kyuu-collection

[kyuu-collection]

not to derail but which bllk guys are gonna be my "they asked for no pickles" angel when i get shy at a restaurant???

literally any and all of them would do this for you im being deadass. but the best example is reo. he's like that one post let me go find it

[kyuu-collection]

you should’ve read the damn contract.

but you were desperate. truly desperate. broke to your bones, barely scraping by on instant noodles and tap water. you had holes in your socks, a phone with a shattered screen, and a wallet so empty it echoed. the idea of splurging on a sex toy? laughable. you couldn’t even afford a second-hand toothbrush. so when the sign-up form for "assistant tester" promised fast money with zero qualifications, you didn’t hesitate. clicked agree. no reading. no questions.

and now?

you’re strapped to a glossy, too-clean chair in a sterile lab with your legs spread wide, bound in place. and between them, humming softly with unholy precision, is a goddamn vibrator from the future.

silver, contoured, sleek—latched in place by soft restraints, the head of it resting firm and perfectly angled against your clit. it’s warm from its internal thermal sync, fitted with pressure-reactive gel pads and frequency mapping. you hadn’t even known vibrators could do this. it’s more machine than toy. and you are its first test subject.

“no offense,” satoru drawls, voice impossibly casual as he leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees, “but you’re twitching like a virgin in a wind tunnel. and this is literally the lowest setting.”

he grins around the end of a candy stick he’s been chewing for the last ten minutes, bright blue eyes tracking the shivers running down your body. his lab coat hangs off one shoulder like he forgot it halfway through putting it on, and his black compression shirt clings tight to his lean frame beneath it. his pants ride low on his hips where he’s slouched, thighs spread, casual in posture but intent in gaze. the goggles meant for "serious" testing sit uselessly on his forehead, pushing back his mess of white hair, strands sticking out in static waves.

his eyes flicker with amusement, mouth quirking as he watches your body react, fascinated. “don’t tell me,” he says, spinning slightly in his chair with a nudge of his heel. “you’ve never used a toy before.”

you jerk when the vibrator pulses, and your breath shudders. your thighs tremble as you try to close your legs on instinct—only to be kept wide open by the straps. your brows knit, lips parting in a soundless gasp, skin flushed from your cheeks to your collarbones. “i... haven’t,” you admit, voice barely above a whisper.

satoru blinks. then brightens. “what? oh my god. you’re serious?”

his grin widens—vicious and delighted.

“holy shit, this is even better than i thought. you signed up for high-grade prototype testing and your poor little pussy’s never even met a toothbrush’s vibration mode?”

“satoru!” you cry, humiliated, squirming against the relentless buzz between your legs. your hips twitch with every pass, toes curling in their restraints, spine arching slightly as the pleasure sneaks up your nerves.

he laughs like this is the best thing that’s happened all week. “nah, this is so good. write that down,” he mock-mumbles, pretending to scribble on his tablet. “subject is hopelessly inexperienced. results? extremely promising.”

he rolls his stool closer, the wheels creaking as he leans in. his breath fans across your thigh. he moves with lazy confidence, legs spreading slightly wider, hands loosely folded over his knees.

“can you even tell what part is making you moan like that? is it the pulses? the heat setting? or is it just the fact that someone’s finally paying attention to that sad little clit of yours?”

your hands grip the armrests harder, knuckles white. your face twists with the effort to stay composed, but another whimper escapes, and your lashes flutter from the building sensation. every hum of the vibrator sends your hips bucking.

“stop staring,” you choke, voice breaking from the mix of shame and pleasure.

he snorts. “what, you shy now? sweetheart, you’re on my table, strapped open, soaking my tech. i’m doing you a favor.”

he flicks a finger against the side of the vibrator casually. it twitches in response.

you gasp, whole body jolting. your eyes fly open wide, lips quivering as your muscles lock up for a moment.

he watches your back arch, eyes sharp and entirely too smug. “god, that’s adorable. you really don’t know what to do with it. how long you been walking around with a cunt that’s never been spoiled?”

beep.

he taps the tablet.

the vibration intensifies.

your whole body jumps, a startled moan ripping from your throat. your eyes squeeze shut, face contorting as your chest heaves in shallow gasps.

“ohhhh yeah,” he says, eyes gleaming. “now that’s the sound i needed on record. keep goin’, princess.”

you shake your head furiously, tears pricking at your eyes. your shoulders twitch with every wave of stimulation. “satoru—i c-can’t—”

“you can,” he says, nudging your thigh with his foot. “that’s literally the point. now stop whining and let the tech do its job. unless you want to redo all the calibration logs.”

he leans forward suddenly, forearms on either side of your thighs. he’s close now, close enough that you can feel the heat of his body, the sharpness in his gaze as he watches you break apart. “you’re already crying and we haven’t even hit auto-rhythm. wanna see what happens when we let it pick the pattern it thinks you like best?”

“no—!”

beep.

too late.

he watches you twitch and writhe, cheeks flushed, lips trembling from overstimulation. your cunt is soaked. the toy hums louder. your jaw slackens as you pant, barely holding onto your sense of self.

“god,” he mutters, not even trying to hide the awe in his voice, “you’re gonna short-circuit the sensors with how wet you are. is this what happens when broke girls finally get some tech between their legs?”

you let out a strangled sound—half moan, half sob—as your body twists against the restraints, chest heaving in shallow bursts. your head tosses to the side, hair clinging damply to your temple, strands sticking from the sheen of sweat along your brow.

satoru tilts his head, one white brow arching lazily as if he’s genuinely puzzled. his lip tugs up in amusement, eyes gleaming with mischief under the fringe of silver bangs. “what’s wrong? you wanna stop?”

your voice breaks on a whisper, barely audible through your trembling breath. “yes,” you whimper, eyes glassy, lashes wet.

he flashes a grin—wide and obnoxiously bright, the corner of his mouth dimpling as he leans back on his stool, spine stretching in a casual roll like he’s just lounging at a bar, not orchestrating your unraveling. “too bad. you signed a full-cycle clause. twenty minutes minimum.”

his wrist lifts casually, tablet tilted toward him with a flick of his fingers. his thumb scrolls the screen like he’s checking a grocery list. “we’re only at seven.”

“satoru, please—” your voice cracks on the plea, lip quivering as your hips instinctively try to shy away from the overstimulation.

he doesn’t even blink. “oh now you’re begging. yeah, that’s goin’ in the notes.” he mutters it more to himself than you, tapping something in lazily, though his eyes never leave the way your body squirms.

his hand comes down slow, deliberate, resting lightly on your hipbone. the heat of his palm spreads through the thin fabric of the gown they’d given you, and his fingers flex slightly, just enough to feel the way your muscles tremble beneath his touch. you flinch—just barely—but he catches it, and his lashes lower in interest.

“try to keep your voice down, though,” he says, tapping your thigh twice like it’s nothing. “walls are thin. or don’t. up to you.”

then he leans back again, reclining just slightly in his seat, one knee bouncing idly, clipboard resting across it. the corner of his smile twitches as he watches your face twist again, eyes fluttering shut. “science is beautiful, huh?”

[kyuu-collection]

MDNI 18+

gojo satoru almost never removes his blindfold.

not during missions, not to sleep. not even when you’re beneath him like this, panting into his mouth. he usually keeps it on—spares him the headache. you’ve never minded, though. his presence alone compensates for what he keeps hidden.

but tonight, something makes him pause mid-thrust.

he stills, breath shallow. two fingers hook beneath the edge of the fabric. with one slow pull, he slides it down. it hangs around his neck now. what’s revealed steals away your breath.

his eyes are otherworldly.

not just electric—opalescent, almost volatile in their beauty. platinum bled to cobalt, cold fire beneath a lattice of lashes so pale and translucent they catch light like spun sugar, long enough to kiss his cheekbones when he blinks. too beautiful to be real. too unreal not to be divine.

you reach up, brushing a lock of silver hair from his damp forehead, fingers grazing the corner of one crystalline eye. his lashes flutter—languid, indulgent, unbearably fond.

“you like?” his grin tilts crooked. boyish and smug. words simply fail you, so you nod. the motion cause you to tighten around him. he exhales sharply, nearly chokes on a groan.

“careful,” gojo mutters, sinking deeper into you. “you keep lookin’ at me like that, i’ll embarrass myself.”

your legs cinch around his waist, and the next breath he lets out is shaky. there’s colour high on his cheeks now—pink cresting beneath damp silver hair, reaching the delicate points of his ears. his gaze lingers on your face, then dips to the bounce of your breasts as he thrusts again.

“told you i was pretty.”

[kyuu-collection]

co-parenting? no. co-pettying.

pairing — single dad satoru x single mom reader

satoru is just trying to console his crying daughter over her tragic bangs—until he finds out the kid who roasted her is your son. petty parenting, unresolved feelings, and karmic bangs ensue.

a/n: in honor of me getting bangs again. pt 2 later ig

satoru gojo is seething.

not the explosive kind. no, this is a slow, bitter simmer—the kind only young single dads with too much pride, a permanently furrowed brow, and daughters crying over their butchered bangs can manage. he sits on the park bench like it personally offended him, ice cream in one hand, the other arm wrapped protectively around his daughter, who’s still sniffling beside him. the vanilla scoop is melting, forgotten, dripping onto his jeans. he doesn’t care. he’s glaring at the sandbox like it insulted his bloodline.

"and then he said i looked like a mushroom," she sobs again, wiping her nose on the back of her hand. her voice warbles. her eyes are red-rimmed and glassy. her bangs—god. they're a battlefield. uneven, jagged, more suggestion than style. like she challenged a pair of safety scissors to a duel and the scissors didn’t even try.

satoru bends forward, crouching beside her like he’s about to deliver a sacred truth. his long fingers gently cup her tear-streaked face, the scar on his knuckle catching the sunlight as he exhales dramatically. "you are beautiful," he says, like he means it, like he’s declaring something holy. "you look like a high-fashion mushroom. like... couture fungus. like the kind of mushroom anna wintour would cry over."

his daughter hiccups through a giggle. small win.

he pushes her hair behind her ears, lets out a sigh that feels older than he is. he’s only twenty-two, but the weight in his shoulders says thirty-five. he ruffles her hair. "who was it?" he asks, too calm. that special, terrifyingly pleasant calm dads get when they’re about to ruin some six-year-old’s entire lineage.

"hiro," she says, almost sulking now. "he laughed and said i looked like a button mushroom. his mom picked him up after school. she gave me a candy and told me boys are dumb. she was really pretty."

hiro.

satoru blinks. that's your kid. he stares ahead, almost offended by the realization. the same hiro who offered his daughter a capri sun last week like he was proposing marriage. the same hiro who now, apparently, inherited your pettiness like it’s a family heirloom.

he remembers it all too well.

the way you stormed down the hallway in high school, bangs equally doomed, fire in your eyes, shouting at him for the fourth time that month. you always looked cutest when you were mad. he’d called you mushroom head and dodged a flying highlighter.

in his defense, he was sixteen and stupid and thought the way your face twisted in outrage was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. he was in love. tragically, stupidly in love. he just expressed it by emotionally terrorizing you every fourth period chemistry class.

now your six-year-old is carrying the baton like a prodigy. divine retribution, with extra glitter.

he sees you a few days later.

the playground buzzes with kids and shrieks and parents scrolling phones with mild exhaustion. you’re sitting on a low stone wall near the swings, sunglasses pushed into your hair, drink in hand, scrolling your phone with one finger and the smuggest smirk he’s ever seen. your earrings catch the late afternoon sun. your nails are fresh. you’re the picture of composed pettiness.

"gojo satoru," you say sweetly, like you’re greeting a man you’d happily watch trip over a lego.

the way your mouth curves around his name is criminal. he hates how much he notices that. hates how fast his ears burn. he adjusts the collar of his hoodie, trying to look unaffected.

he gives you a dry look. "heard your kid's been practicing stand-up comedy. at my daughter's expense."

you hum, tilting your head. "is that what we’re calling emotional resilience these days? because if he gets it from anyone, it’s me."

satoru eyes you. his hoodie’s stained with dried syrup, there’s a faint bruise on his temple—cabinet incident. his posture’s a little slumped, like sleep is a distant fantasy. he scratches the back of his neck. his fingers tap a silent beat against his thigh.

"he called her a mushroom."

"a cute mushroom," you counter, not missing a beat. "like, toad from mario. he’s a legend."

you sip your iced latte without breaking eye contact. he scowls.

"you taught him that."

"you say that like i wouldn’t weaponize shared trauma."

the corner of his mouth twitches. your words are sweet and soaked in petty, and it’s driving him insane. you’re too calm about it. too good at this.

"you’re enjoying this."

"oh, i’m thriving," you say, leaning back slightly, letting the breeze catch your shirt. "do you know how many years i waited for the universe to do this? it’s like my karmic investment finally matured."

his jaw ticks. "i was a kid. you were cute when you were homicidal."

you laugh, but there’s a bite to it. "i was feral, satoru. you made me snap a pencil with my bare hands."

"still the hottest thing i’ve seen."

the words slip. he bites the inside of his cheek too late. his eyes flick up, reading your face, then quickly dart away.

you blink, slowly. your lips part, but nothing comes out at first. then you scoff, shaking your head with a little smirk, like you’re filing that away for later.

hiro runs past then, thrusting a friendship bracelet toward satoru’s daughter. it’s neon pink, too tight, barely holding together. she takes it like it’s the crown jewels. behind them, someone’s kid faceplants into the mulch. a mom sighs deeply without looking up from her kindle.

"see?" you say, lifting your brows, voice light but smug. "my kid has more emotional intelligence than you did at seventeen."

"okay, that’s—"

"—true," you interrupt, standing. you stretch lazily, fingers laced above your head. your shirt rides up slightly, revealing a hint of skin. he notices. his eyes snap away too fast.

you glance down, lips curling with practiced sweetness. "how’s it feel? to be on the receiving end of the mushroom prophecy?"

"is this revenge?"

"no," you say, brushing invisible lint from your jeans. "this is me being a good mom. and maybe also petty. definitely petty."

and then—god—you wink. like this is your sitcom and he’s still the fool in love.

satoru groans, slumping on the bench, hands dragging down his face. beside him, his daughter is giggling, her butchered bangs fluttering as she tugs hiro toward the slides.

across from him, your laughter rings out—soft, wicked, triumphant. it curls through the air like the ghost of a grudge with perfect eyeliner, like the echo of a high school hallway where a boy once said "mushroom head" and a girl nearly committed homicide with a highlighter.

god. he’s losing a custody battle against karma. and karma’s wearing lip gloss.

he watches you walk away, heart pounding, throat tight. he never said it. maybe he never will. but god—you still do something to him.

and maybe that's the real punishment.

not the bangs. not the karma.

just the ache of wanting you, after all this time.

[kyuu-collection]

BITE YOUR TONGUE, I LIKE IT BETTER BLOODY

pairing: bully satoru x manipulative reader

synopsis — gojo satoru hates you. you smile too sweetly, lie too easily, and wear your innocence like armor. he’s known you forever—known how sharp your claws are beneath the lace. but no one else sees it. no one but him. and when he throws milk at your head in front of the whole cafeteria, he swears it’s just hate. but behind stairwells and bitten lips, hate starts to taste a lot like want.

tags: enemies with benefits, public humiliation, dubcon elements (consent is a blurry concept when you're both assholes), manipulation, obsession, power imbalance, mutual degradation, possessiveness, toxic dynamic, satoru is an asshole, reader is worse, oral sex (m receiving), deepthroating, swallowing, semi-public sex, unprotected sex, overstimulation, creampie. 5.8k wc, MDNI.

a/n: another very detailed explicit smut because you guys loved shy reader sucking the soul out of frat!gojo. no thoughts, just enemies rawdogging behind the gym stairs. plot? not here. soulmates? unfortunately. enjoy the filth before i drop my wordcount-heavy apothecary diaries au this week :3

satoru gojo despises your guts.

he makes sure you know it, too.

"oops," he says, voice dripping with false sympathy just before the milk carton arcs clean through the air and smacks the back of your head. it bursts on impact, cold and humiliating, soaking into your blouse and turning it nearly see-through. thin cotton clings to your skin—your shoulder blades, the curve of your spine, the delicate outline of lace beneath. the chill bites into your nerves, crawling down your spine like a taunt.

there's a beat. the cafeteria shifts. chatter falters. a few heads turn. someone drops a fork.

you stiffen just for a second. one inhale held too long. then your hand rises to touch your hair, wet and dripping. you blink slowly, lashes damp, before pasting on the kind of smile reserved for misunderstandings and small kindnesses. your lips tremble—not from emotion, but as if suppressing laughter. like you’re charmed by the absurdity of it all.

"my hand slipped," satoru adds from behind, leaning one elbow on the table like he's bored. his tie's loose, shirt half untucked, and the sleeves rolled high enough to show veined forearms. his white hair falls just enough to cast a faint shadow over one eye. he grins, tongue pressing to his cheek, teeth catching on the corner of his lower lip like he's chewing the inside of it. there’s milk on his fingers. he wipes it on his slacks. "maybe don’t stand around like a target next time, princess."

he calls you that like it’s a slur.

someone snorts into their lunch tray. a few others glance up with vague concern, but not enough to intervene. not enough to think it's serious.

you turn with a lightness that's infuriating. wet hair clinging to your cheek, uniform plastered to your back. you look ridiculous—soaked and humiliated—and yet you smile. your fingers trail delicately down your blouse like you’re inspecting damage on fine silk.

"that’s alright, satoru," you say sweetly, as if he’d bumped into you in the hallway. your voice is soft, gentle as a hand on a child’s head. "you’ve always had poor coordination."

a few students murmur agreement. someone chuckles. the tension breaks. someone tosses a crumpled napkin toward the bin, missing it entirely.

but not for him.

he watches the twitch of your lip—the briefest break in the mask that no one else sees. no one but him. and that’s what drives him insane.

because he’s known you since kindergarten. known the tantrums, the fights, the scratches behind school buildings. he remembers how you’d corner some poor kid together—mocking, poking, stealing snacks—and how when the teacher showed up, you’d burst into tears and point at him with trembling fingers. he was the bad one. the instigator. the boy who made girls cry. even when your hands were just as dirty. maybe worse.

you’ve always been like this: clever, calculating, cruel in lace and smiles.

and he hates that no one sees it but him.

hates how you float through school like some porcelain saint. all soft glances and kindnesses, like you’re too sweet to harm a fly. how you apologize so readily, voice thick with false guilt. how even your sighs are delicate things, like spun sugar on the tongue.

but he knows. and he won’t let you forget that he knows.

you dab your temple with a napkin, offer a small bow to the room, then walk away. every step deliberate. he watches the way your skirt sways, the soft slap of your wet shoes, the curve of your back visible beneath the soaked fabric. it’s obscene. like you’re doing it on purpose. he knows you are.

his throat tightens. his pants do, too.

fuck.

he shifts, pressing his palm into the table edge to ground himself. his cock throbs anyway. he glances down, jaw ticking, leg bouncing under the table. his tongue flicks over his teeth. he rubs his thumb against the edge of the bench, imagining it’s your pulse.

he hates you.

he hates how every time you laugh, it turns heads. how nanami makes you smile in that quiet way that you don’t give him. how your voice turns feather-soft when you're being praised, how you say “thank you” with bowed lashes and an angel’s lilt. how you look at others like you’re grateful they exist, and how you look at him like you’re grateful he’s suffering.

he hates that you let everyone believe you’re good.

and he hates that you are good—at lying. at playing them. at leaving him hard in the middle of class after pressing a note into his hand that simply read don’t forget to beg.

he still has that note. it’s tucked into the back of his physics notebook, creased and fingerprint-smudged. he looked at it three times yesterday. once during morning announcements. once after gym. once when you passed him a pencil and your fingers brushed.

he’s not even close to done.

not when you keep pushing him to the edge with every infuriating smile, every light laugh shared with someone else. not when your lip gloss tastes like strawberries, and he knows because he tasted it once. in a stairwell. two weeks ago. you kissed him like it meant nothing. then walked away before he could say a word.

he hates you.

and he wants you so fucking bad it makes him sick.

later, behind the gym stairwell—where the walls reek of sweat, rubber soles, and old water—you find him.

there's a hum in the silence, the kind that rings inside your skull. your footsteps echo first, then stop. only the hush of your breath now, quiet and deliberate, like a secret begging to be found. 

he’s already there—slouched against the wall like he’s waiting for something violent. one leg bent, heel hooked behind him, the other stretched out, foot tapping a restless beat against the cracked concrete.

he’s still in his uniform, shirt untucked, collar damp with sweat. the sleeves are rolled up, exposing long forearms slick with effort. his knuckles are red from earlier. a faint bruise darkens near his jaw from sparring. pale strands messily raked back like he’s run his hands through it one too many times. sunglasses gone. his eyes, sharp as cut glass, track your approach with slow disdain.

you take him in, shamelessly running your gaze from his tousled hair to the veins snaking up his forearms, the taut muscles in his chest straining against the fabric of his shirt. your eyes trace the line of his jaw, the subtle flex of his neck, and you feel the heat in your own chest rise at the sight.

something about the way he looks—disheveled, dangerous, and all too aware of his own effect on you—sends a pulse of heat straight through your veins.

he pops a pink lollipop from his mouth, tongue dragging lazily over it before he crushes it between his teeth. the sound snaps the tension like a whip.

“you’re hard,” you murmur, voice syrupy-sweet, almost innocent. almost.

he doesn’t flinch, but the twitch in his jaw gives him away. his eyes drop—low, deliberate—then crawl back up your body like a threat, heat simmering beneath his gaze. his lips part, then press together tight, as if reining something in.

“don’t flatter yourself,” he mutters, but his voice cracks—taut and ragged, like it’s been dragged through too many thoughts he shouldn’t be having.

you tilt your head, lips curling into something too tender to be kind. “too late,” you coo. “you threw milk at my head and came in your pants about it.”

you look pristine—hair ribboned neatly, lip gloss shimmering under the harsh light, skin flawless like lacquered porcelain. beautiful. breakable. except your eyes gleam with something wicked, mean little stars dancing in a galaxy made just for him.

his fists clench at his sides. one thigh shifts, an involuntary twitch. he breathes out too sharp through his nose, like trying to exhale the want.

“you’re such a fucking brat,” he bites, but his voice stumbles on the edge of something more desperate, less controlled.

you only smile wider, slow and knowing, lashes fluttering as you step forward and then lower yourself to your knees. not in surrender. never that. it’s worship with teeth—dangerous, deliberate. your skirts spread around you like spilled sin. the way you look up at him is reverent and ruinous.

his entire body tightens, chest rising like he’s been starved of oxygen. the bulge in his pants throbs with restraint. his hand flinches at his side, like he’s debating whether to reach for you or himself.

you reach first.

he snatches your wrist mid-motion, fingers locking around your pulse with bruising pressure. his touch is trembling, barely keeping it together. his pupils are blown wide, breath shuddering.

you tilt your head, all mock-concern. your voice is honey-laced poison. “you gonna cry?” you whisper. “go on, satoru. tell them i bullied you.”

his lip curls—not quite a smirk, not quite a snarl. a flash of teeth, predatory and unsure. “you’re not in control.”

“then prove it.”

you move slowly, deliberately, fingers curling around the buckle of his belt, the leather cool and smooth under your touch. the scrape of it sliding free pierces the stairwell’s silence, sharp as a blade, bouncing off the concrete like a warning. your knuckles graze the taut fabric of his pants, a fleeting brush that draws a quick, jagged breath from him, raw and unguarded. he’s already throbbing, his cock straining against the material, a dark stain spreading where precum seeps through.

your fingertips linger, pressing just enough to feel the heat pouring off him, the pulse of his desire thrumming against your skin. his legs stiffen, muscles coiling under his slacks, and his hands flex at his sides, curling into loose fists before easing, like he’s wrestling with the urge to touch you.

when you free him, easing the zipper down with a slo I'mw, intentional drag, his cock springs out, flushed a furious red, veins stark, the tip glossy with precum that beads and drips, catching the dim fluorescent light. satoru hisses, shoulders curling inward, the motion abrupt, like he’s been struck. his jaw locks, a tendon pulsing under the skin, and his throat works as he swallows hard, the motion visible. his ice-blue eyes flick down to you, pupils dilated, but they skitter away—to the wall, the ceiling—like he’s dodging your gaze, afraid of what it might cost him to linger.

“pathetic,” you murmur, voice low, barely above a whisper, laced with venom. your hand wraps around the base of his cock, fingers coated in his precum, gripping just enough to make him jerk, a ripple coursing through his frame. you don’t say more—words feel redundant, your focus honed on the weight of him in your palm, the feverish heat, the way he pulses under your touch.

his hand darts to your hair, fingers knotting in the strands, tugging your head back with a force that steals your breath, throat exposed to the cool air. “watch it,” he growls, voice guttural, scraping like he’s dragging it over broken glass.

and yet his thumb brushes your cheek, a fleeting, unsteady graze, soft against the snarl. his hips inch forward, cock nudging closer to your lips, needy, unguarded. his other hand clamps onto the wall behind him, knuckles paling, nails gouging the chipped paint. his chest heaves unevenly, shirt stretching across his pecs, sweat beading at the base of his throat, catching the light.

you don’t respond. your lips curve into a faint, wicked smile, eyes fixed on his cock, hunger consuming you. your tongue darts out, barely skimming the head—a cruel, calculated tease that sends a jolt through him, his legs quivering under the strain.

his reaction is instant, a choked, guttural sound ripping from his throat, raw and fractured. his head snaps back against the concrete, the dull thud echoing, white hair glinting as it spills messily over his eyes. his jaw tightens, lips parting, tongue pressing to his palate like he’s swallowing a curse. his eyes snap shut briefly, lashes stark against his flushed cheeks, then flare open, wild and unfocused, pupils swallowing the blue.

then you start.

your lips part around him, slow, reverent yet vicious, like a predator savoring its prey. you take him inch by inch, tongue gliding along the thick vein with a greed that borders on fixation. spit pools at the corners of your mouth, dripping down his shaft, coating him in a glossy sheen. your hand moves in rhythm, fingers gripping tight, sliding through the mess of precum and saliva, the sound wet and obscene in the quiet stairwell.

you’re consumed, barely pausing for air, lips stretching around his girth, tongue circling the sensitive tip with relentless precision. no words—just the sloppy cadence of your mouth, a low, hungry hum in your throat as you draw him deeper, ravenous. your eyes flick up, catching his chest heaving, abs contracting with every jolt, his fingers tightening in your hair, tugging just enough to sting before they waver, grazing your scalp.

he struggles to breathe, chest rising and falling in fits and starts, shirt plastered to his sweat-damp skin, collar creased and damp. his fingers in your hair flex, then slacken, like he’s battling the urge to steer you. “fuck—fuck—” he chokes, voice splintering, no coherent words, just raw, desperate noise.

his hips jerk, a small, involuntary thrust pushing him deeper into your mouth, and you hum again, the vibration tearing through him. his head tilts back, throat bared, adam’s apple jumping as he swallows hard, a low groan slipping free. his other hand scrapes the wall, nails clawing at the concrete, leaving faint scratches.

you don’t taunt. your focus is absolute, lips gliding over him, tongue pressing flat against the underside of his cock, slick with saliva and precum. your free hand grips his thigh, nails sinking into the taut muscle, feeling it tense under your touch. saliva drips from your chin, staining his slacks, leaving dark, wet patches.

you take him deeper, throat constricting around him, and he bucks, a sharp, fractured sound bursting from his lips, hips twitching again. your eyes dart up, catching his face contorting—brows furrowed, lips parted, sweat tracing a path down his temple, snagging in his pale hair.

and then he’s coming. too soon, too overwhelming, hot and thick down your throat. you swallow with purpose, slow, deliberate, letting him feel the tight grip of your throat, savoring every pulse, every drop, like you’re claiming him entirely. spit and cum mingle, dripping from your lips, coating your chin in a glossy, obscene mess that catches the dim light. his knees soften, a faint quake in his legs, and his hand in your hair tightens briefly, then releases, fingers quaking as they slide to your jaw.

but you don’t stop.

your mouth keeps working, merciless, lips gliding over his oversensitive cock, tongue swirling with unyielding hunger. your hand strokes the base, slick with his release, relentless, pulling him into a haze of overstimulation. he gasps, nerves raw, eyes snapping open, wide and glassy, pupils blown to hell. “stop—fuck—please—” he chokes, voice shattered, hands fumbling at your shoulders, fingers flexing like he’s torn between pushing you away and pulling you closer. his legs quiver, muscles twitching under your palms, his breath coming in short, frantic bursts, catching in his throat.

you don’t answer. your lips tighten around him, sucking harder, tongue pressing against the sensitive head, coated in the remnants of his release. he jerks, a raw, humiliating sound scraping from his throat, body betraying him as his cock pulses again. his head tips forward, chin against his chest, eyes squeezing shut, lips quivering as he tries to breathe through it. his fingers press into your shoulders, leaving faint marks, and his other hand braces against the wall, knuckles pale, nails digging into the concrete.

and he breaks again, release spilling over your lips, hot and messy, dripping down your chin in glistening trails. he groans, deep and guttural, the sound echoing like a confession. his legs falter, knees nearly buckling, his breath shallow and jagged, a man unraveling.

you lick him clean, slow, deliberate, relishing the salt and heat, the way his skin jumps under your tongue. his hand in your hair slips away, fingers quaking, settling on your neck, lingering like he needs your pulse to anchor him.

you pull back at last, lips swollen, chin slick with his mess, and look up. he’s ruined—pupils dilated, cheeks flushed, sweat beading at his hairline, pale strands plastered to his forehead. his chest surges, shirt clinging to his damp skin, top button undone, revealing the sharp line of his collarbone.

“thought you hated me,” you murmur, voice soft but cutting, wiping your mouth with the back of your hand, the motion slow, deliberate, your eyes never leaving his. “thought you were stronger than this.”

he glares down at you, breathless, lips parted, tongue grazing his palate like he’s chewing on a retort. “you—fucking—bitch,” he rasps, voice raw, barely holding together, but his eyes betray him, lingering on your lips, the glossy shine of his cum on your chin, staring too long.

you climb into his lap, slow and deliberate, letting your weight settle against him, your soaked panties beneath your skirt dragging against his thigh with obscene friction.

he groans, low and fractured, his cock stirring again, the tip brushing your stomach, leaving a faint smear of precum. his eyes drop to the dark, wet patch on your underwear, and something in him snaps—his jaw tightens and his fingers press into your hips, hard enough to leave marks.

“soaked,” he mutters, voice hoarse, reverent, like he’s cursing a god. his tongue darts out, wetting his lips, and his gaze lifts to yours, dark and ravenous, holding eye contact briefly before dropping again, like he can’t resist. “you fucking get off on breaking me, don’t you?”

“maybe i do,” you whisper, voice silk and poison, leaning in until your lips brush his ear, your breath hot against his skin. “maybe i’ve been getting off on it since we were kids. maybe i knew you’d fold the second i got my hands on you.”

his hands seize your hips, fingers sinking in like he’s bracing against a storm. he pulls you down hard against his thigh, and you gasp, sharp and high, hips rocking instinctively, chasing the searing friction.

your breath catches, a flicker of weakness crossing your face—lips parting, eyes half-lidded for a moment, fingers clutching his shoulders, nails biting into his shirt. he catches it, his eyes glinting with something dangerous, lips twitching into a faint, predatory smirk.

“don’t act like you’re any better,” satoru snaps, voice low and ragged, almost a growl. his hands slide up your sides, thumbs grazing the curve of your ribs, lingering like he’s memorizing you. “you’re dripping like a fucking slut. you’d crawl for this cock if i let you.”

“i don’t crawl,” you hiss, but your voice wavers, betraying the heat pooling in your core, the way your legs press around his. your fingers tighten on his shoulders, gripping the fabric.

“oh, you will,” he says, dark and certain, his hand slipping beneath your panties like he owns you. two fingers slide inside, curling deep, and you choke, walls gripping him, slick and eager. his thumb circles your clit, tight and practiced, and your hips buck before you can stop them, a soft whimper escaping. his eyes lock on yours, unblinking, daring you to look away first.

he flips you with a force that steals your breath, your back slamming against the cold concrete wall, the chill biting into your spine. your hands scramble, nails raking his shoulders, leaving red lines through his shirt. his cock presses against your entrance, slick with your arousal, hot and pulsing, and you shiver, a soft moan slipping free despite yourself.

your eyes half-close, lips quivering, a fleeting vulnerability crossing your face, your breath hitching as you press your teeth into your lower lip.

