#treatise on why the ending wasn’t what I wanted
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Okay, this is 1600 words of (positive!) meta regarding the OFMD finale. Included is character analysis and a treatise on why a certain trope people keep throwing around does not apply here.
This is of course just my take, and I'm sure people will disagree, but I needed to get this out. Apologies if it comes off disjointed, I've had like no sleep.
Spoilers within, obviously. You have been warned. Heed the tags. I didn't tag any characters because I consider it a spoiler, but you know who this is about.
Listen. Listen.
Let me start off by saying I have been where you are. I’ve had beloved characters die, either because it was important to the narrative or for shock value. I’ve been there, so I’m not coming at this without empathy. I’m not an Izzy hater. I loved him as a character. I’m truly sad to see him go.
But from what I’m seeing around Twitter and tumblr, some of you do not understand the role of an antagonist in a story.
Izzy was always meant to die. The moment he said, in the first season, “the only retirement we get is death,” I knew he was meant to die in the end. The foreshadowing ran through both seasons. Izzy was the true antagonist of S1. He was there to keep Blackbeard tethered when he started pulling away, and yet he also set the plot in motion. He inadvertently introduced Blackbeard to the person who let him be just Ed. He put Ed on his own path to redemption without even knowing it.
S1 ended with Izzy getting what he wanted as Ed lost everything he had. S2 was about Izzy coming to terms with the fact that he’d gone too far, he’d turned Ed into a monster. It wasn’t what he wanted. He wanted Blackbeard back, just like old times. Instead, he got the Kraken, and it was more than he bargained for.
Especially after it cost him his leg and he realized how far gone Ed really was. The conversation that ended with Izzy’s half-assed suicide attempt was the final blow to Izzy—Ed really didn’t seem to care anymore. Where Izzy wanted him to stop giving a shit about his silly boyfriend, he instead got a Blackbeard who didn’t care about anything, and he was apparently now included in that category.
(I said half-assed suicide attempt because Izzy wasn’t meant to die then, THAT would have been an empty, pointless death. It wouldn’t have taught Ed anything—in fact, all it did was make him more self-destructive, which was Izzy’s purpose to the narrative, but not his endgame. That Ed thought Izzy killed himself pushed Ed to the brink. Ed wanted to die and take every scrap of Blackbeard with him. Had Izzy successfully killed himself, Ed and the Revenge would be at the bottom of the ocean.
It wasn’t until the crew left Izzy the unicorn leg that he realized the power of compassion, the incredible act of grace from a crew that suffered so much from Izzy’s own machinations and didn't need to forgive him. It moved him to tears, and it moved him to accept that maybe it wasn’t such a bad idea to let people in, to let himself be cared for. It was a foreign concept and something Izzy likely hadn’t experienced since losing his family (I fully expect a shit ton of fanfic of Izzy’s life before piracy).
Israel Hands found the capacity to let love all the way in and by god, did he pursue it.
But, again, Izzy was always meant to die, and I’m glad they stuck to the narrative they set out with instead of placating fandom and letting our influence dictate how they told this story That’s never good, trust me. Fandom should not influence a creator’s decisions regarding their own characters. It rarely if ever ends well.
[Stares in Voltron S8]
And I see a lot of people out here throwing the “bury your gays” phrase around—I beg you, please look up the definition of the trope. Izzy didn’t die because he was queer, he didn’t die because of his disability. He wasn’t one half of the only queer couple in the show fridged for shock value. He wasn’t killed off due to pressure from conservative viewers. He wasn’t the only queer, disabled character.
They didn’t kill off Lucius, or Jackie, or Wee John. Would you be as outraged if it was any of them?
Killing Eve is bury your gays. Supernatural is bury your gays. Pretty much any film, book, TV show, whatever, where a queer character dies because they’re queer, of AIDs, to further the narrative for a straight person, etc—that is burying your gays.
Izzy’s death was none of those things. Izzy’s death had meaning.
Izzy’s death freed Ed from the Blackbeard persona. It finally forced Izzy to say the things he couldn’t say until he realized it was his last chance. Izzy was also tired. I honestly think he stuck it out for Ed’s sake, because he was afraid to let Blackbeard go without making sure Ed would be ok.
He loved the idea of Blackbeard, but over time, he learned to love Ed. He finally understood what Ed tried to tell him the whole time.
“Fuck off, you twat. You’re surrounded by family.”
You’re safe. You’re loved. You don’t need me anymore. You don’t need to be reminded of who you’re capable of being, you need the people who will guide you to who you will become, and I’m not one of them.
I know a lot of Izzy fans are stung by his death, some of you are deeply upset. I get that. Like I said, I’ve been there. Sirius’s death made me throw that fucking book across the room. That Fucking Woman™ killed off my entire OTP, purely for shock value and, imho, a direct response to shippers. Trust me, I have felt betrayed by a creator for their decisions.
But I need you to understand that no, this was not a personal attack, this was not malicious, this was not “bury your gays." A show that celebrates queerness and diversity is not suddenly homophobic and ableist because your favorite character died and happened to be both of those things. But when the majority of your cast of characters is different in some way, and they’re in a show about 18th century pirates, you have to accept that one of them could, in fact, die. “Anyone Can Die” is also a trope and the more accurate one to describe E8.
If only being queer and disabled made you invincible.
Spoiler alert: it doesn’t.
And no, I’m not an Izzy hater. I loved him, I loved him as an antagonist, and I loved his redemption arc. He was fascinating and Con put his whole O’Nussy into that part. I’m sorry to see him go, but as a mystery writer who often has to kill off beloved characters, I understand that he served the purpose he had from the beginning.
I swear, if some of you had your way, there’d be no conflict at all in any form of media. This what a steady diet of nothing but fanfic gets you. This is not a fluffy one-shot with magical healing dick and a happy ending where everyone sails off into the sunset. If that’s what you wanted, what you headcanoned, you did this to yourself. It’s not David et al’s fault that we took that character and babygirled him. That’s the risk we take when we decide to love a specific character, when we take a genuinely terrible person (in S1) and woobify him.
So, please stop harassing and attacking David, Alex, et al. David did not and should not change his story to placate us. The fact he went ahead with it despite the backlash I’m sure he expected makes me respect him as a creator even more.
Anyway, I’m going to revel that we have three (!) queer relationships with happy endings where one or both didn’t immediately die (again, the actual definition of “bury your gays”) and that we got at least two seasons of a little show that celebrated individualism, diversity, queerness, compassion, and love.
In the end, it all came down to love.
“There he is.”
Goodbye, Blackbeard.
Hello, Ed.
#ofmd spoilers#ofmd season two spoilers#ofmd finale spoilers#ofmd finale#Meta#ofmd s2 spoilers#our flag means death
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Black and White Chapter 5
Read on AO3
Chapter Rating: M
Pairing: A!A X Female Tav (Non-abusive fic.)
Summary: Astarion introduces Tav to the Upper City. During their little jaunt, they run into a man that Astarion considers a bug in need of squashing. He also realizes something about Tav: He knows nothing about her.
Tags: Mentions of past sexual abuse/trauma.
It had been raining for days in Baldur’s Gate, the gray clouds casting a dark and gloomy atmosphere over the city. Astarion didn’t mind such weather. Being a creature of the night, he felt right at home. As an added bonus, it was also the perfect excuse to be cooped up with Tav. Neither of them had reason to leave the mansion and it gave him a sense of ease. She was safe, she was home, and he could protect her.
Taking a small break from his book, Astarion relaxed on the couch, resting his head on the back, and felt the gentle flames from the fireplace warm his face. Outside it may be warm and humid, but the library always managed to stay cold and dry. There were so many books down here that were kept hidden away from him when he was a spawn.
Cazador was not keen on his spawn reading anything he considered “of value.” Reading leads to being educated. Having an education meant his slaves could find a way to revolt. That was to be avoided, therefore most of the library was forbidden. Astarion picked up the hobby as yet another means of spiting his former master. He was going to take all the knowledge that was denied from him for two centuries.
“There you are!” Tav called from the doorway. She came up behind him and ruffled her hand through his hair, “It’s stopped raining.” Astarion took her hand and guided her around the couch. She let out a small yelp when he pulled her down to sit with him. Surprised she may have been, but no protest did she make. Not even when he placed his arm around her. The vampire was becoming much more bold in his advances.
“What’s this?” she asked, picking up the book, “‘Treatises on Conducting One’s Reason?’ My lord, are you trying to discover ways to put elves to sleep?” Astarion scrunched his face and snatched the book. He turned the pages to the first chapter, then placed it in front of her.
“Don’t knock it until you’ve read it. Go on,” he pointed to the first paragraph. Tav snapped the book shut and turned her body to face him.
“Come on, Astarion, enough reading. We’ve been shut in for days, let’s get some fresh air,” she whined, “Show me around the Upper City.” Taking the book back, he opened to where he left off. Why go out when he was perfectly content as is? He had a book, a fire, and a beautiful woman at his side.
“Please, Astarion,” she begged, resting her head on his shoulder. He angled his head just enough to see her pleading eyes and he was done.
“Fine,” he rolled his eyes, “ I suppose we should start introducing you to high society.”
“I’ll get ready!” Immediately, Tav hopped up and dashed away. Astarion let out a sigh and decided to wait for her in the foyer.
Tav descended the stairs in a deep blue dress with silver ornamentation and a neckline cut just low enough that he could see the swell of her breasts. She hadn’t worn such a style before. It wasn’t enough to be considered vulgar, but it did leave him wanting to see more. Now isn’t the time, he told himself, shaking the thoughts from his head. Astarion focused on the business at hand; a stroll in the ton, getting fresh air, and familiarizing Tav.
“Master, before you depart,” the chamberlain calmly strode over wearing his usual dead stare, “I have word from the suppliers. Provisions for the Eighthday gathering have been secured. Also, the lady has received a letter from Gale Dekarios.” Astarion nodded and waved him away. A letter from Gale? He didn’t like that, not one bit.
“Gathering?” Tav asked.
“Did I forget to mention it? I’m hosting a little soiree for a select few of society’s elite. Of course my little gatherings tend to end up in a mass of naked bodies moaning and screaming by midnight.” He let out a little giggle, but Tav was more than a little perplexed.
“Astarion, you’re bringing in society’s elite and making meals out of them? Why? Are you asking to be staked?” Immediately, he burst into laughter.
“Oh my dear, you are so wonderfully naive.” He watched her face turn a beautiful shade of red as it dawned on her what he meant by ‘naked bodies moaning and screaming.’ Playfully, he opened the door and swept his arm, “Ladies first.”
Midday promenades were typically conducted at the park and today was no exception, despite the dampness. Since the rains had finally receded, the wealthy were out in full force picnicking, walking, playing games, and -of course- gossiping. No outing would be complete without an earful of salacious news, no matter how true or untrue it may be. He knew by the head turns, the way they fell silent when they passed by that within the hour they were going to be the topic of speculation. Not that he minded.
They carried on along the path, nodding and greeting their fellow pedestrians. All were wondering about this new lady by his side. This left him with the same mixed emotions as the night at the arena.
Tav wasn’t being courted, not officially at least, and it gave him a nagging feeling that someone would try to steal her away. After all, she did turn him down during the party at the grove. But, that was when he was a pathetic spawn. He was different now, better. More worthy. Wasn’t he? She was more welcoming of his touches in the past few days, or was that in his mind?
“What’s that?” Tav’s question interrupted his thoughts. In the distance, he saw the hem of a skirt sticking out from behind a hedge. Sensing potential scandal, they veered off the path for a better view. The pair were in their own little world and didn’t see them approach. One of them was a face Astarion knew all too well.
“That is Lord Carlo Foxworth,” he whispered to Tav, “and that is most definitely not Lady Foxworth. Shall we say hello?”
“Let’s see how long it takes for them to notice us,” she proposed. Liking the idea, Astarion nodded and they stood in silence, eavesdropping. Nothing they said was particularly useful or damning, but Astarion did learn that Foxworth’s flirtations were some of the worst he’d ever seen.
“And I thought Petras’s pick up lines were awful.” Foxworth must have vaguely heard the hushed remark. His eyes scanned the surroundings and jolted when he saw Astarion and Tav. Neither of the pair seemed to care about being discovered.
“Ahh, Lord Ancunin. Have you come to lose more of your fortune to me playing cards?” Foxworth acted completely normal. Astarion would need to learn if this was a ruse or if the lord truly didn’t care about a scandal.
“No, no, no,” Astarion shook his head, “I cannot afford to part with any more capital. After all, I will be making quite the purchase in the lower city.” The bidding war in the lower city was scheduled to begin in two months and these two were the main contenders. Both men sought the locations for power and control, but for different reasons. Astarion wanted to expand his web, while Carlo desired to build housing units where he could bleed the population dry from rent.
“If that’s the case, you have no cause for concern” Foxworth came within a foot of Astarion, his nose turned upward and dark brown eyes stared down in condescending threat, “That pittance you use to fill your purse will not be going anywhere,” he pretended to flick dust off Astarion’s coat, “so don’t you worry.”
~~~~~
Tav shifted her attention between the potential mistress and the contest of who had the bigger manhood, gleaning whatever tidbits she could. The young lady seemed positively bored at the turn of events, standing there with her arms crossed, foot tapping, and the occasional yawn. Tav almost felt sorry for her, but not really. As for the men, she felt the staredown had gone on long enough.
“Lord Astarion,” she touched his arm, “aren’t you going to introduce me to your friend?” Astarion didn’t take his eyes off his rival, even as he motioned toward Tav.
“Lord Foxworth, this is an old friend of mine and advisor, Tav.” Upon the introduction, she curtsied. Carlo returned the gesture with a bow, then stared as if he recognized her.
“Have we met before?” he asked. Tav had a brief moment of panic. Most of the aristocracy from her time in society were human men and women. Anyone who knew her previously would be dead by now and Lord Foxworth was only in his late thirties. They couldn’t have met.
“The lord must have mistaken me for another,” she laughed, “I have been in the city less than a tenday,”
“I see,” he leered at her for longer than was comfortable, ”Tell me, miss advisor, will you be Lord Ancunin’s little get-together this tenday? I would love to be advised by you.” The innuendo was not lost on her. Judging by how he arrogantly resumed staring at Astarion, the intent was to provoke the vampire’s anger more than a request for…advisory.
“Lord Foxworth,” she spoke, her features and volume filled with suppressed ire, “I’d advise you to introduce us to your companion. You have been quite rude to her, making her stand in the background like that.” Tav smiled at the woman who couldn’t have cared less.
“Yes. This is Mariana Nightshade. You can call her my advisor.” Foxworth’s tone once again was mocking in nature. Mariana smiled politely and didn’t curtsy or speak. In the five minutes Tav had interacted with the couple, she knew she didn’t like them, she would never like them, and would love to see them placed alive in whatever cremation device Astarion had installed in his dungeon.
Close by, they heard labored breathing and the ruffling of skirts. Tav looked around the hedge and saw a portly woman with a gorgeous smile walking their way.
“Oh, there you are, Carlo!” she cheerfully spoke, “And Lord Ancunin is here too! How wonderful. Oh, and with a lovely lady,” she extended her hand, “Analee Foxworth.”
“Tav,” she replied. Analee’s handshake was as sincere as the woman herself. She reminded Tav of a woman she met briefly at a wine festival named Cora Highberry. The halfling was the target of a Bhaalist, whose assassination they were able to thwart. Like Cora, Analee seemed to radiate kindness.
With a face full of pride, Lady Foxworth pulled out a very detailed embroidery featuring a boy resting under a tree being adored by woodland creatures. The piece was unbelievable. Tav marveled at the painstaking effort that must have gone into such a finely crafted piece.
“This took me three months to finish, and it looks spectacular,” she pointed at the boy on the canvas, “That’s little Carlo. I can’t believe he will be ten this year!” The woman was positively beaming with joy, but her husband looked utterly annoyed.
“Put it with the rest, Analee,” he groaned.
“The rest? You have made others like this?” Tav asked, with purpose. Should she be able to secure a friendship with Lady Foxworth, she could learn something of value for Astarion. So, she feigned interest.
“Oh yes, I’ve been doing this since I was old enough to hold a needle,” she excitedly placed a hand on Tav’s forearm, “You should stop by next Firstday, if you’re available. We could have tea and I can show you my other works.” Carlo stepped in to protest, but before he could, Tav graciously accepted the offer. He roughly grabbed Analee’s arm and dragged her off without a goodbye.
Tav watched on, hoping her new acquaintance would be all right. Life for noble women might be privileged, but it wasn’t without perils. Sighing, she turned to say something to Astarion, but froze when she saw the intense scowl on his face. He said nothing. He did not move. How things played out obviously displeased him, but she wasn’t sure how or why and was too afraid to speak about it.
Suddenly, he snapped his head forward and walked off at a pace Tav barely kept up with. Heart pounding, she wondered what she said or did. The hour was getting late, so they headed back to the palace in silence. When they approached an archway exiting the park, they noticed a handsome man leaning against the stone wall. The lascivious look he gave Astarion indicated to Tav that she was, once again, about to have an encounter with one of his lovers.
Don’t look, don’t think, don’t feel, she told herself. It was an old trick she’d picked up over the years. Keep going, stay the course, bury your sorrow. She kept her eyes to the ground as they struck up a conversation.
“Lord Astarion, a fine day to be out and about. I felt the need for a brief constitutional. Increase my stamina and all that. Come Eighthday I will need to be in peak condition.” Tav kept her eyes down, trying to block them out. She felt stupid being jealous. It wasn’t as though she and Astarion were anything other than friends. Not that she believed he should take interest in her.
“Indeed you will, Bromwell.” Astarion’s voice was cordial with no trace of his underlying fury. Tav kept her eyes averted as they continued, and closed off her mind by internally singing an old elvish ballad. She was well into the third verse when Bromwell sauntered next to her and put an arm around her shoulder, pulling her from her thoughts.
“And will she be joining us this Eighthday?” he asked, motioning his free hand between the three of them. It took Tav a moment to understand the meaning, and when she did she instinctively broke free of him and moved closer to Astarion. The scowl had returned in full force.
“The lady has yet to decide.” The vampire slid his hand firmly around her waist, which she welcomed.
“I meant no offense,” he said, throwing his hands up. Astarion said nothing to the man and practically dragged Tav back to the Crimson Palace. It greatly unsettled the bard. She had seen him angry, but never at her and not like this.
~~~~~
“Vampires are scheming, paranoid, power hungry beasts.” Those were his words to her once. When Foxworth thought he recognized Tav, he wondered, “how does he know her?” That one, tiny thought soon escalated into a maddening torrent of questions.
Does he know where she came from? Did Astarion know where she came from? Where did she grow up? Does she have a family? What are her aspirations? Why did she come to him? Was she using him?
His mind began to spiral.
Who she was, where she came from, it was a complete mystery. All that time side by side and he only now realized she could be nothing but a pretty charlatan. It was a game he knew all too well. Lure your target in, get what you need from them, then cast them aside. The more he brooded, the more his confidence chipped away. His psyche was slowly devolving from confidant vampire lord back to pitiful little spawn. Because of a woman.
Was she secretly laughing behind his back on the nights he opened up to her? They would constantly chat the night away about some of their ally’s shortcomings. Astarion smirked, despite himself, as he recalled how they puffed their chests imitating Dame Aylin when she joined their camp. If she did that to them, why not to him?
Did he have reason to suspect her? History told him, “yes.” While she had never outwardly done anything to him, it could all be a ruse. It would be just his luck.
Astarion brought them both to the back parlor, pacing the room. The walls felt like they were closing in on him. He unbuttoned his collar, but still couldn’t breathe. What a godsdamned fool he was! Falling for the same tricks he pulled time and again. He knew it, he knew it was too good to be true. He was a vampire and the gods went out of their way to ensure nothing good came his way to stay.
“Astarion, please, talk to me. What did I do?” She pleaded. Those lilac eyes of hers glistened with concern. He wanted to fall for it, to cast aside the lunacy that took hold of him. Staring out the window, he gazed at the clear blue sky. Actually, she was right. It was time to talk.
“I have detailed histories on everyone I keep in my household and network. I know where they came from, who their families are, strengths, weaknesses, professions, so on and so forth. All but one.” Astarion turned his head just enough to see her, “Foxworth recognized you. How?”
Looking back and forth, Tav didn’t know how to respond. Dumbfounded, she chewed on her lip. Was she racking her brain or thinking of a cover story?
“I don’t know,” she said with sincerity, “The only possible explanation I can think of is he saw me perform on the road.”
“Ahh yes, the wandering bard. Maker of merriment,” he scoffed. He turned around, arms folded, “Or so I’ve been told,” he took a deep breath, “How ridiculous of me to just today realize that after all we’ve been through, I know precious little about you . You had me bare my soul, stripped me to my most vulnerable. You told me to trust you, yet I have my doubts as to whether or not I should have.”
Tav shifted uncomfortably, then poured herself a glass of brandy from a decanter. Her hands were so unsteady he thought she might end up dropping the snifter. The amber liquid filled the room with notes of cinnamon and vanilla. She downed it in one gulp.
“You never asked,” she explained, refilling the snifter. Astarion was not amused. He shattered a nearby vase on the floor, then came within inches of her face. Spawn Astarion might have let her walk all over him, Ascendant Astarion would not.
“I’m asking now. No more games, Tav. Heh. Is that even your real name?”
“Not the one I was born with, no,” she whispered. Astarion threw his hands up in disbelief. A joke that turned into truth. In reality, he felt like a joke. His suspicions of her betrayal were all but confirmed in his mind.
“I have told you every embarrassing detail of my slavery and you haven’t even told me your fucking name,” he shouted, all sense of sanity gone, “Was it funny, Tav? Listening to all my sorry tales of being pimped out and flayed? Was it? Did it inspire a song or two, little bard? How lovely it will be in the centuries to come to go to the taverns to see the drunkards dancing to a song about the vampire streetwalker.”
Astarion slammed his fists into the wall behind her. She would give him answers, “I do not dance to others’ tunes any longer. Answer me. Who are you?”
“What’s going on? Where is this coming from?”
“Answer me!” he shouted.
“Fine. Well, let’s see,” she cleared her throat, “My mother was a high elf prostitute and my father one of her customers. A drow. The only feature I got from him is my eye color. And that’s what I know of my parentage. When I was very young,” she swatted tears from her eyes, “her madam sold me to an old, wealthy, unkind aristocrat in the Gate along with two other equally young girls. I’ll spare you the details.
He later took me as a wife when he became a widower to show the world how,” she became performative, “youthful he was in spirit and how he was still able to win over pretty, young maidens.. Heh. If only they knew.
I spent two decades with the bastard until bandits attacked our carriage on the way to Waterdeep. Because of that, I was able to escape, but not before I gutted the son of a bitch,” she smiled, “I watched him flop on the ground while he choked on his own blood.” Astarion couldn’t help but smile too. She continued, “By some miracle I was found by followers of the drow goddess, Eilistraee, who took me in. They taught me the art of song and sword.”
“And they gave you the name Tav?” he asked.
“Yes and no,” she emptied the glass, “They asked my name and I was in such a state of shock all I could say was “Tav.” For three months after, “Tav” was the only thing I said. I didn’t mind being called Tav. My birth name is still unpleasant to hear. I stayed with them for three decades until I began traveling the roads, spreading love and joy wherever I went,” she raises the snifter, “for a price. I even visited Evereska. Learned more about our culture.”
Astarion didn’t know what kind of tale she was going to tell, but it certainly wasn’t that.
Tav took hold of his chin, looking him dead in the eye, tears trickling down her cheeks, “So, Astarion, to answer your other question, it wasn’t funny or amusing listening to. Those memories haunted me for decades and it tore me apart to watch another go through the restless nights, the self loathing, the fear. Gods! The fear!” she pointed a finger into his chest, “So don’t you ever let me hear you accuse me of that again. I didn’t want you to go through that alone, not like I did.”
The two stood in an uncomfortable silence until Astarion pulled out a silk handkerchief from his breast pocket and wiped her tears with the soft fabric. The storm of delusions had subsided. Now, he just felt like a feeble ass for allowing his thoughts to run away like this.
“I was harsh,” he admitted.
“I used to lash out too. Not quite like this, but it was hard for a long time to learn that not everyone was out to get me,” she hugged him tightly, “We’re in this together, my lord. Two decades will never compare to two centuries, but I feel your pain all the same. You need to learn to talk to me. Am I not your advisor?”
Sighing, he let go of her, picked up the decanter and refilled Tav’s glass, “You honestly think I invited you to stay here as an advisor?” She brought the snifter to her lips, blushing and bewildered. He would leave her alone, for now. It was her turn to stew in her thoughts.
~~~~~
Near midnight, Tav sat alone in the library with the empty decanter of brandy, reading the letter from Gale. It was a nice distraction from her new predicament. The wizard’s note was equally boring and sweet, going between talks of his new career at Blackstaff Academy and his ravings of a fellow professor named Gemma. The way he wrote of her nutmeg skin, luscious lips (which he spelled losious in his infatuated state), and how she challenged his intellect on equal footing gave away that he was head over heels in love.
“Now that you’re back and settled nicely with Astarion, I was hoping I could make use of your bardic talents. As you know, I try my hand at poetry on occasion. Currently, I’m in the process of refining a poem to use as a marriage proposal. I want this to be no less than perfect, so your input would be invaluable. If you want to put it to song, all the better!”
These were the moments bards lived for. Tav squealed, holding the letter to her chest, “Aww, that’s so sweet!” A poem, a song, it was going to be magical.
“ Ignis!” A blaze shot into the fireplace, making her audibly gasp. A soft orange light dimly lit the room, filling it with warmth. Astarion sat on the opposite side of the couch with a scowl. He picked up his book from earlier, turning its yellowed pages to where he left off.
What would she say to him? When he told her he wanted her as more than an advisor, her heart fell. Tav knew she would have to discuss her condition with him. Would he laugh at her? Tell her to leave and never speak to him? She wanted to be at his side, even if it was only as a friend.
“Reading your letter from Gale?” he asked, not looking up. Was there a hint of jealousy in his voice? Tav folded the letter and scrunched it back into the envelope.
“Mhm.” Then back to awkward silence. Another brandy would have been nice. If it wasn’t so late, she would have had another bottle fetched. Tilting her head, she could see him just within her blurred peripheral vision. Still scowling, he stared into Treatises on Conducting One’s Reason, but didn’t appear to actually be reading it.
“You know, darling, about Eitghthday. If you want to attend, I won’t judge you,” he said out of nowhere. May as well bring it up now, she thought.
“No, no,” she shook her head with a shaky smile, “I’ve never cared for, eh, intimate relations. I’ll make an appearance and say my hellos, give my well wishes, but I will return to my room when the festivities truly start.” Her heart was nearly pounding out of her chest.
Astarion closed his book and looked straight ahead, as though wondering if he’d heard her correctly. Gods, she felt pathetic. He went to a small cabinet and pulled out a bottle of wine and two glasses. After uncorking it, he sat next to her and poured the dry white to the brim.
“You don’t like sex?” He blurted out in disbelief. Tav grabbed the stem of the glass, affixing her senses on the fragrant, pale gold liquid.
“Yes, well,” she hesitated, “I told you I was married for two decades. My ex husband didn’t make our marital bed a happy one. Sometimes, heh, I think he went out of his way to make it a miserable experience. After his death, I had tried taking a few lovers. They were equally terrible, I fumbled like an idiot with them in the sheets, and one of them told me I was like a dead fish. So, I wrote the activity off entirely,” she smiled wryly and raised her glass to him, “Now you know.”
