#you murmur that you ought to thank him

[rcmclachlan]

what if i put my life in your hands? what if i took your life in mine?

[moonstruckme]

mae my lovely, can i possibly request emt!marauders and reader who hasn’t replied to any texts in a few days/a week? pre-established relationship but not quite living together, and reader struggles with her mental health and has holed herself up in her apartment which worries the boys greatly? please don’t write if you feel uncomfortable (and if you’ve already written it but i’ve devoured emt!marauders today and i don’t think you have) obviously!! love you

Thank you for requesting my love! And thanks to @ellecdc for helping me figure out the emt stuff <3

cw: mental health struggles, self isolation

emt!marauders x fem!reader ♡ 1.5k words

Sirius’ knuckles rap loudly on your door. 

“Fuck, ease up.” James winces. “She’s gonna think we’re the cops.” 

“Good. Maybe she’ll answer for them.” 

“You need to calm down.” Remus’ voice is patience with a firm edge. “We don’t know what’s going on. If we go in angry with her, it’s not going to help anything.” 

“I think I have the right to be somewhat miffed,” Sirius argues. “You ghost someone after a first date, not once you’re in a relationship. It’s fucked.” 

“She’s not ghosting us,” James says certainly. Sirius’ mouth pinches in response.

James knows that, truly, his boyfriend is as worried as any of them. You’re well past the point in your relationship where you feel the need to establish the next time you’re going to meet before parting, but after your date last week it took the boys a few days to put it together that none of them had heard from you. 

At first, James presumed you’d simply gotten busy. Remus was convinced he’d done something to upset you. Sirius, secretly the most prone to worry, would rather believe he’s been slighted than consider the possibility that something might be keeping you from responding to their calls. Now that it’s been nearly a week, James is convinced something’s happened. You’ve had to take an emergency trip out of town or something’s spooked you and made you avoid them or—worst case scenario—you’re ill and have been holed up here with no one to check in on you for almost a week. 

Once he brought up that idea, it wasn’t difficult to convince his boyfriends to do a wellness check during their shift. 

“Just don’t be harsh with her,” Remus says gently. 

Sirius huffs. He knocks again, albeit somewhat softer. 

“NHS,�� he calls. 

James holds his breath when he hears some shuffling from inside. Gradually, it gets closer and louder, until the door is creaking open and you’re peering through the crack. 

Your voice is scratchy, like you haven’t used it in a while. “What’re you doing here?”

James expects Sirius to snipe at you, is already prepared to smooth it over himself with kinder words and a gentler tone, but something seems to shift in the other boy at the sight of you. He pushes through the crack in your door, hugging you fiercely. 

“We…” Remus seems as thrown by this deviation as James is. “We thought we ought to check up on you.” 

Your hand migrates up, touching Sirius’ back tentatively. “Why?”

“It’s a wellness check.” Sirius’ voice is bitter, but the effect is somewhat muddled by how he’s speaking into your neck. “We had reason to believe you could be harmed or deceased.” 

“Oh,” you murmur. 

James takes a moment to look you over. You’re in pajamas, visibly rumpled, and yet you look as tired as if you’ve not slept in some time. There’s something off about your expression, something missing that he can’t put his finger on. It’s unsettling in a way that makes him want to wrap you up in a tight cuddle and not let go. 

“Are you okay?” he asks, perhaps more brash than he means to be. Normally he’d expect more tact from himself, but he’s shocked Sirius hasn’t asked yet, and someone has to.

“Can we come in?” Remus asks at the same time. 

You look between them like you’re not sure what to do with them. Like you’re questioning whether you’re still in some sort of dream. 

“Yeah,” you say after a moment. James gets the sense you mean it to answer both of them. You step back from the door to make room for them, and Sirius moves with you. “Um, forewarning, it’s really bad in here.” 

Really bad by your standards isn’t the same as James’. If he hadn’t seen the way you normally keep things, he’d never notice anything was amiss. Your place smells a bit stale, like when you leave for a weekend and then come home. There’s a laundry basket on the floor with a few balled socks like you’d started to fold them and given up, and if he peers into your bedroom he can see a small trash pile on your floor and the covers of your bed all twisted up. It’s no worse than his side of the dorm he’d shared with Remus and Sirius in school. 

“What happened?” Sirius asks you. His voice sounds clearer now, and James focuses back in to find that he’s let you go enough to press his forehead to yours. His brow and lips are pinched. “Why have you been avoiding us?” 

James is nearly overcome by the desire to kiss him and rub his back, but he decides to let you have the honor, if you want it. 

You look unsure whether you do. 

“I’m sorry.” The words seem scraped out from some aching part of you. “I wasn’t trying to.” 

“Then why didn’t you answer our calls?” Sirius’ tone matches yours for desperation. Remus’ expression twinges compassionately. 

“I couldn’t.” 

“Why not?” 

“Sirius,” Remus chides softly. 

Your shoulders are slumped, but when Sirius moves away you seem to droop further. He’s only giving you space, his expression far from unkind. 

“Why couldn’t you pick up, dove?” Remus asks gently. 

“I…” Your eyes meander the floor. “I didn’t know what to talk about. And then my phone died, and it was just easier. I’m really sorry.” 

“Is talking to us really that bad?” Sirius is clearly making an attempt at joking, but the heartache underlying his words is unmissable. 

“No,” you sigh. “I’m just not really fit for the world right now. I didn’t want you to worry.” 

James’ ribs hurt at your admission, but he feels himself nodding. Even if he doesn’t know exactly what it is you’re dealing with, he’s familiar with people who think they’re somehow so damaged they don’t deserve to engage with anyone or anything. Sirius was like that once. Remus even more often. He sees the recognition on both of their faces now, pity and love and regret all tangled up into one messy thing. 

“Well, it was a noble effort,” says James, giving you a small smile, “but you can’t stop us worrying. Can I hug you?”

You nod, making an effort towards returning his smile. It’s a half-hearted, flickering thing, but he appreciates it nonetheless. 

He kisses your forehead as he folds you into his arms, starting gentle and tightening when you hug him back. Your grip feels a bit weak, if ardent. James pushes his palm up your spine. 

“Have you eaten today, sweetheart?” 

Your hum in the negative vibrates against his skin. 

“I’ll make us something.” Remus starts toward the kitchen, passing a hand over James’ curls as he goes by. “A sandwich alright, dovey?” 

“Yeah,” you murmur. “Thanks.” 

“Don’t mention it.” His voice raises as he enters the kitchen, and James knows he wants you to hear. To understand that this is something he would happily do for you. 

“Let’s sit down,” James suggests. “Pads, would you mind opening the curtains some?” 

Sirius complies with vigor, whipping open your drapes while James gets you situated on the couch. In the light, the shadows under your eyes are more evident, as is the redness in them. 

James squishes you up against his side. Rubs up and down your arm. “It’s okay,” he murmurs. 

You make a tiny, stymied sound, and turn your head down. 

“Hey.” Sirius sits on your other side. He kisses your shoulder, worry hewn into the lines of his face. “What’s wrong?” 

Your shoulders give a little shake. It’s small, defeated. You curl further in on yourself. 

“Oh, baby. I’m so sorry.” 

“You don’t have to explain,” James tells you, continuing to drag his hand up your arm. “It’s okay. You’re alright.” 

“I wanted—” You take in a wet inhale. He feels close to tears himself. “I wanted to be better when I saw you. I’m sorry.” 

“We don’t need you to be any sort of way, sweetheart.” Sirius’ voice is soft but fervent. “We just want to be with you.”

“As much as you’ll let us,” James agrees. His own voice is thick, and Sirius slides his arm around you to rub between his shoulders. 

You don’t say much after that. James holds you tight until your trembling stops, and even then he only loosens his grip to let you eat the grilled cheese Remus has made for you. From the wrappers he saw in your room, it’s likely the closest thing to a prepared meal you’ve had in some time. 

When you’re done eating, Sirius insists on kissing the saltiness from your cheeks even though your tears have dried. Remus coaxes you into a bath while James and Sirius tidy your room and change your sheets, and then Remus enlists Sirius to shampoo your hair while he tucks your sheets in more effectively. They put your phone on the charger. James makes dinner and puts it in the fridge for you to have later. None of it fixes anything, but he hopes it makes you feel less alone. 

When they have to go out for another call, Remus gives you a long hug, James makes you agree to go on a walk with him the next day, and Sirius threatens to pester you with calls until you block his number if you ignore them ever again. 

Your eye roll at his antics makes James’ heart sing.

[ckret2]

Chapter 49 of human Bill Cipher being such a miserable prisoner even the Pines are starting to feel bad for him: The Eclipse: Epilogue.

####

"The heck did you do to that poor woman?" Tate asked, staring out the window. Bill was sitting on the pier, legs dangling in the water, staring blankly into the depths. He was still muddy and trembling. "She looks more traumatized than when y'all left."

Ford couldn't meet Tate's gaze under the brim of his hat, but he could feel Tate raising a brow when he spotted Dipper pacing back and forth on the pier behind Bill, muttering furiously.

"We've had a very bad day," Ford said. 

"Uh-huh."

"Could I borrow your phone to call my brother?"

Outside, Dipper was oblivious to everything except the one line he'd managed to remember from the Axolotl, the words he'd picked out as they crossed the lake. "'Sixty degrees that come in threes,'" Dipper murmured. He knew that much. It was a poem. It was a rhyme. He couldn't remember the rest. What did it mean? He murmured it over and over to himself as he walked, trying to remember the next line, "'Sixty degrees that come in threes,' 'sixty degrees that come in threes'... breeze, freeze, ease, lease, knees—" He couldn't remember the rhyme.

Bill was considering grabbing Dipper by the ankle and dragging him off the pier just to shut him up when whatsisname, the younger McGucket came out of the shop. "Hello there? Miss Goldie?"

Human. Strange human. Human that Bill could get on his side. Be charming. He tried to remember how to be charming. He offered a feeble smile. "Yello?"

"I wanted to make sure you're all right," Tate said. "You look like you, uh... you've had a hard time."

Bill laughed ruefully. "Well, I've been dragged all over the mountain, I'm hungry, exhausted, and half-drowned, and I can barely walk—but I'm not currently dead. Allegedly. I'll take what I can get."

The corners of Tate's mouth twitched down in a concerned frown. "Is there anything you need? A..." He floundered for a moment, "A water, or...?"

"I've had enough water to last me a lifetime." He wondered idly whether he could claim he was too exhausted to make it all the way home—there was a sofa in the staff room, Tate would probably let the poor bedraggled "woman" take a nap, if Bill got that bit of distance between himself and the Pines maybe he could... maybe he could... do something with it? But he couldn't think of anything more definite than that and now Ford was coming back and the window of opportunity closed. He shrugged wearily. "Just need to get back to the shack. Thanks." He half heartedly used the lake water to wash the drying mud off his lower legs and knees.

"Stan will be here in about twenty minutes," Ford said, and tried to ignore the dirty look Tate gave him. 

"I'll be just inside if you need anything else," Tate said. "Watching." He headed inside—and then, indeed, stood at the shop window and watched.

Ford was never going to get on Tate's good side. He suspected Tate would be a little less sympathetic to the poor woman on the pier if he knew who he really was; but it certainly wouldn't make Tate like Ford any better for keeping him around.

"Nothing to do now but wait." Ford unloaded the rest of their supplies from the borrowed motor boat. He dropped Soos's Monster-Mon backpack beside Bill—it was heavy, Bill must have just shoved his clothes and bedsheet straight in without bothering to wring out the water—and the plastic bag of snacks Dipper had bought. "You ought to eat more while we wait." Ford nudged the snack bag.

Bill sneered at it. "I don't want that trash."

"What?" Ford examined the bag's contents. Jerky, chips, candy, cups of marshmallow cereal... "This is ninety percent of what you eat."

"Ninety percent of what I eat is what I can scavenge from the counters."

Ford looked through the bag again. Ah. Right. So it was. "If you want something else, you know you can ask us to..."

"Mac and cheese."

Maybe Ford had better stop talking. He sighed and glanced at Dipper to see how he was doing.

It didn't look like Dipper had even registered Ford's return, too busy pacing and muttering to himself. Ford frowned. "Dipper?"

"Axolotl," Bill explained. "He's obsessing over him. Didn't I tell you that meeting that thing would drive him insane?" He tilted his head toward Dipper. "Look at that, he's already mumbling to himself. Don't suppose you have his therapist's number, do you? I doubt that would save him, but it might slow the process—"

Ford shushed him.

Dipper had briefly tuned back into the conversation when he heard Bill say Axolotl; and now he grit his teeth and stubbornly tuned it back out. No. He was not going insane. Dipper would figure this out. If he just remembered the rest he'd be fine. He tried to go through all the potential rhymes alphabetically, "—bees, cease, d—deez?" That wasn't a word. "Fees, geese, he's..." and on and on, "seas, tees, uh... vees? Wheeze..."

"I've had enough of you trying to convince that boy he's about to go mad," Ford muttered to Bill. "What do you get out of saying that? Even if you do convince him he's insane, it won't make him start trusting anything else you say."

"I'm not lying," Bill said heatedly. "You ought to know that, you've been in the multiverse, you've seen plenty of maddening sights. You saw them before you even left the Nightmare Realm."

Ford hesitated before responding; was Bill trying to persuade Ford he was insane? But he could still remember those first few moments of terror in the Nightmare Realm: the creatures that had seemed to move and shift in impossible ways as they swam in and out of dimensions Ford couldn't see, the lights and colors that throbbed like an inverted migraine, Bill himself seemingly suspended a million light years away and a foot in front of Ford's face at the same time. Until Ford had latched onto his quest to destroy Bill and let that focus him, his mind had felt like an unraveling sock. "You were chief among those maddening sights."

"I was," Bill acknowledged neutrally.

"But I didn't go insane."

"Because you knew when to look away." He cast a sideways glance at Dipper, an implicit unlike him. "I know you used to read cosmic horror. Do you know why the narrator always goes mad just from looking at some giant beast? It's not because it's too ugly to take. It's because once you meet something, you try to understand it; but if you want to understand the reality something like that comes from," he rolled an eye up toward where the invisible Axolotl had hung in the sky, "you have to lose your understanding of your own reality. They're incompatible. Like the lunatics who escaped Plato's cave and came back ranting about nonsense like sunlight and colors."

It was a twisted interpretation of the cave allegory. Plato had meant it as a metaphor for education: that learning about the true nature of reality was enlightening, but alienated you from your peers.

Perhaps to Bill, enlightenment and insanity were the same thing.

Ford murmured, "Once your eyes have been too dazzled by the sunlight to see the dim shadows, you'll never be awed by a candle again."

"You have been there before."

Ford didn't answer.

"Once you've seen something like that, if you let yourself dwell on the significance of it all, you're doomed. Better to tell yourself it's unimportant and try to forget it ever happened."

Ford thought of Fiddleford.

Bill twisted around to snap tiredly at Dipper, "So stop staring at the sun before you go blind, moron."

"Shut up." Dipper had been trying to mentally drown out Bill's dire predictions by grasping for more rhymes—"disease, unease, Socrates"—but enough filtered through to make his stomach churn with nervousness. What if Bill was right? What if he never remembered what the Axolotl told him—what if he drove himself mad trying? What if this turned into a lifelong obsession—but he'd be fine and could let it go once he remembered—was that the trap? Was whatever it had told him impossible for a human to remember? Was it something so incomprehensible a human couldn't remember it without going crazy?

But he'd seen plenty of stuff last summer that was supposed to make humans go "insane." Bill had to be messing with him. He remembered the first line—surely that meant he could remember the rest—but was that part of the trap? "'Sixty degrees that come in threes'... come on, there's something else, I know it, what is it? 'Sixty degrees that come in threes'—"

Bill sighed irritably. "'Watches through the eyes in trees.'"

Dipper stopped pacing. He hadn't realized he'd raised his voice enough to be audible. "What?"

"What?" Bill said.

"What's the rest of it?"

"What rest of it? It's a couplet. That's all," Bill said. "Is that what he told you? He gets rhymey when he feels self-important, it's no big deal. Maybe you're lucky. Put it out of your head and you'll be fine."

Dipper turned the words over in his head. Sixty degrees that come in threes, watches through the eyes in trees... "That's not exactly right," he said slowly. "It was 'watches from within birch trees.'"

"Is that how he translated it? I've never heard it in English before. I got close, though, I knew it'd rhyme."

Ford echoed, "'Sixty degrees that come in threes.' Like a triangle?"

Dipper gave him a perplexed look. "What?"

"You're taking geometry next year, aren't you? The inner angles of polygons always have the same number of degrees; and a triangle has a hundred and eighty degrees. Three angles of sixty degrees forms... an equilateral triangle."

Dipper and Ford stared at Bill.

Bill gave them a tired, unreadable look. "What?" he said. "Don't look at me. I'm not the only equilateral triangle in the universe."

Well, now Dipper was sure there was more to the poem than just a couplet. "How many other equilateral triangles spy on people through birch trees?"

"Lay off," Bill said crabbily. "I didn't have to tell you that line. Don't make me regret it." He planted his elbows on his knees, laced his hands together, pressed his forehead to them, and massaged his eyelids with his thumbs.

He tilted slightly to the right, keeping the weight of his head off his left arm.

####

"Nice shirt," Stan said, eyeing Ford's anger management t-shirt.

"If you like it, you can have it."

"What happened to your coat?"

"Somewhere at the bottom of the lake," Ford sighed.

"How...?"

"I'll fill you in later."

Bill's trembling was almost unnoticeable by the time Stan arrived. Or, at least, it was slight enough that he could stand and make the short walk from the pier to the car without an obvious struggle. 

He climbed into the back seat, slid across the bench, leaned against the door, wrapped his arms around his Monster-Mon backpack, fell asleep, and didn't wake up for the entire drive home.

Dipper and Ford fell silent when they noticed; and, sensing the heavy atmosphere, Stan followed suit.

####

The event organizers for Higher Dimensional Gate had arranged for the Magister Mentium's audience to surround him in a circle with as large a circumference as possible, so that as many shapes as possible could pack into the first few rows where they could see him. Even so, the crowd was much too large for everyone to be in the first few rows. Speakers had to be planted throughout the crowd so that they'd all be able to hear the Magister speak. Most of his audience couldn't see him.

But he, with his all-seeing eye, could see all of them.

The crowd extended back, row after row after row, in every direction like flecks of multicolor confetti filling the air all the way to the horizon. He'd never spoken to such a large crowd before. He didn't think he'd ever seen such a large crowd before.

Not all of them were his worshipers. He didn't have that many worshipers. The rest were drawn in by his boast—to be the first shape outside of legends to predict an eclipse, over six months ahead of schedule. They were here for a spectacle. He meant to give them one.

If he succeeded, all these spectators would become his worshipers, he was sure of it. If he didn't succeed, he lost everything. The whole nation knew about his bet. He'd be financially ruined. His worshipers would abandon him. There would be no fleeing to a new town and starting over; everyone everywhere knew who he was. His life would be over.

This would be only the third eclipse he could recall. There's no way to neatly map shape ages onto human ages. Different year lengths, different aging speeds, different mental and physical milestones. But approximately, compared to a human, he was scarcely over fifteen years old. 

But he wouldn't fail. He pushed all his fears aside. He didn't even want to think about them. He wouldn't, because he couldn't, because he could see what nobody else saw. He could see the eclipse's approach.

It was traveling across the vast empty gulf outside the world.

The only other third dimensional objects he'd ever seen were the sun—which looked to him like a circle—and the stars—which seemed to be mere points. He assumed all third dimensional objects were fundamentally just second dimensional objects, moving on a strange plane. He had no capacity to model a 3D object in his mind.

But the eclipse was a beast that twirled and gyrated around impossible axes, moving and rotating in ways his eye couldn't even comprehend. To him, it looked as though the living creature—he assumed it was a living creature, sometimes it manifested a couple of limbs or an eye—was constantly shapeshifting, its perimeter moving and altering. Its uncanny undulations had haunted his nightmares for months after he first watched it, so young he'd barely started school. It wasn't any less nightmarish now.

