Aegon and Maelor and can only hope they are safe. He thinks of Jaehaerys and Jaehaera, little white nightgowns seeped with blood, and tightens his grip on the hilt of Dark Sister.

Something disturbs the water above him.

He can see their faces through the darkness, a thousand and one, constantly shifting. Without saying a single word they tell him he is safe.

Something like a limb curls around his torso and grabs him. The pressure on his chest is excruciating but he cannot scream with water in his lungs. It hauls him up. He feels the break through the surface of the lake but he still cannot breathe. 

He wonders if this is the Stranger himself crushing come at last to claim his life and face whatever judgement the gods will pass on him.

Until he lands on solid ground, though not quite solid. It shifts beneath him, cold and sharp under the palms of his hands and the side of his face. With his heart drumming frantically in his ears, his body acts for its own survival, pushing him up onto his hands and knees, retching up blood and water, gagging on the taste it leaves in his mouth.

He hears something land on the ground before him and knows it is a dragon. Through his own struggle he recognises the sound of footsteps against the pebbles, slow and cautious.

His vision is blurry and the only light the sky can offer is a gloomy red. He can see the gleam of it against Dark Sister, the sword of Visenya, Maegor and Daemon, just beyond the reach of his fingertips. 

A hand that is not his own closes around the hilt and brings it out of his line of sight, the point coming to rest at his throat.

Retribution will come with fire and fury…

He drags his body back to rest on his haunches so he can look up at her.

She’s covered in red, her skin under the sunset, her skirt and the sigil of the three headed dragon embroidered on her riding leathers. But she is unmarred by blood, either her own or another’s.

She looks eerily peaceful, a quiet rage simmering under the surface of tired eyes and a soft, rounded face. He does not take his eye from her and she meets his gaze without shame, without fear or pride. He thinks then, he would be content to die at her hand.

He waits for the blade to pierce through his throat, for whatever warmth is left in his body to fade and for the world to go dark again. He waits for the pain to finally end.

… and so it will be your salvation.

Tags (comment to be added to either)

General taglist: @randomdragonfires @jamespotterismydaddy @theoneeyedprince @tsujifreya @dreamsofoldvalyria @targaryenrealnessdarling

Series taglist: @boundlessfantasy @toodlesxcuddles @starwarsslut @skikikikiikhhjuuh @arcielee

[evolutionsvoid]

For years, there has been debate and wondering about what truly is down there in the abyss. It is the never ending topic amongst sea folk, and the ceaseless, fruitless endeavor of researchers and philosophers. There is a world down there, no doubt, and the creatures down there share a familiarity with us that we find strange and unsettling. From the odd fish caught in nets, to the words of wisdom granted by the aquatic messengers that come to our shores, we know there is a faith below. What else can explain the Bishops and Monks? How else would you describe the carved trinkets of ambergris and whale bone, whose visage is alien yet exudes an aura of reverence? And then there are the visions, which some can easily cast aside as odd dreams or fits of fearful hallucination, but so many of these glimpses share similarities and the way the seers speak of it all shows that there is something more than mere imagination.

The abyss has a religion, it has its beliefs. So much so that there are even some folk up here on dry land who seek its teachings and wisdom. Yet, there is little in physical proof to show what this faith entails, what do they believe in, what do they preach? At night, upon the calm ocean, sounds of prayer and faithful chanting can be heard emanating from the deep, but these words hold no meaning to us. Even the script carved into the ambergris totems that have been collected elude translation, so there is much left as a mystery. However, there is something to their faith that is known, and cannot be denied. A figure that hangs above it all, whom we must assume all these prayers and offerings go to. Though no one has ever seen her in the flesh, the many carvings and artifacts that bear her visage cannot be ignored. And when those who come in contact with the abyss dream, they speak of her flowing form drifting through the endless blue void. To the beings that live down in the bowels of the ocean, she is their god. A figure of the abyss, of life and death, and the endless cycle that all living things follow: she is the Mother of Snow.

From glimpses in visions and study of found carvings, her body is shaped by death and decay. Flesh, bones, scales and rot are a part of her form, and so are the ravenous scavengers that feed upon them. She is born from the death of leviathans, and congealed of the countless piscines that perish in the vast depths. Yet, her deathly form shows no aggression, no malice. Her carvings show a reverent nature, slow and delicate. When they dream of her, they see her drift almost lifelessly through the void, like a floating corpse destined to be devoured. And to her followers, that is what she offers in her infinite kindness. From her body drifts the ceaseless marine snow that nourishes the world below. Her flesh is in a constant state of rot and decay, sloughing off in crumbling flakes that rain down upon her followers. Those who pray to her rejoice in her offerings, singing out in praises as they collect the manna from the sky. To the creatures of the abyss, life only exists because of their divine Mother of Snow.

The gentle drifting of rotted flakes are not the only things she bestows upon the faithful, as she can grant great bounties and feasts at times. Dead fish and ravaged corpses can fall from her hand down below, but the real miracles come when she beckons to the dying leviathans. It is said that when one of these great beasts of the sea is on their death bed, they will hear her song. She sings to those who are doomed and dying, calling upon them to follow her to the cycle beyond. The leviathans will answer, and seek out the kind Mother. Their journey ends inevitably with death, but it is believed that their passing is done in the exact spot where their corpses may fall upon the billowing cathedrals below. From their death comes a great feast, a great bounty of nutrients that shall feed the people of the deep for a good long time. They sing, pray and give thanks for the food, all while happily holding the knowledge that the time will come when their flesh will do the same. This is the nature of the cycle, where death feeds life, and life needs death. She is the embodiment of this, and her followers preach it to all who will hear.

While the Church is lenient on those who ascend from the abyss, able to use their similar acts of worship as evidence that the Church and its golden Ichor is truly divine, they do not speak much of the Mother. For all is fine and acceptable as long as their idol is held the highest, but the presence of this goddess challenges their position. In some sects, they refuse to acknowledge her existence, pretending it is all some silly sailor's story. Others claim that she is more symbolic of the offerings that fall from the hands of those above, where "foolish" abyssal beasts mistake the scraps of humanity as something godly. At worst, strict members of the Church see her as a blasphemous symbol, one that denies golden Ichor and the true gods that fall from the skies. Her song and offerings are twisted into malicious an deceptive things, luring people to their death. There are certainly a fair share of land-based depictions that show her as something wicked and vile. However, this vision of the Mother is often only held by those who stay far from the sea, never meeting its shores or sailing upon its waves. For the sea folk who live their entire lives near and upon the waters, they hold a different belief that they are sure to keep secret from the Church.

Spend enough time on the vast expanse of the sea, and you will learn some things that cannot be explained on land. When you rest upon the blackened waters at night, rocked to sleep by the gentle undulations of the waves, things may come to your dreams. Even those who do not make their living on the oceans can experience these odd visions, often triggered by exposure to its benthic artifacts and strange creations. Those who hold these carved tokens or cling to weapons made by abyssal hands can find themselves dreaming of an endless watery void, and life humming far down in its depths. It is through these strange dreams we have learned what we have about this strange underwater world, and it is also how we have seen the Mother of Snow, or more so, felt her.

