#fade and forge

[akkivee]

au where ichiro's always been able to see the red string of fate and was kinda in denial about being connected to kuukou, except the glitch in fate occurs and it adds another layer to ichiro's heartbreak lol

[tilbageidanmark]

Rust

[confused-disaster32]

Tobias releasing the songs in a 3, 2 (assuredly 1 or the entire album in one go) sort of way fills me with joy I adore this man and his music

[littledxves]

tag dump ! isaline & apolline.

[anderfels]

sometimes i think about bellara's chat after you help her check on the artifacts and her companion quest and i feel like i have to lie down for a little bit.

[kissingwookiees]

lucanis calls it a letter opener jokingly but i know rook has used the lyrium dagger to open missives several times in order to prompt that all to solas’ annoyance

[meringuejellyfish]

[orpheusterminals]

he lies, she stands.

late-light fading, early-dark rising.

copper sky on tile, silver earth beneath.

sparrows drift, crows plunge.

to rest upon to flee from.

his open palm— his clenched fist—.

then comes the roar, then falls the whisper.

of iron beast, of wooden lamb.

Model T unbridled, hand-forged plow yoked.

clattering past coal and rust, gliding over silk and gold.

shattering calm— sealing chaos—.

the birds, in sudden fright, the crows, in slack repose,

take wing and vanish, descend to dwell.

steel and sinew meet: silk and water part:

be water to the stone, be fire to the breeze,

yet bend the torrent back— yet break the ember forth—.

he rises as willow drift, he falls like anchored oak.

palms wide as heaven, fists tight as earth.

touches the machine’s throat— frees the spider’s web—.

crack! silence!

the hood blooms open, the gate locks closed.

chassis arcs skyward, wheels sink earthward.

the Ford overturned, the wagon upright.

its belly bared to dusk, its crown hidden from dawn.

silence— clamour—

only wind through girders, only stillness in meadows,

and the empty sky where wings once rested, and the crowded earth where feet now roam.

twelve lives wander between boar and ox, one death stands beyond hawk and lion,

shaping each motion fracturing every pause

into the single fulcrum, outside the path of division,

where flesh and spirit rend steel, where void and shadow mend silk.

under ghost-moon, beneath sun’s flesh,

he beckons the furious chariot— she dismisses the gentle carriage—.

hands upon its roaring heart, feet away from its silent veins,

and stills its blood of pistons, and ignites its flame of leaves.

then— now—

soft as returning rain— hard as scorching drought—.

sparrows come home, crows depart,

settling once more fleeing forevermore

on his outstretched hand, on his folded arms.

the way is simple: the path is tangled:

yield, resist,

reverse, continue,

rend, sew,

restore, fragment.

Master Kar Fu

[tiny-space-platypus]

A King and a Prince

Danny screamed.

He screamed and screamed, using his ghostly wail until his voice shattered and his throat was raw with the echoes of his own agony. He wailed even after the battle was won. After the last of the GIW had fallen, even after Vlad’s final, gasping breath had faded into silence. He wailed as Amity Park crumbled around him, as the last flickering lights of his home were swallowed by ruin.

It didn’t matter.

No one was left to hear him.

No one left to be farmed by his despair.

He had outlasted them all—the Guys in White, Vlad, even Pariah Dark himself. He had survived, clawing his way through blood and betrayal, only to realize, too late, that survival was the cruelest fate of all.

He had lost everything.

His home—reduced to rubble. His friends—gone and buried beneath the wreckage of the school. Their last standing ground from the GIW's control or maybe blissfully scattered to the winds. His family—torn apart, mom and dad dead by his hands. Not purposely but they had picked their side. Jazz dead by theirs attempting to protect him. Their laughter, the happy family they were, now just a ghost in his hollow chest. His city, his obsession, his afterlife—all ashes, all dust. And what had he gained? A crown of thorns, a throne he never wanted. The title of King Phantom, ruler of the dead, sovereign of a graveyard empire.

He built a council. He forged a government. He crafted a system that could run without him—because he could not rule, not when every decree tasted of blood, not when every whisper of his subjects sounded like the voices of the lost. Not when he was so lost.

So he vanished.

Not in triumph, not in secrecy—but in surrender. He would sleep. Finally really sleep. He would sleep for centuries, for millennia even, until the worlds forgot his name. Until the stars themselves burned cold. Until even the memory of his suffering was nothing more than a sigh in the dark. And maybe, just maybe, if he slept long enough… he would forget, too.

Fate, it seemed, had other plans.

Danny awoke to crying.

Not the wailing of the long-dead, nor the hollow sobs of forgotten spirits—but the raw, shuddering pleas of someone new. A voice too young, too broken, gasping between tears:

"Please—"

"Dad, I’m sorry—"

"B, you promised—"

Danny blinked slowly, his limbs heavy from his long sleep. His mind swam in fog, his body sluggish, as if moving through deep water. But the sound, a sound too familiar to ignore, pulled him forward, guiding him through the mist of his own exhaustion until he found the source—a boy.

A small, bloodied thing in a torn costume of green and red and gold, hunched over his own grave.

Danny’s chest ached.

Oh.

A newly dead. A child. One so much like him, once. Danny watched him for awhile. Days maybe? It had been such a long time since he had needed to keep track of time... He stepped closer, his voice soft as settling dust. "Hey."

The boy jerked upright, his masked face streaked with inky tears. "You—you can see me?"

Danny huffed a quiet laugh. "Oh, so he does talk."

The boy stared, trembling, his breath hitching. Danny knelt—not too close, not too far—and tilted his head. "My name’s Danny. What about you?"

The boy opened his mouth. Closed it. Opened it again. "My name? My name is… My name is…?" His voice cracked, panic rising like a tide. "My name—my name—?" He didn't remember. Not many ghostlings did.

"Hey, hey," Danny murmured, reaching out—not to touch, but to offer. With a thought, he summoned a little blob ghost, its form wobbly and bright, and placed it gently in the boy’s lap. The creature nuzzled against him, purring like a gooy contented cat. The boy’s hands stilled. Then, hesitantly, he began to pet it.

Danny smiled. "A name doesn’t have to be a name," he said softly. "It can be anything you’d like."

The boy swallowed. "...Robin," he whispered. "I’m Robin."

"Robin," Danny repeated, like it was something precious. "It’s good to meet you, kid."

A beat of silence. Then, small and scared:

"Am I dead?"

Danny’s core clenched. He let himself float just a little, settling cross-legged in the air, making himself smaller, lesser. "You are," he admitted gently. "I’m sorry, Robin."

The boy—Robin—choked on a sob. "Is that why Dad wouldn’t—why he didn’t—?" Danny didn’t answer. He didn’t have to. Robin crumpled.

Without thinking, Danny reached out and gathered him close, tucking the boy against his chest the way Jazz had once held him so very long ago—after bad nights, after bad fights, after the world had been too much. "I know," he murmured, rocking him slightly. "I know. It sucks. It’s not fair. But you’re not alone, okay? Never alone." Robin shuddered, his tiny fists clutching Danny’s cloak of stars. Danny felt the threats forming, a soul bond. He had had one will Elle, with clockwork, with few others. A bond of trust.

Danny didn’t hesitate. He let his ecto unwind, warm and golden green and royal, and carefully, so carefully, began to mend the fractures in Robin’s soul. The pain, the fear, the jagged edges of a death too soon and too violent. The death of someone trying to be a hero—he took them into himself, replacing the hurt with quiet, with safety. Slowly, Robin’s breathing evened. His weight grew heavy against Danny’s shoulder.

Asleep.

Not that ghosts needed sleep. But children did. Danny exhaled, looking around the graveyard—at the other small, lost shades watching from the shadows. His chest tightened.

…He could help them.

Just for today. Just for now. He could make Gotham a little lighter. And maybe, just maybe, it would help Robin, too—to have something familiar.

Robin followed Phantom like a shadow—or, more accurately, like a small, determined firefly, darting after the king’s trailing cloak as he moved through Gotham’s gloom. Honestly the child was a little beacon of light. Bright like a little firefly.

At first, he simply watched.

Phantom moved like a whisper between worlds—guiding lost shades toward peace, nudging lingering spirits toward unfinished business, even coaxing the living, stubborn bleeding-hearted vigilantes, into just the right places at just the right times. They never knew they were being helped, of course. But Robin saw.

And slowly, he began to copy.

A nudge here—a whisper there. A flicker of movement to draw a grieving widow’s eye to a hidden letter. A gentle tug on a cape to steer a batarang just wide enough to avoid a fatal blow. Gotham, ever so slightly, began to brighten.

And so did Robin. So much brighter than the dead boy Danny had met. He had even taught the boy to change his form from his one in death to a Robin in life. He was so much brighter not covered in blood and debris..

Phantom watched, warmth curling in his core, as the boy—his little prince—blossomed. Robin laughed as he flew, spinning through the air like a fallen leaf caught in the wind. He chattered to the other ghosts, coaxing even the shyest shades out of their hiding spots. He guided lost souls with a patience that belied his age, his voice soft but steady—"It’s okay, you’re safe now"—and when they finally faded into peace, he turned to Phantom with stars in his eyes.

"Did you see! I did it on my own!"

Phantom ruffled his hair. "Yeah, kid. I saw."

And oh, the way Robin glowed.

He was happy here. Happy to help, happy to fly, happy to tuck himself under Phantom’s arm after a long night and murmur about all the things he’d seen, all the people he’d saved. Gotham was still dark. But now, there were pinpricks of light—like stars or tiny, stubborn sparks—where before there had been none. And at the center of them all, brighter than any ghost light, was Robin.

[sixeyesonathiel]

love & war — ares!gojo x aphrodite!reader

part 2 of all’s fair. 18+, YEARNER gojo, LONG HAIRED GOJO I REPEAT, LONG HAIRED GOJO. jealous & sort of possessive gojo, he breaks your wedding ring. cunnilingus while u sit on ur throne, squirting.

the feast is decadent.

ambrosia drips like honey from silver goblets, pooling at the edges like nectar too sweet to swallow. laughter rings through the marble colonnades of mount olympus, reverberating against pillars gilded in gold, lilting and hollow—like a song sung too many times, a chorus with no soul. but the gods don't care for meaning. they care for spectacle.

and tonight, you are the show.

you sit at hephaestus' side, spine straight, expression the picture of benevolence. the torchlight catches in your hair, setting it aglow like strands of molten gold. the chiffon draped across your body slips just so—revealing the curve of your thigh, the soft swell of your shoulder, the shadow between your breasts. suggestive, never vulgar. worshipped, never touched.

you tilt your goblet, fingers tracing the rim like you're tuning a lyre. your lips, red and warm, brush the edge but never drink. your eyes flutter closed as apollo's laughter crescendos, and you feign delight—mouth curling in a smile that could bring mortals to their knees. beside you, your husband remains silent. his hand is steady on his chalice. he forged the ring on your finger with hands calloused from fire and fury, and yet you wear it like it's forged from spider silk—a fragile thing, breakable.

and you don't look at satoru.

not at first.

but oh, you feel him.

his presence seeps into the room like smoke. the god of war is leaned lazily against his throne across the hall, the picture of restraint. clad in armor darker than midnight, trimmed in crimson, his white hair is tied back by a ribbon dyed red, trailing down his back like a war banner, a declaration. but his restraint is a lie.

his goblet remains empty. always empty. he drinks nothing tonight—not wine, not ambrosia—because it is only you that he hungers for.

his blue eyes, pale and gleaming, fixate on you. they don't waver. not once. they drink in every movement of your fingers, every curve of your smile, every deliberate flutter of your lashes. he watches you toy with your ring like it's a sin he's yet to commit. he watches you lean closer to dionysus, watches your laugh tilt toward apollo, watches your bare foot slip from under the tablecloth like a secret invitation. it's cruel. deliberate.

it's punishment.

your favorite dress, ruined. your thighs, bruised. your lips, bitten and left cold in a tent heavy with the stench of blood and iron and war. he kissed you like a man possessed, like a god starved. then he left you aching.

and now?

he aches.

not with the sharp, glorious pain of battle—but something worse. duller. quieter. the kind of ache that sits beneath the ribs and gnaws like hunger, like longing.

when the feast ends—when wine-soaked laughter fades into sultry sighs, when silk rustles and marble floors grow slick with pleasure—you do not rise.

you stay seated in your throne, golden and still, carved like a statue of temptation by hands far crueler than fate.

you wait.

and like always, he finds you.

you don't hear his footsteps. only the subtle shift of air. the softest rustle of a crimson sash brushing against bronze armor. then the press of a shadow curling into yours like a secret.

“that's twice now,” his voice comes low, smoked silk and sharpened edge, curling around your spine. “once on the battlefield. now here. you like making me wait?”

his tone holds accusation—but the way he looks at you, moonlight caught in those cerulean eyes, it's not anger. it's reverence. it's ruin. it's worship.

he looks like war incarnate dressed in restraint—white hair tied back by a ribbon the color of spilled blood, pale skin brushed faintly gold beneath olympian firelight, armor kissed by countless hands but pierced by none. and he looks at you like he's starved. like he would gut himself if it meant dying with your name on his lips.

your lashes lower, slow. you don't turn to face him yet. you let the pause bloom between you, heavy with all the words you shouldn't say and all the touches you're not allowed to crave.

then—deliberately—you twist to meet him.

your gaze is lazy, liquid, the wine having turned your movements feline. your dress slips like a sigh over your thighs. your lips curve just enough to wound.

you reach to press a palm flat against his chest, over the gilded armor. his heat hums beneath it. a mortal man would be scalded.

“you ruined my favorite dress,” you murmur, voice hushed and sugared. your fingers curl, tracing the seam between plates of gold. “and left me in a tent that smelled of blood and glory and you.”

he breathes in sharply, jaw ticking once—just once—but it's enough. enough to unravel you.

his exhale is quiet, but charged, like the hush before a battlefield scream. his chest rises with restraint, sinewed muscle tense beneath his black tunic, straps of armor left discarded at the threshold like a promise he intends to break.

he steps forward. slow. deliberate. like the way fire creeps, hungry and patient. another step. then another. the weight of him warps the air. heat blooms in your lungs.

your hand stays raised between you like a shield, but your wrist trembles, traitorous. it remembers the weight of his grip, the way his fingers once mapped constellations into your skin. your mind whispers no. your pulse chants yes.

his eyes flicker—not to yours, but to your hand. to the ring.

“and you think this—” his voice, low and hoarse, curls at the edges like smoke, “—wearing this ring makes us even?”

he slides his fingers beneath yours, not with force, but with reverence. with fury disguised as grace. he lifts your hand like it's an oath he's been denied. like it's home.

he doesn't meet your gaze. his attention stays pinned to the band of gold—hephaestus' craftsmanship, forged in fire and jealousy, fitted for a goddess who never wanted to be possessed.

he looks at it the way a warrior looks at a wound he cannot close. as if it mocks him. as if it dares him to tear it off with his teeth.

his thumb ghosts over it. slow. scalding. like a brand.

you inhale, lips parting to say something cold, something final—but your voice crumbles before it can reach your tongue. all that leaves you is a whisper, soft and shaking, “you shouldn't even be touching me.”

his head lifts.

his eyes—blue, impossibly bright, like the sky just before it breaks—lock onto yours. and they don't just look. they consume. scorch. drink you in like a man dying of thirst, parched from years of wars he didn't win, undone by a beauty he was never meant to hold.

you feel it then, the tremble in the air between you. like something sacred cracking. like prophecy catching fire.

“then stop me.” he says.

his voice isn't loud. doesn't need to be. it's low, rough like gravel but sweetened with reverence, a thread pulled too tight, fraying at the edges. and it tugs at something inside you—something soft, something ancient.

your fingers twitch in his grip. not to pull away. gods, never to pull away. but to stay. to linger. to clutch the fleeting moment like it might fly from your grasp if you dared to blink.

you don't stop him.

instead, you tip your chin up, just slightly. prideful. defiant. divine. and you raise your hand higher between you both, baring the delicate line of your wrist like an offering on an altar. like a lamb to the slaughter. like a challenge written in perfume and silk.