But as incomprehensible and terrifying as it was, he could see it, and nobody else here could, and that was all that mattered. He could watch it on the horizon and publicly announce that it would cross the sun in two weeks—and then in about three days—and then, to his humiliation, not tomorrow but today, guaranteed, as the creature sped up and threw off his estimate. His worshipers and bemused spectators had taken over the square to while away the time. They'd quickly gathered around him to wait after he'd declared it would arrive within the hour

That had been almost an hour and a half ago. The stupid thing had slowed down.

The triangle was terrified.

In every direction, shapes were staring at him. Waiting. His father was watching him—his stare seemed to grow heavier by the minute. He could see reporters in the crowd taking notes.

He had to fight not to pace, not to cringe, not to show any nerves in front of the hundreds of eyes.

Now. It had to be now. It was so close. Please don't let him be wrong. Every cord in his body quivered in terror as he grabbed his microphone and announced: "Lines, bis, tris—quads, quints, and more! My dear students and beloved believers, and my—" he cut off the urge to say something nastier, "—curious visitors, who I hope will join our quest for enlightenment. This is the moment you've been waiting for! The eclipse is upon us! In less than a minute, it will begin!" He had to keep his gaze forward as he spoke, looking at his audience. (His mother had always said the way his eye went white when he was looking at the third dimension unnerved people.) "Soon—you won't have to take all my claims about the third dimension on faith. You'll be able to see for yourself the effect of the third dimension on the plane."

The crowd murmured excitedly. He could see his father relax. He stared up-but-not-north, gnawing nervously on his eyelid until he caught himself. The beast above glowed a warm pink in the light of the nearby sun.

And the stupid thing. Slowed. Again.

He stared in disbelief.

"Sixty seconds," his father whispered, out of range of the microphone.

His stomach flopped. He was dead.

"One minute, fifteen seconds. What's going—?"

He held his microphone away and hissed, "The eclipse decided to zigzag."

"Eclipses can zigzag?"

"Shhh!" He'd already failed. He'd already shown everyone he was wrong. He could hear the murmurs. His eye hurt from staring at the sun and from straining for so long to turn so far upward-not-northward, go faster faster faster—

There! The snout of the eclipse was this close to kissing the perimeter of the sun. He cried triumphantly, "Now!"

The wretched beast did a loop-the-loop around the sun and missed it entirely.

The triangle felt the last strands of his fraying self-composure snap.

He howled in rage.

He could hear laughs from the crowd. They felt like daggers in his sides.

"ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!" He was bellowing into outer space as if he thought it might hear him, "Do your think this is a game?! Is this funny?! Are you trying to humiliate me in front of the whole world!" His father put a hand on his arm; the triangle shoved him away. "Get back here right now! You thick, brainless, blobby, pink, feeler-faced two-eyed freak of nature! GET BACK HERE and LOOK ME IN THE EYE!" He was a lunatic, everyone would know it, their leader raving in a direction no one could actually see about some big pink delusion, what did he care, no one would ever take him seriously again anyway—

And the thing in the sky.

Stopped.

And looped back.

And came closer, and closer, and bigger, and bigger—it just kept getting bigger, how far away had it been before, how large was it, how large was the sun?

He hardly noticed the crowd's gasp as the creature twirled between them and the sun—the light shone through its body, pink with blood—and then out of the way, and then in again, and out—until finally it was so close that its perimeter completely engulfed the sun. He'd taken a field trip to the planet's surface once—an enormous solid mass of stone and crystal. Until now, he'd never seen another solid objects so large. To his limited understanding of 3D objects, it looked as though there were no organs inside its perimeter—just a layer of solid, uninterrupted flesh. He didn't know how it could even move.

It stopped straight over him.

He was sure the two black circles embedded inside its body must be its eyes. His whole life he'd heard psychic powers—psychic powers like his own—described as having an "inner eye." But he'd thought the phrase was just a metaphor. An eye on the inside of a body instead of on its perimeter would be useless to most people. He'd never seen a creature with an eye literally on the inside of its body. But the eclipse had two.

And they were looking at him.

A giant ever-shapeshifting cosmic horror from outside of reality, staring through the veil separating the sane world from outerplanar space, and it was looking—at—him.

He was terrified.

He heard an alien voice in his head, vast and deep and slow as distant whale song:

"Hello there!" It was overjoyed. It was tickled pink. "I've never been spoken to by a shape on the wall before. I didn't know you could see off of it!"

Weakly, the triangle repeated, "'A shape on the'...?"

"Yes, this wall of yours." The eclipse gestured with its tail at—everything. A single sweep that took in an entire dimension. "I've probably commuted past this wall billions of times, and nothing's ever called to me before. I didn't know shadows could do that!"

"'Shadows'?" the triangle echoed again. That was all they were? An eclipse's shadows?

"I'm absolutely delighted," the eclipse said. "First contact from a lower-dimensional species! I've watched you for eons and never imagined. Isn't this exciting! How charming of you! Tell me who you are."

Him? "Me?"

"Of course. Who else?" It stared at him. Only him. A shapeshifting force of nature the size of a planet with two inner eyes, an eclipse that saw him as a shadow—and it was looking only at him.

Weakly, he said, "I'm... the Magister Mentium."

The eclipse thought that over. Its tone was a tad dubious and not terribly impressed (why should it be impressed? he was embarrassed at himself for giving his silly puffed-up title)—but it said, "Yes, I suppose that's true. I am the Axolotl. It's been a pleasure meeting you." It began to shapeshift again—its eyes slid sideways through its body, until one reached its perimeter and disappeared.

It dawned on the triangle, in its first immature understanding of third dimensional objects, that its eye had disappeared because the Axolotl was turning away. "Wait!" he cried. "Why..." Why answer him? Why focused on him so completely, if he was just a shadow? Why ask who he was like he mattered? He didn't even know how to put those questions to words in his own mind, much less out loud. "Why are you here so early?"

The Axolotl turned back to the triangle. "Oh! I had to go back for some documents I forgot at the office. Big case in the morning," it said. "You shadows know my schedule?"

"You... pass in front of the sun."

The Axolotl turned away, eyes disappearing and frills fluttering, to look at the sun. "So I do! How funny." It turned toward the triangle and gave him a strange, grotesque look that—by the tone of its psychic voice—he suspected was a smile. "I must get going. I'll be heading into the office a few hours late tomorrow, but perhaps I'll see you again then." And it turned away. It felt like it took forever for the enormous body to sail over-not-north-of the triangle—and pass, at last, out of the sun's path.

The triangle didn't look down-but-not-south until someone shook his side—his father. He lowered his dazed gaze to the crowd—the cheering, applauding crowd. Ma-gi-ster, Ma-gi-ster. A sea of multicolor confetti shapes that filled the air to the horizon.

Shadows.

His father shook him again—"Go on, say something. They're waiting"—and the triangle held up his mic as though he were in a dream. He tried to remember what he was supposed to say. "I was right," he said flatly. "Just like I always told you. I can see the third dimension. The realm of dreams—of colors, of light, and..." The lies left a sick taste in the back of his eye. He couldn't say them. Points of light in darkness and pink nightmares.

"I'm s— You'll all have to excuse me," he said, his voice childish and small. "I can't—I've had a... a... profound... spiritual experience. I must meditate on the revelations I've received." The words felt like woo-woo mumbo-jumbo. "The next eclipse will be a few months after the new year." It seemed important, for some reason, to pass that information on. Wasn't that what he always said he did? Share the wisdom of third dimensional spirits with his followers? "I... have to go now."

His father took his elbow. "This is your moment," he whispered. "Come on, son—you don't want to lose your chance to speak directly to them, do you?"

He shoved the microphone in his father's side. "You speak to them."

"But—"

"I can't," he said. "I can't."

He cut through the crowd as fast as it would part for him—if they were any slower, he'd have started stabbing his way through—haunted the whole way by their applause.

####

And that was it.

From the Axolotl's perspective, he had just had a brief pleasant exchange with a precocious tadpole in a sidewalk puddle.

From the triangle's perspective, he might as well have been standing on the boat deck watching as Cthulhu rose from his millennia of dead slumber at the bottom of the ocean, turned to the fragile vessel bobbing on the waves, and said, "Good morning! Glorious weather we're having, isn't it?"

And from the perspective of the Higher Dimensional Gate, their Magister Mentium had predicted an eclipse, been rightfully insulted when it didn't come the exact second he ordered it, and furiously summoned down an eclipse darker and swifter and longer than any in recorded history.

Up until then, he had been seen as, at best, an oracle. A prophet. A messenger to share the secrets of the third dimension, but that was all he could do. But now, he had commanded forces in an unseen dimension, creating an eclipse months before it was natural. He had made it flicker on and off like he had his finger on the sun's light switch. News reports and the most unimpeachable scientific authorities reported that the eclipse had centered on the location of the Higher Dimensional Gate rally, narrowed down to an inexplicably small radius around that point, and then remained unchanged for several long minutes, long enough for anyone in its shadow to grow fatigued from the missing sunshine. Nothing like that had ever happened before. It defied every known fact about the science of eclipses.

People around the gathering—even people who had known nothing about the Higher Dimensional Gate rally—reported that during the eclipse, they'd become inexplicably disoriented, unable to tell compass directions, and had felt themselves fall toward the darkness—as if gravity's pull had suddenly moved from the south to the epicenter of the eclipse. Public building inspections confirmed that somehow the entire town had shifted, ever so slightly, closer to the epicenter. Closer to the Magister.

Never mind prophecy; as far as the Magister's rapidly-increasing followers were concerned, he might have been a god.

It was the greatest triumph a baby cult leader could ask for.

He barely noticed.

####

For days, he could hardly sleep, speak, or think. He kept losing track of conversations to stare into space. Now, it awed his followers when his eye turned an empty white—he must have been communing with something in a higher dimension.

He didn't argue. It was better than letting them know he was losing his mind.

He spent his time alone locked in his room, pacing back and forth, trying not to look up-but-not-north and failing. Dwelling on the significance of it all. Feeling like he'd never figure it out.

He used to love cosmic horror stories, back when he had time to read. They followed a reliable pattern: the hero travels farther than any rational shape ever should, meets something big, and goes mad from the realization.

And what was it that the hero always realized? That he was a dust fleck in the firmament. That he was insignificant. That he didn't matter. That there were things out there he'd never seen before and would never truly understand, and that they cared not for mere shadows on the wall like him, and that in the grand scheme of the cosmos he was nothing. That he was utterly unimportant.

In moments of what felt like lucidity in between the shivering horror, the triangle  wryly acknowledged that it was no surprise he'd ended up in a cosmic horror story. He could see into another dimension. In the stories he'd read, that made it all but inevitable.

But all the authors had gotten the maddening revelation wrong. He could have handled knowing he was nothing. It almost would have been a relief. 

True horror was knowing he mattered.

He'd spent the majority of his young life selling the idea that he was oh-so-important, as part of a big con to trick gullible idiots into liking him and flinging cash at his rotten undeserving family—and he'd only been able to do it because when the guilt got to him, when his conscience asked what would become of the shapes forking over their life savings on false promises of divine secrets, he could look out into bleak black space and tell himself that nothing really mattered, nothing was important, nothing he'd ever do would really make a difference, and the people he manipulated didn't matter any more than he did. He meant everything to his worshipers, and nothing to the universe. He could do anything and it didn't matter.

For a moment, a vast mind-melting shape-shifting incomprehensible eldritch god had focused its full attention on him—of all the universe, of all the dimensions beyond the known universe, it had looked at him and only him—a mere shadow on the wall, and yet in that moment, it found him interesting. It found him worthy of notice. He had screamed into the cold uncaring void, and the void had cared. For a moment, he'd held cosmic importance. He mattered. His actions mattered.

He'd felt it see him as important, but why? What was so important about him? There had to have been something significant he'd done, something he showed it, something in what he said. He replayed their conversation in his mind over and over and over and over, trying to remember what he'd done that proved he mattered.

He didn't know what it was. He couldn't find it. All he could remember was just... being.

The writers were wrong. Cosmic horror wasn't when an elder god's eyes slid past you without noticing you existed. It was when the elder god gazed down at you at your lowest and bleakest, during your most petty and selfish act of mass swindling, from a dimension where not even slamming the door and shutting your eye could shield you from its gaze—and it decided you were worth caring about. Cosmic horror was when you encountered a colossal alien that planted the incomprehensibly alien idea in your head that you had an inherent worth just because you existed. Cosmic horror was when a force of nature asked the name of a shadow on the wall.

If it was true... if it all mattered... then what was he doing? How could he? What had he done?

####

He was lucky—he was lucky that his parents had raised him to think so clearly about issues like morality and money and easy marks. His only saving grace was that he was too rational to seriously entertain the Axolotl's mad ideas.

And yet, his mind boiled with mad regret. It blazed with insane guilt. The heat of it could burn him out. It was months before he could continue his public sermons without feeling sick—and even once he did, he could still feel the delusion that what he did mattered, festering in his mind.

It would fester for the next trillion years.

####

(And that concludes this plot arc! I hope y'all enjoyed it!! I'd love to hear what y'all thought of the whole thing—especially now that we've looped back to the original eclipse. 😁)

[simp4konig]

nggghmhh... been thinking about Nikto getting into a fight and Reader fussing over him and cleaning up the blood on his knuckles and bandaging his hand as he watches them with hearts in his eyes... 🥺💞

It wasn't that nasty of an injury, really. Really.

You were simply fussing over him too much, as per usual.

His knuckles were split after punching someone in the face perhaps a tad too hard. Just a little. Just hard enough to knock out a few molars, maybe... or a row.

"This will sting," you murmur — though, mostly to yourself, as Nikto isn't particularly talkative, and usually only replies in grunts.

Eventhough Nikto could have gone to medical to have his injuries treated by a more qualified individual, he went straight to you instead: maybe you applied too much pressure on accident when disinfecting the wound with antiseptic and his skin would sting; maybe the bandages were never tight enough and always on the loose side; and maybe your handiwork wasn't as precise or skillful, but Nikto found that simply being around you was enough to heal him.

Yes, it does sting. A lot.

Or it should. Nikto has become desensitised to pain, and it doesn't register like it used to. What should be excruciating agony feels like a dull throb in the background, or the aftershocks felt from a body that didn't belong to him, yet does. Not to mention that he dissociates a lot, so he can make active pain... passive.

So yes, it does sting. It just doesn't hurt.

Nikto lets you do as you please, watching with silent attention the entire time. He keeps his hand limp, letting you hold it however you want...

...Just as long as you're holding it.

The size difference is stark, his large fingers easily encircling your wrist almost in its entirety. He’s big and built, scars and old wounds littered across his pale skin, pink and raw in the places that he was burned. You? You are small and... soft.

Your biceps aren't as big as his. Your muscles aren't as defined as his. Your build isn't as solid, strong, and stout as his is.

Instead, you are… delicate. Like a porcelain doll. And as pretty as one, too. Especially when your eyes are as glassy as they are now, and catch the light at such an angle that it makes them sparkle like rare gems to be treasured and cherished. Nikto's treasure.

Delicate to him, at least; because, no matter how much you insist that you are not petite, not tiny, and not fragile, it further solidifies in his mind how he ought to protect you. Which was annoying as fuck, since you weren't a child that had to be coddled and protected, but it was what it was. It was almost... adorable?

"Is it alright?" You ask, antsy with anticipation, absentmindedly chewing on the inside of your cheek without realising. "Maybe... try flexing your hand?"

He does, surveying your handiwork, twisting his hand this way and that, clenching his fingers into as tight of a fist as he can make it.

"Or... is it, erm... too tight? I-I can wrap it again, if it's uncomfortable—”

“—No.”

Truth of the matter was, it could have been better — any nurse would have been appalled, and hastily bandaged Nikto's hand again for themselves.

But, since it was you that treated him, it was the best treatment which he could have ever asked for.

And it was not "alright", but immaculate, thank you.

With a sigh, you release his hand, and miss how Nikto instantly tenses, missing the intimacy, as subtle and fleeting as it was.

“You get into too many fights," you say, eyebrows furrowed slightly over your eyes in unconcealed disapproval.

A shrug. “Too many people provoke me," Nikto puts bluntly.

“Provoke you how, exactly? By breathing? Existing?"

For a long moment, Nikto was quiet. You were on edge — your sarcasm did not bode well with Nikto sometimes, and it probably came across as malicious and accusatory...

Fuck. Fuuuck...

However, through gritted teeth, Nikto utters: “They… were saying bad things about you.”

Instantly your demeanour changes, and although you attempt to disguise it with a stern expression and cold tone, your features soften considerably, and the furrowed brows and the wrinkles in your forehead smoothen, like ice melting.

“Nikto…”

Nikto, defending your honour? He, punching not just recruits, but other operators, and threatening the commanders with death lest they mess with you? Hurt you? Merely talk badly about you?

Oh fuck... your heart aches, and stubbornly clenches with affection eventhough you ought to scold him, to tell him to stop, to behave rationally... despite not particularly wanting to.

Since the idea of being defended by Nikto is... nice.

Still.

“Nikto... please don't fight people on my behalf.”

Immediately, he becomes defensive, and gruffly grunts a harsh: “Why not?”

You bite your lip. “Because… I don't want you to get hurt. Okay?"

“I don't care if I get hurt. All I care about is you. You're all that matters."

“And I care about you. I care if you get hurt. Because it matters to me. So… don't, okay?"

"...Hmph."

"...Please," you whisper, pleading nonverbally with your eyes. "...For me?"

For you? He would do anything...

...not get hurt, that is.

Next time a person insulted you or made a snarky remark about you in any way, he would hurl a chair at them. Or plot the most inconspicuous murder.

Just as long as he wouldn't get hurt, yes?

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

@blackinkniko @arrozyfrijoles23 @wil-xyz @revnatheshadow @feelya @liminal-chickenskin @zoloftwithdrawalnausea @soupiiiie @lizzy019

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

A/Ns

One Nikto wip done... 12+ more to go!!!!!, 🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉

.....i will only pass away peacefully if i finish these .....

..... then and ONLY then im going to bash my head against a wall so i am in a coma 😇 (JOKE)

Going to miss my anons:(((... Im verysad to have closed my inbox but it was necessary for me 😟...

Anyways, my closed inbox gives me motivation to write as fast as possible so I can interact with them (you!!! <333) again ☺️💞💞💞

[valsverse]

‎‎‎‎‎‎⠀⠀(୨୧) STOLEN KISSES AND POMEGRANATE SEEDS⠀

⠀⠀⠀⠀. .⠀PAIRING ⠀⟡⠀ percy jackson x child of aphrodite!reader

﹙💌﹚ in which ：as a child of aphrodite, you have a liking for things that are red. roses, pomegranates, percy jackson's lips- wait, what?⠀ ── ⠀ 645⠀requested

THE DROWSY SUMMER SUN bled through the leafy canopy of the oak tree where you and percy sprawled at a weathered picnic table. half-sliced pomegranates littered the space between you, their seeds like tiny rubies glinting in the light, the crimson juice trickling down the oak’s surface, painting it in delicate, sinuous lines of red.

percy moved with practiced ease, his pocket knife flashing as he worked, methodically picking out the seeds for you to savor. slice, halve, pick. slice, halve, pick. you stole glances at him from the corner of your eye, captivated by the way the sunlight played in his dark hair, how his laughter lines carved deeper when he smiled, how his focus sharpened as if each seed were a treasure meant only for you. his hands were steady, deliberate, as he plucked each seed and let it fall into the porcelain, gold-rimmed bowl from which you ate.

breaking from your trance, you nudged him lightly with your elbow. “you know aphrodite was the first to plant pomegranates, right? you ought to thank her later,” you teased, a sly smile tugging at your lips.

percy looked up, his brows arching in exaggerated surprise. “oh? is that right?” he asked, his chin resting on his hand as his knife paused mid-air. his eyes, a stormy sea green speckled with flecks of gold, met yours with an unsettling calm that sent a flutter through your chest—a flutter that had been growing more insistent lately, as if it had a mind of its own. almost annoying.

