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froggyfantasy · 7 months ago

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shadowbound- john price x reader

part i: prague - the patch had been left on your doorstep two months ago, the threat clear. it was a warning, the only headstart you were going to get.

word count: 4.2k tags/warnings: language, assassination attempt, abduction, brief torture, allusions to ghost's backstory. price is an asshole and reader is a menace. afab reader.

notes: is it overly ambitious of me to start two series at the same time? probably. am i gonna do it anyway? absolutely. idk what this is really, i just wanted to do a bit of a reader on the lam kinda thing, bit of a hunter/hunted dynamic ;)

Prague had been an impulse decision. A dart thrown at a map, a large city with a population over a million, a booming tourism industry, and plenty of places to hide. A fake passport had gotten you over the border easily enough, but with how far you wanted- needed- to run, only the real deal was getting you out.

Which is how you find yourself sitting at a quaint cafe on the river, exposed and anxious, trying your level best to pretend to be a normal person, a regular nine-to-fiver just enjoying a cup of overly priced and overly sweet coffee and a danish the kind cashier had sweet-talked you into buying. The key word being trying, because you're anything but a nine-to-fiver- you're not normal, and you shouldn't be here, out in the open and so fucking vulnerable.

You need the documents you'd paid way too much for too badly to leave.

So you sit there, sweeping the area again as you sip your coffee, willing your rapidly bouncing knee and the fingers tapping against perforated cast aluminum to be fucking still. You try to quell the rapid staccato of your heartbeat drumming painfully against your ribs, to fill your lungs with careful, measured inhales, to expel the anxiety in each exhale. It doesn't work. It never works. Your knee continues to bounce, your fingers continue to tap, your eyes continue to dart across every face you see until you settle on them.

Two men sitting at a table nearby, clearly trying to blend in as much as you are but far too tense for the early morning ambiance of a quiet Prague cafe, and oh god, are they looking at you? They're dressed casually, but the way they hold themselves screams military. Danger. Your shoulders tense as you lift your gaze from them to pretend you're just looking around, but your knee finally goes still as you prepare yourself to run.

Even more concerning than the men, though, is the slightest glint of light you see atop one of the buildings across the street.

Fuck. You're moving without thinking about it, clearing the railing surrounding the patio half a second before the shot splits the air and a bullet lodges in the wall near where your head had just been. Startled screams, muffled by the blood rushing in your ears, shatter the still tranquility, and you have to duck as the brickwork you're sprinting past explodes under the impact of another bullet.

Rapid heartbeat pulsing more adrenaline through your veins, you duck down the nearest alleyway you pass, another shot striking the ground behind you as you run full-tilt toward the railing you can see at the far end of the alley, blocking the short drop to the river below. A gruff voice yells something, but you pay it no mind as you jump, planting a sure foot on the iron and launching into the air. You suck in as deep a breath as you can manage, straightening your entire body into one sleek line as you plunge down into the icy water of the Vltava.

The shock of the cold nearly punches the air right back out of your lungs. You fight the heavy drag of your clothes as you swim up, gasping in a breath when your head breaks the surface- you're relatively safe for now, their sightline blocked by the buildings lining the river and the levees along the bank, but you only have so long before they find a new vantage point and a lot less cover in the water.

The chatter of your teeth aches deep in your jaw as you swim to the opposite side of the river, hauling yourself up the levee. Ignoring the surprised noises of the people walking along the bank you spare one last glance behind you, scanning the horizon for another scope flash and disappearing into the crowd when you don't find one.

As you wind through the gaggle of tourists and locals alike, people side-stepping out of your path and giving you curious looks as they take in your sopping state, you keep your head on a swivel, fully aware of your environment even as your mind races a mile a minute. Given how easily you'd been found at the cafe, it feels safe to assume your apartment had been compromised- not that you kept much there, your important belongings packed away in a backpack at the train station for situations just like this. In that vein, it also raises the possibility that your contact had been burned, too, and you were going to have to figure out another way out of this damn country. That is a complication, an irritation, but also a thought for later.

Right now, you need to get your bag and get the hell out of this city.

The train station is relatively packed this time of day, people boarding and unboarding en masse on their way to work or wherever else they spend their days, and it's easy to blend in despite your still dripping clothes, winding through the crowd until you reach a tall row of orange lockers. You fit the key into the lock on yours when you crouch down, pulling out your go bag and giving it a quick once over before zipping it back up and tossing the key down in the bottom of the locker.

With your lifeline secured and a heavy sigh you rise, slinging your pack over your shoulder and turning… and freezing.

You're staring down the barrel of a gun, and one of the men from the cafe is holding it. Wide eyes travel up the suppressor, over the sleek black body of the pistol, to assess the man, quickly taking in stern blue eyes under a black toque, mouth set into a scowl amidst a a questionable beard choice, brown mutton chops shot through with salt and pepper. He has a broad build- broad shoulders, broad chest, with brawny arms and thick, powerful thighs. He looks like a man who could crack you in half without breaking a sweat, and his partner, a few steps behind him with a weapon of his own, is built the same with his own questionable hair situation, dark hair shorn into a mohawk of all things.

Well, you can't help but think as you slowly raise your hands to show that they're empty, if I'm about to die at least my executioners are nice to look at.

"Who are you?" Mohawk barks in a thick Scottish brogue, piercing blue eyes fixed as firmly on you as his gun is.

"Does it matter?" you answer carefully, and you can tell they're not expecting an American accent by the way Mutton Chops inhales sharply, drawing your gaze back to him, to the weapon still pointed between your eyes. "You can't detain me like this, I've done nothing wrong."

"You were shot at in broad daylight on a crowded street," Mutton Chops growls back, and you can't help but flinch at that. Now that you're not in active danger- from that threat, at least- you wonder if anyone had gotten hurt in your attempts to get away from the sniper. "You can imagine why we might have some questions. Starting with your name."

