#vitriol halls

[lockjawmotif]

my original character designs are getting steadily more elaborate and harder to draw.

[hollowflay]

honestly i think it's VERY funny that heather's immediate reaction to being sexually attracted to a man is the visceral urge to brutally murder him

[utsugi-ren]

Honestly don't understand the cavetown hate, just admit they're trans in a way you think is cringe

[outer-edges]

OH HALLE BAILEY AND RACHEL ZEGLER ACTORS ON ACTORS VARIETY YOU PERHAPS ATE WITH THIS ONE

[comatosebunny09]

serve & protect | sylus

— summary: you’ve stood dutifully by his side for years. seen him at his worst, not once letting that side of him deter you. can you blame him for craving more than your loyalty? — cw: royalty au, king sylus, femme reader, knight/bodyguard reader, mutual pining, marking, restraints, sexual tension, slow burn, sylus isn’t a normal king, this isn’t a medieval setting, there are cars and indoor plumbing ‘round here, reader has hair for the sake of plot — notes: a reimagining of something i wrote a few years ago. heavily inspired by final fantasy xv & the beast within (2024). tysm for reading! [ prologue ] — now playing: tender strength - yu-peng chan, hoyo-mix

Willing His Majesty to behave and him actually doing so are two foreign points on a map. 

It’s kind of your fault, really. 

You almost don’t. Nearly preserve your aloofness, your decorum. But then you do let your formalities slip for the briefest second, and that’s what heralds this mess. 

A traitorous sigh slips past your lips, summoning the attention of your wintry-haired charge.

Warmth pours throughout your person, a prickly spike of embarrassment clotting your veins. You stiffen, staring at the dark, heavy curtains shielding the dining hall from the sun’s brilliant spill. Try to ignore how your skin tingles beneath the curious study of your king. How those scarlet eyes crinkle mirthfully, wittingly, and you know all too well no good will come from that look. 

He’s in a playful mood, isn’t he? And you’re about to serve as his court jester. 

“Are you alright, dear friend?” he intones, loud enough for only you to hear, ignoring the monotonous prattle of his guest across the table. 

His voice curls around your brain, seeping through the folds of it. You straighten, arms stiffly folded behind you, quietly clearing your throat to ward off the spell of dizziness threatening to take hold. Curse him for sounding so devastatingly hot. For being so terribly distracting, so unfairly handsome.

You murmur an apology, not once taking your eyes off the far wall to look at him. To do so would be dangerous. Get you into more trouble. You hope by ignoring him, he’ll leave you be, but—

Well, His Majesty is a stubborn man, and once he gets going, there’s no stopping him.

He fiddles with a fork on the dining table with long, skillful fingers. Smooths out the little wrinkles forming in the tablecloth, adjusting himself in his wing-backed seat into an uninterested slouch. “You’ve been awfully huffy today. Are you bored?” 

A little, you inwardly reply. You don’t care much for politics. For these fickle conversations of wealth, alliances, and nobility. You merely follow orders, keeping your opinions to yourself unless they’re explicitly requested. 

Being a knight proves to be much more entertaining than serving as a tactician or advisor. At least you can keep your hands and feet busy instead of rotting away at a desk, ripping out your hair and fretting over the intricacies of running an entire nation. 

You remain quiet, tuning out His Majesty’s attempts to get you to break character. 

But, as mentioned before, your king is a persistent man. 

He sighs, slipping further down in his chair. Props his temple on his knuckles, an ankle resting on the pocket of his knee whilst the free set of fingers drum on the chair’s arm. “I don’t blame you if you are. She’s not very entertaining, is she? Nor is she very bright.”

You snort despite yourself. Quickly remember your decorum, a scowl twisting up your lips. Your eyes shoot to your wayward king. “Majesty!” you admonish on a whispered yell.

A smirk pulls at his lips. He playfully narrows his eyes at you from behind the shelter of his hand. Has you right where he wants you, feeding into his childish games. Just like old times. 

Your staring contest, however, is short-lived when the sharp click of a teacup meeting its saucer echoes through the stilled dining hall.

“I’m sorry,” quips a voice doused in vitriol from the table’s other end, causing your attention to snap to its source. “Am I interrupting something?”

The Queen of Universum ingests the pair of you with sharp, mead-infused eyes, vexation tugging at her red-painted lips. Like two scolded children, you straighten, King Sylus sitting up in his seat with a brilliantly fake smile.

“Of course not. Please, continue with your monologuing,” he says with a theatrical flourish of his fingers. He would roll his eyes if he could; you just know it.

You disguise a laugh as a cough, piping up when the queen’s glare snaps to you. You try not to bristle beneath the weight she carries. Beneath the thin stretch of her lips. She doesn’t like you very much. Of course, you don’t care for her, either. 

She’s made it perfectly clear that she views you as a threat to her plans—marrying her daughter off to your king to forge an alliance between your countries, to spread her family’s reign. No room for love. She’s mentioned more than once that your familiarity with the king is inappropriate, a threat to his crown. How scandalous it would be for him to take you as his bride instead of someone with noble blood.

You bite the inside of your cheek, fingers curling into a fist at your back until your nails bite unforgivingly into your palm. 

Like you don’t already grapple with the notion every time he touches you or smiles a little too charmingly in your direction.

You’re not fit to be a contender for his heart; not fit to be a queen. 

Her eyes finally slip away from you, refocusing on the center of your musings. Your relief is short-lived as an impish smile rounds her lips. You swallow thickly, the queen’s body language boding danger.

“Is it truly necessary for your lapdog to be here? Her presence is spoiling my meal.”

You blink rapidly. Incredulously, mouth spilling open.

Lap—

Lapdog?

I’m sorry, what?

If you had hackles, they would raise. Instead, your nostrils flare, the tendons in your neck pulling, jaw set in a rigid line. An omniscient smirk cants the queen’s lips. She knows just how to creep beneath your skin, how to wrap her claws around your pride and pull it apart. 

How dare she compare you to a bloody dog! You’re loyal, yes. At His Majesty’s beck and call. His shield. Have been for years. But to be compared to an animal, of all things—

He feels the malice sloughing off your skin in waves. Eyes you warily in his peripheral before raising a hand to quell your silent rage.

“Down, girl,” he teases, and you glower at him. 

It seems he also wants to play along with these dog jokes.

Leaning forward, your king perches his elbows on the dining table. Twines his fingers together, resting his chin atop his knuckles, a deceptively sweet smile boasting his teeth. Having known him for as long as you have, you can easily sense the irritation pouring over the tense set of his muscles. The stiffness between his shoulder blades, peering through the tailored pleat of his jacket.

“My Lady,” he begins, words bathed in silk. “I’m not sure how you treat your subjects in Universum, and frankly, I do not care. But here, we address our people with dignity and respect regardless of race, color, status, or creed.”

The queen’s expression morphs into one of mortification. She straightens in her seat, a steady creep of redness inhabiting her cheeks as she studies the doily texture of the tablecloth. You resist an urge to cheer.

“While you are my guest, you are expected to behave with poise and grace. And I would greatly appreciate it if you did not disrespect my friend here like that again.” 

Scarlet eyes briefly flit to you, shining with a spark of fondness—a tenderness that sets your body alight with heat—before returning to the queen. 

“Or anyone in my kingdom, for that matter. Understood?” His Majesty concludes with a raised brow, sparing no room for argument.

Pride swells in your chest, warm like the soft embrace of a fur shawl on a wintry day. He’s shut her up in his own way. Read her to filth with the poise and regality of a man of his stature, and you’re envious of his composure. They don’t call him a king for nothing. 

You straighten at his side, mouth twitching with the threat of an arrogant smile, and your chin lifts slightly. Defiantly. 

She studies her lap, pulling at her fingernails. You watch a kaleidoscope of emotions stroll across her face before a nervous titter falls from her lips. 

“My apologies, Your Majesty. That was very inappropriate of me.” Her pink tongue darts out to wet her lips while she sweeps a chocolate ringlet of hair behind her ear. “I was only hoping that the two of us could have a little…chat.” She looks at you, a note of caution stirring beneath her lashes. “Alone.”

Sylus sits back with a scoff as if he’s just as confused by her request as you are. It’s rare you leave his side. Rare you’re not in his shadow, head on a swivel, fingers wrapped about your sword. You’re even present when he’s sunk beneath the murky pull of sleep. 

“Does her being here pose some sort of threat to you?” he interrogates around a smirk.

“Not so much a threat as it is a distraction.”

A distraction to whom, you wonder. It’s a ridiculous request. You’re his bodyguard, for the Gods’ sake. You wouldn’t put it past her to make an attempt on his life in your absence. Forgo the pleasantries and proposal for marriage and end his lineage here and now. Not that she could.

Your mouth works around a protest, yet it dies in your throat when your king calls your name after some time spent deliberating. He peers at you from his shoulder, and you snap to attention.

“Sorry, dear friend,” he says, tone sloping with repentance. “Would you mind giving us some space for a little while? I fear your presence is making our guest uncomfortable.”

You cast him a pensive look. Lips tremble and part. His expression softens, and he winks at you, turning up the dial of his charm.

“Don’t worry. I’ll be fine. I promise.”

Of course, he will be alright. His Majesty is more than capable of handling himself. Sometimes, you wonder what purpose you serve. He’s a hulk of a man, brimming with untapped power and bleeding intimidation. Most days, you feel you’re by his side to create the illusion of protection. 

Remembering your place, you step back and excuse yourself with a curt bow. You caution one last look at your charge before pivoting, briskly making for the door, ignoring the thunderous drum of your pulse in your ears.

You feel his eyes track your every move as your boots click soundly against the glittering, marbled floor. Feel the queen’s gaze drilling into your back, exuding a quieted smugness as if she’s won your silent war of wills. 

As the solid, ornate doors of the dining hall draw closed behind you, you catch wind of their conversation over your shoulder, and your heart plummets to your feet. 

“So,” begins the queen, voice steeping low. “I hear you are in need of a bride.”

—

You’re a mess of grit teeth and unease on the doors’ other side.

You’ve paced back and forth for what feels like an eternity, warring with your emotions. You’re not sure what has you more on edge: having been made to look like a fool in front of your king, or the implications of that statement when you departed from the dining room. 

“I hear you are in need of a bride.”

The conversation was inevitable. Doesn’t mean you have to like it. 