“go on, then,” you whisper, lashes lowered like a veil. the words curl out of you like smoke, like honey laced with venom. “break another rule.”

and he does.

not with rage. not with thunder.

but with reverence.

he sinks to his knees—not like a soldier kneeling before his commander, not like a penitent before a god—but like a man who has already decided that he would rather burn at your feet than live untouched in another's arms.

the marble floor groans under him. the sound is quiet, but it echoes, somehow—sharp and cold, like the world remembering how to breathe.

his white hair, bright as new snow and wild as flame, slips loose from its ribbon and cascades around his face like falling starlight. it brushes against his cheeks, glows silver where it catches the lamplight. divine. disheveled. ruinous.

his hands are warm when they cradle yours. calloused from centuries of war, yet careful. trembling, just barely. he lifts your fingers like they might dissolve in his palms.

he bows his head to the ring—hephaestus's ring, forged in fire, in resentment, in the echo of zeus's command—and kisses it. once. twice. the third time, his lips linger.

then—he bites.

there's no warning. just a clean snap. metal splits beneath his teeth like fate surrendering. the ring breaks. falls. its fragments scatter across the marble like shattered promises.

and you exhale, shivering. not from fear. from recognition.

his mouth finds your bare finger again, lips dragging slow over skin where the band once sat. his teeth press again—gentler now, but no less possessive. he doesn't break the skin.

but the mark blooms anyway.

golden ichor wells to the surface. one drop. warm. pure. precious. it gleams like molten starlight, catching the flicker of torches. it doesn't harden, but it remains—a glimmering, radiant mark that pulses like a gem, impossibly beautiful against the curve of your skin.

no forge. no chains. no vows.

only power. only him.

his ring. your ruin.

he doesn't move. doesn't rise. just kneels there, his mouth hovering over your skin, his breath soft and reverent like a prayer whispered at the altar of something sacred. his eyes flutter closed, and there's a tremor in the air between you.

he lifts his head just slightly, the weight of his gaze pulling you deeper than any touch could. his voice breaks the silence, low and broken, the words crackling with something raw.

“this... is the only semblance of a ring i can give you.” he murmurs, as if the words are both a gift and a confession, an admission of a longing that has no end.

it carves through you like lightning.

you should pull away. remind him of the vows you wear like shackles. of your station. your symbols. that zeus did not gift you to hephaestus out of kindness, but as a solution. a ceasefire.

but instead—your hand lifts. as if guided by something older than reason. you cradle his face in your palm, thumb brushing the sharp angle of his cheek. your golden ichor paints him—bright against pale skin, like warpaint. like a claim.

“you'll get me killed one day.” you say. the words float out of you soft and slow, silk soaked in prophecy.

he laughs, low and broken and full of something starved.

“only if someone gets to you before i do.” he turns his head, catches your fingertip between his lips. kisses it. reverent. ruinous.

his lips trail down your wrist, slow—like he's savoring not flesh, but fate. your breath hitches. somewhere behind you, the world still feasts. but here, in this quiet ruin, it's only the two of you. the war god, and the goddess he was never meant to have.

“do you want me to stop?” his voice cracks, a threadbare rasp that trembles with something dangerous.

you don't answer, not right away.

your body shifts, the fabric of your chiton whispering against your skin, slipping like liquid gold, pooling at your hips, revealing just enough to stoke the fire smoldering in his gaze.

his eyes darken, pupils swallowing the blue entirely, consumed by the weight of you.

satoru, the untamed. satoru, the one who has never known restraint. satoru, brought to his knees by the soft curve of your thighs.

you lean down, your breath warm against his ear, lips grazing the shell, barely there. “then kneel properly.”

and he does.

the groan of his armor is deafening, the pressure of him against you—heat and steel—his forehead against the crest of your hip, his nose tracing the curve where skin is softest, most vulnerable. his hands, large and calloused, find the firm flesh of your thighs, not with the intention to mark, but to learn, to remember. every small movement you make, every breath you stifle, he maps them, tattooing them in his mind like a strategy, like war.

his tongue flicks, slow, deliberate, not a conqueror's claim but a prayer. grateful in it’s intensity.

you arch into him, your back a taut bow, the world blurring for a moment as the weight of his touch splits you in half.

the torchlight bathes your skin, casting molten gold over the sweat-slick column of your throat, the flutter of your lashes so delicate, like wings caught in the flame. your fingers twist in his hair, not guiding—never guiding—just holding on.

as if you fear the heavens might tear him away from you, pull him from your reach.

he notices. of course, he does.

satoru, who feels the tremor before the spear flies. satoru, who senses the precise moment an enemy's resolve crumbles to dust.

his hands slide upward, fingers finding the curve of your waist, thumbs pressing into the soft hollows beneath your ribs. it's a question without words. a question only you can answer.

and you do.

you roll your hips once, sharp, precise, and his groan cuts through you, the sound shaking your bones, a crack of thunder in the silence of the room.

“satoru—”

your voice breaks, a whimper caught between prayer and curse. the ceiling above, painted with the gods' own hands, seems to sway with the weight of it—or maybe it's just your vision, blurry at the edges.

he pulls back just enough to catch your gaze, a smile curling at the corners of his lips, glistening, intoxicating.

“louder,” he demands, voice as dark and thick as smoke from war-horns. “let them hear.”

you kick him, weakly, a distant protest, your heel sliding off his pauldron with a dull clang.

his laugh is ragged, breathless, a sound that rattles the air between you then he dives back in.

no hesitation. no mercy. just hunger, raw and relentless, like he's been dreaming of this moment for centuries. his hands grip your thighs, fingers pressing into the soft flesh hard enough to leave marks, hard enough to remind you who you belong to. his mouth moves with the kind of skill that comes from obsession—from nights spent imagining exactly how you'd fall apart for him.

and oh, you do.

It builds slow, then all at once—a coil tightening in your stomach, your back arching off the throne, your fingers twisting in his hair like you're clinging to sanity itself. you bite your lip hard enough to taste ichor, but it's no use.

the world simply narrows to heat and pressure and the slick drag of his tongue and you break.

a choked gasp rips from your throat as your back arches off the throne, thighs clamping around his head like a vice. golden ichor spills—not the slow trickle of a wound, but a flood, a surrender, dripping down his chin, painting his lips in liquid radiance.

he doesn't pull away.

he drinks.

greedy. reverent. as if this—your ruin, your release—is the only ambrosia he'll ever crave.

when he finally lifts his head, it's with a slow drag of his tongue along your inner thigh, savoring every drop. his breath fans hot over oversensitive skin as he surveys his handiwork—your trembling limbs, your heaving chest, the mess glistening between your thighs.

“look at you,” he murmurs, voice wrecked. his thumb swipes through the gold streaking your skin, smearing it like war paint. “all that pretty composure, shattered.”

your cheeks burn in embarrassment as you kick at him again, but it's weak, the force gone, the desire too heavy.

he catches your ankle with ease, his grip unyielding. his lips pressing to the arch of your ankle, tender, almost reverent. then his teeth find it—sharp, a bite.

you jolt beneath him, a shiver running through you like lightning.

“still sensitive?” his voice is dark with satisfaction, low and predatory. he runs his tongue along the mark he's left, soothing it, his mouth just as cruel as it is tender. “good.”

a/n : ares gojo brainrot so bad i wrote this instead of continuing my wips... dunno if i made some misconceptions since im not that invested on greek mythology but if i did yall can expect my apology video w/ tears 😔✌🏻 first time actually trying to write smut omg dont jump me i did my best... part 3 someday idk

[pomegranatelifethis]

Why doesn't anyone see me?

Warnings before you start There are disturbing elements, self-harm, eating disorders, and implicit mentions of harassment.

The grand hallways of Wayne Manor looked magnificent from the outside, but to you, they were nothing more than cold stone. You were sixteen, and in this house, in this family, you had always been just a shadow. The man you called your father — Bruce Wayne — had left you to drown in his darkness. The marks on your body, on your arms, back, legs... each was a silent scream. Each one reminded you how a world you once trusted had torn you apart. And the worst part? The one who did this wasn’t a stranger. It was someone who had existed in the background of your life, like a ghost.

You tried to speak up once. That night, you opened the door to his study. Bruce sat at his desk, surrounded by files and glowing monitors. His Batman suit hung in the corner — as if that costume was his real face.

“Dad,” you said, your voice trembling. “I need to talk.”

He looked up, his blue eyes tired, distant. “What is it?” he asked, but there was no real curiosity in his tone.

You took a deep breath, trying to ease the tightness in your chest. “I... Something happened. A while ago. And it still…” The words got stuck in your throat. You didn’t want to show him the scars — but maybe, just maybe, he would understand. Maybe he’d see you.

But Bruce lowered his head back to his files. “Now’s not the time,” he said, voice flat. “A lot’s going on in the city. We’ll talk later.”

Later. Always later.

You closed the door behind you, and tears began to slide down your cheeks. Batman could save Gotham — but he didn’t even try to save you.

The next day, you turned to Jason. The rebel of the family, a soul forged in his own pain. Maybe he’d understand.

You found him in the garage, working on his motorcycle.

“Jason,” you said, stepping closer. “I need to ask you something.”

He looked at you, wiping his hands with a grease-stained rag. “What do you want, princess?” he said with a mocking lilt.

You swallowed hard, gathering your courage. “Something happened to me. Something bad. And no one’s listening. I have scars—here,” you said, pulling up your sleeve slightly to show a faded mark.

Jason fell silent for a moment — then laughed.

“Everyone’s got issues, little lady. Go outside, see what I’ve seen. Then come back and cry.”

His words hit like a blade.

“But this is serious!” you cried, your voice cracking.

“Serious?” he snapped, standing and getting close. “You mean your little princess trauma? Grow up.”

Under his sneer, you felt yourself shrink. He didn’t see you either. He left you, too.

You decided to try Damian. Despite his young age, he had a sharp mind. Maybe he had noticed something.

You found him in the training room, practicing with a sword.

“Damian,” you said from the doorway. “Do you have a minute?”

He turned to you, green eyes cold and calculating.

“What do you want?” he asked, stabbing the blade into the floor.

“I… Something happened to me. And it’s hard to carry,” you said, choosing your words carefully.

He frowned, then smirked. “You’re weak,” he said, flatly.

“What?” was all you could manage.

“If you can’t carry it, then you don’t belong in this family. I know pain — but all you do is complain.”

His words were poison. His scorn felt worse than Jason’s mockery. Because Damian saw you as a burden. And in that moment, you felt the final thread tying you to this family snap.

You found Tim in the library, headphones in, eyes on his laptop.

“Tim,” you said, sitting beside him.

He pulled out one earbud. “Yeah?” he replied, eyes still on the screen.

“I need to ask you something. It’s important.”

“One sec, let me finish this line of code,” he mumbled.

Minutes passed. You sat there, waiting.

Eventually, he said, “Just tell me later,” and put his headphones back in.

He hadn’t even heard you.

Dick seemed different — or so you thought.

You found him in the lounge, laughing, mid-conversation.

“Dick, can we talk?” you asked, voice faint.

He turned to you with his bright smile. “Of course, little one! What’s up?”

But before you could say more than “I…” his phone rang.

“Hold that thought — I gotta take this,” he said, walking away.

He never came back.

That night, in your room, you stood before the mirror. You looked at the scars — each one a story no one wanted to hear. Tears wouldn’t stop. This house, this family, was a prison. Bruce didn’t see you. Jason mocked you. Damian belittled you. Tim and Dick didn’t even notice you were there. You might have been Batman’s daughter, but in this place, you were nothing.

You walked to the window and looked out at the lights of Gotham. Maybe it was time to leave. Maybe you couldn’t escape your family, but you could escape this silence. You packed a small bag — a hoodie, some money, a long-sleeve shirt to cover the marks. At the door, you paused. Maybe someone would notice. Maybe someone would stop you.

But the hallway was quiet. No one came.

As you stepped into the street, the cold air slapped your face. Were you free? Or just stepping into a different kind of shadow? You didn’t know. But at least now… now, you were trying to find your own voice.

Gotham’s streets swallowed you whole. You had escaped Wayne Manor, but the darkness inside you came along for the ride. What you thought was freedom was just another kind of prison — this time, one built within your own mind. With your bag slung over your shoulder, you walked under the flickering streetlights. The cold concrete beneath your feet was a warning: No one here is coming to save you. But you weren’t expecting to be saved anyway. Your family had never seen you; maybe you really were invisible.

Days passed. You holed up in a cheap motel, using the credit card your father once gave you. You knew the money would run out — but you didn’t care. Under the dim lights of the room, you stared into the mirror. The scars were still there — on your arms, your back, your legs. Each one whispered that you were something filthy, something ruined. You clenched your fists, nails digging into your palms.

“Why me?” you murmured.

No answer.

The reflection staring back filled you with disgust. This body, these scars… it was all your fault, wasn’t it? If you had been stronger, if you had spoken louder, maybe your family would have heard you. But you hadn’t. You were weak. Damian was right.

---________________________________________---

Days blurred into weeks. Gotham’s gray sky felt like a mirror to your soul. In the motel’s small bathroom, you sat with a cheap razor in your hand. You stared at your scars… and added new ones. Thin lines of blood appeared — but they didn’t bring relief. Pain couldn’t fill the emptiness. Every cut echoed the rejection you’d endured. Bruce’s cold “Not now.” Jason’s mocking laugh. Damian’s “You’re weak.” Tim and Dick’s silence. It all etched itself into your skin.

Every time you looked in the mirror, the hate grew.

“This is my fault,” you whispered.

Your eyes were swollen. Hair tangled. You’d stopped eating — your stomach turned at the thought of food. Sleep brought nightmares. Again and again, you relived the trauma — shadows, hands, the silence of your unheard screams.

When you woke, clutching your pillow, all you felt was emptiness.

Your family hadn’t called. Maybe they didn’t notice. Maybe they didn’t care.

Batman saved Gotham.

But not his own daughter.

Depression wrapped itself around you like a blanket — cold and heavy. Hurting yourself became a routine. Your arms were covered in cuts, but even that wasn’t enough.

“I’m worthless,” you said one night, your voice breaking.

“No one wants me. Not even me.”

You punched the mirror. Glass cracked. Your knuckles bled.

Still, you felt nothing.

Then, one day, everything stopped.

You lay on the stained motel bed, razor in hand again. Sirens wailed outside, but your world was quiet. You looked at your scars one last time.

“It’s over,” you said.

“I can’t do this anymore.”

Tears slid down your cheeks as you thought of your family — Bruce buried in files, Jason fixing his bike, Damian swinging a sword, Tim staring into his screen, Dick laughing…

None of them had seen you.

None of them had heard you.

This time, you used the blade one last time.

There would be no coming back.

The blood soaked the sheets — slow and silent.

You stared at the ceiling. Through the window, Gotham’s gray sky watched over you.

“I’m sorry,” you whispered, though you weren’t sure to whom.

Your breathing slowed.

Darkness closed in.

The sirens faded.

Bruce Wayne’s daughter vanished into the shadows.

---________________________________________---

The next day, the motel worker knocked, but there was no answer.

They opened the door — and found you.

The police report was brief:

“Female, aged …, suicide.”

When the call reached Wayne Manor, Bruce finally put his files down.

Jason went quiet.

Damian dropped his sword.

Tim turned off his screen.

Dick’s smile faded.

But it was too late.

They hadn’t seen you.

They hadn’t heard you.

And now… they never would.

---________________________________________---

[youthguk]

Black Ribbon Bride ۶ৎ | jjk (m)

Mafia AU · Dark Romance · Arranged Marriage · Angst · Smut ·

“I want this one,”he said, eyes on you like a predator. A marriage sealed in diamonds and blood. You were supposed to hate him, but monsters don’t let go of the things they’ve claimed.

wc: 18k

WARNINGS: explicit content (minors do not interact), explicit smut, forced marriage, power imbalance, slight graphic violence, death threats, mentions of murder, forced intimacy

Jungkook's voice cuts through the discord like a knife through silk. His eyes, when you meet them, hold neither pretense nor mercy. Just certainty. "I want this one." The words fall like destiny.

His touch, when it comes, is winter-cold against your cheek. Your soul flinches from those precise fingers even as your body remains still. He carries the scent of woodsmoke and exotic spice, foreign and dangerous.