The wine tingled in her throat. Sharing this with him brought back feelings of being broken, deficient, and inadequate.
“I see,” Astarion tapped the rim of his glass, “Is that why you turned me down?” To Tav’s relief, he sounded curious instead of condescending. Pouring herself another glass, she kept her eyes averted.
“Being touched like that has always been painful. I don’t think I can feel pleasure during sex,” she spouted. Not really an answer to his question, but she wanted to be done with this and drink herself further into oblivion. At any moment, she was going to break. The vampire moved closer, touching the side of his leg to her’s, and propped his head on his hand just inches from away.
“I see. Tell me this then,” his voice went low and hushed, “Do you like it when I touch you?” Wide eyes and a reddened face confirmed what he already knew. Tav couldn’t possibly deny it when time and again her body reacted so splendidly to his.
He ran his hand sensually up her thigh, testing the waters. Tav moaned softly, making no attempt to stop him. Astarion’s hand kept going, settling on her breast.
“Are you sure-”
“Ah, ah, darling. You said so yourself. We’re in this together.” A clawed hand pulled up her skirts, “I only wish you told me sooner, rather than lumping me in with such inattentive lovers. I should be insulted. Wouldn’t it be a pity if you never got to enjoy my company because of them?” A pity indeed. His fingers coiled in her hair, tugging her head back, “Don’t be afraid, darling.”
Astarion lightly brushed his lips against hers in a quick, enticing motion, then firmly kissed her. It was fiery, electrical, sending shivers down her body. This was different, this felt like how the ballads described a kiss between lovers.
Then it abruptly ended. Confused, she reached for him, but he turned away. Tav wondered if she was really that bad. Astarion was looking at the empty decanter.
“Shit.” He let out a long sigh, “Tav, how much have you had to drink?”
“I don’t know, I never really stopped.” The effects of the wine were kicking in, leaving her worse for wear.
“You should get some rest,” he groaned. Astarion stood up, frustrated. Humiliated and on the verge of tears, she quietly got up with him. Then the room went black.
~~~~~
Astarion caught her before she crashed into his tea table. What a day this had been. Harrowing, anxiety ridden, full of self loathing, and with far too much alcohol. He looked at her peaceful, slumbering face; cheeks still flushed from wine and desire. It wasn’t all bad, though. Some might say it was productive. Often he had said that Tav was the only person in centuries who truly understood him. Little did he know how deep that understanding went.
Lifting her up, he carried her back to her room. Strangely, he felt renewed. He set her on the bed, propping her on her side. How ironic that she was telling him to open up to her, then have it be her that opened up to him. It was nice, actually. To have her rely upon him like he did her during their journey. Normally, he hated speaking of feelings and emotions, but this was nice.
The night could have ended better, with her squirming under him and panting his name. He had waited months for this, what was one more night? In the meantime, he was satisfied in the knowledge that she did want him.
“Rest well, darling,” he kissed her forehead, “Tomorrow, you are mine.”
Feel free to reblog, like, or comment. I love interacting with everyone. :)
#astarion fanfic#baldurs gate astarion#astarion#bg3 astarion#astarion x female tav#ascended astarion x tav#ascended astarion fanfic#astarion romance#astarion bg3#astarion x tav#astarion ancunin#astarion ascended#ascended astarion fic#ascended astarion romance#ascended astarion
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Bruce Wayne's Headache Classification System Chapter 4
IKEA Verse
AN: I'm so sorry for disappearing for months again, things have been very hectic for me, but I finally got this done so at least I'm starting off the new year strong. No promises as to when the next one comes out. I hope y'all enjoyed this fun little look at the girls. I wish I included them in the first story, but I wasn't thinking at the time. I choose Steph for the POV because I felt her internal snide commentary could help balance Cass's more quiet reserve. There was an alternative ending for this that had Marinette using her powers more, but I decided to go with something softer and mushy. It felt in line with where Marinette would be comfortable showing the depths of her powers and continuing to drive the Batfam insane by not finding out how her powers work.
Chapter 4: Interlude - The Stalking of Daminette, a Treatise by Steph and Cass
Slate grey skies hang heavy over Gotham promising rain. The city isn’t any less busy for it, especially not during the day when most sane people agree, on average, it’s safer to conduct one’s business. Steph thinks that’s boring of them, but eh, she parkours over rooftops and punches goons as a night job, so maybe she’s the crazy one.
Wait. Weather. Grey Skies. Rain on the horizon and all that jazz.
Not the best of circumstances for a stakeout, but they’ve survived worse.
The rooftop they posted themselves on is comfy at least. No bird’s nests, piles of beer bottles, or scattered needles. Not too high they can’t observe the streets below. But not too low to the ground for people to notice they’re hanging out up here. Which is, strictly speaking, not exactly legal.
Also, they don’t want Damian to spot them.
Steph sighs, peering down at the coffee shop she knows Damian is sitting at, but she can’t see. She pops an M&M in her mouth and nudges Cass. “Pass me the binoculars?”
Cass lowers the equipment with a blank face stare. Well, blank face to anyone who wasn’t siblings with her. Steph is familiar with her pseudo-adopted sister’s micro-expressions. This one read clear as day, ‘why didn’t you bring your own?’
Steph blows out a frustrated pout, “I forgot, okay? Damian slipped out of the manor all wily and suspiciously and we followed him on a whim. I didn’t think to grab them. Couldn’t figure we’d pull a stakeout on our own little brother.”
Cass signs, “I had mine with me.”
“Yeah, well we don’t all hide stakeout equipment on us at all times like over-paranoid busybodies!”
“You had snacks on you.”
Without a trace of guilt, Steph grabs another M&M and places it in her mouth. “Snacks are not surveillance equipment. They’re a normal thing to keep in your bag.”
“Your bag also contains mace, a taser, and smoke pellets too.”
“It’s Gotham, sis. That’s just best practice.”
Cass rolls her eyes, but hands over the binoculars.
“Yay! Thanks.” Steph places them to her eyes. It takes a second to adjust before she focuses on the cafe down the street. Damian sits at an outdoor table, alone, sipping a drink out of one of those tiny white teacups.
Pshh, what a pretentious little twerp.
“Wonder who he’s meeting?”
“IKEA girl?” Cass says aloud softly since Steph’s looking down the street and can’t read her hands.
Steph grins wildly, searching blindly for another M&M with one hand, holding the binoculars steady with the other. “Oh, I hope so. Timmy’s frantic rambling over her is the most entertained I’ve been all year. And Jay’s spittin��� steam over her little trick on him.”
“Dick’s worried.”
Steph waves a hand clutching three pieces of candy with a careless air. “Dick’s always worried, Cass. He’s a serial worrier. He doesn’t know how to do anything but worry.”
Steph pops the chocolate into her mouth, watching Damian peer up from his phone and scan the street with keen eyes. She’s, like, seventy-two percent sure he doesn’t know they’re watching him. After all, they’re halfway down the street, fifteen stories up, lying belly down on the roof of an office building. But it is Damian. The League and Bruce trained him. Steph’s still convinced the little brat has the psychic power to know when he’s followed.
“No info.”
Steph sighs at the short-remark reminder of her family’s tendencies to stick their noses fucking everywhere. “Yeah, well maybe she has decent cyber security for her life. More people need to do it these days.”
Silence.
Groaning, Steph grabs another few M&Ms out of pure stress. “You went looking too, didn’t you?”
“Little brother.”
Good lord, this family. They’re lucky she loves them so much.
“Yeah, yeah, I care about the brat too, doesn’t mean he needs his hand held constantly. He can make his own choices. Including hanging out with people, regardless of if his extremely invasive family managed to compile a dossier on her entire life.”
“You said we follow.”
Steph scoffs through a mouth of chocolate, “Yeah, ‘cause he was actin’ sus, just because I think we should leave her alone doesn’t mean I don’t think we should annoy him by stalking his date.” She focuses back on Damian. “Plus,” she mutters. “I don’t want to deal with Bruce bitchin’ about that car chase we pulled with the Volkov Family gang members, so this seemed like the better option.”
It wasn’t their fault the stupid goons running point from the pet shop’s back room decided to run on them.
“We helped,” says Cass resolutely.
“I don’t think B will see it that way.” Steph readjusts the binoculars and notices Damian’s attention sharpening. He looks out onto the sidewalk, eyes focusing on a person drawing closer. “Oh, oh, oh I think she’s here!”
There, approaching the café, in the cutest little yellow dress, a woman approaches and pauses by Damian’s table. Thanks to the high-tech binoculars she can view every emotion flickering across Damian’s face as his newest acquaintance greets him. He places down his cup and vacates his seat, pulling out the opposite chair and allowing the young woman to sit, before retaking his own.
Steph whistles lowly.
“Hmm…” prompts Cass.
“I- I don’t think the others are joking. He- he just pulled out her chair for her.” They are all capable of manners. Alfred made sure of that. Even for those in the family who’d joined later. (The disparity between the manners the Drakes’ taught Tim and the actual behavior expected of a Wayne was night and day and not in a good way. Meanwhile, people like Cass or Damian needed teaching ground up how to interact with people without pulling weapons on them. Quite frankly so did the rest of them, but Alfred was unafraid and whipped them all (metaphorically) into shape.)
So, yeah, manners.
Something they all could do.
But not necessarily likely to be performed by all.
Especially Damian.
Damian is like a feral raccoon who wields a bowie knife when it comes to Untested People. Short. Prickly. Rude in the way where you know you’re getting insulted, but the conversation already turned the corner and you stand there, shell-shocked, that this kid verbally bested you six ways to Sunday.
Of course, Damian isn’t much of a kid nowadays.
Standing as tall as Bruce and starting to shake off the lankiness of his teen years, Damian was growing into, as a posher person might say, 'a fine young man’. Steph still remembers him as that little feral kid, who only smiled when besting others or petting furry creatures. But no, now he’s smiling at other things. Adult things. Things that happened to include pretty French girls.
“She’s dangerous,” says Cass.
Steph pulls down her binoculars to find Cass peering at the seated couple with her phone, camera mode engaged, and zoomed in to see their interactions.
“Why didn’t you use that in the first place?!” Steph asks, annoyed. Reaching towards the candy wrapper her fingers find empty plastic. Damn it.
Cass narrows her eyes at her screen, ignoring the question. Steph huffs. Rude.
“What do you mean dangerous?” Replacing the binoculars, she focuses back on the couple. If she didn’t know who Damian was, her eyes would slip over them as another pair of lovebirds, eking out a final moment of good weather before Gotham’s stormy ways crushed the vibe. “She’s a little slip of nothing.”
“So am I.”
Steph rolls her eyes. “Yeah, but you were trained to fight since birth. She looks like the human embodiment of sunshine.” And the woman does. From this angle, she sees both their faces while they talk. The girl, Marinette, has sleek black hair possessing a blueish shine. Striking bright blue eyes and a smile that lit her face like the summer sun contribute to the overall impression this was a very normal, very friendly person.
“Looks are deceiving.”
“Of course, they can, and I’m not sayin’ she’s not sus, but…” she gestures down. “Look at them! This is the most normal I remember Damian acting in his life. Would he do that, could he really do that if he thought she was dangerous?”
“Hmm.”
“Don’t ‘hmm’ me! I’m serious! Sure, she might have powers, so what? Lots of people are magical and metas these days. Doesn’t mean she’s inherently dangerous.”
“No info.”
“Good security.”
“Something to hide.”
“A healthy sense of caution.”
Cass snorts. “She moved to Gotham.”
Steph pauses. And yeah, when you consider where the girl came from (Paris! Freaking Paris) and what she was studying… Moving to Gotham for a fashion degree sounds like moving to Las Vegas to join a nunnery.
“Yeah, okay that’s weird, I fully admit that. But maybe she has, like, I dunno? A danger kink or somethin’?” Steph shrugs. “Which, you know, is kinda good 'cause I think the demon brat has one too, so they’re like a match made for each other.”
Cass shoots her a highly unimpressed look.
“What!? At least I’m trying to think of somethin’ plausible, instead of jumpin’ to the doomsday scenario like the rest of you paranoid weirdos.” She turns back to her binoculars and her long-distance observing. “Listen, doin’ the whole overbearing intrusive family routine maybe isn’t the best way to act the first time Damian has, voluntarily, shown interest in a person more than complimentin’ their fightin’ skills.”
She places the binoculars back up to her eyes and watches Damian and Marinette chat. Damian’s smile hasn’t disappeared yet. In fact, it’s grown even larger. Marinette says something, her accent strong enough to throw Steph off on the exact words, and Damian throws back his head in laughter.
It’s a normal human reaction, laughing with such abandon. But it’s so not for Damian, that Steph’s mouth drops open in shock.
“Please tell me you took a picture of that?” she asks. Dick is so bound to freak the fuck out when he sees this.
“Mh hmm,” Cass hums in agreement.
They probably spend another thirty minutes watching the young couple. Cass takes pictures, and Steph makes commentary whenever Damian or Marinette looks sickeningly sweet. Cass sends the photos over to Steph’s phone, and in turn, she sends them to Dick. Most people would probably find it mind-numbingly boring, but both of them spend hours casing joints and running point of stakeouts before, so less than an hour is easy. But as the top of the hour approaches, the grey skies grow darker, and rumbling thunder appears.
Steph watches Damian blink as if shocked the weather suddenly turned bad.
Shit. Bruce would so kill him for that lack of awareness. “He’s in so deep,” she mutters.
“No covering. Will get wet,” Cass warns about their own situation.
Steph sighs, placing down her binoculars. “Shit, yeah, you’re right. Damn it, I wanted to keep watching them.”
Cass tucks the phone into her pocket with a sly smile and signs, “I took plenty of photos. We should go and find cover. Can’t head home yet because we took the bikes.”
“Yeah,” Steph mutters. Quickly though, she grabs the binoculars again and looks back at Damian and Marinette. The couple grabs their umbrellas – smart of them, too bad Steph didn’t think of those when she impulsively decided to follow Damian – and head off down the street. Together.
The date, apparently, isn’t over yet.
“Do we wanna trail them?” she asks Cass. “Any chance you stored umbrellas in that bag of yours?” Half joking, half serious. What? You never know.
Cass shakes her head though. “No, but I do have ponchos. Do you want to follow them? They’ll be heading inside. Damian will surely spot us.”
Steph snorts, highly doubting it. “He’s so damn distracted at the moment, I’m pretty sure an alien invasion could happen down the street and he wouldn’t notice unless little-miss-sunshine started screamin’.” She grins, wide and mischievous. “Pass me a poncho sis. We’re not giving up this hunt yet.”
Despite the high-quality ponchos, they still end up quite soaked. That’s the tradeoff for having an unnoticed trail high above their intended targets. Sharp stabs of water bite at their faces, as they race across the rooftops. Steph’s shirt clings stuck to her body, damp and humid between the poncho and her chest. Damn, a shower is gonna feel soooo good later.
For any normal person, the weather would make it impossible to follow the young couple. Not to mention the distance from the ground. But Steph and Cass were trained by the best hunters in the world, following their prey was simple – if very wet and uncomfortable – matter.
Rain pours from the sky even faster, thunderous noise drowning out all other sounds, and quickly empties the streets below. The typically numb Gotham populace seeking shelter from the crappy weather. Eventually, Marinette and Damian duck into an older building, the overhead awning buckled in from the rain collecting on top. The windows are dimly lit, and a cracked and faded sign flickers reading:
MAGNUS ANTIQUES ~ EST. 1902
Cass and Steph cross over the street with a quick grapple line. Both wouldn’t dare under normal circumstances; it’s the middle of the day and they aren’t even in domino masks. The slip in procedure would hardly endanger them with nobody around, heavy clouds turning the early afternoon dark as dusk, and the rain pouring thick sheets, obscuring even the highest tech cameras. They land on a building next door, and carefully climb down the siding, landing in the alleyway, behind the antique store.
A young man, in his mid-twenties, slouches against the brick wall a few feet down the alley huddled under another old and tattered awning that barely keeps him dry as he vapes. The shop’s back door sits propped open with a crate, and it takes all of a second while the man leans against the old brick façade with his eyes closed enjoying his few minutes of damp peace for Steph and Cass to slip quietly inside through the back door.
Score!
An old, musty smell hits them as they creep through the back entrance. Piles of boxes line the walls, old antiques half-boxed, or laid on shelves. The store is dark and stale. All of old Gotham oozes an aura of grime and darkness to it, like no matter how hard you scrub the walls and floors will never be clean, the shadows grow thicker in corners, and the cold lingers even in the depths of summer. But that might just be the fault of an old store with even older objects inside. Steph’s never put much stock on that old fairy tale of Gotham being cursed and all.
Under a worktable sits a box – of what she could generously call towels but would more accurately call rags – and they wriggle out of the rain-soaked ponchos. Steph stuffs the soaked ponchos in the box and pulls out a handful of the least questionable-looking rags. Handing one to Cass, Steph does her best to sop up the worst of the water.
“I’m gonna get blisters later,” Steph whines softly, her toes wriggling in soaked-through socks.
“You always have blisters, all of us do,” signs Cass, drying the front of her shirt.
“No, we have calluses, we haven’t formed blisters since we were teeny tiny baby vigilantes who didn’t know shit and our bodies thought they had the right to strike about their living conditions.” Steph tries to wrangle the water out of her hair. “We wear waterproof suits though, so my feet don’t get regularly soaked.”
“Well, sorry for not having pocket rainboots too,” Cass signs sarcastically, rolling her eyes.
“How unprepared,” Steph shoots back, gaining another eye roll in return.
Steph pulls her hair into a ponytail and wrings out her shirt and feels slightly more human now they’re back on dry land. Cass, with her pixie cut, vigorously scrubs her hair with a towel before it flops out, mostly dry. Lucky.
Quietly, both of them creep out of the back workroom. A glistening crystal doorknob attached to an old wood door sends Steph cringing when it creaks open into the store proper. Dim lighting flickers above, a high wine pitch of electricity crackles in the old wires. Tall shelves chock full of nick-nacks and blasts-from-the-pasts cast the store in even deeper shadows. Heavy rain pounds the building’s walls, mixing with the hum of electricity. Barely any light pierces through the charcoal clouds, which traps the store in an evening aesthetic rather than the middle of the afternoon.
Steph turns to Cass, signing, “Spilt up? Or stick together?”
Cass shakes her head. “Stick together, two chances to spot us are worse than one moving target.” Steph nods in agreement.
The store is quiet, minus the rain and a faint sound of classical music drifting from the front. Steph pads softly over wooden floorboards, which look like they’ll creak if you look at them wrong, and Cass follows behind, silent as a mouse. Rows of shelves stretch from front to back, ladened down with objects, Furniture and old clothes pile up on the sides. It is a chaotic, yet organized mess. None of it’s her style, but she’s sure Tim would enjoy it in here.
Slowly, ever so slowly, they creep from aisle to aisle listening for the low drawl of Damian’s pretentious voice. The store’s chaos turns what should be a straightforward search into a winding maze, but eventually right before they turn a corner, Damian’s distinctive scoff rings through the air and stops Steph and Cass in their tracks before giving the game away.
Ducking into one of those separated booths – the kind most antique stores were made of, creating tiny stores within one big one – a genuine score, because Magnus Antiques only sported a few. Fully cluttered with racks of mothball-smelling vintage clothing, the booth made for a perfect hiding spot, while also allowing them full-view access. Steph swipes a dull scarf off the table and ties it over her head, helping to disguise her distinctive blonde hair, as she hides halfway into a rack of big, dull winter clothing. Cass, using her smaller size and an all-black outfit, gracefully climbs an antique dresser and camouflages with an elaborate black feathered bouquet.
Truly, masters of stealth.
Damian and Marinette walk into view; fully focused on the shelves before them, and completely oblivious to the stalker duo creeping in on their date.
“I can call us a car. We do not need to linger until the storm passes,” Damian says with that highly entitled vibe he always gives off, despite Steph knowing Damian’s pretentiousness is mostly a font these days.
“Oh, come on Damian,” chides Marinette, crouching low to look at the bottom shelf. Her accented lilting voice is soft but carries in the quiet store. “It’s just a little bit of bad weather. There’s no reason to call a person to drive through it, we don’t want anyone hurt in an accident. We can wait it out here.”
Damian’s face contorts, “Here?” Eyeing the shelf full of porcelain dolls with dread – which, you know, totally fair. They were creepy as fuck.
But Marinette rolls her eyes and shifts through the pile on her side. “Yes, here. It’s like a treasure hunt, you never know what you’ll find.” She pushes a large black blanket off a cardboard box and smiles wide. “Ooh, see, a whole box full of ribbons and trim.” She fully falls to the floor and starts pulling rolls out of the box.
“Careful, we are likely to find germs.” Damian swipes a finger across the shelf and pulls it away covered in dust. He grimaces. “Or tetanus.”
Marinette giggles, like actually giggles, and not out of politeness either. She genuinely finds Damian’s offbeat, dry-as-a-bone, humor funny. Steph, safely out of sight, rolls her eyes. Oh, good lord, they’re perfectly horrible for each other.
“Says the man willing to climb into a box store air vent shaft at the drop of a hat.” Steph watches as Marinette sets aside a number of trims to buy.
Damian places a hand against his chest, offended. “That was tactical. This is stubborn desperation.”
“We were on the run, sounds a bit like desperation to me.”
“On the run? We were hunting our prey.”
Marinette’s face turns questioning, “Oh I’m sorry, did you not get chased by Jason with a nerf gun through half the store and the back areas? Was I not barely outrunning Dick before I took out the store’s electricity? We won by luck and the skin of our teeth. That does not sound like apex predators to me.”
Damian turns to the shelf he’s standing on, and, with a mutter, Steph barely makes out, says, “We could have taken them.”
“Sure, in a fight,” says Marinette without skipping a beat. And oh, isn’t that interesting. Steph knows the boys don’t tone down their personalities and skills the same way Bruce does (he doesn’t so much as tone down, as does a complete one-eighty, but it works for B, so Steph ain’t hatin’) when out of costume, but even they wouldn’t be so stupid as to act completely like their vigilante selves. It’s still, you know, not a lot, and Marinette probably saw more than most due to the game’s competitive nature. So, for her to say she could take them in a fight, with certainty, means she thinks quite highly of her own skills.
She could totally be overestimating herself.
Or… the rest of the family could be right, and Marinette is very dangerous indeed.
“… but we weren’t trying to take them in a fight, we were trying to outlast them. And anyway, it’s a moot point, we won, they lost, and now they hate me.”
Well, at least she was perceptive, Steph would give her that.
“They don’t hate you,” Damian shoots back.
Marinette rises from the floor holding an old roll of ribbon, bright emerald green, the lettering faded and worn on the cardboard spool. She lets out an inelegant snort, “Fine, Dick is suspicious, Tim is frustrated, and Jason hates me.”
Oh, she’s very perceptive.
Damian pauses for a second, then tilts his head and smiles thinly. “Yes, it is quite likely Todd does hate you. But he should blame me, not you. I told you what to say. He’s directing his anger all wrong.”
Steph blinks. That was… a shocking amount of self-reflection from the demon spawn. All directed towards this tiny little slip of a woman who looked like she could barely harm a fly, much less impress the likes of Damian Wayne. At this point, Steph has to believe this girl is magical because this shit is just unreal.
“Perhaps, but what I said obviously scared him-”
“That’s what we were trying to accomplish,” Damian mutters, mulishly.
“And one day I will learn the context of it, so I can properly apologize.” Steph watches Marinette’s eyes; focused and regretful. “I know I do not have their trust, and I do not have the right, but when I do, I will.”
Damian’s face flickers through emotions faster than a roulette wheel, eventually settling on a variation of soft and amazed Steph’s only seen on a besotted movie protagonist. And barely makes out his words. “I have no doubt you will earn those secrets. Your heart is big enough, and your will strong enough to melt my family’s own.”
Oh.
Oh.
Steph's mouth falls open in complete shock. Damn… just, damn.
This isn’t just a crush.
This is full-on, head-over-heels, besotted beyond belief, in love.
Damian is implying Marinette is important enough to earn the details of Jason’s death, to know why he was so scared of his family being hurt and dying and him unable to help (yeah, Jason ranted to her about Marinette’s little speech; yeah, it was harsh, but what else could you expect from Damian, he doesn’t do shit by halves). All of that implies she’ll learn of their identities, the biggest secret their family kept under lock and key. Only a handful of Justice League members and assorted friends (and enemies) knew of their full identities.
This is a girl Damian met two and a half days ago.
Steph, nearly so lost in her own shock and incredulity, almost misses Marinette’s reaction.
Face flushed and eyes tilted down, Marinette’s smile conveys embarrassment, joy, and a hint of sadness all at once. “Has anyone ever told you, you’re very sweet?”
Sheepishness seeps into Damian’s face and body, as he raises a hand to rub the back of his neck, a move making him look exactly like Dick. “Most people say the exact opposite, or they are in the middle of cussing me out.”
He’s not wrong.
Marinette's smile grows wider, “Well, I’m-”
“Not most people.” Damian and her finish together with a look building the foundation of an inside joke.
“No, all the more I learn of you,” Damian says, tone fond. “I find you are definitely not most people.”
“I aim to impress,” Marinette says, with a sly and besotted smile, and Steph doesn’t know if she will pass out from the sweetness or vomit, and at this point, it could go fifty-fifty. The woman looks over Damian’s shoulder. “Looks like the rain stopped.” Steph vaguely sees weak rays of light coming from the store’s front. The kind indicating the Gotham sun, a rare and noteworthy presence, has burst through the clouds to shine upon rain-soaked streets. “I should probably head back to my apartment before it starts again; I have a commission project to work on.”
Damian readjusts himself, folding away the soft, besotted emotions until he looks more like himself again. “And I need to return home as well, my father’s back from his business trip and will wish to speak with me.” He winces, “He is most likely already speaking with my brothers, which means I need to run interference before they blow the entire situation out of proportion.”
Marinette smirks, unrepentant and teasing, and for the first time Steph understands why Jason kept ranting ‘she’s just as demented as he is’, “To be fair, we did set Tim on fire, and break the store multiple times.”
Damian smirks right back, and “First off you broke-”
“We, don’t forget your part with the display and tying up a security guard.”
“-second, we set fire around him, he wasn’t hurt. No one got hurt. Except for their pride.” He pauses, and amends, “Well, perhaps that unpleasant woman at the end had an aneurysm with her screaming, but that’s hardly our fault, so it shouldn’t count.”
Both of them laugh until it fades into a contented silence. Then, Marinette places a dainty hand on Damian’s arm, and says, “This was fun. We could… do it again sometime?” For the first time, uncertainty crosses the young woman’s face.
Damian’s face, on the other hand, is as eager as Steph has ever seen it. Wow, what must his head and chest feel like with all these new intense emotions bandying about? “Uh, o-of course, yes, this was fun. We’ll… text?”
“Sounds like a good idea.” Marinette leans down and picks up the small pile of trimmings and ribbon she found in the box earlier. The spool of emerald ribbon balanced on top.
“You took the bus in? I can walk you to the stop?” Oh, kid; if he had a tail, it would be wagging.
Marinette tilts her head, “Didn’t you ride in on a motorcycle? Shouldn’t you take advantage of the break in the rain?”