“don’t,” you warn, voice thin, fraying at the edges, barely holding together. it’s too much—the way he fills the air, the way his touch sears, the way you want him even as you hate him. your chest tightens, fingers twisting into his shirt, gripping the fabric, a nervous reflex betraying the chaos inside you.

he ignores you. adjusts your hips, pins you there like a specimen, his hands bruising, possessive. “you wanted this,” he snarls, voice thick with need, his lips brushing your jaw, teeth grazing the skin. “you fucking earned it.”

and he pushes in.

slow, devastating, stretching you inch by inch, balls deep, his hips flush against yours. you both groan—low, rough, animalistic. your legs wrap around him, pulling him deeper, heels pressing into his lower back. your arms lock around his neck, nails carving crescent moons into his skin.

his face buries in the crook of your shoulder, breath hot and uneven, teeth grazing your collarbone, a faint scrape that sends a jolt through you. his tongue traces the salt of your skin, lips lingering, marking you.

satoru moves with purpose, every thrust a war cry, deep and unyielding. the sound of skin meeting skin echoes like thunder, mingling with your gasps, his grunts, the slick rhythm of your bodies.

your moans grow loud—too loud—and you bite your lip, teeth sinking into the soft flesh, trying to silence them. his hips drive forward, each thrust measured but forceful, his cock striking deep, making your walls grip him. his breath is ragged, puffing against your neck, and his fingers press into your hips, leaving marks that will darken by morning.

then—footsteps.

heavy, uneven, echoing from the top of the stairwell. a shadow flickers across the wall as the door creaks above, the sound sharp and jarring. your heart surges, panic flaring, eyes darting to the stairs, wide and glassy. but satoru doesn’t stop. his cock plunges deeper, harder, balls deep with every thrust, the wet rhythm of his hips against yours brazen in the silence.

you bite your hand, teeth sinking into your palm, muffling the moan clawing up your throat. your other hand grips his shoulder, nails biting in, and your legs quiver, trying to close, but his hips keep them spread.

“satoru—someone’s—” you whisper, voice frantic, barely audible, your eyes flicking to the stairs again, where the shadow lingers. your breath catches, a sharp, unsteady inhale, and your fingers twist into his shirt.

“let them see,” he growls, lips brushing your ear, voice low and vicious, dripping with cruelty. “fuck, you’re so pretty like this—look at you, no fake saint act, just my filthy little whore, taking me so fucking deep.” his words are condescending, but there’s a raw, genuine edge, like he’s seeing you for the first time, stripped of pretense, and it cuts deeper than his thrusts.

his eyes lock on yours, unblinking, pupils blown wide, and his lips twitch into a faint, predatory smirk. “you’re beautiful when you’re real,” he murmurs, voice dipping, almost soft, but the cruelty in it stings, exposing you. “no mask, no lies, just you, stuffed full of my cock.”

your body betrays you, walls gripping him tighter, pleasure surging despite the shame. the footsteps pause, a muffled voice calling out, “anyone down there?” and your heart pounds, but satoru’s thrusts intensify, more punishing, his cock filling you so completely it’s overwhelming.

you press your hand tighter over your mouth, eyes stinging, teeth digging deeper into your knuckles to stifle the sobs of pleasure. your hips jerk against him despite yourself, chasing the high. the voice mutters something vague, and you pray they leave, pray they don’t see you—legs spread, panties shoved aside, satoru’s cock buried deep, your body quaking with the effort to stay silent.

“shh,” he mocks, thrusting deeper, his cock hitting that spot that makes your vision blur, your walls tightening around him. “don’t let them hear you, princess. wouldn’t want your worshippers to see you like this, would you? their perfect little saint, fucked stupid by the guy she hates, creaming all over my cock like a desperate slut.” his voice is low, taunting, and his hand slides to your throat, not squeezing, just resting, his thumb tracing your pulse, feeling it race. his eyes flick to your lips, to the way your teeth sink into your knuckles, and he smirks, slow and cruel.

you whimper, shame and pleasure twisting into a tight knot in your core. your hips buck against him, a tear slipping free, catching on your lashes. the footsteps linger, the shadow still hovering, and his hips drive forward, relentless, the slick rhythm of your bodies louder now, brazen, and you bite down harder, tasting blood, trying to lock the moans in your throat.

“you’re so fucking gorgeous like this,” satoru murmurs, voice dipping low, almost reverent, but laced with venom. “no pretending, no bullshit. just you, taking me like you were born for it.” the praise is cruel, so genuine it burns, and your walls tighten around him, a soft, broken sound escaping despite your efforts. his eyes soften for a fraction of a second, a flicker of something raw, before they darken again, holding your gaze like a challenge.

the footsteps fade, the door creaking shut, and you exhale, the sound shaky in the air. but the relief is fleeting—satoru’s hand tightens on your throat, just enough to feel your pulse leap, and his cock drives deeper, unyielding.

“you love this,” he sneers, hips snapping harder, making you gasp. “you love being my dirty little secret, don’t you? look at you, clenching around me like you can’t get enough. like the greedy spoiled brat you really are.”

your breath hitches. “i don’t—” the protest dies halfway, strangled by a moan as he thrusts deep and just right, catching that devastating spot inside you. your fingers dig into his shoulder, nails biting through the fabric. your mouth parts, trying to form words that won’t come.

“harder,” you plead, voice breathless, fraying at the edges, a crack in your control. it’s a moment of weakness, raw and exposed, your lips trembling, eyes half-closing as you press your teeth into your lower lip, trying to anchor yourself. satoru catches it, his smirk widening, eyes glinting with triumph, and his tongue darts out, wetting his lips, as though he can taste your surrender.

satoru gives it to you.

fucks you like it’s the only language he knows, like every thrust is a sharp syllable, every moan a desperate rebuttal. your bodies argue in heat and rhythm, friction and breath. his hips drive forward like a point he's determined to make—over and over, merciless and unrelenting, a cruel kind of eloquence.

it’s not love, but it’s the only way either of you knows how to say stay.

his cock fills you, thick and unyielding, stretching you with every measured thrust, the head grazing your walls, slick with your arousal. the wet rhythm of your bodies colliding echoes, brazen, mingling with the uneven huff of his breath against your neck. his hips surge forward, balls deep, the coarse hair at his base brushing your sensitive skin, sending a spark through your core.

your walls tighten around him, eager, possessive, and he hisses, a sharp, involuntary sound, his jaw locking, a tendon pulsing under his flushed cheek. his fingers press into your hips, bruising, and his eyes flick to yours for a fleeting moment—wild, glassy, pupils blown—before darting away, like he’s dodging the truth.

your body gives out first. the coil inside you snaps, and your spine arches like a drawn bowstring, fingers clawing down his back, leaving angry red trails. your mouth opens, but no sound escapes—just a broken little gasp, sharp and cut off like a secret you never meant to confess. pleasure floods you, white-hot and overwhelming, stealing the air from your lungs.

your legs shake, heels pressing hard against his back like you’re anchoring him inside, keeping him close, keeping him real. your brows furrow, eyes wide and glassy, lips parted in a quivering o that never forms a word. your walls pulse around him, slick with your release, a faint sheen coating his cock as he eases back slightly, the sight drawing a low, guttural sound from his chest.

a sob claws up your throat, half-stifled by your palm. your other hand scrabbles for purchase, nails sinking into his skin, and he groans at the sting, at the way your body fights to hold him even as it unravels. his legs tense under yours, muscles coiling, and his tongue grazes his lips, a quick, unconscious flick.

his cock twitches inside you, heavy and hot, filling you to the point of ache. saliva gathers at the corner of your mouth, a thin trail sliding down your chin, mingling with the sweat beading at your throat. his eyes catch it, lingering on the messy shine, and his throat bobs as he swallows hard, his grip on your hip tightening.

he follows not long after.

his body stiffens, chest pressing flush to yours, a quake running through him like a snapped wire. his eyes flutter shut for a second, lashes quivering, and your name spills from his lips—hoarse, cracked, reverent, like prayer and curse in one.

satoru spills into you, deep and pulsing, his release hot and thick, filling you until it leaks out, a slick trail tracing down your thighs, pooling on the concrete below. his breath breaks against your neck, coming in short, ragged bursts, and his mouth finds your shoulder, teeth grazing the damp skin, more mark than bite. it lingers, a claiming, a confession he can't say aloud.

his fingers flex on your hips, then loosen, only to tighten again, like he’s afraid to let go. his eyes open, locking on yours for a moment—wild, raw, unguarded—before he jerks his gaze away, jaw tightening.

but satoru doesn’t stop.

he should.

you’re shaking beneath him, overstimulated, your breath hitching in choked hiccups. but he doesn’t stop. he fucks you through the comedown, through the soft sounds you make—half-cries, half-whimpers—through the desperate grip of your spent muscles.

his rhythm falters but persists, each thrust carving a space where only he fits, like he’s terrified you’ll vanish if he slows. his cock drags against your sensitive walls, slick with cum and arousal, the sound wet and relentless, filling the stairwell. your legs quiver, heels digging into his lower back, and your hand clutches his shoulder, nails leaving faint red crescents.

your other hand presses harder against your mouth, teeth biting into your palm to muffle the sounds you can’t contain. his breath sears your neck, puffing in uneven bursts, and his lips graze your collarbone, leaving a faint trail of saliva that cools on your skin.

“hate you,” he snarls, voice wrecked, raw and shaking. his hips snap forward again, sharp and deep, his cock driving into you with a force that makes your walls clench, a soft, broken whimper escaping your lips. his forehead presses to yours for one trembling second, eyes locked on yours—wide, wild, panicked—like a man holding his breath underwater.

his tongue flicks out again, wetting his lips, and his fingers flex against your hips, a faint tremor in his hands. his thrusts are relentless, each one deliberate, measured, but forceful, the head of his cock hitting deep, making your breath catch in sharp, stuttering gasps.

your eyes flutter, dazed and glossy, lashes clinging to damp skin. your mouth opens, but nothing comes—only the broken breath of someone who should say stop but can’t.

you’re still trembling, thighs clenching unconsciously around him, breath shallow and uneven. your walls flutter around his cock, slick with the mess of your release and his, and a faint, wet trail drips down your inner thigh, pooling on the floor.

he shamelessly drinks in the sight and jerks his gaze away like it burns him, like he’s afraid of what he’ll see—afraid that if he keeps his eyes on you too long, he’ll realize he’s not angry at you at all. his jaw clenches, a muscle ticking under the skin, and his tongue presses to the inside of his cheek.

his hips stutter, just for a moment, but he keeps going, thrusting deep, the wet squelch of your bodies louder now, a rhythmic, obscene echo. his fingers dig into your hips, bruising, and his breath puffs against your neck, hot and uneven, a faint groan slipping free as your walls clench around him again.

he’s angry at how much he wants you to stay.

and how terrified he is that you will.

“you’re such a bad liar,” you breathe, ragged, voice barely there, lips trembling as you speak. “you beg like you worship me.”

“does that make you think you’ve won?” he growls, thrusting harder, making you gasp, your head tipping back against the wall. “you’re way delusional than i thought. you’re just as fucked as i am, princess. look at you—cumming on my cock like it’s the only thing you’re good for.”

you clench again, a weak, desperate moan slipping free, and he groans, cock twitching inside you. your lips crash into his, messy, obscene, tongues tangling, teeth biting. his blood is in your mouth, sharp and metallic, and yours is on his tongue, a shared wound.

the stairwell reeks of sweat, sex, and something sacred, your ribbon lost somewhere on the floor, his shirt clinging to his sweat-slick skin, wrinkled and damp. your eyes meet—unfocused, wild, wrecked—holding for a moment before you both look away, like the truth is too much.

“this meant nothing,” he rasps, voice raw, lips trembling as he speaks, his eyes flicking to your lips, lingering there. his fingers loosen on your hips, then tighten again, like he can’t decide whether to let go.

“good,” you whisper, lips brushing his, still trembling from the aftershocks, your breath puffing against his mouth. “then we’re doing it again tomorrow. maybe in front of a mirror. i want you to see how pathetic you look when you’re begging.” your voice dips, soft but cutting.

he doesn’t reply, but his hips roll into you one last time, slow, deliberate, like punctuation. his mouth catches your gasp, fingers tightening on your skin, and his eyes hold yours for a moment—wild, raw, unguarded—before he looks away, tongue pressing to his cheek again. you know neither of you will ever forget.

“this meant nothing,” he rasps, voice rough around the edges, lips twitching like he almost regrets saying it. his hands flex on your hips, like he can’t decide whether to let go or keep holding on.

“good,” you murmur, breath brushing his mouth, still winded. “then we’re doing it again tomorrow. in front of a mirror this time. i want you to see how desperate you get.” your voice is calm, cruel, intimate. your fingers smooth down his chest—tidying what you ruined.

he doesn’t respond.

instead, he leans in and steals a kiss—quick, hard, teeth clashing. like he can’t help himself. like he needs one last hit before he walks away. it’s messy and angry and not meant to linger, but it does.

his mouth hovers just a second longer than it should. your breath catches.

then he pulls back, silent, something unreadable flickering behind his eyes. like he’s already thinking about next time.

[kyuu-collection]

call it first aid

pairing — underground boxer satoru x nurse reader

satoru gojo wins every fight under the lights—but somehow, he only ever shows up bruised and smirking at your door when he wants to lose. between your fussing fingers and his maddening grin, ointment turns into foreplay, tension coils tight, and soon enough, it’s the mattress doing all the talking while you forget who was supposed to be in control. wc — 2.3k

it starts with you threatening to break his nose.

not because of the bruises sprawled across his ribs or the split above his brow—but because he’s done it again. shown up unannounced, all bloodied and beaming, like a living, breathing disaster movie premiering in your damn hallway. your floor’s probably stained with his blood at this point, and he doesn’t even have the decency to look ashamed.

"you have got to be the dumbest man alive," you snap, looming over him with a cotton pad soaked in antiseptic, knuckles tight with irritation. your fingers are steady, precise—years of nursing instinct—but your tone drips venom. "are you trying to die, or do you just like making my life a waking nightmare?"

satoru, infuriatingly unfazed, just grins. there’s a glint in his eyes—mischievous and stupidly fond—and the bruises blooming along his cheekbone only seem to accentuate it. he looks like he lost a bar brawl and liked it. silver hair damp, curling at the tips, streaked with red from the cut at his temple. his chest rises with slow, deliberate breaths, still flushed from exertion. the corner of his mouth twitches with every inhale, like he’s holding back another wisecrack.

“third option,” he says, fingers drumming along the mattress edge. his hand twitches between taps—restless, like he’s got something to say but would rather tease. “maybe i just like seeing you like this. bossy, scowling. real cute when you’re mad.”

“bite me,” you snap.

“maybe after i’m done being a good patient.”

“you are two seconds away from a lobotomy,” you grit out, brushing a thumb beneath the fresh gash. he winces, but the grin doesn’t budge.

“ooh. medical threats. my favorite.”

his grin stretches wider when you swat at his arm. not that hard, but enough to show you’re done playing nice. he lets out an exaggerated gasp and collapses back against the bed like you’ve just shot him point-blank. his legs flop dramatically over the edge, socks half-on and mismatched.

"abuse," he groans, throwing an arm over his eyes. “unbelievable. and after everything i’ve suffered.”

“what you’ve suffered,” you mutter, leaning in to clean the gash on his forehead. “you mean the injuries you got for fun?”

his voice is muffled by his arm. “for glory.”

“for attention.”

he peeks at you from under his lashes, pout dramatic. “maybe i just missed you.”

your hands pause. just a beat. then, you're back to dabbing, more aggressive than before. he hisses.

“good,” you say, clearly unapologetic. “serves you right.”

his fingers brush against your knee absentmindedly, tracing lazy circles against the fabric of your scrub pants. when you glance down, he’s watching you. less teasing now. a little softer. it makes your throat tighten.

"you’re staring," you murmur without looking up.

“yeah,” he breathes. “you’re hot when you’re mad.”

“i’m always mad when you’re around.”

“lucky me, then.”

you roll your eyes, shoving at his shoulder, but he catches your wrist halfway. the movement is fluid, instinctual—like muscle memory. your breath stutters just as he tugs, and you’re off-balance, toppling with a startled yelp.

“satoru, don’t you—!”

but you’re already falling, dragged into the mess of rumpled sheets and warm skin. he flips you with ease, laughing low in his chest, pinning you underneath him. your wrists are caught above your head in one of his large hands, his body caging yours like he’s done this a hundred times—and he has.

his grin is boyish, smug, the corners of his lips twitching, but there’s a flicker of focus in his eyes. the kind that knows every inch of you—every twitch of your lip, every breath you draw in before you mouth off. strands of white-silver hair fall into his eyes, glinting under the yellow bedroom light. his lashes flutter slightly as he leans in, nose nearly brushing yours.

“you done playing rough?”

“not even close,” you growl, twisting beneath him.

your thighs lock around his hips and you try to throw him off with a sharp jerk of your body—but he moves with you, shifting his weight, pressing down harder. he’s annoyingly strong, and way too comfortable like this. his breath fans across your cheek, warm and uneven. there’s a bead of sweat that trails from his temple down the curve of his jaw.

“fuck you,” you snarl.

“mmm,” he hums, eyes dropping to your lips, “later.”

his grip tightens slightly when you squirm again, testing his hold. your glare falters when his voice drops, low and teasing, with something hotter simmering just beneath it. “careful,” he warns, mock-gentle. “keep moving like that and i’m gonna think you like being under me.”

you flush, jaw tightening. “let go.”

he tilts his head. “say please.”

“drop dead.”

“already did. in love with you.”

that shuts you up. your scowl weakens, but your eyes are still fierce. your breathing is shallow now, and his is starting to match it, both of you caught somewhere between playful and perilous.

he leans in, nose brushing against your cheek, and whispers against your jaw, “you gonna take responsibility for roughing me up, pretty girl?”

his voice is low and rough around the edges, but his hand—resting beside your head—trembles just slightly. he’s holding back. always does with you. you can feel it in the way he’s hovering, not quite pressing down all the way, in the tension coiled in his back and the unspoken question in his eyes.

you want to snark something back. tell him off. but your words crumble, dissolve somewhere between the brush of his lips against your pulse and the way he’s looking at you like he’d bleed all over your floors a thousand times if it meant ending up right here.

his hips shift subtly, slotting neatly between your thighs. his cock presses against your core, hot and insistent through the layers of your clothes. he breathes through his nose sharply, jaw flexing as if trying to focus on anything else.

you squirm, expression twitching between indignation and something more vulnerable. your glare falters, lips parting. “satoru—!”

“what?” he murmurs, lashes fluttering, lower lip jutting in mock hurt. his eyes flicker to your mouth, and he swallows thickly. “you started it.”

you want to argue, really, but your retort fizzles when his mouth skims along your jaw. his breath ghosts hot against your cheek, uneven, and when his teeth scrape your neck, your lashes flutter, breath hitching as he whispers, “you gonna take responsibility for roughing me up, pretty girl?”

you’re about to say something smart—really—but his free hand’s already pushing up your nightdress, fingers grazing the damp lace of your panties before tugging them aside. suddenly your thoughts are gone, completely, as he drags the tip of his cock along your slick slit, teasing, lazy, grinning, smearing your arousal over his swollen head.

“still mad at me, nurse?” he murmurs, voice hoarse from the fight. “’cause i think i deserve a little reward for winning.”

“winning?” you snap, trying to sound angry, but your thighs are already trembling around his hips. “you came back with your eyebrow split open.”

“and you’re here,” he says, pinning your wrists again above your head like it’s nothing. “patching me up. touching me so sweet. kinda seems like i won, baby.”

you open your mouth to argue—but his cock’s already pressing between your folds, fat and heavy and searingly warm against your dripping cunt. it drags up your slit slow, deliberate, reverent—like he’s savoring every millimeter, like he knows exactly what he’s about to do to you. the head of him nudges your clit on the way up, sending a jolt through your hips, slick coating his shaft. your breath stutters. your back arches, toes curling. your eyes flutter shut, lashes trembling on your cheeks—

until his hand snaps around your jaw.

“uh-uh,” he murmurs, low and hot against your lips, thumb pressing into your cheek, pinky grazing your pulse. his breath brushes your skin like heat rising off pavement. “eyes on me. want you to watch when i split your tight pussy open.”

your lashes flicker. your pupils bloom wide. you open your eyes, dazed, heart hammering. he’s right there—so close you can count each pale lash stuck to his damp cheekbone. his gaze is locked on yours—ice blue turned pitch at the edges, pupils blown wide with hunger, reverence, need. you nod, slow, shaky.

then he pushes in.

you choke on a gasp. your entire body goes taut, back snapping into a high arch, thighs tensing around his waist. the stretch burns—hot and overwhelming, his thick cock forcing your walls to yield with a wet squelch. your cunt flutters, straining to take him. he’s thick. too thick. your heels dig into the mattress. his groan rumbles through his chest, lips parted, sweat beading at his temples. he bows his head, snow-white hair clinging to his forehead in damp, messy strands.

“shit,” he breathes, voice strained. his hips roll forward in small, careful thrusts, giving you time. his hands tighten around your wrists, knuckles pale. his lashes flutter, eyes half-lidded and glassy. your body squirms involuntarily under him, searching for relief, unable to speak—only soft, helpless whimpers fall from your lips.

“you feel that, baby?” he whispers, voice gone rough, as his forehead tips to yours. “feel how fuckin’ deep i am in your soaked little cunt?”

his thumb strokes over your temple, soothing, gentle. his lips brush the corner of your mouth, soft and warm, completely at odds with the way he’s stretching your pulsing pussy. he watches every twitch in your expression, every breath caught between your teeth.

“so pretty like this,” he murmurs, hoarse and reverent. “all folded up. all mine.”

“n-no—” you gasp, though your legs lock around him like chains. “i’m—still mad at you—”

the corner of his mouth ticks up, smug and wicked.

“yeah?” he says—then slams into you. your cry is strangled. the bed rocks beneath you. your spine bows off the mattress, fingers spasming in his grip. he pulls back, and does it again. harder.

“you sure?” he pants, voice thick with amusement. sweat glistens down his chest. his grin is feral now, wild and flashing. his hips snap forward, sharp and deep, punching the air from your lungs.

he finds a rhythm—brutal, perfect. each thrust hits deep, rocking through your core, dragging moans and hiccups from your lips. the headboard slams against the wall in time with his pace, and the room fills with the obscene sound of slick skin on skin, your wet pussy smacking around his cock.

you try to speak—really, you do—but each attempt shatters into whimpers. your back arches. your arms tremble in his hold. he watches you like he’s starving, like each flicker of your lashes feeds something primal inside him.

his hand leaves your wrist to grab your thigh, folding it tight against your chest. the new angle punches a cry from your throat—high, breathless. he groans, jaw flexing, as he slams in harder, his cockhead kissing your cervix.

“such a fuckin’ mess down here,” he growls, gaze devouring your face. “and we’re just getting started.”

it builds too fast. the tension in your belly coils tight, electricity crawling up your spine. you clamp down, thighs locking around him, whole body curling into the sensation—

and then it crashes. your orgasm hits like a riptide. your body convulses, thighs shaking, mouth falling open in a silent scream. your cunt milks him, spasming, wetness gushing around his cock in hot, sticky spurts. your toes curl. your vision goes white.

“fuck, there she is,” he moans, forehead pressing into yours, breath catching. “knew you were close. knew you’d break so sweet.”

but he doesn’t stop. doesn’t even slow. he wraps an arm under your back, hauling you closer. your cheek brushes his shoulder, nose buried against the salty curve of his neck. the other hand slips between you—his fingers find your clit, cruel and skilled, circling hard and fast over your swollen bud.

“one more,” he growls, panting. “gimme one more, baby. i know you can.”

you sob, shaking your head—your body says otherwise. your hips buck. your back bows again. tears spill down your temples, pooling into your hair. you’re babbling now, incoherent and trembling.

he drives into you harder. your body rocks with every thrust, pushed to the edge. every nerve screams. you can’t breathe. can’t think.

then the second orgasm hits—sharper, meaner. your thighs quake. your mouth drops open with a strangled wail as your body clenches around him. wetness splashes between you, drenching your thighs, his stomach, the sheets. you’re squirting—legs spasming, muscles seizing. your hands claw uselessly at the air.

he stills, stunned. “ohhh fuck,” he breathes, staring down at the slick mess between you. “you—baby—look at you. ruined. holy shit.”

your chest heaves, throat raw. your eyes are unfocused, lashes wet. every inch of you trembles, spent—but he’s not done.

he dips his head, tongue dragging up your throat. then he bites—a soft, possessive nip over your pulse point. his hands drag down your body, mapping every inch, claiming every curve. he thrusts through your aftershocks, slow but relentless, cock still hard in your pulsing cunt.

“gonna cum inside,” he groans, nearly slurring. “gonna fill your tight pussy up. fuck, baby, you want that, huh? want me to breed you? make you mine?”

you nod—no, sob, a desperate sound wrenched from deep in your chest. your nails scrape his shoulders weakly. he thrusts again, deep, punishing—

he cums with a broken groan. his hips stutter. his body locks above you, trembling. he buries himself to the hilt, twitching inside you as he spills hot, thick ropes deep into your womb.

his body slumps. his head drops to your shoulder. his breath fans over your damp skin in hot, uneven waves. his hair clings to your collarbone, soaked. inside you, he’s still pulsing, still impossibly thick.

he kisses your cheek—once, twice. barely there. “...still mad at me?”

you don’t answer. can’t. your mouth opens, lips trembling, but no sound comes out. your thighs twitch, stomach muscles fluttering.

his hand drifts between your legs, fingers brushing over your soaked, cum-slick slit. your hips jolt, breath catching. he laughs quietly against your skin.

“thought so,” he whispers, voice still rough. “good thing i’ve got stamina to spare.”

a/n: i wrote this with my legs crossed and my dignity hanging on by a thread. satoru gojo if you're out there, pls. i am but a humble citizen with a high pain tolerance and a very available schedule. take me to poundtown and leave no survivors 😭🙏🏻

[kyuu-collection]

you ever draw someone so hard you ride them?

pairing — star player satoru x broke artist reader

synopsis : after months of being your muse, satoru finally flips the table and makes you his canvas—reverent, hungry, and utterly devoted. you spent weeks capturing his form; now he worships yours, whispering that you are the masterpiece.

wc — 3.5k tags — smut, fluff, university au, pining, finally touching, soft dom satoru, service top satoru, hand worship, oral (f receiving), mirror sex, slow burn payoff, first time, established relationship, emotional smut, he loves you so much it’s sick, you lets yourself be loved, gentle filth, satoru is down so bad it’s pathetic

a/n: yes. this is the smut for free throws & figure drawings. i couldn’t add smut in the original oneshot, but these two never left me alone, the part two which includes their life after college is still in the making!

eight months in.

that’s how long it takes before satoru touches you like this.

not because you weren’t ready. not because he wasn’t. but because he’s a golden-retriever-faced menace who waited—waited—until your need outweighed your pride. he could tell. he always could. and he never pushed, never asked, never made you feel cornered. just circled closer every day like gravity, like fate. one teasing comment at a time. one lazy smirk, one thigh brush, one perfectly timed stretch of his jersey in your face. every moment so casual. calculated. loving. he gave you time to breathe, time to bloom.

he made it a game. but not one he ever planned to win fast.

he’d kiss you slow in the halls, hand in your back pocket, mouth curling into your neck just to feel you twitch. he’d crawl into your bed after practice, shirtless, smelling like sweat and mint gum and expensive laundry detergent. he’d grin like a devil and mouth at your collarbone like he was innocent. always stopping short. always leaving you throbbing, breathless, caught between a gasp and a growl. and he’d laugh when you shoved him away, cheeks pink, thighs pressed tight, muttering something vicious under your breath. and then he'd say something stupid like, "it's cute when you fluster," as if you weren't already melting inside.

satoru gojo is shameless. but he’s also patient. reverent. completely and utterly yours.

he never tried to touch what you weren’t ready to give. not once. not even when you straddled his lap in the studio, thighs framing his hips while you adjusted the light for your latest sketch. not when you fell asleep with your hand in his shirt and your face in his throat. not when your breath hitched the first time he kissed the base of your spine, or when your hips unconsciously pressed against him during a late-night cuddle. he’d grin, yes. he’d tease. but he’d always stop. always wait. because he wanted you to feel safe. he wanted you to choose.

because he knows how much you overthink. how long you spent folding your love into corners, how tightly you hold your own body together, like it’s a project you haven’t quite finished. you’re an artist—your hands are your pride, your purpose. and he knows that too. better than anyone.

he fell in love with them first.

long before you ever let him in, he was already watching the way you curled your fingers when you thought, the way you rubbed your thumb over your pencil before sketching, the way paint smudged the edges of your knuckles like a secret only he was meant to see. he watches them like a man starved. kisses them when you let him. cradles them like they might shatter. memorizes the little freckle on your index finger and the groove of your palm. calls them magic. says they saved him.

"you know you could ruin me with these," he’ll murmur sometimes, his lips brushing the heel of your palm. "all that talent, all that precision, and you use them to paint me?" his smile is crooked. adoring. "no one's ever been so lucky."

and when you look away, flustered, pretending not to care, he kisses the dip of your wrist and whispers, "i’d let you wreck me. just say the word."

but he waits.

days turn to weeks, then months. your sketchbooks fill with him. you pretend they don’t. he pretends not to notice. he starts bringing snacks to your sessions, then full meals. makes you take breaks. kisses the stress from your forehead. lays his head in your lap and lets you draw in peace. he runs errands for you. he fixes your squeaky cabinet. he folds your laundry, badly. he doodles in your margins when you aren't looking and gets scolded every time.

he never asks for more.

and still, he waits.

until one night, you pull him into your bed.

not like usual. not with the intent to sleep. not with your body curled toward the wall and his arm tossed carelessly around your waist.

no. this time, you kiss him first.

this time, your mouth is open and soft and wanting, your hands sliding under his shirt like you’re memorizing the ridges of his stomach. and for one suspended breath, he freezes. just to make sure you mean it. his lashes flutter. his breath stills. his hand hovers above your thigh, waiting.

and you do.

because for once, you aren’t overthinking. you aren’t afraid. you want him. you trust him. more than you’ve ever trusted anyone.

and the moment your back hits the sheets, he’s all over you.

knees planted wide between your legs, hands everywhere, mouth hot and eager as it trails kisses down your body. his eyes are bright and ravenous, that blue burned down to smoke, lips already slick from the kisses he's stolen. his hands shake, just barely. like he can’t believe he’s allowed to touch. like he doesn’t want to ruin anything by rushing.

"took you long enough," he breathes, voice shot to hell as he watches you peel your shirt off. his gaze drags over your chest, reverent. like you’re light. like you’re art. like you’re his. something in him breaks a little, seeing you like this. bare. willing. glowing.

"you’re so annoying," you mutter, breathless, smiling despite yourself.

"mmhm," he hums, nuzzling against your neck. "but you’re still letting me fuck you. can’t be that bad."

your glare doesn’t land. not when he’s pressing you into the mattress, nosing at your jaw, whispering, “been dreaming about this. you, under me, making all those noises you try so hard to hold in.”

he kisses your hands first. of course he does. each finger, with reverence. your palm, with warmth. your wrist, with devotion. he presses them to his chest like they’re sacred. says something about how they’ve built whole worlds. says he wants to earn every touch.

he doesn't just want you.

he cherishes you.

and fuck, you are noisy.

it drives him insane.

satoru hears it before his mouth even touches you. that soft, hitched breath when his hands slide beneath your thighs, calloused fingertips dragging slow and reverent like he wants to learn the shape of your tremble. the little gasp you try to swallow when he kisses the sensitive skin above your knee, letting his lips linger there too long, humming softly as if he's savoring something decadent. the sound that breaks from your throat when his thumb barely brushes over your folds and finds you soaked — it has him swearing under his breath, jaw going tight, shoulders tensing as though he’s barely keeping himself leashed.

his groan is guttural, lodged deep in his chest, like it takes effort to keep himself from diving in right then. his eyes are hooded, lashes clinging to sweat-slick skin, pupils blown wide beneath strands of silver hair that stick to his damp temple. his mouth is parted, a bead of spit catching on his bottom lip—already pink from where he's been biting it raw. his expression flickers, moment to moment: awe, hunger, something like devotion. he looks like a man seconds from prayer and sin all at once.

“mm,” he hums low, dragging a knuckle through your slick. his thumb ghosts over your clit but doesn’t linger yet. “you always get this messy when i just look at you?”

your thighs twitch. your jaw clenches. your hands fist into the sheets, trying not to give him the satisfaction. but your eyes flutter half-shut and your lips part around a breath that catches anyway.

“don’t narrate it,” you mumble, voice shaking, already unraveling.

he laughs into your skin, hot breath ghosting over the inside of your thigh, and his grin is all teeth and mischief.

“can’t help it,” he murmurs, dragging his mouth lower. “you’re too fuckin’ cute when you try to be mad at me.”

his palms slide behind your thighs, thumbs smoothing over your skin as he eases you apart, spreading you open like you’re something sacred—his. the air hits your wetness and your body jerks, but he’s already lowering himself, settling between your legs like it’s his home.

his eyes roam every inch of you before he even touches. he stares, quiet for once, like he wants to memorize the way you look right now, how flushed you are, how your chest rises with shaky breath.

“shit,” he whispers, licking his lips. “you’re unreal.”

you breathe his name again, soft, tentative. he glances up, and when your eyes meet, his smile softens into something molten.

