#which would avoid the rite and by avoiding it she would have stayed in the HoW and feyre would be probably death

[serpentface]

Could we possibly get a timeline of Brakul and Janeys’ relationship?

Here's the broad strokes of established timeline and notable events. Also includes some Hibrides specific events because she is integral to the subject at hand, the three of them are a Feelings Triangle.

(When I say 'present' here I mean the beginning of the white calf story)

---

-They first meet a bit over 13 years before present on the opposite side of an armed skirmish. Brakul is captured as a prisoner of war and offered a job as a mercenary.

-He and Janeys both work in the same mercenary troupe for a little over two years and become friends. Janeys was down bad VERY quickly, Brakul took a lot longer.

-Brakul eventually likes him enough (and wants to avoid the consequences of his old life enough) to stay with him, keeps working as a mercenary when given the option to quit. They have mutual romantic feelings for each other at this point.

-Towards the end of this stint, the two are separated + ultimately ditched by their troupe after an ambush and are stranded alone in the wilderness together for a couple weeks. There's some fanfiction-ass huddling for warmth going on here but mostly starving and horrible horrible gastrointestinal distress from drinking bad water. They both almost die.

They have both seen each other at their absolute worst and the situation could easily go in the direction of 'I never want to see this fucking guy ever again' but ends up in the polar opposite 'I owe my life to this guy and can utterly rely on and trust him'.

-They make it to the city of Erub and stay there for a few weeks, recuperating. They undergo formal sworn brotherhood rites. This is an Extreme move because this is in large part a legal arrangement with lifelong kinship and inheritance implications.

-Janeys brings Brakul home a little over 10 years before the present day. Brakul discovers that Janeys has had a wife this entire time.

-Janeys returning home about two years later than he was supposed to, having already been regarded as a soft man by his parents, very obviously fled from his marriage, not gotten his wife pregnant, and now returning blatantly enamored with some big muscular dude he picked up and announcing that he has formally sworn brotherhood with him, does not go over well with his parents. Pretty much looks like he's become the fucktoy of the first dude that would take him and is now trying to impose this shameful relationship onto his family.

Janeys is immediately dragged through the fucking mud by his mother for entering into legal kinship with some random 'heathen'.

Janeys' father is like 'yeahhh no' and does not accept Brakul as kin, though is substantially less aggro about it.

Brakul makes a good impression on Faiza, as an Odonii she has freedom to formally accept him as kin (with associated familial obligations) without her father's consent and ultimately does so. She's very glad to see that Janeys has like, an actual friend who isn't her, though is also nervous about the Homosexual Undertones and is hoping to do some damage control.

Couya hears about this secondhand and is like 'ok...fags'

-Brakul manages to remain polite in the face of hostility from Janeys' parents, but this is extremely humiliating and wears heavily on him. Janeys is very defensive of him and cuts some ties with his mother in an utterly unprecedented show of backbone (though she comes back into his life more frequently later on).

-Brakul and Hibrides become friends. They have a very close and positive relationship for a few years.

-Brakul and Janeys start reaffirming their oaths on a very frequent basis, which is a comforting intimacy. This slowly devolves from a solemn, lengthy ritual involving slicing the palm and drinking mingled blood in wine, to cutting each other's chests and backs and consuming the blood straight from the source while fully aroused.

Both of them are very attracted to each other and fully want to fuck each other but they can't because they're equals and can't 'shame' each other. Both are aware of this but rarely verbalize it. For a long while their sexual relationship is exclusively the blood stuff.

-Hibrides starts seeing Brakul's wounds/scars and thinks he's being abused by Janeys. Starts thinking of Janeys as a really depraved pervert.

-They kiss for the first time ~8 years before present, which is like 6th base and a stage of intimacy that only occurs after the foundations of 'coming in pants while having open wounds licked and just pretending it didn't happen'

-Brakul starts participating in the annual Wardin city games. He does this almost every year from this point on. Janeys starts buying him khait and khait accessories.

Brakul gains some modest local fame within the city of Wardin for successes in the khait-wrestling event over these years and attains his own income separate from being Janeys' live-in life partner/ostensible sugar baby.

-7 years before present, Janeys and Hibrides have been married for six years and have not yet produced a child. This is socially damaging and questionable for both of them, given this is ultimately the point of a marriage. The 'have a Hibrides-Brakul pregnancy and pass the child off as Janeys'' plan starts formulating.

-Brakul and Hibrides have sex for the first time while Janeys stands near the door (arguing that he needs to be sure where the child came from to claim it, he HAS standards) and furiously stares at the wall.

This was something Hibrides consented to and played a key role in instigating, but this was still highly traumatic for her (and Brakul as well in different capacities) given much of their underlying relationship is like 'this is the ideal husband/wife because he/she loves me and is a dear friend also does not want to fuck me'. It's still quite clear that both of them are not sexually attracted to each other, but the full feeling of safety never returns.

It takes multiple attempts for a pregnancy to actually occur.

-Hibrides and Brakul's relationship starts to go down the drain.

-Hibrides sees them in the act of their Blood Shit with Brakul as the active participant, sees that Janeys is also covered in scars and has some bite wounds, decides that Brakul is actually just a pervert too.

-Janeys is now intensely jealous of Hibrides (starting with the pregnancy) and goes from being disinterested to outright hostile towards her.

-Hibrides has realized that Janeys has no response to people actually standing up to him and starts dishing the hostility right back at him. The environment gets very tense.

-Hibrides and Janeys get into a verbal argument and Janeys slaps her across the face. Brakul physically drags him out of the room and throws him on the ground, tells him never to do that again, and threatens to kill him if he ever lays a hand on HIS (read: his) child. And then disappears for several days, as is his standard method of not-dealing with problems. Janeys has a fucking meltdown. Hibrides is left alone with him and has to be the one to actually deal with the consequences of said meltdown. (He doesn't hurt her further and its more like him suddenly getting pathetically clingy to her as an emotional proxy, which was almost worse).

Brakul reappears to find Janeys a complete wreck and in full placation mode. Janeys is also now flinching and nervous around him, which disturbs him tremendously. Brakul reverses gears into being mega-conciliatory and coddling him. It takes a while for Janeys to stop feeling scared of him.

Experiencing physical violence and then being left alone with the guy who did it while he spirals was really, really hard on Hibrides. She's just like 'why did you leave me alone with him for days on end after all that, what the fuck' and Brakul's like ":("

-Six years before present, Erubi Haidamane is born.

-Hibrides experiences severe post-partum depression on top of regular depression. Brakul does a significant proportion of the parenting during infancy, but is cut off from this after the first year.

-Brakul knew what he was getting into but desperately wants to be a father, and finds it extremely difficult to be living in very close quarters with his biological daughter and pretending she isn't his.

Janeys is overall unsympathetic and just like 'get a wife make your own children damn' and Brakul is like 'I don't want a wife I want you :(' and Janeys is like 'Don't Fucking STart That Shit Right Now Or So Help Me God'.

There's a period where Janeys tries to arrange a marriage for him, partly because it's weird that Brakul is just There in his household as a bachelor, but he is very easily persuaded out of it (he doesn't exactly want that either).

-Hibrides and Brakul start having casual sex (mostly non-penetrative) around this time. Neither is attracted to each other and this is kind of an emotional outlet/Coping mechanism. Their mutual non-attraction makes them 'safe' sexual partners for one another in a roundabout way- they can approximate desired intimacy that they cannot fully acquire in ways they Want to, and feel less like broken perverts by performing expected sexual roles and playing husband/wife. Definitely NOT healthy though.

Janeys becomes aware of this at some point and cannot even begin to decide who he should be mad at here and is just like "STOP??????????"

-Six years before present, the famine begins. Janeys is wealthy enough to keep his household minimally affected beyond minor inconveniences for the first couple of years.

-A little under four years before present, the decision is made to try for another child in hopes of producing a male heir this time. Hibrides gets pregnant again.

-Hibrides has a very blatant 'affair' with a female trainee assistant to her physician-priestess midwife, which ends when the assistant is caught stealing from their home.

-Three years before present, Livya Haidamane is born.

-Hibrides and Brakul's relationship has been progressively worsening and has essentially shattered by this point, largely due to strains surrounding a second child coming into the picture. They now mostly avoid each other. Brakul and Janeys are now pretty much joined at the hip.

-At some point in this time range, Janeys manages to self justify the concept of giving a blowjob as not shameful or spiritually harmful. This is life changing.

This quickly results in the metaphysical implications of Ingesting Semen playing a role in their preexisting oath bloodsex (which is a thing throughout this timeline). It gets elaborate.

-2.5 years before present, Janeys' father dies abruptly after being kicked in the head by a khait. Janeys receives a significant chunk of inheritance but is not named as heir to the family business, this is instead given to his uncle Odela. This was strongly rooted in his father's suspicions that Janeys' children are illegitimate.

Janeys has kind of accepted that he is to be the death of his family line and has given up at having a son. He is extremely Not cool about this.

Janeys starts reconnecting with his mother in grief, who fully agrees that he is the death of his family line and pretty much just hates him at this point (in a very complicated way, she projected many of her hopes for the future and wishes for things she was denied in her own life onto her son, and resents him for failing at it).

-An employee and close confidant of Janeys' father makes a public accusation of his children's illegitimacy and specifically suggests Brakul as the father. Janeys denies this and challenges him to a legal duel as recompense for slander. He wins and kills the man (which will be interpreted as indicating his truthfulness against slanderous lies) but the damage is done.

Both Janeys and Brakul becoming increasingly paranoid in the aftermath of this. Janeys is even more distrustful of most of his non-kin relations than he already was and also takes out a lot of his anger on Brakul, on the basis that these accusations wouldn't be happening if Brakul would stop being a fucking baby and get a wife.

They kind of break up at one point here, which lasts approximately 5 minutes.

Brakul has already had a 'Don't be fucking touching me in public get your hands off me stop it' thing going on and this is intensified from this point on. He's fine with pretty much anything in private but expects complete restraint in public, while Janeys is very physically affectionate in all contexts (when in public this is mostly in ways that are culturally acceptable between close male friends/kin, and he doesn't see any issue with it and thinks Brakul is being ridiculous). This causes additional strain.

-Throughout this entire span both Janeys and Brakul have pulled small stints as mercenaries. ~2 years before present they are fully inducted as soldiers and given command positions, which is nepotism on Faiza's part (who is a personal friend to the Usoma Stavis Amanti). They perform in a military operation quelling an attempted mid-famine military coup and get some commendations for it.

This particular stint brings them more intensely into the public eye and it becomes strongly rumored among their soldiers that they're fucking. Janeys is assumed to be the emasculated (bottom) one. This is partly because people tend to assume the Smaller One performs the role of a woman, partly because he's considered somewhat effeminate (his presentation is hard masc by cultural convention but his lack of a beard, his emotional mannerisms, and the fairly public knowledge that he was his father's only son and refused as an heir anyway goes a long way), and largely because he is generally unliked.

They gain the moniker of 'the bitch and his dog' (which is slightly more contextually layered in the source language but ultimately means what it sounds like). Brakul beats the living shit out of the guy who coined this. He generally has a placid demeanor (and if anything strikes most as overly passive) and this is very startling and intimidating to the men around him. Janeys loved it.

-6 months before present they become privy to the plans for the pilgrimage (which had been a couple years in the making) and are offered positions of honor in roles commanding soldiers (this is more nepotism).

-2 months before present Brakul and Hibrides both get drunk and have sex for the first time in ages. Nothing was even remotely expected to come of this (Brakul was completely shitfaced and thus didn't maintain for long, and Hibrides was less intoxicated and could actually remember this with a degree of confidence after the fact) but bad miracles happen.

-1 month before present, Janeys' mother dies. Janeys is alternating between 'I'm glad the dogfaced bitch/cunt/whore/BITCH is dead' and sobbing in a ball.

Janeys receives some inheritance but is given basically the bare minimum and is repeatedly insulted in his mother's dictated will (along with Couya, who receives absolutely nothing). He's like "This is fine. I feel normal about this.

-Janeys gets heavily drunk one night shortly after his mother's death and outright asks Brakul to fuck him, who refuses. The next half hour is instead spent with Brakul sitting next to Janeys and awkwardly rubbing his back while the latter pukes. They don't speak about it after the fact but both know damn well it happened.

-Brakul starts including Janeys' mother in his daily naming and honoring of ancestors in hopes of keeping her contemptuous spirit satiated and out of his affairs.

-Days before present, the sighting of a newborn white aurochs calf occurs and it is decided that this should replace a previously prepared sacrifice for the pilgrimage. Brakul is among those selected to capture and retrieve it.

-Hibrides (as the wife of a nobleman on the pilgrimage) is expected to come along. She and Brakul had obviously not informed Janeys of the Incident and it had gone partly forgotten, but she has missed a couple periods at this point and exhibited some symptoms of pregnancy. She's really hoping its a fluke (and actually does WANT to attend, at least at first) and decides to not tell anyone, thus dooming everyone on pilgrimage to being witnesses of a Hibrides-Brakul-Janeys soap opera along the way, and is a piece of a wider domino effect that results in the Imperial Usoma being killed in a coup and replaced by a god-emperor. So it goes.

..and the story starts here

[duskandcobalt]

Echoes in the Hallway

Elain didn’t know why it bothered her so much. Yes, she’d been prepared for a cozy night in with her nephew - just the two of them - but an additional presence in the house wasn’t usually something that would set her off like this.

Typically, she’d welcome having someone else around. She knew she wouldn’t be feeling like this if it was Cassian or Mor that had stayed back with her.

But Azriel…

….

18+ pls

Azriel finds himself playing chaperone again, this time for the girl he’s been avoiding for months…. What could possibly go wrong?

This is like 7.7k words of shameless angst and smut????? enjoy!!

…

Read on AO3

“Azriel.” Rhys’ voice broke through Azriel’s concentration. Their eyes met as the Shadowsinger looked up from the reports he’d been diligently reading for god knows how long, reclined on a couch in Rhys’ office after their morning debrief with Cassian.

Azriel raised his eyebrows at his brother, already wary of the conversation they were about to have based solely on the seriousness in which Rhys had addressed him.

Rhysand leaned against the corner of his desk. “We’re all going to the Court of Nightmares tomorrow…”

Azriel nodded, shuffling his papers together and setting them to the side so he could sit up straight.

“I know you were supposed to come but something’s come up and I’ll need you to stay here.” Rhys continued.

“Why?” Suspicion laced Azriel’s voice.

“The twins aren’t available and Elain…” Rhys paused, carefully watching his brother’s reaction.

Azriel tensed at the name, frustration immediately building under his skin. He hadn’t let himself even think about that name for almost nine months now.

Solstice felt like a fever dream - a night that had gone so wrong, so quickly that he deigned it easier to just try to forget any of it had even happened. Even if he’d quickly realised that was easier said than done.

“Elain is staying back to watch Nyx.” Rhys finished. He was still studying Azriel, waiting for a reaction that wasn’t coming. Anger flowed through Azriel but he pushed it down, wouldn’t let that icy exterior that he’d spent so long perfecting crack.

It had been Rhys after all that had put an end to everything before anything had even had a chance to begin.

“And you want me to stand guard?” Azriel inquired, quiet and steady, no sign of that underlying anger as he spoke.

“No.” Rhys sighed. “But we need Nesta to come with us and Cassian refuses to let her out of his sight after everything happened with the Blood Rite. Feyre’s already stressed about leaving Nyx for the night, with everything that’s happening. Elain and Nyx, leaving them for the first time… she insisted you be the one to stay back.”

“Why me? You told me…”

“I know what I said, Az.” Rhys cut him off. “And please don’t get any ideas. I stand by what I said.”

“So then why me? Why not someone else?”

“Because Feyre trusts you, Az.” He took a deep breath before continuing. “We both trust you.” ‘

“Do you?” Azriel scoffed. It was the first obvious display of emotion he’d let Rhysand see during this conversation.

They’d both be lying if they said things hadn’t been a little tense between them since that night where Rhysand had exercised his power, his ranking, in a way he hardly ever did. And for him to use that ranking to call Azriel off for a matter of the heart… Azriel had struggled to move past the decision even if he had done his best to obey.

“You are my spymaster, Azriel.” Rhys leaned back into his chair but his eyes stayed fixed on Azriel. “ You are my spymaster and my brother, of course I trust you.”

Azriel said nothing, only dipped his chin in acknowledgement of the clear sincerity in Rhysand’s tone.

“Don’t do anything to undermine my trust, Az. Just be here tomorrow night and keep an eye on things. There is to be nothing more. Is that understood?”

“I’ve stayed away, haven’t I?” Azriel stood, gathering his things before rolling his shoulders back and allowing his wings to flare behind him. A slight show of power to let his brother, his High Lord, know exactly how he felt about the situation.

“Is that understood, Azriel?” Rhys ignored the display, repeating his words with that same sense of command that he'd used on Solstice.

“Yes.” Azriel replied, words sharp as he swiftly exited the office and made his way out of the house.

…

“I just don’t understand why I need a chaperone when I am the chaperone.” Elain grumbled, avoiding even looking in Azriel’s direction.

They were in the kitchen, Nyx balanced on her hip as she bustled around getting a bottle ready for his first feed of the night. Azriel was standing across the kitchen from her, one scarred hand braced on the counter as he flipped through a thick stack of paper with the other. Also avoiding looking at her.

More reports. His distraction for the night.

The rest of the household had just left for the Hewn City mere minutes ago. Rhys and Feyre had chosen to only inform Elain that Azriel would be accompanying her and Nyx right before they winnowed away.

“It’s a safety precaution, with everything going on…” Azriel replied, his voice barely above a whisper. His hazel eyes stayed focused on his papers.

“Ridiculous. This house is protected within an inch of its life.” Elain threw back, her words cutting.. She saw him tense out of the corner of her eye, clearly unused to hearing this tone of voice from her.

Good.

Elain didn’t know why it bothered her so much. Yes, she’d been prepared for a cozy night in with her nephew - just the two of them - but an additional presence in the house wasn’t usually something that would set her off like this.

Typically, she’d welcome having someone else around. She knew she wouldn’t be feeling like this if it was Cassian or Mor that had stayed back with her.

But Azriel…

She couldn’t even justify being upset at Rhys and Feyre for not telling her sooner. Why would they have thought to warn her? How could they possibly know that spending even a moment alone with the Shadowsinger wasn’t exactly high on her list of enjoyable activities these days?

Having him in her space after all these months apart had completely thrown her off, had her fumbling as she tried to put together a simple bottle. She cursed under her breath as she attempted to screw the top on for the third time. Nyx was entirely unhelpful as his little hands tugged at her hair, pulling curls loose from her braid and further distracting her from the task at hand.

“Need some help?” His low voice was closer than anticipated. She hadn’t noticed him come up behind her.

Alway so damn quiet - something that she’d found endearing once upon a time.

“I’m fine.” She bit back, silently willing her hands to stop shaking as she tried yet again to get the lid on the bottle.

“Elain.” Azriel sighed. Gods, she’d forgotten what her name sounded like on his lips. The effect it had on her body. “I know you don’t want me here. At least let me make myself useful.”

She set the lid down on the counter and turned to face him, making eye contact with him for the first time that night. For the first time since Solstice, really.

It’s hard to make eye contact with someone that seemed to do everything in their power to avoid her.

She could see the exhaustion in his hazel eyes but his face was as beautiful as always. The summer months had leant him a healthy glow, his already tan skin a couple shades deeper, a few freckles dotting the bridge of his nose. His dark hair was just a little longer than she remembered and a slight curl had developed along with the length.

How she had once ached to run her hands through his hair.

Anger flooded her veins again, a fresh wave, this time at herself for even allowing herself to think of him like she used to do.

He was infuriatingly expressionless as he watched her, patiently waiting for her to say something.

“I’ll take him to the great room. Bring the bottle and a cloth.” She relented, shifting Nyx in her arms as she quickly stepped around Azriel. His wings retracted to let her through.

…

Azriel took his time putting the lid on the bottle and grabbing a cloth in order to give Elain a little space.

He felt terrible about this - about having to be in this house, a looming presence that she very clearly didn’t have any desire to be around.

He didn’t know what else he had expected from tonight. He certainly didn’t think things would be like they used to be, back when she’d welcome him into the house with a shy smile, when they’d spend hours quietly talking to each other in the garden. He hadn’t even expected for them to exchange more than a few words.

He just hadn’t been prepared for the anger that radiated off of her.

It was so unlike her, so different from the girl he’d come to know. Of course, he knew that Elain wasn’t as quiet or demure as everyone seemed to think. She was kind, yes. Soft spoken compared to her sisters, yes. But she was also intelligent and sharp and funny in a way that often caught him off guard.

He’d seen her upset in the past, seen her frustrated, but he couldn’t remember ever seeing her like this. So angry that the same raging fire which had once been a constant presence in Nesta’s eyes now infiltrated Elain’s.

