#troubadour's chapter

[shiningdesignersreflections]

Troubadour’s Chapter: Journey 4

Unlocked after obtaining the last item, the hair.

Narrator: Deep in the forest, Yeeso tries to enter the altar shrouded by the mist.

Narrator: Heavy mist swallows up everything. Even under the light of the burning torch, one can’t see a corner of the dark forest.

Narrator: All means to determine the direction are useless. No matter which direction they go, they’ll encounter thick mist.

Narrator: They walk around and return to the edge of the Mist Forest.

Yeeso: Damn it. We’ll have to wait for the Queen here.

Corleone: Some people are approaching.

Narrator: Corleone puts out the torch and the mercenaries skillfully find shelters to hide.

Narrator: Some black-robed riders linger on the edge of the mist, followed by several horses carrying special instruments.

Yeeso: Are they also waiting for the Queen? We must strike first.

Corleone: Okay. The Commander is interested in the instruments.

Haby: This place is suitable for ambush. The timing is perfect. They can’t escape this time.

Narrator: Things are blackened into blurred shadows in the mist. When the black-robed men realize the attack, they’ve fallen into a disadvantage.

Narrator: The battle-hardened mercenaries from the Justiciars appear quietly and raid their prey.

Narrator: The black-robed men soon give up and begin to retreat. Yeeso leads his partners to pursue them.

Narrator: They run out of the Mist Forest. They see a plain where numerous flowers are in full bloom.

Narrator: Without any hesitation, the two teams rush into the sea of flowers.

[muddyviolets]

Reserved this on the online catalogue, picked it up and recognized the cover. I used a few chapters as a reference for a term paper I wrote about 8 years ago

[eratosmusings]

Stolen Destiny (I)

Feyd Rautha x fem!reader

summary: Your father had been promised an heir. But the choices made by another stole that fate from you. Now it's your turn to take theirs.

warnings: adults only, all characters are over 18, smut in future chapters, blood, misogyny, dark themes, canon typical violence

word count: 1.2k

dividers / masterlist

“Again,” the swordmaster calls out. 

Gritting your teeth, you comply and fall back in position with the others. All this show for what?

With a nod, a troubadour began to pluck at the strings of her Baliset again. Your feet move in the familiar pattern, hilts of the swords bouncing against your hips. This is a waste of time.

Air stills as the rest of the women swirl away from you when another Baliset, one played with a bow sliding against its strings, joins the melody. The blades gnash against their sheaths in protest as you pull them free. They sing in the air, spinning easily between your fingers. Faster and faster they spin to match the skirts of the others now twirling in a circle around you until the music slows.

Once, twice you clink the blades’ together before you stab one into the plush stool in the center. Soft, slow pattering of the drums begins as you turn your back to it. The sword that remains drags its tip against the stone floor. The women bend a knee where they twirled. Sparks follow when you twist quickly.

This is the silliest part. You face a non existent opponent. Bringing your sword forward you drop into a defensive stance. The music rises and now you fight. Thrust, retreat, parrie, circle, advance, lunge, parrie, retreat, parrie, parrie. On and on it goes until you drop the sword. Your arm extends to the partner who does not exist and spin into nothing as the music reaches a crescendo. Chest heaving, you stay there and stare into the abyss until the music and the last of your dignity finally dies.

One of the girls is quick to retrieve and return the swords to you. In contrast, you’re slow to sheath them. You’re not eager to hear the word you know waits on his tongue. But you can only stall for so long.

You turn and face him. His voice cuts sharply across the silent hall. “Again.”

“You look ridiculous,” your father says under his breath so only you can hear. 

A gown, styled after your mother’s House, hung loosely on your frame, hiding any hint of the woman’s body beneath it. You feel ridiculous in it, but had thought it better than the other options. You should have known there was nothing you could have worn that would please him.

“My apologies, father.”

He scoffs. Nothing you do will ever please him.

It’s why you still cannot understand why this celebration is being held. He saw no honor in you being born, why would he see it in you coming of age? And to invite the likes of the Atreides? Was this all some masochistic need to see the son he should have had?

He says outloud, “Don’t embarrass me.” In your head you hear the word he leaves unspoken. ‘Again.’

The Major Houses arrive hours apart, the lucky few Minor Houses invited padding the time between. First is the Princess Irulan. Beautiful, graceful, kind. She compliments you, embracing you as if you’d been friends for life. And it feels as such. A connection left despite the broken destiny. There would be no marriage, but your father whispers that a friendship could offer nearly as much.

The Atreides come next. The Duke is handsome. His concubine, Lady Jessica, hides behind a veil. A Bene Gesserit indeed. Their son, Paul, is charismatic and not as handsome as his father, but more beautiful. He places a kiss on your hand, complimenting your dress and, as he calls them, your lovely eyes. They fall flat on you, but he seems to preen at your own compliment of his hair with a boyish grin painting his face.

Your father’s mood shifts when they and their people are led away to the castle. “Well done. Who knew you could charm so well.” The praise, as backhanded as it is, prickles your skin. “Let’s hope can you keep it up.”

At last, as the sun sets, the Harkonnens arrive. 

Pale and hairless, they're intimidating in their black attire. The Baron did not come, instead having his nephews take his place. The eldest, Count Glossu Rabban, is a giant of a man. From the stories you’ve heard, he's a sadist but an idiot. In his shadow lies the true danger. 

Na-Baron Feyd-Rautha. He’s deceptively slight next to his brother. But to be the chosen heir for a House like the Harkonnens there must be a brutal intelligence. Like Paul he takes your offered hand and presses his lips against it. They’re cold, chapped and rough. Unlike Paul he offers a grin that had no boyishness left. Blackened teeth bared, he tugs your arm harshly. You stumble forward into him. The hand he doesn’t hold presses against his chest to catch yourself, the one he does hold twisting out of his grip.

Warm metal presses against your throat. 

Something akin to amusement dances in his eyes as they rove over your. It’s the only sign that he probably doesn’t want to kill you. There’s a measured pause of his gaze, first on the blade then sinking lower, before it flits back to your own. His voice is raspy as he speaks, “It is a pleasure to be here for your coming of age, my lady.” He leans forward and presses a kiss to your cheek. The blade retreats. His eyes don’t leave yours as he releases you, flips it, and offers you the hilt. “A gift.”

“Thank you,” you say, hoping your voice holds firm, and reach for the dagger. 

A hand flashes from behind you with a plea of, “Allow me, my lady,” from a guard. 

Feyd, tisked, pulling it out of reach. “It is not a gift for you.”

You’re unceremoniously knocked aside when the guard steps between you. “She will be given it after an inspection.”

“An inspection is unnecessary,” you hiss, face warming. It was embarrassing enough he’d managed to catch you and your court so off guard. But to openly suspect him of intending harm, after such a brazen display of weakness, would cement the failure of any good relations between your houses. Your father would never forgive you.

“He poisons his blades,” the guard insists, not quietly enough.

Feyd-Rautha’s laugh is harsh. He turns to the Harkonnens behind him, lifts his arms, and bellows, “He worries I poison the blade!” It humors them. Rabben guffaws as if he’s never heard a funnier joke. When he faces you again his black grin is even wider. He stares down the guard as he slices the blade across his open palm. Blood soils the blade and drips on the stone beneath him. His eyes shift to you again. His tongue juts out. In a grotesque exhibition he licks it. “Death does not wait for you in my hands today.”

“I never suspected it did, Na-Baron,” you agree, stepping around the guard. He moves to stop you, but a harsh glare has him backing down. There’s still a chance to save this. Appease the Harkonnens and quell your father’s resentment you can feel rolling off him in waves behind you. Feyd offers the hilt again and you take it. The blade slices across your own palm without hesitation, your blood joining his on the stone. You extend your hand to him again.

a/n: my first fic! any thoughts would be appreciated 🥰

be my muse

next chapter

[aurianavaloria]

KoH - To Rival Eden (Baldwin IV x Reader)

Fandom: Kingdom of Heaven

Pairing: Baldwin IV x Fem!Reader

PoV: Split (Baldwin - Fem!Reader)

Length: Short (<4k words)

TW: Vague mentions of leprosy

A/N: Well, here we have it, the much-anticipated sequel to "What Good May Come"! I took your feedback into account regarding Y/N's preferences, as well as circumstances and relationships, and created another chapter in this little romance. As in the previous story, I've done my best to keep Y/N as generic as possible with a personality that seemed to fit what is currently popular. I hope you enjoy it as much as the first, and once again, thank you all for being awesome! 🤗

Baldwin could hardly believe his good fortune.

Tiberias had spoken truth: she loved him.

He hadn’t slept a wink that night after she left his chambers. Had barely paid attention to his physicians’ work as he’d given his failing body to their care for the hundred-thousandth time in his short life. Whilst his mortal shell continued its slow and endless march towards inevitable disintegration, his heart and mind were soaring above the clouds, his spirit filled with a fire he hadn’t felt in years.

Lady Y/N loved him.

He lay in his bed, eyes staring up into the canopy’s shadows, yet unseeing of anything that was actually there. Instead, he saw her sitting before him as she had that evening, the smile dancing across her lips, the color in her cheek…

Thus lost in his thoughts, all he had to do was close his eyes to still feel her warmth in his arms, the touch of her hand upon his own… still smell the sweet perfume that cloaked her in its allure. Even as his fears screamed at him that every moment he spent near her was a risk he was selfish to take, that the poison coursing through his veins could destroy her like some fetid rot devouring a perfect flower, all he desired was to hold her again… to imagine what her hair would feel like slipping between his silk-gloved fingers…

These visions of her swirled in his mind all night long and into the next week, until he thought he might go mad with them. He had never thought much of the songs of the troubadours before, dismissing their melodramatic lyrics as nothing more than mere fantasy.

But now he had tasted that very pain of love of which they sang, and he knew they were right.

Love was insanity.

Unfortunately, it was an insanity he had to endure through nearly a week’s worth of increasingly-numerous duties that forbade his interaction with anyone other than his advisors and court petitioners. Conversation on such matters proved his only respite, for when he was finally left alone once more, she haunted the depths of his mind.

And as his quill slowly glided through the practiced motions of his signature upon his latest letter, his aching heart wondered if he haunted hers the same way…

He hoped and prayed she had not taken offense to his exclusion of visitors outside his immediate council. It was all such ill-timing, and yet the administration of his kingdom could not wait for courtship. He could not afford the distraction of anyone else’s presence amidst such delicate matters, and there were some things that he refused to delegate to others.

That he could not trust to others.

The thoughts of sharing those tasks with a queen he truly loved and adored above all else, however…

Plunk!

He abruptly sat back in his chair, squeezing his eyes shut.

That was it. It was time for some fresh air.

Rising slowly to his feet, he reached for his hooded cloak where it hung nearby. Without even being asked, his servant Ihsan wordlessly appeared from the shadows to help him don it, moving with quiet grace.

“Shall I accompany His Majesty?” the Christian Syrian asked, aiding Baldwin in pulling the hood over his head. Jerusalem’s sun was bright today, and harsh on the ill king’s eyes.

“No, I shall walk alone, I think.”

“As you wish, sire.”

And loyal Ihsan melted into those shadows once more, as quickly as he had emerged.

With that, Baldwin began making his way to the palace gardens, keeping his pace measured as he followed the long halls, close to the wall should he need it for support. Alas, his numbed foot would allow for nothing else. Yet, even so, he didn’t wish for this stroll to be a hurried one, crammed in between the endless sessions of his work. He needed time to center himself – to clear his mind and ease his heart.

His hood low over his mask, he still squinted against the sun as he emerged into the palace gardens. The strength of its rays had only seemed to intensify in recent years, even as their warmth had faded; his body hardly felt it, now, beaming down upon him, as if he had already hovered between the land of the living and the dead. But his eyes most certainly did, and he kept his head dipped low, his mask half-shadowed by the hood of his cloak.

Anyone else who had chosen to wander the gardens the same as he soon found themselves departing, as usual. The king was instantly recognizable, even cloaked like this, his presence garnering immediate notice by his courtiers. Their dread of his disease they always attempted to cover with pretense – the courtesy of yielding the space to their liege-lord as they offered deep bows and curtseys. Yet they always slipped away with the hiss of whispers swirling in their wake…

His lips twisted in amusement at the thought that his experience behind a mask had made it easier to see past theirs.

Thus, he largely ignored them as they bestowed upon him their customary greetings, their well-rehearsed gestures of obeisance. And the answers he gave in reply were just as superficial. They deserved nothing more. Little by little, they left as he slowly made his way along those meandering paths, bordered by every plant native to these lands, flowering or not…

All but one.

At the end of one of the paths, perched upon a bench before a towering hedge, was Lady Y/N.

She sat with a small book open in her lap, her garb a simple green bliaut with a matching embroidered belt. A brilliant white veil over her hair, pinned to the barbette that looped beneath her chin, shielded her downturned face from the sun. Even from this angle, he could see the slight smile that played across her lips, and he felt his own mimic the expression beneath his mask.

The sight of her thus made him pause his stride, and he considered backtracking to the previous fork in the path and leaving her to her peace. Yet another part of him desired nothing more than to speak to her – to self-indulgently converse, even if only briefly, with this sweet angel of a woman he’d neglected for the sake of his divinely-mandated duty.

What resulted then, was an indecisive hovering, a prolonged pause at the bells of the lovely flowers that brushed his silken sleeve – blossoms whose aroma was now all but lost to his dulled senses. But none of the velvet-petaled jewels gracing this paradise of a garden now compared to the one he could not tear his eyes from, yet hadn’t the heart to approach…

================

Jerusalem’s palace garden was a sanctuary as peaceful as the cloister of any church you’d seen and perhaps twice as beautiful. The open air was filled with the scent of the exotic flowers that had been meticulously cultivated there, surrounding visitors in an alluring embrace. The cool shade beneath the towering hedgerows and elegant palms had been too tempting to resist, and, with a new book of poetry in hand, you’d made a beeline for an empty bench in the farthest shadowed nook you could find.

Gardens such as these were haunts for lovers, or so you’d been told. Some had even been designed in such a manner that encouraged clandestine trysts – a convenient niche here, a cleverly-planted bush there…

Alas, there were no such surreptitious visits in your near future. No, you’d merely come to the gardens this day for some fresh air and relative peace and quiet.

It was with great eagerness that you had rushed to the bench, sweeping your skirts beneath you and opening the book upon your lap. It was a loan, in fact, from Sibylla; the princess had been spending more time with you in the past week, indulging in light conversation mostly revolving around scholarly interests and pastimes. During the course of one of these discussions, she mentioned having received a few books from France and, quite unexpectedly, asked if you would like to borrow one of them.

Such a generous offer had been impossible to refuse, and your eyes had lit up as the princess passed you the small, leather-bound book of poetry, which you handled with utmost care.

The plan was to spend an upcoming evening sharing what the two of you had enjoyed most about the tomes over refreshments.

It was something you rather looked forward to.

Now, you were fully immersed in the book, your eyes drinking in the copyist’s hand as it swirled across the delicate vellum pages; it was a work of art in and of itself, to say nothing of the words it held within. So engrossed were you that, for a long moment, you failed to notice you were being watched…

But then, suddenly, a slight movement from the periphery of your vision caused you to glance up, and for a brief second, you thought you saw an angel. You quickly realized, however, that it was not.

The awestruck smile that tugged at your lips was perhaps a bit uncouth, but you couldn’t help it. Angel he was not, and yet the king was still radiant enough that you wouldn’t have been at all surprised to see a pair of wings upon his back or a fiery halo ringing his head. The hooded cloak he wore, trimmed in gold, was such a blinding white in the midday sun that it almost blurred his outline, and the half-concealed silver mask with its perfectly-chiseled countenance could easily be mistaken for the face of a saint…

“Your Majesty!”

On reflex, you stood, abandoning the book on the bench before starting to dip into a curtsey, but the upwards flash of his gloved hand stopped you mid-movement.

“I require no epithets or courtesies from you, Lady Y/N,” he replied as he wandered down the path towards you. “I should hope that I may abandon such performance in your presence.”

The warmth in his voice heated your cheeks. “Very well… Baldwin.” This was only the second time you’d dared to speak his name without a title preceding it, and it felt oddly right on your tongue. “If that is the case, then I must also insist that I am simply Y/N.”

His hooded head dipped. “Of course. Y/N.”

Something about the way he said your name made your heart flutter, and you glanced away briefly even as you sidled nearer to him. “It is good to see you again. Baldwin. You are well, I hope?”

“I am now,” he replied softly. Now you could look up into his silver-clad face and see the glitter of his eyes beneath the shadow of his hood. In their impossibly-blue gaze you found a softness that belied the sharpness of their hue.

“I… missed you,” you breathed at last, your voice lowering. “I must admit, I’ve worried for you. Lord Tiberias assured me all was well, but… well, you’ll forgive me for being a bit distrusting.”

A low chuckle emanated from him. “If there is anyone you may trust with his honest assessment of matters, it is Tiberias.”

A chuckle of your own escaped you in response to his jesting remark before he continued in a far more serious tone, “I must offer you my sincerest apologies, Y/N – here you’ve given me the most beautiful gift anyone has ever bestowed upon me, and I’ve done nothing but neglect you in return. Already, I fear I must seem a poor partner in courtship.”

Your mouth opened a little in shock at that. “Absolutely nothing of the sort! I understand you are busy. I know you wouldn’t have isolated yourself like this otherwise.” A light smile played upon your lips as you met his eyes again. “I’m just glad to see you again now.”

It was then you reached forth, brushing his nearest forearm lightly in reassurance. The damask silk of his sleeve was so very soft and smooth beneath your fingertips. And warm. Though from his body heat or the sun, it was difficult to tell…

Suddenly, another movement out of the corner of your eye had you glancing past the king at a visitor on the garden path: a small tabby cat – silver with stripes of black – trotting along the hedgerow towards you.

“Oh, look!”

You pointed, and Baldwin half-turned to follow your gesture, another quiet chuckle following once he realized what had caught your attention. “Ah, a palace mouser, I see. Either that or a street cat has managed to breach the walls.”

His choice of words elicited a light laugh from you. “Perhaps he is a scout, then. Come to assess our defenses.”

The two of you watched as the cat slowed a few paces away, looking up at the both of you.

“Mrow?”

It was a questioning little sound the tomcat made as he hunkered close, sniffing first at the toe of Baldwin’s shoe before doing the same at the hem of your skirt. For a moment he merely stood there, his banded tail a waving S in the air as he continued to take in king and lady with shining green eyes.

“Mrrp.”

A quiet trill followed as the cat proceeded to bump up against your shin, tail curling about as he wound his way behind you before bumping against Baldwin’s calf in the same manner. He paused, staring upwards, and then he repeated the pattern, his path creating an infinity knot around both your feet.

“Aww, I think the darling wants attention,” you cooed, bending at the waist towards the little feline as you held out your hand. You were rewarded with another bump up against your palm, whereupon you happily scratched behind the cat’s ears, a grin plastered to your face.

“I would greet him as he wishes,” Baldwin remarked beside you, “but I fear I’d lose balance and keep going.”

You glanced up at him. “Well… we can’t have His Majesty tumbling face-first into the roses, can we?”

“No, I do believe that would tarnish my reputation for being upright.”

A snort escaped you at that. Baldwin’s sense of humor never ceased to amaze you – that he could find humor at all amidst his terrible suffering was a testament to his fortitude.

Confident that the cat was comfortable with you, you then reached for him, moving to pick him up, which he allowed with surprising ease. Palace mouser indeed, and obviously used to human company; you were certain no street cat would allow such familiar handling so soon…

“Oh, look, he has little gloves, like you.”

Your observation of the cat’s stark white mittens, curled as they were overtop your arm, had Baldwin chuckling lightly once more, and he nodded in reply, his own gloved hand slowly approaching. “So he does. Alas, I fear his bear weapons mine do not.”

He paused long enough for the cat to sniff again at his fingers – which he did – before gently stroking the top of the creature’s head between his ears. Almost immediately, a rumbling purr emanated from the feline’s throat, his eyes half-closing. Despite the near tentativeness of Baldwin’s movements, the cat seemed quite satisfied with the attention, though a part of you wondered how much the king himself gleaned from it…

“Can you feel that?” you heard yourself ask.

“Barely,” was the quiet reply, a lengthy pause following before he withdrew and added, “I relish moments like these while I can. There will come a day when I shall feel nothing with these diseased hands, glove or not.”

His words shot like an arrow straight to your heart. As much as you both tried to ignore it, to look past it, the truth of the matter was that Baldwin was slowly being eaten alive from the inside out, and it was only a matter of time before it utterly consumed him. Just this simple encounter with a sweet palace cat was enough to bring reality crashing down around both your ears.

And you hated it.

Swallowing, you cleared your throat and then bent to set the curious feline back on his feet. “Let’s let our intrepid little friend here continue on his way now, to do the noble work his kind has been mandated to do, yes?”

Once released, you gave the cat one final pat on his head and he was off, trotting away down the path before promptly disappearing under a bush.

“Y/N?”

The softness of your name upon Baldwin’s lips suddenly brought your attention back to him, and then there was his hand on your cheek, cupping your face gently as his eyes searched yours. You could feel the concern in their depths, his gaze probing your own for answers. No doubt he sensed the shift in your mood – you never had been the best at keeping your emotions hidden…

“I wish I could do more for you,” you whispered before he could ask. “I wish I could… I wish…”

There were so many things that you wished. You wished for him to be healthy again. You wished you could lift the many burdens from his shoulders. You wished you could rid his court of the treacherous vultures just waiting for his final breath to tear apart the corpse of his dream. You wished you could send his enemies running for their lives beyond the desert sands. Alas, you could do none of that.