“shhh,” he says, lips brushing your skin. “just lemme taste you, baby. wanna make you feel good.”

and then he devours you.

no teasing. no hesitance. just tongue, mouth, hunger.

he groans like he’s been starved, like every inch of his body is aching to have this. he buries his mouth in you and licks like he’s drowning and the only thing keeping him breathing is you. his tongue is hot and slow at first, dragging between your folds, mapping out every part of you. and then deeper, messier, hungrier.

his nose nudges the crease of your thigh and he exhales sharply through it, groaning as his tongue circles your clit and flicks just right. your hips jump and he grins, lips curved against your skin.

when you moan, broken and high-pitched, his lashes flutter and his eyes roll back, like the sound of you is enough to undo him. he tightens his grip on your thighs, keeping you still while he feasts. you feel his jaw flex, the sharp edge of his cheekbone brushing your thigh with every movement.

he pulls back just a moment, lips slick, breath ragged, eyes glazed.

“you make the prettiest sounds,” he breathes, voice thick, reverent. “c'mon, don’t hide them from me. wanna hear everything.”

his tongue returns, more focused now, lapping and sucking in rhythm. you twitch beneath him, thighs clenching, and he lets out a low, gravelly noise of satisfaction. his lashes flutter again, mouth working hungrily, jaw moving with purpose.

“mmm,” he hums against you, smirking. “tastes better than any fuckin’ sweet i’ve had. should’ve done this sooner.”

your hand flies to his hair, tugging without thinking, and he groans loud—vibrating straight through you. his shoulders shudder, like he wants to grind himself into the mattress just from your sounds alone.

“fuck,” he breathes, and the tip of his nose bumps your clit again as he speaks. “pull harder. make a mess of me.”

then—without warning, without mercy—he sinks two fingers inside you.

thick. slow. deep. curling like he knows exactly where you need him.

your back bows. your breath stutters. your body arches up into him, and you make a sound he’s never heard from you before—wrecked and raw. his free hand anchors you down, palm spread flat against your stomach like he’s holding you to the earth.

“look at you,” he groans, eyes flicking up to watch your face. “so fuckin’ tight. like you’re made to take me.”

his fingers work a slow, maddening rhythm inside you, knuckles dragging firm as his tongue flicks your clit in sync. the room is too hot. your vision swims. your thighs shake beneath his mouth.

he watches every twitch, every breath you catch, every expression you can’t hide. he looks wrecked—hair damp and curling against his temples, lips swollen and slick, jaw sharp with tension.

he pants against your cunt, voice breaking.

“close,” he murmurs. “i know. i can feel it. fuck, baby, gimme it. let me have all of it.”

you shatter.

legs trembling, voice cracking. your orgasm crashes through you like thunder, loud and bright and soaked, and he moans into it—desperate and unfiltered, mouth still moving, tongue still pressing through every wave. your body jolts with every aftershock, thighs shaking around his head, hands twitching against his shoulders. your fingers go slack in his hair, your voice frayed.

his fingers don’t leave you. they ease, slow, coaxing every tremor from your body with tenderness. his mouth lingers, placing soft kisses now, like he’s trying to soothe you through the comedown.

your hands push weakly at his shoulders, breathless, spent.

and he loves it.

he finally lifts his head, breath warm against your thigh, chest heaving like he just ran through a storm and found peace in you. his pupils are blown wide, nearly eclipsing the soft blue, hair disheveled and damp with sweat, strands sticking to his flushed forehead. his lips glisten, raw and parted, breath shaky as though your taste alone stole every last thread of his composure. his tongue drags across his lower lip slowly, like he’s still savoring the flavor of you, the corners of his mouth twitching into a smug, breathless grin.

he looks wrecked. and radiant. wild with need and dripping with adoration.

“you okay?”

you nod, barely. dazed. lips swollen, eyes glassy, pupils unfocused. your lashes flutter as he kisses up your body—delicate presses, reverent, like each inch of skin is something sacred, like he’s anchoring himself in the world by mapping every place he’s made you feel good. he doesn’t speak at first. just hums, low and satisfied, murmuring quiet praises into your skin like they’re instinct. like worship.

his mouth finds yours again, and he kisses you deep—wet and warm, a slow press that melts into something messier. he lets you taste yourself on his tongue, groaning into your mouth as your hips roll against him without meaning to. when you whimper, he exhales through his nose, kissing you deeper, his fingers slipping beneath your thighs to anchor you down.

“mm,” he exhales, voice syrup-thick as he shifts beneath you. “not done.”

his hands settle at your hips, palms steady, guiding you effortlessly into his lap like you’re weightless. your back meets his chest with a slick press, your sweat-slicked skin sliding against his. his arms coil around your waist, strong and grounding. his chest rises and falls behind you, a little too fast, like he’s barely managing to keep himself from dragging you under.

the mirror is in front of you.

angled just right. angled perfectly. and god, he made sure of that.

his cock, flushed dark and twitching, slides between your folds as he shifts his hips beneath you, letting the tip nudge against your clit before gliding through your slick. the friction alone makes your head tip back, a choked sound escaping you.

he watches your reaction in the mirror, that infuriating smirk pulling at the corner of his mouth. you feel it—his amusement, his awe.

“look at that,” he purrs, voice heavy with affection and mischief. “haven’t even put it in yet, and you’re already fallin’ apart on me.”

he kisses the side of your head, nose brushing your temple.

“breathe, baby.”

his fingers dip down again, slow, teasing circles over your clit. featherlight, just enough to make your stomach tighten. your head tips back, body twitching in his lap. your nails scratch lightly down his arms, the only defense you can muster.

then—

he pushes in.

inch by inch.

thick, stretching you open like it’s the first time. because it is.

your breath shatters. your whole body jolts, hands flying to his forearms. your nails dig deep. your thighs strain to close, but his arms hold you open. you gasp—a helpless, breathy thing that breaks before it ever becomes a word.

“shh,” he coos, voice gentler now, lips grazing your ear. “s’okay. i got you. just breathe. you’re takin’ me so good already.”

he groans—low, shaky. your walls flutter around him with every inch he sinks in, the stretch making your whole body shiver. his hand doesn’t leave your clit, rubbing slow, steady circles to ease the burn.

“fuck,” he moans, forehead dropping to your shoulder. “you’re squeezin’ me like a vice. gonna make me lose it before i even move.”

you try to speak, to say something biting—but the words collapse into a soft, keening sound as he bottoms out.

his hand finds your chin and tilts it forward.

“nuh-uh,” he murmurs. “don’t look away. wanna see how fuckin’ pretty you look like this.”

your eyes drag open, hazy and wet, and meet the mirror.

you barely recognize yourself—flushed and shining, lips parted in a stunned gasp, your skin glowing with sweat. your brows are drawn, mouth twitching as your walls flutter around the thick weight of him inside you.

he starts to move.

slow. dragging. deliberate.

your breath stutters. your knees twitch, thighs trembling.

“that’s it,” he hums, breath hot on your neck. “just like that. god, you’re makin’ the cutest faces. y’know that? fuckin’ adorable. you sure you’re not the one obsessed with me?”

he rolls his hips deeper. you cry out, barely a sound, just air and heat. your hands tremble where they grip his thighs, too overwhelmed to speak.

“what’s that? no smart little comment now?” he teases, kissing your shoulder, his voice drenched in adoration. “thought you were tough, angel.”

he grinds up into you again. your mouth falls open.

a whimper.

a moan.

and nothing else.

he laughs. delighted. wrecked.

“knew it,” he whispers. “knew i’d turn that sharp mouth of yours to mush.”

his thrusts quicken. deepen. his arms wrap tighter around your waist, locking you in place as he fucks up into you, smooth and controlled. the mirror shows everything. your body bouncing with every roll of his hips, his cock splitting you open again and again, the muscles in his abdomen flexing as he moves.

“look at you, baby,” he growls, picking up the pace. “fuck—how’re you this gorgeous and still act like i’m the muse?”

his voice cracks with it. because you are—your expression undone, jaw slack, eyes lidded and wet. your thighs tremble with each thrust, every sound that escapes you more broken than the last.

“don’t hide from me,” he pants, breath sharp and quick. “keep watching. wanna see the exact moment you fall apart.”

you try.

but your eyes blur. your vision swims. your body rocks helplessly in his lap.

your orgasm coils tight in your belly, sharp and violent.

“satoru—please—i’m—”

“that’s it,” he whispers, mouth brushing your ear. “let go. let me feel you, baby. wanna watch you fall apart all over my cock.”

you break. again.

your body collapses against him, your scream breathless, voice cracking. every muscle pulls taut, trembling. your walls clench hard around him, and he groans—deep, raw, as he fucks you through it, chasing his own edge.

“that’s it. fuck, that’s it—”

he spills into you with a strangled cry, hips jerking, cock twitching deep inside, thick and so much it spills out around the edges. his arms crush you to him. he moans again, low and broken, like he doesn’t know how else to react. he doesn’t thrust again. just stays buried. trembling. like finishing inside you knocked every last thought out of his head.

his arms wrap around you like he’s trying to anchor himself—like if he loosens his grip, he might float away. his palm is pressed flat against your belly, grounding you, fingers twitching like they still don’t know how to stop touching. his forehead rests against your shoulder, breath ragged and warm, strands of hair clinging to the sweat-damp skin of his temple.

your bodies breathe in tandem. chest to back, sticky with sweat and afterglow. his cock twitches again inside you—a slow, pulsing aftershock—and you feel the lazy, inevitable trickle of his release starting to slip out around him. your thighs twitch. your toes curl. your reflection in the mirror shifts, barely perceptible, trembling like the rest of you.

“you okay?” he murmurs, lips brushing the back of your shoulder.

“no thanks to you,” you mumble, your voice thick and flat with exhaustion. it lacks the bite you were aiming for.

he laughs—quiet and hoarse—and kisses your jaw. “so mean,” he croons, nuzzling against your cheek. “and here i was, giving you the best night of your life.”

“shut up,” you whisper. your eyes are half-lidded, unfocused. “i can’t even feel my knees.”

“that’s a good thing,” he says, smug now. “means i did it right.”

you groan, shifting just enough to smack his thigh with the back of your hand, weakly. “you’re insufferable.”

“you love it,” he replies, kissing your temple. he still sounds dazed, too satisfied to be cocky for real. “gonna run you a bath soon. hot. lavender oil. bubbles.”

“don’t make promises you’re too tired to keep.”

he exhales a breathy laugh, the sound low and melted. his hand trails up your stomach, then down again, soothing, thoughtless. his thumb traces just beneath the curve of your ribs.

“give me five minutes,” he murmurs. “then i’ll carry you. princess treatment.”

“mm. better.”

he adjusts his hold on you slightly, only so he can tuck his nose into the crook of your neck, exhale slow and deep like he’s trying to memorize the way you smell like skin and sweat and everything he just did to you.

“but not yet,” he says, the words nearly lost in your skin. “just let me stay like this. hold you a little longer.”

and he does. he stays wrapped around you like he was carved to fit there.

like if he lets go, the world might stop.

a/n : i missed writing them—missed how individual they are, and how their chemistry feels like a natural consequence of who they are, not just the romance. free throws & figure drawings is still the piece i’m proudest of, and this feels like a little love letter to that <3 also: i toned down the explicitness in this one—not because they aren’t filthy, but because i really wanted to center the intimacy over the porn teehee :3

[kyuu-collection]

a treatise on inconvenient attraction

pairing — undercover prince satoru x servant reader

synopsis : satoru is many things: a crown prince in disguise, a so-called eunuch draped in silk and secrets, and entirely too clever for his own good. but when you appear in the middle of palace chaos—calm, competent, and wholly unimpressed—satoru finds himself watching a little too closely. you cure what the court physicians couldn’t, ask the wrong questions with the right kind of precision, and somehow manage to look like you belong everywhere and nowhere at once. he tells himself it’s curiosity. it’s duty. it’s absolutely not personal.

but then again, inconvenient things rarely are.

tags — oneshot divided into two parts, apothecary diaries au, fluff, humor, slow burn, sexual tension, secret identities, enemies to lovers, royal court politics, witty banter, mutual pining, medical drama, imperial intrigue, disguised royalty, forbidden affection, reader is so done, satoru is so annoying, suguru is tired, palace hijinks, touch-starved idiots, eventual smut, masturbation, possibly inaccurate court etiquette & other cultural inaccuracies, i tried my best please be kind ^^

wc — 29k | gen. masterlist | part two | read on ao3?

a/n: yes this was meant to be a oneshot but tumblr said no to my 46k draft so i split it into two parts. part two will be up tonight or tomorrow!! i also added A LOT while editing because i have no self-control. huge thanks to power thesaurus for enabling the vocabulary overdose. sorry for the long wait and i hope you enjoy <3

a calamity of cosmic proportions had just befallen the inner court—or so the wrenching sobs reverberating through the silk-draped pavilion would have you believe.

a hairpin, delicate as a poet’s ego, had snapped clean in two, its jade heart fractured like the dreams of a dynasty on the wane. the air thrummed with tragedy, thick with the scent of jasmine oil and the faint, acrid tang of ink from a nearby scholar’s overturned pot, as if the universe itself had taken offense at the ornament’s demise.

at the pavilion’s heart, satoru held court like the star of an imperial opera, his presence a spectacle of calculated excess.

“it is truly a heartbreak of craftsmanship,” he intoned, cradling the broken shard as if it were a soldier felled in a war only he had the imagination to mourn. the jade caught the morning light, refracting it into mournful glints that danced across the lacquered floor. “this was no mere ornament, my lady. this—this was a poem carved in bone and stone, an elegy to elegance itself.”

the concubine, lady mei, sniffled with the fervor of a stage heroine, her silk sleeves fluttering like moth wings as she dabbed her eyes with a gold-threaded handkerchief. each sob was a performance, perfectly pitched, as if she’d rehearsed it in front of a mirror. her powdered cheeks glistened with artfully placed tears.

satoru sighed, the sound heartfelt and entirely performative, a maestro playing to an audience of one. he tilted his head just so, pale hair spilling over his shoulder like moonlight cascading over porcelain, catching the light with a shimmer that felt choreographed.

a breeze curled through the open lattice, lifting the hem of his embroidered robes with such enviable timing it seemed less nature’s doing and more the work of a bribed servant. with satoru, both were plausible.

behind him loomed suguru, a study in austere black, hands clasped behind his back with the rigidity of a man bracing for chaos. his expression was carved from stone, all sharp angles and weary resignation, as if he’d been sculpted to endure satoru’s theatrics for eternity. his hair, tied with habitual neatness, let a few rogue strands graze his cheek.

his gaze skimmed the scene, heavy with the exhaustion of a man who’d watched this exact farce, with only slight variations in props, more times than the palace cats had stolen fish from the kitchens.

“perhaps,” satoru declared, raising the jade fragment aloft as if offering it to the heavens for judgment, “we must mourn it properly. a vigil, steeped in moonlight? a commemorative tea ceremony, with cups etched in sorrow?”

“a funeral pyre,” suguru muttered, voice dry as the desert beyond the red cliffs. “i’ll fetch the kindling. maybe some incense to mask the absurdity.”

satoru ignored him with the serene grace of a man who’d long since perfected the art of selective hearing, his eyes never leaving lady mei’s trembling form.

“fear not, my lady,” he vowed, dropping to one knee with the flourish of a knight swearing fealty. he clasped her hands, his fingers cool and deliberate, adorned with a single ring that glinted like a conspirator’s promise. “i shall find a replacement—more exquisite, more divine, more… unbreakable. yes, even if i must scour every silk merchant, every jade carver, every whispering bazaar between here and the red cliffs.”

he let the silence stretch, heavy with portent. lady mei gasped, her breath catching like a plucked zither string. a single tear traced her cheek, glistening like dew on a lotus petal.

mission accomplished. satoru’s lips twitched, the faintest ghost of a smirk, gone before anyone but the narrator could catch it.

behind them, suguru pinched the bridge of his nose with the slow, methodical frustration of a man who knew it would do nothing but give his fingers something to do. his sigh was a silent prayer to deities who’d clearly abandoned him long ago.

when the theatrics finally subsided—lady mei comforted, her handkerchief sodden, the jade fragments swaddled in silk like relics—satoru glided from the pavilion with the poise of a swan who knew exactly how devastatingly beautiful he looked. he trailed perfume, a heady blend of sandalwood and smug self-satisfaction, curling behind him like incense smoke.

suguru followed, a silent shadow with a scowl etched so deeply it might’ve been carved by a jade artisan.

once they slipped beneath a carved archway into a quieter corridor, the performance peeled away like silk robes sliding over lacquered floors. satoru’s spine straightened, the exaggerated flourishes vanished, and he walked with the easy, unyielding grace of a man born to command palaces.

the air here was cooler, scented with wisteria and the faint, medicinal bite of herbs drying in a distant courtyard.

“what?” satoru asked, eyes gleaming with faux innocence as he adjusted the sapphire-studded sash at his waist. “i was being helpful.”

“you were being ridiculous,” suguru replied, his voice flat as the surface of a frozen lake.

“ridiculously helpful,” satoru corrected, flashing a grin that could outshine the emperor’s polished jade throne. he flicked open his fan with a snap, waved it twice, then forgot it entirely.

suguru shot him a sidelong glance, more sigh than stare, the kind of look that carried the weight of a thousand unspoken retorts.

now that the mask had fallen, subtle details sharpened: the glint of satoru’s ceremonial earrings, forged from gold so pure they whispered of plundered kingdoms; the way his sleeves brushed the corridor’s tiles with deliberate drag; his hair, nearly waist-length, swaying like a silk banner, catching latticed sunlight in a cascade of silver.

“a hairpin emergency,” suguru deadpanned. “you skipped a logistics meeting—where we were discussing grain shortages—for a hairpin emergency.”

“it was tragic. deeply symbolic. that hairpin was the fragility of desire itself, suguru,” satoru said, his tone lofty, gesturing with the fan. “a metaphor for the fleeting nature of beauty, shattered in an instant.”

suguru glanced skyward, seeking divine intervention from heavens that had long since stopped answering.

the corridor stretched before them, vermilion pillars rising in regal procession, their surfaces carved with dragons that seemed to smirk at the absurdity below. sunlight filtered through the screens, painting latticed shadows that danced over the tiles.

“and your grand plan to unravel the true nature of court politics,” suguru said, each word measured, “involves… hosting interpretive grief sessions for concubines over broken accessories?”

“the best disguises become second nature,” satoru replies, his wink a fleeting spark in the afternoon light, the sapphire stud in his earlobe catching a glint as he tilts his head. “besides, would you rather i act like a stuffy prince?”

the irony isn’t lost on him—he is a stuffy prince, or will be someday, when his father, whose breath rattles like dry leaves in his chest, finally yields the crown still heavy with the ghost of tragedy.

the late empress’s assassination, when satoru was barely old enough to stumble through palace corridors, had carved a brutal lesson into the imperial family: visibility invites blades. better to cloak the heir in silk and paint him with harmless whimsy than risk another dagger finding its mark.

only five souls in the sprawling palace know the truth: his father, whose sunken eyes track satoru with fading sharpness; the imperial chancellor, whose pinched lips birthed this charade; the minister of justice, whose tribunal and ledgers guard the succession’s fragile legality; suguru, whose shadow clings to satoru with the weight of unspoken oaths; and satoru himself, whose laughter sometimes blurs the line between performance and truth.

the inner court, bereft of an empress dowager, pulses with the consorts’ ruthless ambition, their silk robes whispering of power sharper than any sword. though the emperor weakens daily, these women wage silent wars for his favor, each dreaming of a son to crown her empress should the hidden prince perish.

they know such a prince exists, veiled for safety, but none suspect he flits among them, orchestrating their rivalries with a peacock’s strut and a courtesan’s smile.

the ladies adore their ornamental peacock—his flair for theatrics, his mastery of rouge and kohl, his gossip that slices like a hairpin’s edge. they sigh theatrically in his presence, their voices dripping with the practiced melancholy of lives honed by ambition and cushioned by luxury.

“what a waste,” the third imperial consort murmurs behind her fan, its ivory slats trembling faintly as her jade-green eyes trace the elegant curve of satoru’s throat, where a single pearl pendant rests against pale skin. “if only heaven had been more generous with your... wholeness.”

satoru’s smile blooms, honed over years—a charm that invites secrets, a distance that keeps them safe. his fingers, glittering with rings that snare the light pouring through latticed screens, adjust a fold in his azure robe, the silk whispering like a conspirator. “perhaps heaven knew i’d be too dangerous otherwise, my lady. imagine the chaos if i possessed both beauty and... capability.”

the women titter, their fans fluttering like startled sparrows, their laughter a delicate chime of scandalized delight. he navigates their tempests with a diplomat’s grace, though the irony of wielding statecraft to soothe cosmetic squabbles stings faintly.

lady xiao, her skin glowing like moonlight on snow from some costly powder, leans forward, her gold hairpin swaying as she adopts a conspiratorial whisper. “you simply must settle our debate, master satoru. lady chen insists crushed pearls in face powder yield the most ethereal glow, but i maintain powdered moonstone is far superior.”

“both have their merits,” satoru replies, his tone grave as a scholar’s, though his eyes flicker with amusement only suguru, leaning against a pillar, would catch. he lifts a strand of lady chen’s hair, its ebony sheen catching the light as he studies it with exaggerated focus, his silver bracelet glinting.

“with your warm undertones, crushed pearls would complement beautifully.” he turns to lady xiao, close enough that her breath hitches, her kohl-lined eyes wide. “but for your cooler complexion, moonstone would weave that otherworldly glow you chase.”

the verdict sparks preening—lady chen’s fingers smooth her hair, lady xiao’s fan snaps shut with a triumphant click. satoru sinks back into his cushioned seat, silk rustling like a secret unveiled, accepting their praise with the ease of a man crowned in their vanities.

“though,” he adds, mischief curling his lips as his lashes cast delicate shadows, “true radiance comes from within. perhaps you should consult the palace physicians about inner harmony before fussing over external charms.”

the suggestion, cloaked in earnestness, lands like a jest. laughter erupts, bright and sharp, the women reveling in his knack for dressing insults as wisdom, their painted nails gleaming as they clutch fans tighter.

suguru watches from the garden’s edge, his black robes stark against the pavilion’s vermilion pillars, his face a mask of weary endurance. a stray breeze tugs a dark strand loose from his neat bun, brushing his cheek as his eyes track satoru’s performance with the resignation of a man tethered to chaos.

“master satoru,” lady qiao ventures, her voice honeyed, her lips glistening with rose-tinted gloss as she tilts her head, a jade comb glinting in her upswept hair. “surely you have preferences regarding feminine beauty? purely from an aesthetic standpoint, of course.”

the question is a silk-wrapped trap. satoru’s smile holds, but his eyes sharpen, a flash of the mind destined for thornier battles. his fingers, tracing the carved armrest, pause briefly, the gold ring on his thumb catching a stray sunbeam.

“beauty,” he muses, “is like fine poetry. exquisite verses reveal new depths with each reading. surface prettiness fades, but intelligence, wit, character...” his gaze sweeps their faces, lingering just long enough to flatter, “those transform mere charm into transcendence.”

the answer sates their hunger for praise while baring nothing, a masterstroke they mistake for depth. their fans resume their dance, silk rustling like whispers of approval.

hours might pass thus—satoru weaving through cosmetic crises with finesse—but today, peace shatters like porcelain on marble.

the trouble begins with a silk scarf.

lady yun sweeps into the pavilion, azure silk draped to accent her porcelain skin, the emperor’s favored hue shimmering with intent. her hairpin, a silver crane, gleams as she moves, her eyes cool with triumph. lady mei, in pale lavender, stiffens, her fan halting mid-flutter, her lips tightening beneath their coral stain.

“how... bold,” lady xiang purrs, her smile sharp as frost, her fingers tightening around a jade bangle that clinks faintly. “to wear his majesty’s signature color so prominently. one might think you’re presuming your position.”

satoru’s fingers pause on his teacup, its porcelain cool against his palm, sensing the venom brewing. suguru edges closer, his hand brushing the hilt of a hidden blade, his jaw set.

“presumptions?” lady yun’s laugh chimes, her sleeve rippling as she gestures, revealing a bracelet of sapphire beads. “i wear what his majesty gifted me. perhaps if you spent less time whispering with servants and more earning his favor, you’d grasp the difference.”

the barb cuts deep. lady xiang’s face flushes beneath her powder, her eyes flashing like struck flint. satoru counts three seconds before chaos erupts.

“ladies,” he interjects, rising with a honeyed command, his robe catching the light in a cascade of azure folds, his silver hairpin glinting. “surely we can resolve this without—”

“stay out of this, master satoru,” lady xiang snaps, her voice cracking, her fan trembling in her grip. the dismissal bites, though satoru cloaks his flinch in feigned concern.

lady yun pounces, her nails tracing her sleeve with studied nonchalance. “how refreshing to see your true colors,” she says, her voice silk over steel. “his majesty noted your... common mannerisms lately. perhaps the strain of clinging to relevance frays your breeding.”

lady xiang’s palm meets lady yun’s cheek with a crack that silences the pavilion, her bangle clinking sharply. gasps ripple through the consorts, their fans freezing mid-air, eyes wide with shock. lady yun’s cheek blooms red, her crane hairpin trembling as she touches the mark with delicate fingers, her gaze hardening into something lethal.

“you dare strike me?” she whispers, her voice low, her sapphire beads catching the light like tears. “a daughter of the northern provinces, educated in the capital, marked by heaven with this beauty?”

“beauty fades,” lady xiang hisses, advancing, her lavender silk swaying like a predator’s tail, her hairpin glinting. “but vulgarity is eternal. his majesty will tire of your pretensions soon enough.”

“his majesty,” lady yun counters, her smile venomous, her fan snapping open with a flick, “has tired of your seduction attempts. why else cancel tonight’s private audience? other matters, he said, demand his attention.”

the blow lands. lady xiang falters, her breath catching, her coral lips parting as the truth sinks in—her meticulously planned evening with the emperor, her chance to secure favor, stolen. her bangle clinks again as her hand trembles.

“you scheming witch,” she breathes, lunging with murder in her eyes, her hairpin slipping slightly in her hair.

satoru moves, swift and fluid, his robe whispering as he steps between them, his fan snapping shut with a crack. “my dear ladies,” he says, voice laced with subtle command, “surely such passion belongs in more... productive pursuits?”

his tone halts them, though their glares burn like embers. satoru’s mind races, cataloging lady yun’s intelligence network, lady xiang’s desperation, the shifting sands of favor. his pearl pendant sways as he tilts his head, feigning concern.

“perhaps,” he ventures, his voice smooth as jade, “lady xiang, you wished to discuss that complexion treatment? and lady yun, your poetry recitation tomorrow deserves preparation.”

the suggestion, edged with condescension, reins them in. lady yun smooths her silk, her sapphire beads clinking faintly, her rage cooling into a mask of poise. lady xiang’s smile sharpens, but she nods, her hairpin now askew, betraying her frayed composure.

satoru claps, the sound sharp, his rings flashing. “how marvelous! such spirited discourse invigorates the afternoon. shall we revisit pearl powder versus moonstone? we were on the cusp of brilliance.”

the redirect forces civility, though tension crackles. satoru sinks into his cushions, his silk settling like a sigh, his mind dissecting the consorts’ moves—lady yun’s spies, lady xiang’s fragility, the court’s delicate balance.

as evening shadows stretch across the marble, satoru rises, his movements liquid, his hairpin catching the fading light. “duty calls, my ladies. the third consort awaits my counsel for her evening attire.”

their disappointment flickers, but they turn to tomorrow’s schemes. satoru bows, precise yet playful, his robe trailing like a comet’s tail. suguru falls into step as they leave, silent until the pavilion’s whispers fade.

“exhausting performance, your highness,” suguru murmurs, his dark sleeve brushing a pillar, his bun loosening slightly.

“getting easier,” satoru replies, shedding his theatrics, his posture sharpening, his fan tucked into his sash. “though my future subjects will despair when their emperor knows more about catfights than regiments.”

“your father would say palace politics and battlefields demand the same cunning,” suguru notes, his voice dry, a faint crease at his brow.

satoru’s laugh carries mirth and shadow, his earrings glinting as he strides forward. tomorrow brings more cosmetic crises, more veiled barbs, more lessons in power disguised as powder disputes. the crown prince will hide behind silk and sighs, studying his subjects’ souls one shallow secret at a time.

after all, the best disguises become second nature. and sometimes, the sharpest power lies in pretending you hold none at all.

the palace hummed with a frenetic buzz—not the charming, festival-lanterns-and-rice-wine kind, where moonlight glints off sake cups and laughter spills like cherry blossoms, but the swarming, fretful, everyone's-talking-and-no-one's-hearing kind that screamed someone important was either sick, scandalized, or both.

lucky for the court, it was a two-for-one special: the emperor's favored concubine, lady hua, had taken ill, and the whispers swirling through the vermilion halls were ripe with intrigue sharp enough to cut silk.

it began with fainting spells, delicate as a willow branch snapping under snow. then came the headaches, each one described with the reverence of a poet lamenting lost love.

by the time rumors slithered to satoru's ears, the court physicians had added skin lesions to the list—delicate ones, naturally, because heaven forbid a woman of the inner court suffer anything less than poetic. “female hysteria,” the physicians declared with the smugness of men who'd never questioned their own brilliance, waving it off as a trifle. “probably just summer heat affecting her delicate temperament.”

maybe it was. maybe it wasn't. but satoru was bored—a state as dangerous as a spark in a lacquered pavilion when paired with his curiosity and the kind of power that hid beneath shimmering silk like a blade in a jeweled sheath.

he sprawled across a divan like a cat claiming its throne, pale hair spilling over the brocade cushion in a cascade that caught the lantern light like spun silver. “i want to see her,” he drawled, voice lazy yet laced with a spark of intent, like a cat batting at a moth it fully intended to devour.

suguru didn’t lift his eyes from the scroll he feigned reading, arms crossed over dark robes that seemed to absorb the light, their folds creasing like a storm cloud on the verge of breaking. his hair, bound with a cord of black silk, gleamed faintly in the slanted glow, as if even it resented being tethered to satoru’s orbit. “the emperor hasn’t summoned you,” he said, voice flat, though the faintest twitch of his brow betrayed a patience fraying like a worn thread.

“that’s the charm of playing eunuch,” satoru replied, rising with the fluid grace of a dancer who knew every gaze followed him. his robes—silver threaded with sapphire embroidery, ostentatiously tasteful—shimmered like moonlight rippling across a still pond, the hem whispering against the polished floor like a lover’s sigh. “every door yields if you smile just so and dazzle them with a touch of charm.”

suguru exhaled through his nose, a sound heavy with a thousand unspoken curses, each one honed by years of trailing satoru’s chaos. “your highness, court gossip is beneath your station.”

“nothing’s beneath my station when i’m cloaked as a eunuch,” satoru chirped, swiping a sesame-crusted rice cake from a lacquered tray as he sauntered toward the door. he popped it into his mouth, the seeds crunching faintly, and shot suguru a grin that was equal parts mischief and menace, as if daring the world to challenge him. “it’s half the thrill. haven’t i earned a bit of fun after wrangling the inner court’s tantrums?”

and with that, he was gone, robes flaring behind him like a comet’s tail, leaving a trail of sandalwood perfume and the promise of impending upheaval. suguru muttered a curse—something about peacocks strutting toward their inevitable fall—and followed, because someone had to tether the fool before he plunged headlong into ruin.

what they found at lady hua's quarters was chaos distilled into a single, suffocating room. maids scurried like ants fleeing a crushed nest, their silk slippers whispering frantically against the floor.

court physicians argued in hushed but venomous tones, their elaborate sleeves flapping like indignant birds, silk badges of rank glinting on their chests as they gestured wildly at treatment scrolls. someone—likely a junior attendant—sobbed into a brass basin, the sound muffled but piercing. the air reeked of bitter medicinal herbs, sharp and acrid, tangled with the cloying sweetness of sandalwood incense and the sour undercurrent of barely-contained hysteria.

a breeze from an open screen carried the faint tang of lotus blossoms from the courtyard, but it did little to ease the oppressive weight of the room.

satoru leaned against the doorframe, one hand languidly fanning himself with a jade-inlaid fan, its painted silk fluttering like a butterfly's wing. the other hand rested lightly on the fan's hilt, fingers tracing the carved dragon as if it might whisper secrets.

he looked like a man at the theater, idly amused by a tragedy he had no stake in—and to be fair, he was. his eyes, sharp as a hawk's beneath their lazy half-lids, scanned the room with the casual precision of someone who missed nothing.

then his gaze snagged on something—or rather, someone.

you.

in the heart of the maelstrom, you knelt in the corner like a shadow given form. not beside lady hua—that privilege belonged to the proper court physicians with their silk badges and centuries of inherited authority—but close enough to see, to listen, to absorb every frustrated gesture and dismissive wave of their sleeves.

you weren't dressed like anyone of importance. your outer court servant robes were simple, practical cotton dyed the color of weathered stone, sleeves rolled past your elbows in a way that would scandalize the inner court but served you well in the servants' quarters where actual work got done. your hair was pinned back with a plain wooden stick, not jade or silver, and your hands bore the telltale stains of someone who ground herbs by moonlight when the day's official duties were done.

but oh, how you watched. your eyes tracked every movement of the physicians' hands, cataloged each herb they selected, noted the precise angle of lady hua's breathing.

when one physician mixed powdered deer antler with ginseng, your jaw tightened almost imperceptibly. when another declared her pulse “flighty as a sparrow,” your fingers twitched against your thigh—once, twice, three times, as if counting beats they couldn't feel from across the room.

satoru straightened, the motion so slight it might’ve escaped anyone but suguru, who stood at his side like a storm cloud tethered to a comet. his fan slowed, silk shivering in the pause, as if the air itself held its breath. “who’s that?” he murmured, voice low, curling like incense smoke as he tilted his head, pale hair slipping over his shoulder like a cascade of moonlight.

suguru had already marked you, his arms crossed tighter over his chest, the dark fabric of his robes creasing under the strain. “outer court servant. kitchen work, mostly. cleans the medicine rooms.” each word clipped, as if to dismiss you before satoru’s curiosity took root.