Damian shrugs off the offer, “I drive in far worse than a little rain regularly..”
“Don’t compromise your safety for my own, I can take care of myself perfectly fine,” Marinette says.
“I’m sure you can, but I want to,” insists Damian. “I parked near the bus stop’s location, it will be no trouble.”
“Alright then, maybe on the way you can tell me more about that art store you mentioned was down my way, I’m looking for a new set of brushes; mine became damaged in the move.” They walk down the aisle and swiftly out of view and hearing range.
Steph doesn’t move, and neither does Cass until Marinette pays for her purchases, and they hear the door to the shop open and close with a creak and a chiming of bells. A second more passes by, before Steph slips out of the clothes rack, and Cass descends the dresser, and they stand in silence for a moment.
“Whelp,” Steph says, popping the p. “That was certainly something. I don’t quite have the words for it yet, cause my brain’s still rebooting. How about you Cassie?”
Cass shakes her head, then pauses, contemplation playing across her features. “I still think she’s dangerous. Her body has the grace of a fighter, with years of practical experience moving quickly and efficiently. But I don’t think she uses her magic, whatever it may be, to influence Damian.” Cass smiles, now looking like a cat holding a canary between her lips. “That’s all due to him being very, very in love.”
“Great, so I wasn’t the only one seeing literal hearts in Damian’s eyes, cool, cool, cool.” She stretches her arms high above her head, spine popping brutally, as she tries to get feeling back in her limbs after observing the two lovebirds for long. “Well, I’m not in the mood to deal with Bruce and his game of twenty questions, so what say we go eat? How ‘bout the new Italian place that opened near my apartment, worse case it starts raining again and we head back there, we covered and hid the bikes well enough.”
Cass nods and they leave the store, passing by an ancient old man seated at the front desk totally absorbed in a creaking leather tome. Summer sun barely peaking through gaps in the clouds. It hasn’t truly stopped raining yet. The sky drizzles a small smattering of rain, and fog mists up from the pavement. It’s a pleasant change from the chaotic, faint oppressive feel of the antique shop.
Steph’s brain turns over the interactions she witnessed between Damian and Marinette. It shouldn’t be such a big deal. People meet, flirt, and fall in love all the time. But it just is because it’s, well, Damian. Even as a little kid he always seemed so removed, he really wasn’t, but he was good at pretending. Steph never pictured him falling in love, not because he wasn’t capable of it, but because she always thought he’d be too prickly for anyone to break through his walls. And certainly not a civilian who had no clue about their double lives.
Steph hopes everyone comes out on the other side, lives, and emotions relatively intact, and in the meantime, she plans to wring this situation for all the blackmail material it’s worth.
#daminette#maribat#damian x marinette#damianette#marinette dupain cheng x damian wayne#the ikea verse#headache classification system#cass and steph are here!#mlb crossover#maridami#ml x dc#damimari#the great ikea game#marinette dupain-cheng x damian wayne
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Dramas for the first half of 2023
Now that we are six months into 2023, time to do one of these posts. I am gonna include both Korean and Chinese dramas, because why not and any drama I even checked out is on it.
DRAMAS WATCHED
29. Romance of Twin Flower (China) - make it cease existing! My favorite het web novel got murdered and then had its grave spat on.
28. Dominator of Martial Gods (China) - if MST3K still existed, this drama would be prime material for it.
27. Wanru’s Journey (China) - acting. Try it!
26. Royal Rumors (China) - they tried acting. But forgot to try having a functional screenplay on top.
25. The Last Princess (China) - acting is nonexistent and the story is trash but it never aspired to be what it wasn’t and was kinda cute.
24. Oasis (Korea) - great acting in a story with a screenplay that goes round and round fruitlessly like a hamster in a cage.
23. The Trust (China) - the OTP in this one swaps bodies but it would have been better for everyone if whoever made this and an actual competent writer swapped theirs.
22. Snow Eagle Lord (China) - yet another drama in which Xu Kai does his best to keep acting opposite a wooden costar and through a terrible screenplay. There is something seriously wrong with that man’s career choices.
21. Heartbeat (Korea) - the good: it’s harmless. The bad: it’s harmless.
20. Back from the Brink (China) - ummm the people are pretty? And if I were 10 I’d be all about this show but as is...
19. Joseon Attorney (Korea) - slightly less fun than reading a legal treatise.
18. The Starry Love (China) - the definition of a xianxia playing it safe and pastel; I did love the secondary couple a lot but it was not enough to save that snoozefest of a drama.
17. Chong Zi (China) - badly acted and a screenplay that somehow manages to be both repetitive and disjointed. But I am a sucker for the shizunfucker trope so here we are.
16. Island (Korea) - a mess but Kim Nam Gil is hot with a sword.
15. Circle of Love (China) - rationally, a hot mess. But so entertaining and addicting and fall of make outs of epicness!
14. Lady Durian (Korea) - makjang from the Queen of Makjang and with that scrumptious cast! This is gonna be GOOD!
13. The Forbidden Marriage (Korea) - sweet and oddly charming despite nobody in it bothering to act much.
12. Pledge of Allegiance (China) - the way they had to edit it likely due to censorship made it less than it what could have been but still more than most dramas this year.
11. Choice Husband (China) - delicious cliches and tropes and angst in the rain!
10. Hidden Love (China) - to make ME of all people to care about a fluffy modern is a bona fide miracle but the two mains are chemistry machines who portray longing so well.
9. Gone with the Rain (China) - wildly uneven but our heroine and the sexy general she eventually chooses are pure gold!
8. The Secret Romantic Guest House (Korea) - how to do youth sageuk right. Everything about this just works!
7. Alchemy of Souls: Light and Shadow (Korea) - it has flaws but is so gorgeous and full of longing and grief and everything good!
6. Tale of the Nine Tailed 1938 (Korea) - a sequel/prequel that is almost as good as the original, how often does that happen?
5. See You In My 19th Life (Korea) - wacky and grieving, delicate and odd, this is everything I ever want in a kdrama.
4. Call It Love (Korea) - a truly exquisite story of trauma and loneliness and healing and love.
3. Till the End of the Moon (China) - gloriously messy in every way this is just MORE. The ending is enraging and there are issues but when it hits, it hits so hard the rest of it does not matter - the dark characters, the dysfunctional love story, the battles, the insane visuals, the EVERYTHING of it. This is what fantasy should be like.
2. Chang Feng Du/Destined (China) - came out of nowhere to own my heart via its story of growing up and finding love and slow organic relationship building and keeping your soul in a world of horrors.
1. The Ingenuous One (China) - the best one, so I am gonna talk about it below.
FAVORITE DRAMA
The Ingenuous One - so impossibly solid, from acting to visuals to screenplay to EVERYTHING! Adult characters with adult issues and choices, both moral dilemmas and battles equally compelling. The love stories, the friendships, the shades of grey. This is utterly and completely adult.
WORST DRAMA
Romance of the Twin Flower - if I could make one drama cease to exist, this would be it.
FAVORITE MALE CHARACTER
Tantai Jin, Till The End of the Moon - the best character this year hands down - by turns (and timelines) unhinged monster, a contained saint, a victim of abuse trying to attain being viewed as human, a schemer, a ruler, grief personified, curiosity and monstrosity and nobility all mingled.
Runner up: Jang Uk, Alchemy of Souls - sunshine boy gone dark and grieving, but still with that same core of steel.
FAVORITE FEMALE CHARACTER
Shim Woo Joo, Call It Love - she’s damaged and impulsive and relationship-phobic and revenge driven and glorious!
Runner Up: Shu Ya Nan (The Ingenuous One) - allowed to be tough and dark and with her own agenda and not a member of a good sect and just so cool.
NEEDS TO BE MURDERED
Han Dong Jin’s Mom, Call It Love - that woman was horrifying and the source of so much of his trauma; a real realistic monster petty in all ways except for the damage she inflicted.
FAVORITE SHIP
Gu Jiusi/Liu Yuru, Chang Feng Du - wholesome and helping each other grow and talking it out but also there is blood feeding and midnight rescues and everything. They are good but not in the least boring.
Runner Up: Woo Joo/Dong Jin, Call It Love - two wounded souls finding such slow but such amazing healing with each other.
FAVORITE SECONDARY OTP
Su Ming Yu/Ke Menglan, The Ingenuous One - there’s actually been a lot of good secondary OTPs this year (General x Fox in TTEOTM, Investigator x Princess, TIO, Rang/Mermaid, TOTNT1938) but these two owned my heart - gentleman merchant x gambling hostess ftw.
NOTP
Romance of Twin Flower - they took my favorite het novel OTP, smart and coldblooded and forces of nature and turned them into THAT?
SHIRTLESSNESS AWARD
Xiao Hong Ye, Circle of Love - guy was a terrible abuser but those pecs were the real sin!
CRAZIEST FUNFEST
Circle of Love - screenplay written by rabid monkeys and populated by a bunch of psychos but such ridiculous, irresistible fun!
FAVORITE SCENE
Tantai Jin confronting Li Susu in jail, Till the End of the Moon - the energy, the intensity, the darkness the EVERYTHING.
BIGGEST CRUSH
Li Gong Quan, The Ingenuous One - yeah whatever, I realize he’s a minor character but I loved him so much! The whole having to bring down your benefactor who’s gone evil tho you are in love with his daughter should have been a whole other drama!
BEST SCENE STEALER CHARACTER
Chen Wende, Gone with the Rain - most of this drama is not that exciting but whenever his King of Trolls hot general shows up, I sit up and pay attention. I am 35 eps deep because of him.
NEEDS A SEQUEL
The Ingenuous One - I am dying to see what happens to royal investigator and supposedly dead princess, how our OTP will travel the world, the merchant and his lady, Ten Taels and his orphans and his girl and just everything. I loved these people so!
NEEDS A DIRECTOR’S CUT
Till the End of the Moon - it was clear they cut a BUNCH in the last third to fit the ridiculous new “40 eps or bust” rule and it would flow so much more smoothly if it was allowed to breathe.
NEEDS SCISSORS TAKEN TO IT
Romance of Twin Flower - it should have been shredded into nonexistence sorry not sorry.
TOO MANY SCISSORS TAKEN TO IT
Pledge of Allegiance - this drama was good but had gaping lacunae where too many scissors were taken to it for censorship reasons; I am surprised even what’s left was allowed to air tbh but still...
TROPE THAT NEEDS TO DIE
Shrill = cute - I see it every year, I hate it every year.
FAVORITE TROPE WE’VE SEEN A LOT OF
Hot Men Whump - come one, TTEOTM alone would fill the quota but we also had CFD, Call It Love, See You in my 19th life etc etc.
BIGGEST DISAPPOINTMENT
Back from the Brink - it’s based on a novel by an author whose other novels (Zhao Yao, Blue Whispers, Mulberry Song) I adore and the novelist was the screenwriter so I was so excited. But it was a juvenile, flat mess that de-powered the heroine and taught me that yeah, sometimes the writer should not adopt their work.
BIGGEST GOOD SURPRISE
Chang Feng Du - I loved the novel but the trailers were a fluffy bland disaster and I checked it out with zero expectations. However, this is a glorious adaptation, a lesson in how to transport a massive novel on screen into slim 40 eps and to account for changes in medium and stricter censorship restrictions for dramas versus books while keeping the essential vibe of the original.
BEST NON-2023 DRAMA I’VE WATCHED IN 2023
The Imperial Doctress (China) - the pining the pining by the Hot Emperor! This is like all my web novel dreams come true!
MOST ANTICIPATED
A Journey to Love/Prisoner of Beauty/My Journey to You/Kunning Palace - maybe one of them will air before the world ends.
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A Father's Duty (35/?)
A Father's Duty on AO3
Summary: An encounter with a quantum fissure leaves Picard with more responsibility than he asked for, but he'll do what he always does—his duty.
Chapter 35
Picard sits in his chair on the bridge long enough to make his presence known, then he retreats to his ready room. There, he returns to the other Data’s logs.
It takes the rest of his shift to finish the remaining two years’ worth of recordings, and by the end he’s once again emotionally and mentally exhausted—but at least now he knows. Remembering Deanna’s advice from earlier, he uses the final half hour of his shift to clear his head, opting for relaxation as opposed to exhilaration this time to settle his mind.
It’s as if the entirety of his being is clenched tight as a fist, but gradually—his eyes closed, Chopin playing gently in his ears, the taste of Early Grey sweetened with sugar and lemon dissolving on his tongue—his thoughts loosen and wander.
There were bright spots amidst the darkness, moments where Louis appeared on screen with a smile to announce that it was his birthday (“I’m 7!”) or that he grew a full inch taller or that he lost a tooth (using two fingers to hook the corners of his mouth and pull it wide to reveal the gap where his two front teeth were missing).
Often, Louis wasn’t visible but his presence was evident in other ways: humming a tune in the background, interrupting Data to ask a question about his school work or the book he was reading, a sound that could only be him practicing the piano.
The worst is over, Picard tells himself. He can’t change the past, he can’t change what Louis went through; he can only control the here and now, help Louis recover, move forward.
Before he leaves, he checks for any messages from Deanna. As promised, she provided a list of toys for Louis but clarified that Louis should be the one to choose and that anything he chooses to play with that’s safe is technically fine. She concluded with a treatise on why Louis should have toys that takes Picard nearly ten minutes to read and leaves him feeling like a complete ass for not thinking to provide them sooner.
There’s a message from Will as well, and when Picard notices the timestamp his heart skips a beat and he moves immediately to the edge of his chair, poised to leap to his feet and run.
But the message merely informs him that Louis was briefly upset by an occurrence on the holodeck, and that he insisted he was okay, wanted to stay, and that Will is monitoring him closely.
As there’s no follow-up message, and as Picard was never paged, he assumes everything is fine.
Nevertheless, he walks more swiftly than is strictly necessary to Will’s quarters.
When Will calls for him to enter, Picard finds him and Louis sitting at Will’s dining table playing cards. Louis smiles at him, a bright, happy grin that warms Picard more thoroughly than a cup of tea or a glass of wine, a liquid warmth that seeps into his very soul.
And to think, there was a time when I believed I didn’t need this.
Gul Madred tried to diminish Picard, the Borg attempted to extinguish him entirely, and both times Picard resisted—he fought tooth and nail to remain himself, to hold onto his identity.
On Kataan, it was his choice to let go and become Kamin, become a husband and a father, become more. He embraced his return to the Enterprise, but he’s not the same person he was before Kataan.
Not deep down.
Deep down he knows that Louis’s smile is worth more than any accolade.
“What are we playing, gentlemen?” he asks.
Will and Louis have cards in their hands, the deck stacked face-down between them, and, at their elbows, cards lying face-up that seem to be paired by color and number.
“Go Fish, sir,” Will replies.
“But with poker faces,” Louis says.
As if to illustrate, both of their expressions go blank.
“I wasn’t aware a poker face is such a crucial part of Go Fish strategy,” Picard remarks.
“In this version it is,” Will explains. “In this version, when someone asks you for a card, you’re allowed to lie and say you don’t have it even if you do—but if your poker face isn’t good enough and they catch you, you have to reveal 3 of the cards in your hand.”
“That’s quite the motivation to tell the truth.”
“Or to have a very good poker face.” Will tilts his head towards Louis. “His isn’t too bad. He just needs some practice.”
“C'est ce que tu penses,” Louis murmurs, smirking at the cards in his hand.
That’s what you think.
Picard chooses not to translate that and instead asks, “Are you ready to go?”
Louis nods. To Will, he says, “Can I use your bathroom?”
“Of course.”
Louis lays his cards down and trots deeper into Will’s quarters. Will starts to stand, catches sight of Louis’s hand, and frowns. “For how long have you had that king?” he calls.
“Since the beginning!” Louis calls back.
Will chuckles and shakes his head. “I guess his poker face is better than I thought. I asked him for that king twice.”
“I suspect you have only yourself to blame for that,” Picard says dryly. “Or rather, your other self.”
Will grins. “That reminds me, sir. Have you considered my invitation?”
The poker game on Friday evening, the day before they’re scheduled to arrive at Earth.
Picard sighs. “I have, Number One. If it still stands—and if you’re certain it’s appropriate—we’ll be there.”
His first instinct was to refuse, until he reasoned that it would be a good distraction, a nice way to relax before reporting to Starfleet Command.
(A brief foray out of his comfort zone, for Louis’s sake.)
“I’ll make sure everyone’s on their best behavior,” Will promises. He glances to his left, then steps closer, and in a low voice, asks, “Did you get my message?”
“I did, and I must apologize—I didn’t see it until only a few minutes ago.”
“It’s alright, sir. If it had been an emergency, I would have paged you directly. I just wanted you to know what happened.”
“What did happen, exactly?”
“Well, he caught a fish” –Will stated he was taking Louis fishing when Picard dropped him off; he’s still in the flannel shirt and khaki trousers he donned for the occasion—“and when we got the fish out of the water…I don’t know, I think seeing it that way, knowing it’s dying…sometimes that’s hard for a little kid.”
There’s a crease between Will’s brows, tension in his posture. He’s worried about Louis, Picard guesses, but also worried how Picard might judge him.
“Commander,” Picard says, sternly but quietly. “I want to make it clear that I trust you.”
“Sir?”
“With Louis, I mean. What happened today in no way diminishes that trust.”
Will couldn’t have predicted that the sight of a dying fish would upset Louis. Picard would not have anticipated it either.
“Thank you, sir,” Will says. “I’m still happy to watch him whenever you need me to.”
“I appreciate your help, Number One.”
Appreciate is not nearly a strong enough word. That Louis felt safe enough with Will to stay with him speaks volumes. Picard must allow that relationship to grow—even if it means that he must also cultivate a more personal relationship with Will, daunting as it is to cross a line he hasn’t crossed as a commanding officer since Jack Crusher.
When Louis returns from the bathroom, they say their goodbyes and then Picard ushers him into the corridor—where they run directly in Deanna.
She’s clearly surprised to see them, but she masks it quickly with a smile. “Hello again.”
“Hello,” Louis replies cheerfully.
Will pokes his head into the hallway. “You’re here early.”
“I thought you might want some help preparing dinner,” Deanna says, tone stunningly neutral.
Will grins. “You don’t trust me to pick what we’re eating, do you?”
“No.” It’s succinct, matter-of-fact, and somehow not impolite.
Louis looks back and forth between them. “You’re friends?” he asks.
“Yes, friends,” Deanna and Will answer simultaneously, their voices in perfect sync.
Louis’s gaze flick back and forth one more time, taking in Will’s carefully blank expression, Deanna’s casual attire and her hair, which seems different than usual though Picard can’t pinpoint how. The boy’s eyes narrow, and Picard knows precisely what’s coming and clears his throat loudly before they’re all plunged into a very awkward situation.
“Well, have a good evening you two,” he declares, giving Louis a pointed nudge in the direction of the Turbolift.
In their quarters, they both change for dinner, Picard out of his unfirm and Louis into something not grass-stained, but when Picard moves for the door, Louis lingers near their dining table.
“Can we eat in our quarters tonight?” he asks.
His voice is small, hesitant, as if nervous about making such a request. Perhaps they rushed him into some things. Perhaps Picard should have followed Beverly and Deanna’s advice and taken more time off, eased him into the crew’s company more carefully, more slowly.
Internally, he decides that tomorrow he’ll take another personal day. Outwardly, he smiles gently, and says, “Today was a very long day. I would also prefer some peace and quiet this evening.”
Louis leans into him, head bowed and tucked against Picard’s side. It’s not quite a hug, more of a…request. Picard puts an arm around his shoulder, runs his other hand through Louis’s hair.
“You know what else I would enjoy tonight?”
“Non,” Louis murmurs, waits, his eyes half-closed.
“Your great-grandmother’s cassoulet.”
As if it heard him, Louis’s stomach growls.
#star trek: tng#star trek: the next generation#tng#star trek fic#tng fic#picard#captain picard#picard fic
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My treatise on how I feel about s15e20:
I have been struggling with why I was so upset by the finale.
I got the best scene I could have hoped for between Dean and Sam. It was as close to making Wincest canon as I could have possibly hoped for. Much more so than I had ever dreamed possible. They ended the episode together in heaven which I had always dreamed of. Dean wasn’t satisfied in the perfect heaven that he deserved until Sam got there. Again pushing the Wincest agenda. Sam didn’t go on to have a happy life. He went on to have a life filled with thoughts of Dean, and crying in Baby to show he was not over his brother, and wearing Dean’s watch literally to the day he died, recounting to Dean Jr the very deathbed words from Dean so often that his son was able to say them back to him, again all pointing exactly to my Wincest dreams. Sam spawned in heaven right by Dean’s side again with the Wincestiest ending imaginable shy of squiking out the GA.
So why? Why am I devastated?
I think the premise of Dean wanting Sam to have a normal life and forcing him into that is flawed. Yes from s1e1 Sam had railed against the hunting life. He has said time and again that he wanted that so much so that it broke Dean’s heart in heaven to witness Sam’s best memories.
I think Sam has evolved and grown as a person over the years and his needs and wants have changed. But even before that, after Dean’s first tragic death at the end of S3, Sam could have gone back to school. It had only been a short time, he could have easily gotten back on track. But he didn’t. He had complete free will over his life and what did he choose? To keep hunting for a way to pull Dean back from the dead.
He wanted his brother.
I think what Sam truly wanted from life from the start was “freedom to choose.”
Just like how Dean railed again the angels in Season 4 and Chuck the last 2 seasons, what did Dean want, to have? free will. For fucks sake, early on Sam and Dean and Cass were known as Team Free Will.
So every time Sam was given a chance, he chose Dean, especially over and over in the later seasons, Sam made it clear, his life was only happy when he was with his brother, and he was fine dying, as long as they did it together.
So why am I so upset, Sam has been at other people’s mercy his entire life. His first 18 years he had to live as John wanted. No big deal right, all kids have to do what their parents say. Exactly, which is why I believe Stanford wasn’t really exactly what Sam wanted, he didn’t seem like a happy go lucky person when we first met him. He wasn’t sunshine and roses. He seemed sad, even at the prospect of his sure thing for law school, and at a Halloween party. There was a sadness to him.
I believe Stanford was Sam’s normal teenage need to rebel. Go the exact opposite direction from his life he had grown up in. It is completely normal for teens to want a different life than they grew up in. But once Sam got to Stanford he was stuck. The way John had thrown him out, he couldn’t go back even if he had changed his mind. I am not saying he would have, just that once again he didn’t have a choice in the matter.
So then he was once again manipulated by the YED into being forced back into hunting due to Jessica‘a death. He didn’t get to choose between hunting and law school. He was manipulated, they just didn’t know it at the time.
Then he was brought back to life by Dean, no choice in the matter.
Then he was forced to watch Dean die. No choice in the matter.
Then he was manipulated by Ruby. He was used and groomed to free Lucifer by both Ruby and the angels, all because he had been left alone and was vulnerable. If the angels hadn’t manipulated Dean’s phone call, and Sam had had full free will, things would have gone completely differently.
Here is where things start to get really ugly for Sam. Sam chose to take on Lucifer and hold him to save the world. Which he did. And he was at peace and happy about it. But he was tortured and raped in the pit for sooo long. When he was brought back, he was soulless, which when he was finally reunited with his soul, he was devastated to find out everything that had happened. Because he hadn’t been free to choose.
This starts a horrible pattern of rape and torture of Sam Winchester. He was raped by Becky and by Lady Bevell. In s14e15 I am not convinced that Sam didn’t have sex with Mrs. Smith when he was mind controlled into believing he was Mr. Smith which again would be rape.
But Lucifer’s torture was the worst for him because he was forced to relive it over and over, not just in Sam’s mind, but when he was forced to confront Lucifer time and again over the seasons. Which as he discussed with Rowena was deeply traumatizing.
Why was Sam soooo pissed at Dean for saving him after the trials with Gadreel’s possession? Not because he saved him. But because Sam didn’t get a choice.
Just like Dean fought all his life against destiny and wanted nothing more than free will, I believe that had always been what Sam wanted as well. Free will, self determination. It just took different forms for Sam than it did for Dean.
Bear in mind, this is only what I could remember off the top of my head. I am pretty sure there are loads more things I could point out on these topics if I went back and examined things and my mind wasn’t fogged with 4 days of crying.
So the point of this long ramble is that in the end, Sam didn’t get to live the remaining 3 or 4 decades his life the way he wanted. He didn’t get free will the way Dean did. Dean took that away from him by asking him to keep fighting. Sam wasn’t happy. Dean’s loss haunted him throughout the years. It was directly pointed out in that scene in Baby where he sat behind the wheel and wept. If tptb wanted us to believe Sam got his happily ever after, they wouldn’t have included that scene.
This doesn’t even touch on the fact that Dean didn’t get to enjoy the fruits of his finally winning his free will. He got to choose to stay dead and not be brought back, sure, but he didn’t get to live. He was planning on getting a job. He had a dog for the first time ever that he clearly loved soooo very much. He fought his whole life and then didn’t get to enjoy his freedom at all.
So there you have it. On why, even though we got so very much Wincest in the finale, and even though, our boys are together now in heaven. This is why I am still not okay.
#supernatural#epic love story of sam and dean#supernatural ending#sam and dean#spn spoilers#why I am still so upset#I am no ok#treatise on why the ending wasn’t what I wanted
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How did Maxwell get to the judge at his trial? Wasn’t he in police custody?
You know, Nonny, I'm so relieved that someone is at last bringing this up. You are so right. In fact, this really opens a whole can of questions for me.
What's happening here, exactly? Is Maxwell (along with being a doctor in training) also some sort of escape artist? Can he turn invisible and evade the gaze of everyone in the courtroom to sneak up behind the judge. Come to that, Nonny, why is the judge even giving his opinion on if Maxwell is guilty at all? Is he not being tried by a jury of his peers? Is that why Maxwell feels it's okay to murder him in front of so many witnesses?
And while we're here. If Joan’s studying pataphysics... why's she need test tubes, huh? Are they imaginary test tubes? How did she and Maxwell even meet? Is he actually interested in someone that, realistically, is diametrically opposed to his own field of study. Or does he think she'll turn him down and wants the excuse to kill her all along? And if that's the case, what's his deal? What are his parameters for murder??
That's before we get to the question of why Maxwell's "back in school". He's in uni studying medicine. Now, I don't know if you've been to uni, but I can tell you that lecturers don't waste their time making unruly students write lines or stay late. They don't give a shit if you fail or not. Some actively prefer it. So, has Maxwell posed as a child and, if so, to what end?
Nonny, I think you've blown this thing wide open. None of it makes sense. I'm calling on Mr McCartney to answer for these inconsistencies immediately. If not, we must, sadly and soberly, consider the possibility this song of great merit and acclaim is not a coherent treatise on life and karma.
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Film Appreciation Studies
WC: 2524 | NC-17 | MSR UST | late S5
Summary: Mulder and Scully watch Cinemax after dark, UST does not turn into RST unfortunately.
Tags: @xfilesbingo @today-in-fic
Bingo: Krycek (bottom right)
Light from the computer illuminates Mulder’s face as he types on the keyboard while cradling the cordless phone to his ear. Despite the late hour, they’re both still working, finally getting close to that elusive finish line with this report.
“Okay Scully, I’ve updated the summary but it’ll be confusing without the-
“Evidentiary findings, give me a minute.”
Scully types away on her laptop furiously, neck leaning at an uncomfortable angle to balance working while on the phone. Working from her dining room table, her messy ponytail and satin pajamas are a stark contrast to her usual business comportment.