It’s the entire reason Universum’s queen has frequented your kingdom so much. Trying to set him up with her daughter, the princess, under the guise of uniting your people. You both know she’s greedy for power following her husband’s untimely demise, and His Majesty is teeming with it. 

You scoff, stopping your march to lean against the double doors, arms crossed over your chest. With a shuddering breath out, your face turned skyward, and your eyes shuttered closed, you try to compose yourself. 

If you keep huffing and puffing about like this, you might convince yourself that you care for your king more than you should. More than you’re allowed to. 

When you’ve begun to settle your nerves, the chorus of boots striking the carpeted floor piques your interest. 

You open an eye as dark figures of varying heights and sizes ease into frame, moving past you, carrying laughter and camaraderie with them. Crownsguardsmen. 

They regard you with quick bows and wary smiles, their banter lulling to a dull murmur in the face of their superior. You acknowledge them casually, still propped against the oakwood doors, not at all in the mood for formalities. 

Amid the gaggle of guards, a set of curious sienna eyes alight on you, widening with recognition before crinkling with glee. 

The smaller guard shoves through her comrades, briskly approaching you as her teammates walk out of sight. You study the top of her sleek, brown hair before she stops before you. And you stiffen, stammering as she snatches up your hands, her excitement palpable. 

Tara. You recognize her as a new recruit with youthful eyes and enough enthusiasm to power the entire Citadel. 

She reminded you of yourself when you first joined the king’s army. A young woman with a target on her back because of her gender and status. She possessed exceptional prowess with an array of weapons and vast knowledge of the kingdom’s technology. Yet, she was constantly beleaguered by her comrades and, oftentimes, her trainers.

You threw around your brass a little, ensuring she was treated as fairly as her male counterparts whilst she trained as a knight. Sometimes sparred or studied with her on your rare occasions of downtime. You were there to congratulate her when she’d been appointed a member of His Majesty’s royal guard.

With King Sylus on the throne, the Crownsguard became more progressive, opening its doors to anyone willing to lay their life down for him. Too bad a bunch of egotistical, chauvinistic airheads still occupied his ranks. 

“Good afternoon, ma’am!” Tara sing-songs, overflowing with zeal. 

You wince at the pitch of her voice, the brilliance of her smile. But you find her infectious, a soft chuckle ducking through your lips. You unwind one of your hands from her grasp, ruffling her hair affectionately. Had she been anyone else, you would’ve reprimanded her for forgoing the proper customs and courtesies. 

But are you really in any position to lecture anyone about etiquette right now?

“Good afternoon, Tara.” You’re surprised by the mildness of your voice. The fondness of it.

If she had a tail, it would surely be wagging. Your innards color with warmth at the thought. You’ve found someone else you want to protect almost as much as your king.

“How are you today, ma’am?” she asks, dispelling the nebula of your thoughts. 

Averting your gaze, you sigh, recalling what’s got you so out of sorts in the first place. You cross your arms, your spine reacquainting itself with the intricate carvings of one of the dining room’s doors with a muted thunk. “I’ve had better days.”

Tara’s expression pulls into one of curiosity. “Something the matter?” 

She steps closer, bursting your figurative bubble. With her hands clasped behind her back, Tara scrutinizes you, ducking this way and that, giving you a visual inspection. 

“Come to think of it, isn’t His Majesty having brunch with the Queen of Universum right now?” She pensively taps her lip with her index finger, eyes narrowing in thought. “Behind you?”

You flinch, watching her from down your nose. She’s eerily perceptive for someone so young. Invasive, pummeling you with a hundred questions a minute. 

“That’s strange. Aren’t you normally by his side? Did something happen? Did you get into trouble?” Tara goads, nudging you with her elbow.

You scoff, pushing off the door. For all the years you’ve known your king, you’ve never been in trouble with him. Garnered the ire of his advisor once or twice, sure. Pissed off his royal entourage with your sharp tongue, maybe. But you don’t think Sylus harbors a malicious bone in his body for you. You don’t think he ever could.

You cross the hall, perching your hands on an adjacent windowsill. The marble texture is cold beneath your palms. Grounding. You study the mixture of historical and modern architecture lining the horizon, a scene reminiscent of a dragon’s maw. 

The land of Insomnia brims with life beyond The Citadel’s walls, a nation once war-torn slowly rebuilding itself under the guidance of your genial king.

“No, I’m not in trouble.” You turn, sitting on the ledge. Your voice descends as if you’re having a conversation with yourself. “But not everyone seems to like the idea of me at the king’s side.”

Tara moves towards you with a placating smile, taking up one of your hands and squeezing it. “The queen doesn’t like you very much, does she?” 

Your silence serves as her answer. 

The smaller woman pats your hand, thumb smoothing over the rough patch of skin stretched over the clutch of it. “Well, I could’ve told you that.”

You cut your eyes at her in warning. What’s with everyone testing your patience today? Picking on you?

“You’re competition,” Tara matter of factly adds, maneuvering to lean against the windowsill beside you. 

You study the weathered tips of your boots before your gaze slowly rises to Tara. Her eyes gloss over with tenderness. With pity as a slow creep of heat inhabits the pit of your stomach. You avert your gaze, boring into the dining hall’s doors. 

You don’t have to ask what she means by that; you’ve heard the statement numerous times as of late. Your king’s recent treatment of you doesn’t help matters, exacerbating the rumor that you’re more than just his loyal subject.

As if sensing your internal plight, Tara decides to shift gears. You’re grateful for the reprieve, getting too hung up in your mind again. 

“So, do you really think the queen killed her husband?” she whispers, leaning in with a hand cupped around her mouth.

You chuckle. Leave it to Tara to fill the space with gossip. “I couldn’t say. But I wouldn’t put it past her. She’s a bit of a bi—”

As if on cue, the grandiose doors of the dining room groan open, spilling the artificial light inside onto the carpeted floor. You and Tara snap to attention like two youths caught dawdling, stone-faced, the remnants of your conversation corked in your throats. 

How anticlimactic, you muse, watching several figures emerge from the room until your eyes alight on a familiar, riotous mop of white. 

Your breath thickens in your throat as scarlet eyes capture yours. The lips beneath them quirk before the towering silhouette they belong to, strides past you.

Tara’s hand brushes yours. You don’t have to look to know she’s giving you the most impish side-eye. 

The queen turns on her heel to face your king, her entourage scuttling about behind her. She’s half-hidden by the mass that is His Majesty, but beyond his bulk, you make out her red lips curving into a deceitful smile. Bile singes the back of your throat, your fists tightening at your sides. 

“It’s been a pleasure, Your Majesty.” She punctuates her words with a small curtsy and head tilt. 

His Majesty stuffs his hand in his pocket, his wispy hair sweeping over broad shoulders. Boredom lances through his deep timbre, and you imagine his eyes rolling with disinterest. “The pleasure was hardly mine.”

An indignant sound salts the air, dredged from the queen’s throat. You bite back a laugh, recalling what got you sent out in the first place. Tara flinches in your peripheral, tamping down a laugh herself. 

Ignoring your king’s waywardness, the queen squares her shoulders and straightens her spine, her head held high. She clears her throat, holding out her hand for your liege to take. When he does nothing, she waggles it expectantly, wordlessly demanding he kiss it.

You watch the scene unfold with bated breath, tight lips. Inwardly cheer when Sylus scoffs, turning away from his obstinate guest. He waves a tired hand over his shoulder, summoning two guards stationed by the hallway’s entrance.

“Please ensure the queen makes it back to her car. Safely or harmed, I don’t care,” he tacks on under his breath.

The guards acknowledge him with nods and move to flank the queen and her royal retinue. The woman huffs, indignantly stomping her foot like a child deprived of their favorite snack. She grabs the tail of her dress and brusquely spins before being led out, carrying her jilted air with her. 

You resist a smile. Pride spools heavy in your chest. It’s almost like your souls are linked; your king’s never cared for rude nobles and their politics, mirroring your sentiment. 

He conquers the space between you in three measured strides. Pilfers the air from your lungs as electricity and pheromones spark between you, and you’re drawn into the ruinous stir of his eyes. 

Sensing the shift in the atmosphere, Tara dismisses herself with a bow, but not before discreetly nudging you in her retreat. Sylus barely acknowledges her, busy memorizing every detail of your face. Every tight breath slipping through your parted lips, every feathery flutter of your lashes.

You rapidly blink as if remembering where you are, keenly aware that the pair of you are alone. 

The king’s proximity throws you off-kilter. The earthy scent and comforting warmth he exudes permeate the thickened layers of your uniform, wrapping around your heart, squeezing, leaving you raw and exposed. Your jaw ticks.

His expression slackens, brows knitting in the inner corners, and he coyly cocks his head to one side. “Are you alright, dear friend?” The texture of his voice is gritty as sandpaper, yet it’s disarming in a way that leaves you weak-kneed with a heavy tongue.

“H-huh?” comes your foolish reply. You would kick yourself for how lovestruck you sound. 

Your king chuckles, a genuine sound reserved for hushed moments like these, tucked away from the prying eyes of his court. Your lips twitch before a slender finger pokes the space between your eyes, dispelling the dreamlike fog that once loomed overhead.

“I asked,” poke, “if you,” poke, “are feeling,” poke, “alright? You look a bit flustered.”

You swat his hand like an enraged feline, to which he chuckles, all manner of refinement thrown to the wolves. He’s as bratty as ever, a reflection of that child you once knew who’d shove you off the hill to be king of it. Who knew he’d grow to take an entire kingdom onto his shoulders?

You clear the phlegm from your throat, taking a step back, haughtiness meddling with your features as his hand falls listlessly at his side.

“I’m fine, Majesty. Though I’d be better if someone learned to keep his hands to himself.”

The monarch in question feigns innocence, blinking owlishly, a dramatic hand splayed over his heart. “What? I thought you liked it when I badgered you like this. When I kept you on your toes.”

You scowl, crossing your arms and impatiently tapping your foot. “Not when it borders sexual harassment. Need I remind you of your briefings, sir? Should we revisit them?”

He sputters, mortification descending on his face. You bite back a snicker. He’s much too handsome like this—playful, boyish, unguarded. An affectionate smile crests over his mouth when you let a bewitchingly sweet laugh slip. He takes a step forward, swaddling you in prickly static, dwarfing you by a good foot. Your traitorous heart thumps something wild, threatening to leap from your chest as the mirth melts from your face.  

“Would you believe that woman came here to coerce me into taking her daughter’s hand?” rasps your king, voice descending into a secret. 