“hmm,” satoru hummed, but his eyes never left you, sharp and gleaming with the delight of a puzzle half-solved. “and yet she’s not scrubbing pots.”

you shifted, angling your body to better observe the lead physician’s fumbling needlework, seeking a pressure point to ease lady hua’s pain. the movement was subtle, practiced—a dancer’s adjustment, born of months spent watching, learning, memorizing from the shadows. your lips moved again, silent but deliberate, and satoru caught the glint of something fierce in your expression, like a blade catching lamplight.

this wasn’t idle curiosity. this was hunger, raw and disciplined, the kind that drove scholars to madness or mastery.

the physician botched his needle placement, and you winced, fingers curling into fists, your silent corrections now a faint whisper of frustration. satoru watched, enthralled, as your hands mimicked the motions—precise, fluid, as if you could thread the needle through her meridians from across the room.

“she knows,” he whispered, more to himself than suguru, his voice alight with discovery.

“knows what?” suguru asked, though his tone suggested he’d already glimpsed the answer and dreaded its consequences.

“that they’re doing it wrong.” satoru’s smile was slow, delighted, like a child uncovering a forbidden game. “look at her hands.”

your fingers danced against your thigh, tracing the exact patterns of needle insertion, herb grinding, pulse-taking—muscle memory honed through countless unseen hours, knowledge that shouldn’t belong to a servant who spent her days scouring medicine bowls. each movement was a silent rebuke to the physicians’ arrogance, a testament to a mind that refused to be confined by her station.

one physician stepped back, wiping sweat from his brow with a silk handkerchief, his voice heavy with pompous resignation. “the lady’s condition defies our current wisdom,” he declared, more concerned with preserving his dignity than her life. “we’ve exhausted all known remedies.”

that’s when you moved.

not with boldness—that would’ve been suicide. instead, you rose from your corner with the fluid grace of a crane taking flight, approached the lead physician with eyes appropriately downcast, and spoke in the deferential tones expected of your rank.

“honored physician,” you said, voice clear yet soft, cutting through the room’s chaos like a bell in a storm, “this humble servant has seen similar symptoms in the outer courts. if it would not offend your wisdom… a kitchen maid last month suffered likewise.”

the physician barely spared you a glance, already dismissing whatever peasant cure you might dare suggest. “female hysteria is commonplace. hardly comparable to lady hua’s refined constitution.”

“of course, honored sir,” you murmured, eyes still lowered, but satoru caught the steel beneath your silk-smooth tone. “yet the maid’s symptoms mirrored these—the headaches, the pallor, the precise pattern of lesions. she recovered fully after a decoction of chrysanthemum, mint, and processed rehmannia root.”

his attention snagged, though he masked it with scholarly disdain. “absurd. such simple herbs could never address a condition of this intricacy.”

you held your ground, voice humble yet unyielding, like bamboo bending in a gale. “your expertise far surpasses my crude observations, naturally. but the maid did recover, and her symptoms aligned so precisely…” you trailed off, the perfect portrait of respectful hesitation, your fingers twitching as if itching to demonstrate.

the physician’s pride warred with his desperation. lady hua’s breathing grew shallower, her skin taking on a waxen pallor that would soon spell ruin for everyone in the room. “these herbs,” he said at last, feigning casual curiosity, “you saw their preparation?”

“this servant cleans the preparation rooms,” you replied, a careful lie wrapped in just enough truth to pass muster. “sometimes the physician’s assistants share their methods while i work.”

satoru watched the performance with rapt fascination, his fan now still, its silk frozen mid-flutter. you weren’t merely suggesting a cure—you were orchestrating the entire scene, playing the physician’s ego like a koto’s strings, submissive enough to avoid offense, knowledgeable enough to be indispensable, desperate enough to seem harmless.

yet your eyes, when they flicked upward for the briefest moment, held secrets sharp enough to cut glass, a mind that danced circles around the men who dismissed you.

within the hour, lady hua sat upright, color blooming in her cheeks like dawn over a lotus pond, the mysterious lesions fading like mist under morning sun. the lead physician accepted congratulations with magnanimous grace, claiming credit for “consulting palace staff to compile comprehensive symptom reports,” his chest puffing like a rooster at dawn.

you had already melted back into the shadows, your work done, but not before satoru caught the satisfied curve of your lips—fleeting, triumphant, gone in a breath.

“fascinating,” he murmured, eyes lingering on the corner where you’d vanished, as if the air still held traces of your presence.

suguru’s expression remained a study in neutrality, though the tension in his jaw betrayed his resignation. “a lucky coincidence. simple remedies sometimes outshine complex ones.”

“hmm.” satoru’s smile lingered, bright and sharp as a freshly drawn blade. “tell me, suguru—what do we know of kitchen maids who memorize advanced medical techniques? who position themselves flawlessly to study court physicians? who move like they’re accustomed to being heeded, not ignored?”

“we know,” suguru said dryly, his voice heavy with the weight of impending trouble, “that you’re about to make this our headache.”

“not our headache,” satoru corrected with a grin. “my amusement.”

because lady hua’s recovery might’ve dazzled the court, but you—you were a riddle cloaked in servant’s robes, wielding knowledge that could heal or harm, navigating the palace with the lethal precision of someone who knew their own danger.

and satoru gojo, crown prince masquerading as eunuch, had just stumbled upon a game far more captivating than court whispers, one he intended to play to its end.

the emperor’s study always smelled faintly of old power—that particular blend of sun-warmed parchment, cedar polish, and something faintly metallic. blood, maybe, or the memory of it. it was the kind of room where even the air seemed to walk softly.

satoru sat across from the emperor with the calm of a man desperately trying not to tap his fingers. he adjusted the fold of his sleeve, eyes flicking toward the desk where his father’s brush moved in careful strokes. his posture was perfect, intentionally so—chin tilted, one knee loosely crossed, silver hair tied back but predictably disobedient with a few strands curling just beside his cheek. his robe, navy lined in restrained gold, sat sharp against the sun streaming through the lattice window. he looked every inch the noble son. all very deliberate.

“father,” he began, and the word felt heavier than it should have. maybe because he hadn’t used it in a while. maybe because he still wasn’t sure which version of the emperor he was talking to today.

no reply. the brush continued its whispered dance across parchment—a list of names, most likely. or death warrants. same difference in the imperial court.

“i’ve been thinking about the medical needs of the inner court.”

still no reaction, just the soft scrape of ink and paper. satoru swallowed the urge to fill the silence with more words and waited instead, watching for the telltale signs of his father’s attention.

then—a twitch of a brow. not much, but it meant he was listening. unfortunately.

“the women,” satoru continued, his voice smooth but softer now. “they’re suffering. quietly, of course. as they always do. they’re afraid to speak about their ailments, or worse, they’ve learned not to bother trying.”

the emperor’s brush paused for just a heartbeat before continuing its careful work.

“because they can’t be examined properly by male physicians, their symptoms are dismissed. attributed to nerves, to wombs, to feminine hysteria.” satoru kept his tone clinical, professional. “real suffering gets reduced to mood swings.”

“and you’ve discovered this how?”

the trap was expected, so satoru smiled—just a little, mostly to himself. “the third consort mentioned it during a conversation about hair ornaments. she gets migraines, told me she stopped letting the court physicians treat her after one tried to give her a mercury concoction and advised her to avoid loud colors.”

he left out the part where he’d actually laughed at the absurdity. she’d joined him. misery loves company, after all.

“she said a servant helped her instead. a woman from the outer court.” satoru watched his father’s face carefully. “i saw her treat the consort myself. her technique was impressive—precise, not palace-trained, but more effective because of it.”

what he didn’t say: you hadn’t spared him a glance during the treatment. your fingers had moved with unbothered certainty, tucking the consort’s hair behind her ear while applying pressure to specific points with your other hand. your eyes had flicked toward him only once, and the look had been unimpressed, functional, dismissive.

it had lit something unfortunate in him.

“you seem very well-informed about this woman.”

satoru inclined his head, letting one finger trail along the edge of the lacquered desk. “i asked around. standard diligence—you know how thorough i can be when something catches my interest.”

“i do,” his father murmured, finally setting the brush down with deliberate care.

satoru let the moment stretch, just enough to suggest sincerity without overselling it.

“she has no political affiliations, no family ties, no suspicious history. she’s been in the outer court six months and caused no disruptions. the only people who mention her are the ones she’s treated, and they talk about her like she’s something they dreamed during a fever—there but not quite real.”

he didn’t mention the late nights he’d spent tracing palace gossip until it led to your name, or how no one seemed to agree on what you looked like, only that you were quiet, clean, and dangerous in the way truly intelligent women often were.

“she’s better than most of our court physicians,” he said simply. “more hygienic too. she washes her hands, makes her patients do the same. revolutionary concept, apparently.”

the emperor gave him a look—hard to read, as always, but with an edge of something that might have been amusement.

“a woman like that, appearing out of nowhere with such skills.”

“suspicious, yes,” satoru agreed readily. “but also exactly what this court needs. what the women deserve. and...” he paused, letting the weight of unspoken words settle between them. “what you need.”

the temperature in the room seemed to shift, though neither man moved.

“you want to bring her into the inner court.”

“i want to give her an official appointment. court apothecary with proper access, recognition, protection.” satoru leaned forward slightly, and the afternoon light caught the edge of his silver hair, framing his face in something almost holy. “she’s worth the risk.”

he waited, watching his father’s expression for any sign of rejection. when none came, he pressed on.

“and there’s another reason.” his voice dropped, becoming something more vulnerable. “your condition hasn’t improved despite everything the court physicians have tried. she might see what they’ve missed, notice something they’re too set in their ways to consider.”

his voice didn’t shake, but it was closer than he wanted. closer than was comfortable.

his father said nothing for a long moment, fingers drumming against the desk in that familiar thinking rhythm satoru remembered from childhood.

“if there’s even a chance she could help...”

“then we should take it.” the emperor’s decision came swift and final. “appoint her. she’ll report directly to you—you brought her to my attention, you can manage her integration into court life.”

relief flooded through satoru like a tide, and he stood quickly, trying not to look as shaken as he felt. “thank you.”

“don’t thank me yet,” the emperor said, and there it was—that familiar edge of knowing amusement. “handling a woman of exceptional skill and mysterious background won’t be simple. especially when there’s personal investment involved.”

satoru hesitated, then offered what he hoped was a convincing lie. “my interest is purely professional.”

his father’s look could have cut glass. “you’ve described her capabilities in detail but haven’t once mentioned her appearance. either she’s remarkably plain, or you’re working very hard not to think about how she looks.”

“i hadn’t noticed.”

“mm.” it wasn’t quite a sound, more like a judgment rendered and filed away for future reference.

“inform the steward of her appointment,” the emperor added, returning his attention to the documents spread across his desk. “and do it properly. if you’re going to gamble on someone, don’t play your hand halfway.”

satoru bowed again, quick and precise, then left the room feeling like he’d been carefully dissected and sewn back together.

the hallway outside hummed with the usual quiet motion of palace life—servants gliding past with tea trays, scribes shuffling along with scrolls tucked into their sleeves, the distant sound of a flute meandering through some half-finished melody. normal sounds, normal sights, but everything felt different now.

you’d be staying. elevated to a position where your skills could be properly utilized, where he could watch you work and maybe, eventually, understand what drove someone with your abilities to hide among the servants.

he tried not to smile as he headed toward the inner court to deliver news that would change everything. tried and failed completely.

the first thing satoru noticed was the crack in your expression—not a chasm, just a flicker, like a lantern’s flame caught in a draft. he was always watching for it, his eyes sharp as a hawk’s, trained to catch the smallest tells in a court where lies were currency and truths were contraband.

that blink-and-you-miss-it smile—the quiet, cautious pride that bloomed when the summons reached you—vanished the instant your gaze landed on him in the receiving hall.

you went still, not with fear but with the kind of disappointment that stings like a paper cut, laced with offense, as if someone had promised you a jade pendant and handed you a wriggling rat instead.

he found it utterly delightful.

“you,” you said, the word a curse wrapped in velvet, sharp enough to draw blood.

“me,” satoru replied, spreading his arms just enough to invite applause, his grin a crescent of pure mischief. his robes today were pale violet, embroidered with butterflies that shimmered like moonlight on water, each thread catching the lantern glow with ostentatious grace.

his hair was twisted into a gold pin, too ornate for a eunuch but perfectly satoru, perched in the grey space where rules bent to his whims. a fine line of kohl rimmed his lashes, accentuating eyes that sparkled with dramatic intent—because if he had to endure the stifling heat and court nonsense, he’d damn well look like a painting while doing it.

the head steward droned on, his voice a monotonous hum about imperial favor and sacred duty, a speech satoru could’ve recited in his sleep.

he didn’t bother pretending to listen.

he was too busy cataloging your betrayals: the faint hitch in your breath, like a zither string plucked too hard; the way your hands folded, knuckles whitening as if gripping an invisible blade; the defiant tilt of your chin, a silent challenge to the world. you were furious, a bonfire masquerading as a lantern, and oh, how you tried to cloak it in courtly composure. but satoru saw the embers, and they thrilled him.

he caught the moment realization struck you, sharp as a needle: this wasn’t just a promotion. this was proximity. to him.

“the inner court welcomes you,” the steward concluded, his voice fading into the hall’s polished silence.

“i’m sure it does,” you said, your tone sugared with venom, each syllable a dart aimed at satoru’s smug face.

once the others dispersed, satoru glided forward, arms tucked within his sleeves, his voice dropping into that soft, insincere purr he saved for spooking cats and bureaucrats. “congratulations,” he said, leaning just close enough to make you bristle. “you’ve ascended. fresh linens, finer herbs, a view of the lotus pond. and, of course, me.”

you blinked at him, slow and deliberate, like a cat deciding whether to swipe or ignore. “is it too late to crawl back to scrubbing pans?” you asked, your deadpan so perfect it deserved its own pavilion.

“don’t flatter yourself,” he said, his grin widening, sharp as a crescent moon. “you’ll still scrub—just not linen. now it’s egos and temperaments, lotus tea for headaches, petals for petty heartbreaks. all the flowers of the inner court, lovingly pruned by your hand.”

“thrilling,” you muttered, the word dripping with disdain, as if you’d rather mop the emperor’s stables. “a promotion and a leash.”

“not a leash,” satoru said, pressing a hand to his chest with a mock gasp. “companionship—unsolicited, exquisitely dressed, and utterly unavoidable.”

and there it was—the faintest twitch at the corner of your mouth, not a smile but a threat, like a blade half-drawn from its sheath. he liked it. no, he adored it, the way it promised trouble as much as it deflected his own.

he lingered a beat too long, eyes glinting like polished jade, before turning and strolling off, his robes fluttering like a butterfly’s wings, as if the world spun on his axis. and maybe, just maybe, it did.

later that evening, purely by coincidence (his words, not truth’s), he found himself drifting past your new quarters. entirely by accident (again, his words). three times, his steps echoing softly on the stone path, each pass a little slower, a little bolder. the fourth time, he stopped.

he waited until the courtyard shadows stretched long, pooling like ink beneath the flickering lanterns that cast gold over the tiles. then, with the humility of a man who’d never known the word, satoru leaned against your doorframe, one hand toying with the edge of a scroll, its wax seal glinting like a conspirator’s wink.

“what,” you said, not turning from the table where you sorted herbs, your voice flat as a blade’s edge.

“i brought a gift,” he said brightly, his tone all sunshine and mischief, as if he’d just unearthed a treasure.

“is it my resignation?” you asked, still not looking, your fingers pausing over a vial of crushed ginseng.

“better. a medical mystery.” he stepped inside, uninvited, and held out the scroll, its parchment crinkling faintly. you didn’t take it, of course. you just stared, expression as unyielding as the palace walls, as if calculating whether a pestle could double as a club.

finally, you snatched it, your movements sharp, and scanned the text with a flick of your eyes. “these symptoms contradict each other,” you said, voice clipped, like you were scolding a particularly dense apprentice.

“i know,” satoru said, leaning against a lacquered cabinet, his sleeve brushing a jar that wobbled but didn’t fall.

“this is fabricated,” you added, your glare pinning him like a butterfly to a board.

“only the illness,” he said, undeterred, his smile a spark in the dim room. “the need for your attention? painfully real.”

you sighed, loud and theatrical, a performance worthy of the imperial stage. satoru mentally awarded it a nine out of ten—solid, but you could’ve thrown in a hair toss for flair.

you unrolled the scroll again, your lips twitching in a scowl as you muttered, “ridiculous.” the word was a dart, but satoru caught it like a prize.

“you’re a parasite in silk,” you said, louder now, tossing the scroll onto the table with a flick of your wrist. “the most useless eunuch in three dynasties, and that’s saying something.”

“flattery will get you everywhere,” he replied, utterly unfazed, his fingers brushing the edge of a clay bowl as he wandered your space like he owned it. “keep going, i’m taking notes.”

“i wasn’t flattering you,” you snapped, finally turning to face him, your eyes blazing like a forge.

“that’s what makes it so charming,” he said, his grin widening, as if your ire was a rare vintage he couldn’t resist savoring.

you shot him a look that could’ve curdled goat milk, then turned back to your work, your fingers moving with the precision of a calligrapher, sorting herbs into neat piles. but you kept the scroll, its corner peeking from beneath a stack of notes, and your muttering continued—snatches of “insufferable peacock” and “why is this my life” drifting like smoke.

satoru prowled your quarters, ignoring the way your gaze tracked his hands, as if you were mentally mapping every pressure point from wrist to neck.

he brushed his fingers over jars, their labels curling at the edges, and peeked into a box of tools, its contents gleaming faintly in the lantern light. he didn’t speak, just watched—the furrow of your brow as you concentrated, the deliberate flick of your wrist as you ground yanhusuo, the rhythm of your work like a silent song.

he didn’t know why he stayed.

or rather, he did, but admitting it felt like stepping into a trap of his own making. you were a puzzle with edges that cut, a contradiction that hooked him deeper with every barb. the faint scent of crushed herbs clung to the room, mingling with the wisp of incense curling from a burner, and it anchored him there, tethered to the moment.

when he finally slipped out, you didn’t look up, hunched over your desk, scribbling notes like you were waging war on the scroll’s nonsense. but as he passed the water basin by the door, its surface caught your reflection—a glare aimed at his retreating back, sharp and searing, like a blade thrown in silence.

it made his whole damn day.

he found suguru by the koi pond, pacing the stone path, hands clasped behind his back like a tutor bracing for a lecture on broken vases. the moonlight glinted off the water, the fish darting like silver needles beneath the surface.

“don’t say it,” satoru said, cutting him off before a word could escape.

“you like her,” suguru said anyway, his voice dry as the desert beyond the red cliffs, each syllable a judgment.

“i said don’t say it,” satoru shot back, tossing his hair with a flourish, the gold pin catching the light like a star.

“and yet, here we are,” suguru said, his gaze flicking to satoru’s face, reading the spark there with the ease of a man who’d seen this play before.

satoru sighed, dramatic and long-suffering, tilting his head to the moon as if it might explain why his heart thrummed like a war drum. “i’m just monitoring a potential threat,” he said, the lie so flimsy it barely held together.

“sure,” suguru said, his lips twitching, not quite a smile. “because that gleam in your eyes screams caution.”

“i’m delightful,” satoru corrected, spinning on his heel, his robes flaring like a dancer’s.

suguru groaned, the sound heavy with the weight of a thousand future apologies. “you’re doomed.”

and he was probably right. but gods, what a glorious disaster to waltz into, with you at its heart—sharp-tongued, untamed, a flame that burned brighter than satoru’s own, and twice as dangerous.

satoru had never been a creature of habit.

routines were for bureaucrats, monks, and men with lives too dull to warrant a second glance. he craved spontaneity, thrived in chaos, relished derailing the meticulously stacked schedules of others like a fox scattering a henhouse.

unpredictability was his dance, disruption his song. so the fact that he now drifted down the same shaded corridor every morning—at roughly the same hour, with the same lazy gait and the same infuriating glint in his eye—was a confession he’d never voice aloud.

not that he’d admit it, even to himself.

his excuses shifted like the seasons. delivering a scroll to a scribe who didn’t exist. inspecting inner court security for threats that never materialized. dodging paperwork that multiplied like roaches in the archives. conducting a surprise audit of herbal stores. critiquing the palace tea for “quality control.” evading a minister whose droning voice on strategy briefings could bore a statue to tears.

each alibi flimsier than the last, but satoru wielded them with the confidence of a man who knew the world would bend to his whims.

really, it was one thing. one person.

you.

he found you as always—elbow-deep in some concoction, sleeves knotted tightly past your elbows, hair pinned in a haphazard bun that threatened to unravel with every movement.

a faint smudge of green—licorice root, perhaps—stained your cheekbone, a badge of your battle against the chaos you wove and tamed.

you were a paradox: a whirlwind of spilled herbs and scattered parchment, yet sharper, more focused than any silk-clad noble posturing in the emperor’s court. you looked like a battlefield medic with a grudge against decorum and a vendetta against wasted time, and it never failed to spark both amusement and distraction in satoru’s usually restless mind.

“you again,” you said, voice dry as crushed ginger, not bothering to lift your eyes from the mortar where you pulverized a root with grim determination.

“you sound shocked,” satoru replied, stepping over the threshold with a roll of his shoulder, his robes—deep cream silk embroidered with winding cranes that shimmered with each step—swaying like mist over a dawn lake.

today’s ensemble was absurdly extravagant for a glorified supply closet, the fabric catching the lantern light in soft ripples. his hair, loosely tied at the nape, let silver strands frame his face, and a delicate trace of plum-red pigment accented the corners of his eyes, a flourish that screamed performance. he was too much, and that was precisely the point.

“i thought we’d settled into a rhythm,” he said, leaning against your worktable, perilously close to your neatly bundled herbs and stacked parchment. “me, you, the tang of crushed roots, and that slow-simmering resentment you wear so well.”

you didn’t answer. instead, you ground the pestle with a force that suggested the root had slandered your ancestors, the bowl rattling faintly under your wrath.

he tilted his head, silver hair catching the warm glow like threads of starlight, his rings—three today, each etched with faint sigils—clicking softly against the table’s edge.

“no one else to pester?” you muttered, jaw tight, your fingers flexing around the pestle as if it might double as a weapon. “no decrees to ignore? no ministers to torment?”

“oh, plenty,” he said, his grin slow and sharp, like a blade unsheathed for show. “but none of them look half as charming when they’re plotting my demise.”

your hand stilled, the pestle clicking sharply against the bowl, a punctuation of pure exasperation. he nearly clapped, delighted by the precision of your irritation.

because it wasn’t just that you disliked him—plenty did, and he wore their scorn like a badge. you didn’t pretend. no groveling, no fawning, no hollow courtesies offered to his eunuch’s guise. your disdain was raw, unfiltered, a silent roar in every glance.

it was refreshing, like a cold stream after too long in the palace’s stifling opulence, and deeply, wickedly entertaining.

he returned the next day. and the day after. each visit a little bolder, a little longer, as if testing how far he could push before you snapped.

sometimes he brought absurdities disguised as inquiries: a scroll detailing a servant who sprouted hives when he lied, complete with fictional case notes. another time, a cracked jade hairpin, its edges worn smooth, which he claimed induced fevers under a full moon’s gaze.

once, he presented a koi scale in a silk pouch, its iridescence glinting like a stolen star, declaring it a rare cure for heartache—just to see if you’d fling it at him.

you did, with the aim of an archer, the scale skittering across the floor as you muttered something about “idiots in silk.” he gave you a mental ovation.

he started noticing things—more than he meant to, more than was wise. you drank your tea standing, spine rigid, eyes flicking to the window like you expected a rope ladder to unfurl. you reused parchment, scribbling notes in the margins of torn festival flyers or crumpled ceremonial edicts, your script tight and precise.

your tools gleamed, arranged like a general’s arsenal, each blade and vial in its place, but your hair perpetually slipped its pins, curling defiantly against your neck until you shoved it back with an impatient hand.

you hummed when you thought no one heard—a fleeting melody, half-forgotten, like a song from a village far from the palace’s red walls. your brows twitched, a subtle dance, when you puzzled over a formula. your lips curled, just so, a heartbeat before you unleashed an insult, as if savoring the barb.

and despite every barbed word, every glare sharp enough to draw blood, you never truly banished him. not really.

“you know,” he said one afternoon, sprawled in the corner of your workspace, one leg tucked beneath him like a cat claiming a sunbeam, his sleeves pooling like spilled cream, “you haven’t thanked me.”

“for what?” you asked, voice muffled as you rummaged behind a bamboo curtain, the clink of vials punctuating your words. “wrecking my mornings like a plague in peacock feathers?”

“for ushering you into the inner court,” he said, tipping his head back against the wall, silver hair cascading over his shoulder like moonlight spilling across snow. the motion was deliberate, a painter’s stroke, and he knew it.

a beat. then the sharp scrape of wood as you slammed a drawer shut, the sound a silent curse. you emerged, clutching a bundle of dried leaves, your glare sour enough to wilt the lotuses in the courtyard.

“right,” you said, each word a blade honed to kill. “my deepest thanks for the promotion i wanted and the permanent shadow it dragged in.”

“shouldn’t you be grateful?” he teased, propping his chin in his hand, rings glinting as he traced the edge of a nearby jar. “i handed you the emperor’s court—prestige, resources, a front-row seat to my radiance.”

you turned to him, slow and deliberate, like a swordmaster sizing up a foolhardy opponent. “and i curse it every dawn,” you said, your voice low, each syllable a spark. “if i’d known you came tethered like a leech, i’d have begged to stay in the outer court, scrubbing pans in peace.”

he clutched his chest, a theatrical gasp, his eyes sparkling with mock agony. “you wound me, truly.”

“not yet,” you muttered, turning back to your leaves, your fingers ripping a stalk with unnecessary force. “but i’m practicing.”

his grin widened, sharp as a crescent moon, and he settled deeper into his perch, as if your scorn were an invitation to stay.

and you let him. not with words, never with warmth, but with the absence of a broom or a thrown pestle. and he kept returning, drawn by the rhythm you’d carved between you—insult, retort, silence. a glance, then another, lingering like a brush of silk. proximity that stretched longer than it should, close enough to feel the heat of your irritation, the weight of your presence.

it wasn’t peace—gods, never peace—but something like understanding, a pattern etched in barbed words and stolen moments. a hum beneath the surface, unnamed, unacknowledged, but growing louder with each visit.

then came the laugh—sharp, unexpected, a single burst when he presented a “case” about a noble who sneezed only during poetry recitals. your eyes crinkled, head tilting back for a heartbeat, the sound bright and unguarded before you smothered it, your face twisting into a scowl as if you’d betrayed yourself. you looked like you wanted to burn the room down to erase it.

satoru stared, too long, too openly, catching the way your cheeks flushed, the way you ducked your head to hide it. he saw you glance at him, then away, quick as a startled bird, and something in his chest tugged—sharp, stupid, undeniable.

he left that day with a thought that prickled like a splinter: he was in deeper trouble than he’d planned, and it was entirely, gloriously your fault.

today’s morning puzzle was more unhinged than usual.

“man experiences nosebleeds only in the presence of caged birds,” you read aloud, your tone so flat it could’ve scraped the lacquer off the palace floors. “and when exposed to lacquerware.”

satoru, sprawled in his usual corner of your workspace like a sculpture no one ordered, blinked with the kind of innocence that fooled no one, least of all you. his robe—warm ivory threaded with golden phoenix feathers—caught the dawn’s light, casting fleeting sparks against the wall like a firecracker’s afterglow. his hair, braided with a defiant thread of red silk (he knew you loathed it), spilled over one shoulder with the precision of a stage cue.

he was every inch the frivolous, silk-draped menace he aimed to be, his rings—two today, etched with coiling dragons—glinting as he propped an elbow on a crate of dried herbs.

“don’t you think there’s a tragedy woven in that?” he asked, voice too chipper for the hour, like a bird chirping before the world had rubbed sleep from its eyes.

“you’re banned from tragedy,” you snapped, shutting the scroll with a crack that made a passing maid jump, her tray of tea wobbling. you tossed it onto the table, narrowly missing a jar of powdered rhubarb, its clay surface dusted with your fingerprints.

this wasn’t his first medical case, nor even the twentieth. he’d stopped counting around the time he concocted a patient who sneezed whenever lies were spoken nearby.

what began as a game—probing your diagnostic skill with obscure, half-invented symptoms—had spiraled into a ritual as absurd as it was unshakable. yet you read every one. scrawled notes in their margins. laced them with insults sharp enough to draw blood. returned them smudged with ink and bristling with barely restrained fury.

he hoarded them like relics.

“you should’ve seen the drafts,” he said, as if that salvaged anything. “the first version had goose feathers and wine fumes. i spared you.”

“if this is your plot to bury me in professional shame,” you said, wrenching open a jar of salves with a force that suggested personal vendetta, “you’re nearly there.”

he tilted his head, a single silver strand slipping free, brushing the curve of his ear like a painter’s afterthought. he watched you move—always with purpose, always taut as a bowstring. you no longer flinched at his presence, but you never softened either. you wielded words like scalpels, keeping him at bay with precision cuts.

he liked sharp things. always had.

at first, the game was straightforward: deliver impossible cases, watch you unravel them, maybe coax a laugh if the stars aligned.

they never did.

you didn’t laugh. but you scowled, rolled your eyes, muttered poetic venom into your mortar as you ground herbs to dust. you called him names with the accuracy of a physician lancing a wound—“peacock,” “nuisance,” “silk-clad calamity”—each one a tiny victory he tucked away like a magpie with trinkets.

“this isn’t a diagnosis,” you muttered now, flipping the scroll open to scrawl furious notes, your brush slashing the parchment like a blade. “this is a poem having a tantrum.”

“you wound me,” he said, pressing a hand to his chest as if your words could be stitched into his ribs. “you’re the only one who’s ever called me poetic.”

“you’re the only fool in this empire whose puzzles come with a musical accompaniment,” you shot back, your brush pausing mid-stroke, ink pooling at the tip.

he grinned, quick and wicked. “you noticed?”

“you brought a flautist last week,” you said, voice flat as a blade’s edge. “he tripped on your sash.”

“he needed the practice,” satoru said, smooth as polished jade, his fingers tracing the rim of a nearby vial, its glass cool under his touch.

you didn’t bother responding, just turned back to your work, sharpening a bundle of dried ginger with a knife that gleamed like a silent threat. the blade’s rhythm was steady, each slice a rebuke to his existence.

he watched it all. the way your hands danced, precise yet restless, as if they could never quite settle. the way your lips pressed thin when you read something particularly absurd, a silent curse forming before you spoke. how your hair, always slipping its pins, curled defiantly at your nape, streaked with ink from fingers too busy to care. how you muttered in a cadence just off-kilter from the palace’s polished formalities, a dialect of frustration and focus.

you were chaos cloaked in competence, a storm bound by will, and he couldn’t look away.

every day, he brought another case. a man who laughed himself into fainting fits during banquets. a servant girl who sleepwalked into the kitchen’s rice stores, waking with flour in her hair. an aristocrat’s daughter who swore her vision flipped upside down every other hour, blaming it on cursed earrings.

he scribbled them late at night, brush half-dry, on balconies between court sessions, once even during a poetry recital where he feigned sleep, his sleeve hiding the ink stains. each case a thread, a tether, an excuse to linger in your orbit.

because you read them. frowned. sighed. looked at him.

and the looking—gods, that was everything. he didn’t need your laughter. he craved what came after: the pause after the sigh, the flicker after the eye-roll, that fleeting moment where you seemed to forget you loathed him, where your gaze held something softer, unguarded, before you rebuilt your walls.

“i should report you,” you said now, your brush scratching the parchment with deliberate force, each stroke a small rebellion.

“for what?” he asked, shifting to prop his chin on one hand, leaning forward like a cat too stubborn to abandon its perch. “creative medicine?”

“for impersonating someone with a shred of sense,” you said, your voice low, each word a dart aimed at his ego.

he made a wounded noise, theatrical and bright, but his smile stretched wider. “i have sense. i just keep it locked away, like a heirloom too fine for daily use.”

you gave him a look, long and withering, that could’ve soured wine. it only made his grin sharpen, his rings catching the light as he tapped the table’s edge, a rhythm to match your knife’s steady cuts.