He took a deep breath in, picking up the bottle and taking a cloth from the cupboard, steeling himself to face Elain again.

Multiple centuries of life - all those terrifying people and places he’d dealt with in his line of work - and somehow he still felt wholly unprepared and nervous to interact with Elain Archeron.

Azriel found her in the great room, as promised, sitting in a large navy velvet armchair. Her feet were tucked under her, her skirts a never ending cloud of soft pink fabric around her. Nyx was cradled in Elain’s arms, the fire in her eyes nowhere to be seen, her features soft as she babbled back to the babe happily babbling to her. The last bit of light from the setting sun streamed in from the glass doors that led out to the river, illuminating them from behind and Azriel’s breath caught - she looked ethereal.

Elain saw him then and watched as Azriel approached her, flames immediately igniting again as she met his gaze. He held out the bottle and she reached for it, careful to avoid touching his hands in the process. She looked away finally, adjusting Nyx against her chest and watching as he latched on to the bottle.

Azriel found himself fighting back the emotions that came to the surface at the sight before him. Of Elain with a winged babe in her arms, humming softly as she fed him. It was a glimpse into what might’ve been. In another life. Another universe. What he might’ve had if the cauldron had only deemed him worthy.

He tried to push the thoughts down, attempted to let them frost over in the depths of his soul as he shook out the cloth in his hands, doubling it over once before tentatively stepping forward and leaning down to drape it neatly over her shoulder - matching what he’d seen Rhys do for Feyre time and time again. He didn’t miss the way Elain stiffened, the way her breath hitched until he was standing upright again. He hadn’t let his hands so much as graze her skin, as much as he might’ve wanted to.

“I’ll be in the kitchen.” He mumbled, one hand coming up to run through his hair, turning on his heel and heading out of the room before she even had a chance to reply.

He couldn’t take it.

There was a reason he’d stayed away all these months and he was quickly remembering just why he’d taken to hiding himself away at the House of Wind with Nesta and Cassian. It was too much - being near her, being surrounded by her scent. Not being able to talk to her, not being able to touch her. Seeing her with Nyx. This unspoken tension between them. It was all too much.

He thought that the months apart would’ve helped, that the pull he felt towards her would’ve lessened with time. He hadn’t realised how wrong he’d been - hadn’t realised just how much he still yearned for her.

Azriel took a seat at the dining table, hands dragging over his face once as he attempted to focus on his reports. It was utterly useless, all he could think about was the female down the hall from him.

He had no idea how he’d make it through the night when the pain of this longing was eating him alive.

…

Nyx’s wailing had been echoing through the house for a couple hours now, so loud that Elain was concerned that the windows would shatter regardless of the countless wards Rhys had placed on them.

The poor babe had refused to settle, only sleeping for a few hours before he awoke just after midnight - tears streaming down his sweet face even after Elain had rushed down the hall to him, picking him up and cradling him to her chest.

She had tried everything - changing him, feeding him, singing to him as she sat in a rocking chair. She was at her wits end, bouncing him anxiously in her arms as she paced the nursery, only the moonlight streaming in from the balcony window providing her with just enough light to watch Nyx as he all but screamed in her arms.

She’d done her best to ignore the shadows at the foot of his crib. They’d been there all night, silently laying on the floor where they typically monitored Nyx whenever Azriel was in the house. She glanced at them now and saw that they were gathered together, a cloud of darkness that seemed to keenly watch her, just waiting to be acknowledged. Elain had a feeling they’d been instructed to mind their business and let her handle things tonight but she could tell that they had a different opinion on the subject.

“Go get him, then.” She rolled her eyes, frustrated enough to give in to what she knew they were itching to do. If she wasn’t so overwhelmed she might’ve laughed at the speed at which they vanished, off to find their master.

Azriel appeared seconds later, stepping through his shadows, fully alert with Truthteller clutched in one hand. His hair was a mess, dark circles beginning to form under his eyes. He was still dressed in his leathers so he clearly hadn’t made it to bed yet.

“What’s wrong?” He asked, eyes scanning the nursery - the empty crib, the corners of the room, the balcony, before settling on her.

She saw him relax slightly once he realised that Nyx was indeed safe but then his eyes were taking her in - ever so slowly grazing over her - head to toe. She couldn’t help the heat that spread through her at his gaze. His eyes burned into her skin as he took in her unbound hair, the thin silk of the nightgown she wore, her feet bare on the plush rug. She was too exasperated to care that he was seeing her in this state of undress.

“I… I don’t know.” Elain rasped, her throat scratchy from being abruptly pulled out of her slumber. “He just won’t stop crying. I’ve tried everything, I don’t know what to do.”

“May I?” Azriel stepped towards her, holding out his arms.

Elain paused for a second, looking up at him before gently maneuvering Nyx into his uncle’s outstretched arms.

Azriel took him, those beautiful scarred hands cradling the still screaming babe and bringing him up to rest against his leather clad chest.

She had watched Nyx fill out over these past few months and had often felt that he was growing too quickly for her liking. But now, seeing Azriel with him… Elain couldn’t believe just how small Nyx looked in the arms of the Illyrian warrior. How tiny his body was in those large hands, how fragile he seemed against that broad chest.

Azriel’s hand rubbed smooth circles over Nyx’s back - in between the tiny wings that were beginning to strengthen.

Just five or ten minutes later, Nyx’s wails finally began to die down, his cries fading into small whimpers as he nuzzled further into Azriel’s chest - one tiny fist clutching at his leathers.

“Go to bed, Elain. I’ll stay with him until he sleeps.” Azriel glanced up from where he’d been walking back and forth in front of the window. Elain peered up at him from the rocking chair that she’d fallen into once Azriel had taken over - fighting the exhaustion that threatened to send her to sleep in favour of watching in quiet awe as Azriel managed to calm Nyx down.

“How did you…?” She started.

“I think it’s the wings.” He shrugged. “They can be quite uncomfortable when they’re growing. Mine were so itchy when they were healing after Hybern. I’d imagine it’s even worse for a babe.”

“I didn’t know.” Elain remarked. “I had no idea how to help him.”

“How could you know? It isn’t your fault.” Azriel said softly, fingers still gently rubbing over Nyx’s back. “The leathers probably help too, feels familiar to Rhys.”

“If I’d been here alone…” Tears were gathering in her eyes, the exhaustion of the past few hours hitting her.

“You’d have figured it out.” Azriel cut her off, crossing the room towards her. “Please sleep, Elain. You’ve been with him all evening. I’ve got this.”

He adjusted his grip on Nyx, holding him firm to his chest with one large hand so he could extend his other hand out towards her.

She sighed, her eyes focused on his outstretched hand before she gave in and took it - doing her best to ignore the spark that coursed through her at the feeling of his hand wrapping around hers and pulling her up until she was standing in front of him. He didn’t let go even as Elain went up on her toes to peer at Nyx. Her other hand pressed into Azriel’s chest for balance as she leaned in to place a kiss on her nephew’s cheek.

“Sleep well now, sweet boy.” She said softly before backing up and finally letting her hand drop from Azriel’s chest.

“Goodnight.” He gave her a small smile and let go of her hand, motioning towards the nursery door with his chin - beckoning her to rest.

…

Elain couldn’t sleep even though she was utterly exhausted. She’d been laying in bed, staring up at her ceiling for hours now, her mind racing with seemingly no end in sight. She couldn’t stop thinking.

The way Azriel had looked at her was burned into her memory - the scan of his eyes over her hair, her nightgown clad body, the way his gaze softened as his alert eyes met her exhausted ones.

She pictured him with Nyx, that icy exterior of his melting as the soft side he kept carefully hidden came to the surface once his nephew was safe in his arms.

She thought of the feeling of his hand around hers - his scars grazing against her skin as his fingers wrapped around her delicate wrist. She remembered the feeling of his leather clad chest under her fingers, how the heat from him melted into her even through the thick material… how that heat made her want more - made her want to press her fingers to his bare skin, to feel the muscled chest beneath those leathers.

She pictured his full lips, how’d they once been barely an inch from hers - one hand on her throat with his fingers grazing her jaw to tilt her face up towards his, his other hand buried in her hair. She pictured what it would be like to have those hands of his on her neck again, on other parts of her too.

That all-too-familiar ache swept over her, settling deep in her bones just as it had for months now - night after sleepless night. The anger that coursed through her body during the day always seemed to shift into an unquenchable longing once the sun gave way to the moon and she was alone in her bed.

She knew it was wrong. Knew she had no right to think of him like this, to want him, need him like this. Not when he’d told her it’d been a mistake - even if the way he’d looked at her tonight had said otherwise.

She closed her eyes, breathing deeply to will away the ache in her chest, the ache between her thighs. She tried her best to try to find sleep until her keen hearing picked up on the sound of a door opening and closing.

Elain barely even realised what she was doing but suddenly she was out of bed and rushing to open the door to her room. She scanned the dark hallways until she found him standing at the top of the stairs. Azriel paused at the sound of her door opening but his shadows continued down the stairs without him.

“He’s asleep.” He turned to face her, those eyes once again quickly scanning her up, down, then back up again. “Why aren’t you?”

She took a second to look at him. Studied the way those leathers clung to him, perfectly contoured to every lean line of his toned body. He was so tall, so statuesque as if one of the gods had carved him out of stone with their very hands. His shoulders were so broad that they blocked out what little fae light carried up the stairs from the lower level of the house.

Elain ignored his question, months of that ache and anger suddenly coming together faster than she could even comprehend, combining into an emotion she couldn’t label. The words spilled out of her before she could even think it through.

“You haven’t spoken to me in months.” She seethed. “You told me I was a mistake and then you left me standing at the bottom of those stairs.” Elain gestured behind him. “You all but disappeared until Nyx was born. Even then, you stopped coming to family dinners, you only ever show up at the house for meetings with Rhys and Cassian and then leave the second they’re done. You go out of your way to avoid me, you refuse to even look in my direction. What did I do wrong?”

Azriel still hadn’t moved from where he had paused at the top of the stairs, his eyes fixed on hers in shock as he took in what she was saying.

“You…” He shook his head. “You did nothing wrong, Elain.”

“Then why?” Her voice broke as she took one small step down the hallway. “Why have you avoided me like this? You almost kissed me, and then you said I was a mistake…”

“I never said you were a mistake.” He took a step towards her. “You were not the mistake, Elain. I was the one who made a mistake by thinking I had any right to touch you.”

“Because you were with her? With Gwyn?” Elain’s hated how timid she sounded voicing the fear that she’d kept to herself all these months.

Azriel’s face fell.

“She was wearing my… I saw her wearing the necklace.” She corrected herself, leaving the rest unspoken. The crippling fear that Azriel had feelings for Nesta’s beautiful friend.

Elain had seen the necklace around Gwyn’s neck a few months ago when Nesta had invited her to the House of Wind to have lunch with some of the priestesses that she was training. She had done everything in her power to smile at the kind priestess, to try to make polite conversation and not break down in tears when she’d caught a glimpse of the stained glass rose sitting just under Gwyn’s collarbones.

She had willed herself not to think of how that necklace had ended up in Gwyn’s possession but had utterly failed. Had sat in silence, her mind racing as Nesta laughed with Gwyn. The priestesses' musical laughter like a soundtrack to the thoughts infiltrating her mind in that moment - had he looked at Gwyn like he’d looked at Elain that night? Had he put the necklace on her? Had his hands lingered on her throat? Had he kissed her like he’d almost kissed Elain? Did he visit her in the darkest hours of the night? Did she share his bed?

Jealousy swelled within her, the roaring in her ears so loud that she could barely even hear him when he spoke.

“Gwyn is a friend, Elain.” Azriel took another step forward, one hand coming up to land over his heart in earnest. “I help train her and we’re friends. There’s nothing more, I swear.”

“Then why?” She still didn’t understand, couldn’t work out how things had changed in a single second that night.

“I don’t know - I wasn’t thinking clearly after Solstice and I ran into her that same night and we spoke. Then I found the necklace with my gifts…I didn’t know what to do but I couldn’t keep it. So I went to the library and asked Clotho to give it to her, to any of the priestesses. I shouldn’t have done it, I know that now.” This was the fastest she’d ever heard him speak, his hands balling into fists at his sides as if he didn’t quite know what to do with them. “I don’t even think she knows it was from me.”

“No. I meant…” Elain shook her head. “If you weren’t seeing Gwyn then why was it a mistake? Why was it a mistake to almost kiss me?”

“You have a mate, Elain.” Azriel’s expression faltered. Even in this dark hallway, she could see the pain in his eyes.

Elain laughed. Just one single exhale of air at the reminder of her mate. Red hot rage once again seeped through her.

“That means nothing to me.” She shook her head. “I am so sick of everyone telling me that that means anything.”

“But it does.” Azriel replied. “The mating bond is… it’s rare and it’s a gift to be treasured. There’s nothing like it. To not acknowledge it, to not try at the very least, would be… it would be a mistake.”

“I don’t want to acknowledge it.” Elain’s throat felt like sandpaper, her frustration building with each second that passed.

“He’s a good male, Elain.” Azriel’s shoulders dropped in defeat as he broke eye contact with her, gazing at the floor before dragging his eyes up to meet her searing gaze once again. He looked defeated. “He’ll be good to you if you give him a chance.”

Elain took three steps forward, the distance between them becoming smaller although the was still so painfully far away.

“He may be a good male.” She paused, a shaky breath escaping her. She was unable to stop the tears that were falling from her eyes, didn’t have the strength to hold them back anymore. “He may be good, but he is not you.”

‘Elain…” Azriel tried to speak but she held up a hand, silencing him.

“He is not you, Azriel.” She sobbed.

…

Azriel’s knees threatened to buckle under the weight of her words. His ears buzzing as he desperately tried to focus on Elain, beautiful as ever in the moonlight despite the tears cascading down her cheeks. The tears that were there because of him.

Azriel.

She’d never said his name before. Not that he’d ever heard, anyway. Maybe she’d used it in conversations with the others but she had never once, in the last few years, ever used his name when speaking to him.

He is not you. He is not you, Azriel.

Those words, the way she said his name, ricocheted in his mind.

He took two long strides towards her, the distance between them minimal now - if he simply reached forwards, he’d be able to touch her.

“Azriel.” She repeated his name, her eyes searching his own. He still hadn’t said anything. “Did you hear me?”

He nodded, opening his mouth to say something but there were no words. He couldn’t think of a single thing to say. Could only stare into the depths of those brown doe eyes, glazed with tears, and listened as she continued to speak.

“Lucien… he tries with me because he feels like he has to. He tries because of the bond. He’d have no interest in me if there wasn’t this thing between us.” She was fighting to speak, her words interrupted by deep, heaving sobs.

Azriel fought every instinct that was roaring through him to reach out to her, to hold her against his chest and wipe away her tears.

“No one has stopped to think about what I want. They think that just because there is this bond, I must give myself over to him. That he is who I must be with. It’s not right. It doesn’t feel right. The bond is there. I can feel it and it is like a knife in my side. There is a pull to him, yes… but I’ve always felt a pull towards you, too.”

Azriel couldn’t believe what he was hearing, could barely keep up with everything she was saying as she bared her soul to him. Not even his shadows were there to guard him, to allow him to shroud himself in the safety of darkness. He was left to face her all on his own as she confirmed what he’d long suspected. That she felt that same pull, felt that energy that seemed to radiate between them since they’d first met.

“I felt drawn to you long before I was forced into that cauldron. You were there for me from the very beginning. You were the only one - the only one - to listen to me, to sit with me, to see me. They all thought I was losing my mind. I thought I was losing my mind. You were the only one to know. The only one to understand me.”

Azriel could tell she had thought this through - over and over again. Every word, though pained, was spoken with clear intent. He could tell that this wasn’t just hysterics in the heat of the moment. Elain meant every word she said and it rendered him absolutely speechless.

“My life was taken from me.” She went on, her voice quieter now as she took a deep breath and squared her shoulders. “I lost my fiancé, I lost my humanity, I lost my father. So many choices were stolen from me the second I was changed. Do I not deserve to have a say in what I do now? Do I not deserve to have a say in who I love? Do I not deserve to have a say in my own happiness?”

“It’s complicated, Elain.” Azriel finally spoke, his voice barely a whisper. “You deserve a choice but that choice comes with endless costs…there is already so much tension between the courts.”

“I don’t care!” She took another step closer until there was no space between them at all. Her hands reached for his and though he should’ve taken a step back, should’ve pulled away, he let her take them, let her intertwine her perfect fingers in his.

“You came for me once.” Elain’s voice was soft as she looked up at him, her eyebrows knitting together as she stared into the depth of this soul - forced him to recall when he’d risked his life to rescue her. “You fought for me then, will you not fight for me again?”

Tears were still streaming down her face but her sobs had subsided, her voice stronger as she challenged him.

“You know I would, but it’s just… it’s complicated.” He reiterated.

“Do you not want this?” Her face fell, her hands dropping from his as she went to take a step back. The confidence that she had exhibited just a second ago, faltering.

Azriel moved without thinking, one hand landing on her hip to keep her with him.

She gasped as his fingers pressed against her, calluses snagging on the smooth silk of her white gown, the feel of his skin through the thin material warmed her from the inside out.

His other hand landed on her neck, just as it had months ago - his thumb tracing a gentle path along the soft line of her jaw.

“Of course, of course, I want this.” He shook his head as if he couldn’t believe she’d even had to ask. His voice was so low he wasn’t sure she’d be able to hear him despite her face being mere inches from his. “I will always want this.”

Her eyes searched his, her shoulders dropping as all the tension she’d been holding in her body flooded out of her, causing her to slump against him. Azriel fingers flexed, his grip on her hip tightening, keeping her steady.

“I want you.” Elain whispered, tilting her face to look at him properly. “It will always be you.”

She was on her tiptoes then, her hands sliding up his torso until they were on his chest for the second time that night - her nails pressed into his leathers until her lips were just barely against his.

“Please, Azriel.” She all but whimpered.

Her plea cracked something in his chest and he could no longer hold back. All the work he’d done to stay away all these months, all these years, all of it was undone in a single second at the sound of his name on her lips. At the feel of her body against his.

Every wall he’d worked so diligently to build, came crumbling down faster than he could even comprehend.

Azriel closed the distance between them, his hand still on her throat as his lips brushed hers for the first time.

…

There was no going back from this.

The second his lips pressed against hers, tentative and sweet, Elain knew in her heart, in her very soul that nothing, no one, would ever compare to this. To him.

Every thought, every worry, every doubt she’d ever had slipped from her mind as Azriel finally kissed her. His lips were soft as they moved against hers, gentle and careful. He was committing this moment to memory just as she was - both of them desperate to remember every second of this, every possible detail. His tongue slid against her lips and she opened for him without a second thought, allowing him to deepen the kiss as she met him stroke for stroke.

Elain couldn’t get close enough to him, her hands frantically coming up from his chest to tangle in his hair, fingers tugging him down in a silent request for more, more, more.

His groan as she pressed her body tight against his reverberated through her and she couldn’t help the desperate moan that escaped her in response. Every ounce of blood, every nerve in her body seemed to be screaming for him - for his attention.

“Touch me.” Elain begged. His face was buried against her neck now, his lips and teeth and tongue grazing the sensitive skin causing her to arch further into him even though there was barely any space between them to begin with. “Please, Azriel.”

He relented, his hand slipped from her throat, one finger slowly skimmed along the delicate neckline of her nightgown before traveling lower. After what felt like a million years, his fingers grazed her peaked nipple, circling once, twice, before his large palm covered her breast and squeezed gently. His other hand released her hip to slip behind her, gripping the generous curve of her ass and pressing her firmly against him - allowing her to feel exactly how hard he was for her.

Her head tipped back, exposing more of her neck to him as her mouth fell open, eyes fluttering shut at the sensation of him in between her thighs. Elain rolled her hips against his as if it was second nature, seeking out that delicious pressure against her core again and again all while cursing the few despicable layers of fabric that separated her from truly feeling every inch of him.

His lips were on hers once more, all his previous gentleness nowhere to be found, replaced instead with pure heated passion as he claimed her with bruising kisses. She was dizzy - all she could feel was him, all she could taste was him, all she could smell was him - the combined scent of both of their arousal was heavy in the air, permeating every square inch of the hallway.

Azriel’s hands slipped under her ass as he continued to kiss her, bunching up the silk of her gown until he could get his hands on the back of her bare thighs. He let his thumbs drift over her soft skin once before lifting her up easily. She wrapped her legs around his waist, her arms draped around his broad shoulders. He carried her with him, walking backwards until he could set her on a small console table in the middle of the hallway.

That familiar energy between them sizzled, only amplifying with each pass of his lips over her lips, her neck, her collarbones. She could’ve sworn there was a glowing aura around them as he lowered his face to her breasts, tongue laving at her nipples over her slip. The sensation of the damp fabric sliding against her skin was enough to have her seeing stars.