“of course it is! are you implying otherwise?” you shot back, crossing your arms. you knew he wasn’t, but you seized onto the distraction, anything to escape the warmth growing in your chest.

percy’s smile only curled with a lazy grace as he toyed with the pomegranate seed he picked earlier, his fingers moving idly as his gaze remained fixed on you. he shook his head with an air of dreamy nonchalance, offering no reply, only a sigh that seemed to drift on the air.

“are you even listening?” you teased, laughter laced through your words as you reached out to snatch the seed from his hand. the seed’s cool, slick surface was a stark contrast to the warmth that spread through your fingertips as they brushed against his. percy arched an eyebrow, a mock offense flickering in his eyes, but let you take it, his touch lingering just long enough to send a shiver down your spine. as the tart sweetness of the pomegranate seed burst on your tongue, you caught the glimmer of something in percy’s eyes—an expression that shifted from surprise to delight. his laugh followed, rich and warm, a melody you'd memorized long ago. “what is it?” you asked, pausing mid-chew, the seed still resting on your tongue as curiosity knit your brows together. “what’s so funny?”

"nothing," percy said, his voice thick with amusement as he tried to catch his breath. "it’s just…" he trailed off, his gaze softening as he leaned in, closing the distance between you. "you’ve got a little something…"

before you could react, he tilted his head and swiped his tongue over the crimson stain of pomegranate juice that had pooled at the corner of your mouth with a deliberate slowness, the touch of his lips sending a shock of warmth through you. and then, as if pulled by a force neither of you could resist, he deepened the kiss, the sharp tang of pomegranate mingling with the heat of his breath, the world narrowing to just this—just him.

his hand cradled your cheek as he finally drew back, his breath still hot against your skin. “there, that's better.” he murmured, a soft smile ghosting across his lips as he held up the pomegranate seed you’d claimed earlier, rolling it between his fingers. “you’re right. i really should thank aphrodite later.”

©valsverse— do not steal, edit, or repost my works. plagiarism is prohibited.

[charliemwrites]

Part 6 of Charmed Slasher Simon!

Simon really ought to teach you not to look at him like that. Those big watery eyes and pouty lips make his teeth feel too sharp for his own mouth. He wants to sink them into you, find out if you taste as sweet as you look. He knows you would, knows it like he knows the slick heat of fresh viscera.

“What.” he demands, voice hard to keep the rasp of dark desire from it.

“I have a little favor to ask.”

He arches an eyebrow, does not believe you. Not when you’re looking at him so beseechingly. He’ll have to get you to make that face again, maybe when he’s got you on your knees, asking to suck his cock.

“Go on.”

You seem ridiculously, foolishly charmed by this stoic, unimpressed front he puts on for you. A little beam of sunshine refracting off of a black mirror. Wonders sometimes what cruel maker built you so unintentionally self-destructive.

“There’s this work trip coming up…”

He has to cross his arms to keep himself from snatching you up and locking you in the bedroom. Mistaking the gesture, you hurry to continue.

“And I have to go, but! We’re allowed to bring plus ones.”

Satisfaction curls warm in his gut, a purring predator cat. He wants to hear you ask, though.

“I’m not hearing the favor.”

“Riley….” you complain, face adorably embarrassed.

“I’m waiting, luv.”

You damn near stomp your little foot at him. “Will you please come as my plus one?”

He arches his eyebrows. “That’s a big ask.”

You could ask for the stars and moon and he’d make them bleed for you. Paint the sky crimson and make a necklace of the heavens to collar you in.

“I know and I understand if you don’t want to - but… but that coworker you met, Brandon? He’s going too, and he’s been looking at me weird all week. Please, Ri? I-I don’t want to go by myself and you make me feel safe.”

Oh it was a sure thing that he’d be going with you, but now there’s no question. He’s so glad for the video cameras; he going to milk himself dry tonight listening to you say please like that. Admitting that he makes you feel safe. His poor, stupid, fragile thing. It’s a good thing he found you.

“Alright, alright,” he soothes. “No waterworks now. I’ll go with you.”

Like a switch, you light up and throw yourself into his chest.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you,” you trill. “I’ll make it up to you somehow, I promise.”

He snorts. You’ve done him the favor by giving him an excuse to follow you - but he’s not about to correct you.

“You let me worry about that. Just send me the details and I’ll be there.”

—

Your job has rented out a ski lodge for this little trip. Not only is it secluded, the booking is for the middle of the week. There will be few, if any, people over than instructors and your coworkers.

He couldn’t plan it better.

The day is spent pretending to care about your coworkers’ names and babysitting you along the slopes. You nearly crack your head open twice, each time he scoops you up, frowning down at your giggly face.

You also nail him in the head with a snowball too. That. That’s he’s going to get revenge for.

When night falls, you squeeze his hand at the door to your room. He leans his palm against the door over your head, relishes in the way you fluster as you tilt your head to look at him.

“Thank you for coming, Riley,” you murmurs. “You’ve made this really fun.”

He lets himself smile at you, just a bit. Knows it’s lopsided and probably a little too sharp, should raise alarm bells in your pretty little head, but you only smile back at him.

“Mm, you’ll have to make it up to me. Doin’ you this big favor ‘n all.”

You laugh. “Yeah? Let me know when you want your pound of flesh.”

Oh he’ll be taking more than a pound.

“Better be ready when I come to collect.”

“Ooh, so scary!” you tease, sticking your tongue out.

“You’ve no idea.”

—

A storm hits that night. A wicked, frigid thing that brews up and boils over in a matter of hours. Whiteout conditions. The power goes out a quarter past 11.

Well, you’ve had your fun. Now it’s time for Simon to have his.

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Masterlist

[eowynstwin]

Blackbird, Fly - Two

Cowboy Gaz x mail order bride—only, not his. After exchanging letters for half a year with ranching man Hans König, you finally travel out west to marry him. - It becomes clear to you that something is bothering him—perhaps it has something to do with you. - ao3

previous

Kyle Garrick—who instructs you to call him Gaz, explaining it as a nickname—drives you out of town in a two-horse wagon. The countryside is dyed in pastels by the softening light of a just-setting sun, every bit as beautiful as Hans had written when he told you about it.

Like a painting, he said. Everywhere you look could be framed in gold. I wake up every day in this land and thank God I have the fortune to live in it.

Here now, as the wagon rattles down the wheel-carved trail, you understand his words. You feel that if you brushed your fingers against the sky overhead, towering with lavender-bottomed clouds as thick and soft as cotton on the stem, that they might come away smeared in blue and pink and violet. The surrounding landscape is a cornucopia of vibrant greens, rich browns of trees and soil, and clusters of orange, yellow, and white wildflowers.

You keep looking all around you to take it in, jostling your driver beside you, but Gaz seems not to mind. At least, he doesn’t say anything.

You’ve been trying not to feel so aware of his presence, but the endeavor is impossible. He is a solid weight beside you on the driver’s seat, exuding warmth where your shoulders brush against each other, and the earthy, masculine scent of him is inescapable. Every time his elbow or knee or thigh nudges yours during the natural sway and jostle of the wagon ride, you have to keep yourself from leaping out of your skin. Ever since you stepped foot off the train, you’ve felt like a lightning rod set out in anticipation of a storm.

You ascribe it to displaced longing for your husband-to-be. You’d spent the whole journey west imagining how you’d meet, longing for the moment he took you into his arms for the first time. Gaz is a handsome man—it’s only natural that your unfulfilled anticipation would transfer onto him. Especially considering he said you were perfect.

But then said very little after that. He’d seemed—well, not friendly, but at least amicable on the train platform, so you wonder if your manners have offended somehow. He’s spent most of the drive now with his eyes ahead, partly obscured by the brim of his hat. Occasionally he glances at the letters in your hand, but otherwise does not acknowledge you.

After one such glance, your discomfort with the silence becomes too much to bear.

“I read my favorites every night,” you tell him.

If Gaz is surprised when you break the silence, he doesn’t show it. “That so,” he murmurs.

All you have is his profile, very handsome in the light. The line of his mouth is taut.

“I know it’s silly,” you continue nervously—you have a bad habit of rambling when you’re uncomfortable. Adjusting your carpetbag in your lap, you go on, “but you must understand, this is the most exciting thing that’s ever happened to me. I never expected to marry, you see.”

He grunts.

“Much less to be a mail order bride,” you say. “I always thought I would be an old maid, for lack of available suitors if nothing else. Mama and Daddy thought I ought to learn to read and write, to improve my prospects, but most folks where I’m from don’t care much about all that.”

“I see,” replies Gaz. He still does not look at you.

“Sometimes I think it even made them like me less, like I was putting on airs, being smarter than them.” You realize immediately how arrogant you must sound. “Oh, but I don’t mean any offense! I don’t mean to suggest I have ideas above my station. It’s only just that, I wondered for years and years why no one offered for me, and it was the only thing I could think of. Why would a farmer’s daughter need to read and write? And why would a wife need to, if her duty is to tend to her children and her home? So that must be why no man has ever been very interested in me.”

You realize with horror that words are pouring out of you faster than you can keep up with them. And your driver’s attention has not shifted; his eyes remain on the road.

You look at your lap, face burning. “I’m sorry, I’m just annoying you, Mr. Garrick. I’m sorry.”

Shame grips you, tight and awkward. If you’d wanted to endear yourself to this cowboy at all, you’ve already failed.

But Gaz finally says, “Most men are idiots.” You look at him; he does not look at you. “I’ve only just met you, and I like you fine.”

He says it matter-of-factly, as if no more need saying on the subject. Simple and to the point; an economy of feeling you imagine must be characteristic of men in this part of the country.

Hans was like that too, in his letters. Communicating feeling without dancing around it, with a bluntness that ends up soft in its honesty.

It eases the tension frothing poisonous in your belly. “Thank you,” you say.

You ride in silence for a stretch. A cool breeze catches the free-floating ends of your hair, rustles along in the tall grass by the wayside. The steady thump thump thump of the horse’s hooves, and the creak of tackle and leather, are the only sounds populating the air.

Home was quiet like this, too; the fields stretching endless and green beneath the sky, the silence there so blank and open that birdcall traveled for miles, and the lowing of the family milk cow sounded sometimes like the trumpet of God.

You peek again at Kyle Garrick. There’s a furrow to his brow, the kind a man gets when he’s in a mood and won’t admit it if asked.

“I’m sorry,” you say again, quietly, because he made you feel better about things, and you’ve done little more than whine.

He finally looks at you, the edges of his face lined and glowing in the evening light. Studies you, for a moment. The furrow eases.

“No,” he says, “I’m sorry, Miss. I don’t mean to be short with you. I’m afraid manners are secondary on a ranch, without a good woman nearby to remind about ‘em.”

You give him a small smile. “Have you worked for Hans very long?”

He turns his gaze back to the road. “Six or seven years, now.”

You toy with the clasp of your bag; you’re brimming with questions. “Is he really all that tall?”

“Oh, yes,” Gaz says. “Like a giant.”

“What’s he like?”

Gaz gives a great breath through pursed, full lips. “Fair, I guess. Asks a lot of us—but then most bosses out here will. Worked for his father for a few years before him, too.”

“You must be a good hand then,” you say.

“I work hard,” says Gaz. “That’s all that matters.”

“I’m sure Hans is grateful,” you reply. “He must trust you very much, to send you for me.”

The furrow returns. “He must.”

It becomes clear to you that something is bothering him, and it’s nothing you will resolve between now and when you make it to the ranch. Perhaps it has something to do with you—a new face, an unknown quantity that threatens to knock the balance of his livelihood askew.

You sigh a little. Of course, you should have expected to have to win Hans’ people over. Their loyalty to the late Mrs. König will inevitably be challenged by your arrival.

Neither of you speak again—you decide not to push what little grace Kyle Garrick has given you, and he does not volunteer any more conversation. The rest of the ride is unremarkable, leaving room for anticipation to grow in your stomach; soon the wagon crests the slope of a hill, and your destination comes into view.

Long Mask Ranch sits at the base of a range of mountain foothills, fed and watered emerald green by spring runoff. You’ve been on Hans’ land for a while now; opening up before you is the ranch proper. A collection of buildings form a semicircle around a large corral in the valley: stables, a barn, some cabins, and a large two-story gabled manor, painted white.

The sun sinks further toward the horizon as you approach, painting the world in liquid orange. Figures resolve themselves, people moving tables and chairs around, and on the manor’s front porch, observing the proceedings, stands a tall man in a rancher’s coat and hat.

Lightning suddenly bolts through you. You sit very, very still as Gaz pulls the wagon through a cast iron archway adorned with LMR at the apogee. Your heart thrums in your throat like a picked guitar string. When you finally come to a stop, the man’s head turns to toward you.

At the worst possible moment, shyness grips you. You look around, at anywhere but him, at the house, the corral, the cowboy beside you.

You startle to meet Gaz’s eyes. The expression he wears is a mask of seriousness.

“This is it,” he says.

Your voice leaves your chest trembling. “Thank you, Mr. Garrick.”

“Just Gaz is fine, Miss.”

“I couldn’t possibly,” you reply. Propriety feels like the only solid thing to cling to just now.

He looks away. The line of his mouth tightens. “Of course,” he says.

He dismounts the wagon in one smooth motion, boots hitting the packed earth hard. Out of the corner of your eye, you see the tall man start his way over to you. Gaz rounds the back of the wagon, and you give your bag to him once he’s at your side. He offers his hand to help you down.

You’re dazed as you take it, lightheaded as suddenly the present moment becomes very, very real. It’s warm, his hand; rough in all the places you expect a cowboy’s hand to be. Yet there’s something soft in the way your palms meet, how the dips and contours align with each other and fit together. You’re shaking very hard as you ease your way from the seat, gripping him tightly until your feet meet the ground, and his grip circles yours with a solidness to it in a way unlike any man has ever held you.

You meet his eyes again when he hands you your bag. Gaz gives your hand a squeeze, averts his gaze, and lets you go.

“There she is!” an accented voice announces.

You pull your gaze from Kyle Garrick and the mystery of his tension with you, and turn to face your intended husband.

Hans König has loomed large in your imagination for half a year. He’d described to you what he looked like, of course, as best he could, but you find as you look upon his face that no written word can convey what it means to meet for the first time the man you will marry. You’d fallen in love with someone formless, absent, but inscribed in other ways with enough distinction to nurture your tender feelings.

Looking upon him now, though…his appearance offers nothing to that distinction. He’s neither ugly nor handsome. As he comes to stand before you, you think he rather looks like every other middle-aged man you’ve met in your short life, although certainly much taller. You meet his eyes—pale blue, as he’d related—and the rush of love you’d expected to feel, once you knew who he was, simply does not come.

This man is a stranger to you.

You reprimand yourself immediately. He isn’t a stranger. You’ve known him for six months. His face is simply not one you have attached any love to yet; the measure of his character is contained in the stack of paper in your hands. In the promises he made to you to make your quietest dreams come true.

So you smile the way you’d dreamed you would—like watching the sun crest the horizon after a long night of darkness, seeing the bounty of the near future coming toward you. Summoning joy by making room for it to exist.

“Hello, Hans,” you say, “it’s me.”

Hans König steps forward. He looms over you truly, now, eclipsing your vision. “It is you, indeed.”

Without another word, right there in front of Gaz, Hans grips your shoulders, bends down, and kisses you on the mouth.

Your brows shoot upward. It’s the first time anyone has ever kissed you. His lips are…hard, and motionless against yours. Almost perfunctory. You are so shocked he’s done it that you don’t think to respond, and then as suddenly as it happened, it’s over. He pulls away, pats your shoulders with a little smile, and then looks at Gaz.

“Get that wagon put away and then go help the others,” says Hans to the cowboy, slinging one arm around your shoulder.

Your brows lift further. Is that all he has to say to him, for delivering you safe and sound?

Gaz doesn’t seem to share your feelings. “Yes, sir,” is all he says, even and toneless.

But he looks between you and his employer for more than just the span of a heartbeat. Eyes going from him, to you, to the arm around your shoulders. Then he meets your gaze, expression stony.

If Gaz is wary of your presence here—if you’re going to win him over—the best time to start is now. “Thank you very much for seeing me here safely,” you say. “I was so glad of your company, Mr. Garrick.”

To your dismay, his expression only tightens. Gaz looks at Hans again, then back at you.

“You’re welcome, Miss,” he says.

Then he climbs back into the wagon, gives the reins a snap, and drives away.

-

next

a/n: fun fact, the ranch and neighboring town are based off Valentine and Emerald Ranch from rdr2 :) the ranch layout is more like Pronghorn Ranch however.

[justlemmeadoreyou]

hii babesss could you write something about harry fucking yn to ease her nerves/relax because she got home from work stressed and tired and needed a distraction? Love uu

summary: harry helps y/n relax after a stressful day.

words: 1.5k

warnings: SMUT! kissing, oral (f receiving), fingering, praise.

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Yn dragged herself through the front door, feeling completely drained after a long, arduous day at the office. Her briefcase slipped from her hand as she leaned back against the door, letting out an exhausted sigh.

"Rough day, love?" came Harry's concerned voice from the living room.

He appeared in the hallway, his warm green eyes instantly taking in her disheveled state. Without a word, he crossed over and enveloped her in a tender hug. Yn melted into his embrace, the tension already starting to leave her body.

"The worst," she mumbled into his chest. "I'm just so tired, Harry."

"I know, sweetheart," he murmured, pressing a kiss to the top of her head. "But you're home now. Let me take care of you."

He took her hand and led her to the couch, guiding her to sit down. Yn watched as he busied himself lighting some scented candles and dimming the lights.

"There, nice and relaxing," he said with a soft smile. "Why don't you put your feet up?"

Yn did as instructed, curling up on the couch as Harry grabbed a thick blanket from the ottoman.

"This ought to keep you cozy," he said, draping it over her legs. He sat down beside her and began to gently rub her shoulders. "Tell me about your day?"

As Yn recounted the never-ending meetings, the rude clients, the looming deadlines, she could feel the stress slowly melting away under Harry's soothing touch.

"You poor thing," he tsked sympathetically. "No wonder you're so tense. Let me run you a hot bath, that'll really help you unwind."

"Harry, you don't have to-" Yn started, but he cut her off with a fingers against her lips.

"Nonsense, it's no trouble at all," he said firmly. "You just rest here, I'll be back in a tick."

True to his word, Harry returned a few minutes later. "All ready for you, my dear," he declared. "I even put in those bath salts you like."

He helped Yn to her feet and into the bathroom, where the tub was filled with steaming water and fragrant bubbles. Candlelight flickered all around, casting a warm, calming glow.

"Harry…this is wonderful," Yn said, touched by his thoughtfulness. "Thank you."

"Of course, anything for you," he replied warmly. "I'll leave you to relax, but shout if you need anything, alright?"

Alone in the bathroom, Yn slowly undressed and sank into the luxurious heat of the water with a blissful sigh. She closed her eyes and just…breathed, allowing the fragrant steam and soothing warmth to cocoon her utterly.

***

Some time later, Yn emerged from the bathroom, skin tingling and pink from the hot water. She felt worlds better, relaxed yet rejuvenated at the same time. Harry looked up from where he was reclining on the couch, a bright smile breaking over his face.

"There she is! Feeling better, my love?"

"Much better," Yn assured him, crossing over to join him on the couch and nestling into his side. "Thank you for taking such good care of me."

"Always," he said simply, dropping a kiss on her damp hair. "I just hate seeing you so stressed and tense. You work too hard, you know."

"I know," Yn said ruefully. "But I have to admit, after that bath and some quality time with my favorite person, I'm feeling infinitely more relaxed."

She tilted her face up toward his, eyes sparkling. "In fact, I think I could go for a bit more…relaxation," she added with a coy smile.

Harry grinned and pulled her closer. "Why, Mrs. Styles, are you flirting with me?"

"Mmm, maybe a little," Yn giggled, looping her arms around his neck. "Is that okay?"

"More than okay," he murmured huskily, capturing her lips in a slow, heated kiss.

As Harry deepened the kiss, Yn melted against him with a contented hum. This was what she had been wanting all day. To be in the arms of her loving husband, while he held her and kissed her like she deserved.

Harry's hands travelled underneath the oversized t-shirt, feeling the soft flesh of her chest against his fingers, caressing her nipples and swiping his fingers over the hardening bud.