“you treat patients like mildew treats silk,” you said, tossing the ginger aside and reaching for a vial, your fingers brushing a stray leaf that clung to your sleeve like a conspirator.

he laughed—not the polished chuckle he offered concubines or ministers, but a real one, sharp and sudden, echoing in the cramped quarters like a misfired firework.

your eyes snapped to him, and for a heartbeat, you weren’t just annoyed. not entirely. there was something else, a flicker of surprise, maybe curiosity, gone before he could name it. but it tightened his chest, a knot he couldn’t untie.

he kept bringing puzzles—not for their cleverness, not for their humor, but because they carved a space for him in your shadow. they let him listen to your muttered curses, watch your hands move like a weaver’s, feel the weight of your presence. they let him be noticed, even if only as a thorn in your side.

and maybe they let him be wanted there, if only for the span of a scowl.

“why are you like this?” you asked one morning, your brush stilling mid-stroke, the question dangerously soft, like a blade hidden in silk.

he had a dozen quips ready—flippant, charming, deflecting. but he leaned forward, caught the way a loose strand of hair curled near your temple, ink-smudged and defiant, and said, soft and unguarded, “you look alive when you’re annoyed.”

you froze, your brush hovering, a drop of ink trembling at its tip. then, slowly, you looked up. met his eyes, their blue sharp and unguarded, like a sky before a storm.

he smiled—not mocking, not entirely, just a curve of lips that felt too honest for the game you played.

you threw the scroll at his head. it sailed wide, fluttering to the floor like a wounded bird.

he ducked, barely, laughter spilling from him as he retreated, the sound trailing behind like a comet’s tail. your glare followed, searing, but he caught the faintest twitch at your mouth, a ghost of something that wasn’t quite hate.

later, he sat beneath the south pavilion’s shade, one leg tucked beneath him, the other dangling off the edge like a boy too restless for propriety.

a breeze tugged at the red sash cinched at his waist, lifting it like a lazy flag, as if even the wind knew he was procrastinating. beside him, scrolls—court reports, diplomatic briefs, a poetry contest invitation he’d already singed at the edges—sat ignored, their wax seals glinting like accusations.

he thought of your scowl, your voice, the way your gaze landed on him like a blade seeking a target. everyone else in the court tiptoed around him, offering flattery or fear.

you never did.

and maybe that was why, every day, without fail, he drifted back to your door, armed with another impossible case, another absurd tale. each one a thread to bind him to you, a reason to linger, to disrupt, to be seen.

because the worst part of his morning was the hour before he saw you—empty, quiet, a void where his thoughts echoed too loudly.

and the best part? watching you glare like you wanted him gone, yet never quite forcing him out, your silence a grudging invitation to return.

the scrolls were getting longer.

not just longer—denser, labyrinthine, absurdly ornate. satoru had upgraded to calligraphy brushes dipped in perfumed ink—rosewater one day, sandalwood the next, a faint whiff of osmanthus lingering on the parchment like a taunt.

he was testing how long it’d take before you snapped and hurled something profane, maybe the inkstone itself. the symptoms wove intricate webs, the logic knotted like a courtier’s braid, the footnotes teetering on operatic.

he cited phantom case studies, fictitious physicians from provinces that didn’t exist, and once, with brazen pride, slipped in a forged imperial seal that nearly landed him in front of a magistrate. nearly. that one, he’d written in couplets, each line a smug little bow.

“you’re wasting my time with this drivel,” you snapped, brandishing the scroll like it carried a plague. “don’t you have feathers to preen or mirrors to seduce?”

he was perched, as always, on the low bench by your window, posed like a statue some lovesick noble commissioned and regretted. his posture was too perfect for someone who’d spent half an hour picking a robe to irk you most—storm blue, embroidered with cranes mid-flight, sleeves pooling over his knees like spilled ink, dragging across the floor with every restless shift.

a gold hairpin gleamed in his braid, red silk threaded through it, swaying like a pendulum when he tilted his head in mock fascination. he was a painting overburdened with flourishes, every detail screaming excess.

“your thorns are almost charming,” he said, sipping from a porcelain cup, its rim chipped from a prior visit when he’d “accidentally” knocked it off your table. his boots, still flecked with courtyard mud, left faint smudges on your floor. “like a pufferfish dreaming of cuddles.”

you fixed him with a stare—slow, lethal, the kind that could sour fresh cream or silence a minister mid-rant. the breeze from the open lattice tugged at the scroll’s edge, rattling the ash tray, but you didn’t blink, your fingers tightening until the parchment crinkled.

he beamed, as if you’d serenaded him.

you muttered something under your breath—likely a curse involving his tea turning to sludge, his bones melting to tallow, and a cholera revival tour.

he showed up again the next day. and the day after. and again, undeterred, even after you told the guards to “misplace his map.” they never did, swayed by his bribes of candied lotus and whispered gossip, plus a promise to rank their uniforms’ aesthetics—a scale he invented on the spot, complete with commentary on tassel placement.

each scroll outdid the last. a plague afflicting only left-handed nobles, their sneezes synchronized with lunar phases. a woman who could digest only white foods, weeping hysterically at the sight of lotus root, claiming it sang to her in minor keys. a child coughing poetry—verses from a romantic epic banned by the late empress, each stanza more scandalous than the last. one footnote, scrawled sideways in gold ink, taunted, “solve this with that temper you wield like a blade.”

you unraveled them all, dissecting each with surgical precision. your annotations bled red, sometimes purple for peak offenses, your brushstrokes sharp as a duelist’s thrust.

but somewhere between the sarcastic jabs and hissed curses, your critiques softened—not in tone, never in tone, but in focus. you asked questions, prodded his logic with a gentler hand, your frowns less like thunderclouds, more like passing shadows.

you lingered over his absurdities, as if they were puzzles worth solving.

not that he noticed. of course not.

suguru did.

“twelve visits this week,” he said, voice dry as a desert wind, eyes fixed on the go board where satoru was losing spectacularly for forty-five minutes. “shall i carve you a plaque for her door? engrave it with ‘satoru’s folly’?”

satoru flipped a game piece, then flicked it at suguru’s shoulder, where it bounced off his black robes like a pebble off a cliff. “i’m running an experiment.”

“on what?” suguru glanced up, one brow arched like a drawn bow.

“the effects of sustained hostility and ground herbs on royal composure,” satoru said, his grin a crescent of pure mischief.

suguru’s stare was withering. “findings?”

“unexpectedly delightful,” satoru said, leaning back, his braid swaying like a metronome.

court sessions were crumbling. satoru, once the deity of theatrical boredom—master of mock gasps, swoons timed to derail debates, and insults so sharp they left officials blushing—was drifting.

he missed the minister of rites’ botched couplet, a travesty he’d have roasted for weeks. he forgot to deliver a memorandum to the archives—twice—its wax seal cracking from neglect. tax discussions passed in a haze, his fan unopened, his quips dormant. his eyes wandered, tracing patterns in the ceiling’s carved dragons, as if they held answers he didn’t dare seek.

suguru kept a tally in his meeting notes’ margins: missed snide remarks: five. disinterest level: catastrophic.

the inner court ladies noticed, their eyes sharp as jade pins, their tongues sharper.

they tracked satoru like hawks circling a wayward sparrow, cataloging his absences with gleeful precision. first, he vanished from their mid-morning gossip salons, leaving their tea untouched and their scandals half-shared. then came his bizarre fixation on medical theory, of all things, muttering about rare fungi and diagnostic riddles like a scholar possessed.

“we’ve scarcely seen you,” one lady said during a stroll through the peony courtyard, her fan snapping open like a dagger’s unsheathing, its silk painted with vipers. “has the emperor’s health grown so dire?”

“oh,” satoru said, voice slow and honeyed, “the apothecary’s got a fungus collection that’s positively riveting. almost as captivating as her glare when i nudge her vials out of order.”

giggles scattered like dropped pearls, sharp and knowing. he offered no further explanation, his smile a closed gate.

that afternoon, he swept into your quarters, scroll in hand, bound with red thread, inked in violet on paper too fine for his nonsense—proof it was his worst yet. his hair was half-loose, wisps clinging to his cheek where he’d skipped pinning it, a faint ink smear on his thumb from a late-night drafting frenzy. the scroll bore your name, penned at the top in a flourish that dared you to burn it.

you opened it, scanned the first lines, and your expression could’ve shattered a tea bowl. “this better not rhyme,” you said, voice low, each word a warning shot.

he smiled, too soft at the edges, less smug than something unguarded, like a seam in his silk had frayed. his fingers brushed the bench’s edge, lingering as if to anchor himself, and he watched you read, his gaze catching the way your brow twitched, the way your lips pressed thin.

somewhere beneath the posture, the perfume, the performance, his heart stuttered—a single, traitorous skip.

it was enough to whisper: this was no longer just a game.

he sent a courier three provinces south for a flower that didn’t even bloom this season.

“you dispatched a royal courier to the southern mountains for a sprig of winter jasmine?” suguru asked, voice taut with disbelief, arms folded so tightly it seemed he was trying to cage a migraine. his shadow loomed across the veranda’s polished wood, sharp against the dappled sunlight filtering through the wisteria.

satoru, reclining in the east veranda’s shade, swirled his teacup with a lazy flick of his wrist, the liquid long gone cold and forgotten. “it’s for a case,” he said, shrugging, stretching one leg until his silken robes spilled over the floor like ivory ink, catching flecks of light.

his fan lay discarded beside him, its painted cranes motionless, but his posture screamed decadence: languid limbs, robe slipping to bare the gleam of his collarbone, silver hair a cascade tucked behind one ear, a blue cord woven through for no reason but to catch the eye.

“it’s a seasonal ornamental,” suguru snapped, his boots clicking as he took a half-step forward, resisting the urge to pace. “not medicine. not even symbolic medicine. it’s for perfume, satoru. perfume.”

“depends on the metaphor,” satoru replied, grinning without looking, his gaze drifting past suguru’s scowl to the corridor snaking toward the inner court. his rings—two, etched with lotus vines—glinted as he tilted the cup, letting it catch the light like a conspirator’s signal.

suguru dragged a hand down his face, his sigh heavy enough to stir the wisteria petals scattered nearby. “i’m going to strangle you with that sash.”

“you’d have to catch me first,” satoru said, raising the cup in a mock toast, his grin sharp as a blade’s edge.

he had no intention of explaining. not the three couriers he’d sent in secret, their horses kicking dust across provinces. not the velvet-wrapped parcel one returned, petals still dewed from mountain mist, their fragrance curling like a secret. and definitely not the way your brow furrowed—half suspicion, half awe—when he set the sprig on your worktable, its silk wrapping unfurling like a bribe from a poet.

“this is fresh,” you said, nose wrinkling, holding the jasmine between two fingers like it might bite. “this isn’t local. not even close.”

“i know,” he said, voice bright as festival lanterns, chin propped on one hand as he watched you with the shameless glee of a man too pleased with his own audacity. “gorgeous, isn’t it?”

your glare could’ve sterilized a scalpel. “you’re unbearable.”

“and yet, here i linger,” he said, his sleeve brushing a vial as he leaned closer, just enough to make you stiffen.

“tragically,” you muttered, tossing the sprig onto a parchment, where it landed like a fallen star.

he stayed longer that day—far longer, until the shadows slanted sharp and the afternoon’s warmth bled into dusk’s cool edge. your tea sat untouched, its steam long gone. your sighs grew louder, each one a performance, yet you never shoved him out. he watched you work: arms bare to the elbow, sleeves knotted loosely, hands stained with pigment and resin, moving like the shelves and tables were extensions of your will.

you always faced the window when handling volatile herbs, not for light, he’d learned, but for the breeze, its faint stir cutting the fumes and teasing loose strands of your hair.

he cataloged it all. the way you hummed when focused—fractured, tuneless, like a half-remembered lullaby from a village beyond the palace’s reach.

it wasn’t daily, but frequent enough that he timed his arrivals to catch its fading notes. the way you sorted jars by scent—camphor to the left, ginseng to the right—ignoring strength or tradition. how you cracked your knuckles before mixing tinctures, a sharp pop like a soldier before battle. the pause before you spoke to him, as if weighing which barb would cut deepest.

it was intoxicating, like chasing the edge of a storm.

he crafted excuses to linger: forged dosage errors scrawled on stolen parchment, misfiled records he “discovered” in dusty archives, fake prescriptions only he knew were nonsense. once, he claimed mint sensitivity just to spar with you over its diagnostic merit. he lost, spectacularly, your rebuttal so sharp it left him grinning for hours.

“i’m starting to think you’re a fixture here,” you said one afternoon, not looking up as he sauntered in, uninvited. your hands were buried in a jar of powdered ginseng, your hair falling into your face, dusted with chalk like a scribe’s error.

“don’t be absurd,” he said, claiming the spare cushion by your shelves with the ease of a man who’d never heard the word no. his robe—cobalt blue, stitched with black cranes and storm clouds—pooled around him, dramatic and excessive, its hem brushing a stray leaf you’d missed. “i have other haunts. they’re just less… stabby.”

“and less likely to throw you out?” you asked, flicking a speck of dust from your sleeve, your tone dry as the desert beyond the red cliffs.

“precisely,” he said, his grin a spark in the dim room.

you didn’t laugh, but you didn’t banish him either. and when your hand grazed his sleeve—a fleeting, accidental brush as you reached for a vial—you didn’t pull back. didn’t flinch. the contact, barely a whisper, burned in his mind like a brand.

he was too comfortable now, not just in your space but in your orbit—your rhythms, your silences, the way you tilted your head before a fight, lips pursing when you swallowed a sharper retort. you insulted him with the grace of someone who’d decided he wasn’t worth charming, each barb a masterpiece of disdain.

it was the truest exchange he had all day.

no one else dared. but you? you called him a fungus with delusions of grandeur. you said his robes looked like a peacock mugged by a thunderstorm. you told him his puzzles were “an affront to medicine and common sense.”

and still, he returned. because every insult was a flare, every glance a challenge, every unspoken word a riddle more gripping than any court intrigue.

he told himself it was curiosity. a game. a puzzle to unravel.

but if that were true, why did he measure his day by how long he could linger before you snapped? why did he trace the curl of your handwriting in his mind, the rhythm of your humming, the way you bit your cheek when lost in thought?

and why, when he left, did the world feel a little flatter, the colors muted, like a painting left unfinished?

lately, he wasn’t sure if he was studying you or unraveling himself. each visit chipped away at his excuses, leaving something rawer, riskier, in its place. he caught himself watching not just your hands but the faint scar on your knuckle, the way your eyes softened when you thought no one saw. he noticed how you lingered, too—not in words, but in the way you let him stay, let him disrupt, let him fill the silence with his nonsense.

he was in too deep, and the worst part? he didn’t care.

because every sprig of jasmine, every forged case, every stolen ribbon was a thread pulling him closer to you—and he was too far gone to cut it.

it began with a flower.

well, no. it began with a lie about a flower.

“lunar-affected fever,” satoru said, voice solemn yet dripping with drama, holding a scroll like it was an imperial decree rather than a parchment stuffed with absurdity.

he lounged across your workspace’s threshold, as if the breeze itself had swept him in, robes of slate gray—stitched with pale moons that shimmered faintly—billowing with each subtle shift. his hair, half-tied with a silver pin, caught the filtered sunlight, glinting like spun thread, a few strands curling defiantly against his jaw. “rare as a comet. strikes only under moonlight. fever, dizziness, faint prophetic dreams. possibly contagious.”

you didn’t look up. didn’t pause. just dipped your brush in ink with the precision of a surgeon, your movements steady as stone. “there is no such thing as lunar-affected fever,” you said, voice flat as a pressed leaf, not even indulging him with a sigh.

he tsked, tapping the scroll against his palm like a tutor poised to chide a wayward pupil. “how can you be sure without seeing the flower?”

your head lifted—slow, deliberate, your eyes locking onto his with a glare sharp enough to wither an orchard. your lips pursed, brow twitching, a silent vow of retribution etched in your expression.

satoru’s smile widened, blue eyes sparking with mischief, like a cat who’d just knocked a vase to the floor and called it art.

which is how you found yourself—against logic, reason, and three stern vows to your own sanity—trailing him through the moonlit paths of the imperial gardens, gravel crunching softly under your sandals.

your sleeves were tugged tight around your wrists, knotted to keep them from snagging on stray branches. your hair, pinned in a hasty bun, unraveled in soft curls that clung to your temples, damp from the night’s humidity. you walked in silence, letting the faint whisper of your steps speak for you.

ahead, satoru moved with the effortless grace of someone who owned every pebble, every leaf. the lantern in his hand swayed, its warm glow dancing across the path, painting his silver hair with flecks of gold, like a halo he didn’t deserve.

he glanced back now and then, just to check you were still there. each time, his smirk softened for a heartbeat, a flicker of something unguarded, before he faced forward, humming a tuneless melody under his breath, the sound weaving into the night like a secret.

“you could’ve just asked me to see a flower,” you muttered at his back, your voice low, edged with exasperation.

“and skip the theatrics?” he half-turned, walking backward with infuriating ease, his robes catching the moonlight in ripples. “you wound me.”

the pavilion he led you to crouched in shadow, draped in ivy and curling wisteria, their leaves glistening with dew. moonlight poured through the open beams, silvering the air, catching the faint mist that clung to the ground. the night carried a sharp, green bite of moss, layered with something sweeter, fragile, like a bloom holding its breath.

and there it was: the night-blooming cereus.

its petals unfurled, slow and tentative, as if coaxing itself into existence. the bloom glowed, ethereal, held together by moonlight and whispers, its edges curling like a secret shared in the dark.

“it blooms once a year,” satoru said, voice softer now, stripped of its usual flourish. he stepped beside you, not quite touching, but close enough for the warmth of his presence to brush your skin. “only under a full moon. they call it the queen of the night.”

your lips parted, breath catching, a faint hitch you couldn’t hide. your arms, folded in defiance moments ago, slowly loosened, fingers twitching as if to reach out. your eyes locked on the flower, and for the first time in days, your face shifted—brow easing, mouth softening, the hard edges melting away. you weren’t the court apothecary, nor the wary prisoner of palace games.

you were someone rediscovering wonder, like a child glimpsing a star for the first time.

“beautiful,” you whispered, the word escaping before you could cage it, fragile as the bloom itself.

satoru wasn’t watching the flower.

“yes,” he said, voice barely a murmur, “it is.”

he stared at you, caught in the moonlight’s caress on your cheekbone, the soft curve of your profile. his fingers flexed, not to touch, but to hold the moment—the way your eyes shimmered, the faint flush on your skin, the curl of hair clinging to your temple. he wanted to etch it into memory, to keep it sharper than any painting.

the silence stretched, warm and alive, a fragile bubble of stillness that pulsed with its own rhythm. the night held you both, the cereus glowing between, its petals trembling as if aware of the weight it carried.

then—predictably, perfectly—you shattered it.

“what a waste of my night,” you muttered, spinning away with a dramatic eye-roll, your sleeve swishing like a curtain falling on a play.

but your hands betrayed you.

you reached for the bloom with a reverence that belied your words, cupping it as if it might crumble to dust. when you turned, you cradled it to your chest, fingers curled protectively, like guarding a secret you hadn’t meant to claim.

satoru didn’t tease. didn’t speak. he fell into step beside you, lantern swinging gently, casting slow-dancing shadows that tangled with the gravel path. he stole glances as you walked, catching the way you peeked at the flower—once, twice, like you needed to be sure it was real. your sandals scuffed softly, a counterpoint to his silent steps, and the night seemed to lean in, listening.

he didn’t sleep that night. not properly. he lay beneath his canopy, robes half-discarded, staring at the lattice ceiling as moonlight slanted through, replaying the curve of your lips, the softness in your eyes, the way you’d held the bloom like it was a piece of yourself you’d forgotten. his chest felt tight, restless, like a bird trapped in a too-small cage.

the next morning, he arrived at your chambers as always, leaning in the doorway like he’d been carved for the space, robes of deep indigo shifting with each breath. you didn’t greet him, didn’t look up, your focus buried in a stack of parchment, your hair already slipping its pins, ink smudged on one knuckle.

same sleeves. same scowl. same you.

but when he leaned too close, feigning interest in your notes, his eyes caught it: pressed between the worn pages of your herbarium, nestled beside meticulous entries on sedatives, the cereus. flattened, pale, its glow dimmed but defiant, like a star pinned to earth.

your handwriting, precise and sharp: epiphyllum oxypetalum. blooms once yearly, under full moon. fragile.

he said nothing. didn’t smirk, didn’t tease. but his chest ached, a low, slow throb, tender and mortifying, like a bruise he hadn’t earned.

for the first time in weeks, he forgot to bring a new case. no scroll, no absurd symptoms, no ribbon-wrapped nonsense. he just stood there, watching you scribble, the silence heavier than it should’ve been.

and when you finally glanced up, your eyes narrowing at his stillness, he felt it—a tug, sharp and undeniable, like a thread pulling taut between you.

he didn’t know what to call it. not yet.

but as he left, his steps lighter than they should’ve been, he wondered if you’d noticed the absence of his usual chaos—and if, maybe, you missed it.

it started with kiyohiro, a court eunuch, collapsing in the corridor outside your chambers.

not with flair. not convincingly. just a calculated wobble, a practiced sway, before he sank to the floor with a theatrical sigh, clutching his stomach like the palace kitchens had slipped arsenic into his rice.

“abdominal pain,” he groaned, palm pressed to his navel, eyes fluttering as if scripted. “possibly fatal. i need the court apothecary at once.”

you didn’t flinch. didn’t glance up. the pestle in your hand ground dried peony root against stone, its rhythm steady, unyielding, like a heartbeat ignoring a storm. “eat fewer sweet buns,” you muttered, voice flat as sunbaked clay, handing a tonic to a maid without breaking stride.

it should’ve ended there.

but gossip spreads faster than truth in a palace of whispers. by week’s end, your chambers had become a pilgrimage site for every bored eunuch with a noble title and a flair for drama. a sudden rash? a fluttering pulse? a dizziness that struck only when you entered, your sleeves brushing the air like a challenge?

satoru watched it unfold, his displeasure sharp and simmering. arms crossed, posture a studied nonchalance that screamed irritation, he haunted your doorframe like a specter with a grudge. his robes—too fine for indifference, deep indigo threaded with silver lotuses—shimmered under lantern light, his hair tied with lazy precision, glinting like frost on a winter stream.

“remarkable,” he drawled one afternoon, voice silk laced with venom, as he ushered another swooning eunuch out with a smile that never touched his eyes. “how many eunuchs have fallen mysteriously ill this month?”

you didn’t look up, fingers folding linen cloths with deft flicks. “jealous?”

his gaze snapped to you, blue eyes narrowing. your face was a mask, but your hand paused, just once, on the bowl’s rim, a flicker of defiance. “of what?” he said, voice low, edged. “their fake ailments or their pitiful flirtations?”

“both, it seems,” you said, a smirk tugging your lips, mischief woven into your exasperation. your eyes stayed on your work, but your voice carried that familiar spark, like a blade hidden in a sleeve.

your sleeves were rolled to your elbows, dusted with faint lotus bark, strands of hair slipping from their pins to cling to your jaw, damp with the room’s humid breath. you looked unruffled, impervious to the parade of titled eunuchs feigning ailments to bask in your presence.

satoru, though, was anything but.

not openly. not officially. but he was there—always. every time a noble eunuch swept in with a new complaint, satoru materialized, claiming urgent business nearby. every consultation hosted his lounging form—leaning against a lacquered pillar, fan snapping open with a lazy flick. he never interrupted outright. he just… watched, his comments slicing with surgical precision.

“takamasa, you faint in sunlight?” he asked, voice dripping with mock concern, as the young eunuch clutched a silk handkerchief to his chest.

“yes,” takamasa murmured, voice frail. “it’s terribly inconvenient—”

“curious,” satoru cut in, fan pausing mid-flutter. “weren’t you sprawled in the courtyard yesterday, under midday sun?”

the silence that followed was a masterpiece, heavy and delicious. you didn’t bother hiding your eye-roll, your lips twitching as you ground herbs with renewed vigor.

“you’re absurd,” you told him later, after he’d dismantled enjirou’s complaint of “chronic sighs” with a single arched brow and a quip about fainting goats.

“i’m diligent,” he said, lips curving, his fan tapping his chin. “your time’s too precious for noble fairy tales spun in silk.”

he didn’t say the rest—that he loathed how they looked at you, like your attention was a prize to be won with theatrics, like you were a treasure to be claimed with a well-timed swoon. he hated the way their eyes lingered, as if they could buy your focus with flattery or feigned frailty.

then came the emergency.

a kitchen servant collapsed, breath shallow, sweat beading like dew on his brow. no posturing, no poetry. just raw panic—gasps, shouts, the clatter of a dropped tray. his skin burned under touch, his pulse a frantic stutter.

satoru was already there.

he didn’t knock, didn’t wait. he followed the stretcher into your chambers, sleeves shoved up, hair slipping from its tie, strands catching the sweat on his neck. the usual glint in his eyes was gone, replaced by something taut, focused, like a blade drawn and ready.

you were already in motion.

your face was a mask of calm, eyes sharp as you issued orders—clear, clipped, commanding. this wasn’t the you who wielded wit like a dagger; this was you at war, hands swift and sure, voice steady as stone. you didn’t glance at satoru, didn’t need to. he moved with you, seamless, like he’d studied your rhythm for months.

he passed you cloths, their edges fraying from haste. helped lift the servant onto a cot, his grip steady but gentle. ground herbs under your curt instructions, his fingers quick, precise, remembering how you liked the mortar angled for rhubarb root, its bitter tang sharp in the air.

“you actually care about these people,” he said quietly, voice almost lost in the clink of vials, as he handed you a ladle and wiped the servant’s brow with a damp cloth.

“someone has to,” you said, eyes fixed on your work, your fingers deftly measuring a tincture. “most here see servants as props.”

he didn’t reply, didn’t know how. just kept moving beside you, his sleeves brushing yours in the cramped space, the air thick with bile, heat, and crushed leaves.

the night stretched on. two more servants were carried in—one vomiting, one limp as a rag. the room reeked of sickness and herbs, the floor littered with discarded cloths.

your voice frayed at the edges, your hands trembled once—briefly—before you clenched them steady. your braid had come loose, strands sticking to your sweat-damp neck, but you didn’t pause to fix it.

satoru stayed.

when it was over—when the last fever broke, the last pulse steadied—you collapsed into your chair, limbs heavy, breath ragged. your brush slipped, smearing half-written labels across the desk. your eyelids sagged, your head dipping to rest on the crook of your arm, ink smudging your cheek like a child’s mistake.

he approached softly, his outer robe already in hand, its deep indigo folding over your shoulders like a shield. his fingers hovered above your arm, a moment of hesitation, then pulled back, leaving only the faint warmth of the fabric.

your cheek pressed to your arm, breath slow, lips parted in sleep.

he sank into the chair beside you, not touching, not speaking. he tilted his head back against the wall, eyes closing, his own exhaustion pulling at him. his feet throbbed, his fingers stained with bark and ink, but he didn’t move.

when you stirred at dawn, throat dry, eyes gritty, he was still there—head back, arms folded, mouth slightly open, a faint crease in his brow, like even sleep couldn’t ease his tension.

your voice cracked, raw from the night. “you stayed.”

his eyes opened, slow, steady, like he’d been waiting for you to speak. “someone had to make sure you didn’t drown in your own brews,” he said, voice hoarse but carrying that familiar lilt, a spark of amusement in the ruin of the night.

you looked at him—really looked—and said nothing more. neither did he.

but the silence between you wasn’t hollow.

it was heavy, alive, woven with something new—something neither of you could name, but both felt, like a pulse beneath the skin.

the summons came at dawn.

no pomp, no ritual—just a folded slip passed in the corridor, stamped with the emperor’s seal, its wax glinting like a quiet threat. satoru read it in silence, his face a mask, brows twitching faintly before he slipped it into his sleeve.

he rose from the window seat where his tea sat cold, the morning light catching the sheen of his indigo robes. his movements were fluid, but a weight clung to him—anticipation, not fatigue, heavy as a stone sinking in still water.

his father didn’t call unless it mattered.

and lately, everything mattered.

the emperor’s chambers were dim, morning sun barely piercing the heavy curtains, casting long shadows across lacquered floors. incense curled in the corners, frankincense and cedar weaving a thick, ancient haze, clinging like a memory too stubborn to fade.

satoru stepped inside quietly, his robes—indigo lined with black, unadorned—swallowing the light. his hair, usually a defiant spill, was pulled into a tight tail, no stray strands, no red cord for flair. he bowed low, spine rigid, fluid as a dancer, but his hands clenched too tightly at his sides, knuckles pale against the silk.

“you’re late,” the emperor murmured, voice thin but steady, a thread stretched taut.

“never late,” satoru said, slipping into the chair by the bed without waiting for leave, his tone light but guarded. “just selectively punctual.”

his father, propped against a mound of cushions, gave a faint huff—half breath, half fond rebuke. his eyes, sharp despite their sunken frame, flickered with a spark of the man beneath the crown. his skeletal hand adjusted the jade charm at his wrist, its edges worn smooth by restless habit.

silence fell, heavy, expectant, like the air before a storm.

“whoever she is,” the emperor said at last, gaze drifting to the far wall where a painted crane seemed to watch, “don’t let her pull you from what matters. your coronation looms closer than we planned.”

satoru stilled, his breath catching, a faint hitch he buried beneath a neutral mask. his lashes flicked, the only sign of the jolt beneath his skin. “it’s strategic,” he said, voice smooth, polished. “she fascinates me for reasons i can’t name. i need to know why.”

the emperor turned slowly, his gaze piercing despite the tremor in his fingers as he smoothed his robe’s folds. “is that why suguru says you linger in her chambers like a moth drunk on lantern light?”

satoru’s eyes dropped to the floor, tracing the mosaic of lotuses and dragons, their curves blurring in the dim glow. suguru, his bodyguard, had seen too much—every visit, every scroll, every stolen glance—and carried it to the emperor’s ear. duty bound him to report, and satoru couldn’t fault him, though the sting lingered.

“very strategic,” the emperor added, voice softening, a faint amusement curling beneath the weariness. “suguru tells me you’ve sent couriers across provinces for her. flowers, of all things.”

satoru’s lips parted, then closed, words dissolving like mist. his fingers tightened on the chair’s edge, the wood cool under his grip.

“she reminds me of your mother,” the emperor said, eyes drifting to the ceiling’s carved phoenixes, their wings frozen mid-flight. “sharp-tongued. unyielding. challenged me every day of our marriage. made me a better ruler. a better man.”

satoru’s throat burned, a dry ache he couldn’t swallow. his gaze stayed on the floor, the weight of his father’s words pressing against his chest, fragile and unnameable. he had no reply, no quip to deflect the truth laid bare.

he left with silence draped over him like a second robe, his steps too quiet, his face too blank. guards bowed as he passed, their armor clinking softly, but he didn’t see them, his mind tangled in the echo of his father’s voice, suguru’s report, and you.

that night, he didn’t bring a scroll. no absurd case, no ribbon-wrapped nonsense to make you sigh. he brought flowers.

dahlias, crimson and bold, tied with an ink-dark ribbon, their petals vivid against the muted light of your chambers. dignified, elegant, deliberate—a choice that spoke louder than his usual theatrics.

he entered with a hesitant confidence, like stepping onto a bridge he wasn’t sure would hold. the air carried the familiar bite of herbs and ink, softened by the faint musk of drying parchment. you glanced up from your worktable, sleeves rolled, fingers stained with licorice root, one brow arching in quiet surprise.

“these are for…” he started, holding the bouquet with a care that belied his usual nonchalance, as if the flowers might wilt under a careless grip.

“another fake ailment?” you cut in, eyes narrowing, though a spark of curiosity flickered beneath the suspicion.

his lips curved, soft, not his usual smirk. “just thought they suited you.”

you paused, breath hitching for a moment, your fingers stilling over a vial. then you reached out, your hand brushing his—a flicker of contact, light as a moth’s wing, warm and gone too soon. it was nothing. it was everything.

neither of you moved, not at first. the air held its breath, charged with the weight of that touch.

then you cleared your throat, turned away, busying yourself with a jar that hadn’t moved in weeks, its label curling at the edges. he smiled at your back, eyes tracing the slant of your shoulders, the faint tilt of your head—always left when you were flustered, a detail he’d memorized like a map.

from then on, he brought meals.

not with fanfare. not every night. just often enough to become a rhythm. evenings blurred with your work, and he’d appear, tray in hand, the food simple but warm—soft rice flecked with sesame, miso delicate as a sigh, sweet egg custards you claimed to dislike but always finished, scraping the bowl when you thought he wasn’t looking.

“you don’t have to keep feeding me,” you said one night, chopsticks hovering, steam curling from the rice like a secret.