“Azriel.” She pleaded again, unsure what she was even asking for.

“Tell me what you want, Elain.” His mouth was still on her chest, hands raking her nightgown even further up her thighs as he raised his eyes to watch her. “Look at me and tell me what you want.”

Cool air hit the heat of her core at the exact same time she met his eyes.

The sound that she let out at that moment was almost embarrassing, her face and chest flushing. She felt him smile against the curve of her breast as he watched her. His eyes were darker than night, darker than she’d ever seen them. His tousled hair fell over his brows, casting shadows that only added to the darkness. Despite their darkness, there was a certain softness, a reverence in his gaze that she knew was reserved just for her.

She still hadn’t answered him. How could she possibly form words when his lips were on her breast? When his fingers were pressing into the flesh of her thighs? She couldn’t think straight, not when the soft ridges of his scars were sliding over her sensitive skin, going higher and higher with each pass as her legs widened for him on their own accord.

His eyes bore into hers as he straightened, raising up until his face was inches from her face. Azriel watched her carefully as he dragged a knuckle up her bare center - an absolute tease of a touch, so light that she almost wondered if she’d imagined it.

“Is this what you want, Elain?” His breath fanned over her as he spoke, their lips almost touching.

He pressed his forehead to hers. “Tell me.”

“Yes.” The word left her mouth in a gasp at the sheer command in his voice, at the brush of that same knuckle over the nerves at the apex of her thighs. She clutched at his neck, nails surely marking his skin as she kissed him.

Azriel kissed her as if he’d never get the chance to kiss her again, a searing kiss that caused a whole new wave of arousal to crest through her. But even his hot mouth pressing over hers couldn’t distract her from the feeling of two of his fingers slowly sliding through her, parting her, before his middle finger dipped into her just once.

“Look how wet you are for me.” He murmured in awe, pulling away just enough so he could bring his hand up between them. Azriel studied his fingers, the way the moonlight caught the wetness gathered there and made it glisten.

Her eyes went wide as she watched him take that finger into his mouth, his lips wrapping around it. She blushed when his eyes fluttered, savouring the taste of her.

“Do you have any idea how good you taste, Elain?” He returned his finger to her core, adding another, and then sank them into her once more in one slow thrust.

She couldn’t say anything, didn’t have the opportunity to when his fingers curled inside her, searching her upper walls until he found what he was seeking.

Those nimble fingers stroked a place that she hadn’t even known existed within her and Elain’s moan echoed in the hallway, her chest arching up into him - the friction of his leathers against her nipples only adding to the feeling of ecstasy that coursed through her.

Her hands roamed, grasping frantically at his chest, at his back. Azriel continued to steadily move his fingers within her. She needed to feel more of him. Needed the warmth of his skin.

“How do I…?” She whined, frustrated that she couldn’t find a single button or zip on his leathers. He’d have to do it. “Take this off.”

“No time. They’ll be back soon.” Azriel took her lower lip in between his teeth, tugging once before letting it go. “Just let me do this for you.”

She started to argue but Azriel kissed her again, increasing the pressure of his fingers as he stroked her over and over again.

“Another time.” He whispered, moving his lips to her neck and biting down lightly at the same time his thumb circled her clit.

“Fuck.” Elain cursed, immediately blushing as Azriel laughed against her throat - both of them surprised by her choice of words. She swallowed her embarrassment, choosing to focus on the desire burning low in her stomach instead. “Do that again.”

Azriel obeyed her order, running his thumb in smooth circles over her as he pumped his fingers into her, maintaining that same rhythm and ensuring that the tips of his fingers bumped against that spot inside of her with each pass.

Just a minute later, before she even knew what was happening, Elain’s vision blurred, her eyes squeezing shut as every nerve in her body came alive. She clutched at his hair, grabbing fistfuls of the silky strands as she clenched hard around his fingers. Her mouth fell open in a silent scream as she came for him.

Seconds, minutes, hours passed before she regained her sense of self. Azriel’s fingers had slipped out of her but he’d pressed himself against her instead, alleviating the emptiness that she felt without his fingers filling her. Azriel’s arms were wrapped around her, holding her tight to his chest, one hand in her hair as she attempted to catch her breath.

“That’s it, Elain.” He whispered into her hair, hands drawing soothing circles low on her back. “You did so good for me.”

“That was… I’ve never…” Elain breathed against his neck.

“You’ve… never?” Azriel stilled, his hand paused its circles but he continued to hold her against him.

“I mean, I’ve had…” Elain said quickly, trailing off. Her words were muffled as she spoke into his skin, “But no one’s ever done that for me. I’ve never…”

“Finished?” Azriel completed her sentence.

She nodded, face still tucked in the space between his neck and shoulder. Despite what they’d just done, she felt shy admitting this to him.

She pulled back slowly when he didn’t say anything further. The sweat from her body caused her slip to stick to her.

Elain swallowed her nerves, looking into his eyes - searching them for any sign of regret.

She found none. Only saw simmering lust and adoration.

“You deserve to feel like that every time, Elain.” A small satisfied smile tugged at his lips. Some primal part of him secretly fulfilled at the knowledge that he was the first person to make her come. He tucked a strand behind her pointed ear. “You should really go back to bed now.”

Elain’s eyebrows furrowed together. She wasn’t ready for this to end, wanted to stay here, safe in his arms, in this blissful bubble, forever. But besides that, she could still feel him - impossibly hard - where he was pressed firmly against her.

She kept her eyes on his as she reached down in between them, fingers itching to feel him but Azriel’s hand wrapped around her wrist, stopping her before she had the chance to touch him.

“They’ll be home soon.” He shook his head, bringing her hand up to his lips and pressing a kiss to each of her finger tips. “We have to save something for later.”

His words warmed something deep within her.

Later.

The promise of more.

“You won’t disappear again?” She allowed herself to voice her insecurity. The worry that things would go back to how they were before.

“No.” He didn’t hesitate. “I’ll seek you out. We’ll find a way. There’s more I want to do for you. With you.”

“Okay.” She nodded, leaning forward to kiss him again.

“This has to be just between us for now.” Azriel’s face was as serious as his voice. His large hands moved to cradle her face, fingers tracing softly along her cheekbones. “I’ll figure out how to make this work but for now… just between us.”

“Just between us.” She promised, repeating his words back to him.

She’d take whatever she could get. For now, this would have to be enough.

To have him in secret was better than not having him at all.

Azriel kissed her one last time before he backed out from between her legs, fixing her night gown to cover her before helping her down from where he’d perched her on the narrow table. His hands stayed on her waist, brushing over her curves until he was sure she was steady on her feet. “Goodnight, Elain.”

“Goodnight, Azriel.” She gave him a soft smile before walking away from him and back to her room.

The Shadowsinger watched until Elain’s door shut behind her and then he sighed, smoothing a hand over his unruly hair as he tried to figure out how the hell he was going to get the scent of them out of this hallway within the next hour.

[ofoceansandtombsanew]

nights like this i wish

cw. 5.3 spoilers, post-natlan archon quest, established relationship

pairing. kaeya alberich x black!fem!reader

synopsis. with the natlan's war with the abyss over, you're finally able to visit your lover's home in mondstadt.

notes. one of the few level 90 characters i have, that's how you know he's a real gem. i haven't written much for kaeya which is a shame when he's my favorite male character in the game and the reason i installed in the first place. so i wanted to write a little drabble for him

"And how are you enjoying your first night in the Land of Freedom?"

Nights are different in Mondstadt.

Crickets singing through the night, the occasional howl from Wolvendom. It's a stark, gentle contrast to evenings in Natlan where it's more common to hear the distant roar of a saurian than a wolf. The throaty rumble of Tollano. Or if you were incredibly unlucky, the declarative war cries of the Abyss. The last of which, fortunately, will no longer again plague your homeland. Nor are you restricted to remaining in your homeland's borders in order to avoid straining the Wayobs.

It's nice; Mondstadt is nice.

"I love it," you beam, falling back into the soft grass of Starsnatch Cliff. It's an aptly named location, you realize. Reaching out your hand, it really does feel like you can snatch the stars right out of the skies. If you ate one, what would it taste like? A giddiness that makes you feel like a child again sweeps over you much like the winds Mondstadt is known for. Kaeya chuckles, watching as you snugly press yourself in the grass. "It's beautiful. I'm happy I can finally see where you grew up."

Mondstadt has welcomed you warmly. In some ways, it reminds you much of your own home.

The poetic words of the bards are much similar to those hailing from the Flower-Feather Clan.

The laidback nature of the people is akin to those hailing from the People of the Springs.

In some ways, Natlan and Mondstadt seem inherently connected. The land of wine and song touched in Natlan's colors. You've wanted to visit long before you ever were aware there was a man named Kaeya Alberich in Teyvat. The founder of the Knights of Favonius hailed from Natlan, after all. From a time before the Night Kingdom, no less. Still Vennessa and her tribe found sturdy roots in Mondstadt, much like the giant tree nestled in Windrise.

Now here you are surrounded by the soft scent of cecilias rather than embercores.

I was born in a lucky lifetime. You never were one much concerned with matters dealing with luck. You aren't able to find any other word to describe it. You were born into a time where you would experience Natlan's victory and live to enjoy it. You'd been lucky enough to come across a gentleman from Mondstadt visiting the Collective of Plenty and Natlan's wine industry.

All these things leading up to where you are now.

"Thinking good thoughts, I hope," Kaeya's deep voice pulls you from your thoughts. He's not wearing his eyepatch for once; a rarity in itself. The starry sky is enough to illuminate his face, though, it isn't absolute. The shadows of his hair still work to keep his scar mostly hidden from your sight. It's still an honor he's comfortable enough to show you, regardless.

Playfully, you give him an incredulous reply, "do you doubt they're anything but?"

"I don't know," he teases, voice wine sweet. "You might surprise me. 'I've already grown tired of the sight of windmills, Kaeya. Take me far from this place. I'm ready for the mountainous terrain of Liyue.'"

"Take me there for Lantern Rite," you giggle, rolling onto your side. You pat the grass between you both, a silent offer. Somewhere between joyful and tired, you watch as your lover adjusts his positioning to lay beside you. "Thanks for hosting me while I'm here, Kaeya. It means a lot just being here."

"Hey now," Kaeya tuts, poking your forehead in his teasing. "What man wouldn't host his girlfriend after she comes all the way to his country?"

"I could have stayed at a hotel."

"Adelinde would kill me before you have a chance to meet her tomorrow if I did that."

That steals another laugh from your lips. You heard many a story about the head maid of the winery Kaeya grew up in. Tomorrow you'll finally have a face to the name. "I'd make sure to vouch for you so she wouldn't. I just don't want to take too much time away from your work."

Long distance is difficult for any couple. Considering Natlan's until recent restrictions, you are sure it was doubly more so for any coupling where half of the party was from Natlan. You'd seen a few relationships crack under that pressure. With Kaeya's own job as a knight keeping him busy, it is anyone's guess as much as yours that you were able to last this long together.

It's a relief.

It's a feeling that's warm.

The smile on Kaeya's face matches it, "you're never a bother to me."

"Even when your friends thought I was your totally-real-Natlanese-girlfriend?"

You both share a laugh at that. Outrider Amber had been more than certain that Kaeya had been making you up all this time. "Especially then," you're sure his diamond shaped pupils are sparkling. "It made their reactions that much more satisfying."

[nalyra-dreaming]

I'm sorry but I can't believe sex in ep6 even topic of discussion.

1)Why would they go to such lengths and spend their time and resources on making floaty sex, if it didn't mean anything and didn't serve any purpose? What purpose did it serve? Well, the first and last time we also saw floaty sex in ep1 and it was clear representation of connection and pleasure that sends you flying to Saturn and back. So, logically, ep6 sex too supposed to show connection and pleasure.

2) Next point (i'm not sure about this one tbh): perhaps there's one more parallel to ep1 scene - Louis "didn't consider himself a homosexual at that time" and we see cut to him having enthusiastic sex. In ep6 he was telling Daniel about being numb and we have cut to him PARTICIPATING in sex and not just lying there like a corpse.

3) They literally included Lestat stopping and checking on Louis and not doing anything before Louis kissed him. He noticed that Louis wasn't mentally there and stopped. Clear indication that Lestat wanted CONSENSUAL sex, if he truly didn't care he would just proceed to fuck Louis because Louis wasn't stopping him.

4) Give Louis a little agency, would you?(general you, not you, Nalyra) As I said, we didn't have any indication that Louis wad pressured into it, that lestat didn't care about Louis' consent and pleasure. Just because you're depressed doesn't mean you're incapable of making decisions. Louis' kiss was him reassuring lestat that he's here with him. He KNEW that lestat needed reassurance to proceed. Lestat can't read Louis' mind, he can't be 100% if Louis wants it or not, so he has to rely on what Louis TELLS him with words and body language. Louis told lestat with his actions that he wants him to proceed. That's Louis' decision, like it or not

5) I know fandom likes to act like Claudia is mentally 14 forever, but for majority of story she's grown woman. I'm actually not sure if she truly thinks Louis wouldn't mind her being in his head while they're having sex or she's actively disregarding his boundaries (that he didn't establish) but there's fact: it's weird. Maybe she thinks she's helping Louis to "cope" with sex because she's projecting her trauma with Bruce on Loustat (which is understandable!) but for me Louis' sounds uncomfortable, and resigned, half-heartedly trying to deflect Claudia. "Anywhere sounds like nowhere" - for me it was clear that he doesn't really want to leave and doesn't want to have this conversation but he fails to say it outright and shut down Claudia. So he just makes up excuses not to leave, avoids telling NO, and blocks his mind when Lestat notices that something is wrong.

So, my point, that cut from Bruce to Lestat was Claudia's mind coming to comparison. She thinks Louis does it to appease lestat, she's probably tries to help telling Louis about her escape plan, she views Louis' reluctants as fear of Lestat and that's it, when probably main reason is Louis simply not wanting to leave.

I'm so sorry for long essay, hope you don't mind! Love your work and blog:)

:) Glad you like.

And yeah... I cannot believe we're at this point again/still either.

Exactly. This is a deliberate thing, a deliberate connection to the best sex Louis had. As said before, it carries meaning.

Well, I mean, there are a lot more instances of Louis saying something and the show showing us something else. Or vice versa. That is... exactly the point. Louis is telling the tale for an effect. And that effect was to lead to the justified "murder night". But the why will be part of season 2.

I know

Louis is (not just) depressed because of Lestat. He is deep in the rite of passage. He addresses that on the bench. And yeah.. for some reason Louis' never gets his agency in these discussions. Because he could have moved away. He could have left. But he did not want to. He stayed right there, in Rue Royale during those 6 years (for example). Where Lestat could find him. But I digress. Louis does have agency, indeed. And it is often dismissed for some reason -.-

Claudia's thinking is very black and white, pun not intended. It's stark contrast. She hates and loves with the full power of puberty, at all times, no matter her mental age. Her hatred for Lestat colors her perception of Louis' love for him - she just cannot imagine Louis loving him. Oh she understands it. But to her Lestat is like Bruce, the worst of the worst, and she cannot fathom that there are actually vampires out there... who are much, much worse. That is part of the horror, that she just cannot... imagine, because ultimately Lestat and Louis raised her as a child and then a loved family member - not as a coven member. She has no point of reference, unfortunately. And no, Louis neither wants to have that conversation (but he is too nice to shut it down), nor does he want to leave. And that just... flies right over her head.

Neither Claudia nor Louis actually fear Lestat, and definitely not even after the fight. The car scene made that quite clear, imho.

Oh, they are angry at him, and justified in that anger. But fear? Nope.

[cogitoergofun]

The Biden administration this fall is quietly moving to overhaul welfare, aiming to end multiple abuses of the nation’s cash assistance program for the poor that a 2021 ProPublica investigation found states have been engaging in for years.

Through a package of proposed reforms to the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program, or TANF, the administration plans to shore up the U.S. social safety net. The regulations are intended to ensure that more federal and state welfare dollars make it to low-income families, rather than being spent on other things or not spent at all.

[...]

The first change would prohibit states from counting charitable giving by private organizations, such as churches and food banks, as “state” spending on welfare, a practice that has allowed legislatures to budget less for programs for low-income families while still claiming to meet federal minimums. ProPublica documented how Utah avoided more than $75 million in spending on public assistance over the past decade by taking credit for aid to the hungry and homeless provided by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. (Many of the vulnerable Utahns we interviewed felt that in order to access desperately needed aid, they had to participate in Mormon religious rites they didn’t believe in.)

By banning this practice, the Biden administration’s plan would force Utah to stop taking credit for what the church does and instead spend more state money assisting people in poverty.

The new rules would also restrict states from spending TANF funds on child protective services investigations, foster care or any other programs that don’t meet the fundamental purposes of welfare: strengthening poor families and keeping them together. ProPublica found that in Arizona and elsewhere, money meant to help parents struggling to raise their children is instead used to investigate them for alleged child maltreatment — which often stems from the very financial circumstances that they needed help with in the first place.

Under the Biden plan, Arizona would likely have to find other ways of funding its aggressive child protective services investigations of poor parents and use welfare dollars to help families stay together rather than removing their kids into foster care.

The reforms would also redefine the term “needy” to refer only to families with incomes at or below 200% of the federal poverty line. Currently, some states spend TANF money on programs like college scholarships — or volleyball stadiums — that benefit more affluent people.

Ashley Burnside, a senior policy analyst and expert on TANF at the Center for Law and Social Policy, an advocacy organization for low-income Americans, said that political support for such improvements to welfare has grown in recent years, especially amid the pandemic, when so many more families started to need help. Media coverage by both ProPublica and Mississippi Today helped make this happen, she said.

As ProPublica has reported, many of welfare’s failures originated with a 1996 law signed by then-President Bill Clinton. That legislation, which Biden supported at the time as a senator, gave states broad flexibility over how to spend their annual grant of federal dollars intended for the poor. In the decades since, legislatures, especially in the South and Southwest, have found ever more creative outlets for the funding, including diverting it to anti-abortion clinics or not spending it at all.

[brabblesban]

Ch 20: Aeterna amantes

Astarion has ascended, and she has stayed with him. Life in the Crimson Palace isn’t as idyllic as it seems. Is there a chance for their relationship to go back to how it was? Or is it too late for the Ascendant and his consort?

This series is about Ban, my Tav, and the Vampire Ascendant. Will be angst and smut, with sprinkles of fluff.

This fic is a softer take on Ascendant!Astarion and of the changes he undergoes after the rite. Can Ban handle the change, and if a chance came, would she choose to run? And can the Ascendant win her back in time? Inspired by the concept of vampire wives and that IGN interview with Larian that discussed the ascension.

Professionally edited by @editing-by-night

The Ascendant and his consort celebrate their first year in style.

Read on AO3.

Masterlist.

Ban bid the last of the guests farewell, sighing in relief.

Finally. That had been the most fun she’d had at one of their parties - not that a lot of them had actually been fun, but still. She’d had fun, and that was wonderful, but she was glad it was over. She headed into the heart of the Palace, towards their bedroom.

Astarion had disappeared sometime near the end of the party, bidding the guests a rather loud and uncharacteristically boisterous farewell; saying he needed to prepare for something important.

She had watched from across the ballroom, rolling her eyes at his antics. He’d been obviously buzzed, which wasn’t uncommon during these events, but that boyish excitement was new and charming. There had been little doubt of what exactly was on his mind, seeing as his eyes had followed her the whole evening.

Ban opened the bedroom door to the sight of Astarion sprawled on their bed; one hand was under his head, pillowing it. The other hand seemed to have just finished unbuttoning his embroidered jacket and shirt - he grasped one side of the garment, as if in the act of peeling it off himself.

That gaze, however, told Ban this was all staged. He’d probably been waiting here since he left the party, anticipating the sound of her footsteps approaching the door.

Actual fucking idiot, Ban thought with fondness and no small amount of exasperation. She’d probably have to have the sheets changed, considering he was on them with clothes that weren’t the cleanest. All the same, she let herself admire the rather fetching view.

“Hello, darling,” Astarion purred, voice thick with arousal. He didn’t have to pretend, having spent the last twenty minutes absently touching himself through his clothes whilst waiting for her.

She couldn’t help it, she laughed as she made her way over to the bed. She sat beside him, patting his clothed thigh patronizingly; pointedly avoiding the bulge right beside it.

“Like what you see?” Astarion drawled. He traced a hand over his exposed torso, running across the peaks and valleys of muscle.

Ban’s eyes followed his hand’s path, unable to resist. The laugh died in her throat.

“I- well, yes, actually,” she managed to say, whatever quip she’d had in mind dissolving at the sight before her.

The smirk on his face widened. I’ve got her, he thought gleefully. His hand continued its path downward, stilling by his waistband.

“You can touch,” he offered, “if you’re a good girl.”

His hand hooked in the top edge, tugging one side down to reveal his hip bone. He looked up just in time to see her lick her lips; it only fueled the mischievous gleam in his eyes.