His tone suggests there's no room for argument but you mull it over for a moment all the same, narrowing your eyes at him. Blood zings copper against your tongue as you chew the inside of your cheek, considering whether you should answer, lie, or just keep your mouth shut.

The decision is made for you when Mutton Chops' finger shifts on the trigger guard. You spit your name out through gritted teeth, eyes flitting between both men as you weigh the odds of getting away if you just hit them with your backpack and make a run for it. Low, if your assessment of them at the cafe had been correct and they are military. You'd probably be dead before you got the first strap off your shoulders.

"Why were ye bein' shot at?" Mohawk again, eyes cold and calculating as he sizes you up. He doesn't look like he quite knows what to make of you or this situation you'd all found yourself in.

"Ask the cunt who shot at me," you snap, and you regret it in an instant when the barrel of the gun closes those last couple of inches to press to press to your forehead. You shrink back at the cold, unforgiving kiss of steel, trying to gain some semblance of distance, but all it does is bump your backpack against the lockers behind you. This draws attention to your pack, and before you can blink Mutton Chops is grabbing you by the arm and yanking you around, pulling your backpack off with one hand and tossing it to Mohawk, the other firm between your shoulder blades as he shoves you into the lockers. Fuck. It takes everything in you to keep your cool, turning your head to look at them from the corner of your eye. "Fucking hell, at least ask before you manhandle me-"

"Shut up." The hand on your back pushes harder, forcing you to exhale with a soft wheeze. Mohawk is digging through your backpack, and your heart leaps into your throat when he pulls out your gun. The suppressed pistol touches the back of your neck in response to the discovery, stormy blue eyes meeting what little of yours he can see.

"Wha's this, then?" the Scot asks, holding up your P890 with a raised brow and a harsh frown.

"You were holdin' one not two minutes ago and you don't know what a gun is?" Pissing them off is a bad, bad idea, but you can't help the sarcastic comment that slips from your mouth. Mohawk's lips press into a tight, irritated line. The gun digs in- right at the base of your skull, where your spine meets your cranium. It'll be quick at least, painless probably, but right now that bite of metal hurts. "Ow, fuck-"

"Quiet." Mutton Chops pushes harder, and you whimper as the metal of what feels like a combination lock digs painfully into your chest. From the corner of your eye you see him glance at Mohawk, still throwing your scant belongings on the ground. "Gonna guess you don't have a permit for that thing?"

"Can't be quiet and answer your questions at the same time," you wheeze, planting your hands against the lockers, the slight push against the metal to give your chest room to expand properly pushing you back into the gun at your neck. "Make up your mind."

Something dark, something dangerous, something that screams at you to run, run fast and run fucking far, flashes in his narrowed eyes. This is it, you think, squeezing your own shut in response as the gun digs further into your spine. I went and ran my stupid mouth, pushed too hard, and now I'm gonna die for it.

But the shot never comes. Both men are dead silent, and when you dare to slowly crack your eyes open to look, you see why. A circular patch sits in Mohawk's hand, a grey remnant of your past life with worn stitching where your thumb had rubbed over it repeatedly. The patch that had been left on your doorstep two months ago, the threat clear.

It was a warning, the only headstart you were going to get. It was all they'd left, not even a note to tell you why, but you'd heard your commander's voice in your head clear as day. I'm comin' for ya, and I like to play with my food. Run.

"We need to leave, now," Mutton Chops barks suddenly, and you barely have time to process before his gun is off the back of your neck, the hand between your shoulderblades grabbing you roughly by the bicep. A yelp of pain and surprise is ripped from your lungs when he hauls you away from the lockers, leaving your belongings scattered across the platform as he drags you toward the stairs leading back up to the street.

"Get off me!" Your angry shout goes entirely ignored, both by your unexpected captors and the people passing by that avert their gazes at the sight of their weapons. His hand is a vice on your arm, pulling you along like you weigh nothing despite your attempts to dig in your heels. Too open up there, too exposed. "Fucking let go-"

"Not a chance." All the air rushes out of you when Mutton Chops slams you into the tile wall of the staircase so hard you're sure the handrail will leave a bruise across your lower back. He holsters his gun just long enough to secure zipties around your wrists, and the fierce, raw anger in his stormy eyes has you shrinking in on yourself, making yourself small. "You're gonna come with us and if you don't wanna tell us why you have a fuckin' Shadow Company patch on ya, we'll make you tell us."

Your mouth goes dry at the implication. "Torture is a war crime."

"I prefer the term enhanced interrogation." With that he yanks you away from the wall again, dragging you kicking and screaming up the last two stairs to where a van is waiting on the curb. He's not nice about it when he opens the side door and throws you bodily into the interior. The only thing keeping you from slamming into the far wall is a pair of legs belonging to another man who lets out a surprised noise. "Bag her."

The door slams, and for the second time in what feels like hours but has probably only been ten, fifteen minutes at most, there are unwanted hands on you.

These hands are surprisingly gentle though, lifting your head to fit a stale-smelling black bag over your head, leaving you bound and blinded. Defenseless.

"Sorry about this, love," a kind voice murmurs, but you know better than to trust it- you've seen the good cop bad cop routine before. They must run it often if, even in the confusion you'd seen on his face when the van door opened, he'd immediately fallen into his role.

"Go fuck yourself," you growl, twisting at the zipties. You're not getting out of them, but it makes you feel a little better to pretend.

"Watch yer ankles, Gaz, she's a feisty one," the Scot's voice sounds off somewhere in front of you, a hint of amusement in his tone. Gaz. One name out of three. A nickname, maybe, or a callsign. "Bit like a feral cat, might bite."

"You can fuck right off too," you spit at him, tugging more intently against the zipties binding your wrists. You should really quit while you're ahead, shut up before they decide it's too much trouble and just shoot you and dump you back in the Vltava, but you're cold, you're wet, and you're pissed.

