#there's another bit in there that describes

[yanderedrabbles]

Yandere Yakuza - Valentine's Special

Romance is in the air and a certain yakuza is keen to teach you all about Valentine's traditions in Japan. Word Count: 4.2k Male Yandere x Fem Reader Mini Sequel to Yandere! Yakuza

As a hostess, you've been looking forward to Valentine's Day. Guests are notorious for spending big and tipping even bigger when romance is in the air.

One problem though. Your yakuza boyfriend does not approve.

"You don't have to work on Valentine's. My Family owns the club. I should get a say."

You ignore his complaining and the arms wrapped around your waist. You're focused on your makeup and no handsome, dangerous yakuza is going to distract you.

He changes tactics. "Onegaiya de? [Please?] Pretty please?"

You sigh and reach up to run your fingers through his hair. "Of course I do. But I need money. If you've forgotten, my brother still owes you. And besides, the house mother told me to come in today."

He frowns. "Naze? [Why?]"

"I'm very good at my job, that's why."

You manage to finish both your lashes and your lipstick before he speaks up again.

"Kurabu ni issho ni ikimasu. [I'm coming with you to the club.]"

You aren't surprised. It seems like he spends all his free time as your customer. As though being in a relationship isn't enough. As though he wants to have you both during and after work.

You turn and plant a kiss on his cheek. You leave behind a lipstick mark that he's in no hurry to wipe off. "If you want to spend all your money on me, I'm definitely not going to complain."

He grins in that lazy way of his and loops his arms fully around your waist. "Anata wa watashi no kanojodesu [you're my girl]. Who else would I spend my cash on?"

He drives you to work with one hand on your thigh. It gives you butterflies - the warmth of his skin bleeding through the fabric of your dress, the way he sometimes squeezes the meat of your leg like he subconsciously wants to remind himself that you're still there.

When he opens the car door for you, he brushes his lips past your ear. "Got a real nice surprise for you later."

You stop and pretend to fix your heels so you can look up at him through your lashes. "Is it the same surprise as last time? Because I loved that one."

Big, scary guy that he is, you think you can still see him swallow and freeze when you look up at him like that. He takes you hand and steadies you but the eyes that trace over your body are hooded, unreadable. "Not what I had in mind this time, no."

He inhales sharply when you step past him and 'accidentally' brush your hand over his belt.

"Too bad," you say, "I love that thing you do with your tongue."

It takes him a second to catch up with you. When he does, he wraps his arm around your waist and hisses in your ear.

"Anta, ijiwaruya na. [You unbearable tease]."

You can't help but smile. Personally, you'd describe yourself as an unbearable, romantic tease. It being Valentine's and all.

You're honestly looking forward to spending your shift with him. Even though he's started calling himself your kareshi, he still doesn't talk about himself much. You're not offended by it. There are a thousand little ways you've pieced together his past. The way he likes his sake hot and the way he turns his nose up at high end sushi, the way he holds his cigarette when he smokes and the way he can flick a match on his thumb. It all tells you a bit more than he'd probably like you to know. And each date you go on, each shift that he spends entirely focused on you, is just another opportunity for you to untangle the mystery that is your yakuza.

Unfortunately, the boss has other plans. You don't even get a chance to sit down before one of the other enforcers pulls him aside. He frowns at whatever the man is saying and then quickly presses a kiss to your forehead.

"Gomen ya de, daisukinahito. Shigotoya nen. [Sorry love. Gotta work]."

He's out the door before you can even object. The house mother narrows in on your table and less than a minute later she has a client seated across from you. She's built a habit of trying to cram as many customers into your schedule as possible when your boyfriend isn't around to steal you away. You can almost admire her dedication.

The first client of the night is a salaryman already happily flushed with drink. He tips you well, buys you several rounds of expensive drinks and gives you a drunken kiss on the cheek before he leaves. A very typical Valentine's date.

You get through a few more without any issues. Mostly businessmen not willingly to go home to an empty apartment. Your wallet gets noticeably fatter after each one. It's long past midnight when things finally go sour.

You're touching up your lipstick when the yakuza walk through the door. You can tell what they are at first glance. And worse, you know these aren't the usual guys.

You expect trouble. You aren't sure when you developed an instinct for yakuza business, but you know that the newcomers most definitely aren't part of the Family.

You try and watch them as subtly as you can. One of the regular enforcers goes up to meet them and - surprisingly - leads them to the back of the club.

The group passes right next to you. You keep your eyes on your compact and lipstick like you've never seen anything quite so interesting as YSL Loveshine. At the last second you look up, and straight into the eyes of a bleached blonde gangster with a mean smile. He must have been looking at you already, because he shoots you a playboy wink.

On instinct, you bow your head. Even if they weren't your Family, it wasn't a good idea to be caught lacking in respect.

When they're finally gone, you sigh in relief. Talk about scary. Those guys looked like their favourite pastime was baseball; the faces and knee cap variety.

You're about to get up and take your break when something makes you look over your shoulder. The blonde yakuza is leaning against the wall just outside the staff-only door. And looking straight at you.

Oh, please not today. You already have one yakuza in your bed and almost constantly blowing up you phone. You want absolutely nothing to do with Mr Tall, Blonde and Evil.

No such luck. He says something to the enforcer next to him and beelines towards you. Eyes locked on yours.

He slides in next to you - not across where a client would normally sit. You shift over to make room for him and wonder if there's something in the water that makes you particularly noticeable to men with a nicotine and tattoo addiction.

"Omae, jitto mi teruyan ka. Na n ya, kiniitta n kai, kawaī ko. [I noticed you staring. Like what you see, pretty girl?]"

His voice is raspier than your boyfriend's. And meaner too.

You can just...pretend to not speak Japanese. But one look at the blond's sharp, lazy smile tells you he'll know you for a liar the second you open your mouth.

"Omaeni mo onaji ko to kiitē wa, ikemen-san. [I could ask you the same thing, pretty boy.]"

He laughs, "She's got an attitude! Not scared of a big, scary yakuza?"

"Are you supposed to be telling me that about yourself?" You lean your chin on your palm and tilt your head. "What if I'm a cop?"

"Then you can put me in handcuffs right now." He let's his eyes roam down your body. "I'll happily do whatever you want, officer."

Okay. Pervert yakuza number two added to your collection. Could you get out of this somehow? A client is a client but you don't want to be next to him any longer than necessary.

"Don't you want a girl who can speak Japanese? I'm still not very good."

"What I want? We won't really be talking if we do what I want."

He pulls out a pack of cigarettes from his jacket and lights one with an easy flick of his lighter. He inhales deeply and let's the smoke out of his nose, like a dragon.

"You got a boyfriend?"

That really does seem to be the first question these guys ask you. What happened to 'how are you?' and 'here's a fat stack of cash, do you want it?'

"Yes." You shrug, like this is just a casual conversation with another client and not a rival with a gun under his suit jacket. "He's part of the Family."

"Wakatta wa. [I see]." He offers you a pull of his cigarette. You almost decline, but you look into his eyes - a dark hazel - and realise what a bad idea that would be.

He holds your gaze as he presses the cigarette against your lips. You pull on it as lightly as you can, the tip flaring a bright orange.

It burns your throat and you turn away from him to cough out the smoke. God, that stuff is awful. Why the hell is your man always lighting one if this is what they taste like?

When you turn back to him, the yakuza is studying the cigarette. Your lipstick left a stain on the filter. Slowly, he brings it to his lips and covers the place where your own lips were. He pulls in deeply and tilts his head back, eyes closed.

"Sweeter than normal," he breathes.

Nope. Nope. Nope. It's flattering really, but you aren't an idiot. You don't want your boyfriend's rival sitting so close to you, you don't want him looking at you with eyes like liquid honey and you most definitely don't want him calling you sweet.

If you could telepathically summon your boyfriend, you would. Unfortunately, he's busy with whatever it is they took him off to do, and you're stuck making conversation with a man who's arm keeps inching tighter and tighter around your shoulders.

You try to stand up and excuse yourself, but he wraps a palm around your thigh and pulls you back down without even trying.

"I need to pee," you tell him. He grins, cigarette casting his features in shadow.

"Perfect. I'm really thirsty."

Alright then. Ultimate host club perv discovered. It's almost a relief. You were worried your boyfriend would continue to hold that unenviable title.

You're about to say something - probably along the lines of it would go down even better with a vodka chaser - when your boyfriend finally arrives. You can tell it's him by the way he let's the door almost slam shut behind him. (You've tried working on that but every time you bring it up, he just says that you're so cute when you're bossy and won't you please take that tone with him later tonight?)

The blonde must have followed your line of sight, because his grip gets just a little tighter on you. "That your boyfriend?"

He's already heading toward your table and his frown spells trouble.

"Yep." You wonder if the blonde would listen to you if you tried to warn him away. You doubt it.

Your yakuza's hair is messy and his sleeves are still rolled to his elbows. He must have come straight from whatever job he got called away for.

He stops right in front of you, his arms crossed.

"Times up," he says simply. "Her shift is over."

The blonde takes another pull from his cigarette. "This your girl?"

Your boyfriend tenses, "Un. Kanojo wa watashi no monodesu. [Yeah. She's mine]."

You can almost feel the room getting colder. Your boyfriend flicks his eyes at the other yakuza standing at the back of the club.

"What are you doing here?"

"Boss had business with your side of things. Said I could throw back. Sample the goods." Blondie runs his palm up your thigh. "I'd have risked coming over ages ago, if I knew you had such cute pieces."

Your boyfriend narrows his eyes. "Times. Up. She's got another date waiting."

The blonde yakuza makes a show of looking at his wristwatch. "Looks like I've still got five more minutes."

"Your watch is late." Every word is bitten off and curt. You've seen him serious before, but never like this. Is this what he's like when he's working?

It's easy to forget his job when he's sprawled in your bed with his head on your chest, muttering about letting him sleep for five more minutes. It's easy to forget that he's a gangster who breaks faces for a living. That he's dangerous.

After tonight, you don't think you'll ever forget that fact. It's terrifying to be across from him, even if his glare isn't directed at you.

The moment stretches - taut, awfully tense. Finally, the blonde breaks.

"Tch. I've got shit to do anyway."

He stands up - and just when you're about to sigh in relief - kisses you right on the mouth. You jerk backwards, more surprised than anything else.

He straightens and runs his fingers over his lips. "Even sweeter than I thought."

You scramble out of the booth and grab your boyfriend's arm before he can do anything stupid. The muscles under your palms are already coiled tight and you're terrified to see what might happen if that strength is unleashed.

You bow in a quick, half hearted way. "O jikan o itadaki arigatōgozaimasu. [Thank you for your time]."

And then you're dragging your man out of the club before he can muster any objections.

It's only when the cold February wind is kissing your cheeks that you dare to look over at him. He's looking back at the club, eyes narrowed.

"How long?" he asks quietly.

"Barely even ten minutes," you half lie. "Really. He didn't do anything until you showed up, I promise."

You tug at his hand. "It's late. Let's go home, please?"

He finally looks at you, eyes flat and face blank. That scares you even worse than if he was frothing at the mouth and swearing.

"Alright," he says mechanically, "Let's go home."

Usually you take the train to work or he drives you. So when he starts walking, you don't immediately realise the streets are all wrong. His car is nowhere to be seen.

Even though Spring isn't that far off, this late at night the city is still icy. You wrap your arms around yourself and it doesn't take him long to notice.

"Koko. Kore o kite kudasai. [Here. Wear this]." He pulls off his suit jacket and drapes it across your shoulders. It smells like him - cologne and cigarettes. You aren't sure when, but at some point that scent became the one you associated with safety, with home.

It's quiet. You can't exactly ask him what work he did while he was gone and you most definitely aren't going to mention the club again.

He's the one who finally breaks the silence. "Purezento o moraimashita. [I got you a present]."

He did mention that earlier.

"Can I guess what it is?"

That earns you a half smile."Mochiron. [Sure]."

"Chocolate."

"No. Not this time."

"Hmm... Flowers?"

"They make you sneeze."

True. But what else would he have bought you for Valentine's?

"A puppy?"

He doesn't immediately reply. Eventually, "I really didn't think about that one. Do you...want a puppy?"

You first instinct is to say yes. Who wouldn't want a puppy? Despite having him, your brother, and your friends from the club, Japan is still a lonely place for you. A puppy would remind you of home.

But it would also make Japan your new home. In a way you aren't sure you want. In your mind, it still feels like you'll leave soon, be gone next week or next month, when this debt issue is settled. Even your boyfriend feels temporary. This isn't your country.

"No," you say eventually, "Not yet."

He must be thinking along the same lines as you because at your reply, his smile thins and he looks away from you.

"Nande ya, ano ko ni inu demo kattaro ka. Muriyari ore to ora setaru wa. [Shoulda got her a damn puppy. Force her to stay with me]."

You don't understand Japanese well enough to understand him when he changes his dialect. He manages a smile.

"Not a puppy either. Do you give up?"

You hate losing. You pull his jacket tighter around yourself. "...Yeah I give up."

He slows to a stop."Mewotojite. [Close your eyes]."

He takes your hand in his and lays something in your palm. You open your eyes to see a diamond necklace on a bed on midnight blue velvet. And it's definitely diamond - even in the neon soaked streets of the Red Light District, it sparkles. You gasp.

You're almost scared to touch it. It looks beyond expensive. Like something you pass in a store window and tell yourself maybe someday.

"You like it?"

You look up at him, eyes wide. "It's incredible. I've never... I've never owned something this beautiful."

He looks beyond smug. He plucks it out of the box and in one smooth move has it around your throat. His fingers brush the nape of your neck as he fastens the clip.

If you were on you own, you'd never dare to wear it out on the street. But only a colossal idiot would try and grab it off your neck when there was an armed yakuza right next to you. You shouldn't feel safer in the company of a criminal, but you do. God help you, you do.

He presses a kiss against your temple."Watashi no gārufurendo ni totte saikō no mono dake.[Only the best for my girl]."

It scares you a little - how much he's willing to spend on you. How are you supposed to repay a gift like this?

"Ie ni kaerimashou.[Let's go home]," he coos in your ear.

You laugh and loop your arm through his. "Want me to show you exactly how much I love my gift?"

"Yes." His voice is low and almost strained. "God yes."

It's only when you're halfway down the street that you remember you have something for him too.

"Oh! I almost forgot!" you spin away from him and dig through your handbag. "Ta-da! A hostess at work was telling me that it's usually the girls who give gifts on Valentine's."

You hand over the chocolate you bought him. It's a thick slab with Turkish delight in the centre. You've stuck a plethora of pink and red hearts to the box, each one with a sappy little quote in the centre.

You feel a little silly giving a gift like this to a yakuza of all people. But you also want to do something for your boyfriend, even if it is sickeningly romantic.

You picked up on him liking Turkish delight when your brother bought you a box, and it was mysteriously empty when you got home that day. Your yakuza claimed he didn't touch it, but he tasted suspiciously like rose candy when you kissed him.

He takes it from you carefully. "For me?"

You stand on your toes and loop your arms around his neck.

"Will you be my Valentine?"

He's quiet for a moment or two, looking at you like he just can't understand you. Finally, he pulls you into him and buries his face in your neck. He takes a deep breath, but when he speaks his voice is just a bit unsteady.

"Of course I'll be yours. Ore wa zutto omae no mon'ya de. [I'll always be yours.]"

A man with a rap sheet as long as a CVS receipt, and somehow he's yours.

You pull him closer against you. "Thank you. For taking care of me. For helping me out when you had no reason to."

He hums quietly against your neck. "Nan demo surude, honma ni nan demo. [I'll do anything for you. Anything]."

He pulls away and something in his face tells you he's just had an idea. He peels the hearts off the box and carefully folds them into his pocket. He breaks off a piece of chocolate and holds it up to your mouth.

You're immediately suspicious of the smirk on his face, but you oblige and let him prop the chocolate between your lips. He leaves a piece sticking out of your mouth and before you can bite it off, he leans forward and does it for you. His hand slips around the nape of your neck to keep you still.

His lips barely brush yours.

He pulls away looking extremely satisfied. You've kissed him so many times already but your heart doesn't care. You can hear your blood rushing through your ears.

"Sweet," he runs his thumb across your bottom lip and then presses it against his tongue. "Just how I like it."

Damn him for a devil and a half. It's so totally unfair how giddy and nervous he makes you feel.

He nods at the building behind you. "Good thing we're already home."

"Home?" Is this his apartment? He never brings you to his apartment.

He leads you to the elevator and to your surprise has to use a key card to access the highest floor. The buildings in this part of town are cramped for space but when the elevator dings open, it does so in a broad corridor lined with heavy doors. He must be earning much more than you realised, to have a place like this.

He pauses on the threshold.

"Gotta carry you in. It's tradition."

"Only if we're newlyweds."

"Not true," He blatantly lies, hands drifting down your back. "Brings you luck for the rest of the year."

Before you can object, he sweeps his arm under your knees and scoops you up bridal style.

"Risuku wa toritakunai de. Un wa zenbu hoshī wa. [Not taking any chances. I want all the luck I can get]."

You don't get to see much of his loft-style apartment before he drops you on his bed. One knee already pressing into the mattress next to your waist.

He drops his head down to kiss the column of your throat.

"You'll be wearing nothing except your necklace when I'm done with you," he promises, voice already dropping to a slurred, needy growl.

Oh my. That's a new one. And you always took him for the lacy lingerie type.

You tug at his shirt but with one twist of his hand, he catches both your wrists. "No. You first."

"Impatient aren't we?"

His hands are already skimming down your back and unzipping your dress.

"Oh you have no idea how patient I'm being."

His lips dip past your collarbones and then lower still. You arch against his chest, breathless.

At the last second he pulls away. You practically whine.

"Move in with me."

You blink. "What?" Is he really asking you this while you're in your bra and panties? And when there are much better things to do with his mouth?

"You heard me. Maiban beddoni ite hoshī. [I want you in my bed everynight]."

You frown. Wouldn't it be dangerous? More dangerous than working in a yakuza club and sharing his bed already was?

His grip on you tightens. He isn't smiling anymore. "You're my girl. You should stay with me. Not your brother. And sure as hell not on your own."

"I-"

He slides down your body until his head is between your thighs. "Good. I'll get someone to move your things tomorrow."

"Wait, I didn't say -" He does something with his tongue that makes you gasp and arch your back.

"No more objections?" he mocks. You're too breathless to answer.

"Ēyan. Kikitakatta kotoya wa. [Good. Just what I want to hear]."

He's awake long before sunrise. You're still curled under his sheets, lovebites littered across your neck.