Yn moaned into his mouth, and as soon as her mouth parted open, his tongue swiped against her plush lips, sliding in and licking her tongue. He trailed his hands down, feather-light touches on her stomach till he reached the waistband of the loose shorts, and pulled it loose.

Using the back as leverage, he used one hand against it to move himself on top of her, their lips never parting.

Only when Harry's hand slipped further down, inside her panties to feel her wetness oozing out, did she whimper into his mouth, and he broke the kiss to take a look at his beautiful, pretty and perfect wife, her hooded and lust-blown eyes telling him all he needed to know.

"What do you want, Yn?" he asked, keeping the eye contact as his fingers slipped between her pussy lips, feeling her soft, spongey but puffy clit and giving it a gentle roll between his fingers. She gasped, her lips swollen with their kisses just moments ago.

"I-I need-" she gasped once again, his hand circling around her tight hole, pushing just the tip of his finger in, teasing her.

"You need, hm?" he asked, and the next gasp she released was stolen with another kiss.

"Yes-Har-Harry, I-I need you"

She managed to sputter out, and as soon as she did, he slipped his wet finger in. Her walls clenched around him instantly, her thighs threatening to shut closed if it wasn't for Harry's thick ones between them. He pushed another in, swirling them around and curling them upwards just right to find her sweet g-spot.

"Oh fuck-yes-god yes, harry-" she pleaded, and Harry began kissing down her neck, her collarbones, the top of her breasts. He began fucking her with his fingers, two digits pistoning in and out of her in a pace that made her toes curl against the couch. She held onto his biceps, digging her nails in as he slid down the couch, getting on his knees in front of her.

Before she could protest, (not that she was going to), he darted out his tongue, and flicked it expertly aginst her clit, drawing out a moan from her. She used her other hand to grab his soft curls, and pulled at them softl.y

"Like that, baby?" he asked, and she nodded, biting her upper lip.

"So good, Har-don't stop"

Not that he was going to. He started to flick his tongue faster against her clit, his cold rings brushing against it each time he thrust his fingers fully in. He had kept them on on purpose, and he knew just how much the wet and cold sensation drove her wild.

His lips licked hers, before licking up her labia and sucking on her clit. Her grip on his hair tightened, and she whimpered once again, her back arching off the couch. Her legs couldn't stop themselves either, wrapping around his neck and pulling him impossibly closer to her core.

She felt the familiar sensation in her stomach, and she threw her head back. Harry licked, sucked and fucked with more frevor, using every ounce of strength in him to make his girl feel good.

Her breathing increased, her legs wrapping around him tighter as she gave his curls one final rough tug, before falling over the sweet edge, with Harry fucking her faster than ever, milking every ounce of orgasm from his pretty girl.

"Give it to me, yeah-that's it, good girl-"

He praised her, her orgasm riding out in the best way possible. Her breathing began going back to normal, her hold around his neck as well as in her hair loosening.

It was once she had fully relaxed around his fingers, that he pulled them out, licking them and cleaning them up like the sick bastard that he was. He wiped his dirty hands on his sweatpants, falling back on the couch beside her, his jaw aching from the work he had put in, but it was all worth it when he got to see her glow like that.

♡~~~♡~~~♡~~~♡~~~♡~~~♡~~~♡~~~♡~~~♡~~~♡~~~♡~~~♡~~~♡~~~♡

tell me if you like this!

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[wholoveseggs]

Dark Star {Part One}

18+ ---- {Masterlist} {Tag-List}

Part One

{Elijah Mikaelson x f!Reader} Bound by love that defies centuries, Elijah Mikaelson will do whatever it takes to resurrect his lost wife. Even if it means forsaking everything he believes in. Once the north star guiding his family, his shattered heart now leads him down a darker path, transforming him into a version beyond redemption. A damned soul, drawing his family into an abyss they may never escape.

♡♡ Hello my lovely followers! This will be a six part series inspired by @njeancastro316 post about red door Elijah (Girl, I've been writing this non-stop since you tagged me! thank you for the inspo). I really put my whole heart into this one, {I even made a playlist to capture the vibes} exploring the depths of Elijah's character and his struggle between love and darkness. Enjoy! && expect pain... ♡♡

6.8k words - Warnings: angst, angst and more angst, grief, heartbreak, intense violence, red door Elijah, emotional turmoil, so much Mikaelson family drama {the whole gang is here && some faves from Mystic Falls will show up later}, No smut in this part, but prepare for plenty of darkness... oh! && croissants...

{Part Two}{Part Three}{Part Four}{Part Five}{Part Six}

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Prologue ~ Europe 13th Century

"This way!" A boy laughed as he darted beneath a low-hanging branch. Behind him, a small girl hurried along, lifting her skirt to keep up, her breath catching in short gasps.

"Slow down! Wait for me!" she called, tripping over roots and brambles in her haste. "I can't run as fast as you!"

The boy glanced back, grinning. "Then hurry, will you."

"We ought to be home by now." She replied, frowning.

"We are almost there," he replied, leaping over a fallen branch before turning to face her, eyes gleaming. "We can get home quicker through the woods."

"I don’t like it," she murmured, clutching her skirt tighter. Shadows crept over the path as the sun sank lower, casting an orange glow through the dense branches. "The hour grows late."

The boy shook his head, catching her hand with a reassuring squeeze. "We’ll be fine. It’s only a short way."

Reluctantly, she nodded, holding onto him. "If anything ill should happen, I’ll tell Mother."

He only laughed, tugging her down the narrow path. "If something ill happens, you may not get the chance!"

Their laughter echoed in the stillness as they raced ahead. The trees grew taller, their branches clawing toward the darkening sky, while thick underbrush crowded the trail, rustling with each step. Yet the children, lost in their game, scarcely noticed, laughing and squealing as they chased one another.

Then, a sound, a subtle, almost a whisper, seeped through the quiet. The girl stopped, clutching the boy’s arm. “Did you hear that?”

“What is it?”

“Shh,” she hissed, pulling him closer, her wide eyes searching the shadows. "Listen."

They stood in silence, the air heavy and still, broken only by their own quickening breaths.

“It’s nothing. Perhaps a deer-”

“No, it’s more than that,” she whispered. Somewhere ahead, faint and distant, came the flicker of firelight. And with it, laughter. Wild and strange.

“What is that?” the boy asked, his voice barely a breath.

“Quiet,” she said, creeping forward, pulling him toward the light.

They peered out from behind a tree, breath catching at the sight before them. A great fire blazed, roaring into the sky as shadows twisted around it. Two figures danced wildly around the flames, naked, their skin smeared with red and ash. Their laughter, sharp and otherworldly, pierced the night air.

The girl’s scream barely escaped her lips before the boy’s hand clamped over her mouth, pulling her back. They stumbled, clutching one another, then turned and fled, racing down the trail as fast as their little legs would carry them, branches clawing at their clothes.

By the time they burst into the village, their faces were pale, their breaths ragged. Villagers gathered around as the children stumbled forward, pointing frantically toward the woods.

“Demons!” the girl gasped, clutching at the skirts of the nearest woman. “They’re out there! In the forest!”

There was a hushed sadness over the compound. The lights seemed to have dimmed, and the atmosphere hung heavy, cold and suffocating. It had been that way since the night Elijah found your lifeless body on the cold pavement. The night that changed everything.

Rebekah didn’t like it here anymore. Her home felt more like a tomb than a residence. It was too quiet, too full of memories and emotions too painful to confront. Her big brother was suffering, and there was nothing she could do to help him.

She found Klaus sitting in the courtyard, staring blankly at a chessboard. The pieces were scattered, mid-game, but his focus seemed to drift in and out. Normally, this contemplative silence from him made her nervous, but today she couldn’t muster the energy to care. The weight of everything was too much.

“Any news?” Rebekah asked, her voice barely a whisper.

Klaus didn’t move, didn’t speak at first. He shifted a chess piece absentmindedly and shrugged.

The sound of Marcel’s footsteps echoed through the stillness of the courtyard. She felt one of his warm hands rest gently on the small of her back, and she leaned into him, drawing comfort from his presence.

“I’ve been asking around. Only lead I have is that he’s somewhere in Europe,” Marcel said, his voice sounding hollow.

“Well, where in Europe?” Klaus finally spoke, his gaze never leaving the board.

“Don’t know. Haven’t pinpointed his exact location yet,” Marcel sighed. “But he’s been killing low-level Strix members, leaving bodies in his wake.”

Klaus scoffed softly, moving another piece on the board. “Keep looking,”

“You almost sound like you care,” Rebekah hissed, glaring at him.

“Don’t start with me, little sister,” Klaus warned, his voice low and sharp.

“Elijah has always been there for us,” she snapped, “And when he needs our help, where are you? Sitting here, playing chess with yourself.”

Klaus’s fist slammed down on the chessboard, sending the pieces flying across the table. He stood abruptly, stalking toward her, his eyes blazing. But Rebekah didn’t flinch, didn’t step back. She held his glare with her own, unrelenting.

“What do you want me to do?” Klaus roared, his voice cracking as his anger gave way to the grief simmering beneath. “Tell me, Rebekah. How do I fix this?”

“I want you to find him!” she screamed, tears stinging her eyes. “He’s our brother, Nik!”

Klaus’s shoulders slumped. His rage deflated, leaving him hollow. “I don’t know how to fix this, little sister,” he admitted quietly.

Marcel cleared his throat, stepping forward. “Maybe we should give him some time. Let him mourn her.”

“He’s not mourning, Marcel,” Klaus growled, clenching his jaw. “He’s murdering. He hasn’t even accepted that she’s dead.”

Rebekah and Marcel exchanged worried glances.

“We can’t just let him destroy himself,” Rebekah argued, her voice breaking. “Wherever he is, whoever crosses his path... they’re doomed. He’s out of control.”

“He’s changed,” Marcel muttered, rubbing his temple. “I’ve never seen him like this. So violent, so volatile.”

“That’s why I’m worried, Nik,” Rebekah said, her tone deadly serious. “If he’s not stopped, the Elijah we know will be gone. He will become a monster.”

Klaus looked down at the shattered chess pieces scattered across the table. “We are monsters, Rebekah,” he whispered, his voice raw.

“No, Nik,” she said, her voice trembling. “Not like this.”

Klaus remained silent for a moment, then lifted his gaze to meet hers. “Suppose someone took Marcellus from you. What would you do?”

“I would raze this earth and dance on the ashes,” she answered without hesitation, the fire of her love and loyalty burning bright in her eyes.

“That’s what he’s doing,” Klaus said darkly.

“Yes,” Rebekah agreed, “but Elijah would come for me. He would find me, and help me, keep me from losing myself. Now he’s the one who needs help.”

“How do we stop him?” Marcel asked, though his voice was laden with doubt.

Klaus shook his head slowly. “We don’t.”

“Nik…” Rebekah started, her voice pleading.

“We contain the damage,” Klaus cut her off, the steely resolve returning to his voice. “I’ll go to Europe. I’ll bring him back.”

Rebekah exhaled, relief flooding through her, and she pulled Klaus into a tight hug. She didn’t say anything, just held him as though her arms alone could keep the family from falling apart. He hugged her back, and for a moment, the cracks in their family seemed to close.

Marcel stood behind her, placing a hand on her shoulder and squeezing gently.

When she finally pulled away, Rebekah gave her brother a sad smile. “Be careful.”

Klaus nodded. “I will.”

His eyes flicked to Marcel, and the two men exchanged a knowing look. They both understood how dangerous this was. That if Elijah couldn’t be saved, they might lose him forever.

Or worse... they might have to put him down.

Two members of the Strix walked side by side, their steps echoing off the marble floors. One glanced around nervously, eyeing the high-tech security measures surrounding them, cameras in every corner, reinforced steel doors, layers of magical barriers.

"Is this really necessary? I can't stand being cooped up here. What's the point?" the taller vampire complained, his voice echoing through the empty corridor.

"Protocol," the other replied, his tone bored. "You know how paranoid Tristan can be. But I’m telling you, no one's getting in here. Not even him."

"I don’t get it. We had nothing to do with her death. Why are we hiding?"

"He doesn’t know that." The second vampire shook his head, his eyes flicking toward a monitor displaying multiple feeds from around the compound. “And he doesn’t seem to care about guilt or innocence anymore.”

They stopped at a reinforced door, pressing their palms to the scanners. As the heavy doors slid open, the two shared a final glance, the reality sinking in that even their supposed impenetrable defenses might not be enough.

They stepped into the dim room, illuminated only by the flickering light of the chandelier hanging above a long oak table. Strix members filled the chairs, their faces tense and uneasy. They had gathered in secret, far from prying eyes. Whispers of fear and uncertainty drifted across the room, but no one dared to speak above a murmur. The air was heavy with dread, and no one felt safe.

At the head of the table, Aya stood, her sharp gaze cutting through the room like a blade. She had always been the picture of composure, a pillar of strength, but now, her patience was thinning, her power waning, cracks in her armor where fear leaked through. Beside her, Tristan de Martel leaned casually in his chair, an amused smile playing on his lips, as if this was all a game to him. His eyes scanned the room, taking in the faces of his fellow Strix members, reveling in their discomfort.

“We all know why we’re here,” Aya began, her voice cold and steady, but there was an underlying tension to it, like a string about to snap. “Our ranks are thinning, and the reason is no secret.”

A murmur rippled through the room. Heads turned, glances were exchanged. They knew. Everyone knew.

“Elijah Mikaelson,” Tristan added, his voice smooth and casual, as if he were discussing the weather. His eyes gleamed with a cruel delight. “The noble brother has gone rogue. It seems the death of his beloved has… unraveled him.”

"That's an interesting way of putting it," one Strix member commented, his voice dripping with disdain. "He ripped apart fifty of my men, left a trail of bodies and witnesses, it took me days to cover it all up,"

"And how many vampires has he killed since then? Hundreds? Thousands?" another voice chimed in, sounding bitter.

"You're just scared," another vampire challenged, his tone mocking.

"Of course, we're scared. Do you know what he's capable of?" the first vampire hissed, baring his teeth.

"Silence," Aya ordered, her tone icy. The room fell quiet, the air crackling with tension. "We cannot defeat him, nor can we sit by and wait for him to tear us apart. He has lost his humanity, and it's clear that we must take action."

"We have already taken action and all it does is piss him off," the Strix member grumbled, "I have no interest in fighting a losing battle."

"You're a coward," Aya snarled, her eyes flashing with anger.

"What would you have us do?" another vampire spoke up, their voice strained, "We're no match for him."

"Perhaps we should consider a bargain," Tristan suggested, a sly smirk creeping across his lips. "Find the killer, deliver them to him, and save ourselves the trouble of being murdered."

The members murmured amongst themselves, some seeming open to the idea, while others still appeared wary.

"I cannot fathom why someone would be so foolish. Surely the person who did this knows the repercussions," a member said, a hint of fear in their voice.

Tristan's smile widened. "They were foolish indeed, and now they are the most hunted man, or woman, in the world,"

Aya's face was impassive, her mind racing. She had no doubt that Elijah would tear down the world to find his killer, and if the Strix didn't deliver them, he would do the same to their ranks. Tristan's indifference infuriated her. While he sat there with a smile, the Strix were suffering the consequences of his poor leadership.

A soft little cough pulled her from her thoughts, and she looked up to see a small girl standing at the other end of the table. She looked no older than twelve, with delicate features and wide, doe-like eyes. She looked lost, and this wasn't a place you could just wander into.

Other members noticed her presence and got to their feet, the scraping of chairs echoing off the walls. Aya narrowed her eyes, taking in the girl's appearance.

"Who are you?" Aya asked, her voice sharp.

The girl was clearly terrified, her hands shaking, and she looked like a deer caught in the headlights. Aya found it strange. She didn't sense the power of a witch coming off her, she was just a girl, and a very young one at that.

"I-I'm sorry," the girl stammered, her voice barely a whisper, "I don't know why I'm here. I just woke up here and now, I-I'm scared,"

"How did you get in here?" Aya questioned, her voice low and menacing.

"A nice man told me to come here," the girl mumbled, her eyes darting around the room, taking in the tense, hostile atmosphere. "He wanted me to talk to you."

Aya raised an eyebrow. "And why would he want that?"

The girl shrugged, her eyes brimming with tears. "I don't know, please, I just want to go home,"

"What did he look like?" Aya pressed, her voice growing louder.

"He had dark hair, and brown eyes," the girl sniffled, trying to hold back her sobs.

Tristan's jaw clenched, his eyes narrowing dangerously. The room was suddenly silent, the tension now unbearable. Aya stared at the girl, her face an unreadable mask, but inside, her mind was racing.

"What did he want you to say?" Aya asked, her voice quiet, dangerous.

The girl’s breath hitched, her words barely audible. "That... he will give all of you a slow death."

The temperature in the room plummeted, and a cold shiver ran down Aya’s spine. She struggled to hide her unease, but the implication was clear: Elijah had infiltrated their sanctuary.

"A-and that... if I can get in..." The girl gulped, her small voice quaking, "He can too."

The room fell into a suffocating silence as the weight of her words settled on the group. Tristan shot up from his chair, his face dark with fury.

“Lockdown procedures. Now.” Tristan barked, his voice commanding and harsh.

"What about the girl?" Aya asked, her eyes narrowing as she looked at the trembling child. Her instincts told her something wasn’t right.

"Kill her," Tristan spat, his voice cold and merciless. "She’s served her purpose."

The room erupted into chaos. Sirens blared as the compound went into immediate lockdown. The lights flickered, dimming to an eerie glow. The Strix moved quickly, vanishing into the shadows, their bodies blurring as they scattered, heading for safe rooms or exit points.

Aya hesitated for a moment, her gaze still fixed on the girl. She started toward her, but a voice in her head warned her against it. With one last glance, she turned and hurried toward the safe room.

The little girl stood trembling in the darkness, tears streaming down her face. The once-imposing vampires had fled, leaving her all alone in the icy silence.

"It's okay, sweetheart," a voice purred from the shadows, smooth and calming. The girl gasped, her heart racing as she felt a hand on her shoulder, firm yet oddly comforting.

She turned to see a tall man standing behind her, his dark hair framing his sharp features, his kind eyes watching her closely. "Run along now," he said softly, giving her a gentle push toward the door.

The girl nodded quickly, wiping her tears before scampering away, the door sliding shut behind her with a soft hiss.

Elijah watched her go, his kind smile fading as the room returned to darkness. His eyes glinted coldly, the warmth in them vanishing like smoke. Slowly, the veins beneath his eyes darkened, spreading like cracks in the surface of his calm exterior.

He was already inside.

As the sirens echoed, he vanished into the shadows once more, his presence like a gathering storm. And what followed this storm, was pure, unrelenting destruction.

The soft drone of a news broadcast drifted through an abandoned loft, dust floating through the air. The heavy velvet curtains were drawn, the room dark and shadowy, save for the light of a flickering TV. The anchor woman's face was somber, her voice solemn.

“Une tragédie a frappé Paris la nuit dernière... un incendie dévastateur a détruit un immeuble historique, laissant peu de traces de ce qui s’y trouvait. Les autorités locales confirment que l’origine du feu demeure inconnue, mais la rapidité à laquelle il s’est propagé soulève des questions.”

Subtitles scrolled across the bottom of the screen in English: "A tragic accident struck Paris last night... a devastating fire destroyed a historic building, leaving few traces of what was inside. Local authorities confirm that the cause of the fire is unknown, but the speed at which it spread raises questions."

The camera cut to images of the smoldering wreckage. Blackened stone, twisted metal, and fire trucks still spraying water over what little remained.

Elijah wasn't paying attention to the TV anymore; he had his head in his hands, hunched over in a chair, his body wracked with sobs. Bodies were strewn about the room, blood spattered on the walls and floors. A macabre painting of violence and rage. The sight of the lifeless forms weighed heavily on him, a chilling reminder of his own actions.

He didn't know how long he had been there, but it felt like an eternity. Each day blended into the next, the hours stretching into a meaningless void. Days would go by where he felt utterly detached, lost in a sea of grief and loss, and then the anger would return, awakening him to a new trail of bodies. There were so many, too many, and yet it wasn't enough.