Astarion’s other hand moved from behind his head to palm himself.

“Fuck,” Ban hissed, eyes glued to his hand. He bucked his hips up to press himself against his palm and she nearly moaned. “Fine.”

Satisfied, Astarion abandoned his cock to tug down the other side of his waistband. Slowly, with his eyes fixed on her, he worked at his trousers, shimmying them down together with his underwear.

“More?” he asked, and at her all-too-eager nod, continued.

Ban swallowed as inch by inch of ivory skin was revealed, pearlescent in the light, and couldn’t help the slight watering of her mouth when he finally uncovered his cock. Pale as the rest of him, beautifully veined, delectably pink at the head - he was perfect. He reached in to gently free himself before tugging his trousers the rest of the way down, kicking them off.

She wanted to ask to suck, to feel him fuck her mouth, to swirl her tongue around that pink tip and taste that salty musk that was just him-

The thought derailed as she saw him curl long, delicate fingers around his hard length, gently stroking.

Astarion moaned, a loud, unrestrained sound that was a little too perfect to not be fictitious.

Ban immediately found herself remembering the similar sounds he had made in the earliest days of their relationship; worry flooded her, and the entire scene became significantly less appealing.

“You do know you don’t have to perform, right? You never do. Not with me.”

“I am completely aware,” Astarion replied, his eyes heavy-lidded and sensual. His hand continued to stroke his cock; it grew harder under his touch as his hips began to slowly roll in rhythm with each pass.

“I would like to, though. To… retake it for myself. To write over old memories with better ones. Performing with love, to heighten our mutual pleasure… it doesn’t feel the same. It feels… good.”

Just as he’d wished for tonight to help counterbalance Ban’s bad experiences with him, he wanted the same for himself, with his own unpleasant memories.

His gaze softened. “Come here,” he gestured, releasing his cock and reaching for her.

She acquiesced, shifting closer. Both of his hands slipped under her skirt, his touch warm against her undead skin. She shivered as he caressed her thighs and began slowly inching his way upward, finding the hem of her underwear.

“May I?” Astarion asked, smiling at her nod. He hooked his fingers into the top and gently tugged them down, slipping her underwear off with a practiced grace. He could smell her arousal on them, could feel just how soaked the dainty piece of fabric was.

Ban was a little disappointed that was the only thing he did while there, a small pout forming on her lips.

He laughed when he noticed. “A little more patience, love.” He tossed the strip of fabric aside.

“My, Ban. This wet for little old me?” Gods. He imagined her at the ball just walking around, soaked, thinking of him - wanting him. The thought stroked his ego a lot more than he would have expected it to. He took a deep breath.

“I suppose your whole seduction routine, as silly as it was, sort of worked,” she allowed sheepishly. Godsdamned Astarion, really. She’d never been able to resist his charms.

Astarion laughed. One hand wrapped around her wrist, tugging her closer. The other settled on her waist, guiding her to straddle him.

Ban lifted her skirt up and out of their way, settling directly over him, but stayed kneeling, keeping a small distance between them.

The proximity of her warm mound so close to his cock nearly drove all other thoughts from his mind.

“I thought you wanted to lead tonight?” Ban was confused, a byproduct of her relative naiveté when it came to sex. All the previous times Astarion had led, it had been similar things - him on top of her, behind her, or standing above her.

He found her inexperience endearing, but also vexing, considering that she didn’t even need experience to make him this weak for her.

“I am leading.” A soft, reassuring smile crossed his features. “Just not in the way I used to.”

In time, maybe they would try again, going rougher, with more aggression. For now, his goal was simply to prove her trust in him wasn’t misplaced.

Astarion knew this next part would be the hardest for her, but he hoped to make it enjoyable for her as well as himself. He slipped a hand under the pillows above his head, retrieving the dagger. He knew he looked a tad anxious, but powered through the potential awkwardness.

Ban went pale at the sight of twisting silver edges wrapped around a central wooden stake. Rhapsody.

Astarion saw her expression change, and quickly tried to soothe her.

“Ban,” he began, his jaw working as he tried to find the words to express his wishes. His hands gently placed Rhapsody’s hilt in her open palm, wrapping her fingers around the grip.

“I know we spoke of this before, and that you agreed, but… I want to reiterate. I want to retake this, too. It carved my back, all those years ago. It carved… Cazador’s back,” He forced the name out; he refused to let it have any more power over him. “It almost killed me. So please. I merely want to make a memory of this blade that doesn’t hurt to recall. If you don’t…”

The words died in his throat, but she understood. Her fingers tightened on the hilt. She looked down at him. He was so beautiful, positively breathtaking, but now she also saw the vulnerability behind the seduction. He was performing for himself, for both of them - trying to reclaim the pieces of themselves that they’d lost.

She nodded hesitantly. “I’m not going to break skin, though,” Ban murmured, easing somewhat. The dagger felt heavy in her grasp.

“I wouldn’t mind if you did, but we can save that for another day - or never.” He watched the blade glint in the light, swallowing. “Whichever you wish to do.”

Ban lowered herself, her folds finally settling atop his length; a shiver ran down his spine at the feel of her - so wet and warm - pressed against him.

“Now,” Astarion commanded, his tone shifting lower and harsher. “Grind on me.”

Ban registered the change. She obeyed, her hips rolling slowly over his cock. She was rewarded with a hiss; she could feel him begin to thrust as well, seeking more friction.

Astarion’s length felt velvety, hard against her clit, the perfect shape and girth to rub herself against. She slid over him as she sought her own pleasure, her slick spreading all along his cock. It felt good - almost too good, Ban thought, averting her eyes from his face to focus on his chest instead.

Nope. That didn’t help either.

Fucking Astarion, really. Too damned perfect for his own good. Or hers.

With every roll of her hips his cock dragged against her clit, eliciting a shaky moan from her. Astarion could hear for himself how wet she was, the sounds of her sliding against him were deliciously obscene when she ground down harder. The warmth of her made his hips snap up.

He stared greedily up at her, eyes taking in every inch. She was still dressed, but he found he didn’t quite care just yet. He noted the sheer want in her expression and smiled widely, his fangs peeking out.

Ban’s patience failed her, slipping the hand not holding Rhapsody down between them, trying to slip his cock inside her. His hand wrapped around her wrist, stopping her before she could succeed.

A small whine of protest escaped Ban’s lips.

“Relax, darling. You’ll have what you want if you behave.” He used her words against her, smirking when she glared.

A little taste of her own medicine. He savored that small glint of anger; it only served to heighten his arousal. She rubbed herself faster on his cock in revenge, and the thought sputtered out of existence. He nearly took back what he’d just said. There was one more thing he wanted before he finally fucked her, however.

Astarion’s hand went back to his embroidered jacket and shirt, opening them further, leaving his chest fully bared.

“Right here,” he whispered, ghosting his fingertips over the dip at the center of his chest, directly over his heart. “The tip, Ban. Right here.”

Ban did as he asked, lowering the dagger with no small amount of hesitation; Rhapsody’s point hovered a few inches above his now-heaving chest.

Astarion growled. “Closer.”

She lowered Rhapsody even more, until the point touched his chest. Astarion could feel his heart pounding against its tip, the sensation sending another thrill down to his cock. The slick down there, the heat of her, was almost overwhelming; Astarion didn’t know how much longer he could endure this without giving in and fucking her senseless.

“So wet for me, Ban,” he murmured, “Such a good girl. Now, press down a little.”

Fingers, trembling ever so slightly, covered Ban’s on the hilt, guiding it. The blade depressed the skin; not enough to break it, but enough that he could feel the slight sting over his racing heart.

His other hand snuck down past her skirt and between her legs to wrap around his cock, stroking it twice. He held it steady for her.

“Go ahead then, love. Take what you want.”

She didn’t hesitate; she’d only been waiting for his permission. Ban shot him a wry grin; gathering up her skirt, shoving it aside.

Astarion temporarily released his grasp on Rhapsody to flap a hand at her, as if to say hurry up, and she made it a point to do everything slower.

Carefully, painstakingly lifting her hips up, Ban looked down along her body to line herself up. She kept herself there, the head of his beautiful cock just brushing her entrance.

Astarion’s hand rejoined hers on the hilt of the dagger. He could feel her warmth radiating against the head of his cock, nearly stealing away any sense of control he had left.

“Ban,” Astarion hissed, “Sit on it or I swear-”

She finally sank down, down into that blessed, wonderful feeling in one rapid move.

There was little resistance; Astarion felt himself sink in to the hilt, fully buried inside her. The sudden warmth and tightness around his cock brought a wild surge of pleasure, unraveling Astarion’s brain; his hand on Rhapsody jerked, cutting into his own chest.

It was a shallow wound, but it bled all the same. Ban didn’t notice at first, lost in the sensation of being spread open and filled. Astarion, impaling her with that beautiful, perfect cock; laid out before her like an offering to be devoured. Gone was her previous bashfulness - all that was left was wanton desire.

Then the smell hit her nose, the sharp, all-too-familiar coppery scent of blood mixed with the sweet notes that told her it was his, and her eyes snapped to him, a mixture of hunger and concern in her gaze.

Astarion smiled. “It’s okay.”

He gently took the dagger from her grasp, knowing that had been too much - too close to what had happened when he’d been injured. He flicked his wrist, tossing the Rhapsody off the side of the bed. He didn’t care where it landed. His hands settled on Ban’s waist, squeezing gently.

“Would be a waste of blood if we don’t at least use it, don’t you think? Lick.” He watched her reaction even as the words left his mouth. Any sign of discomfort from her, any hint of her retreating into herself, and he knew to end this little game. His hips began to roll, fucking her gently, a pleasurable rocking motion that he hoped would help in easing her.

But there was no distress. Ban’s mind was filled with nothing but him - his length moving inside her, his hands holding her, his blood pooling on his chest. And most of all, his eyes, which told her everything she needed to know. They seemed to whisper I love you. You can trust me. You’re okay.

He smiled, enjoying that his beauty so easily distracted her. “Ban. Lick.”

She leaned forward in response to his command and began to lick the blood from his chest. The taste of it, of him, sent a shiver of pleasure through her, causing her to clench around him.

He groaned, relishing the sensation of her squeezing him. He increased the pace of his thrusts, ensuring each roll of his hips dragged against her walls and hit her spot.

“Gods, Ban. You’re perfect,” he whispered, voice soft, the act all but forgotten.

She hummed in delight at his praise, pausing mid-lick to look at him, tongue still pressed against his skin, fangs glinting in the light. She smiled, a gesture that told him she was fine, that she was genuinely enjoying this.

The happiness and trust in her eyes made Astarion’s heart swell. He lifted his head to see her better.

“Take your clothes off. I want to see everything.”

Ban licked off the last of his blood and sat up. She felt for the hem of her dress, tugging it up with both hands. As she pulled the dress over her head she rocked her hips gently, grinding to match his pace.

She revealed her skin inch by inch, pale from undeath, though not as much as his. Muscles rippled as she undressed herself. She lifted the dress off and let it fall onto the bed, riding him without any pause or change in her rhythm.

His eyes raked over the lines of muscle as they flexed with every move, over the scars and moles and every single imperfection on her skin. Over her breasts, which were small and tight and just her, and all the more beautiful because of it.

She was the most magnificent thing he’d ever behold, he mused.

Astarion reluctantly forced his hips to still. It took more effort than he’d like to admit, the urge to blindly rut into her was far stronger than anticipated. Still, he wanted to make her work for it a little, to keep his little game going.

“That’s it, pleasure yourself on my cock, darling,” he cooed, eyes greedily taking in every inch of her, as if she might disappear on the morrow and he wanted to commit her to memory. He slid a hand up to cup her breast. She whined at the sensation and he squeezed - not too hard, but enough to bring forth a tantalizing mix of pleasure and pain.

Astarion’s other hand drifted lower, running down her belly and moving between her legs. He felt for her clit and began rubbing. Gently at first - a light flick - a move that was instantly rewarded when she tightened around him and rolled her hips particularly hard. Satisfied, he rubbed more insistently; the feedback to his touch was near instantaneous, her soft whimpers of pleasure urged him on.

That, and the wonderful way Ban clenched around his cock.

Slowly, inevitably, his desire to perform slipped away. What was the point? They were already in the thick of it; she was moaning out her need for him, her walls caressing him with every move, their desire mixing together in a way they had only ever done for each other. He was done playing.

“Love me?” Astarion murmured, a little unsure. He was glad that it no longer needed to be a command, no longer something he had to coerce from her. He merely had to ask, and it was his. Still, the slight uncertainty crept into his voice; he’d asked for this so many times and heard it back in just as many ways, but so many of those had been during moments of darkness - of anger, of desperation.

Then there had been Ban’s feelings - resignation, submission, apathy. It had torn at his heart, made him hate himself, stained everything like blood spreading through cloth. He longed, hoped, for tonight to be a step towards reclaiming this as well, towards cleaning the stains from the fabric of their relationship.

“Of course,” she said, panting a little. Ironic, Ban thought, that this was what he always asked for, because it was the one thing she always felt. Looking down at her husband, she watched his face - openmouthed and adoring - as she slowly rode the thoughts out of his mind. Seeing his hesitance as he asked for something so simple as her love had almost made her want to stop and just cuddle him.

Almost. His cock felt too good to stop.

“I love you. Always have. Forevermore will.” Words she had said in similar situations, but at times hadn’t wanted to utter, or hadn’t felt in those moments. As she said them now, she heard his breath catch; the hand lazily playing with her nipple went still. She could even feel his cock throb inside her at the same moment.

“Astarion?” She looked down at him with affection and slight amusement. It took a moment for him to lock eyes with her, his own gaze hazy with lust, his mind still basking in her words.

“I love you,” she repeated, smiling down at him.

Those words, repeated, were music to his ears; a low whimper left his lips. He was still fighting to keep his hips still, to let her keep riding him, but he was rapidly losing. His hips stuttered here and there, unable to deny the urge.

His thoughts were scattered between the feel of her enveloping him and the overwhelming devotion that was washing through him. Never again, he thought. I would rather die than lose this again.

Ban’s hips increased their pace. Seeing Astarion so obviously coming apart from just her words never ceased to excite her. It was always her he needed; even at their lowest, that had never changed. Being so wanted, so needed, brought a heady sort of satisfaction to her.

Astarion’s neck was beginning to hurt from the effort of holding his head up, but he didn't care. He needed to see her, needed to see the one person who had ever mattered to him, the only one he could ever enjoy this sort of touch from, her and only her alone-

The way she lifted and slid back down around him grew more intense; he could feel his own desire pressing against him more insistently, the beginning tendrils of that electric need to empty himself in her beginning to unspool from his cock out through the rest of his body. He fought himself for a few moments more, wanting to tease her for just a little bit longer, but the words slipped from his mouth unbidden.

“Do you want to come, love?” He wouldn’t ask her to beg; it was something he felt was too close to his old ways, and he refused to remind her of that right now.

“Yes, please,” Ban replied quickly, still frantically riding him. She wanted, needed more, more than his hand playing with a breast and fingers rubbing her clit. She wanted him to fuck her, but gods was he being obstinate.

He let go of her breast, slipping his hand to the small of her back while the other continued toying with her clit. He gently pushed her down, guiding her to lay on his chest.

“Let me do this for you,” Astarion whispered when her cheek made contact with his chest, kissing the top of her head. “Just listen to my heart and allow me to pleasure you.”

Let me do what I should have been doing long ago. Put her first - her needs, her wants. Give her the love she deserved. When he’d first ascended he had tried to fuck her broken pieces back together, throwing every single trick he knew at the problem, but he’d since realized that he’d been doing it the wrong way around.

He only ever really needed to be himself to make her happy; a truth he had once known and lost sight of. He offered it every day now, regularly bared his heart and soul to put her pieces back together. But even then it was no guarantee. It could still be too late.

But that didn’t mean he wouldn’t try.

He held her tightly to him in a one-armed embrace. Placing his feet flat on the bed, Astarion began to snap his hips up into her, hard and fast. She moaned; he could feel his blood rush, his pulse racing from the effort.

“For you,” he murmured, hand and hips working diligently. “Only you.”

Astarion’s hips and fingers worked in concert, stroking her just the way she liked, hips angling so that every stroke caressed that secret spot inside her that only he knew. He closed his eyes, focusing on feeling her reactions, listening to her breaths, eager to bring her to paradise.

The blood-red sheets were silk satin, gorgeous but oh-so-slippery. He fought to keep his feet firmly planted where he placed them. The tension in his legs made him grunt and they slowly began to tire from the effort required to keep himself ideally positioned for her. A slight burn set in, but he didn't relent.

“Astarion-” she gasped. She was still trying to grind down onto him, but her movements were weak and irregular, her body completely taken over by his ministrations. She didn’t even know what she wanted to tell him - that she loved him? To go harder, slower - a different angle?

To tell him how good it felt, to have him inside her, filling her and stretching her with every stroke? How intimate it was to hear his heart roar for her, only her? How amazing it was, that he knew exactly how and where and when to touch her? All this, she thought, and more. So much more.

“I- I know. I love you,” he whispered to her, gliding his hand across her skin from her clit, over her hip, to her ass. He gripped tightly as he slammed her down onto his cock hard, in rhythm with his thrusts. He continued pistoning upward, his own desire threatening to overwhelm him. He held back, biting his lower lip. Not yet.

He stilled, hoping to regain some composure, to last longer. Ban whined, rolling her hips insistently. It almost shut his brain down and he growled, the hand on her ass squeezing hard in warning.

“Wait.” He took a breath, needed a moment to focus on something else - anything other than her and the overwhelming need to come. He could feel his cock twitching, begging for the friction to resume. Ban stopped moving, thankfully; he opened his eyes, meeting her gaze. He quickly stretched his legs before repositioning his feet. He began to thrust up again, hammering into her relentlessly.

The sensation of his cock stretching and fucking her mercilessly, the head dragging against her walls, slamming into her spot again and again, in combination with the sound of his heartbeat thundering in her ears, sent her over the edge.

Ban finally came with a loud cry, fisting her hands into the sheets. He felt her walls flutter around him, the familiar squeezing and clenching very nearly finishing him off as well.

He held her close as she rode out the waves of her ecstasy, peppering small kisses to the top of her head and rubbing her back with fingers that trembled.

When she finally quieted, she lifted her head from his chest. She was met by soft, affectionate eyes. “Did you…?”

Astarion shook his head. “Not yet.” He was still buried in her, cock twitching, legs tense.

Ban frowned, confused. “You seemed close. Why didn’t you come?”

He smiled softly. “I wanted you to finish first.” He brought a hand up to tilt her chin, pressing his lips against hers. The kiss wasn’t insistent, but it still intensified his need.

Astarion flipped them over mid-kiss, pinning her underneath him. He rested on his elbows, looking down at her. His curls were a mess, hanging over his eyes.

Should’ve started with this position, he thought.

She giggled a little, amused by the sudden change. He could feel her smile against his lips. Breaking the kiss, he shifted down to mouth at her neck. He pushed her leg up with his right knee, spreading her legs further apart, allowing himself to sink deeper into her.

Astarion parted his lips, pressing his fangs against her skin - a gentle touch, waiting. She didn’t protest.

“Ban,” he murmured, “May I?”

She laughed. “Thought you were leading?” She bucked her hips playfully and he was immediately on edge again. He growled against her neck.

“I was,” he replied, then sighed, the fight leaving him. “Obviously, I lost the thread a little.”

“No, not really. You’re just having too much fun, Astarion, that’s all.”

He chuckled and nodded. “Hard not to, with you.”

Repositioning his mouth against her pulse, he tried again. “So, Ban, again, since you were too distracted to give a proper response the first time I asked. May I?” That, he thought, should work better. A little more edge to it, although definitely nowhere close to what he’d envisioned for tonight.

Not that he minded.

“Yes, you fool.” She ruffled his hair, and he sighed in exasperation, finally sinking his fangs into her neck.

He moaned as her blood gushed into his mouth - the flavor he cherished above all others, and always would, regardless of anything else he would taste for the rest of his life. He gripped her thighs, holding them in place. His hips resumed their movement as he fed, driving himself into her hard and fast and deep, the taste of her blood fuelling his arousal. Her on his tongue, all around his cock, in his arms. Her love for him. Today and tomorrow and forevermore-

Astarion came with a low growl, eyes squeezing shut, hips losing their rhythm and stuttering as he finally spilled inside his wife. He rode out the waves of his orgasm, smearing a little of Ban’s blood by accident as his mind went blank and his fingers dug into her skin.

When he finally came back to himself, he realized Ban was whispering to him, her hands stroking his hair.

“I love you,” she repeated, her fingers trailing through his sweat-soaked curls.

He licked off the spilled blood, going boneless on top of her, exhausted. He smiled into the crook of her neck, happy. Hers.