The smile he offers holds neither warmth nor malice - just the satisfied smile of a man who always gets what he wants. "Don't look so scared," he murmurs, voice silk over steel. "We're going to have so much fun."

One week ago.

Dawn hasn't broken, but consciousness seeps in like winter frost. Your body knows the rhythm of secrets - when to rise, when to fade, when to become nothing more than a shadow against stone walls.

The pre-dawn air tastes of endings. Each breath crystallizes before you, little monuments of everything you can't keep. Your fingers, sheathed in black silk, trace meaningless patterns on frozen glass - a language of loss you're still learning to speak.

The chapel path recognizes your footsteps. Frost shatters beneath each step like promises, like futures, like the carefully constructed cage of expectations you've lived in since birth. Even your older sister Nora, who shared these halls with you for three years, never discovered this sanctuary where ancient pines hold their breath and weathered stones keep their silence.

Beyond the courtyard, the other girls drift between rose gardens and marble benches, their uniforms pressed to perfection, their laughter measured in careful octaves. But here, in this forgotten corner where mist meets morning, you've found something raw and real - a holiness that has nothing to do with their polished prayers.

Your Saint-Margaux winter uniform clings like a second skin, ivory wool buttoned to the throat like armor against uncertainty. The black ribbon anchoring your curls might as well be a crown of thorns.

"Je ne suis pas prête," you breathe, watching Lake Geneva stretch below like quicksilver. The French makes it sound poetic. Then, softer still, in Italian: "Non sono mai stata pronta per questo."

Your carefully constructed future lies shattered at your feet: The UN internship you earned through sleepless nights. Geneva's diplomatic corridors where you were meant to walk. Rome's ancient streets calling your name. All those perfect grades, those meticulously practiced curtsies, those debate championships – sacrificed to your father's unexplained whims.

London. The word tastes like ash on your tongue. Why there? Why now?

Your mother's note burns against your ribs, her elegant script a funeral dirge: "Be ready by sunset. They're coming."

École Saint-Margaux rises behind you, a cathedral to calculated futures. Here, where tears are forbidden unless quoted in Ancient Greek.

"We don't raise dreamers here," Madame Directrice always says, her smile sharp as cut glass. "We raise queens."

They're forged into living weapons, taught to smile while drawing blood. 

"Queens who smile through gritted teeth," you whisper to the dawn. "Queens who negotiate peace while swallowing war. Queens who marry power because they're not allowed to claim it for themselves."

Your schedule mocks you with its pristine normality:"En garde!" at noon brings your final dance with steel, four o'clock tea with Professor Valbonne - discussing Machiavelli while pretending your world isn't crumbling.

Lavender-lined suitcases wait in your room, packed by your mother's trembling hands. Your sister's muffled sobs echo through the halls like ghostly footsteps. Your brother Luca's silence speaks volumes. And your father... his absence is a wound that both terrifies and relieves you, his iron grip on your future tightening even when he's not here.

Something crackles in your pocket - a dried white peach blossom, edges curled like fingers reaching for yesterday. Its fragrance unlocks a memory: blood on snow, trembling hands, a boy whose name you never learned but whose life you saved many years ago with nothing but quick thinking and forbidden fruit.

The blossom slips from your fingers, caught in the morning breeze. You watch it spiral toward Lake Geneva's steel-gray surface, this final piece of softness you can't afford to keep. Your sister's allergy to white peaches - your most cherished scent and flower - feels like fate's way to mock you once again.

A motorboat violates the lake's surface, its wake splitting the silence like an omen. You trace a cross in the frozen air - half benediction, half curse - and whisper words that taste like goodbye. The chapel bell announces noon with solemn finality. You turn toward the university, spine straight as a blade. Non importa più.

Queens don't look back, and prisoners learn to watch without turning. You've been both.

The salle d'armes wraps you in familiar scents - chalk dust hanging thick in afternoon light, ancient leather padding worn smooth by generations of calculated violence. Trophy cases line the walls, their glass clouded with age, each cup and medal entombed like frozen dreams that never learned to fly.

You move beneath centuries-old beams, your breath a whispered prayer behind cold mesh. The blade in your hand sings with deadly grace, an extension of everything you've been molded to become.

Your opponent dances the steps she's been taught - precise, controlled, a perfect puppet of propriety. But there's wild electricity in your veins today, something that makes your movements liquid lightning. You strike not with the measured grace they demanded, but with elegant fury barely contained.

The lunge comes like destiny - inevitable, beautiful, terrible. Your blade cuts through air like fate itself, writing tomorrow's grief in today's perfect form. Steel kisses steel with a sound like breaking promises.

Her parry comes a heartbeat too late. Your point finds her heart with butterfly gentleness, the touch both caress and condemnation. This is how we end - not with violence, but with devastating grace.

"Touché," falls like judgment in the hollow air.

You retreat with practiced poise, each step a study in contained rebellion. This is Saint-Margaux's secret language - not fencing, but warfare dressed in silk and centuries of refined cruelty. They taught you to fight like falling snow - beautiful, silent, deadly. To strike with a smile, to kill with courtesy.

But beneath your perfect form writhes something untamed - a creature of starlight and stolen chances, something they couldn't breed out or break down. It's the same force that once made you save instead of strike, that makes you wear defiance like perfume and weaponize tenderness.

Victory brings no applause - only silence thick as cemetery snow. The maître d'armes nods once, your wild heart thundering rebellion against your ribs as you lower your blade.

That's when you feel his presence - Professor Valbonne, half-shadow and unspoken truths at the gallery's edge. His stillness speaks volumes in this temple of calculated violence.

He waits until the salle empties, approaching like truth itself- inevitable, terrifying.

"Your blade speaks what your voice cannot," he says softly, studying you with that terrible gentleness that makes your ribs ache. "You fence like someone who has learned to turn cage bars into wings.”

A laugh escapes you, sharp as broken glass. "Wings are just prettier prisons, Professor."

"Perhaps." His eyes hold yours, steady as truth. "But they remember what freedom tastes like."

You turn away, sweat-damp black ribbon clinging to your neck like a collar. White peach and rosewood cling to your skin - soon to be scrubbed away, replaced with the sterile scent of duty and diplomacy.

"You look haunted today," he observes. "Or you’re just not happy to see me.”

"I’m not happy to leave," you answer, truth slipping past your guard like a blade between ribs.

Silence stretches between you like a bridge neither dares to cross. He leans against cold stone, a scholarly revolutionary in this fortress of careful conformity.

"If I could write you a future," he says, "it wouldn’t begin with someone else's last name.”

Something in your chest splinters, words hanging between you two like shattered stars. You both understand everything, there is no need to name things vocally. "I was born to be a transaction."

His jaw tightens, grief etching itself in the corners of his mouth. "You were born to be a revolution."

His arm appears like an offering - this small rebellion, this moment of pretend equality. You take it with the care of handling broken dreams.

The walk to the chapel gates is a funeral march in slow motion. Words would only pollute this last pure thing between you - this shared understanding of cages and wings.

At the threshold, he pauses, eyes fixed on horizons you'll never touch.

"When they write your name in history," he says, "make sure they spell it in lightning."

You look up at the ghost-pale sky, where even clouds know better than to break formation. He'll never read your name the way he hopes.

You slip away like morning frost before the sun, before he can watch another future die.

Raindrops streak down the airplane window like tear tracks you weren't allowed to shed at every carefully orchestrated farewell. The sky bleeds into the same shade of steel that haunted every funeral where your spine had to remain straight as a blade.

First class feels like a gilded cage - all polished chrome and hushed whispers. The flight attendant's eyes slide past you like oil on water, trained to see nothing, hear nothing. Somewhere between Geneva's promises and London's threats, you're suspended in limbo, watching France blur beneath cotton-wool clouds.

A quiet sob catches in your peripheral vision. Nora. Your sister - your perfect and pristine Nora - has mastered the art of beautiful devastation. Even now, she's practicing for her future role: the tragic bride. Her fingers tremble against Chanel-painted lips, but her posture remains museum-worthy. The tears that escape are precisely timed, like crystal drops in a champagne fountain.

"Have you heard-" her voice cracks like fine porcelain, "-what they whisper about him? The youngest Jeon?"

You trace patterns in the condensation on your window. Each swirl feels like writing epitaphs for the futures dying in your chest. The glass fogs with your silence.You don't answer - she's not speaking to you but to whatever god abandoned girls like you to fates like this.

Nora's laugh sounds like shattered crystal. "Last spring - crashed a Maserati through the Louvre's courtyard. Called it 'performance art.' Three million in damages, swept under imported Persian rugs."

"The auction incident," she continues, voice dropping lower, "when he used Van Gogh's 'Starry Night' as an ashtray. 'Too pedestrian,' he said. The curator nearly had a stroke."

"And the women-" her voice catches, "God, the women. Like butterflies in his collection. He pins them down with diamonds, watches them suffocate in luxury, then adds their tears to his champagne."

The papers call him 'l'héritier de marbre' - the heir carved in marble, as though his beauty could excuse his barbarism and his wealth could cleanse the blood from his hands.

The Jeon empire rises like a gilded fortress: Jeon Antiquities & Restoration. They polish history until it gleams, restore broken things until they're worth more than they ever were whole. But beneath every restored masterpiece lies a massacre; behind every preserved beauty, a battlefield. They don't just collect beauty - they weaponize it.

Their public face gleams like polished marble, but beneath? It's all gunmetal and old blood. The Jeons don't just run an empire - they curate violence, frame it in gold, and sell it at invitation-only auctions. They don't just kill enemies - they transform them into art, into debt, into whispered warnings.

And Jungkook Jeon? He's their youngest sin. Trust fund terror with a smile that breaks hearts and necks with equal elegance. The whispers follow him like perfume: genius, they say. Rebel, they whisper. Monster, they mean. Every society photo shows the same warning: beauty sharp enough to draw blood.

"He'll destroy me," Nora whispers, pressing her forehead against the cool window. "Like one of their marble angels - pretty and hollow and broken."

"Isn't that the point?" Luca's voice cuts across the aisle, sharp as a blade between ribs. "Better broken than worthless."

The temperature drops ten degrees. You turn, ice crystallizing in your veins.

"One more word," you breathe, "and I'll show you exactly what Saint-Margaux taught us about making pain look elegant."

"Truth hurts, doesn't it?" He doesn't look up from his Financial Times fortress. "At least crying prettily might raise your market value."

Nora's whole body flinches, a butterfly pinned to silk. Your mother's voice slides through the tension like a poisoned blade. “Fix your face, Nora. Tears age you. The Jeons prefer their art unmarred."

The silence that follows tastes like ash and dying dreams. You grip your armrest until your knuckles match your mother's pearls, trying to anchor yourself to something - anything - that isn't falling apart. But there's nothing solid left to hold.

Jungkook Jeon. The name sits like lead on your tongue. You've never met him, but you know him - the way prey knows predator. A man carved from privilege so ancient it's crystallized into cruelty. Living art with venom in his veins. A marble god with gunpowder for blood. And your sweet sister is being gift-wrapped for this demon in Dior.

Grief fractures through you like safety glass, a web of tiny breaks held precariously together. The pain comes in relentless waves - not just for Nora, but for the shadow of your own future. Her tragedy is merely a preview of what awaits you in the procession of sacrificial daughters, your fate already sealed in your father's ledgers.

Your family fortune bleeds out in frozen accounts and foreclosed dreams. The name still glitters - just enough to barter away daughters like vintage jewelry. Your father's already pricing your future, weighing your worth in potential alliances. He'll find someone hungry enough, cruel enough, rich enough to buy the last of his daughter's freedom.

London materializes beneath you like a tomb of fog and steel. As you watch Nora reapply her Chanel Rouge with surgeon-steady hands, you see her clinging to composure like a lifeline, still believing grace might be armor enough. Something hot and sharp lodges in your throat - she thinks dignity will save her, and you pray she never learns how wrong she is.

Rain hammers against the windshield as your car crawls through the rusted gates of Amare estate. The ancient iron groans like a wounded beast, London's sky weeping harder as though trying to wash away the shame of what you've become. Each raindrop feels like an accusation against the facade you're desperately trying to maintain.

"Home sweet home," Nora whispers beside you, her voice trembling like the droplets sliding down the glass. You say nothing, watching the ghost of your childhood dreams loom before you - a castle turned prison.

The marble steps are cracked now, nature's fingers prying apart what wealth once held together. You trace the familiar path with your eyes, remembering how your smaller self used to dance here, spinning tales of ivory moldings and enchanted corridors. Now the walls tell different stories - of water stains mapping your decline, of paint peeling away like shed skin, of chandeliers that sputter and gasp rather than sparkle.

The door creaks open before you reach it, and there he stands - Father, a shadow cut from faded glory. His suit whispers of too many wears, though his pocket square stands at attention, starched with the last remnants of your pride. The silence between you stretches like a taught wire.

"Twenty-three minutes late," he says, each word falling like ice. "I suppose punctuality wasn't part of that expensive education."

Nora's breath catches beside you, a butterfly trapped in a jar. You feel her fingers brush against yours, seeking anchor, but you both know better than to grasp it.

He steps aside - not an invitation but an order. As you pass, his fingertips graze your shoulder, light as frost but heavy with unspoken threats. Your body remembers before your mind can catch up - memories of shattered crystal, of cold water, of darkness behind locked doors. The bruises have faded but the lessons remain, written in your bones.

Mother's heels click against warped wood, a metronome counting down to something inevitable. The foyer air hangs thick with mildew and Chanel No. 5 - decay dressed in designer perfume. Each breath feels like swallowing stones, the weight of this homecoming settling in your chest like lead.

"Your rooms are prepared," Mother announces to no one in particular, her words floating in the shadows like lost things. "I trust you remember where they are."

Your suitcases land with hollow thuds against marble that's seen better days. Your father's presence fills the space like frost, immediate and biting.

"The Jeons arrive in two days." Each word falls like a death sentence, precise and final. "We'll be ready."

His eyes rake over Nora like winter wind, cataloging every imperfection. "Go upstairs. Fix yourself. You look weak." The last word snaps like a whip, and Nora - sweet, fragile Nora - folds in on herself like origami crushed in a cruel child's fist.

The question that's been poisoning your thoughts since Geneva claws its way past your lips, "Why would the Jeons even want us?"

Your father's smile is all broken glass and tarnished silver. "Because our name still matters." He savors the words like aged wine. "Because even monsters want their sons to marry nobility." He turns away, leaving you to drown in the acid truth of it. You don't push further - this rare moment of actual answers instead of his usual artillery of screams and humiliation feels like a trap you're too tired to spring.

Rain drums against the window panes like a metronome counting down to dawn. The sound almost - but not quite - drowns out Nora's muffled sobs filtering through the wall. Each hitched breath feels like a dagger between your ribs as you trace the sound to her room, finding her curled into herself at the edge of her bed. Her silk robe pools around her like spilled moonlight, mascara-stained tears mapping constellations of despair across her pillow.

"Don't-" she chokes out before you can speak, her fingers twisting in the sheets. "Please, just... pretend you can't hear me falling apart."

The mattress dips beneath your weight as you settle beside her. Some wounds run too deep for words to reach, so you let the silence speak instead.

"God, you don't even see it, do you?" Nora's laugh shatters like crystal against marble. "The way they look at you - at Saint-Margaux, at every gala, every breath you take. Like you're something rare and precious. While I..." Her voice cracks. "I'm just... here. Taking up space. Fighting for scraps of attention."

The words hit like ice water. You want to laugh, but the sound dies in your throat. You've spent years perfecting the art of invisibility, of folding yourself smaller and smaller until you barely cast a shadow.

"Nora, I-" But she cuts through your protest like a blade through silk.

"There was someone," she whispers, each word falling like a confession. "In Switzerland. Behind the old cathedral where the shadows grew long in winter. His hands were gentle - like he thought I might shatter. He looked at me like I was art worth preserving, not just another pretty thing to be sold."

Your heart stops. Dating wasn't just forbidden - it was heresy against the careful cultivation of your worth. You were precious commodities, after all. Pristine dolls waiting to be auctioned to the highest bidder.

"He loved me." Her voice breaks on the past tense. "And I thought... for once, someone chose me first. But then the Jeons...I never thought anyone would ever want to marry me when we have you." She presses her face into the pillow, shoulders shaking. "Who would want the spare when they could have the masterpiece?"