You swallow, staring between his eyes, unconsciously leaning back. You nod when words fail you. Bristle as a set of spindly fingers creep down your forearm in pursuit of your hand, scorching through the fibers of your coat.  

Your breath catches whilst His Majesty brings your hand to his lips, and he kisses it with as much fervor as he did in the gardens. It’s a simple gesture. An innocent one that feels perverse in a way, burning down to your core, the molten heat creeping back up to take residence in your neck and face.

“The only hand I wish to hold,” he smooths his thumb over the notches of your knuckles like a blind man committing their texture to memory, “is this one.” Another brush of full lips makes you wince as if branded by a hot iron. 

It’s becoming increasingly difficult to breathe. Not with him so close, nor with the potency of his gaze drilling down to your soul. You wonder if he’s trying to kill you when he tugs you to him, a possessive hand falling to your hip. 

Whatever oxygen was left in your lungs abandons you in a sharp gasp, making way for a pleasant fuzziness and overwhelming heat. He snakes his arm around your waist before dipping you like the pair of you are waltzing, and your hand instinctively clasps around his shoulder to keep you from crumbling to the floor.  

Hooded eyes pan in, filling your vision with nothing but a beautiful wash of red. His stare centers in on your mouth, and he leans closer until your breaths intermingle, and your limbs feel like jelly, and you’re lightheaded, and…and—

You screw your eyes shut, pushing your palms against his catastrophically hard chest. He’s a dream forged by the Gods. Temptation sent to lure you astray.

“Majesty,” you gasp. You sound so incredibly pitiful, so breathless, and it makes you sick. “Majesty, please. You can’t—we can’t—” You twist your head, pillow-soft lips grazing your cheek instead of your mouth, pleasant tingles of sensation humming throughout your body.

“Can’t what?” he breathes, voice strained with the effort of containing himself whilst he roots his nose against the tender space behind your ear. He draws you closer against the hard press of his body whilst nosing along your jaw, ingesting the warm scent wafting off your skin.  

Your shoulder throbs beneath your uniform where two raw indentations reside. They’ve never truly healed after two years, the pain announcing itself in intimate quarters like this with your king. It’s a reminder of your anchor to him, to what truly lives beneath his skin. 

“The maids, the guards. What if—” You scramble for every excuse not to give in. Not to betray the oath you took to protect him. To always put him first, to never fall for him. “—what if someone sees us, Majesty?”

A bitten-off, barely there growl cleaves through your ramblings. Lithe fingers encase your jaw, coaxing you to look at your charge. A glacial thrill shoots through your body at the sight that greets you. White, mussed hair falls perfectly into his face, lips parted and glistening invitingly, eyes wrinkling with a mixture of anguish and yearning. He reminds you of something beastly, fighting to reign in his instincts. Fighting not to lose control. 

“You’ve known me for however long, yet you insist on calling me that.” 

He gathers your cheek into his pleasantly warm palm, angling your neck further back. You fight to keep your eyes open, your fingers curling into the fabric of his blazer. You’re spilling over the edge. Teetering over that blurry line between daydreams and reality. 

“I wish you would stop with the formalities. Majesty this, Your Majesty that.” Scoff. “Is this your way of shutting me out? Pushing me away?”

You haven’t the gall to tell him yes, too distracted by the flats of his nails dragging along your cheek, sweeping errant hair strands behind your ear. You shudder, and he pans in, your mouths but a whisker’s width apart.  

“If you carry on like this, I may have to punish you for your insolence.”

You suck in a breath at the underlying threat in his voice. Know it carries no weight. He’d never lay a finger on you outside of affection. But how wonderful it sounds, to be punished for your insubordination. 

Your noses brush, mouths ghosting over each other whilst careful fingers curl around your nape, scrawling through your hair. You fear that you might faint, the heat spooling in your belly threatening to burn through layers of flesh. You’re clutching the lapels of his jacket for dear life now. Torturing yourself, wanting to conquer what little space remains between your mouths and—

Forbidden. The accursed word echoes in your mind like the weighted chime of a church bell. It resounds so miserably in your mind, reminding you of your place. Your duty. You’re no noblewoman. No contender for his heart. 

“Please don’t,” you utter between a laugh and a sob. Begging is unbecoming of you, but when it comes to protecting your king and his crown, you would fall to your knees if you had to.

The body against yours stiffens. A pained sound tears through His Majesty’s chest, crackling like a hearth fire. You feel terrible for denying him again. For pushing him away like you always do. But many women regularly throw themselves at his feet, willing to ease his affliction—women of noble blood, of virtue. 

Grief furrows his brows, his eyes sweeping over your face. A forlorn smile touches his lips. He exhales loudly, shakily, his thumb cruising over the outward arc of your brow, his gaze tracking the gentle movement. 

“Of everything that resides within these walls, within this kingdom, you manage to elude me the most.” 

His eyes snap to yours, and you shiver beneath the weight they boast. He could easily flex his power over you. Command you to stay still while he ravages you. But that’s never been his style, has it? Another trait of his drawing you deeper into his spell. 

“Why do you run from me? Why do you continue to deny me? Why continue to deny yourself? I hear how your body calls to me. Your heartbeat, your scent. So ripe. So untainted.” 

The exasperation in his voice makes your stomach lurch. 

I’m not denying anyone, you wish to say. I just…I don’t know. I don’t—

“Where in the hells is he?!” a familiar voice ricochets through the empty hallway—your saving grace. Seems his advisor is on a rampage again. You’ve never wanted to kiss the eccentric man more.

“Impeccable timing as always,” sighs your king, rolling his eyes. He reluctantly releases you, his hands at your waist until your legs remember they are meant to support you. 

Just as you spring apart, and you begin smoothing out the wrinkles in your uniform, your hair spills in warm tendrils down your neck, puddling around your shoulders, water-falling from its usual coiffure.

You blink incredulously, taking note of the impish smirk canting the king’s lips. Something silver gleams in your periphery.

You watch with horror as he twirls your hairpin between dexterous fingers before bringing the warm, tarnished metal to his lips for a kiss. It’s an intimate sight. An image that makes a shiver wrack your spine, makes you dizzy, and you don’t know whether to be flattered or mortified. 

“Y-Your Majesty, give that back!”

The monarch in question chuckles something smoky, dangling the ornate pin out of reach when you swipe at it. He has an unfair advantage over you. You contemplate kicking him in his shin, figuring the risk of losing your foot is well worth it. 

Your breasts scrub against him as you struggle on tippy toes, clawing at your hairpin with the ferocity of a cat. And as your nipples knot beneath the rough glide of your uniform, you are reminded of the devastating press of His Majesty’s body.

By the Gods, it’s too much. You’re sure your face is all types of flustered now, heat spuming beneath your skin.

“My, my. Throwing yourself at your king like this. How scandalous,” he purrs, enjoying your plight a little too much. His twisted way of getting revenge for you staving off his advances. 

“Your Majesty, that is my mother’s,” you pant, taking a step back with beseeching eyes. 

He clicks his tongue, studying the pin as if it houses all the secrets to your bloodline. “That makes the spoils of victory that much sweeter.”

You watch with puffed up cheeks as he tucks the hairpin into his breast pocket, the jaded metal gleaming condescendingly at you. 

“Consider it collateral.”

For what, you haven’t the foggiest. 

With all the smugness of the world, your king brushes past you, his hands in his pockets. You stomp behind him, fighting to keep stride with his longer ones, clawing at his pocket when a moment presents itself. 

You try to sweep your hair into some semblance of neatness before the pair of you meet his advisor. Before curious eyes can form questions where there should be none. 

You hardly miss the enamored smile rounding his lips as he peers at you over his shoulder. 

“You lunatic,” you curse beneath your breath, barely concealing the hint of unguardedness inhabiting your voice.

— 

It all makes sense as you shackle his neck with a rusted collar. You can count on one hand how often you’ve had to do this in the past year. 

You step back after sliding your fingers over the stubble on his cheeks. His eyes harbor a deep sadness despite the smirk on his face, baring a pointed canine. 

“What? No muzzle this time?”

You scoff, kneeling before him, defiantly peering into his eyes, a harsh forefinger pressed between his pectorals. “If you keep talking, I’ll have one of the twins fetch it from the car.”

He chuckles at your brazenness. Leave it to him to try to lighten the mood in an atmosphere rife with tension. Thick with urgency, with fear. He tests the cuffs around his wrists and ankles, ensuring they won’t give too much when they’re put to the test later.

As if on autopilot, you reach out to ease sweat-slicked hair from his forehead, and he pauses, those brilliantly devastating eyes drinking you in. 

He swallows, studying the ground. For the first time in a long time, you’ve seen true fear stain your king’s visage. 

“One day, I won’t leave this cage as the man you know and love.”

You scoff, masking your anxiety as you placatingly pat his thigh. You stand, swiping his coat on the way up, dust speckling its sleeves. You have to be strong. You’re slowly falling apart at the seams but must remain fearless. He needs all the strength you can lend him right now.

You give him a quick look, a brief upward pull of your lips, before turning away from your king, the cage’s heavy door squealing shut behind you. You err in your steps when he calls your name. Slightly tilt your chin over your shoulder.

“When that day comes, I expect you to uphold your end of the bargain.”

Your grip on his coat tightens, jaw set in a terse line. “That day will never come,” you murmur, more to yourself than him, and you hurry up the sand-laden stairs towards the structure’s entrance. 

The twins address you with curt nods as you pass them on your way to the car. Night and soaring evergreens stretch overhead like a yawning beast. The moon peers through the treetops, sluggishly cresting its way to the center of the sky.

You sling His Majesty’s coat across the backseat. Stiffen when a familiar glint of silver catches your sight from behind his breast pocket. You grit your teeth, leaning against the car door to grant yourself a moment of respite.

“How do you stand this? Does it ever get any easier?” you recall Tara asking, her eyes glossing over with a thin film of tears as she squeezed your hands. 

She was still fresh to this lifestyle. To this harrowing secret lurking beneath the kingdom. You couldn’t blame her for being scared witless. No one wanted to see the king in pain. Only a handful of people knew of his true nature. What bubbled beneath his skin. 

It never does, you think, pushing off from the car and slamming the door shut. 

Your boots crunch soundly over dead grass and splintered twigs as you make your way back to the twins. You squeeze Kieran’s shoulder reassuringly, giving him a tight-lipped smile. He nods, his somberness hidden beneath the gaudy beak of his mask. 