“Did you enjoy that, love?” Astarion asked later as they sat together in the tub, bathing and basking in post-coital bliss. His back was facing her chest as she washed his hair.

He should be enjoying himself, but he couldn’t stop the wisps of doubt from wriggling into his mind.

What if I scared her? Didn’t do well? Reminded her of things she’d rather forget?

“I did,” Ban said, massaging the shampoo into his hair. “It’s been a while since we did it that way, and, well…”

“Well?” He raised an eyebrow. “Well what? Did it feel good? Was I… Did I…”

“Do well?” She leaned forward to hug him. “You did wonderfully.”

“Of course I did.” He puffed up his chest, outwardly smug, attempting to hide the nervousness behind the bluster. “I know your body even better than my own.”

True, of course. But that hadn’t always been enough. He hadn’t always used that knowledge solely for her pleasure.

“And you, Astarion? Was it good for you?” Ban asked, resuming caring for his hair.

“Better than good.” He paused for a moment, searching for the right words. “You gave me your trust again. That’s… that’s all I wanted, really.”

“But the sex was decent too, of course,” he added quickly, effortlessly dodging her hand as she playfully attempted to smack him.

“Ever think we’d end up this way?” Ban’s voice was quiet, looking at him as they rested together in the darkness.

Astarion considered the question.

“Had I not done what I did? Yes. But I did do it. Therefore… no.” He reached for her, and they turned onto their sides, curling up together with her back to his chest.

“We became bitter and twisted, and falling into that was terribly easy to do.”

She considered his words. “Fair. And getting here was-”

“Exceedingly difficult, yes,” Astarion finished for her. “There’s still more work to do, you know.”

Ban nodded. “I know.” She felt a small pang of guilt for not being quite there yet.

“Don’t,” he said sharply, “I know what you’re thinking - so don’t.”

She didn’t answer, and that familiar dull ache began in his chest. He sighed.

“For what it’s worth, Ban, you’re worth the work too,” Astarion offered, “And no matter what happens now, I’m just glad it’s with you.”

She twisted in his arms to face him, pressing their lips together in a gentle, affectionate kiss.

They fell asleep tangled in one another’s arms.

There was still a long way to go - relearning each other, rebuilding what they’d once had, forging a new path forward. There were old wounds that still needed healing, wounds that needed a careful hand to avoid reopening. And there would always be fresh trials and new challenges to overcome.

But if they stumbled, if they fell, they would always have one another to hold onto.

Finally, the future felt bright.

Astarion rested peacefully throughout the night. Here in the heart of his palace, in the center of his power and earthly possessions, he held the only thing that truly mattered. Her.

When dawn arrived, Ban opened her eyes. A shaft of sunlight peeked through the gap between vermillion curtains, shining on her face. Her hand moved, reaching for the space beside her before she stopped herself. There was no need to check. There never would be.

An arm reached back, wrapping around her waist.

He was here. And he always would be. Eternally.

As would she.

[zenmiren]

❝ when mountains bow to gentle things . ❞

╰➤ genshin impact xiao x fem! reader

— . A quiet love story about the vigilant yaksha and a merchant's daughter, who he fears he may taint.

{ romance, fluff, (some) angst, happy ending }

|| visionless! reader

───────♡───────

PAGE 1 . Calming Breeze and Meeting, His Gaze

chap summary :: The first meeting. Taking place at Wangshu Inn, [name] is only there to deliver foreign supplies to the chef that works there since her father is friends with him. When [name] stumbles and nearly trips while she's climbing up one of the many staircases in the inn, she braces for impact, only to be left speechless when instead, she is met with the scent of cedarwood and bergamot, and a cold hand grabbing her wrist to keep her still. The handsome stranger who saved her from a lifetime's worth of embarrassment introduced himself as Xiao.

PAGE 2 . Befriending Someone Silent, His Avoidance

chap summary :: [Name] returns, this time, she looks out for him with the intent of being friends. The girl was always very outgoing, and Xiao didn't seem to understand why she continuously wanted to strike conversation with him, leading him to continuously avoid her. It's only when [Name] gives up and leaves, only to get ambushed by a camp of hilichurls, that Xiao finally shows up to save the day.

PAGE 3 . Gold In The Sky, His Awe

chap summary :: The Lantern Rite. [Name] finds him roaming the outskirts and invites him to join her. Reluctantly, Xiao agrees, and the two make their way to Liyue City to enjoy the festivities. When their there, they come across The Traveller and their companion, Paimon, who mistake them of being on a date (to which they immediately decline). After the awkward encounter, [Name] releases a lantern for her late mother. . . And one for him, too.

PAGE 4 . When Injuries Happen, His Softness

chap summary :: [Name] journeys to Qingce to deliver a package for her father. Xiao is in the area, spots her, and is about to teleport back to Wangshu Inn before his gut told him to stay and watch for whatever reason. Xiao's brain protested, but his heart and gut told him to keep watch, and fortunately, Xiao was right to ignore his brain when a heavy downpour happens, causing [Name] to slip and injure her ankle. He carries her without hesitation, to a village inn nearby, staying with her there for the night.

PAGE 5 . Words Of Regret, His Doubts

chap summary :: [Name] invites Xiao to visit her father's shop, with the intent of stopping by to have Xiao meet her father, asking for money, and spoiling Xiao with almond tofu from Ms Xiangling's store. Her father, however, disapproves, and the two get into a heated argument. The words echoed caused Xiao's thoughts to erratically travel through his brain, causing him to do something he might regret.

PAGE 6 . Something Sudden, His Distance

chap summary :: 6 weeks without Xiao's presence causes [Name] to become angsty and moody. She was facing the subtle realisation that maybe she liked him, and that without him around, she felt. . . Empty? Lonely? [Name] didn't even know anymore. All she did know was that she needed him around and that she missed him. Xiao, on the other hand, fought more and more hilichurl camps, abyss mages, anything to keep his mind off of how he essentially ghosted [Name]. [Name] gets ambushed by another hilichurl camp. They landed devastating blows on her, and in a moment of desperation, she calls for Xiao's help.

PAGE 7 . Warm, Yet Inexperienced, His Lips

chap summary :: Xiao admits to only leaving her because he didn't want to taint her with his negative emotions and karmic debt, fearing that because of him, her gentle warmth would fade into something unrecognisable. [Name], usually always so happy and composed, yells, full-on screams at him, and during this interaction— completely out of the blue. . . [Name]'s lips meet his.

— this is just the series masterlist for a series i have planned. the first chapter will probably be released somewhere around the next 2 or 3 weeks.

COMMENT IF YOU'D LIKE TO BE IN THE TAGLIST!!!

zenmiren OUT!!!! 🥷🥷🥷🥷🥷🥷

main masterlist <- HERE!

[lovemyromance]

Math, according to the anti’s

Elain avoids Lucien every time he is in Velaris + Elain loses her newfound boldness around him =

"Elain is scared of just how well Lucien knows her. She is scared how much he sees her. She is avoiding him because she feels too much for him."

Like, come on babes. How can he see her if he’s not even there? How can he “know her too well” if he’s NOT THERE. If she avoids him, how is that because she’s secretly pining for him? Especially when multiple characters comment how she is uncomfortable in his presence?

Azriel receives an order from Rhys to "Stay away from Elain" + Azriel is forced to tell Elain "this was mistake" hurting both of them =

"Azriel avoids Elain after solstice because he doesn't like her and knows what he did was wrong 😑 the BC ended Elriel!!"

Really guys? That's what you took away from this very clear chain of cause and effect? That Azriel, out of his own will, suddenly decided he's done with Elain?

Azriel, desperately in love with his woman, is agonizing over why the Cauldron didn’t pick him as her mate + Azriel, willing to beg on his knees for a taste of her =

"azriel is an incel fuckboi! He only feels lust for Elain! He feels entitled to her! "

Sorry didn't realize having attraction for your love interest in a ROMANTASY was bad now.

Azriel goes after the already mated Elain Archeron + after 500 years, it seems Azriel has moved on from Mor =

"Azriel only wants a mate! Thus, he waits 500 years and suddenly goes after an already mated female!"

He never said he wanted a mate. Where did this come from? He wants Elain and Elain only. Also, if he wanted a mate, why would he even be going after Elain in the first place? Wouldn't he go for any available female? He's not stupid, he knows she's not his mate. So why still pursue her if he only wanted his mate?

Majda says a mate should be able to figure out what is wrong with Elain + Azriel figures out her powers, freeing her from her murky realm with his understanding =

"Well, Azriel just figured out her powers. Her powers aren't what was wrong with her. Azriel just figured out her powers because he was excited the night court got a new weapon. And Rhys figured out Nesta's powers too, so it doesn't matter."

Come on. Literally she said, more importantly, SJM wrote, "if anyone can figure it out, it's a mate." And then AZRIEL figured it out. Is that not obvious?? Her mate was right there so he easily could've buzzed in at anytime with the correct answer. But no. It was Azriel.

Azriel, canonically, wanting to get on his knees for a chance to taste Elain + Azriel buying her a custom necklace + Azriel giving her truthteller + Azriel sitting with her in the gardens =

"nah, azriel doesn't like her. He's just like an older brother trying to be nice to a sibling that won't leave him alone and he pities her."

Idk how your sibling relationships are like, but maybe you live in Alabama or something. Bc that is clear attraction. Those are not mere acquaintances. Those are literally two people with big fat crushes on each other

Nesta tells Azriel "You're the new ribbon, Az" + Azriel remains unphased when Nesta and Gwyn and Emerie get taken for the blood rite =

MATES. Gwynriel are MATES. There is no other conclusion or possibility. She looked at him once and he raised a brow when she squealed. They are endgame meant to be.

Y'all just look silly now. Have you never been around a man? Is that it? Is that why you think perfectly platonic reactions are somehow signs of true love?

2+2 = 4. It is the right answer. It is the proven answer. You shouldn't have to jump through hoops and twist canon every which way and taint every interaction Elriel has with your scathing commentary just to make your ship work. Stay mad that your ship has 0 romantic moments 🙄

[ferrocyan]

not to be a weeb but i do think about tarts personal pronoun changing over the years

in arr its アタシ (atashi, its girly and kinda childish) then changed to ワタシ (watashi, technically proper except being written in katakana suggests shes a bit awkward w it) in hvw except when she avoided using that around edmont or the other high house members (even francel tbh, haurchefant and emmanellain are the only exceptions) then in stb zenos made her slip back to オレ(ore, the masculine pronoun which is rude to use irl but its normal for anime boys. in katakana its more casual) its just one time though tart mumbling to herself abt thinking of zenos as her friend.. best friend... (ominous) or it was until he killed himself and tart fully became an ore girl around the alliance soldiers. she didnt rly like this abt herself tbh... so after falling at the ghymlit dark she told aymeric "うちに帰らせてありがとう" (thanks for bringing me home) うち(uchi) taking on a double meaning as both home and a feminine personal pronoun so it also means "thanks for bringing me back to myself" oh im crazy i dont even speak japanese ignore what i say this probably doesnt work lmaooo [if aymeric ever brings this up again tart will absolutely murder him] anyway so in shb and edw she uses ワタシ again except around reeq she would use オレ tbh but its fine this time its different trust me. anyway the big bombshell is when tart the catboy calls the scions to introduce himself after his "fantasia" and uses 私 (watashi. the normal way you write it) in this context i mean it to say that tart has shed his awkwardness and despite the complicated Circumstances around his gender change he is comfortable in his own skin. so even just from that its easy for the scions to accept who he is now. but then. when the rite of succession is over and tart rejects wuk lamats offer to stay as her companion, he starts to use 自分 (jibun, meaning oneself) why, oh dont worry ab--(a page from the website japanesewithanime dot com falls out of my pocket) "The pronoun jibun 自分 is associated with military officers, police men, detectives, professions that follow a strict rules, and where knowing your place in the hierarchy is fundamental." ahem i said dont worry about it hes not a clear reflection of zoraal ja or anything, definitely not someone feeling like hes losing his place in life bc he doesnt know how to exist as his own person and not a weapon for the military. definitely not a problem so bad that sphene cant stand to see him denying his own personhood and she kills him about it. yeah no its all good. so tart as souleater definitely uses オレさま(oresama, the most pompous male pronoun in existence. however not in kanji like 俺様 bc his ass is faking that pomposity) onstage. in fact he should call himself このオレさま(same thing but with emphasis. you want to smack this brat upside the head so so bad) once it would be so funny. hearing tart say jibun outside the arena gives yaana whiplash but honeyb is just like "okay repressed catholic i know what you are 😒" okay thats all i have to say thanks

[clericofkelemvor]

so sil joined the church of kelemvor roughly fifteen years before the game. now in the comics we DO get a little bit of a glimpse at kelemvor's church in the gate. theres a chapel dedicated to him, managed by father alby and nerys kathon, as well as other unnamed (and i think not shown, but like, its not just the two of them ofc) clergy.

some canon info and a lot of conjecture under the cut abt the way the church of kelemvor works, but tldr: over fifteen ish years, sil first works in the city then travels to places in need of a death priest, and they get kidnapped for illithid purposes while theyre on the road.

some time after 1485DR, likely still during the 1480s, thieves get their hands on the relics kept at the chapel and nerys, through circumstances, becomes and adventurer. with minsc!! and other people. the next significant thing is in 1492, after elturel is restored to the prime material plane, this particular group of adventurers comes back to baldurs gate and encounters the cult of the absolute. father alby at that point has been infected by a parasite and he has an ominous conversation with nerys, fights her and her companions that night after they prevent a ritual from completion, and dies by nerys's hand shortly after at the chapel - a mercy kill, before he fully turns. nerys also notes when she comes back to the chapel that it is in a state of disrepair and kind of falling apart.

what this means for sil is that 1) they very likely knew both nerys and father alby, and its totally possible that theyd heard of minsc specifically as nerys' friend/adventure companion! i dont think the inverse would be true though, they didnt hold a very high position and weren't a fixture at the gate at that point, but thats a fun bit. 2) i think they would have heard of the cult of the absolute. even if the mindflayer bit was kept secret, there had to have been an explanation given for father alby's death, and the cult was already somewhat known, though not the illithid part. we dont see what happens there, so im assuming nerys handled or took part in alby's burial before leaving again like three days later (only 2 of which were not filled with adventuring stuff. busy life.).

thats kind of it in terms of canon, although im gonna try to read the comics and see if i find anything else or can get more precise timelines.

now members of the death clergy seem to have somewhat varied roles. im pulling this from the forgotten realms wiki and a 3rd edition i believe book on deities (but seemed like very little had changed between 3rd and 5th edition for this).

i think sil started as a novitiate in the city and helped mostly with burials and administrative matters around those. considering their disposition at that time, they definitely avoided being the person consoling the grieving (or were kept away from it by other clergy), so they prob ended up doing more things like giving last rites, assisting with then later on leading funerals, and helping out with matters related to the deceased's wills or last wishes.

this next part is definitely more me extrapolating but what is dnd if not a beautiful sandbox. anyway. there are a few special statuses in the death clergy, but sil isnt an actual cleric until the game starts, and they were much too despondent to take on a more warrior role before then anyway. i think they stayed a regular acolyte for all these years, but specialized in travelling to communities that needed the services of a death priest. this could include small settlements that simply dont have anyone to perform burials, but also diseased or ravaged areas with a lot of death, in need of care for both the dead and the living. the wiki indicates that followers of kelemvor opposed the lengthening of ones life through necromancy or magic and despise undead (:^)), but also that they tried to ensure people didnt meet their end before they were supposed to. i interpret that as caring for the living as well as the dead; the grieving or abandoned who might take their own lives, and the injured and sick who might succumb too early. so i think for a good decade sil mostly traveled, at first with others but then gradually more often alone - due both to gaining enough experience to handle their duties by themselves and their very taciturn demeanor not making them a particularly sought out travel companion - to either remote settlement or places that had suffered/were suffering some sort of calamity, like hostile raiders, natural disasters, or fast spreading illnesses. they developed an affinity for medicine and treating people, a good sense of whats needed to handle inhospitable environments (say, mountains in winter, flooded villages, stuff like that), and eventually scripts they can fall back on when interacting with the distressed people they would inevitably encounter.

theyd be back in the city when the stuff with father alby happens, and help with restructuring the clergy there, and at that point start having a more important role within the church in the gate. theyve been around for a while, theyve fulfilled their duties well, and theyre in the right place at the right time to have a say. they're still very detached, but theyre dedicating whatever's left of their life to the church of kelemvor and they want it to run well. i dont think theyd get a higher rank necessarily, but theyre listened to when they say something, and just have more weight. i think that means theyd be targeted for tadpoling; as a fairly unremarkable and easy to disappear for a bit person who still has some connection to the rest of the church, and can thus be a gateway to infecting more people in an organisation that the cult has tried (and managed!) to take over before. they go back to travelling a couple months after the father alby stuff so i figure they got abducted on the road pretty easily.

the church of kelemvor presence in the gate doesnt seem huge, and doesnt seem actually particularly concentrated in one location. the chapel is presented as the seat of it in the gate and is situated in the lower city, but it seems pretty small, and while kelemvor isnt a widely followed deity it still makes more sense to me that the chapel seems so small because most members if the clergy are spread out across the city in smaller offices, either attached to cemeteries or legal offices and maybe even with the fists and guards. something thats also mentioned in the wiki is the "most solemn order of the silent shroud", composed mainly of workers, artisans and crafters whose activities are related either directly or peripherally to death (embalmers, gravediggers, etc). their task is to "inform the church of gravesite desecration and undead sighting", but i figure theres also just logistics that ties them to, if not the church, then their local clergy, and specifically death clergy. so i think itd make sense that theyd work closely together and that youd have scattered members of the church; their role in general doesnt particularly benefit from them being all in the same place, and esp in a city as big and frankly fucking messy as baldurs gate theres prob need of them in plenty of places. plus, like sil, i figure a fair amount of them operate outwith city boundaries as well.

i think thats most of the thoughts i have on this so far. i like thinking abt it bc this is actually such a huge part of their life, not just in terms of amount of time but bc they genuinely believe in the work and in kelemvor's guidance of souls. for backstory reasons :^) that im sure ill expand in eventually

[foundtherightwords]

Come, You Spirits

Pairing: Ralph (Timewasters) x OFC (Thu from "All Our Yesterdays")

Summary: Stuck in the past (again) and bored during the Ghost Festival, Ralph and Thu decide to check out the most haunted building in Hanoi, with unexpected consequences.

Warnings: none, just a brief mention of a murder and some general spooky stuff.

Word count: 4.6k

A/N: This is both my submission for the JQ Spookathon (yes, I've decided to participate after all! Thank you to @palomahasenteredthechat for hosting and all the mods!) and a soft continuation of my Ralph fic, "All Our Yesterdays" (if you haven't read it, that's OK. I tried to make this a standalone.) I've never written horror before, so here's something on the silly side instead. Plus, out of all of Joe's characters (other than Eddie), I feel that Ralph is most suited to a spooky story, and when Ralph is concerned, everything takes a silly turn for me.

As with "All Our Yesterdays", this is based on an actual urban legend of Hanoi and the location is real (see the photo at the end). The title is a quote from "Macbeth" too.

"You want to do what?" Thu asked, thinking she'd misheard Ralph over the flapping of the bamboo fan she was using to dry her hair. There was a power cut, and she was already sweating despite having just showered.

"Check out that haunted building you told me about," Ralph repeated.

Right, so she hadn't misheard him then. "OK... why?"

Ralph shrugged. "It's something to do," he said. "We've eaten at every possible street vendor in the Old Quarter, we've seen every sight there is to see—I know you take pride in Hanoi being traditional, but when it hasn't changed much since sixty years ago, there's not much left to do."

"That still doesn't explain why you want to see a haunted house."

"Isn't it the Ghost Festival today? Shouldn't we do something to celebrate?"

"Our Ghost Festival is not Halloween!"

"You said it was the day all the souls are released from the Underworld to visit Earth. That sounds like Halloween to me."

"Yeah, but we're supposed to be avoiding spirits, not searching for them!"

"Ah, that's no fun," Ralph sighed. He picked up a paper with a listless hand and threw it down again.

"And anyway, we did go to the mausoleum to see Uncle Ho's mummified body," Thu pointed out. "That wasn't macabre enough for you?" The trip to Ho Chi Minh's mausoleum, a rite of passage for every school kid in Hanoi, had been less of a success than Thu had expected. Ralph had treated it less like a curious relic of Vietnam's past and more like a carnival sideshow. 

"No," now he said. "It was just... weird. It's not even real!"

"Oh, like you'd know!"

"You seriously believe that they can preserve a body that well?"

"Why not? The Soviets did it with Lenin."

"Have you seen that one?"

"... No."

"Well, I bet that's not real either."