He didn't give you a chance to notice them last night, but there's a bouquet of roses waiting for you on the nightstand.

He leans in the balcony door, cigarette smoke curling between his teeth. Just watching you.

His girl. His to touch. His to have. His to hold and keep.

Do you have any idea how lucky you are that it was him you ran into that night? If it was anyone else sent to collect your brother's debt, they'd have just left you to drown under the mountain of interest. Let it get so bad that you couldn't possibly pay your way out and then offer you a job at a soapland. Hell, that was his plan too when he first laid eyes on you. Pretty thing like you would have made a fortune as a yūjo.

But then you went and made him fall for you. It's selfish of him to want you. He knows it's dangerous to have you on his arm. That blonde bastard from last night was proof enough. He knows, and still...

You can't expect a criminal to be selfless. You can't show him something precious and expect him to let it go.

"My girl." He exhales a cloud of smoke and leans his head back. "Gonna make you my wife someday. You just don't know it yet."

[tumblerislovetumblerislife]

minor corrections: there are two tiers, ainur and maiar (three if you count eru illuvatar but he's his own thing). morgoth is an ainu (the higher tier), and sauron is a maia (the lower tier), but gandalf, saruman, and the balrog are also maia, so they're on the same tier as sauron. ungoliant and shelob are never explicitly placed in this hierarchy, but given how ungoliant overpowers morgoth, she would be on a similar tier to him in terms of power. as for shelob, there's a bit in lotr describing how sauron thinks of her as a pet cat:

And as for Sauron: he knew where she lurked. It pleased him that she should dwell there hungry but unabated in malice, a more sure watch upon that ancient path into his land than any other that his skill could have devised. And Orcs, they were useful slaves, but he had them in plenty. If now and again Shelob caught them to stay her appetite, she was welcome: he could spare them. And sometimes as a man may cast a dainty to his cat (his cat he calls her, but she owns him not) Sauron would send her prisoners that he had no better uses for: he would have them driven to her hole, and report brought back to him of the play she made.

(the archaic sense of owe as in "acknowledge"/"yield to", so "his cat he calls her, but she owns him not" meaning she doesn't recognize his authority (x))

also, the deal between ungoliant and morgoth relates to three gems, the silmarils, which have nothing to do with sauron's helmet, although morgoth does wear them in a crown. however by the time lotr comes around, the silmarils no longer exist as-is in middle-earth: one was cast in the true sea, another into a volcano, and the last is at the prow of a semi-mythical ship (and, fun fact, the source of light in the phial galadriel gives frodo, which he ends up using against shelob!)

Thinking of the larger context of LOTR and like, the fellowship swapping old war stories and shit and Sam just says “Yeah I killed a huge spider…Shelob, I think?”

And Gandalf just blinks and is like, “You what now?”

“Yeah, killed it. Had to save Frodo”

Gandalf elects not to tell Sam that he killed the spawn of a primordial demon.

[ghost-proofbaby]

GHOOOST i saw your valentine blurb event and thought i’d drop in something! 🥹

24 hours eddie has been living in my mind rent free and i can’t help but feel like he’s the type to act tough and all that, but instantly melts into a gooey simpy lovesick puddle the second you call him “baby” ❤️ like yeah he likes to be called nicknames like ed or eds, but petnames??? he’s done for. just turns into a blushing blubbering mess. especially with the way he has repressed all his emotions for so long, it’s fun to kind of tease him and call him “handsome” “pretty boy” “baby boy” just to see him break his facade and just unapologetically be the golden retriever that he really is ❤️❤️❤️

i think my favorite thing about this vision is the way he would try to fight it so bad. hiding his face in your neck and blushing all terrible and gaaaaaaaahh. i hope this does it justice <3

warnings: fem!reader. reader is described to be wearing a dress, makeup, earrings, and heels. not edited. set in twenty four hours universe, after the story!

“Eddie!” 

No answer.

“Eds!” 

No answer.

“Edward Munson!” 

Your patience is wearing thin as you finally pop on the back of the earring you had been struggling with. The studs weren’t even anything fancy, hardly worth all the time you’d just spent fighting with it, but you were determined to look nice. 

Valentine’s Day. A day meant to be filled with blissful serenity and endless heart eyes, that was really only becoming the bane of your existence. 

“I swear to God,” you mumble to yourself, huffing a bit as you try to clean up the mess you’ve made of the bathroom sink. Makeup everywhere, various pieces of jewelry scattered, your curling iron still warm on the edge of porcelain. You decide rather quickly it’s a mess to be dealt with later tonight. Or tomorrow. Or next week. “If he’s still fucking with that bike.” 

The sharp clicks of your heels transform as you walk from tile to laminate-wood flooring, becoming a bit more dull and less obnoxious as you take the hallway by storm. 

Next year, you’re telling Steve to go fuck himself if he tries to lure you and Eddie into another double date. 

“Eddie, we only have thirty minutes until we nee-” you stress as you reach the end of the hall, cutting off entirely as you catch sight of the living room. 

Of the living room, and your boyfriend. 

“What is that?” 

You think you might actually kill him. 

“What?” Eddie doesn’t even look up at you, and you make a mental strike against him, “I told you, I’m working on the bi-”

“Yes,” you cut him off, taking a few harsh steps into the very crowded living room, “You were supposed to bring up a part of the bike. Why is the entire bike in our living room, Munson?” 

You mean it – you’re going to kick his ass by the end of today. 

His bike is propped up there, right in front of the TV, entirely blocking the pathway to the balcony. The bike that should be outside. The bike that certainly has God knows what all over the tires, and is sitting right on your rug you just bought for the living room. 

Eddie stops his tinkering with whatever piece he’d removed from the bike to work on on the coffee table, abiding by your rule of having a towel down below it to avoid getting grease everywhere, “What do you mean?” 

He’s playing dumb. And he probably thinks he looks cute as he does it, but no amount of fluttering lashes or boyish grins can soothe your irritation. 

“You’re an idiot, but you’re not stupid,” you hiss as you cross the room and stand right in front of him, only seeing the crown of his head as he keeps his eyes dipped low in shame, “When did you… How did you…. When the fuck did you bring the bike up?” 

You can hardly manage a fluent sentence as you look between Eddie and the bike, mind blown in the truest sense. 

His voice is a mere murmur as he fiddles with one of his wrenches, flipping it over a few times before he answers, “While you were in the shower.” 

“How?” 

“The frat boys downstairs,” he rushes out in one breath, eyes still locked on the ground rather than you. “I, uh, paid a few of them to help me lug it up.”

You sigh heavily, throwing your head back before you move to the couch and dramatically throw yourself down with defeat, “You’re a real pain in my ass, you know that, Munson?” 

“You say that like it’s new news,” he says as he twists to finally look at you, eyebrow quirked and the shadow of his dimple making an appearance while he fights a smug smile, “I think you’d be more worried if I wasn’t being a pain in your ass.” 

He’s right. It doesn’t slow the roll of your eyes, though. 

“You know I love you, right?” you say, suddenly using a sickeningly sweet tone as you lean in closer to where he sits on the ground. His face falls a bit, confusion lacing his brows together, “But, baby, if you keep this up… I’m going to kick your ass.” 

He should look a whole lot more scared than he currently does as you deliver the threat, but he entirely throws you off when he grins. 

An ear splitting grin, spreading cheek from cheek, radiating with anything but trepidation. He lights up, posture perking up as he looks at you with soft eyes. It looks as though you might have told him you loved him for the first time all over again, as though you’ve just reminded him of how you wanted to spend your life with him rather than said you were going to kick his ass. 

The fight and issue at hand is momentarily forgotten as he whispers, “What did you just call me?” 

“What did I just call you?” you question incredulously, leaning back fully, wholly concerned now. Maybe you should call Steve and cancel the date, “I- I just threatened to kick your ass, and you’re making heart eyes at me, asking me what I just called you?”

You rewind a bit in your brain, going over the moment again, trying to figure out if you’d let something unusual slip. Deciphering any moment that might have pulled this reaction from him. 

You come up empty. Nothing. 

“Did you just…” he trails off, cheeks surely aching as they shine with a bit of natural blush, “Did you just call me baby?” 

Oh. That. 

You look about the room for a second, taking in this predicament you’d gotten yourself into, “Do you not want me to call you that? I just-”

“No!” he rushes to stop you before you can take it back, “I mean, it’s fine. That’s not the issue, I just-” 

He cuts off, and you realize just how flustered he is. 

Now you’re smiling, right along with him, “You like it?” 

“Sort of,” he shrugs, going a bit shy on you now, “It… I mean, if you want to start calling me stuff like that, I don’t mind. It’s fine. It’s cool.” 

“Baby,” you say in place of his name, so naturally, like honey. You’re leaning forward once more, entering his orbit as you softly tease, “You’re blushing.” 

The words turn him even more scarlet, “Fuck off.”

“What?” it’s your turn to act innocent, rearranging yourself on the couch to be more comfortable, “I thought you said you liked it when I called you stuff like that-”

Eddie movies quickly from the floor, gathering himself up in record time that would have had him groaning in protest on any other occasion. You’ve hardly leaned an elbow back on the couch’s arm when he gets on top of you.

Even if he’s trying to stop you from all your taunting with his words, his kiss says otherwise.

It’s hot, heavy, desperate – like alarm bells might be ringing in his head and telling him to run to the nearest safety of your lips. You welcome him in, of course. Take his lips right between yours with an eagerness to match, forgetting all about the lipstick you’d just applied moments before. Thighs spreading to bring him home to you, arms quickly searching out solace of all the skin below his Deftones t-shirt. Straining biceps as he holds himself over you, squared shoulders as he balances to stay right where he belongs. His chest even heaves ever so slightly with little gasps between kisses, both your lungs needing air despite the magnetic protest between you two. 

“God,” you gasp out during one of those short breaks, making him divert a kiss to the corner of your mouth instead, “If you’re gonna kiss me like this every time I call you baby, I should do it more often,” he grunts, and tries to reignite a kiss, probably just to shut you up. You don’t let him, turning a cheek and forcing his searching mouth to plant a peck there instead, laughing a little, “Maybe I should be sure to use the nickname during dinner with Steve, hm?” 

“Don’t you dare,” he groans as his lips seek out your jaw and neck next, peppering kisses between words. For each syllable, there’s a smack of his lips against your skin. 

You ponder back to the time before you saw this side of Eddie; before someone so soft, so caring, so affectionate existed for you. It’s hard to even recall all those times now with the puddle of a man hovering over you. 

“No?” you hum, head thrown back, letting him have his way as your fingers toy with the band around his bun, “What about pretty boy instead?” 

Another groan, vibrating against your skin. 

“Or handsome?” 

This time, he nips the sensitive spot below your ear with his teeth in response.

You gasp, half from the bite and half with faux enthusiasm, “Oh! I know! I’ll take one out of your books and call you sweetheart.” 

He finally moans in annoyance, and you know it’s all an act as he faceplants into your chest. You can feel his smile, radiant as ever, muffled by your skin and dress. 

“You’re such a pain in my ass,” his echo of your earlier words come out around the cotton neckline, “You know that?” 

You ruffle the kinks of his curls at his scalp a little, giving a scratch for good measure, “Yeah. Tell me something I don’t know, handsome.” 

The full weight of him falls along your body finally, and he has a boyish glint when he raises his head. Seeking hands find promise along your hips, bunching the fabric of your black dress up into his fists before he’s kissing you again. 

A little less hot, a little less heavy, a little less desperate. Just as rewarding as before, though. 

Somewhere between simply nice and deathly devoted, you two let your mouths explore at a leisure pace. His lips, the apples of his cheeks, the line of his jaw down to his chin – no space is left unkissed, and you finally notice the smear of red lipstick. 

“Oh, shit,” you laugh out, not sounding the least bit sorry as you look at the fading marks left behind, “I got my lipstick all over you.” 

When he lifts from the crook of your neck, you catch the stain feathering out around his own lips, a bit smeared along his chin, “And you. I dunno if we can go to dinner lookin’ like this, doll.” 

You get it. His reaction to your slip of a pet name. 

You have the same reaction as he does it to you, gut fluttering and chest buzzing with tenderness at the sentiments. It’s a simple thing, probably a bit cheesy and cringey to outsiders, but it works between the two of you. You like hearing him grant you the pleasure of a nickname, whether it be sweetheart or doll. You love the hidden devotion beneath the delivery, whether it be idiot or fool. 

There’s always an unspoken my in the mix. A certain sense of belonging to him that you can’t really explain to others without being looked at as if you’ve grown a second head. 

Why would you want to belong to another person, in any sense of the word? 

The answer feels simple enough when you look up at your boy, covered and pretty in Maybelline’s “Ruby for Me”.

“You’re not getting out of this double date,” you whisper back, still toying with his hair, still looking up at him with all the love you’re capable of growing within this chest of yours. It’s a bit more than yesterday, that much you’re sure. Each day, he finds a way to push the limits just a bit more, make a little bit more room behind your ribs for all the affection you hold for him, “If I’m stuck in this impending disaster, so are you.” 

He sighs, head slipping into the crook of your neck, “Yeah… Yeah, that sounds about right.” 

“Don’t sound so disappointed.” 

“Me? Disappointed with you?” he gasps, breath hot on your skin still as he snuggles in a little closer, grips the soft fabric of your dress a little tighter, “Oh, never.”

“Oh, so you decide to sound sarcastic instead?” you’re fighting a grin, trying to find a reason to be mad at him again. Hell, you even glance at the motorcycle in your damn living room to reignite the smallest of sparks – nothing, “You wound me, pretty boy.” 

“You’re all about stealing my lines tonight, I see,” he teases as he finally begins to peel himself away from you. He’s all soft – soft eyes, soft smile, soft cheeks, soft flush. Soft, soft, soft. “I guess if there’s no way to convince you to stay home instead of going to this stupid double date, we both gotta get cleaned up now.” 

You adore him. If you could bottle up all that softness you’re witnessing with your own two eyes just for a rainy day, you would. 

He starts to stand on his knees, moving to leave you entirely and take all that mellow delight away from you too soon, when you lock your heels against his lower back. 

Wrapping your legs a little too tightly around his waist, you raise a brow, “You may not be able to convince me to stay home entirely, but… no one ever said you couldn’t convince me to be about, let’s say, ten minutes late.” 

He tilts his head at you, eyes wide, “Only ten minutes?” 

“Okay, you’ve twisted my arm. Let’s make it fifteen.” 

He crashes back into you in an instant, both of you giggling in the process. 

With the weight of your pretty boy between your hips, and the caress of his lips against your chest, you accidentally make it nearly thirty minutes late. You don’t really care – not when it comes to Eddie.

[dont-look-its-embarrassing]

Inner Ace pt.2

The Hunting Incident

I'm glad you guys like this idea! Personally, I couldn't really jive well with the image of Feyre just balls to the wall learning how to hunt suddenly and being perfect at it to survive. This storyline was my original bridge for that in my mind, so I am glad that it went well with you all :)

Update right before I post; I'm going to be honest I got EXTREMELY carried away with this one, so I apologize for the length...

Summary: As the time went by and tensions rose between the human lands and fae, the IC have been working tirelessly to try and maintain a balance and a new ally. As The High Lord and Lady cannot be outside their court for long (as other matters must be attended to in preparation for the war), Azriel is designated liaison for reporting back on the movements and whereabouts of the human queens. Having become friends through Feyre, Azriel finds himself spending more time with the human girl, coming to his own conclusion of close friendship and more? Late nights between the two have confusing tensions rise, that is until the Inner court makes a group stop to check in with Y/n before talking with the queens. An accident has not only the IC realizing this bond might go deeper then friends, but a realization within the Spymaster himself as he finds himself gazing at the beautiful woman more often than not.

Warnings: injury, cannon typical violence, fluff, sexual tension, (a little) angst, potential non-cannon faebane workings (ngl some of it is lost on me), non-cannon time (meaning it is a bit longer of a timeline bc wym this all happened in less than a couple years?!), injury, alcohol consumption

Pt 1 Masterlist

WC (I forgot this in the first part, oops): 11,301

The time that Feyre and the males came and went from her home left Y/n's head spinning. Although for a couple days, the relief and warmth within her home was notably missing upon their departure back to their court. Although Y/n understood that Feyre had in fact become an influential power figure within their world, the hole that she leaves when her presence is gone always has Y/n reeling. She wouldn't describe herself as some who is dependent on another person or her friends, but it sure does make the cold nights a bit warmer with the promise of seeing them tomorrow. Y/n had grown extremely close to the bunch within her home. As her status of 'best friend' with Feyre was any sort of key, the rest of the males quickly followed suit with dinners and time spent with each other talking and getting to know about the other party. Although Cassian had to be cut off with some of the stupid invasive questions he asked the girl, it only fueled the bond that they all began to share. It made the goodbye (although not for forever) harder for them all.

"You need to come back and see me." Y/n had eyed the Feyre down, not allowing her to break. "This isn't a request or some sort of bargain that I don't understand. You are going to make time for a sit-down gossip session like we used to have."

Laughing as if this plan would happen within a week, at most, Feyre had embraced Y/n in an all-encompassing hug.

"Of course."

Giving a nod and pulling away, Y/n's eyes had met that of the High Lord, Rhys. Upon a small chat with Feyre, Y/n had been informed that this man, or male, was Feyre's forever bond or something. He had offered a warm smile, one that Y/n sent back easily.

Again, something that the human girl didn't fully understand, but respected none the less.

"Thank you for letting us stay. I know that it was a risk, we won't forget that and are in your debt." The small eye roll that Y/n couldn't hold made him chuckle.

"Relax there, lover boy." A nickname that again, upon hearing about her best friend's lover, was given. It had caused an exaggerated aghast look when Y/n had used it only days ago, which also made her tense in worry that she had insulted him, but the loud laughs that Feyre couldn't hold in let her tension ease.

The chuckle to her right brought her attention to the gentle giant that she now knows as Cass. He was a breeze to get along with to say the least. Although her initial assessment as him being the biggest- thus- scariest was the most far off out of the three. Granted, he was a force to be reckoned with, but amongst friends he was nothing but a pile of jokes, laughs and warmth.

His large stature altered a bit sideways as he folded his large wings into himself further as to not hit his brother, turning towards Y/n.

"I'm offended I didn't get an invite to this gossip session." The human girl laughed while giving a hug into the side of the larger male.

"You can't gossip when the topic of the gossip is there." She joked. Shaking his head, Cassian offered another squeeze to her body before letting go and stepping back a bit.

Then all who was left was Azriel.