Maybe feral cat wasn't too far off.

"Watch it princess, or you'll get some duct tape too." The new voice has you stopping cold. Definitely English, deep and gravelly and edged with a deadpan kind of danger that has the hairs on the back of your neck standing on end. Something tells you that Mutton Chops' handling of you had been a gentle tickle compared to what this man could do to you.

But your mother had always told you that you had more guts than sense. "Eat shit, you fucking cunt-"

"Kid's got a foul mouth on her," Mutton Chops' voice filters back from the front, and you growl under your breath. "Duct tape's not a bad idea."

"Got some righ' here, Captain," the Scot says cheerfully, and you bristle at how easily you'd been dismissed as a threat if they feel comfortable enough to joke around in front of you. You force yourself to focus on the second identifier instead- a rank. Definitely military then.

"So what's the story here anyway?" the one called Gaz asks, and you feel a boot nudge your leg. The tap has you growling, squirming your body across the uncomfortable metal of the van's floor to get away from it. He hauls you back with an almost embarrassing ease. "We come here to meet an informant and leave with a random American?"

"This." The rip of velcro, and a sharp whistle cuts through the vehicle, followed by a quiet grunt.

"What's a Shadow doin' in Prague?" the deep voice rumbles.

"That's what we're gonna find out."

When the van stops you focus on the opening and subsequent slamming of doors. The side door slides open, and you thrash violently as hands grab at you. Your feet are barely under you before they're dragging you over what feels like loose gravel, up a short set of steps, over a threshold, up a longer set of steps. Safehouse. Two floors at least.

You're shoved bodily into a chair, and you squint against the sudden intrusion of light as the bag is ripped off of your head, wincing when several strands of hair go with it. Your gaze flits around the room, skating over the four men that come into focus, cataloguing every minute detail from the frigid metal beneath your thighs to the space devoid of anything else but a table shoved against the wall next to the door.

Once you've taken in what little you can see of your surroundings, you focus on the men. The first to catch your gaze is the one they'd called Captain, flanked by the Scot and two men you hadn't gotten a look at yet. On the captain's right hand side stands a tall man with warm brown skin and dark eyes shadowed by the brim of a faded blue ball cap, and a few steps behind them all is the largest man you've ever seen. Built like a brick shithouse, you have to crane your head back until it hurts to see his face, and a violent shiver rolls straight down your spine when all you see is dead, empty eyes staring back at you from behind a skull sewn into a black balaclava.

Fear twists like a hot knife in your gut- you know just looking at him that the others had been child's play so far. This one looks like one he could crush the life out of you with one large hand. He looks like he'd enjoy it.

Your train of thought is broken as the captain crouches down to your eye level, and you have to force yourself to drag your gaze away from the man in the skull mask to meet his cold blue stare. "Here's how this is going to work. You're gonna tell us why you have this." He holds up the patch, making sure you can see the logo stitched into it. "Truthfully. If you lie, if you refuse to talk, we'll have to resort to more… encouraging methods."

"Given how you treated me on the platform, I'm surprised you didn't want to start with that," you taunt, and at the same time you want to kick yourself, tell yourself to shut the fuck up because what exactly do you hope to accomplish by continuing to rile up men who aren't above torturing you for answers? You must have a fucking death wish. Still, you can't stop yourself from sticking your foot in it further, lowering your voice and leaning closer to his face. "Bet you get off on that shit, don't you? Pushing women around, trying to scare 'em. Hurting them." Something flashes in his eyes before they harden into steel, fingers crushing the patch into his palm.

"Last chance."

"Fuck you."

"Have it your way. Ghost." The captain rises, nodding to the man in the skull mask before leading the other two out of the room. The door slams shut behind them, leaving you alone with the one he'd called Ghost.

Well, in for a penny, in for a pound. "What's with the mask? You ugly under there or something?" The only response you get is dead silence, not even the sound of his footsteps as he walks over to the table and starts laying out his weapons. You imagine he's probably heard the question a million times, but that doesn't keep you from poking, distracting yourself from the leather bundle he's currently rolling out across the table. "I get it, I guess. If I was torturing innocent people I wouldn't want them to see my face either."

"Never met an innocent Shadow." In this enclosed space, you can almost feel the deep timbre of his voice vibrating in your bones. He's slow, methodical as he runs a his fingers along the tools he's laid out, picking some of them up and examining them before putting them down again. What he's doing isn't lost on you- an intimidation tactic, one you'll never tell him is working. "You have until I turn around to change your mind and start talkin'."

"Are you deaf? I've been doing nothing but talking-"

"Defense mechanism, yeah?" He picks up a wicked looking combat knife, turning it over in his gloved hands. You watch the motion, note the pattern of bones on the back to match his mask- at least he's committed to the aesthetic. "You're scared, so you're puttin' up a front. Seen it before. Everyone breaks eventually."

Satisfied with his choice he turns slowly, those dead eyes meeting yours again. He's idly running a finger along the edge of the blade, gaze boring into yours with an intensity that makes your earlier interaction with the captain feel like a childhood staring contest.

"Maybe I had it wrong earlier," you muse, tipping your head back to keep your eyes on his as he stalks toward you, ignoring that twist of fear, shoving it down to a rolling boil in your gut. "Maybe you're the one that gets off on hurting women."

You aren't expecting a reaction- nothing you've said so far has gotten anything less than cold indifference from him, but that stops him in his tracks. You can see a tense muscle ticking in his jaw beneath the mask as he processes what you've said, and the brief flash of something you see in his eyes feels almost familiar.

It almost looks like fear.

You can't help but prod at it.

"What, I hit a nerve?"