“Les témoins affirment avoir vu des ombres avant que l’incendie n’éclate, mais aucune preuve tangible n’a été trouvée. Des sources proches de l’enquête évoquent une possible attaque ciblée, bien que les détails restent flous.”

"Witnesses reported seeing shadows before the fire broke out, but no physical evidence has been found. Sources close to the investigation say there may have been a targeted attack, though details remain unclear."

"You used a child? My love, what has become of you?"

Elijah didn't flinch, didn't react as he felt your arms wrap around his shoulders, your lips pressing a gentle kiss on his cheek. Your voice was soft, tinged with sadness and disappointment. He hated himself for it.

"She's fine," Elijah said, his voice strained, barely able to meet your gaze.

"You don't know that," you sighed, your hands moving to his chest, trying to soothe him. "And you know this isn't the way,"

"There is no other way," he replied, his voice cracking, desperation lacing his words.

"You used an innocent child, one not much older than Hope," you said, a hint of anger breaking through your sadness.

Elijah stiffened. He knew you were right. It didn't make what he did any better, and he felt his self-loathing increase tenfold.

"They killed you; I did what I had to," Elijah defended, but the words felt hollow, a pitiful excuse.

"This isn't the way," you repeated, your voice pleading, "and you don't know who did it, or why. This is all just a guess, a hunch."

He let out another quiet sob, then grabbed his glass of blood and threw it against the wall, the shards falling like crimson rain. He stared at the stain on the wall, watching the liquid trickle down, and he couldn't help but feel a sick sense of satisfaction.

"You have to stop," you whispered, appearing in front of him, your hand cupping his cheek, trying to pull him away from the dark, destructive spiral he was on.

"I can't," he said, his voice breaking, unable to look at you, this ghost haunting him.

"Please," you begged, your hand moving to his neck, gently stroking his skin, trying to comfort him. "I know this pain. It's agony, it's consuming, but I promise you, it will fade."

He pulled you onto his lap, his arms wrapping around you, holding you close, trying to breathe in your scent, to feel your warmth. But he couldn't. You were an echo, a phantom he couldn't grasp.

"You can't bring me back. You know that," you whispered, your voice barely audible, a soft, sad reminder.

He didn't respond, just held you, his fingers digging into your skin, his eyes closed tightly, fighting back tears. He had spent so many nights like this, crying himself to sleep, waking up to nothing, just an empty bed, a cold room, and a hollow, broken heart.

He opened his eyes and let out a gasp as he realized he was clinging to one of the dead bodies on the floor, the vampire's skin gray and decaying, the body long since gone cold.

Elijah released the body and staggered to his feet, his head swimming with despair and self-loathing. His pain and sorrow gave way to anger and frustration, fueling the urge to hurt, to destroy anything and anyone.

"Par ailleurs, une jeune fille a disparu après ne pas être rentrée chez elle. La jeune fille, qui aurait douze ans, a été vue pour la dernière fois dans la zone de l'incendie,"

"In other news, a young girl has gone missing after failing to return home. The girl, who is reported to be twelve years old, was last seen in the area of the fire..."

Elijah snapped, grabbing the TV and throwing it against the wall, the sound of shattering glass echoing through the room. His rage burned bright, a hot, white flame. His heart raced, his breathing ragged, his body shaking with fury.

He wanted to scream, he wanted to kill, but more than anything, he wanted you. He wanted to hold you, to feel your warmth, to hear your voice. He couldn't take it anymore; he was falling apart.

Klaus was never a big croissant fan; he preferred something heartier for breakfast. But here, in France, the flaky pastry seemed to taste infinitely better. Maybe it was the morning sunlight filtering through the café windows or the distant sounds of bustling streets.

He took a sip of his espresso, his eyes scanning the crowded café, absorbing the lively atmosphere. Freya sat across from him, her brow furrowed as she read a spell book, her expression thoughtful.

"Anything in there about wrangling wayward siblings?" Klaus teased, a wry grin playing on his lips.

Freya glanced up, a slight frown creasing her forehead. "That's more your area of expertise."

Klaus let out a huff of laughter. "Fair enough."

Freya’s expression softened, a small smile breaking through. "It will be okay. We'll find him."

Klaus nodded, biting into his croissant, the flakes melting in his mouth. The clatter of dishes and murmurs of conversation surrounded them, along with the distant strains of a busker playing a violin.

"Then what? I’ve never known what to say to him," Klaus said, a hint of sadness in his voice. "He’s always the one with the wise words, not me."

"Honesty is all we have," Freya replied, her tone gentle. "We tell him we miss him, that he’s our brother, and we want him home."

"And that we need to have a funeral, or at least a memorial. Hope is very confused about what happened to her aunt," Klaus added, his gaze drifting to the people walking by the window.

"We'll do it together, as a family," Freya reassured, reaching across the table to squeeze his hand. Her touch was gentle, a lifeline in the turmoil. "He needs to know we’re here for him."

"And if he doesn’t want to come back? What then?" Klaus asked, his voice heavy with concern.

"We will cross that bridge when we get to it." Freya pointed at the spell book, her expression brightening. "I’m looking into ways to calm his mind. Perhaps if he can control his rage, he can start to heal."

"I don’t wish to subdue him," Klaus said, frowning. "He deserves the right to his pain, to grieve in his own way."

Freya’s eyes widened, surprised by his response. It wouldn’t be the first time Klaus had tried to force Elijah or the rest of their family into doing things his way. Yet, despite his brashness, she knew Klaus was a man of deep, powerful emotions, capable of empathy.

"What?" Klaus asked, quirking an eyebrow at her.

"You’ve grown," Freya smiled. "It’s good to see."

"Don’t get used to it," Klaus quipped, taking another bite of his croissant and washing it down with a sip of his espresso. "I wish for us to go back to normal, where I’m the problem."

"You’ll never not be a problem, Nik," Freya grinned, a mischievous glint in her eyes.

"Rude," he scowled.

"But true," she sighed, returning to her book with a smile.

Klaus took another sip of his espresso, his gaze drifting to the TV hanging in the corner. A news broadcast caught his attention, the images of a fire flickering on the screen. He leaned forward, his expression sharpening as he listened intently.

"De nouvelles informations proviennent de l'enquête sur l'incendie du centre-ville de Paris. La police a désormais identifié plus de deux cents corps retrouvés sur les lieux, sans aucune indication pour l'instant du nombre de personnes portées disparues. Il semblerait que les victimes étaient toutes membres de une société privée de conservation d'œuvres d'art, possédant des participations dans plusieurs pays. Alors que les autorités enquêtent toujours sur la cause de l'incendie, il a été suggéré que l'incendie avait été allumé délibérément.”

"There is new information coming in from the investigation into the fire in downtown Paris. Police have now identified more than two hundred bodies recovered from the scene, with no indication yet of how many are still missing. It's believed the victims were all members of a private art curation company, with holdings in several countries. While authorities are still investigating the cause of the blaze, it's being suggested the fire was set deliberately."

Klaus’s stomach dropped, a familiar dread creeping in. The timing was too convenient, and this 'art curation company' sounded like a cover for a secret society. He gestured to the screen, espresso still in hand, splashing a few drops onto the table. "Looks like a place for us to visit, wouldn’t you say?"

Freya looked up, her brow furrowing. "Do you think Elijah has anything to do with it?"

"If this organization is the Strix -sorry, was the Strix- then absolutely," Klaus replied, a grim smile forming on his lips. "Perhaps they gave him the answers he was looking for. Answers we weren’t able to find."

"I can’t imagine it would have been a pleasant reunion," Freya sighed, shaking her head. "I can’t say I blame him."

Klaus’s smile faded. He had tried his best, searching for months through the ashes of Elijah’s rage. He had gone from city to city, country to country, even continent to continent. And now, as he stood on the brink of discovery, he couldn’t help but wonder what condition Elijah would be in when they finally found him.

"Well then, no point in wasting any more time," Klaus said, taking a final sip of his espresso.

Freya nodded, closing her book, quickly downing her coffee before stealing the last bite of Klaus’s croissant, earning a playful glare.

"Oi!" he growled, "I was going to eat that."

"Too slow, brother," she smirked.

Klaus rolled his eyes and stood, tossing a wad of cash on the table without bothering to count. The two of them hurried out, the waiter shaking his head as he picked up the money and Klaus's empty plate.

"Americans," he muttered under his breath.

The site of the fire was a blackened husk, the acrid smell of smoke still heavy in the air. Klaus and Freya walked along the sidewalk, watching the firefighters douse the smoldering remains with water. Distant sirens echoed, a haunting reminder of the chaos that had unfolded.

"Can't believe it's still burning," Klaus mused, a slight frown on his face.

"Must have been quite the inferno," Freya remarked, her expression thoughtful.

"Magic?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.

"No, I don't sense any," Freya said, shaking her head. "Whoever started it didn't use magic."

Klaus glanced at her, a smirk on his lips. "I thought you didn't think Elijah had anything to do with it?"

Freya shrugged. "Maybe he did, maybe he didn't."

Klaus wrinkled his nose, his keen sense of smell picking up the lingering scent of blood beneath all the ash and smoke. Human, vampire, a mix of the two. The fire had raged through the night, burning hot and fast, devouring everything in its path.

"I do sense death, though," Freya murmured, her brow furrowing, her expression darkening. "Lots of it."

"Well, I can't imagine there'll be much left for us to find, considering how thorough my brother is," Klaus muttered, his gaze roving over the ruined buildings, his stomach sinking.

"Why are you so sure it was him?" Freya asked, her eyes narrowing.

"Because I can smell his cologne, no1 passant guardant," Klaus replied, wrinkling his nose.

"Kinda weird that you can smell that, Nik," Freya smirked, giving him a sideways glance.

"I'm a hybrid, love; it's one of my many gifts," Klaus replied, his tone matter-of-fact.

Freya shook her head, a wry grin on her lips, suppressing a giggle as she watched her brother sniff the air, his eyes closed, his expression one of intense concentration.

"Could be someone else with the same taste in cologne; you never know," she teased, nudging him with her elbow.

"It’s very difficult to come by; only a handful of stores carry it," Klaus muttered, ignoring her teasing. "And... she bought it for him just before... you know."

"Ah," Freya's expression softened, her amusement replaced by a mix of sadness and understanding.

Klaus opened his eyes, his gaze sweeping over the destruction once more, the weight of grief settling on his shoulders. He missed you. Your laughter, your wit, the way you could put him in his place. He admired your loyalty, your strength, and how much you loved his brother.

"What are you thinking about?" Freya asked, her voice quiet and cautious.

"Our departed sister-in-law... the cause of all of this," Klaus said, a sad smile on his lips.

"You can't blame her, you know," Freya murmured, her eyes filled with understanding and sympathy. "I miss her too."

"It's hard to be reminded, is all," Klaus replied, a hint of pain in his voice.

Freya gave him a soft, sympathetic smile, her hand gently squeezing his shoulder. "You know... I never learned how they met," she said, trying to steer the conversation toward something less melancholy.

Klaus laughed, shaking his head. "Oh, it's quite a tale, and some parts I'm not privy to. But I can tell you that she was a novice in a convent," he began, a sparkle in his eye.

"A nun?!" Freya exclaimed, her eyebrows shooting up.

"Indeed, although she hadn't taken her vows," Klaus chuckled, amused by the surprised look on her face.

"So, what happened? How did they end up together?" Freya asked, intrigued.

"For all parties involved, it was quite a dramatic affair," Klaus continued, a wistful smile forming on his lips. "But we have more important things to focus on, don't you think?"

Freya sighed, rolling her eyes. "You're no fun."

Klaus let out a huff of laughter and returned to focusing on the scents around him, trying to find a trail, something that might lead him to his brother. He caught the faintest whiff of blood, the scent leading away from the fire, and deeper into the city.

"This way," he said, striding confidently down a street, away from the site of the fire.

Freya hurried to catch up, her long legs making short work of the distance, her boots clattering on the cobblestone streets.

"How can you be so sure?" Freya asked, falling in step beside him, her voice low and cautious.

"I just am," Klaus said, his tone brooking no argument. "That bloody cologne of his is everywhere. No one else has such atrocious taste in fragrances."

"Nik..." Freya cautioned, her tone warning, her gaze flickering to the passersby, making sure no one was eavesdropping. "We don't know what's waiting for us. We can't just charge in."

"I know; that's why you are going in first, my dear sister," Klaus smirked, a mischievous glint in his eyes.

"Nik," Freya protested, her expression indignant.

"Don't worry, I'll be right behind you," Klaus grinned, giving her a playful nudge as they rounded a corner.

The two of them came to a stop outside an old building, its stone façade crumbling, the windows boarded up. Klaus gestured for Freya to go in, and with a roll of her eyes, she did.

"This place is creepy," she muttered, her boots echoing on the cracked tile floor.

"There's blood, a lot of it," Klaus said, sniffing the air, his eyes closed, his body tensed. "Upstairs."

They made their way up an old spiral staircase, the steps creaking under their feet. They reached a landing; the hallway was dark and narrow.

"Down there," Klaus said, pointing at a closed door at the end of the hall.

Freya nodded and slowly approached the door, her senses alert, her magic tingling under her skin. It was eerily quiet; the silence weighed heavy in the air, pressing down on her.

She stopped at the door, her hand hovering over the handle. She looked back at Klaus, his expression calm and composed, but she could sense his nervousness, his apprehension.

"Ready?" she whispered.

Klaus gave her a curt nod. Freya took a deep breath and turned the handle, the door opening with a creak.

"Elijah?"

The two of them were met with the sight of a massacre: body parts strewn across the room, blood splattered on the walls.

Freya gasped and took a step back, Klaus's hand gripping her shoulder. His eyes roved over the carnage, landing on a lone figure in the middle of the room, standing motionless.

"Elijah," Klaus breathed.

His brother was wearing an old T-shirt and jeans, tattered and bloodstained, covered in dirt. His hair was matted and wild, his eyes haunted, the light dimmed within them.

Klaus and Freya stepped inside, careful not to slip on the blood, the floor sticky and wet. They approached Elijah slowly, his gaze fixed on the severed arm in his hand, his eyes dull and lifeless.

"Brother?" Klaus said, his voice barely above a whisper, his hand reaching out.

"You are not real," Elijah murmured, not taking his eyes off the limb, his expression vacant and distant.

"Elijah, we're here," Freya said gently. "It's time to come home."

"I won't be fooled again," Elijah hissed, his grip tightening on the severed arm.

Klaus took a tentative step forward, one arm stretched behind him to protect Freya, the other held out, placating and non-threatening. "We're not illusions, brother," he said softly, reassuringly.

"Freya," Elijah breathed, his head snapping up, his gaze finding hers.

"Yes, Elijah, it's me," she replied, giving him a gentle smile.

He blinked, his eyes flicking from her face to Klaus's, his brow furrowing. "Have you found a way to bring her back?"

Klaus and Freya exchanged glances, their expressions sad and resigned. It wasn't something Freya wanted to do... to tap into such dark magic. She had been searching for you on the other side but found no trace. She believed you had found peace, and to tear you away from that would be a cursed, evil thing, an affront to the balance between life and death.

"Elijah, there's no way, not without consequence," Klaus said, his tone firm, his eyes filled with regret. "We discussed this."

Elijah dropped the severed arm, his hands clenching into fists. "You're wrong. There is a way."

"Elijah," Freya began, but he cut her off.

"Bring her back," he demanded, his eyes burning with intensity.

"I can't," Freya said, her voice quiet and regretful. "I'm sorry, Elijah. She's gone; she's at rest."

"No, no, no," Elijah growled, his hands coming up to grip his hair, tugging at the roots, his chest heaving, eyes wild.

"Brother, she's in a better place," Klaus tried, his tone firm and reassuring. "I think it's time you come home... You need to let her go."

Elijah shook his head, his breathing ragged, his whole body trembling. "No, no, no," he chanted, his eyes darting around the room, looking for something.

"Elijah," Freya murmured, her brow furrowed, her expression concerned. "Please, come with us. She wouldn't want this for you."

"No, no, no!" he growled, his voice echoing off the blood-spattered walls, his face contorted in a mask of rage.

He grabbed a nearby table and threw it against the wall, the sound of splintering wood reverberating through the air.

"Bloody hell," Klaus growled, grabbing Freya and yanking her backward, shielding her with his body.

Elijah lunged at them, his fangs bared, a murderous look in his eyes. He tackled Klaus, sending them both crashing into the wall, the plaster cracking under the impact.

"Nik!" Freya exclaimed, her magic sparking at her fingertips.

"Elijah, you've gone mad," Klaus grunted, shoving him away, sending him careening across the room. "She's dead."

"Niklaus," Elijah growled, his body vibrating with anger, the haunted, hollow look in his eyes replaced by raw, unhinged rage. "Bring. Her. Back."

"We can't, and you know it," Klaus spat, his eyes flashing yellow, his face shifting into the hybrid’s feral features. "She's at peace, Elijah. We need to let her go."

"I won't, I can't," Elijah raged, his body trembling, his eyes filling with unshed tears that threatened to spill over. His voice broke. "How can you ask me to do that?"

Freya’s heart clenched at the sight of her brother unraveling, his usual restraint shattered. "Come home, please," Freya pleaded, her eyes welling with tears, her voice thick with desperation. "We can help you."

Elijah's chest heaved, his wild eyes shifting from Klaus to Freya, barely recognizing them. "Get out," he growled, the words vibrating through the bloodstained room. His gaze locked on Klaus, his voice turning into a vicious snarl. "GET OUT!"

Klaus stared at him for a moment, his expression conflicted. Freya watched him pull a silver dagger out of his pocket, the familiar glint of the cursed weapon that had subjugated their family time and time again. She hadn't even known he had brought one with him, and her heart clenched at the sight. She didn’t want this for either of them. But given Elijah's state, she knew it was necessary.

"I'm sorry, Elijah," Klaus said, his voice solemn. He rushed forward, his movements a blur, and before Elijah could react, he buried the blade in his brother’s chest. The gasp Elijah let out echoed in the empty, ravaged room. The look on his face was heartbreaking, a mixture of shock and pain. Klaus had to steel himself against the emotion threatening to overtake him, reminding himself it was for the best, for all of them.

"Rest now, brother," Klaus murmured, pulling him into a tight embrace, cradling his body as Elijah slumped, his strength leaving him. His big brother, the north star of the family, now lost to grief.

"I thought you didn't want to subdue him," Freya whispered, her voice shaky, her eyes wide with shock as she pressed a trembling hand against her mouth.

"It was a last resort," Klaus said, his voice thick with emotion, trying and failing to hide the crack in his composure. "I couldn't bear seeing him like this any longer. I didn't think... he would be so... unhinged."

"He's grieving," Freya said softly, her eyes filled with sympathy as she knelt beside them, brushing a hand through Elijah’s matted hair. "He loves her, Nik. Losing her... it's broken him."

"I know," Klaus muttered, his arms tightening around Elijah, holding him close as if he could protect him from the demons he was fighting inside. His voice cracked, and before he could stop it, a tear slipped down his cheek. Quickly, he wiped it away, trying to maintain his strength.

"Time to go home," Klaus said, his voice barely above a whisper, thick with sorrow. "For all of us."

Freya reached out, gently taking Elijah's limp hand in hers, squeezing it tight as they prepared to leave the nightmare behind. She hoped and prayed that Elijah could feel her love through the numbness, that somewhere, deep within the wreckage of his mind, he knew they would never give up on him.

That the battle to bring you back hadn’t been in vain. It had only just begun.

{Part Two}{Part Three}{Part Four}{Part Five}{Part Six}

[shiorimakibawrites]

Bound (Daredevil Fan Fic)

Sequel to Relax Pairing: Matt Murdock x AFAB! Reader Word Count: ~4400 Rating: 18+ Warnings: Bondage, nudity, full naked male character, partially clothed female character, female gaze, female masturbation, voyeurism, oral sex (male and female receiving), face sitting, unprotected sex, p in v sex, swearing, dirty talk, begging General Masterlist / Matt Murdock Masterlist Taglist: @loves0phelia, @nowheredreamer, @beezusvreeland @yarrystyleeza, @bellaxgiornata, @waywardxrhea, @parker-murdock A03

Special thanks to @visionsofcarnality for some dialogue assistance and @shouldbestudying41 for beta-reading.