There are no writings, no explanations to what she is and what she wants, and these dreams never have words to them. The abyssal creatures will chant and pray in tongues unknown, and those visited by the Mother will find her to either be silent or emitting her gentle song. She will give no words, no wisdom, so we do not know her intent, yet all who are visited by her are certain of what she is. They speak of kindness, of a serene calm that washes over them in these dream depths. They find peace in her presence, a feeling that often sends the speaker into tears merely thinking about. She says nothing, but they know of her love, there is no denying it. Her mere visage settles all fears and unease, and her song brings something that words fail to describe. It is a gentle and calming tune, leaving no doubt in why the leviathans follow her when the end comes. They find comfort in these final moments, an understanding that this shall end but bring forth something miraculous. Death will bring blessings to others, and your own essence shall continue on into the cycle, guided by her song and motherly presence. The beasts of the sea know this peace, and some who have encountered death upon the ocean have witnessed it too. When a ship is lost at sea, there are many horrid ways to die, but some who have been rescued have spoken of strange times where their pains and fears vanish. Of fellow sailors smiling as they sunk below the waves, of times where they let go of their rafts and supports so that they may be taken by the sea without fear. A famed tale speaks of rescuers pulling a survivor from a sunken ship, where all hands had been lost save for one. Despite this salvation, the lost man refused their aid and fought as they pulled him on board. He made attempts to throw himself back into the sea, weeping and begging to join the others. He heard her song and felt her arms, and he wanted nothing more than to find that peace.

In most of the visions and dreams, the Mother of Snow is silent, drifting about with her flesh and form billowing in the current. It is said that if you see her, than blessings are sure to follow, raining down upon you like her own rotting gift. However, in the rare instances you hear her song, the sea folk would say that your time is coming. The end is near and she is visiting you to give you peace before it happens. Do not be scared, do not fight it. It is simply meant to be, with no cruelty or hate attached. On the ships, those who share the fact they have heard her will often gain a reverence from the crew, who will not fight them if they give an odd request. They will nod their heads and let them be, knowing that their end will soon be here. However, there will certainly be some subtle distance kept between you and the rest of the crew, who want to be sure that they too don't get swept up in your inevitable demise.

While the Church tears down her image and claims her a false idol, there are plenty of whispers about the Mother of Snow and our own gods. The humors and Godly Fluids that feed our world fall from the sky, carried to us by the corpses of the divine. And yet down below, another god sheds her own flesh to feed her followers. If this is how they thrive, then how are we any different? We all pray to the heavens for manna to rain down, for divine death that may bring forth life. We bow before great corpses, and feed upon our deities with reverence and respect. We both look to the skies and hope, wondering what hangs so impossibly high above our own heads. Are we truly separate in our ways? Are these not our fellow brothers and sisters in faith? Or perhaps, something more than we are willing to admit?

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

"Mother of Snow"

Here is a remake of an old piece of mine, a concept that I have always enjoyed: the Mother of Snow. Once I got going with FOI, I knew she would fit right in! Even then, I feel like she would fit in with all my worlds. I am really happy with how she turned out, which is good, because DEAR GOD SO MANY FISH TO DRAW!

[stromuprisahat]

Queen Alicent had reluctantly agreed to the betrothal of her granddaughter to Rhaenyra’s son, but she had done so without the king’s consent. Aegon II had other ideas. He wished to marry Cassandra Baratheon at once, for “she will give me strong sons, worthy of the Iron Throne.” Nor would he allow Prince Aegon to wed his daughter, and perhaps sire sons who might muddy the succession. “He can take the black and spend his days at the Wall,” His Grace decreed, “or else give up his manhood and serve me as a eunuch. The choice is his, but he shall have no children. My sister’s line must end.” Even that was thought to be too gentle a course by Ser Tyland Lannister, who argued for the immediate execution of Prince Aegon the Younger. “The boy will remain a threat so long as he draws breath,” Lannister declared. “Remove his head, and these traitors will be left with neither queen nor king nor prince. The sooner he is dead, the sooner this rebellion will end.” His words, and those of the king, horrified Lord Velaryon. The aged Sea Snake, “thunderous in his wroth,” accused king and council of being “fools, liars, and oathbreakers,” and stormed from the chamber. Borros Baratheon then offered to bring the king the old man’s head, and Aegon II was on the point of giving consent when Lord Larys Strong spoke up, reminding them that young Alyn Velaryon, the Sea Snake’s heir, remained beyond their reach on Driftmark. “Kill the old snake and we lose the young one,” the Clubfoot said, “and all those fine swift ships of theirs as well.” Instead, he said, they must move at once to make amends with Lord Corlys, so as to keep House Velaryon on their side. “Give him his betrothal, Your Grace,” he urged the king. “A betrothal is not a wedding. Name Young Aegon your heir. A prince is not a king. Look back at the history and count how many heirs never lived to sit the throne. Deal with Driftmark in due course, when your foes are vanquished and your tide is at the full. That day is not yet come. We must bide our time and speak to him gently.”

Fire and Blood (George R. R. Martin)

[sleepvines]

Let's give Reed and Koda a proper introduction shall we?

Buckle up, this will be a long one.

(characters belong to @acewarden and I!)

Once, sailing on the crests of a great dark sea, there was a young man who inherited the ship and crew of his retiring mentor. He was a fine captain, surely, but he managed to invoke the crew's wrath through his thin facade of bravado and never-satisfied hunger for company. In truth, he was just lonely, and clumsily copying what he saw in the former captain's success.

A mutiny led to Captain Reed being confronted with his arrogant behaviour. The sheer anger and indignation drove the crew to throw him overboard The Albatross. This emotional swell was enough to curse him as he plummeted below the waves, twisting him into something piscine and forsaken. Thankfully it's what saved his life in the end. A captain should never know how to swim, lest the sea make him do it. And rarely, she teaches him how.

The crew would assume him dead and move on with their lives as he fled the scene, fear and rejection pushing him as far as he could get.