You must have, because he closes that last little bit of distance in one long stride to crouch down in front of you, the hand not holding the knife grabbing you by the jaw and angling your head until you're forced to stare right into his eyes, narrowed and absolutely frigid. Whatever you'd seen before is gone now, replaced by a fury that, if you were standing, would have brought you to your knees.

"I don't get off on it," he growls, fingers squeezing into your cheeks like he's trying to press his fingerprints into your teeth. "I'm doin' my job. That job is to deal with threats." You gasp when he releases you with a solid push of your head, but he doesn't stand up.

Instead, he brings that knife down and drags it slowly along your thigh- not to break skin, but to taunt you. A tease, a promise, of what's to come if you don't answer his questions.

It's a familiar threat, and a tired sort of resignation settles over you as you watch the blade catch on your jeans, ripping a tiny hole in the dark denim. The tip presses slowly into your thigh until flesh splits beneath the steel, and oh God it burns, but you just drag a sharp breath through your teeth at the sight of blood beading on your skin.

He hasn't asked a single question yet, staying perfectly silent as he drags the tip of the blade through denim and flesh, his eyes burning into your skull. Steady, perfect. It'll scar nicely, you think, cocking your head to the side as the blade digs in slightly deeper near your knee. Not like the ugly, unsightly scars the commander had left across your torso and back.

Suddenly the blade flicks up to your chin, pressing into the soft flesh and forcing you to tilt your head up until you meet his eyes again. His stare is almost curious, detached but still scrutinizing, searching for something. You stare right back, wondering what he's looking for, what he sees.

He's harder to read than the Captain and the Scot had been, more of an unknown. You don't like unknowns, don't like anything you can't predict, and you think you could spend years trying to decipher even some small part of the man in front of you and get absolutely no where. On a primal level, that irritating little instinct scratching at your hindbrain, that terrifies you.

"Hm." The noise draws your attention, eyes refocusing slightly on the skull mask in front of you. You watch wordlessly as he rises to his feet again, setting the knife on the table and rapping twice on the door. You can hear hushed whispers when it opens, see the captain shaking his head. The door shuts again, and your eyes track Ghost picking something else up from the table- the hood you'd worn in here.

He drops it unceremoniously over your head before noisily cleaning up his tools and leaving you alone in the dark.

part one - masterlist - part two

please like/reblog if you enjoyed! :) top/bottom divider by: me line divider by: @/saradika-graphics

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froggyfantasy · 1 year ago

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Literal masterpiece

Oh Muse, Tell me of the Things Done by Golden Aphrodite

(Simon 'Ghost' Riley x F! Reader)

Rating: Explicit Wordcount: 5.6k Warnings: None Tags: Greek Mythology AU, Greek God inspired, Human sacrifice reader, God of death and wrath Ghost, Size difference, Size kink, Praise Kink, (Marriage kink if you squint?), PiV sex, Aftercare, Eros and Psyche inspired, Cliffhanger A/N: Part two dependent on reception

They call your fate a tragedy.

It’s a necessary one, the temple priest says, as you weep at the steps leading up to the grand mausoleum- inlaid with gold and obsidian. You wrap your arms around yourself as they tell you of your duty, inform you of your sacrifice. The statue of the god of wrath and death looms tall and menacing behind him, his bone white mask a single flash of pale amidst the dark, swirling robes that cover his limbs. You shiver as you look upon it, flesh cold as you imagine your final moments pleading at his feet.

A sacrifice, they say.

One to appease the god as death ravages your city, an holy offering innocent, beautiful and pure to quell his anger and rage. Eyes rest upon your trembling shoulders in a mixture of hope and pity, and you know even if you cry out none shall aid you. Your destiny is to die at the hands of a god so that they may live, and if it means your life is called for, they shall offer it for you.

You do not scream or struggle as they take you into the temple, you do not speak as they wash you and smooth aromatic oils into your shivering skin. You do not even look at them when they clothe you in a dark chiton and allow a veil to flutter over your despairing, tear-rimmed eyes.

When they close the altar doors behind you, you dare not throw yourself against them in one last bid for freedom.

The altar is dark, black marble columns stretching high above you and vanishing into a ceiling that the candlelight doesn’t reach. Lanterns litter the steps leading up to the sacrificial altar, with opulent offerings of jewels, weapons, and polished bones stacked high. Shadows dance between them, casting long and sinister against the temple walls. Your bare feet skim the cold stone floor as you ascend, tracing your hand against the frigid, dark mirror surface of the altar. You were not told what to do, only to wait.

So you wait, and you wait longer, sitting upon the edge of the altar, trembling and holding in your cries until they break apart inside your throat. The chamber is silent as the grave, with not a breeze or whisper of warm air to comfort your frigid flesh. Eventually only the sound of your hiccuping sobs fills the emptiness, as you weep for your fate, for the tragedy that has befallen you, for how they shall remember your name in poems, until at last you fall asleep splayed upon the dark altar and awaiting your demise.

As you dream fitfully of the ever after, the candles waver and snuff out with a cold gust of wind. Dark eyes regard your pliant form prone atop the piles of offerings.

and quietly, arms reach forward and cradle you to him as you are taken away.

---

When you awake, it is in somewhere new.

You come to far more gently than you anticipated, soft dreams still clinging velvet to your slumber. It takes a moment for you to realize that you’re no longer curled tightly atop the hard surface of the altar, but rest instead upon silk sheets and soft, plush bedding. The veil still drapes across your face, and as you delicately lift it, your surroundings are revealed to you.

It’s a large chamber, far larger than the temple, but sparsely furnished. You lay upon a bed fit for a man larger than any you’ve ever laid eyes upon, adorned with dark sheets and embroidered with gold thread. Torches flicker with a strange black light against the walls- silver dancing along the outer edge of flames. The blazing hearth does the same amidst a mantle of dark stone, stretching upwards into a ceiling you’ll never reach. A mirror and a basin stands in the corner, and beside them curtains blow in from the balcony, where dawn glows yellow against the horizon.