But you could do this…

Without a word, you swiftly closed what gap was left between you, wrapping your arms around him in a tight embrace.

Instantly, he stiffened, his hands clamping to your shoulders on reflex, their grip tighter than you anticipated.

“Y/N…”

“Hush!” you hissed, interrupting any warning he felt impelled to give you. “Let me do this… let me do it, and let yourself have it!”

You could feel him tremble in your arms, his breathing uneven. For a harrowing moment, he was naught but a statue, indecisive – no-doubt waging a war in his own mind, if you knew him by now as well as you thought you did…

Whichever side flew the banners of Propriety and Precaution, though, evidently lost the battle, as a shaky sigh escaped him at last, a quivering hiss of breath between the lips of his mask.

“God forgive me.”

And then, in a move that made your heart flutter wildly again, his own arms slid around you, pulling you into him and shrouding you in sun-soaked silk. The pungent scent of herbal salves alongside crisp linen followed, piercing past the exotic fragrances of the garden flowers, although you detected the distinct note of roses rising amidst it all – perhaps from the oils the physicians applied to soothe his ravaged flesh. He cocooned you in this warmth, the hardness of his mask as it rested atop of your head a sharp contrast to the softness of the rest of him. And thus he held you tight, tighter than you had expected him to, your ear pressed to his chest where you heard the quickened thumping of his heart.

For one blessed moment, nothing else existed. Perhaps he was an angel after all, just awaiting the wings set aside for him in Heaven. For here he held you in earthly Paradise amidst a garden to rival Eden, shining bright as the light of the sun that enveloped you both in its purifying rays, and you knew peace…

You heard the raggedness in his breath, however. The unsteadiness of his hold. Pulling back from him, you promptly swept his hands up in your own, tugging him towards the bench. “Come. Sit. Stay with me a while and forget your troubles, if only for a few moments. If you can spare them, at least.”

His regard held an almost painful tenderness as it met yours, his voice dropping to a silken timbre. “That and more, should you but ask.”

Your eyes never left his, then, as you led him with ease to your chosen perch. Scooping up Sibylla’s book, you made room for him to sit beside you there, and as he slowly settled himself, letting out what sounded like a sigh of relief, you were keenly aware that your legs were touching, hip to knee…

“Do you like poetry?” you inquired, choosing to ignore how your heart continued to race a little at his continued close proximity.

He glanced sideways, his eyes flicking downwards towards the book in your lap. “As much as the next person, I suppose. Is that a new acquisition?”

You grinned up at him. “Princess Sibylla loaned it to me, actually. We’re planning on discussing it in a few days.”

He nodded slowly at that, seeming to approve. “My sister is in need of good company. I am glad to hear you are getting along well with her.”

“She terrified me at first,” you admitted with a laugh. “But I think she truly wishes for us to be friends.”

Baldwin’s gaze leveled at you behind the mask. “And you were not terrified of me?”

The question was a soft one, wavering slightly, though from recent exertion or emotion, you couldn’t quite tell.

A gentle smile tugged at the corner of your mouth. “Never.”

For a long moment, his eyes searched yours, and you couldn’t help but let them. Their color, their shape, their intensity… they were so beautifully expressive that it didn’t matter that his mask concealed everything else. When they looked at you, you were almost certain you could feel what he felt in your own heart. And what you felt now was more warmth. This time, though, it blossomed from within as those eyes relaxed into a half-lidded stare that was so much like that of the cat you’d just found…

Aware of the blush heating your cheeks at such a look, you finally tore your gaze from his and cleared your throat. “Would you like to hear a bit of this? It’s rather good…”

“Yes, I very much would,” he answered, his tone an almost distant one.

With that, you opened the book where you left off, taking a breath before beginning to read aloud. You hoped he didn’t mind romances, as that was precisely what this one was – a chivalric tale of doomed love…

Any self-consciousness you possessed about the contents was banished, however, the moment you felt his hand curl around your waist.

It was so light a touch it barely registered at first. But then you saw the flash of white out of the corner of your eye, bright upon the green of your gown. Felt the slight weight of that hand upon the curve of your waist. Almost instinctively, you leaned into him in response, and his grip tightened a little.

“I am not hurting you, am I?” you asked quietly, concerned about the effects of any weight against his fragile flesh.

“You could never hurt me,” he replied in a whisper.

And that was the moment you felt his head rest against yours as you continued to read.

Thank you all very much for reading! 😊I hope you enjoyed! ✨ And if you have any other ideas for Y/N, I'd love to hear them!

[gretavanmoon]

Valor - Troubadour

Pairing: Daniel x OC

Word Count: 13k

Warnings: Cursin', Smokin', Drinkin'. Angst: Mention of Struggle and Poverty, Mentions of Violence, Mentions of Weapons, Mentions of Murder and Death, Allusions to Shady Activities, Mention of Police, Concealing a Fugitive. Smut: Flirting, Kissing, Unprotected Sex.

Hey everyone! Thanks for being here! Was really missing the Valor world (what's new) and decided to satiate my needs with a little Danny spin-off. This story picks up just a few months after Chapter 14 ends and before the Epilogue, when Danny has decided to busk around the Midwest in search of fulfilling his musical heart and hitting the open road on his motorcycle. This Danny side-quest story will only be a few parts, but hope you enjoy the ride!

Big thanks to my bestie & cowriter @gretavangroupie for all the edits and wonderful idea inputs <333

Read Valor Ch. 14 here

Read the Epilogue here

TOPEKA, KANSAS

DANNY

“Cheapest bottled you got, please. From the back of the cooler,” I yell over the crowd as I pull off my hat, raking the back of my sleeve across my forehead to clear away the dripping sweat threatening to fall into my eyes. I’m tired and my voice is a barely-there rasp, but these past few weeks have had me flying on auto-pilot, running on fumes and the new high of performing on stage with a live band, just like I’ve always dreamed of doing. The bar we’re in tonight is crowded and full of loud-mouthed drunks, but honestly, I feel frighteningly right at home. 

Glass beer signs line the walls and the pool tables are barely lit and in desperate need of some new bulbs. The faded green felt is tattered and torn, and the cues have seen better days. I can tell that every cent this place makes is not going to the upkeep of the building, that's for damn sure. The walls are dripping with nicotine and and the floors are sticky with spilled beer and god knows what else. Truly, feels just like Canaries, a place I thought I’d never see the likes of again.

The bartender furrows her brow at me as she turns toward the cooler, obviously thrown off by my odd request. As she slowly leans down, I can’t help but let my eyes rake over her backside, hardly covered by the ripped and cutoff Levi shorts hugging her hips and thighs. She pulls her hair to the side as she bends lower at the waist, reaching as far back as she can to get to the furthest beer. She’s bent completely in half, and I have to calm myself with a full breath of air to keep my thoughts from getting the best of me. It’s been a while, sue me.

I snicker to myself as I pop a few peanuts from the bar bowl into my mouth, satisfied that she fell right into my trap. 

Oldest trick in the book. 

Finally she pops up, returning shortly after with a frosty brown bottle in her hand. She unscrews the lid, tossing it against the wall at the end of the bar before it falls into the waiting trash can below it. 

“Just realized why you asked for one from the back of the cooler. You think I’m some kinda sleaze, or somethin’?” she asks, leaning her elbows down on the bar with just enough force to squeeze her tits together. Her hand is still damp from handling the icy bottle, and I watch as she gently rakes her fingertips across her collarbone. Hm… I am no stranger to her type.

I lift the bottle to my waiting lips and take a long pull, never breaking eye contact with her. Finally I swallow, leaning onto my own elbows to meet her challenging gaze. 

“Beer’s coldest back there. You think I want somethin’ warm after sweatin’ like a hog up there on stage all night?” I ask. “It’s goddamned hot in here.”

She scoffs and her eyes roll, standing back up straight as her expression tells me she is already over my shit. Still she looks at me, crossing her arms tightly across her chest, the faded words on her shirt barely legible anymore. “Just cause you play a little guitar don’t mean you can get whatever the hell ya want here,” she bites, her eyes now seething and sexy. 

I growl a little beneath my breath, flashing her a glance of my teeth. “Well it fuckin’ worked, didn’t it? I gave you a show, only fair you give me a little one, too…” I reply audaciously. 

“Fuck off, prick. ‘Fore I bar you,” she says, fighting back a smile. 

I stand and smile too, pulling a few bucks from my back pocket to lay on the sticky bar top. 

Her lips purse, “Band’s got a tab, you ain’t gotta pay now,” she explains, effectively ignoring the other patrons who are now nearly begging for the attention that she won’t stop giving to me. 

I bite my bottom lip as I squint my eyes at her. “I don’t like owin’ people. I’ll pay as I drink,��� I insist as I take another swig off the top of my beer. “Unless of course, my money’s no good here?”

I watch her snap back in surprise as the music from the house band begins to swell from the stage behind me. Her tongue pokes through her lips as she blows the bright pink gum in her mouth into a bubble, eyeing me as it inflates and pops, and she pulls it back between her teeth. 

She slams her palm onto the money and swipes it from the bar top, spinning quickly as she heads to the cash register. 

“Danny, my man! Kickin’ ass and takin’ names!” Suddenly I feel the harsh palm of my new band mate Shawn grip across my neck, shaking me from side to side. He’s drunk already, but that’s to be expected of a front man who would rather chug a fifth of warm Jack Daniel’s before a show than warm his vocals up during sound check. “Hell of a fuckin’ set. Who the hell taught you how to pick a guitar, huh? The devil himself?”

I smirk a little, unable and unwilling to tell Shawn that yes, the devil was definitely with me for all the years I sat quietly in my room with my guitar, drowning out all the noise around me with whatever sound I could get to come from the damned thing. My foster parents, Ace… the revving of Valor’s engine all the nights that Jake suffered trying to fix her. 

“Just practice, I guess,” I yell back in his ear as he stumbles into me. “Practice and patience.” I’d never tell him the skill was born of necessity. He didn’t need to know that much. 

“Well, m’glad we found you on the side of the road when we did. You got more talent in your baby toe than Rog had in his entire fuckin’ body, man,” Shawn slurs, his own cocktail splashing onto my shirt as he speaks. “I mean that.”

I give him a curt smile and nod as he disappears back into the crowd, an elongated arm and pointed finger trained on me as he falls away. 

I couldn’t be more thankful for him and the other guys; they’d stumbled across me busking outside a little string of bars outside of Memphis right after we burned Ace’s down and I’d decided to hit the road on Ruby. I needed some space, I needed some freedom. And I needed the open fuckin’ road so badly I could hardly stand it. So that’s just what I did.

It was strange at first, being away from Jake and away from Joslyn after they were all I’d known for the majority of my life, but I knew deep down that if I didn’t go, if I didn’t leave, I’d get stuck right back where I’d started from in that goddamned town, running from the law and all the demons I’d decided to collect on the way. 

I knew Jake needed Y/N, and they needed to start a life together in privacy. I didn’t fuckin’ like it, bouncing from cheap motel to cheap motel, but after some time, I got over myself and my needs and began to rely on the road, and the sound of my tires spinning across it. I grew to love the feeling of a guitar in my hand more than the feeling of a socket wrench. And I began to like the sound of a loud, cheering audience more than the sound of a tuned-up Mustang engine. I reckon part of that is due to Y/N’s encouragement, getting me over my own fear of performing.

But that ain’t to say that I didn’t miss mechanicin’ a little. 

This band was full of miscreants just like myself, who had gathered together after realizing their talents and how much better they’d be if they meshed together. Their old guitarist, Rog was good, but he just didn’t have it in him, from what I understand. I didn’t want to settle down with a band, and honestly I’m still tossing around if it’s a good idea or not, but the money is alright. And sleeping in a shitty van beats sleeping under a tarp on a sidewalk or roach infested motel. Not that I am above that now.  

“Cowboy, your change?” I hear the bartender’s voice interrupt my thoughts, pulling me back into the headspace of the crowd and the chaos. 

“Nah, s’yours,” I reply to her, giving her a wink as she fights off another sweet smile, chomping on her gum again as she makes a point to give me a full up-down. 

Cowboy. I don’t like that. 

I’m far from a fuckin’ cowboy. Don’t think I’ve ever even mounted a horse in my life. I guess if I’m gonna continue to wear this cowboy hat, I’d better get used to the nickname. 

And if she’s gonna keep lookin’ at me like that all night, I’ll let her call me whatever the hell she wants. 

—

I drape the hat from a hook hanging on the motel room wall, making good on my new knowledge to never lay it down. I’d fallen asleep on a park bench one night a month or so ago with my guitar case open in front of me, and I’d woken up to the dirty old hat laying right in the center of it. Underneath it was the rip off the edge of a piece of receipt paper, some chicken scratch handwriting across the bottom of it: “Looks like you need this more than I do”, was all it read. 

I didn’t bother cleaning it, or trying in earnest to return it to its rightful owner, because they were right. A hat in the heat of the Kansas sun was like a godsend. It’s a pale beige straw with a camel brown leather strip, and I have to admit, it fits me like a glove. I made a mental note that day to take it with me wherever I go, and to always be thankful to the nameless stranger who had left it for me. Though it’s not my style, I still wear it with pride.

“Hat looks good on you, Cowboy. Sure you don’t wanna leave it on?” She smiles from her place on the bed. 

Yeah, I’d brought the bartender home with me, obviously, after we’d shared plenty of back-and-forth banter with one another between the few sets our band played tonight. She’d managed to get me pretty drunk after the last set, sliding me a double shot of whiskey on the house after I insisted on tipping her for every beer I’d ordered. 

I’d splurged on a king-sized bed tonight, forgoing joining the rest of the guys exploring the little Kansas town we’d found ourselves in. And I’m glad I did. The bartender, Sherry, I’d learned, is sprawled out in a red lace getup, making herself comfortable on the scratchy brown felt blankets and over starched sheets. She’s definitely fuckin’ sexy, and she’s easy to talk to, and I knew I’d made the right decision for the night when she didn’t actually get mad at me for my advances on her at the bar. She seems like just my kinda lover. 

I rip my t-shirt over my head and toss it onto the floor behind me before clicking off the lamp on the nightstand beside us. My mind is still swirling from the adrenaline of the crowd and the feeling of the music we make, and from the intoxication I’d put onto myself. Fuckin’ whiskey.

At the last second I change my mind, grabbing the hat from the hook before I crawl toward her on the bed, hand over knee as I place it directly on top of her head. 

“Yeah, I’m sure, think it would look better on you, anyhow,” I say, pressing it down a little to make it fit snugly on her. She giggles, reaching up to tilt the brim of it back to get a better look at me in the dim light reflecting from the cracked bathroom door. 

“You tryin’ to tell me somethin’, Cowboy?” she says, pushing me by the shoulders to lie back into the pillows. “Tryin’ to tell me what you want, tonight?”

She thrusts one of her legs over my waist, straddling me fully as she lets one hand drift across my ink-covered torso while the other readjusts the hat on her head. Fuck, she really is fine as hell. Has a different look to her than most of the women back in Joslyn. A little grittier, a little more confident in herself. My hands immediately grip her thick thighs as I lick my lips, glad she picked up on my insinuation. 

“I’ll take whatever you wanna give me, baby…” I say as my hips buck up into her, her bright red nails digging with a little force into my chest. My eyes blur from my drunkenness, but I can feel my heart racing with anticipation for whatever the night is about to bring me. The TV behind her is blasting late night MTV videos, Peter Gabriel, Dire Straits, ZZ Top… the light casting the silhouette of her perfect figure right in front of my face. Her tits are sitting perfectly in the lace, and I find myself slipping quickly into the feral mindlessness of foreplay. I reach my hand up to free her breast from the confines, gripping her left cup to rip it down. 

I feel my mouth salivating as her perfect nipple perks up, and I feel no shame in taking it all in my hand. “You’re fuckin’ gorgeous baby…” I praise her, my filter nearly completely gone. I squeeze at it a few times before sitting up to take her in my mouth, bringing my tongue harshly across her nipple. Her head dips back at the contact as she sits down a little harder on me, grinding her hips a little and looking for friction. 

“Fuck, Cowboy, we’re really gonna get into this?” she asks, her hips already circling on my hardening dick. 

I hum onto her, making her hiss between her teeth. “Mmmhm, unless you want me to take you back home…”

“No no, no…” she urges, shaking her head side to side as it falls back, and I free her other breast, taking it into my mouth as well. “I’m good here.” 

Her nails dig into me a little bit more, showing me that if we want this night to keep going how it is, I need to get myself together. She huffs a loud breath as she sits back, unbuckling my leather belt as her hands start to hastily shake. Her head tilts down and she looks at me again under the brim of the cowboy hat, her bottom lip sucking in and out of her mouth. 

“You need a hand?” I ask, offering my help with the belt and button. She nods a little, and we work together to pull my pants and underwear all the way off. My dick springs free as she drops my pants to the floor and I can hardly decipher the string of words and obscenities that fall from her gorgeous red lips. She leans down, and without any warning at all, takes me all the way into her mouth. 

My head falls back in surprise as my hips act on their own, pressing themselves to get me deeper into her throat. “Oh, shit, Sherry baby…” My hands find hers, and I give them a tight squeeze to let her know that I’m okay with going forward. Not that I really had any say so, anyway. Her tongue glides across the length of my cock, already begging for more as she pays special attention to the tip. Her red lipstick makes for a sinful visual, even in the partial darkness. 

The air in the room is already starting to heat, heavy with the smell of lust mixed with cigarettes and bad decisions. I thought maybe I’d change when I left Joslyn, and I did, in many ways. But goddamnit if I didn’t keep the same fuckin’ love for my vices. Cheap beer, rolled smokes, and women. All shapes and sizes, all makes and models, fuck. I’ll never fuckin’ grow up, and I’m not sorry for it. And now I’ve added a whole new love to my roster- playing the ever-loving fuck out of a guitar. 

“You wanna look at me, or not?” Sherry breaks my train of thoughts after she pops her lips off the tip of my dick. 

I take a deep breath, watching as her hand takes the place of her mouth, slowly and languidly gliding her grip up and down the length of it. “Whatcha mean, baby?”

She crawls up on me, placing one hand on either side of my head. She leans down, placing the tiniest peck on my lips. “Reverse, or…” 

“Oh…” I breathe, my body begging for more of her touch, anything at all, anywhere. “Can I pick both?”

She laughs a true laugh, displaying a dimple in her cheek, crawling back down the bed and stepping off the end of it. Her thumbs hook in the side straps of her thong, and she slowly sways her hips from side to side, pulling it slowly down her legs. She shimmies free of it before turning around, bending at the waist as she gives me quite the show yet again, just like I’d tricked her into doing at the bar. 

“Fuck… bring yourself over here…” I beg of her again, holding my two middle fingers up to beckon her. My entire body is writhing with want, and I can feel myself already teetering on the edge of pleading. She does as I ask, her bottom half completely uncovered now as she crawls up on me once again, before turning herself around backwards. Yes, baby. 

She glances at me over her shoulder before taking me in her hand again, working me up to where she wants me. She uses the utmost care in making sure I’m there again. She’s still flawless in the blue light of the TV as “Every Breath You Take” by the Police pops on behind her.

“Ugh, god I hate this song,” she complains quietly, and I barely hear her over the sound of my own heartbeat in my ears. I’m too blissed out with the visual of her ass grinding against me to even register what she’d said. 

“It’s so…whiney…” she complains again, her hand still working me. Her hand feels buttery soft against my cock, and I have to stop my stomach muscles from tightening in on themselves. God, I could already fuckin’ bust. “M’sorry Cowboy, I gotta turn this shit off. I can’t concentrate.” 

“Damn, whatcha got against Sting?” I chuckle, a little miffed that she’s hopping off me to reach for the television knob. She twists it once, and I huff an aggravated breath as the news pops on. 

It’s fuzzy and the picture is blurred, but I guess it appeases her more than the music did. She takes her position again as she grips my dick in her hand, leaning down just a little bit to take me in her mouth again. My hands knead at her ass as we pick right back up where we started from. My teeth are biting hard into my bottom lip, stifling the noise I want to let fly. “Goddamnit, Sher-“

Now, Sherry isn’t the first woman I’ve fallen victim to since leaving Joslyn, and she most definitely won’t be the last. Sometimes I think back on my time with Y/N, and how things had progressed so quickly with her before I got my head on straight and realized that I was moving in a direction my moral compass didn’t need to point. And when I realized my brother was madly in love with her. 

Things had felt good with her during that time, and honestly, I thank her for it. Though we only spent a fraction of time together, she gave me a taste of what it felt like to truly care for someone in that regard, and she let me know that maybe my heart is big enough to love someone other than just Jake and Bubba. Watching her and Jake together taught me more than they ever even knew, showed me that with the right counterpart, even lungs full of cigarette smoke and hearts full of resentment can turn on a dime, and reciprocate a love they’d never even known before. 

Love?

Nah, I never felt love for her. At least I don’t think I did. I did feel serious enough to want to change my life for her, that much was true. But thankfully I caught myself before I started to tumble. She helped me learn that I am capable of doing it, I can be that man for the right woman, if and when the time comes. 

But that time isn’t now, and that woman isn’t Sherry. 

“Fuck me, baby… god yes…” I groan into the thick air as Sherry finally sits all the way down on me, taking me fully inside her with one swift motion. I huff a fast breath through my gritted teeth, sitting up a little to get a better view of her. I grip her hips as she starts to rise up and down, getting a rhythm together as she starts to bounce. 