Something fractures in your chest - not a clean break, but a spiderweb of cracks spreading outward. All this time, she'd carved out this tiny paradise of stolen moments, while you... you were an open wound she kept comparing herself to. The realization burns like bitter poison in your throat.

But looking at her now, trembling like a bird with clipped wings, how could you be angry? She'd dared to grasp at happiness in a world that offered only gilded cages. The secrecy stings, yes, but her pain cuts deeper than any betrayal.

Save her, your heart screams. But what power do you have? You're just another pretty puppet with strings of silk and obligation, taught to bend but never break, to endure but never fight.

Words fail, so you reach for her hand instead. Your fingers intertwine - a bridge across the chasm of secrets between you. You can't rewrite her tragedy, but you can stay there with her. At least for today.

Midnight strikes with mechanical precision, each chime reverberating through the drawing room like fate's own countdown. Through leaded glass, you watch them arrive – three obsidian vessels cutting through the rain, their polished surfaces drinking in what little light remains. No emblems mark their passage. No flourish announces their intent. They move with the silent certainty of apex predators.

At your vanity, fingertips ghost over the black ribbon – your chosen weapon for tonight's battle. Beside it, the perfume bottle gleams with poisonous promise. White peach, innocent as first love, deadly as the last. You anoint the silk with calculated precision, watching droplets seep into darkness like secrets into skin. When you weave it through your hair, the scent wraps around you like a lover's promise – or a noose.

Your mother's approval comes in glacial silence. Luca's scorn breaks it like thunder.

“Still playing the grieving virgin?” he sneers, eyes catching on your ribbon, your carefully crafted despair. “Or are we mourning your relevance, sister? The Jeons didn’t come for you.”

You meet his gaze with the weight of winter. “You’re standing in a house that’s falling apart.”

“Which is why we’re selling the prettiest thing we have left.” he hisses, teeth gleaming. “And it’s not you.”

The words dissolve like frost as you descend, each step carrying you closer to the awaiting storm. Your father stands sentry at the door, his spine curved in submission to powers greater than pride. The air shifts – not with cold, but with the kind of sharpness that precedes bloodshed.

They enter like darkness given form. The matriarch first, towering in her sovereignty. Her nineteenth-century choker catches light like a blade – emeralds and onyx, beauty and warning intertwined. She surveys your home as one might examine a failing empire: cataloging weaknesses, calculating worth.

The grandfather follows, silence his scepter. One nod to your father speaks volumes – here, at last, is someone who makes even your tyrant tremble.

Their entourage filters in like smoke – advisors, guards – until finally, he appears.

Jungkook.

He moves like sin made flesh, each step a study in controlled chaos. Power clings to him like shadow to night – from his obsidian gaze to his deliberately disheveled elegance. His suit, artfully askew, mocks propriety while his presence commands it. Dark hair kisses his throat like spilled ink, and raw energy radiates from him like heat from a forge.

His disinterested sweep of the room stutters when it finds you. Something flickers in those depths – recognition, perhaps, or hunger – as your carefully chosen scent reaches him. His posture shifts minutely, like a predator catching prey's scent on the wind. His gaze lingers, heavy as prophecy, and something molten coils in your core.

You don't yield. Nora materializes beside you, trembling like autumn's last leaf. Perfect in her dress, betrayed by the rising flush on her throat, her glassy eyes, her failing breath. Your mother makes introductions like offerings at an altar, your family name wrapped in silk and shame.

The scene unravels with terrible precision. Nora's curtsy falters. The white peach blooms around you like judgment. Her allergy reveals itself in stuttering breaths and panic-wide eyes, her composed facade cracking like ice in spring.

Guilt lashes you even as hope whispers that your plan might work. But the Jeons' reaction isn't pity – it's disdain.

"We were promised perfection," the matriarch pronounces, each word a blade. "Not fragility."

Your father's mask slips, pride warring with fear. "She's merely overwhelmed—"

"She's weak," Luca interjects, venom dripping.

The room descends into chaos – old money snarling at older money, wounded pride clashing against cold contempt. Until…

"She's not the one I want anyway."

Jungkook's voice cuts through the discord like a knife through silk. His eyes, when you meet them, hold neither pretense nor mercy. Just certainty. "I want this one." The words fall like destiny.

The room falls still as breath catches in throats - your mother frozen mid-gesture, Nora swaying like a reed in winter wind, the matriarch's face transforming to cold, unforgiving marble.

"Jeon Jungkook—"

But his gaze remains unbroken, and the white peach at your throat burns like a brand. This wasn't the sacrifice you had intended to make - your carefully laid plans had twisted into something unrecognizable, leading you down a path you never meant to walk.

A silence falls like velvet, heavy with unspoken words that press against the gilt-edged walls until even the shadows hold their breath.

Your father's eyes dance between you and Nora like a master appraiser examining jewels. His gaze is cold arithmetic - measuring worth, calculating losses, tallying gains. To him, you were never daughters; merely assets in his grand portfolio. Two precious stones: one crystal, one porcelain. Now one bears a fatal flaw.

His lips curl into something between a smile and a sneer as he delivers your fate with businesslike efficiency. "If that's the one the Jeons want..." A careless shrug seals your destiny. "Then she's yours."

The words strike like winter frost, crystallizing the air in your lungs. Beside you, Nora's choked sound of despair is quickly muffled by your mother's gloved hand.

Your plan shatters — delicate, doomed, never yours to control. You were meant to be the savior, not the sacrifice. The thought of becoming his choice had never even whispered across your mind.

Memories assault you in violent flashes: your father's leather-bound ledger, your mother's desperate mantra of survival, the wicked glint of Jungkook's rings catching lamplight, white peach perfume clinging to black silk like a death shroud. The sound of breaking - not glass, but your very essence - as your name is bartered away without consent.

You shrink into yourself, a child's instinct to become invisible. But his gaze pins you like a butterfly to velvet. There is no hiding now. You are seen. You are chosen.

The Jeons regard you with clinical interest, recalculating your worth like merchants at auction. The matriarch's lips press into a blade-thin line. The grandfather's slight nod falls like an executioner's axe.

As they file out, you remain rooted, a marble statue carved from pure shock. Nora trembles beside you fragile as frost about to crack, but your arms hang useless. Screams build in your throat - take her instead, take me back, unmake this moment - but they die unspoken, turned to stone by terror.

He approaches with lethal grace, each step a claim of ownership. His presence weighs on you like storm clouds heavy with lightning. You've become his territory now, marked without permission.

His touch, when it comes, is winter-cold against your cheek. Your soul flinches from those precise fingers even as your body remains still. He carries the scent of woodsmoke and exotic spice, foreign and dangerous.

The smile he offers holds neither warmth nor malice - just the satisfied smile of a man who always gets what he wants. "Don't look so scared," he murmurs, voice silk over steel. "We're going to have so much fun."

The doors seal your fate with thunderous finality. You sink to the marble floor, barely conscious of the movement. Around you, the scene arranges itself like a baroque tragedy - Nora's muffled sobs providing the score, your mother's absence speaking volumes, Luca's triumphant smirk completing the composition.

Reality settles over you like a burial shroud: you are no longer daughter or sister or savior. You have become property, his property. And as this truth sinks its teeth into your heart, you wonder if anything of you will remain when he's done.

Time slips by like grains of sand through an hourglass, each moment dissolving into an infinite stretch of silence. The world outside your window fades to watercolor impressions, bleeding at the edges like a painting left in the rain.

You exist in whispers now. Food remains untasted, questions unasked. The house holds its secrets close - rewound clocks marking phantom hours, curtains drawn against persistent daylight. From your perch on the velvet chaise, you watch raindrops trace silver paths down windowpanes, each one carrying away fragments of the freedom you once knew - freedom lost by your own design.

When they come to take your measurements, you don’t move. The Jeons’ tailors arrive with tape and notebooks, their hands cold and precise. They don’t look at your face. They pull the fabric of your nightdress taut against your hip bones, murmur numbers in a language you don’t understand, and note the curves like they’re assessing a statue to be replicated.

Their fingertips brush against your skin as they take measurements - the inside of your arm, the curve of your neck, the gentle slope of your back. One whispers to the other in hushed tones, no doubt commenting on your rigid posture and reluctant demeanor.

Your mother hovers nearby, her voice drifting through the air like wisps of smoke. "Add more stones," she murmurs. "She needs to shine beside him. Something from the Jeons' blue vault - something rare." She pauses, eyes critical. "Yes, longer sleeves. Hide the ribs."

Your father's voice cuts through the room, sharp and businesslike. "If we're going to do this, make it count. Double the diamonds. Let it be known what house she's marrying into."

You stand motionless, a butterfly pinned beneath layers of silk and expectation. Numbness flows through your veins like winter frost - you neither flinch at the bite of pins nor stir at honeyed compliments. In the mirror, a stranger stares back: a creation of ice and diamonds, beautiful and hollow, already half-ghost.

Time blurs in the silence of the house, each day melting into the next. The halls have grown quieter, more hollow, with only the ghostlike passage of untouched food trays marking the hours.

But it's Nora's absence that weighs heaviest on your heart, making each breath more difficult than the last. No footsteps outside your door, no whispered conversations through the wall, not even the faintest sign of her presence in the dark hours.

You find yourself unable to cry, your grief crystallized into something too solid for tears. Instead, a single poisonous question haunts your thoughts: What was the purpose of your sacrifice if she doesn't comprehend what you tried to do for her?

And Nora - sweet, fragile Nora - remains distant, unreachable. She neither visits nor acknowledges your presence, as if the space between you has become an uncrossable void. Perhaps she harbors hatred for what you've done, or maybe the truth is more painful: she was never meant to be saved, and you were never meant to be her savior.

The veil floats like a whisper of tulle and threat, weightless as frost yet heavy with fate. Before the gilt-edged mirror, you sit wrapped in ivory and diamonds, a bride sculpted from winter's essence. The silk remembers your shape, clinging to your ribs while stones adorning your sleeves scatter morning light like scattered secrets.

Behind you, voices blend together - the dressmaker's soft murmurs, rustling house staff, and your mother's instructions cutting through the air like sheathed knives. But your mind wanders elsewhere, to someone unexpected.

Valbonne. His calm, curious voice echoes in your memory, speaking of how your mind was a cathedral and your anger a kind of music. He saw you differently then - the girl who fenced with restrained grace, never allowed to truly run free. His words linger like an unfinished promise: "If I ever read your name in history books..."

You wonder now if he would even recognize you. You look at your reflection, skin glazed in peach and powdered rose. This is not the girl who wrote essays in French about revolutions and smiled over Latin conjugations at dusk. This is not the girl who debated in the courtyard until her voice cracked, or the one who wanted to work for the UN, who wanted to be something.

“Je ne suis plus moi-même,” you whisper to the mirror. I am no longer myself.

The door opens without warning. Through the mirror's reflection, you see her - Nora, her hair pulled back too tightly, her lipstick perfect, looking like grief painted in gold.

"So this is the masterpiece," she says, her voice cutting through the silence. The words hang in the air between you, heavy with accusation.

"You came," you whisper, your breath catching.

She moves into the room with controlled fury. "I had to see it - the moment where you finally became what you always wanted."

Confusion breaks through your numbness. "What are you talking about?"

Her laugh rings out like shattering crystal. "Don't act innocent. YYou didn’t just take my wedding — you took the one time I was finally enough."

"But you said you'd rather die than marry him," you protest, your voice weak. "You were crying about someone else-"

"You think tears meant I didn't want this?" She advances closer, each word precise and sharp. "A man like him - rich, young, beautiful. I could have thrived. Do you know how many girls would kill to be chosen by Jungkook Jeon?"

Your pulse thunders in your throat as she continues, her voice turning to ice. "I would have let the other one go for this. For once, I wasn't second choice. But you-" her eyes narrow, "you couldn't stand it."

"That's not true," you manage, rising on trembling legs. "Tu pleurais. Tu disais que tu voulais disparaître-" ["You were crying. You said you wanted to disappear-"]

"You're so greedy," she cuts you off, ignoring your French plea. "You needed to be both savior and sacrifice, martyr and bride. You couldn't let me have anything without making it about you."

You can only stare, your carefully constructed world unraveling thread by thread.

"I hate you for it," she says simply, then turns and leaves. You want to scream that it wasn’t supposed to be this way — but guilt is louder than truth.

The door closes behind her with the finality of a tomb being sealed. In the silence that follows, you stand motionless before the mirror. The veil trembles in the breeze, but your eyes remain dry. There's no room for tears in a girl made of lace and betrayal - only silence, the lingering scent of peach perfume, and the sound of your heart shattering beneath a cathedral of lies.

The cathedral is carved from light and silence, its vaulted ceilings vanishing into shadow. Golden ribs and silvered arches trace delicate patterns overhead, while chandeliers hang like captured constellations. Candlelight pools along marble, dancing across a sea of couture-clad guests draped in legacy, their hollow eyes and diamond-adorned faces watching with barely concealed hunger.

You stand at the center of their attention, both masterpiece and sacrifice. Your gown, threaded in silver and framed with pearls, shimmers like a dying star. The train follows you like a whispered surrender, while your veil - long enough to mask your doubts but not your trembling - floats ethereally around you. In this moment of pristine ceremony, everything glows with an intensity that burns.

Your body glides down the aisle — but your mind lags behind, somewhere in the crushed space between Nora’s voice and your father’s warning. You don’t remember when the music began. You barely register the clicking heels, the cameras, the smell of roses imported from Florence. Everything is white and violent.

Your father walks beside you with measured grace, his hand firm on your wrist and posture iron-stiff with pride. You sense his movement before the words come — his mouth dipping close to your ear.

"If you dare to ruin this," he hisses through clenched teeth, "I will destroy everything you are."

Your breath catches as he continues, his grip tightening painfully, "One wrong move in Jeon’s mansion and you'll wish you were never born. No one will take you in after you displease Jungkook. You'll be ruined, discarded, a broken doll no one wants to touch."

Wordlessly, you nod, your gaze fixed on the endless expanse of marble before you - a pristine river of white that stretches like fate itself, each step bringing you closer to him, inevitable as gravity pulling stars from the sky.

Jungkook waits at the altar like a marble statue come to life, all sharp edges and cold beauty. His black suit might as well be carved from midnight itself, perfectly fitted to his frame like a second skin. The single pearl at his throat gleams like a tear frozen in time - a beautiful "fuck you" to tradition. His hair falls in a precise line across his nape, ink-black against stone-white, and you hate that you notice. You hate that you care.

You hate how your traitorous mind catalogs every detail - the fresh haircut, the way his jaw clenches slightly, the calculated perfection of his appearance. Each observation feels like a betrayal of yourself, like you're collecting precious stones to add to your own cage.

His eyes don't leave you as you approach, dark and assessing, like he's appraising a rare artifact he's already purchased. Your footsteps echo through the cathedral - not because you're walking slowly, but because each step feels like signing away another piece of yourself.

When your fingers finally meet his, the air shifts like it always does around him. His hand is warm, steady and sure against your trembling one. You try to hide it, this weakness, but his knowing smirk tells you he feels every quiver. Of course he does - the self-satisfied glint in his eyes suggests he anticipated your trembling long before you arrived. Nothing escapes that calculated gaze.

The vows dissolve like sugar on your tongue, crystalline and too-sweet, while the officiant's words blur into a symphony of carefully chosen platitudes. Unity, power, bloodlines, blessings - "eternity" floats past like a butterfly with broken wings, and "legacy" follows, heavy as a curse.

The ring they give you burns cold against your skin - platinum and promises binding you tight. Your "I do" emerges barely above a whisper, like a secret you never meant to tell, the words feeling foreign in your mouth as if borrowed from someone who knew how to want this. But Jungkook's response rings clear as church bells, sure as sunrise, as though he's been rehearsing this moment since birth.

When the ceremony concludes and the crowd rises in a wave of silk and diamonds, he leans in close enough to count your heartbeats. The kiss isn't proper - that would be too kind. Instead, his lips find the corner of your mouth, precise as a knife's edge yet soft as a threat, tasting of possession.

You freeze, a perfect statue in white as the cathedral carries on its ancient dance of sparkling chandeliers and clicking cameras. But deep inside your chest, something ancient and angry begins to stir, like the first crack in winter ice.