You’re alone.

You’re careful as you creep from bed towards the balcony, the wind ruffling your gown as you stand at the precipice. Below, a stark mountain valley yawns dark and fathomless without end.

The door groans as it opens.

You flinch away from the sound, spinning and feeling terror pool low and vile in your stomach at the sight that awaits you.

It’s him.

Taller than any man, a being of pure power, the god Ghost stands at the doorway clad in billowing dark fabric, his dark eyes boring into your shivering form from behind the stark white of his skull mask. The sheer size of him is enough to send goosebumps racing down your spine, his immortal stature ensuring you scarcely come up to his chest. The strength of his limbs is curled in tight muscle discernible even with his cloak, and when you meet his eyes you think of the space between stars- a void into which no light escapes.

He takes only three strides to cross the chamber.

You cower backwards until your spine hits the railing of the balcony, and as you glance over your shoulder the valley wind roars from the depths. You wonder if it is a more fitting end to hurl yourself from here than face whatever slow death the God of Wrath has ordained for you.

He stops just at the threshold, regarding you as you look up at him with tearful, terrified eyes. At this nearness you can sense the pure energy that rolls off of him in waves, a strangeness that speaks of something far from human, an unfathomable power that your mortal soul will never fully understand.

“Don’t.” Is the first word he ever says to you, looking past you to the valley. He reaches out his hand, not an inch of his flesh visible beneath his gauntlet of white bone. “Come.”

You stay where you are, heartbeat fluttering as you eye his outstretched palm.

“If I was going to kill you, I would have done it when you were asleep.” He intones, voice deep like distant, rolling thunder. There’s a strangeness to it you cannot place, the tone of it ringing between your ears in a distant echo, otherworldly.

“Don’t hurt me, please.” Are the first words you return to him, desperate as a thing wheezes from your lungs.

Ghost stares at you unblinkingly, and despite the black ichor that paints his gaze, his eyes look almost kind.

“Come away from the balcony.” He tells you, his voice softer.

You cast another glance down at the dark valley, swallowing hard, before at last reaching your hand forward and settling it in his cold palm. He draws you inside, out of the wind, and you find yourself hovering near the hearth with its strange, dancing flames.

“Your name.” He tells you, watching as you hesitantly warm yourself, carefully looking at him out of the corner of your eye.

When you tell him, he repeats it. Slow, purposeful, as if tasting a foreign fruit for the first time. It shivers through you, as if he somehow has wound magic through the sound alone.

“You will stay here.” He tells you under no uncertain terms. “In my palace. No harm shall come to you here.”

You blink at that, face falling open with confusion as you turn to him fully.

“Why...?”

Ghost regards you coolly, but when you focus on his eyes you can swear they crinkle with a wry smile.

“I have no reason to hurt my bride.” He explains simply.

“Your...” You echo, blinking. “I...”

“You were given to me.” He tells you, advancing upon you until he’s mere inches away, one arm braced on the hearth so he bends over your smaller, mortal form. “As a sacrifice. I saved you. Your life is mine by rights.”

Fear pulses bright through you, limbs awash with dread as the blood drains from your face. You had expected death, but the daunting reality of this, of being given to a god as a bride...

Ghost must see the terror in your eyes, for he removes himself from you, striding towards the heavy, ancient door.

“I will not touch you unless you ask.” He states, voice lower. “You are free to roam this palace as you like. There is food in the banquet hall.”

He pauses, observing you as you hesitate near the hearth.

“I will return at dusk.”

and with that, your new husband vanishes.

----

True to his word, no one stops you from roaming the palace.

It’s a massive structure, with towering black columns and high ceilings. Obsidian, marble, and gold accentuates every corner, and you find treasures and trophies displayed at every turn. You are entirely alone as you wander, bare feet skimming against the cold tile as you take in your new home. Each room reveals a new wonder. A bath with glimmering water that billows steam from golden fountains, a garden with dark roses that creep along stone walls, a library with scrolls in tongues you don’t understand, and a banquet hall filled with food that doesn’t seem to rot.

You eat until your stomach is full, and with every bite the food tastes more delicious than the bite before. You scrub yourself in the bath, and when you exit you find fresh garments awaiting you, embroidered with glimmering thread. The finery is beyond anything you dared imagine, and quietly you feel your reservations departing you as the thought of possibly escaping ebbs slowly from your mind.

Dusk finds you back at his chambers, watching the shadows grow long against the walls as slumber slowly descends upon you.

You’re on the brink of sleep when the bed dips, and a bare hand curls gently against your cheek. In your half-dreams, you nuzzle into the touch with a languid sigh, feeling the air fan across his palm. Ghost is silent as he lays beside you, observing your restful face with half-lidded eyes. His mask lays on the table beside him, disposed along with his cloak and armor.

You see nothing when you’re roused by the sensation of him tucking you against him, the world engulfed in darkness. Hypnos whispers across your senses as your eyelids flutter, trying to discern the shape of him as he presses in close behind you. Ghost tucks his legs under yours, his massive frame curling around you and his nose burrowing into the junction of your throat and jaw, where he draws in a heavy breath.

“Sleep, mortal.” He whispers there, one massive arm wrapping across your front.

True to his order, and engulfed in the warm sensation of his body pressed against yours, you find the gossamer veil of sleep draw over you once more.

He’s gone again come morning.

You awake alone, and find yourself missing the presence of him.

The banquet hall is refreshed with food of all kinds- delicacies from far lands you’ve never traveled to. You spend an exorbitant amount of time in the baths, dozing gently as steam billows around you. In the library you find a collection of war poems that you devour with eager eyes until the sun begins to slope towards the horizon, and oddly you do not find yourself entirely bored despite being alone in the massive pantheon to which he has left you.

Yet as darkness descends, you find yourself awake in his bed, waiting for him.