Her hands move from in front of her on the bed, and one reaches back and grips her left ass  cheek while the other holds on tight to my hat on her head. She feels like fucking heaven, silky sweet and velvety as she switches between backward thrusts. “How’s that, Cowboy? Feel good, baby?” she asks, her voice breathy as I watch her ass bounce against my thighs. She twists her head around to look at me with an eyebrow perked as she awaits my answer.

“Yeah… fuckin’ tight, baby, s’ perfect…” I could say more, but she switches herself up and hops to balance on just her feet, giving herself more space to ride me. She balances perfectly without the help of her hands, and somehow, the sight of her fucking just the tip makes me want to let it all go right there. Her wetness is dripping down on me, and it takes everything in me not to grab her hips and pull her all the way down again. But the show is just too damn good. I’m impressed, I really am, and I wonder if she does this with every victim at the bar that she flirts her way home with.

Ah, who gives a fuck. I’m her choice for the night just as she is mine. 

This view has me throbbing inside her, and for a second I don’t know what to do with my hands. She starts slowly swirling her hips, her hands balanced on her knees as she works me to near perfection. “You’re gorgeous baby, keep it right there…” I groan, my entire body starting to burn with need. I bring my open palm across her ass, eliciting a high pitched squeal from her, followed by a devious laugh. Somehow, I knew she would like that and the visual of my red handprint on her skin pushes me even further.  

I grab her hips and pull her down onto me, and I swear she feels even better than she did before. She falls back down to her knees into the position she was in before, still gyrating back onto me. I move my legs and sit up on my own knees, pressing a hand to her back as she leans down to all fours. I press deeper into her now, nearing myself closer and closer to the edge with this new angle. I feel rabid now, wanting to have all of her that I can in what I know will be this short span of time. 

“Ssss, fuck…” she grits, her voice a near whine now as I begin pounding into her ruthlessly. Her walls are fluttering around me violently, and I realize now that I never even told her my name. 

“Yes… yes…” She arches her back as she bucks her ass onto me, spreading her knees apart on the bed below and pressing her face into the mattress. “Harder, Cowboy, please…”

The hat is still hanging on for dear life as the room around me loses its shape, and all I can think about is the vicious sound of our bodies smacking together. I’m sure the neighbors are enjoying the sound of the headboard rattling against the wall, but I truly couldn’t care less. I’m trying to be careful not to leave bruises on her hip bones, but given the way the night has gone, I’m sure she wouldn’t mind, anyway. 

Without warning, I feel her hand reach between her own legs, gripping my balls firmly in her hand, and giving them a few tight squeezes. The sensation has me mindblown and my knees weaken, like she knows exactly where my weakest spot is without me even telling her. 

“Fuck, you’re a dirty little thing, aren’t you?” I ask, my hips moving at an ungodly pace as she continues to squeeze. I’m not sure if she wants me to cum faster, or if she really just wants to give me a show. For this to be the first night the two of us have met, she’s really uncaring of any of her manners. 

“Mmhm…” her breath is heavy, pitiful and wanting as I continue my relentlessness. “Just want you to feel…good, baby…” she whines through the thick blankets on the bed. Her hands are gripped tightly into them now, as she holds herself in this position. 

I take a fistful of her hair in my hand tightly at the root, and pull her up to me. My sweat-covered chest is pressed against her back, and I grab one of her tits with my free hand. I stay buried deep inside her, and I can feel both our pulses raging through us as we catch our breath. “Sexy, Sherry…” I breathe into her ear. Her hips start looking for friction, and she begins grinding them back onto my cock again, slow and ragged as I know she’s getting near the finish line. 

She falls onto her hands again and I feel us both begin to reach that point, and the muscles in our bodies start to shake and tremble. My eyes blur over as I wait to hear the sweet noises fall from her lips, but instead I’m met with another sound. 

“Cowboy…” she says, her voice stern. But I barely hear her as I concentrate on my own pleasure. “Cowboy!” she repeats even louder, but I continue to drown her out, not letting up on pounding into her. 

“DANIEL?” she yells, quickly pulling herself away from me and hopping across the hotel room.

“What, what? What’s wrong Sherry?” I ask, suddenly surprised and confused. She rips a sheet from the bed and covers herself with it, and I notice that her eyes are blown out with fear. She cowers in the corner as her eyes dart back and forth, searching for her clothes. I’m completely confused, and a little blindsided as my body tries to figure out what it should be doing.

“You– I, it’s you!” She points to the TV as the picture flashes across the screen. All I see is the face of a news anchorman, reading something off the papers in his hands. 

I stand from the bed and walk closer to it, watching as he continues to read. “Sher, it’s just the news, what do you–”

“Get away from me!” she cries, stepping back harshly into the wall. “Don’t touch me!” She suddenly seems as if she is a trapped animal, searching for her escape.

I instinctively walk toward her. “Sherry, what in the world?! I’m sorry if I–”

“Stop! Don’t come any closer! You fucking liar!” Her eyes are wide and terrified as she looks at the television again, and I’m nearly frozen in place as I try to piece together the past few seconds. I look from her to the TV again, and the picture is staticy and fuzzy. I back away from her and adjust the antenna, watching as the picture clears a bit. I turn up the volume and listen to the anchorman speak. I feel my legs hit the back of the bed and I sit down harshly, waiting to see what in the fuck Sherry saw for myself. 

“Authorities are asking for the public’s assistance in locating these men, as they are believed to be armed and likely dangerous. It is positively believed that they are directly responsible for the death of a man in Joslyn, Missouri, by means of murder by arson. Both men fled the town shortly after the incident, and are believed to be living separately, or traveling on the run.” My hand shoots to my mouth as I watch in complete terror as a sketch of mine and Jake’s faces cover the TV screen. “Authorities are just now building a solid case, and need your help in finding these men. If you have any information regarding their whereabouts, please call the telephone number at the bottom of your screen.”

I feel the blood drain from my body as I take the first breath I have in nearly a minute, and I feel myself going into a state of shock. 

What… the fuck…

I feel Sherry’s body rush toward me as she drops the sheet that was covering her to pick up the clothing she had strewn across the dingy carpeted floor. “I gotta get out of here…” she rushes, her hands shaking. 

“Sherry, listen to me. I can explain-”

“Explain? Explain what?! That you’re a murderer?!” she screams, and I watch as fearful tears begin to well in her eyes. She hastily pulls her shirt over her head and I listen to her breathing pick up as she tries to calm herself. 

“I’m not a murderer, Sherry! Listen to me! I swear you have no reason to be afraid of me…I–I just let me talk, please…” I beg her, my voice rising with the temperature of my skin. 

“Stop. Shut up. I’m getting away from you, and I’m callin’ the police,” she says through a completely shaken voice as she steps back into her shorts. I can tell she is in complete self-protection mode. 

What in the fuck is going on? How did this happen?

My heart rate starts to rise as everything hits me… the sketch of my face on the screen, Jake’s face… armed and dangerous, wanted for murder by arson… My head is spinning with confusion, with worry, with the sudden want to run, myself. I think about Jake, and about Y/N, and how I haven’t spoken to them in a few days. Do they know? Where is Bubba, are he and Geraldine okay?

It’s then that I realize I can’t let Sherry go, I can’t let her call. 

“Sherry, stop. Can you just listen to me for a second?” I ask again, grabbing her by the shoulders with as little force as possible. She tries to pry herself away, so I switch gears, knowing that if she isn’t going to listen, I have to use another tactic. “You do not need to get into this, this goes a lot deeper than it looks on the surface, Sherry. Please. I’m not a monster. I swear to god, I’m not.”

“You expect me to fuckin’ believe you? You never even told me your fuckin’ name! Daniel, is that even it?” she cries, the tears flowing down her face. 

“Yes! Yes, that is my real name. That much is true. And the other man, that’s my brother. His name is Jacob. Jake,” I explain, trying to throw sincerity into my already panicked voice. I adjust her shirt that she had pulled back over her head, straightening the fabric to cover her more. “We are from Joslyn, Missouri. And… And-”

“And you fucking killed a man!” she yells, ripping herself from my hold. “You’re insane! Are you a serial killer? Because if you are, I swear to god that you won’t leave this goddamned town in one fuckin’ piece, do you understand me?” she threatens, catching her breath. “I’ve got friends, Cowboy, friends in low fuckin’ places who would walk to the ends of the earth for me. I wouldn’t test my fuckin’ luck. All it would take is one call, and you’d be a dead man, yourself.”

I watch as she swallows, suddenly feeling a bit brave as the sexual mindset completely leaves us both. 

“I don’t doubt it, Sherry. I don’t doubt that one bit.” I swallow down my panic and sit back down, trying to diffuse the situation as best as I can. In a split second, I bargain whether or not I should tell her the whole story, the whole truth, but I know that would leave her with more questions that I fear she simply won’t care to have answered, as scared as she is. I want to be honest with her, I really do. But I also want to seem as clueless as I can so as not to make things worse. “I’m not a serial killer. I swear to god. I may look rough around the edges, and barely have a penny to my name, but I’m no killer, Sher. Swear on my life.”

She’s clutching her purse in her arms, hugging into herself with her worried facial expression tight as she takes my words into consideration. She’s listening to me…

“Back at home, my brother Jake and I were into some deep shit, some shit we didn’t want to have anything to do with, but we had no choice. Had been years upon years of never ending cycles of threats and manipulation. We had nothing, we were nothing. We weren’t saints, but we were good, honest, working men. Just tryin’ our best to survive, ya know? We uh… we were being threatened, our lives were being threatened… our home. The people we loved…” I rub a hand across my face as all the memories of just a few months ago come rushing back to my mind. Bubba, Josh… and Sam…

“It was going to end badly. It was going to be deadly in ways that we couldn’t even fathom. Along with innocent people who loved us getting caught up in it, too. These men were monsters, liars and cheats. Gave a damn for no one but themselves. So we got some help. We got some help from our own friends in low places, Sher, and they helped us to make moves to end it, get us out of the situation. And it uh… It just so happened that the man who was threatening us, the man who wanted us dead, got caught in the crossfire. He came to kill us, but ended up killing himself, instead.” I know it’s not the entire truth, and there are details that I could go on about for days, but for now, this explanation will have to do. I have to make sure she sees my side of the story. If not, it’s handcuffs. 

I feel bile rising in my throat from even disclosing this much. She shouldn’t even know that much of the story. I could have lied, I should have lied… but for some reason something deep inside me stops me from it. I’ve never been a liar in my life and I won't start now.

Sherry’s body is shaking with adrenaline, or maybe even fear, but she’s calm. “Why you tellin’ me this, Cowboy?” she whispers, pulling out a box of cigarettes from her purse. She plucks one out and lights the end, taking a long drag. Her hand shakes as her thumb and ring finger balance on her cheek, the smoke billowing around her face. 

I swallow. “Because, it’s the truth. Last thing I’m gonna do is lie to you. Don’t have any reason to.”

She takes another long puff, and I find myself envying the nicotine. “Why ain’t you lyin’ to me? You don’t even know me…”

I shake my head, pulling the sheet back over my exposed lower half. “I’ve never been one to lie. Never really got me anywhere but in trouble, anyway. I ain’t got a perfect past, Sherry, that’s the honest truth. But I’m not running from my demons, I’m running from a past that I don’t want followin’ me.”

She brings her lips into her mouth, taking another few puffs of her cigarette. I say a prayer that she’s considering my plea. It feels like hours that I stare at her just standing there, her eyes floating around the room before her cigarette is nothing but a filter. She moves to the nightstand, putting out the butt in the ashtray by the phone. She turns her back to me and blows the last puff of smoke into the air before her hand scratches the back of her head. 

“I ain’t gonna call the cops,” she admits quietly. 

I stand quickly and go to her, stopping myself from taking her in a full embrace. “Fuck, thank you thank you, Sherry. Really, I– Thank you.”

“You’ve got one hour. Get your shit, and get the fuck out of here,” she warns, crossing her arms again. “If I see you here still, it’s straight to the police. And don’t ever come back to this town, do you understand?”

“Yeah, yeah I get it. I won’t,” I promise as I begin working to collect my few things from the floor. She stands and watches me as I pack, and I know that she’s fighting the urge to go back on her word as her eyes move from me, to the phone, to the door, and back again. This is taking a lot from her. 

I finally have my few items shoved into my bag, and I realize that reality is once again hitting me right across the fucking face. I sit on the edge of the bed and pat the blankets, inviting Sherry to come and sit by me. She does, slowly, and with the utmost caution. 

“Why you helpin’ me?” I ask quietly. 

“Cause,” she chokes, pulling her tongue to the side of her cheek. “Feel like you’d’a done the same for me. I’ve been where you are, Cowboy. Maybe not for arson, maybe not for murder, but I’ve been there.”

I nod in understanding, extremely thankful understanding.

“And I don’t feel like you’re tellin’ me the whole story. Sounds like you and your brother have some skeletons in your closet. And I ain’t no judge, and I ain’t God. Who am I to decide what your reasonin’ was?”

I take a deep breath, suddenly overwhelmed with gratitude for her words. I take her hand in mine, bringing it to my lips to kiss over and over. “I need you to understand that it was life or death for us. Was us or him. The cards we were dealt just happened to fall that way. We did nothin’ in cold blood, Sherry. Please believe me.”

She finally looks me in the eyes for the first time in a while. “I believe you, Daniel. I don’t fuckin’ know why, but I do. God, I’m insane for doin’ this…”

“You might be, Sher, but that’s why you and I were drawn to each other, I think,” I try to lighten the mood, and she gives me a half smile.

“Still don’t like you,” she groans, giving me a lethal side eye.

I stand and wipe my hands across my thighs. “You must like me some…” I lean down to her, letting my nose graze across hers. To my surprise, she doesn’t pull away. I hear her breath hitch as I watch her reason with herself on deciding to let me, or slap me. 

When she doesn’t pull away, I lick my bottom lip, gently brushing it across hers as her eyes flutter closed. My heart rate rises again as my body reacts, suddenly pulled right back into where we had just left off minutes ago. I must be fuckin’ sick in the head. 

“Fuckin’ vagabond,” she whispers, her breath hot across my lips. “Criminal…”

I laugh against her. “I ain’t none of them things, baby. Troubadour, maybe…”

I let my lips crash onto hers again, pissed at myself for being this way. Why am I this way? I need to run…I need to call Jake.

But she kisses me back, her hand immediately flying to the back of my head to pull me in closer. God, she’s just as fucked up as I am.

It’s heated and messy again as I push her back onto the bed, her nails already digging into my back as we writhe together. She moans into my mouth as I press my groin into her, making sure I’m in just the right spot. We lie like this for a few minutes, both of us knowing we’re soaking up the last bits of each other that we’re going to get.

“I ain’t lettin’ you fuck me again, Cowboy. This is just a goodbye kiss…” she breathes, her teeth nipping at my stubbled jawline. 

“You sure?” I ask as my eyes roll back. “I never got to hear you come for me…”

She laughs a guttural cry, shaking her head as she scoffs at me. “And you won’t. Not right now, at least.”

I grind between her legs again. “Thought you told me to never come back to this town?” I ask cheekily.

I pull away, looking her in the eye as she takes a quick breath to speak. “People saw me leave with you. Same people who are watchin’ the news, right now. They will recognize you. They’ll be breathin’ down my neck with interrogation on your whereabouts before the sun rises. I was a drifter once, too. Looks like I’ll just have to go back to my old ways…”

“Run with me, Sherry,” I ask before my mind can even process the thought. 

“Nah, that’s not part of the deal.” She pats my chest with her hands, signaling me to get off of her. So I stand, understanding that our time together has come to a close, and I need to make a fuckin’ break for it. “Shame, though. You’re some of the best dick that’s come through this town in a while.”

I can’t help but laugh at her as she stands from the bed along with me. “Thanks, I think.”

“Get the hell out of here, Cowboy. Go. Don’t talk to nobody, and keep your head down. Head East and don’t fuckin’ look back, ok? There’s a fueling station about twenty-five miles outside of town on Route 40. Red pumps. Stop there, they don’t think twice about drifters. Call your brother from there. Let him know you’re comin’.”

“How’re you so good at this?” I ask her, slinging my bag over my shoulder. 

She sucks her teeth as she fixes her hair and residual lipstick in the motel mirror. “Told you I was a drifter once, too. Some things are just in your blood, ya know?” She turns to me, craning her neck up as we prepare to say an actual goodbye. 

“Can I give you somethin’ to remember me by?” I ask, holding my cowboy hat out to offer to her. 

She shakes her head, taking it from my hand and placing it back on top of my curls. “No, you’re gonna need it. It’s gotten you this far…” She adjusts it on my head, brushing a few stray hairs away from my face, in an act of pure softness. “Actually, wait,” she says, brushing past me to open her purse sitting on the table. A few seconds later, she emerges with a brand new Polaroid camera in her hands. “How about a photo to remember you by?” 

I second guess it, not really wanting a perfect stranger to have her own photograph of me, but Sherry has shown me more mercy than I deserve tonight, and a photo is the least I could do. 

“Sure, why not,” I agree, adjusting the hat on my head once again. 

“Here, put these on,” she suggests, handing me my aviator sunglasses that were by her bag on the table. I oblige, feeling a little out of place, but going along with it all anyway. She pulls the camera up to her eye and positions her finger over the button, making sure I’m in the frame. “Smile for me, baby…”

I know my cheeks blush at her words, but she snaps the photo before I have the chance to make myself look ready for it. 

“Hope I didn’t break your lens,” I joke.

“Nah, it’ll be perfect. Thanks.” Her smile sends butterflies through my stomach for the third time tonight, and if things were different, I might have asked Sherry to come on the road with me for real. But I know that the issues I’m running from are bigger than anything she needs to be involved with, right now. Maybe I’ll see her again some other time, in some other smoky bar.

I grab her chin between my fingers, laying a sweet kiss to her lips. “I’ll see you around, Sherry. Thank you. Be safe out there.”

She gives me a sweet wink as she sniffs a quick tear away. “Back at ya, Cowboy.”

—

“Come on… please pick up… pick up…” I whisper into the payphone as I try to will Jake to answer on the other end. The last we spoke was about six days ago, and he and Y/N had been traveling around scoping out places to live. They’d settled in a little apartment just outside of Memphis, where I had originally planned on busking around to make some cash. I liked it there, but the winds of change kept me rolling down the road to a new nowhere.

I’d ridden into this tiny slice of highway with only my guitar on my back and my bag hooked to Ruby, and I silently thank her for carrying me this far on my journey. The guys in the band had let me put her in the cramped equipment trailer that they had luckily left unlocked when I left the motel. Careless sons of bitches, I could have easily stolen anything I wanted.

I hated leaving them without any word, but they’ll most likely see the news, and be glad that I decided to run away, anyway.

“Hello?” a gravelly voice answers.

“Jake, hey, did I wake you?” I yell anxiously into the payphone at the gas station Sherry had told me about. She had been right, the attendant never even looked at my face as I threw my gas money onto the counter.

“Yeah, it’s fuckin 4AM, what’s wrong?” he replies, his voice thick and full of sleep. “Are you OK?”

Fuck. Of course he hasn’t seen the news. 

“Ah, no not really… are you uh. Are you with Y/N?” I ask, running my fingers through my hair as I peek around the corner to make sure Ruby is still sitting where I parked her. 

I can hear him rustling on the other end of the line, finally getting his bearings. “Yeah, she’s right here, why? What’s goin’ on?”

I clear my throat nervously, “Turn on the news. Local, maybe.”

I hear him rustling around again as he pulls himself out of bed, taking a deep, shaky breath as he wakes Y/N. “Danny, I don’t like that you’re not fuckin’ tellin’ me what’s going on.”

“Just go,” I urge him, my head on a swivel. 

There’s a pause before I hear him move around and switch the television on. “You’re lucky, we just got this fuckin’ TV yesterday… Hardly know how to work the damn thing yet.” he complains.

“Just–” I bite my tongue, waiting for him to see what he will inevitably see flash across the screen very soon. There’s a pause again and I hear the faint sound of Y/N’s voice beside him.

“Oh my fuckin’ god,” he says blankly. “Oh… oh, fuck. What–”

“Just listen to it,” I say quietly, letting him listen to the whole news story. 

“That’s our fucking faces, Daniel.”

“I know. I know it is,” I begin to pace as far as the short payphone cord will let me. “What the fuck are we gonna do?”

I hear Y/N’s worried voice again. “Jake, what… they can’t do this…”

“It’s gonna be okay, baby” he reassures her, but I can hear the doubt in his voice. “Danny, where are you?”

I clear my throat again, getting my head back on straight. “Uh, just outside of Topeka. ‘Bout 25 miles. I’m headed your way.”

“Do you know my new address?” he asks, overtop of more rustling and heavy breathing.

“Yeah,” I reply, “got it memorized.”

“Well forget it. We’re going somewhere else. We can’t be here,” he says angrily. 

“Jake, but, you just–”

“Y/N, do you remember Oz’s address? Lucienda’s?” I hear him ask her, and I immediately agree that going to them might be our best shot, even though Oz is most likely still serving his time for the last circus we got ourselves into.

“Yeah, I think so…” I hear her reply. “But Jake, we can’t just leave…”

I hear subtle aggravation in his tone, but he manages to keep it at bay. “I paid ahead three months’ rent, Y/N. We’re just… gonna leave for a while.”

“Jake what the fuck are we gonna do? Turn ourselves in?” I press. 

“I–I don’t know yet. No, we just play dumb for now. We need to get to Lucienda. Talk to her. She’ll be able to protect us for a while, she’ll know what to do,” he says. 