The ballroom unfolds, adorned with champagne and ancient bloodlines. Beneath vaulted ceilings, strings swell while crystal and candlelight dance together, every surface glinting with gold, diamond, and carefully crafted deception. At Jungkook's side, you stand like a statue carved from pearl, his arm a ghostly presence at the small of your back while you receive strangers masquerading as friends - your smile and curtsy perfectly measured, your voice carefully contained.

The first dance ends and your gown whispers warnings as the floor fills with aristocracy. Distant royals and international moguls move through the space while women drift by in couture worth fortunes. The air is heavy with imported orchids and centuries of refined violence, threatening to pull you under.

The Jeons move through the room like gods draped in tailored suits, untouchable and unreadable. His mother maintains her regal pose, wine glass pristine and untouched, while his grandfather sits motionless as heated marble, observing all. Around them, guests trade danger and influence with practiced ease, their diamonds and secrets competing for brilliance.

Though Jungkook's fingers remain steady at your waist, his eyes retain their coldness. Behind you, the Jeon security team emerges from the shadows - Namjoon, Jin, Hoseok, Taehyung, Jimin, and Yoongi. Their beautiful suits barely conceal the violence in their bones, each man moving with purposeful intent, awaiting instructions.

The music shifts. Your first dance has ended. The floor is filling again with distant royals and corrupt diplomats, soft laughter smeared across every corner. Toasts rise like smoke. Cameras flash. Every mouth says “congratulations” while every gaze says “how long until she breaks?”

The numbness, ritual, and pretending almost bring relief, until everything shifts. You sense their presence before you see them - in the subtle falter of musicians, the way Jungkook's posture stiffens, and how Namjoon and Jin move closer without touching, just hovering near.

When you look toward the entrance, they materialize: The Maranzano Syndicate. Their appearance is immaculate - perfect suits, gleaming shoes, and smiles that stretch too wide. Though you know nothing about them specifically, you recognize their nature - the kind of silence that's been trained to kill.

Leading them is a man your age, his presence commanding attention. Handsome and controlled, he moves across the floor with deliberate grace, champagne in one hand and clear intent in the other. As he approaches, you feel the temperature drop and every Jeon ally tense. When he stops before you, his smile carries weight.

“Forgive the intrusion,” he says, tone velvet-smooth. “It would be rude to leave without congratulating the bride.”

Jungkook’s hand twitches at your waist.

The man takes your hand — slowly, theatrically — and raises it to his lips. His mouth doesn’t touch. But it hovers just enough. Long enough. The entire room stills.

"Leo Maranzano," he murmurs. "Piacere."

The glass shatters from Jungkook's grip as he lunges forward, seizing Leo by the shoulder. His face transforms from marble to murderous fury. "Disappear," he growls.

Leo's smile widens with deliberate provocation. "You're not the only one who appreciates women's beauty, Jeon."

Violence erupts in an instant - too swift for the guests to follow, but precisely what these trained men anticipated. Tables crash and champagne sprays as chaos unfolds. Jin materializes to shield you while Namjoon steps protectively forward. Through the mayhem, you glimpse Taehyung dispatching an attacker, Yoongi's blade appearing and vanishing like lightning, and Hoseok moving with lethal grace.

At the center of it all stands Jungkook - sleeves torn, chain gleaming against his throat, transformed into something dangerous and wild. He doesn't command; he simply acts, throwing bodies aside with ruthless efficiency.

You remain frozen, deaf to Namjoon's urgent words. Your eyes fix on Jungkook - your husband - as he hurls another man to the ground. The wedding ring seems to tighten around your finger, a burning reminder of your vows.

Jungkook whirls toward you, blood staining his collar, eyes fierce. "Why the fuck are you still here?! GO!"

But your legs won't move. Namjoon curses and drags you backward as another violent crash reverberates through the floor.

And then silence descends as a single gunshot echoes through the room. At the center stands Jeon Grandfather, holding a pistol with an ivory-inlaid grip. His expression carries not anger, but disappointment as he raises the weapon, wielding it like a priest might hold a cross during sermon.

His voice slices through the tension. "Back in my day, men didn't dishonor women and children with their cowardice. They handled their vengeance where it belonged - in the dark, out of sight."

The assembled crowd remains motionless as Leo steps forward with deliberate confidence. "I came to honor the bride," he states simply. When Jungkook moves to retaliate, Jin restrains him with a firm hand and whispered warning.

Turning to you with a gaze both gentle and menacing, Leo continues, "The Jeon family killed my father. They will answer for that, but not tonight. My grandfather learned patience, as will I." His smile transforms into something sharp and dangerous as he adds, "Try to enjoy the wedding night, Mrs. Jeon."

Jungkook lunges forward, his face contorted with murderous rage. "Keep my wife's name out of your dirty mouth before I fucking kill you," he snarls, muscles coiled like a predator ready to strike. Namjoon's arm shoots out to block his path while Hoseok grabs his shoulder from behind.

"Not here," Namjoon hisses through clenched teeth. "Think of the consequences."

Jungkook's eyes burn with barely contained violence, but he stills under their restraining grip, every muscle in his body taut with suppressed fury. Leo's satisfied laugh echoes through the room as he and his men retreat, the heavy doors closing behind them with finality.

In the tense silence that follows, a single voice dares to ask, "Shall we continue?"

The music returns, violins gliding back into waltz-time as champagne flows freely. The guests — trained creatures of legacy and fear — seamlessly resume their practiced dance of pretense, their laughter echoing through the hall as if violence had never touched these marble floors.

Jungkook, temple still stained with blood, vanishes down a darkened hallway while waiters weave through the crowd with fresh glasses. Under the glittering chandeliers, toasts rise and fall like waves against the shore, each clink of crystal a studied performance of normalcy.

You stand frozen, diamonds cold against your trembling collarbones, and face the terrifying reality of what you've married into — and wonder how long it will take to learn the art of survival in this glittering, dangerous world.

The ride is long and silent. One black car glides through the night like a hearse, and behind it — two more, identical in their gleaming precision. Their engines hum low like beasts beneath chains, headlights slicing through London fog as if daring the dark to follow. The city blurs past in streaks of silver and neon, but inside the car, everything is still.

You sit beside Jungkook, trembling quietly in a cage of lace and diamonds. Your gown spills over the leather like a spilled secret, crushed and wrinkled at the knees. You keep your hands folded like a prayer that will never be answered.

Across the seat, he is all silence and shadow.His jaw is clenched. His breathing even. But his mind is somewhere else — you can feel it, like storm clouds gathering in the distance. One leg draped loosely, his ringed fingers tapping once against the edge of the window. There is blood at his collar, dried now, half-hidden beneath the pearl.

No one speaks. Outside, security guards on motorcycles flank both sides. A third car follows behind, lights off, ready. One of the men in the front seat glances back, but neither of you look up.

The Jeon penthouse rises above the city, all glass and power, its windows gleaming with cold wealth. You don’t even remember how you got out of the car — just the blur of doors opening, voices murmuring orders, arms lifting packages and flowers and boxes of gifts wrapped in gold paper and blood-colored ribbon. They carry everything inside.

The penthouse is breathtaking in its silence — a towering open space where the walls don’t hold memories, only expensive taste. Marble floors echo under your shoes. The scent of white roses hangs in the air like a threat disguised as beauty. Chandeliers glimmer above you with a cruelty sharper than candlelight. Even the air here feels conditioned to perfection — expensive, perfumed, untouched.

Jungkook strides ahead silently, his jacket unbuttoned and fists clenched tight. His people dissolve into the shadows with practiced efficiency, bowing once before they disappear. The heavy doors seal shut with a decisive click, leaving you utterly alone.

You remain frozen where they abandoned you, rooted to the pristine living room floor like some tragic modern art installation. Your wedding gown - this beautiful, suffocating thing - pools around your feet like spilled moonlight. The veil still clings to your hair, a gossamer reminder of promises made under crystal chandeliers. Each breath is a battle against the corset's cruel embrace, while your legs have long since surrendered to numbness.

The silence stretches between you like a taught wire, ready to snap. He's there, a dark silhouette against darker shadows, methodically undoing his cuffs with elegant, calculated movements. Without a word, without even the courtesy of a glance, he vanishes into the bedroom.

When exhaustion finally drives you to follow, the bedroom rises before you like a gilded cage - all emerald walls and gleaming gold, with a bed that could swallow kingdoms whole. The sharp edges of wealth cut through any notion of comfort. You're a sparrow in a falcon's nest.

And there he is - sprawled across silk sheets like sin incarnate, jacket discarded but otherwise fully dressed, radiating the casual danger of a predator at rest. His silence fills the room like smoke.

"Why are you still dressed?" The words fall like ice between you.

You stand paralyzed, breath caught in your throat as your fingers nervously twist in the yards of white fabric. His eyes rake over you methodically, dissecting every tremor and fear until his expression settles into something more cutting than cruelty - pure disappointment.

His words shatter your composure, unleashing a tide of fury that drowns your fear. "I never wanted this," you whisper, voice trembling with raw emotion.

"What?" His expression darkens dangerously.

The truth pours out, bitter and sharp. "This marriage, you, this entire twisted world - I only did it to save her."

He rises like a storm gathering force, each movement a study in controlled violence. City lights paint him in shadows as he stalks closer. "What the fuck are you talking about?"

Words become weapons: "You were never wanted. Not by her, not by me. You were a death sentence, and I stepped in because she was dying at the thought of you."

Something dangerous flickers in his eyes - not shock, but a terrible fascination. His smile unfurls like a blade. "Interesting."

He advances slowly, and you instinctively back away, feeling every bit the cornered prey he sees you as.

"Did you think we'd sleep in separate beds on our wedding night?" he murmurs, fingers moving to his buttons. One by one, they come undone like falling stars.

You can't look away as skin appears - beautiful and brutal, carved from marble and midnight. He undresses like someone who's never known shame.

Then he's behind you, his presence radiating heat and shadow as his breath ghosts across your neck. His fingers find the buttons of your dress, methodically undoing them one by one while panic floods your veins, causing you to tremble uncontrollably.

He pauses, lips brushing your ear: "Anyone would want this night with me. But you're shaking like prey about to be devoured."

The warmth vanishes. His voice turns to steel. "I don't need this."

He collects his jacket like gathering shadows. At the threshold, without turning: "If you change your mind, I'll be in the other room."

Then he's gone, leaving you alone with your fear and your fury and your wedding dress coming undone.

You lie in the dark, cocooned in too much silence and too little peace. The sheets whisper over your bare skin as you shift — lace against skin, skin against memory. You hadn't meant to take the dress off so soon, but the corset had left bruises across your ribs, and your legs gave out the moment he left. Now you wear only your underwear and the quiet pulse of your thoughts, lying in the center of a bed too large, in a home too vast, after a night too violent to forget.

Sleep eludes you as memories of the night replay endlessly in your mind. The echo of gunfire lingers, accompanied by Maranzano's haunting presence - his smile forever imprinted in your thoughts, the way he regarded you like a silk-draped warning. Yet what truly unsettles you is the image of Jungkook - bloodied fists, disheveled collar, claiming you as his before a room of demons.

In a strange twist of fate, you realize he became your sole defender, choosing you for reasons still shrouded in mystery. This revelation propels you from the bed.

You wrap yourself in a robe of pure seduction - flowing silk that caresses your skin, its shortened hem and plunging neckline suggesting intentions you hadn't consciously formed. Or perhaps you had.

Moving silently through the penthouse, you find yourself before the open double doors at the hall's end. The room beyond bathes in amber light, where Jungkook reclines on an enormous bed, his bare chest catching gold like sculpture. A MacBook rests in his lap, screen light playing across his jaw, while his legs - long, parted, powerful - stretch across the duvet, clad only in black boxer briefs.

His eyes meet yours and he freezes, the air between you transforming into something tangible. You witness the exact moment desire overtakes thought in his gaze as it traces the curves beneath your silk-draped form.

Setting aside his laptop, he leans back with calculated grace, the embodiment of sin made flesh. "Knew you'd come to your senses," he drawls as he tilts his chin and widens his legs slightly, a silent command. "Go ahead."

Instead, you voice your turmoil. "The wedding... the Maranzanos... I can't sleep."

His jaw flexes, a slight tell. "I don't know what I'm more afraid of," you confess softly. "Them... or you."

Something in your words spurs him forward, his predatory grace on full display as he rises, his arousal evident against the thin fabric of his boxers. You try to steady your breathing as he approaches with measured steps.

"I will never let those filthy fuckers touch something that's mine," he declares, voice cold and sharp. "And you are mine."

Your slight nod draws his scrutiny. "Still afraid?"

"I believe you're powerful..." you hesitate, "but power itself can be terrifying."

His smile turns razor-sharp as he closes the distance between you, until his breath mingles with yours. "You think I'm a monster."

"I know you are."

His laughter - deep, rich, dangerous - slides down your spine like poisoned silk.

“Everyone’s a monster,” he murmurs. “You just happened to be lucky enough to marry the most dangerous of them all.”

His hands find your thighs. His thumbs drag slowly upward — grazing, pressing, testing. Your robe parts beneath his touch. You feel heat spread like fire through your veins, breath catching as his fingers brush over your hips, then the curve of your waist, the dip between your breasts. Your body trembles, not from fear anymore but from something deeper, more primal.

"Let me pull back the curtain," he whispers against your neck, "and show you what I might give you."

At your subtle nod, he guides you to the bed with the careful precision of someone handling their most precious weapon.

You’re guided gently into his lap — your thighs folding around him, your knees pressed to the mattress, your robe already falling from your shoulders. His hands don’t rush. They devour.

You begin to move — hesitant at first, your hips swaying forward with tentative rhythm, the silk of your underwear dragging against the heat straining beneath his boxers. It’s an unbearable kind of friction, featherlight but charged, as if every breath you take draws fire from the contact.

Jungkook exhales harshly — the sound low, broken — his head tipping back slightly as your hips grind again, slower this time, deeper. His hands stay resting at your thighs for a moment, as though he’s restraining himself, letting you move, letting you lead. But his muscles twitch under your touch, like a storm waiting to shatter the sky.

You find your rhythm. Back and forth, your hips brushing his with increasing urgency, and the softest moan slips from your lips, unbidden — a sound that startles even you.

His reaction is immediate as his mouth trails to your neck, pressing a kiss just below your jaw — hot, open, unhurried — then drifts lower, brushing over the hollow of your throat, your collarbone, teeth grazing so lightly it sends shivers down your spine. He’s not in a rush. He explores you like he’s reading a language he already knows but wants to savor syllable by syllable.

Your breath catches as his lips skim the edge of your bra, teasing the skin above the lace. He doesn't ask. He doesn’t need to. His hands slide up your ribcage, palms wide and reverent, finding the soft swell of your breasts and cupping them through the fabric — thumbs stroking lazily over the thin material, coaxing gasps from your throat like he’s plucking at the strings of some hidden instrument.

Every moan you release feeds the hunger in his eyes. And he’s watching you — every twitch of your hips, every parting of your lips, every flutter of your lashes. It consumes him.

You can feel his arousal beneath you, hot and solid, straining harder with every roll of your body. His hands move again — one gripping your waist with bruising intent, guiding your movements, while the other trails along the curve of your lower back, holding you flush against him.

The rhythm intensifies — friction now slick, pulsing, unbearable. Your thighs tremble. His jaw clenches. Every breath is shared now, your open mouths hovering close, not kissing but just existing in that charged space where desire lives and burns.

You can feel the tension building, hovering at that delicious edge. When he moans - low, guttural, nearly a growl - something inside you shatters. As you arch forward, his hands tighten their grip possessively. You feel yourself unraveling — not with shame, but with the devastating knowledge that no one has ever made you feel like this before.

You’re close — so close — when his hands suddenly shift.

With a strength that feels effortless, Jungkook lifts you in his arms as though you weigh nothing at all, his grip steady beneath your thighs. The motion steals your breath. The loss of rhythm makes your body cry out silently, aching and wanting.

He lays you down onto the bed like he’s placing something sacred — your hair fanning over silk, your skin burning against the cool sheets. The robe hangs loosely at your elbows, forgotten now, as your chest rises and falls with a rhythm that has nothing to do with breath and everything to do with him.