When he at last appears, as the moment where all light has drawn away from the horizon, the dark candles snuff out in a cold billow of wind. Plunged into darkness, the only sensation available to you is a hand caressing your cheek.

“Little bride.” He rumbles as the bed dips before you. “Were you so eager to see me you chose to forego sleep?”

Hesitantly, you raise a hand to press his own against your face, feeling the immense size of it dwarf your own.

“Yes.” You tell him in a scarce whisper, as if you’re revealing a tender secret. Your heartbeat thrums loud in your ears, fluttering inside the cage of your ribs as he draws closer. You try to remember the words you had meant to say- a thank you for saving you? Awe at the splendid riches allowed to you? A quiet plea to leave, one which you don’t truly mean?

You reach forward in the darkness, finding the shape of him broad and strong against your palm. There’s smooth skin of scars that litter his immortal flesh, across the wide breadth of his chest, down to his waist, traced across his arm and shoulders and the massive span of his back. He’s bare to you, and you can’t suppress a shiver at the mere thought that you are laying with a God.

“You’re frightened.” He notes at the shake in your hands, attempting to draw away from you.

“No.” You tell him, a hand gripping tighter to his to prevent his retreat. Words clog your throat, lips parted with breath as you feel his coal-dark eyes bore into you in the inkinesss of his chambers.

“Touch me.” You whisper instead.

When he bends to you, he swallows the sigh that pours past your lips.

Ghost defiles you in the way warriors do- pure strength tempered by careful restraint. You splay under him bare, his hands smoothing over your flesh like admiring a masterful weapon. He memorizes the curves and softness of you, humming notes low and deep into your skin as he drinks in your scent like ambrosia. He spends his time admiring the outline of you in the darkness, fingers dipping between your legs and spreading you over large, calloused fingers until you mewl and grip at the fine silk sheets.

“Sweet little thing.” He rumbles, pleased, as you offer him high, keening moans, head tossed back against the pillows. Wetness dribbles down your thighs, coats his hand just as he licks greedy and hot into your open mouth that chants his name. His towering frame bends over you, hauls you to his waiting hands with hardly any effort. Your hands scrape against his shortly shorn hair as he lays claiming bites across your throat and collarbone and Ghost moans against your skin like the pain and pleasure are twin beings.

“Ghost.” You chant in a hymn as his worshipers do when his clever tongue drinks down your arousal at your entrance, and the answering growl that he responds with sends pleasure fissuring down your spine like the earth split open. His hands hold you still as you buck and writhe with your climax, broken sounds filling the empty chamber so loud you think your shout can be heard at the far reaches of the palace.

He shushes you when at last he sheathes himself inside you, the girth of him splitting you wide enough you whimper into his chest. Yet he holds you to him, noses into your hair and whispers low, soothing words as your legs quiver.

“Good.” He purrs as you go pliant against him with a keening sigh, arms looped around his neck and nails digging into the flesh of his spine. “Perfect little bride. They were right to offer you to me.”

You think the nectar of the gods must taste like the glide of his tongue when he kisses you.

Ghost plays the symphony of your flesh like poets play the harp. His massive frame hunches over yours, the sheets tangled around you and his fingers entwined with your own. Each roll of his hips has you choking on a plea, has him huffing hot breaths and growling filthy praises in your ear.

“Made for me. Just me.” He groans, voice grinding deep in his chest as he ruts into you. Slow, measured, infuriatingly not enough. The drag of him inside you threatens to pull you under into madness as you mewl and squirm, desperately chasing the touch of him. “Made to take me, made to be in my bed, in my palace.”

It’s possessive, almost wild with the force of his claiming you. You go to him willingly, tears watering your eyes as you choke on a sob of pleasure. Yet it’s not enough, as he draws your pleasure higher, higher, burning you alive like the inferno of the heavenly sun but refusing to push you over the precipice. You plead his name, dig your fingers into the dip of his spine, ask for divine mercy that he keeps just beyond your mortal reach.

“Say my name.” He tells you, the sound of your coupling echoing out into the chamber- wet and debauched along with your desperate gasps.

“Ghost.” You sob, clinging helplessly to him, laying kisses upon his bare face in the darkness as an offering to the altar of him. “Ghost.”

In return, Ghost bestows upon you your own name, snarling it wild and feral against your lips as you at last fall apart beneath him. You choke on a cry of his name as something great and tender snaps abruptly inside you, races outwards along your limbs with such sudden ferocity you wonder for a moment if you’re been burned alive. Yet the pleasure itself drowns you like the deep and bottomless ocean- a surrender where you try to claw your way to the surface and instead allow the depths to take you.

Ghost growls as he buries himself fully inside the wet clutch of your heat, emptying inside your heaving form with a long, low groan. You feel the spend on him leak from your joining, collapsing against him as you try to remember how to breathe. Ghost adjusts so you lay sprawled atop his broad chest, rising slow and purposefully beneath you as you tuck your head under his chin. A war-worn hand strokes lazy paths against your skin, and you hear him hum with a deep satisfaction at your consummation. You feel claimed in the best of ways, not as one of his beloved war trophies but as his.

When you finally grow restful against his chest, you prop your chin up and try to find the shape of him in the darkness. He’s absent of his mask, you know, and curiously you try to discern his features in absolute blindness. You wonder if he’s as handsome as you dare to dream.

“Why can I not see you?” You ask in a whisper, and Ghost’s hand stills where it traces along the ridge of your spine. He’s tense, and it startles you when he speaks with his voice pitched low, authoritative in a way he’s never spoken to you before.

“As long as you remain here, you will never see my face.” He tells you, his chest vibrating under your palms. “I will care for you, protect you, and you will be mine, but you never see me. Understood?”

You don’t, really, understand. Confusion wrinkles your brow at the enigmatic declaration, but Ghost eases under you as you nod anyways, and the comfort of his gentle touch resumes, and assuages you of your worries until you fall asleep.