...But that's only the first half of his curse, with the second blooming out of acceptance and a true selfless act. The story of a strong friendship in motion and how he came to be who he is today.

~~~

Reed managed to drag himself to the shores of his coastal home: a dingy port town where goods and precious cargo passed through, but never stayed. He was unrecognizable in his new body, and took to drowning his emerging dysmorphia in drink and impersonal pleasure. Things that only made his pockets drain and his heart sink deeper than any hope of returning to life on The Albatross' deck. In desperation...he ached for any familiarity.

One of the crew, a lass by the name of Koda, happened to live in this town. Word was it that she left to find more stable work with the ship's tumultuous change in management, as she wasn't keen on working under those who would toss a man to the sea. Reed decided it was possible she could help him get on his feet again.

He sought her out one night. Reed a stranger, Koda a warm face. Though intimidating in appearance, she gave him a home to stay at without much question. She...had never had anyone ask to spend time with her in earnest. To be as tall and as bestial as she was made others keep her at an arm's distance. Her heart glimmered with hope when he didn't flinch, nor recoil. Still, he was a broken man these days, who had given up on his old persona and was left vulnerable. Koda kept him around, enjoying his company in his happier moments. Reed kept his old identity hidden, not wanting to be seen with resentment. They soon became friends.

It was one day out on the water, sailing in a small boat, that the two found themselves caught in a storm. It wasn't the kind of vessel that could withstand the danger. A wave crashed into the side of it's humble hull, and unable to brace herself, Koda fell into the sea.

Rather than flee with the boat...Reed cast off his coat and dove into the water to save his friend. She was heavy, and barely able to push an arm through the current. Listless, fading. Yet he still did not leave her behind. He pulled and kicked and wriggled until he felt the water give way and her body slump back into the boat. He barely had time to register how he had managed it until he himself succumbed to the unconscious.

The next morning, he awoke back at their home, in bed. Reed felt tremendously sore, and Koda had clearly been tending to him in the meantime. He was glad to see she had come out of the storm alive. Strangely enough his curse had extended further, which had granted him the strength to drag her to safety. The changes were...conflicting to say the least. But feeling it was the right time, he told her exactly who he was. Full story, start to finish.

And Koda? She didn't mind. If anything, to meet her former captain again as his genuine self was both a fulfilling experience and a decent closure to what she considered witnessing a murder. For Koda, it was even healing to harbor someone in her home who didn't fear her, no matter who it was. The truth only strengthened their bond, and as of now they remain close knit.

And that is that, the tale of a disgraced captain who learns to be himself, and an intimidating deckhand who learns she will not always be judged by her cover.

~~~

(Koda illustration by my friend @spearxwind! )

(headshot by me)

[glasyasbutch]

What Gets Left Behind (D&D Homework Week 1)

After James D'Amato's RPG Character Backstory Guide.

The last piece of Break that Day has left is the remains of her god piece. The shard of bone chipped off from the dead god's fossilized body that every Aegis gets implanted in them to bring their clay to life, and provide their magic, and link them to their past memories, and to the consciousness of every other Aegis.

The problem, of course, is that God may be infinite, but God's dead body is still a finite resource. Maybe they're not going to run out tomorrow, or soon, but they're going to run out eventually, and what happens then? The refusal of the Aegis to answer that question is what caused Day and Break to walk away the first time, and their stubborn refusal to acknowledge that Break had ever asked it is what caused Day to leave the second time.

A shattered god piece represents just about everything he found fault with in the Aegis, everything Break spent her life fighting against, which makes it all the more ironic that it's the only thing of hers that survived her destruction.

Former Flame

This object is related to a former passion. There was once something that moved you the way wealth, glory, or righteousness moves you now. Choose two five, then describe the detail in your own words: - I could not take this with me on the road. - My interest slowly waned over time until my heart had fully stolen away. - I could hold it in my hand and feel pride. - There were many in my life who smiled when they saw this. - Even now, I sometimes think of it during wistful nights. - This was crafted specifically for me with love. - I made this with my own hands.

"Her name, her full name, is 'Only once you break all earthly bond and dissolve into the astral sea shall you truly know god's fullness'. She went by many shortenings in the time I knew her. Earth, Bond, Sea, Full, True. Astral.

"Break.

"They were first created, the same as the rest of us, in a moment of pure divine desperation, by a god so angry at not being able to do anything that the earth itself rose up to enact His love for the mortal existence. They were created, the next five or so times, by His will as well. Struck down and melted into nothing but mud, only to reform in moments.

"After He was destroyed, we had to rely on each other for our creation. We took to building each other new forms each time one was lost, working together with careful eyes and hands to make sure all the details were just right. Whoever held them dearest would take the lead, their Sculptor. They had aid from the others, of course, we all cared a great deal for each other, and we'd spend a year working to get every last marking perfect. Then, on the final day, the ones among us with the steadiest hands would chip away a sliver of divinity from where he fell, sized to fit perfectly in your hand.

"We'd place it in their chest and stand by as the clay writhed and shuddered with new life, organs forming in the hollow chest cavity, blood pumping for the first time through empty veins, nerves exploding with sensation all at once. That was the most painful part, for them as well as their Sculptor, who would stand by and watch but know better than to touch them, as much as they might want to give comfort, as it might mar the clay that had not yet set.

"But it would pass. It would pass, and they would stand up and greet you with life in their chest again. You would know that you had done well when they smiled that same smile you'd been missing for a year and a day, and nothing had changed in a way that mattered.

"I sculpted her almost more times than I can remember, as she had sculpted me. Not every time, certainly not every time, but enough times that no one would challenge either of us for the role once we had claimed it. Hundreds of years of memories poured into her clay each time.

"She was everything to me - my mentor, my lover, my best friend, my protector, my partner, my guide, my creator, my creation. They were worth so much that I left our world with them, walked away from our demiplanar home and our life's work, just so that I would not have to leave their side.

"And there were no regrets in leaving. We found a new home, full of love and laughter even amongst the strife of adventure. Champion's Call, obviously. Everyone got along with her instantly, like she was meant to be there all along.

"Though my name is the one that evokes light, they were truly our beacon. Always the optimist, cool and calm against any threat, convincing the rest of us that we were going to fight and win and live through sheer will power. Outside of battle, the truest, kindest friend you could ask for. He was … our Break.

"She gave herself up for us, in the end. She stood between the planes so that we could all get out safe, running between two losing battlegrounds. They knew they could be rebuilt. They trusted me to remake them. And I did.

"But the things that allowed her to leave home the first time were … not quite so in this new form, and time had altered a few key factors in the social situation as well. So when I stepped back to rejoin my friends in retirement, she chose to remain behind."

Day sits for this interview, one of the few they ever managed to get pinned down for, formally describing their relationship with Break to some young and curious reporter with a notepad. It's uncomfortable, mostly because he's not used to this kind of attention the way the rest of the Call were. They all had the year after the planar split where they were hounded by people like this (and other, far less respectful ones) to get used to the questions and scrutiny. But Day had been doing as he described, a year and a day in the Aegis home plane, and only now was he facing the effects of his fame.

It feels strange to answer these questions, baring open the secrets of the Aegis. But then again, they've been around for hundreds of years, the legend is nothing new, and it's not like he's shared any details that people didn't already know at some point or another. Hopefully, he can end up correcting some of the truly egregious bits of misinformation out there.

Everything they say is all very formal, very planned (they sat down with Kez to practice their interview voice all of yesterday), just enough to make this reporter think they're getting the whole story. Just enough omission that they don't know where to ask the kind of prying questions that will really hurt to hear.