The very male that she admittedly harbored a small stupid crush on as his soft shadows continued to swirl around her space. They had had multiple conversations, but also multiple silences, just allowing each other to exist in the other's company. Over these past few days, it was found that they had very similar sleeping habits, finding it hard to find peace to rest and keeping them up to all hours of the night. Initially, the small creek of the Spymaster sneaking out of his room the first night had Y/n shooting up off the couch, throwing the book she had been reading to the ground. Azriel had apologized that night for startling her, but it was also the night they became comfortable within the space together.

"Can't sleep?" Her voice was soft, soft enough to have the spymaster's eyes flutter slightly at the sound. Her silhouette was illuminated by the hearth that still flickered in life, it made the curve of her form warm and inviting to his eye. The setting was oddly, intimate.

"No, sadly." He offered. Y/n nodded while taking ahold of her hands, laying them in front of herself. Azriel realized it wasn't a defensive or uncomfortable gesture, just one that was simply inquiring. Not knowing what else to offer, Azriel attempted to meet her halfway realizing he had stepped into her impromptu 'room' as she had given away her only beds to himself and his court. "Cassian snores."

Azriel winced the moment the sentence came out of his mouth. Never in his life has he felt so inept to talk to a female.

However, nothing could prepare him for the soft bell like sound of a hushed giggle that resonated from Y/n. Her eyes held mirth as she picked up the book from the floor and moved her bedding over on the larger seat, placing herself in one of the corners.

"Well, you are more than welcome to come here for some peace. I normally read until much later." Offering the seat on the other corner of the more comfortable couch Azriel couldn't push down the budding warmth that spread within his chest.

Y/n couldn’t help it. She didn’t know why her nerves settled with this fae in particular, but the dry remark of Cassian snoring had her defensive pacifism towards him dropping like the dead. He looked just as lost and hesitant as she was, she couldn’t help but giggle at it. The image of this tall, dark and handsome powerful being having the same reserves about someone as frail as herself made this whole ‘I should be worried’ thing seem petulant. If he truly meant her harm, she knew she would’ve already been dead.

He stood there for a moment, Y/n assumed he was trying to figure out what to do about the offer.

“There are some novels on the shelf under the stairs.” She offered. “You’re more than welcome to help yourself if you need something to pass the time.”

"Thank you." His tone was soft enough to match Y/n's as he took a step or two over to the desired pages. Assessing the shelf's titles, he grabbed one, grey in color. Brining himself back to the offered seat, Y/n made sure to do one more check to see if he had space to sit and adjust. Upon his weight settling on the cushion less than a foot away from her, she relaxed back into her position.

A soft silence settled over the two as the popping of the fire's light licked at their skin.

Azriel didn't know how much time had passed, he was a good chunk of his novel through, when he glanced back to the human girl. Y/n had been fully engrossed in the story that played before her. Luckily, the binding of the book didn't give way to the soft love story that unfolded within the pages. The glimmer in her eye caught by the Spymaster as a question flooded his mind. Without much thought, he let his inquiry slip through his lips, falling victim to the comforting nature of his company.

"How do you know how to read?" The deep baritone broke Y/n out of her trance. However, the question made an easy sly smile spread on her face. Slowly turning her head to meet Azriel's gaze, Y/n couldn't tell if it was the warmth of the fire that painted his cheeks in a dusty rose, of it he truly didn't think before he spoke.

Azriel wanted the floor to swallow him.

What was he thinking?

How do you know how to read? Really.

The laughs of his shadows taunted him as he swallowed, beginning to try and dig himself out of his never-ending hole.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean it like that-" Scanning her face, that sly smile and raised brows queued him into her train of thought just enough to cut himself off. "You think it's funny." He whispered a deadpan.

"I think this is hilarious, to be quite frank." Y/n closed her book, placing it at her side while returning her attention back to the male. "Out of the two of us, I should be the one stumbling over my words and saying the wrong things."

A sigh followed through her lips; Az fought himself to lean closer.

"But here you are, all of you." Y/n gestured to the bulk of the male on the couch, "Do I make you nervous?"

Azriel allowed his shoulders to fall, melt into the space and even felt his guard lower enough for the girl to peek through.

"I haven't figured that out yet." He offered, placing his book down as well, allowing himself to turn towards the girl. A brief pause as they looked at each other.

"You were asking that because Feyre couldn't, right?" Y/n began. Az nodded a simple 'yes', allowing her to bring her knees to her chest, getting comfortable. "I barely knew myself when I found her, and we became close. I had maybe two, no, three books?" Y/n's eyes had glazed in memory.

"It was always on the list of things to try and teach her, but I could only work so fast." The spymaster quirked his head towards her at that, an elaborative gesture. "Survival seemed more important." Was all Y/n gave him. She had hoped it wasn't received as a 'I don't want to talk about it', but it was simply a sore spot for her. She had faulted herself on all the things she never got to do with her best friend, but truly, some things were more important.

"From when she left, I got better. Taught myself to read more sophisticated books to a degree and attempting to write when I could." Y/n looked down, blush coating her cheeks. "I still can't write very well. It isn't super legible."

Azriel had imagined this was similar to how his brother felt upon realizing the female in front of him was pushed aside on something so vital but simple.

"Would you like to practice? I can help."

"You are only going to be here for a couple days."

"I'll be back." Y/n was surprised at the instancy and promise that laced Azriel's voice. For her, she would be lucky to see Feyre again after this, but now, there is another promise for someone else to come see her. For someone else to care about seeing her.

"Okay." The heat didn't leave her cheeks for the rest of the night as their conversation continued after that, soft and vulnerable in nature. As the rest of the house slept, it would be a little secret of theirs and routine for the following days. Every night, right as Cassian would start to snore within the shared bedroom, Y/n could count on the shadow of wings and a soft hum of blue stones making his way down to the couch, grabbing a book on his way.

"I'll be back." Azriel said, bringing back Y/n the present. His tone wasn't as warm as that night, but the underlying promise still stood prominent between them. A small elbow jab into the side of Rhys had him turning to his mate, clocking the excitement in her eyes as she watched the two.

You are sending him back here upon the earliest opportunity.

Of course, Feyre darling.

Y/n hadn't moved from her spot and Azriel didn't know if he should go for an embrace like his brother or keep his distance. Everything in his being told him closer, closer, closer.

Closer. Closer. Closer. Embrace. She wants it. Embrace.

Or it was just his shadows pushing him towards her. Y/n had noticed during the time they spent together; his shadows couldn't help but flock to the similar nape of her neck like they had done the night they met. Upon its repeated offense, Y/n had assured the spymaster that it was a welcomed experience and to not worry about it. To her, she couldn't quite grasp the whole 'they are a part of me' conversation, so in her mind, every so often the slipped out from his control.

Azriel didn't correct this way of thinking at all. In fact, he indulged in it more than he probably should have. When she had left for the woods, a small cluster of them had followed her without much of her knowledge. Anytime her frame was out of his gaze a small tendril would follow, reporting back to its' owner of any inconvenience or issue that she might come across. It was a precautionary measure for his high lady's best friend, at least that is what he told himself as his mind eased with the quick sight of shadow darting behind her neck.

The brush of wind and breath against Y/n's ear had her shiver slightly. Even without a welcome embrace of the male, this was oddly more him.

As the group funneled out of the door, the promise of aid and help floated in her direction before they had disappeared into what seemed was the wind.

She wouldn't see anyone from that group again until a week or so later when a rapt on her door drew her attention from the meal she was prepping for that night. She hadn't been expecting anyone, her normal buyer for game wasn't set to arrive until next week and her produce hadn't grown in for the month yet to be selling, so Y/n was at a loss.

Hesitantly making her way to the door, she stopped to listen to see if anyone would inquire about who they were or what they wanted. Upon pressing her hands against the door in preparation to crack it open, a familiar breath against her ear made an involuntary smile take ahold of her features.

"You know, it is pretty cold out here. Could you please open the door?" The voice of Azriel came out muffled through the wood.

Y/n couldn't open the door quick enough to grab the male and drag him inside.

A small chuckle rung from him as he followed her in quickly.

"You can't do that!" She chastised, quickly closing the curtains and peeping out the window to make sure nobody was around.

"I didn't want to be rude."

"Ya? Well, be rude. You will get yourself killed otherwise."

"Am I supposed to just winnow in here then?"

"Win what?" Azriel stopped, placing a small sack down on the couch, turning to her with amusement in his eyes. His brow raised in question, asking to continue, it had Y/n nodding.

"Remember when we left?" Y/n nodded again; the motion making the spymaster's chest flutter. "It seemed that we just..." He searched for the word, "disappeared?"

"Yes, I assumed one of you had magic wind powers that no one told me about." Y/n knew she sounded stupid, ignorant even, but this whole experience made her ignorant to what felt like everything. However, Y/n would be as ignorant as she needed to be to elicit the loud laugh that came from Azriel. He was sat down now, all but sprawled on the couch in laze. The two had been comfortable before, now with his return it seemed they had entered a much deeper trust.

"No, that's not-" another laugh, "not how it works." Y/n followed suit, letting herself settle on the nearby seat. She giggled at the situation.

"What? You can't expect me to get that right first guess." Her giggles filled in the space between Azriel's now dwindling laugh.

"It is actually close now that I think about it." Looking to her again he began his short explanation. "It is some sort of magic. Cassian can't do it."

"Ah, I see. Doesn't have the ol' flare that the rest of you have?" The spymaster didn't want to think to clearly about the ease in which this girl pulled a relaxed smile from him.

"No, I guess not." He had continued with his little explanation, Y/n nodding the whole way through. Upon his finale she had adjusted herself to stand again. His eye's grazed over her form as she stood.

"Where are you going?" Her cheeks warmed.

"Just to add some more ingredients for dinner."

"Oh, speaking of which..." Az had reached for the bad he had tossed onto the furniture earlier, prying open the top. Reaching in he had grabbed a handful of a smaller pouch that resided in it. Upon tossing it towards Y/n, her hand instinctually catching it from the air. It was heavy and 'clinked' when it landed within her palm, that familiar weight and sound had the girl's eyes widening. "That is from the court."

"By the gods, this is a little much for a couple months, no?" It wasn't that Y/n was ungrateful, but a pouch filled as much as this one could have her living more than comfortably for a long time around here.

"It isn't that much Y/n."

"Yes, it is."

"Not for Rhys."

"Still, I feel bad."

"Why do you feel bad?"

"Because I feel like I'm using you guys."

"You are not using us."

"Really? Because how heavy this is I would say I'm using."

"Just take the coins Y/n."

"Okay."

Y/n twirled back towards the kitchen, quickly finding her stash of money and hiding it away. The quick banter between the two lingering in the air as a grin still remained on both of their faces. Following through with her plan, Y/n began adding some more portions to the already marinating meats.

The hours passed by quickly, an ease of comfort and warmth enveloping the two while Azriel got his tasks in order for what he needs to find and where he could go to find it. Y/n didn't pry much about his work, obviously seeing the tenseness gradually seeping into his form with each shadow that would return to him. So, as dinner came and went, the girl had made herself busy preparing his room and planning her route for the next day.

When she came back to the living room moments later, Y/n was surprised to see the lack of the hulking male that was once sat on her couch. Picking up her pace, she had quickly cracked the front door to see if he had left by foot. Upon finding no footprints on the snow, she shut the door and returned to cleaning up the place a bit more before his return.

Hours ticked by, Y/n had changed and prepped for bed quietly stepping back into her living room, grabbing the latest novel on her way. She had adorned a simple nightgown, nothing fancy or elaborate like what she had seen the Archerons wear after Feyre's departure, but the garment was divine to sleep in, emphasizing the "gorgeous silhouette" that her best friend had insisted about. She had worn it many times before, but the idea of the Spymaster seeing her in it had her heart skip a beat at the thought.

Y/n had taken her seat across from the fire that cackled, opened her novel, and began to read.

Azriel was annoyed.

He had gotten a whisper from one of his shadows about movement within one of the queen's guards and upon his departure, he didn't even have time to leave a note. Az knew that she wouldn't fret after hearing the summary of winnowing hours prior, but the thought of her looking for him without explanation about his absence struck a chord within his chest. He had been staked out for hours, not moving or even twitching from his position amongst the dark. The whispers continued to circle him, all reporting the same thing.

He had wasted his time tonight, there was nothing substantial going on with the Human Queen.

He let the vein in his forehead throb with the clench of his jaw. He had turned once more, checking the area around himself before settling on the decision to leave. His body almost longed for warmth despite his anatomy making it very hard for him to be actually cold. Azriel stopped his thought before he could dive any deeper on the thought of the specific heat he craved.

Home. Back. Beauty. Soft. Beauty. Leave.

It was a drug he couldn't quit. Without much else of a thought, Azriel had allowed his shadows to take him back to your little house that stood at the edge of the wall. Taking your prior conversation (and as much of a threat as Y/n could conjure towards him), he had winnowed right into the living room, bypassing the door.

Warm. Soft. Beauty. Look. Look. Look.

Azriel's eyes had trailed over to the couch, Y/n's form capturing his attention immediately. His shadows hadn't been lying, the way you laid was that of a spiritual sight. The curve of your body held gently by a soft looking nightdress that she must've put on after he left. The familiar lick of the hearth's light caressing her softly, almost akin to the most attuned lover, kissing her skin and shadows.

I was a sight that Azriel forced himself to memorize, and one that he knew he would see in his dreams to come.

It was obvious that you had been reading, the novel fallen on to the floor with some pages crinkled with its own weight.

Although Azriel didn't want to disrupt the sight of something so vulnerable and captivating, the thought of her sore body the next day from a fitful rest on the used couch made him move quickly. He had prayed to whatever deity that listened that his 'quiet' reputation proceeded him as he took steps on the creaking floor to get to Y/n without waking her. Upon his success, he let out a silent breath.

As effortless as she looked, Azriel had picked her up cradling her to himself as securely as possible without altering her form. Her slight sigh and twitch had him stalling for a moment, checking her heartbeat to ensure she was in fact still asleep. With his confirmation, he began his trek up the stairs and towards her room. He had passed by it multiple times during his prior time with his court, but holding her now as he placed her onto the bed, it stirred that inexplainable flutter in him.

Az had wanted to start helping Y/n on her writing tonight, but the subtle (although meaningless) shift in guard had pulled him away.

Tomorrow night then.

Y/n was ecstatic to have the spymaster around for as long as he did. Although only a couple days, the two had bonded and laughed with each-other. Much to Yn’s surprise, Az had been adamant on beginning her practice with a pen. It was a bit rough in the beginning, but by the end of his stay she was confident in some of the letters and how they flowed.

But sadly as all things do, he had to return home.

It was another awkward goodbye, this time the brush of his shadows lingered, almost matching the lingering gaze he shared with her. Y/n had sworn she almost got lost in it.

He had left her with the same promise as before.

“I’ll be back.” Then the male all but vanished from her door.

The next time he had stopped by it was in a flurry of motion, one that even had Y/n reeling. He had apologized before vanishing away only to be back in the middle of the night. Upon the sun rising, he had left a platter of produce on the table with another small pouch of coins and a note explaining his hasty departure.

It made Y/n smile, although disappointed she couldn’t see him more.

Occurrences like that became common for the two. His stays never lasting more then a couple of days at most before he was gone again. Through Azriel’s increased trips, Feyre had akin him to a letter boy with all of her messages and small trinkets that she wished to tell her still human best friend. As for Y/n? She couldn’t be happier in her life if she tried. Sure, Feyre wasn’t here with her next door and the male she has come to crush on like had their own demons to fight which took their time, but for the first time in a very long time Y/n felt remembered.

Even though the last trip that Azriel had taken tested the waters between the two, and Y/n would be damned if she didn’t stay up at night in embarrassment.

The breath against her ear didn’t startle Y/n anymore. She had become akin to the soft silken caress of the spymasters shadows and even reveled in their touch when they caressed her neck. The snow had officially begun to melt by now, the ground slowly becoming soft as the sky broke away to the sun once more.

“I need to wash the bedding in your room before you retire for the night.” She had twirled around, gentle and soft, adding to the allure of the scent of fruit that she had been cutting prior. There stood Azriel, as beautiful as ever, in her foyer looking over her form. It was a welcome gesture as since as much as she had tried capture his attention, he seemed as fortified as a fortress. Y/n would be lying if she said she didn’t attempt to try and test the boundaries between them. A glance here, accidental brush there, the best of her wardrobe when preparing dinner for herself hoping he would snatch her away.

The last thought was a bit much, but her mind didn’t care.

Az had noted a couple visits prior, sent a compliment towards her and the dress she had managed to adorn through the leftovers of the last coin pouch. It was a frivolous purchase, but she knew she needed to be a bit more open to receiving help as Feyre would have her had (and no doubt Azriel’s) if she didn’t.

“Don’t fret if it isn’t done until later.” The Spymaster assured. Y/n couldn’t help but throw a questioning glance at him. “I have to check something out for a bit and report. Might be a little while.”

“Shall I count you for dinner?” Y/n had hopes he would as she had missed him from his time away. “I’m going to grab some drinks from the market today, I was hoping you would try them with me.”

“I should hope so. If not this will be a long night.” Y/n smiled at that.

“Any specific types of drink you prefer?”

“Whatever you favor.” Azriel did not know much of human alcohol, he assumed there was the standard of wine, but that was as far as he had ventured. It wasn’t worth much to fae as it was not nearly as potent to have any sort of effects.

“Ah, I well then it’ll be a surprise to us both.” Y/n had turned around fully, back to her task, and also to hid the slight brushing of red that dusted her cheeks. She was embarrassed by her lack of experience, but he didn’t need to know that.

Obviously, Azriel figured it out, and quickly at that. Her hesitance with accepting his answer along with the slight rush of her heart and as a dead giveaway. Thinking about it now he assumed that there wasn’t much that this human girl could lie to him about that he wouldn’t catch. Az knew he can read people well, but this was almost effortless, as if he was attuned to those emotions.

He also knew that since her experience was limited, if at all, she would definitely have 0 tolerance.

Even if Az would be caught up in the most perilous situation (he wouldn’t be, but even so) he would make sure to find himself back at this little house by sundown.

As for Y/n, the idea that the male would be there for the experience brought a sense of comfort to her. Yes, it wasn't Feyre like she had hoped as since they had planned to get her 'inebriated' according to her best friend, but it was someone.

Y/n wouldn't be alone.

Plus, the person she would spend the experience with was a hulking dark and handsome male, so that was a huge bonus.