“and miss watching you eat while insulting my wit?” he said, settling beside you, his knee brushing the table’s edge. “never.”

some nights, words came softly, worn by exhaustion—snatches of court gossip, old memories, musings on the rain like it held answers. other nights, silence reigned, comfortable, heavy with unspoken things.

your chairs drifted closer.

knees brushed beneath the low table. once. then again. neither of you pulled away. his hand rested a little too close to yours. your gaze lingered a little too long. and the quiet between you stayed warm, charged, not innocent, but not yet dangerous.

still disaster bloomed, as it always does, in the quietest breath of night.

the garden held its breath, a rare stillness cloaking the night. the koi pond shimmered under moonlight, liquid silver rippling with each stray breeze, its surface catching the faint glow of lanterns swaying like conspirators. wisteria hung heavy, its scent weaving with damp earth, sharp and fleeting, the air thick with the promise of something about to break.

you walked side by side, sleeves brushing now and then, deliberate in their graze. the concubine you’d treated earlier slept at last, her fever broken, the air in her chambers no longer taut with dread. yet neither of you moved to part, steps slowing as the garden’s quiet conspired to hold you there.

satoru trailed a half-step behind, hands clasped behind his back, his long robe whispering against the gravel, its pale gray hem catching the lantern glow like mist.

moonlight wove silver through his white hair, sharpened the elegant line of his jaw, made him look like a figure etched from starlight. his eyes, glacial blue, flicked to you every few moments—memorizing the curve of your profile, the way your hair curled against your neck, damp from the humid air.

his silence tonight was heavy, careful, like a man cradling a glass too full to spill. “you really don’t rest,” he murmured, voice low, a thread of concern tucked into his usual drawl, barely louder than the wind’s sigh.

you didn’t slow, sandals scuffing softly. “rest is for those who can afford carelessness.”

he huffed, almost amused, the sound soft as a falling petal. “remind me never to share my medical records with you.”

your lips twitched, a ghost of a smile, gone before it could settle.

silence returned, thrumming now, alive with something unspoken—full, heavy with possibility, like a storm gathering just out of sight.

then you stopped.

he nearly bumped into you, catching himself with a soft inhale. you turned, gaze locking onto his, clear and unreadable, a spark of something sharp and startled flickering in your eyes. his breath hitched, chest tightening with a feeling he didn’t dare name.

no script existed for this. no smirking quip, no practiced tease. just a slow, swelling pause, the world narrowing to the space between you.

he leaned in—not a game, not a performance—raw, unguarded, his heart a traitor beating too loud.

his hand lifted, trembling faintly, hovering near your cheek as if afraid to shatter the moment. his eyes searched yours, seeking permission, a sign, anything to stop him.

you gave none.

so he kissed you.

softly at first, reverent, lips brushing yours with the care of someone handling porcelain. his mouth was warm, unsure but honest, and your breath caught—a soft hitch he felt and paused for. his eyes fluttered half-shut, lashes long and pale, his silver hair swaying slightly as he leaned in further.

your lips parted, startled but not retreating, your fingers curling tight at your sides. his hand found your jaw, slow and sure, thumb grazing your cheekbone like he’d memorized it. he tilted his head slightly, shadows shifting along his high cheekbones, his breath mixing with yours. your heart thudded, loud in your throat.

you tilted up, just enough, your mouth moving under his—tentative, then firmer, a quiet answer. the moment bloomed between you, the stillness of the air broken only by the soft brush of silk against silk, the distant sound of wind chimes trembling in the garden. satoru forgot how to think. his mind emptied, breath stolen. the world dissolved into the warmth of your breath, the taste of crushed herbs on your lips, and something sweeter beneath that made his chest ache.

he kissed you again—deeper this time, less cautious, more aching. his hand slid from your jaw to the back of your neck, fingers threading into your hair, holding you there like a secret. his other hand, trembling, hovered at your waist before pulling you in by the small of your back. his lips parted, tongue brushing yours in a slow, exploratory sweep, reverent, like he was afraid to break you.

and you kissed him back.

not immediately, but when you did—it was real. your mouth opened to him, breath shaky, spine stiff but yielding. you leaned forward, just slightly, your hands still curled but not pushing. he tasted you like a prayer, like something sacred, like maybe if he kissed you long enough you’d stay.

then he pulled back, eyes dark and wide, pupils blown, lips red from the kiss. he looked at you as if he couldn’t believe it had happened, as if the world had turned inside out and there you were, still in his arms.

“you—” he breathed, voice hoarse, gaze flicking from your mouth to your eyes, dazed, lost, drunk on something he never thought he could have.

and then he kissed you again.

this time, hungry. this time, like a man stepping into fire knowing full well he’d burn. your lips met his with a gasp, and you let him take you for one heartbeat too long. one second too many.

your fingers twitched. your knees wavered. you wanted to hate him for how good it felt.

and then—you shoved him.

hard.

he stumbled backward, arms flailing like a heron skidding across ice, nearly tripping over the embroidered hem of his robe. he caught himself on a stone lantern with a grunt, robes fluttering around his ankles. his eyes were wide, lips still parted, chest rising and falling like he’d just run a mile.

“have you lost your mind?” you snapped, voice like a blade. your cheeks blazed, your chest heaved, and your glare—gods, your glare could level dynasties.

he blinked, then grinned despite himself. crooked and boyish, maddeningly unrepentant.

“possibly,” he said, breathless.

“i’m not wasting my genes on a eunuch,” you spat, your voice sharp as shattered jade. “no matter how pretty his face.”

satoru froze.

then blinked.

then let out a laugh. not one of those dramatic, hand-over-mouth princely chuckles he liked to use when causing a scene. no, this one was quiet, startled—undignified, even. a breath of disbelief that hiccuped past his lips and got swallowed by the wisteria.

“you think i’m a eunuch,” he muttered, mostly to himself.

you didn’t dignify him with an answer. nor did you stay to argue. didn’t pause for a cutting remark or a dramatic glance over your shoulder. no, the moment he stilled, the moment that too-long silence fell between you like a dropped fan, you turned. spun on your heel and stormed off with the kind of pace that said if you didn’t leave now, you might do something you’d regret—like kiss him again. or worse: ask if he meant it.

which, of course, he did.

still, you muttered as you walked away. low and furious, under your breath, like the words were bubbling out whether you wanted them to or not. he caught fragments. something about hormones. about silk-robed maniacs with too many rings. about eunuchs, eggplants, and the gods forsaking your common sense.

the silence sank teeth into his shoulders. the night air folded around him like silk dipped in ice. his thumb grazed the edge of his bottom lip, slow, like he could rewind the last few seconds through touch alone.

he had forgotten.

forgotten what he was pretending to be. forgotten the rings, the incense, the mask he’d sewn into his skin over the years. he had kissed you like a man—not a prince, not a eunuch, not a myth wrapped in silk and riddles. just a man.

and you had kissed him back.

but the moment shattered before it could be named. your words had carved right through it. not cruelly, not intentionally. that was the worst part. you didn’t know what you’d done. you hadn’t even seen him.

you kissed the lie.

he pressed his hand to his mouth, jaw clenched. it was almost funny. it should have been funny. and maybe in the morning, it would be.

but right now?

right now, he was half-sick with the sweetness of it. with how close he’d come to believing that moment was real. with how much he still wanted it to be. the ache wasn’t sharp, but it was deep—a bruise blooming slow beneath the ribs.

he should have laughed it off. he should have returned to his quarters, poured wine, told suguru something smug and unrepeatable. instead, he just stood there, dumb and dazed and smiling like an idiot.

“she thinks i’m a eunuch,” he said again, quieter this time. and still—still—he wanted you to kiss him again. not because you didn’t know who he was.

but because, somehow, impossibly, you might want him anyway.

he didn’t see you for three days.

not for lack of trying. you were a specter, slipping through locked doors, vanishing into sudden meetings, leaving maids shrugging when he pressed for your whereabouts. even the gossiping servants, usually eager to spill, offered nothing but vague apologies.

in court, he was a shadow of himself. during a trade council, he sat rigid, staring through a minister droning about tariffs, his fingers tracing the same spot on his lips where your kiss had burned.

the room’s incense choked him, too sweet, and when a scribe dropped a brush, the clatter made him flinch, his thoughts snapping back to your startled shove. he nodded at the right moments, but his voice, usually sharp with quips, was dull, his eyes drifting to the window where moonlight might’ve been.

concubines noticed. one wept over a broken hairpin, its jade splintered like her heart, and satoru could only muster a tired, “it’s just a pin.” another sulked over a petty slight—someone had worn her shade of crimson—and he waved her off, words flat: “wear blue instead.” their pouts deepened, but he had no energy for their dramas.

suguru found him sprawled on the pavilion roof, one arm flung across his eyes, the other tossing dried plums at passing sparrows, each throw more despondent than the last. “so,” suguru said, tossing him a rice cracker with no pity, “she hit you with reality?”

“no,” satoru muttered, snapping the cracker in half with the mournful air of a man betrayed by fate. “she pushed me. emotionally.”

suguru’s pause, mid-bite, was louder than words, his raised brow a silent judgment.

the worst part? satoru couldn’t stop replaying it. the shape of your mouth against his, warm and yielding. the sharp twist of your face when you pulled back, eyes blazing with fury and something softer, unguarded.

a week passed. he performed—attended court, smiled on cue, offered wry commentary in meetings, even penned a birthday poem for the favored concubine’s pet nightingale, all wit and charm. but it was hollow.

in a session on border disputes, he doodled your name in the margin of a scroll, then scratched it out, ink smearing like his resolve. a concubine wailed about a lost fan, and he stared through her, muttering, “buy another,” his voice a ghost of its usual spark.

every night, when the palace quieted, his steps led him back to the garden, to the spot where you’d stopped, where he’d leaned in, where the line between strategy and sincerity had dissolved. the wisteria was fading now, petals curling brown, and he stood there, moonlight pooling around him, hand drifting to his lips, still tingling.

the ache wasn’t intrigue. wasn’t curiosity.

it was want—raw, relentless, refusing to fade.

and as he lingered, the irony gnawed deeper: he’d disguised himself as a eunuch to protect his life, only to lose his heart to a woman who thought he had none to give.

the problem began with a scream.

not yours.

hers.

lady mei, daughter of the insufferable minister of war, unleashed a shriek that could’ve cracked the palace jade, scattering birds from the rafters and jolting the court from their jasmine-laced tea. it ripped through the corridors like a war horn, shrill and self-important, drawing eyes and whispers like blood draws flies. by the time satoru caught the rumor, it had spread like ink in water—ravenous, unstoppable, vicious.

poison. hair falling in clumps.

dark magic, they hissed. foreign plots. a witch.

and you—gods, you—stood accused before the tribunal, chin high, jaw forged in iron, wrists bound in red silk that chafed raw welts into your skin. your robe sagged, one sleeve torn where a guard’s grip had twisted too hard, but you didn’t flinch. your lips were a tight slash, face a mask, yet your eyes blazed—defiant, untamed, a storm caged in flesh.

satoru overheard it by chance. or fate. call it what you will.

he’d been pacing the eastern promenade, robe loose at the throat, hair tied with reckless grace, his posture a thin veneer of boredom. two servants lingered by the reflecting pool, their whispers sharp, gleeful, cutting through the spring air. “she cursed lady mei’s beauty cream,” one breathed, eyes wide as lotus blooms.

“no,” the other hissed, leaning in, “a tonic. thins the blood. deadly in excess.”

satoru’s world snapped. his ears roared, a high, searing hum drowning all else. the garden’s lattice blurred, its patterns bleeding like smeared ink. the koi pond burned too bright, the air choking despite the breeze.

his hands clenched, nails carving crescents into his palms, silk twisting in his fists. he spun, robes flaring like a tempest, the blue fabric cracking with each furious stride. court eunuchs scattered as he stormed past, their bows faltering, stunned by the raw fury radiating from him. the usual glint in his eyes was dead, replaced by something glacial, murderous.

suguru caught him at the tribunal wing’s threshold, breathless, hair tied back, sleeves rolled as if he’d sprinted from his post. “your highness,” he hissed, seizing satoru’s arm in a grip that could bruise, “you cannot barge in. your position. your disguise.”

satoru’s head turned, slow, deliberate, like a blade aligning for a strike. rage poured from him, white-hot, unyielding as a forge. “they’re going to execute her over lies,” he snarled, voice low, jagged, each word a shard of flint. “i won’t stand by.”

his body trembled, not with fear but with violence barely contained, his jaw locked so tight the muscle twitched near his ear. his eyes burned beneath his white hair, colder than a winter’s edge, promising devastation.

“think strategically,” suguru urged, stepping in front, voice firm but pleading. “this screams more than justice. it screams you.”

satoru’s breath caught, a sharp stutter. his lips parted, then clamped shut. a beat. another. he exhaled through his teeth, a hiss like a blade drawn from its sheath. “fine,” he bit out. “strategy. but if they touch one hair on her head—”

“they won’t,” suguru said, softer, his gaze tracing satoru’s face, seeing the fractures in his mask. “they won’t.”

satoru didn’t nod, didn’t thank him. he turned, vanishing like a storm unleashed, not to brood but to burn.

he tore through the palace like a wraith on fire. scrolls ripped from shelves, bamboo frames splintering under his grip. records cracked open, pages scattering like ash. his movements were sharp, relentless, stripped of the lazy grace he once wore like a second skin.

servants stammered, spilling secrets under his stare, their voices quaking. he bribed, coerced, lied, threatened—one steward nearly fainted when satoru leaned in, his smile all teeth, voice a silken blade: “care to clarify?”

by midnight, his sleeves were rolled, white linen smudged with ink and soot, his hair fraying from countless rakes of his fingers, strands clinging to his sweat-slick neck. scrolls and witness names littered the lacquered table like battlefield wreckage, his voice raw from demanding testimony. lady mei’s handmaidens trembled under his questions, eyes darting like sparrows before a hawk.

her perfumer tried to flee, only to find satoru waiting by the storage room, leaning casually against the doorframe, voice like frost: “running somewhere?”

he summoned an outer court physician under a false name, tearing through ledgers with brutal precision—red stamps, supplier lists, ingredient logs—until he found it.

mercury.

tucked in an imported skin tonic’s recipe, a whisper of silver in the fine print. enough to shed hair, to bleach skin, to kill in time. he held the vial to the candlelight, its liquid shifting like molten guilt, thick and treacherous. his reflection twisted in the glass—pale, wild-eyed, lips a grim slash, the boy who’d kissed you burned away by rage.

the fury in him cooled, hardened, became something sharper—certainty, cold and unyielding.

he didn’t smile at first.

then he did. not the charming mask, not the courtier’s grin. this was jagged, raw, all teeth and shadow, a predator’s bared edge.

because he had it—the proof, the truth, the blade to cut you free. because no one—not a spoiled heiress, not a scheming courtier, not a whisper cloaked in silk—would touch you.

not while he still drew breath.

his rage didn’t falter, didn’t soften. it fueled him, a fire in his veins as he prepared to storm the tribunal with evidence in hand, the irony of his eunuch disguise a bitter sting. he’d hidden to save his life, only to find his life now hinged on saving yours.

the vial still sat in his palm when the sun began to rise.

dawn crept in, golden and soft, a cruel jest against the storm in his chest—tight, raw, ready to split at the seams. light spilled like syrup across the chaos of scrolls and vials strewn around him, glinting off ink-stained bamboo and glass, but nothing could dull the acid churning in his gut. he hadn’t slept, hadn’t sat, the night consumed by evidence and fury, leaving only the mercury’s cold gleam and the certainty that if he didn’t act, they’d rip you from him.

he didn’t change, just yanked his robe tighter, the pale silk creased from hours of pacing. his hair, tugged back with a frayed black ribbon, was crooked, strands escaping to cling to his sweat-damp neck. his movements were sharp, stripped of flourish, the mask of poise shattered by sleepless resolve.

he strode through the palace corridors with lethal purpose—not the slouch of a court eunuch, not the drawl of the royal fool they took him for. he moved as who he was: crown prince, predator, a blade honed and aimed. his steps struck the tiled floor like war drums, each echo a challenge.

no bowed head, no softened gaze—his outer robe flared with every stride, stark against the morning’s glow seeping through latticed windows. officials turned, startled, as he stormed into the tribunal, a figure cloaked in silk and wrath, moonlit hair twisted high, eyes like shattered ice.

suguru trailed three paces behind, silent, jaw clenched tight enough to crack stone. he moved like a shadow, hand resting on his sword’s hilt—not for defense, but as if ready to drag satoru out if this went too far. his disapproval burned like a brand between them, unspoken but searing.

you were there.

kneeling, silent, spine rigid as jade. your robes were plain, hair hastily knotted, strands fraying against your neck. your wrists, unbound now, rested stiffly in your lap, fingers knotted white. your lips were a taut line, jaw locked, and your eyes—gods, your eyes—had shifted. still clear, still fierce, but now laced with something new: calculation, suspicion, a blade-sharp wariness that hadn’t been there before.

because you’d seen him enter—not as a servant, not as the eunuch you’d assumed, but as a man with too much power in his stride, too much steel in his voice, too much weight in how the court stilled. something didn’t add up, and your gaze cut through him like a scalpel.

satoru’s eyes locked on yours. unwavering, unyielding.

for the first time, in all your barbed exchanges, he couldn’t read you.

“lord satoru,” the minister of justice intoned, voice brittle as dried reeds, “you were not summoned.”

“i rarely am,” satoru replied, smooth but icy, his smile a blade that didn’t reach his eyes. “yet i arrive when it matters.”

he stepped forward, robes hissing across the floor like a drawn sword, and drew a lacquer box—black, polished, lethal—from his sleeve. “i trust the tribunal still cares for truth?”

he didn’t wait for permission, didn’t bow, didn’t blink. his fingers, steady as stone, snapped the lid open.

inside: the vial, sealed, labeled, venomous.

“lady mei has been slathering mercury on her skin,” he said, voice clipped, cold as a winter’s edge. “an imported cream to bleach her complexion. overuse brings tremors, fatigue, hair loss.” he let the last word hang, sharp as a guillotine. “symptoms unrelated to the apothecary’s work.”

he turned to the panel, gaze unblinking, deliberate. “it wasn’t her tincture that poisoned mei. it was mei’s own vanity.”

whispers erupted, spreading like mold. fans snapped shut, silk rustled, discomfort coiling through the court. ministers exchanged glances, some avoiding your eyes, others squirming under satoru’s stare.

“your source?” the minister of justice asked, voice thinner now, authority fraying.

“her handmaidens. her perfumer. her personal effects.” satoru tilted his head, expression a mask of frost. “shall i list the ingredients by name or rank them by toxicity?”

suguru’s glare bored into his back, a silent warning, his tension a pulse in the air. satoru felt it, ignored it.

because the room shifted. your name slid off the pyre.

“the tribunal finds no fault in the apothecary’s conduct,” the minister of justice said, voice tight, reluctant. “charges dismissed.”

you exhaled, a soft release, like you’d held your breath since the scream. your fingers flexed, chin lifted, but your gaze didn’t soften—not for him.

satoru’s shoulders eased, just a fraction, the knot in his chest loosening. but relief was fleeting.

“how convenient,” the minister of justice said, eyes narrowing, voice dripping with suspicion, “that you know so much about a servant’s case. one might think you have a personal stake in this apothecary.”

satoru smiled, slow, calculated, a jagged edge of teeth. “knowledge is my trade.”

“very well, your hi—”

the slip was a whisper, barely there. the silence that followed was a chasm. satoru’s gaze didn’t flinch. suguru’s jaw ticked, a muscle jumping under his skin.

—“master satoru.”

and that was that.

the matter closed.

satoru turned, robes flaring like a storm’s wake, the lacquer box gripped tight, its edges biting his palm. no triumph warmed his chest—only dread, heavy as iron, settling in his bones because he’d stormed in with fire in his veins and too much truth on his tongue.

suguru followed, wordless, his silence blistering, storm-browed and heavy. they didn’t speak as they left the hall, didn’t need to—suguru’s disapproval was a blade at satoru’s back.

but just before satoru crossed the threshold, he turned.

just once.

just long enough to see you, still kneeling, still watching. your eyes weren’t grateful. they were narrow, probing, a scalpel slicing through his facade.

and in that fleeting second, he breathed—not relief, not victory, but the hollow ache of knowing he’d saved you and damned himself.

you wouldn’t thank him. you’d ask questions—the kind that could unravel his lie, his title, his heart.

and gods help him, he’d still do it again.

contrary to what he was expecting, you gave him nothing—that’s the thing about silence—satoru feels it like a blade to the throat.

especially when it’s yours.

it hits him hard—not metaphorical, but literal, a sharp slap to the back of his head from his father the morning after the tribunal, in the locked imperial study where guards stood sentinel and the air reeked of bitter incense and sharper disappointment.

“have you lost your senses?” the emperor snapped, voice a low rumble, the kind that precedes a storm’s break. “you kindized your cover for the court apothecary. do you grasp the risk to everything we’ve built? your coronation looms, and one slip could have the court tearing itself apart with questions.”

satoru stared at the floor, fists clenched, knuckles bone-white, jaw locked until his teeth ached. his ceremonial robe sagged, sash skewed, hair knotted with an ink-stained ribbon, the black fraying at the edges. “i did what was right,” he said, voice steady but tight, each word a stone dropped in defiance.

“you did what was emotional,” his father countered, eyes piercing, seeing too much.

the worst part? he was right. no defense would sound like anything but a confession, so satoru swallowed it, the truth burning like bile.

now, days later, he’s chasing the one he risked it all for, and you won’t even look at him.

your silence is a weapon, surgical, precise. he feels it instantly—the way your shoulders tense when his voice spills into a room, a subtle flinch like you’re bracing for impact. your spine stiffens when he steps too close, a wall rising without a word. your gaze skims over him, light as a stone skipping water, never settling, never sinking. your hands freeze, as if expecting an unwanted touch, your face a perfect mask, blank and unyielding.

it’s not avoidance. it’s retreat—calculated, deliberate, leaving nothing for him to grasp, not even your sharp-tongued barbs.

he first catches it in the herb garden, where you’re crouched among flowering angelica, sleeves rolled, fingers stained green, a smudge of pollen dusting your cheek like gold in the sunlight.

you glance up, startled, then pivot smoothly to the court physician beside you, words clipped, professional, before excusing yourself. you brush dirt from your hands, braid swinging like a snapped cord as you vanish around the corner, leaving the air colder, heavier.

satoru stands frozen, clutching a jar of honeyed lotus he’d meant to give you, its petals already curling, drooping like his hope. he follows—of course he does.

the next day, and the next, he trails you through corridors, across courtyards, into the inner palace’s echoing hush. he memorizes the whisper of your sandals, the way your lips thin when he enters, how you wrap your arms tighter around yourself, even in the summer’s heat, as if shielding something fragile.

you don’t insult him. don’t banter. don’t anything.

your greetings, when they come, are cold, formal, a blade pressed lightly to his throat—polite, practiced, punishing. each one carves deeper than your sharpest quip ever could.

he corners you by the water jars one morning, after mapping your routes like a hunter. his robe is creased from rushing, a loose thread dangling from the sleeve, his hair half-falling from its tie, white tufts framing his temples. he clutches a sprig of purple gentian—regret, he’d learned, hoping you’d read it too.

“hey—” he starts, voice softer than he means.

you look through him, eyes empty, like he’s vapor, insignificant. then you step around, sandals hissing on stone, not rushing, not flinching, gaze fixed ahead, unreadable, distant. you leave him clutching a flower that feels heavier than it should, its petals bruising in his grip.

he staggers, heart lurching, chest hollow with disbelief. not because you’re cold—he’s endured worse. not because you’re sharp—he’s always craved that. but because you’ve erased yourself from the game he loved losing. you’ve left him swinging at shadows, and the absence of your fight is a wound he can’t staunch.

by midday, he slinks into suguru’s quarters, dragging his feet like a scolded child, arms crossed tight as if they could hold his unraveling together. his sash is half-untied, a dark smudge on his collar from spilled ink he didn’t bother to clean. he collapses onto a cushion, graceless as a felled tree, robe tangling at his ankles, a gentian petal stuck to his shoulder, wilted and sad.

“she’s avoiding me,” he declares, voice heavy with the weight of a man mourning a war lost. his hair is a wreck, strands clinging to his neck, the petal fluttering to the floor like a final surrender.

suguru, buried in scrolls, raises a brow, unimpressed. “yes. i noticed.”

satoru flops back, one arm flung across his eyes like a tragic poet. “i’ve been to the medicine hall four times today.”

“i’m sure they loved the interruption.”

“they offered me a foot bath and begged me to leave.”

suguru hums, dry as dust. “reasonable.”

satoru peeks from under his sleeve, the gentian now a crumpled heap beside him. “why?”

suguru sets his brush down, pinching his nose like he’s bracing for a saga. “maybe she’s unnerved by how you stormed the tribunal to save her.”

satoru sits up, indignation flaring. “i couldn’t let them execute her.”

“and that,” suguru says, voice flat, “is why she’s dodging you.”

satoru scowls, raking both hands through his hair, worsening the chaos. “that’s absurd. i saved her. she should be calling me brilliant, handsome, terrifyingly heroic.”

“she should,” suguru says, bland, “but instead, she sees you as a threat.”

“i’m not a threat,” satoru pouts—yes, pouts, lips jutting like a child denied sweets. “i’m charming.”

“you kissed her,” suguru says, blunt as a hammer, “then risked your identity to clear her name. you nearly exposed yourself in the tribunal. if that’s charming, we’re reading different scrolls.”

satoru opens his mouth, then shuts it, the truth landing like a stone. he is dangerous—not to you, never to you, but in the way men are when they want too much, feel too much, when your name in your sharp-tongued cadence has become a rhythm he can’t unhear.

maybe you saw it—the depth of his care, the reckless edge of it. maybe you knew what it could cost in a palace where love is a weakness, where weakness is a death sentence. maybe that’s why you’ve gone silent, because you’ve lived here long enough to know how quickly devotion becomes a noose.

and gods, it hurts.

no one’s ever run from him like this, not with this quiet, cutting precision. he’d rather you scream, call him a peacock, mock his silk robes—anything but this silence, this absence that feels like farewell.

because he’s not ready to let you go—not when your kiss still burns his lips, not when he’d burn the palace down to keep you safe again.

the thing about denial is satoru is incredibly good at it.

he’s practically a master of delusion—an expert in selective optimism, an artisan in pretending everything is fine, especially when it very much isn’t. it’s the first week of your silence, and he’s convinced this is a temporary misstep. a phase. a momentary lapse in your usually impeccable judgment that will surely pass.

surely.

he starts showing up in places he has no business being.

“oh! what a coincidence finding you here… in the herb garden… at dawn… when you always collect morning dew,” he says brightly one morning, attempting nonchalance. he leans far too casually against the wooden trellis, his outer robe slightly askew, strands of silver-white hair glinting with condensation from the early mist.

he even has the audacity to smile like he hasn’t been pacing that path for the last half hour, waiting for you to arrive.

your back is to him. you don’t flinch, but your hand pauses over the mint leaves for a beat too long before moving again. your fingers move with mechanical precision as you snip the stems, pile them into your basket, and keep your gaze locked firmly on the greenery in front of you.

you don’t answer.

he stands awkwardly for another breath, then another, shifting from foot to foot, clearing his throat once—twice—until you finally rise with your basket and brush past him with all the grace of a falling leaf that still manages to cut like a knife. your sleeve doesn’t even brush his. your hair smells faintly of crushed basil and dried chrysanthemum, and the scent follows you as you walk away.

undeterred, satoru escalates.

he appears in the medicinal stores that afternoon, arms folded behind his back like he owns the place. which, in a roundabout way, he technically does. his hair is freshly tied back, his sleeves rolled precisely to the elbow like he might do something useful. he’s even wearing his softer silk robes, the ones he knows don’t intimidate patients.

he produces a small pot from within his robe with the dramatic flourish of a magician mid-performance.

“a rare specimen from the southern provinces,” he announces, eyes sparkling. “white-tipped chrysanthemum. useful for calming fevers, clearing toxins, and healing broken hearts.”

he adds the last bit with a grin that slides a little crooked at the corners. lopsided. hopeful. a little pathetic.

you don’t even look up at first. your hands continue grinding dried rhubarb root into powder, movements efficient, clinical. your brow is furrowed. there’s a streak of ash under your eye from hours near the incense brazier, and your sleeves are dusted with crushed herbs. when you finally glance his way, it’s brief. dispassionate. two seconds of eye contact that make him feel like he’s been dissected and found wanting.

“i have twenty-two of these in the western cabinet,” you say, voice devoid of venom or warmth. “but thank you for the… professional courtesy.”

your bow is precise. and then you’re gone. the hem of your robe whispers against the stone as you turn the corner without a single backward glance.

he stands there in the cool quiet, alone but for the chrysanthemum pot in his hands, which suddenly feels heavier than it should. the silence in the room hums louder now. it presses at the back of his skull. he sets the pot down on the nearest shelf and doesn’t look at it again.

later, he finds himself slouched sideways across suguru’s low table, picking at the edge of a rice cracker he has no intention of eating. his forehead is pressed to the polished wood, arms sprawled out like he’s melting.

“she’s just busy. it’s nothing personal,” he mumbles into the grain of the table.

suguru, who has been dealing with palace politics since before satoru could tie his sash properly, looks at him like he’s watching a fire burn too close to the curtains.

“busy?” suguru echoes, his tone so dry it might as well be powdered bone.

satoru lifts his head a fraction, eyes shadowed under his bangs. “overwhelmed,” he insists, sitting up and tossing the uneaten cracker onto the tray. “the tribunal aftermath, new responsibilities, increased patient load—she’s under a lot of pressure.”

“you stormed a tribunal to save her,” suguru interrupts, setting down his brush with pointed slowness.

“yes, but heroically,” satoru says, arms folding tighter around himself, like he can physically ward off the doubt creeping in. “nobly.”

suguru’s eyebrow rises. high. impossibly high. it might detach from his face and float away like a skeptical spirit.

“look,” satoru mutters, shifting to lie on his back and drape an arm over his eyes like the protagonist of a particularly tragic play, “this is just a bump. a weird, quiet, icy bump. i’ve weathered worse. she’ll come around. she always does. she—she has to.”

he pauses.

“right?”

suguru doesn’t answer. just watches him in silence, eyes narrowing with the kind of older-brother pity that makes satoru want to melt through the floor.

and then he sighs. a long, theatrical sigh that fails to lighten the weight in his chest. because he’s starting to realize this isn’t just a bump.

this is a slow, cold freeze.

and you’re the one pulling the frost line farther back every time he gets close. the air between you grows thinner, colder, until every word he wants to say dies frozen on his tongue before it ever reaches you. and for the first time, he’s afraid that all the warmth in the world might not be enough to melt it.

the thing about desperation is it turns satoru into a mastermind of madness.

week two dawns, and your icy silence is a fortress his charm can’t breach, so he pivots. he schemes. he crafts plans so absurd they’d make court poets weep for their lost dignity. you can’t be mad he saved you—impossible—so this is just a phase, a fleeting misstep he’ll charm into oblivion.

his opening gambit? a theatrical ailment, served with flair.

“my pulse races, i can’t eat, and sleep’s a stranger,” he proclaims one morning, materializing at your workstation like a ghost draped in pale silk, robes pristine but hair gleaming as if he spent an hour brushing it to catch the dawn’s glow. he leans over your table, just close enough for his sleeve to graze a vial, voice dripping with mock woe. “also, my palms sweat when i see… certain people—which is definitely not you!”

the apothecary hall hums with early light, golden rays slicing through lattice windows, casting woven shadows across stone. camphor and dried licorice root scent the air, sharp and heavy. junior assistants shuffle behind, sorting valerian and lotus pods, their murmurs a soft drone.

you’re a statue, unmoved, flipping a ledger page, ink brush scratching measurements with ruthless calm. “sounds like a minor imbalance,” you say, voice a blade, clean and cold. “chrysanthemum tea and more sleep.”

satoru gasps—gasps, hand to chest, staggering back like your words are divine judgment. a pestle clatters from an assistant’s grip, a tea bowl teeters on a shelf, wobbling like his pride. “none of that worked,” he insists, eyes wide, tragic. “it’s chronic. possibly terminal. i need daily checkups. twice daily, for… observation.”

you don’t reply, just pluck a jar of calming ointment from a cabinet and set it on the table’s edge with a thud, not sparing him a glance. he snatches it, clutching it like a sacred talisman, bowing with such reverence his hair spills forward, a silver curtain brushing the floor.

that’s the spark.

what follows is a campaign satoru deems elegant, a symphony of strategy. in truth, it’s a farce teetering on lunacy.

he turns sleuth, all subtle inquiries and innocent smiles. he grills kitchen staff on your lunch habits—bitter plum candies, you love them. he corners a laundry maid about your robes—same deep indigo, always pressed. he charms couriers for your midday haunts—west pavilion, near the koi pond. harmless, he swears, just… research. he scribbles notes, tucked in his sleeve, scrawled between council dronings: tools right to left, hums odd rhythms, hates wasted ink.

he’s not stalking. he’s conducting a study, a meticulous survey of your existence.

“reconnaissance,” he mutters one afternoon, crouched behind a decorative screen in the infirmary’s rear hall, wedged between a linen cart and a scroll of spleen meridians, half-unrolled like his dignity.

it’s a ritual now. daily excuses, each more brazen. a fan “dropped” near your herbs, its silk tassel suspiciously pristine. a scroll “forgotten” on your desk, its contents a poem he swears isn’t his. a comb—his personal seal carved deep, definitely not his—left by your inkstone. a pouch of dried dates, “slipped” from his sleeve, suspiciously your favorite.

he times his returns perfectly, catching the flicker of annoyance in your eyes, the slow sigh as you spot his silhouette. your jaw tightens, lips purse, gaze narrows like you’re diagnosing a plague.