“I’ve got my fuckin’ bike, Jake. I won’t be able to make it anywhere fast, especially not to fuckin’ Miami,” I say, suddenly a little panicked again. I pull my tin of smokes from my pocket and light the end of one. The rush of nicotine instantly fills my lungs and calms me. Well, enough for now. 

“I know you can’t,” he says, taking a breath. “We need to go back to Joslyn first.”

“Joslyn?” I practically yell into the phone. Quickly looking around. “Are you fuckin’ crazy?! That’s the last place we need to go, Jake!”

But in the back of my mind, I know he’s right. We don’t have to show our faces, just a quick in and out to hide my bike and grab the last bit of cash we ended up hiding back in Ace’s safety deposit box for emergencies. And, we have to make sure Bubba is safe. With this new surge of information, god knows whether or not Teddy’s guys have gone after him yet, looking for some type of vengeance.

“You know I’m right…” he says quietly. “How long has it been since you’ve talked to Bubba?”

I swallow, taking another drag. “Week and a half. Maybe two.” I hadn’t been traveling with the band very long, but I know that I had told Bubba of the good news of them hiring me on, so it was around the same time. The last we talked, he claimed he was safe and sound. 

“Same here,” Jake says, taking a long pause as he thinks. “Get to Joslyn, stay quiet. We’ll meet at the old house by the creek. Nobody even knows that place is there anymore. It’s our best bet.”

“Okay,” I agree, nodding my head. “You gonna call Bub? Or do you want me to?”

“I’ll call the diner. Tell Geraldine everything. She’ll tell the truth, Bubba will sugarcoat if there’s anyone fuckin’ with him.”

“True,” I agree, exhaling again. “We can’t get on a fuckin’ plane, Jake. Someone will recognize us. It’ll take us days to travel to Miami and we need to get there fast.” My mind suddenly starts to spin with all the different plans of action. None of them seem like the right one. Traveling to Miami seems like too much land to cover, but staying in Joslyn doesn’t feel right, either. 

“Then what the fuck do you suggest we do?!” he exclaims. “We ain’t got a fuckin’ home, anymore, Daniel.” I can tell he whispers that last bit into the phone. 

“I’ll meet you at the creek. We’ll make a plan from there.” I stomp my cigarette out onto the cracked pavement, my skin beginning to sweat with nerves as I glance around again. 

“Okay,” he says again through a huff of grievance.

“Bub’s okay, right Jake? He’s alright?” my voice feels hollow as the words fall. 

I can hear Jake exhale on the other end, the same rush of worry flowing through him as it runs through me. “Yeah, he’s alright. And if he’s not… If they’ve touched him again…” He’s quiet for a second, and I can almost hear his teeth gritting together. I know that the exact same thought is running through both of our minds. I haven’t seen Jake mad in a really long time, but I know it wouldn’t take much for him to snap back into his old ways, especially when it comes to Bubba.

“I’ll see you at the creek,” I say with conviction, and I hang up the phone, wholly not ready for this journey. 

—

Well, here I am. Joslyn. Dirty and run down as ever, quiet but loud at the same time. A once bustling town rich with life and aspiring men looking to provide for their families now a mess of cracked sidewalks and sunken rooftops. Failed and closed storefronts, abandoned homes… the list goes on. This place is never gonna fuckin’ change. 

It’s been a long two days’ travel coming back here, and I halfway regret not renting a vehicle to be a little more inconspicuous coming back into town. But, an unknown car rolling through Main Street might set people off all the same. 

My stomach churns with old nerves coming back to the surface again, old habits and muscle memory making me feel like my head is already on a swivel again. It’s nearing 8PM as I roll into town, so I’m careful not to hit the throttle on my bike any more than just a light idle. The last thing I need is someone hearing me and suspecting I may be back.

As the late evening sun begins to disappear from the sky, I pass by Wanda’s motel, still just as shitty and run-down as it was. Teddy’s dry cleaning building, now looking either half-alive or closed completely since he’s not around to make it look like an actual fake business now. The bank, the countless churches… and the grocery store. 

The grocery store. 

I grit my teeth as I realize that Jake, Y/N and I will need supplies and food if we’re going to be hiding out in the old cabin for a few days. I hope to god his ass thought to bring blankets and pillows, and hopefully some food. I wonder if they’ve beat me here. I have no way of knowing, besides going all the way there first to check, but then if I don’t stop, I risk spending a whole night without food or water. Or whiskey.

I quietly pull my bike into the back parking lot of the store, parking it alongside the building behind the ice cooler. My hands are already shaking, I have to admit, and as I pull the kickstand down, my eyes dash quickly to my sides to ensure no one has followed me. Just a few stray bodies here and there coming in to grab a TV dinner before retreating back to the trailer park to finish off a six-pack. The coast is seemingly clear. 

I pull a cigarette from my tin and stretch my legs, hyping myself up to go into this grocery store where nearly everyone knows my face. Or, knew my face. After a minute or two, my boot extinguishes the butt of my smoke and I take a deep breath, the finally-cooling Autumn air filling my lungs and bringing me back down to earth a bit. I grab the cowboy hat from my pack and place it diligently on my head, tucking my hair up underneath it to conceal another one of my identifying factors. I pull out my wallet to make sure I still have enough cash for some food, at least, and I step in through the glass doors. 

It looks and smells exactly the same, musty cardboard mixed with the faint scent of a floor cleaner, with the fluorescent lights overhead barely providing enough light to brighten the poorly stocked aisles. I don’t know why I expected it to be any different, we’ve only been gone a few months, though it feels like an eternity. 

I put my head down and make a mad dash down the first aisle, luckily remembering the place like the back of my hand. I grab a loaf of bread, a jar of peanut butter, and a box of saltines, tossing them into a shopping basket I’d found abandoned in the aisle. “What else, what else…” I whisper to myself, ignoring the eyes of each and every person I walk by. My heart is thrumming in my chest as I pace up and down the aisles, throwing a few more cheap yet necessary items into the basket. 

When I’ve finally gotten it full, I race to the checkout line, but not before stopping and grabbing a half-pint of Early Times, a box of matches, and a bag of cut tobacco. I place my basket onto the checkout counter, keeping my head down still as I realize the clerk is someone who knows me well. Knows me very well. 

“You 18, kid? Can’t sell you this if not…” he says, his voice still just as crackled and raspy as the day I met him. He stands the whiskey bottle up on its base as I swallow my nerves down, one by one. He cranes his neck to look at me from underneath the bill of my hat. 

“Kid, hey, you got any ID on ya?” he asks again, his wrinkled hands the only thing I can focus on. Fuck. He sees my ID, he recognizes me. Recognizes me as the murderer on the loose, in the very town he ran from. My heart is pounding, how had I not thought of this? He’s never ID’d me before, but then again, he knew me. He snaps his fingers when he realizes I’m not meeting his eyes or answering him. 

I peek up gently, thankful that I’d decided to leave my sunglasses on at the last minute. “Ah, ya know, left it at home, I think. Had a long day. I don’t need the bottle,” I say, trying like hell to conceal my voice, yet keep my local accent. I push it to the side as I pull my wallet out and prepare to pay for the rest. 

“Shit,” he says under his breath. He scans the whiskey and slides it into a paper bag, slipping it in beside the rest of my items before hitting the total button on his register. “Ain’t no thing. Can tell ya hands is dirty, can’t deny a workin’ man his vices,” he grits quietly. “That’ll be $19.70,” he says a little louder now, and I feel a relief lift from my shoulders, all the sound coming back into my ears now that my heart rate isn’t flying. 

I can finally hear the muffled music coming over the speakers in the ceiling, along with the beeps of the checkout lines beside me. I pull a twenty from my wallet and graciously place it in the man’s hand. It’s funny, all the years I’ve been coming to this place, and I never learned this man’s name. He doesn’t even wear a nametag.

“Appreciate that, old timer. Saved me a night of sittin’ with my troubles,” I reply, avoiding his eyes again as he hands me my change. 

“Don’t we all need that,” he grumbles as he hands me my bags. “Ya know, I don’t recognize you. You from ‘round here?”

Goddamnit, goddamnit. Think.

“Uh, yeah. From up on Bolter Street. Been gone awhile, moved back to take care of my folks,” I say, clearing my throat. I used to live on Bolter Street, many many moons ago. That part isn’t a lie.

“Hmph,” he grunts, pulling a toothpick between his lips as he squints at me. “Not a lot of folk live on Bolter much anymore. Street kinda died with the town.” I can tell his tone is interrogatory, and I feel the sweat beginning to pool on my forehead. Get it together, Daniel. 

“S’why they called on me.” I nod and give him a curt smile as I begin to back away. “Have a good evenin’, sir.”

I grab the bags and tip the brim of my hat, making my way back out of the store and into the fresh air. “Fuck,” I breathe as I reach my bike. That was fuckin’ close. If it was that hard to get groceries, how in the hell are we going to do literally anything else?

I cram the bags into my side packs, uncaring if I smash the bread or not. I’m anxious, and desperately in need of a damned drink. I wish like hell I could go to Canaries’ for a beer, but who knows what state that hellhole is even in, anymore. Or if the clientele is even the same. Shit, that place used to be a haven for people like us, until it wasn’t. Until Teddy and his crew turned it into a place where you had to look over your shoulder every other second, or else you risked a cue stick across your back if you said a sly word. 

I need to make my escape, and I need to make it fast. 

I kick the stand on my bike and pull the key from my pocket, sticking it into the ignition and turning it over a few times before she starts. I plan to take as many back streets as I can to avoid going straight through town again, but that’s not as easy as it looks. Passing by the diner is going to be necessary. 

A minute or so later, I’m cruising by Louie’s Diner, the parking lot only holding two or three vehicles as opposed to the normal ten or twenty. Strange, I think to myself, and I slow down and peer in the windows a little more closely. There behind the counter is Geraldine, looking worse for wear than I had seen her in a very long time. Maybe ever, actually. My heart falls as I realize she looks nothing like herself. Her hair isn’t fixed, and her nails aren’t painted their normal bright, red color. 

I quickly glance to the end of the bar where Bubba normally sits, finding the chair to be empty. Again, my stomach falls at the realization that he isn’t there, waiting with Geraldine to finish up her dinner shift like he normally is.

Shaking my head, I concentrate my attention back onto the road in front of me as the abandoned houses begin to turn back into the forest, and the two-lane turns back into one. I snap my headlight on as I rack my brain, trying to think of where Bubba could be, if he is okay, and why Geraldine looks so down. My stomach churns with nerves at the possibilities, but I hold out hope that maybe he had just gone home for the night, and Geraldine is just tired. 

I cruise down the winding road toward the creek, trying like hell to breathe in the fresh air to calm me. I pray I don’t pass any police cars, or anyone who would recognize my bike. But as the asphalt turns to more of a rocky concrete beneath my tires, I begin to feel a little relief. Man, I could really use a fuckin’ smoke. 

I cross over the bridge and turn onto the dirt road, the same one that Jake, Ace, Bubba and I had used so many times to get to our special spot on the creek. Darkness has fallen now, and I find myself feeling a little nostalgic at the scenery. For the first time in months, I see things that I could recognize even in complete darkness, I take curves that I could turn blindfolded, and I begin to smell the scent of the murky water and mossy trees that line the creek. No matter how much I hated it, no matter how badly I wanted to run away, this will always be home. Joslyn will always be a place that lives in my heart, no matter how dusted and horrible the time I spent here was. 

I make another right turn, watching for any other vehicles to be parked and out for one last late-night fishing pole cast before the weather starts to break. When I find our spots to be empty, I gain yet another feeling of relief. The gravel turns into thick bedrock, and I use caution as I navigate Ruby down, all the way to the bridge by the swimming hole. 

I park the bike at the foot of the hillside and stand, remembering that I have a spare flashlight in my pack, equipped with brand new batteries. I dig it out and turn it on, slowly panning around to take in my surroundings again. It still looks just the same as it always did, the large leaf-covered trees leaning over the water to provide almost a storybook-like scene. But this town is anything but a storybook. The frogs and crickets know that their time is almost up, and their songs have begun to slow and their tones have become deep. Again, my nostalgia almost knocks me over. 

I push my bike over to a cluster of trees, lodging it between a few trunks out of sight of the road. I bite the flashlight between my teeth and begin pulling my bags and necessities from my side packs. My guitar suddenly feels like a burden, when for months all it was was an object of comfort. Now, it feels like something that might weigh me down the further along I go on this journey. Either way, I throw the makeshift rope case strap over my shoulder and begin lugging my things across the old bridge, straight toward the cabin. 

As I trudge through the thick mud, thankful for my high boots, the beam of my flashlight catches something reflective down the creek a bit, and I nearly drop all the bags in my hands. “Shit,” I gasp, gripping my hands onto everything more tightly. I glance over, realizing that my light had bounced off a tail light. I walk a little closer and shine the light more directly, seeing that the tail light belongs to Jake’s truck.

“Son of a bitch,” I mumble with relief, suddenly realizing that I’m not alone in the least. My best friends are just on the other side of this treeline. Not just my best friends, but my family. 

I put a little pep in my step, letting the thick pine branches pull at my sleeves as I traipse along the muddy creek bed, straight up the incline and onto the trail to the cabin. I feel excited to see them, but also in the back of my mind I know that our meeting isn’t going to be a joyous one. It’s going to be one of deciding on our next move of survival. 

After a few minutes’ hike, I’m finally to the clearing at the cabin, and what I see in front of me isn’t what I expected in the least. Instead of the old, dilapidated building I had spent many a summer in, the cabin is now more of a house, with a new roof, a repaired front porch, and even a brand new front door. What in the hell?

I see a faint light on inside, and I stop for a second, hesitating on whether or not to proceed. Is someone living here now? No, no one knows about this place except for us. And maybe a few trusted others who have caught word of it over the years. 

If it weren’t for me seeing Jake’s truck, I may have considered turning around, but just as I approach the rickety stairs of the cabin, the front door flies open, and a silhouette that isn’t Jake is standing in the doorway. 

“Daniel, my boy! You made it!”

“Bub?!” I drop my bags and the flashlight in my mouth, rushing up the stairs to greet the old man. He wraps his arms around me as I take him around his shoulders, the both of us pounding our open palms against each other’s backs. “What are you doing here? We were going to surprise you!” I say as we finally break apart. 

“Surprise? You boys ain’t as slick as you think you are…” he chuckles a raspy laugh as he replaces his cap on his head. “Practically raised ya, and ya can’t even tell an old man you’re comin’ home?”

“Ah, Bub, we were going to, but–”

“Hey you just gonna leave me hangin’ over here?!” I hear Jake’s familiar gravelly timbre fill the air as he plummets into me, almost knocking me back as his arms embrace me. The embrace of a brother. “Heyyy, brother…” I laugh, not sure of the last time Jake and I actually hugged. It’s funny, we spent so much time together for so many years, I was positive that when I left him and went my own way, I wouldn’t think twice about it. And I didn’t really, until I’d find myself needing to ask him a question only he would know the answer to, or I’d hear an old Neil Young song in a bar. It was at those times that I realized he’s the other half of me, and he always will be. We do alright being apart, but the world feels more at ease when we’re together.

We pull apart, and I catch sight of Y/N leaned in the doorway, her arms crossed across her chest as she eyes us with a sweet, familiar smile. “Well looky here, the two outlaws, themselves,” she grins, and I immediately pull her into the same embrace that I’d pulled Bubba into. She feels a little different now, not sure why, or how, just different. Her hair is longer and she’s got a suntan from the Tennessee rays. My mind hardly ever reminisces on the time we shared together, and I’m thankful for the fact that we have been able to stay good friends after our whirlwind romance. She’s as much a part of me as Jake is, now. Just in a different way. 

I feel her fingernails scratching at my back as we hug, and her voice is muffled as she tries to speak with her mouth pressed against my chest. “You two really couldn’t even manage to stay out of trouble for six months, could you?” she playfully complains. “The hell am I gonna do with ya…”

“Not even funny, Y/N,” I say, pushing at her shoulder as Jake and Bubba make their way inside the cabin with my bags in hand. We follow them in, and Bubba pulls the door closed behind me. He pulls a deadbolt, and a slide-lock, and a chain lock across the brand new door, and kicks a wooden wedge up underneath it. 

“Damn, what is this, Alcatraz?” I ask, too surprised to take a look around the place. 

“Might as well be,” Bubba says, rushing over to the windows to pull the heavy blue curtains in front of them. 

“What the hell is going on?” I ask, finally taking notice of the state of the cabin. The interior has been completely re-done, though not all brand new, it looks better than it used to. The floor is no longer caved in, and the roof has been repaired. There’s a table and chairs, and a large couch in the living area, along with two recliners. There are dishes on the shelves, and a wood stove has been installed in the corner of the kitchen. “What happened to this place?”

“Come, sit, Daniel,” Bubba beckons me, and I make my way over to the chair he has pulled out for me. Jake and Y/N follow suit, and he takes his seat last. The air in the room is heavy, and I realize that the only light is coming from three oil-burning lanterns placed around the old tables and countertops of the house. The warm flickering glow accentuates Bubba’s wrinkles, reminding me yet again that he isn’t getting any younger and that the world has continued turning. 

“I was just tellin’ these two, Danny, I took the liberty of movin’ up here ‘bout, oh, five, six weeks ago. Been trying my best to fix the place up, make it feel like home. I know you two wouldn’t care, and I know your Pops wouldn’t have cared eith–”

“Wait wait wait,” I cut him off. “Moved? What do you mean you moved?”

“I mean, I moved. All my things are here, in the back bedroom,” he responds matter-of-factly.

“What about your trailer? Your place?” I ask, my hands flattening across the dusty wooden tabletop.

Bubba licks his wrinkled lips, bringing his hand up to rub across his shaven chin. “Sold it, son. Property and all. I just… wanted away from it. Wasn’t doin’ me no good.”

“But you said right before we left that you were happy, when we asked you to come with us, you said you were fine–”

“Hell, ‘course I did, Daniel. You wouldn’ta left and gone out on your own if I’d’a told you my plans.” He pauses, clasping his hands together. “Plus, Geraldine and I separated, knew this would be a better place for me, anyway. Give me somethin’ to keep my hands busy.”

All three sets of our eyes grow ten times in size. “Bub, what?” Jake nearly yells. “You separated? Why?”

Bubba waves us off, almost like it is no big deal. “Aw, shit, boys. You know damn good and well why. After y'all left, shit fell apart even worse than it was already fallin’. After Teddy died, and his posse didn’t have a head honcho no more, they started goin’ out on their own, causin’ more trouble than they had before. Stealin’, botherin’ folk… Teddy was a piece of shit but he kept those vagrants in line, I will say.” He rubs his hand over his chin again as he adjusts his legs under the table. “Anyway, I… I didn’t feel safe… havin’ these ties with you boys, and, and the shop burnin’ down and the history we already had with Teddy. I just didn’t want Geraldine caught up in it, ya know? Didn’t want her worryin’, or worse yet bein’ a new target for them boys. She don’t deserve that. Don’t deserve it at all. Thought it best I just leave her to herself.”

“Bubba, that’s ridiculous!” Jake says, and we nod in agreement. “I–I mean, I know where you’re comin’ from, but. You two are in love, made for each other.”

“Yeah,” Y/N adds, “wouldn’t you feel safer being with her? I mean, keeping a closer eye out for her is easier when you live in town, right?” 

Now I know why Geraldine looked so down. She had just gotten dumped. 

I pull the half-pint of whiskey I had shoved in my pocket, cracking the lid and tilting it back for a few refreshing seconds. I pass it off to Jake, and he happily rips it from my hand and does the same.

Bubba grits his jaw and shakes his head and hands at us. “It was for the best, just trust me. But that’s enough about me. We need to figure out what in the hell to do about this new problem of yours.”

“What happened in town?” I ask. “After we left? Did they come after you?”

“I said enough about me, Daniel. You hard of hearin’?”

“He asked you an honest question, Bubba,” Jake says calmly. “Did they touch you again?”

Y/N’s eyes are trained downward as she doesn’t dare bring them away from staring at the table. She knows good and well that if Bubba says yes, that the two of us are going to come unglued. 

“They didn’t touch me. Tried to, few times but.” Bubba shakes his head furiously from side to side. “They don’t know I’m out here. Geraldine still brings me supplies. I try my best and make myself scarce.”

“What do you mean they tried to?” Jake demands.

“Can’t ya leave it alone, Jacob?”

“Tell me, Bubba!” he raises his voice. “What did they do?” I can see the flame of the candle light flickering in Jake’s eyes, and unfortunately, I know that look all too well. It’s the same one that’s probably in my eyes, right now. 

It’s pindrop silent in the room as we anxiously await an answer from Bubba. He’s breathing hard from his flared nostrils, and wringing his wrinkled hands together. He pulls his red handkerchief from his back pocket and pats it along his brow, and I know that if he doesn’t say something soon, I’m gonna jump out of my skin. Hard to tell what Jake would do.

Finally, Bubba looks up from his hands, swallowing hard as his voice is barely audible. “If I tell you boys, you promise not to leave this cabin?”