It wasn't long before Azriel had head out, making sure to bid a small farewell and promise to see her tonight. Y/n had taken this opportunity to not only tidy up the house, make sure his room was cleaned and ready, but also to make herself a bit more presentable to head into town. It wasn't often that she ventured this way, most times she was fresh from the forest and outside her house skinning the latest kill for fur and cuts of meat. Occasionally she would venture in with produce and some wheat she could grow year-round, both instances made for dirty work and one that wasn't very presentable.

Now as she ventures that way, freshly bathed, adorning new clothes and smelling like berries; Y/n felt new.

She had missed the glances her way from the men around her, and the warmth she was received with from the elderly women as she walked by. The way she had held herself was that of a below common person, but in the eyes of the people, she was anything but. If they hadn't watched the girl grow up there would be no doubt that she would be mistaken for the very thing they feared most from her beauty alone.

"Hello." Y/n found herself standing outside a small storefront, the walls adorned with bottles. Within the booth, a smaller man sat, a worn cap on his head. He received her with a smile.

"What can I help you with ma'am?" Y/n roamed her eyes over the shelf hesitantly. The different bottle heights, sizes and colors making her indecisive. The shop keep must've seen the nervousness in her eyes as he let out a small chuckle.

"I can give you some recommendations, if you would like?"

The breath of relief was audible from the girl.

"Yes please."

"What is the occasion?" The question wasn't targeted or sly of any sort, more so inquiring for a better understanding of what he should recommend to Y/n, but she couldn't help but nervously ring her neck where a small wisp hid as blush spread over her skin. She had a small hope that (despite not knowing how they work) her hand clasping over the small silken thing would stop it from potentially hearing the conversation.

"I have a friend coming for dinner tonight."

"Do you want something to pair with the meal or for after?" A small amount of mirth entered the man's eyes as he mentioned beyond the food. It made the color darken on Y/n's neck and spread to her ears.

"I'm not sure..." She hesitated; it was so out of her element for her to even think such a thing could happen for her. Yeah, aside a couple nights with Feyre where they wanted to "practice" and learn with someone they were comfortable with (at least some of it), Y/n hadn't been with anyone. The thought of her being entrapped in passion, much like the books she enjoys every so often, with another had her already nervous stomach filling with flutters. It only increased when the thought of the fae male being the one to spend it with. "Both?"

She didn't mean to say it as a question, really. The man's grin widened as he nodded, turning around to his inventory. He reached under the counter, shuffling some things out of the way before grabbing what he desired. Before a second passed, he had placed a short red bottle on the counter. Y/n eyed it carefully as the lowering sun's rays hit it perfectly to see the rose-colored liquid inside.

"Pair this with any sort of fruit or shoot it straight. It can be sipped on or mixed." Y/n nodded, checking the price as he turned around again. She could easily get the bottle and another with the ruminants of the coin purse that Az had brought his last visit. Upon fixing his room up earlier, she had seen another stashed away in his bag with her initial on it. She wanted to give the small delicate fabric bag back to the spymaster as she had felt bad for having it as long as she did, so a little drink would be the perfect occasion to use it on.

"Red or white meat tonight for dinner?"

As Y/n ventured back towards the house, the sun began to officially set beyond the tree line. She had picked up a bit of pace on her way back to make sure she had enough time to put on the slip dress she adored so much. Upon her arrival home, Y/n glanced at the windows (which remained curtain shut as to keep out the eyes of others) in hopes to potentially see the outline of a male. She had left fireplace lit and the candle lanterns around the house going as to make sure he had light if he did come back early. Entering the house however, Y/n didn't feel the presence of the shadows or their master within. Placing the alcohol on the table, Y/n made her way upstairs to change and freshen up her appearance.

Upon her satisfaction she made her way back downstairs and to the table where the drinks lie.

She had taken them out of the bag, placing the wine she had purchased for the meal on the small table. Keeping the smaller red bottle with her as she went to the cabinet, Y/n grabbed two cups.

She didn't have any fancy glassware so this would have to do. She highly doubted Azriel would mind.

Placing the cup she meant for him on the table next to the wine, Y/n couldn't help the wandering eye towards the little red bottle that stood ominously on the counter. The way the fire licked at the color looked taunting, but the continued flutter in her stomach at the thought of the spymaster had an idea popping in her head.

Maybe she should try it. Just a little.

Y/n had to make sure it was good before she served it, right?

Before she let herself think too much on the decision, the human girl had popped the lid off, poured a couple seconds into the glass, and shot it back.

The taste was not something she had expected in the slightest. It was sweet, to a degree, with a smoothness that allowed it to gently slide down her throat. The heat that came with the liquid surprised her. Her chest that had been tight all day with the image of her guest warmed and relaxed, the feeling still lingering, but did not have as much of a hold on her.

Y/n like this liquid, she had hopes Azriel would too. Maybe he would even compliment her for picking it out.

A small shy smile broke onto her features at the thought.

Azriel had watched as the sun receded below the tree line. He had done everything he needed to do with his report and check in, quickly making time to tie up any loose ends while he was there. Nothing violent (luckily, as he didn't want to scare a specific human upon his arrival home) but simple covering of his tracks and finalizing some plans before next month.

Everything was clicking into place perfectly as far as he knew.

Giving a small nod to himself, he felt his shadows pull him back to the small house, eager to see the girl within. He didn't fight them but simply allowed himself to appear withing the familiar foyer. The smell of food was the first thing that he had noticed. For a human, with the limited palette that they possessed, Y/n had somehow crafted her cooking to be palatable by fae standards. It had been a plus of his visits here as he could enjoy his time and not feel like he was starving unlike the trip to the other Archeron's house all that while ago.

The second thing he noticed was the bottle of what looked to be some sort of human wine on the table. Az allowed a small warm smile to spread at the gesture. It was sweet, like her, to pick something out that he knew she had heard him talk about prior when recalling his time with his family. It gave insight to just how much she had been listening to him.

The third thing he noticed was the second, smaller bottle sitting on the table slightly behind the human wine. It had been obviously opened as with his quick assessment Az guessed it was about half empty. Taking a step or two to the table, Azriel had picked up the bottle to examine it.

Upon a small sip of the liquid Azriel found It was strong, almost illusionary with its taste. Even he, as fae, felt the warmth go down his throat and a small heat to fill his chest. Confusion gripped him.

This was definitely not a human made drink. If he had any guesses, he would have thought this was some sort of sipping fae gin infused with some sort of floral to cut the bite.

Half the bottle gone made him notice the fourth thing within the house, Y/n's form on one of the seats reading. If the obvious red on her cheeks was any give away to her status at the moment, her lack of notice when he had entered the house would be the most obvious telltale sign.

Y/n was drunk. Deceptively so as she sat cozied up in the chair, obviously reading some sort of romance book.

Az had placed the bottle down a little harder than he normally would, allowing the small ring to jolt Y/n out of her fantasy.

"Azriel! You're back!" Springing up off the couch with more grace than any sane person who is drunk, Y/n had effortlessly gotten to Azriel and enveloped him into a small embrace. It made the male freeze, unsure if he should wrap his arms around the girl or wait until she removed herself from him.

How desperately he wanted to return the embrace.

So, fueled by the liquor that ran through her veins, he settled his hands just above her waist.

Y/n couldn't believe that he made it back for dinner. She didn't try to stop that joy from spreading to her face as the warmth in her body buzzed through her. She didn't mean to drink as much of the liquid as she did, but once she started, the confidence and buzz that came quickly after felt reliving from her crushing nerves.

"I have dinner ready! I also got some of the wine the man at the stall recommended!" Y/n all but burst at the seams with the male's small smile towards her.

"Did he also suggest the other bottle too?" The question was soft, careful to not seem as if she had done something unknowingly wrong. He wasn't upset or anything with her, just an ounce of concern resided in him for her head tomorrow morning.

"He did! It's wonderful too. Try it!" With or without her knowledge, there was very little Azriel wouldn't do for the look that Y/n gave him. Her eyes wide and shining towards him. Very few times had he every received something like this from someone. Az had watched his brothers receive these looks and vulnerability, but never did he think someone could feel safe enough with him to be worthy of it.

Here Y/n stood, almost toe to toe with the fae, giving the best attempt at 'the eyes' that Feyre had talked to her about when they were younger. It was stupid, she knew this, but it was the best time to try and test her effect with them. She made sure to bat her eyes a couple times to emphasize her request towards the shadow singer until he gave a little chuckle and broke away from the embrace. His scarred hands reached for the red bottle and not to long after he was taking a long draw of it from the cup Y/n had selected for him.

"And? Did I do well?" Y/n fished. Azriel gave in quickly.

"Yes, very well. It is quite good, just like how the food smells." Y/n jumped. "Is it ready?"

"Yes!" Y/n all but bounced over to the kitchen, grabbing a plate and handing it to Azriel who had followed behind her. They had sat to eat, allowing the small talk between them to carry. All the while, Y/n had opened the wine and began to pour for herself and Az. It was different then the red bottle liquid. More drinkable and less potent for her. The stall owner did in fact call the type to pair well as one glass became two, two became three, and soon the bottle was done.

Y/n was surely floating.

Azriel should have stopped her after the first glass. The slowing of her movements, softness within her eye, the normal sharp wit reduced to putty as she gently talked. All of it was also why he didn't. It had been so long since someone talked to him gently, reached for him softly, asked him about little details that would normally never matter about himself.

It was as addicting as the drink she had finished minutes before.

Her standing sent a small shock of surprise through him. Her reaching for his finished plate while holding her own had him slightly panicked. He had made notion to stand and take his own plate to put away, but the soft 'I got it' and gentle ease of her hand putting pressure on his shoulder to sit again kept him stationary. Everything in himself put the idea of her serving him in such a way put his nerves on fire. Maybe it was the gin, maybe it was the fact that he couldn't stop the way his eyes trailed the flow of that damned sleeping gown that had his hands twitching to grab.

"We can go to the couch if you want." She had returned to him and grabbed his hand, something that had Az analyzing her face to determine just how drunk she was. They had some physical contact before, but this was a new level.

Azriel luckily let her drag him over to the sitting room. She had guided him to the softest area to sit while she took position next to the male. Upon her placing herself next to him, all but draped on the furniture she let the drink drive her words.

"Is it cold?" Y/n forgot that the male couldn't read her mind, thus when the questioning look towards her and then the fire made a string of giggle slip from her lips. "When you fly silly."

Right, Az was the silly one right now. However, the inquiry was welcome as he settled into his seat and altered himself to see her more clearly.

"Not really. Only If I go really high, but it's dependent on the weather I guess."

"Really? I always thought it would be cold not matter what."

"I'm also just naturally hot."

"Yes, you are."

Azriel laughed.

"No, I mean physically."

"Ya, I know."

"No." Y/n couldn't help but let the confusion cross her face. She agreed with him, why was he laughing? Sure, she would listen to it any time he would give it to her, but it was lost on her why. "I mean I'm Illyrian, we are warm naturally."

The blush on her face all but multiplied and deepened in color, no longer just the drink affecting it.

"But I am glad you think I'm hot." Y/n tried her best to hide in her hands and hair, only for the male to gently reach for her jaw, tilting her head back for him to see. Y/n didn't stop his touch, nor did she stop her intrusive thought to test the theory of his warmth herself. She had strung her hand around his wrist, guiding his hand against her cheek. She didn't think it felt any different than her own hands., maybe it was because the fire behind Az's eyes distracted her.

She had shut her eyes, pressing his marred flesh into her soft skin.

Azriel was going to combust. He didn't know if it was from the ever growing affections for the girl (that he no longer fought as hard), or the growing issue she was causing if he let his thoughts slip for even a second (that he was fighting for his life against right now).

Y/n opened her eyes again, meeting Azriel's easily as a slow, easy smile spread over her. It was as simple as taking a breath. The comfort of it all was that of her relationship with Feyre, but this felt heavier. It was a welcome relief from all the cold and disdain she caught from her best friend's sisters.

"I'm really happy your here." Y/n dropped her hand, which still encased his. "I'm really happy you come to see me."

Y/n had to blink a couple times to make sure she wasn't imagining the slight color on the tips of his ears that she swore was not there prior. There was no look of surprise, or any sort of telltale sign of his that suggested that he was uncomfortable or upset at what she had said, but the wide-eyed look of his had her moving without her knowledge.

She felt her lips make contact with the shell of his ear before she had pulled away to see them doubled in color. Another giggle of hers bubbled out and into the room. Azriel was a statue under her touch, the only notable difference was his slightly heavier breathing that she caught sight of. Before mentioning it however, her head lulled to where his neck met his shoulder, trying to understand why the room seemed distorted more than it had before.

"I'm tired." It was the only conclusion in which she could come to about her predicament. She had felt the male above her nod and a rush of air. It seemed that the statue shadow singer had been holding his breath. Gently pushing her body off of himself much to her disappointment. He stood before her; however, Y/n gave no inclination to move. Her arms however raised in motion for him to succumb to her wishes as she didn't trust her legs to work. A small huff and chuckle exited him before allowing her to get away with such a behavior.

"Okay there little vixen, let's get you up." Her smile was contagious at the name, but she kept the rather heated comments to herself. As she settled into his arms, her own wrapped around his neck in a feeble attempt to try and make herself a bit lighter for the male, easier to carry. By no means was she a tiny woman, Feyre had gotten all the slim genes between them, and while she wasn't unable to live her life, Y/n had curves. Most of it was muscle from the years out hunting and foraging on her own, but it didn't stop the slight worry that she was in fact a bit heavy to Az as he carried her.

Each step that Azriel took was slow, calculated even. He had to try and control himself as to not scare the human girl staring at him so intently that it warmed him to his core.

He also prayed that if he moved slow enough, she wouldn't notice the problem that currently threatened to make itself know if she moves just a little. It sure didn't help that the flesh of her ass was held so easily against his arm, keeping her stationary against him.

Gods she was addicting, and so, so easy to become enamored with.

Azriel didn't understand how in just a couple of months that a human could be so dear to himself. He didn't doubt that the girl in his arms knew him in more depth than most within his life to this day. He truly believed she saw him.

He loved his family, but this was different.

Her bedroom came into view too quickly for Y/n's liking as she hadn't finished memorizing the feel of his chiseled body against hers. Swiftly, as the bed had come to view under her, Y/n had let go of the male and simply fell back into the comfy blankets and pillows below. Her mind swirled with her descent while the only thing that seemed to be in focus was the male of her affections.

"You can lay down too." Her own voice was foreign to her, no longer did she have control over the words that spilled out.

Azriel stood still, watching.

"I don't bite~"

Y/n had reached out to grasp his hand. Successful in her contact, she gently pulled him onto the bed, positioning him on his back, careful of his wings. Without much else of a thought, Y/n had moved his arm just right, allowing herself to curl up within the space it made against his torso. The warmth radiating from him had Y/n passed out in mere minutes, while the poor shadow singer fought demons to keep his composure and not jump the girl.

The next morning Y/n hadn't remembered the entirety of the night, but she sure did remember the little love-bite she had quickly delivered to his ear. She had apologized profusely if she had made him uncomfortable and swore off the sinning liquid. Azriel had insisted that she would in fact want to drink again, and that he didn't mind in the slightest about her welcome intrusion of his space. Y/n wasn't convinced but still took her apologies and made them breakfast while nursing her head.

Sadly, Azriel had to depart that day for a report he had to make to Rhys. This time however, he allowed himself to embrace Y/n, lingering slightly within her scent.

The most recent time in which Y/n had guests within her home, it was the entire Inner Court (or at least the ones she had met before).

"Y/n!" Feyre had yelled upon exiting the winnow into her house. Loud thuds had been heard from the second story before the familiar sight of the human girl raced past all the males and into the arms of her best friend.

"You're here!" If the embrace was any tighter, oxygen would be difficult to pass between them. The sight had made the males in the room melt as the familiar warmth of Y/n surrounded them. Even Azriel couldn't help the small smile that adorned his features despite the jab to his ribs from his brother.

"I am so sorry for the drop in with no warning, but the timing for our play with the queens seems to be now." Feyre had explained, pulling back to look at her.

"That is more than okay Angel, you're always welcome to come anytime you feel."

From the small amount of explaining and information that Azriel had given to Y/n prior through his visits, the timing of it all had seemed to be the most up in the air. They had enough on their plates and didn’t need another excuse to feel bad about being in her residence for the time being. 

However, despite having the support of the court even now, she did not have enough to plan for when they were gone in a week or so for her stock. Thus, the decision was that she had to go out to the market, and also the forest. She needed to hunt again just so she can tide her stock over and keep her clients that she had built within the market. Plus, Y/n had wanted to make Feyre's favorite from when they were kids, which required a deer.

"Take up the rooms you had last time," Turning to Rhys and Feyre she gave a small smile, "I'll wash everything and change it for you guys when I'm back if that is okay."

"Don't worry about it Ace, is the washing still where it used to be?" the fae girl prompted. Y/n nodded with a smile. "Then I got it, we have to organize our plan here anyway. It'll give us a bit of a break before getting back to work."

"Knock yourselves out then."

After giving a quick hug to Cass, Y/n's eyes settled on Azriel who had taken a couple steps back. Her body gravitated slightly towards him while he brushed the back of his hand against her arm. It gave the human a surge of confidence.

"Welcome back." Y/n had allowed the low tone of her voice to carry a soft undertone which had the spymaster checking to make sure his family wasn't snooping since they had wandered towards their living arrangements.

"I missed you." The softness in his voice made Y/n melt.

"I missed you too."

Grabbing her hunting bow and dagger, she stepped towards the door. Y/n hesitated before opening the door and looked to the stair that led to her old and new friends. As the sun began to set, the obvious specks of light suggested she would not be alone out in those woods. 

"I have to go and grab some things in the market and out..." Y/n trailed off. Azriel had glanced out the window briefly, not able to hide the small flicker of nervousness that showed there. Although Y/n didn't allow herself to let the moment proceed as she broke contact and turned toward the small table that resided near the door. She had taken out the small paper she had picked up some odd weeks ago and one of the pens Az had brought as a small gift. She had been practicing between visits and confidently scribbled the note down.

Out hunting for dinner. Be back soon, stay inside. The town is out.

Deciding that was enough, she strung her cloak over her small frame and headed out the door and towards the tree line, sparing a small glance at the shadow singer on her way out. Admittedly, she hated the forest during this time. There was a false spring that everyone had thought would bring the warm weather to only be hit by one more blow from the mother. With it brought a frigid cold and icy flurries that would no doubt melt by the end of the week. The snow and wind whipped all warmth she had away from her in a matter of minutes and the ever-concerning watchful eye of beasts who long to have her for supper also put her on edge. 