It never gets easier, hearing him scream like that. Bloodcurdling and raw, reminiscent of a demon clawing its way from the hells. Hearing him call to you in a voice so broken, you feel its talons sinking into your heart. You’ve just grown more skilled at hiding your pain. Holding back your tears.

What good are you if you can’t even protect your liege from himself?

— tags: @f1c-recs, @mt2sssss, @samoankpoper21, @lovemesomesaltysylus

prologue | masterlist

[blackberreh-art]

The archives are a complete mess, but Michael's gotten down Gertrude's organization system (Or lack thereof) for the most part...

He knew this one, he was sure. He kept his attention diverted, eyes unfocused as he located it, careful not to take in any of the words.

It was about that yellow door. He remembered.

His heart raced, pounding in his chest as anxiety spiked.

Ignore it. Ignore it ignore it ignore it-

It hurts - he's unravelling, the very fabric of his body and soul splitting and pulling and tearing and he can't stop now, not when Gertrude depends on him - not when he's spent so long trying to find a place where he matters, where he's useful-he felt like he's been going mad for so long and its finally culminating in the complete annihilation of his very being-

He is unmade.

He is put together, and he is no longer himself.

Michael Shelley dies, and in his place, the Distortion Now Known As Michael seethes.

A new Archivist sits where Gertrude Robinson once did, and Michael hates him. It is sudden and unexpected, felt with such intensity it made it pause.

It was such a human emotion.

Michael hated it. Just as it hated the Archivist before it.

The hatred was, of course, misplaced. Jonathan Sims had done nothing to deserve such vitriol, at least not from Michael personally. But even still, Michael hated him, because Gertrude Robinson was no more, and all that remained of her was the position she left behind.

Misplaced human anger… It took too long to discard, making it all too easy to cause the Archivist pain with his silly little attack. Michael didn't set out to harm the Archivist. But still, this served as an efficient warning, it supposed.

Being in the Archives made it difficult. Something in Michael roiled and twisted in disgust, feeling far too thrilled to be within the halls of the Beholding. A greedy unseen gaze bore into it, trying to Know - just like how the Archivist looked at him right now, with wide, scared curious eyes-

Coming here was a mistake. Michael let its boredom, its interest, its curiosity sway him further away from its neutrality. Too alien a feeling, too human, too sickening -

It almost killed the Archivist. That�� would not do.

It wouldn't. Not yet.

Soon. Maybe. Soon.

[yandere-daydreams]

tw - modern!au, unhealthy relationships, obsessive behavior, nonconsensual touching, and stalking. written for a very lovely anonymous commissioner.

“I’ve been thinking about us, again.”

He was barely trying to whisper, his voice loud enough to earn several pointed looks from the people around you. You’d tried to put yourself at a distance from the rest of the class, to sit in a deserted corner of the near-empty lecture hall, but he wouldn’t have cared if you were in the first row. That was something you’d had to learn quickly about him – Kunikuzushi was shameless at the best of times, actively vitriolic at the worst. Your public humiliation wasn’t just a pleasant side-effect of his company, but an active goal he was striving towards during every minute you spent together.

“You don’t have to look so worried – if I was going to break up with you, you’d know.” You kept your eyes trained on the lecturer, your expression schooled to practiced disinterest, but his voice lulled like you’d broken into tears. You felt him shift that much closer to you – his thigh pressing into yours. “I just don’t think we spend enough time together. I know, I know, we’re both busy, but still. If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were avoiding me.”

You were. Just last week, you’d spent two hours locked in your bedroom closet – lights off and knees pulled into your chest – because Kuni had somehow gotten your address and decided it would be a good use of his time to loiter on your doorstep and refuse to leave until you came out. You planned your day-to-day schedule meticulously to make sure it would never bleed into his, went out of your way not to have to go where you knew he would be, but there was only so much you could do to get away from someone willing to blow off his classes and skip work just to spend the better part of a day sending you candid pictures from one of his countless burner phones. You could only be thankful he was too caught up in his own delusions to ever let his obsession turn violent. Lashing out at you for never acknowledging whatever relationship he thought you were in would be akin to admitting you didn’t have a relationship at all, he would never do that.

He took up your hand, his fingers soon intertwined with yours. You tried, weakly, to pull away from him, but he only let out a breathy chuckle, his head soon resting on your shoulder. Compared to how he’d acted when you first met – standoffish, bristly, constantly on the verge of losing his temper – he was practically a touch-starved puppy, happy so long as he could sit in your lap and bask in your attention, positive or negative.

If only you’d ever wanted a pet.

“I don’t know why I can’t just come out and say it.” Another laugh, a playful squeeze to your hand. “I think we should move in together.”

You snapped in his direction, your knees jolting against the bottom of your desk and earning a few pointed glares. After mouthing a sheepish apology, you dug your nails into the back of his hand, keeping your voice as low as possible. “Kuni, I— I don’t think that’s—”

“Don’t think it’s practical?” Predictably, he cut you off. “I knew you’d say that. If it wasn’t for me, you wouldn’t be able to find the nerve to leave your apartment.” You felt his smile against the dip of your shoulder, then the crook of your neck as he nuzzled against you. “I’ve already handled it. By the time that moron—“ He rolled his eyes towards your professor. “—shuts up, everything should be taken care of.”

You felt something heavy and sharp drop into the pit of your stomach. “But, you don’t have a key—”

“I made myself a key a couple weeks ago – got tired of waiting for you to offer. I love you, babe, but you’re too timid for your own good.” His grin, pressed the curve of your throat. “You can thank me later on, after I’ve shown you our new place.”

His hand fell to your thigh, just a touch too high not to trigger some buried, primal instinct inside of you. You didn’t think, didn’t hesitate – bolting upward and tearing yourself away from him. Your chair scaped against the tile floor, your palms slamming against the desk, and in an instant, every pair of eyes in the lecture hall were on you. The professor scowled in your direction, his ire tangible. “Do you have something to say, (L/n)?”

You opened your mouth, but your mouth was dry, your throat suddenly swollen shut. Your gaze fell back to Kuni – his smile still wide and his eyes still so, so dark.

Wordlessly, you shook your head and collapsed back into your seat. As the lecture picked back up and all concentration was returned to the front of the rom, Kuni latched onto you once again, his hold twice as strong and twice as suffocating as it had been.

It was almost a comfort to know that, this time, there wasn’t anything you could do to get away from him.

[syndrossi]

Okay, this takes place shortly after the NYE prompt for Daemon bearing down on Winterfell to reclaim his boys. Daemon's chosen backstory for full Cersei unhingedness is that he's Rhaegar Targaryen and he survived the Trident to join his family in exile in Essos.

x~x~x

“I am told you begged for an audience.”

It had been so long since Cersei had last heard him speak, the prince she had longed to marry so long ago. She did not count his battle cry in the yard as dragonflame poured from the sky to roast Robert like the beady-eyed boar of a man he was—that had been the furious roar of a dragon come to reclaim his crown.

Rhaegar’s voice had been warm honey before, enough to melt a girl from the inside, and his purple eyes dark and deep, wounded in a way that only she could heal. Handsome men and pretty boys had come and gone from court over the years, but all had paled beside the memory of his beauty.

The sadness was absent from his eyes now, which were both lighter and harder. They burn. Just as she had come to burn over the years with every new insult and indignity visited upon her by her brute of a husband. They had both changed. She was no longer that girl who longed to soothe away his heartache.

I want to burn with him.

“I did, Your Grace,” she said, taking a daring step to see what might come of it.

Rhaegar simply watched, unmoving, the suspicion in gaze lending a hardness to his features that did not lessen their beauty. The years made Robert ugly and fat, but he is as a sharpened blade.

He had heirs now to replace those her father’s men had butchered—the boys that Ned Stark had so laughably claimed as his own. Robert had proved the greater fool in believing him, as though Aemon did not look like Rhaegar reborn.

They should have been mine. She would not have sullied his dragon’s blood with dark-haired children as Elia Martell had, or whatever foreign whore from across the Narrow Sea he had been forced to claim as a bride. Or Lyanna Stark.

It was not too late, though. She was young enough to give him more, and secure her own children’s safety. He may demand that Joffrey go to the Wall. But he would be alive, her sweet son. Myrcella was the right age to wed either of his heirs, Baelon or Aemon, and be queen herself someday, a mother of dragons. And Tommen is so young, he is no threat.

Her father was an old man now and still lacked an heir. Perhaps Tommen could be the next lord of Casterly Rock, should Rhaegar decide to strip House Baratheon of Storm’s End.

“Speak, then,” he said, his eyes continuing to burn into her.

“You are without a wife,” she said, drawing nearer to him with each step.

Her dresses had been moved to the guest hall before the wagons had burned, thankfully, and she was wearing one of her favorites: a deep ruby with sleeves of black silk, the bodice heavy and glittering with black pearls and onyx beads. She had worn it on the days that she decided she would lay with Jaime, the Targaryen colors an act of defiance that never penetrated Robert’s thick skull.

“And you would present yourself as an option?” His mouth twisted faintly. “Your husband’s ashes have not fully flown Winterfell yet.”

“My marriage to your cousin was not of my choosing,” she said. He was close enough to touch, if she dared, and she dropped her eyes for a moment, wondering whether he would be enticed by wounded prey—or if he preferred the lion. “It was my duty to my house, nothing more.”

“A house of traitors.”

The vitriol in his voice was enough to make her glance up, startled. It is to be expected, she reminded herself. My father’s betrayal then threatens to doom our house now. How fitting that she should be the one who could save it.

“My heart never wavered,” she said, touching a hand to his arm. She could feel the firm muscle beneath, that of a swordsman. He was the equal of Ser Arthur Dayne. Even in this, Jaime cannot compare. “I was meant to be your queen. Our fathers chose differently, and the realm burned.”

“I will burn the realm again.”

His growl was low and deep, nothing like those haunting songs she remembered, but it shuddered through her with the same intensity. Every inch of her skin felt hot and she wanted desperately to feel his, to see if it burned like hers—like a dragonlord’s must.

She thought about riding him and feeling that heat deep within—and of riding atop his dragon, of soaring above the world and watching the people below mill about like ants.

Cersei was not a dream-addled girl any longer, nor a blushing maid. She had learned to take what she wanted, as Robert had always taken what he wanted. And Rhaegar had known women before her, and taken them too.