Taglist: @wetkleenex-gvf @eyelinerjake @farfromthehomelands @sacredstarcatcher @britney-gvf @stardustjake @jakesmustache @starshine-wagner @mweasley19 @emsfallingsky @joopsenthusiast @ageofbajabule @ladywhimsymoon @vanfleeter @myleftsock @joshskittytickler @ageoflou @freefallthoughts @ohgodthefeeling-gvf @literal-dead-leaf @welllauragvf @writingcold @bizzielisteningtogreta @neptune2324 @itsafullmoon @violet-hayes @gvfmarge @demonrat444 @mybussyinchrist @cl0ver-j4de @earthgrlsreasy @what-i-read-home-of-reblogs-mama @mama-likes72 @laurngvf @racheljuneeee @farfromthehomelands @cat3rpillarbaby @cassiesgreta @jarmonicasweat @violet-hayes @ghostly--photography @josh-iamyour-mama @raviolilegs @gvfmarge @milkgemini @jaketlove @watchingover-hypegirl @ageoflou @cl0ver-j4de @takenbythemadness @lightmyloverry

@flightofseams @torniturntomyarrow @allmylovejtk @m0uthfl13s @klarxtr @styles-canvas @fleet-of-fiction @gretavanbear @builtbybrokenbells @jakekiszkapunchmeintheface @starrymoonslut @lightmy-love @edgingthedarkness @gvfmarge @dannys-dream @demonrat444 @jjwasneverhere @fleetingofthegretas @highway-tuna @gretas-sweat @darianh07 @age0fwagner @stardustjake @Catharu77 @milkgemini @watchingover-hypegirl @lightmy-love @erlha @twinszka @peaceloveunitygvf @gretavangroupie

[inklings-challenge]

2024 Team Tolkien Story Archive

Secondary World

All Things Great and Small by @supreme-leader-stoat (unfinished)

Ananse and the Haunted House Club: The Old Poe Place by @rosesnvines: Chapter One

Beyond the Starless Sky by @starknightgirl (unfinished)

The Executioner's Sword by @ladyminaofcamelot

Field Work by @phoebeamorryce

The First Magic Lesson by @o-lei-o-lai-o-lord

From the Other Side of the End of the World by @fictionadventurer

Homecoming by @shakespearean-fish (unfinished)

Honor Among Devils by @icwasher

Inklings Challenge 2024 by @secret--psalms--saturn

Inspired by True Events by @plainshobbit (unfinished)

The Invincible Spell by @bunnyscar (unfinished)

The Lake and the Moon by @rowenabean

The Princess, the King, and the Troubadour by @ladyminaofcamelot

Saint and Sinner by @brisingirl (unfinished)

Son of the Dragon King by @taleweaver-ramblings

Stolen Moments by @fictionadventurer

The Top of the World by @physicsgoblin

Unfinished Tolkien Entry by @shaylalaloohoo (unfinished)

Untitled by @catkin-morgs-kookaburralover

Untitled by @find-the-path (unfinished)

The Woodsman by @ripple-reader (unfinished)

Time Travel

Castaway by @incomingalbatross

Cherished Emery by @simplyghosting

Familiarity by @phoebeamorryce

From the Other Side of the End of the World by @fictionadventurer

In Saecula Saeculorum by @kanerallels

Last Rest by @thegreenleavesofspring

One Last Chance by @ladyminaofcamelot

Playing Catch-up by @lydiahosek

The Princess, the King, and the Troubadour by @ladyminaofcamelot

Stones of Memory by @healerqueen

Tell Me About This Time Loop, Again? by @larissa-the-scribe (unfinished)

Warning Signs by @fictionadventurer

[cleoenfaserum]

The Color of Pomegranates

The Color of Pomegranates is a 1969 Soviet Armenian art film written and directed by Sergei Parajanov. The film is a poetic treatment of the life of 18th-century Armenian poet and troubadour Sayat-Nova. It has appeared in many polls as one of the greatest films ever made and was hailed as revolutionary by Mikhail Vartanov. The film is now regarded as a landmark in film history. .The Color of Pomegranates - Wikipedia

THE FILM:

LINK: https://youtu.be/E86IaZXQO60

ANALYSIS OF THE FILM:

LINK https://youtu.be/s2Xw3LvNT20

Timestamps/Video Chapters: 00:00 - Introduction 04:52 - Structure 05:56 - Censorship 08:27 - Who is Sergei Parajanov? 10:49 - Davtar/Daftar 11:53 - Pomegranates and the Kingdom of Armenia 13:26 - Pomegranates and Parajanov’s Other Works 15:01 - Pomegranates and Fertility 18:28 - Pomegranates and Its Evolving Significance 21:12 - Bleeding Dagger 22:09 - Crushed Grapes and Manuscripts 25:04 - Fish between Two Bread 25:45 - Vase and Kamancha (or Kamancheh) 26:53 - Thorns and Religious Iconography 28:07 - Who was Sayat-Nova? 30:02 - Drenched Books 32:25 - Dyed Wool 34:22 - Nature and Sacrificial (Animals) 36:06 - Baths 36:43 - Surrealism, Parajanov and Freud 38:35 - Homoerotic Subtext 40:41 - ‘The Poet’s Youth’ 41:40 - Floating 42:28 - Tableau(x) Vivant/Tableau(x) Aesthetic 44:11 - Mechanical Movement 45:43 - Examples of Mechanical Movement 48:56 - Dialogue 49:27 - Frames, Mirrors and Windows 50:40 - Frames, Cherubs and Anna 52:26- Frames and Graveyards 55:15 - The World is a Window 57:16 - The World is a Cage 58:13 - Mirroring and Repetition 59:00 Sofiko Chiaureli 01:00:49 - Repetition (and Difference) 01:02:35 - Lace 01:03:38 - Pantomime 01:04:26 - Khakuli Icon Triptych/Khakuli Triptych Icon 01:06:40 - King Erekle’s Hunt 01:08:31 - Tomb/Fortress 01:09:27 - The Red-and-Black Sequence 01:10:45 - Llama 01:11:39 - Asceticism and Sensuality 01:13:27 - Soundtrack 01:14:08 - Death of The Holy Father Lazar/Lazarus/Ghazaros 01:15:45 - The Poet’s Dream 01:18:32 - The Nativity 01:19:21 - Nostalgic for Childhood 01:22:07 - Old Age 01:24:37 - Lavash and Graveyards 01:25:54 - The Acceptance of Death 01:26:24 - Skull 01:26:39 - Bleeding Wall 01:27:15 - The Angel of Resurrection

SOURCE OF INSPIRATION: leviathan-supersystem🎬 The Color of Pomegranates 1969, dir. Sergei Parajanovwww.tumblr.com

[hannibard]

"I'm choking from the taste (but I can't help but swallow)"

Chapter 2: The (not so) calm before the storm

Summary: Jaskier settles into his new life as things get progressively worse.

The first few months at the Redanian court weren’t too bad all things considered, (especially in comparison to what was to come, the bard thought wryly). One of the first things Jaskier had to do when he arrived at the palace was surrender his travel-worn clothes, together with his beloved leather jacket, and shave his patchy beard. The clothes were replaced by silk garments in various colors, made to fit Jaskier’s exact taste and measurements. He was also given a haircut, his hair now longer than when he first met Geralt but still relatively short. Apparently Radovid wasn’t a fan of his most recent hairdo. (Truthfully, neither was Jaskier, but he refused to voice that opinion.)

Radovid kept Jaskier on a tight leash, never letting him stray too far during their time together, but he was allowed to perform at banquets and the like. Those were his favorite moments while in Radovid’s presence. He could almost pretend he was a normal court bard when he was prancing around, dancing on tables and entertaining an audience. He had done this plenty of times in the past, but he always found courts stuffy, no matter how much he enjoyed the lavish balls, and usually tried to limit his stays to a season or two. It was the main reason he’d abandoned his noble birthright and became a traveling troubadour that ended up broke more often than not. Courts were only tolerable in small doses.

That’s also what the nobles knew him as. Radovid’s court bard. There were rumors going around, gossip being one of nobles’ favorite pastimes, and many suspected the true nature of his relationship with the king, but none of them knew the specifics. It’s not like they could just up and ask about it without evoking the king’s wrath.

Radovid’s physical changes were nothing in comparison to those in his personality or the way he appeared before others. The façade of the irresponsible naïve prince that only cared about the pleasures of life and knew nothing about politics was nowhere to be found. In his place stood a ruthless and commanding leader that ruled his people with an iron fist. ‘Radovid the Stern’ they called him.

Apparently, in the time between his enthronement and the present, Radovid had engaged in a long and intricate power battle with the spymaster Dijkstra and the court mage Philippa and had come out on top. Now both of them had been demoted to mere advisors, without any real say in the inner workings of the kingdom and forced to comply and assist the king with all his whims.

There was also another reason Jaskier cherished the time he spent performing, something that had nothing to do with the love for his profession. Being at the center of attention, unnerving as it could become occasionally, even for a seasoned bard like Jaskier, also doubled as a shield of protection. When everyone’s eyes were on him, Radovid kept his distance.

Many would argue that there was no better way of cementing a monarch’s reign than the birth of an heir, and since Radovid had yet to take in a queen, him having a male lover wouldn’t exactly be met with applause. Moreover, the king didn’t want any of his remaining family members to get any ideas in response to his sexual preferences. He had bigger problems to deal with petty attempts to usurp the throne by his ambitious relatives.

When he was left alone with the bard it was a different story. Jaskier didn’t have his own quarters in the palace, he was obligated to spend every night in the king’s company. No one could protect him in these moments. Radovid may not have been ready to announce their relationship to the world but that didn’t stop him from leaving a myriad of marks on Jaskier’s pale skin. It was the bard’s responsibility to cover them up as best he could, regardless of their placement. He didn’t know which he hated more, the knowing smirks or the pitying looks he was met with by the servants that helped him wash up and dress each morning.

Radovid didn’t always touch him. Sometimes he just wanted to engage in conversation and bask in the bard’s company. These instances were almost harder than the alternative because Jaskier was forced to pretend to be his usual charming and witty self, when all he wanted to do was scream at the other man to let him go.

Most of the time he was also under the supervision of the not-so-kind fellow that brought the bard to Radovid in the first place, whose name he later found out was Blade. (a bit on the nose if you asked Jaskier, but he named himself after a flower so who was he to judge?).

They had short auburn hair, hazel eyes and a lean physique that allowed them to move nimbly and blend in with their surroundings. It was a true feat because they usually kept their signature hood on, yet somehow their presence was hardly ever noticed.

Blade wasn’t always visible to the bard, preferring to stay in the shadows, but Jaskier knew he was constantly being watched by the ever-present tingling sensation at the back of his neck. And also because all his attempts to escape were immediately squashed.

The first time he tried was about a month in. He had played nice with Radovid in order to lower the king’s guard, while secretly mapping the castle’s interior in his mind. When he deemed his efforts sufficient, he made a run for it during a set break at a banquet. He managed to bypass a handful of knights and almost make it outside when Blade suddenly appeared, blocking his path. They rolled their eyes in disapproval and pulled out a knife, which they pointed at Jaskier and nodded for him to walk back towards the banquet hall.

Despite Jaskier’s fears, the king didn’t mention his little blunder that night. He acted completely normal, being sweet with the bard and talking about his day, to the point where Jaskier assumed Blade hadn’t mentioned it to him yet. But when he was pulled to the bed, it was with far less gentleness than usual. The king had placed him on his hands and knees, whereas he usually preferred positions that allowed them to make eye contact, and entered him after little preparation. He set a punishing pace, his hands leaving dark bruises on Jaskier’s hips, and completely ignored the bard’s pleasure. After he finished, he went to wash up, leaving the bard unfulfilled and dripping with Radovid’s seed on the mattress. They didn’t exchange any more words until the next day.

Some of his other notable efforts to break free included when he tried to sneak in a noble’s carriage unnoticed (it was stopped and searched at the gates), or when he pleaded with an old classmate from Oxenfurt, that had recently inherited his father’s title and had traveled to Tretogor with the intention of pledging allegiance to the crown, to deliver a message to Geralt. (Blade had interrupted them mid-conversation and told the noble that the king wanted to have a word. Jaskier never heard from him again.)

It was failure after failure, so Jaskier’s disheartened attempts became few and far in between. A part of him had even started to feel guilty for wasting Blade’s time. Following the bard around all day was probably tedious enough on its own. Privacy was a concept long forgotten but there was something almost comforting in the knowledge that Blade was never far behind, even if the bard couldn’t see them. Jaskier was so starved for genuine human connection that he was starting to become fond of his captor.

During daytime, while Radovid was busy dealing with his kingly affairs, Jaskier was left to wander around with no real purpose.

The library was, predictably, one of his favorite spots. It contained a vast variety of books that mostly focused on the politics of aristocracy and such topics, in contrast to those at the Oxenfurt Academy or the library in Kaer Morhen whose main subjects were poetry/sciences and encyclopedic knowledge on monsters respectively. Jaskier much preferred the latter two, but beggars can’t be choosers.

The kitchens were a precious place for the bard as well. The servants he usually encountered had at least some sort of idea of his importance to their king, while also being aware of Jaskier’s noble status, so their behavior towards him was strictly polite, maintaining a distance that none of Jaskier’s quips and jokes could manage to bridge.

The cooks and their helpers on the other hand, who were always steadfastly cooped up in their workspace, having no reason to venture outside of it as that’s where their responsibilities lied, knew nothing of Jaskier’s identity other than ‘renowned bard’. They had no clue what was happening outside their little bubble, and for that ignorance Jaskier was grateful.

The head chef, a kind older woman named Burneta, with distinct laugh lines visible around her eyes and messy braids wrapped in a bun, always welcomed him with excitement and treated him to bits and pieces of whatever she’d made that day, in return for a small exclusive performance that Jaskier gave with pleasure.

Her husband, Chleb, was more of the taciturn type, whose job was to help around with tasks that needed physical strength, like butchering entire cows and carrying in ingredients in bulk. He always glared at Jaskier and swiped at him with a towel when the bard made feign advances on his wife but the small grin as he did it gave his mirth away.

Sometimes Jaskier liked to take walks in the gardens. They were beautiful and well-groomed, containing hundreds of flower variations and a few rare species of birds that resided there. The sound of their chirping, the sun against his face and the light breeze that gently ruffled his hair made Jaskier feel alive.

Being outside gave him a sense of freedom, that though false, did wonders for his ever-declining mental health. Sadly, his access to the gardens had been recently restricted after yet another escape attempt. (He tried to jump over a fence only to find another, smaller garden on the other side. Blade was already there waiting for him unimpressed).

Nature had always been of big importance to Jaskier and being away from it made the fact that he was a prisoner all the more real. He couldn’t even look outside since most of the castle windows were decorated with stained glass illustrating Redania’s coat of arms, a crowned silver eagle on a red field, and other such designs.

Whoever created them was clearly skilled, every detail having been made with meticulousness. The colors were vibrant and yet the light that passed through them gave off an elegant glow without being blinding. Aside from their beauty they also served to inspire a sense of patriotism to the masses, while also showcasing the crown’s power and keeping the nobles in check.

When Jaskier was once dragged here by his father for official business as a child as the heir to the Lettenhove estate, he spent hours staring at them. It was the first time he was experiencing such awe. It inspired such powerful feelings to the young boy, the need to somehow captured them pushing him towards his first awkward attempts at poetry.

“I saw you back then.”

Radovid told him as they were lying in bed after a passion filled night. Jaskier had mentioned his long-time interest with the palace windows as a form of small talk, and he was surprised by the excited response he got. It almost felt like the king had been waiting for him to bring it up.

“I used to be a sickly child, and my brother was the heir, so I wasn’t allowed to venture outside my rooms much. My existence as a spare was rendered useless due to my poor health, with most considering the possibility of my survival to adulthood unlikely.” He twisted to his side in order to gather Jaskier in his arms. “Vizimir was nice to me though. He always made time in his busy schedule to come visit, even skipping his lessons on occasion.” He let out a wet laugh. “Though I suspect he was just using me as an excuse to avoid them.”

The king’s eyes were shining with unshed tears, his lips trembling. Vizimir’s death was obviously a raw subject still. This was one of Radovid’s rare shows of vulnerability that he only ever allowed in Jaskier’s presence. Those glimpses of his past self, the one the bard once fell in love with, made Jaskier’s heart swell despite everything.

Radovid shook his head to clear away the memories. “There was a council meeting that day and most of the servants were busy. Due to some sort of miscommunication, I was left unattended. When the hunger got too much, I stepped out by myself for the first time in search of food. The overall anxiety and the fear of being caught almost made me turn back on my heels.

But then, I saw a boy standing in the hallway. He had beautiful brown hair and the most stunning blue eyes. He didn’t notice me in his trance, seeming fascinated by the window décor. I had never met anyone my age and I didn’t know how to approach him, so I settled to just watching him. I think I was as fascinated by him as he was by the stained glass. He made me see it a new light. For me it was just part of the background, something I never thought to pay close attention to, but I wanted to understand the boy, see the world through his eyes. And so I looked again with this new perspective as if it was the first time. The beauty I’d overlooked for so long almost made me tear up.”

Radovid looked softly down at the bard and caressed his cheekbones with his knuckles. Jaskier’s mind was reeling from this revelation, not expecting it in the slightest.

“I later found out, after some pestering, that his name was Julian and that it was unlikely I’d ever see him again. That didn’t stop me from thinking about him though. When I heard the phrase ‘love at first sight’ a few years later, I knew exactly what it meant.”

The king chuckled and kissed Jaskier’s forehead. “I had never asked for much until that point but this wasn’t something I could stay quiet about. Vizimir promised me he’d keep an eye out for news about him and soon after I was informed that Julian had enrolled in Oxenfurt Academy. I begged and begged but my father wouldn’t allow me to attend. When I turned 18 I made up some excuse to visit the Lettenhove viscounty, but when I got there I was greeted by your cousin Ferrant. He told me you had relinquished your title to him and left, managing to slip right through my fingers…

After that instance I stayed out of trouble until my brother could safely ascend the throne, and then I started drinking, partying and the like. I developed an interest in music and poetry and frequently invited bards to perform for me and my circle. My favorite pieces were created by someone called ‘Jaskier’, but I never managed to contact him. Nevertheless, I continued revisiting his work because for some reason it was the only thing that made me feel anymore.”

Radovid pushed a shaken Jaskier to his back with a glint in his eye and gave the bard a long, open-mouthed kiss. “Then a miracle happened. Dijkstra and Philippa wanted my help, the war having left them with few options. I was going to refuse before they mentioned your stage name. They wanted me to use my royal status to convince you to bring them Princess Cirilla, but I didn’t much care for that. I was just excited to meet the person I’d been a fan of for so long.

When I caught your lute and we made eye contact, I instantly recognized you as the boy from my past. Our kiss that night at the Thanned island was one of my happiest moments. But then I fucked up. I tried to take the princess and you started to resent me. When we met again the next day, despite all I did, you gave me hope, and I wanted nothing more than to earn your trust. I returned to Redania and told my brother that I had found someone I wanted to be with and asked for his blessing to go to them. Vizimir agreed but I regrettably never got to depart for reasons you already know...”

Jaskier stared at him in shock. Radovid was going to abandon everything for his sake? That couldn’t be true, could it? No one would go to such lengths for him. Destiny had created an intricate plan ready to play out and Jaskier was but a mere storyteller, fated to follow the main characters around and record their heroic tales. He could help lighten the mood when things got tough and offer what little assistance he could as a weak mortal, but that’s where his role ended. His importance was insignificant in the grant scheme of things and to the people around him.

And yet Radovid held a different opinion. To him, the king of a powerful nation, Jaskier’s sole existence was valuable. He had never felt so wanted in his entire life. He didn’t even think it was possible.

The emotions he felt overwhelmed him. His heart was beating so fast it felt like it was about to burst through his chest. Jaskier grabbed Radovid’s head and pulled his face down, crashing their lips together. It was the first kiss he had initiated since their reunion.

The kiss deepened and Radovid’s hands moved lower down the bard’s body, his thrill at Jaskier’s response apparent. Jaskier’s senses were completely occupied by the man on top of him, he couldn’t see, hear, feel, smell or taste anything other than the king. That changed as soon as Radovid paused the kiss to start mouthing at his neck. With his eyesight back, Jaskier’s awareness started slowly creeping in. What was he doing? Why was he allowing this to happen? ...Was there even any point left in resisting?

Letting himself go would certainly be easier. He couldn’t get out of this situation either way so maybe acceptance was the best way forward. He could just pretend he was there willingly and ignore everything else… Jaskier was about to close his eyes and leave any rationality behind when Geralt’s disappointed face flashed through his mind. What would the witcher think if he could see him right now? If he saw how weak Jaskier was, how quickly he gave in? Besides, the bard didn’t choose this life and that’s not something he could forget no matter how much he wanted tried.

The king’s story may have sounded romantic at first but his actions spoke of something different, something darker, and Jaskier couldn’t allow this false narrative to override the truth.

Having made up his mind, Jaskier pushed Radovid off with as much strength as he could muster. The king was caught off guard and he stumbled backwards until he fell off the bed. It would have been a funny sight if it weren’t for the way Radovid immediately stood up, eyes blazing, and grabbed Jaskier’s hair to drag him close.

“What the hell was that?” All the sweetness from mere seconds ago had vanished.

Jaskier looked at him defiantly. “Something I should have done long ago. What you felt for me both in the past and present isn’t love. It’s obsession. You used the idea of me to help you get through hard times, I get it, and your feelings may have been genuine once but I fear that time is long gone. If you cared about me even a little bit you wouldn’t have fucking kidnapped me! All you care about is yourself and I’m done keeping quiet just to appease you!” he yelled, releasing all his pent-up frustration and misery. The adrenaline coursing through his veins was making him light-headed combined with the overwhelming surge of gratification.

Radovid’s jaw clenched but his expression was eerily calm as he moved his hand from the bard’s hair to wrap around his neck. He slowly started squeezing.