While waiting for Scully to finish, Mulder starts restlessly wandering around his own apartment looking for a distraction, making use of his cordless phone. He mindlessly opens and closes the fridge, tosses his basketball from hand to hand a couple of times, circling back into his living room from his fidget tour.
“Do I need to include the bone density studies of the victims in the table?” Mulder takes a moment to debate her question internally, not wanting to create more work but knowing this report needs to be comprehensive.
“You better, I’m sorry Scully, I should have thought of it earlier.”
“No it’s fine, I did it yesterday I just have to find where I saved the data”
“Nice…” Scully assumes the comment is directed at her initiative, but Mulder’s attention has been co-opted by the TV the moment he notices a sultry brunette taking her top off. As he grabs the remote and settles in on the couch to check out the movie Scully startles him by suddenly declaring she’s finally finished over the phone causing him to accidentally hit unmute.
“Harder big boy” the TV blares like a siren, the over-dramatized fornication sounds reverberating through the room and down the phone line. With a deep blush of humiliation, Mulder furiously tries to lower the volume, phone still glued to his ear.
“Mulder, are you seriously watching porn right now?!” Recovering from his embarrassment, Mulder feels the need to defend himself.
“It’s not porn, it’s one of those late night Cinemax movies, it just came on after Austin Powers.”
“What channel?”
“Oh right, you’re going to watch with me?” Mulder asks incredulously.
“If you say it’s not porn then that shouldn’t be a problem.”
“422.”
It's the way Mulder gives her the channel number that feels like a dare to Scully, she wasn’t serious at first but now she’s not going to back down. Scully settles down on her couch and turns her TV onto the channel. There seem to be lots of men and women in swimsuits lounging around a pool, pretty tame so far.
“Ok so catch me up”
“Umm there’s a resort in Cabo and people have sex in it..”
Watching porn with Scully had been a long time fantasy for Mulder, however in his reverie Scully was always inspired by the on screen action and decided to use Mulder as a willing test subject to try out new techniques. Mulder can’t help but smile knowing the reality of watching adult entertainment with Scully will involve her harsh critiques on story, over analyzing non-existent plot points, questioning everything and potentially turning the whole discussion into a feminist treatise on gender roles in the adult industry. He couldn’t wait; Scully’s brain has always been his number one kink.
“Mulder, if this is set in Cabo why aren’t they speaking Spanish?”
“I guess they’re all tourists,” and so it begins he thinks to himself.
“But none of the staff are Hispanic either, that’s just poor casting.”
“Don’t be such a buzzkill Scully, you’ve gotta go with it..” The buzzkill comment is met with a derisive snort from Scully, and Mulder can’t help but grin at the thought of her cute petulant pout on the other end of the phone.
“I’m going to need some wine if we’re watching this crap”
“Good idea, I’m grabbing a beer.” They both get up and grab their respective drinks, a little more quickly than usual, and get back to their respective seats to watch the movie.
The scene has changed to what looks like a massage room in the resort’s spa. A bronzed man lies faced down on the massage table in a low hanging towel, getting rubbed down by a busty blonde who has used too much massage oil and isn’t very focused on technique.
“Ok Mulder, who’s this guy?”
“A guest and he’s getting a massage. Scully I’m watching this at the same time as you, we’re getting the same contextual clues. How are you having trouble following this?”
“I thought I missed his backstory when I was getting my drink! How am I going to be invested in the story if I don’t know the characters?”
“Fine if it makes you happy, the guy's name is Frank. He plays bass in a Journey cover band and is in Cabo to help him get over a bad break up with an over analytical redhead. That’s why he needs a massage.”
“Really?” Scully asks, her voice feigning innocence, getting some enjoyment from annoying him.
“Sure…” Mulder replies in his most condescending tone.
“Aww it looks like Frank’s glutes are very tight..”
“Yup, he’s holding a lot of tension under that towel.” Frank rolls over so he is lying on his back and they both go quiet as the massage takes an erotic turn, the masseuse working on his groin under the towel. Scully breaks the silence with a contemplative revelation.
“Should we be concerned about the lack of consent here? Frank thinks he’s getting a message and ends up getting molested.”
“He seems to be enjoying it-”
“Well he is now, but she didn’t know that going in.”
“I get the feeling sex with you involves paperwork”
“Signed in triplicate..”
There’s a silence as Mulder takes a few moments to imagine sex with Scully, while his partner is actually getting sucked into the action on screen. The blonde masseuse has now mounted the table and is straddling Frank and it looks like they’re about to test the endurance of the massage table. Mulder’s daydream about massaging a very naked Scully, is abruptly interrupted by her outraged cry.
“They just cut before the action!”
“Yeah I told you it’s not real porn-“
“But I wanted to see how the table held up under the stress of vigorous activity.”
“I love that you’re worried about the structural integrity of a massage table when you’re watching people about to have sex..”
Mulder and Scully both laugh at the absurdity of what they’re doing, enjoying their banter and teetering on the perilous edge of sexual tension that exists between them. This should be awkward and uncomfortable, but in their twisted relationship they seem to be at their best when they’re defying the norm.
“Ohmygod! Mulder, that waiter looks like Krycek!”
On the screen a man who vaguely resembles Krycek with a thick porn mustache leads a customer behind a deserted poolside bar for a triste.
“Krycek doesn’t have that awesome mustache. Lucky him, it looks like he’s about to get a BJ from that hot brunette… there’s a joke about leaving a tip in there somewhere.” Unbeknownst to Mulder, Scully is a little irked by the ‘hot brunette’ comment and decides to toy with him a bit.
“You know Porn Krycek has a great body, he’s pretty sexy.”
Mulder doesn’t do a good job of hiding the twinge of jealousy in his tone, “is porn Krycek doing it for you Scully?”
“I appreciate good muscle definition-”
“I’ve gotta start working out again, I’m getting fat.”
“Your body is fine Mulder-”
“Just fine?” Scully ignores his shameless attempt to elicit a compliment and changes the subject. On the screen, porn Krycek starts dancing around in leopard skin briefs.
“He might look like that rat-bastard, but Porn Krycek has got some serious moves. Is the real Krycek ripped in real life?”
“Why would I know what Krycek’s body looks like?”
“I thought you two were close back in the day. Didn’t he kiss you?”
“Like one time, and it was a Fredo kiss! But you know, on the ear… Yeah it was weird.”
“See consent matters Mulder.”
“I never said it didn’t!”
“So what happened with Krycek was consensual?”
“Nothing happened! Scully, I’m comfortable with my sexuality, but for the record if I did go for men I could do better than Krycek.”
Scully’s voice turns deeper as she wants to play with Mulder some more, finding it more entertainment from teasing him than the movie.
“Maybe, but when you tell that story about Tunguska you’re both definitely topless in my head”
“Funny you’re topless in my head too!” Scully gives a seductive laugh, “ah you got me Mulder, I’m sitting around topless in January watching porn and talking to you.”
“You don’t have to get me a birthday present if you say that exact sentence again so Frohike can hear.”
They both laugh some more, but Scully is a little disappointed Mulder hasn’t pushed the flirting further. She doesn’t want to dwell on why for too long and makes an active decision to focus on a distraction. “Ok so far we’ve seen a lot of couples simulating copulation in a variety of places around the resort, but no one has used their hotel room…”
“‘Simulating copulation’,you could have your own hotline with dirty talk like that… You know this would be the perfect hotel for us, the rooms are probably way cleaner compared to where we usually stay.”
Scully rolls her eyes, of course Mulder would think to bring her to a porn resort to enjoy clean accommodation instead of sex with each other.
“If we go there I’m bringing an industrial bottle of Lysol and spraying every surface.”
“Yeah getting an STD from a park bench in Cabo would be a lousy vacation story…”
The word vacation hangs in the air and Scully can’t help but smile that his fantasy trip with her isn’t work related.
Terrible jazz muzak plays over the movie now with slow cliched shots of a beach sunset and a couple composed of a petite bottled redhead and a tall lanky man holding hands. Scully can’t help but feel more than a twinge of jealousy and hates herself a little for it.
“Aww look a cute couple walking on the beach, I wonder where they’re gonna have sex?” Scully says, her voice dripping with sarcasm.
“She kind of looks like you Scully”
“If my boobs were ten times bigger and silicone”
“Yeah your boobs are way better and your hair is prettier.“
Scully chooses to ignore Mulder’s comments and changes the topic as the couple on screen get into a beach side hot tub.
“Plot twist, it’s sex in a hot tub”
“See, and you thought they were going to have sex on the beach…”
“I assumed wrong, but I guess it’s one of those cliches that’s better in theory..”
“Are you talking from experience Agent Scully?” Mulder asks, hoping for salacious details.
“Sand everywhere.”
“I’m going to need more information than that-”
“Okay, pseudomonas folliculitis is a bacterial infection that can be contracted during intercourse in a hot tub-”
“That was definitely more information..”
They both go quiet, enjoying the couple sensually making out on the screen in front of them. As things start to heat up it fades to black and goes to a commercial break, much to Scully’s outrage. “What!! Mulder, they cut away again!”
“You’re really struggling with this format..”
“I don’t get it, all they did was dry humped in a hot tub. They didn’t even pretend to have sex!”
“Technically I don’t think you can dry hump in a hot tub. Maybe they were worried about pseudomonas folliculitis?” Mulder loves her indignation over the awkward censorship of the film, he knows Scully has a passionate side and tonight he’s getting a glimpse into it.
“Mulder, why do you watch this?”
“Right now, your running commentary. Definitely working for me. Although almost everything you do works for me..”
Scully smiles and for a moment allows herself to understand the subtext that he is sublimating his desire for her. Looking to break the tension Scully continues her critique of the movie.
“I think I need more story than this. Oh look a man with towels by the pool, let me take my top off”
“He looks pleased with this arrangement”
“Never trust the beach towels at a hotel”
“Scully, we are not having the pubic lice discussion again. First bacterial infections, now parasites.”
“Should I stop packing a spare towel for you?”
“No.” Mulder begrudgingly accepts his know-it-all is completely desensitized to diseases and will go into great details to see him squirm if he doesn’t yield.
The show is back on and the petite redhead is working reception, wearing a white blouse that barely buttons up and a skirt that is way too short for any office. Mulder can’t help but be delighted that her provocative office attire is definitely something he’d love to see Scully wear to work.
“Awesome, porn-Scully is back!”
“Can you stop calling her porn-Scully?”
“Sorry, no. Look she’s doing paperwork, it’s like a porn parallel universe version of you” Mulder jibes at Scully.
“I don’t think she’s focused on filling those forms out if it makes a difference”
“No, her hand is otherwise engaged. This is going to mess me up next time I picture you doing expense reports.”
Turning Mulder’s teasing around, Scully’s voice drops lower as she continues to banter. Their natural rhythm slows down and builds on the tension between them. As porn-Scully touches herself on screen Mulder starts losing the battle of picturing Scully doing the same thing.
“Well Mulder, she does seem to be enjoying herself, even if it’s not the most productive way to handle paperwork.”
“What do you think she’s thinking about?” Mulder’s voice sounds like gravel and he’s unable to hide his desire, he hopes that Scully will play along.
“She’s picturing her tall coworker, coming up from behind, taking his hand and gently placing it over hers.”
Mulder can’t believe what he’s hearing, Scully is actually going to have phone sex with him.
“Then what does he do, Scully?” He asks with a reverent awe normally reserved for observing UFOs or cryptids.
Scully’s voice is breathy, and it reverberates to his core. “She takes his hands and slowly guides him, showing him how she likes it.”
“Yeah?” Mulder is completely captivated.
“Then he gets a little rough, his passion taking over as he changes their position…”
Mulder waits with bated breath for her to continue.
“Finally he’s there, Mulder stroking his long, hard…. pencil and filling out his own damn expense reports..”
“Fuck, Scully.”
Scully tries to suppress her laughter, she got him good.
“Hey Mulder?”
“Yeah…” Mulder replies with a pout.
“Still think I’m a buzzkill?”
Mulder gives a hard laugh and hangs up on her. They both immediately miss each other at the call’s conclusion, replaying highlights of their conversation while they attempt to sleep. Both of them hoping it’ll rain sleeping bags soon.
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Imagine if Meng Shi begged and bargained and collected favors till she was able to send her A-Yao to education with the Lan Sect, perhaps even become a cultivator with them. Would he take that change? Would he become a rogue cultivator? Would the strict rules help curb his inner muderimpuls or enrage him or teach him to hide better?
A Good Fit - ao3
“The…Lan sect?” Meng Yao said doubtfully. “Are you sure?”
“I am sure,” his mother said, her mouth tight. She looked upset, the way she always did these days when he referenced, intentionally or otherwise, the original plan that she had had to send him to join his father, sect leader of Lanling Jin. She’d raised Meng Yao on a steady diet of stories of what his life would be like when his father finally took him back the way he’d promised her he would, stories that had filled his days and nights for years and years and years, and then just last year she’d suddenly stopped talking about it entirely. It was as if the person who’d told those stories had nothing to do with her.
Meng Yao didn’t know what had happened, but he assumed it must have been pretty bad.
“It'll be a good fit,” she added.
“Then I’ll go to the Lan sect,” he said, and pretended not see the way his mother relaxed a little, relieved that he wasn’t asking too many questions. “I’ve heard they are gentlemen there, righteous but gentle; it will be the best match for my personality, I’m sure.”
A lie, of course. ‘Gentlemen’ were just as likely to come to the brothel as brutes, and they were all the same once they had a cup of wine and a beauty in their arms – Meng Yao tried not to have any illusions.
“Can we afford it?” he asked instead, since that was something he was sure his mother would have thought of, would have expected him to ask. “Gusu is so far away…”
“I have obtained a letter from the local sect recommending you to their sect leader, Lan Qiren,” she said. “He’s the one that teaches the classes – the one that sent out the summons asking the subsidiary sects to look for individuals with raw talent to join his classes and offering them an extra seat for their sects for each nameless orphan they find that lives up to Lan sect standards. Only the Heavens know why he’s doing something like that…I assume they’re trying to expand.”
That seemed like the most reasonable explanation. Meng Yao nodded. “So I’ll be traveling with the local sect?”
“That’s right,” his mother said, and raised her chin a little. “At least this much, your mother was able to do for you.”
She’d begged and bargained and traded favors for it, then, Meng Yao thought, and yet taking him along was to their own benefit: if they were looking for inherited cultivation talent sufficient for the Lan sect, then the bastard son of another Great Sect leader would be a better bet than some random nobody. She’d probably humiliated herself for nothing.
“Will you come with me?” he asked, more concerned with that – it was too easy for women of ill repute to disappear into the depths of the city if they didn’t have someone to watch out for them.
Even someone as young as he was. He wished he was older.
“You can come back to visit me during the Spring Festival,” she said, which meant no. “I’ll be all right, A-Yao.”
Meng Yao wasn’t so sure.
Still, not having him around would at least remove a visible reminder of his mother’s age – she’d been kicked out of the better brothels because of him, because no one wanted a woman who was a mother. Leaving would at least do that for her.
“I’ll write,” he finally said. “I’ll write as often as they let me.”
“And I’ll write back,” she promised him, kissing his cheek. “I promise.”
With that, Meng Yao supposed he had to be satisfied.
-
The Lan sect was both exactly like what Meng Yao expected and absolutely nothing at all like anything he could have dreamt.
For the first, his cynicism was almost immediately confirmed: the boys raised there were snobby as anything, looking down at the rest of them as little better than barbarians, and many of the adults were the same way. It was clear that this whole business of recruiting talented nobodies was a project of the sect leader’s – the interim sect leader, no less, not even the real thing – and nobody else’s; they were only just barely going along with it. Adding to that the fact that there were dozens if not hundreds of rules, and Meng Yao could glumly foresee a future of having his lack of knowledge held over his head as a fault, even with his marvelous memory to act as his backing.
For the second…
Well, there was Lan Xichen, who was – as unbelievable as it seemed – to actually embody all those things that people said about gentlemen, all kindness and gentleness and fierce upright pride, except only for real. There was Lan Wangji, who was basically perfect in every way and kinder than he gave the impression he was, willing to help tutor anyone who asked if only they dared disturb his solitude long enough to do so. There was the boy Meng Yao shared a room with, Su She, who’d punched the boy from the Yunping cultivator clan in the mouth for calling Meng Yao a son of a whore and pretended it was because they weren’t allowed to talk about that sort of thing, when actually it’d been because he hadn’t wanted rumors to get around that might make Meng Yao’s life harder in the future.
There was Lan Qiren, who was strict and a little boring but fair, painfully fair, handing out punishments with an equitable hand no matter that it meant that he was punishing the locals as often if not more often. It’d been his idea to bring people like Meng Yao into the Lan sect, and defending the idea was the only time he truly seemed moved to passion. Now that they’d passed the initial examination and been judged to match Lan sect standards, Lan Qiren announced, as far as he was concerned, they were Lan sect just as if they were born there, as if they’d been children of his own.
And he even seemed to really believe it, too.
Today, Meng Yao’s head was still warm from when the stern Teacher Lan had put his hand there, gentle and approving, and his ears still burning from the murmured “Well done, Meng Yao, as expected.”
“I think I would kill someone for him,” Meng Yao said dreamily to Su She, who snorted.
“You’ve got such father issues,” he said disdainfully, as if he didn’t have entire family issues. That was just Su She’s way, though – he bitched and moaned and complained without end, and he’d probably kill someone for Meng Yao if Meng Yao so much as hinted it was something he’d want. They’d made friends for a reason. “You know the bit about the poor kids being his own children is a lie, right?”
“I know which sect’s leader is my father, thanks,” Meng Yao said, rolling his eyes. “I’m well aware it’s not Teacher Lan. Like he’d ever have kids of his own, anyway.”
“That’d require noticing when someone’s flirting with him,” Su She agreed, all solemn for just a moment, and then he dissolved into sniggering giggles. Meng Yao couldn’t blame him: it was, in fact, extremely funny when women (and sometimes men) tried to flirt with Teacher Lan, mostly because of the way that he very genuinely and completely missed that that was what was happening each and every time.
“Laugh all you like,” Meng Yao said peaceably. “You’d kill for him, too.”
“Probably,” Su She agreed. “But only because of you.”
That was fair enough. After getting the lay of the land, Meng Yao had arranged for them to ‘accidentally’ be overheard by Teacher Lan while talking about the misconduct of one of the teachers who was the most biased against guest disciples, one of the ones that had been harassing Su She in particular for over a year before Meng Yao had arrived, and despite Su She’s initial nervousness about the plan, it had all gone splendidly. Sure, they’d been punished to do five copies of a treatise on upright conduct because they’d breached Talking behind the backs of others is prohibited, but the teacher in question had been sentenced to two hundred strikes with the discipline rod for abusing his position and three months of enforced seclusion to contemplate his misbehavior, and then, Teacher Lan had said, his expression dark and threatening, they could discuss what role would be the best fit in the future.
The other teachers had taken notice and shaped up very quickly, after that.
Comparatively, those five copies made in the nice cool Library Pavilion instead of having to do chores on the hottest days of summer? Practically a pat on the back for bringing it to his attention.
Su She would never have dared to raise anything if it was just him, Meng Yao thought; he had a strange fear of authority figures that combined envy and misery in an explosive combination – he would have just suffered and suffered and suffered until he’d been pushed too far and then it would have all burst out at once. He wasn’t like Meng Yao, who was unwilling to keep to his “proper” place and was more than willing to use his greater-than-average share of brains to get what he wanted, no matter what rules he broke in the process. He was the sort of person who was willing to do whatever it took to obtain his desires – no matter what it took.
Well, maybe not no matter what. He wouldn’t want to disappoint Lan Qiren too much.
(Okay, so maybe Su She was right and he had some unresolved father issues. So what if he did? Whose business was it but his?)
-
It’d taken Meng Yao a while to fully adjust to the Cloud Recesses.
Some parts he’d figured out right away – the way they all flattered themselves as gentlemen even if they were actually little more than hypocrites (Teacher Lan and his personally taught nephews exempted, of course), which of course meant that Meng Yao’s ability to act pitiful at the drop of a hat and cleverly turn black into white made him a teacher’s pet at once. The vegetarian meals were easy enough to adapt to, given that his mother hadn’t had the money for meat all that often, and the training and cultivation and all that wasn’t any challenge for his excellent powers of retention – he had ambitions of becoming one of Teacher Lan’s aides one day, and worked assiduously towards that goal. Even waking and sleeping early, which was practically the opposite of his schedule at home, was something he could adjust to, given time and incentive.
It was his mentality that took some time to adjust.
Meng Yao had perhaps grown up with too many of his mother’s stories, painting an image of a matchless paradise – at the start, he looked at everything around him, serene and elegant but not quite as rich and shining and thought that it would do, for now. When he’d first arrived, he had had every intention of making a good reputation for himself and using that reputation to get his real father’s attention – he’d liked Teacher Lan from the beginning, despite his best attempts to not let his heart be swayed, but he’d reasoned that if a teacher was like this, then a blood-related father would be even better.
And so, for the first half-year, he’d treated his time at the Cloud Recesses…not lightly, no. He was extremely serious about making sure to get the maximum benefit he could. And yet, at the same time, he still was not really committing himself to the place.
This wasn’t where he was going to live his whole life, he reasoned; it was just a stepping stone to a better future. That meant he would exert himself to point out things that made him look good, to eliminate obstacles in his path, to win himself allies, but not bother with those longer-term problems, the ones that really ought to be fixed but which would take a great deal of effort with little reward other than annoying people.
His feeling of superiority and emotional distance lasted right up until the first discussion conference.
From a distance, Jin Guangshan was everything Meng Yao could have imagined – perhaps a little too similar to the clients that his mother often saw, a little dissolute to pull off the air of a refined scholar he affected, but wearing more gold than Meng Yao had ever seen in his life, with a retinue of servants that dwarfed the other sect’s. Each of those servants were dressed more finely than even main clan cultivators in some of the smaller sects, and though Meng Yao’s Lan sect guest disciple clothing was of such quality that he didn’t need to fear their disdain, he couldn’t help but be secretly impressed.
He'd exerted himself more than usual to trade away all of his chores and duties, freeing himself up to take on patrol duty near the Jin sect. He’d perhaps daydreamed about some sort of encounter – nothing active on his part, of course, but he couldn’t quite resist playing through some fantasy of catching someone’s eye by chance, getting called over, a “You have a familiar set to your chin, who’s your father?”, a shy halting admission, recognition, a joyous reunion…
Instead, his father spent the entire night getting drunk and cursing the Lan sect’s hospitality for not providing him with girls to go with his liquor, calling Lan Qiren a miserable prude with a stick up his ass right in front of the Lan sect disciples that clenched their fists in barely concealed rage. He’d seen Meng Yao all right, ordered him to come forward, but it’d only been to mock him in front of all of his servants – and not even for being his bastard son, no, that would involve bothering to pick him out from the crowd or to ask who he was. No, he’d mocked him simply for being one of the poor disciples that Lan Qiren had taken in, all because his accent was marked with the distinct tones of Yunping rather than the sweetness of Gusu.
“Tell me, boy,” he said, breathing fumes into Meng Yao’s face and making him feel suddenly as if he’d never left the brothel – that the Cloud Recesses had all been a vague dream, and now he’d woken up and lost it all. “How does that old fart Qiren expect you to pay him back for all he’s done for you? I heard the Lan sect includes a pretty face as one of its standard requirements…”
Meng Yao put his gaze above his father’s head and pretended to be deaf.
“It seems like rather a lot of effort,” one of his father’s attendants remarked. “Even if Second Master Lan wanted a boy to warm his bed, couldn’t he just buy one like any normal person?”
“Bah, boys,” his father said, and leaned back, waving his hands in dismissal. “Why would anyone bother with a boy when you could have a soft woman instead? Just as long as they’re stupid enough – you know, there’s nothing worse than a woman who’s talented and knows it, too smart, always trying to get above their station…”
“You’re thinking about that whore in Yunping again, aren’t you? The one that interrupted your dinner and made a scene, claiming you’d promised to take in the son she bore you?” the attendant said, laughing. “I told you, you should’ve just killed her for her impudence rather than just having her beaten and thrown out. That way the matter wouldn’t still be bothering you…”
“Go away, boy,” another servant said to Meng Yao, who was frozen stiff in belated terror, nausea churning in his stomach as he realized his mother could’ve gone out one day and never come back, and he would never have known why – or maybe it was that he’d been spending his considerable time and brain on pleasing someone who would have done that, who nearly had done that. “Your accent’s brought back bad memories, don’t you see?”
Meng Yao left.
No, to be more blunt: he fled. He ran away, hot tears filling his eyes until he couldn’t see – belly full of regret and disappointment, crushed dreams feeling like broken shards of glass in his mouth and throat.
He tried to tell himself that it was better to find out now, when they were still distant, before he'd sold his soul for the futile chance to get that horrible man's affection, but he couldn't quite throw off the shame of knowing that if he hadn't heard such a thing up front, he probably would have done that. Would have humiliated himself like that, and for what? A man who regretted not murdering his mother?
He ran right into Lan Wangji, who was also on patrol.
Lan Wangji took one look at him and grabbed his wrist, dragging him away from the main pathway and all the way to his uncle’s rooms.
Lan Qiren was still awake despite the late hour, writing something at his desk, but he set aside his brush at once. “What’s going on?” he asked, frowning. “Wangji – Meng Yao – one of you report.”
“Meng Yao was on patrol by the Jin sect,” Lan Wangji explained as Meng Yao furiously tried to dash away his tears using his sleeve.
“Who permitted that? First year disciples aren’t permitted to patrol during discussion conferences,” Lan Qiren asked, his frown deepening. “It wouldn’t be proper – ah, but no, I recall now. I suppose it was inevitable. Wangji, well done, and thank you. You are dismissed.”
After Lan Wangji left, he turned his eyes on Meng Yao.
“You volunteered, didn’t you?” he asked.
Meng Yao felt his back go cold: Lan Qiren knew, then. It had never been said out loud by anyone as far as he knew, and yet it was clear that Lan Qiren knew who his father was – and probably his mother, too.
He knew that Meng Yao was – that he wasn’t anything more than –
“You are one of my most promising disciples, Meng Yao,” Lan Qiren told him, and poured him a cup of tea from his own pot, pressing it into his hands. It was finer tea than Meng Yao had ever had in his life, full of smoke and flavor. “The rules say Be loyal and filial, but they also praise reciprocity. You have not been recognized, and have not received your forefathers’ grace. You can fulfill your obligations to chivalry through your respect for the parent that raised you.”
Meng Yao stared down at the teacup. Lan Qiren had completely misunderstood the nature of Meng Yao’s concern – he was disappointed in what his father was, not worried about not living up to his obligations of being a filial child. And yet it was a little nice to hear that as far as Lan Qiren was concerned, the rules said that he could tell his father go hang for all he cared…
And that he ought to honor his mother, which was something no one who knew her had ever said to him.
“Even if she –” His voice stuttered. “Even if she’s a…”
He couldn’t say the word.
“Appreciate the good people is not qualified by class or profession,” Lan Qiren said, and his monotone voice was blissfully without emotion, as if this were just another lesson in class, and not the deepest hurt of Meng Yao’s life. “I have never met your mother, Meng Yao, but you are a good child – diligent, organized, sincere, with good judgment, and you clearly adore her. That tells me everything I need to know.”