Why should he not have seized the Stark girl and been rid of her after the thrill had waned? For all Robert’s drunken weeping, it was no different than what would have happened once he’d wedded her. Rather than Cersei, it would have been his beloved Lyanna suffering an endless parade of whores and bastards.

“Take me as your queen.” She guided his hand to the swell of her breast, longing to drag it lower. “The Westerlands and the Stormlands will flock to your banner.”

His other hand moved faster than she could blink, closing around her wrist in a bone-bruising grip. “Cowards and traitors. What need have I of their allegiance?” He ripped his hand free of hers. “Know this, Lannister. I will burn Casterly Rock and Storm’s End. I will burn the Riverlands and the Vale. I will make a pyre of those who dared take my son from me.”

Her pulse pounded in her throat, equal parts terror and desire, as he leaned in close. “Pray to your Seven that I do not decide to throw you upon it as well.”

[marichild]

satosugu fics i entreat everyone to read

these are just some of the amazing fics I’ve read! I highly recommend every single one to my fellow satosugu lovers. you won’t regret it, I promise.

Carry Me Home by @valleykey [58.4k, completed, T]

The boy shifts on his feet. “The year is two thousand and eighteen? Common Era?” Slowly, smile still plastic on his face, Suguru faces Satoru. This fucking dumbass. “Satoru,” he says, dangerous edge to his voice, “what did you do?” Satoru makes some bastardization of a sound, half between a laugh and a cough.  “...Whoops?”  “I,” Suguru grits, pinching two fingers together, “am this close to mass murder.” He’s joking.  Probably.  ///OR: Shortly before Geto would have massacred a village, he and Gojo are thrust eleven years forward into a would-have-been future that Geto is conspicuously absent from.

愛のある場所; river of light (that brings me to you) by @yuzudetergent [66.8k, completed, T]

A lesson in love is a lesson in swimming. Except for Suguru, it's getting dropped into the deep end with the tide licking at his neck, no kickboard or life preserver keeping him afloat. (Or: This is how Satoru finds the ocean.)

achilles, only the dead stay seventeen forever by getou_suguru (dheiress) [7.9k, ongoing, T]

He looks like a little kid, insouciant and irreverent, smiling at you like that. This is how you want to remember him. “Winter snow melts into Spring, of course!” You open your mouth to laugh and laugh and laugh and— His breath tastes, inexplicably, like spun sugar and honey on your tongue.  (Gojou Satoru is not a God, not yet. But He will be and you think (you know) that you will be  the first to kneel in worship and offer Him your blood, your flesh. Build Him a temple inside the circle of your arms until He sinks inside your ribcage, there to dwell safe and sound and beating just for you.)  ((Pay attention, now. This is a story about how a boy—the Hallowed one, the enlightenment of all, the one who rose high above others, the one and only—fell.))

Always an Angel (Never a God) by 0atmlk [44.6k, ongoing, M]

"The first time I saw the sunset here, I wanted to send you a picture."  Suguru looked at him, surprised. "Why didn't you?"  "Because I knew you’d been here before on your own, it was probably something you'd seen plenty of times." Satoru paused. "But I almost did. Opened it and everything to send to you. Then I saw the date of the last message you sent. We were pushing year three. So I didn't." . . .  Suguru finds Satoru at fifteen. Satoru finds him at twenty-eight.

I’m Sorry: In Various Translations by @koifishscribbles [45.9k, ongoing, M]

The coffee in Satoru’s stomach curdles. He feels the weight of every one if those eight years roll through his entire body like an earthquake. All the missed sleep clings to his eyes, and the unsent texts threaten to erupt from his mouth. Getou Suguru. It is not that his stitches unravel. Those took years to craft, cinched with vitriol, and won’t be undone in a single moment. It’s his very being that unspools onto the dirty linoleum floor. He wants Suguru to pick him up and untangle the length of him. His fingers once again becoming familiar as they expertly craft him into something new, better.  —— Gojo Satoru has not seen his ex, Getou Suguru, since college. Until he shows up one day teaching in the classroom across the hall from him.

an anthology of bad ideas by ilovegetosuguru [9.5k, completed, gen]

Gojo panics and asks a very attractive stranger to be his fake boyfriend for a wedding.  Here’s the problem — there’s no wedding.  (Fake Dating AU)

april pink by @valleykey [3k, completed, gen]

“Dude,” Satoru says, first thing off the train, glasses sliding down, wide eyes peering over the rim, “you have, like, flowers. In your lungs.” “Oh really,” Suguru says, dry, “I hadn't noticed.”

Puppet On A String by @killjoyproductions [6.8k, completed, E]

“Huh,” he muses. “Are you… saving yourself for marriage?”  “Nope.”  “Are you asexual?”  Satoru shakes his head. “I’m not asexual, just a virgin.”

Autonomic Breath by finalproject [10.9k, completed, E]

She turns to Satoru and asks, "When did you know?"

Lies That Bind by Anonymous [48.1k, ongoing, E]

“Really now,” Gakuganji snorted, doubtful. “How convenient. Who is this alpha, then?” And of course, Satoru had seen that question coming as soon as his claim of having a mate was halfway out of his mouth, but by that point he was already talking and it was too late to stop. “So nosy.” He wagged his finger in a tut-tut motion in the geezer’s face, watching him turn a horrible shade of angry red. “It’s Geto Suguru, of course.” Satoru's sick and tired of all the higher-ups insisting he needs to find an alpha and settle down just because he's an omega, and the simple lie that Suguru is his mate seems like the easiest way to get some peace and quiet. What could go wrong?

like the tides, never standing still. by antepuer [1.1k, completed, T]

“I fucking hate it sometimes.” Suguru taps the ash off and looks at him. Puppy-dog eyes, has no idea what Satoru refers to, but it would be far from the first time. “What do you mean?” “Being queer.” He finally admits. “It fucking sucks.”

once we have sufficiently tortured one another by irrevenance [4.6k, completed, E]

Suguru’s throat goes dry. “You’re no longer a sorcerer,” he realizes, a hysterical laugh bubbling in his throat in response to the sick joke that has laid itself before him. “And you came to me?” “Yes,” Satoru says pleasantly. “What will you do about it,” and here he lowers both his eyelashes and his tone, a mockery of seduction, “Getou-sama?”

the dream house by irrevenance [6.1k, completed, E]

Suguru adopts two little girls, marries Satoru, and becomes a teacher. It’s not enough.

where shall we go tomorrow? by elivellichor [15k, ongoing, T]

“Who the hell are you, and what the fuck do you want from me?” a raspy voice hisses, breath on the shell of his ear, knocking Suguru out of his daze. Suguru tilts his chin up to better meet his pursuit face to face and goes breathless. Enraged and fiery cerulean eyes stare down at him with a twisted expression. This child is undeniably Gojo Satoru. He can’t imagine any other with a disposition so fiery and confrontational.  Or: an indulgent age-regression fic featuring One (1) Baby Gojo Satoru and One (1) Very Tired Geto Suguru feat. healing <3

Caesura by @cielelyse [85.5k, completed, M]

The first time they meet, Suguru and Satoru do not like each other. Arrogant, cocky, insufferable, they think. Despite the smirks Shoko gives Suguru, or the sighs Yaga gives Satoru, they do not like each other. Until a mission changes that.

it's not gay unless the domains touch by @hollow-lime-green [40.2k, completed, E]

Funny thing is, when you put up walls made of infinity, you don’t expect people to start slipping in. And you certainly don’t expect to start wanting them to. Gojo Satoru never had a chance to get used to people touching him. Suguru gets that, and he’s happy to help. That’s what good friends do, right? Alternatively: Geto Suguru is the most oblivious man alive.

two sorcerers chillin' in a hot tub (five feet apart cause they’re not gay) by @hollow-lime-green

Geto Suguru has almost two decades of practice pretending not to see things that are clearly there, and Gojo Satoru has a well-documented history of being the most socially-stunted motherfucker alive. That’s how they got here. That’s also why neither of them know where the hell they’re going with this.

BONUS! Baby Mine by @seaemberthesecond

There was something just slightly off in every interaction between Gojo-sensei and Fushiguro and once Yuji’d begun to notice it, he couldn’t unsee it. It wasn’t a bad kind of off – at least he didn’t think so – but it was just different from the way either of them acted around everyone else. * Or, Yuji's journey to discovering that Megumi is Gojo's baby boy, featuring: an insane amount of simping, the mundane indignities of being a parent, and a lot of Yuji snooping in places he really shouldn't be.

(aka, that fic I go back to all the time. gojo being megumi’s dad will never not be one of my favorite things ever.) (clearly)

[space-mango-company]

Stranger | Chapter 4

Chapter Links: [1], [2], [3], [4], [5]

TW: Mentions of Cannibalism, Choking

Tags: Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen x Atreides!Reader, Arranged Marriage, Eventual Smut, POV Second Person, No use of y/n, Original Characters, Canon What Canon

Word Count: 1.4k

A/N: Ok, so clearly I'm a big fat liar. I'm sorry this chapter also took ages. I think I'm just a slow writer lmao. Anyway, it was fun writing this so I hope you guys enjoy it. As always, thanks for all the lovely comments I appreciate them a lot. Take care and have a good one!

"Where is he?" you snarl as you march through the halls gripping Iassa's choker. "Where is the na-Baron?" Your voice a threat.

"He is doing his morning drills, my lady," Zora, your new servant chases after you, growing increasingly panicked, "he trains with the Warmaster."

You pick up your pace, "Take me to him." When Zora hesitates, you yell, "Now!"

When you arrive, Feyd-Rautha is sparring with who you assume to be the Harkonnen Warmaster in a shallow recessed pit in the center of the training room.

"Where is she?" you call from the doorway, your voice filled with vitriol.

Your unexpected presence catches Feyd-Rautha off-guard and his sparring partner manages to cut his right abdomen through his shield. He growls at the Warmaster and snaps his head to you, "I am preoccupied at the moment, my lady."

"Where is Iassa?" your glare pierces through him.

"Who?" he asks genuinely confused.

Your grip on the choker tightens, "Don't pretend. The servant girl assigned to me. You left this in my room, didn't you?" The realization he had snuck into your quarters while you were asleep quietly creeps on you. "What have you done with her."

"Ah," he tilts his head, ignoring his bleeding wound, "I thought about just cutting her tongue out." A smirk grows on his lips, "but my darlings were hungry."

It was only then you noticed his concubines in the room, lounging in a corner of pillows. Their sharp-toothed grins only stoked your fury.