She fiddles with something in her hand as she talks, turning it over and over and over and over to keep calm. It looks like a stone, perhaps. Off white, rubbed smooth and shiny with wear. Sized perfectly to fit in her hand.

The reporter had eyed it when he slipped it out of his pocket before they sat down, but hadn't asked anything outright. "Just a worry stone," Day had told them, to keep them from getting curious later. "I'm not used to fame quite yet, still get anxious doing things like this - off the record, of course." This last bit said with a coy grin on Kez's advice, to imply that they're already quite comfortable, giving away perhaps a few extra details, so the reporter wouldn't feel the need to press for any.

"And I assume you miss her?" the reporter asks, eyes flitting up from their notepad for the first time in several minutes.

"You would assume correctly," Day answers, squeezing the item in her hand so tight it threatens to leave permanent marks in the clay of her palm. "Though, of course, I understand why she had to stay. And time has helped close the wound, at least part of the way."

"Do you think you'll ever see her again? That she'll leave - or that you'll return home?"

"Perhaps," and it's everything he can do not to shatter it, but he doesn't, he can't, it's all he has left of her. "I doubt she'll leave, but I may go back. Not any time soon though, I've got plenty of years still to keep the rest of the Call company out here before I go anywhere. And who's to say what will happen in those years to change my plans. We've already got one little one to see grow up, and I wouldn't be surprised if there were more soon."

Mention Callie getting pregnant if you need to change the subject, Kez had said. They'll drink that shit up like it's elvish firewine.

As promised, the reporter's eyebrows raise. "Are you implying the Edlynne family is expecting a second child?"

"No, no, not yet - at least as far as I'm aware." Day laughs, casually. The item is back to being turned, gently, between their fingers. "I'm just saying, Arthur and Callie have only fallen more in love in their retirement. Anything could happen."

The rest of the interview floats by, mostly questions about what it felt like to talk to a god as someone who was a direct creation of a god (intimidating, still), and whether they've visited any of the now-missing planes in any of their lifetimes (about half of them), and who in the Call would win at charades (Kez, not because of skill, but because of stubborn rules lawyering).

The interviewer stands up to shake their hand, Day returns the favor, and then quickly ducks out of the room, leaving them alone to gather their things in the parlor of Kez's tower. She's waiting for Day just up the stairs, arms ready for a hug that Day practically falls into. There's no tears, but there is a heaviness to it, enough that Kez has to guide them over to a chair and settle down across Day's lap, or else she wouldn't have been able to hold on to him.

"Why does it hurt so much to talk about?" Day mutters into their shoulder.

"Because it was everything, and now it's over." Kez's tone is soft, despite the matter-of-factness of their words. They've already had this conversation, several times, it's not like Day needs to hear the message. Just their voice.

"How on earth did you sit through so many of those things without losing it?"

"I was on WAYYYYYYY more drugs than you are right now, Daisy. Or drunk. Or both. Do you want something?"

"No. Maybe. No. … Later." Day repositions her head, unburying her face from his shoulder, turning sideways to press her cheek to his chest. She can hear his heartbeat, steady, strong, alive. "Can we just sit here for a bit?"

"Of course," Kez murmurs, pressing a kiss to the top of Day's head before threading a hand into their hair, keeping their head close.

They lightly squash and reform the locs beneath their fingertips, methodically working one of the more mold-able areas of clay in that way Day's always found calming. He hums contentedly, almost on cue. The godpiece is still in his hand, slung around Kez's back and resting near their hip.

He starts turning it over again, spinning with the same rhythm as Kez's fingers in his hair. He knows there's nothing there, really, but he can swear he feels a bit of energy sparking through it, into his hand. For a moment, just a moment, he can pretend all three of them are in one room again.

.

.

Broken Shackle

Before your life on the road, you suffered a persistent dread that you would end up condemned to a life of unnoticed misery. You were reminded of this fear every time you touched this object. Roll a d6 or choose, then describe the detail in your own words: - This was part of a profession you are glad to have escaped. - It was a way for society to punish what it did not understand. - Every detail whispers the dark promise of tedium. - Its delicate features make your strong hands feel ugly and unworthy. - It looked old and broken before you ever touched it and it looks much the same now. - This was given to you by someone with love in their eyes and pride in their heart.

The second to last look that Break ever held on her face was fear.

Fear that it would all be for nothing, that their little family would be torn apart if Thorn and Kez couldn't scramble through fast enough, that the cracks she could already feel climbing up her arms as she baked in the radiation of the space between planes would give out too soon and the rift would collapse and something devastating would happen.

Fear that she would not be strong enough to commit herself to this.

But that look faded quick enough, as she manged to stretch her hand out and yank Thorn through the portal, collapsing under the weight now borne on only one shattering arm.

They were all safe, she had kept them safe, she had kept the world safe. The planes were going to rip apart, and she was not going to get out in this last half a second, but that didn't matter in the slightest. She could see them all standing together, staring at her, in various stages of horror as they figured out what was happening.

Don't worry, she wants to say, but there isn't time. It doesn't hurt, she promises. I know what I'm doing, she thinks.

I chose this. I chose you. Every day I chose you, and I would never not choose you.

Do you believe me? I need you to believe me.

Everything I feel for you, it's written in my heart, in my core. If it's the last thing I do, I will give it to you, to make sure you believe me.

It's here, in my chest, Day put it there years ago. It's under my sternum. I can feel the cracks forming. The air's already hitting it, three inches deep.

Someone catch it, when I go.

Take it, hold it, feel it, so you know how much I cared for you, what I would have done for you, how I would have stood here crumbling for a thousand years for you, if it came to it. Take it and know, and let those sad, scared looks fall off your faces.

Don't worry. It doesn't hurt. I know what I'm doing.

I chose this. I chose you.

The last look Break ever held on her face was love.

.

.

Ghostly Comfort

Even if you despised your former life, there was at least one bright spot. What purpose did this serve? Choose one, then describe the detail in your own words: - It helped me sleep. - It reminded me of those I have lost. - It was a glimmer of beauty lost in ugliness. - It eased my pain.

They were in love until they weren't, because Day became too different of a person in the aftermath to feel those feelings the way he used to, they way they were expecting him to, like nothing had changed. He could fall back into the routine easy enough for a moment, a day, a week. But it was never going to be permanent. It was never going to be the way it used to be.

In the years since, you have tried unsuccessfully to recreate what you derived from this object. Write about the moment when you decided to discard your most recent attempt.

He tried pretty recently to reconnect, then ended up scrapping it and throwing it away: https://glasyasbutch.tumblr.com/post/748899769588596736/findings-in-the-waste-paper-basket-of-a-particular

Alternate answer, he tried pretty recently to reconnect, then ended up scrapping it and throwing it away:

"It really made me realize something, Kez, and you need to hear it. But you're going to hate it, so it's a good thing I'm telling you now, because I'm about to walk out that door and leave so you can get mad and strawman me as much as you need until you really process what I said to you ..."