Meng Yao burst into tears.
-
Meng Yao liked Lan Xichen a lot, but he also had to admit that sometimes, the older boy was, well…
“Dumb as a pile of rocks,” Su She announced.
“Do not criticize other people,” Meng Yao said piously, but then chuckled, shaking his head. “Say, rather, that he’s naïve and sheltered, and overly inclined to believe the best in people.”
“Like I said: dumb as rocks. How many times is going to get himself swindled into being someone’s sword or shield before he figures out that the problem is him?”
“Some people don’t have the capacity to understand the depths of humanity’s foulness –”
“Yeah, dumb ones.”
“Su She, please.” Su She held up his hands in surrendered. “At any rate, if Lan-gongzi is going to keep falling for people’s tricks, it’s beholden on us to help protect him.”
“You just don’t want Teacher Lan to be sad about something serious happening to his nephew,” Su She said knowingly, but he was already nodding. “All right, what are we going to do about it? He outranks us. We can’t exactly tell him to his face that he’s being…”
He paused.
Dumb as rocks went unsaid, but then, it didn’t need to be said out loud for the meaning to be clear.
Meng Yao sighed.
“You can only trick someone so many times,” he said. “If we want to keep him from getting tricked by other people, then we have to trick him first. And better.”
“What do you mean?”
“Lan-gongzi likes to save people,” Meng Yao explained. “He really sees himself as a chivalrous gentleman – he puts chivalry first, even though Teacher Lan says Learning comes first. That’s why he always sides with whoever he perceives to be the underdog in a given situation, no matter how wrong that impression is. That’s how most of the people who’ve been tricking him have gone for it: playing the victim, appealing to his sense of righteousness, pulling the curtains over his eyes to obscure what’s actually happening.”
“Okay. So?”
“So, we’ve both got miserable backstories – you being taken from your family at a young age and then bullied, me with my mother and, even worse, father. If we get him on our side, early on, he’ll side with us over anyone else – that way we can keep him from getting roped into other people’s private grudges.”
Su She frowned. “That seems a little manipulative.”
“It’s for his own good, and that’s what’s important,” Meng Yao said, and smiled faintly. “Wouldn’t you agree, Lan-er-gongzi?”
Su She jumped, turning around just in time to see Lan Wangji, who had been standing in the shadow of a nearby tree, step out.
He had a serious expression, as always, but a thoughtful one.
Meng Yao waited patiently.
“You cannot take advantage,” Lan Wangji finally said, and Meng Yao knew he’d won the most important ally in the battle to save Lan Xichen from himself. “That would change it from a virtuous act to a selfish one.”
“Like we need anything from him,” Su She said haughtily. “Maintain your own discipline.”
“Arrogance is forbidden.”
“It’s not arrogance if it’s justified! It’s just self-confidence!”
“Do not argue with family,” Meng Yao quoted, and was pleased to see both of them drop it at once. “Listen, we all share the same goal, and we have to start somewhere, don’t we? We’re stronger together than apart. Together, we can do anything, even protect Lan-gongzi.”
That and more, he thought as the other boys nodded, following his lead. Lan Xichen is just the start.
-
“The Wen sect will make trouble sooner rather than later,” Meng Yao said thoughtfully, one day. His friends turned to look at him. “Yes, I’m serious.”
Lan Wangji nodded, serious as always, but Su She scoffed.
“You can’t even convince that Wei Wuxian boy to leave poor Lan-er-gongzi alone,” he said snidely. “How exactly are you expecting to bring down the Wen sect?”
“I don’t convince Wei Wuxian to leave Lan-er-gongzi alone because Lan-er-gongzi doesn’t want to be left alone,” Meng Yao said. “Obviously. Isn’t that right?”
“You should call me by name,” Lan Wangji said, which wasn’t answering the question and definitely wasn’t denying anything. “You were saying, about the Wen sect?”
Meng Yao smiled.
-
“What brings one of Teacher Lan’s most promising disciples to the Unclean Realm?” Nie Mingjue said, peering at him thoughtfully. “You’re at the wrong time to be one of the usual messengers.”
Meng Yao smiled at him.
“I think you’ll find that we have similar goals, Sect Leader Nie,” he said. “When it comes to making sure that certain people in our lives don’t get hurt by the bad decisions of others, I mean. In your case, it’s your younger brother, who’s a friend of mine –”
Friend, source of information, it was all about the same thing in the end. Meng Yao didn’t have real friends outside the Lan sect, but he’d been very careful to cultivate good relationships with all his most important peers.
“- and for me, well. A teacher for day, a father for a lifetime. I’m sure Sect Leader Nie can understand the importance of protecting one’s father – right?”
“You don’t need to use any sophistry on me,” Nie Mingjue said, rolling his eyes. “If you have an idea on what we can do to stop the Wen sect before they go and burn someone’s house down, I’m all ears.”
By chance, Meng Yao did.
It was a good plan, too, daring and brave in equal measure. If it worked the way he hoped it would, he’d win enough fame to get Jin Guangshan to beg for him to join the Jin sect – not that he would, of course.
Meng Yao knew what he wanted, and he knew how he was going to get it, too.
-
“This is a lovely house, A-Yao,” Meng Shi said, running her hand along one of the soft tapestries on the wall. “Truly lovely. Whoever you rented it from has good taste.”
Meng Yao bowed. “Thank you for the compliment, Mother. I put a lot of thought into it.”
“You own it?” she asked, surprised. “But don’t you live up the mountain, with the sect?”
“I do. This is for you.”
“For – me? A-Yao! This is too much – how much must it have cost–”
“I saved the Lan sect’s core texts from being destroyed,” Meng Yao said. “I’m an inner sect disciple now – I could ask for a dozen houses like this, and they’d grant them to me without blinking twice. Teacher Lan would insist on it.”
“Teacher Lan,” his mother murmured. “That’s the one you’ve taken to treating as your own father, isn’t it? You’ve spoken so much of him, in your letters…”
“There’s no need to scheme,” he told her. “He wouldn’t notice your flirtations, anyway.”
His mother arched her eyebrows at him.
“He’s really oblivious.”
“Still…”
“Really no need,” Meng Yao said, and couldn’t help but smile at the memory of Lan Qiren pulling him into a hug when he realized that the books – and Lan Xichen – were all safe from the Wen sect’s attempt to burn down the Cloud Recesses, and, later, again, that Wen Ruohan was dead. He may have deliberately schemed for that second hug, and he might or might not have plans for more. “He already takes me as a son.”
His mother relaxed.
“Good,” she said, and smiled herself. “So, A-Yao, was I right, all those years ago? Was the Lan sect a good fit for you?”
“Yes, Mother,” Meng Yao said. “Yes, it was.”
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Half-Light, Half-Life - Chapter 3
Every eight days, the servants of Ai'Vaerin are allocated one day of rest, to tend to their own affairs or take their leisure, their work for the moment forgotten. There are no duties, no early morning wake up call, no questioning presence calling attendance - so long as the maids are back in the evening at final curfew, they are free to spend the day as they please.
Elreith makes the most of it, as she always does, working late into the early hours of the morning, until her hand begins to cramp with the effort of writing such small tight script and her eyes begin to strain from the candlelight. When she wakes, shuffling out of bed long past when the morning call would be due, she makes right back for her desk, pulling a shawl around her shoulders as she settles there, still wearing her nightgown, shuffling through her notes, taking up her books once more.
There's a hunger in her, as she paws through each book, her curiosity a thing that cannot be sated. Any junior scholar might find it tiresome, being forced to read such weighty and dry texts, but most days Elreith can barely keep her eyes off the page - it's fascinating, learning how the world works, what the ancient poets and philosopher's of old sing of in their great treatises, the history and nature of the many races, the orbit and alignment of the celestial bodies, laws of inherent truth that underpin the world, laid out in bare calculus. To learn of history, of poetry, of why birds sing in the morning and how fish breath beneath the sea, to learn of the stars and why they shine at night, magic and how the god-lines came to be, legend and history and truth and myth, all overlaying pieces in a greater puzzle.
Elreith could get lost in it in a lifetime and a half, and still want to learn more.
She'd intended to just give her notes a quick pass over before getting dressed, but when Elreith looks up again two hours have passed and she's three chapters into a new book, another four pages of parchment sitting filled beneath her quill. The script on them is tiny and packed, as small as Elreith can make it to save space, the end page almost a solid wall of stacked text. It's necessity, more than preference, a habit she's settled into out of enforced frugality - ink she can make stretch, but parchment has always been her limiting factor, and buying new parchment is always expensive.
It's almost noon by the time Fayenna comes knocking on her door, prying her away from her desk and forcing her to venture out into the outside world. "Elreith, it's already noon. You're not even dressed!" Fayenna says accusingly, clicking her beak, stepping in through the door and casting a glance over the desk with its stack of books and sprawled papers. "Really, I don't know how you do this, sitting here all day. Now come on, there's a market today, and you promised you would come. Don't think I've forgotten!"
"Alright, alright," Elreith says, and lets herself be chivied out of her room. Fayenna drags her through into the common rooms first, giving her an unimpressed glance and sitting there to watch her eat, too well used to her habits by now. She sits impatiently across from Elreith, chattering all the while, already talking of all the things she hopes to see in the market.
"-wasn't on our last rest day, such rotten timing, really it was completely unfair - I even heard the Greenway maids had that day off, and so they all went, and of course Etty was bragging all week about all the things she saw! Oh, I do hope they still have that beautiful fabric from last time, it was such a nice blue, and I've finally saved the money to buy some. Do you think the merchant will still be there? Oh, I dearly hope so-"
"I'm sure they'll still be there," Elreith assures her, finally setting aside her knife and fork. "It wasn't a traveling merchant, if I recall, so I can't imagine any reason they wouldn't be there."
That makes Fayenna nod, looking relieved, the ruffled quality of her feathers smoothing somewhat as she lets out a breath. "Right," she says, "well that's something at least. Oh, you're done? No time to waste then, come on, come on, we're already late!"
"I'm not sure we can be late, when we never said what time we were planning to leave," Elreith points out, amused, but lets herself be shepherded out the door regardless. It's an odd thing, to walk the halls of the high city without wearing her veil, and she feels conspicuously bare without it as they make their way through the halls, to the main servants' way. The many great halls of the high city are connected by an even more extensive network of servants corridors and passages, spiraling out through the upper reaches of the city like a bloodstream, winding and labyrinthine, carrying the unseen and integral workmen and servants to every corner of the great libraries and palaces.
The mains stairway is busy, servants of all ranks and casts passing them, caught in a hectic organized bustle, all dressed in their own blacks and many sporting their own veils, their purpose and hierarchy set aside by the glint of their embroidery. The vast majority of them are human, with only a few spirit kin among them, Averia and the other blessed lines rare in the service. None give the two of them so much as a glance as they pass, and then they're out, stepping through the final gates and into the Middle Quarter itself.
The streets themselves are busy, as they always are, made only more so by the presence of the Middle Market. The streets are tall and narrow, townhouses pressed wall to wall, high sloped roofs pitched and angled, gargoyles bearing their snarling teeth from above. Carriages run through the streets, great wheels rattling on the cobblestones as they pass, the sidewalks themselves no less busy, home to a constant stream of passers by - men at work, wives and mothers off on some errand, servants passing through on some task or another. This close to the Upper City, the townhouses are rich and well furnished, wealthy, and the pedestrians no different, the shops they pass too fine and expensive for the likes of Elreith and Fayenna, maids that they are.
Deveura pass, dragon folk adorned in the finery of high society, their scales dripping gold and dress fletched with glittering embroidery, looking so elegant and grand in their finery as they step into carriages or walk in the streets, the latest fashions all the more flattering for the way they accent the shine of their scales, the glint of their fangs, the proud height of their stature and the curve of their horns. Humans and children of Haema's lineage alike walk side by side with them, men and woman walking beside spirit blessed descendants, resplendent in their finery. As Elreith watches, a woman of Haema's lineage steps from a shop, her sharp ears glinting with teardrop jewels, her dress a beautiful thing of silver and blue that accents the fall of her hat where it sits angled on her head, covering her silvered eyes, a man in a dapper suit only step ahead of her, offering his arm for her to take as he helps her up into a carriage.
Eyes catch her and Fayenna, gazes lingering, and Elreith knows they can only be wondering what two such as them are doing in such a part of town - a Nightdaughter and an Averia are unheard of company in the upper crust, and even the servants that pass through are all mostly human themselves, making the two of them stand out all the more. Elreith ignores it with ease of long practice, Fayenna chattering on, barely seeming to notice at all, or perhaps just well practiced at ignoring it herself.
Given a few blocks, the streets become a little calmer, the houses a little less ostentatious, and while the people in the streets are still dressed finely - men and women in their best, tradesmen and servants all in uniform - the air is a little more relaxed. Elreith sees more men and women here, humans, and a few of the Duurum folk too, a dwarf standing proudly outside his shop in conversation with a customer, an array of pocket watches and clockwork affairs glinting behind him in the window. The two men give Elreith and Fayenna a nod as they pass, the customer stepping aside on the path to give them room, sparing them from having to step out into the road, and Elreith gives a polite nod in turn, Fayenna not having seemed to notice, too caught up in her awe of a hat she'd spotted across the street.
"- such beautiful feathers, and that blue! I could see myself wearing one in white, don't you think? It would be such a beautiful accent to my own colours- Elreith? Elreith are you even listening?" Fayenna asks finally, and Elreith shoots her an amused look.
"I am," Elreith says, because at this point she's given up on ever trying to redeem Fayenna. Her attention span had always been a haphazard one, as flighty as a bird - which Elreith supposes can only be the point, given Fayenna's race. "It was a beautiful hat, and white feathers would indeed be a pretty match for your own."
"Yes, it would be," Fayenna agrees happily, craning her head to catch one last backward glance of the woman and her hat. She lets out a sigh. "Oh, if only I could have one just like it, but I wouldn't have anything to wear it with. Let me tell you, Elreith, if I had even half the capital of such a woman, I could make it stretch very far indeed - you'd never catch me wearing anything out of season. Oh, I'd even buy you such pretty dresses as well. Why you never wear white or yellows I don't know, they'd be such a sight on you-"
Elreith makes a fond noise, amused, shaking her head. "I don't have the money for such things, and anyway, my work dresses suit me just fine."
"That's only because you spend all your pay on ink and dusty papers," Fayenna says plaintively. "Oh, Elreith I do wish you would live a little, sometimes. It can't be good for you, sitting hunched over a desk all hours of the day and night - just watch, if you get a twisted old back in your old age I'll have told you so! Ah, look, the market is ahead, we're not too late!"
They couldn't be late if they tried, the market running until well past nightfall, but Elreith lets Fayenna usher her on all the same. They're far enough down the Middle Quarter now that the streets are simpler, the crowded townhouses and shops rising tall, painted in humbler colours, roofs bearing the occasional sign of cracked tiles and mismatched replacements, the cobbled streets bearing the occasional pot hole or crack. There are no carriages in this part of town, not today, the streets for blocks instead filled out by a throng of passing pedestrians and impromptu stalls, which lean over the edge of the pavement and spill into the streets themselves, laughter and calling voices rising in a cacophony as a thousand merchants and curious shopper speak over each other.
Elreith doesn't know exactly how it was the tradition of the Middle Market came to be, but twice each months vendors and traders from all over Ai'Vaerin and beyond gather in the streets of the lower Middle Quarter to peddle their wares, spreading out from the locus of the Hundred Fountain Square and spilling through the surrounding streets, drawing crowds from all over the city. It is the one time when you can find goods from throughout Ai'Vaerin without having to travel the span of the city to do it, and the congregation of all the many and varied merchants means there is always something interesting to be found, well worth the visit for the entertainment alone if nothing else.
The crowds are a mix of people from all walks of life - humans and Duurum folk and spirit kin alike, a few Deveura to be seen and even the rarer and more occasional Averia passing through the crowd, feathers flashing in the bustle. The crowd is loud, and cheerful, dressed in all manner of clothes and garb, the clothes perhaps more humble but appearing in a riot of colours not seen amongst the more curated and carefully cultivated styles they'd seen passing through the upper Middle Quarter. No one spares them so much as a glance as they pass, Elreith and Fayenna quickly finding themselves lost in the market, Fayenna tugging her along, letting out a delighted noise every time she spots a new stall to be explored.
There are vendors selling cloth and bolts of fine embroidery, others jewelry and fine watches, and even more still selling so many different kinds of food that Elreith cannot even begin to count. Traveling merchants pass through Ai'Vaerin specifically to set up stalls at the markets, and the effect is that all manner of strange things can be found - gleaming engraved swords and glowing nightpearls from the Dusklands, beautiful and bright woven fabrics from the Burning Lands, idolatry and sermons and musical scores from Talthun, exposing the grace and beauty of their god the Living Light. Anything you can dream of in the world passes through the market at one point or another, the question is simply finding it amongst the maze of stalls.
"Oh, I do hope that that that fabric merchant is in the same place as last time," Fayenna frets, once they've gawked at enough sets of jewelry that she sets aside her distraction enough to remember the true reason they'd come, "or we'll have a mission on our hands even trying to find him."
"It was over on the south side of the square, wasn't it?" Elreith notes, setting down the silver ring she'd been holding and giving the merchant a little smile as she steps away. The woman behind the stall, a Duurum folk with the most beautiful red hair and beads in her beard, simply nods in turn, sending them off cheerfully even as she turns to start talking with the next customer.
"It was," Fayenna remembers, delighted, and Elreith rolls her eyes fondly as Fayenna starts chivvying her in that direction, not wanting to waste another moment. They do find the merchant in the end, and while the price of the cloth Fayenna has been eyeing up has gone up by another few sterlings, Fayenna puts up enough of a fuss that she manages to haggle it right back down, walking away in the end with a bolt of beautiful deep blue fabric. Fayenna clutches it in her arms as they walk away, looking positively radiant with joy, already espousing with great glee the beautiful frock she intends to make with it.
Elreith in turn takes the opportunity to pick up a few required odds and ends, slipping through a gap in the stalls and into one of the shops back from the street, picking up a new stack of parchment and a fresh bottle of ink to go with it, stowing the lot safely away in her bag before stepping out. Fayenna, when she emerges, has already disappeared, and Elreith spots her halfway down the street, before a stall selling roasted honeyed meats.
Elreith catches up with her, sending her an amused look as she does, but passes the merchant a few coppers to get one of her own. The two of them end up sitting on one of the outer streets of the market, where the tall streets open and give way to a high terrace overlooking the lower levels of the city, the Lower Quarter barely a haze in the mist below, and the distant arc of the rest of the middle Quarter curving beyond, the two of them leaning against the high stone rail and watching as travelers and carriages pass along the great bridge below. Ai'Vaerin stretches above them like a great looming beast, the high towers of the Upper City piercing the heavens, while it's mountainous roots sink deep into the earth, the Middle Quarter spanning the space in between, stacked layers growing atop each other in eccentric formation, equally likely to start growing horizontally outwards into thin air as it is upwards.
Guards in their shining silver armor can be seen standing at attention on the bridge, like a line of statues dotting the great length of the bridge where it reaches from the great lower square across the Lower Quarter and out to the outskirts of the city, letting merchants and travelers pass through into the city's heart directly. From where they stand in the Middle Quarter, the figures on the bridge are so small and distant that they might as well be ants, and Fayenna, ever curious, makes something of a game of it, delighting in guessing who they might be and where they might be headed. Elreith savors her skewer of meat, the meat sweet and soft and well spiced, enjoying the moment to just stand there and feel the sun on her skin, the soft breeze passing through from below.
As they watch, there's some sort of commotion on the great bridge, the carriages and wagons behind shifted aside to make way for something, and the cause soon becomes clear when a party of knights comes riding in. There are almost three dozen score of them, their shining armor and dark cloaks cutting distinct and regal figures as they ride back in, a flock of silver starlings, flying along the length of the bridge, banners flying behind them. This high, they're too far away to make out the details of them properly, but Elreith can only imagine they're back from some mission or another.
More hunting parties head out each week it seems, knights send out to deal with troubles in the lands surrounding the great city, and the smaller tributary villages and towns that fall within Vaelthran's side of the borders. It is the dead, Elreith knows, the incidences of unsettled ghosts and vengeful bodies only seeming to have grown more prevalent these last years. There's always been issues with them, Elreith knows, Vaelthran's kingdom founded in the lands where the veil itself draws thin because of that exact reason, but these days all one seems to hear is more news of them. Every week you seem to hear about some new village that seems to have come under siege, some new terror causing trouble for travelers on the road, the knights being sent out to tend to it.
"I wonder what it was they fought this time?" Elreith asks, speaking more to herself, and Fayenna makes a curious noise.
"I'm sure I don't know. Some horror or another, most likely." Fayenna replies. "No, I'm quite happy to leave the dealing of the knights to the knights. Can you imagine actually having to pick up a sword and fight, having to ride out for days and weeks just to find yourself between the teeth of some great monster?" She shivers, shaking her head, feathers fluffing up a little, the effect leaving her looking rather ruffled. "No, I'm quite satisfied being a maid, thank you."
Elreith doesn't disagree. "Still," she says, looking down at the knights, the flutter of their banners heralding their approach into the city itself, a party of guards moving out in their gleaming armor to meet them. "It is interesting."
"You're interested in the grimmest things, I swear," Fayenna replies, sounding more bemused than anything. "Tell me, did you hear about Rhyniea, from the Southcast? I think I introduced you to her a while back - the girl with the bow, remember? - anyway, I heard the most interesting news the other day. Apparently she's run off! Etty was telling me, and all the maids are convinced that she had a man on the side, and the two of them have eloped! Just upped and vanished one day, without a word, caused a whole scandal and no end of trouble for their matron, because no one can find hide nor hair of her-"
Fayenna is still talking, launched properly in to a recounting of all the last days gossip, and Elreith casts one last glance down onto the lower city, where the gleam of the knights armor can just be seen disappearing down through the main street, noting the three empty horses that ride behind the last knight. She wonders how many went out, and how many knights had failed to return, who it was at home who would be mourning the loss of those three knights.
-
It's late afternoon by the time they finally make it back to the Towercast. Between greeting a few of the other maids and eating supper and checking over the week's new schedule, it's past the eighth bell by the time Elreith makes her way back to her room, growing dark enough that she leans over to light her candles, settling herself down at her desk once more. She sets aside her new stack of parchment, and sets her new bottle of ink behind the old one, ready to be opened when it finally runs out.
She looks over her books, and thinks about picking up her tome where she'd left off - slowly deciphering the twisting script of the Malthaunis volumes - but in the end she doesn't have the energy for another night of painstakingly translating the transcendental tongue, and dealing with the intricacies of high ordinance calculus on top of it. She picks through the books, glancing over each one, and finds herself pausing as she reaches the travel journal, the book thinner and smaller than any other in the stack, noting with some surprise that it's actually written in common.
Nearly all books in Ai'Vaerin are written in the transcendental tongue, language of the high scholars. Any knowledge worth remembering is worth writing properly, they say, unifying texts from all corners of the realm into a single common tongue, highest and most beautiful and most poetic of them all, the one capable of reaching precision and beauty and an understanding of truth that no other can. Its script is elegant and flowing, all twisting cursive, the language itself equally complex to learn, and it's only years of long practice that have given Elreith any speed at translating it at all, even then the process is still slow and time consuming.
In contrast, the journal's title stands out almost starkly in its humbleness, words written simply and plainly. It's cover is soft brown leather, embossed with a modest title and name. Journey through Night, it reads, and names the author simply as Daughter of Masvha.
Elreith hesitates. Her stack of parchment sits on the desk, waiting and ready, her quill already at hand. She should study, she ought to study, to reach for one of her proper books, can't afford to really waste a single moment, and yet- Aesynth wouldn't have recommended her the book if it wasn't worth reading, Elreith reminds herself, and even a travel journal can be educational in it's own way.
That thought is what finally tips her over the edge, and she sets the book down in the center of her desk, carefully shuffling the rest of the stack to the side. The leather of the cover is soft beneath her fingers, well aged and bearing a few signs of wear, soft scratches that have never truly been worked out. The paper is aged and creamy when she opens it, the text written in faded black ink. A foreword has been written on the first page, seemingly added in in retrospect by the author, squeezed in tightly in the scant space above the opening page, and Elreith feels her breath leave her as she reads it.
These are the tales of the Daughter of Masvha, who gave up her own name in repentance for her crimes. Born beneath the fourteenth era of the rising sun, she offers here the stories of her life and travels through the Dusklands, tragic though their end may have been. Judge her not too harshly, for by the time any read this she will already be dead, and the dead can bear no sins.
It was written by a Nightdaughter, Elreith realizes, feeling her heart clench in her chest. It's the journal of a Nightdaughter, born and raised and living in the Dusklands. Why would such a book be in the library? While Vaelthran devotes itself singularly to all forms of study and learning, store of all knowledge, her kingdom's disdain for her mother's distant homeland has always been pronounced. Vaelthran might not despise the Dusklands quite as much as they do Talthun, who's god and Sept decries the Divine Bodies as heretical abominations, but still the Nightchildren are not held in high esteem by the scholars of the Veiled Lands.
They can respect the honor and strength of the Duskland's warriors, perhaps, their military and strategic might, but the people of the Dusklands are seen as largely brutish and violent, too caught up in the glory of combat and war and preoccupied by pretty squabbles. Elreith remembers very little of her homeland. She left it young, and her mother rarely spoke of it, keeping her silence on the subject save for the few times she was melancholic enough to tell a story or two of the home she'd grown up in.
Elreith doesn't know why they left, what it was that spurred her mother to move half a world away, to a kingdom that thinks so bleakly of their kind, but whatever it was it was enough to make sure her mother had never once spoken of going back, or who they might have left behind. In the end, Elreith can only suppose it was some conflict or another that drove them away. There is no war in the Dusklands, not technically, but when the great houses fight, working to prove their strength and improve their standing in the court, it is not just their warriors who feel the sting of it, and any house that finds themselves subsumed quickly learns the harshness of life as a vassal.
Elreith's fingers trace the line of the page, something almost tight in her chest, staring down at the book. Why one of the Wordkeepers thought this was a tome worth preserving, when Vaethran usually disdains the Nightchildren so much, preserving a simpler travelers journal from an unknown author amongst the other great tomes of the Scholariums, Elreith doesn't know, but she can only suppose it must have ended up there somehow by accident. Why Aesynth saw fit to give it to her is another mystery, but Elreith can only guess that she must have had some reason.
Elreith slowly turns to the first page all the same, eyes drawn to the scrawled ink as if by a magnet, unable to help her curiosity.