“oh, thank the heavens,” he says one afternoon, kneeling by your table, robes pooling like spilled moonlight, embroidery glinting in the sun. “i feared this comb lost forever.”

“that comb is carved with your seal,” you deadpan, stirring crushed kudzu, steam curling around your face. “you’re the only one here who uses that seal as inner palace manager.”

he gasps, hand to heart. “so it is mine. a miracle.”

assistants exchange glances. one chokes back a laugh, sleeve muffling the sound. another’s eyes roll so far they might never return. you just stir, unamused, the bowl’s steam hiding the twitch of your mouth.

suguru finds him later, crouched behind a silk screen in the medicine hall’s corner, half-veiled by pressure-point charts and an abandoned anatomy scroll.

satoru’s staring at you mixing tinctures, gaze soft as if you’re a rare painting or a storm breaking over mountains. your sleeves are rolled, ginger staining your fingers, brow furrowed as you test the liquid’s thickness. a stray hair slips free, brushing your cheek each time you lean, and he tracks it like a comet.

“are you… spying?” suguru asks, voice teetering between worry and exhaustion.

“reconnaissance,” satoru says, eyes never leaving you. “completely different.”

“how?”

“it’s dignified.”

suguru’s sigh could topple empires. he walks away, leaving satoru to his vigil.

he stays, knees aching, drafts chilling his ankles, even as shift bells chime and servants pass with raised brows and whispered gossip. he can’t stop. watching you work—your precise hands, your quiet focus—is the only time the world feels right, the only time you’re close, even if you won’t see him.

your silence can’t be anger, not when he saved you, not when he was your shield. it’s just… a phase. you’ll crack, throw a barb, maybe hurl a vial at his head. he’d take it gladly.

he’ll keep showing up, unavoidable, until your frost thaws or you snap.

because if he’s in your orbit, you’ll have to see him eventually—right? right?

the thing about humiliation is satoru has no sense of it.

or maybe he feels it but buries it beneath stubborn vanity and desperate theatrics, draping it in silks and timed flourishes like a tragedian clutching a tattered script. he’s not wrong—you can’t be mad he saved you—so he barrels forward, undaunted, a peacock in a storm.

week three crashes in like summer monsoons—heavy, unyielding, impossible to ignore. satoru’s antics scale to operatic madness, each act more brazen than the last.

it begins at a court ceremony, the air thick with incense curling like specters around bored officials’ heads. sunlight seeps through high lattice windows, spilling gold across tiled floors, glinting off jade pins and silk fans fluttering like moth wings. courtiers murmur, voices low, while a servant’s dropped tray earns a hissed rebuke that echoes faintly.

you stand beside the inner palace physician, posture rigid, face a mask, eyes fixed forward, your refusal to see him sharper than any blade.

he notices. gods, he notices.

so he “collapses”—clutching his chest, dropping to his knees with a choked gasp mid-chant, silk robes pooling like melted snow. the sacred hymn stumbles, a musician’s brow arches, but the koto strings hum on. “weakness,” he rasps, voice cracking just enough to sell it, hand trembling as he sways. “sudden… overwhelming…”

you glide to him, linen rustling, herbal scent trailing like a faint curse. kneeling, you press two fingers to his wrist, jaw tight as iron. his pulse? steady as a war drum.

“your hands are so healing,” he murmurs, lips parted, lashes low, a saintly look ruined by the smirk tugging his mouth.

you drop his wrist like it’s plague-ridden.

“get up,” you say, voice flat as slate.

he pouts. “but—”

“up.”

he rises, brushing nonexistent dust from his robes, their shimmer catching the light like a winter lake, regal and utterly shameless.

it spirals from there.

next, the rash. “a mysterious affliction,” he whispers one afternoon, leaning in the apothecary doorway like he’s spilling state secrets. his robes are artfully mussed, a few silver hairs astray for effect, his seal as inner palace manager glinting on his belt. “in places too improper to show anyone else.”

you don’t look up from your mortar, grinding ginseng with mechanical precision. “i trust your medical discretion,” he sighs, hand over heart, theatrical as a funeral ode.

you gesture for a eunuch assistant without a blink. satoru dismisses him in five minutes, claiming a “miraculous recovery,” his grin brighter than the noon sun.

then, the hiccups. “three days,” he tells a dubious herbalist, face grave between hiccups so staged they could headline a festival. “unprovoked. incurable.” they flare only when you’re near, vanishing the instant you leave. “hic—lady rin fainted in the greenhouse—hic—scandalous—hic—heat or a lover?—hic—”

you shove a pressure point chart his way and keep walking. he trails you, hiccuping like a deranged waterfowl, robes swishing in your wake.

he takes to hiding behind potted plants—literal, not figurative. you catch the glint of embroidered silk behind a jasmine bush near the treatment wing. it rustles. he sneezes. you don’t pause. the gardeners are less forgiving; one finds a scarf snagged in a fig tree and mutters about cursed spirits with tacky taste.

a palace maid starts a betting pool on a parchment scrap behind the tea station. by midweek, court ladies wager on his next ailment: lunar migraines, aphrodisiac allergies, silence sensitivity. the tally’s pinned to a beam, fluttering like a rebel flag.

suguru finds him one evening, propped against a doorframe outside the record room, squinting at his reflection in a polished bronze tea tray. “what are you doing?” suguru asks, voice flat as a stepped-on reed.

“finding my best angle,” satoru says, tilting his chin, robes catching the lamplight like liquid frost. “this side’s devastating.”

“why?”

“some of us care about aesthetics, suguru.”

suguru stares three heartbeats, then leaves without a word, sandals slapping stone. satoru sighs, adjusts his sleeve, rechecks the tray. the problem isn’t his tactics—clearly, it’s the lighting.

because you can’t be furious. this is just a phase, a fleeting frost he’ll melt with enough flair. he’ll keep performing, unavoidable, until you laugh or snap—either’s a win.

the thing about pretending is the mask eventually cracks.

week four creeps in like a slow fog—dense, suffocating, clinging to satoru’s bones. his schemes, once fueled by giddy denial, turn brittle, their spark snuffed out. you’re not mad he saved you—surely not—but your silence is a void, and his antics no longer draw your gaze. still, he can’t stop, even as the performance bleeds into something raw, something real.

he spends an afternoon perched in a tree outside your window, teetering on a gnarled branch not meant for a man in layered silk. robes bunch under his knees, snagging on rough bark, his personal seal as inner palace manager glinting at his waist. ceremonial hairpins clink with each shift, the branch groaning under his weight.

petals drift into his lap, mingling with dust and a bold beetle that crawls up his sleeve. he swats it, muttering, as sap drips onto his shoulder, staining the silk. birds mock him from above; a maid below stifles a giggle, scurrying off.

he stays for hours, legs numb, arms clutching the trunk, eyes fixed on the lantern’s warm flicker behind your rice paper screen. a breeze carries distant gossip, the clack of slippers, the faint crash of a dropped mortar from the apothecary wing. he dozes off—chin to chest, cheek mashed against bark, mouth slack, snoring softly, undignified. a sparrow shits on his sleeve and flees.

your window slides open, airing out the stale warmth. he jolts awake, flailing, a squawk escaping as he tumbles—a sprawl of silk and limbs hitting dew-soaked grass with a grunt that echoes through the courtyard. leaves tangle in his hair, a grass stain blooms on his shoulder, a twig juts from his sash. one robe sleeve hangs off, his hairpin crooked.

you stare down.

“i was inspecting landscaping,” he croaks, blinking up, voice raw, throat scraped from days of shouting your name. “root systems. erosion. vital work.”

your eyes narrow. you slide the window shut, the wood’s soft thud louder than any rebuke.

his voice starts failing after that. he calls after you—across training fields, past koi ponds, through garden paths—first hopeful, then frantic, then ragged with need. his throat burns, words slurring, a dry cough haunting quiet moments, like his own body rebels. you never turn, not even when he trips over his sandals, voice cracking on your name.

“you’re overworking yourself,” suguru says one morning, watching satoru prod a congealed pile of rice. the breakfast hall buzzes—teacups clink, servants weave with platters of dumplings and lotus root—but satoru sits still, a ghost in the chaos where he once shone. his robes sag, collar limp, sash half-tied, dark crescents bruising under his eyes. he hasn’t slept, not truly, not in a way that heals.

“i’m fine,” he rasps, voice a brittle whisper, throat raw.

a thread frays from his sleeve, tugged absently for half an hour. a maid swaps his tea for honey water; it sits untouched, steam curling into nothing.

he stops performing—not by choice, but because his body betrays him. the court notices, their amused whispers turning wary. “cursed?” one mutters under the moon-viewing pavilion’s arch. “heartbreak,” an older consort replies, fan slow, knowing, “untreatable by herbs.”

the betting pool withers; no one bets on a man breaking in plain sight.

a young court lady tries teasing him during a scroll signing, giggling about his missing sash. he looks through her, face blank—not cold, just gone. her smile fades, and she retreats, fan drooping.

the emperor summons him. the chamber reeks of aged wood and sandalwood, cicadas shrieking outside, a moth dancing near the lantern.

“your distractions are… obvious,” the emperor says, voice mild over a porcelain cup of spiced tea. “have you sworn to starve?”

satoru blinks slowly, words sinking in late. “i’m capable,” he says, voice fragile, unconvinced.

the emperor sighs, cup clinking softly. “suguru, pinch him when he sighs.”

“gladly,” suguru mutters, already poised by the window.

he pinches satoru at the next council briefing. satoru yelps, startling a western envoy who drops his brush. “sorry,” satoru says, straightening, blinking fast, “muscle spasm. stress. common.”

no one buys it, least of all him.

you pass him in the apothecary hall later, face blank, pace even, tray of powdered herbs in hand, fingers stained with crushed petals. your sleeve brushes his, a fleeting touch that stops his breath, his hand twitching, hoping for your gaze.

you don’t look. not a flicker.

he wonders if he’s fading, if he’s a ghost you never truly saw.

the thing about hitting rock bottom is satoru drags props and a crowd with him.

by week five, even the imperial koi dodge him, one darting away when he slumps over the pond, sighing into its depths like a poet scorned. a servant mutters, “talking to fish again?”

another hisses, “no, monologuing. there’s a difference.” his antics swing from pitiful to deranged, depending on the hour and how close you are before he sneezes. palace staff whisper behind sleeves, watching a tragedy laced with farce unfold in real time.

it starts with rain—a relentless downpour soaking roof tiles, seeping into scroll rooms, turning courtyard stones slick as eel skin. it clings to bones, weighs hair, chills marrow. attendants scurry with parasols, eunuchs huddle under eaves, guards eye the sky, dreaming of indoor shifts. the head gardener slips twice, cursing weather gods with a rake in hand.

satoru lingers outside your quarters.

four hours.

he leans against a wooden post, a drenched statue of damp nobility and sniffles. rain beads on his jaw, dripping onto his robe’s collar, silver hair plastered to his cheekbones like wet silk threads. his soaked outer robe clings, transparent, revealing embroidered underlayers meant for court, not courtyards. his slippers squelch, squishing with each shift. he sneezes every five minutes, loud, pathetic, drawing glances from servants who now reroute entirely.

you open the door—not from pity, but because maids are betting in the side hall, giggling: five minutes more? ten? the cook wagers candied ginger he’ll faint; a laundress bets on a song; the steward swears he saw satoru’s eyelashes blink code.

you sigh, step inside, return with gloves and a cloth mask. your hair’s knotted tight, sleeves pinned, expression sharp enough to carve jade. he coughs, theatrical anguish. “you’re treating me like i’m plague-ridden.”

“you are plague-ridden,” you snap, gloves crackling as you seize his wrist, touch clinical, cold. his skin’s chilled, pulse steady despite his act.

he leans into your grip. you flick his forehead, precise as a dart.

he whines all day, mostly to suguru, who slumps in the physician’s lounge, regretting every choice leading here. an unread scroll lies in his lap, herbal poultice stench thick in the air. outside, birds chirp, mocking the farce within.

“she wore gloves, suguru,” satoru moans, swaddled in three blankets, sipping a garlic-laced brew that reeks of despair. his personal seal as inner palace manager dangles from his sash, glinting dully. “gloves. like i’m a festering toadstool.”

“you’re feverish,” suguru says, eyes on his scroll. “you are a toadstool.”

satoru gasps, rattling a tea set. an attendant flinches, a teacup teeters, caught by a mortified apprentice.

then, self-diagnoses. “nocturnal hemogoblins,” he declares one evening, bursting into your workroom, clutching his side, face pale from sleeplessness and a dusting of tragic powder. “it’s dire.”

you don’t look up from your parchment. “you mean hemoglobinemia.”

he beams. “you spoke to me.”

you freeze, brush hovering, face souring like you bit a rotten plum. you resume writing, silent. he tallies seven words in his head, a victory he celebrates like a war won.

his ploys escalate. rare herbs appear—ones you haven’t seen since southern training, wrapped in silk not from palace stores, their earthy scent lingering in halls. he trails sandalwood one day, golden pollen the next, a perfumed cloud like incense smoke.

“found this lying around,” he says, setting a saffron root sprig on your table, its crimson threads vibrant against wood.

you raise a brow. “saffron root from the western isles… lying around?”

he shrugs, smile strained.

then, disaster. he brings a volatile herb you’ve warned against, cradled in a velvet box like a jewel. within an hour, his face swells—left eye shut, lip ballooned, nose a vivid plum. “i feel… handsome,” he slurs, voice muffled.

you administer antidote with the weary air of someone resigned to fate, humming faintly, maybe to cope. your fingers are deft, grip firm, expression a blank wall. “where’d you get this?” you ask, spreading minty salve with a spatula reeking of despair.

“sources,” he wheezes.

that night, suguru catches him before a mirror tray, rehearsing lines like a doomed actor. a breeze lifts the corridor’s sheer curtain, a moth fluttering past.

“oh! fancy meeting you here, exactly where i knew you’d be!” satoru chirps, smoothing his robe, chin tilted for sincerity—looking haggard instead. “new hairpin? it suits you perfectly!” “your humor theory’s brilliant. also your face. mostly your face.”

suguru sighs, shoulders sagging under satoru’s folly. “gods save us,” he mutters. “he’s full peacock.”

satoru twirls a mugwort sprig, eyes glassy, grinning at his warped reflection. “she’ll talk tomorrow. i feel it.”

suguru doesn’t argue—not when satoru looks like he’s praying to a deaf god.

because rock bottom isn’t the end, not when you haven’t looked at him. he’ll keep performing, props and all, until you see him again.

the thing about spectacle is it spills beyond the stage, especially when you’re satoru—inner palace manager, supposedly useless eunuch, suspiciously well-connected, and now openly consulting marble lions for romance tips.

by week six, palace gossip sheds its humor. giggles behind perfumed fans turn to pity, whispers hushing as he enters, soft glances heavy with concern and secondhand shame. attendants quiet, kitchen staff wince at his approach. he’s no longer the flamboyant eccentric juggling concubine schedules, overseeing embroidery, delivering orchids with a bow. he’s a wilted ribbon snagged on your heel, trailing the apothecary who won’t spare him a glance.

the man who once danced through courtyards now stumbles into furniture, walks into half-shut doors, topples garden lanterns, eyes locked on you. you’re not mad he saved you—impossible—so this is just a phase, he tells himself, even as denial frays.

“i think i’ve forgotten how to swallow,” he declares post-midday meal, voice grave, like he’s diagnosing his own doom. honeyed yam lingers in the air, courtiers’ fans rustling faintly outside in the spring heat.

you don’t look up from your scroll, brush scratching ink. “that’s a tragedy,” you say, dry as dust.

“what if it’s muscular or psychological? some stress-induced esophageal issue?”

“chew slowly. drink water.”

“but what if i choke?”

“then i’ll have peace at last.”

he haunts formal events, a mournful specter five steps behind you—always five, counted under his breath like a lifeline. “one, two, three—damn it,” he mutters, crashing into a eunuch with a hairpin tray when you veer past the lotus fountain. the clatter echoes, pins scattering like stars. three attendants scramble to clean it.

you don’t pause.

his hair, once a silver crown, rebels, strands haloing unevenly, a jade pin perpetually crooked. his robes, once pristine, misbutton, sashes unraveling, trailing like a poet’s failed verse. he’s less courtier, more shipwreck, washed ashore after a botched love letter.

in the east garden, he slumps against a mossy lion statue, sighing so loud the gardener pauses, rake hovering, checking for wounds. “should i go for subtle longing or theatrical suffering?” satoru asks the lion, squinting at its weathered snout. “be honest.”

the lion’s silent. a maid stifles a snort, fleeing.

suguru finds him there—again. “are you talking to rocks now?” he asks, arms crossed.

“he listens without judging,” satoru says, solemn.

“he also doesn’t talk back.”

“that’s the appeal.”

satoru’s decline hits new lows. suguru catches him outside your quarters, face blank, as if willing himself into the stonework.

“you’re groveling for scraps of her attention like a starving dog,” suguru says, voice sharp but steady.

satoru’s head snaps up, eyes flashing, lips jutting in a pout that could shame a spoiled child. “groveling? me? the inner palace bends to my every whim! and soon the empire!” he huffs, crossing his arms, personal seal glinting at his waist. “i’m strategizing, suguru. strategizing! she’s just too stubborn to see my brilliance yet.”

he stomps a foot, robe swishing petulantly, then jabs a finger at suguru. “and don’t you dare call it groveling when i’m clearly executing a masterful campaign of devotion!”

suguru raises a brow, unmoved. “a campaign? you spent three hours yesterday faking heart palpitations just so she’d take your pulse. then you begged for a recheck because ‘it might be irregular.’”

“my heart does race when she’s near,” satoru says, chin high, though his voice wavers, petulance cracking. “that’s a medical fact!”

“it’s called infatuation, your highness, not an emergency.”

“and that swallowing thing could happen to anyone,” satoru adds, puffing his chest, but his shoulders slump, the fight leaking out.

suguru’s gaze softens, concern replacing jest. “this isn’t sustainable, satoru. you’re the crown prince. this behavior—it’s beneath you.”

satoru stiffens, petulance fading to a flicker of dread. “i know my place,” he says, but the lie tastes like ash, heavy on his tongue. his shoulders sag, bravado crumbling under the weight of his secret.

the emperor summons him that evening. the chamber glows dim, sandalwood incense crackling, its nostalgic scent thick in the stillness. tea steams untouched in a porcelain cup, its delicate aroma lost.

“you’re not sleeping,” the emperor says, eyeing him over his teacup, voice calm, not accusatory.

“i’m fine,” satoru lies, sitting rigid, eyes shadowed, nails carving crescents into his palms. his sleeve bears an ink blot, smudged from hours hunched over pointless scrolls.

he’s not fine.

“whoever she is,” the emperor says, pausing, gaze unreadable, “she’s left a mark.”

both of them know who is his father referring to.

the thing about spiraling is you run out of masks to hide behind.

week seven slips in like damp air—silent, heavy, inescapable. no corridor theatrics, no feverish wails, no ailments flung at your workspace. the palace corridors echo emptier, as if bracing for a storm. satoru stops performing, and the silence left screams louder than his boldest quip.

no giggling attendants trail him. no court ladies stage stumbles for his glance. he doesn’t lurk by the apothecary hall, conjuring maladies. he watches—from shadowed walkways, courtyards, corners where he can feign a passing errand. his eyes follow you, a silent question too raw to voice.

in court, his voice fades. once a spark in the dull churn of palace bureaucracy, now he speaks only when called, words brief, humor gone. no jabs at garish sashes, no quips to ease tense silences. he lets the quiet fester. when he skips sparring with the southern envoy—a woman who thrives on his banter—heads turn.

suguru notices, arms crossed in the council chamber, head tilted, eyes asking: what’s happening?

the truth lies at your door.

before dawn, satoru leaves heliotrope bouquets at your threshold—small purple blooms, fragile yet vivid, whispering devotion, unspoken love. not native, not in season, their existence defies reason.

he pulls strings—his authority as inner palace manager, his personal seal flashing in shadowed deals with garden masters and secret merchants. delivered under moonlight, wrapped in fine parchment, stems cut sharp, they’re offerings to a shrine only he tends.

he never signs them, never speaks of them. he waits—behind a painted screen, a corridor curtain, close enough to see your fingers brush the petals. his breath catches. your face stays stone, but he sees: the pause, your fingertips lingering, the faint crease in your brow, swallowing a sigh.

each day, the bouquets grow intricate—heliotrope laced with silk one dawn, wrapped in medical gauze the next, paired with a scrawled line from a physician’s text. the message roars, wordless.

palace staff whisper. some say a ghost leaves the flowers—who rises before the fifth bell? others bet on a noble’s secret suit. a concubine swears a fox spirit’s at work. guards step around the blooms, wary, reverent.

satoru says nothing, just watches, always watches.

at night, he haunts the moonlit garden—where you kissed, where he fractured. barefoot, steps silent on stone, pale hair loose, catching moonlight like spun silver. he murmurs to the koi pond, half-hoping for answers. “she doesn’t hate me, does she?” he asks, voice a breath, hoarse.

suguru finds him there, again. “does she hate me, suguru?” satoru asks, raw, fraying.

suguru pauses, arms folded, gazing at the pond’s still surface, a breeze barely stirring it. “it’s not that simple.”

satoru exhales, shaky, slumping, rubbing his palm against his eye, exhaustion carving every line. “what did i do wrong? besides everything.”

he replays your voice, your teasing eye-rolls, how you’d answer his nonsense yet see him, real. now your tone’s cold, courteous as a blade’s edge, eyes never landing. when he nears, your wall rises, unyielding.

in a corridor, maybe chance, maybe not, you nod politely. something breaks. “don’t worry,” he mutters, bitter, sharp, “i won’t keep you. i know you find me repulsive.”

you stop, head turning, confusion and guilt flickering, but he’s gone before you settle.

his mask flakes—slow, not sudden. he skips meals, nights blur sleepless, small slights spark fury. he snaps at a scribe for smudged ink, slams a door, cracking its frame, over a misfiled scroll. his hands shake reading reports you once marked with sharp notes.

“are you well, master satoru?” a junior physician asks, soft during rounds.

he smiles, too bright, too thin. “never better.”

the court whispers—behind screens, fans—about his silence, his temper, his drift. the inner palace manager, once a dazzling oddity, fades. none suspect his crown prince blood—only suguru, the emperor, the chancellor, and chosen ministers know, their secret guarded tight. but they question his focus, his steadiness.

suguru hears it—every murmur, every doubt—and watches his friend, the empire’s sharpest mind, the boy who made consorts laugh, unravel, thread by silver thread.

because spiraling starts quiet, until it’s a scream he can’t voice.

the thing about shame is that it never arrives alone. it drags longing behind it like a train of silk, heavy and unyielding, and satoru’s learning fast that longing is a damn tyrant, bowing to no one, least of all him.

week eight’s been a fever dream of jagged edges, but now, in a corridor outside the emperor’s chambers—vermilion walls lacquered to a bloody sheen, sandalwood choking the air like incense gone sour, scrolls rustling behind paper screens like whispers of the dead, morning light slicing through lattice to scatter dust motes like ash—satoru gojo is a wreck.

his robe’s crooked, one sleeve slipping, silver hair half-loose, sticking to his sweat-slick neck, dark crescents bruising under his eyes. his breath catches, raw, as regret gnaws his ribs, sharper since last week’s bitter words. your silence, your averted eyes, the way you glide past like he’s a plague-riddled corpse you won’t bother to name—it’s worse than your barbs, worse than fury. it’s absence, and it’s killing him.

you appear, a flicker of your silhouette against the screen, steps soft on the worn runner, scrolls clutched to your chest like a shield. your jaw’s clenched, lips a tight slash, gaze fixed above his shoulder like he’s nothing, air. his heart stumbles, forgets how to beat. he moves too fast, too desperate, a man drowning.

“fancy seeing you here,” he says, breathless, slouching to fake nonchalance. it’s a lie—his voice shakes, hands twisting in his sleeves, fingers knotting silk to hide the tremor. his eyes, bloodshot, cling to you, raw, pleading.

your face doesn’t shift, cold as stone. “i need to pass,” you say, voice clipped, sharp as a blade’s edge, stepping left.

“not until you tell me what i did wrong,” he says, sliding into your path, shoulders hunching, robe swishing like a broken fan. his tone’s too raw, too sharp, betraying the ache clawing his chest.

“i have patients waiting.” you pivot right, scrolls creaking in your grip, knuckles pale.

“they can wait longer.” the words cut, harder than he meant, and he sees it—a flicker in your eyes, anger or hurt, gone before he can name it. “why are you avoiding me?”

you move left. he mirrors. you shift right. he’s there. his robe flares in dramatic waves, a stage actor mid-meltdown, planting himself with the stubborn desperation of a man who’s got nothing left to lose.

your lips press thinner, a muscle twitching in your jaw. “move,” you say, low, a warning that could draw blood.

“not until you look me in the eyes and say you’re just busy.” he drops his voice, rough, tilting his head to catch your gaze, breath unsteady, carrying a tremor of need.

you scoff, eyes dropping to the runner’s frayed weave, and duck under his arm. “i’m not avoiding you,” you lie, voice snapping like brittle wood. “i’m simply—”

“look me in the eyes and say that again,” he demands, voice low, gravelly, arm bracing against the wall, caging you without touching. his sleeve hovers near you, trembling, silk brushing the air like a ghost’s touch.

you pivot. quick. a step to the side, a swerve meant to slide past him.

he steps with you.

you dart the other way—he’s there too, like a mirror with better posture. you try a feint, then a fake-out, then a spin worthy of palace dancers. every time, he matches you beat for beat, fan flicking, robe swishing, like this was all a pre-choreographed tragedy staged just to annoy you.

“are you—are you blocking me for sport?” you hiss, ducking and weaving like a cat trying to escape a curtain.

“i consider it cardio,” he replies, far too pleased.

“you are not—” you lunge left—blocked. “—a door.” you spin right—blocked. “you are—”

he shifts again, one arm rising to lean against the opposite panel, successfully completing his transformation into the world’s most aggravating, smugly-dressed wall.

“damned peacock,” you mutter under your breath, your patience unraveling like a poorly tied sash.

he grins, all teeth and challenge. “is that panic?”

then—fate, that cruel bastard, plays its hand. in his eagerness to perform one final smug pivot, satoru overcommits. his foot catches the embroidered hem of his robe—once regal, now a treacherous coil of silk. a curse, sharp and scandalized, escapes him as his balance betrays him.

his arms flail like a bird startled mid-preen. he reaches—grabs the only thing in reach—you.

the world lurches.

you’re yanked forward in a graceless blur. scrolls burst from your sleeves like startled pigeons. your sandal skids. silk snaps. the floor rises.

you crash atop him, your knees bracketing his hips, robes tangled, your weight knocking the wind from his lungs. one hand braces on his chest, the other—lands on his thigh, then slips higher, dragged by momentum and misfortune—and then time stops.

your hand rests where no eunuch’s should be, pressing against the hard, pulsing truth of his lie. satoru’s eyes snap open, wide as moons, heart slamming, drowning the corridor’s hum, his pulse a wild drum in his throat.

you freeze, breath hitching, eyes widening in slow horror, pupils dilating until they swallow the light. your lips part, a faint gasp, your gaze locked on his lap, then flicking to his face, shock warring with disbelief. your fingers flex, instinctive, the slight pressure a spark that sets him ablaze, raw, unbearable.

his face ignites, crimson flooding ears to throat, sweat slicking his brow, matting his hair. shame burns like a pyre, but longing—eight weeks of it, festering, unspent—flares hotter, primal, coiling tight in his gut. his cock twitches under your hand, a traitor, throbbing, straining against silk, a humiliating pulse he can’t stop, fed by your touch, your horrified stare.

he tries to speak, mouth opening, closing, a fish gasping on dry land. a sound escapes—half-whimper, half-choke, not human, raw with need and mortification, a plea he can’t shape.

“y-you’re—” you start, voice a trembling whisper, hand jerking back like it’s burned, fingers curling into your palm, scrolls forgotten, scattered across the runner.

“late for a meeting!” he yelps, pitch shattering, a glass-breaking wail. he scrambles up, nearly headbutting you, sleeves flailing in a whirlwind of panic. “as are you! very late! we should go! separately! you first! or me! both!”

he shoves himself upright, stumbles, one sandal half-off, toes catching the runner, and crashes into a lantern stand. it wobbles, brass clanging like a mocking gong; he mutters a frantic, “sorry, sorry,” to the metal, voice high, fraying.

he’s gone, fleeing down the corridor like death’s on his heels, robe flapping, silver hair streaming like a comet’s tail. his footsteps echo, uneven, desperate, fading into the palace’s hum, sandalwood trailing like a curse.

he doesn’t stop until he hits the eastern wing’s darkest storage room, a crypt behind a forgotten pantry. dusty scrolls pile like forgotten sins, edges curling in stale, mildewed air. a broom slumps against a wall, bristles choked with cobwebs, spiderwebs veiling the corners, shimmering faintly in the gray sliver of light from a cracked window. the floor’s cold, gritty, biting his knees as he collapses, back slamming the door shut, sealing himself in.

his breath heaves, lungs raw, face buried in his hands, fingers digging into his scalp, tugging silver strands until his scalp stings, sweat dripping down his neck, pooling at his collarbone. shame scalds, a molten wave, but longing—weeks of your silence, your cold eyes, your absence carving him hollow—chokes him worse.

your touch, accidental, sears like a brand, your horrified gaze a knife twisting in his ribs. his cock’s still hard, painfully so, straining against his robe, a throbbing pulse that won’t relent, fed by every thought of you, every memory of your voice, your fire, your fleeting glance that once saw him whole.

he groans, low, broken, forehead pressed to his arm, cursing himself, you, the gods, the robe, the corridor, the whole damn world. his hand twitches, hovering over his lap, resisting, pleading, but the need’s a tyrant, born of eight weeks’ yearning, your sharp tongue, your gaze that cut him alive, your silence that breaks him now. he surrenders, fingers fumbling, shoving silk layers aside, fabric scraping his fevered skin, cool air hitting the heat of his flesh like a slap.

he frees himself, cock heavy, swollen, tip slick with precum that glistens in the dim light, dripping down his shaft, a shameful bead that pools on the gritty floor. he grips himself, a hiss escaping through clenched teeth, the contact a jolt that makes his hips jerk, his breath catching like a sob, raw and ragged. it’s not lust—it’s longing, raw, bleeding, for your eyes that once saw him, your barbs that cut him alive, your touch that burned through his lies.

he strokes, slow, punishing, hand tight, calluses from a hidden sword scraping sensitive skin, each slide dragging a moan, chest heaving, sweat matting his hair to his flushed cheeks, silver strands plastered across his brow, his throat bared as his head tips back, veins pulsing under sweat-slick skin.

he pictures you—your wide eyes, shocked, lips parting as you fell atop him, robe clinging to your frame, the faint herb scent on your skin, sharp and clean. he imagines your breath on his neck, your fingers deliberate, curling around him, guiding him, your voice whispering his name, not in horror but want, low and rough like it was in his dreams.

his strokes quicken, desperate, slick with precum, the wet sound obscene, echoing off dusty scrolls, bouncing in the stale air. his free hand claws the floor, nails scraping grit, fingers digging into cold stone, seeking an anchor as his body shakes, hips bucking into his fist, rhythm frantic, no control left, only need.

his moans spill, raw, unfiltered, bouncing off the walls, a litany of broken sounds. “fuck,” he gasps, voice shattering, “why you?” it’s your absence, your fire, the way you looked at him once, like he was real, now a ghost he chases.

his hand moves faster, rougher, slick and relentless, each stroke a plea for you to see him, to cut him again with your gaze. “please,” he whispers, to you, to nothing, “just look at me.” his vision blurs, tears or sweat, he can’t tell, heat coiling low, a knot tightening, pulling, until it snaps like a bowstring.

he comes hard, a shudder tearing through him, spine arching, hips jerking as he spills over his hand, thick, hot, splattering the gritty floor, staining his robe’s hem, a shameful mark that burns his eyes. his moan’s a broken cry, half your name, half a curse, echoing in the crypt-like room, jagged, raw, filling the air until it chokes him.

he collapses, sprawled across dusty linens, chest heaving, eyes wide, staring at the cracked ceiling, its fissures mirroring his fractured mind. his hand’s still wrapped around himself, slick, trembling, aftershocks fading into a hollow ache, longing unspent, pooling in his gut like poison, heavy, unyielding.

he lies there, time blurring, mildew’s scent thicker now, mingling with his sweat and release, air suffocating, pressing his chest. his hair’s plastered to his face, silver strands streaking his flushed cheeks, robe a tangled wreck, one sleeve torn, another inside-out, silk clinging to his sweat-soaked skin. he’s gutted, undone by his own hand, your touch a memory he can’t unmake, your horrified eyes a wound he can’t close, bleeding him dry.

later, he emerges, robe barely tied, one sleeve dangling, hair damp at the temples, flushed like he’s wrestled a demon and lost. his steps falter, sandals scuffing stone, smile forced, brittle, not touching his bloodshot eyes, dark crescents bruising beneath, cheekbones sharp from skipped meals, skin pale as moonlight gone wrong.

suguru passes him, dark robe pristine, pausing mid-step. “you look like you fought an assassin,” he says, flat, one brow lifting, eyes scanning satoru’s ruin—flushed skin, trembling fingers, sweat-slick hair matted to his neck.