Her body still noticed the absence of her friend that used to go not these little missions together. Although the girl is currently residing back at the house, it still stung for when she would leave. Y/n never really got used to the feeling of loneliness that came with her best friend's freedom. Although it was a selfish thought, she did miss the time they would spend hours together just chatting and getting through this life together. She missed her. 

She was elated to have her back, even to this capacity. She would never stop being thankful for her return.

A cold tear shook her from her thoughts. Shaking her head, she wiped it away and moved on deeper and deeper into the forest. 

Although she pulled the bow closer to her body, she achieved no extra security and for some reason she couldn’t shake the feeling of lurking danger beyond the trees that surrounded her. The wind whipped louder, blocking out the sounds of the forest and any audible cues that would give away a predator or prey. It added to the nerves of it all. It's why nobody should ever have to do this to survive.

As her boots crunched in the snow below her, she allowed her mind to wander as she squatted down into the white below. Here she would stay for an hour or so waiting for a migration or flock to cross her path. Since the snow and wind was so bad however, she highly doubted she could cross many prey, let alone a deer. Predators however were another story entirely, and she was sure she would come across one. Settling down once again, she relaxed the bow and rolled her shoulders, causing the assortment of ash arrows and regular to jumble further. 

Hazel eyes flooded her thoughts as she waited. Specifically of a Fae man with wings that is currently resting within her residence that she had left at the door. One with blue stones and friendly darkness that always wrapped around the nape of her neck, it was almost as alluring as all the riches and security in the world. The night he moved her to the bedroom because he had felt unease about her resting on the couch while she had stupidly trusted a drink, the chance she opened her eyes and smiled at him, and he finally allowed a redness to spread over his face as she had kissed his ear. The late nights they would stay up and read, gentle conversation flowing from the both of them, it was intoxicating. Even more than the drink she is still haunted by.

Without the human girl's knowledge, Feyre had called it, and now Rhys owed her all new paints for her studio. The girl had probably the biggest affinity for the male in such a short time that either of them had seen. Granted it had been about two occurrences that the court had witnessed in person, but the closeness of the two and the flustered avoidance that the shadow singer would insist wasn't happening. It was all so obvious, and the first time that both of them where as readable as a book.

Hearing a snap in the twigs behind her, Y/n's body moved like water as she pulled her bow taught and aimed with a watchful eye to the intruder of her space. Loaded in the string was an ash arrow, until her eyes met with the very hazel she was just dreaming about. 

“It’s just me.” Azriel said with his hands raised, eyeing the tip of the arrowhead. Y/n sighed and lowered the weapon giving a small smile to him. Even with the weather around the two, the male didn’t look even the slightest cold. Sensing the small displeasure of the stare at her arrow she stepped closer and rubbed the back of her neck. 

“Ever since Feyre was almost killed and then taken by a Fae man, I’ve carried these. You never know out here, and I had a feeling if it were to happen again, I wouldn’t be so lucky.” She explained and he nodded slightly. The image of her suffering the same as his High Lady was nauseating but was worse as he knew she in fact wouldn’t be as lucky and most likely killed if she were to run into another enemy Fae. "I had it before meeting you all."

She had attempted to reason, hoping that he wouldn't take offense to her carrying the very thing that could kill him and his family.

Her nerves settled though when he nodded at her and offered a small smile to assure her there were no hard feelings.

“Why are you out anyway? I left a note; the town is out today, and I don’t want you all to get caught.” She poked before sending him a small smile as his shadows seemed to envelop her hands to try and keep them warm. The silken texture felt nice against her digits, as she brought them up to give a slight breath to hopefully add some warmth.

“I was worried.” It was simple and curt but the meaning behind it made flurries and warmth spread through Y/n's whole being. So much so, she felt as if she almost didn’t need the jacket. 

“Oh,” She paused and looked into his eyes again as she hesitantly stepped closer, feeling a heat radiating from the larger male form. It had been a since the drinking incident that they were so close together. Thinking back to that night, Y/n allowed herself to giggle.

“You aren’t even feeling the cold are you.” It was more a statement than a question, and it made Azriel let out a smile and sigh. 

“No. Perks of being an Illyrian I guess.” Y/n shook her head as she took another step into his warmth, allowing herself to fully engulf the memory of that night. He hadn’t stepped back or retreated from her body, so she took this as a chance to not only warm up slightly but also test the waters more openly, without alcohol. His eyes seemed to study her movements as his shadows still swarmed her hands, the curve of her body under the layers of cloth, the way her hair gently blew despite the howling wind, the way the snow reflected off her eyes. Even for a Fae she would be considered ethereal. 

Snap 

Before Azriel could even flinch and his mind could come back from the thoughts of the woman in front of him, Y/n had placed herself around his side with an arrow taught. 

A yell erupted from whoever broke their peaceful encounter as Y/n let the arrow fly. She registered the Faebane soaked sword before the male behind her could and the throwing knife that he let in the direction of the shadow singer. 

The arrow hit before Azriel processed what happened, and the man’s body hit the snow staining it with the familiar crimson. His eyes hardened at the sword that fell into the snow and the rage that permanently covered his face, he also noted the ash arrow that Y/n had buried in his chest with great pride. She was lethal, her abilities honed by pure survival and instinct. Even he was impressed by her response to danger. A pride that would soon turn to panic when the girl he became infatuated with turned towards him. 

“I understand why the inside part was necessary-” He began but shortly cut himself off when his shadows screamed, and his eyes found that very crimson on Y/n. “Shit.” He began. 

Y/n felt the dagger hit; she also knew that if she didn't put herself there it would've stuck the male behind her in the middle of his chest (although she highly doubted it landing as his shadows had coiled around himself without his realization she guessed). Luckily, she knew it didn’t hit anything too vital as it embedded into her shoulder, but it would leave one hell of a scar and at least a month of no hunting for her meals and trades.

“We need to go home.” She ground out. Azriel nodded quickly before scooping the smaller girl into his arms. 

“You know, when I imagined of your size in my arms, I did not have this scenario in mind.” He attempted to joke, but when it landed and Y/n wheezed, it was painful. He cursed again and quickly melted into the shadows to get home.

“You think about that?” Y/n wheezed out. Allowing a small tense chuckle to escape him, he took in the now significantly paler girl.

"More times than I care to admit."

Coming to the familiar door, he rushed inside whilst the few of his family talked over some food and a fire. His sudden appearance had startled the group, and it took Rhys to speak up about the startled and shaken look on his shadow master’s face. 

“Help her.” Such small words and yet the whole of the building into a frenzy. Launching up from the couch, Feyre cursed at the girl as she willed her magic into her smaller body to try and help heal her.

"What the hell happened?!" She exclaimed upon seeing the wound not close as she was intending. Unbeknownst to the group, Feyre had never seen her friend with this much blood on her. Sure, they had skinned and butchered game when they had got it, but it was never hers.

Feyre hated the sight.

Everyone did.

But none more than the male who had carried her back.

Cassian attempted to find any gauze and ointment that could take the edge off of her pain upon Feyre's directions to the cabinet, even if it was a slight improvement. The way the girl forced back her writhe of discomfort was not a welcome sight. Even Rhysand was with his mate tried to aid in the healing but to no avail, much to their shared displeasure. Azriel was on the other hand by Y/n’s face, watching to see any change and trying to comfort the small girl. 

“I’m not dead, just dying if you don’t get this thing out of me and stop the bleeding.” She bargained trying to sit up wincing as she went, but the High Lady of the house pushed her back down. 

“No, we are fixing this. Stay still. Please” Azriel grasped her hand trying to will his own agenda of her staying down and letting them heal her. He knew she would be fine. The wound wasn't fatal in the slightest and hadn't hit anything that would be a long-term issue.

The sight of this female, this human woman bleeding on a table with a throwing knife that was meant for him through his brain into a spiral. The nudge in his chest had begun to feel like the knife had hit him, not her.

“It won’t work.” She coughed. Everyone stopped to look at her as Cassian began unloading the things he found. “It was meant for Az, it’s coated in faebane and ash. Magic won’t work.” 

Scarred hands had grabbed hers, tight and almost pleading. A realization settled over Azriel as he held her steady. A realization that he didn't know what to do with, nor did he ever think would happen.

Almost if he sensed it too Rhys snapped his eyes to Azriel.

Rhysand looked to Azriel’s eyes for confirmation, he nodded and went back to holding her close, unable to think of doing anything else.

It was going to be a long month for Y/n.

Hope you all enjoyed! I got a bit carried away with everything.

Tag list: @rcarbo1 @cherryinsalemverse @kabekusa @hellohauntedturnstudent @optimisticbabydreamer @historygeekqueen @whhyyynottt @love-over-fears @alainabooks143 @ariaaira @snoopyspace @moonlwghts @meritxellao @paintedbyshadows @tiredsleepyhead @annaaaaa88 @willowpains @annamariereads16 @the-onlyy-angie @bbontenswhhore @rahdaleigh @casiiopea2 @littlemissfix-itfic

[max1461]

Linguists deal with two kinds of theories or models.

First, you have grammars. A grammar, in this sense, is a model of an individual natural language: what sorts of utterances occur in that language? When are they used and what do they mean? Even assembling this sort of model in full is a Herculean task, but we are fairly successful at modeling sub-systems of individual languages: what sounds occur in the language, and how may they be ordered and combined?—this is phonology. What strings of words occur in the language, and what strings don't, irrespective of what they mean?—this is syntax. Characterizing these things, for a particular language, is largely tractable. A grammar (a model of the utterances of a single language) is falsified if it predicts utterances that do not occur, or fails to predict utterances that do occur. These situations are called "overgeneration" and "undergeneration", respectively. One of the advantages linguistics has as a science is that we have both massive corpora of observational data (text that people have written, databases of recorded phone calls), and access to cheap and easy experimental data (you can ask people to say things in the target language—you have to be a bit careful about how you do this—and see if what they say accords with your model). We have to make some spherical cow type assumptions, we have to "ignore friction" sometimes (friction is most often what the Chomskyans call "performance error", which you do not have to be a Chomskyan to believe in, but I digress). In any case, this lets us build robust, useful, highly predictive, and falsifiable, although necessarily incomplete, models of individual natural languages. These are called descriptive grammars.

Descriptive grammars often have a strong formal component—Chomsky, for all his faults, recognized that both phonology and syntax could be well described by formal grammars in the sense of mathematics and computer science, and these tools have been tremendously productive since the 60s in producing good models of natural language. I believe Chomsky's program sensu stricto is a dead end, but the basic insight that human language can be thought about formally in this way has been extremely useful and has transformed the field for the better. Read any descriptive grammar, of a language from Europe or Papua or the Amazon, and you will see (in linguists' own idiosyncratic notation) a flurry regexes and syntax trees (this is a bit unfair—the computer scientists stole syntax trees from us, also via Chomsky) and string rewrite rules and so on and so forth. Some of this preceded Chomsky but more than anyone else he gave it legs.

Anyway, linguists are also interested in another kind of model, which confusingly enough we call simply a "theory". So you have "grammars", which are theories of individual natural languages, and you have "theories", which are theories of grammars. A linguistic theory is a model which predicts what sorts of grammar are possible for a human language to have. This generally comes in the form of making claims about

the structure of the cognitive faculty for language, and its limitations

the pathways by which language evolves over time, and the grammars that are therefore attractors and repellers in this dynamical system.

Both of these avenues of research have seen some limited success, but linguistics as a field is far worse at producing theories of this sort than it is at producing grammars.

Capital-G Generativism, Chomsky's program, is one such attempt to produce a theory of human language, and it has not worked very well at all. Chomsky's adherents will say it has worked very well—they are wrong and everybody else thinks they are very wrong, but Chomsky has more clout in linguistics than anyone else so they get to publish in serious journals and whatnot. For an analogy that will be familiar to physics people: Chomskyans are string theorists. And they have discovered some stuff! We know about wh-islands thanks to Generativism, and we probably would not have discovered them otherwise. Wh-islands are weird! It's a good thing the Chomskyans found wh-islands, and a few other bits and pieces like that. But Generativism as a program has, I believe, hit a dead end and will not be recovering.

Right, Generativism is sort of, kind of attempting to do (1), poorly. There are other people attempting to do (1) more robustly, but I don't know much about it. It's probably important. For my own part I think (2) has a lot of promise, because we already have a fairly detailed understanding of how language changes over time, at least as regards phonology. Some people are already working on this sort of program, and there's a lot of work left to be done, but I do think it's promising.

Someone said to me, recently-ish, that the success of LLMs spells doom for descriptive linguistics. "Look, that model does better than any of your grammars of English at producing English sentences! You've been thoroughly outclassed!". But I don't think this is true at all. Linguists aren't confused about which English sentences are valid—many of us are native English speakers, and could simply tell you ourselves without the help of an LLM. We're confused about why. We're trying to distill the patterns of English grammar, known implicitly to every English speaker, into explicit rules that tell us something explanatory about how English works. An LLM is basically just another English speaker we can query for data, except worse, because instead of a human mind speaking a human language (our object of study) it's a simulacrum of such.

Uh, for another physics analogy: suppose someone came along with a black box, and this black box had within it (by magic) a database of every possible history of the universe. You input a world-state, and it returns a list of all the future histories that could follow on from this world state. If the universe is deterministic, there should only be one of them; if not maybe there are multiple. If the universe is probabilistic, suppose the machine also gives you a probability for each future history. If you input the state of a local patch of spacetime, the machine gives you all histories in which that local patch exists and how they evolve.

Now, given this machine, I've got a theory of everything for you. My theory is: whatever the machine says is going to happen at time t is what will happen at time t. Now, I don't doubt that that's a very useful thing! Most physicists would probably love to have this machine! But I do not think my theory of everything, despite being extremely predictive, is a very good one. Why? Because it doesn't tell you anything, it doesn't identify any patterns in the way the natural world works, it just says "ask the black box and then believe it". Well, sure. But then you might get curious and want to ask: are there patterns in the black box's answers? Are there human-comprehensible rules which seem to characterize its output? Can I figure out what those are? And then, presto, you're doing good old regular physics again, as if you didn't even have the black box. The black box is just a way to run experiments faster and cheaper, to get at what you really want to know.

General Relativity, even though it has singularities, and it's incompatible with Quantum Mechanics, is better as a theory of physics than my black box theory of everything, because it actually identifies patterns, it gives you some insight into how the natural world behaves, in a way that you, a human, can understand.

In linguistics, we're in a similar situation with LLMs, only LLMs are a lot worse than the black box I've described—they still mess up and give weird answers from time to time. And more importantly, we already have a linguistic black box, we have billions of them: they're called human native speakers, and you can find one in your local corner store or dry cleaner. Querying the black box and trying to find patterns is what linguistics already is, that's what linguists do, and having another, less accurate black box does very little for us.

Now, there is one advantage that LLMs have. You can do interpretability research on LLMs, and figure out how they are doing what they are doing. Linguists and ML researchers are kind of in a similar boat here. In linguistics, well, we already all know how to talk, we just don't know how we know how to talk. In ML, you have these models that are very successful, buy you don't know why they work so well, how they're doing it. We have our own version of interpretability research, which is neuroscience and neurolinguistics. And ML researchers have interpretability research for LLMs, and it's very possible theirs progresses faster than ours! Now with the caveat that we can't expect LLMs to work just like the human brain, and we can't expect the internal grammar of a language inside an LLM to be identical to the one used implicitly by the human mind to produce native-speaker utterances, we still might get useful insights out of proper scrutiny of the innards of an LLM that speaks English very well. That's certainly possible!

But just having the LLM, does that make the work of descriptive linguistics obsolete? No, obviously not. To say so completely misunderstands what we are trying to do.

[sandwitchstories]

Mouse's Best Friend

Welcome back to another adventure in Mouse's Mini-verse! This time the family has gotten bigger, but it's not baby #2 just yet!

If you prefer to read it on AO3 click here !

WC: 1000+

Summary: Sukuna comes home after a week away to find his daughter has a new best friend and his household has grown in size.

AN: To anyone new to my Daddy Duty series- Mouse is Sukuna's two year old daughter. Welcome to Mouse's Mini-verse!

CW: Reader called Mama but not described, family fluff, toddler hijinks, Mouse and reader adopt a yokai, mentioned that reader is pregnant

“What is that doing here?” Sukuna’s voice held an edge of accusation in its firmness as he came out onto the engawa.

“Welcome home, my love. And I am assuming you are referring to your daughter’s new best friend. Sukuna, meet Tuna,” you said, sipping your warm tea smiling as you watched your daughter playing happily in the yard.

“That is not a friend. That is a yokai. It’s a damn kitsune,” Sukuna said, sitting down next to you and crossing all 4 arms. He had all 4 eyes fixed on his perceived opponent and his jaw was clenched shut.

“I am well aware of what he is,” you said with a roll of your eyes. You knew a week ago when you told the beast to come inside that Sukuna would have this exact reaction to it. But like usual, you did not let that stop you from doing what you wanted. 

“How did this even come about?” he asked, face still pinched in displeasure.

“Mouse.”

“I had already assumed that. I was hoping for a bit more information exchange before I have Uraume make me a kitsune snack.”

“If either of you touch a hair on that creature’s head I will make you wish you were dead,” you narrowed your eyes on your husband’s giant form.

He glanced down into your face and saw your determination, coupled with your pregnancy hormones he knew exactly how this was going to go. Certain that in your current mood, you would make good on your threat, he gave a loud, disgust filled exhale. “Answer my question, precious one. How did we acquire a new, apparently useless, member of this household?”

You grinned at him and rubbed your distended belly. “Mouse kept sneaking out to the yard at night while you were gone. About the 3rd night in a row that I had to go out there and carry her back inside I told the damn thing to get in the house.”

“Did she stop sleeping outside?” he asked with an arched eyebrow.

You gave him a droll stare. “What do you think?”

Sukuna snorted in amusement. She was so much like you. Both hell bent on getting your way once your mind was made up. “Alright, next question.”

“Hmm?” 

“Do you know why it was in the yard to begin with?” Sukuna questioned.

“I asked if she knew where it came from and she said one day she saw it on the fence and got it to jump down and play with her. She told it he could stay and that’s when she began feeding it and trying to keep him warm in the yard,” you said with a smile as you spoke about your sweet girl.

“Papa!!! You came home!!! We comin’ Papa!! Wait right there, please and thank you!” Mouse finally spotted him from across the yard and started jumping up and down squealing in excitement. She leaned down and scooped up her new ‘best friend’ in her arms. “Come on, Tuna! We go see my Papa!”

Sukuna took note of the way the white fox demon with swirling red markings was so placid in his daughter’s arms. He counted tails while Mouse made her approach. 5 tails. The damn thing was 500 years old and sporting one of Mouse’s small kanzashi in the tuft of fur on the top of his head. 