I do not know who would care to read this, or why someone might even want to, but I am told that setting events to paper helps with peace of mind, and at this point it seems like just as good a way of wasting time as any other, and if it can bring me peace of mind then all the better. I could start by telling you my beginnings, and how this tale all began, but instead I'll start here and now. I am traveling through the Turindale, those high unforgiving mountains bordering the Deluge, and my traveling companion died three days ago -
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Hi!! Im the Leo-withdrawal anon! I didnt ask anything prior to the one you just answered, but I'm so happy you responded! I'd honestly listen to anything you write--I think you have a wonderful way of expressing yourself, and the way you write is just... *chef's kiss* I guess, a question I'd have for you is this: What sort of hobbies do you headcanon our fearless leader to have? Quirks? Both endearing and... less so? I think that'd be a fun start!
hokay.... finally getting around to this!! sorry for the wait and thank you for bearing with me, anon! (ty for the compliment, too -- i'm very flattered jfjflk i just like talking about turtles ok (•̥ ̫ •̥) )
now... lemme talk blue to ya.
if we're talking about hobbies, well. stop me if you think you've heard this before -- leo loves training. for all of the guys, ninjutsu is a way of life; it's how they survive the world, how they connect with themselves and one another; it's their entire culture that the foundations of their family is built upon. and that's super neat. but watch 2k3 for like, one episode, and you'll very quickly see that the only one that fully leans into it is leo. mikey and don have their own interests that they often can't get to quickly enough once the day's training session ends. i think raph actually enjoys training recreationally as well -- but he's more interested in the physical aspect, spending his energy, bulking up, not necessarily focusing on skill or technique. i like to imagine that growing up, leo and raph spent a lot of time in the dojo together doing their own thing, kind of "separate but together"; before casey came along and raph got into hanging out topside with him.
leo, though, he throws himself fully into training. he's incredibly dedicated to it not only because of his sense of responsibility, but because he genuinely enjoys it -- he enjoys improving his technique, his skill. he enjoys the repetition of learning, which helps to calm and center him. he enjoys meditation, which helps him focus and clear his mind. as an introvert, and precisely because his family doesn't hang around the dojo as often as he does, leo's solo training time is his time -- it's his chance to relax and decompress. i think it's exactly why he spiraled harder and harder in season 4 no matter how much training he did: at that point, it was no longer a hobby, but an obsession. leonardo normally uses training as a healthy outlet, but when he channeled his exodus trauma into it, he removed his main method of decompression and replaced it with the intent to fuel that exact trauma. (sidebar, though i've talked about it before: i also feel like this is why fast forward is so excellent at showing leo's character growth. he is extremely zen and such a huge advocate of healthy self-reflection in the way he coaches cody and his clone. my sweet boy, so proud of him in that season.)
now i know what you may be thinking. and you're right. there's more to leo than his life in the dojo... so let's talk about some other hobbies i like to think he has!
so here's the thing, and i think it's something else i've touched on before... but i think leo actually has a very strong bond with donnie. their temperaments are very similar, they feel similar burdens when it comes to protecting the family, etc... and to be honest, i think they bond a lot over the same nerdy hobbies too! i think leo is a huge freaking nerd.
i legit think that donatello has probably absorbed his brother into more than one of his hobbies, both unwillingly and not. some things click for leo, and some things don't. some things he has a hard time getting into until he discovers a certain aspect of it or views it from a different perspective. but he is very often willing to try anything.
for example, i imagine that growing up, leo and don played a lot of chess together. don used to overwhelmingly win, until they got older and older leo got deeper and deeper into the tactical aspect, and soon he was beating don quite soundly more often than he wasn't. don started getting into engineering manuals and physics books, while leo started getting into history texts and military treatises, but both shared a love for novels and would swap their favorites regularly. and they still play chess, of course.
don got into nerdy sci-fi shows. like, really into them. and leo couldn't quite pick up the thread on that one, but he was content to endure every fourth movie night when it was don's turn to pick. and slowly he began getting drawn into it, the same way anyone does -- he enjoyed the campiness of the plot, how absolutely ludicrous the fight choreography was, how sometimes there were actually deep and thoughtful moments. it was both a welcome respite from the intensity of his reality and something he could put to practical use if he had to, like, steal a spaceship one day, though the odds of that happening seemed pretty low⁽ˡᵒˡ⁾. he was never able to quote any of the episodes verbatim like donnie, but it was something they could discuss and lightly bicker about during the times when leo is mindlessly helping out around don's lab. (more on that in a sec.)
also? i can absolutely. totally. easily see leo as a tabletop game enthusiast. i think i'll refrain from getting lost in the weeds on that once, since this is already starting to run long, but i just want to put that in your mind. tmnt dnd gaming nights. let that sit for a second.
okay moving on.
i genuinely think that leo just likes existing in the general vicinity of his family and extended family. not necessarily doing anything; just being there, doing something with his hands. if don is working on a project, leo may drift in, and don will ask him to hand him certain tools or read aloud certain notes on the screen, because he knows the deal. if raph is lifting weights and leo wanders over from his own training session, raph may ask him to spot, or set up the next pair of weights, because he knows how it is. if mikey is sitting in the living room playing video games and leo appears on the couch next to him, he might toss him a controller, or he may just start blabbering about what game he's playing and what level he's on, because he's got it. if april and casey are tidying up her shop for a new shipment of merchandise and leo just randomly appears in the window, feathered duster in hand, april smiles and puts on water for tea and casey teases him and throws him a broom instead without blinking. because that's just how leo is.
the thing is, leo is one of those people who have such a strong presence that -- as long as he's not trying to hide it, of course -- you know he's there because he carries such an atmosphere with him. on the other hand, leonardo is the type of person who is genuinely content to just be in the background. which may sound totally at odds with the whole leader schtick, but i think it's just kind of this duality he has: he can be both at the forefront and in the background, depending on the situation and what is needed from him. does this mean he doesn't have his own hobbies or interests? of course not! but even canonically, throughout the series leo is shown to be just as happy with his hands off the reins so long as there's not a mission in front of him. and i think it's precisely this lack of that constant need for control that shows just how whole and rich leo's inner life is, how he feels full and complete without his leadership/big brother role completely defining him, and how season 4 rips that carpet from under his feet to show the unhealthy side of that particular coin.
so as much as a cop-out answer it may sound like -- i think that leo just enjoys doing things with his brothers. he likes rooftop runs with them. he likes pizza and cards with them. he likes movies, sports, and games with them. but he's also his own person, and he enjoys being in his head, and he has hobbies that help him make his head a healthy place to be; his family absolutely respects that quality, and leonardo is a much more well adjusted person for it.
er.... i didn't really get into quirks or bad habits, but this has run really long already and it's getting late, lmao. so i think i will stop here for now. =w= thank you for letting me ramble again about my blue boy, anon; i know i'm slow, but hopefully i rambled enough to make up for it!
#tmnt#tmnt 2003#leonardo#meta#long post#if u aren't sick of me.... ofc i'd be happy to talk about the rest sometime flkjfds
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Someone, Broom in Hand
Kaz died before he turned sixteen. That’s the story. When he reappears, it’s at the side of the Dark General, wearing the thin fluttering robes of the Sun Summoner. Jesper travels to the Little Palace to punch his fucking teeth out.
Kaz[/&]Jesper | 7.5k | content note: nonlinear narrative, past and offscreen abuse
The purple kefta is too big for Kaz. Jesper doesn’t want to think about why he dumped his coat over Kaz’ head, except that Kaz looks weird and cold in his ugly fancy yellow paper taffeta shirt, his one layer that he’s wearing apart from the underpants that leave his knees bare.
That he looks uncomfortable at all should be nothing but a trick of the violent light: there are two separate lit fireplaces in the bedroom, so awkwardly placed that they were probably retrofitted by a Fabrikator. It might have been David, though then Jesper would surely have heard a treatise on the stones used to erect the Little Palace, or Gaz, or Lizaveta or any of the other Materialki Jesper’s been bunking with but—but anyway, if Kaz felt like wearing more, he could order an attendant to fetch another shirt or two. Unless there’s nothing he owns that isn’t thin and revealing and fucking yellow. Unless he’s not allowed… Unless he can’t even dress himself anymore without a gaggle of attendants. Man moves up in the world and forgets everything he knew: tale as old as time.
“Just like you forgot us,” Jesper mutters, less viciously than he should.
The Kaz-doll makes no comment. No protest. No further manipulation of Jesper’s old affections. No snide mockery for Jesper passing his kefta on to the man that less than an hour ago, he tried to kill.
He just pulls the coat on. With his odd bare fingers—no claws after all, just thin and human—he closes button after button, including the top four that Jesper’s never once used, struggling to pull the material over the bone-tines sticking out of his chest. (And who back home would believe that Dirtyhands has ordinary fingers and a totally fucked up chest?) It would be easier to leave it open, but Kaz, even now he’s a sunny lapdog, doesn’t do easy. When he drops his arms, the too-long sleeves fall down over his hands, and with his thumbs he traps the fabric there. Sad little improvised half-gloves, more than Jesper’s seen him wear in the month since he let himself get conscripted into the Little Palace. He looks back at Jesper.
There’s no Thank you—Kaz Brekker never knew that word, and it seems in the two years they had him, whatever else they forced on him the Ravkans failed to teach him any more manners—but there is something new in his glare. It’s not just the purple washing the colour off his smooth—his way too smooth face. No. It’s something old: defiant, and angry, and scheming, just barely breaking through the placid paint and the rust beneath it.
Bit by bit, as he buttons up Jesper’s kefta Kaz simultaneously pulls on the moth-bitten coat of Dirtyhands he’s kept way back in the wardrobe of his brain, the ruthless killer, Bastard of the Barrel, Dregs lieutenant and future gang boss unless he gets murdered first. And it didn’t stick the first time. Pulls it over whoever it is that he was before. Over the doll beside Kirigan.
Over that person in the corner, that cornered boy, brittle and alone and stripped of armour and weapon and self, and Jesper wants to kill every single fucker in the Little Palace.
“Back home, you had a plan for everything,” he says instead. “I’m not assuming it’s a B or even a Z or a Q squared, but I know you. I know you’ve considered it. What do we do now your beloved long-lost friend’s shown up to help you steal the Sun Summoner?”
☼
Yesterday, Kerch accepted the terms of the Ravkan crown. Ex-crown. Dark fucking empire. Whatever. Test all children and send the Grisha to the Little Palace, conscript some people into the First Army—though what they still need an army for when they have the Fold is anyone’s guess—send food, booze, and, worst of all to the fastidious greedy Kerch, pay tribute without receiving anything at all in return. It was in the mouth of every paperboy on the streets, every mercher, every gang boss. By Ghezen how could we just surrender? they moaned, and Do you want to end like West Ravka? and Didn’t you see him? Kirigan’s going to crown himself king of everything. He’s unstoppable. And that boy next to him, the Sun—
Honestly? Jesper doesn’t give a fuck anymore. He’s paying fifty kruge just to sit on Inej’s bed for an hour and braid her hair. Ketterdam can burn to the sopping wet ground for all he cares. The world can rot. Like the Dregs did. Like everything Jesper cared for.
Inej, though, watched it.
“I had to see,” she’s whispering into Jesper’s ear, barely moving her miserable red-painted lips even though his hair should block out most lines of sight already. Inej’s smart, though, and desperate: if Jesper keeps returning to the Menagerie as nothing but a smitten small-time gangster with an incredibly vanilla hair fetish, he won’t catch attention. Tante Heleen will have fewer reasons to raise Inej’s rates. Jesper can barely pay for a visit a month as it is, and even those he allows himself mostly because he’s given up the hope of ever paying off her indenture unless he wins big.
“I snuck out yesterday. I had to see. Heleen got a new girl from Ravka six months ago, and she believes, too. Had a cheap pamphlet with her, last thing she had, of the new Saint. The illustrations… they looked just like Kaz.”
“Fu—” Inej elbows him. Jesper presses his lips into the braid over her ear. “Forget about Kaz Brekker. You’re the only one who matters now. He died, and you ended up here.”
She’s trapped in the Menagerie now because Kaz disappeared into the harbour like so many orphans before him; because he didn’t tell Jesper jack shit about Inej’s situation that might have helped him keep her safe in the Dregs; because he allowed senile Haskell who knows the names of all his five hundred thousand miniature boats and literally nothing else to stay in charge of the Dregs instead of killing him as soon as possible, which allowed Haskell to let the payments for Inej’s indenture lapse, which meant three months after Kaz just disappeared from his life Jesper got back to the Slat to find that Inej, too, had gone without a trace, and it was only luck and a pervert old Dreg that Jesper soon afterwards ‘accidentally’ shoved off a roof talking about the girls at the Menagerie that meant he found her again. Found her, only to realize he can’t help her at all.
Inej pulls Jesper’s ear back to her mouth. “I saw him, Jesper. I saw Kaz. Kaz is alive. He was there. I saw him.”
“You what?!” A sharp elbow darting out of her red sad nightgown that would have slipped right in-between his ribs if it was one of the knives she still mourns, and he’s not even given anything away. Heleen’s a hell bitch, but what use would she get out of random surprise?
“I saw Kaz. He’s the Sun Summoner. I was far away but—it was Kaz, standing next to General Kirigan, holding his hand, when the Merchant’s Council signed the terms of surrender. It was Kaz. I’m certain. Sankt Kaz.”
“I—” Jesper burrows his face into Inej’s hair. “You didn’t happen to have a knife on you, did you? A really tiny one she couldn’t confiscate. A super lethal one. Might never get as good a chance again.”
“Jes—”
“Fuck him sideways with a rusty shovel. That traitor. Did you forget how you ended up here? He left us. Saw a bigger pile of cash and skedaddled, I bet. He always wanted to be king. Guess becoming the Darkling’s queen was the next-best option.”
Inej doesn’t even defend Kaz. Jesper pulls away from her so he can look at her face. She always looks sad these days, unless she has specific painful orders to perk up, but it’s deeper now. She’s not doing the gesture, not holding her hand against her chest. Faith, now, is just one more thing Kaz Brekker took from her. Jesper can’t blame her, even though he never believed. Not even when Ravka’s new ‘Sun Summoner’ started gaining them the whole continent. Power’s power, though, no matter whether the stories around it are true. If Kaz truly is the Sun Summoner, then it’s not just Kaz Brekker who sent her back to the Menagerie—but one of her Saints. Fucking asshole.
He buries Inej in his arms. It’s all he can do now, to hold her until this month’s hour is up, because it’s not like he can just murder the Ravkans special weapon in retribution, can he? Can…
“This changes nothing,” he whispers. “The only priority is still paying off your indenture. Kaz quit the Dregs. He left us, and that means he’s nothing now. Less than nothing. I have a good feeling about the Makker’s Wheel at the Emerald Palace this weekend. Lots of pigeons there for the ‘Fete of Unity with Mother Ravka’ or whatever, and the minder thinks I’m hot. It’s risky, of course, but if I do this right—”
☼
Jesper’s just about to crawl right back out from under the bed—weapons raised, since hell knows what Kaz was planning back there, and fuck Jesper for apparently still harbouring enough trust in the guy to follow his lead two years after he deserted—but then, a series of clicks and rumbles heralds the opening of the door. Footsteps, and it slides shut again.
Shit, that was close.
And Kaz wasn’t bluffing, after all. Well, well… it certainly means something that Kaz, beloved Saint and Sun Summoner and ally to the Darkling, just told his attempted murderer slash old friend and-or stooge to hide. Kaz never did anything without a motive, be it profit or power or vengeance, and even this degraded, polished version surely isn’t so far gone as to engage in ideas as base as altruism. Ergo, Kaz will want to use Jesper for—something, though what is there he wants when he’s basically a prince of—but he isn’t, is he? He’s in a cell. A cell Jesper can unlock.
Three pairs of footsteps move around the room. One of them might be Kaz, but without his limp, it’s hard to recognize him. None of them says a word, which… it probably means this is a routine visit. Whatever’s going on, they all know their role.
Two pairs stop moving, while the third one—circles around them, it sounds like, and then someone else stumbles a little and catches themselves. Jesper hopes they’ll hurry up. He’s in mortal danger, technically—Kaz can still choose to reveal the intruder inside the Sun Summoner’s private room and-orprison, but, prison. Jesper’s far more useful alive, and so, hiding under the bed is fucking boring.
There’s not even anything interesting in-between the slat frame and the mattress. It’s the only place where you could hide anything—that Jesper can think of, at least, but there’s just nothing there at all, and Kaz used to be a real magpie. It’s a gaping void, just like everything else in this room. Like everything else in this palace, a chasm painted over with gilt and power. Unless—something’s stuck to the underside of a cross brace. Jesper slides a fingernail under the edge, and it comes loose easily enough. Not exactly a cache worthy of Dirtyhands, and anyway, it’s just a… a mangled piece of paper. A paper that looks like it’s been chewed on and spat out—and an entire corner actually torn off, or bitten, maybe—and whatever used to be printed onto it mostly rubbed off except for a couple of letters here and there, RAV. Curved lines and tiny hats. What would Kaz need to hide in his room? Apart from weapons he doesn’t have. Other people’s jewellery, dito. The only thing that Jesper knows about him now is that he’s trying to open the door. Trying to leave. It’s probably a map, then.
Which means an escape is planned, and Jesper’s just providing the desperately sought means. Good. That means he should have even more leverage here.
Somebody stumbles again, this time taking two steps to catch themselves. Almost as if they’ve jerked away.
“You’re falling behind,” slimes the smooth, rich voice of the Darkling. “On second thought, our people would miss you at the celebration. I’ll inform the staff that you wish to dance, all night long.”
☼
“You’re hanging around here because you heard that General Kirigan and the Sun Summoner are due back this hour, aren’t you?” The woman in a tidemaker’s kefta that just sidled up to Jesper speaks unaccented, high class central Ravkan. Even if her dark skin is an indication of Zemeni heritage, she came to the Little Palace long before the Darkling’s recent territorial acquisitions. She’s no ally, just like the rest of the crowd that surrounds them: an old-school Grisha, veteran Second Army, not someone whose loyalties may yet be pliable. Not someone like Jesper, whose skin started crawling the moment he showed his skills to a Ravkan occupation officer so he could sneak into the Little Palace. She’s friendly, though, and looks at Jesper’s face with clear appreciation. “You must be new. Hi. I’m Nadia.”
“Jesper,” he says, throwing a flirtatious grin like a blanket over his nerves and anger. It’s almost fun, playing the suave infiltrator assassin Grisha. Except Inej’s still in the Menagerie. And Kaz is still a piece of shit. “Yeah, I just got here! They didn’t test for Grisha ability in Novyi Zem when I was little, so I barely knew who I was… but once I heard about the Darkling, about this place, I crossed the True Sea as soon as I could!”
“That must have been so hard. So lonely. This place is…” She grimaces. “This place was our sanctuary. You’re lucky you’re Materialnik.”
“Why?” It’s the first time since his arrival that anyone’s had even a neutral opinion of Durasts, let alone good, and granted, it’s not like he cares that much about the ability his Ma died from, and he’s only talked to a dozen people since arriving yesterday, but…
“Listen, I know you want to see the Sun Summoner, and don’t tell anyone I said this but…” Nadia pulls Jesper a few paces away from the crowd on the training grounds, into a corner formed by two enormous bales of hay. Well-chosen: he can barely see the crowd that just surrounded them peek out behind the yellow stalks. “You’re sweet—”
“Listen, you’re gorgeous, but we just met—although, on second—”
“No!” She laughs, but it’s bitter. “You’re cute, but no. It’s my duty, to her, to protect you. The new ones. You’re Materialnik, so you’re not combat, so you’re not going to actually meet the Sun Summoner. Ever, if you’re lucky.”
“He’s that bad?” Kaz was always a dick, if Jesper’s honest—it was part of his charm—he was just a charming magnetic one, and back with the Dregs Jesper hated his ruthlessness just as much as he admired it. He was worst to his fellow Dregs and his enemies, though: he could charm a mark when needed. So it’s a tad unexpected that Kaz earned himself the hatred of a Grisha indoctrinated from childhood to see him as her Saint and saviour. Apparently, he’s just that talented. That obnoxious.
Well, Jesper’s not complaining. That makes his plan much easier.
“He killed my best friend,” Nadia whispers urgently. “The last time I saw her they were taking a walk, and then I found her, blisters and burns all over her body. Who else? There’s a reason he’s not allowed to have weapons. I heard the Darkling doesn’t let him go anywhere alone, or he would murder us all. He killed Baghra too, I’m sure—she was our teacher, but she disappeared two years ago. Just stay away from him, alright? He looks harmless, but he’s a rabid dog. Oh. There he comes.”
Jesper barely manages to whisper, “Thank you,” before she pulls away from him and returns to her previous place. Back to the crowd of Etherealki and Corporalki on the training field, but she finds her place in the last row, standing—hiding—behind two men much taller than her.
Jesper follows into the crowd. No need to alert Kaz that the past is hot on his heels, and then—
Well. There he is.
There someoneis, anyway.
If Jesper trusted Inej just a hair’s breadth less, he’d have cursed her and sneaked back out of the Little Palace the second he sees the person holding General Kirigan’s hand. Sure, the Sun Summoner is male, with dark brown hair and dark eyes and pale skin, and just a little bit taller than Kaz was at fifteen, but that’s where the similarities end. Dirtyhands had his impeccable mercher’s suits in a grim mockery of Ketterdam’s upper class, and gloves to feed the rumours, and a cane to walk and kill. His hair managed to be at once floppy and severe; just like his gaunt face, in the right light, made him look utterly captivating and not just like an annoyed scheming rat. He looked exactly like the Bastard of the Barrel should. Not pleasant or easy, but the person Jesper once would have followed into any lion’s den.
This—this Sun Summoner, on Kirigan’s arm, is beautiful. Healthful. Pristine.
Barely even a fucking person.
It’s the face, mostly.
You could never tell what Kaz was thinking, just looking at him, because he was, after all, thinking in layers upon layers of incomprehensible schemes at all times of the day and then went to bed and dreamt about ploys and deceptions. Jesper could barely follow him the three times total he deigned to explain part of his plans. But you could always tell that Kaz was thinking. Planning, scheming, plotting his greedy bloody vicious way out of and into every possible house on every possible street.
The Sun Summoner looks empty. He’s staring straight ahead, but he’s not even doing thatwith any kind of purpose. He’s like a pet on the Darkling’s arm. He looks more airheaded than all blackout drunk heirs and heiresses in Ketterdam combined.
It’s incredibly eerie, because now he’s searching for it Jesper can sort of read Kaz Brekker back into the Sun Summoner’s face. This face is much smoother, without the marks of past firepox, plumped and rosy-tinted, but that might partially just be a testament to the quality of Ravkan cooks—or, how skint the Dregs always were. He has a normal haircut. It probably suits him better, unless your standard for beauty is Dirtyhands, and unfortunately Jesper—anyway. The Sun Summoner doesn’t have a cane, either, and he doesn’t need one, apparently, because he isn’t limping. Ravkan royal healthcare, but honestly, Kaz could have pressed a Grisha healer into service back in Ketterdam only he always insisted—well, whatever. Fuck his words of wisdom. Fuck him. Fuck Kaz. Jesper shouldn’t even be remembering that snake.
Kaz Brekker betrayed Inej, left her to rot in the Menagerie, so whatever role he’s playing right now in whatever scheme this is—because it has to be a scheme that put Kaz into the yellow robe he’s in right now, so thin it’s translucent, and sleeveless too in the Ravkan winter. The Dregs tattoo on his arm is gone. Two Inferni are flanking him and the Darkling, their hands perpetually on fire just so Kaz can parade about in a robe no Menagerie slave would go outside in, but still, it’s Kaz. It’s definitely Kaz Brekker. Jesper can see it now.
Fuck him. He traded the Dregs for this. He abandoned them to Haskell’s mismanagement and let Inej go back to the Menagerie. He betrayed them all.
(Of course, Jesper abandoned Inej now too, and without a word, but—after that last catastrophic loss in the Emerald Palace, there’s a zero percent chance the Dime Lions wouldn’t have strung him up by his own entrails—or sold him into indenture, trying to make back at least a fraction of the fifty thousand kruge he owes—so really, he had no choice. It’s the next best thing, right? If he can’t help her anymore, at least he can kill the bastard that started all their troubles.)
Kaz just walks off, hand in the Darkling’s grasp, towards the Little Palace. Carelessly following the other man’s lead.
The old Kaz would have noticed Jesper.
☼
Footsteps and then, a series of clicks and pieces of wood and metal rubbing stones. The door. Kaz’s legs, taking steps backwards to the bed in a perfect, healthy gait. The rich soft creaking of the bed as he sinks down again, and in front of Jesper—the same two muscular, pale, bare, identical hairy calves. Like the legs of a statue, or one of those de Kappels he used to like, except the right leg is trembling finely. Barely noticeable if it wasn’t right in front of Jesper’s face. Those Ravkans maybe aren’t so crafty after all.
Then: nothing.
After what feels like an hour in which Jesper doesn’t dare move, even though the Darkling must have left already, a hand drops off the edge off the mattress. Middle and index finger erect, then crooking twice in quick succession. It takes a moment to connect. Jesper hasn’t seen those signals in such a—move, path clear. Yes. That’s what it was.
Jesper wriggles out from under the bed, annoyingly free of dust. Pristine. Empty, just like everything else.
“Didn’t think the Sun Summoner needed to use our secret code, boss,” he drawls up at Kaz from the floor. Kaz, with his barren black eyes and his new porcelain doll face, picking at the wide open collar of his yellow shirt.
“Never drop a tool you can still use,” Kaz says. A beat. “Didn’t think I was your boss anymore.”
“You aren’t.” Jesper turns his head away, looking at the spotless floor and the intricately painted walls from his low vantage point. Exquisite, imposing, empty: a Saint’s cage, as beautiful and terrible as Inej’s room in the Menagerie. The bare wall hiding the inaccessible door. “That guy really fucking hates you.”
Kaz doesn’t reply. Jesper turns his head back to watch him again, even though that won’t give him anything more: Kaz used to be willfully inscrutable even back in the Barrel, but after whatever Grisha surgery they did to him, there are only traces left of the real person trapped inside him. Dollface, Jesper thinks again. Who’d have expected they’d turn fucking Dirtyhands into a dollface?
It’s Kaz who turns away, fingers clawed into his neckline. His voice is rough, even if it’s a shadow of the damaged rasp that used to be him. “I thought about it sometimes, back then. The first time.”
Every fibre of Jesper’s being wants to interrupt with, What are you talking about? I don’t speak cryptic anymore. I’m out of practice. He should get off the floor, raise his guns, resume—but whatever it is, whether it’s some stupid new Grisha power, whether it’s zowa, or his memory of Kaz is just coming back, he doesn’t—
“It was like this. I was on my bed already, usually, when it grew hard—and I thought you would be up for not being on the bed, and there wasn’t much else in my room. I imagined watching you. I didn’t touch it. That was better.”
Uh. What.
“He probably knows I threw up after we—I tried to hide it. I thought I could manipulate him into seeing me as his partner, I thought I’d healed, that I’d practiced enough—but he just saw that I was still weak. He saw he could control me. But if he didn’t do it again because I threw up, I’m—”
He was right. Jesper would have stayed on the cold hard floor back then for him. Even now, Jesper would crawl around like a worm jerking off for the fucking asshole he got himself trapped in the Little Palace to murder, if that meant Kaz never had to—
Kaz pulls the neckline of his flimsy thin single ugly yellow shirt closed. The shirt that doesn’t protect him. The shirt he didn’t choose.
☼
Jesper’s imagined the Sun Summoner’s quarters, of course. Most of the Grisha in the Little Palace are wretched gossips—or Jesper’s been charming as many people into spilling as many secrets as possible to him so he can plan his attack, same difference—and anyway, he needs a backdrop for his imagined kill shots. It’s Kaz Brekker, after all. Dirtyhands. The ex-Bastard. You’d want to rehearse that death. Think of some witty one-liners.