He kneels beside you, his gaze slow and molten, taking in every curve, every tremble, every shiver that escapes you now without resistance.

His hand skims down your stomach — fingers dragging with maddening slowness. The silk of your skin, the shallow dip at your navel, the heat blooming beneath every inch of his touch — he traces it all, not as a man in a hurry, but as one who means to memorize you.

His fingers find the center of your heat, where friction once burned and now aches for more. A gasp escapes your lips as he pauses, his other hand reaching for the clasp of your bra. Before you realize it, your palm presses against his chest, stopping him.

Not yet. Whether from fear, pride, or the need to maintain some control, you can't let go completely. The tension between you crystallizes into something quieter than rejection as he studies you, his expression unreadable.

He leans in, lips brushing your jaw as he speaks in a voice both molten and low. "This act of patience," he murmurs, "is exclusive. For you."

His words sink into your skin more than they reach your ears, and then he moves lower. He doesn’t remove the bra — doesn’t try again — but he does not ignore you. His mouth descends over the lace, hot breath seeping through the delicate fabric. His tongue flicks, teasing just above the cup. Then lower. The edge of your breast. The underside. He kisses there, open-mouthed, savoring the way your body arches, how your thighs tense around nothing.

His hands slide down across your waist, steadying you before moving lower with deliberate intent. You feel him shift, his shoulders slipping between your knees, parting them with a reverence that only makes the air leave your lungs faster.

He presses slow, searing kisses along the inside of your thigh. His fingers draw your underwear aside with maddening control, brushing lightly against sensitive skin before his mouth descends.

The first drag of his tongue is like nothing you were prepared for — slow, wet, deliberate. Your back lifts from the bed as your hand shoots out, gripping the sheets like they might anchor you to the earth.

He moves with the precision of someone who has studied power — who knows exactly how to wield it and when to be cruel with pleasure. His tongue circles slowly, testing you, tasting. Then deeper — firmer. His mouth closes over you, lips parting to suck gently, then harder, then teasing again, and again.

You cry out, a sharp, desperate sound you’ve never heard from your own throat before.

Your hand finds his hair. Your fingers tighten in the dark strands as his rhythm deepens, his moans vibrating against you, low and hungry. Your thighs tremble as your breath breaks apart.Your body begins to spiral faster, helplessly — his tongue working in endless rhythm, his grip steady on your hips as you start to fall apart in his mouth.

You cum like something tearing open inside you — high and hot and trembling — your gasp catching, then breaking, then disappearing entirely as your body arches up into his mouth like it belongs nowhere else.

He maintains his steady devotion, drawing out every wave of pleasure until you lay completely still, breathless and undone beneath him.

When he finally rises, his mouth glistening and eyes dark with pride, he presses one final kiss to the inside of your thigh before meeting your gaze with a satisfied smirk. His voice comes rough with shadow.

"Now that," he purred against your trembling thigh, voice dripping like honey and sin, "was just the beginning of what I can give you."

You wake tangled in silk and shattered moonlight, sin still sticky-sweet on your tongue. Your robe whispers secrets against feverish skin, one sleeve sliding down like a lover's touch, sheets still singing hymns of his warmth. There's an ache threading through your muscles like golden honey, each pulse a reminder of hands that knew too well where to press, where to bruise, where to worship.

The air is thick with him still - spice and shadow and something darker, something that tastes of stolen prayers and midnight confessions. You stare up at a ceiling that gleams like polished bones, willing yourself to forget.

But memory is a cruel mistress. She paints his hands in watercolor bruises across your mind. His mouth - oh god, his mouth - the way he consumed you like you were his last meal, like you were salvation itself. And you? You broke apart like stained glass beneath a light, scattered and sacred and his.

You must have lost your mind.

You press trembling fingers against closed eyes, shame and want warring in your chest like caged birds. It should repulse you - this descent into darkness, this willing fall from grace. Some part of you remembers innocence, remembers when touch meant tenderness instead of torrential need.

But there's a monster living in your ribcage now, purring at the memory of worship wrapped in violence. It remembers the weight of him, the raw intensity of his focus, the way he made devotion feel like damnation.

Have you always been this hollow, waiting to be filled with fire?

The bedroom holds no answers. Just cold marble and colder air, roses drowning in some foreign scent that wasn't there before. Everything's too sharp, too sterile, too vast.

He's gone. Of course he is. Demons never linger for too long. The penthouse feels different now, hollow and cold in his wake. Stepping into the hallway, you're greeted like fine china - precious, pristine, breakable. The world wants its doll back, wants to forget how she shattered in the dark.

There's a ritual waiting by the window: breakfast laid out like an altar. Poached eggs under crystal domes catch morning light like tears. A blood orange bleeds perfectly on white china. Fresh brioche exhales steam into the silence. The Jeon family crest watches from your napkin, judging.

You don't dare touch any of it.A maid ghosts through the room, her "madam" falling too quickly, too properly, gaze skittering away like scattered pearls. Another servant arranges your armor for the day: silk blouse with a collar high enough to hide secrets, modest skirt, pearls to match your cage.

Steam curls from behind the bathroom door, a siren song of hot water and false comfort.Your feet refuse to move. This attention scrapes against your skin like sandpaper wrapped in silk. It's not luxury - it's surveillance dressed in gold leaf.

Watched. Always watched.

Every gesture is a report in waiting. Every bite you don't take will be noted. Every wrinkle in your robe tells stories to ears you'll never see. The mirrors - god, the mirrors - they're everywhere, reflecting your uncertainty in infinite angles until you're drowning in your own discomfort.His presence lingers like smoke, invisible but choking. The walls have eyes, and they all belong to him.

You perch at the table like a bird about to flee, clutching silk around yourself like armor.The perfect breakfast dies slowly in the sunlight.Your appetite fled with the night.

It starts like this: a whisper of rebellion, soft as moth wings against silk. Your fingers find the white peach perfume, its crystal bottle cool and dangerous in your palm. One spritz — delicate, precise — finds your wrist. Another graces its twin. The hollow of your throat accepts the third like a blessing. The scent blooms in the air, all summer-sweet defiance, honeyed memories that curl through empty halls like forgotten prayers. And no one — no one — dares stop you because of some allergies.

These marble halls may cage you in gold and expectations, but they can't dictate the way you smell anymore, can't police the way your bare feet whisper secrets against cold floors. Your robe trails behind you like a queen's cape, leaving echoes of fruit and rebellion in your wake. Deep in your belongings, the black ribbon waits. It remembers you, this small scrap of darkness. It remembers the shape of your defiance.

The silk slides home against your hair and it for a moment it feels like armor. He materializes like a dark fairytale - no warning, no preamble. Just the whispered code at the door and footsteps that paint promises across marble floors. When he enters, the room holds its breath. Storm-cloud presence, predator grace. His skin still gleams from whatever violence he's been courting - white shirt, rain-slick hair and a towel draped carelessly around his neck. Cedar and sweat and danger roll off him in waves.

Your ribbon-bound hair and peach-sweet defiance catch his attention like matches to gasoline. His grin splits the atmosphere. "Miss me, Pesca Mia?"

The Italian drips like honey-coated thorns - My Peach - far too gentle for a man whose smirk could cut glass. You answer with silence, with measured steps past him, with carefully crafted distance.And of course he follows, tigers don't let prey walk away.

"Playing ghost bride still?" His voice chases you down the hall. "We share a home, Peach. Looking at me won't turn you to stone."

But then the air thickens, and his shadow swallows yours whole. His hand finds your wrist - a brand of heat that stops your heart.

He materializes before you, all aristocrat skin and lethal grace. Too close. Not close enough. Your eyes refuse to trace the dangerous landscape of his chest.

"Why?" Confusion bleeds into his voice, softening its edges. "You're my wife, yet you treat me like a stranger."

You meet his gaze at last. Your voice comes arctic cold. "You are."

Two words, quiet as falling snow yet sharp as winter wind. Something flickers in his expression - pain, maybe, before pride swallows it whole. His laugh comes out all broken glass.

"You think I'm desperate for your attention?" Arrogance wraps around his words like armor. "Girls would kill to wear your crown, peach. Don't think you're irreplaceable."

Your silence lingers, though his statemnt stings. He exhales - one sharp breath that carries worlds of frustration. And he urns away like you're not worth the oxygen.

"I won't beg you to claim what's already yours," he mutters, defeat dressed as disdain. "You don't want me? Fine."

His exit is soundless, but it echoes in your bones. The door slams like punctuation. But the halls still whisper of peaches and regret.

IIt's 2:17 a.m. and the universe holds its breath.

Your heartbeat counts time with the expensive clock on the wall, both of you locked in this infinite moment of waiting. Silk sheets coil around you like living things as you sit there, spine straight as a blade, every nerve ending electric with that delicious cocktail of rage and loneliness. The lamp bathes everything in honey-gold light, making shadows dance across the pristine emptiness beside you - a canvas waiting for a body that isn't there.

He hasn't returned. You tried maintaining your cold façade, denying how the empty space beside you slowly hollowed out your chest, how the silence grew unbearable. You called it strategy, convinced yourself it was necessary breathing room. But now? Now you're done waiting. Your fingers find your phone with lethal grace.

Namjoon picks up on the second ring, his voice heavy with sleep yet carrying an edge of anticipation, as if he'd been expecting this call.

"Is he with you?" The words slip out like ice daggers.

The pause speaks volumes. "...No. He's at The Roselace."

Your lashes lower once, slow and dangerous. "A club?"

"Yes." The word hangs there, heavy with implications that flicker like warning lights in the dark. But you stopped needing warnings the moment you tasted rebellion on your tongue. Your voice doesn't just turn to steel. No, it crystallizes into something far more dangerous: diamond-sharp certainty wrapped in velvet menace. "Bring the car around. I want to go."

Another heartbeat of silence, shorter this time. "I'll be outside in five."

Night bleeds neon across rain-slick streets, your revenge wrapped in a dress that fits like a promise. The city's a living thing tonight, all electric pulse and wet concrete confession. And you? You're winter made flesh in the backseat, ankles crossed like loaded guns, while Namjoon pilots the car through streets that taste of destiny. He knows better than to speak - you can't small talk with gathering storms.

Jin materializes at the club entrance like a harbinger, umbrella in hand, face carved from marble. His words fall soft as burial dirt: "Back lounge. Always."

You ghost past him without acknowledgment. Some moments don't need words.

The Roselace wraps around you like sin in silk stockings - all crushed velvet shadows and dripping crystal light. Bass thrums through your bones while bodies write poetry against each other on the dance floor, everything drenched in rose-gold desperation and champagne dreams.

Then the VIP lounge opens its maw and your world tilts sideways. There. Him.

Jeon Jungkook. Sprawled like fallen royalty across black leather, shirt undone like an invitation to sin, silver chain catching light like stolen stars. A glass of scotch hangs from his fingers.

But it's the women that make your blood crystallize. They're draped across him like living jewelry, all velvet curves and sheer promises. Their hands map territories you were claiming last night, lips writing stories against skin that was against yours yesterday. One whispers something that pulls a smirk from him like poison from a wound.

His eyes find yours across the chaos.

And smiles like the devil has just been entertained.

Your body moves without conscious thought - a bullet made of silk and fury. The click of your heels against marble sounds like a countdown to chaos. Your fingers find soft flesh, yanking the nearest woman away from him with the kind of graceless violence reserved for scorned goddesses.

Her shriek pierces the air like shattered crystal. She stumbles backwards, a doll thrown from its perch.

"You selfish, arrogant, fucking idiot-"

His laughter cuts through your rage like a knife through velvet.

"You're so fucking sexy like this," he purrs, voice dripping with dark honey, watching your anger like it's the most exquisite show he's ever seen.

"I swear to God, if I ever see…" The words die in your throat. Because his mouth claims yours like he's signing a contract in sin.

He kisses you like he's trying to steal your soul - all open mouth and wicked smile. One hand cradles your face like you're made of precious things, while the other brands your lower back, pulling you into his lap like you're the missing piece he's been waiting for.

Time stops breathing.The bass still pounds through the walls but the world goes quiet. The women dissolve like smoke. Staff melt into shadows. Even the velvet walls seem to lean away. There's nothing left but the dangerous heat between your teeth and his. He breaks away just enough to trace your bottom lip with his tongue.

"Don't look at me like that in public," he whispers, eyes like molten gold. "I'll forget every rule I've ever learned."

Your palm finds his cheek - not gentle, not cruel but Jungkook only grins wider.

The city blurs past like smeared watercolors as Namjoon guides the car through rain-slicked streets. Jin's profile cuts a careful silhouette against neon-lit windows. The air between you all feels like the moment before lightning strikes.

You're a study in barely contained fury next to Jungkook - all crossed arms and white knuckles, electricity crackling beneath your skin. He's sprawled in his seat like a fallen angel, that split lip you gave him worn like a badge of honor, watching you with the kind of smile that makes devils nervous.

"Still giving me the silent treatment after that kiss?" His voice drips honey-sweet venom.

"Touch another woman," you breathe, each word dipped in ice and promises, “and I will bury your body in the same marble your family worships.”

Up front, Jin's cough shatters the tension. Namjoon's eyes catch yours in the mirror - a flash of pure amusement you choose to ignore.

And Jungkook? He laughs like you've just told him the most delicious secret, leaning in until his breath ghosts across your ear, voice pure sin, "Baby, your jealousy looks better on me than designer suits."

You don't give him the satisfaction of a response. But your traitor pulse skips like a scratched record, and the devil's smile says he knows exactly what he does to you.

A knock that sounds like the universe holding its breath. Like fate writing the first line of a tragedy.

You're poised at the edge of the grand sitting room like a statue carved from anxiety and expensive silk. Your blouse is buttoned to your throat - armor, really. Chandeliers drip gold light like honey. White roses perfume the air with your false hope of Nora coming to visit you too with your family. And then the door opens the past comes crawling in like poison through your veins.

Your mother glides in first - her hairspray a helmet, her lipstick a warning sign in crimson. Then Luca, wearing wealth like a borrowed skin, pressing family obligation against your cheek in a kiss that tastes of nothing. And finally - because the universe has a cruel sense of dramatic timing - your father.

He moves through space like a black hole, warping reality around him. The kind of presence that makes rooms smaller, air thinner, daughters invisible. His suit whispers of faded glory but his eyes? They gleam with collector's greed.

Your flinch is barely perceptible, but Jungkook - beautiful and dangerous - catches the subtle movement like a treasured secret. He's sprawled in his armchair like it's a throne, all devastating grace and calculated nonchalance. Whiskey glass dancing between elegant fingers, watching, waiting. The temperature drops ten degrees when his gaze sharpens.

"Where's Nora?" Your voice plays at lightness. Fails.

Your mother's hand waves away concern like smoke. "Unwell."

Luca's jaw twitches. He won't meet your eyes. Your father has no such restraint.

"Well?" The word drips disdain. "This is all... quaint. But when are you buying me a proper mansion?"

His words splatter against the pristine air like acid on silk.

You straighten your spine. "The Jeons have already given enough."

Jungkook's laugh of disbelief is velvet-wrapped steel.

"Enough?" Your father's scoff could curdle cream. "I gave Jeons my precious daughter. Raised you right. Paid for her schooling. Trained her to speak six damn languages. And they give what? A glorified cottage and few millions on bank account. This is not serious."

Jungkook shifts - barely a movement, but it rewrites gravity. You speak first.

"Don't embarrass us." You aim for ice. Your voice cracks like spring thaw.

Your father whirls. "Since when did you grow fangs, little girl?"

His hand rises - a familiar choreography of pain, promising bruises that would match your designer earrings. But the blow never lands.

Jungkook's fingers wrapped around your father's wrist with quiet, absolute authority - a prophecy written in bone and blood.

“My grandfather raised me with manners,” Jungkook muses, voice soft, “taught me to never strike someone older.” He leans close. "Don't make me disappoint him."

The silence has teeth. Your father's face performs an ugly dance between rage and humiliation. He retreats, inch by inch. Jungkook releases him like dropping something contaminated.

Then, quiet as a blade between ribs: "And don't ever think of hitting my wife."