[basicsofislam]

ISLAM 101: Belief in The Hereafter: Part 1

What is the hereafter?

It is the eternal world to go to after this world.

Belief in the hereafter is one of the six fundamentals of belief.

1. Stages of Life in the Hereafter

There fourteen stages in the life in the hereafter:

1- Life in the grave

2- Blowing of the trumpet

3- Qiyama (Apocalypse)

4- Resurrection

5- Gathering

6- Delivering the book of deeds

7- Reckoning

8- Scale

9- Kawthar Pool

10- Sirat

11- Shafaat

12- Purgatory (Araf)

13- Hell

14- Paradise

1. Grave / Barzakh Life

A verse: “Then, He causeth him to die, and putteth him in his Grave; Then, when it is His will, He will raise him up (again).” (Abasa, 21-22).

The stage from the death of men in the world till they are resurrected after the apocalypse is called the life of grave. This life is also called “barzakh life or barzakh world” because it expresses the transitional period between the world and the hereafter. Barzakh means a drawback, barrier, or curtain between two things.

It is not necessary to put the body of a man in the grave for him to live the life in the grave. Whether the dead person is put into the grave or his body is eaten by wild animals or it is eaten by the fish in the sea or it is burnt to ashes, his life in the grave starts. It would be better to use the term barzakh life in order to prevent misunderstanding because grave means a place dug in the ground.

Our Prophet Hazrat Muhammad (PBUH) describes life in the grave as “the first stop of the hereafter” in a hadith (Tirmidhi, Zuhd, 5). In another hadith, our prophet Hazrat Muhammad (PBUH) says: “Grave is either a garden from the gardens of Paradise or a hole from the holes of Hell” (Tirmidhi, Qiyama, 26) , stating that there will be torture or reward in the life in the grave.

In yet another hadith he says;

“After man dies and is put into the grave two angels called Munkar and Nakir will come and ask him questions like “Who is your Lord? Who is your Prophet? What is your religion?…. The believer answers these questions easily. As for the unbeliever, he cannot answer them and suffers grave torture” (Tirmidhi, Janaiz, 70), informing us about the life that will last till the day of resurrection.

2. Soor (Trumpet) and Blowing of the Trumpet

The trumpet is an instrument blown by the angel Hazrat Israfel to start the apocalypse and after the apocalypse to resurrect people and to gather them in the gathering place. According to what the Quranic verses tell us Hazrat Israfel will blow the trumpet twice. During the first blowing everything on the earth and in the heavens, except what Allah wishes, will be shaken fearing it and die and the apocalypse will take place. With the second blowing, everything will be resurrected and will run towards their Lord in order to gather in the gathering place. Let’s give two of these verses as an example:

“The Trumpet will (just) be sounded, when all that are in the heavens and on earth will swoon, except such as it will please Allah (to exempt). Then will a second one be sounded, when, behold they will be standing and looking on!” (Zumar, 68).

“The trumpet shall be sounded, when behold! from the sepulchers (men) will rush forth to their Lord!” (Ya Seen, 51).

3. Qiyama (Apocalypse)

Qiyama has two meanings: the first one is the breakdown of the order in the universe, everything turning upside down, destruction of everything and the end of the world.

The second is the resurrection of dead people and their walk towards the gathering place. Qiyama in the first sense will start with the first blowing of the trumpet by Hazrat Israfel, in the second sense with the second blowing. So qiyama is a very important event that involves the death of all men and their resurrection.

The Quranic verses inform us about it. Allah states the following in one of the verses about qiyama:

“O mankind! fear your Lord! For the convulsion of the Hour (of Judgment) will be a thing terrible! The Day ye shall see it, every mother giving suck shall forget her suckling-babe, and every pregnant female shall drop her load (unformed): thou shalt see mankind as in a drunken riot, yet not drunk: but dreadful will be the Wrath of Allah.”(Al-Hajj, 1-2.).

"He (man) questions: "When is the Day of Resurrection?” At length, when the Sight is dazed, And the moon is buried in darkness. And the sun and moon are joined together―That Day will Man say “Where is the refuge?” By no means! no place of safety! Before thy Lord (alone), that Day will be the place of rest” (al-Qiyama, 6-12).

Although the Quran mentions qiyama often, it does not answer the questions about the time of it and emphasizes that no one except Allah has any knowledge about it. Our Prophet (PBUH) gives some information in his hadiths that there will be some signs of the qiyama when it approaches.

[nifwatch]

Watched(*) Death and other details.

And my number one question is, why should I care?

(spoilers ahead, obviously)

The main character (Imogene) is supposed to both be an audience stand-in and a brilliant detective all on her own, a poor rich girl with a tragic past. The tragic past turns out to be a lie, her (not) dead mother is a psychopath. The only brilliance Imogene posses is a very good except when it's bad memory, and the ability to spot a clue if it repeatedly yells at her.

The detective. We really did not need the detective, he does nothing. Cut him out of the story completely, give his part to Imogene and you won't even spot a difference. There'll be less ”dear reader, behold, another time skip”, but Imogene can do her ”I cosplay memories, so it's not so boring when you see the same thing a fourth time” trick and all shall be well.

The technology. In a world of mobile phones and 24 hours coverage, the crime investigation is literally live-streamed and nobody thinks that might be relevant? The killer went after the one guy who asked ”who the fuck are you”, but not after the livestreamer???

(World second shittiest detective - you're playing as a rich douche, and the words ”but I memorized the crew roster and you were not on it” naturally spill out of your mouth?)

Still on the technology. If there were recording devices in your room, where could they plausibly be? in the, say, pillows or up in the corner of the room?

Also, if we're in an isolated - isolated my ass. I still don't understand why everybody pretended they HAVE to be at sea, even if that means keeping a body in the kitchen freezer near all the food. Malta was half an hour away, and they were free to boat ride there at any time, apparently! You don't even have the (racist) ”we don't want the dirty local police to investigate”. Anyway, if were on an isolated (THEY HAVE MOBILE PHONES!!!) boat, and a mysterious Interpol agent shows up, does... no one look her up online?

You can wave a lot of this by going ”but the evil robin hood guys could have hacked EVERYTHING”. And I'll say, that's kinda lazy and deus ex machiny.

Now. Tho the ”serous” stuff. The issue of poverty. In this world, being poor is a mysterious condition, nobody knows exactly what that means. A small mansion, a shared family plane, cocaine only every other day? I mean, with a little bit of willpower, even a sweatshop worker can become one of the richest business women in China, so I really don't see what the fuss is about /s.

But it's easy to spot the really evil rich people, cause... um... they are the ones wasting their entire fortune on bringing their factory up to regulations? I mean, granted, 20 years too late, but they compensated their affected workers so well one of them was able to become one of the richest business women in China. Somehow.