Bound

It had been an impulse, born of fantasy. But being in his arms gave you the confidence to ask. Matt had immediately agreed. Both that night and the next morning, when you made sure his agreement wasn’t the product of him being half-awake and sated. It wasn’t. He seemed intrigued by the idea, visibly excited that you had outright asked for something you wanted in the bedroom.

But for all that excitement, carrying out this fantasy took some preparation. For one, the only ropes in the apartment were his Muay Thai ones. Which hadn't been chosen with anyone’s comfort in mind. Furthermore, they were stained faint rust from blood. Both of these factors combined into a no on using them for bedroom fun from you.

It hadn’t taken you long to find something that looked suitable online. Silk ropes with premade loops for the wrists. Which ought to be strong enough to hold Matt without irritating his skin. Or yours. You had the feeling, if this went well, Matt would ask to use these ropes on you.

Which you weren’t opposed to. Just the idea of being entirely at Matt’s mercy had you squirming.

And you could get it in red. Daredevil red. It was like a sign.

The second hurdle was safety and aftercare information. Matt wasn’t adverse to a little pain in the bedroom. He made it very clear that he enjoyed it when your nails raked down his back when he fucked you. Or when you pulled his hair while he ate you out. But there was a difference between that and causing him actual harm. Which you never wanted to do. 

You wanted Matt to enjoy this. Even if you never used those wrist ropes again, you wanted him to look back on this night with fondness.

A couple days later, everything was ready.

You had gotten off work before Matt today. You spent your time well, preparing for the night to come. You put fresh sheets on the bed. Moved one of the chairs from the living room into the bedroom, positioning it at the foot of the bed. Set out all of the necessary supplies on the bedside table. Then you got yourself ready.

You took a shower, scrubbing off the grime of the day. Then you dressed yourself. You had thought long and hard about what you would wear. You wanted to drive Matt crazy. You had considered lingerie but the only appeal that held for Matt was when he was touching you. Which both of you had enjoyed in the past. But that wasn’t the plan. Not this time. But then you thought of something perfect.

You picked up one of his button-down shirts, specifically the one he had worn yesterday. It still smelled like him. You slipped it on and did up the buttons. And that was your entire outfit. You hoped the combination of no panties and his scent on your skin would turn Matt on.

You were making dinner when he came home, softly returning his greeting like this was an ordinary evening. You knew your outfit was a success when you felt Matt wrap his arms around your waist, his firm chest molded to your back. You smiled, feeling the already growing erection pressed against your ass.

“Smells good,” he murmured, nuzzling your neck.

“Dinner’s almost done,” you said.

“That also smells good,” he said, kissing your neck. You felt that familiar rush of heat south. His hands rubbed your stomach where the waistband of your panties would have been had you been wearing any. His grip on you tightened. “You aren’t wearing any underwear.”

You made a humming sound of agreement. He made that deep rumbling moan, his hips pressed more firmly against you.

“Little minx,” he growled, nipping at your neck. You shuddered. It was almost instinctive to offer him more access to your neck. Something he immediately took advantage of, trailing kisses down your neck. One hand slide down from your waist, moving under the hem of his shirt to move up your thigh. Headed straight for your mound. It was tempting to let him continue. Very tempting. You knew how talented those hands were.

But not as tempting as your plans.

You put your hand over his, halting his movement. And before he could start worrying, you said softly, “I was thinking something a little different tonight, Mr. Murdock.”

It didn’t take him long to connect the dots. You felt his cock, still pressed against your ass, twitch. “Tonight?”

“Yeah,” you said, turning in his arms enough to look at him. “If you are still willing?”

“I’m willing, Mrs. Murdock,” he said. “I am very willing. Now?”

“You don’t want dinner?” you asked, teasing him.

“Maybe later.” He kissed you. It was a very thorough kiss, sending a wave of toe-curling pleasure down your spine. Fueling the growing wetness between your legs. Matt moaned into your mouth, then drew back far enough to whisper, “I have a different hunger.”

Good point. You did too. Dinner could wait. You turned back around, then leaned forward to turn off the burner. A process that had Matt making another small moan as the movement pushed your hips even more firmly against his. “Bedroom?”

“Bedroom,” he agreed.

As he turned to go, feeling unusually confident, you raised your hand. Then swung it forward to smack him across that glorious ass. It wasn’t a hard hit but he still jolted. He paused, looking over his shoulder. “Having fun, sweetheart?”

“You know,” you said. “I rather think I am.”

He chuckled but continued toward the bedroom. You followed him, admiring how good his ass looked in those slacks. Not as good as it looked without them but still a sight worth seeing. That you were gifted with it every day never lessens its impact.

Matt had started unbuttoning his shirt as he walked, pulling it all the way off as he went through the doorway. Tossing the shirt in the general direction of the hamper, he immediately turned his attention to his belt. In less than a minute, his slacks and boxers had joined his shirt.

The sight of your husband naked was nothing new. But it never failed to get your heart racing or your cunt clenching desperately around nothing. You had the feeling it always would. But that didn’t mean you couldn’t tease him a little.

“Eager, Mr. Murdock?”

“I’m not the only one,” he pointed out. His voice sounded mild, almost conversational, but his eyes were dark with hunger. A hunger that grew when he licked his lips. Watching his cock swell in response to the taste of your arousal in the air only brought a fresh wave of slick to coat your thighs.

“Where do you want me, Mrs. Murdock?” he asked, his voice growing huskier with each word.

You pressed your thighs together, trying to control yourself. It was difficult. His voice had always given you the tingles but that husky tone? That went straight to your cunt. Being naked did nothing to diminish Matt’s smug confidence. If anything, it had increased. He knew perfectly well that he was good-looking. That you found him attractive. And that you would be remembering just how good he could make you feel with that smirking mouth. What pleasure could be gotten from those large, warm hands. How much you loved his cock buried inside you.

You didn’t deny any of that. You couldn’t. But there were other things that you wanted. That you craved.

You wanted to give Matt the same pleasure he gave you. Wanted him to feel your hands over all of his body, caressing every sensitive spot with your fingers and mouth. To leave little marks scattered across his flesh like he did yours. You wanted to suck his cock. How and where Matt had gotten it into his head that you didn’t enjoy having your mouth on him was beyond you.

“On the bed,” you ordered. Your voice had turned breathy.

Still smirking, Matt turned to obey. Once again putting his ass on display. He had the best ass that you had ever laid eyes on. Perky and round, each cheek more than an ample handful with you grabbed it. Firm but still enjoyable to squeeze, to dig your fingers . . . honestly you could spend hours waxing poetic about how beautiful his ass was. But today, you simply raised your hand and gave him another solid smack against his ass.

He wasn’t surprised this time. Knew he was doing, turning his bare ass to you like that. The look he gave you over his shoulder was all kinds of smug. “Sure that you don’t want another one, sweetheart?”

“I’m good.”

The smug grin widened. “Positive? I know how much you love grabbing my ass.”

He is such a cocky little shit, you thought with a mixture of fondness and exasperation. It was the grin that solidified your resolve. One way or another, you were going to wipe the smug off of him. “Get on the bed”

“As you wish.”

Could there be some extra sway in his hips? You wouldn’t put it past him. Especially when he was already being a smartass. But it might have been your imagination. It wasn’t like his ass needed anything extra in order to draw your eyes. It was a little disappointing that sitting down hid that glorious ass from your sight. But only a little. The rest of his body was just as beautiful.

After Matt had pulled his legs up on the bed and moved closer to the headboard, you picked up the wrist restraints from the bedside table. Drawing Matt’s attention in that direction. His head canted slightly to one side, brow furrowing a little as he tried to make sense of the new addition.

You picked up the wrist rope from the bedside table, drawing Matt’s attention in that direction. His head canted slightly to one side, brow furrowing a little as he tried to make sense of the new additions there. “A knife?”

“Yes,” you said. “In case of emergencies.”

In the event that you couldn’t get the rope loose afterward. Or you had to release him quickly. Like if he heard someone getting murdered. Or some other reason. The silk restraints were pretty and hadn’t been the cheapest thing but you would gladly sacrifice it if necessary.

He nodded, then held out his left hand with an expectant look. You slipped his hand into the loop, then pulled it taut before repeating the process with his other wrist. A gentle push against his shoulder was enough to communicate your desire for him to lay back. You raised his arms over his head by the connecting rope which you tied around one of the headboards’ wooden slots.

“Think that can hold you?” you asked. Matt made a thoughtful humming noise, then gave his bonds an experimental tug. The loops tightened around his wrists but the knot held. Even a stronger pull failed to loosen the knot. It did succeed in distracting you a little. You couldn’t help it. Watching those big muscles of his flex had always gotten you worked up.

A fact that Matt was well aware of you. You could see it in that confident, smug smirk. Hear in his voice as he answered your question, “Seems like it.”

“Color?” you asked, momentarily ignoring his smugness. When you had discussed doing this, Matt had agreed to use the spotlight system.

“Green.”

His tone made it clear that he thought the answer was obvious. But you rewarded him for answering the question regardless of how silly he found it. Cupping his head in your hands, you pressed a kiss to his forehead. Then another to each check which was dusted pink. You found indescribably adorable that something so chaste could make him blush when the filthiest of dirty talk didn’t even phase him.

You kissed him again, pressing your lips against his. Licking softly into his mouth, you worked your hands into his hair. Massaging his scalp with your fingertips until you felt the tension that had built up over a day of lawyering ease. You greedily swallowed every single one of the low moans Matt made into your mouth.

He tried to chase your lips when you pulled away but stilled at the gentle pull of his hair. You admired your handy work. He looked so beautiful like this. His pink lips kiss-swollen, hazel eyes half-lidded with pleasure. Soft and pliant was one of your favorite looks on him.

“Color?”

“Still green.”

“Good,” you said, straightening up and moving down the side of the bed toward the chair.

“Where are you going?” he asked.

“Just over here,” you said, sitting down on the chair.

“Why so far away, sweet girl?” Matt asked. Some of his earlier smugness creeping back into his voice. “I can tell how much you want me.”

He wasn’t wrong. You did want him. And you knew from previous experience that riding him turned Matt into a whinny, desperate mess. But you wanted him to be that desperate mess before you rode him. And you thought you knew exactly how to do it.

You had chosen the perfect spot for your chair. It gave you the perfect view of his beautiful body. Allowing your eyes to survey the feast before you, you unbuttoned his shirt and draped it open. Matt’s hands made an aborted jerk against the rope. You had to suppress a smile. He knew you were practically naked. And he seldom could resist the opportunity to touch your skin, to cup your breasts in his hands . . .

Your own hands cupping and squeezing them didn’t feel the same but it did feel good. You sighed softly, spreading your legs. This time Matt couldn’t stop himself from pulling on the rope but it held, keeping his hands up near his ears.

“Still green, Matty?” You asked, one hand sliding down your body.

“Yes,” he said, his voice resonating with the deeper gravel of the Devil. You shuddered, felt your cunt clench desperately. A rumble almost like a growl erupted from his chest.

“Is that all it takes?” he asked through a tensed jaw. “To get you so fucking wet? My voice?”

“Partially,” you answered, then gasped as your fingers brushed against your clit. The little nub was already swollen, aching with need. Rubbing gentle circles onto it, you moaned. At the sound, his cock twitched. You moaned again, imagining that weeping cock pressed against your cunt, the head nudging your clit . . .

“Partially?” Matt rasped. “What else, sweet girl?”

You didn’t answer at first. You ran your fingers through your soaked folds, traced your entrance. Building anticipation.

A faint whine escaped his control. “Tell me, sweet girl. What’s going through that pretty little head?”

“Your body,” you started, then cut yourself off by slipping a single finger into yourself. The room was so quiet that the wet squelching noise was obscenely loud. So was the cracking sound that some distant part of your brain was alarmed by. But the rest was too occupied by the network of veins popping into high relief across his muscles as the rope strained to keep Matt’s hands where they were. By the feeling of your finger pumping in and out of yourself.

 It felt so good. But not enough. Your cunt was used to Matt’s fingers. Which were longer and thicker than yours. You worked a second finger into yourself. You let out a loud groan at the stretch, the feeling of fullness. Much better. Then added, “What I want to do with you.”

Matt let out a second, louder whine. “Fuck, you smell so good . . . Can I taste you?”

“No,” you said, shaking your head. Your other hand abandoned your breast for your clit. “Not this time, baby. Maybe later.”

He actually whimpered, squirming on the bed. No more smugness out of him. You relished it. Up until his restless legs blocked that beautiful cock from your sight.

“Don’t spoil my view, Matthew,” you said, stern as your breathy voice would allow. “I want to see your cock.”

He whined but lowered his legs. You moaned, increasing the pace of your fingers as you imagined that cock buried deep inside you. Imagined him fucking you into this chair. Your fingers inside you couldn’t replicate that feeling. Not thick enough but . . . you increased the pace of your fingers in and out . . . chanting out his name as that familiar warmth built and built . . .

You cried out his name as that warmth crested and exploded into pleasure. Matt thrashed against his bonds as you rode out your orgasm. As the fluttering around your fingers began to subside, you slipped them out of yourself. Your legs were a little shaky as you stood. But they held your weight as you moved toward the bed.

Matt’s struggles stilled as you got onto the bed. Despite your recent orgasm, your cunt clenched. He looked so beautiful. Chest heaving, eyes wild . . . the weeping head of his cock was almost purple . . . your mouth watered.

“Sweetheart, please,” he begged. “Let me taste you. Let me fuck you.”

“Not yet,” you said, as you crawled up between his legs on your hands and knees. “I have something else in mind. Color?”

“Green.”

Matt couldn’t contain a cry when you gripped his cock in your hand.  Another cry escaped as you licked a long, flat strip up the length to the head. There you gave him short, teasing laps. Much like the way he liked to tease your clit with his tongue. Trying to catch every drop that leaked out of the tip. Under the hand on his thigh, you could feel his muscles tense and twitch.

“Please, please,” he begged, seemingly only able to say that one word.

The sound Matt made when your mouth engulfed the head of his cock was nearly a scream. Another loud cracking sound accompanied it but you ignored it in favor of the choked moans that followed you swallowing down as much as his cock as you could. The little jerks of his hips when he couldn’t quite stop himself from trying thrust deeper into your mouth as your head bobbed up and down. A self-control he lost when you hummed around his cock, the vibration drawing another loud cry from his throat.

“Fuck,” Matt groaned out, a sentiment he repeated when you cupped his balls, gently fondling them in your hand. “Fuck . . . shit . . .  fuck . . . g-gonna cum.”

Your only answer to this warning was another hum again, louder this time. Screaming out your name, he spilled down your throat. You suckled at his cock, once again trying to capture every last drop while he squirmed and moaned. Only when his whimpers started sounding a little pained did you pull off his cock.

“Color, baby?” you asked.

“Green,” was his answer but he didn’t sound certain. Nor did he look certain when you lifted yourself up on your knees to get a better look at his face.

“Lie,” you said. “Want to try again, Mr. Murdock?”

He shuddered, his spent dick twitching in a valiant effort to rise again. “Green. F-eels good. But  . . . sensitive . . .”

You felt a surge of pride at making your lawyer husband so blissed out that he was struggling to string together a sentence. Even the nagging feeling that something about the sight in front of you wasn’t quite right couldn’t dispel it.

It wasn’t until you had crawled up his body to press another kiss to his forehead that you realized what was bugging you. Because his hands were kneading your ass. How . . . his hands that were supposed to be tied up . . . You looked again and wanted to sigh.

Technically his hands were still tied. The silk rope was looped tightly around his wrists. But the middle section that had been tied around the headboard wasn’t anymore. Largely because that piece of headboard was broken. Snapped right in the middle. The rest of the headboard seemed fine . . . . your mind boggled. You knew Matt was strong but sometimes just how strong still surprised you.

“You broke the fucking headboard.”

“Sorry,” Matt said, not sounding sorry at all. “I can’t hear you over how nice your ass feels.”

You rolled your eyes. Then gasped as one hand abandoned your ass to snake between your legs, drawing your attention to the throbbing ache there. Your cunt was no longer sated. A deep moan rumbled out of his chest as his fingers ran through your soaked folds. “Can I taste you now? Your body is screaming at me, sweet girl. All I can smell is how wet you are for me.”

“I don’t know -” you started but was cut off by a moan when those fingers found your clit. Fuck, he was so good with his hands . . .

“Please?” he begged, an element of whine creeping back into his voice. “Let me taste you. I’ve been good.”

Aside from the headboard, he had been . . . and the thought of having his mouth on you brought fresh wetness to your thighs. Something that made Matt’s hand on your ass tightened its grip. “Please, sweet girl.”

“Alright,” you said, then tried to move off of him. Only for his hand to tighten their grip again.

“No, not like that,” he said. “Sit on my face.”

Your cunt clenched. It had been a while since you had done that particular act . . .

“Please . . .”

“Alright,” you agreed. “You’ve been a good boy. You deserve a reward.” 

You crawled forward until your knees were on either side of his head. Then you gripped the top of the headboard (and hoping that it wasn’t also broken) and carefully lowered yourself toward his face. If you had any doubts about how eager Matt was, they were quickly dispelled.

Fingers digging into your ass, he devoured you. His grunts and moans mixed with the noisy slurping sounds as his tongue sought out every single inch of your folds. Then he moved down to your entrance, lapping and sucking while you panted. Pants that turned into a squeal as that wonderful tongue dipped inside you. You didn’t know what felt better. Fucking you with his tongue or his nose grinding against your clit. Your hands clamped tightly around the headboard. It was taking everything you had to hold yourself relatively still.

You whined when he shifted, his mouth pulling away from your cunt.

“Don’t hold back, sweet girl,” he ordered, his voice having that deep, raspy purr that it only got when he was drunk on sex. “Ride my face, crash me between these beautiful thighs, pull my hair . . .”

As if to punctuate that demand, his lips around your clit and sucked. You couldn’t have stopped yourself from grinding on his mouth if you had wanted to. And you didn’t want to. Especially when he rewarded this by moaning. You all but screamed. The vibration felt so damn good . . . 

When he did again, this time you screamed. Your thighs were shaking. Close, you were so close . . . You grabbed his hair tightly in one fist, desperate to keep his mouth where it was. He groaned loudly into your cunt, pushing you even closer to your peak.

“Don’t stop, don’t stop, don’t stop,” you said. Not even caring that you were begging. All you cared about was the pleasure coursing through your body. About that mouth alternating between kissing and sucking on your clit. About the sounds of pleasure coming from the man beneath you, the near-bruising grip he had on your ass. About feeling your cunt clench desperately. Until you fell over that edge.

Matt’s arms remained locked around your shaking body as his tongue greedily chased every single drop of your release. You were unable to keep your head up, resting it against the arm still holding onto the headboard. Until his tongue’s lapping on your clit started dancing over that line between pleasure and pain.

You whimpered, tugging at his hair. “Matty, enough.”

He made a disappointed whine but after one last kiss to your clit, he pulled away. Despite how wobbly your legs felt, you managed to heave yourself over to his left side. Matt almost immediately plastered himself against your back. Even with his wrists still in the loops, he wrapped his arms around you. You had to smile. Octopus mod had been fully activated.

You had gotten the wrist restraints off when you realized that wasn’t the only thing that had gotten activated. He was hard again. His hips were making small rocking motions against your ass.  His newly freed hands fondled your breasts as he nibbled at your neck.

You pressed back against him. “Do you want to fuck me, baby?”

“Can I?” he asked. “Please?”

“Yes,” you said. Despite two orgasms already, your cunt was eager about the idea.

Lifting your top leg back over his, you felt his cock press against your entrance. Then he was inside you. Sinking deeper and deeper until he was fully sheathed. Moaning against your neck, he began to fuck you. Each thrust was slow but deep. You moan, feeling yourself already back at that edge. Matt wasn’t going to last either. His thrusts soon became faster, the rhythm sloppier. One brush of his finger against your already oversensitive clit pulled you over that ledge for the third time with a cry. A strangled groan against your neck, then with a powerful thrust Matt was coming inside you.