The room stills. Your mother's face turns to marble while Luca shifts uneasily on his feet.

They retreat like storm clouds dispersing - your father leading with violence still coiled in his shoulders, your mother trailing behind him like winter fog. At the threshold, Luca pauses to mumble an apology before disappearing, leaving only traces of expensive cologne.

When the doors finally close, silence blankets the room like fresh snow. You exhale years of fear.

Jungkook stands beside you, offering neither touch nor words - just his presence, steady as gravity, protective as shelter. In this space where fear once lived, something gentler takes root.

Warmth.

Maybe love isn't some grand revelation inscribed in starlight. Maybe it's quieter than that - like finding shelter during a storm you didn't know was coming.

There was something about that moment in the sitting room. The way his hand caught your father's wrist mid-strike, precise as a knife's edge, gentle as snowfall. Not a word spoken, just the weight of his presence beside you, heavy as gravity and twice as constant.

Protection wrapped in silence. Devotion dressed in designer suits.

And how it caught in your throat - this unfamiliar feeling of being shielded rather than shaped, protected rather than possessed. Like watching a bruise bloom backwards, violence turning to velvet beneath your skin.

You've spent so long being a prize to be won, an asset to be traded. But here, in the aftermath of that infinite moment, you taste something different on your tongue. Something that whispers of possibility, of paperback endings you never dared to want.

Because maybe love isn't about grand gestures or flowery declarations. Maybe it's in the way he caught your flinch like a secret worth keeping. The way he stood guard over your fear without trying to own it. The thought haunts you like perfume, sweet and lingering, as you drift through marble halls in bare feet. Past crystal that catches light like promises, through silence that feels, for once, like peace.

Tonight, you could let the walls down brick by brick. Maybe tonight, you could let the curtain open just a little wider. Not in surrender, but in hope of something softer. Something that tastes less like warfare and more like coming home.

The clock says 11:42 p.m. when you finally allow yourself to move. Your robe slips to the floor like dusk shedding its skin, and you reach for the lingerie that still carries its tag, something delicate and barely-there — lace the color of antique ivory, with ribbon straps that whisper against your shoulders like secrets.

You spray white peach across your collarbone, behind your knees, over your wrists. The scent hovers in the air like the memory of hands you don’t flinch from. You find the black ribbon — a little wrinkled now, a little tired — and tie it loosely in your hair. A small crown. A little defiance. A reminder that this softness is yours to give.

Then — because courage needs ritual — you pour yourself half a glass of wine. You sip it standing by the window, your reflection doubled against the city: bare legs, trembling fingers, a girl sculpted from want and silk and something beginning to resemble hope.

What if I’m allowed to be held gently? the thought hums behind your ribs. What if I’m not just a transaction in pearls?

Tonight, you want more than to be protected like property - you want to be wanted like a woman. You want to feel that warmth again and maybe dare to discover more of it. Setting down your glass with shallow breath, your heart presses against your ribs like a caged bird seeking freedom. Then, with quiet certainty, you call his name. “Jungkook.”

Not a shout, nor a whisper - just your voice carrying through the stillness. And somewhere in the penthouse, you sense the shift in the air, hear the soft footsteps approaching. You wait, your heartbeat marking time in the silence.

  ───────── ౨ৎ ─────────

When the door finally creaks open, the light from the hallway carves his silhouette in gold.

Jungkook enters shirtless, barefoot, and breathing like he ran. The low waistband of his black boxers hugs his hips like sin sewn into fabric. His dark hair is tousled, damp at the ends. His chest gleams faintly from the shower or the gym — you can’t tell — but the muscles move tight beneath his skin as he scans the room, jaw clenched.

"Did something—" His words trail off as he takes in the sight before him.

Laid out across the pale sheets like a prayer wrapped in lace and quiet invitation. The ivory lingerie clings to you like mist, your legs tucked slightly to the side, bare shoulder framed by long hair and black ribbon. One hand holds the edge of the sheet. The other rests over your stomach — steady only in appearance.

You don't speak, simply holding his gaze and letting him take in the sight before him. His breath catches in his throat as he stands motionless, a moment of pure reverence washing over his features. Something raw and unguarded crosses his face, as if witnessing something he'd only dreamed of. You offer a gentle, uncertain smile and reach for him with tentative fingers.

“Jungkook.” A whisper. A gift. Like a flame lit in the darkness.

His expression shifts, tension and panic melting away in a single breath. What replaces it is hunger - not the violent kind that devours, but the kind that worships.

“Fuck,” he breathes, crossing the room like gravity commanded it. “Do you even know what you look like right now?”

You open your mouth to answer, but the words catch as he drops to the edge of the bed, body sinking against yours in one fluid, dangerous motion.

His skin is hot — all over, everywhere. His thigh presses to yours, bare and hard. His hands hover at your waist like he’s afraid to touch too much. But his eyes... his eyes consume.

“Say it again,” he whispers, voice hoarse.

You swallow. You’re trembling now, but it’s not from fear. “I wanted you here.”

That breaks the last thread of his restraint. His mouth finds yours in a kiss that starts tenderly - cautious at first, his hand cupping your cheek with careful reverence. But when you respond, matching his intensity, the gentleness gives way to something deeper, more urgent.

Your arms wind around his shoulders, your body pressing to his instinctively, lips parting under the low groan that leaves him like the last tether snapped.

That’s when he loses himself. His body crushes into yours, warmth and weight and scent — white peach still fresh on your throat, and he moans against your mouth like it’s the first time he’s ever been given something soft.

Is this what it means to be wanted? you think, dizzy under the weight of him.

His hand slides down to your hip, then your thigh, pulling you closer, and you feel it — his arousal, hard and unmistakable, pressing between your legs through the thin barrier of his boxers.

You gasp softly into his mouth. He pulls back, just enough to whisper — breath ragged, lips brushing yours. “You have no idea what you do to me, Peach.”

He leans down and begins trailing kisses down your throat, hot breath dragging over your skin, and then his fingers move to the front clasp of your bra — slow, teasing — as if asking silently. You nod once, breath catching in your throat as the fabric falls away. He pauses, eyes darkening with desire as he takes in the sight of you. With a low, reverent sound, his mouth finds your breast - tongue teasing your nipple with exquisite tenderness until you arch up against him, fingers threading through his hair.

"Jungkook," you breathe, voice trembling.

"Yeah?" he murmurs against your skin. "Want more, baby?"

He switches to the other side, tongue dragging in a spiral before sucking — hard. The sound that leaves your throat isn’t gentle. He groans in approval then he’s back at your lips again, devouring you now, and his hand slides between your legs, palm pressing against the damp lace.

“Shit. You’re already this wet?”

Your hips buck as his fingers slip past the fabric, dip down, find you with terrifying precision. He circles once, testing. “Let me hear you,” he whispers against your mouth. He sinks one finger in and you cry out softly — not from pain, but from the sudden fullness.

“So tight,” he breathes, “fuck—” and adds another. He curls them both — slow, precise, devastating — and your body trembles like silk beneath a storm.

You gasp, head tipping back into the pillows, eyes fluttering shut as his fingers stroke deeper, searching and finding the ache you never let yourself name. His mouth is at your neck again, tongue warm, breath hotter. He doesn’t rush and doesn’t demand. He explores you like he’s learned you — like every moan, every arch of your back, is a sacred response he’s waited lifetimes to unlock.

The pressure builds, low and thick, like a fire rolling beneath your skin. His palm grinds against the base of you with every push, every curl, and it lights you up from the inside — slow-burning, tender, terrifying.

“That’s it,” he whispers, lips dragging against your throat. “Let go. Just feel me.”

And so you surrender to it completely, allowing yourself this precious first taste of freedom. You let go of the shame, the cold hands of your past, the bruises you were told to hide and the hunger you were told to deny. You let go of every time you were touched only to be controlled, looked at only to be priced. Because this is different - his mouth leaving trails of reverence across your skin, his voice a mixture of raw need and gentle wonder.

This is the silk of your thighs shaking against the sharp cut of his rings, and the way he slows his fingers just when your breath catches — just to listen to the sound of you breaking open.

And in the chaos of it, a thought blooms. You feel good. The revelation hits like lightning in slow motion. God, you feel so good. You didn’t know it could feel like this. Like warmth without danger. Like pleasure without debt. Like being touched and not owned, kissed and not erased.

His lips find yours again, and this time it’s deeper — slow and thick and intoxicating. He kisses you like a man no longer teasing, but claiming. You moan into his mouth, your fingers tangled in his hair, nails grazing his neck. He groans low, a vibration that pulses down his chest, straight through to the way his fingers curl again, firmer this time.

“You feel this?” he breathes against your lips, his voice barely coherent. “How your body’s taking me so fucking sweet? You were made for this.”

You whimper — a sound of surrender, of disbelief, of joy. You’re trembling now, the pleasure cresting fast, and he knows it. He sees it. He watches you fall apart under him like he’s watching art come to life.

“You’re close, aren’t you?” he murmurs, nose brushing your cheek. “Let me see you fall, baby. Let me feel you break.”

And when he whispers “Come for me, Peach,” the world splits open. Your thighs tense. Your breath stutters. And the moan that spills from your lips is broken and holy, like a prayer finally answered. Your body pulses around his fingers, over and over, as he coaxes every wave from you, patient and wicked and tender.

He doesn’t stop until you collapse back into the pillows, breathless, limbs heavy, the world spinning in white peach and warmth. You blink up at the ceiling, then at him, marveling at how the space between you finally feels like sanctuary instead of battlefield. Though familiar with pain, this experience is different. For the first time, pleasure flows through you without guilt or fear, and you find yourself yearning for more, unashamed of your desire.

You’re still trembling in the aftermath, breaths shallow, lips parted, your whole body drawn tight like silk thread loosened from its spool.

Jungkook kisses your throat — soft, slow — and you feel his breath against your skin, warm with awe, not just desire. His hand strokes gently along your thigh, then stills. For a moment, he just watches you.

You nod, breath trembling, body already molded to his heat. He shifts lower, moving from your mouth to the space between your legs, his skin brushing yours in a trail of quiet possession. The soft rustle of fabric draws your gaze downward — his boxers sliding off his hips with effortless ease, revealing him fully.

Your breath catches, but you don’t look away. The sight of him — aroused, bare, utterly unashamed — steals the rhythm from your lungs. There’s fear, yes, curled low in your belly like something primal and unspoken, but it’s laced with something stronger, deeper: anticipation that feels like hunger, and the dizzying ache of knowing there’s no going back.

He sees the shift in your eyes — the tension, the heat, the way your thighs press together unconsciously — and his gaze grows darker, steadier. There’s no smirk now, no cocky remark, just quiet reverence carved into every line of his face as he settles over you, breath warming the skin below your ear.

“Tell me if you want to stop,” he says, voice rough but patient. “I’ll never take what you won’t give.”

You swallow, fingers curled around the sheets. “I want it,” you whisper. “I want you.”

And God, the look in his eyes — something wounded, something honored — like he’s trying not to fall apart just from hearing you say that. He kisses you again, slower this time. His hand cups your cheek. You feel him guide himself to your entrance, his length brushing against the soft slickness between your thighs. He presses forward, just the tip, and you gasp — a sound that’s more surprise than pain.

“Breathe,” he murmurs. “Let me take care of you.”

You inhale, long and slow, and when he begins to push in deeper, you feel the stretch — unfamiliar, thick, slow. Your body adjusts to him inch by inch, heat curling deep in your belly as he moves inside you, every second filled with breathless restraint.

“Fuck,” he groans, burying his face in your neck, “you’re so fucking tight—so warm—it’s driving me insane.”

You whimper as he settles fully inside you, his hips finally flush against yours. He doesn’t move at first — just stays there, forehead against yours, eyes half-closed.

“You’re doing so well,” he whispers. “So fucking perfect, Peach.”

You shift your hips slightly, and the sensation ripples through you like wildfire. “Move,” you breathe. “Please.”

His first thrust is slow, careful. He draws out almost entirely, then presses back in — deep, deliberate, letting you feel every inch. The rhythm is slow at first, aching and tender. Every time he sinks into you, you moan softly, your fingers clutching his shoulders, legs trembling as they wrap tighter around his waist.

“That’s it,” he groans. “Take me, baby. Let me in deeper.”

“You feel so good,” you whisper, dazed. “It’s… it’s so much—”

“You can take it,” he breathes against your mouth. “You were made for me.”

His rhythm builds. Not frantic, not rough — just sure. Deep. Intentional. You feel every part of him, each thrust grinding you deeper into the mattress. His name spills from your lips like confession. His hands grip your hips tighter as you start to move with him, arching, circling, giving as much as you take.

“You’re perfect like this,” he whispers, panting against your shoulder. “So fucking wet, so tight—fuck. You were made to take me.”

You moan louder — the sound shameless, raw, a full-body ache turned into voice. The pleasure builds so fast it almost frightens you. Your walls pulse around him, fluttering each time he hits that spot inside you that makes the world collapse.

He thrusts deeper now, hips snapping with desperate rhythm, sweat-slick skin slapping against yours. The room fills with the sound of skin meeting skin, of breath and moans and curses bitten between kisses.

You can feel the edge. You’re tumbling toward it, helpless to stop.

He starts to move faster — still careful, but no longer holding back. Your moans rise to meet his as he thrusts deeper, fuller, the wet sound of him filling you over and over echoing through the room, joined by skin meeting skin and both your voices breaking into the air like shattered stars.

“You’re mine,” he growls, each thrust harder, rougher now, “say it—say it.”

“I’m yours,” you gasp, legs tightening, eyes rolling back. “Only yours.”

Your climax builds like a storm held too long behind trembling sky — not sudden, but rising, demanding, layered with sensation you can barely hold.

Every thrust winds you tighter, every kiss unravels something old in your chest, every whispered word — you’re mine, you feel so fucking good, you were made for this — leaves you burning, open, filled. Your nails dig into his back as your moans dissolve into his mouth, thighs trembling around his waist. And then — it hits. Hard, deep, unstoppable.

Your body arches into him as if trying to fuse, your cry breaking against his lips like something holy, too raw to be pretty, too intense to be silent. The wave doesn’t crest — it shatters, again and again, your walls pulsing around him as pleasure rushes over you in waves so sharp it almost hurts. You barely register the curse he chokes into your neck, the way his rhythm breaks.

His hands grip your hips — tight, desperate — and he buries himself to the hilt one last time, hips jerking as he spills inside you with a guttural groan that shakes you to the bone. The sound he makes is not triumphant — it’s wrecked, torn from his throat like he was holding it back too long. His forehead drops to yours, breath trembling, body shivering as he rides the aftershocks with you still wrapped tight around him.

When he finally pulls out, you whimper from the loss. He kisses your lips to soothe you, then your shoulder, then your hip. Then he lies beside you, pulling you to his chest, both of you still catching your breath. You wrap your arms around him. Your leg stays hitched over his waist, like your body doesn’t know how to stop holding him.

His hand rubs lazy circles into your back. “You okay?” he whispers.

You nod against his skin. And for the first time in your life — in this warm, slow silence — you feel safe. And maybe, just maybe…

…a little bit loved.

Stillness hits different in the morning-after glow. And then there's the heat between your hips, like your body's keeping secrets from last night.

The black ribbon is tangled in the linen near your waist half-unraveled, like a confession. The air's thick with white peach and memory, and you're breathing it all in like it might disappear if you don't.

Love. The word sits in your chest like a bird that forgot how to be afraid. Is this it? This quiet after the storm, where nothing hurts and everything's warm and your body remembers kindness instead of fear? Where peace isn't just a pretty lie people tell in daylight?

His voice reaches you first - all sleep-rough and commanding, drifting through the penthouse like smoke. He's on the phone somewhere in the kitchen, words too far to catch but tone saying everything.

The silk of your robe whispers against your skin as you tie it. Your feet carry you toward his voice like you're caught in the undertow of last night's tenderness. Maybe you just want to see him. Maybe you just need to know this isn't another beautiful dream your mind made up. Maybe it's because for once, someone held you like you wouldn't shatter. You turn the corner.

And you stop.

You find yourself frozen in the archway, dawn's first light painting you in half-shadows. He hasn't noticed you yet.