“If that’s what you think then there’s nothing I can do. You’ve had months to come to terms with the situation, and I’ve gone above and beyond to make you comfortable. I’ve been so fucking patient and this is how you repay me?!” Radovid’s harsh voice gradually got louder as he spoke. “I gave you a rare gift, but you didn’t want it.”

In the blink of an eye, he had maneuvered Jaskier on his back against the bed, choking him still. The grip was tight enough that the bard’s airways were completely closed, and he was left desperately gasping for air. He tried to claw Radovid’s arm away, which didn’t budge an inch.

“But there’s something you’re forgetting darling. Remember what I said to you at our little reunion when you refused to join me?”

Jaskier’s vision was beginning to blacken, but even then, the memory flashed clearly through his mind. He let out what was meant to be a whimper but came out as a choking sound.

Radovid understood the recognition in the bard’s eyes and he smirked cruelly in response. His free hand came up to stroke Jaskier’s torso, running through his chest hair and pinching a nipple when it came into contact with it. He leaned close to give a teasing little bite to Jaskier’s lower lip before hissing in his ear:

“If you won’t come with me willingly, I’ll just have to take you by force.”

That was the last thing Jaskier heard before everything went dark.

[throughtrialbyfire]

WIP Wednesday <3

tagged by the amazing @saltymaplesyrup @skyrim-forever and @your-talos-is-problematic !!

tagging the incredible @thana-topsy @totally-not-deacon @viss-and-pinegar @dirty-bosmer @orfeoarte @changelingsandothernonsense @mareenavee @thequeenofthewinter @archangelsunited @gilgamish @wispstalk and anyone who wants to participate, consider yourself tagged!!

this week i bring a section of the rewritten chapter 9 of Cycle of the Serpent. i'm planning to do some final edits to chapter 8 and 9 both and update those in the fic, finish 10, and then do some tiny editing for consistency in the rest of the published chapters in the next couple of weeks. for now, have this! <3

Thick, impenetrable night slid through the cracks of the inns walls, cool air and occasional passes of torchlight from outside bringing slivers of light into the otherwise dim hall. In the rented upstairs room, the flickers from the hall found their way in, bathing it in a bronze hue. Sleep, the elusive beast, sometimes captured and sometimes wild and far away, had wrestled itself from Athenath's grasp minutes ago. So now, he lay there, eyes fixed on the ceiling, the heavy wooden beams, the aged surfaces revealing previously unseen shapes as his mind tried making sense of the dark. There were promises to keep, come tomorrow. Whispers from under the balcony flew up through the wooden floors, the conversations of some patrons up well into the night. The constant hiss of syllables against teeth, the sharp, whistle sounds of them, made the Altmer want to grab the pillow and shove it over their ears and clutch it until his hands forced themselves loose from aching. But he couldn't do that, and he definitely didn't want to wake his friends, so they lay there, chest tight at the agitation. The shuffle of blankets rose up to end the quiet. Just Emeros, turning over in his sleep. They glanced to him and then returned to staring at the ceiling, brow knit, the sound of whispers softly fading. Finally. A sigh of relief had nearly left their mouth, but they stifled it, his focus again on the two Mer beside them. He didn't want to wake them. They'd both earned the rest. Athenath could hear Wyndrelis breathing, but aside from the rise and fall of his side when he did, he resembled more a corpse, entirely still and curled into himself. Emeros, meanwhile, had his forearm tucked under the pillow, his other arm around himself, blankets tight to his form.

The bronze light dimmed. A torch blown out. The night must be deep into itself, somewhere in the latest hours before morning would come and wake everyone up with its crowing. Athenath had blamed his sleeplessness on the whispering below the bed, but now, it was as though that had just been the catalyst, and now he was truly awake and alone, and unable to creep out of the bed if he even wanted to. At this rate, they'd look like a draugr in the morning, shambling up to Dragonsreach and barely forming the words to tell the Jarl of what happened to Helgen, what happened to them.

He shut his eyes tight. Gods, they didn't want to think about that day. But it still found a way to invade their thoughts, even when they were making all the effort in the world to go back to sleep. Their mind ignored every attempt to shove the fires aside, Athenath's arms wrapping tight around their middle as he stubbornly tried to push his mind to something else. What about the nights in Anvil, walking the salt-scented paths through town? And the dares to go up and knock on the old haunted mansion? What about the laughter of their old friends, and the house they grew up in? What about the shopkeep with the strange necklace, and the strangers in town in their black coats, and… Athenath's eyes shot open. The dark was still the dark. The same thing he'd closed off. But now, it seemed to wrap around them, tighter than they could bear. They fixed their gaze on the ceiling and thought of poems he'd memorized on the road with troubadours from High Rock, or the songs that they'd thought about writing down and quickly forgot, or the bards who sent them on this damn journey in the first place, but none of it replaced the sinking feeling in his stomach, like he was desperately clinging to a broken raft far out to sea. "What are you doing up?" Emeros whispered. He didn't need to open his eyes. He knew from jokes shared at the campfire that Athenath never slept on their back, and here they were, and he could feel the way the blankets laid over them and how different it was from when they were truly well asleep. Athenath shot their gaze to him, brow knit.

"Just can't fall back asleep," they whispered back. Emeros cracked an eye open, face half-buried in his pillow, hair tousled along his neck. He pushed a hand through the front strands, a couple small noises leaving his throat as though he were returning to the waking world by force. "Tomorrow, I fear, is going to be dreadfully long. Don't keep yourself awake, or you'll regret it." "It's not-" Athenath inhaled, held it, and exhaled, "I'm not. I know." "Then what's the problem?" "I woke up, couldn't fall back asleep, and now I'm just… Up. When I wish I wasn't." A long pause. Emeros sucked his inner cheek between his teeth on one side, then repeated to the other. "Did you have a nightmare?" "No," Athenath blinked curiously at the Bosmer, "did you?"

The alchemist rolled slowly over onto his back, palm draping over his eyes, other hand still firmly beneath the pillow. He inhaled, moved his hand down his face, before his arm came to rest over his middle. "I suppose one could say that fire has never been my favorite thing." The bard didn't reply, laying there, watching him as well as they could. He sucked in his cheek, then exhaled, peering at Athenath out the corner of his eye and the smallest turn of his head. "It'll be morning before you know it. Try not to keep yourself awake." The smallest fringe of concern at the edge of his words caught the Altmer off-guard, who only continued to watch him quietly. Emeros' gaze shifted. "You too, Wyndrelis. I know you're listening in." Wyndrelis snorted. "How did you guess?" At this, Emeros merely grinned, rolled over, and said, "I saw you move."

[whencyclopedia]

Medieval Song from Aristotle to Opera

This book is an interdisciplinary exploration of music and sound with a focus on medieval songs. In the introduction, the author explains how the new interdisciplinary field of sound studies along with her view of song as anachronic (something from a later time period that is transferred back to an earlier one) has led to the interesting title of the book. Its intended audience is scholars in the areas of musicology, sound studies, medieval music, and philosophy.

Sarah Kay is a prolific writer on medieval European literature and the arts. The concept of song as logos and phone (text plus music) is most apparent in medieval song, where not only the performance of the song but its presentation in the manuscript along with the specific musical notation and performance venues all intertwine to go beyond song into how imaginary animals and real animals presented in the songs might have sounded. Given that modern-day scholars can only guess at what and how medieval song may have actually sounded like in performance and how that performance would have been internalized or analyzed by those who heard it, the author explores many interesting threads in the book such as singing as the paradoxical conjunction of touch and thought, song’s association with animal breath and soul, and the specific example of the siren and siren song as presented in medieval song manuscripts. The anachronic exploration of reading medieval song operatically becomes a focus throughout the book as well. The section in the introduction called “Reading Medieval Song Operatically” is an example of this anachronic analysis.

Chapter One looks at the concept of touch and thought in Guillaume de Machaut’s "Remede de Fortune" and its description through music, text, and manuscript illustration, including how the concept of touch is exemplified in Boethius’s On the Consolation of Philosophy to the touch of the Muse in late antique society up to Hope’s touch and the touch of love in the songs of the troubadours and trouveres. Chapter Two examines the concept of the voice as light in such songs and texts as the alba “Reis glorios” by Giraut de Bornelh and the Marian hymn “Domna dels angels regina” of Peire de Corbian.

Chapter Three focuses on the breath of beasts and the ecologies of inspiration in troubadour lyrics and songs such as Nicole de Margival’s "Dit de la Panthere" and Machaut’s "Dit dou Lyon," where the panther and the lion and the concept of the pneuma in medieval philosophy are discussed. The author brings her expertise in ancient and medieval philosophy, depictions of these concepts in medieval illuminated manuscripts, and concepts of air and breath along with colored plates and charts to illustrate her train of thought on these interesting threads, tangents, and trails which bring all these concepts and examples together. Chapter Five discusses a specific imaginary creature, the siren, and its death-luring song, using Machaut’s "Jugement dou roy de Navarre" as an introduction, moving to sirens in medieval singing and operatic representations, up to their depictions in medieval illuminated manuscripts such as the Queen Mary Psalter, Troubadour Book M, and various other medieval songs. In Chapter Six, on imagining hearing song, there is more examination of various troubadour and trouvere medieval songs related to sound and its performance, reception, sensing, and imagining. A short essay on the loss, retrieval, and future of medieval song in scholarship today closes the book.

Kay is Emerita Professor of French Literature, Thought, and Culture at New York University. Some of her previous books include Animal Skins and the Reading Self in Medieval Latin and French Bestiaries (2017) and Parrots and Nightingales: Troubadour Quotations and the Development of European Poetry (2013). One of the most exciting additions to Medieval Song from Aristotle to Opera is its companion website, which contains audio and some video recordings of the songs in the book with complete texts and translations, performance scores, and chapter-by-chapter performance reflections. It is a must for readers to go through this companion website in order to hear and see how the author’s concepts and impressions of these medieval songs are imagined and performed. This book is definitely aimed at experienced scholars; readers unfamiliar with this topic would benefit from learning some fundamental knowledge about this field before preceding.

Continue reading...

[shiningdesignersreflections]

Troubadour’s Chapter: Journey 3

Unlocked after obtaining the sixth item, the harp.

Narrator: Realizing Loen’s real intention, Wind Elves can no longer sense the whereabouts of Nikki and her friends.

Narrator: Anger turns into hostility. Wind blades are woven into an impenetrable net to attack Loen.

Narrator: But the invincible wind blades can’t even touch Loen’s garment. Loen easily dodges all attacks.

Narrator: The air is full of restlessness, as if Wind Elves are panting anxiously.

Loen: You can’t attack me by doing that. If you don’t understand, look around.

Narrator: They come to the sea of dandelions. The fierce battle awakens the sleeping little white umbrellas.

Narrator: Dandelions’ soft leaves tremble and white fluffy balls fly in the sky.

Narrator: Among the fluffy balls, the traces of the wind are like flowing brushstrokes on the canvas and their traces can be clearly seen.

Loen: The wind is shapeless, but it is visible.

Narrator: Air currents form transparent and swift figures of Water Elves, which gradually emerge in the air.

Flying Petals: Outsiders, get out! Don’t trample on this forest!

Loen: It is the God of Water who wants to destroy this forest, but you aim your weapons at us, the insignificant outsiders.

Loen: Is it because Wind Elves have no guts to fight the God of Water, Arionus?

Narrator: Wind Elves are enraged and the air currents are about to cause a terrifying storm.

Flying Petals. You’ll pay the price for your words and deeds!

Narrator: Loen doesn’t intend to fight. Realizing the goal of delaying the time is achieved, he deliberately angers the Wind Elves to create a chance to escape.

Loen: I’m kidding. Don’t get mad. Bye.

Narrator: While Wind Elves are accumulating power, Loen crosses the sea of flowers and disappears in a blink of an eye.

[ginsengkitten]

༺Beautiful Dangerous༻

A slashxreader fanfiction

༺☆༻

Chapter Three

Guns and Horses

☆Tracklist ☆

You shook me - Led Zepplin

The excitement and anxiety ate away at you the entire drive. The closer the city lights grew again, the more your heart raced. The more your memory flooded with the scene of that guy from the record store. You'd thought of him every day since you saw him a week ago. Something about him just couldn't escape you. It was impossible to think of the city and not him as well.

Maybe if there was extra time, you could visit the record store again and maybe he would be there?

You hadn't packed for a rock show and in turn opted for throwing daisy's leather jacket over your outfit and hoping it made you look like less of a square. You tried to roll your skirt up higher, hoping you looked more rocker and less schoolgirl.

-

Music and voices blared out of the venue. A line formed out the door. The collection of scents that made up the Hollywood air once again filled your nose.

"Troubadour" you read the venue name allowed off its lit up neon sign. Was this dangerous? Is this a dangerous part of town? Fuck. stop it, stop with this dangerous talk. Enough of this. You shook the timid thoughts from your mind. "This way Y/N" Daisy grabbed your hand. "We have another way in" she smiled. Rounding the building to a seedy alleyway in the back, stood a stage door. You pass couples very intimately embracing one another, and a few other shadier characters aligning the dark alleyway. The smell of cigarettes grew stronger back here. Daisy bounced on her feet anxiously and looked around. "Okay Y/N, you wait right here. I'm going to go find Joel. I'll be right back." You start to panic "What? Daisy-" one of the couples embracing in the shadows give you an annoyed look of "pipe down loser". You immediately silence yourself. Don't be a square. "Right back, I promise." Daisy affirmed as she jogged out of sight. You stood alone, in this dark alleyway. You tried to keep your cool and mind your business. Stay as small as possible and maybe you'll be alright, you thought to yourself. You shoved your hands into your leather jacket pockets and leaned against the brick wall , trying to blend in. You gazed up at the Smokey night sky that peeked above the open alley. Not a true night sky and the light pollution from of the city gave it a smoggy under glow. It almost seemed prettier that way..

Suddenly the stage door burst open and out poured a group of shaggy haired, leather toted men. Laughing and bouncing off one another maniacally and boyishly. A previous conversation coming to a close with a joking "Fuck off man!" Laughed out loud. "Catch you bastards later. Save some Night Train for me!" A voice called out to the rest of the men walking away. He stayed behind and sat his back up against the brick wall across from you. You froze as you saw his face appear from behind a huge mop of frizzy curls.

He didn't seem to notice you staring. He hurriedly pulled out a pack of cigarettes and gave it a casual shake before beginning to flip one out and light it. He quickly planted it between his lips. He moved in a rushed manner, like he only had little time to smoke this cigarette.

This was the guy from the record store. It 100% was him. You remember his curls. His stature, his face. His hands.

He finally glanced upward and pauses. His rushed demeanor slows to a halt. His eyes narrow and the cigarette in his mouth dances as his lips turn upward in his signature smirk. His pouted lips curve around the cigarette. You dart your eyes to the ground and try your best to recover from obviously staring at him. You feel his eyes on you once more. Be cool. After attempting to act as if you weren't aware of him. You acknowledge his presence again. You can't help to stare at the smoking cigarette pursed between his lips.

He noticed you but did he remember who you were?

"Need a smoke?" He says. An overwhelming desire to say yes overcomes you. So you do. You nod yes and he walks over to you, a smirk still across his lips and his eyes scanning you up and down. You try to avert his gaze. You keep your arms folded across your chest cooly as you can. watching him tower over you as he comes close. A familiar scene.

“Here to see the show?" He asks casually. "Yeah." You show off your insider knowledge courtesy of Daisy. "Some rock band called Guns and Horses." You reply cooly. He laughs. "Roses." He says back. Your expression begins to switch as you realize you messed it up. "Guns n' Roses, is the name." He smiles. You try to recover and remain calm. "You know them then?" You ask, watching him watch you. He steps closer to you and you back up against the wall once more. He takes the cigarette from his mouth and holds it. "Something like that." He says lowly. He slowly brings the cigarette to your lips. You see the rings decorating his fingers. The snake ring. You hold your eye contact with him and cautiously wrap your lips around the cigarette. His cigarette. Your body flushing with the same electricity again as he stares into you. You slowly admit an inhale of his cigarette, being mindful of your previous encounter with a cigarette. You try to seem as though you do this regularly, but you can tell he sees through it. And yet his interest in you doesn't seem to falter. He must remember you, he must. He backs away just as the tension was seemingly so thick, leaving you as the new owner of the cigarette. He walks backwards slightly and smiles again.

"Well. I hope you enjoy the show." He says now very casually again. You take the cigarette from your mouth and hold it in your fingers unnaturally. "Yeah. You too." You glance at your feet. A tinge of dissatisfaction running through you. He opens the stage door and pauses to look at you again.

"Later, Foxey." He says.

[swannposting]

new chapter!!! <3 preview under the cut. . .

As the sun inches toward the sea, a group of Teague’s men enter the room in preparation for the ceremony. Looming at the edges of the room, Jack watches them wrap the corpse in linens. 

Jack has yet to decide whether or not he will divulge the king’s unsavory secret to her subjects. If he chooses the path of exposure, the burial might just be the most advantageous place to do so. Will Captain Swann’s calm demeanor from the night prior remain steadfast when the eyes of Teague’s brethren are fixed upon her? 

Reluctantly, Jack knows that he will struggle to keep his own demeanor when the time comes. He trails behind the funeral procession, hands stuffed into his pockets, eyes askance and brow furrowed. The men who carry the body to the beach cast nervous glances at him. When they lock eyes, he gives them the  occasional nod. It isn’t the body he’s worried about now, it's how it got here. 

They reach the shore, where the body is placed into a longboat that is half-lodged in the sand, ready to be pushed out to sea to meet the Troubadour , waiting just offshore to watch the flames consume Edward Teague. 

A sizable crowd has gathered, with lanterns and flowers and fruits. Elizabeth’s face is illuminated by a candle. She holds the flame in both hands as night begins to shroud the ceremony. And she gives Jack a smile as he falls in line beside her, though Jack has done nothing to indicate what he shall be doing about her and her secret assassination. 

Perhaps she has made up her own truths, or perhaps she is trying to ensure that she receives his mercy, for she places a hand on his shoulder in a show of comfort that he does not care for. 

The quartermaster is the first to say a few words about Captain Teague and his legacy, during which several old sea dogs stagger forward to chime in, garnering sad laughter and cheers from the crowd. Jack ignores most of it, save for the stories that he remembers. 

The few remaining crewmen from those days are looking at him, gauging his reaction. Elizabeth touches him again, and he lets her gently runs a hand over his back. If he appears to be in mourning, perhaps the others will stow away their judgements. 

After the quartermaster has said his piece, he cedes the floor to Elizabeth, to speak on behalf of the Brethren. She gives Jack’s shoulder a squeeze, then steps forward to address the crowd. Too well versed is she in diplomacy, he thinks as she begins her speech, too eloquent for a crowd of rotten scoundrels such as this. Perhaps that is why they seem to fawn over her, lowering their hats in respect and suppressing their drunken outbursts. 

Jack can ruin this for her, if he wants to. 

The inhabitants of Shipwreck may not pay him the respect they pay their darling English royalty, but he can change that in an instant. All it would take is a handful of words. He would merely have to summon his voice, step out of the line of mourners, point a finger, and he could take that from her. 

continue on ao3. . .

[the-paintrist]

Eugenie Servieres - Blanche of Castile freeing prisoners - 1818

oil on canvas, height: 141 cm (55.5 in) Edit this at Wikidata; width: 109 cm (42.9 in)

Musée des Beaux-Arts de Libourne, France

Blanche of Castile (Spanish: Blanca de Castilla; 4 March 1188 – 27 November 1252) was Queen of France by marriage to Louis VIII. She acted as regent twice during the reign of her son, Louis IX: during his minority from 1226 until 1234, and during his absence from 1248 until 1252.

A crowd of serfs of the officers of the chapter of Chastenay had been plunged into the prisons of this chapter for not having paid the size attached to their condition. The Regent, touched with compassion, at the complaints she received, asked the officers of the chapter to release them from prison on her bail; but she was refused and soon learned that a number of these unfortunate people were going to perish, either from hunger or from all the inconveniences they suffered in a place barely capable of containing them. Blanche, indignant, goes to the prisons of the chapter, where she orders the doors to be broken down, and with her scepter gives the first blow. This blow was so well seconded that in an instant the door fell to the ground. We then saw a multitude of men, women and children, with dying, pale and disfigured faces, who, throwing themselves at her feet, begged her to take them under her protection (His. of the Queens and Regents of France , volume I)

Eugénie Honorée Marguerite Servières, née Charen (1786 – 20 March 1855) was a French painter in the Troubadour style. She specialized in genre period paintings.

[lalogawrites]

“Why do you care, anyway?” he asked.

“I’m a troubadour, sir,” Kali replied, adding a small, mischievous smile. “I seek inspiration wherever I go. And I’ve learned that every story is worth listening to.”

“Hmm.” Hondo lifted his mug and examined it as he replied. “You may think that all we care about is money — which is true. Mostly.” He glanced at her. “But there is one thing that I—that all those in my line of work, I think—value above all else. Can you guess what that is, my lady?”

Something flared within her, some warning bell sounded in the back of her mind, but she held his gaze. “What?”

“Freedom.” He downed the contents of the mug before setting it to the table with a clatter.

[gretavanmoon]

Valor - Troubadour II

Word Count: 9.2k

Warnings: Cursin', Smokin', Drinkin'. Angst: Mention of Struggle and Poverty, Mentions of Violence, Mentions of Weapons, Mentions of Murder and Death, General Sadness and Hopelessness, Allusions to Shady Activities, Mention of Police & Detectives, Concealing a Fugitive. Mention of sex. Mention of Fire, Loss, and Burned Buildings. Mention of Drugs.