For a while, you both remained where you were as you caught your breath. Matt succeeded first, hissing a little as he slipped his cock out of you. You were pretty sure it was sheer stubbornness that propelled your husband onto wobbly legs and lurching toward the bathroom. Channeling your own stubborn streak, you dragged yourself over within reach of the bedside table. Specifically the bottle of lotion you had placed there earlier. You had reached it just as Matt returned, damp washcloth in his hand.

While he cleaned up the mess he left between your legs, you inspected his wrists. The wrist restraints had left pressure marks but the skin didn’t look irritated. You insisted on applying the lotion anyway. But afterward, you both settled into your profession of blissful puddles. Cuddling puddles as sex had in no way disabled Octopus Mod. Quite the opposite. Which was perfectly fine with you.

[twi-liight]

Sooo. You just posted Petty Jealousy 20 mins ago and I just wanted to say that I loveeee itttt. Can we please have more? Like Astarion and the other companions subtly do somethings to the person they’re jealous of to turn them away from Tav.

Tav’s companions are just sooo cutee when they’re jealous. Wyll and perhaps, Halsin being the only sensible ones.

Thank you!

Red With Envy ❣

The YA love heptagon of the century: Tavrem. ❥ Astarion/Tav, Gale/Tav, Lae'zel/Tav, Companions/Tav. It's Gale/Astarion if you squint. ❥ They/them pronouns for Tav. ❥ Tav is the nickname for the reader/oc insert. Their real name is up to you! ❥ PREVIOUS CHAPTER

Astarion would never beseech himself to touch a member of the working class, but things change. People change. And here he is draping an arm around Gale’s shoulders to boldly declare his presence upon the rickety, wooden table. 

“Oh.” Blink blink. Gale gawks with round eyes, then not-so-discreetly glances away from Astarion’s heavy gaze to the only present company at the table: salted bread with thick slices of white cheese, anchovies, and sop for the bread. This sorry excuse of a presentation must be breakfast, which begs the question- Is Gale’s blood so blue that he cannot skip a meal or is he trying to make a favorable impression? 

Astarion would much prefer the former. It means he does not need to scrub his hands raw from the filth of peasants after this interaction.

“Uh, good morning, Astarion.” 

“Mm?” He flashes his fangs to grin. “A good morning indeed, my friend. How lovely the dawn breaks over the horizon, but with no one to share the scenery with! I pitied you, and out of the kindness of my heart, opted to join you.” 

Alright, enough touching. Astarion draws his arm back to poise a curled hand beneath his chin, glancing over Gale’s face in a vain attempt to study him. “Well-combed hair. Your posture,” he raises his hand to gesture at the wizard, “is much cleaner than yesterday. You’re practically glowing with morning dew, and…”

Here, he leans forward, just enough so that his nose lingers on the curve of Gale’s neck, just so his hot breath hits his skin as he murmurs, “You smell like Tav.” 

This greedy bastard slept in their tent last night because he caught some sickness from meandering about gaseous spores, and Tav cannot ignore the needy. Would that Gale be some beggar on the road and not an accomplished wizard with a higher emotional maturity than he.  

Astarion would be more comforted if he was a one night stand, a quick romp for the leader of their party to take the edge off. But anything beyond that is sabotage for his best-laid plans. 

Astarion’s smirk curls as deep, roiling darkness tug at his mind. He leans back slowly, never breaking eye contact. “They let you sleep in their tent. What a darling.” While they slept by the fire, ash and dirt swirling in their hair, Gale was embraced in Tav’s blankets and scarves. The lingering scent of something floral sticks on his skin, and Astarion recognizes it as the oleander Shadowheart presented Tav a fortnight ago. 

Gale smells something else: rusty and metallic, like the smell of a storm brewing. Has Astarion’s eyes deepened in color, like wine? His tongue feels heavy in his mouth all of a sudden. “Yes,” he agrees, thinking of Tav for some semblance of comfort. “I was sick, and they offered their tent for the night. More blankets, they said. Easier to be warm in - look, Astarion, do you have a problem with my friendship with Tav?” 

The laugh that pushes its way forcibly out of his sneering lips is sharp and mocking. Something burns in his chest, and it feels like seething anger. “My, that’s a strong word. I would say acquaintance is more befitting of your,” Astarion gestures to Gale once more, fighting back a scowl, “station. You’ve known Tav for barely a few months - they’re not quick to brand just anyone as a friend.” 

“Is that right?” Gale’s brown eyes spark with challenge. What a doll. Finally got his spine. “I ought to wonder how you befriended them, then. Anyone with half a mind knows your shenanigans are acts of desperation; you want them to like you so you can manipulate them. I know your type, Astarion.” 

“And you… You, what, you are not? You’re using Tav just as much as I am, darling. Otherwise, what are you here for? Companionship? Ha!” Astarion does not know why, but his entire being is alight. As if the sun’s rays are scorching him. He can barely contain his temper, barking out between sharp teeth, “Get a grip.” 

Gale is hardly fazed. “You’re delusional. Whatever threat you think I present to you?” He lifts his chin, eyes alight with power and rage. “Confront it. Dig your grave. Lie in it. While you’re busy lurking in the shadows, waiting for the opportune moment to dance them around your little games, guess where I will be?” 

Silent, seething anger. It burns. Astarion’s eyes are blown wide with rage as he gazes into Gale’s eyes, digging his nails into his palm as his fingers wrap around the hilt of his dagger. 

“There to catch them when they realize everything you’ve done is just an act.” Gale leans forward this time, a warning blazing in his brown eyes. “Think whatever you wish of me, Astarion, but never in your life think I would never fight for those I cherish.” 

Cherish. Astarion almost sinks his teeth in his throat to shut him up. “Good,” he purrs, fighting every urge not to massacre Gale where he sits with his dingy little breakfast. “I would be sorely disappointed if you succumbed too easily to me.” 

This would be so much easier if Astarion didn’t care about losing Gale, either. If he must concede, Astarion can admit to himself and the Devil alone that Gale is beyond useful in battle. Herald of the Weave, Mystra’s little boytoy? He would be endeared to watch Gale’s story end. Whether it be in smithereens or in the bosom of his former goddess, it will be fun to watch. 

Something in the back of his mind gnaws at his anxiety that Gale will be the one to turn Tav against him. This pretty little fool never wanted him in the party, wary of him, which is the smart thing to do. Tav was not. Tav was too easy to trust him. To easy to ply around his fingers until he had them even offer up their blood. 

He resents Gale for making space in their heart. It could have been his. 

“The dawn rises as I do: strong, and watching over two bread boys exchanging heated words like knives.” Lae’zel’s voice, sleek and smooth, startles them. Gale visibly jolts away from his proximity to Astarion’s face, brown eyes widening as Lae’zel approaches the table. She takes one gander at the spread, grabs a fistful of anchovies, and shoves it down her mouth without care. 

“You,” Gale stammers. “That was for–” 

“Silence. Githyanki must feed well to prepare for the new day. I will not hear your incoherent mumbling, wizard.” Lae’zel at least has the decency to chew with her mouth closed. She gulps the food, grips her fingers around Gale’s mug of watered down wine, and downs it with a tilt of her head. 

Astarion pouts. “We were having a moment, dearest Lae’zel. Now, I love to tease Gale as much as you, but it is my turn to press on Gale’s pretty little nerves until he explodes. He does not need to be,” he flares a hand out to Lae’zel, who is still downing the disgusting concoction with impressive concentration, “hounded.”

Gale looks confused. Astarion thinks that is not a state he often experiences. “Thank you?” 

And now he’s grateful? Astarion regrets his string of words in the last five seconds. They should go back to fighting.

Lae’zel slams the mug down on the table, perishing the rest of Astarion’s train of thought. She wipes the drink from her lips with her arm, thinks for a second, then nods, resilience plain in her expression. “I must warn you: distractions outside of our goal will be our end. I will not fail to cut either of you down if you produce disappointing results. However.”

There’s a ‘however’? Gale and Astarion exchange a glance, the animosity between them gone, replaced with more confusion. “I think you may be misunderstanding,” Gale begins. “Astarion and I-” 

“You two are lovers,” Lae’zel says with the confidence of a thousand burning suns. Astarion has never wished for that to be more true. He wants to be eviscerated where he sits right now because he cannot pick up his jaw from the ground. 

Gale looks like he just swallowed a rat. Like he is seconds away from throwing up. He needs a moment, experiencing vicious whiplash from wanting to kill Astarion to now, wanting to kill Lae’zel. “You— huh.”

“I support this companionship,” nods the githyanki sagely. 

“You are a bloody fool.” 

“No. I am efficient. Two of my enemies have been wiped off the playing field, which means there is less competition.” Hands on her hips, Lae’zel looks at the campgrounds proudly. “Make love to each other loudly.” She jerks her head over her shoulder, a sneer twisting her sharp features as she looks at them. “Try to drown out my name from Tav’s lips tonight, for I will be taking their hand and heart.” 

No fucking way. An oversight on his part. How could he have been so blind? Of course Tav is desired, not just by him or Gale, but by everyone else in the damn camp! This is much more troublesome than he realized. Fine, then. He should prioritize the rational thinkers like Wyll, Gale, Shadowheart and– oh, Karlach. Not darling Karlach. She would never turn Tav against him, would he? 

Fine. Halsin and Lae’zel can go first. 

“Momentary truce?” Gale offers. 

“You read my mind, handsome. Lae’zel, darling! Come back over here - we just want to talk.” 

❥ Additional links: kofi | ao3

[moonstruckme]

Hii i have a request for doctor!remus or maybe emt!marauders (whichever you think goes best) with clumsy reader who is constantly covered in mystery bruises and maybe she bumps her head a lot in a just a few days between them and they find out bc they feel or see the bump or they see her bump her head and maybe gives herself a concussion ?? This is kinda what happened to me a few days ago when i smacked my head really hard and then yesterday at an appartement sighting right infront of the previous tenants and the real estate agent 😩 and i remember walking home and seeing like these white spots you see after hitting your head, you know?? And thinking oh if the boys where here they would be scolding me soo hard but also the coddling i just wanted to be wrapped up by them 😭

Oh god sorry for the long unnecessary and embarrassing backstory 😅

And ofcourse you only have to write this if you want to !! Hope you have a great day 💗🫶🏻

Thanks for the request lovely, hope your head is okay!!

cw: concussion

emt!marauders x fem!reader ♡ 658 words

Sirius watches you, nearly falling asleep against Remus’ side at one in the afternoon. You’ve been in a funny mood all day, only wanting to lie around with the curtains drawn and watch films you hardly seem to be paying attention to. It’s not very much like you, but your boyfriends are more than happy to go along with it. Remus has been half drifting off too, while James keeps going back and forth between the kitchen to make more snacks and Sirius sits with your legs across his lap. 

“Is your head still hurting you, lovie?” James asks as he sits down again, probably only for another ten minutes. 

You hum discontentedly. 

Remus responds by holding you to him as he leans forward, taking your water bottle from the coffee table. “Drink some more,” he tells you, voice rough with drowsiness. 

Sirius watches vigilantly as you take a few slow sips. You look tired and put out, but your expression eases into something closer to contentment when Remus pets your hair approvingly. Sirius sees the moment your boyfriend’s brow furrows. His frown as he looks down at your head, moving his hand over the same spot again. 

“Dove, what happened here?” 

“Hm?” You look up at him, but then Remus must press down slightly because your expression pinches. “Ow.” 

“What is it?” Sirius scoots closer. James leans forward in his chair, too.

“There’s a bump on the side of her head,” Remus says worriedly. He’s trying to part your hair to see better. “Can you lean forward for me, love?” 

Sirius sets a hand on your shoulder, encouraging you to bend over and murmuring a thanks when you do. While Remus tries to turn on his phone flashlight, he brushes his fingers gently over your head. You inhale, and his heart flinches. 

“Sorry.” He kisses your hair consolingly. “Do you remember bumping it?” 

“Yeah,” you sigh, as though the mere memory exhausts you. “I knocked it on a cabinet yesterday at work.” 

“You knocked it hard?” James stands up, peering over Remus’ shoulder as he inspects your head. 

“It felt hard at the time, yeah.” 

“Angel, why didn’t you say anything? You ought to have called us after a bump like that.” 

You shrug. Sirius can see you looking sheepishly into your lap. “It was embarrassing, and it didn’t seem very bad. It’s fine now, just a bit sore.” 

“But you have a headache,” Remus says dubiously, “and you’ve been tired ever since.” 

You hesitate. “Yeah, but…” 

“Can you look up here for me?” Sirius touches under your chin, prompting you to sit back up. He holds up his flashlight, making sure you see it before clicking it on. 

Though it shouldn’t be a surprise, you flinch hard, your face scrunching with the force of your squint. Sirius clicks the light off. 

He kisses the space between your brows. “I think you’ve given yourself a mild concussion, sunshine.” 

“Really?” you ask, bemused, at the same time as James makes a horribly dejected sound and leans over for a hug. 

“Our poor sweetheart,” he laments, bent over awkwardly with his arms around you. “No wonder you’ve been feeling so odd today, hm? We really shouldn’t be letting you watch TV while your brain’s trying to recover.” 

“No, we shouldn’t,” Remus agrees, reaching for the remote and switching it off. “How do you feel about a nap, dovey? You’ve seemed sleepy.” 

“That’s a good idea.” Sirius mushes another kiss into your temple. “It might help a bit with your headache, and I know Remus would nap with you.”

You hesitate. James tightens his hold and Remus strokes the hair near your injury, each of your boyfriends desperate to dote on you in their own ways. “Sure,” you say. “That could be nice.” 

“There you go, lovie,” James says approvingly. “If you hadn’t wanted to cuddle with our Rem, then we would’ve had to really worry about your head.”

[hoodzgyal]

the corruption kink would be STRONG in a roy/jay threesome

𝐒𝐔𝐆𝐀𝐑.

#DESCRIPTION: the one where jason and roy make it their mission to ruin their longtime bestie, the local good girl at uni. mdni.

#NOTES: this singular comment inspired a whole (albeit poorly written) fic. thank u. also the song are y’all are listening to in the fic is sugar by sleep token, hence the name. also pls be nice this is my first full fic omg😚

“I really oughta go home,” you hum as you look at the clock, sweet voice ringing out into the otherwise quiet of Jason and Roy’s shared living room.

The three of you became friends quickly, under the crucible that was a horrific semester of an Advanced Statistics class during junior year of college. Now, a year later, you find yourself spending weekends at their shared apartment, watching movies, playing games, and just existing in their space.

There’s always been a sense of tension between the three of you, whether or be the bizarrely evident sexual tension between Jason and Roy, or you and one of the boys. You’d never dare bring it up, though, for fear of ruining the sacred friendship you three have forged.

The men are seated on either side of you on the couch, virtually squishing you between their hard, muscular frames. The quiet croons of Jason’s favorite band occupy the rest of the space as the two of them indulge in their personal vices, Jason’s being a glass of whiskey and Roy’s being a homemade Old Fashioned.

Though you say you ought to head home, you make no move for the door.

“It’s dark out, sweetheart,” Jason rumbles, sipping on his drink, “And late as fuck. We’ll take ya home in the morning.”

Roy nods at this before chucking your chin, murmuring, “It’s our first sleepover in literally forever, how fun!”

You nod without saying anything, letting a comfortable silence settle over the room, save for the suggestive croons and whines of the song coming from the speaker. You feel heat crawl over your neck and face as you listen to the song, realizing how close Jason and Roy are to you. How pink their lips are. How the taste of the alcohol they’re sipping would taste on their lips if you were to ki-

“Sweets?” Roy leers down at you, auburn lashes blinking in confusion, “What’re ya looking at?”

“You know what she’s lookin’ at,” Jason rumbles, as one of his muscled arms come down to wrap around your shoulders, keeping you in place.

Your eyes are wide as they flicker between the two men. You sharply exhale, parting your brown, glossy lips, unsure of what to do or say.

“Poor thing,” Roy drawls, cupping your cheek, “Lookin’ like a deer in headlights. ‘S okay, sweets, we don’t bite.”

“Not unless you want us to,” Jason adds, setting a large hand over your bare thigh. His eyes are lidded, watching you like a predator watches prey. He glances at Roy, and slyly smirks at the shared understanding between the two men. Still, they want to give you a chance to say no, a chance to leave and act like this never happened.

“Say you want us to,” Roy mumbles, green eyes searching your body. It’s only now that you realize how scantily clad you all are, Jason being shirtless, Roy in a pair of loose boxers and a black wifebeater, and you in one of your ratty oversized band tees and tiny pajama shorts. You find yourself nodding, eyes still wide in disbelief.

“He said, say it, sweetheart,” Jason tuts in your ear as he pulls you into his lap. He allows you to settle into him, letting out a low growl at the friction you create while doing so.

“I want you to- ah”, you gasp, shuddering as Roy’s lips find your collarbone. You can feel him smiling into you as his fingers tease the hem of your tee, barely ghosting the waistband of your shorts. Your hands come up to meet his hair, idly playing in it as Jason’s large hands find their way into the waistband of your shorts.

You lift your hips for him, allowing the shorts to slide off of you as Roy works his way around your neck, tugging at your tee with a pout. Jason seems to get the hint as he hums from behind you, “Lift your arms f’me, bunny.”

Ever the obedient little thing, you do so as Jason lifts the shirt over your head, exposing the lacy pink bralette and panties to the boys. The garments hug your plush body deliciously, highlighting every curve and dip as you slowly grind on Jason’s lap.

“You little minx,” Roy groans as Jason’s arms cage you where you sit, “How long you been hiding this from us, huh?”

“Too long,” Jason mumbles, nipping at your ear as his large fingers find their way over your barely clothed pussy, “Let Roy have a taste, hm baby? How’s that sound?”

“So good,” you whine, pushing your ass into Jason’s lap. You can feel his thick cock pulsate as he groans, “Go ahead, Roy. Make baby girl cum.”

Roy all but rips off your panties, exposing your cunt to the cool air. “She’s so pretty,” he marvels, before pressing a sweet kiss to your clit.

You whine in embarrassment, turning your head away from the sight of Roy lapping at your wet pussy. Jason catches your lips in a sweet kiss as he works your bra off of you. He eagerly swallows your moans as his fingers come up to toy with your hardened nipples.

“I want a taste,” Jason says, tugging at Roys hair. He pulls the redhead up for a heated kiss before pulling him back down, rasping, “stretch ‘er out f’me,” as he ruts his clothed cock against your bare ass.

“Someone’s gettin’ impatient,” Roy leers, sticking a thick digit into your glistening cunt, giving you languid, slow strokes. You let out a near pornographic moan at the intrusion before Roy snickers.

“Guess I should add another, huh,” he murmurs, adding another finger. You keen, arching into Jason as his thumb presses on your needy clit.

“Such a greedy little girl,” Jason muses as you moan in delight, “Whaddya want now, hm?”

“Wan’ cum,” you mewl, breathless, “wanna cum on your cock with Roy’s dick in my mouth.”

“You’re disgusting,” Jason smiles down at you, “On your hands and knees. Now.”

Roy smirks in anticipation, stopping the pumping of his fingers to allow you to get on your hands and knees in front of him.

“Open wide,” Roy sings, tugging his red boxers down to expose his fat cock, tip angry and already leaking. He slaps the tip on your tongue a few times as Jason kneads your ass from behind you. He gives it a sharp smack and you lurch forward, gripping onto Roy’s strong thighs with a strangled moan.

“Look at you,” Roy sighs as you weakly stroke his cock with both hands, “takin’ initiative. Such a good girl.”

You can hear Jason hum in assent behind you, pressing the thick head of his cock into your pussy. You gasp, lightly squeezing Roy’s dick as Jason enters you fully. He rocks his hips into yours, allowing you to get your bearings as you give Roy’s dick kitten licks along with languid strokes.

“She is a good little slut, ain’t she,” Jason grunts as he picks up the pace, snapping his hips into yours as you suckle the head of Roy’s cock. Roy mewls as one of your hands comes down to fondle his balls, causing him to let out a strangled moan. His moans grow in volume as you take him further into your mouth and down your throat as he whines, “Just like that, baby. Don’t fuckin’ stop, you’re doin’ so good for me.”