The creature seemed completely and utterly unphased by its imprisonment in the arms of the toddler from hell. Though, judging by the size of its belly and the way Mouse kept kissing it’s head and whispering to it while she walked, this thing was living a life of pampered luxury. 

Ridiculous did not begin to even describe this… situation. He should have expected that the two of you wouldn’t be satisfied with something as mundane as a cat or a goldfish. 

“Why the hell did you name it Tuna?” Sukuna couldn’t keep the amusement out of his voice at how ridiculous it was to be calling a 500 year old yokai the stupid name.

“It’s him’s favorite food. So I call him Tuna so I can’t forget he likes Tuna,” she grinned at him like it was the most genius idea in the world. She unceremoniously plopped the creature in question down on his lap. “Tuna, meet Papa! Papa, this is Tuna. He’s my best friend.”

Sukuna picked the white furred creature up by the scruff of its neck and dangled it in front of his face, sizing it up and letting it feel a taste of his power. He sensed no trickery or magic coming from the creature. 

Mouse’s hand shot up to pat it on the back in a comforting gesture. “It okay, Tuna! Don’t be scared! Papa not going to eat you. He holds me up just like that too!”

“You protect her or you’ll be dinner. Got it, furball?” Sukuna narrowed his eyes on it when it had the audacity to yawn in his face in response.

“No! Bad Papa!” Mouse scolded, shaking a finger at him just like you did when scolding her.

“Excuse me?” The brat was fearless. Sukuna was convinced his daughter was going to be able to conquer the world with only her obstinance and audacity. 

“Really, Suk?,” you huffed, your movements jerked with annoyance as you took the beast from his hand and returned it to your daughter’s waiting arms. You watched her head off to play with her friend on the opposite side of the yard. 

Sukuna put an arm around your shoulder and pulled you close. Another hand gently turned up your chin so you were looking in his gaze. “All I’m going to say is… Tuna is a stupid fucking name.”

“You know what else is a stupid fucking name?” You asked with a cheeky grin.

“Are you planning to say precious two?” he said with no amusement.

“It's scientific proof that it’s from you that she gets her horrible naming genetics.” He scoffed and let go of your chin to look away. You smirked and grabbed your tea, taking another sip. “Indisputable, scientific proof.”

“When are you going to let that go?” Sukuna gave you a grumpy side eye.

You set down your drink and laughed. You tilted your chin up, and tugged lightly on your husband’s haori sleeve so he would lean his head down to meet your lips. You cupped his face and kissed him gently 3 times before you pulled back and replied with a shit eating grin, “Never.”

[venussaidso]

The Genius, Misanthropic Inventor 👩‍🔬

As I've explored a bit in my Sun Dominant Themes post, the whole disillusioned, misanthropic character type is portrayed by Sun nakshatra natives.

In the film Tomorrowland, Uttara Ashada Moon native George Clooney plays Frank Walker who is a cynical, reclusive genius that lost hope in the future/humanity. His character reminds me of the toymaker, Jeronicus Jangle, from the film Jingle Jangle: A Christmas Journey, whose light deemed when his apprentice betrayed him, and he lost all his creativity and hope. Jeronicus Jangle is played by Uttara Phalguni Moon native Justin Cornwell and Uttara Phalguni ASC native Forest Whitaker.

Frank Walker is said to be a disenchanted grump who was a boy-genius inventor as a kid. His beautiful inventions were a symbol of hope or joy, much like the inventions of Jeronicus Jangle.

This reminded me of the character Powder/Jinx from the animation series Arcane, who is voiced by Uttara Phalguni Sun native Ella Purnell.

She was insecure about her creations growing up. Although I see her Swati influence as well, she also had a journey from being full of innocence & life to being extremely disillusioned and lonely.

Speaking of the inventor that Jinx is, I just remembered a favourite character of mine from my childhood! I checked, and he was indeed voiced by a Sun nakshatra native as well! From Phineas and Ferb, Dr. Heinz Doofenshmirtz, the evil cartoon scientist, whose prime motivation is creating obscure, nefarious inventions to conquer the "entire Tri-State Area", is voiced by the Uttara Phalguni Sun & Moon native Dan Povenmire.

He, too, has been bullied when he was a kid. Which is why he's so ridiculously "evil" and grumpy.

Even Phineas and Ferb themselves, the brothers who invent incredible things in their backyard, which bring their friends so much joy and fun, are voiced by Krittika natives!

Being respectively voiced by Krittika Moon Vincent Martella & Krittika Sun Thomas Brodie-Sangster.

In the film How The Grinch Stole Christmas, Uttara Ashada Sun native Jim Carrey plays the Grinch who, similar to Dr. Heinz Doofenshmirtz, and even Shrek, has been bullied into self-isolation. He is very misanthropic and he absolutely hates the Who people. Josh Ryan Evans played young Grinch, and he could have had Uttara Ashada Sun. Young Grinch is shown breaking random things down to invent something beautiful to make someone happy.

And this trait is seen in adult Grinch, ostracized and secluded, who now invents for ill-intentions to take away Christmas from the Who people.

Obviously, Sun nakshatras aren't the only nakshatras present in the evil genius/inventor archetype, I'm sure. But another example of the misanthropic archetype is the character Shrek, who is voiced by Krittika Sun Mike Myers.

As expected, he is depicted as a reclusive grump who has been disillusioned by the idea of community.

In the film The Other Woman, Krittika Moon Cameron Diaz plays a highly respected lawyer who has always been disappointed by men.

Her distant, grumpy nature is really just her disillusionment manifesting through her interactions and behavioural patterns.

Honestly, this evolution of the Sun nakshatra natives is simply another part of them forming tougher skin or putting more boundaries. But also, this plays as a theme for the native to rediscover that light they used to have and choose to remain purely authentic regardless of the darkness and ignorance that surrounds them. As I described with the symbolisms and lessons in Christmas films.

This goes back to the genius inventor, the clever alchemist. Solar natives are fantastic at self-inventing or reinventing themselves, hence, their redemption story arcs.

[mastermatoyas]

I'm maintaining my strong belief in vampires having venom. A lot of vampires are described as having hypnotic and seductive abilities, but when you think about it, the right kind of venom could have a similar effect. Namely, if it functions as a sedative: dulling pain around the site of the wound, causing the victim to become drowsy, and potentially also creating a pleasant high.

The obvious primary benefit of this would be to prevent the vampire's prey from struggling enough to injure them. This is pretty self-explanatory - you don't want to break off a fang!

Another benefit, however, comes into play for vampires that don't outright kill their victims on the first feeding (which is surprisingly common in vampire stories.) A sedated victim is less likely to clearly remember what happened to them, meaning that they may struggle to identify their assailant or even understand that they experienced something supernatural. Good for keeping vampires incognito. It's also possible that some people might find the experience pleasurable, and therefore willingly offer themselves to vampires for feeding purposes (yes I do realise that a lot of people would be into that regardless, but it doesn't hurt to offer a bit of extra incentive, right?)

Basically, I think vampires being venomous would explain a lot.

Since I’ve entered a Vampire Era and realized this is more commonly believed than I thought, here’s a poll.

No nuance. Do they bite and suck or use sippy straw fangs?

[bybobbysbeard]

Fine Gold

Day 11 for @bucktommyfluffebruary: double date read on ao3 read other days here

Karen gestures expansively, her horribly bright cocktail sloshing dangerously. “So I said, the rotational energy is going to overcome the momentum and you’re not going to land where you’re expecting to. And he laughed at me. Like, what, I developed the thrusters so I don’t understand how a gyroscopic inertial works? It was my trajectory he was screwing up!” She smacks the table with her free hand. The little skewer of pineapple in her drink wobbles around the glass. “It was infuriating!” 

Tommy laughs, tipping his head back to hit the padded booth.

“Tommy! Stop laughing at me! I need another mechanically-inclined mind at this table. Buck’s too ADHD to hold a scientific conversation when he’s drinking and I can literally see my wife’s eyes glazing over.” She flaps a hand at Hen, slouched against her and watching the dancefloor.

Hen waves her nearly empty beer glass in Karen’s face. “Hey now, I am plenty scientific. Just not about aerospace engineering.”

“Yeah, cut your wife some slack Karen, it’s not like she’s a doctor or anything.”

Hen gasps, mock offended. “Et tu, Brute? The betrayal. And after I invited you and Buck out to our favorite bar.” She grabs for the pineapple skewer, dodging Karen’s block and biting off a chunk spitefully. She takes a sip of her beer and makes a face.

He laughs again. “Bet that tasted great.”

“Oh shut-up Kinard. I thought spending more time with Buck was supposed to make you less of an asshole. Where’s your better-half gone anyways?”

Tommy leans forward, trying to see the bar. “I’m not sure, I thought he was getting another pitcher. I can’t see him from here.” He’s just about to get to his feet when Karen pipes up.

“Uh oh.”

“Uh oh? What’s ‘uh oh’?”

Hen follows Karen’s gaze and sighs, heartfelt. “Your boy’s dazzling the regulars again.”

“For the love of God… excuse me.” He clambers to his feet, draining the last of his beer, and turning towards the bar. Hen’s right. Evan’s holding court, animatedly describing something with one hand while he holds the requested pitcher of beer in the other. At least four people of various genders are pressed close around him, a snapshot of Sweetwaters’ eclectic clientele.

This is the third time this has happened tonight. Evan is a natural flirt, moreso when he’s not even trying. Add in the fact that he’s glowing with happiness, and a little bit drunk, and he’s basically irresistible. Like a 6’2” puppy. Tommy can’t really blame them for getting sucked into Evan’s orbit. Hell, it happens to him everyday. It doesn't hurt that his boyfriend looks phenomenal, lit by the glow of hundreds of string lights hanging above the bar. Of course, Evan always looks good, even half-asleep and covered in drool, or after a 48 and covered in soot, but there’s something special tonight. 

His pastel-blue button-up shows off his tanned arms and his dark slacks fit his incredible legs, incredibly well. The white sneakers were a choice, but Tommy can admit they work with the look. Two pitchers of beer have left a light flush on his cheeks, and his curls have passed artfully tousled to nearly reach sex-hair levels of chaos. His lips are pink, pink, pink, spread around a wide grin and he’s making devastating eye contact with his audience. He makes some motion, probably reenacting a rescue, and throws his arm up above his head. Even from here, Tommy can see his cuffed sleeve straining at the seam. 

One of the women actually swoons back half a step. Okay, this is getting ridiculous.  

There’s a gold chain hanging loosely around Evan’s neck. It rests just below the hollow of his throat. The lights from the bar catch it and throw little caustics up against the smooth skin of his jaw. A heavily tattooed man at the bar, tall and lean with glossy waves of blond hair, leans forward. He rests a proprietary hand on Evan’s forearm and smiles charmingly. Evan looks startled, but still happy, glancing down at the hand on his arm. 

Possessiveness churns in Tommy’s stomach.

Three hours ago Evan had sat, completely naked and still damp from the shower, on the foot of their bed. He had sighed and pouted, and complained they were going to be late, but Tommy had been adamant. He knew the bar they were going to, and he was self-aware enough to know how tonight was probably going to go for him.

He hadn’t been joking all those months ago when he told Evan he could get jealous too. 

So, sue him. He wanted a visible claim on Evan. Not a hickey, though he was sure he was going to be leaving those on the delicate skin of Evan’s neck before the night was over. But something subtler. Something he could look at when he saw other men fawning over his boyfriend, trying to catch Evan’s attention, wanting him. Something to remind himself the only one Evan wanted was Tommy. 

Evan had perked up when he opened the slim, blue velvet box, and had audibly gasped when he dangled the fine gold chain in front of him. He had ducked his head when Tommy stepped close, carefully draping it around his neck and fastening it, before spinning the clasp to the back. He had hummed, watching as Evan’s eyes drifted closed as his fingers danced over the chain. One hand had gone to Evan’s jaw, tipping his head up and to the side so Tommy could see the gold against his skin. He had traced the cool metal with his fingers, over and over again until it was warm from their shared body heat and Evan was squirming and straining against him. Then, he patted his boyfriend on the cheek, and told him to get dressed or they really would be late. 

Evan had swore at him, and threw a pair of balled up socks at his head.

Tommy was paying for his earlier teasing now. He’s not sure how much is Evan getting his revenge, and how much is just his naturally adorable self. His boyfriend can sometimes come across as guileless about social cues, but he’s got a bratty streak a mile wide. Either way, Tommy is suffering. Hen had taken one look at his face the first time Evan had gotten ‘distracted’ by someone at the bar, and nearly laughed herself sick. 

Tommy walks up as the tattooed guy sways even more into Evan’s space, letting go of his arm to get a phone out. Evan is nodding at something he’s saying, but his eyes trip over to Tommy when he gets close enough. There’s a light there, catching in his blue eyes; some sparkling mischief that lets Tommy know that this encounter, at least, is Evan playing with him. The stranger’s eyes also move over to him, and he leans back on his stool, clutching his phone and straightening up. He gives Tommy a slow once over. Brown eyes dart between the two of them.

Tommy lays a hand on the small of Evan’s back, leaning in to press a quick kiss to the rounded muscle of his shoulder. “Was wondering where you got to with the beer, baby.”

“Oh sorry, I was just talking tattoos with Jordan here.” Evan turns his head towards Tommy, close enough to kiss but not reaching out. His eyes drift down to his lips.

“Is that so?” He murmurs into the space between them. His eyes flick back up to ‘Jordan’ and he lets his expression go flat.

Jordan straightens even further. He looks kind of bizarre, perched on a bar stool with his back ramrod straight. When he speaks, his voice is loud, blusterous. “Yeah man, Buck’s got some nice ink.” And then, more confrontational, “What about you?”

Tommy turns to face him, lips curling up into a smirk. “No tattoos here. I’m more into piercings.”

He can hear Evan gulp beside him. 

Jordan’s nostrils flare. Tommy smirks wider, letting his teeth show. Evan squeaks out some excuse, turning away from the bar and hugging the pitcher of beer to his chest. He flutters his free hand over Tommy’s back as he herds him back towards the table. Over his shoulder he throws a distracted, “Nice to meet you.”

Tommy chuckles as Evan harries him, Hen and Karen looking up as they get close. Evan’s blushing, making his blue eyes stand out even more. He thumps the pitcher down, sitting down and scooching into the back of the semi-circle bench seat, looking up fervently at Tommy. He sits down too, laying a hand heavily on Evan’s thigh. Hen’s shaking her head as she pours herself another beer, and Karen slurps noisily at her straw.

“I expect this kind of behaviour from you, Buck, but Tommy, if you get us kicked out I will never forgive you.”

“No harm done, Evan was just making friends.” He slides his hand higher on Evan’s thigh just to see him freeze and choke on a breath, before trying to hide it behind his empty beer glass. Hen rolls her eyes and takes a long drink of her beer. 

Karen giggles at them, fishing the last ice cube out of her glass and crunching it, with obvious satisfaction. The music changes, something poppy and upbeat, and a cheer goes up from the dancefloor. “Ooh!” She grabs Hen’s hand. “Let’s dance! You guys coming?” She looks at Buck for an answer. 

“I–I’m okay right now.” He looks to Tommy, who shakes his head, lifting his palm off of Evan’s thigh and reaching for the pitcher. “We can watch your stuff though.”

She pins him with a knowing look and his blush darkens. Hen and Karen shuffle out of their side of the booth and step away, melting into the swarming crowd. Tommy pours them both fresh beers and takes a long sip. The song swells. The lights change too, dimming around the tables and strobing pink and purple over the dancefloor. Tommy slips a hand around Evan’s waist and pulls him close. He brushes a kiss over a smooth cheek and Evan melts against him.

“Were you trying to make me jealous, sweetheart?” He speaks right into Evan’s ear, staying close to be heard over the music.

Evan nods, breathlessly, and turns until his cheek brushes Tommy’s and he can feel hot breath on his ear. “Yeah, I m–mean, yes. Yes, I was.”

Tommy hums curiously. “How’d that work out for you?”

Evan groans. “God, you’re so hot. When you’re jealous, when you’re being a bitch, when you’re laughing at me.” He swallows, and a hand drifts to Tommy’s chest, fiddling with the buttons of his black shirt. “Can we get out of here?”

Tommy doesn’t answer, instead pressing a kiss to the side of Evan’s neck. The hand on his chest wanders higher, warm fingers reaching his collar and brushing across bare skin. He bites down on a tendon, lightly, and Evan makes a sweet little noise. Tommy worries at it with his teeth until Evan squirms, his other hand sliding up to Tommy's neck. He hauls his boyfriend closer by the arm around his waist, his other hand landing on the sticky table top. Shaky fingers drift over the bolt of his jaw and find an earlobe, tracing over the thick silver hoops he's wearing. 

The hand on his chest turns purposeful. Evan unerringly finds his nipple through the two shirts he’s got on, searching for one of the little barbells he recently started wearing again. It’s not surprising behavior; Evan’s obsessed with his piercings. He tugs on the metal bar, twists it carefully. Heat pools in Tommy’s belly. 

He licks the abused skin under his mouth, pressing another light kiss to the blooming bruise before backing off. Evan’s hands on his body keep him close, but it's far enough. His boyfriend looks debauched. His eyes are blown black, a thin ring of blue around big, fat pupils. His mouth is red and open, an indent in his lower lip from where he was biting to keep quiet. 

Tommy grabs his glass and takes a deep drink. He sets it down with a sound that he can’t hear over the pounding music and Evan’s heavy breaths. His hand is damp with condensation. He loops a finger through the fine gold chain around Evan’s neck and gives it a gentle tug. He bites his lip again, half muffling the little moan that tries to escape. Blue eyes are fixed on Tommy. 

“Let me finish my beer, and then we’ll say goodbye.”

[stillthesunkenstars]

Gallifrey One Brax Crumbs from Miles Richardson

Most things are paraphrased! If something is a direct quote I’ll put it in quotation marks. This only what I Heard and remembered so feel free to add on to me in a reblog or another post.

Q&A:

My Q: I felt that the element of ‘performance’ is very present in brax, he performs the role of a villain in the late collection era, he performs to be a symbol in the Deindum war, and he performs masculinity to present as a man in general, how would you connect brax with the element of ‘performance’ in his identity?

MR: I see Brax as someone who is both and in between, someone who is ‘androgynous and asexual’, more fueled by the want of power (for the general greater good) than anything else. He is a pragmatist who sees sex as something that is unnecessary to him, and also very fond of women in the ‘purely honorific’ way. I also tried to play Brax with an ‘air of camp’, and Scott Handcock once described me as the ‘gayest heterosexual’ he’s ever seen.