Hey everyone! Thanks for being here! Was really missing the Valor world (what's new) and decided to satiate my needs with a little Danny spin-off. This story picks up just a few months after Chapter 14 ends and before the Epilogue, when Danny has decided to busk around the Midwest in search of fulfilling his musical heart and hitting the open road on his motorcycle. This Danny side-quest story will only be a few parts, but hope you enjoy the ride!

Big thanks to my bestie & cowriter @gretavangroupie for da edits <333

“If I tell you boys, you promise not to leave this cabin?” 

Bubba’s eyes are pleading and sincere, and full of a gritted remorse that I’ve only seen in him a handful of times.

“I don’t make promises I don’t intend on keepin’, Bub,” Jake growls, his top lip snarled into some emotion other than disgust. 

“And that’s just the reason, Jacob. God damnit! Now, I told you I’d tell you the truth, but if it means you boys goin’ back out there and gettin’ into more trouble than you’re already in, I ain’t sayin’ another damned word!” Bubba slaps his handkerchief down onto the table, making Y/N jump a little bit. She’s probably never seen him worked up like this. His voice is shaken and loud, and Jake and I know it’s just because he’s worried for us. Worried for all of us. 

“Bubba, listen…” I intervene, feeling the tension in the room growing to new heights. 

“No, Daniel, you listen,” Bubba stands from his chair, placing his hands firmly down onto the table. “Ace kept more secrets from you two than I care to even talk about. I know that much is true. But guess what, he kept the majority of them from me, too! Me! His best friend…” Bubba pounds his fist to his own chest as his chin begins to shake with his words, his eyes welling up in the flicker of the candlelight. “The night he died and I saw the hurt in both of you boys’ eyes I promised myself I’d always tell you the truth, even when it hurts. And right now, it really fuckin’ hurts…”

The entire room is silent besides the sound of Bubba’s voice, and for the occasional sound of the wind whipping across the tin of the new roof. I watch as Y/N’s hand reaches out to grip Bubba’s, squeezing and holding it tightly as she knows she has no dog in this fight, except to try her best and be a mediator. 

Jake sighs, his head falling into his hands as his leg begins to bounce under the table. Sometimes Jake and I both do a really shitty job at remembering that Ace left us with more than just a ghost of his memory. He left us without a father, but he left Bubba without a brother. 

It was never lost on me that Ace was to Bubba, what Jake is to me. I wouldn’t know what to do without him, either.

“I know it hurts, Bubba. I know you miss him, we all miss him,” Jake says softly.

“He’d know exactly what the hell to do, right now. He might not’a made the best decision, but he would have had a plan for you boys before you even got here. Woulda been expectin’ ya. Woulda protected you from all this,” Bubba sniffles through a few breaths as he stares at the wall, picking up his handkerchief again with his free hand as Y/N still holds the other. It wasn’t often that Bubba spoke of his best friend like this, but when it came to situations where Ace’s sons were in danger, or faced with some great unknown, Bubba always felt the need to have to protect us. Step into the role that Ace never got to carry out. Must have made some big promise to him the day we put him to rest. I hate it, but it's the role he’s fallen into. But honestly, he has done one hell of a job.

“Bubba, we did this to ourselves,” I say. “You should feel no responsibility for this.” 

“No responsibility?!” he squeals. “I’m the one that set the goddamned fire, Daniel!” Bubba’s eyes are blown out and dark black, and the bright crimson of his face makes his emotions more evident than I’d like to admit. Whatever the fuck Teddy’s guys did to him after we left, we aren’t going to like one bit. 

“We put you up to it. It was all our idea, right Danny?” Jake leans forward and slaps the back of his hand across my chest, giving me a stern look. 

“Right,” I nod. “None of it involved you. If we’re going to go down for this, your name ain’t gonna be no where near it, Bub.”

Bubba harshly shakes his head from side to side. “No. That was not part of our agreement.”

“We didn’t have an agreement, Bubba!” Jake raises his voice. “We didn’t sign some contract with fine print and dotted lines! We had to make a decision, and we had to make it fast. And I think it worked out just fine…”

“Yeah, just fine. Now there’s investigators out there searchin’ for you two. God knows when the FBI will get involved!” Bubba replies, his voice still shaken. “And all we got out of it was Teddy endin’ up in the grave. Fuck, maybe this was all a mistake…”

At the time of the fire, we had entrusted the fact that there would be no evidence to tie everything back to us, especially to Bubba. We’d relied on the idea that if Ace’s burned down, no one would care. No one would even notice. Hell, hardly anybody in this town gave a fuck about me and Jake anyway, unless they needed their oil changed or a new set of tires. 

Teddy’s body being found in the building with his own gas cans would have absolutely nothing to do with us. We’d planned on abandoning the place for weeks…

…At least that was gonna be our story.

“Nothing leaves this table, you hear me?” Bubba finally says with conviction as he takes his seat again, turning his solemn features into serious ones as he speaks. He takes a second to look each of us in the face, one by one, as we all nod in agreement of going along with the old man’s wishes. 

He gives Y/N’s hand one final squeeze as he releases it, folding his own hands together in front of him as he takes a shaky breath. 

“They robbed me. Robbed me blind. Came back from the diner one night to find all my belongin’s out in the yard, all my cabinets empty. Everythin’ was destroyed… The tornado had done a number of it’s own, but by god, they had done worse. Beer cans smashed all over the place, windows broken… I went insane, lookin’ for ‘em that night. Drove all around town searchin’ em down. Even stopped a few places I thought they might be holed up… nothin’. Jesus, I was blind with rage. Even more rage than I had when I learned what Teddy had truly done to Ace that night. Why, I don’t know. Think it was because I finally realized that this was what it had all come down to. This. My home. Why? Why…”

Jake and I exchange another quick glance of understanding, knowing that we owe Bubba this time to get his emotions out. Poor guy is probably terrified that we could go to prison for something that, technically, had happened at his hands. God, everything is so fucked up. 

“Even if they got no clue that I stayed behind that day to make sure Teddy was inside when the place went up, they know that gettin’ to you two through me was just as satisfying. They don’t care. Never have, never will. After you boys left, the town went to even more hell that it had been when Teddy was alive. Them guys had no more direction. No more boss tellin’ em what to do. They stayed drunk and high for weeks, terrorizin’ the town. People really missed you two.”

“They missed us?” I ask. 

“Yeah, when we left, they had nobody else to pick on except the general public,” Jake replies sarcastically, rolling his eyes.

“No, no. That’s not what I mean,” Bubba says. “You might not have realized it, but you boys meant a lot to this community. Think folks felt safe with you in town, felt like they could call on you had they needed anything. Then, when Teddy’s boys scattered out, they did need you. And you weren’t here.”

Jake and I exchange looks again. That doesn’t make any sense… Felt safe with us? People hardly even talked to us, let alone made us feel important. Maybe only when they would stop in the shop or want in on a poker game.

“But that’s neither here nor there,” Bubba continues. “Anyway, I moved out here cause I had nowhere else to go. Couldn’t go back home, was no home to go to. I did end up sellin’ the place, though. For next to nothin’. Broke things off with Geraldine. They’d started comin’ into the diner and harrassin’ her a bit. Nothin’ serious, just enough to worry me and the cooks. Thought if I got myself away from her, they’d leave her alone. Think I was right.”

“So far,” Jake says accusingly. “If there’s one thing I know about them, it’s that they don’t stop, Bub. They ain’t got lives outside of makin’ everybody else’s a living hell.” 

“You don’t gotta tell me, boy. I’ve been watchin’ them do this since you was takin’ your first steps across the shop. You and your brother, both…” Bubba goes silent again, his eyes drifting to a far off memory as he recenters himself. “Where are your brothers, anyhow? They safe?”

“I’d like to think so,” Jake replies, clearing his throat as he scoots his chair forward. “Actually haven’t spoken to either of them in a few days. That’s… That’s why we came here, to the cabin. Knew we could hide out here and make a plan in secret while still keeping an eye on things from afar. The law is gonna be lookin’ for us at every turn, and it’s only gonna get worse.”

Bubba nods, biting his lip in as if in deep thought. 

“We just didn’t expect to find you here, Bub,” I add, shoving him in the shoulder. I manage a little smile from him, the first one I’ve seen since stepping in this place. 

“Threw a wrench in your plans, didn’t I?” Bubba adds, his features softening a bit. 

“Nah, Bubba,” Y/N leans in. “You made everything better.”

—---

As much as Jake and I were chomping at the bit to sneak out after Bubba had fallen asleep to go and spy on Teddy’s guys, we reluctantly stay put in the cabin, letting sleeping dogs lie for tonight. We both have found ourselves kicked back in the twin recliners after Bubba and Y/N had retreated off to bed, but just like always, our minds are racing. 

“What are we now, fuckin’ fugitives?” I ask him through a quiet whisper. My skin is crawling with restlessness, and not just a want, but a need to get out of here and make the trek back into town. I feel paranoid, like we’re being watched with no protection, no clue as to what their knowledge is, and worst of all, no plan to protect ourselves at all. 

“Guess fuckin’ so,” Jake replies, passing the whiskey bottle back to me. I take a small nip, getting the feeling that I may need to stay level-headed tonight. His gaze is trained on the old unlit woodstove across the room, and I can tell his wheels are turning a mile a minute. I haven’t seen him in a couple months, but he looks different. He looks more mature than he ever has. He looks like Ace. 

“We need to call Sam. And we need to get ahold of Lucienda.” I push the recliner down with my legs and sit back up, shaking my hair out as I run my hands over my face. “I can’t just sit here, Jake. I’m about to crawl out of my fuckin’ skin.”

Jake’s eyes break from the stove and move to Bubba’s bedroom door before landing back on me. “We need to respect his wishes, Daniel. Do you know how pissed off he’d be if he found out we’d left to do his dealings?”

“They ain’t his dealings, Jake! They’re ours! What the fuck, have you gotten soft or some shit? Teddy’s guys could be out scoutin’ around this place as we speak. Plannin’ something, watchin’ Geraldine…” I’m kinda dumbfounded by Jake’s sudden… fear? of going out and taking care of things on our own. No, fear isn’t the word. He is probably scared of leaving Bubba here with Y/N, alone. 

Yeah, he’s matured. 

Finally he leans in to me, his neck craned and his eyes dark as he grits his jaw. “You know just as well as anybody that it’s fuckin’ killin’ me not being out there and seeing what the fuck we’re up against, Daniel. I can’t leave her here… we can’t just disappear.”

I can tell by the look on his face that he really wants to go, he knows we need to bust out of here, but he’s also not wrong. 

Suddenly Jake stands up and begins feeling on the undersides of the tables and the cabinets, opening drawers and makeshift closets and on top of shelves. I watch as he quietly ransacks the place, and it only takes me a few seconds to realize what he’s doing. I can’t help but grin to myself as I twist the lid off the whiskey again, letting the warmth of it coat my bones with another drink. 

“Ah, there she is,” he says as he pulls a faux drawer open to reveal a mounted shotgun. “Knew he had to have one in here somewhere.” 

“Probably has a few,” I reply, twisting the lid back on. I stand slowly as he inspects it and checks to see if it’s loaded. When we find it to be locked and loaded, we have a brief moment of understanding. Just as if we haven’t left each other at all, we have a wordless conversation with our eyes. 

“I’ll take it to him,” I say, gripping the barrel. 

“Don’t wake him,” he reminds me. “Just prop it by the door.” 

I nod. “You gonna leave her unarmed?”

“No, she has my spare pistol,” he whispers, slipping away toward where she lay asleep in their room. 

I move away and gently open Bubba’s door, propping the gun just on the inside of it where he will see it, had he need to use it. 

I’m back out in the kitchen quickly, my blood beginning to pump as my body prepares itself to make our quick exit. I grab my jacket as I glance behind me for Jake, but all I see of him is his silhouette in the shadows, leaned down over the bed as he quietly tells Y/N what we’re about to do. I watch his hand brush through her hair, and his face gently press down onto hers. His motions are soft and sweet, so different from the way I’m used to him being. 

He’s fallen so hard for her, he’s damn near turned into a new man. 

I hear their light whispers as she moves under the thin blanket, and finally Jake stands again, making his way back out the bedroom door. “Let’s go,” he whispers, ripping his own jacket from the back of the recliner. We begin to make our way to the front door, our steps light and careful as we tread across the old wooden floors of the cabin. Jake opens the creaky door and steps outside ahead of me, and the rush of cool air hits me in the face, familiar and encouraging. 

“Danny,” a sweet voice stops me in my tracks, and I turn around to see Y/N perched in their bedroom doorway, her arms folded across her chest. Her hair’s a mess, her t-shirt is pulled down over her shoulder, and for the quickest second, my nervous system reminds me just how tantalizing she really is. I perk my eyebrows to her. “Take care of him,” she orders, the corners of her lips turning up into a smile. 

“Only thing I know how to do, Miss Thing,” I assure her, watching as her cheeks turn a dark pink, the pet name I used to have for her probably gone from her mind, altogether. I shoot her a wink before pulling my cowboy hat from a hook on the wall, placing it on my head, and closing the door behind us. 

—---

The Autumn air is thin as the coolness of the wind reacquaints itself with me, and I take a deep breath of it, letting the familiar smell of my homeland course through me. Fuckin’ Joslyn… if she were a woman I’d call her a few choice names, and rightly so. Everyone here would, even the honest ones who still fill the church pews every Sunday morning. 

Jake and I walk the trail back toward the creek, silent and stealthy as we could probably walk these paths with our eyes closed. I follow closely behind him, watching our six as he keeps his head swiveling through the thick pines. I hear the trickle of the creek and smell the familiar scent of the moss, and I know we’re close to the truck. 

We don’t have a plan, we don’t have a goal. 

It’s dangerous, and we know that. We have a lot more to live for, these days. But something deep within us, something still ingrained in us reminds us that at our very cores, we’re still nothin’ but a couple of sorry misfits, craving risk and all the things associated with it. The thrill of the threat, the glory of the fight. We can thank Oz for making that craving even worse. 

But just like Jake has matured, so have I, in ways. I’m still the sorry son of a bitch I always was, but I’m also a bit more trustworthy in myself. Growing in ways I never got to before. 

“Should we go on foot?” Jake whispers when we finally cross the footbridge and make it to the old Ford. 

“Nah. Take us an hour to get back into town. I say we drive in and park at the old machine shop. No one will see the truck back there. Then we can walk the rest of the way in,” I suggest, earning an understanding nod from Jake. 

We get into the truck and gently close the doors, and I pull my weapon from the back of my jeans, checking that the safety is still on. Jake starts the engine and slowly backs out of his hidden spot, and we begin making our way back toward town. 

He forcefully hits the dial to turn the radio off, and he cuts his headlights to dim them a bit. I feel the rage rising up in me again, my gut growing a hot flame when I start thinking about what they did to Bubba and Geraldine after we left. What they did to all the people in town. Sorry motherfuckers. 

“You think Joey is leading the pack, now?” Jake asks from out of nowhere as he cranks his window down a bit, and lights a cigarette. My mind flashes back to all the harassment Joey put us through… following us when we’d leave for fights, he and his guys jumping Jake in a parking lot and breaking his ribs…

I shrug. “I dunno. Maybe, the way Bubba spoke sounded like they’re just runnin’ around like a free for all. No guidance.” 

Jake shakes his head as the smoke travels out the window. “Like a bunch of wild animals.”

I hate to think of it like that, and I hate to think that the community we left behind has been so manipulated by them. If what Bubba said was true, maybe the townsfolk did feel a little better with us around; even if we were Teddy’s punching bags, at least the heat was off the innocent other people. 

But not everyone was innocent. 

Lies and deceit and cover-ups run deeper than you’d think around here, and I’d be willing to wager that a bunch of those cops who helped cover up Ace’s murder are still alive and well, givin’ their advice to the so-called ‘law’ that runs the town, now. Conspirators and liars, all of ‘em. 

“What’s the plan?” I ask him as I watch the orange embers of his smoke fall to the floor of the truck. 

His lips move into a thin line, and I can tell he’s still on the fence about leaving them behind, at all. But he knows we’ve got to do this, and under the cover of darkness is our best bet. He tosses his cigarette out the window and spits behind it, resituating himself in his seat. 

“Don’t got one.”

—----

We allow the truck to crawl into the back parking lot of the old machine shop that has been closed and out-of-use since we were probably teenagers. It used to be the spot to go to take a girl out in private, but it has long since just fallen victim to the elements, the lot now a mess of cracks and overgrown grass. 

Jake puts it in neutral and we both step out, walking the truck silently over the cracks of the lot over to the corner, under the cover of a few trees. We close the doors as quietly as we can, grabbing our weapons and flashlights and whatever else we think we may need to make this recon mission a successful one. He stuffs his keys into his pocket, and we carefully begin our trek into town. 

It’s quiet, much quieter than I expected given what Bubba had described as the current state of Joslyn, but maybe that’s because everyone is staying indoors, reluctant and scared to go about their normal nightlife activities. We walk side by side, trying our best to stay behind buildings and away from streetlights. There is hardly any foot traffic, let alone any vehicles passing by. 

First we come up on Canaries’, still open and functioning but with hardly any cars in the lot. Not as many as usual, at least. I feel my heart begin to thrum in my chest as I hear the muffled sound of the jukebox and the distant sound of people chattering inside. The nostalgic sound is comforting for just a second, before it’s pulled away from me by Jake’s whisper. 

“Joey’s truck, right there,” he points to an old beat-up Chevrolet, parked cockeyed right in front of the doors. “Probably in there sheistin’ people out of their paychecks.”

“Sorry mother fucker,” I say, wanting nothing more than to bust through the doors and find the nearest cue stick. God, I hate that guy.

“Let’s go,” Jake suggests, and we continue our walk through the thick brush toward the center of town. We stay under the cover of trees, meandering through back alleys and hidden driveways, hoping to god we don’t see any law pass by. Or worse, anyone else who might have us on their radar. 

Louie’s Diner is nearly empty, save for the few flies who occupy barely any other seat other than the ones at the bar, quietly sipping their coffee as they talk about the same old things. 

“Geraldine’s still here,” I blurt as soon as I see her through the windows, still downtrodden and acting as though she’s moving in slow motion. 

“Shit,” Jake says, “I hate seeing her here alone this late. Damnit, Bubba.”

“We should go talk to her, right?” I ask, kneeling down behind a dumpster in the lot. “Let her know we’re here?” 

I watch Jake’s wheels turn again as he runs his inked fingers over his mustache. “What do you think? Is it a bad idea?”

I look through the glass again, watching as she puts on a fake smile for the man seated at the bar as she pours what’s likely his fifth cup of coffee tonight. “Looks like she could use a little reassurance at the moment, don’tcha think?”

“We gotta keep it quiet, Daniel. No one can see us,” Jake says. “You got a dime?”

“A dime?” I ask, confused. I dig in my pocket, feeling a few spare coins sitting at the bottom. “Why?”

Jake motions to the pay phone on the corner. “Gonna give her a ring. Need her to come out to us.”

I pinch the coin between my fingers and place it in his palm. “What are you gonna say?”

“Tell her there’s someone trying to break into a car in the parking lot of Louie’s, and that I’ve already called the law,” he says, the tiniest smirk on his lips. 

“God, Jake, what are you tryin’ to do? Give her a heart attack?” I chuckle. 

“Nah, she’ll be fine. Tough ol’ broad,” he replies, craning his neck to check that no traffic is on the way down the street. “Watch my back.”

I do, and after a ten-second phone call, he is hopping back toward me, his head switching back and forth to make sure we’re still alone. The two of us hurry over to Geraldine’s car and crouch behind it, waiting for her to come out guns a-blazing. 

“Get the hell away from here! The law’s on the way! I got a gun, and I ain’t afraid to use it!” We hear her yelling before she even makes it all the way through the door of Louie’s. We can’t help but laugh to ourselves a little, knowing that within seconds, she will have forgotten about the prank call altogether. 

She rounds the corner and we slide out from behind her car, startling her a little as we step into the dim streetlight. She stops in her tracks, a loud gasp escaping her lips. 

“Jacob?” she squeals. “Daniel?! Is that–”

“Yeah, it’s us, Geraldine,” Jake whispers, opening his arms to her. She rushes us both, taking us in her tight embrace as she lays quick pecks to our cheeks. 

“My boys, my boys! I gotta be dreamin’!” she says, her excitement evident. “Oh, I can’t believe it, I’ve missed you both so!”

After a few seconds of pure happiness, she pulls the towel that she had across her shoulder and slaps it across both of our chests, leaving a stinging sensation on our skin.

“What the hell are you two doin’ here?! You need to be at the police station!” she says gruffly.

“Shhh, shh,” I say, placing my finger over my lips. “We can’t go there, Geraldine! We’re kinda… in hiding.”

“Yeah, we came back here to hide out in the cabin and make a plan, but when we got there, we found Bubba had already taken up shop,” Jake explains quietly. Her face goes stark at the mention of his name, and she swallows down the emotion. 

She crosses her arms over her chest, stepping us further back into the shadows. “He–he ok? He faring well out there?”

“He’s fine,” I answer. “Just missing you somethin’ terrible.”

“Like hell,” she says, pulling her pack of cigarettes from her pocket. “Man dumped me like a sack of potatoes, he not tell you?” She quickly lights one up and closes her eyes as the smoke hits her system. 

“Yeah, he told us,” Jake whispers solemnly. 

“Many years together, many happy years, gone. Just like that.” She snaps her fingers on the word, and we watch as her eyes become teary. “All because of some stupid little threats from some stupid little men. Bub knows I can handle myself. Bub knows that… I–”

“It’s alright, Geraldine. We’re… we’re gonna talk to him about that. He’s just worried, you know? He has good reason,” Jake says. 