Nadia said it was gorgeous inside, like a dollhouse. Lizaveta, who Jesper’s been told to shadow so he can learn how to become a proper Durast, insisted it’s totally empty. Grzegorz said there were live kittens inside, so the Sun Summoner could sate his lust for innocent blood, Sayyna thought there was a giant swimming pool, and a lovely naïve boy from the edge of the permafrost up at the former border insisted it was just like the quarters of all other Grisha, except with a little more privacy. Since they’re all siblings fighting for a world that will be kind to Grisha.
Jesper, privately, imagined a few stolen paintings and a mishmash of furniture. Because he’s an idiot.
This is just like—
If it is the Sun Summoner’s bedroom at all. It should be. Jesper did his homework: he followed the Darkling and his Sun Summoner creature that wears the skin used to house Kaz, and a variety of Materialniks, to the end of this specific corridor, five times in total. Watched the Materialniks unlock a hidden mechanism, and then the two most powerful men in Ravka—in all charted countries, ruling everything this side of the True Sea but pockets of Shu Han and even that’s a matter of time—they walked inside, hand in hand. The Darkling always left, after a while, alone, and so it only made sense to assume that the hidden room that Jesper just snuck up to and unlocked is, in fact, the Sun Summoner’s room. Kaz’ room. It’s the best time for breaking into it, too. There’s going to be a party in two days, so hopefully everyone’s too busy, and even if the Sun Summoner’s out doing preparations then Jesper can just hide in here and kill him in an ambush. That’s probably easier, actually.
First, though, he locks and hides the door again, because… yeah, he went to Ravka expecting to get caught. At some point. This is a suicide mission for revenge, after all—suicide is in in the title. But it’s no fun if he gets caught before the gory glorious revenge part. Before Kaz admits he was a piece of shit. Both guns cocked and ready, he turns around, and actually inspects the room he broke into.
No. Nothing changes, even when he blinks and blinks again. That wasn’t a faulty first impression.
The room still looks like a fucking prison cell.
A fancy, clean cell, but a cell nonetheless. It’s empty except for the bed, and Jesper owes Lizaveta more money than he has on him (though to be fair, technically, Jesper’s fifty thousand kruge in debt anyway, so does it really make a difference at all if he’s a few Ravkan coins more in the red), and even the windows—Jesper’s had enough training now that he can look at the windows and see the subtly reinforcing mesh inside the glass. No curtains. No curtain rods. Nothing—there’s a subtle mesh inside the bedclothes too and the frame of the bed looks far too sturdy to be torn apart by anyone who isn’t a skilled Materialnik. There are meshes in front of the fireplaces.
Nothing in here that can be used as a weapon.
Not against others, and not against oneself.
No escape.
There’s nothing in this stark white massive room but a person, acting like he never did before and still looking more like himself than when he was walking through the training grounds. It’s probably the distance from other people. He’s got his back to Jesper and he’s in the furthest corner from the door, which should be a tactical misstep because he can’t escape from there but really—it’s as good as any other location, in this room. There’s nothing of use to anyone left, not even to someone as shrewd as Dirtyhands used to be before he lobotomized himself into the Sun Summoner. Or before he was—
Kaz pushes himself up from his kneeling position using the walls he faces. He mutters, “I beg your forgiveness for keeping you waiting, Aleks.” His voice sounds odd.
“Are you crying?”
“Jesper?!”
Kaz turns so quickly he has to brace himself against the wall again lest he fall over. His translucent shirt ripples. His dark eyes in his weird new too-handsome face trace over Jesper, again and again. If they were fingers, Jesper would feel like he’s being caressed. No, that’s the wrong thought. A thought from a book he won’t admit he’s read. Jesper’s got his guns out. He came here for a reason. A bloody, glorious reason.
“Inej wouldn’t want me to do this, but she’s locked up in the fucking Menagerie,” he announces, just to see whether Kaz can feel even a shred of guilt. “Just so you could be a Ravkan prince in ugly yellow lingerie.”
“Just follow my—”
No, then. Or maybe it’s just the new face Jesper can’t read. Not that it matters. “Shut up. Do you remember what you told me when I joined the Dregs? About what you’d do to traitors? Well, I have added a couple of my own ideas.”
“Shut up, Jesper. You can monologue when we’re done, but—”
Jesper aims right between his weird, smooth pebble eyes. “When you left us, you knew it would all go to shit. Inej’s in the Menagerie, and there’s no way to get her out again. Haskell let the Dregs collapse after you disappeared. No Dregs, no kru—”
Kaz flinches. “Quick. Get under the bed. Now.”
Whether it’s surprise, a sex instinct, or—far worse—a lingering sense of loyalty, Jesper obeys instantly.
☼
“We’re lost,” Jesper moans. They’ve been surrounded by trees for four days. He’s not even sure they’re trudging vaguely southwards anymore. Everything looks the same. What wouldn’t Jesper give to be back in Ketterdam already, with its lovely street names and pedestrians and garish landmarks (and gangsters about to string him up), or at least somewhere in Novyi Zem where he sort of understands the landscape. Or what’s left of Shu Han, so Kaz can unclench.
“We’re not lost,” Kaz rasps. “Keep going.”
“How do you—the map.” The half-chewed-up map hidden under Kaz’ bed, the map he snuck into his coat—Jesper’s kefta, whatever—even though he probably already knows it by heart.
“Yes. The map.”
“Why the fuck are you telling me to choose where we’re going if you’re memorized the map?!” What an asshole. Jesper just clean forgot what a piece of shit Kaz is. He forgot it so utterly he’s helping him break out of Ravka, without even extracting anything in return. He’s a fucking idiot. “Is it so you can blame me when we get caught?”
Kaz, the dick, rolls his eyes. “Wouldn’t I rather not get caught at all? Think, Jesper—what’s the one advantage you have over me?”
“I’m prettier,” Jesper shoots back. “My winning personality. I have a better tolerance for hard liquor. Fashion sense. I’m funny. No, wait—I’m a much more generous lover.”
“He doesn’t know you,” Kaz hisses, making the pronoun sound even more slimy than the guy it’s referring to, which is honestly quite a feat. “Do you think this is my first attempt? He’ll send people to every single route out of his core territory that poses any advantages. He has enough soldiers for that. What he doesn’t have, though, is enough soldiers to watch every route your bird-brain might pick at random.”
And then, he stalks ahead viciously. No. Limps ahead.
It’s been growing much more pronounced over the days. At first, even without a cane he walked just like any person with two healthy legs, and that’s what Jesper expected. The Ravkans healed their Saint’s leg, didn’t they? That’s what they would do. Only Kaz can think around enough corners to make his bad leg into an advantage. But with every passing day, Kaz’ gait has grown closer to what Jesper remembers from back before the world went to shit. Kaz was touchy about accommodations back then, though, or people being nice in general, so Jesper hasn’t even brought up improvising a new cane. All he’s dared to do is slowing down his own steps to what he remembers would have matched Kaz, back then.
And insisting on taking breaks. Like he does now.
“It’s almost night, you refuse to make light despite being made of sunshine, and I’m hungry,” he complains.
“I’d assume that Ketterdam has made you soft,” Kaz rasps, “o cherished crown jewel of crime and commerce, and what’s the difference.” He limps back to the fallen tree that Jesper has chosen as their camp site, though, so he must be a just few steps short of utter collapse.
Jesper unwraps the two woollen blankets he’s been carrying on his shoulders. They didn’t get a chance to steal much, mostly because Kaz was a prick about it and didn’t even let Jesper go back to his room: apparently there was time for Kaz to fold up a paper bag into a facsimile of an envelope and write an address in Djerholm onto it and have Jesper talk a stable-hand into riding out to deliver it, right now, but no time to search anywhere else for supplies. They took just whatever they found in the stables, which amounted to extra coats, some boots, the blankets, and horse feed. And gloves. Kaz declared it was time to run as soon as he’d found gloves.
Balefully, Jesper chews on his oats. Even wrapped in his blanket, the night is cold, and Kaz—who’s still wearing nothing but underpants besides the robe/gloves/Jesper’s kefta/stolen coat combo and ill-fitting boots without socks—is shivering violently.
“We should steal you some real clothes from the next house we see,” Jesper mutters. “And some decent food.”
“We’re not stealing anything until we’re in Shu.”
They’ve had this argument before. Jesper shouldn’t be as thrilled about that as he is. There’s no way to resolve it, until they find the border—or until Kaz keels over from hypothermia, because then even his rational fear of detection won’t keep Jesper from finding some trousers. For the time being, though—
“I’m going to sit closer and steal your body heat. In exchange, you can wrap my blanket around your legs.”
Kaz glares. He can do it masterfully again: just like the limp snuck back as soon as he left the Little Palace, his face over the days grew thin and pockmarked. Vicious. Jesper’s commited it to memory, in case Oily, Tall and Dark steals it again.
“If you freeze to death tonight, this was all for nothing. I could be sleeping in a palace right now. Well, a dingy side house, with the other Materialniks, but joke’s on them. This whole escape would have been much more complicated if I’d been a Squaller. Or a Sun Summoner, who refuses to even use his power to warm us up.”
“Leave it.” Kaz runs a finger roughly over where his collarbone should be, and he shudders. The temperature, or something worse, some new pain he’s not revealing—but carefully, he leans his blanketed side against Jesper, and allows Jesper to throw his own blanket over him, too.
“I’ll make you a new cane tomorrow. With a head, too, if we can scavenge enough metal from the buttons. Not a crow. You haven’t earned that until we free Inej, but maybe… a worm.”
“That’s just a stick,” Kaz mutters. “Go to sleep.”
Easy for him to say: Kaz is taking the first watch, and so he’s not balancing on a fallen log in the cold without a blanket, trying to fall asleep sitting up while leaning against Kaz’ shoulder with as little contact surface as physically possible. After some hours or minutes, though, Jesper’s suffering is too much for even Kaz to handle. Who knew there was a limit! Who knew Kaz had heard of mercy! Maybe he just doesn’t like Jesper wriggling next to him. He fists a lock of Jesper’s curls and pulls his head down into his lap.
“I didn’t help you because I want to fuck you, just so you’re aware,” Jesper jokes, because this is actually—it’s actually almost comfortable curling up on the fallen tree with his head on the blanket on Kaz’ thighs, even though there’s the remnants of a branch digging into his hip and they’re on the run from all Grisha in the world and also the new, expanded Ravka that covers nearly every country on this continent and Inej’s still imprisoned and if they actually manage to get back to Ketterdam, Jesper’s going to be in so much shit. And still, it’s… “I mourned you, you know, when Haskell told me you’d died. I wasn’t just angry because the Dregs were a shambles without you.”
Kaz is quiet. Jesper sort of wishes he’d touch his hair again, or his shoulder—and he never seemed to have any trouble touching the Darkling, so what, is Jesper not good enough—but he also looked like a void back there, like in order to endure it maybe he had to smother—
“That’s not why I mentioned that fantasy back there,” says Kaz, lyingly. Sure. He just happened to invoke Jesper’s obvious past crush for no reason whatsoever. The awfully convenient infatuation Jesper didn’t have sense nor skill to hide back then. Kaz is exactly the kind of person who’d exploit someone’s first love. The person who’s realize, long before Jesper did, that maybe, he’s not actually completely over—but maybe that wasn’t the important bit then. It went on. And that story about the Darkling—
“You thought I’d help you out of pity?” Jesper would have done, if he hadn’t been so angry—if he hadn’t been already so freaked out by the placid expression, the clothes that looked expressly designed to torture the Kaz he knew, the cell… It wasn’t pity. What is it you feel when a person you knew—maybe not his secrets or his past or his thoughts or what trouble he just dragged you into because he’s a secretive dick, but still, you knew him, it was burned into your heart, his movements and the codes he taught you and just when a heist was about to trigger one of his fears he’d never mentioned and you needed to get him out now… What do you feel, when that person comes back from the dead, and comes back wrong. Like a stag with too many tongues inside its mouths and its hands locked behind its throat. Except the other way round, because Kaz Brekker was terrifying, and what he was made into or what pretended to be was only scary because it wasn’t. Anyway. Kaz is a manipulative commandeering asshole again, so it doesn’t matter. “You despise pity.”
“It’s a tool, just like everything else. One he couldn’t take. And pride just gave me—pity got me out of the Little Palace, didn’t it?”
“Something did.” Jesper tips his non-existent hat, and Kaz slaps the top of his head to make him stop wriggling. He keeps the hand there this time, knotted tight in Jesper’s hair. It stings, but it’s also… Jesper closes his eyes and tries to fall asleep before inevitably, it’ll leave.
“Pride. It was my fault.” Kaz’ voice almost sounds the way it did back home. Harsh, vicious—and damaged. Human. “I thought I could bear it. He was—the Sun Summoner could have no weaknesses, he said, nothing for our enemies to use, and I allowed myself to think… ‘our’ enemies. I practiced. It was easier, after a while, to bear touch. I thought—it seemed like the best option, to stand at his side, and to make him see me as his partner I should… I was tired of being a prisoner. I thought I could use him.”
That’s bad enough, but… “But you’re limping again,” Jesper hisses. “If he’s forming you like a clay doll to make you his perfect Sun Summoner, he should have started with healing you.”
“They did, when I first came to the Palace. I didn’t want—but I learned to accept it. After my first escape, he broke it again, personally. Had it tailored over, afterwards, every few days. Incentive for cooperation.”
There’s nothing Jesper can do to fix this stagnant, lifeless voice. He could hug Inej, at least, but this—
“It’s what I would have done, too. He was just better than me, and he didn’t need another one, so he had to change me.”
“By dressing you up and making you look like a doll. If you tell me it was a sex thing, at least I could—no, still couldn’t relate. His taste’s shit. That beauty was pretty ugly,” Jesper mutters into Kaz’ thighs.
Kaz pulls at his hair again—probably a rebuke, but the sting travels down Jesper’s spine to—well, it’s time to change the subject rather quickly. What’s there to… oh yeah, his head’s on a blanket. That’ll do. “I just had a great idea,” he says, and—yeah, his voice is still completely normal and steady. A little loud, maybe. Kaz hasn’t moved his hand away, though, so it can’t be too obvious.
“Don’t hurt yourself.”
“Fuck off, my bright idea of breaking into the centre of Grishadom to kill you in a murder-suicide attack because what else was I going to do, let the Dime Lions grind me between millstones to press out the fifty thousand kruge I may perhaps still owe them—”
“You what?!”
Jesper powers on, because that’s really a conversation best left for when he’s not lying in a forest with his head in Kaz’ lap and trying to forget, desperately, the way it felt when Kaz pulled his hair. The way it feels when he does it again. “I’m just saying, it saved you. You’re welcome. So anyway. We only have one pair of trousers. I was going to suggest we alternate wearing mine, but we both know I wouldn’t get them back.”
“Your so-called idea is… interesting,” Kaz mutters, voice almost pulled asunder trying for both disturbed and mocking. “But I’m far more interested to hear about the fact you skipped out of Ketterdam without paying your debts. A crime punishable by death in every gang. Every gang in Ketterdam, the city where you want us to go.”
And yeah, that’s occurred to Jesper, but… “That’s a problem for later. You’ll think of something, boss, if we make it that far. You always have a plan. For now… I wouldn’t—well, I would carry you if your legs freeze off, but it wouldn’t be fun for either of us, so… You sewed yourself up constantly back home, and I’d wager sewing is just like swimming. Once you know, you can never forget.”
“Skills are useless if you lack every materia—Jes—”
“Yeah, I definitely can turn a button into a needle now. We just need to tear the second blanket into some vaguely trouser-shaped pieces, and for thread—well, we could just tear up your Sun Summoner robe, it’s useless anyway.”
“Jesper,” Kaz rasps again.
“I’m a genius?”
“No, you’re still an idiot. Why not, though?”
☼
Kaz Brekker disappeared between Sunday and Tuesday night. That’s all Jesper knows, and it’s that precise only because Kaz has been experimenting with the payroll recently. Apparently, handing out wages on late Tuesday maximizes the chances of flushing as much money as possible back into the coffers of Dregs-owned establishments, and he’s also taken to handing out the money personally. Some weird power play that Haskell hasn’t yet forbidden: everyone knows Kaz barely bothers to keep his accomplices informed about the job they’re currently doing, and the big boss tolerates him mostly because Dirtyhands is still more useful insubordinate than dead.
It’s Wednesday now, though. Wednesday afternoon.
And Jesper still hasn’t gotten paid.
Kaz is gone.
Jesper’s in Haskell’s office, inquiring about everyone’s money. Too irritated by the games of Makker’s Wheel he was forced to miss out on last night to perform anything but the most pro forma I remember my boss’ boss is technically my boss and can kill me pleasantries. Instead of promising to kick Kaz’ ass, though, like Jesper hoped, Haskell just tells him Pasko will give him his wages tomorrow.
Haskell won’t say anything else. Just, “That boy got himself mixed up in something he couldn’t handle alone, and it fucked him. You won’t like what you find, when you go looking for the dead.”
#jesper fahey#kaz brekker#inej ghafa#kaz x jesper#I'm free! well sort of I have an idea for a coda in which jesper roleplays the darkling so.......#dimtraces makes things#shadow & bone#shadow and bone
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More than a memory
Sorry if this is formatted really horriblly I finished this up on mobile I hope you like this there’s about 2 paragraphs I cut of ruby nerding out
Once they got to Vacuo oscar was sorta unofficially a huntsman now laws are a lot looser here so he’s been saving quite a bit of money from going on missions after team rwby and Jaune came back it was weird they were only gone a month but so much had changed the merge was almost finished he could feel it every day he felt less like himself he didn’t even object when Theodore called him oz anymore he and ruby weren’t as close anymore whatever happened wherever they were changed her he got bits and pieces from Jaune and yang but the others kept quiet he knew that he’d be gone soon so he wanted to leave something for her kinda like proof that they ever met in the first place so he was now standing in a vacuan market at 12 am alone with a lot of lien on him this was probably a bad idea but at one point he heard ruby ramble about this gun shop that they were the best at what they do so he called made an appointment it just so happens they prefer to see let’s just say unofficial clients at night he knocked at the door it read “bikal bullets” it opened and an old owl faunas man opens it his large yellow eyes are piercing “hello mister pine headmaster theodore told me to expect you” oscar rubs his hands together “yes mister bikal he said to come late” mr Bikal leads him inside on the walls hang dozens of expensive weapons “so mr pine what are you looking for” oscar took the blue prints out of his bag and set them down on the drawing table “um im looking for something custom built its for a friend” mr bikal takes the blue prints and examines them “these are pretty impressive mr pine did you draft these yourself theses yourself” oscar nods “mostly i had a little help with the math part of it but the mechanical stuff i did myself” mr bikal nods “something like this will cost a good amount even with the discount you get for being school staff” oscar nods “do you have an estimate on the price and how long it'll take to make” mr bikal snaps his teeth “around 12000 lien and 2 weeks” oscar nods he had 140000 saved up but he did want to buy some more things for the others “alright i can uh i can afford that” mr bikal goes over to what looks like a drawing table and pins them up “i will start work immediately mr pine you make your payment on completion if you desire the school has credit with me the price includes 3 magazines and a case so that will also be custom made shall you pick it up or would you prefer its delivered” oscar stands uncomfortably as mr bikal starts measuring out pieces of fine metal “ill pick it up dont worry” mr bikal nods and says “alright mister pine your can go now its not a good look for a young man to be out so late especially so close to the red light district” oscars face gets red “yes of course” oscar leaves and walks back to the academy sneaking back into his dorm room was easy tho nora did pester him about where hed been he had left a note saying when he would be back for the next 2 weeks he kept a poker face nora helped him set up his bank account so the sudden spending of 12000 lien did give her pause so she decided to ask him about it
He was sitting on his bed reading some Treatise about some long-forgotten subject she knocked on the bedpost and he looks up “hey Nora did you need something” she sat at the end of his bed “hey what did you spend 12 thousand lien on” he hides his face “please don’t tell anyone it was on something for ruby” she smiles “ah young love I was worried that you wouldn’t make your move so what kind of thing sets you back 12 thousand it’s something big right” he nods his head “its a gun i-i had it commissioned for and it’s not really cause I’m trying to make a move or anything it’s more like a going away gift” Nora frowns and shakes his leg “where you going taking a vacation or something” he feels tears bite the edge of his eyes “Nora the merge it’s soon I know it won’t be long until I’m gone and I want you all to remember me but her especially I don’t want to be just a memory” he struggles to keep the tears at bay but nora pulls him into a hug tighter but somehow softer than her usual ones “hey you will never ever be just a memory you will always be you and even if your not you'll always be one of us we all love you so much” and then the damn breaks and he sobs into her shoulder “i don't wanna go away nora i want to live i wanna go to school see my aunt again” she rubs his back and says “i know sweetie you'll get to do all that ok i promise” he sniffles “nora i need you to do something for me if i do disappear ok i need you to go back to my aunt and tell her everything ok it can't be oz ok don't tell her how to find him it won't make sense i'll just hurt worse i dont want that for her” she nods “i won't ever have to do that ok but i promise” she holds him until he stops crying and they take a a a nap they always helped him calm down
Finally, after a long 2 weeks, he goes to pick it up when he goes inside Mr. Baikal shows him the box it’s a beautiful dark red mahogany wood he opens the case and looks at the pistol inside its silvered handle and barrel were beautiful he’s almost afraid to touch it the engravings were perfect exactly as he had drawn them if not better the moon and rose he had designed look perfect he takes it gently in his hands he looks down the sights the night sights glow a brilliant carmine red he looks at the magazine even it was of an amazing quality everything down to the smallest detail was exactly as he pictured it he sets it back into the case “thank you, mister, Bikal it's absolutely perfect” Mr. Bikal smiles and nods “I’m glad everything is to your satisfaction Mr pine if you find there is anything wrong with it or you want something changed everything I make comes with a lifetime warranty the paperwork is in the case as well as a certificate stating that I am in fact its builder” they shake hands and oscar takes it home in his bag he excitedly gets back to his dorm he sets it down still in his bag on his bed now all he have to do is give it to her
He sits on it for a few days but finally decides to just give it to her oz has his reservations about this but decided that oscar deserves this to maybe say goodbye in his own way
Ruby was going on walks around shade it’s something he noticed so he waited for her to go on one of those walks it was cool in vacuo at night the air was nice compared to the oppressive heat of the day she was meandering along the walkways he followed behind her a bit the case hung heavy in his bag even tho it wasn’t heavy at all after a while she sits at an old wooden bench overlooking the gardens he approaches and she perks up “oh hey oscar are you going somewhere” she says pointing to his bag he shakes his head “do you mind if I sit” she shakes her head “no go-ahead did you need to talk, something about Theodore?” he sits down on the other side of the bench gently setting his bag between them “no uh no I just uh I wanted to give you something” he opens his bag and takes the case out holding it out to her she takes it “it’s not my birthday is it this looks really nice you didn't have to do this” ruby says smiling “well i've been wanting to do something nice for you” oscar says rubbing the back of his neck she lifts the top and gasp gently lifting it from its case “oscar this is this is amazing” she drops the magazine and pulls the slide back making sure its clear and runs her hand along the engraving her symbol etched into the left side of the grip “oh thanks i uh actually designed it myself oz helped me with the math” she looks at him her eyes wide “oscar it took me 8 attempts to successfully design a functioning crescent rose gun design is really hard how long did you spend on this” oscar blushes “the idea kinda started in atlas i was gonna ask you to help me make one so i wouldn't have to rely on my cane but everything happen and when you were gone i kept messing with the idea and i kept thinking about you so i kinda ended up designing it for you more than me eventually do you like it” ruby scoffs “oscar do i like it i love it its probably the single greatest gift anyones ever given me” he smiles wide “really that makes me really happy I was worried you wouldn’t like it” she sets it back gently into its case “really Oscar it’s amazing you have a knack for design your gonna have to show me the draft notes and everything cause this is this is amazing I can’t wait to shoot it this is wow” she chokes up and he leans down “ruby are you ok” she nods wiping her face of nonexistent tears “no worries this is just really cool and sweet and god your so amazing” he felt his heart flutter and his cheeks heat up “the guy who built it that bikal guy you talked about was just as great as you always said” she puts a hand on his shoulder “are you telling me Hephaestus bikal made this Oscar” she says seriously “uh yeah why is that bad” she kisses his cheek and squeals “oh my god your amazing this is now even better god I could die happy wait his rates are insane how did you afford this” still recoiling from the kiss he bites his lip “uh huntsmen work” she narrows her eyes “how much did this cost Oscar it had to be expensive” he shakes his head “not telling it’s a gift you don’t need to worry about it just enjoy it” she punches his arm “I will but I am going to repay you for this somehow ok” “you already did” he says quietly he says rubbing the back of his neck “ruby I don’t really know how long I have left and I would like to spend at least some of it with you I understand if you don’t I know it might make it harder when I’m gone bu-whoa” he’s pulled into a hug she pulls his head into her shoulder and holds him tight “I wanna spend more time with you too but you will always be Oscar ok oz is oz you are you” he sighs and smiles “see what I mean by paying me back”
#rwby#rose garden#rosegarden#ruby rose#guns#Oscar pine#angst#this is sadder than I wanted it to be#at first this was gonna be sorta related to my weed garden fic#but the idea of ruby pushing Oscar away after that was too sad#for my fluffy little ass#I wish ruby got to nerd out about weapons more#Oscar is still a simp even if he’s sad#do not ask me about the gun I will elaborate#that is a threat
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Tarnma, “Don’t cry. I promise I will love you and protect you to the best of my ability, til death do we part.” please?
(I spent more time on this one than any of the others, I think ^^; )
In Pharma’s defense, it had been in the drunken aftermath of his third breakup with Ratchet, and the only thing on his mind had been the half-crazed conviction that he would never again subject himself to the idea of being another mech’s secondary. If Ratchet wouldn’t have him, after he’d swallowed down his ego mouthful after mouthful for so many years, just waiting to become the prize that Ratchet never seemed to want--well, to hell with the whole institution, Pharma wouldn’t be anybody’s second.
He put in his application to the arrangement firm as a Primary Conjunx, hit send, and passed out several hours later in a haze of engex.
A month later he’d been presented with the saddest little empuratee on Cybertron, all haunting single optic and clumsy tapping talons.
Pharma whirled on the matchmaker. “What is the meaning of this! I asked you for a secondary and you brought me junk!”
“Doctor,” the matchmaker said, clearly disapproving of the outburst. “Damus is a rare outlier, and has brilliant test scores at Shockwave’s Academy. He’s young, willing, and perfectly fertile despite the unfortunate, hem, adjustments. He’s also a very talented musician, aren’t you, Damus?”
“Yes,” Damus said, very softly. He had a surprisingly deep voice for such a little creature.
“Well there you have it,” the matchmaker said. “Everything you asked for. Culture, intelligence, and submissive temperament.”
“He’s a criminal!” Pharma said, throwing his palm wildly in the smaller mech’s direction. “Think of my career! I’ll look like some kind of--of--”
“We do have other candidates,” the matchmaker said, sighing to himself. “Give me a moment, I have to speak to my secretary…”
He turned and let himself back out the front door, taking a turn toward the garden that Pharma shared with his nearest neighbors. Pharma grimaced at the would-be conjunx in his living room. It wasn’t that Damus was entirely ugly, if you got past the empurata. Pharma did like wheeled vehicles. And he was a good height, not taller than Pharma, but not too small.
“So what did you do,” Pharma asked (very rudely, but he was in a bad temper). “You’re not a murderer, are you?”