There he stands - a study in contradictions. Bare chest catching morning light, sweatpants riding low, silver chain kissing his throat like a whispered threat. His shower-damp hair curls at the nape of his neck, soft in a way that makes your heart ache. The untouched water glass in his hand trembles slightly.

But his voice - winter steel now, nothing like the honey-warm murmurs from last night. All sharp angles and cold professionalism. You clutch your robe tighter, silk whispering against your skin like a warning. The transformation happens in heartbeats - his tone flattening, sharpening, becoming something familiar in its danger. Like watching a knife being unsheathed.

"No." The word falls like ice. "Don't bring him in." Silence stretches, taut as piano wire. "Leave him where he is. I'll handle it myself."

Glass meets marble with a gentle accusation. "I said leave him. Yoongi—this one's mine."

He turns, and time stops breathing. There you stand, a portrait in morning light - bare feet on cold floors, white silk clinging to last night's memories, hair still tangled with black ribbon. Peach perfume hangs between you like a broken promise.

The call ends abruptly, leaving silence to crystallize between you like. His phone finds its place on the counter with deliberate casualness. He shrugs, voice light as smoke. "What?"

Words fail you. Your eyes speak volumes. "It sounded like you were giving an order," you whisper, throat desert-dry. "To kill someone."

The pause that follows feels ancient. His response comes without hesitation even thought you see slight regret in his eyes. "I was."

Words echo through the kitchen like a shot that didn’t need a bullet. Your breath hitches before you realize it’s even left you, chest tightening under the satin tie of your robe. The morning light has turned unforgiving now — too clear, too sharp, too holy for a confession like that to survive without tearing something apart.

He doesn’t blink. Doesn’t shift. Just watches you with that maddening, polished calm — the kind that doesn’t come from confidence but from certainty. The certainty of someone who has never had to regret his actions because power paved over everything that came after them. Jungkook stands there in black sweatpants and bare skin, the picture of a man too rich to be touched by consequence, too young to be so terrifyingly composed.

And you realize it — fully, bone-deep — that last night, you kissed a man who was capable of this. You let him touch your body with hands that break other men open. You slept in the arms of someone who casually decides whether another heart should keep beating.

You let him inside you. And he’s let death inside himself.

“I…” Your voice breaks like glass against tile.

He tilts his head slightly, unreadable. “Are you surprised?”

You open your mouth to speak, but nothing comes out. He takes a step closer, but it’s not enough to reach you. Just enough to feel the weight of his presence settling into your skin like smoke.

“I never lied,” he says, quieter now. “You called me a monster. I never disagreed.”

You want to scream. You want to shake him, claw your way out of this invisible trap you’ve stumbled into, this house with velvet floors and bleeding walls, this man who kissed you like worship and murders without flinching.

“I know,” you whisper, and it’s all you can manage. “It’s just—”

The sentence never lands. It crumbles halfway through, pulled down by the gravity of your throat tightening. Your face crumples, lashes wet before you even know what you’re crying over — the shattered illusion or the horror of having ever believed in it. Tears spill silently down your cheeks as your trembling fingers fail to wipe them away.

“I was so stupid,” you whisper, and your knees almost give. “I am just so fucking stupid.”

He takes another step forward. His voice is softer now, unsure. “Y/N—”

“Don’t come near me!” It tears out of you like thunder, shrill and broken and sharp. He halts, hands open at his sides, stunned — and something flickers in his eyes then. Not guilt. Not remorse. Just something… hurt.

“You knew what I was,” he says, his voice rising now too, cracking like heat through glass. “Don’t look at me like I’ve changed. I didn’t pretend to be anyone else.”

You can’t stop the shaking. You want to run and tear and scream and break all the mirrors that ever told you this was safety. “I know. I just—I didn’t know it would feel like this,” you cry, wiping at your face with the back of your hand. “I didn’t know I’d be the kind of girl who could fall for someone who kills people like it’s breakfast.”

He flinches. “You think this is easy for me?”

Your laugh is bitter, strangled. “Easy? It’s not normal to kill, Jungkook. It’s rotted. I guess I thought—God, I guess I was just confused. Maybe I mistook this all for love because I never saw love before? And maybe I am just broken—maybe I let you touch me and hold me and fuck me because I don’t know what else love could feel like.”

Silence slams into the room again. He stands there, chest rising, jaw tight.

"Could I ever be with someone like you?" you whisper, wiping under your eyes. "A man who deals in death? No. What you offer... this isn't love. This is just velvet and guns. And God help me, I got lost in how good they felt."

You turn then, robe twisting around your legs, footsteps already thudding back toward the bedroom before he can speak. “Y/N, don’t—”

“Don’t follow me!” you scream from the hallway, a sob catching on your throat. “I can’t even breathe around you anymore.”

For a moment, you hear nothing. Just the hum of the fridge. The distant city beyond the window. The silence that only comes after something inside you snaps. Then his voice, low and bitter behind you, cutting through the air like frost on glass.

“This is life,” he says, not loud, but deep enough to sink. “You’re either prey or predator. You think marrying a monster’s hard? Believe me, you wouldn’t want to be married to a coward.” You hear the door close seconds later.

He’s gone.

The bedroom is filled with lingering traces of your shared intimacy. Of everything that happened between midnight and morning — the black ribbon fallen half beneath the bed, the white peach still clinging to the hem of your robe, the echo of hands and lips and breath where silence now smothers it all.

You stand there for a while, motionless in the center of the room, one hand pressed to your lips like that might keep the sobs down. But they claw their way up anyway — low, gut-wrenching sounds that don’t belong to any version of yourself you’ve ever let survive.

Your fingers tremble as you reach for the edge of the dresser. It’s instinctive, almost mechanical — the way you slide the drawer open, the way your hand curls around the strap of your old black backpack, the one you brought with you the day you arrived. It still smells faintly of Switzerland, of pressed notebooks and old perfume and snow.

Your body moves with the strange grace of someone else's strings - mechanical poetry written in desperate motion. Each movement is sharp, decisive, divorced from thought. Clothes tumble into the backpack like falling stars, necessities gathered by muscle memory while your mind screams white noise. Underwear. Blouse. Jeans. The basics of a life you're trying to rebuild, tossed together like a prayer. Your hands work faster than your heartbeat, racing against the clock of his inevitable return. You have to go - have to run - before his gravity pulls you back into orbit, before the dangerous warmth of him seeps back into your bones and turns your resolve to stardust.

With trembling fingers, you slip your ring off and place it on the marble counter of his bathroom beside his cologne. The note you write by hand comes out unsteady, the paper remaining crumpled as your shaking hands set down the pen.

If I ever meant anything to you, please don’t come after me. Let me go in peace. Let me have whatever life I can build without this. Don’t ruin it.

Your signature lingers at the bottom of the note, an inked farewell that feels heavy with finality. Placing it gently on his pillow, you turn away from the life you're leaving behind, knowing there's no turning back now.

The elevator descent feels like falling, each floor counting backwards as seconds slip by like shards of glass against your spine. When you reach the street, a grey and uncaring sky looms overhead as you step into a taxi, hood drawn up and voice carefully controlled while giving the driver your destination.

In the silence that follows, only the steady hum of tires and the blur of an indifferent city keep you company. Your phone's screen blazes too bright as you retrieve it with trembling hands. You try your sister first - one ring, two rings, then voicemail. You end the call before leaving a message.

When you dial Luca next, the four rings that pass before he answers feel heavy with unspoken weight.

"Luca," you whisper, voice trembling, "I left him. I need to come home."

There's a heavy silence before his voice comes through, flat and serious in a way that makes your stomach drop.

"You can't come home, Y/N. If Father finds out you walked out, he'll kill you."

His words carry no drama or shock - just the bleak certainty of someone intimately familiar with their father's nature.

"But where can I go?" Your voice breaks.

He exhales slowly before responding, "I'll send you an address. I have an apartment no one knows about. You can stay there while we figure things out."

"An apartment? I don't understand, when did you even…"

"Don't ask questions," he cuts in, his tone growing darker. "Just get off the street. Now."

The line goes dead and a message appears moments later - coordinates falling into your phone like a stone into still water. You read the address twice, memorizing it before turning to the driver.

He nods at your new instructions, changing course as the indifferent city slides past your window.

And then—time fractures like glass beneath winter's first frost. The world lurches sideways, reality splintering at its seams. The door bursts open with a thunderous crash, shattering the silence. Dark figures emerge as rough hands grab you, pressing a chemical-soaked cloth against your face.

You fight with every ounce of strength, your body thrashing against the iron grip of your captors. But the chemical-laden cloth works quickly, and consciousness begins to slip away like all the maybes you’’ll never get to live. The world around you blurs and distorts, reality folding in on itself until finally, mercifully, everything fades to black.

.

.

there’s a second and final part already finished and available exclusively here

(if you have any issues with it - message me directly, not anon pls)

your feedback means the world to me. 🖤

[astrofaeology]

Venus in the Signs

paid readings | masterlist

ᡣ𐭩 Please support me by reposting, liking, following me and commenting your placement. Venus in the natal chart represents love, romance and luxury. Knowing your venus placement can help you understand what type of beauty/love language you have.

0º is the degree which doesn't have a coresponding sign assigned to it. It's a fresh new degree and will amplify the themes of the sign that it's in

Aries (1,13,25º) Your approach to love is characterised by a straightforward, bold, and exuberant energy that frequently leads to you falling in love quickly and pursuing your desires with unwavering devotion. You don't hang around; you connect with a powerful sense of competition, appreciating the excitement of a new romance and the thrill of the chase. However, due to your impulsivity, you may get into partnerships without much consideration and occasionally become disenchanted once the initial spark has faded. You are drawn to strong, self-sufficient individuals who share your zest for life and are not afraid to take risks. You value a partner who understands your need for freedom and adventure, and you express your feelings in an honest, direct, and occasionally open manner.

Taurus (2, 14, 26°) The experience of love is incredibly affectionate, stable, and sensual. You appreciate tangible signs of love like physical contact, appealing surroundings, and the stability that comes with a committed partnership. You are searching for comfort, reliability, and long-term relationships. You enjoy sharing the finer things in life, like delicious food, art, the outdoors, and luxurious comforts, with your partner. Your enduring dedication and desire to create a secure, peaceful home environment are signs of your affection. Once you've settled into a comfortable pattern, you might struggle with possessiveness or an inability to adapt because change can be upsetting.

Gemini (3, 15, 27°) You prefer fascinating convosations and intellectual hobbies, thus your love language is witty and cheeky. You flourish with partners who can keep up with your quick-witted, curious mind and engage you in a wide range of topics; you require diversity, freedom, and an open mind in your relationships. Clever teasing, exchanging ideas, and a never-ending desire for new experiences—whether travelling to new countries or learning new things together—are all ways to express your love for one another. When it comes to long-term commitment, the issue may be a sense of emotional detachment, as you may intellectualise your thoughts rather than genuinely express them, as well as restlessness or hesitation. You need a spouse who understands your need for independence and intellectual stimulation.

Cancer (4, 16, 28°) indicates a loving, sensitive, and deeply emotional heart, in which you prioritise profound security and a strong emotional attachment over all else. You are extremely compassionate and protective of those you love, frequently acting as a carer in partnerships. Your feelings are conveyed through acts of kindness, genuine empathy, and a strong desire to establish a safe, caring family environment. You place a high emphasis on tradition, family, and a sense of belonging, frequently forging lifelong bonds. However, your strong emotional nature might lead to moodiness, clinginess, or lingering on past hurts, and it may take you a long time to trust and open up completely to a new relationship.

Leo (5, 17, 29°) Your love style is passionate, generous, and a little dramatic; you frequently seek to be the centre of attention in your relationships. You show your love grandly, with sweeping gestures, impassioned statements, and a desire to make your spouse feel truly special and cherished. You thrive on adoration and acclaim, and you require a partner who values your charisma and originality and places you on a pedestal. You place a high value on loyalty and demand nothing less in return. While your warmth and compassion are evident, you might be prone to jealously if you feel unappreciated or overlooked, and your pride may make it tough to confess mistakes.

Virgo (6, 18° ) implies a realistic, committed, and analytical approach to love, in which you express your passion by acts of service, thoughtful gestures, and unshakeable attention to detail. You are extremely supportive and helpful, and you frequently display your love by attempting to improve or simplify your partner's life. You cherish dependability, efficiency, and a companion who understands your need for order and self-improvement. While your commitment is strong, your analytical side can often lead to being overly critical of yourself and your lover, or to overthinking emotions rather than simply experiencing them. You're looking for a spouse who is grounded, intellectual, and appreciates your diligence.

Libra (7, 19°) Harmony, balance, and partnership are essential in your relationships. You exude a polite, diplomatic, and fair-minded demeanour, always working to create a tranquil and aesthetically beautiful atmosphere. You value mutual respect, teamwork, and shared experiences. Your feelings are manifested through a sophisticated appreciation for beauty, a willingness to compromise, and an innate capacity to make others feel at ease and cherished. You may struggle with indecision, a strong desire to avoid disagreement at all costs, and a tendency to prioritise your partner's demands over your own, which can lead to people-pleasing behaviour.

Scorpio( 8, 20°) suggests an intense, passionate, and genuinely faithful love nature, in which you seek deep emotional and psychological bonds. You are drawn to the enigmatic, profound, and transforming parts of a relationship, looking for a connection that goes deeper than the surface. Your feelings are conveyed through unwavering loyalty, intense intimacy, and a yearning to join souls with your spouse. You place the highest emphasis on honesty and authenticity, and you fiercely protect those you care about. This intensity, however, might emerge as possessiveness, jealousy, and a proclivity for power conflicts, since you are strongly affected by betrayals and carry grudges.

Sagittarius (9, 21°) Your love life is defined by a fun-loving, free-spirited, and adventurous personality. You want intellectual connection and shared experiences, valuing honesty, freedom, and a partner who will accompany you on your many life adventures. You are drawn to open-minded people who share your enthusiasm for learning, travel, and philosophical talks. Your affections are communicated through optimism, shared laughter, and a sense of community, which frequently blends friendship and romance. The difficulty for you may be a fear of commitment, restlessness that prevents you from feeling tied down, and, on occasion, emotional detachment as you prioritise freedom and progress over intimate closeness.

Capricorn (10, 22º) reflects a solid, practical, and slightly guarded approach to love. You take relationships seriously, looking for long-term commitment, stability, and a partner that exemplifies maturity and dependability. You are typically cautious in love, preferring to lay a solid foundation over time rather than rush into things. Your affections are conveyed through responsibility, loyalty, and a modest but intense commitment, which frequently prioritises your partner's safety and your shared destiny. You value prestige, achievement, and tradition and are drawn to those who are ambitious and respected. The possible problem here is appearing cold or distant because you may struggle to openly express your emotions, as well as a preference for profession or public image over emotional vulnerability.

Aquarius (11, 23°) Love is a warm, unusual, and intellectual affair in which you respect uniqueness and open-mindedness in your interactions. You are drawn to folks who are unusual, clever, and progressive, and who can challenge your thinking while still sharing your humanitarian beliefs. Your feelings are conveyed through common interests, fascinating interactions, and a respect for personal autonomy within the partnership. You often combine friendship and romance, and you may choose unorthodox relationship patterns. The issue can be a propensity towards emotional detachment, as you may prioritise intellectual connection above real intimacy, as well as an element of unpredictability in your romantic gestures as you resist being constrained by traditional expectations.

Pisces (12, 24°) Your love is passionately romantic, sympathetic, and extremely idealistic. You long for a soulmate, someone with whom you can have a spiritual and sympathetic tie. Your feelings are communicated through deep empathy, unconditional love, and a readiness to make sacrifices for the person you care about. You are artistic, imaginative, and extremely sensitive, always seeing the best in others and fantasising about an ethereal, perfect link. As a result of your unlimited idealism, you may be easily hurt, prone to martyrdom, or ignore red flags in relationships. You may also be prone to escapism, preferring romantic fantasies to everyday realities.

DISCLAIMER: None of my posts are intended to cause strife and if it doesn't resonate leave it. This post is a generalisation and may not resonate. I recommend you get a reading from an astrologer (me). If you want a reading from me check out my sales page.

[furiousgalaxygoatee]

Was bored, made Fade from Valorant cuz she's hot.

Made with https://www.heroforge.com