Thu could tell they were in for another pointless bickering session, which had been happening with increasing frequency lately. Time traveling tends to do that to you, especially when it is as unpredictable as time traveling with Homeless Pete. No matter how in love you are with one another, it can be stressful when you keep ending up in different times throughout history, without warning. And this particular period hit a little close to home—in 1991 Hanoi, with her birth just six years away, Thu ran the risk of running into her parents and experiencing her own version of Back to the Future. She and Ralph had managed to find a place to stay on the other side of town, away from her parents' university, but the strain was getting to her.

Thu knew she should be thankful they had landed in peacetime—if it had been close to either of the wars, the suspicion on Ralph would make it impossible for them to stay. And they had managed to avoid the worst of the 1980s economic crisis as well—she still remembered too clearly her parents' half-humorous, half-painful stories about standing in line for hours to get their meager rations, the mortal fear of losing one's ration book, the stress of hoarding any product you could get your hands on. At least all of that was behind them now. But on a night like this, it was hard to feel grateful. The August air was muggy, the power was out for the third time that week, and the smoke from the burning of joss paper for the Ghost Festival only made the heat more unbearable. No wonder Ralph was feeling restless.

Still, she wished she hadn't told Ralph about that haunted building. They lived just down the road and had come across it while trudging around searching for Homeless Pete, who had disappeared yet again. Built in the Eastern Bloc style, all gray concrete and sharp corners, it squatted on an intersection like some scowling monstrosity, already exuding an air of inhospitality and menace despite being newly constructed.

"That's going to be the most famous haunted building in Hanoi," Thu said without thinking, pointing at it.

"Going to? What happens?" Ralph asked curiously.

Thu told him about how the building was meant to be the new Bulgarian Embassy, but was never put to use for some reason and was left empty over the next thirty years. "And in Vietnam, whenever a house is abandoned, it is said to be haunted," she said. "They say it was built on top of a cemetery or a hospital morgue, and people often hear strange noises or crying inside. The usual urban legend stuff. And then there was the murder—"

"What murder?" Ralph's eyes opened wide with fascination.

"Some woman stabbed her lover in his car right outside the back gate. In the early 2000s, I think. They say his ghost still lingers around."

"Wizard!"

Thu didn't share Ralph's enthusiasm. She didn't really believe in ghosts, but like most Vietnamese people, she had a healthy respect for the supernatural and avoided it when she could. Ralph had no such hang-ups, apparently. And now he wanted to check out the place! On Ghost Festival of all night!

"It's not really haunted, you know," she said, hoping to dissuade him. "Those stories are just made up by junkies and criminals, so they have a place to hang out."

"But you said those rumors only started after the building was abandoned," Ralph pointed out, and Thu silently cursed his memory. "So why was it abandoned in the first place?"

"It's probably just due to some bureaucratic crap."

"Where's your sense of adventure?"

"Let me get this straight," she said, rubbing her eyes. "We're stuck thirty years in the past with no IDs, and you want to sneak into an embassy to see if it's haunted, all because you're bored?"

"Yes," Ralph said, as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

"No. We are not doing that."

"Please?" He was practically pouting and batting his eyelashes at her, like freaking Betty Boop.

"Stop making that face. You know I can't resist that face."

"It's history!"

Thu sighed. Their apartment was cramped, and the fried fish that the family next door was having for dinner did not smell so great. Perhaps some fresh air would do them good. This was a time when you could still get fresh air simply by walking outside, without having to worry about pollution or traffic, so she might as well take advantage of it.

"Sometimes I do worry about your sense of self-preservation, you know," she said, getting up to find her shoes.

"Come on, that's what you love about me." Ralph grinned and gave her a kiss as she passed him.

***

They walked. Usually, during a power cut like this, they would meet plenty of people and families with kids all along the street, trying to cool down in the night air. That night, however, the street was deserted. The only person they saw was a scrawny student trying to read a book under a street lamp. Clearly, the night of the Ghost Festival was no time to be outside. And even if anyone had ventured out, the stifling, humid air would offer little relief. They really needed some rain soon.

"I'm afraid this isn't the vibe you're looking for," Thu said. "It's too hot to be spooky."

"That helps though." Ralph, always determined to make the best of every situation, pointed at the fat full moon shining languidly over the darkened street.    

Just a few minutes later, they reached the embassy building. The place was surrounded by a tall iron fence, sharp points piercing the moonlit sky. The wan light of the street lamps gave the concrete blocks a blotchy, moldy look, and when combined with the scraggly bushes around its courtyard and the leftover building material, the building looked old, ruined, abandoned even before it was inhabited. A giant banyan tree by the main entrance spread its twisted branches over the flat rooftop, its roots hanging down like a curtain, dark leaves rustling menacingly although there wasn't a breath of wind.

The sight of that tree gave Thu pause.

"What's wrong?" Ralph asked.

"They should have done something about that tree," she said slowly.

"Why?"

"A banyan tree, especially one this ancient, is usually home to spirits and ghosts," Thu explained, "but cutting it down will anger the spirits, so people often set up some sort of a shrine or an altar on the tree for them. There's no shrine here. Not even some rice and salt for the lonely spirits." She dug in her bag and found a packet of puffed rice, one of many she'd bought earlier that day as offerings for the Ghost Festival, and scattered the grains over the tree root. To do it right, there should be some incense as well, but she was sure the spirits would find the rice just fine.

Ralph gave her a sidelong glance. "I thought you didn't believe in ghosts."

"I don't."

"Then are you trying to frighten me?"

A corner of Thu's mouth lifted up. "Is it working?"

"Not a chance." Ralph walked around the back. "Come on."

The back was more of the same, sinister walkways leading deeper into the building, eerie shadows that seemed to appear just out of the corner of one's eyes, furniture piled up waiting to be moved in, creating all sorts of odd shapes. An empty swimming pool gleamed pale under the moonlight.

"OK, we've checked it out," Thu said. "There is no ghost or spirit to be found here. Are you happy now?"

There was no answer. She looked around, but Ralph was no longer by her side. He was at the back gate, unwinding the chain holding the gate shut. There was no lock. Shit.

"Ralph, stop! Come back here!" she called, trying to keep her voice low, but it was too late. He had slipped through the gate and disappeared into the murky depth of the building.

Shit, shit, shit. Ralph had always been game for anything, and he was right to say it was what she loved most about him—his endless passion, his ever-present optimism. But she was sure that, having spent time in an Indochinese prison, he would be more careful about putting himself at risk of getting arrested again.

Well, there was nothing to it. She slipped through the gate after him. If the lack of a lock was anything to judge by, the place was not very well guarded, being newly built and not yet inhabited. They may be lucky and not get discovered.

She caught up with Ralph, who was strolling down the covered walkway that connected the two wings of the building, looking for all the world like he was taking his constitutional along the Thames, despite his modern-day clothes. Apparently, one can take the boy out of London but cannot take London out of the boy.

"Get out of here before you get us into trouble!" she hissed.

"Relax," Ralph said. "There's nobody here."

"And there's no ghost either," Thu said, with more conviction than she actually felt.

It wasn't simply the fear of getting arrested that made Thu jumpy. She hated to admit it, but being in this building, knowing its history—or rather, future—made her hair stand on end. She didn't believe in ghosts, she told herself. But something about those cold, gray concrete walls, those dark, tunnel-like corridors, and the sheer emptiness of it felt like there was a razor pressed to the back of her neck, making her want to stand with her back against a solid wall. She fought the urge to take Ralph's hand. 

"So you have time-traveled, yet you don't believe in ghosts?" Ralph said.

"That's different," Thu muttered.

"How?"

They were now inside the main hall. The building must have its own generator—there was a naked light bulb on the ceiling, shedding its yellow light over a reception desk of cheap plywood and a floor that still hadn't been completely cleared of sand and mortar. They climbed the staircase leading to the first floor, where another bare bulb swung from the ceiling, bringing more shadows than light.

"Time travel is—is—science," Thu said lamely.

"Is that so? How does it work then?"

"It works by—by—I don't know, some wibbly wobbly, timey wimey stuff!"

Ralph looked blank. "What?"

Thu bit back a teasing smile. "You're probably the only Brit alive that doesn't know Doctor Who. If—when we get back to the present, we really need to sit down and watch it."

"To be fair, I was born ninety years ago—"

A heavy, drawn-out sigh echoed down the corridor, cutting him off. It was ringing clear, as though the person was standing right by them.

Ralph gripped Thu's wrist. "Did you hear that?"

"Oh, for Heaven's sake!" She shook Ralph's hand free and strode forward with long, decisive steps. "It's probably just the wind or something—"

She rounded a corner, and her heart stopped.

A figure wavered in the gloom at the end of the corridor.

Then the figure moved into the light, and Thu realized it was much, much worse than a ghost.

It was a middle-aged man, dressed like a security guard, wearing the green pith helmet of the Vietnamese army, with a baton in his hand and a startled expression on his face.

"Excuse me!" he exclaimed in Vietnamese. "Who the hell are you?"

Thu didn't know where she found the clarity of mind to stick out an arm and block Ralph, who was still hidden from view behind the corner. But block him she did, and she could hear him duck into an empty room, much to her relief.

"This is private property! It belongs to the government of Bulgaria!" the guard shouted, limping toward her. "What the hell do you think you're doing here?!"

"I'm so sorry, sir," Thu said, running up to the guard to prevent him from going further down the corridor and discovering Ralph. She decided the best course was to tell the truth—or a version of the truth anyway. "The gate was open, and I—my friends and I heard that the place is haunted, and they dared me to go inside..."

"Haunted?" The guard frowned. He had the yellow teeth and yellow fingertips of a chain smoker, and, as he got close enough to her, the breath to match as well. "I've worked here since they started constructing, never heard of no haunting."

"It's just what people say—isn't this place built on an old temple? Or was it a cemetery—"

The guard narrowed his eyes at her. "Aren't you a bit old to get up to such shenanigans?" he asked.

Thu was ready to get offended, but then she remembered that thirty years in the past, someone in her mid-twenties could very well be married and having kids already—her own parents were. "You're absolutely right, sir," she said. "I'm so sorry. I'm leaving now."

She turned to leave, but the guard put his baton up. "Hold on," he said. "Let me see your ID."

Thu's heart dropped. "I—I don't have it with me."

"Where do you live?"

"Just... down the street."

"Right, I'll go with you to get your ID then."

"No!" she exclaimed. Realizing she would not be helping her case by panicking, she tried to soften her voice. "Please. You'll get me in trouble with my parents. Please, sir. I haven't done anything. I just walked around—"

Her plea fell on deaf ears. The guard grabbed Thu's arm with vice-like fingers. "So you just admitted to trespassing. Come with me."

"Hey, you can't do this!" She tried to pull away, but his hold was too strong, despite his limp. "Do you even have the authority to detain me?"

"Ooh, like to use fancy words, don't we?" The guard's craggy face took on a harsh, unyielding look. "You're right. This is a police matter. I'm only detaining you until I can fetch them." Ignoring her protests, he dragged her down the corridor and threw her into a room at the very end. "And for your information, young lady, my authority is absolute here!" he said, before snapping shut the padlock at the door with a cruel click.

"Shit!" Thu said out loud. How could she have been so stupid? She should have dragged Ralph bodily out of here—no, she shouldn't have let him through the gate—no, she should never have agreed to come here in the first place!

When she first time-traveled, she had lived for six months in 1929 without any ID whatsoever, but things in 1991 were very different, and with the police getting involved, how was she going to explain herself? She could only pray that Ralph was smart enough to get out while the guard was preoccupied. She may be able to come up with some crazy story to the police to explain her lack of ID, but explaining the presence of a young Englishman who was actually born in 1904 was too much for her. She could see the headlines—"Mad Woman Claims to Come from the Future". "Mad Foreigner Claims to Come from the Past". Or worse, there would be no headlines at all. They would just get thrown into jail or a mental hospital and forgotten.

Thu looked over her jail cell, trying to figure out what to do. She was in a bathroom, lit by a bare light bulb as the rest of the building. The door was of sturdy wood, and the only window was a tiny square high up on the wall. Even if somehow she managed to wriggle through it, it was still a two-floor drop to the ground. No wind came through that window, and the room was boiling. Sticky sweat poured down her back.

A shadow passed by and stopped just outside the room, blocking out the narrow strip of light underneath the door. It was gone in an instant, followed by several more, rather like a group of children crowding each other to peer into a room. Thu pressed her ears to the door but heard nothing, no footsteps or even a rustling of clothes.

"Hello?" she whispered in Vietnamese. Receiving no answer, she switched to English. "Ralph? That you?" Still no answer, but there came that long, heavy sigh again, and the light went out.

The sweat on Thu's back turned to ice. She staggered away from the door, heart hammering, spine crawling, until she hit the wall with her back. The solid wall made her feel slightly better, though the tiles chilled her. She missed Ralph's warm arms.

She sat down on the toilet, trying to gather her wits. Some shadows, a noise, and a power cut were nothing to be so shaken up about. It was just Ralph's overactive imagination and those damned stories getting to her, that was all...

BANG!

She nearly jumped out of her skin, before realizing it was just a window on the ground floor. Probably just the wind. She took a deep breath—

BANG! BANG! BANG!

This time they came right above her, one after another, sounding too fast and uniformed to be caused by the wind. A quick glance out the window told her that the night was as still and muggy as ever.

The guard's voice came from somewhere in the bowels of the building, "Who goes there?" Thu heard a high, clear giggle, but it could be her imagination, or it could simply be from a kid playing in the street outside. This was followed by a long moment of silence, then a scream—more like a yelp, thin and far away, then silence again, ringing in her ears, endless, unbearable.

The silence was broken by running footsteps outside the corridor. Her heart in her throat, Thu cast wildly about for a weapon. She settled for the heavy porcelain cover of the toilet's water tank, though what good it would do against a ghost, she had no idea. But then again, ghosts wouldn't have footsteps, would they?

"Thu?" came Ralph's familiar voice, and the band squeezing her heart loosened, almost making her drop the cover on her foot. She scrambled to the door.

"Ralph! What happened?"

"The guard fell into the pool."

Shit. "What did you do?!"

"I didn't do anything!"

This was no time for more bickering. "He must have the keys on him," she told Ralph. "Find them and get me out of here!"

"OK. Hang on."

His footsteps receded. After what must be the longest five minutes of her life, he came back, the door was opened, and the next thing she knew, Ralph was pulling her into his arms. "Are you all right?" he asked. "I'm sorry, this was all my fault—"

Thu was so relieved she wasn't even angry with him anymore. After all, she had followed him into the building of her own volition.

"No time for apologies. Let's just get the hell out of here," she said.

Grabbing each other's hand, they ran down the corridor, down the stairs, and toward the back gate. As they passed the empty swimming pool, Thu glimpsed the dark shape of the guard lying in a heap at the bottom.

"Is he dead?" she asked, horrified.

"No. Just knocked out, I think," Ralph said. Seeing Thu slow down, he paused as well. "What are you thinking?"

Thu weighed the bunch of keys in her hand. "I have an idea," she said, motioning for Ralph to climb down into the pool with her.

They put the keys back into the guard's pocket and carried him into the bathroom where he'd locked Thu up. This way, Thu reasoned, when he woke up, the confusion would be enough to throw doubt over his story, and they would be off the hook.

"Are you still angry with me?" Ralph said as they made their way back to the apartment. "I won't do anything like that ever again, I promise."

"You better keep that promise," she grumbled, but when he tentatively reached for her hand, she didn't push him away.

***

For a few days afterward, Thu avoided going past the embassy, just in case the guard still remembered her face. One evening, she and Ralph were going to dinner when they found their path was taking them past the building again. There was a great bustle as workers went in and out, carrying furniture and cleaning up the leftover building material. Seeing a woman struggling with a heavy chair, Thu came over to help.

"Are the Bulgarians finally moving in?" she asked in Vietnamese.

"No," the woman replied shortly. "They're moving out."

It was then that Thu noticed the furniture was being loaded on carts and taken away. Did this have anything to do with their misadventure the other night?

"Why?" she asked the woman. 

"No one wants to work here," the woman said. "The locals say it's haunted."

Startled, Thu looked back at Ralph, whose eyes were open so wide they threatened to pop out of his face. He hadn't learned much Vietnamese, but he had certainly caught the word "haunted" and understood what it meant. Có ma. Inhabited by ghosts.

"What happened?" Thu asked the woman, trying to sound casually interested.

The woman cast a look around, before dropping her voice. "On Ghost Festival, a security guard was working there alone. He said some woman showed up, telling him the place is haunted. He thought she was a trespasser and locked her up to wait for the police. Did everything by the book, right? Only she vanished! And the guard found himself locked up instead! What do you make of that?"

Thankfully, Thu didn't have to answer that, because another worker was calling to the woman irritably, "Hey, move it! Some of us want to get out of here before it gets dark, you know!"

As the woman scurried back to her work, Thu gave Ralph a brief summary of what the woman had told her.

"I guess we were the ones that started that whole haunted rumor," she said ruefully.

"Well, at least now we know why it was abandoned," Ralph replied, cheerful as ever.

Thu shook her head at him, half exasperated, half affectionate. She should really stop letting him draw her into these harebrained adventures, but it was hard to say no to those puppy eyes.

"So tell me," she said, slipping her arm through Ralph's as they continued on their way, "what did you do to that poor security guard, exactly? How did you know where the breaker was?"

"The what?"

"The electricity. You turned it off to scare the guard, didn't you?"

"I thought that was another power cut?"

She slowed her steps, puzzled. "But you did slam the shutters, right?"

"Yes, the one on the ground floor. I thought it might make a good diversion."

"And the ones on the second floor too."

"No, I didn't go on the second floor."

"But I clearly heard three slams, right above me."

"I heard those too. I thought that was you!"

Did he think she was that gullible? "Come on, Ralph. You're messing with me."

"You're messing with me! How could I have gotten from the ground floor to the second floor so quickly?"

"Right, and next you're going to tell me you didn't make the guard fall into the pool either."

"I told you I didn't! He was already there when I found him!"

Thu finally stopped and looked straight at Ralph. "What are you saying?"

"I am telling you the truth," Ralph said slowly. "All I did was slam the shutters to draw the guard away. Then I hid. I didn't see anything. I only heard giggling and panting, and the guard's scream. When I found him, he was unconscious in the pool."

They stared at each other, neither uttering a word, minds running wild with all sorts of possibilities, while a strange, oppressive feeling—not quite fear, but a vague unease—clutched at their hearts. Thu could feel the razor on the nape of her neck again. As one, she and Ralph turned to look at the building. The workers had finished and left, and the building was deserted once more, looming gray and silent in the last rays of the sun.

"Perhaps the ghosts were helping us because you gave them some puffed rice," eventually Ralph said.

"I don't believe in ghosts," Thu snapped.

"Maybe you should," Ralph said. "They believe in you."

Thu looked over her shoulder again. It could be her imagination, or it could be a trick of the dying light, but the banyan tree looked like it was winking at them.

Definitely her imagination. Maybe.

"Don't say things like that," she said, trying to shake off the crawling sensation on her back. "It sounds so creepy!"

"Sorry."

She glared at Ralph. His eyes were full of earnest concern, with no hint of the twinkle he usually had when he was teasing her.

"You're lucky you're cute, you know that?" she said.

Face brightening up, he grinned back at her. "I know."

For all her bravado, Thu's grip on Ralph's hand was tighter than usual as they walked home in the gathering dusk. Then again, perhaps that was what he was aiming for, the cheeky tosser.

[rosavulpes]

Holding on to the handle of his mop rather firmly as he moved it around the flooring of his primary work space , he'd maneuver it around , and underneath his furniture . Lifting some chairs , and more to ensure that every inch of the floor was properly cleaned .

He'd already swept earlier , to clean off any dirt , or dust that his clients may have tracked in with them when they came in to see him but he knew that cleanliness , especially when working as a doctor was essential . It was an aspect that he could not lapse on .

The floor would be swept , moped , chairs wiped down , surfaces disinfected , windows opened to help facilitate the breeze moving throughout the space to avoid any stuffiness congregating in any of the rooms . Similarly any of his tools , supplies , or appliances that he'd used throughout the day needed to be thoroughly wiped down , and disinfected less he do more harm than good .

He was nearly done with his tasks , a soft scent of incense in the air from where he'd lit a few sticks to help make the atmosphere of the room more inviting , and comfortable .

While Shuichi was no longer expecting any further patients to come in for the day , unless it was an emergency of course , he was expecting her to come by .

He knew that his request may have been unorthodox , and entitled in that he'd put in a request at the Wangsheng Funeral Parlor to meet with it's director , Ms. Hu Tao . With the arrival of spring came seasonal allergies , and common sinus infections , so he'd found himself to be busier than he'd initially expected to be but ... he had heard from some of his neighbors whom owned or rented out spaces of their own for their own businesses of the Funeral Parlor's eccentric personality ... as well as her door to door visits promoting the Funeral Parlor's services .

With most of his time being eaten away by his work , he couldn't find the time to stay at the parlor for a prolonged period to discuss what he was seeking without being asked to return by one of his patients .