But maybe this is a morally gray world, where the justice system does not work, and the evils and the good guys race each other to the bottom? Fair, but you still have to give me ONE character I care about. And it can't be ”I steal from the rich family who raised me for fun, it's not fair they have the nice stuff” Imogene.

...the costumes and decors were nice, the actors were good, and it probably would have benefited from a tighter script, and less episodes and less filler (we did not need the Ukrainians. One smart observant yet wrong little girl is enough).

Would not watch again. Would recommend, maybe? it's good for screaming at the screen, but there's no pay-off, neither in terms of deductions nor in emotional terms.

*I second-screened it. It was clear after the first episode that this series was not designed for full attention.

[queenlucythevaliant]

Professor Kirke remained at the small dining table after the last of the dishes had been cleared away, puffing clouds on his pipe. It was strange, thought Lucy: he had a faraway look in his eyes, as though some tiny aspect of his reality had shifted over dinner and he was struggling to accommodate it.

“I wonder what he’s thinking about,” murmured Lucy to the others. Edmund shrugged and Eustace (who had only met the professor that night) said nothing, but Peter chuckled merrily and patted Lucy on the arm.  

“You’ll find out soon enough, that’s certain. He got that look in his eye when you were talking about the Island of Dreams, Lu. No doubt he’ll call you into his study for a lesson later on.”

It was a little more than a week later that Peter’s prediction came true. Professor Kirke seated himself across his desk from Lucy with an enormous tome of poetry spread out before him. “Have you heard The Rime of the Ancient Mariner?” he inquired.

Lucy shook her head. Yet rather than muttering about the state of the schools as she had expected, Professor Kirke simply smiled beneath his whiskers and began to declaim:

“It is an ancient Mariner /And he stoppeth one of three —"

Lucy leaned back in her seat and fixed her attention on the words as best she could. Once, she’d spoken in such a register as queen of Narnia, but now she was only a girl of ten and unaccustomed to the flowery language of Romantic poetry.

“At length did cross an Albatross,

Thorough the fog it came—”

“Oh!” cried Lucy. “Is that why you wanted me to hear this poem?”

“Just so,” the professor replied. “Your account of the Island where Dreams Come True bears a marked resemblance to The Rime, beginning with the presence of the albatross. In this poem, the albatross bears a symbolic connection to Jesus Christ himself.”

“How peculiar!”

“I thought so too. Samuel Taylor Coleridge wrote this poem in 1797, in a time when sea voyages to the polar regions were very much like your own voyage to the end of the world. The albatross had only lately been described in writing, but he wrote it coming out of the desolate fog to guide sailors to safety. And Coleridge was a neo-Platonist! Fog and ice are very much like darkness, the way he uses them here.”

“A neo-Platonist?” Lucy asked, wrinkling her nose.

And now came the Professor’s customary muttering. “Yes. What do they teach in these schools? You may read darkness and fog both in Coleridge as something between ignorance and innocence, with the Sun as a symbol of Reason. Does that make sense?”

“A little,” said Lucy, who privately didn’t think it made much sense at all but was eager for the professor to continue the poem.

“It ate the food it ne'er had eat,

And round and round it flew.

The ice did split with a thunder-fit;

The helmsman steered us through!”

Lucy hadn’t meant to interrupt again so soon, but the words were out of her mouth before she was really aware that she’d spoken them. “So it really is just like in Narnia! It guides the ship out of the ice like my Albatross guided us out of the darkness.”

“Yes.” Professor Kirke was entirely unperturbed by the interruption. “Precisely.”

“How lovely. Isn’t it interesting how you just know when birds are trustworthy?”

The professor chuckled. “You may change your mind in a few stanzas. Shall I go on?”

“Please.”

Lucy returned to her concentration as the mariner recounted how a good wind had sprung up after the Albatross and how it had stayed with the ship and perched on the mast sometimes for evening prayers. Yet the mariner must have looked unhappy, for the groom interrupted to ask him why.

“With my cross-bow/ I shot the albatross.” Professor Kirke paused here in his telling and looked very hard at Lucy.

It took her a long moment to understand. “The albatross isn’t dead, is he?”

“He is.”

“I thought you said he was like Aslan.”

“And didn’t you see Aslan die?”

Lucy opened her mouth, but closed it a moment later. Open again, “But why did the mariner kill him? Doesn’t he give any reason? The witch killed Aslan because she was evil and trying to conquer Narnia. Why would the mariner kill the albatross when it’s done nothing but help him?”

“Perhaps,” the professor replied, “the Gospels are a simpler comparison here. ‘I shot the albatross’ has the same kind of blunt irrefutability as ‘And they crucified him.’ There isn’t any excuse, which I think makes the confession all the more powerful.”

Lucy sighed. It was exhausting trying to keep this all straight. “I suppose that makes a kind of sense. But then we’re trying to think on three different levels of parallel—the poem, the Bible and Narnia—which isn’t very pleasant.”

“And yet, it’s necessary if one wishes to understand deeper meanings. We can pause for tea, if you’d like?”

“No, that’s alright. I think I’m keeping track well enough for now. I say though, is this what you do with Peter all day?”

The question seemed to catch Professor Kirke off guard, for he let out a sudden, loud burst of laughter as soon as Lucy asked it. “Yes, after a manner of speaking. Shall we go on?”

“Ah! well a-day! what evil looks

Had I from old and young!

Instead of the cross, the Albatross

About my neck was hung.”

It was a difficult thing to imagine and Lucy wondered if Aslan’s albatross was unusually large. Aslan was always bigger than she expected him to be, so it would not be strange if he took the form of an unusually large albatross. Yet the more Lucy considered, the more sense the image made.

“It must have been at least three meters,” said Lucy. “The albatross, I mean. Mine was more like four, from wingtip to wingtip. It would be a dreadful weight, but I suppose that’s the point. The mariner can’t carry it, can he?”

“I think you’re right,” said Professor Kirke.

A smile tugged at Lucy’s cheeks. It was lovely to hear the professor give such an unequivocal endorsement of her analysis. Galvanized by the success, she continued, “I thought of a cross when my albatross appeared out of the darkness. There’s something in the proportion of the body to the wings, and in its stillness of it as it glides through the air. My albatross tore away the darkness. But here—it’s like the mariner carries his albatross like he thinks that act can save him from what he’s done.”

There was a glittering in the old professor’s eyes then, and suddenly Lucy realized that she wasn’t struggling with the poem’s language anymore. Maybe it was because she’d been listening to it for the better part of ten minutes, but privately she wondered if Narnia’s magic might be working on her somehow. Perhaps this poem contained some quality of the rich Narnian air.

“I looked to heaven, and tried to pray;

But or ever a prayer had gusht,

A wicked whisper came, and made

My heart as dry as dust.”