“No,” Damus said. “It was for sedition. I was caught at a protest.”
“Really,” Pharma said. He considered it. Ratchet’s clinic was borderline seditious anyway, so it wasn’t as if Pharma had it in him to be particularly shocked about the existence of civil unrest. “Well,” he decided, “That’s alright then. As long as I’m not about to be stabbed in my sleep.”
Damus made a sound somewhere between a buzz and a laugh. He seemed tired. “No wonder no one wants me,” he said, “if that’s what you’re all thinking.”
“...I suppose you’ve been given the run around with a few before me,” Pharma said, feeling an unwanted pang of unhappiness, or sympathy, or something.
“Seven,” Damus said, with dark humor.
“Seven,” Pharma said, and then felt annoyed at himself for being surprised. He hadn’t wanted Damus, so why should he be surprised no one else did? But Damus seemed charming enough in his own way, unlinking single optic aside. Pharma switched tracks. “Why do you even want a conjunx, anyway? It’s not exactly suited to the life of a lone rebel.”
Damus looked at him for a silent moment, and then turned his head to the window. “I don’t know that you’d understand,” he said. “Your home is beautiful, your job is prestigious, you have enough career to be worried about it--I’m not sure you could understand what it would mean for me, doctor.”
“Try me,” Pharma said, impatiently doubling down.
“I guess I’d just like to feel…” Damus went over to the window. “Safe, again. Like I belong somewhere.”
Pharma stared at his back for a long stretch of silence. Outside, the wind ruffled a set of hanging chimes.
“Alright,” the matchmaker said, bustling back in with a ‘pad in his hand, “if you want to see the other options, or defer--”
“No,” Pharma said, suddenly, “let’s give this a try, I think. You have trial periods?”
“Oh,” the matchmaker said, and then hurriedly, very enthusiastically, “yes, yes, the handfasting period is already built into your contract with us if you’d like to utilize it--”
So Damus moved in. Pharma was irritable and techy about the whole thing, about which things were to be placed in what spots, but Damus didn’t have so many things of his own and really it was just a matter of berating the mover bots until they did as Pharma wanted.
The first night was. Strange. Damus very politely waited in the doorway of the berthroom until Pharma--equally nervous and trying not to show it--snapped at him to come lay down already, the morning alarm wasn’t getting any farther away. In the dark, their frames several inches apart, Pharma watched Damus’s hands lift, and flinch, and fall back silently to the berth.
There were meals. Pharma had shifts. The novelty of coming home to someone who was waiting for him, wanting to know about his day, was intoxicating. Damus had any number of passionate opinions on any number of subjects, and would happily make them known at length over the complicated spread of fuels he’d put together for Pharma’s evening return. He soaked up information like a sponge too--any obscure medical treatise or bit of gossip Pharma brought home was eagerly considered and dismantled.
But still… they did not, actually, touch each other.
Pharma thought about it. Most nights. Sometimes during the day. He wondered how far Damus would let him go. He wondered what Damus would look like, pressed down into the pillows, helplessly wriggling on Pharma’s spike. The allure of it spun Pharma’s head around with unease and confusion--no one fantasized about empuratee frames except the worst kind of fetishists, the lowest of the low, and Pharma hated to think he might be one of those, the type that wanted muck and dirt and crying.
Damus went sometimes to see friends, and was out long late nights, in which Pharma lay curled on the berth that was really built for one and felt terribly, horribly hollow. He did not actually have friends, he had realized. There had only ever been Ratchet.
The handfasting period dwindled to its appointed end. They were only a few dozen days away from the end of it when the news came, screaming neon light on the billboard in the quarter square which stopped Pharma dead in his tracks as he made his way home from the hospital--Senator Shockwave, missing, found finally with his frame mutilated by unknown assailants. They flashed the picture. The glaring yellow optic in the expressionless helm, so like Damus’s, made him almost sick in the street.
He transformed and flew home, heedless of sky laws. Clouds whipped past, stream of ice bit his nosecone. He let himself into the house without knocking, door shoved aside, and it was only when he found himself face to not-face with Damus in the metal that he realized what he had been afraid of. But Damus was fine. Physically, anyway. If he’d been crying, it was impossible for anyone to tell.
“I,” Pharma said, and then had no idea how to finish. He felt naked, like armor stripped to protoform.
“So you saw,” Damus said, in a very even, very reasoned voice, and then abruptly spoiled it by making a horrible grizzled sobbing sound down deep in his throat. The overhead lights flashed and popped, spraying glass over their helms.
Pharma discarded reservations entirely. He surged forward, cupping the blazing monstrous helm in both hands as gently as he could, and said, “Damus, my darling, you’re safe here. There’s no safer place in the world than here with me.”
“I’d love to believe that,” Damus managed. The voice came out busted and hazed with static, each syllable like a horrible little scratch against Pharma’s spark. “But Shockwave, he was our--Shockwave is a senator, if he--”
Pharma pulled the smaller body against his own, mouth a thin line, the back of Damus’s helm cupped in his palm. His visions, in that moment, were grim and bloody.
He was the primary. It was his job to make sure that Damus was cared for, safe, that nothing in the world touched him.
“Don’t cry, Damus,” Pharma said, “your conjunx is here.”
His thumb stroked the curve of Damus’s helm, absently tender, as a thousand vicious certainties flashed behind his eyes. In that moment, career and politics were the furthest they had ever been from Pharma’s mind.
“I promise I will love you and protect you to the best of my ability,” he said. “Til death do we part.”
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word count: 1000 summary: once, the witch of the waste and mrs. pentstemmon were girls. they did not grow old together.
i. doubt thou the stars are fire It was a clear night after a blustering autumn storm. The stiff wind that had parted the clouds now ran through the grass and shook down stars from the sky like fruit from heavy-laden branches. Agatha Pentstemmon and Desdemona Brenner did not hold hands as they watched stars fall. Agatha was acutely aware that between grand gestures, Desdemona’s hand kept alighting in the grass, bird-like, inches from her own. “I’m going to catch a star,” Desdemona said. “One day.”
“Desdemona,” Agatha said, watching the dark horizon and not, determinedly not, Desdemona’s hand in the grass beside hers. She could have said That isn’t possible. She could have said By the time a star falls, it’s too late. She could have said You know it as well as I do. It would have been no use; Desdemona did not believe in the impossible. “Agatha,” Desdemona mimicked. Up leapt her hand once more, painted nails glinting dark as she pointed. “I’ll catch one for you too.” Agatha did not want a falling star. But she could listen to her talk for hours under skies like these. In spite of herself, and her empty hands, she asked, “And what would we do with our stars?” Desdemona hesitated only long enough to draw Agatha’s gaze, then flashed a ferocious smile. “Swallow them whole.” A clever girl, but a little wild, their teachers said of her. They were wrong. She was incandescent. Agatha’s chest felt split open, wordless wishes spilling out like the pearls of a pomegranate. That was when she knew that she shouldn’t love her as she did. That was when she knew how a star felt as it fell.
ii. doubt thou the sun doth move The candle by Agatha’s desk guttered as Desdemona blew in. “It worked, you brilliant creature,” she said. The winter wind that gusted in after her put high color in her cheeks and sent her dark hair flying like lightning. The room was suddenly full of her. “What are you talking about?” asked Agatha. “Your treatise. About old magics, about blood and passion and stars.” The memory stung. Agatha spent ten years distilling magic to its simplest rules, trying to understand its heart. She had written a volume on her findings; it was met with only laughter. Brilliant was not what others called it. “That was nonsense. It was just theory.” “It was right,” said Desdemona. “I didn’t understand. The first magic is fire. It’s this,” she said, and kissed Agatha with burning lips. Everything uncertain was seared to ashes. One of Agatha’s hands grasped for the edge of her desk, knocking into her inkwell; the other had found the curve of Desdemona’s jaw, her feverish cheek. Agatha pulled away breathless. “You did it. You caught a star.” She could sense it now: new magic pulsing through her, or perhaps it was the pounding of her own blood. “And now the world is ours,” Desdemona said.
iii. doubt truth to be a liar It was spring, and the eastern sky was golden. Desdemona only ever came by night. Maybe that was why it had taken so long for Agatha to notice the hardness of her eyes. There was disdain in the arch of her eyebrows as Agatha described the young enchanter she taught. “How much longer are you going to go on with this?” she asked. Agatha’s jaw tightened. “I want to teach.” “No, you don’t,” Desdemona said impatiently. “You’re too clever to be stuck here. You could do anything, you could–” “Be like you,” Agatha guessed. Desdemona stilled. Every time, it was the same silent request; go and catch a falling star. You’ll see. You’ll see. You’ll understand what I’ve become. But unease had taken root in her chest. “They say you’re burning the prairies, terrorizing towns, cutting down anyone who stands before you. They say you’ve killed.” “But you don’t believe that,” she said. “I don’t want to believe it,” Agatha said. In her heart, she pleaded, Tell me it’s not true. If you tell me I’ll believe you. Make everything simple again. Morning shadows melted from the garden where they sat; the gentle breeze smelled of jasmine and Desdemona. As silence bloomed and withered, Agatha exhaled, allowing herself one more moment of softness. Over the years she had developed a reputation of her own: fierce, formidable, brilliant. She felt none of these now. But she straightened like her spine was steel, and said, “You shouldn’t come back.”
iv. but never doubt I love Agatha Pentstemmon had known death dogged her for some time now; she didn’t think she would recognize the tread. It had been decades, and still the sound of her footsteps was as familiar as her own heartbeat. She would know her by night. She would know her blind. “Desdemona,” Mrs Pentstemmon said, rising slowly in the sweltering summer heat. The Witch of the Waste’s lip curled. “You’ve grown old.” She still looked the same. Same hard eyes, same dark hair, same clever hands. She cared as little for the passage of time as the concept of impossibility. “You made a contract with a fire demon,” said Mrs. Pentstemmon. “It was that star you caught, wasn’t it?” “Who told you?” Her gaze sharpened. “Howl. You’ve seen him.” Her tone was hungry, and hateful. It wasn’t Desdemona’s voice. Agatha looked pityingly at the thing that wore the face of the woman she’d loved. I wish I had gotten to mourn you. The Witch of the Waste would not grieve for her. “I know you’ve seen him,” she hissed, flames licking her fingers. “Tell me where he is.” To her own surprise and the Witch’s, Mrs. Pentstemmon laughed. As if she would betray her student. As if she was so easily cowed. As if she would give an inch to this cruel creature. “Over my dead body,” Mrs. Pentstemmon said. It seemed fitting that it all would end in fire. With a flash of magnesium-white, she fell.
(names invented by @born-to-strange-sights :))
#THE SECTION TITLES ARE HAMLET LEAVE ME ALONE#i have many feelings. all of them self-inflicted.#anyway this is the fic that has been consuming my brain for the last few days#mrs pentstemmon#the witch of the waste#lula tag#fic tag#my writing#howl's moving castle#if you rb with your favorite line i WILL fall in love with you that's how it works#it's about.... falling stars and falling in love and falling from grace....#hearts of stars and hearts of women....#and how lonely it is to watch the stars by yourself
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The Last Night Part XV
(A/N at end)
Parts I-XIV:
Here is Part I
Here is Part II
Here is Part III
Here is Part IV
Here is Part V
Here is Part VI
Here is Part VII
Here is Part VIII
Here is Part IX
Here is Part X
Here is Part XI
Here is Part XII
Part XIII
Part XIV
Part XV
Lucie’s Aunt Cecily and Uncle Gabriel’s house was an old brick-fronted Georgian house near the railway station. A suite of severe bottle green horsehair furniture occupied the dark-paneled front room, and Lucie tried not to slide about as she waited perched on the edge of a curlicued sofa. Heavy curtains disguised the elegance of the large windows and stopped the sun from penetrating. A thick Turkey rug in shades of purple and brown added notes of affluence. As she waited, she grew quietly more agitated at the impending conversation she had been practicing since dawn with Grace Blackthorn, of all people. She wished she had the moral strength, or the disciple to stay away as Jesse had requested, but considering what he requested was frot with idiocy and a cruelty unlike himself, she decided to ignore it. Still, after three days of his absence, she could almost feel him smirking in disapproval behind her, but without the courage to face her.
Or perhaps he was being as stubborn as she was.
Impossible, she was far more stubborn.
At last a door opening in the paneling and Aunt Cecily with her dark hair curled and pinned to rest against the nape of her neck, arrived with Grace following behind her. The girl always reminded Lucie more of a ghost than her brother ever did.
“I’ll have some tea brought in,” said Aunt Cecily. “You girls let me know if there is anything else I can bring you.”
“Thank you,” said Lucie, without taking her eyes off of Grace, as her Aunt quietly left the room. When the door clicked shut behind her, Lucie removed her gloves one at a time and placed them on the wooden coffee table in front of her. “And thank you for agreeing to meet with me. My aunt says that you haven’t been accepting much company. Is that because they all know what a conniving monster you are and you’re afraid of what they’ll say... or because you’re embarrassed by what they know?”
“Can it be both?” Grace asked down at her folded hands.
Lucie tilted her head. “You don’t get to sit up here and feel sorry for yourself.”
“That’s not what—“
“Not when my friend is lying on her death bed because of your selfish actions,” she said, straightening her posture as the maid walked in with a silver tray of tea and freshly baked biscuits. “Would you like some tea?” asked Lucie with contempt.
Grace shook her head.
“What you did was utterly abhorrent,” started Lucie, as she poured herself a cup. “Shackling my brother with some dark magic when he was nothing but a stupid, idiotic boy, without the brains or know-how to refuse a beautiful girl; all these years just stringing him along like a lost dog to use for your entertainment when you felt like it. Then, when he was finally free of you; engaged to the most perfect of humans to walk the earth since Raziel himself, and you kiss him, in front of his betrothed.”
“I can explain,” said Grace, though she kept her eyes on her hands which Lucie could now see were trembling.
“I didn’t come here for shallow explanations,” said Lucie, surprised by her cruelty. “If you wish to confess your sins then find a church, I am not here to pardon you. I am here about your brother.”
Grace’s eyes lifted then and widened at Lucie’s words.
“Jesse Blackthorn,” said Lucie. “And don’t bother telling me that he’s dead and has been for years, I already know all of this. What I want to know is where you have his body and your plan for resurrecting him?”
Grace peered at her closely as if looking for signs of madness.
While Lucie would have much rather found this knowledge out herself, she’d come to realize after hours of laborious concentration that if she were going to bring Jesse back from the dead without the last breath of his life, then she was going to need some assistance. And since Jesse, the heartless coward, was no longer responding to her, she decided that the only person in the world that she could possibly alliance herself with was Grace. Grace who lived with the corpse of her dead brother for years inside a dusty old manor. She realized that he may never speak to her again if she did manage to raise him from the dead, but at least he’d be alive.
“I’m afraid I don’t know what you’re talking about,” said Grace. Still looking slightly confused. If Lucie didn’t know better, she might believe her blank expression.
“Since you’ve stained yourself an unbelievable liar and a pathetic loner, I’m going to tell you a secret of mine that no one else in the entire world knows aside from my awful brother, but before I disclose this information, if I find out that you’ve told a soul what I’m about to tell you, I will tell everyone what Cordelia and I walked into that night before she left,” said Lucie, looking Grace directly in her solemn silver eyes. “I will destroy your reputation beyond repair that not even Charles Fairchild will stand to look at you.”
Grace’s face dropped, horrified.
“I can commune with the dead,” said Lucie, and sipped her tea. “Your brother,” she willed herself to say his name, “Jesse. I’ve been talking to him for months now. He saved my brother’s life with his last breath that he’d been keeping for himself, for that I owe him more favors than I can possibly repay in this lifetime. I want to help bring him back.”
Grace, who wore an expression, as if Lucie had reached across the room and slapped her suddenly blinked after a long time of not. “Is he here now?”
“No,” said Lucie. “We’re not on speaking terms at the moment. He’s being stubborn. Though, I suspect he’s not far away.”
Grace released a ghost of a laugh that sounded more like a breath. “He’s always been quite stubborn, Jesse. Always.” She gave Lucie a solemn look that roused in her the slightest trickle of sympathy for the girl she considered her enemy. “But I’m afraid I cannot help you.”
“Why not?” Lucie rose as Grace did, preparing to block her path from leaving the room. “Don’t you want to see Jesse alive again? Isn’t that why your mother has been preserving his body all this time? You’ll just leave him to settle in-between realms when he so utterly deserves to return to this one?”
“Of course I want to see my brother alive again,” said Grace. “But you don’t understand what you’re asking.”
Lucy set her teacup and saucer down on the table and straightened again. “I know exactly what I’m asking. I’m not naive enough to think this isn’t dangerous or ridiculous, but I’m also desperate enough to believe that it will work. And since you’ve made yourself quite the social pariah of our small circle, I’m offering you something of a partnership.”
Grace smoothed her pale hands over her lace skirt, embroidered with snowflakes made of gold thread along the hem. “And what would James or Cordelia think of this partnership?”
Without hesitation, Lucie answered. “They needn’t know of it.”
Grace sunk back down onto the sofa, her quicksilver eyes focusing on the teapot in the center of the silver tray as she spoke. “My mother, she was an awful woman— is an awful woman. A tyrant and a bully, but she was not always that way. The world was cruel towards her since her childhood. Death always knocking on her door, but never for her, just for those she loved. It made her cruel and vicious.”
Lucie fought the urge to insist that she already knew all of this and move Grace towards the part where she agreed to help, but she reached for a biscuit instead.
“Death begets death begets death. Did he not tell you, my illusive brother? You cannot take from death without giving to death first and sometimes it takes more than its share.” Grace twisted a silver ring around her middle finger. “I’ll help you, but I’ll ask you first Lucie Herondale, only once and never again, what are you willing to lose to death for the return of my brother? What life are you willing to exchange for his?”
The biscuit turned to ash in her mouth and it took a great effort for her to swallow. Names flashed before her eyes: her mother, her father, James, Cordelia, Uncle Jem, her aunts, uncles, cousins, friends… But before she could answer, her aunt Cecily appeared in the doorway, a letter in the hand that rested at her side.
“I’m sorry to interrupt you girls, but your mother’s sent word,” said Cecily to Lucie. “Cordelia is awake and she’s asking for you.”
Lucie stared out the carriage window the entirety of the drive home, her hands fussing with the fabric of her skirts as London went by out the carriage window. Her thoughts flooded with what Grace had told her about bringing Jesse back from the dead. If what she’d told her was true, and she wasn’t entirely sure that it was, she’d need to find another solution and soon.
Why didn’t Jesse tell her? She wondered. Why didn’t he say anything? He must have known and instead of simply explaining what it would cost to bring him back from death, he ran away like a petulant child.
Recovering her composure by taking a steady breath through her nose and out her mouth, Lucie tried to think about her situation in a less objective way. It was a trick her father had taught her as a child when she was sad or angry. To analyze the problem in a larger, more empirical way would, he always said, improve her mood and her intellect at the same time. Though she now thought it possibly a very unsuitable response to a crying child, she often found herself rearranging her problems as if planning to present them in a small treatise.
Besides, she couldn’t think about her situation with Jesse now. There was a more pressing matter at hand. Cordelia was awake. And Lucie's intricate web of lies to keep Belial’s agenda unknown until she could figure out how to bring Jesse back to life and anyone finding out about her ability would only draw unwanted attention to herself. She needed to know how much Cordelia remembered of what Belial said to Lucie and how much she’d already told the others.
Lucie was out of the carriage before the driver could open the door for her. She gathered her skirts in her hands and took the marble steps two at a time and burst through the doors and nearly slid to a halt on the wood floors as her eyes befell Cordelia standing by the front window between her mother and Alastair.
All of Lucie’s worries suddenly vanished like steam from hot tea into open air.
Cordelia looked a vision standing in front of the floor to ceiling stained glass window, cut with colors to look like a lake with a shining angel hovering above it. Lucie took in every detail in her mind to use in her writing later: elegant in a pink silk dress that hugged her frame. Her vibrant red hair had been twisted back in a coronet with tightly wound curls hanging in her face. Her skin lush with color in her cheeks and her eyes were alert as they caught Lucie. A sad smile broke across Cordelia’s face as she looked upon her friend.
“I’m sorry!” Lucie shrieked and ran the rest of the way towards her friend with arms outstretched. Cordelia opened her own and welcomed Lucie without hesitation. “I’m sorry I wasn’t here when you woke up. I should have been—“
“Careful, Lucie,” said Tessa sitting on the couch between her father and Uncle Jem. “Cordelia is still healing.”
Lucie cursed, which earned her another scolding from both of her parents this time.
“I’m sorry,” she repeated to no one and everyone.
Cordelia’s smile brightened as Lucie released her and stepped back. “It’s alright. I’m not as fragile as they’ll have you believe.”
“She is,” said Sona, who also appeared healthier than when Lucie had seen her last. “She won’t admit it, but she is.”
“I will mind myself perfectly,” promised Lucie, with a nod. She made a face only Cordelia could see and understand, earning herself a laugh from her oldest friend.
“May we have a moment,” asked Cordelia to the people in the room. “I wish to speak to Lucie alone, if that’s all right.”
Sona looked to be about ready to disagree, but Alastair took her hand and led her towards the doorway that went into the dining hall. Tessa, Will, and Jem followed after leaving Cordelia and Lucie alone.
“Should we sit?” asked Lucie. “Are you still in terrible pain?”
“Not so much anymore,” said Cordelia, as she lowered herself onto the sofa. Though the way she angled her body showed that she favored her left side some. Sitting beside Cordelia, Lucie could see what she could not before. The dark shadows underneath Cordelia’s once bright and vibrant eyes, now dull by what she’d seen; what had happened to her. The dryness of her once smooth lips. The veins in her neck and dark bruising along her chest that peaked out from the lace collar of her dress.
The memory of finding Cordelia collapsed in the sand at the feet of Belial, like a broken doll, assaulted Lucie. Her mouth went dry and her eyes burned as the sound of her screaming Cordelia’s name through the wind echoed in her ears.
“You look well,” said Lucie, her throat tight and unlike herself. “You didn’t miss much while you were asleep. We were all scolded something terrible for going after you without informing the adults. We’re all on a strict curfew and cannot go out in large groups unless it’s for something mundane.” She reached forward and took a biscuit from the center of the coffee table. She took a bite and chewed for a moment, dusting the crumbs from her skirt, thinking of a way to approach the Belial subject without frightening Cordelia back into a coma. “Probably for the best. My brother and his band of— whatever they call themselves— can use a little restriction.”
Cordelia tensed a fraction, but enough for Lucie to notice. She quickly went over her words to see what she might have said and realized that her delinquent brother was not amongst the people in the room when she’d arrived.
“You haven’t spoken to him?” asked Lucie.
Cordelia shook her head.
“Good,” said Lucie. “You don’t have to if you don’t want to. Consider me your personal guard. I will shield you from his presence at all times.”
Cordelia’s mouth twitched at the corner. “Thank you,” she said, “but I think it’s important that we talk if I’m going to be staying here a bit longer with my family.”
“A bit longer?” Lucie inhaled. “You’re still leaving for Alicante?”
Cordelia nodded. “Once everything settles down and I remember what it is that happened to me inside the shadow realm with your— with Belial.”
Lucie could not restrain a slight start of shock. “You— you don’t remember anything?”
Cordelia only shook her head, those intricate curls falling across her face as she looked down at her hands. “I only remember leaving the institute with Alastair and then everything goes dark. Brother Zachariah said that it’s not uncommon for memory loss and that what I might have suffered was traumatic.” She said the word as if she didn’t quite trust it. “It’s the mind’s way of protecting itself. They told me that you were there. That you rescued me.”
Lucie could hear her heart beat in her ears as she met the expectant eyes of Cordelia, searching for the pass that would free her of London, James, Belial, and the memories that came with all three.
When Cordelia left that fateful night after finding Grace and James in the throws of passion, and Cordelia told Lucie that she was leaving with Alastair to return to Alicante indefinitely, she’d been overwhelmed with a dreadful loneliness that she often felt as a child when James would dismiss her to play with the other boys including Anna, and all Lucie had were her stories. While stories were a wonderful place to spend her time, some intrinsic part of her craved companionship, if not someone to share her stories with.
And then she met Cordelia, and not only did she have someone to share her stories with, but she had someone to fill her stories with. She wanted to write many more adventures of the beautiful Cordelia; their adventures as parabatai, when it was unexpectedly ripped away from her.
And now, she was being presented a second chance. But, as with everything, it came with a terrible price.
“Lucie?” said Cordelia, as if she’d been saying it for some time. “Are you all right?”
“Yes,” Lucie nodded and reached to take Cordelia’s hand in her own.
“They said that you brought me back from the Shadow realm?” asked Cordelia. “How? What did Belial say? Why did he want me?”
“He was after James.” And there went another strand to the web of her lie. Lucie released Cordelia’s hand and smoothed out her skirt. “I suppose word got around of your engagement. Apparently even in the Shadow Realm, engagements announcements do not go unnoticed. He thought that if he captured you it would draw James out of hiding, but instead I arrived. I tried to kill him, but he cannot be killed by earthly or heavenly weapons, and since I have nothing to offer Belial, he threatened to kill us both and return our corpses.” She went on perfecting her story as if she were writing at her desk and not lying to her friend. “He was about to do it too, but I managed to convince him that wasn’t in his best interest. If he killed me then he’d never gain access to James. So, he settled for your life instead. You did a wonderful job convincing him of your death. I, for a moment, believed it myself. The next thing I know, we were falling through what appeared to be a dark tunnel and when I opened my eyes again, we were back on the street. James found us moments later.”
Cordelia frowned. “He was after James?”
“Yes,” said Lucie, taking another bite of her biscuit. “Poor company that brother of mine. Biscuit?”
Cordelia shook her head and while she asked no further questions, Cordelia seemed to ponder Lucie’s story.
The door to the foyer burst open followed by a cacophony of loud voices and even more obtrusive footsteps as Thomas and Christopher walked into the Institute, arguing with someone over their shoulder about being five minutes late.
“Thank you for this information, Thomas” said Matthew following behind them. “Years of academia and study and I never did manage to learn how to tell time.”
James emerged last, his hands tucked in his trouser’s front pockets, as he extended his leg back to close the door. A smile curved on his mouth that did not reach his eyes then wandered towards the sitting room where Lucie remained beside Cordelia, watching her friend intensely.
Cordelia stood, her dress falling around her ankles, her fingers gliding over the fabric as she said, “Hello James.”
(Author’s Notes: Hi guys! I hope you’re all doing well. Thank you for the kind words on the last part. I missed writing/reading with you guys and I’m so thankful that you all came back to The Last Night. I have a new obsession, I’ve finally read Sarah J Maas’s A Court of Thorns and Roses. Have you all read this? Am I super behind? It’s amazing! I love that story so much, so if my blog is suddenly splashed with ACoTaR, then ya’ll know why now. It’s just SO good! I hope you enjoyed this chapter, please hit that reblog and spread it around, give it some love, leave me a comment about what you thought, and follow along for updates. Okay, love you guys, bye! Next update Sunday 9/13)
#the shadowhunter chronicles#The Last Night#jordelia fanfiction#jordelia#james x cordelia#james herondale#Cordelia Carstairs#lucie herondale#jesse blackthorn#grace blackthorn#the last hours#chain of gold#cassandra clare#Matthew Fairchild#christopher lightwood#thomas lightwood#tessa gray#alastair carstairs
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