You scoff in anger, "because she revealed your farce? Are you so insecure?"

Is cocky expression evolves into a glare. "Leave us," he orders, eyes staying on yours. Servants flood out of the room asking with the Warmaster but it seems his pets were exempt from this command. "Why do you cry for a girl you knew less than two days?"

He was right. Why do you care so much? You were hardly 'close' with Iassa. You've had servants on Caladan and you were never particular with any of them. Would you anger for them the same way? Why must you suddenly be a paragon of justice? And at the risk of the Harkonnens' contempt?

When you remain speechless, the na-Baron continues, "You may not be familiar with slaves but here, their death is inconsequential—save for the economics of it all."

"Is that so?" You look at his pets then back at him. Your breath is dragon-like and your tone hardens, "then relieve your concubines."

"What?" Feyd-Rautha's low voice echoes through the room. His concubines hiss at you from their raised platform.

You stand taller, shoulders back, still clutching Iassa's choker in your hand, "If I am to be your wife, I demand you take no other women."

He takes a moment to determine how serious you are being, then decides it doesn't matter. He walks up the steps surrounding the pit and you aren't given time to react before he has your neck in his grip. "You are in no place to demand such things, Atreides." His black gritted teeth at the last word match the darkness of his voice.

Your hands fly to claw at his wrist, "How dare you lay a hand on me." You struggle against his unrelenting grip, "Let go of me!"

He leans down to your ear, "You're a feisty one, aren't you, little hawk?" You feel his hold continue to tighten and panic rises in your chest. Before you can be rendered speechless, you make a decision.

"UNHAND ME."

The Voice echos from your mouth seizing Feyd-Rautha's mind and his hand releases your throat. As you gasp desperately for air, he attempts to recover from the haze of the mental intrusion. When he finds his bearings, you see the thrill in his dark eyes. Witch, you can almost hear him say.

"Aren't you just full of surprises," he smirks.

"And I will have many more," you say bitterly. Straightening your dress, you regain your self-assured stance and meet his eyes with a cold stare, "Be rid of your harpies before we are wed or I will kill them myself."

You don't spare his concubines a glance as you turn to leave. You don't see the way Feyd-Rautha looks at you, head tilted, as you storm off.

You dismiss Zora and lock yourself in your chambers. Sprawled out on your bed, you stare up at the dark gray ceiling and question what could have possibly possessed you to challenge Feyd-Rautha the way you did. You go back and forth on whether or not it was an overreaction but eventually chalk it up to the Atreides' fiery defiance. Certainly, it wasn't the brightest decision but you sense that your father and brother would not have condemned it. Your heart is still pounding from the encounter. And the flicker in Fey-Rautha's eyes—you dismiss the idea that he might have enjoyed it.

You had hoped to hide your mother's training for longer. She had trained you and Paul in The Voice and Prana-Bindu. As a high-born lady, you could have been sent to a Bene Gesserit School in your formative years, but it was decided against due to Baron Vladimir's thinly veiled aversion to The Sisterhood. So, Lady Jessica resolved to teach you in secret. You were grateful for it anyway as you didn't have to be separated from your family. You think about how your mother would be able to continue to train Paul without you. You had always been more adept at The Voice than him. Now, he has the opportunity to surpass you. The thought triggers your competitiveness against your sibling but the feeling quickly melts into melancholy. You miss him. You miss all of them.

Is this to be your life? Married to a twisted psycho who feeds his concubines human flesh and kills people you care about? You sit up and place Iassa's choker carefully in the drawer of your nightstand. You hoped she didn't fear you as she did the Harkonnens.

Your thoughts are interrupted by a knock at the door. You had really hoped no one would bother you for the rest of the day but then you feel the emptiness in your stomach. You had skipped breakfast that day to confront the na-Baron. When you open the door, Zora is holding a covered tray which you assumed, and hoped, to be lunch.

"Would my lady like to eat in solitude?" she asks after she sets your meal at the small table in your quarters. Your heart sinks. She is so young.

"Ah no, I would like you to stay if that's alright." You sit at your table and cut into your food while Zora stands politely to the side. "I'm sorry for yelling at you earlier. The na-Baron—my fiancé—he has caused me some aggravation."

"It is quite alright, my lady," she says, her head bowed low.

After your meal, you ask Zora to fetch you various projections on the planet of Giedi Prime from the Harkonnen archives. You were hesitant to make the request considering the fate of your last servant but you hoped you managed to convince Feyd-Rautha you were not to be trifled with. Besides, what harm could you do by learning about flora and fauna.

You spent the rest of the day watching informative holograms about your new home's ecology and biodiversity. Apparently, one of the planet's greatest exports is wood from the Pilingitam tree which is prized for its pliability when freshly cut but sturdy hardness once aged and dried. It was also anti-fungal and naturally fire-resistant. It was a surprise you didn't see much of it. Everything in the fortress was cold stone and concrete. You wonder how beautiful furniture made out of Pilingitam must be when carved by a skilled artist.

That night, you make sure to lock your door and fall asleep to images of sprawling landscapes.

The following day was similarly spent, watching projections about Giedi Prime's geographical features. You were left undisturbed save for Zora's quiet knocks on your door to serve your meals. Your life as a baroness is days away so you might as well educate yourself. Although, you suppose you should probably focus on politics and history more than the planet's Obsidian Planes but you weren't really in the mood to learn of the Harkonnens' gruesome past right now. You would cross that bridge when you got there.

Come evening, you hear an unfamiliar knock at your door. Zora had already brought you dinner earlier so you are wary as you crack open the door.

"Hello, little hawk." Feyd-Rautha's tall figure looms past the doorway.

You stare him down, making no move to let him in.

He tilts his head slightly, "Would you really kill my darlings?"

Chapter Links: [1], [2], [3], [4], [5]

Taglist: @torchbearerkyle @austinswhitewolf @dreamlandcreations @emeraldsgirl @strawberryfieldsforevermore @bornslippys @vexis-world @aoi-targaryen @alexandrainlove

[lockjawmotif]

vitriol halls: 1

Four days.

It's been four days since you woke up here with four strangers.

You still don't know much about them, really.

You know their first names but not their last, or even if they have any. You know you're the youngest, but not by how much. You don't even know where they're from, other than the fact that they're clearly not from where you're from.

From what you can gather, Emily is the closest. Sure, she's seventy years or so in the past, fashion wise, but vintage clothes aren't the strangest thing you've seen. Not when Delmonico is wearing a cloak of red fur and raven feathers. Not when Anya is married to a half orc. Not when Scratch… well, everything about Scratch is more than enough to understand she's not like you.

You're tired. You've been tired for four days, since you first opened your eyes to the dark, damp hallways of this nightmarish place.

They never seemed to end, bending back on each other in impossible ways at impossible angles, tangling together and practically devouring themselves, devouring you, eating you and your companions alive. Well, companions was a strong term. Fellow mice in the maze, fellow bites in the gullet, fellow shits in the sewer drain.

"Caspian," Someone murmurs, forcing you to finally admit you're awake, cracking open one eye to squint up at the face leaning over you. "Come on, food's ready."

You exhale, sitting up slowly. Your back hurts.

"How'd you sleep?" Emily asks.

"I want to kill myself, for one thing," You respond, calmly. "Or Delmonico."

Delmonico chuckles from where he's hunched over the fire. "Sorry sweetcheeks."

You don't respond to that, hauling yourself to your feet. Emily helps steady you, and you sigh, cracking each of your joints as loudly as you can, glancing around the fire, taking in everyone's state.

Emily looks about as exhausted as you feel. Her wig sits carefully on her head as always, but her dress is wrinkled, and her makeup is smeared. Her housewife display is faultering, but as she catches your eye, she pushes her shoulders back and pushes her jaw out.

Anya looks fine, about as fine as she did when you all first woke up, at least. She's brushing her hair, the soft waves no longer braided with beads and jewelry, but still soft looking. You don't like Anya much, but you have to admit her vanity has a basis in reality. She is unfortunately, once you get past the beard and the fact she's no more than three feet tall, very pretty.

Scratch is chewing on a cigarette you'd given her a couple days before. She doesn't smoke it- she knows you only have a couple left, just gnaws on it. Her short white hair sticks straight up, and she isn't wearing her sunglasses, making her look so much more deranged and less intimidating than usual, her Terminator-like build shrunken in on itself as she stokes the fire.

Delmonico, on the other hand, seems to take up the whole hall, his massive figure casting shadows that swallow everything. His wild mane of dark hair falls down his back, and his open shirt is rolled up to reveal the methodical, parallel scars on his forearms. He catches you looking and winks, giving you a smile that seems almost taunting.

You ignore him.

A few hours later, you've all packed up and begun walking, in the same direction you'd been travelling in the night before. You're not sure it was night, really. You're not sure of much.

The walls all look the same, crumbling stone brick with an occasional torch. You're not sure how the torches are burning still, but you assume it's whatever bullshit magic brought you here in the first place.

After an hour or so, Delmonico stretches dramatically, reaching his arms over his head, and opens his mouth to speak.

Scratch cuts him off with a raised hand.

"Did you guys hear that?" She hisses, and you feel your stomach plunge. The monsters in this hellscape are fast, and you don't know if you're ready to run right now.

"Hear what?" Anya asks, a little too loud, and Emily thumps her on the shoulder with the back of her hand.

"I heard something… footsteps?"

You wrap your hands around the pocket knife you carry with you. It won't do much, you know, but as you hear the gentle tapping finally come into earshot, you decide to go out swinging.

And then the footsteps pause, just around the corner up ahead, and there's a complete, total silence, broken only by the hiss of Delmonico drawing his knife.

"Oh, if I come out, you mustn't attack!"

You all freeze, staring at the darkness. You almost expect a gnome to pop out, but there's nothing.

"Who's there?" Anya asks, again, a little too loudly. "Come out with your hands up!"

Around the corner creeps two pale hands, followed by the sleeves of a heavy grey overcoat, and then…

"Rat man." Delmonico says simply, sheathing his knife again.

"Ah! I am a goblin, actually-" The rat headed… thing says in a very helpful tone. "-There's quite a difference!"

Delmonico hums, a crooked grin resting on his lips as he clearly thinks something very mean.

"Hi," Emily starts. "I'm Emily, this is Caspian-"

"And Anya and Delmonico and Scratch!" The goblin says jovially. "My name is The One Who Hides! You may call me Hide!"