Lucy shut her eyes and remembered the fighting-top of the Dawn Treader. The night-mare life-in-death was a black abyss, and all her own nightmares had been there in it. There had been monsters, of course, and the idea that even if she ran down to stand beside Edmund he might become a monster himself. But somewhere in all that dark, there was a Lucy who never spoke to Aslan again. She’d imagined herself in Lord Rhoop’s place, trapped forever in a state of endless fear-without-courage, because she could not call him.

“That was my night-mare too,” she whispered. “Not being able to pray.”

She saw the professor’s lips thin beneath his whiskers and wondered at it. “You’re wiser than you have any right to be,” he murmured. “Ten years old and your greatest nightmare is alienation from God. What a marvel you’ll be when you’re grown.”

Well then. Lucy didn’t have any notion what to say to that. She half expected that if she tried to reply, she might start crying.

“Might I ask—what did you do then? Until the albatross arrived, once you realized that you couldn’t pray. How did you react?”

And that was a question she could answer.

“But I could pray! I did. I whispered, ‘Aslan, if you ever loved us at all, send us help now.’ And that was when the albatross came. I didn’t talk about it after—it was too much my own for me to share it, really—Edmund knows—but well…”

The professor made a sort of choked noise in his throat. “Perhaps it was the only nightmare that the island couldn’t bring true.”

“But there have been times,” continued Lucy, “when my heart was too dry to speak with Aslan. There were whole years when I was queen that he didn’t come at all.”

It was with a much softer voice that Professor Kirke resumed his reading.

“A spring of love gushed from my heart,

And I blessed them unaware:

Sure my kind saint took pity on me,

And I blessed them unaware.

 The self-same moment I could pray;

And from my neck so free

The Albatross fell off, and sank

Like lead into the sea.”

Here, the professor lapsed into silence. Lucy thought that the poem might be over, but when she peered across the desk at the page there were columns of stanzas still left.

“Even after all these years,” he whispered, “some things still remind me of my own days in Narnia.”

He’d told the children his story before, of course: beginning with how he met Aunt Polly and concluding with the origins of the wardrobe. Aslan had not condemned him for bringing the White Witch to Narnia. Instead, he’d had loved Digory enough to shed tears and sent him home with an apple so beautiful that it healed his dying mother.

“Grace,” Lucy whispered into the hush. “Of course. Maybe this is the moment where Aslan leads the mariner out of the darkness.”

Professor Kirke exhaled heavily. The faraway look in his eye lessened a little bit, and at length he read on.

“The spirit slid: and it was he

That made the ship to go.”

Never had Lucy felt Aslan’s presence more keenly in his absence than during those last days as the Dawn Treader had sailed over the still, clear waters at world’s end; like Aslan himself had been drawing them towards himself by some great, invisible rope.

The closer they’d come to his country, the more tangible his spirit had been. When at last she glimpsed those green mountains beyond the waves, Lucy’s very bones understood that Aslan had made the still seas bring them there.

A voice spoke out of the air concerning the mariner, and Lucy remembered the piercing silence of the Last Sea. Of the voice, the mariner said, “He loved the bird that loved the man/ Who shot him with his bow.”

Not for the first time, Lucy wondered about Aslan’s father, the Emperor-beyond-the-Sea. What did he say to Aslan when he left that land of high mountains to return to Narnia and die at the Witch’s hand? What did he think when Aslan went flying across the lily-covered seas on feathered wings to rescue their little ship? If Lucy had crossed that final threshold with Reepicheep, would she have met the Emperor there?

“The voice is his father,” Lucy said, voice brimming with certainty. “The albatross’s father, I mean. The Emperor-beyond-the-Sea.”

“I know,” the professor replied. “And beyond the sea is just where our mariner meets him.”

“Do you think the mariner knew that the albatross loved him?”

The professor stroked his chin again, and a ghost of a smile played across his features. “If the mariner didn’t know it when he shot him, he certainly knows now. But come, we’re nearly at the end of the poem.

“Swiftly, swiftly flew the ship,

Yet she sailed softly too:

Sweetly, sweetly blew the breeze—

On me alone it blew.

Oh! dream of joy! is this indeed

The light-house top I see?”

“There’s one more thing I haven’t told you,” Lucy said. “Something so bright and mysterious that I’ve not even told Edmund. When the albatross came, it—it spoke to me. And I wasn’t afraid anymore.”

Professor Kirke leaned forward, but his words were, “You needn’t tell me what he said if you’d prefer not to.”

Lucy nodded slowly. Somehow, she knew that if she tried to describe “Courage, dear heart,” she would fail. There was nothing, no word or image or music or poetry in this world or any other that could convey what that moment had been. To speak of it at all would be like dancing about architecture.

“I was the only one who heard him,” Lucy whispered. “It was my prayer, and he spoke to me. I wonder how this poet knows what it was like?”

“I think he knows the same way I do, in my own way. Coleridge lived a difficult life. He was a laudanum addict when he wrote this, for one thing. When the Divine voice speaks into our darkness and we feel his breath on our faces, it binds us together with every other person who has ever been rescued by an albatross that loved us. We don’t know what he says to other people, but we know how the breeze feels.”

The professor returned to his reading and concluded the poem while Lucy sat in astonishment and let the strangeness of the last hour wash over her.

“…A sadder and a wiser man/ He rose the morrow morn,” and with those words Professor Kirke shut the book. The heavy pages fell with a thud, and with bright eyes he looked at Lucy. “What do you think of it?”

“I think,” said Lucy slowly, “that it was a beautiful story. The very best kind.”

What she did not say, but what she was thinking, was that it reminded her of the story she’d read in the Magician’s book: the one about the cup, the sword, the tree, and the green hill. The two tales had no common points of reference, but they left her with much the same feeling.

“But why do you think Aslan came to me as an albatross?”

Professor Kirke harrumphed. “I have been asking myself that same question ever since you spoke of it. Why indeed? I wonder whether perhaps in part he appeared that way so that you would come back here and read ‘The Rime of the Ancient Mariner,’ and come to know him better by it. If nothing else, I do not think it was a coincidence.”

Yes, perhaps, but the answer still felt incomplete. “Maybe it’s a stone in the bridge he talked about,” Lucy said. “Maybe he only wanted to show me—to show us—that he’s here too. In this world, in this time, and in all others. Maybe it’s like you said, and there’s an albatross for every person who’s ever been rescued from the darkness.”

[eddieredmayneargentinablog]

Happy Poetry Day!

The Waste Land , T.S. Eliot (1888-1965): II. A Game of Chess read by Eddie Redmayne and Felicity Jones for The Poetry Hour in 2012.

    The Chair she sat in, like a burnished throne,

Glowed on the marble, where the glass

Held up by standards wrought with fruited vines

From which a golden Cupidon peeped out

(Another hid his eyes behind his wing)

Doubled the flames of sevenbranched candelabra

Reflecting light upon the table as

The glitter of her jewels rose to meet it,

From satin cases poured in rich profusion;

In vials of ivory and coloured glass

Unstoppered, lurked her strange synthetic perfumes,

Unguent, powdered, or liquid—troubled, confused

And drowned the sense in odours; stirred by the air

That freshened from the window, these ascended

In fattening the prolonged candle-flames,

Flung their smoke into the laquearia,

Stirring the pattern on the coffered ceiling.