In the morning he lingers in your marital chambers, the pale light of dawn glinting off the armor he has donned before you awoke. He sits at the edge of the bed, a bone white gauntlet stroking with surprising gentleness across your brow. You catch it with your palm, kiss across his ivory knuckles as he huffs a warm breath of affection.

“I will return.” He tells you softly, and steps towards the balcony, only to vanish in a billow of smoke.

You lounge in bed in his absence, feeling the pleasurable soreness of your lovemaking imbue itself in your muscles and limbs. Even after a full rest you find yourself exhausted, and it isn’t long before you curl back into the sheets until the chariot of the sun reaches its zenith. Even then, you wince to yourself as you creep from bed, roused by your empty stomach and the mess between your thighs. You don’t make it farther than the basin at the edge of the room before your legs threaten to fail you, and you resign yourself to a few sips of water and washing what you can before collapsing back into bed.

You’re still there when he returns, and Ghost pauses when he hears your empty stomach, hums with dissatisfaction when you tell him of your troubles. With no effort at all, he lifts you into his arms and walks in the way gods do- only several long strides before you find yourself at the baths. Candles cast shadows against the walls, dancing hypnotically as Ghost deposits you at the edge of the water, pausing to disrobe himself of all but his mask before once more lifting you and walking into the baths with you in his arms.

The moan that bubbles up your throat at the heat that ensconses your weary limbs prompts a laugh from the God above you, who releases you only enough to reach for oils at the tiled edge. Ghost is careful, deliberate as he washes you, and despite your protests he insists, as if the act itself is another means of proving his devotion. Yet he can’t resist grazing a rough thumb over your nipples until you squeak, dipping his fingers between your thighs in slow, lazy circles until your legs tighten around his wrist.

Ghost takes you like that, holding you flush to him as his fingers work deftly inside of you, plucking at something bright and powerful until your voice fills the chamber with gasping, wanton pleas. You grip at him as you gush over his palm with your climax, a whimpering sound caught in your chest as he lauds affections into your slick skin.

When you are at last clean and sated, Ghost wraps you in his own cloak before you find yourself in the banquet hall with grapes being lifted to your lips. You know the tale of the goddess taken to the netherworld and having eaten the fruit there, know it meant forever tying herself to a place of death. Yet as your lips close around his fingers as the morsels are fed to you, you can think of no other realm in which you’d rather be.

and silently, you wish you could see the face of the man who has taken you as his bride.

The days are spent as such. You become accustomed to the palace, teaching yourself its interior so you can navigate it blind. You spend hours in the baths, dozing with your head cradled by your arms on the tiled edge. You devour the poems in the library and write your own thoughts on parchment beside them which you find in boundless supply. In the afternoons before Ghost returns you walk on long strolls through his gardens which seem ever changing, blooming with iridescent blossoms and fragrant lilies bright like starlight. You find a harp which seems to offer no sour note despite your lack of familiarity, and wind beautiful music through the obsidian and onyx halls of his home. You find yourself wanting for nothing- not food or shelter or finery of any nature. In return, you offer your love to the God who has claimed you, and to you he returns the same.

Ghost returns to you at sunset, and most nights find your form tangled with his as he takes you whimpering and breathless against the sheets. He seems to know your body like a swordsman knows his blade, invents new ways to pluck at your desire until the only thing you can offer him is reedy, desperate sounds of his name, reminding him you are his. Afterwards he tends to you, and even then you kiss the other shell of his mask as steam billows around you in the baths as your bare bodies embrace.

You find yourself increasingly nocturnal if only to spend the long hours of darkness in his company, talking and touching in the absence of any illumination. You ask him of the poems in his library, of the trophies that adorn his palace, of the emptiness between these walls and how he bore the loneliness that came before you. You ask him of the offerings given to him by his worshippers, of immortality and all things of a god-like nature.

You never ask him to show his face.

Instead you map it with delicate touches in the darkness, trying to instill in yourself an image of his likeness behind the mask. His jaw is strong, and along it you think you feel the smooth skin of another scar that snakes up towards his ear. His hair is short, and you wonder if it is the same dark color as his ember stare. His lips are soft as they press to your skin, as if he himself is the acolyte to your divinity.

As the weeks turn into seasons, and the high winds of autumn reach the mountaintop, he tells you of how he became a God.

Gods are not born. They are chosen, he says. Those of great valor, of devotion and strength are lifted into the pantheon and blessed with immortality, with divinity beyond that of human comprehension. Outliving those who once knew them as human, their legends are inscribed in the songs and poems, spoken of in many tongues until their following becomes great and loyal.

When you ask him with quiet reverence how he became immortal, Ghost’s form goes rigid with something you think can only be fury.

“I was betrayed.” He tells you, voice filled with murderous intent.

He tells you how he was once a soldier- a warrior that some claimed was already a demi-god. Yet he was mortal when his commander betrayed him, abandoned him on a hill of battle upon which Ghost was buried beneath a pile of rotting corpses, slowly suffocating under the weight of dead men. He had clawed himself free with savage intent, feeling rage become the only emotion known to him. It had taken days for him to free himself of the putrid flesh and decay that surrounded him, and it was only once he stood upon the pile of death that he breathed in his first gasp of immortality. The wrath became him, and he became wrath, or so the legends are said.

When you ask him how long ago this was, Ghost does not answer you.

You try not to think of what will happen when he witnesses your final, mortal breath.

and you try not to wish to see his face before you die.

“Are you hideous?” You ask him teasingly, drawing circles on his bare chest as his fingers idly soak themselves in the spend between your legs.

“Far from it.” He replies dryly, and you place a giggling smile upon his grinning lips.