———

My Q: Are there chances of Brax returning in future BF audios?

MR: Lisa Bowerman told me on David Warner’s Funeral that I can ‘look forward to working with her again soon’ so I hope I can return to the audios. (He also talked about how David Warner suffered severe vertigo in the last few years and was unable to do regular acting, and was grateful for the opportunity that BF had given him to work in audio.)

———

My Q: Which Shakespeare plays do you think Brax would like?

MR: Braxiatel’s favorite Shakespeare plays would be Coriolanus and Titus Andronicus, there’s something really ‘braxiatelian’ about how gory the latter is.

My Q: (follow up from a bit later) Can you elaborate on why you chose these two plays for Brax?

MR: I chose Coriolanus because it's about a man who desired control but is slowly losing it, and Titus ‘because it's a revenge play, and brax can be very vengeful at times.’

———

My Q: Did you know Brax was a professor of Theatre before he moved his collection to KS-159?

MR: I didn’t know!

Scott Handcock: Yeah that’s why we cast you.

MR: I took a post-grad course on teaching Shakespeare!

———

My Q: Justin Richards said he named Brax ‘Irving’ because it was a theatrical name, do you know what did he mean by that?

MR: It must be after Henry Irving, who was a very famous actor in the 1800s.

———

My Q: What are your favorite episodes to have acted in in the Benny series?

MR: Glory Days and Tub full of Cats, the former because I get to do a lot of different Brax voices, and the latter because of how ‘wacky’ it is.

———

Trivia:

When Brax proposed to Romana in Gallifrey 401 MR tried his best to sound ‘sexy and appealing’.

MR thinks a lot of Brax fans draw Brax based of his looks

MR likes the ‘Benny breakfast’ from Denny’s a lot! (I went to Denny’s the next morning and tried it, it’s called ‘Classic Benny Breakfast’ and don’t flame me for it but I think it’s kinda bad 🫢)

Before the con he went to Griffith Observatory with Seán Carlsen

He came to the con wearing formal suits because it would seem more in character for Brax fans

This is personal but I gave him two brax photocards and a Brax Charm, and he says he remembers my artstyle from when Kenny Smith passed two of the same photocards to him after the Gally in 2023! He also said he has those in his office near his laptop 😭😭

Also personal but I showed him my new itabag with Benny photocards and he pointed to the Brax one and went ‘Oh that’s me! I look so handsome in there’ 🥺

[moonsdrs]

FANDOM IN MY 60S FAME DR...

would you be able to survive being famous in my 1960s fame dr?

there's only one way to describe fandom life in my 60s fame dr and it is: crazy. crazy as fuck. now, don't get it twisted! i truly adore and cherish mine (and the boys') fanbase with all my heart and soul and everything in between but dear god would i be lying if i said they don't scare me too. i'm already big and famous and i already associate with some of the biggest acts of the decade and decades to come so imagine my fandom and their fandom mixed together...yeah. it's a lot.

having to be escorted everywhere like you're god damn jfk with about 5-8 policemen on motorbike, cars with tinted windows, bodyguards to the 9, sneaking in and out the back. and it's not like they'd hurt you but they're just a bit- handsy. they like to grab and pull you and all they want is a hug but damn you bout to pop my arm out it's socket!

other fandom things is how serious they take things. like modern day streaming. they will get your whole album charting all numbers on the top 10 if they got to. they will go to WAR for you even if just as one bad rumor or word of you is dare uttered. like once this interviewer low key dissed me and mine and the boys' fanbase was so mean back that he had to send me a written apology directly.

my favorite memory is the first time michael and i confirmed ourselves to be in a relationship and y'know there are like those weird few that had acted as if he was THEIRS the whole time but otherwise we were well received. many of the guys' fandom didn't really dabble in mo-town or the type of pop i put out so they also benefited to expanding their own music to my own which then introduced them to jimi so on so forth. i had my own like..following? from their fans who basically dedicated themselves to me too. they made posters and letters and gave flowers and stuffed animals.

and another thing, items i even HOLD for merely a moment will be sold out within 72 hours. that one strawberry chapstick sold in basic corner stores? you won't see it for at least another month. those mary janes that were 35 bucks? yeah, well they're 100 now because of the demand. i said i liked this one song by this singer? suddenly they're charting (but not too close to my own).

so, i have more to talk about eventually and much more for when i shift and come back i'm sure. but for now this is where i will shut up. if you got questions and stuff please ask in my inbox and i'll get back as soon as humanly possible. love ya xx

[kuiperblog]

A big one is that Costco stocks fewer unique items. A typical Costco location will have maybe ~4,000 SKUs, whereas a Target might have ~80,000 SKUs. This has several benefits:

Fewer SKUs means quicker inventory turnover

The higher the sales volume is for an item, the easier it is for sellers to move.

If a SKU is obscure or unpopular enough, it might never get bought, winding up as "dead inventory." (Maybe Target never manages to find a buyer for the last 2 bottles of sriracha-flavored mushroom ketchup.)

Costco only stocks the most popular ketchup SKUs that will move off the shelf quickly.

Think about what it actually means for a product to "move off the shelf quickly." That's not just a poetic way of saying "people are really eager to buy it," it means that Costco inventory literally spends less time on the shelf. When a huge part of the retail cost is the cost of keeping items on the shelf (and paying for the rent, utilities, security, etc), "less time on shelf" = "less inventory expenses".

And aside from the inventory costs of having a shelf on the item for longer, and just think about the time value of money: in a world where deflation means the dollar shrinks with every passing day, every extra day that an item sits on the shelf before being sold is a day that it is losing value.

Consider what it means for the cash flow of the business: suppliers typically get paid "Net 30" or "Net 60," which means that the retailer pays the supplier 30 to 60 days after receiving inventory. (The suppliers are essentially extending the retailer a line of credit -- this is something Dan Davies described in Lying for Money, and which I summarized in my book review.)

If the product sits on the shelf for longer than that, then the retailer has "cash flow problems," and they probably have to find a line of credit since they are now paying for inventory that they have yet to make a sale on.

When Costco products "move off the shelf quickly," they have the opposite of these types of cash flow problems: they make the sale, get the money, but still have another 20+ days to pay their supplier. This is called "negative working capital" and essentially amounts to getting an interest-free loan from your supplier.

Some inventory depreciates on the shelf

This is related to the above point about inventory turnover. I mentioned "the time value of money" which is real but sort of marginal; inflation doesn't reduce the value of a dollar that much over a 30 day period.

However, there are some items that decrease in value the longer that they sit on the shelf. Big examples of these are electronics like TVs. A TV that is $4,000 today probably won't be worth $4,000 in 12 months. It loses value for every day that it spends on the shelf. So once again, Costco's approach of "stock fewer SKUs -> get faster turnover" is preventing this kind of loss.

Fewer SKUS means higher sales volume per SKU

This is more marginal than the other factors, but bears mentioning: instead of having a little bit of many things, Costco has a lot of a few things. Just as you can save money by "buying items in bulk" from Costco, Costco can save money by "buying items in bulk" from its suppliers.

Costco has less shrinkage

Costco, which charges an annual membership, has a shrinkage rate that is around a tenth of a typical retailer. (Reportedly, Costco shrinkage is 0.1-0.2%, average is 1.6%.)

Shrinkage is a huge deal when you consider that net retail margins are pretty tiny (Walmart has a net profit margin of 2.5%, Costco's is 2.4%).

We can't really do math using the net margins since those already have shrinkage baked in to the calculation of costs, but consider a hypothetical example of a retailer that has 5% net margins if we consider everything except shrinkage (so we're factoring the wholesale price of the goods on the shelf, the wages of the employees that stock the shelf, the cost of literally keeping the lights on and paying for all other utilities, etc etc.)

For this hypothetical retailer with a 5% margin ("net except for shrinkage"), that means that when they sell a frozen pizza for $10, their total cost is $9.50, and they make a profit of 50 cents on the transaction. But if someone steals a frozen pizza off the shelf, they lose $9.50.

In other words, when one pizza is stolen, they need to sell 19 pizzas just to break even!

Fewer SKUs means lower operational/labor costs

A non-trivial amount of the labor cost of a Target location is the time that employees spend stocking the shelves. (I am reporting this based on my own experiences as a 23-year-old Target employee, rather than industry research, but my entire job was putting inventory on the shelf, sometimes just a few bottles at a time.)

Suppose Target sells 10 different kinds of ketchup and stocks 6 bottles of each SKU, while Costco sells 2 kinds of ketchup and stocks 30 of each SKU. Target will much more frequently encounter the situation where a single SKU runs out and they need to send an employee to restock the shelf, even if it's just to put 10 bottles on the shelf, whereas whenever a Costco resupplies the ketchup shelf, they'll be putting 40+ bottles there.

(The above is not a real example -- Target would have more bottles of the popular SKUs like Heinz classic and fewer bottles of the less-popular SKUs like "Hunts reduced sugar ketchup" but hopefully this imprecise model is still useful as an illustrative example.)

Also, this is once again just "reckoning from my perspective as an employee," but it just seems to me like Costco has fewer operational costs due to the way they move inventory around on the floor. I have been at Costco location where it seemed like "restocking" was just driving a forklift and placing a pallet at a designated spot, whereas as at Target the process more often involved a person physically going to the stockroom, finding a specific box, bringing out a relatively small quantity of product, carefully arranging them on the shelf, and breaking down the cardboard box.

I'm sure that Costco employees spend some of their working hours doing "small annoying things," but the modal Costco employee seems to be accomplishing more with an hour of their time than I did with one hour of my time as a Target employee. Also, Costco probably has higher employee morale than Target because Costco doesn't force its employees to bring their own boxcutters to work. (That observation about boxcutters is not really all that germane to the discussion of "how is Costco so successful," but it emerged from deep within my soul as a former Target employee.)

[armyyoftwoo]

another caldre noncon fic but w/ sub andre, and bloodplay (requested by anon)

guys i hope u enjoy this its like 4500 words which is way longer than i usually do but i had fun w this request!! its also now uploades on ao3 if anyone cares

andre laughed. "she really said that?"

cal fiddled with a loose razor blade between his fingers, the cold metal glinting under the dull light of his bedroom lamp. "she's stupid. i mean, i like her 'n all, but rachels stupid. you're no crazier than me."

andre leaned against the wall, his eyes flicking over cal's cluttered room. "dunno. i guess she's right. i can be a bit much."

"you're just not everyones cup of tea, that's all," cal said, shrugging his shoulders, his eyes still focused on the razor blade. it spun in his hand, the light playing off its sharp edge. "i don't think you're too much."

"thanks, i guess." there was a hint of sarcasm in andre's voice. "but really, she has a point. well, not a point, but you know. i understand where shes coming from. i'm scarier- i don't mean to be, but i am."

cal looked up from his blade, his expression serious. "no, man, you're not. we're in this together. equal parts scary."

andre laughed. "cal, you are not fuckin scary. i mean, maybe with a gun in your hand, but other than that, you come across as kinda," he paused, searching for the right words, "meek."

hearing andre describe him as meek was almost laughable. calvin gabriel was not fuckin meek. cal's face twitched at the remark. "meek?" he echoed, his voice rising slightly. he felt a sudden surge of indignation. "is that what you think of me?"

andre, caught off guard by cal's reaction, raised his hands in a placating gesture. "hey, man, i didn't mean it like that. it's just... people don't look at you and think 'dangerous' right away."

cal's eyes narrowed as he studied the razor blade, his thumb tracing the edge with a practiced ease. "maybe i'm just good at hiding it," he murmured, his voice tight.

"look, cal, i know you've got your shit, but you're not like that. you're... you're nice, you know? sweet even," said andré, clearly trying to smooth over the tension that had suddenly coiled around them.

cal's gaze didn't waver from the razor blade. "sweet?" he echoed.

"yeah, you know, like how you take care of me. you're always looking out," said andré, desperatly trying to clarify his point.

"do you not think im capable, of like, anything serious?" cal glared up at andré, the razor blade now still in his hand, the anger bubbling just beneath the surface.

andre took a deep breath. "of course i think you're capable of serious shit. i mean, zero day is pretty serious, right?" he said, "i mean, you're just not scary to me, since i know you'd never hurt me." he offered a small, reassuring smile. it only served to piss cal of further- did andre not see cal as an equal? did he not understand that cal was just as dangerous, if not more so?

"just because i can control myself doesn't mean i'm not as dangerous as you," cal spat out, his grip tightening around the razor blade. "you think just 'cause i dont freak out every five minutes that i'm not in this just as deep?"

andre looked at cal, surprised by the sudden hostility. "cal, chill, i didn't mean it like that. we're on the same page, remember?" he tried to reassure him, glancing around the room for something to distact cal with to diffuse the situation.

cal's knuckles turned white around the razor blade. "you're always underestimating me," he hissed through gritted teeth. "i'm not just some weak-hearted pussy who's going along for the ride."

andre sighed heavily, his annoyance etched on his face. "i know you're not, okay? it's just that sometimes you seem so... i don't know, so not into it."

with a sudden burst of energy, cal sprang from his chair, the legs scraping against the floorboards with a sharp sound that made the hairs on the back of andré's neck stand on end. before he could react, cal was on top of him, pushing him onto the bed with a surprising strength that belied his smaller frame. andré's breath left his lungs in a whoosh as he stared up at his friend, anger flickering in his eyes.

it didn't take much wrestling around to get the blade held up to andres neck, the sharpness of it cold and unyielding. "cal, come on, man, that's enough joking," andre chuckled nervously, his eyes darting to the side, looking for an escape.

it felt nice to finally not have to pretend, cal thought as he straddled andré, the razor blade poised at his friend's neck. the mask of innocence had been slipping for a while now, and it was exhausting to maintain.

"cal, seriously, get off of me. this isn't funny." andres voice quivered as he stared into cal's cold, unblinking eyes. cal's grip on the razor blade was unyielding, his thumb poised just right to draw a crimson line. the room grew eerily quiet, the only sound the erratic thumping of their hearts.

as cal leaned in closer, the smell of sweat and metal filled the air. he felt something strange, something he hadn't anticipated - an unwelcome stirring in his pants. he realized, with a jolt of self-loathing and excitement, that he was hard. he almost pulled off of andre, worried that he'd call him out, make fun of him for it. but then it clicked. andre was in no place to laugh. he wouldn't dare. not with the blade so close to his neck, not with the look of absolute seriousness cal hoped he was conveying.

cal took a moment to admire the sight that was andre kriegman, sprawled out beneath him. andre's cheeks were flushed with exertion, his breathing rapid. his eyes darted around the room, looking for anything that might serve as a distraction from the cold steel against his skin. cal felt a twinge of pleasure at the power he held over him. he wondered if this is what it'd feel like when zero day rolled around. he hoped so.

with a sudden jerk, cal fumbled with the drawstring of andré's sweatpants, pulling them down to mid-thigh. andré's eyes widened in shock, his heart racing even faster. "cal, what the fuck are you doing?" he squeaked, his voice high with fear.

cal brought the razor blade down with a swiftness that belied his earlier clumsiness. andré's body convulsed, trying to squirm away, but the movement was ill-timed. the blade sliced through his skin, leaving a crimson trail in its wake. the pain was immediate and intense, like a bolt of lightning tearing through his leg. andre let out a strangled yelp, his eyes watering. the blood began to flow, staining the fabric of his underwear and pooling on the bed.

"fuck!" andré yelped, his voice a mix of shock and pain. his eyes darted from the blade to cal's face, searching for an explanation. but cal's expression remained eerily calm, his pupils dilated with excitement.

the razor blade hovered over andré's trembling thigh, the line of red already forming a gruesome pattern on his pale skin. "cal. cal, that really fucking hurt!" he panted, trying to push cal away with his hands, but the latter's grip was like steel. "why'd you do that? fuck, get off, i need to stop the bleeding!"

cal ignored the desperation in andré's voice, his own mind racing with a thrill he hadn't felt in a long time. "you tried to squirm away," he murmured, his voice devoid of its usual awkwardness. "i told you not to." he leaned in closer, his breath hot against andré's neck, and andre tensed up, his eyes never leaving the blade.

the room was filled with the scent of fear and blood, a heady mix that only served to excite cal further. he felt his own heart pounding in his chest, his pulse racing as he traced the blade along the fresh wound. he watched andré's eyes water, the pain clear on his face. of course he was already crying- it was almost funny how low andres pain tolerance was.

andres eyes darted down to cals crotch, and back up again. cal could tell he was about to freak out. he wasnt sure if he felt bad or not. sure, he hadnt meant for it to get to this point, yet here they were. andre looked at him with a mix of fear and anger, his breath coming in short, shallow gasps. "cal, stop it, you're scaring me," he managed to say, his voice trembling.

scaring him. cal was scaring him. and he could see it in andres eyes, the way they widened, the way the pupils dilated. it was a heady feeling, one that made his own pulse quicken. and his cock throb. he didn’t expect this. he didn’t plan for it. but as the blade hovered over the fresh wound, the power rushed through him, a high he hadn’t felt in ages. it was exhilarating.

swipe. a second cut. a line, straight and precise. andre's leg jerked again, the pain searing through him, his voice hoarse as he yelled out. "cal! what the fuck is wrong with you?"

cal just stared at him, the blade still in his hand, a strange look of fascination on his face. "i told you not to move," he said, his voice calm, almost detached.

andre was *shaking* now. cal considered getting off him, but the feeling was too good to let go. he'd never felt like this before. powerful, in control, alive. "cal, this isn't funny," andre repeated, his voice shaking as much as the rest of him.

but as cal went to readjust the blade, his hand slipped, a drop of sweat making the metal slick. he swiped it down again, but this time, it was his own finger that felt the bite of the blade. a line of red appeared, so thin it almost didn't look real. "fuck."

cal didn’t make any move to get off and grab a bandage, just stared at the crimson bead forming on his fingertip with a strange fascination. the pain was there, but it was distant, almost as if it were happening to someone else. he brought his finger to his mouth and tasted the coppery tang of his own blood. it was oddly comforting, familiar.

but andre was still there, his eyes wide with a mix of fear and disbelief. "cal, stop. please." his voice was shaking, his whole body tense. cal realized he'd gone too far. he had to regain control before andre freaked out completely.

but andre was already freaked out. and really, what was the harm in pushing things a little further?

andres body jolted, and his eyes squeezed shut when cal yanked down his boxers. when he recovered, he glanced nervously at cals crotch, then back to the blade, and then back to cal's face. "cal, man, i'm not...i'm not like that. you know i'm not." he stuttered, his heart racing, his face burning with embarrassment. "neither are you. i know that. so just...just get off me, okay?"

cal stared at him, his expression unreadable. he hadn't expected andré to react like this. but he had to admit, the fear in his voice was like music to his ears. "what do you mean, 'not like that'?" he hummed, the blade hovering over andré's exposed thigh.

andre's eyes snapped open, the desperation in them palpable. "i mean, we're friends, cal," he whispered, his voice trembling. "i don't wanna do... whatever you're trying to start here."

cal's gaze was transfixed on the sight of andré's bare skin, the softness of his thighs a stark contrast to the sharpness of the blade. he felt his grip on reality slipping, the line between playful banter and dark reality blurring into one. the warmth of andré's body beneath him was a stark reminder of his vulnerability, and cal's heart hammered in his chest as he realized the power he had. he slid the blade away from andré's skin, letting the metal graze his inner thigh, leaving a trail of goosebumps in its wake. andré's breath hitched, his eyes squeezed shut tightly as he waited for the next cut.

with a twisted smile, cal brought the razor back up, watching andré's muscles tense in anticipation of the pain. he didn't hesitate, slicing into the flesh again, this time creating an deeper slit. andré clamped a hand over his mouth. the warm, sticky blood began to seep out, the metallic scent filling the room, mixing with the salty tang of their sweat.

cal stopped when he realized andre was crying, his eyes wide and desperate. "quiet down," he murmured, his voice soothing despite the blade in his hand. "it's just a few styros, andre." he smiled, "it's not the end of the world."

andre's chest heaved, tears streaming down his face. "it hurts, cal," he whimpered. "stop."

cal looked at him, the blade still in his hand. and then, as if a switch had been flipped, his expression changed. he looked down at the blood, and then back at andre's tear-stained face. and then, something else took over. he looked down at his own crotch and paused, before pulling out his cock, the blood on his hand smearing onto the shaft. he stared at it, pulsing in the dim light of his room, and he knew what he wanted.

andre's eyes went wide, the fear turning to horror as he realized what cal was about to do. "no, no, no," he whispered, his voice shaking. "please, cal, don't. we're friends. fuck, we're partners. we're not supposed to—"

but cal was beyond listening. the blood had brought something to the surface, something primal and dark that had been festering within him for years. he leaned in, pressing the tip of his cock against andre's trembling thigh, the blood mixing with precum to create a slick mess. andré's eyes grew even wider, his breath coming in short, panicked gasps as he stared up at his best friend.