For as much as he didn't want to think of it ... there would eventually come a time where he knew that he would have to bid farewell to the two people that mattered most to him in this human life , his beloved mother and father . There was no way for him to give back the time he'd taken from them ... the time he'd stolen from them . So when that time came ? Regardless of what stories he'd heard of the director's behavior there was no denying anywhere that the services she , and the WangSheng Funeral Parlor performed were the very best one could find in Liyue .

The very best .

Her dedication in promoting the parlor services proof enough of the parlor commitment to excellency . So , who better to entrust their final rites to then them ?

Still , as he finished up his final cleaning tasks for the day . He'd close up the windows . A sweet smell of baked good wafting down from the secondary floor he rented out which contained a table , shelves holding his inventory , an a secondary wooden stove that could be used for heat , or cooking .

In this case , as a means of welcoming , and thanking the director for accepting his meeting request he'd decided to prepare a few things for her . While he'd originally intended to make almond cookies , he'd heard that the director had a fondness Taiyaki . Unfortunately he didn't know what kind of filling , or what particular fish she may have preferred to see so he'd settled on a traditional sweet red bean paste to fill them with when baking them . The cakes cut , and modeled into the shapes of sweet-flower medaka fish .

A pot of jasmine tea being kept warm next to it . Covered , and waiting to be served . Berries added for a sweet , and sour contrast .

Hearing the bell chime of his door sing as it was opened , he glanced over his shoulder quickly . Starting to put away what remained of his cleaning supplies .

" Good evening ! I'll be with you in just a moment ! "

@papilio-anima

[teriwrites]

The Lies in the Legend: Part 4

My Live Reactions to Reading Through My 2022 Novel

She's officially had her 50th birthday and stepped into young adulthood (ig I was wrong earlier, 50 is actually coming-of-age for these elves)

Emmyth took her to the historic/cultural city of 'Ashinse' as a traditional rite of passage

Present Day!Ghislaine is going on a tirade about history being essential as a lens of helping us examine the current events around us

We're getting right back into the heavy infodumping about my worldbuilding, folks

This time, with a Shan folktale: the story of Ashin, a servant to Prince Galionel the Prevailing, the very first Prince of Sha

Sha existed as a small city-state which held the largest portion of the Othix Augment at the time (big important leyline situation, remember)

A war broke out between them and their northern neighbor, an 'Alcaudan Empire', which lasted for over a century, and though Prince Galionel was doing well and gaining ground, he was past his prime, and was afraid that if he died, the shift in power from him to his heir would cause them to lose focus

So Ashin gets sent off, and, to put briefly, the folktale says that he summoned the illusion of an army so large and so powerful (both the army and the illusion itself) that the Alcaudan Empire surrendered before they even met on the battlefield

'At the time of my coming-of-age trip, I accepted this at face value. During my later time at Baird, however, I would look deeper into this story and discover that the direct translation clearly depicts Ashin as a practicer of necromancy, not illusion.' omg he summoned a massive army of the dead, that's kinda sick

The modern-day 'Ashinse' is named for the site where this battle took place

Another fun fact: necromancy is largely considered taboo throughout Irim, and in Sha, the only references that are made to it outside of like deep arcanic study are that it's destructive and evil - but at the time of this folktale, it was a common enough practice that the strength of Ashin's task was more in the intensity and longevity of his spell than the spell itself

Delving further, apparently Ashin directly claimed that the reason he was able to maintain such a taxing spell for so long was, in part, thinking about the feast he'd get to indulge in when it was done

'It might seem ridiculous to try comparing a necromancer of immense strength from thousands of years ago to a person of today. But, then, I ask, how many of us push ourselves through a grueling day with the promise to reward ourselves with a small treat at the end of it? People have not changed; we all crave our small luxuries. Nor have problems changed; war continues to break out across Irim, commonly for greater access to the arcane. We cannot erase these cycles. But we can try to learn from them. And, hopefully, as I write my own examples, those that come after me can avoid stumbling over the same pitfalls that have caused me to plummet.' (i kinda like the idea of Ghislaine using various figures through Irim's history to highlight like 'here's what most people would know about them - here's a lil thing that draws the humanity back into them' since that's kinda what her book's about anyways)

'It was a snowy night in early spring when I came to the conclusion that I didn't want to spend my entire life as Selniril's primary healer.' omg it's a (not exactly snowy) night in early spring rn!!

She's feeling cooped up in her small fishing town :(

That said, time has finally seemed to heal the wounds of her being held apart from the town - she feels much more settled and accepted now (especially now that she offers a much-needed service *cough*)

Ohhhhhhhh guess who's back!!

It's Anhi 🥰

'Anhi and I were no longer the close companions we'd been in childhood.' :(

It was just a natural process of growing apart - Ghislaine staying in school longer, then taking on an apprenticeship in another town, and Anhi remained in Selniril as a scribe until she reached her coming-of-age, at which point she was granted permission to join her father and split her time between En'sicie (neighbor nation to the north) and Isironoth (the capital)

She's only back in Selniril for her cousin's wedding, then it's on to Isironoth to open up the 'drafty old house'

"I take it then that you prefer life in En'sicie?" Out of the corner of my eye, I could see her smiling. "I don't know if I can say that. I enjoy them both, it's only the actual process of opening up the house after a year of having it shut up that I dislike. Isironoth itself is beautiful, and no matter how long we stay, there's always more to take in. Ialdai might be the capital of En'sicie, but it's also far more quaint. But, of course, I'll always look to Selniril as home." I stemmed off the wave of envy before it could roll over me, not wanting to ruin what had otherwise been a pleasant reunion. "What are they like? The cities?" A moment passed in silence as Anhi considered her answer. "Different. And I don't just mean that the buildings are taller and pressed closer together. The people are different there. Life is different. Everything feels a little less connected than it does here. You have your own community, of course, with those you meet with and work with and befriend. But that community is surrounded by an entire ocean of total strangers, people who don't know or care anything about you." "It sounds disheartening." "It is, a little bit. But usually, things are busy enough that you don't find yourself dwelling too much on it." (ghislaine trying so hard not to feel bitter about her friend's perceived success while actively being the first full-time Selniril arcanic healer in Ages is sadly a mood, blind to her own accomplishments)

Anhi's still working as a scribe, and she takes some advanced courses in literature awwww

Ghislaine having no concept of higher education is so interesting because like of course nobody would probably think about that in her lil town

'Finally, something Anhi could talk about without the risk of my developing jealousy. I'd hated those days in a schoolhouse, and I was far from eager to return to poring over old texts.' lmao this vs. her sitting in her professorial office, writing out this book is such fun irony

Anhi casually name-dropping said institute that Ghislaine will (spoiler alert) attend and then teach at

"I don't know anybody in attendance - they tend to be pretty self-contained at Baird - but it's said to be one of the greatest arcane schools across Irim! I took a tour of their campus once, and it's stunning. The architecture dates back to the later days of Prince Galionel or something like that. It's ancient." sounds like a pretty lame place

Oh shit, Emmyth actually has very distant ties to the place - an old client (prior to the whole dissolution of his marriage and their business situation) had a nephew that attended

'Anhi perked up at the mention. "So many of those working in the Prince's Seat are said to be graduates from Baird. It's almost a disappointment to those of us that weren't gifted with magic." She said it with a laugh, but an edge slid into her voice with real resentment. Neither of us looked away from the fire.' (love a lil toxicity, both of them feeling a lil resentment of the other's success but in different ways)

LMAO September/October usually being the time frame in which I reread/rewatch/re-interact with Anne of Green Gables, and then November being the month where I write these projects shows up so often

Spot the difference: AoGG: 'When I left Queen’s my future seemed to stretch out before me like a straight road. I thought I could see along it for many a milestone.' TLitL: 'My life seemed then to be a path set in front of me, stretching out to the horizon, and my only duty was to follow it.'

Like girl you're not even TRYING to hide the influences

'I think my greatest source of envy with my childhood friend was not solely found in her freedom to travel. It was in how yielding her future was compared to my own. The chance to see the world was a great part of that, certainly, but to be able to take on new skill-sets, change her entire career path if she so chose, offered a privilege most of Selniril could not afford. I see the irony here, too.' (at least she acknowledges it lol)

Bro and literally in the first sentence of the next part, I QUOTED Taliesin Jaffe 💀

'From the life I have led, I tend to not be the largest believer in fate. I think that too much faith in some predestination leads people to rely on the whims of circumstance to guide them, rather than forging their own way.' 'the whims of circumstance' is LITERALLY a quoted phrase from Taliesin Jaffe's 'Between the Sheets' interview

Like, his quote was (in regards to like regrets and stuff): "Choices are better than not choosing. Not choosing means you're at the whims of circumstance."

Wild

I love how I'm calling myself out here bc like if you think THIS is on-the-nose, just wait until my 2024 novel

'That being said, there have been certain periods and moments in my life that I find hard to explain through coincidence. And though I believe the gods above to be largely satisfied leaving their creation to its own devices, even they sometimes are moved to action. Whether it be from benevolence, or pity, or simply for their own amusement, the gods can set up a single event whose aftershocks will be felt throughout Irim. And who am I to deny them the evidence of divine intervention when I see it? I have no other way of explaining how or why Nym Ehlark stepped into my life.' (you can also tell that this was semi based around slotting in for a d&d setting because i wanted to be vague about the divine lol normally, i prefer to actually have characters Interact with the religions I build for their world)

Oooo more context for the Baird Academy of Arcane Arts (fancy Isironoth university): 'As an arcane-based school, Baird's admittance had more to do with a baseline of skill than academic - or financial - achievement. This means, rather than opening applications which would largely only be seen by those in the capital region, Baird hired several 'enlisters' to go about Sha in search for those who might gain entrance.'

That's kinda nice of them, albeit not in an altruistic way, seeing as they really just want to get their hands on the best arcanists

Nym is one of the traveling enlisters, and they travel across the country along the leylines, since that's where the strongest mages are typically going to be found

They meet in the Vihaule market (I've said it before, there is no world in which I am inventing a fantasy setting without introducing a bustling city marketplace) as Ghislaine helps run her father's stand while he meets with a client

She's bored sitting behind the stand and works on practicing some of her spells to distract herself from how hungry and hot she is - jerkily levitating and waving a fan in her face

Nym walks up and literally just Stares at her, and she stares back bc they're dressed up SUPER weird for the region - all decked out in a uniform emerald green, fancy ass coat and blouse and trousers and riding boots - and they suddenly are like 'omg so sorry for being weird, LOVE the magic'

'The not-customer extended their hand, and I shook it tentatively. A warmth spread in my palm where our hands met, and, when I pulled away, I saw a small sigil fading at the base of my thumb. "I should introduce myself," they told me, catching my gaze as it drew back from my hand. "I'm Nym Ehlark. I hope I'm not coming across too overeager. In my field, I rarely get to witness displays of raw potential like that. You see, I'm an enlister for the Baird Academy of the Arcane Arts." It was my turn to nod emptily. The Baird Academy meant nothing to me; I could hardly be expected to remember a passing comment about an academic institute from decades ago. Seeing my disinterest, Nym persisted. "Baird is the foremost institution for arcanic education in Sha. I would personally argue across all of Irim. As an enlister, it's my job to seek out potential like yours in the farther regions of Sha." "You're offering me a position in an elite academy because I was able to perform a levitating spell?" I asked sardonically. Nym shook their head, smiling. "Not quite that. I was hoping to open a conversation to test your skills, see whether Baird might be a worthy venture for you, and then prepare you for the entrance examinations." (nerd alert)

Ghislaine is 'okay i'll consider it maybe but what tf did you just inscribe onto my palm'

It was a memory charm to help her remember the conversation - Nym cast an identical charm onto themself to demonstrate

Obviously she can't go and have like an interview while running a stand, so she waits for Emmyth to get back

His meeting went well with the client!

Awww apparently he's selling off the trading routes he's built up (don't ask me how that works) bc the man is getting old and retiring

He's somewhere in his 600s at this point, and I think I was basing this lifespan off of the idea of 750ish (10x or so the life of a human, give or take) (although based on this general time period i'm not sure humans would actually have a life expectancy in their 70s but we're not gonna worry about that) (if d&d can do it, we can do it)

Ghislaine is now in her early 80s

She's not particularly interested in pursuing higher education, but she Does kinda want a way out of the region, so she's going to give Nym that conversation

Instead of telling her dad that she's going to talk to a college recruiter, she pretends she's going to go search the market for some new curtains for her apothecary

Nym asked her to find them in the local library, and she's immediately uncomfortable on stepping inside - this is promising

But why would Ghislaine consider, then, applying for university?

"Because I want more." I was surprised by my own honesty. "I don't know if your Baird is the right way for me to find it. But it's the first offer I've gotten, and I owe it to myself to at least hear it out." "You're more self-aware than most of my recruits," Nym said. "If it's more than selling goods in a market you want, Baird is the key to opening a new door." "I can't be sure it's the type of door I'd want to walk through. I have little in the way of bookish ambitions." (says the professor)

Nym actually shows her one of the large stack of scrolls they're carrying, and it's actually just like sequences of runes for specific spells - essentially, a reference guide

Ghislaine is still fighting, being like 'okay but i'm a healer, i like healing, i just want a change of scenery' and Nym is like 'cool, then concentrate in healing??'

"And how much gold does Baird require from its students to attend?" Finally, some discomfort from Nym. They averted their gaze and shifted their weight between their feet. It was easy for an enlister, paid by 'the foremost institution for arcanic education in Sha', to sing its praises to a poor town healer. But gold had to come from somewhere, and my wages were often paid more in barter than in gold. "You are a merchant's daughter, from Vihaule?" they asked. "From Selniril." Seeing the flash of confusion covering their features, I elaborated. "A fishing village on the coast." "Right." If anything, my explanation seemed to have brought some life back into their face. "Well, either way, your prospects are likely not exactly up to the living standard of Isironoth. I will not try to pretend otherwise and put on a front that you should be comfortable making such an adjustment. But what I will tell you is that benefactors from the academy, as well as the academy itself, often pay the way for promising students. They do not believe in barring those with lesser finances from success. We would hardly be such a front-running academy if we only allowed the elite and their limited viewpoints into the ranks." "That is very righteous of you, but I can hardly be expected to drop my responsibilities to run off and spend my time scouring libraries for runes." Nym gave another shrug. "You are the one who longs for more. I cannot force you to accept the opportunity, only encourage it." With that, they swept the scrolls back into their arms and began to find their way to an empty table. I bit at the inside of my cheek, cursing myself for ever casting that levitation spell in the first place. And, with a settling weight in my chest that spoke to the decision's importance, I followed after Nym.' (meanwhile, spot Emmyth wondering wtf is taking his daughter so long to check out new curtains)

I'm actually going to go into the final part for this section as well, so buckle up for an even Longer post

No massive time jump this time! Ghislaine opens by talking about her father's reaction to the offer she's been made ('best be described as supportively befuddled.')

She also mentions all the proof she got to confirm that Nym was, in fact, who they said they were - credentials, a reference letter, etc.

"What was an enlister for Baird even doing in Vihaule?" he pressed. "They never travel out to this part of Sha, as far as I've heard." I asked Nym about this once, years and years after this conversation. Apparently, they had been in town specifically to get their hands on some reference work in the Vihaule library system. They'd stopped into the marketplace for a quick bite to eat, and that's where our paths had crossed for the first time.' (yk maybe fate DID have something to do with that)

Okay, specifically, Ghislaine is 83

Which would be kinda young for an elf to leave home, due to the weird cultural stages I developed on a whim, but not unheard of

She also has to figure out how to tell her clientele - being too confident that she's leaving feels like she'll accidentally curse herself to fail the entrances, but not saying anything would be cruel, so she lands on giving a note in with the usual medications she delivers to people

'The following afternoon, I had tea with Madam Celote. When I proposed going to the capital, she gave me one of her rare, wide smiles. "I wondered when you might find yourself too constrained by our little corner of the world," she told me confidently. "Don't be too sure I won't stay." Madam Celote laughed. "Oh, I have no reservations about it. You'll leave Selniril, Ghislaine Agassi. Whether it's for some ostentatious academy or simply to find your own way, there was never a doubt in my mind that you would do what was needed to stretch your wings." (this coming from a divinator)

We actually large skip over her actual entrance exams in favor of a rant she gives addressing how Selniril was a place she could not remain, but a place she loves regardless

Like, how they treated her poorly, and she spent her childhood dreaming of leaving and finding somewhere that would actually accept her and she could 'belong', but then the tumult of developing arcane abilities sending that desire to leave out of focus as she fought to control it and develop it, and by then the town having changed their opinions, she sort of paid them back for it by being their healer. except that involved suppressing the part of her that still desperately wanted to leave. And now here she is, about to take exams that might let her leave, so she's stressed af about passing it

'I gave myself responsibility for the wellbeing of the town that had rejected me in order to keep me complacent. I do not write this to sound embittered to Selniril. The town's name is in my title, and I hold it proudly. Of all the places I have traveled across Irim in the over-five centuries I have to my name, I always find myself drawn most to the smallest seaside villages. But nor will I gloss over the reason for the constraints that tied me for so long. It is in addressing our subjugators that allows us to learn how to free ourselves.' (she's so preachy; i love her so much)

'I do not need to spend any more pages explaining that my trip would be a success. I was granted entrance to the Baird Academy of the Arcane Arts in Isironoth, and Selniril honored me upon my return with a feast.' i get that you don't Have to explain the exams, but that could've been fun

So, it was briefly mentioned before, but the schooling system in Sha has two semesters: a late winter/early spring (think like starting in early March) into summer semester, and then a summer into late fall

AKA, winters are the split between their years

AKA, Ghislaine has to make it to Isironoth for the start of the year by late winter/early spring

AKA, she has to travel through the winter to get there

And apparently teleportation is not an accessible form of transportation yet

Oof

I was gonna try to calculate how far Vihaule and Isironoth are based on the six weeks of travel with a caravan, but the terrain is too inconsistent for me to really confidently gauge it

'I had never lived anywhere else, excluding those first couple years before my father sold his family homestead. Looking about the dimly-lit room, I took in the plush mat, the fine ceramics that decorated our shelves, the paintings I had made ages ago that still hung over the hearth. I loved it here, and I felt so at home. But there was an air of finality to the morning that scared me, like I knew even then that I would never live under that roof again, only stay for the occasional visit.' :(

'There were no good-byes as we passed through the town. Plenty of townsfolk had stopped by over the past couple of days, and a party had been held two nights ago. But, just then, the people of Selniril were asleep, and I passed through, ghostlike, with the pent-up, nervous energy of anticipation causing my fingers beneath the blanket to tremble. We were on the main road, sliding our way over the snow, when Emmyth turned to me. "Are you ready?" Unlike at home, I gave myself one long look at the frost-covered houses, storefronts, and envisioned the unseen shoreline. Turning back, I looked to the inland road winding out before us, the start of my long journey to a new life. And I gave a single, silent, solemn nod.' (and she's off!)

Ending Thoughts:

Remember when we met Lady Ghislaine way back in The Abernathy Chronicles?? She's got such a long way to go before she steps into the shoes of the confident diplomat throwing shade at the Prime Minister of a foreign nation. I'm so excited to jump into the next section, 'A Scholar of Baird Academy', and to see her get to step into the wider world of the capital of her nation. Plus, writing/reading academia is always fun lol

[ncisfranchise-source]

If there is one thing NCIS: Origins knows how to get right, it’s an emotional journey filled with tears and fears. No character on the show is safe from development. We just hope the show picks up the pace a little.

One of the main concerns viewers have for the premiere season is that Special Agent Lala Dominguez needs to be developed and utilized correctly.

NCIS: Origins Season 1 has had some ups and downs, but the show has consistently delivered exciting episodes. However, some definitely shine above the rest.

Best Episode — “All’s Not Lost” — Season 01 Episode 04

There are emotional episodes, and then there is this gem sitting smack dab in the middle of the season. Viewers have likely not forgotten much of what happened in this episode, but let me give you a little refresher.

The episode opens with Gibbs getting the news that his family was murdered before the NIS takes on a case about a missing little girl, bringing to the surface everything that Gibbs has been avoiding.

If you read the NCIS: Origins Season 1 Episode 4 Review, you know we had to give it up to the actress who played the little girl. Hattie Hoskins as Mildred Jones was absolutely incredible.

It was a tearful moment that Gibbs shared with Mary Jo, which led to Gibbs finally accepting Franks’ dinner invitation. Out of every other episode so far, this is the one that saw Gibbs make a change for the better.

Lastly, the one thing that stayed with me and still does is how high Mary Jo’s damn heels were in this episode. That woman can do no wrong looking as fabulous as she always does.

Worst Episode — “Bend, Don’t Break” — Season 1 Episode 3

This was the kind of episode Gibbs should look back on in embarrassment. Did he help solve the case? Absolutely. Did he do it completely unhinged? The man was nuttier than a squirrel up a tree.