You all sit in silence for a moment, just staring at it in befuddelment. It seems utterly unbothered.

"How do you… how do you know our names?" You ask, when it seems abundantly clear no one else will.

"Oh, I know lots about you five, don't you worry!" It wiggles its very humanlike fingers playfully.

"That's… what?"

"What?"

You glance at the others, who seem as baffled and concerned as you, with the exception of Delmonico, who looks just as cruelly amused as he always does.

You don't like Delmonico very much.

[leftistfeminista]

Trolls Used Her Face to Make Fake Porn. There Was Nothing She Could Do.

Sabrina Javellana was a rising star in local politics — until deepfakes derailed her life.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/31/magazine/sabrina-javellana-florida-politics-ai-porn.html

Most mornings, before walking into City Hall in Hallandale Beach, Fla., a small city north of Miami, Sabrina Javellana would sit in the parking lot and monitor her Twitter and Instagram accounts. After winning a seat on the Hallandale Beach city commission in 2018, at age 21, she became one of the youngest elected officials in Florida’s history. Her progressive political positions had sometimes earned her enemies: After proposing a name change for a state thoroughfare called Dixie Highway in late 2019, she regularly received vitriolic and violent threats on social media; her condemnation of police brutality and calls for criminal-justice reform prompted aggressive rhetoric from members of local law enforcement. Disturbing messages were nothing new to her.

The morning of Feb. 5, 2021, though, she noticed an unusual one. “Hi, just wanted to let you know that somebody is sharing pictures of you online and discussing you in quite a grotesque manner,” it began. “He claims that he’s one of your ‘guy friends.’”

Javellana froze. Who could have sent this message? She asked for evidence, and the sender responded with pixelated screenshots of a forum thread that included photos of her. There were comments that mentioned her political career. Had her work drawn these people’s ire? Eventually, with a friend’s help, she found a set of archived pages from the notorious forum site 4chan. Most of the images were pulled from her social media and annotated with obscene, misogynistic remarks: “not thicc enough”; “I would breed her”; “no sane person would date such a stupid creature.” But one image further down the thread stopped her short. She was standing in front of a full-length mirror with her head tilted to the side, smiling playfully. She had posted an almost identical selfie, in which she wore a brown crew-neck top and matching skirt, to her Instagram account back in 2015. “It was the exact same picture,” Javellana said of the doctored image. “But I wasn’t wearing any clothes.”

There were several more. These were deepfakes: A.I.-generated images that manipulate a person’s likeness, fusing it with others to create a false picture or video, sometimes pornographic, in a way that looks authentic. Although fake explicit material has existed for decades thanks to image-editing software, deepfakes stand out for their striking believability. Even Javellana was shaken by their apparent authenticity.

“I didn’t know that this was something that happened to everyday people,” Javellana told me when I visited her earlier this year in Florida. She wondered if anyone else had seen the photos or the abusive comments online. Several of the threads even implied that people on the forum knew her. “I live in Broward County,” one comment read. “She just graduated from FIU.” Other users threatened sexual violence. In the days that followed, Javellana became increasingly fearful and paranoid. She stopped walking alone at night and started triple-checking that her doors and windows were locked before she slept. In an effort to protect her personal life, she made her Instagram private and removed photographs of herself in a bathing suit.

Discovering the images changed how Javellana operated professionally. Attending press events was part of her job, but now she felt anxious every time someone lifted their camera. She worried that public images of her would be turned into pornography, so she covered as much of her body as she could, favoring high-cut blouses and blazers. She knew she wasn’t acting rationally — people could create new deepfakes regardless of how much skin she showed in the real world — but changing her style made her feel a sense of control. If the deepfakes went viral, no one could look at how she dressed and think that she had invited this harassment.

[1800titz]

BROKEN BOTTLES OPEN WOUNDS | SCISSION (the first part)

4.6ᴋ ᴏɴ ᴘᴀᴛʀᴇᴏɴ

ex!proffesor Harry

ᴄʜᴇᴄᴋ ᴏᴜᴛ ᴛʜᴇ ʀᴇꜱᴛ ᴏꜰ ᴛʜᴇ ᴘᴀᴛʀᴇᴏɴ ᴍᴀꜱᴛᴇʀʟɪꜱᴛ : ᴍᴀɪɴ ᴍᴀꜱᴛᴇʀʟɪꜱᴛ

“Boy or girl?” is what you ask on a Tuesday. That’s a new thing— he comes in on Tuesdays now, and Fridays. Sometimes, Saturdays. Through the window, the sky is barely in that fading tip-over from the polychrome tarp of gold and magenta— the one that blooms when daylight creaks on its hinges. He’s on his third drink. You’ve grown to recognize the pattern between, here— the shape his mouth makes, like a grimace but not quite, the way the bottom of the glass clinks against the counter when he sets it down. The way his ring finger scuffs the wood. Taps. One, two. And then— That look in his eyes.

preview

Harry comes back for his wallet, but that’s no blindside. 

It’s the last time you expect to see him around these parts (it won’t be), and he’s wearing a navy wool overcoat with a hand buried in his pocket. 

You know what he’s here for before he goes looking. Tell him, left it on the counter, and procure it from behind the scraped up, metal cash drawer that gets stuck and locks up on itself every other use. Hand it off, and your fingers brush across the node of striated goat leather (too nice to belong to someone here)— his are cold (long, thick, massive, like the breadth of his palm)— and he peels the wallet apart with a downcast gaze, prodding into its nooks and crannies with his eyes. Maybe making sure that all that was there is still there. 

Only, he doesn’t probe into the long seam where the cash is tucked, doesn’t look where he should, if he should be looking. He just holds it open and stares. From this angle, nothing is fathomable from under his long, dark lashes, the unseemly, placid mold of his eyebrows. 

He pulls a tenner out from the gaping pocket with his thumb and forefinger. Slides it across the countertop into your direction and tells you, “Thanks, sweetheart,” thick and low. Blunt; impassive. Your sine qua non in wrinkled green. 

Maybe the worst revelation, in all of this, is that he’s handsome. Undeniably; unfitting and perfect to slot back into the timorous groove of this— your timeline. Charming in the unsmiling domain of his visage, the dismissive mystique…

He was cute, back then. Older, something to ogle in front of the board from the other end of the lecture hall. Conventionally, maybe only surface-level for the rest, but he harbored this magnetism in the form of rejection, even in all the ugly of his mean. 

(Your faulty, crackled pole— chipped— drawn to be near. Broken, scratched up, fragment, leaning towards anything that vaguely resembled the shape of repudiation.)

“Do you remember me?” you bluster, and the moment his eyes crawl up your face (creased, brows notched, the hints of a frown scraping at the corners of your mouth), you want to gnaw off your tongue. 

When he swallows, his Adam’s apple bobs in his throat. So much vitriol out of that mouth, vile, mean, and you wonder if the words still linger there like sediment at the bottom of a lake. The faintest pleat of a furrow draws its imprint between his eyebrows. 

“Should I?”

It comes up before you can eat it back down. Sticks to your throat and itches its way out at the way his inkpools settle on you, so unwavering. Focused— clarity, hypervigilance, something, yesterday, submerged behind a dew across his eyes (suffocated in the deluge of amber). 

“I was in your class. English Lit, years ago.” 

His mouth purses. He bobs his head. It’s nonchalant— an as polite I don’t know you as can be mustered.

“Saw a lot of faces in English Lit, years ago.” 

You chew into your cheek. It’s still bright out, chalk-white through the windows, and it chisels the edges of his scruff, from behind, in the dark nook of the bar. Along the air, you see little pieces of dust floating, clinging to the light. You open your mouth. Close it.

“I came to your office hours with my extra credit, and you… made me cry.” 

It feels… humiliating. The kind of confession that should’ve stayed buried, with broken plates and ghosts in your closet. Awkward when he stares down at you from the bridge of his nose, bemused, gears turning, and then—

A spark, an arc, galvanism, in a blistering lightning shock. His eyes narrow. List. Refocus, with the buoyancy of recognition lost over the surface of a murky apathy. His mouth purses.

“A Monster and its Humanity.” 

You swallow, thick. It tastes like soft, bitter nostalgia. It’s allusive; testimony of a memory on a shelf, gathering dust. A reference to the title of your paper, the one you handed across his desk that day, rocking on your toes when he’d turned the page— Don’t bother, I’ll look it over now.

“One of the worst,” Harry murmurs, a mirror rebounding, six years after, soft-spoken. The polynyas of his gaze— murky, pitch, suffocating— make your throat dry. Even years later. Unremitting. 

It’s the exact same thing he’d told you then, and despite the lack of derision hewn into his tone, the words alone do enough. He says it like recalling a distant memory and then looks at you for a moment, after. 

“…I remember you.” 

You clear your throat. It feels like a slap to the face. 

[joffyworld]

Shamura -

They of Knowledge and War

It's hard to remember much these days.

Often it's impossible to remember anything at all,

To recall the finer details and find my way;

It's as if I've been entangled in a darkened red shawl:

I can see beyond the darkness in glimpses of authenticity,

I can reach past the madness and almost touch what has now been repealed.

But there remains a thin veil between myself and the truth;

It feels insurmountable as I fall into my minds' obscurity.

Godly ichor seeps out of the wound naught can yet heal,

I sit there and watch it drip down till they come with more news

Were my past machinations truly mine or those of fate?

It's increasingly difficult to make it back from the fall.

Do I deserve these conditions for living a life full of hate?

I know those who claim to be my siblings don't deserve a life that's so cruel.

Even if I recover what awaits? A world of stability?

Can such a world, with us in it, even be real?

Every day I awake is a veritable who's who.

Did the past-me ever imagine a life of such vulnerability?

Are these the consequences of taking actions guided with zeal?

I see strange faces come and go, they mutter "we love you"

When I gave the order, was I at all even phased?

It seems so out of character, so unusual.

They tell me it was desperation that changed how I behaved;

But would a God of Knowledge really resort to adding to the fire more fuel?

Was it just of us to punish curiosity?

Was it righteous of us to tell our brother to kneel?

It didn't feel correct to leave a sibling askew.

When we plunged the chains through his limbs in this violent atrocity,

Did any of us leave room to heal?

Or had we already broken through the time to heal and break through to you?

Now when I close my eyes I see a void-white gate,

Standing at the end of a long, dark hall.

Traversing the barrier I spy a long-hewn lake,

I bellow loudly to its occupant, but they never hear my call.