"cal," he whispered, his voice trembling. "please, man, this isn't right. we can't—"

but cal was in his own world now, his eyes glazed over as he leaned closer, the razor blade still poised in his hand. "just one more, andré," he cooed, his voice unnaturally gentle. "just one more and then i'll stop. i promise."

andre's eyes widened even further, his voice shaking as he begged, "no, cal, please. we don't need to do this." his words fell on deaf ears, though, as cal's grip on the blade tightened. he took a deep breath, his nostrils flaring with the scent of fear and blood.

with a twisted smile, cal brought the blade down again, aiming for a spot just below the first cut. but in his excitement, he applied too much pressure, and the blade sank deeper than he intended, hitting the layer of fat beneath the skin. andré's body arched off the bed with a muffled screech, his hand flying to the wound as if to hold in the pain. the sight of the deeper cut, the blood welling up and mixing with the fatty tissue, brought an unexpected rush of pleasure to cal's face.

the pain was searing, white-hot, and andré's eyes rolled back in his head. his breathing was ragged, his chest heaving with the effort to stay still. "oh god, oh god," he whimpered, his hand pressing hard against the wound.

cal's own breath was coming in short, sharp bursts now, his eyes locked onto the crimson mess he'd created. he was hard, painfully so, his cock pulsing with each beat of his racing heart. the blade was still in his hand, but it was no longer needed for the pain he sought to inflict. instead, he brought his hips down, grinding against andré's thigh in a desperate attempt to find relief.

andre let out a little shriek as cal began to grind his cock against his bleeding thigh. cal wondered if the neighbors could hear them, but the sound of his own pulse in his ears drowned out any other sounds. he pushed down harder, feeling the slickness of blood and precum mixing together, creating a strange sort of lubricant. he could feel andré's muscles tense under him, the tremors of pain and fear causing his thigh to quiver with each thrust.

"cal, stop," andré whispered, his voice barely audible. his hand was clamped over the deepest cut, trying to stem the flow of blood. "please, just get off me."

cal wasnt where he went wrong in life to have ended up in a situation like this. maybe it was all the weird porn he'd watched, the violent video games. maybe it was just that he'd been holding it in for too long, the anger and the pain. or maybe it was just because he was just fucked in the head. but as he felt andre's trembling thigh beneath him, the blood smearing against his own skin, he realized he didn't care. all he cared about was the power he felt in that moment, the absolute control he had over the other boy's body. it was a rush like nothing he'd ever felt before.

he pushed andres hand away from the deepest cut, the blood oozing out in a steady flow, revealing the yellow layer of fat beneath. it peeked out like a shy, grotesque sunflower, the edges of the wound gaping open. the sight of it made cal's stomach churn in a not entirely unpleasant way. he wondered what itd feel like to touch- to stick his finger inside and feel the squishy wetness, to see if he could make andre scream louder.

nothing was stopping him, he realized with a sudden, wild euphoria. he could do whatever he wanted, and andre wouldn't stop him. not with the blade in cals hand and the blood on his thigh. so he leaned down and kissed andre, hard, his teeth clicking against his teeth. andre's eyes went wide, and he tried to pull away, but cal's grip was too strong.

cal's tongue forced its way into andré's mouth, tasting the salt of his tears. andré's body went rigid, his whole being screaming in protest. he tried to push cal away, but his hands were too slick with blood to gain any purchase. cal's tongue danced around in andré's mouth, feeling the warmth and wetness, the taste of fear. it was exhilarating.

as cal pulled away, panting, a cruel smile played on his lips. "you know, andré," he said, his voice thick with lust and malice, "you're not so tough after all." he took a moment to appreciate the horror in andré's eyes before his hand moved down to the gaping wound on his thigh.

"cal, ohmygod, don't," andre's voice was barely a whisper as he watched cal's hand move towards the open wound. "please, man. i'm sorry for whatever i did to make you mad." his voice was shaking, his body trembling underneath cal.

but cal's mind was made up. he wanted to see how far he could take this. he pushed his finger into the wound, and andré's whole body convulsed. he let out a little whine, his eyes squeezing shut as cal explored the inside of his leg. cal looked back up just in time to see andre turn his head to the side and retch, vomit spilling out onto the comforter. the smell hit him, but he didn’t move, didn’t stop.

andre's body was shaking, his breath coming in hitches as he sobbed uncontrollably. tears and snot ran down his face, and cal felt a strange mix of pity and excitement. he'd never seen andre like this before. never seen the tough, angry kid break down so completely. it was...beautiful in a fucked up way.

cal pulled his finger out of the wound with a wet pop, the blood sticking to his skin. he brought it up to his mouth and sucked it clean, watching andré's reaction. his sobs grew louder, his body trembling as he tried to scoot away. but there was nowhere to go, not with the way cal had him pinned down.

and then, without warning, cal shifted his weight and ground his hips down, his cock rutting against andré's soft dick. the feeling was foreign, but it didn’t dull the excitement. andré's body went rigid, his eyes wide with shock and disgust. he tried to push cal away again, but his hands slipped on the blood-soaked comforter.

cal's eyes rolled back in his head as he felt the softness of andré's cock against his own, the horror of the situation lost in the haze of his newfound power. the warmth of andré's blood was like a siren's call, urging him onward. he moaned, his hips moving in a rhythmic pattern, the friction of skin on skin sending waves of pleasure through his body. andré's dick was hardening now, despite his fear, the body's involuntary response to stimulation.

cal buried his face in andres shoulder, his teeth digging into the soft flesh as he rutted against andre's hardening dick. andre's body was a taut bowstring of fear and disgust, but his traitorous body was responding to the pressure, his cock swelling with each desperate thrust. cal felt a little bit of pride at that, at his power to make andre react even when he didn't want to. he took andre's hand and guided it to his own cock, the stickiness of the blood making it even more slippery. "touch it," he breathed into andre's ear. "please, just touch it."

"i don't wanna," andre managed to choke out, his voice thick with fear and revulsion. "please, cal. 'm dont wanna touch it."

but cal's grip was firm, his hand wrapping around andres own, guiding it down to his cock. he felt andre's hand shake, but eventually, his friend's trembling fingers curled around his length, the blood on his hand making everything slippery and warm. it was a strange, almost comforting feeling.

cal groaned, his hips bucking up against andres hand. "that's it," he murmured. "just like that."

andre's hand was a clumsy mess, his grip too tight, his entire body trembling, but cal didn't mind. the mere fact that andre was touching him was all he needed. he continued to thrust against him, his breathing growing more ragged by the second.

and then, without any warning, it was over. cal's body went rigid, his hips jerking up once, twice, and then he came, spurting hot cum onto andre's stomach and chest. the suddenness of it took him by surprise, and he couldn't help but let out a little gasp of embarrassment. he pulled back, his face flushing, the blade finally slipping from his grasp to clatter onto the floor.

andre was crying now, his body a mess of blood and cum and vomit. he looked up at cal with a mix of anger and fear, his eyes glittering with unshed tears. "cal- cal, i need to stop the bleeding- theres, fuck, theres so much blood-"

cal paused, his breathing heavy, his mind racing. he looked down at the mess he had made, the blood and cum and vomit staining the comforter. he kind of regretted loosing control like that. atleast itd been andre, and not rachel, or someone like that.

it was weirdly hard to go back to his usual facade after that. it took him a moment to consider what to say, how to act. he opened his mouth, hesitating before finally speaking. "oh- oh my god, dude, fuck, i-i didn't mean to do that," cal said, his voice shaking with what he hoped was a convincing mix of horror and regret. he rolled off of andre, his legs feeling like jello. "i'm sorry, andre. i don't know what came over me. does it hurt?"

andre was a mess, his eyes wide and wild, his hand still clutching at his leg. "yes," he whispered, his voice shaking. "yes, it fucking hurts, what kind of question is that?"

cal swallowed hard, trying to push down the smugness that threatened to bubble up. he had to play this right. "i'm gonna help you up, okay? and we can get some bandages." he offered a hand to andre.

♡

an hour later, they were sitting in the bathroom together, the water a murky red from the blood that had been washed away. andré's leg was bandaged up now, but he'd still yelp whenever cal accidentally bumped against it. cal on the other hand, was sitting on the edge, his legs in the water, sobbing into his hands.

he looked at andre through red rimmed eyes. "i'm sorry, 'dre. i'm sorry for everything. i'm just...i'm a monster," cal said, his voice cracking with each word. "i don't know what's wrong with me. i've never done anything like that before." his sobs grew louder, his body shaking with the force of his emotions. he hoped he looked remorsful enough.

andre stared at him, his expression unreadable. "you're not a monster, cal," he said softly, his voice thick with pain. "you're just...fucked up."

cal paused, for a second, before rememberimg his act. he took a deep breath, his chest heaving with fake sobs, his shoulders shaking. "i'm such a piece of shit," he choked out, his eyes squeezed shut. "i can't believe i did that to you, andre. i'm so sorry."

andre looked up, his eyes red and swollen from crying. he took a deep, shaky breath. "cal, man, it's okay," he murmured, reaching out a trembling hand to his friend. "it's not your fault. i know you didn't mean to."

cal grabbed his hand, clinging to it like a lifeline. "i really didn't. and i'm sorry. i'm just- i'm disgusting. you think im disgusting now, don't you?" he said, his voice cracking.

andre squeezed cal's hand back, the warmth of his touch surprisingly gentle. "no, man, you're not," he murmured, his voice thick with pain. "you just...you just had a moment. we all do." he took a deep, shaky breath. "please don't cry. i'm not mad at you. we're still friends."

cal leaned against the bathroom tiles, his shoulders shaking with his forced sobs. he whispered a silent 'thank you' to the heavens above, grateful that andre was so desperate for companionship that he would overlook what had just happened.

wiping his fake tears away, cal took a deep, shuddering breath, still trying to mimic the sound of someone genuinely upset. he sniffled, a bit too loudly, and then spoke, "andre, come on, man. you're hurt. let me help you 'outta the bath. i can take care of you." he hoped the mix of guilt and concern in his voice was enough to convince andré of his remorse.

andre looked at him with a mix of confusion and pain, but eventually, he nodded. what a gullible fuck, cal thought to himself, feeling a twinge of something close to admiration for the ease with which andré accepted his apology.

"i love you, man," cal said, his voice a little too high pitched.

"i love you too." andre replied, looking down. cal had to resist the urge to roll his eyes at the naive declaration.

[moonpie2405]

The Deal With Lindel's Reindeer

One of the reindeer here is obviously different - it is huge and pure white, obviously, and more importantly it doesn't seem to pull Lindel's sleigh at all, leading the way and coating the path in ice instead. In fact, it would have been simpler to have that reindeer pull the sleigh and cover the ground in ice at the same time, but Lindel doesn't do that.

Later on, he even asks the reindeer to 'say hello' to Chise, which it seems to understand.

All in all, Lindel doesn't treat this specific reindeer as a normal animal (which it isn't, obviously. Reindeer don't normally use ice magic.)

Also, reindeer, especially white reindeer are very spiritually significant to the Sámi.

My theory is that the reindeer is a gazzi

Here, Lindel specifically introduces himself as a shaman. In Sámi culture, shamans are called Noaidi.

All Noaidi had helping spirits or “gáccit/gazzi/gadze”, which varied depending on the realm in which the Noaidi was traveling. Gáccit usually manifested to the Sámi Noaidi in the form of an animal. Biret Maret Kallio, a spiritually guided Sámi woman, describes her experience with prominent Sámi views on gáccit: “Written tradition talks of three kinds of gazzi: One, usually a bird, accompanies the noaidi on journeys to the upper world; the second, usually a four-legged wild animal, accompanies the noaidi on journeys in this world, also called the middle world; the third, a fish, a snake, a lizard, or some other animal that can live underwater or underground, accompanies the noaidi in the lower world” (Kallio 1997).

It also seems like the gazzi is a companion to the person from birth to death, which also checks out since Lindel is shown to be accompanied by a white reindeer even as a child (though of course there is literally no confirmation that it is the same reindeer. The horns do look a bit different.)

Another source also said that the strongest shamans have reindeer bulls as their gazzi, which is very cool. (Though again, of course we don't know if it is a bull.)

I think it isn't unreasonable to think of it as a spirit companion to Lindel, which also adds a layer of complexity to Lindel being unable to leave his reindeer behind even after turning his back on everything else.

[thornrings]

SCROLLING ON NOELLE'S TIKTOK ACCOUNT

"HOLY CHEESE AND CRACKERS..." *video of noelle quickly flicking her room's lightswitch on and off. she quickly gasps and points the camera down at her hooves.* Holy cheese and crackers, guys... It's Uboa...

"I FOUND MEW UNDER THE TRUCK??" *footage of catti's dad under his car changing the oil* Yeah, holy crap, guys, I thought it was a myth, but... *noelle giggles* *she turns the camera towards herself* *text reading "XDDDDDDDD" appears on screen*

"PART 2/? - I FOUND A BAD EGG!!!" *noelle holds an egg painted to look like one from pokemon up to the camera* Yeah, I tried throwing it out again, but it just came back... *she very gently places the egg in the trashcan, closes the cabinet, and opens it again. the egg is gone.* I just can't seem to... get rid of it... *she walks over to her fridge and opens it, the egg is there* Yeah, I think my fridge might have had a bit too much fruitcake, *she zooms in on the fruitcake in the fridge* haha... Sound off in the comments if you have any ideas on how to get rid of this thing.

"WEIRD CAT PETTERZ RPG GLITCH" *noelle is pointing her phone camera at an old-looking tv* Uh, yeah, I don't even know how to describe what's going on here... Did somebody, uh... *she laughs* Did one of you shove fruitcake into the VCR when I wasn't looking? Seriously, if anyone knows what's going on here, leave a comment...

"LITTLE-KNOWN DRAGON BLAZERS SOFTLOCK?" *more of a scripted tone here, but her mic still sucks* Most people know that in the original Dragon Blazers, you can get softlocked in the cross-shaped maze if you don't bring the character who knows the way through. It's even acknowledged in the manual as "one of the bad guy's magic spells". But did you know that you can actually get softlocked even earlier? If you save in the area just south of the forest dungeon, then avoid saving riiight up until your sister gets cursed, then die, you can actually warp back to an area that's impossible to traverse without one of her debuffed spells. If you save there, you'll never be able to get out. Spooky!

"60 seconds of OG Cat Petterz ambience" *a wide shot of noelle's desk, including her computer (open to Cat Petterz), a few school books, and an open window. it's a beautiful day outside. the camera jitters slightly with the natural shake of noelle's hands.* *there is text on screen that reads: "It looks like you've been scrolling for a while! Maybe you should take a break with some cozy Cat Petters ambiance."* *there is something dark outside the window* *it lurks, it writhes* *it seems to greet you* *noelle holds the camera just as steadily as before. does she not notice?* *how could she not...?*

You feel compelled to scroll back on her profile, as far as you can go. You open one of the oldest videos you can find.

"FUNNNY Ice-E Snow prank on sister" *noelle's finger covers most of the camera. the edges of a snowy forest scene are visible around it. she speaks in hushed tones to another child.* You're sure about this…? Okay, you're probably right… If it's for a funny video, then… Right, it's fine… I'll relax, you just watch me! *the camera's perspective changes.* AAAH!!! I JUST SAW ICE-E OVER THERE!!! … YEAH, OVER THERE!!! *the wet crunch of a hand compressing snow is heard. noelle huffs, dashing forward. a taller person fills out the edges of the frame. a rustling of fabric nearly peaks the microphone, and then the person shrieks.* -- HEY!!! WHAT THE-- *the camera backs up again.* Elly, why would you… … You little shit…! Wait! They didn't-- It was me that-- *the video cuts out. it resumes to a closeup of noelle's face.* I just realized… I had my finger over the camera the whole time, fahaha… Uhh, I guess I'll post the video anyway… Yeah, yeah, I'm still posting it! I'm doing it right now! **END.**

[tea-cat-arts]

Shen Yuan getting transported into pidw isn't "the system punishing him for being a lazy internet hater," but instead representative of "step 1 of the creative process: getting so mad at something you decide to go write your own fucking book" in this essay I will