Gibbs broke just about every protocol while trying to detain a suspect in an elevator. Sure, his instincts were right about the security guard, Prado, but Gibbs didn’t make any friends with his tactics.

From beginning to end, Gibbs manages to rub just about everyone the wrong way. From Franks to Gibbs Senior, everyone got a piece of the chip on Gibbs’s shoulder.

This episode made it hard to root for Gibbs after everything he went through. Thankfully, Mike managed to get Gibbs back on track.

Best Character — Mike Franks — Season 1 Episode 5

I’d say it’s unanimous that every viewer absolutely loves Kyle Schmid’s portrayal of a young Mike Franks. Schmid better get at least an Emmy nomination for this role.

The actor completely disappears into the character, and all that’s left is one surly Mike Franks.

In “Last Rites,” Mike practically goes to the end of the Earth trying to uncover the remains of a victim after promising the family they could lay their lost loved one to rest.

If you have seen that episode, you know that Christopher Redman (Chicago Fire), as Albert Hope, gave Mike Franks a run for his money.

Seriously, Mike seemed like he was ready to rip out what hair he had left. Hannibal Lecter would have been proud.

The bottom line is that this episode showed why we love Franks so much. He may be rough around the edges, but Mike genuinely cares for people to a level he would never admit.

Even those who aren’t Mike’s biggest fans have come around. Remember how Franks and Strickland bumped heads in “Last Rites” because she wanted Mike’s help to get her profiling program off the ground?

Worst Character — Lala Dominguez — Season 1 Episode 6

Listen, I don’t want this to become a witch hunt, but what is going on with Lala Dominguez? The agent has been in every episode but is by far the least developed.

Considering the first episode, that is a strange choice for the NCIS: Origins writers. If you recall, a present-day Gibbs narrates at the end of the NCIS: Origins Season 1 Premiere by saying, “This is the story of her.”

Like you, I have struggled to understand what makes that statement true. At first, Lala just came across as an intelligent and capable agent who doesn’t take crap from anyone.

The NCIS: Origins Season 1 Episode 6 Spoilers discussed how that episode could finally answer the question of how Lala fits into Gibbs’s story.

It could be me, but I don’t see any chemistry between Gibbs and Lala. The scene where Gibbs tried hard to get Lala to go out for a drink felt so forced.

Gibbs went from the brooding, always-serious agent to acting like a kid asking his crush to hang out. Hopefully, Lala’s inclusion will make sense when the show returns.

You didn’t think we’d have a whole article about NCIS: Origins without specifically talking about Mary Jo, did you? This phenomenal character is the beating heart of the show.

She gets some of the best lines, like when Gibbs asks Mary Jo how to get the enormous printer off his desk, and Mary Jo replies, “With your arms, baby.” I couldn’t stop cackling.

Later in the same episode, she comforted a teary-eyed Gibbs. And who could forget the “come to Jesus” talk she gave Mike in “Last Rites?”

The only words to describe Mary Jo are funny, fabulous, and fearless. Hopefully, we’ll get more of her back story as the show continues.

We should all keep an eye out for when Gibbs starts to put his plan together. You know the one I’m talking about. Possibly the reason he joined NIS in the first place.

If you remember, Gibbs Senior told Leroy he was not cut out for the NIS. There’s only one reason I can think he wanted to join: to find the man who murdered his family.

There were hints early on that the show was headed that way, but things have fallen curiously silent since then. Regardless, longtime fans of the franchise know the event is inevitable.

All I can say is that we don’t know what we don’t know, and CBS‘s NCIS: Origins could have something epically intense planned for the second half of the season.

We’ve got a good team here. Let’s just hope the team can make it to the finish line in one piece. Not everyone makes it to the original NCIS.

[merryfortune]

tragic start's happy ending

Written for the Hurt/Comfort Bingo by @sweetspicybingo

Prompt: Self Doubt

Title: tragic start’s happy ending

Ship: Corrin/Mozu

Fandom: Fire Emblem Birthright/Fates

Rating: 

Word Count:

Warnings: 2,767

Tags: Female My Unit, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Grief, Canonical Character Death, Kissing, Family Feels, PTSD, Happy Ending, Food as a Metaphor for Love

   Her whole village was gone in an instant.

   Her Mother was torn from her right in front of her eyes.

   Her own life had been snatched from her. The Faceless’ fingers and claws, narrowly avoiding her face as precious memories turned Mozu to cowardice, to weakness. She couldn’t do a thing as her village was torn to shreds.

   And now she was here. It was strange and surreal and people expected a lot from her, Mozu thought. She didn’t even know where to begin. To get stronger? The thought daunted her. Or to pretend that nothing had changed at all, that there were chores to be done and soil to be tilled and animals to be fed or hunted.

   It was awful.

   She didn’t deserve to be alive. She shouldn’t have been the sole survivor, she shouldn't have been a survivor at all. She was just a girl from a small village, she hadn’t been trained for greatness and yet. Here she was. Thrust into it as the newest recruit in Princess Corrin’s personal army.

   Mozu felt as mindless as those monsters which had put her into this mess at all. She didn’t deserve a spot amid all these talents knights and sorcerers, diviners and ninja. Doubt crippled her. Everything about her felt weak as she was lost in the slurry of grief but the people around her, Corrin especially, encouraged her to keep going. That she was going to be a valued part of their army, that their meeting - despite the pain - had been fate.

   Mozu didn’t disagree but for the first week of her stay, whenever she got up in the morning, it was after awful nightmares and they didn’t stop just because she was awake. When she would till the soil, toiling in the fields, hoeing and digging, she would open up quakes full of worms and the memory of burying her own mother.

   She couldn’t even give anyone, least of all her parents, proper funeral rites. Back home, it was a mass of shallow graves. Corrin’s army had, at the very least, done that kindness for the bodies who hadn’t been burnt in the carnage or otherwise ravaged by monsters, animals, or the elements at large.

   It made things difficult, however. When it felt like digging deeper, she was just spearing through the face of her mother and other loved ones with the head of her shovel but Mozu stilled herself from these visions. The living had to eat and the dead had to be eaten. That was just the way of nature.

   The first harvest made it worth it, however.

   Mozu prepared the first meal she had for Corrin and her army. She prepared it gravely, however, the instructions inscribed in her heart and soul, etched their by her mother and her mother’s before her. She treated every vegetable, to the last potato or carrot, no matter how misshapen or appetising looking, with the utmost respect. She hunted the boar, too, whose flesh would become pork after she treated it.

   The resulting meal, there was crying out for more, for seconds and thirds. Unfortunately, Mozu had not made enough. She had made a bowl for every person in her village but their numbers were slightly smaller than Corrin’s army - or at the very least, they needed less since they were just farmers.

  Still, being praised, it felt good. Even if it made Mozu cry herself to sleep that night. She had thought for sure that everyone would hate her cooking, that it would be bland and tasteless. That it would be just as lifeless as the people who had passed on such recipes to her. 

   The next morning, she was red-eyed and weary, but she was back in the field. This time, her harvest would be enough so that everyone could have a feast, to eat until they were full after having as many as fourths if they so chose.

   Until then, Mozu had to contend with how her back breaking work was heartbreaking, too. 

   But getting out of her head, and the fields, every so often helped. Things changed day by day, getting to know the others helped. Especially Corrin. Mozu really enjoyed getting to know her.

   They talked about school and education. Fancy things Mozu had never dreamed of before. They talked about clouds and the weather. They talked occasionally about the friends Mozu had at the village before the Faceless had taken them. They talked about the things they liked to eat and there came a day when they talked about the things that scared them.

   Made them sad.

   It was a calm, still dusk in the Deep Realms. Mozu had finished yet another hard day’s work on the farm. She was filthy, caked in mud and sweat, but Corrin didn’t care. The twilight air was cool on the back of Mozu’s sweaty neck. sSe liked that a lot as they watched the stars reveal themselves one by one before becoming constellations. 

   They sat at the top of the hill and at the bottom of outer space, it was almost like they were the only two people in the whole wide world. Their chatter was quiet, the crickets were louder than them as they exchanged a deep and meaningful almost out of nowhere: the six month anniversary of their meeting, and of course the deaths in Mozu’s village.

   “Did I ever tell you…?” Corrin murmured. Her hand wandered to Mozu’s side but she wasn’t quite daring enough yet to touch Mozu, instead her fingers scraped through the dirt and grass they were sitting on. “I lost my Mother, Mikoto, from right in front of my eyes, too.”

   “O-Oh, Corrin, I’m so sorry.” Mozu said.

   “I wanted you to know. I promise, even though we are so different, I think we’re quite the same underneath.” Corrin said.

   “I-I think so, too.” Mozu replied.

   She felt her heart seize when Corrin finally plucked up the courage to touch her. She sheltered her hand over Mozu’s and held it tightly.

   “I want to make a world where children won’t ever have to see their parents die in front of them like that. Violently, that is.” Corrin said.

   “‘S a good dream.” Mozu said. “I’d like to help, if possible.”

   “You already are.” Corrin replied.   

   Mozu tried to smile but she cried instead. Her heart felt like a heavy rock deep within her and Corrin could understand why. She really could. She shuffled in closer and lended her shoulder to Mozu. Mozu curled into her side and bawled.

   She let it all uncork. She didn’t care if she got tears and snot on Corrin and Corrin didn’t care either. She was loud and noisy, too, as she wailed. It was just a little cry at first, a couple tears, but as Mozu kept going, it kept happening. She figured it was just the month by month of what she hadn’t released until she finished with a sputter.

   “This is the first time I’ve ever seen you cry, country girl.” Corrin pointed out, meekly.

   “I-I wanted t’ b’ strong f-fer you a-an’ Ma…” Mozu mumbled. Though she didn’t feel that strong, until she turned her head slightly.

   Corrin was haloed by the silver starlight and within it, she looked steely and stalwart. Her heart and her head in the right place as she spoke with genuine conviction.

   “You have been, don’t you worry.” Her voice was soft despite the depth it carried in so little.

   Mozu nodded weakly and she retreated slightly. She remained curled towards Mozu, however, as she put her hands in front of her, she kneaded the grass thoughtfully. 

   “I… I love you, Lady Corrin.” Mozu said. “Thank you… thank you for finding me. For giving me a home. For saving me.”

   “You saved your…” Corrin trailed off before deciding she shouldn’t share what she was thinking.

   Mozu had a pretty good clue that she knew what she was. She nodded weakly. She thought about how she took the first kill of the Faceless in retaliation: before Corrin, before anyone else official to Corrin’s army but her. She had pushed everything the village had taught her into a dinky old brass spear and got her revenge.

   But it was the only kill she got. After that, she had to be coddled and protected like a little kid. Doing all that had taken all her strength…

   Though now look at her. A master of her spear, she had even taken up archery. Even now, as she carried on, she did so with their spirits on her shoulders. Everything she had learned from them was as much a blessing as it was a burden amid her grief. 

   “Can I kiss you?” Corrin asked.

   “Please.” Mozu replied.

   They kissed desperately afterwards, as though the world was going to end tomorrow. It may as well have, because in the night, in their own bedrooms, they would both dream of those moments again: of a mother crying out, hands outreached, pushing away a daughter to keep her safe above all else. But for now, the taste of salt from the tears that Mozu had shed grounded them to each other, to comfort and console, for better or for worse.

   A ring would follow soon enough. Though for Corrin, not her, with Mozu in the fields more often than not, she didn’t want it to get lost or ruined but the thought was more than enough. Especially when a wedding and a marriage came afterwards but no honeymoon. Not until the war was over but they spent their time planning it like they would an assault in the war room: Mozu had big plans and Corrin wanted to help bring them to fruition.

   Even at her time of marital bliss, in between the current conflict, Mozu pined for her village and wanted to see it rebuilt. That was how she wanted to spend her honeymoon and for another six months, it seemed like it would just be a dream but eventually, with the assistance of her loyal army, Corrin brought peace to both Hoshido and their adversaries, Nohr.

   It was not without loss, however. 

   It was not lost on Mozu that in carrying out Corrin’s will, she had created many more selves akin to her own in Nohr. Though they tried to minimise casualties, accidents happened and temporary incapacitation could take a turn for the worse. Mozu just hoped the children whose parents had been taken from them would one day forgive her.

   She hoped the remaining siblings of Corrin’s from her Nohrian past could forgive them one day, too.

   But for now, there was a bittersweet victory. Even peace. That meant construction and rebirth could follow the carnage that had been wrought between the nations that had been at conflict. It felt like it would never come but it did: the working honeymoon between Corrin and Mozu.

   Together, they set up camp in the remnants of Mozu’s hometown and it was difficult. The nightmares that Mozu had forgotten came back in full force, it made her reckless during the day but Corrin steadied her. Between the two of them, they were able to erect better memories to the folk who had lost their lives to the Faceless and then, with the help of others, their friends and acquaintances, they started to rebuild. 

   Three months was a long time yet not long enough. They hardly got started at all before Corrin was called back to Shirasagi for royal duties but they left the rebuilding in good hands. Kind people were everywhere, their efforts had attracted goodwill from neighbouring villages, people Mozu scarcely remembered from her childhood, now adored her as a hero. They wanted to help. She promised she would return when she could but as queen-to-be, her noble mission was made complicated.

   But an actual holiday from her honeymoon would not be unwelcome, especially in the opulent fold of Castle Shirasagi, both Mozu and Corrin would agree. Although, Mozu still craved the mundane busywork and that would be that.

   Upon returning to the peacetime, there was a restoration of the usual rites and rituals of the royals. To a certain extent, anyway. This included the surrendering of chores to the servants but not in this instance. After three months of this order, Mozu’s return did buck that resuming trend.

   Both Mozu and Corrin insisted: this was the celebratory meal after their honeymoon, they wanted to celebrate properly with their family. Mozu wanted to cook dinner for her siblings-in-law and of course, her beloved wife.

   “Please.” she insisted, brows furrowed as soon as she proposed the idea.

   There was no resistance as memories of her meals had not faded in her three month absence from the army. That pleased Mozu greatly as she used her own harvest and recipes in the kitchen, completely undisturbed by the others. Though help was poked and prodded at her but no.

   This was something she had to do all alone.

   Even if that intimidated her.

   The hall was spick and span, so clean and shiny that food could be eaten off the floors. Mozu felt like she was tracking mud through the wooden panels underfoot regardless of what she did. She hovered, like a mouse, going to and fro as she second guessed her menu until inspiration struck. She had a lot of hungry bellies relying on her and that was enough to propel her forward.

   She stood in the royal kitchen, with all their glistening pots and pans and did her best. 

   When it came to serve, her best was more than enough. Her meals were plain and simple but because she executed them so well, they became unique and memorable. Mozu sat, with Corrin, not at the head of the table as that belonged to Corrin’s brother but adjacent to his side.

   “A verifiable feast.” Ryoma remarked.

   “Here, here!” Hinoka agreed.

   As did everyone else at the table, their individual sets customised to their liking. Mozu remembered all their favourites, likes and dislikes. She wanted to impress and so she did.

  “You're welcome.” Mozu said but her voice cracked.

   Corrin’s ears pricked on it immediately, “Hey, what’s wrong?” she asked.

   Her hand lunged at Mozu’s and held it, she looked up at Corrin, concerned. She blinked and it was only then that Mozu realised, she had been crying.

   “Huh? What’s this?” Mozu asked.

   With her other hand, she wiped away the tear but looking at it, a dewdrop on the pad of her finger, Mozu could hardly recognise it as hers but a dull ache began to throb in her chest. She was overwhelmed with bittersweet ennui. It came all at once and she was too slow to have even felt it at first.

   “Why am I… crying?” Mozu asked.

   “How should I know?” Corrin joked but it felt inappropriate. Her sheepishness in her smile made that apparent.

   “I’m finally with my family again, why am I so sad?” Mozu said.

   “You think of us of family?” Sakura shyly inquired from across from her.

   Hinoka and Ryoma exchanged a knowing smile. Mozu glanced at all the faces. Sakura, Hinoka, Ryoma, and Takumi, as well as their entourage and spouses, even children. Mozu nodded shyly.

   “I’m a very lucky gal,” Mozu began to explain as Corrin rubbed her thumb over her knuckles, warm and consoling, “I have so many sisters an’ brothers-in-law, nieces an’ nephews. I-I love you all an’ I know I’m loved in turn. I-It’d make my Ma an’ Pa, up in heaven, very happy.”

   “Oh… Mozu.” Corrin’s eyes began to water as her voice warbled.

   “I mean it. An’ I’m lucky to have you, best of all. Th-Thank you, Corrin.” Mozu said.

   It felt awkward, even though they had kissed in front of Corrin’s family before but they kissed again. A sweet and simple kiss, so utterly chaste, that stole Mozu’s breath away and dried her tears. It was a kiss that could have, honestly, lasted until the end of the world but instead, only a few mere seconds. Interrupted by the growl of Mozu’s stomach.

   Leaving Corrin and Mozu both looking rather demure, and flushed, afterwards.

   “Hungry?” Corrin offered an awkward segue from her and her wife’s public display of affection. She blushed as she heard her sisters snicker from across from her, her brothers had wisely averted their eyes.

   “Famished.” Mozu said as she picked up her bowl to take a sip from it. The taste of her mother’s miso soup recipe warmed her heart and soul but was tinted by the taste of Corrin.

[darkanachronism]

Finally! An excuse to talk about Dirk.

Name: Acantha Dirk Knifely, there's no secret reason why she doesn't use Acantha anymore. She just doesn't like it, the vibes are wrong.

Race: Hexblood, but mechanically half wood elf. (It's works fairly well, Minthara being racist felt extremely on point.)

Class: Circle of Spores Druid

Background: If you ask Dirk it's not much of a story, she's a perpetually unlucky kid from The Outer City. Her parents are dead, her boss is an asshole, her only friends are rats and she has to bribe them. And she can not catch a break. That's all there is too it.

But I feel like rambling.

Her mother escaped a druidic circle who had performed the rite of thorns, by making a deal with hag for her first born child. As a result Dirk isn't quite human. She normally just says she's a half elf and if anyone asks about the moldy splotches all over her skin she'll mumble something about it not being contagious and it being a Druid thing.

By all rights she should be a green hag by now. That usually happens on the thirteenth birthday.

But her parents sort of exploded, along with the little apothecary shop they owned.

Which resulted in Dirk going off the grid, she was a pretty forgettable child, so no one actually cared where she ended up, and as a result her hypothetical hag mom can not find her.

She ended up staying with one of her dad's card buddies, a small time fence, crook, kidsman and shyster named Druid Dave. (He's not a Druid, he's a wizard school drop out with a dip into warlock because he can not make good decisions.)

It was on the condition she could earn her keep, so Dirk did, making potions, picking pockets, hurling a healing spell someone's way for a gold piece or two, and using her wild shape to break and enter. (It's amazing the places a rat can get.)

She's been plying her trade as a petty thief and career criminal ever since. She was in the middle of running away from a job gone pear-shaped when she got picked up by mindflayers.

Personality: Dirk is a hard one to explain. Suspicious, awkward, jumpy. And just generally off-putting, despite being fairly perceptive and good at getting a handle on a situation she has a phenomenal knack for saying the wrong thing. Charisma is her dumpstat. Frankly, it should be lower than eight.

She's blunt and lacks any real idea of how to keep her thoughts to herself even when she knows she should. She tries most of the time.

She generally tries very hard to shut the hell up, avoid notice and let everyone else talk. Since when she does it it's always a disaster.

She's not enjoying being the main character. Dirk is spending her whole tadpole adventure one bad minute away from a panic attack.

She's used to stress though, does well as long as she has a clear cut goal she can usually power through.

Admittedly a lot of the constant dread in her life comes from being a little guy with one ho and no money, she's well into her adventure by now and very quickly realizing she's a force to be reckoned with, which tends to manifest of bursts of overconfident stupidity.

She's also quick to grab at anything that will give her power. All it took was the offer of Authoirty for her to start using those tadpoles.

She is finding shes better at the whole hero thing then she ever would have thought, that she might actually, like helping people, or at least people who remind her of her, kids, animals, goblins, and anyone getting kicked around by power structures. She's softer then shed like to be in that respect, sometimes you just need to let some gnomes die instead of starting a fight with all of Grymforge.

Romancing: Astarion, neither of them know what they're doing. This is just two idiots who have never had a healthy relationship in their life. Withers acknowledged this was an actual relationship before either of them did. She's still not quite sure what to call it.

Hobbies: Dirk is significantly better at Lanceboard then people expect on looking at her. She has a good head for strategy and remembering the moves.

She also really does enjoy alchemy. It's a work skill technically, but she likes it. She's spends most of her nights restocking health potions and messing with new recipes.

Tav thread???  I wanna see em all.

• Tav name/pic

• Race

• Class

• Backstory

• Personality

• Who they're romancing

• An interesting hobby they have