I see my voice extend, almost physically, with such velocity.

But it quickly recoils, and is brought to its heel.

It was you whom I had called to,

You, my brother the Lord of Death and magnanimity.

I remember once you heard my voice, I watched it make you reel,

I suppose the voice you least expect is that which has betrayed you.

As I heal slowly all that's left is to ruminate,

Reflect on the ways in which I failed my thrall.

It drives me ever closer to the madness that consumes and degenerates:

Across my mind does it sprawl, a slaughter-hall of the attentive and philosophical.

That which once saw every angle and possibility has ultimately been replaced by this vacant unpredictability.

The madness has caused my brain to slowly allow the crown to congeal.

The crown's influence spreads with its purple-hazed hue,

The cue to allow the crown to finally take responsibility, to be rid of the me that was me and become without humility,

I can feel myself slipping away, until all I can recall is the ordeal;

The ordeal that took you.

I remember walking up to those ivory arches and the cacophony of silence that followed. The wave of the trees from the wind, the exposed roots struggling against the combatant wind at every turn of their opponent.

I remember the darkness filling the air where once there stood nothing, blackened tar swirling with vitriol at every second it hung so loosely in our world. The almost viscous substance that materialised in an instant, and seemed so eager to disappear as quickly as it had come.

I remember the eyes that peered down and gazed upon the windows of my soul with unknowable intent. How they scanned every detail of my form, how they analyzed without repent every single finite piece of me as though I were a piece of discarded art, thrown away by its creator, then remembered and gazed upon once more for its flaws, not its graces.

For long there was silence, glares exchanged and stances readied. Longer still was the time that passed, every second felt an hour, every minute felt a day, yet little passed at all but a matter of minutes in the days stead.

Then it spoke, measured, calm, poised:

"Son of Sun, God of War, God of Knowledge that you are. We beseech you listen closely, for your foes they closely are. They tread and thread within your web so take caution when you spin. The conspiracy lies deep inside, and you are deep within. Illusions of your safety work vice versa with yourself. Take heart in what companions you trust deeply with your wealth. There lies only one within the five that you should dare to question. You mistrust and pray that that's enough but irony's your predilection. There will come a day where you will say, that you had known for better. You will dull the pain with maddened songs that tell of your grief's measure.

Make your choice, They of War, but pray caution when you move. It is time to right your wrongs,

Just make sure your wrongs don't right you."

[lucky-lucky-duck]

Forget You, Forget-Me-Not

A continuation based on a reply to my Vaga Snapshot post that i'm writing between cram sessions. The semester ends in 2 days and I'm dying, but it's fine. c: Everything is fine. c: I'm gonna start on the matchup in a couple days when my load lightens, this is just a late night creative outlet for stress c':

Leo Kurosagi x Vagastrom Ghoul Reader (2nd person pov and gender neutral)

Leo goes too far in an argument, and I'll fill this out tomorrow. For now, it's sad. Reader nearly gives up on braking the curse causing the people around them to slowly forget they exist. Fuck I'm tired

Morning edit - I fixed a couple of spelling mistakes, but the description made me laugh so it stays. I'm still fucking tired.

"I'm passing the phone to a No-Name NPC who is so unremarkable that the faculty evaluators actually forgot they existed."

You're ignoring him. It's been four days, and you've barely said a word to anyone, but everyone knows that Leo is somehow the culprit.

It doesn't really matter, you think with dull amusement. Sho and Alan had both been out at the time; the only witnesses to your humiliation were you, Leo, and the general students. Leo's too busy trying to bait you into argument to gloat about his win to the others, and you aren't about to tell them yourself.

The general students are a non-issue, too. Most of them struggle to remember your name most days, they're not about to suddenly start remembering gossip about you.

The thing is, you've had fights with Leo before. Hell, fighting with Leo has something of a hobby to you once you started sharing a living space with him. There's just something about him that brings out the worst in you. The vicious snake-like part, that coils up with anticipation and prepares to strike when you see Leo enter the room. You used to think of it as something that you both secretly look forward to, once the vitriol died down and your metaphorical fight-to-the-death turned into elementary-school bullying.

He's never brought up your curse like that before. It's been tit-for-tat, both of you giving just as good as you get. It's supposed to be fun.

You squash the pang of longing in your chest with snarled anger, only to be drenched in an icy kind of apathy. There are lines both of you choose not to cross these days (you were under that impression at the time, at least.), and the waning acknowledgment of your existence had definitely been one of them. Christ, you didn't exactly pour salt onto Leo's obvious abandonment wounds during these fights, did you?

"What did Leo do to you?" Sho's voice snaps you out of your thoughts.

"Nothing, why do you ask?" Your voice scrapes lifelessly as you meet his eyes with a small, strained grin.

"Really? Then what, you've been moping around the dorms the past few days because you enjoy the smell of sweat and motor oil?"

"You know me, can't get enough of the ol' sugar and spice." The attempted banner falls flat as you make to slip around him and head for your dorm at the end of the hall, only to be held in place with a single strong hand on your wrist. "You ever tried shake weights?"

"Stop," he shuts down your distraction. "You know he's a rat bastard, right? You can't take what he says personally. We're going to find a way to break the curse."

So, Leo told Sho what happened after all, has he?

Sho's words slow to a stop when he notices the dead-eyes and scowl that have overtaken your forceful nonchalance from earlier.

"I wasn't lying, I'm not angry at Leo for what he said to me," Apart from the fact that you kind of are. "He wasn't exactly wrong."

"Shut up already!" You don't turn your head to look at Leo as he appears in the corridor. Figures he would listen in on a private conversation. It's probably him who sent Sho to find you in the first place. Bastards.

In the end, the choice is made for you, and a new set of hands grip your shoulders, yanking you face-to-face with the person you wanted to see least.

"Are you telling me I've been wasting my time on someone this fucking pathetic?" The words would hurt more if the expression on Leo's face were less desperate. If anyone looks pathetic here, it's him. "Of course. You would be willing to sit back and watch as you sink into irrelevance, wouldn't you? If that's what you want, fine." It's funny how adept you've become at interpreting Leo's mannerisms after all of the fighting.

For all of the accusations and insults, the only thing you see in front of you is a hissing kitty cat desperately trying to make amends in the only way it knows how. It's a shit apology, but... Leo isn't the type to put on this type of fit unless he feels threatened and cornered, and, as far as you are aware, the only threat being posed at the moment is you walking away from him.

Your bar sure has sunk low these days, yikes.

"That would probably hurt more if you weren't still gripping my shoulders like we're in a steamy novel. Do you have fantasies of pinning me down often?" You're promptly shoved away and insulted once more, free to turn back and walk back toward your dorm without sparing either boy behind you a glance.

As you prepare yourself for bed, you notice the ache in your chest loosening just enough to let you breath deeply. If just for tonight, you'll fall asleep free from the fear that tomorrow will be the day you finally wake up as a stranger.

[foxconfessorandthewolf]

Okay, so I’m a bit wine drunk but I don’t think I’ve ever really articulated why I love Snarry together and I’m currently trying to finish a fic after taking a three-year-hiatus from writing these two, so this is probably a good exercise!

I’m a bit on the older side of fandom, having been a fanartist and fervent reader since 2003, so my connection was really sparked during that time between OOTP and HBP when Snape and Harry were at some of their most clashing and deeply vitriolic, forced together into hateful vulnerability by Occulmency lessons. Every scene between them was electric, laced with tension as we truly did not know how things would go, or even where Snape’s true loyalties lay. He was an unknown, tied up with Harry’s own family’s mysterious past, connected to Harry in a myriad of odd ways that few other characters were, and - as a rivals-to-lovers lover - I was fascinated by him. From that first moment when they lock eyes in the Great Hall and that frisson of pain shoots through Harry’s scar, I desperately wanted to know who the hell this man was and his story. I think a lot of Snarry shippers come to the ship with a special appreciation for Severus Snape’s character himself. He’s such an incredibly drawn character, rich with complexity, complicated and pretty fucked up, with clearly-held passions, hatreds, weaknesses, and motivations. He’s emotional in a way a lot of other characters aren’t, though I think he’d loathe to hear that. And his character voice! It’s unique and pitch-perfect. You always know exactly who is speaking with his lines. Honestly, the way he evolved from a spy/traitor stock character to become so multifaceted and enigmatic is a masterpiece of characterization, and it’s an aspect of why I’m drawn to him - there’s still so much about his origins and well, what his damage was, that we don’t know. Because of this, I especially love Snarry fics that delve into character studies of him, trying to explore all the shadows left behind. I also admit I have a preference for interpreting Snape as morally grey. I like him petty, sharp-tongued, ambitious, with an incredibly liquid definition of what is right and wrong. He’s self-interested, dripping with disdain, and really doesn’t see that as a problem. What happens to him when he deeply falls in love?

I love a ship that makes me work for it. There’s no obvious line of how Snape and Harry might wind up together, so each fic is a wealth of possibilities of bringing these two together despite their roadblocks. As I mentioned, I’m big fan of animosity in a ship. Give me rivals, give me enemies, give me the sparking passions, the sharp fury, the way they stoke each others’ emotions and seek to hurt, the racing hearts, the raised hackles, the intense emotional reaction to another person. Just throw it at me. I devour that shit. I love the messy and taboo nature of their relationship, the complications raising from their age difference, temperaments, and largely similar and shared traumas. There’s an interesting element of Snape being a foil to James Potter, and how that relates to Harry and their past. Basically, this shit is really good potting soil for incredible fucking fics, packed with nutrients.

The shared natures of their traumas, like Voldemort and each being forgotten and abused as children and how they might be able to understand each other and bond from it is also something that’s fascinating to explore. I love when a writer pushes on Snape’s bruises, looking to make them hurt, cracking his sardonic brain open and rooting around in there, and I love when they compare and contrast to Harry’s. There’s a seductiveness to how Snape is so obsessed with Harry, fixated on his Boy Who Lived heroic reputation, clearly dripping with envy. What, beyond jealousy, might draw Snape to Harry and what, other than hatred, might draw Harry to Snape?

It’s all this, the passionate, electric, dangerous nature of their relationship; the way their characters contrast each other yet have surprising connections; and the question of finding solace that keeps me here, 21 years later. I’ve had wines less complex than this ship. They’re fascinating. They’re messy. They’re everything.

[crossposted from a reddit comment I just left, and wanted to share with y’all]