Jasons pace grows more erratic as time goes on, and one of hands creeps under you to play with your clit. He gasps as you clench around his thick cock, your muffled whines and moans only bringing him closer to orgasm. Your cunt seizes around him as you cum without warning, whining and keening around Roy’s dick. The vibrations of your voice only spur him forwards as he groans, thrusting forward and painting your throat white.

Jason sighs with pleasure as you fuck yourself back on him, seeking another orgasm.

“Of course you want another,” he grits out, hips snapping into yours, “You’re such a- fuck, you’re just a little whore for us, huh?”

You nod, looking up to see Roy stroking his overstimulated cock, nearing tears. He leans down pulling you into a deep kiss as his tongue probes your mouth, searching for the taste of himself.

“Fuck, I’m gonna fuckin’ cum,” Jason whines, ramming himself into you from behind. He slows as he empties his load into you, keeping you on his cock for just a moment longer.

You’re spent, lip gloss smeared, mascara ruined, and lace front messy as Jason lifts you off of his cock with ease, rubbing soothing circles into your hip. Roy palms himself at the sight, eyes focused on the cum dripping from your glistening cunt.

“Hey sweets,” he rasps, licking his lips as they both walk you to the bathroom, “Let me uh, clean you up, yeah?”

reblogs and comments are appreciated !! thanks for reading, dear heart ! also here @xoxoyourdoll !!!

[cursedhaglette]

Colleagues

You're been nothing but helpful to Magistrate Ancunin, working to advance your career by supporting his cases. Your crush on him has lasted almost as long as your time spent working together.

And then he decides he wants to show you just how grateful he is for all your thorough help.

Rating: E Word Count: 2.5k Content: 18+, oral sex, PIV sex, squirting, cum swallowing, pre-canon

[ao3 link]

A/N: I don't know what magistrates do and not sure if I really care, but if fantasy judge/lawyer combo doesn't work for you then sorry!

“Madam, I have Magistrate Ancunin here to see you,” the voice of the office assistant reaches your ears before the door opens and the heavy hinges creak in that way you hate. The older human woman who assists with your paperwork and appointments allows in the familiar, handsome face. You nod your thanks and Vilna closes the door promptly, as she always does. 

“Magistrate,” you say in greeting, and he smirks as he approaches.  

“You always say that like it’s not your title as well,” he argues, the same comment the two of you make every time you have this exchange. 

You’ve been smitten with him for an almost pathetic amount of time, but while you’re still unsure whether his flirtations were just for fun or genuine, you held off on making any real move. Being rejected by one of your fellow magistrates, one of your senior colleagues that you’re so often tasked with assisting, would be far more humiliating than you’re willing to risk. 

“Do you have those case notes ready?” He asks, and the deep caress of his voice scatters your mind as you fumble for the information you’d collected for him. You remember you’d filed it away just last night, wanting to be sure it wasn’t mixed in with the other handful of cases you were either overseeing or assisting on.

“Sorry, yeah - it’s over here. I was working on it until late last night, but I think it should be more than enough to present your case.”

He doesn’t respond, so you move around your desk to where you filed the documents the evening prior.

“You really ought to make me work harder for this,” he smirks, and you watch every movement of his clever mouth as you turn to meet his gaze. “So much done, all for me? None of the other junior magistrates are quite as helpful and thorough as you are, darling.”

“I’m far too generous, I’m wholly aware,” you turn, noticing how much closer he’s gotten. How his body is nearly against yours, your back meeting the edge of your filing cabinet as you adjust, watching as he takes another step closer.

“You ought to be careful,” he whispers, and you think you might be able to smell cigar smoke and brandy on his clothing, his breath a puff of warm air against your skin as he draws ever closer, “associating with the ‘hanging judge’ might earn you a reputation an innocent thing like you might not like.”

“Maybe I’m not so innocent. I can handle myself,” you murmur, and mean it. You weren’t scared of his reputation, not when you wanted to make your own. Assisting him, making a name for yourself as you grew your career, it was all part of a plan. Falling for him was the only piece you hadn’t accounted for. “And maybe I like working with you.”

“I’m glad, because I like it as well,” he grins, “so tell me you’ll let me show you my thanks.”

“Astarion…” you whisper again, and your eyes can only focus on his lips. The way his tongue flicks to wet them, so full and perfect. Gods, you wish he would just break this tension so you could finally feel his hands around your body.

“Let me show you how grateful I am,” he says again and leans against you, dipping his head to whisper a gentle kiss along your neck, then another below your ear. “Let me show you how much I like working with you, Tav.”

“Is this a good idea?” You hate the question, hate that it could end the delicious warmth seeping into your core as his lips move lightly against your skin. But you have to know, have to be sure…

“Probably not,” he grunts but pulls away for long enough to look you in the eyes as he says, “but if you want this, then I don’t give a damn how good or bad an idea it is. Do you want this?”

“Yes,” you moan, and then his mouth is on yours and it’s like your prayers are finally answered. His mouth is warm and perfect, his tongue dancing against the seam of your lips until you open, eagerly, to welcome him in. He pushes you against the cabinet, your back digging into a drawer pull, but you don’t care as his hands move to cup your ass and lift you slightly, enough to angle your core against his. 

You can feel his hardness and it draws a desperate, gasping moan from you that he swallows with his kiss. He holds you firm, his grip likely strong enough to bruise. Have you noticed how strong he was before? You knew he was fit, but Gods, the way he holds you shows off how easy this is for him. He’s experienced, and you are too…but not like this. Not with someone you’ve wanted for ages, dreamt of kissing or laying with as you sign off on each individual document you’ve prepared for him over the last year.

“I’ve wanted you,” he growls as he shifts and gently sucks on your sensitive earlobe, “since I first laid eyes on you. Since you first walked into this office.”

“Really?” you gasp, and Astarion’s hands move to the buttons of your blouse, his mouth kissing along your collarbones. He pulls away for a moment, eyes scanning yours and you watch in delight as his gaze flickers to your flushed cheeks and swollen lips. Then, he takes your hand, and moves it to the hardness pressed against you - guiding you to feel the full length of him, still taught and held within his fine, leather trousers but begging for release. 

“Do you feel this?” He asks, smiling as your blush deepens. You bite your lip and nod. “This is how desperately I’ve wanted you. How hard I’ve been trying to hold back from doing this every time I see you. But I can’t hold back any longer, not if you want me too.”

“I do,” you moan, and he’s on you again, his kisses somehow more desperate than before. But then he’s kneeling and -

“May I?” He looks up at you, both hands warming your thighs and you know what he wants, even if you’re shocked this is happening at all. You nod and his hands move to your waistband, tugging off your work trousers and undergarments in a single movement. 

You’re bare for him for a moment  before he nudges your legs apart and finally his fingers find your clit, gently pressing against your pleasure. Astarion looks up at you, eyes dark with lust, as you whimper at the touch - simultaneously feeling overwhelmed by the sudden caress and desperately needing more from him. 

“Put your foot on my shoulder,” he instructs, and you do without thought. The heat at your core, the way your want feels like a thrumming ache that grows with each second that goes by drives away any second guessing or nervousness you might feel. All you can think of is the way his hands caress your hips, your thighs, as he looks at you laid bare. “Gods, look at you. Soaked for me and so fucking beautiful.”

“Please,” you gasp, and he smirks but finally obliges you. His hands move to grip your ass and stars burst behind your eyes when he finally drags the flat of his tongue from your hole to clit. His mouth latches around her, sucking and licking in alteration as soaked, sloppy sounds begin to fill her small office. You’re being feasted on, and each groan with pleasure vibrates through you and adds to the building release he’s bringing you toward.

Astarion moves one hand from your ass and shifts his mouth only slightly, his tongue never leaving your swollen bud as he slides two fingers into your heat, immediately finding the soft spot inside you that has everything going white behind your eyes. 

“A-Astari-uhhhnnn,” your knees buckle as you cry his name, reaching for his hair and holding his mouth to you as the dam of your arousal bursts.

Pleasure floods you, and you soak him in the process, grinding against his face and coming around his fingers as your body thrashes in release. His ministrations continue, licking and fingering through the final clenches of your orgasm before he finally pulls away, his face slick with your arousal and release. 

“You taste fucking delicious,” he growls and stands, pulling you into another deep kiss so you can taste yourself on his lips. You moan into his mouth again and finally feel him tug free his cock, stiff and dripping with his own excitement. 

“Can I taste you?” 

“Not now, darling,” he growls and pulls you off the cabinet, his hands rough. “I’ve got to be inside you now, or I may go mad.”

He guides you to your desk, papers and files scattering in the wake of your desperate movements, banging your way around the office without letting his lips leave yours, his hands lingering at your sides, your hips, your breasts. 

Your ass meets the edge of the desk at the same moment his fingers find a nipple, pinching and twisting viciously, enough to have him groaning at the sound of your gasping cry. He kisses his way down your body again, his lips meeting your breasts and sucking gently before he moves lower, kissing down the planes of your stomach. 

Propping yourself on your elbows, you watch as he finally pulls away and lines his cock up with your slit. He rubs his head against your sensitive clit, wetting himself on your still soaking cunt and each rubbing slide feels better than the last. He’s so hard, the head of his beautiful, thick cock so soft, and it’s all for you. After so long, after so many late nights spent wishing you could have him all to yourself.

Your head hangs back as he begins to slide into you, the feeling overwhelming as your body stretches to accommodate him. He takes his time, his own eyes closing slowly as he adjusts in his own way, the feeling of your heat and slick enough to have him biting his lip in concentration. 

“Astarion,” you whine and your back arches as he moves forward another inch, “I can take it, I want it all, please - I need more, please, pleee-aahh -”

He fills you to the hilt, giving all of himself to you in one movement and you can only muster a deep, primal groan as he begins to set a steady rhythm, rolling his hips against yours. Each movement is practiced and perfect, managing to hit every spot inside you that begs for pressure.

“So ti-ight, mmmm,” he groans, picking up speed. He reaches between your legs, his thumb rubbing circles in time with each thrust. “Can you come for me again? Around me?”

You clench around him, feeling the tug behind your navel and the added moisture between your legs and then you’re coming, coming around him like your body knew to obey his ask with words alone. Your second undoing under his hands is somehow stronger than the first, your body convulsing like a woman possessed as you shatter again and again. 

“Good girl,” he grunts and sputters, “such a good…mmmmph…good girl, coming for me.”

You milk him with every slowing contraction of your body, tugging him deeper into you, and he stammers your name like the chants of monks in a chapel. You listen as he repeats it, over and over, as his breath hitches and his movements grow erratic, desperate and his own pleasure begins to build toward climax. 

He’s close, so close and you don’t have a tonic so you lean up and kiss him, his body slowing as his focus shifts to your mouth. This time his moan fills the space shared between you and the sound would buckle your knees were you standing. 

When you tug away, both of your breaths still ragged with pleasure, you whisper what you want, no - what you need. “Come in my mouth. Let me taste you that way.”

“Are you sure?” He grunts the question, leaning in for another languid kiss as he continues each deep, slow movement within you. You nod through the kiss, then move off the desk, to your knees. 

He’s coated in your slick, and flush with pleasure, each vein in his gorgeous length thrumming with need you can’t wait to slake. You roll him in with your hand, luxuriating in this hiss it earns you. 

You swirl your tongue around his head before sucking it into your mouth, groaning as you realize that you’re about to know how you taste in combination with him. 

“Gods,” he pants, “don’t stop, y-you feel…unbelievable.”

You smile and take him deeper, adjusting to his length for a few moments and then letting him fuck into your throat at the pace he needs to finally reach his peak. He bucks quickly, his eyes close as yours water, his length hitting the back of your throat.

You swallow as he quivers through his end, and then bob up and down once more before pulling away from him, your mouth popping as you release his head from your mouth. You lick him clean, any release you hadn’t caught already you wipe away with a warm tongue, feeling his eyes on you as you do. 

“Fucking hells,” he whispers, a hand reaching to stroke your cheek as you finally sit up, “that was…”

“Okay?”

“You delicious fool, that was the best head I can ever remember receiving,” and he folds himself over to reach where you still kneel before him, kissing you deeply and slipping his tongue into your mouth - tasting himself on your tongue. It’s salty and perfect, the taste a lingering reminder of the ecstasy you shared.

Astarion moves to dress quickly, as though suddenly reminded that it was the middle of the workday and you were both in an office, and you follow his lead. 

He straightens his coat, rubbing his palms down his shirt to even out the wrinkles left over from their earlier collision. He looks almost nervous, watching as you finish lacing up your shoes, then looking at the utter chaos left behind on the desk. 

“This won’t make things…uncomfortable between us? Will it?” You ask the question carefully, aware that it very well could change everything. Could ruin all that hard work. But Gods, it sure as hell felt worth it in the moment. 

“Oh lovely girl,” he smiled, finally meeting your eye again with that perfect smile, “if anything, this just got a lot better. In fact, I could imagine you and I will be very, very good colleagues.”

“Well then,” you stand and walk toward him, taking his coat in both hands and tugging the handsome elf flush against you once more, “I suppose the cases we work on together are going to be a lot more fun from here on out.”

“Oh my dear,” he kisses you quickly, a gorgeous, devious grin lighting his face as he pulls away, “I couldn’t agree more.”

[xiayannie]

𝙨𝙩𝙖𝙮 𝙛𝙤𝙘𝙪𝙨𝙚𝙙 | scaramouche

synopsis : the loud explosions of the fireworks certainly are a nightmare when you're trying to get a goodnight's rest. scaramouche helps you tire out and sleep good. new years special !!

cw(s) : smut ! fingering, scaramouche laps up your juices, fem! reader

"ugh, I'm so not excited for the barrage of fireworks tonight." you groaned, hearing a distant one go off.

SCARAMOUCHE hummed in agreement as he sat behind you, idly scrolling on his phone.

"... not like it matters to you anyways, since you sleep like a log." you said it in a jealous tone, feeling a bit annoyed at the fact that your lover wouldn't lose any sleep tonight with you. he rolled his eyes, putting his phone down to gently lift your head up to look at him.

"does the noise bother you?"

"it'ssss... it's just too loud."

"wanna try ear plugs?" his suggestion made you shake your head, as you hated the way they fit in your ears. "I'm out of options, then." to which you huffed in dismay at his quick defeat.

"how about I distract you?"

"you ought to fall asleep once you're tired, right?"

SCARAMOUCHE's goal to get you exhausted and distracted worked, as his fingers plugged up your cunt with ease. moaning and squirming led to you tiring out quickly. the overstimulation drove you further into a mess as you wordlessly and unconsciously bucked your pelvis into his hand.

his voice was soft as he cooed in a calming tone, encouraging you orgasm after orgasm. SCARAMOUCHE promised to get you a good night of sleep, after all.

"easy now, sweet girl." he murmured quietly, watching as you cried out his name particularly loud when the pad of his fingers prodded at your sensitive spot.

SCARAMOUCHE's thumb rubbed small circles around your clit, whilst his other hand gently fondled with your boob. it was about your pleasure and comfort tonight. SCARAMOUCHE praised you as you shook and came again, your hands tightly gripping onto his wrist as your walls spazzed and fluttered. it was uncharacteristic for him to be so soft, but you didn't mind it.

"you're moaning so loud, it's as if you're trying to beat the fireworks in volume." he teased lightly, bringing his fingers from out of your sweet cunt. SCARAMOUCHE smiled as he admired the sheen of which your arousal covered his fingers in, before he brought it up to his mouth.

too tired to feel embarrassed, you breathlessly watched as he licked and popped his digits into his mouth (quite lewdly, without meaning to) to lap up your juices.

your eyes met, and he leaned down slightly to give you a loving kiss. the sounds of the fireworks at this point sounded like a blur to your ears as you focused on the sound of his breathing instead.

"thank you scara..." you mumbled tiredly, trying to keep your eyes open.

"mhm. just sleep. I'll clean you up, and then I'll join you back in bed."

"...happy new year, love."

SCARAMOUCHE lightly pinched your cheek, his signature smug smile and adoring gaze was the last thing you saw before you knocked out cold from exhaustion.

you slept well that night, waking up almost glowing the next morning.

[youvebeenlivingfictional]

omfg i’m so in love w your writing 😭 i’d like to request a harvey fic, maybe where they j have a secret relationship, but really everyone knows cause he j goes so soft around the reader (and maybe they get caught making out too, any spice you can add is awesome) tysm!!<3

Thanks, buddy! Here you go :)

Warnings: Smooches?

"Harvey."

"Mm?"

“Are you going to make yourself useful, or are you just going to stand there?”

“I may just stand here. I’m enjoying the view.”

You bite the inside of your cheek, shaking your head as you shove a box back into its place on the shelf and draw the next out. You pop the top, beginning to finger through the files.

“There’s nothing else that you could be doing right now?” You press.

“Jessica told me to stop hanging around her office.”

“See, that’s strange to me, Mr. Specter.”

“I know, it’s ridiculous. Who wouldn’t want me around?”

“Can’t exactly say you’re being particularly helpful hanging around here right now.”

“I’m not going to help an associate.”

“But you are going to nag me until I’m finished in here? For what? Just to slow me down?”

“How else am I supposed to get my kicks?”

You roll your eyes, drawing a file out of the box and replacing the lid before you push it back into place. You turn, starting past Harvey, only to slow, then still as he grasps your wrist.

“Harvey,” You warn softly, glancing between the shelves. There’s no one else from what you can see, but that doesn’t mean that other people won’t come in.

“Just wait a minute,” He murmurs. His hand slides from your wrist to smooth over your waist. You bite your lip, allowing yourself to lean back against him.

“I have work to do.”

“I’ll let you get back to it in a minute.”

“What’s gonna happen in that minute?”

“You tell me.”

You can’t help but smile as he turns you to face him. His gaze skates your face for a moment before he leans in, pressing his lips gently to yours. For a moment, you let yourself forget how much trouble you could be if anyone walked in right now.

If it were Louis, he’d nail you to the wall—he’d make your life hell, try to goad you into quitting for being Harvey’s little girlfriend—you can practically hear him sneering it now.

If it were Jessica, you’re almost certain you could be let off with a warning, and Harvey would be given a hell of slap on the wrist. She’s already given you curious looks, sidelong gazes when Harvey has openly watched you as you leave a room. She’s asked you about your workload, and the cases tangentially involving Harvey have always had far more pointed questions.

If it were Mike, you’d get a hell of a lot of teasing. He has his suspicions about you and Harvey, sure. He’s asked joking questions, but there’s always been a thread of truth in them. You’re certain that Harvey has confirmed it to him, but maybe Mike thinks that Harvey is taking him for a ride, that there’s no way you’re gotten together with a senior associate when you’ve only just arrived at the firm.

If it were Rachel, you’re certain that you would be teased mercilessly. You know that she knows—that Donna found out, and that the fact has almost certainly been shared with Rachel. Rachel’s never asked you about Harvey outright, but she’s given you sly smiles and winks.

Donna hasn’t asked you about Harvey so much as offered tips—when he’s in a good mood, a bad mood; when he’s hangry; when he’s got his nose to the grindstone and is up against a deadline.

You can’t help but giggle as Harvey steers you back toward a shelving. He grasps the folder in your hand, shoving it onto the shelf behind your head before he takes your face in his hands. You moan softly, reveling in the feeling of his suit jacket as you slide your arms around his shoulders. You really ought to go, but as Harvey teases his tongue between your lips, you’re almost certain that you won’t be leaving anywhere any time soon—

“Ahem.”

You jolt, nearly biting Harvey’s tongue as you draw back from him. Your face goes hot as you spot Donna at the end of the aisle, her arms crossed around her chest as she cocks a brow at the two of you.

“Louis is looking for that file," She nods toward it, "And he’s on the warpath.”

“Oh, shit.” You turn, straightening your clothing and turning, grabbing the file and hurrying toward the door. “Thanks, Donna!”

“You’re welcome.”

“I don’t get a thank you?” Harvey calls after you as you reach the door.

“Absolutely not!”