You try not to dwell on it. There is so much you have to be grateful for, after all. A warm bed, a blazing hearth, clothes, a home, food, endless entertainment, and most importantly a husband who swears his devotion to you every sunset.

Yet in the daylight you find yourself missing him, and in the hollow place of his absence you try not to let temptation take root in the emptiness.

It’s on a cold morning when you find a snake in the garden.

You’re bent over a swath of coal-dark dahlias when you hear it slither behind you. When you turn, you’re greeted with mahogany dark eyes and shimmering green scales. Yet even as you flinch away the serpent doesn’t deign to chase you, regarding you curiously as it speaks in sibilant, seductive words.

“I see the God of Wrath has found himself a muse.” A feminine voice purrs, amused. “Which mortal realm did he steal you away from?”

“I wasn’t stolen.” You retort, shying away as the snake curls closer around your bare feet. “I was an offering.”

Sinister, the snake laughs at you. “And has he refused to let you leave? Are you too afraid to try? He may kill you, hermosa.”

“He wouldn’t.” You manage, tucking yourself up on a pedestal where your dress drapes over the edge. “He loves me.”

“Oh?” The snake asks, curling around the base of the stone, where the light reflects upon its shimmering body. “Are you sure, little muse?”

“Of course.” You reply quickly, even though a shadow casts longer upon your heart with every word spoken by the serpent.

The snake hums thoughtfully, winding itself around the stone slowly, until at last it raises its smooth head to the level of your gaze.

“Then why hasn’t he shown you his face?”

You falter at that, hugging your knees defensively and brow furrowing with dismay. The serpent plucks at the secret doubt inside you that you quietly tuck away at every sunset, that you feel thrum under your fingers as you trace the planes of his face in darkness. You try to conceal it, hardly ever speak of it, but you can’t help but wonder why Ghost refuses to show himself to you.

“Maybe he’s a monster.” The snake goes on. “Grotesque and rotten. The only way he can have your love is if you never see him.”

That can’t be true. Your husband is beautiful and strong, and you know even if he was hideous you would still love him for his fierce protectiveness and tender care. Even if his visage was obscured by scars of battle past, you would still love him.

“He doesn’t trust you, little muse.” The snake hisses quietly, and it sounds strangely pitying, a sadness which you feel plays upon the harp strings of your ribs. “Can you truly be wed to a man who does not believe in you?”

“Ghost loves me.” You repeat in a whisper, mostly to yourself.

“If that were true, he would love you even if you saw his face.” The snake offers, tongue flickering in your ear.

Something dark and viscous simmers in your stomach like tar, and you further hunch in on yourself, uncertain.

“Away with you.” You say at last, refusing to look at the serpent, who laughs wickedly as she winds herself into the bed of dahlias, and vanishes.

That night, when Ghost lays with you, the whisper of his affections feels sour against your skin.

You lay awake even as he sleeps behind you, his massive form curled around you and bracketing you in his warmth. The darkness looms long inside your thoughts, where the words of the serpent echo into the void where light fails to illuminate the face of your husband.

He loves me, he loves me, he loves me.

Yet you know of Ghost’s warning, his oath that you will no longer be his if you see his face. To risk the love he has given you for such a temptation seems sacreligious, a sin for which there is no return.

He doesn’t trust you, the snake whispers.

In the morning, you feign sleep while you hear him depart to realms unknown.

He’ll return after dark. He loves you, he loves you, he loves you.

You do not find the snake in the garden.

He doesn’t trust you.

“You’re mine.” He huffs, dark and deep against your lips in your bed that night, and you shield your cry of desperation behind a moan. You give everything to him, your entire being, lay it bare before him as the offering you are, knowing he will keep you safe and love you with fierce devotion the way warriors love their oaths.

He loves you.

He leaves at dawn.

but he doesn’t trust you.

The wick burns against your fingertips as you light it.

You approach the bed with silent steps, your bare feet skimming across the stone as they did in the temple at the altar as you’d sacrificed yourself to him.

He loves you.

He’d taken you, spared you, made you his bride. He gave you his palace and all the treasures within, and with it came his love.

You see the broad, scarred plane of his back as you draw closer.

He hides behind a mask, refuses to let you see the one thing that nobody else has ever seen. Not even you, his offering, his bride, his muse, his beloved.

The candlelight illuminates his face.

and you feel your breath catch tightly in your chest.

He’s breathtaking.

The word ‘divine’ does not compare to his likeness, with his eyes closed and his lips parted in sleep. His alabaster skin shielded from the sun is written with scars, but the stories told by them seem like the songs of great poets, wild and magnificent in the way of feral things. Long, blonde lashes swoop gently over his cheeks, still rosy with the exertion of your lovemaking, face slack and open in his slumber.

He’s the most beautiful creature you’ve ever seen.

Even when his dark eyes open, look upon you with despair, he’s still beautiful.

“No.” Ghost speaks in a tone you’ve never heard, full of grief, and it stabs through you like a blade. “How could you?”

“Ghost-” You try, reaching for him as he raises himself from bed, drawing to his full height and towering above you. Yet your fingers are just short as he draws away, towards the balcony.

“Leave.” He tells you, his voice hardening with fury as a cold wind begins to billow around his form, cast in starlight.

“No-” You try, panic bubbling up your throat as you try to move forward to him, pleas for forgiveness upon your lips. “Ghost-!”

“LEAVE.” Ghost bellows as smoke churns wildly about his immortal form, the cold wind slicing against your skin and preventing you from drawing near.

“I love you!” You cry in desperation as tears form, and the mantle of his cloak descends upon his shoulders, bone white replacing his face.

Ghost doesn’t respond, not as he becomes wrath, not as his eyes look upon you with betrayal and despair. You try to move forward, to touch him once more, but when you reach out your hand, skim your fingers against the outline of him-

He’s gone.

As the cold wind retreats, and with it your husband, you collapse to the floor and wail with your despair.

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