Huge sea-wood fed with copper

Burned green and orange, framed by the coloured stone,

In which sad light a carvèd dolphin swam.

Above the antique mantel was displayed

As though a window gave upon the sylvan scene

The change of Philomel, by the barbarous king

So rudely forced; yet there the nightingale

Filled all the desert with inviolable voice

And still she cried, and still the world pursues,

“Jug Jug” to dirty ears.

And other withered stumps of time

Were told upon the walls; staring forms

Leaned out, leaning, hushing the room enclosed.

Footsteps shuffled on the stair,

Under the firelight, under the brush, her hair

Spread out in fiery points

Glowed into words, then would be savagely still.

My nerves are bad to-night. Yes, bad. Stay with me.

    Speak to me. Why do you never speak? Speak.

      What are you thinking of? What thinking? What?

    I never know what you are thinking. Think.”

    I think we are in rats’ alley

Where the dead men lost their bones.

“What is that noise?”

     The wind under the door.

“What is that noise now? What is the wind doing?”

           Nothing again nothing.

           “Do You know nothing? Do you see nothing? Do you remember Nothing?”

 I remember

Those are pearls that were his eyes.

“Are you alive, or not? Is there nothing in your head?”

But that Shakespeherian Rag —

It’s so elegant

So intelligent

“What shall I do now? What shall I do?

I shall rush out as I am, and walk the street

With my hair down, so. What shall we do to-morrow?

What shall we ever do?”

           The hot water at ten.

And if it rains, a closed car at four.

And we shall play a game of chess,

Pressing lidless eyes and waiting for a knock upon the door.

When Lil’s husband got demobbed, I said —

I didn’t mince my words, I said to her myself,

HURRY UP PLEASE ITS TIME

Now Albert’s coming back, make yourself a bit smart.

He’ll want to know what you done with that money he gave you

To get yourself some teeth. He did, I was there.

You have them all out, Lil, and get a nice set,

He said, I swear, I can’t bear to look at you.

And no more can’t I, I said, and think of poor Albert,

He’s been in the army four years, he wants a good time,

And if you don’t give it him, there’s others will, I said.

Others can pick and choose if you can’t.

But if Albert makes off, it won’t be for lack of telling.

You ought to be ashamed, I said, to look so antique.

(And her only thirty-one.)

I can’t help it, she said, pulling a long face,

It’s them pills I took, to bring it off, she said.

(She’s had five already, and nearly died of young George.)

The chemist said it would be alright, but I’ve never been the same.

You are a proper fool, I said.

Well, if Albert won’t leave you alone, there it is, I said,

What you get married for if you don’t want children?

HURRY UP PLEASE ITS TIME

Well, that Sunday Albert was home, they had a hot gammon,

And they asked me in to dinner, to get the beauty of it hot —

HURRY UP PLEASE ITS TIME

HURRY UP PLEASE ITS TIME

Goonight Bill. Goonight Lou. Goonight May. Goonight.

Ta ta. Goonight. Goonight.

Good night, ladies, good night, sweet ladies, good night,

     good night".

Source: The Poetry Hour

[mnemosyne-xiv]

The moment you returned with the Scions, I knew you were avoiding everyone. Her parents weren't oblivious. My father could hardly keep track of where you were going. And before I could find you, you had already left for Thavnair.

But when you returned yet again, you had no choice but to come to me if you wanted access to my true line of work. The Atiascope was beyond even my father's grasp. Only with my endorsement would Master Fourchenault begin to consider listening to your party's request. Something you knew yet kept to yourself, deciding it better to speak with me alone as far away from your comrades as you could get.

"You'll find more than the Mother Crystal down in the aetherial depths of this star," I warned. "I've seen the Antecedant myself. Do you believe Thancred capable of continuing down this path without letting his guilt and grief consume him?"

"Our friend has come far since last you saw him," came your confident reply.

"And what of you? After everything you've endured, if you saw her, could you continue down this path until the very end?"

"..."

I took a step closer. "What lies at the edge of existence will test your heart far more than venturing into the aetherial sea. If you can't face Moenbryda and promise me you'll work to find inner peace, then I can't give you my support knowing you'll end up dead when all is said and done."

Your silence hung heavy in the air. Painfully so. The weary pull on the corners of your once bright eyes spoke volumes on your behalf. This fight has been long and taken its toll. From the moment you left this little hamlet we call home, you've been tested time and time again, and once more must you choose the choice of sacrifice in the hopes it shall grant us all the salvation you wish to gift.

Before I realized it, my hand found its way to your cheek. A warm, gentle touch that you leaned into as though it were the first source of comfort you had felt in years—and perhaps it was.

"Promise me you'll return," I whispered into the small space left between us. "Promise me, Urianger."

"I promise thee that I shall return no matter the costs."

"Then I'll speak with the Forum on your behalf."

[fiction-quotes]

Hardly a word was spoken on board all that day, till about dinner-time (no one wanted any dinner, the water was enough for them) Drinian said:

“I can't understand this. There is not a breath of wind. The sail hangs dead. The sea is as flat as a pond. And yet we drive on as fast as if there were a gale behind us.”

“I've been thinking that, too,” said Caspian. “We must be caught in some strong current.”

“H'm,” said Edmund. “That's not so nice if the world really has an edge and we're getting near it.”

“You mean,” said Caspian, “that we might be just – well, poured over it?”

“Yes, yes,” cried Reepicheep, clapping his paws together. “That's how I've always imagined it – the world like a great round table and the waters of all the oceans endlessly pouring over the edge. The ship will tip up – stand on her head – for one moment we shall see over the edge – and then, down, down, the rush, the speed – ”

“And what do you think will be waiting for us at the bottom, eh?” said Drinian.

“Aslan's country, perhaps,” said the Mouse, its eyes shining. “Or perhaps there isn't any bottom. Perhaps it goes down for ever and ever. But whatever it is, won't it be worth anything just to have looked for one moment beyond the edge of the world.”

“But look here,” said Eustace, “this is all rot. The world's round – I mean, round like a ball, not like a table.”

“Our world is,” said Edmund. “But is this?”

“Do you mean to say,” asked Caspian, “that you three come from a round world (round like a ball) and you've never told me! It's really too bad for you. Because we have fairy-tales in which there are round worlds and I always loved them. I never believed there were any real ones. But I've always wished there were and I've always longed to live in one. Oh, I'd give anything – I wonder why you can get into our world and we never get into yours? If only I had the chance! It must be exciting to live on a thing like a ball. Have you ever been to the parts where people walk about upside-down?”

Edmund shook his head. “And it isn't like that,” he added. “There's nothing particularly exciting about a round world when you're there.”

  —  The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (C. S. Lewis)