“I guess so,” she agrees. “Just… I miss the ol’ man. Shouldn’t be like this, boys. This shouldn’t be how things end up for us. Begged him to come live with me. He decided it’d be safer to just cut ties with me, altogether. Makes no damn sense…”

Jake and I exchange sullen glances, knowing well and good where Bubba was coming from in his decision, but still hating how the outcome has fallen. There is no good answer, for any of it. 

“Anyways,” she says. “You boys gotta turn yourselves in, you know that? Just do what they say, maybe they won’t take it to trial. Pay them with all that money ya’ll had buried up… whatever it takes,” she says. 

“We might get there at some point, but not right now. We’re gonna stay hidden, play dumb for just a little bit longer,” I explain. “‘Specially since learnin’ what Teddy’s guys are puttin’ you all through…”

“Screw Teddy and his boys!” she almost yells. “You boys listen to me, and you listen good,” Geraldine says as she stomps out her cigarette on the cracked pavement. Her finger is outstretched and in our faces, and I have to admit, I’m a little scared of her. “You two ain’t ever had a Momma to tell you what’s right and wrong, and I know Bubba did his best with you, and you did fine all by yourselves. So don’t take no offense to my advice. But life is short, so much damn shorter than you’d think. This ain’t no little charge, boys. This is serious. Murder by arson. You need to go to the law and turn yourselves in. Tell them the whole story. The truth. Start to finish. Don’t you be worryin’ about the part Bub played in it all, he’s a grown man. Can take care of himself.” She lowers her finger and glances around. 

“Thank you, Geraldine… for the advice, really,” Jake says, clearing his throat. “It all will come about in good time. I promise, you have nothin’ to worry about.”

Geraldine scoffs. “You two are all I’ve worried about since the day you left. Night and day.” I can hear the frog in her throat as she tries not to cry, probably so mad at us and happy to see us, all at the same time.

“Are you okay? Do you want us to stay so you can close up?” I ask, laying a comforting hand on her arm.

She shakes her head, her eyes peeling to the ground. “No, thank you honeys. I’ll be just fine. Got Dale in there with me, tonight. Retired Army. I’m in good hands,” she smiles.

The three of us stand for a second, feeling the heaviness of all that is happening falling down around us. The sky is bright and clear, and for the first time in a long time, I notice the stars. 

“You two get out of here, stay safe,” she says, ushering us along as she sniffles back a few tears. 

We begin to make our way back down the sidewalk, feeling probably as badly as she does. 

“Hey boys?” she says, and we turn back to her. “Tell him I said hello, and that I love him, and that I’ll be there in two days with his things,” she murmurs. “Tell him not to worry ‘bout me.”

We both nod in understanding, offering her small waves of goodbye. “He loves you too, we’re sure of it.”

—---

I know Jake didn’t plan it. I know he didn’t mean to. He probably had just started to get in his head, reminiscing on old times, simpler times when we were kids and had to walk everywhere we went. 

Before we had bikes, before we had motorcycles. Before we had trucks. Walking was the only way we could get around. And after some time, we’d worn a pathway in the grass alongside the road, meandering around the back of Wanda’s Motel, behind the post office and a few more dilapidated buildings, cutting through a field and along the edge of a fenceline. Until it made it to the curve going uphill, straight to Ace’s shop. To our home.

I don’t question him, I don’t try to stop him, I just follow him… 

He’s got Ace’s black leather jacket on, still worn and dirty and covered in cigarette burn holes, and I guarantee he hasn’t gone a day without wearing that thing since the weather changed. Guess it makes him feel close to him. 

Maybe it’s what drives Jake to walk up this godforsaken hill. Maybe he wants to see it for himself, maybe he wants to see if there’s anything left behind in the ash and rubble. Maybe he wants to say goodbye to Ace one more time, the right way, now that he’s found some peace in his life. 

I don’t ask, I just follow.

Jumping across grass-covered ditch lines, over big rocks and along broken pieces of concrete… I follow him.

We finally crest the top and the road levels out, and I can see it in the distance. The streetlight out front is no longer there, and the fence that bordered our property is almost nonexistent. All we can see is a big pile of wood and metal, piled almost as high as the building was, but not nearly as big. 

I feel a rush of nerves flow through me. This is going to be harder than I thought. 

We keep walking toward it, and I contemplate saying something to Jake, but when I open my mouth to speak, nothing comes out. Nothing even comes to mind. What is there to say? 

We cross the road onto the grass, still trying our best to stay hidden in the moonlight. He shoves his hands in the pockets of his jacket as we get closer to the property line, and I can tell that he’s taking some deep, centering breaths. 

Finally we reach the entrance to the lot, taped off and blocked with yellow caution tape. Fuck, this is not something I ever thought I’d see. 

We lift the tape and go under it, slowly and quietly making our way over to where the shop once stood. My heart rate flies as a strange feeling comes over me, that the place that was once our home is now charred and burnt and reduced to nothing–the way we once lived now feeling like a million years ago. 

It’s just…flat. All the junk cars in the lot are moved and in disarray, the outbuildings not connected to the shop are pushed over and still covered in black soot from the fire. The rubble still remains; pieces of tools and car parts and building materials are all piled and covered in ash. 

We kick around the mess, suddenly uncaring of if anyone sees us, or not. The breeze blows up little tufts of ash, and the scent is stranger than anything I���d ever experienced before. Like home, but incinerated. 

Jake’s still silent, I wouldn’t expect him to talk. We take off separate ways, looking around in the rubble for anything that might stand out, that might look familiar. I do catch sight of what looks like a few of my tools, and maybe even the remains of my toolbox. It’s melted and barely even recognizable. The feeling is so surreal, and so infuriating. How everything ended up, how Teddy was literally going to lock us in here, and make this building into our graves. 

I can’t lie, I get a little emotional at the flood of thoughts running through me. I’d had nightmares since that day of being locked in there and hearing the screams of Jake and Y/N, but completely unable to scream, myself. 

I wonder what was going through Teddy’s mind as it was all happening. Did he even know what was going on? Did he hate himself for it? Did he have any regrets?

“Probably not,” I whisper to myself, kicking through a little bit more charred wreckage. I glance over to Jake to see him doing the same thing, and I find myself wanting to console him. Wanting to go to him and try to make this better, when in all reality, this was just as much my home as it was his. I need consoling too. But still, it doesn’t feel right. 

“See anything you recognize?” I hear his voice from a few yards away, deep and sorrowful and aggravated. 

“Kinda, I don’t know,” I reply. 

“The burn pile is still there, look. From after the tornado,” he says, motioning with a tilt of his chin. I look over and see it, the large remains of the burn pile that we had all worked together to form to do away with all that was destroyed in the storm. The two of us walk toward it, and I remember that night like it was yesterday. The night we all worked together to clean up, then gathered as a family. When Jake played his harmonica for the first time in what felt like years. 

We take a few minutes and walk back to where the shop was, kicking around a little bit more. 

“Fuck, Jake. Look at this,” I say, crouching down to wipe the dust off what used to be the sign that hung at the entrance of the lot. 

‘Ace’s’ is all that is still legible, the rest of the letters and wording all broken from melting away in the flames. 

“Think we should keep this,” I say. 

Jake joins me at my side, the toe of his black boot kicking at the metal framing of the old sign. “You think Ace ever thought things would end up this way? All he ever worked for, torched in a fuckin’ blaze of glory?”

I stand back up, hissing through my teeth. “No. I don’t think he did. But, if he was still alive for all this shit, I think he would have done the same thing. Think he would have caught Teddy up in his own game, just like we did. Let him be the victim of his own fuckin’ stupidity,” I reply honestly. 

It’s quiet for a minute as we just stand there, taking it all in. Everything suddenly seems even more unfair than it did before. This place was shit, but at least it had heart. 

“I miss my toolbox. And my lift. How our showerhead had just the right amount of pressure ‘cause Ace took the water saver out,” Jake says very slowly, as if he’s remembering all the little things about the shop that hadn’t visited his mind since we left. “I miss my desk chair, and the sound the fluorescents made when you first turned them on. I miss the smell of the kerosene heater in the winter… I even miss all the damn grease that was permanently embedded in my hands.”

I laugh a little and nod, reminiscing on the old times, myself. It feels like a millennia ago, when in all reality, we hadn’t been gone long, at all. 

“But you know what I miss the most?” he asks, running his hand over his mouth. 

“What’s that?” I say. 

“How you used to turn that goddamned radio up so loud, it ended up being my alarm clock,” he grins, stuffing his hands in his pockets. 

I can’t help but laugh. “And you were never tall enough to reach the volume button.”

“Shut the fuck up,” he chuckles, slapping me across the stomach. 

“Hey,” I laugh, “it worked, didn’t it? Got your sorry ass out of bed when all you did was stay wrapped up with Y/N til fuckin’ noon.”

“No, not noon, don’t make shit up, Daniel,” he jests. “I never slept in past nine.”

I give him a sarcastic, disbelieving glance. 

“Ok, maybe noon a time or two. But can you fuckin’ blame me?” he replies. 

I quickly shake my head. “No, no I can’t. If anybody understands how hard it is to deny her, it’s me. Believe me.” 

He exhales a short breath. “Woman’s got me in a tailspin…”

I divert my attention to him. “What do you mean? Everything okay?”

He pulls a cigarette from the pack in his front pocket and lights one up. I notice he still carries Ace’s zippo. 

“Yeah, think so. We’re alright. Just…shit’s gotten a little confusing, lately. Little…hectic, I guess.”

I feel my brow furrow as I try to understand his less than descriptive explanation. “Hectic?”

“Yeah…” he lets the smoke flow from his lips as he tilts his head back to look at the sky. 

“You…you wanna talk about it?” I offer. 

He shakes his head. “Not really. She’s everything I’ve ever fuckin’ wanted, ya know? And I didn’t even know I wanted it, til she came around. Guess we just didn’t…guess I just have just started realizin’ lately that maybe I’m not ever gonna be the man she deserves, the one she needs.” 

“Goddamnit, Jake,” I say. “Didn’t you two have this conversation like, a hundred times already?”

“And didn’t you realize that we’re currently wanted for fuckin’ murder, Daniel?” he bites, his jaw locked in place as his eyes bore through me. Sometimes, just sometimes, Jake scares the ever living hell out of me. 

Like it never left him, his temper is still there underneath it all. 

“Jake,” I relay, “she loves you, man…she, she’s stuck around this long, I don’t think she’s gonna change her mind, now. I can see how she acts around you, I’ve seen it since day one.”

“Yeah.” He takes another drag of his smoke, letting it billow through his clenched teeth. He shakes his head a few times, like he’s trying to free his mind of the demons apparently haunting him. 

I know for a fact I’m not gonna break him free of it, I can tell by his body language that he’s still trying to work it out, himself. 

But I know him. I know him better than he knows himself. And if I had a twenty in my pocket, I’d bet it all on the fact that Jake is feeling conflicted on whether or not he needs to do the exact same thing Bubba just did to Geraldine. 

“Don’t do it, Jake. Don’t make the same mistakes your parents made… that Bubba just made—“

“Is it a mistake, Daniel? Hm? Feels more like protection for her, actually. I get why Bubba did what he did. I understand it completely. Because I’ve come this fuckin’ close to doin’ it, myself.” His voice is hitched as he leans in toward me, reminding me more of Ace as the minutes tick on. Gruff and dejected, like the world and everything in it is working against him. 

He walks away for a second, rolling his cigarette out between his fingers so the tobacco falls into the wreckage. “Last thing I want is for her to get caught up in this shit. Have her name attached to somethin’ she had no part of, all because I drug my fuckin’ feet fixin’ her Scout. She could have been gone by the time all that went down. Because I was lazy. Because I was selfish…”

“Jake, don’t blame yourself, fuck! I’m not innocent in all this, either! I could have been fixin’ her car, too…”

He rolls his eyes as he steps away again. “You don’t get it, Daniel.”

“Oh, I don’t get it?” I charge him, craning my neck as I approach him. “Just because I’m not serious with someone and havin’ to deal with this doesn’t mean I don’t get it, Jake. I can imagine how it feels…”

“Oh really? How?” he presses. 

“Because I wanted that with her! Okay? What you two have… I wanted it. It was short lived, and probably just my fuckin’ imagination, but…god,” I grit, my emotions coming through a little as a harsh breeze comes through and dust flies around us. “I thought about it. With her. A life. Settling down, white picket fence, all of it.” I shake my head as he just stands there, listening to me. 

“I’ve never had a woman make my mind think in that capacity,” I go on, more quietly now. “Fuck, you know me. My sex life is a revolving door. But that short amount of time I spent with her flipped my mindset on it’s fuckin’ head, okay? Made me realize that maybe I am capable of… love… with someone. The real thing. Sacrifice, all that.” I spit onto the ground, and kick some dirt over top of it. “Feelin’ left me as soon as it found me, though. Just disappeared one day, ‘specially when I realized that it was you she belonged with.”

I watch as he holds my gaze for a second before dropping it, swallowing down whatever it was he wanted to say. “So don’t tell me that I don’t get it. I may not understand it as completely as you do, as Bubba does, but I understand where your mind is, Jake. And we’re a fuckin’ team, we’re fuckin’ family. And Y/N is part of that family, now.”

He turns away, pulling his hand through his hair as he collects his thoughts. For a second, I knew that he was feeling jealousy for whatever feelings I used to have for Y/N, but I hope that he knows that I’d never ever do something like that. To either of them.

I watch as Jake twists on his feet, bending his knees to sit on the ground. I wait a second before walking over to him, taking my spot on the cold dirt beside him. We’re just on the outskirt of the shop, right where our kitchen table used to sit. The moon is almost full, and I swear I’ve never seen the sky so clear. I pull the bottle of whiskey from my jacket pocket, nipping a little off the top before handing it off to him. He swallows it down, never breaking eye contact with the moon.

“You ever miss the fights? The matches?” he asks.

“Fuck yeah, I do. Miss ‘em bad. Miss the adrenaline the most, I think,” I reply, swirling another sip around in my mouth to stave off the cold coming across the air. 

“Me too,” he says dryly. “One of the best fuckin’ feelings I’ve ever had. Ya know thinkin’ back, I don’t think I ever had any fear to step into a ring. Anxiety? Yeah, but. I don’t think I was ever scared.”

I nod in agreement.

“‘M scared now, Daniel. Real fuckin’ scared,” he mutters. 

I feel my blood boil in a way that I haven’t felt in a really long time. It’s not rage, and it’s not spitefulness, but the heat that finds my face alerts me that maybe I’m scared, too. 

“What if we don’t make it out of this? What if they throw us in prison? It would have been all for nothin’...” he says. “All the bullshit we tried to fight off… all the good things that have ended up happening to us…” 

“This is only the beginning of the road, Jake. We’ve got a lot more ahead of us. Who knows, things could go the complete opposite way we think they’re going to,” I say, trying to convince myself. It’s just natural for he and I to think that things are always going to go the opposite of our way. It’s all we’ve ever known. “Plus, we’ve got a lot more now than we used to have…”

He shoots me a sarcastic scoff, motioning around to the charred remains of our home around us. “Seriously?”

“Yeah, idiot,” I say, picking up a handful of dirt and tossing it at his chest. “We have our brothers. And Y/N… and Bub… We’ve got family now. And if you ask me, that’s the best thing we’ve ever fought for.”

“What are you, a fuckin’ poet, now?” he laughs, finally smiling. 

“Nah,” I breathe. “That ain’t poetry. It’s the truth. Since when have we ever had people relyin’ on us?”

“We haven’t…” he says. “We gotta call Josh and Sam.”

“Yeah,” I reply. “And soon. Do you and Josh not have any weird twin telepathy or whatever?”

We both stand from our places on the dirt, wiping the dust from our pants as we prepare to make the trek back to the truck. 

“Uh, maybe? I don’t know. If we do, he probably fuckin’ spazzing out worse than he normally is,” he laughs. “Oh shit, look at this…”

I look to where his finger is pointed in the dirt, trying like hell to get my eyes to adjust. He picks up a few burnt pieces of wood and tosses them aside, revealing a small piece of what looks like white paper. He picks it up and dusts it off, pressing it to the soft fabric of his t-shirt before taking a second look at it.

“Oh my god, I’ve never seen this…” He holds it out to me, and I finally focus in, realizing it’s a photograph of Ace and Stella. Stella is sitting on Ace’s lap, kissing his cheek with force, right here at the kitchen table. 

“How in the hell did this survive?” I ask astonished, carefully taking it from Jake, and noticing that there are hardly any burn marks on it, at all. 

He shakes his head slowly as we turn it toward the moonlight. “Beats the hell out of me…”

“You’ve really never seen this?” I ask.

“No, never. It must have been hidden somewhere… in his desk or something upstairs…" We both look up above us as if the building is still intact, realizing that Ace’s desk used to sit right above the kitchen, only a floor up. “They look so happy…”

“They were happy, man. Maybe not all the time, but…” I reassure him, knowing that this must be another heavy feeling for him, on top of everything else. “I think this is him tellin’ you not to be scared.”

“Maybe so…” Jake barely mutters before gently placing the photo in his pocket. “Let’s get the fuck out of here, huh?”

Just as we get our bearings and begin to make our way back to the road, we’re both met with the visual of a dark silhouette of someone in the distance, walking right toward us. All I can make out is a long coat, and the lit end of the cherry of a smoke. 

“Who the fuck is that,” I ask with a forced whisper, sturdying myself as I grip Jake’s arm. 

“Don’t know. Just… Just act cool,” he replies, his hand immediately going to the weapon stuck in the back of his jeans. 

The figure continues coming toward us, its feet moving fast and kicking up dirt. 

I can hear my heartbeat in my ears as the familiar feeling of adrenaline seeps into my veins. Jake and I share a brief moment of preparation to fight, and my mind begins to spin with possibilities of what we may be up against. As it gets closer, I can make out the figure of a man, shorter in stature and wrapped up in a trench coat. He wears a fedora style hat on his head, and there is a cigar between the fingers of his right hand. Reminds me a lot of Oz, save for his height and quicker-paced walk.

“Evenin’, fellas. About time you two got here,” he says as he approaches us, tossing his cigar to the ground. 

“Back the fuck away, we’re armed,” Jake warns. 

The man stops short, holding his hands up. “I’d assume you are, being wanted for murder, and all.” The smoke is still gliding from his lips as he comes into full view, now, revealing his face. He removes his hat and holds it to his chest. “I can assure you though, you won’t want to be using that gun, son.”

“Who are you?” I ask. 

The man exhales through his nose, extending his right hand. “Name’s Raymond Antone, Detective Raymond Antone, if you please.”

When neither of us return the handshake, the man awkwardly pulls his hand back and replaces the hat on his head. “Understandable,” he clears his throat. “I’m the agent assigned to your case, it’s a pleasure to finally meet you,” he says. 

Jake and I look at each other, dumbfounded and confused. “A pleasure?” I reiterate.

“Yes,” he says, matter of factly. “I knew it would only be a matter of time before you two drifted back into town. Everyone said you’d probably run, but. I had an inkling that you wouldn’t. Glad to say I was right.”

We’re struck silent, stumped on what to do, much less what to say. 

“Why aren’t you… why aren’t you arresting us?” Jake asks, still standing very close to me. 

“Because,” the man replies, “those press releases and facial sketches were just a ploy to get you two back here. And it worked.”

“Wait wait wait,” I say, stepping to the side. “So we aren’t wanted for murder? There are no charges?”

“Oh no son, there are charges. I just needed something solid to get you two back here. And fast.”

“You’ve got to be fuckin’ kidding me,” Jake says, turning his back. 

“Sorry, kids. The force ain’t made of money, couldn’t afford a manhunt for the two of you. Had to get creative with my tactics,” he says, almost as if he’s amused by it all.

“Can you do that? Can you lie to the public?” I ask. “Lie to people about what they’re being charged with?”

“Don’t worry about that, son. Legalities are the least of your worries, right now,” he says.

“No, they’re actually at the top of our list. We have a lawyer,” Jake lies. 

“And I’d like to meet him,” the man says, fiddling around in his pockets. He pulls out  business cards and hands one to each of us. He turns on his heels, and begins to walk back from the way he came.

Jake and I exchange confused looks again. “Wait, so… you’re just letting us go? You’re not gonna take us?” I ask. “What the fuck is going on here?”

Suddenly the man is charging back toward us until his face is within inches of ours. “You boys don’t understand even the half of what you uncovered, here. The fiery death of our friend Theodore in your beloved mechanic’s shop was just the tip of the iceberg, kids. Whether you like it or not, you opened up a can of worms larger than you can even fathom.”

The man looks us up and down, and turns to leave again. 

“Wait you– You’re trusting us to not leave Joslyn?” Jake asks.

“I am,” the man says. “Plus I’ve got LEO’s from all over the county making sure you don’t. You’re not under arrest, boys. But I need you here. Need you badly.”

“What for?” we ask.

Raymond stops again, lighting yet another cigar. “Character witnesses.”

He gives us a large, toothy smile before he’s on his way again, back toward whatever vehicle he had parked in the distance. Jake and I stand in utter disbelief, absolutely lost and confused on what just happened. 

“Character witnesses? For who?” I ask. 

“I don’t know,” Jake says. “But look at the card. Senior Agent Raymond Antone, State of Missouri. Drug Task Force.”

“Drugs?” I repeat. “Wha– Jake, what the hell did we do?”

He swallows, looking quickly from me to the card again. 

“It looks like we killed a kingpin.”

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