“calisthenics,” satoru chirps, too bright, voice cracking, a pitch too high. “fantastic for circulation.”

suguru’s eyes narrow, lingering on the rumpled robe, the damp hair, the faint bruise on satoru’s knuckles from clawing the floor. “circulation,” he repeats, slow, heavy with doubt, like he smells the lie and the shame beneath it.

satoru hurries off, pace quick, like he’s fleeing a fire he set. his robe flutters, misaligned, dragon’s tail mocking him with every step. he doesn’t dare picture your face, your hand, your horror—not again.

he’s considering faking his death. or switching identities. exile in a fishing village sounds appealing.

(give him two hours. maybe three.)

a/n: LMAO pls don’t mind part one ending here. as i said this is meant to be a oneshot only 🧍🏻‍♀️

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[kyuu-collection]

painfully domestic. fem!reader. established relationship. aged up characters.

in title, itoshi sae is simply 'the boyfriend.'

he is exempt from all tasks that would fall under the category of fatherly duties, and he should be fine with that. yet, he's been staring at your daughter's snoopy-themed lunch pail forgotten on the dining room table, for a little over ten minutes. he knew you were in a rush when you kissed him on the forehead and left for drop-off, clutching a tumbler of coffee in one hand and your work bag in the other. today was that important work meeting with administrators that you've been preparing for, and grabbing your second grader's lunch must have slipped your mind.

well, shit. of course this happens on his one day off.

he usually prides himself on his decision making, driven by instinct and unconscious knowledge from past experiences. but for the life of him, he continues to rest his chin on his clasped hands as his elbows dig into the table, glaring at the well-loved bag like a terrible first date. he checks his phone. it's 11:04. her school lunchtime begins at 11:30. if your daughter didn't eat lunch, she would come home grumpy; if she was grumpy, you would be equally grumpy when you pick her up from after-school care; that meant that by the time everyone was at your apartment, he'd be stuck in the middle of two hangry monsters that would gladly tear him to shreds.

so, he snatches up the pail--it's lighter than he thought it would be--and pulls his car keys from the hook by the door.

on the drive over, he imagines every possible way this interaction could go wrong. he was just the boyfriend, just the guy that you brought over every once in a while after date night. your daughter adored him, yes, but he wasn't as permanent of a fixture in your life as he wanted to be. if this all went sideways, you could think he was overstepping and break up with him. or, your daughter could think he was overstepping and tell you to break up with him. the front office could call the police on him and accuse him of trying to poison your daughter...and then you break up with him. the thought makes him grimace even as he pulls into the parking lot at 11:15.

his eyes narrow on the suspiciously collapsed bag in his passenger seat. upon opening, his heart drops into his stomach when there is nothing to be found but a broken plastic fork and a used napkin. had you forgotten to make her lunch altogether? were you that stressed and he had missed it? he's throwing the car back into 'drive' before he can finish swearing under his breath, pure adrenaline and muscle memory navigating him into the nearest fast food drive-thru and reciting your daughter's order that he'd typed into his phone. you didn't know he had the note containing all of your favorite food spots, orders, and other things that were special to you and your daughter; it was a secret he intended to take to his grave.

he pulls back into the parking lot at 11:25. five minutes until lunchtime started.

the bell hanging from the door handle makes a jingling noise as he enters the front office.

"hello, i'm here to drop off lunch for a student. she forgot hers this morning," he says as warmly as he can, holding up the lunch pail containing the fast food (he didn't know the school's policy on outside food and thought it best to hide it. he prayed the cup of soft serve didn't fall over). the receptionist looks up at him and then shakes her head in shock, like she couldn't believe what her eyes were feeding her.

"oh-oh wow, you're-you're that footballer," she sputters and he nods, his smile threatening to become strained and impatient.

"yes, i'd be happy to sign something after i drop this off," he continues. his eyes flick to the other office workers who have begun whispering among themselves, no doubt exchanging opinions on his surprise appearance.

"yes, of course. your student, she talks about you a lot." she does? "the other children complain to us that she is lying, but we were never able to dispel the rumors...until now."

"right." his smile is now more like a fraying tightrope. "so, i'm able to drop this off for her?"

"of course, all guardians on the emergency contact list are allowed to bring lunch for their students," the woman chirps. for the first time, sae's brain completely shuts down. he was on the emergency contact list? but he didn't put himself there, so does that mean you had put him down? "shall i call her up to the front office, or would you like to deliver it to her classroom?"

"either is fine, whichever is faster since lunch is about to start," he replies. she nods, picking up the desk phone and murmuring to whoever was on the other end of the line.

"she'll be here in a few minutes; you can have a seat in the meantime," she informs him after she hangs up and gestures to the chairs behind him. he obliges, and it's only two minutes before your daughter comes barreling around the corner with a smile so wide, he's afraid she might damage her jaw.

"mister sae! mister sae! mister sae!!" she squeals, leaping forward and throwing herself into his arms. his arms instinctively secure around her body despite his mind's shock.

"hey, kid. forget something today?" he places her on the floor and kneels to her level, handing her the snoopy lunch pail. she gasps, grabbing it and jumping in place with excitement. "careful with that, there's a surprise inside that may or may not be ice cream," he whispers secretively, giving her a wink.

"do you go back to work now?" she asks, a pout pulling down her bright smile. "i don't want you to leave."

the office door bell jingles before he has the chance to answer. he smells your perfume a split second before you say with amusement, "well, who do we have here?"

"mama!" your daughter attaches herself to your legs while sae turns to you with a smirk. "mister sae is here."

"i see that." the surprise of seeing your boyfriend at your daughter's school temporarily stuns you, despite you being the one who put him on the emergency contact list. "whatcha got there?" in your daughter's hand dangles her lunch pail, which smells interestingly like the greasy paper bag of fast food that you'd rushed to grab after you finished your meeting.

"mister sae brought me lunch since i forgot it today," she explains. "he says there's ice cream."

"among other things," he interjects, earning a chuckle from you and a giggle from your daughter. "i woke up and saw the pail on the table, and...just didn't want her to be hungry."

"you didn't need to do that." you look at him with something soft in your eyes, and he looks back.

"but i did." the shrill sound of the school bell breaks the intimacy of the moment and you set your daughter back down. "we should get going," he reminds your daughter. "you've got some food to eat."

"what about mama's food?"

"i think mister sae and i can finish it off, no?"

"guess i'm switching cheat day to today," he confirms. "go ahead and go to lunch, honey. we'll be back in a few hours to pick you up."

"promise?"

"promise."

[kyuu-collection]

bachira meguru is a dog person ! i don't make the rules !

well, that's not usually there.

he stares down at the dirty green tennis ball in the center of the grass where he usually plays soccer. bachira knew his area like the back of his hand, down to cracks in the concrete and weeds wrapping themselves around the fence. so, when the tennis ball appeared among the ankle-high blades of grass, curiosity took over and spurred him to investigate its origin.

it doesn't take long for him to find the dog park; the sound of incessant barking and scurrying paws is an easy enough beacon to follow. tossing the ball absentmindedly in the air, he slips through the gate and is immediately bombarded with a large mass of muscle and fur. the animal nearly knocks him over and he stumbles, barely able to keep his balance when he registers a wet tongue trying to wedge the ball from his grip. the culprit is a huge golden retriever with a bright green collar, and it sits patiently while eyeing the toy in bachira's hand. when bachira finally throws the ball, the dog races off, quickly followed by half a dozen other dogs that scramble for the tiny green sphere. the golden returns to him, the ball proudly in its mouth, and drops it at bachira's feet expectantly.

"ah, sorry about that. he's been looking for that ball for a week and he wants you to throw it since you found it." a sheepish voice approaches him from behind and he squints through the sunlight over his shoulder. when you're finally close enough that bachira can see your face, something in his chest stops working. maybe it's his heart, maybe it's his lungs; either way, it feels like his whole body shuts down for a solid three seconds when you smile at him. "i hope you don't mind the slobber," you continue, rubbing the back of your neck with your palm. if you notice the way bachira's eyes are popping out of their sockets or how he keeps dragging his sweating palms on his shorts, you don't mention it. "he's still learning his manners, unfortunately."

"it's alright, i'm happy to play with him if it's okay with you," he answers, hoping you don't sense the sudden nervousness in his voice. your entire being radiates warmth and kindness, something that he's drawn to like a poor moth to a burning candle in a dark room.

"of course it is." you glance around, presumably looking for another dog to run up to bachira. "are you just," you pause, looking for the right word, "here?" the awkwardness of your question hits you after the word leaves your mouth and you backtrack, trying to reassure the stranger that there's nothing wrong with him being here alone. he, however, can't stop himself from bursting out laughing at the bluntness of your statement.

"i mean, i guess i am," he chuckles. cute, he thinks when you avoid his eyes with an embarrassed expression. "i usually play soccer on the other side of the park, but i figured i'd return this ball to its rightful owner." he chucks the ball again, the golden bounding after it in a flurry of hair and dirt. you're smiling softly when he glances at you out of the corner of his eye, and he turns away quickly when you catch him staring. you introduce yourself to fill the silence as your dog returns; bachira commits your name to memory and manages to blurt out his own.

"it's a pleasure to meet you. oh, and this is frank." the dog in question prances over to you and leans against your legs, his tail flicking happily while you rub the side of his body. "short for frankenstein."

"your dog's name is frankenstein?" bachira didn't have pets, nor did he know anyone else with pets, but he still knew that frank's name was...unique, to say the least. you shrug and he interprets it as shame, something he's lightning-quick to correct. "not that it's a bad thing!" you make a noise between a cough and a snort.

"it's okay, it's okay," you laugh and he thinks it sounds like a melody. "he, uh, had surgery at the shelter where i got him. his heart stopped for a bit, but he fought his way back and had stitches when i brought him home," you explain, frank looking at you with all the love in the world. bachira probably had a similar expression. "hence the name frankenstein."

"that's amazing," he says, awestruck.

"mhmm, he's my little monster. i choose to ignore the fact that frankenstein was the doctor's name," you add, pressing a kiss to the top of the dog's head and ushering him back over to bachira. "you ready to throw again? he'll keep going until your arm falls off." if it meant he kept talking to you, bachira was ready to play fetch with frank until his arm popped out of its socket.

---

there's a new space in bachira's routine reserved for you and frank. even though you attend a different school, you live around the same area and visit the park at similar times when bachira practices solo. after a few weeks of meeting you in the dog park, he invites you and frank into the secluded little patch of grass where he kicks the ball alone.

"wait, stop for a second," he requests before you throw the ball for frank again. you look over at him, puzzled, and he moves his soccer ball up against the fence. he reaches behind a tree and pulls out a vibrant orange ball about the same size as the soccer ball, but this ball has handles carved into it. "i hope it's okay i bought this; i noticed frank likes when i kick the ball for him..." you take the ball from his hands and are too surprised to notice the bashful pink on bachira's cheeks. you gape at the toy for a few seconds longer before summoning frank, squealing look at this, buddy! and you have a new playmate! and isn't this wonderful?

"this is-this is so nice of you, bachira," you manage to say once frank goes after the large ball, a firm strike from your friend sending it flying. "you really didn't need to buy this."

"i wanted to," bachira shrugs, "and you can make it up to me by calling me meguru." he shoots you a grin that makes your knees wobble before meeting frank halfway across the grass, dribbling the ball away from your dog and running him in zig zags. i could get used to this, he thinks as frank dutifully follows his dribbling, the sound of your laughter shooting through his veins like caffeine.

---

"i didn't know you had a dog," isagi comments the first time he sees the polaroid on the back of bachira's phone case. "o-or a..." he stutters, taking a closer look at you pressing a kiss to meguru's cheek while he holds frank's furry body close.

"i think isagi's just surprised you have a life outside of soccer," chigiri finishes for him.

"i'll introduce you to them at some point, i promise," he beams, unfazed by his fellow strikers gaping at your picture. "one's the love of my life and the other's a golden retriever, so they're both pretty important to me! now, let's win so i can get back to both of them sooner."

if you enjoy my writing and would like to support me, you can buy me a coffee on my ko-fi! you can also check out my full masterlist here :)

[kyuu-collection]

amateur pornstar or onlyfans!nagi???

au masterlist

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onlyfans!nagi who goes live one night when it's late. his subscribers didn’t expect to see his camera angled down to where his cock was shoved in and out of your pretty pussy, as he groans about how it's so tight around him. he's fucking into you harshly, as you let out of whimpers of, "please, 'm so close, wan' cum, please, please.." and "c-cum in me, please! wanna feel it so bad, have you— oh fuck, baby— fill me up, shit, you're so big..", his viewers think that you're just a guest, so it's to their absolute shock when he casually says that you're his girlfriend.

onlyfans!nagi who now uploads videos of you two having sex in all kinds of positions. his comments are filled with men wishing they could fuck you instead of him, and others begging for more content of you, claiming you were so, so pretty taking nagi's huge cock like a champ.

onlyfans!nagi who always goes live late at night, camera angled between your thighs as his big hand shifts into frame, resting right on your pussy. he's not even fingering, just patting it and occasionally giving you small rubs while he praises you, saying things like "mm, my angel's pussy is so pretty, don't you all think?" or "cute pussy always takes my cock so well," as his comments agree as you whine softly.

onlyfans!nagi who goes live yet again, his screen showing you spread out beneath him, the glossy slide of his cock in and out of you. he thumbs at your clit so casually, while telling his live so lazily, voice flat but dead serious, "tell me what to do. she'll take it," reading his comments with an unbothered look.

choke her

slap her pussy i'm begging

face fucking i need to see her gagging around that huge cock

don't let her cum edge her omfg

onlyfans!nagi who hums a little. "mm... that one." you let out a helpless sob when he pulls out abruptly, feeling your cunt clench around him, signaling you're about to cum. but when he sees the comments about you, he lets out an annoyed sigh and ends the live, before squishing your cheeks together with one hand and looks directly at you, "g'nna make you cum now, okay? be good and take it. then, i'll fill you up, angel." he tries to act unbothered, but no guy wants to see his girlfriend being lusted after by others, especially when they look like:

she's so pretty i'm beating my dick to her rn

i wanna cum in her so bad it leaks out

i can fuck her better than this guy tbh

onlyfans!nagi who also doesn't necessarily care about the money. well, it's more like he forgets about it. in fact, reo manages it and nagi simply blinks when he sees the deposit, saying "that's cool." he spends most of the money buying you little treats — bracelets, hair clips, stuffed animals, bags, and of course, skimpy clothes and lingerie he wants to see you in.

onlyfans!nagi who has thousands and millions of fans falling for his content, their eyes on him, but he only has eyes for you, his heart so full of his pretty girlfriend. ♡

[kyuu-collection]

 ✰ the copy of your apartment key you had handed your best friend!Satoru months ago was definitely the best decision you could have taken, it avoided you the hassle of having to stand up from the cozy spot on the couch to open the door, which happened quite a few times a day, it was like the blue eyed lived there at this point. with a pair of his shoes next to yours at the entrance, one of his blindfolds tucked into your underwear drawer, and that one jacked you once told him it was really cute hanging on the back of a chair, he did not wear it anymore, he said looks better on you either way.

so when the usual sound of your doorknob turns, you know it’s him, loud and whining your name, almost like a blur since he is on top of you in a second, face buried on the crook of your neck, “she cheated” is what he mutters.

the girl Satoru was dating for what? a week, it did not matter, he was hurt and pouty, extra cute in your opinion, so your hands find his scalp and scratch, “aw, baby, I’m sorry, she doesn’t deserve you”

“I found her making out with another dude” he cries in another whine, lips warm and soft on your skin, just like his hands sliding under the shirt —his— you wore, to press on your tummy and gently slide the waistband of your shorts and panties down, “he was not even handsome”

you can’t help but chuckle a little “no one is as handsome as you, baby” you coo, raising your hips just enough for him to bare you from the waist below, “it’s her loss” “her loss” you try to keep yourself coherent as Satoru fucks into your tight, warm pussy with deep but languid strokes, still keeping his face on the crook of your neck but his hips smack with a mind of their own, messily splattering the wetness seeping from your cunt onto thighs and pelvis, grinding a little with breathy whines from his part.

you could not understand how someone could even dare cheat on Satoru with how loving he was, so sweet, and with such a fat cock, “y-you’re the best boyfriend, baby, the ah! the... the best” moans and whines leave your throat, having first hand experience in your best friend’s gestures, it was strange why his relationships didn’t last.

“y-yeah, you promise?” he sounds so cute with that breathy and pleasured voice, knowing it’s your pussy making him that drunk, seeking for a compliment you are more than willing to give, “I- ah, fuck... love... your pussy” the white haired groans on your neck, hands squeezing on your hips tighter to keep you steady as he fills and stretches your tight hole, “the best I have ever had... nghm...” that sentence being enough to push you closer to the edge, hips bucking to have his cock hit the delicious spot inside your walls.

“mngh! the best... the best...” you repeat, lover, friend, fuck, who cares, fucked too good to even make up your own emotions.

[kyuu-collection]

Animals - G.S.

Synopsis. Yes, your best friend is secretly an alpha. Yes, he acts like a fúcking anímal when he rúts. No, you don’t think you’ll make it out alíve.

Pairing. Gojo Satoru x Reader

Content. MDNI, fem! oméga! reader, alpha! Gojo, rúts, best-friends-to-lóvers, creampíes, bréeding, GOJO’S POWERS, knots, MARATHON SÉX, overstím, knots, MATÍNG BÍTES, cúmplay, OMÉGAVERSE AU, pússy-spánking, héats tríggered, semi-public, matíng press, oraI (fem), slight bondagé, pet names, swéaring.

Word count. 7.0k (uh-oh)

A/N. Nanami always gets the short end of the stick LMAO, anyway hope y’all have the loveliest week <3

“Satoru, you’re being strange.”

Granted, Gojo Satoru acting weird wasn’t anything new. 

Especially not when he’s two hours deep into the most droning meeting you’d bribed him into attending as of late - knee bouncing, fingers tapping, head turned towards that firmly shut door like he just wanted to escape. Needed to. 

Then again, even you found your attention waning. Finding whispering with your best friend much more interesting than whatever latest mission statistic Yaga had to present. 

“M’doing just peachy, sweetheart.” Gojo smiles - but it looks stilted, pained. And even through his blindfold, you already knew his snowy brows were furrowed. “Who’s the one not listening to ol’ man Yaga now?”

You scoff, narrowing your eyes down at his figure beside you - draped over the cool mahogany table as if he owned the place. “Well- you better not be faking sick to get out of this meeting. Again.”

He only hums, “Don’t worry your pretty lil’ h-head about it, m’kay?”

With a final, tired rub at your temples, you’re turning back to Nanami to ask for all the world where Yaga was on his fifty-page report now-

And then, it hits you.

Suddenly.

Something smells sweet.

Like candy - particularly that sugary, strawberry-flavored kind you’ve had to tell Gojo off on more than one occasion for eating too many of. Tilting your head just a bit, you think you could also catch hints of honey and pine, such a strange, hypnotic combination.

“S-Satoru…” your words come out in a syrupy gush, feeling your head whirl.

“Hm?”

And despite yourself, you’re taking in deep, heavy inhales of the air surrounding you. Hungry. Mouth salivating as that heady, perfumed whiff clouds up all your senses. “Do you- hah- what is- do you smell-”

“Ngh- no?” he’s cutting you off with a barely-audible groan, one you probably wouldn’t have even caught if your abilities weren’t so sharpened right now. Gojo’s movements seem sluggish, languid as if he was moving through molasses when he raises up one hand to massage the back of his neck.

You can only watch as his head droops down onto the long table with a wince. 

Strange. If you didn’t know any better, you’d have almost thought- 

No, there was no time to be entertaining wild conspiracies. Because at this very moment you’re too caught up flitting through the dates of all your previous heats in your mind. Urgently. 

Three weeks.

Your next heat wasn’t due for another three weeks. So, sure, you didn’t take your suppressants just yet but, that really didn’t matter, did it?

It wasn’t normal for jujutsu sorcerers to be anything other than a beta - and as an omega, you knew firsthand just how difficult it was to fight tooth and nail just to be able to sit at this table. 

Historically, any other faction of society would rather be caught dead than outed, and have their second gender be taken advantage of by the very curses you were supposed to exorcize. Forced to face the stigma of alphas and omegas being too “unstable” or “vulnerable” to be trusted with missions.

This was the very thing you’d been trying to avoid ever since you argued your way into studying at Jujutsu Tech - losing control. 

Especially now.

But god, you were burning up. It smelled so sexy.

And, taking a sweeping glance around the table of betas - at your fellow sorcerers, those grim elders, and your disheveled best friend - that left only you to explain the scent.

You were only thankful that their noses weren’t as powerful as yours. Clinging onto this as a saving grace, with a shaky gulp, you gently nudge Nanami on his side. “Hey- Ken?”

“Yes?” And maybe it was the heat - whatever this was - but Nanami’s deep baritone sends shivers down your spine, and you find yourself leaning in traitorously closer to his heated body. His jaw ticks, “Is something wrong? You look…”

“Satoru’s also-”

“So what?”

Without warning, one of his hands comes to splay out across your forehead. Just a mere touch has him sucking in a sharp gasp, “You feel warm, I think you have a fever. You can’t continue the meeting like this.” 

You shake your bleary head in protest. 

“I won’t let you.” Nanami’s voice hardens with a tone of finality, and yet, you still find yourself trying to whirl around to look at Gojo. Maybe for help, maybe for a distraction to escape when your colleague speaks again - this time directed at Yaga. “Principal Yaga, it seems my dear friend here is sick.” Circling an arm around your shoulders to pull you up from your seat and onto weak legs. “If you’ll please excuse us, I will escort-”

Nanami stills - everything stills. 

Everyone stills when his voice tapers off with a ragged grunt, and you feel his chest heave in unsteady breaths. So close now that you can mark the exact moment Nanami’s eyes widen, “Are you…”

Shit. 

Shit shit shit-

“Wait.” Yaga’s voice bellows reproachfully. “Is this- That smell-” But even he can’t find the words, slumping back down into his seat.

Truly, the scent was so saturated now, so primal that even the most stubborn of unmated betas were sneaking peeks at you. You bite your lips raw at another glossy gush from your already-heated cunt. It was so embarrassing - your heats have never acted like this before, let alone come three weeks early.

Sure, perhaps that one time on your very first day at Jujutsu Tech itself - which was embarrassing by itself. And, yet, your mind had never been clearer than it was right now. 

Eyes sliding over to a familiar, trembling mop of white hair - never been needier. 

Fuck, what was your delirious self thinking-

As if drawn by an invisible string, Nanami’s inching impossibly into your hot proximity, hazel eyes falling half-lidded when he takes in a deep whiff. Grumbling, “My love-” Another. And another. Nose almost grazing your pulse now, “-you’re in-”

Slam!

“Out.”

It’s a threat.

That was the first thought that slammed into you, and then the voice continues, slow, snarling like a predator on the edge of ripping something to shreds. “I won’t repeat myself.”

Before you finally understand, it’s a command.

There’s one strong hand around your front, pinning you against a sculpted chest. Something about it has your pulse booming in your ears, fingers clawing at that pale wrist at your shoulder. Yet, he doesn’t even flinch.

Nanami, however, reluctantly detaches his hands from your body, and you finally have enough strength to look towards the origin of the words. Only for your glassy gaze to meet with a towering Gojo Satoru standing at his full height - when did he even get up? 

Jaw clench, sharp canines bared, blindfold dangling haphazardly around his neck - ah, he looked like a man that crawled from hell and back simply to take you all along with him. 

With you at lucky number one. 

First in his line of sight. Close enough that you can finally smell him. 

Oh.

Oh. 

And you swear you saw his eyes tint with the faintest blue lightning when your own scent perks up. Boring into you for just a millisecond before narrowing his gaze down at a stupefied Nanami, cracking the kinks in his neck. “Unless ya wanna watch.” He bares the rest of the room with his flooring glare, “Unless all of you want to watch.”

It’s chaos. 

They understood - perhaps long before even you did. 

Chairs clatter, the desk trembles, and that safe haven of the door is swung open. That weezing council of elders are first to stumble over one another into the hallway, Yaga following shortly with a wordless sigh. 

Until the only ones left are you and him - and Nanami.

Blond brows raising, his eyes flit frantically between you and a possessive Gojo. Sputtering out, each word jagged, and dry as if they’re being wrenched from his chest. “What is the meaning of this- We- I thought you were a- a beta.” 

Everyone did, and Nanami was speaking what your mind couldn’t right now. 

Gojo Satoru always presented himself as a beta - never affected by your heats, never disappearing once every few months for his ruts as you remember Suguru did. He always seemed so normal - perhaps the one thing about him that was. Unaffected by the stupid little trials and tribulations of alphas and omegas in sorcery. 

But it was undeniable, he was an alpha. 

And taking a deep inhale of his saccharine sweet perfume - so overpowering - he might just be the strongest you’ve ever encountered. How fitting.

“You thought.” Gojo’s voice was clipped, rumbling with a low growl that sent electrifying shivers down to your very cunt. And his tone just makes Nanami jolt. “And I can’t right now so I- fuck-”

Gojo’s body wracks with a violent shudder, making him hunch over - with you in tow. His hot breath puffs out in feverish pants near your ear, abs clenching as another velvety wave of pheromones emit from him. 

You mewl when your body is jostled in his toned arms, nudging the very curve of your ass - tight uniform skirt hiking up just enough - so that you push in a slow drag against something rock-hard. Massive. Weeping out in a sticky damp spot that seeps into your skin. 

“Hah-” you’re gasping, face swirling to nose up the crook of his neck - where the candied scent was most prominent. “Toru–”

There’s a gasp - and it’s not from you this time. 

Both you and Gojo are snapping your dazed heads upwards at a frozen Nanami, his hand shooting to cover his nose. Eyes wild- “I-”

Before thinking better of it, it seems like Nanami opted to keep some part of his sanity as he abruptly turns on his heels without a second glance backwards. Marching robotically, the only moment he stops is once he’s at the doorway. One hand tugging on his suddenly too-tight pants, the other on the doorknob. Eyes still trained forwards when he calls out gruffly, “Don’t break the table, insurance doesn’t cover it.”

SLAM!

Finally alone.

Your vision swims - is the door even locked? Is this- God, you feel hot. So hot - too hot.

And Gojo’s burning up, arms wrapping around you so tight that you could feel the way his skin flushed with a thin sheen of sweat. He breathes out into your ear, “My pretty girl…”

“Oh sh-shit–” you’re whimpering, big fat tears welling up behind your eyes. And without wasting a second, as soon as it splatters hotly on your best friend’s skin, he licks a long, lazy stripe to lap at the hazy saltiness. Babbling away, “Feel so dizzy hngh- and you- you’re an alpha?”

Honestly, part of you still didn’t want to believe it.

But as soon as he husks out a gravelly moan, as soon as his tongue dips down a wet pathway to the scent gland on your neck - you already know you won’t be making it out of this alive. “Why did you hide it from me?”

“Mhm- fuck! m’sorry.” he grunts into your skin, slightly muffled. Nipping ever-so-slightly, “M’sorry m’sorry- had to- my sudden rut made my- hah, made my pretty omega go into heat, didn’t it?”

His soft palms glide down your trembly body, greedily kneading every dip and curve that comes his way. He’s lost. So, so lost. 

Plastering his lips down every inch of skin he could reach, that sweet scent sticking to you like a sloppy second skin. And you can barely even think when you feel his swollen dick just twitch behind you, a fresh wave of swelteringly hot precum sloshing right through your silken skirt.

You whimper when you’re rutting messily back and forth, and he drags a thick thumb to pry your spit-glossed lips open. “Aww, poor baby. Tell me- fuck tell me what you want, sweetheart.”

And all you can really give him right now is a circular swivel of your hips, which evidently wasn’t enough. 

Because Gojo’s furious tip only hardens, and he hisses with a slight tug up your skirt. Cold fingers dancing ravenously up the edge of your drenched panties, gliding the very rounded tip of his index slowly across your sopping slit. 

“Tha’s not enough.” he snickers, and suddenly you’re hit with another wave of emanating pheromones. Enough to make you just slobber a glistening coating all down his long digits. “Use your ah- w-words like a big girl now. Because when I start…” His teeth find your earlobe, and his fingers find themselves planting a dripping wet slap! across your puffed-up clit. Unwavering. Unapologetic. “I won’t be able to stop.”

“Please, Toru.” That cute little nickname makes him jump, makes him throw his head back with a low moan. Brows scrunching together as if pained. “Don’t want you to stop-”

Maybe you were going to say more - maybe you would’ve called him that nickname and driven him even crazier. 

But Gojo doesn’t wait to find out. 

In one, fluid motion he’s picking up your body into the easiest princess carry you two would’ve laughed at if this was one of those romcoms you watched together. Just splaying you out on your back across the cool table, he situates himself in the perfect position between your legs. 

Oh, how he loved this view. How he’s spent so many ruts just like this imagining this view.

“F-fuck- You have no idea how- how crazy it drove me.” rasping groans drag out from his throat, strained with every slow drag of his cock down the front of your now-see-through panties. “How wild-” You’re nearly screaming when his canines dig in to that soft spot underneath your ear. “-to pretend I didn’t know you smelled so hah- so fucking delicious.”

And then you feel him still - alert, ready.

Chest heaving, an almost chilling tone dipping into his words when he spits, “Except when you smell like him.”

Your jaw falls slack when the temperature in the room heats up another few heady degrees, and the sheer power of your two scents mixing together is almost maddening. 

“He- he? Toru, what do you-” you’re gasping out in tiny huffs, while he busies himself with biting and licking down your exposed neck. Enough to leave you smeared all over with marks. “Who- Kento?”

“Oh, sayin’ another man’s name when you’re with- fuck- me?” Gojo’s bucking powerfully into you, his body was pinning you down. Scorching, now. “Such a naughty omega- I should kill him for how he touched you.”

Truly, his alpha was fucking clawing at him to trek out of this room right now and finish off the job - but, no, you were too hypnotic. And Gojo Satoru, the strongest, was no match for you.

The wet thwack of his fingers once more kisses in a rude smack against your clit, making you squeal. Ringing across your thundering ears, he swears at that broken, blissful noise from you. “Fuckin’ oh, would ya let him see you like this, too? Let him touch you like th-this?”

And Gojo looked so starved, velvety blindfold tickling your chin when he leans in close. Lips ghosting your own - but not quite. You’re suddenly brought back to the very first thought you had - that this is about to be a bloodbath. 

“I wouldn’t–” you bite back in your honeyed tone, and you can feel your omega just purr in satisfaction. “N’ it’s not my fault that someone-”

Smack! Harder, sprinkled with tiny bolts of electricity.

“Correct.” 

It’s breathed out into your mouth - a quick, hedonistic peck. Gojo just taunting your sanity before he’s pulling away with a gruff string of profanity, like it hurt him just as much as it did to you. 

You feel your slick dribble down into a saturated puddle below you. And the mere sight of it makes Gojo just reel his hips deliriously forwards, grinding his massive bulge across your dripping cunt until you could see it soil a fountainy dark patch on his pants. 

“F-fuckin’-” his eyes roll to the back of his head at how hot you were. How pouring wet. Wrangling your quivering legs painfully stretched open, “-woman of my dreams.”

With two, thick fingers hooked over the hem of your skirt, it’s being torn off in an easy pull. Falling somewhere in a pile of impractical tatters onto the meeting room floor, along with your shirt.

And as soon as it’s off, Gojo’s only growing more feral. More hungry. 

He’s drooling from one corner of his mouth, but he doesn’t even notice at this point. Honestly, barely even realizing the burning pain when he falls to the floor on his knees. Clattering haphazardly, insatiably nosing up your jittery inner thighs. 

“Oh sweetheart- oh my pretty girl. My pretty, pretty girl–” he’s breathing out, head lolling drunkenly against your legs. And Gojo gulps when he spreads your panties away with a wet glide of his thumb, just enough to see your messy hole winking up at him eagerly. All soaked and needy. “M’gonna have so much fun being yours.”

He kisses wetly through your panties - without warning, without even breathing. Just surging his pretty face into the heated crevice between your thighs, taste buds on his pinkish tongue grazing up the soaked fabric.

Like he was addicted.

“Oh- oh my god-” you’re mewling out, lower lip wobbly at every sultry swirl of Gojo’s tongue over your pussy lips, painting your messy hole in every mesh of slick and spit he could conjure up. “It feels too- hah–”

You were always so sensitive during your heats, every single one of your senses heightened to the max. So it made your mind all overwhelmingly melty inside to have his steaming hot mouth on your equally ravenous cunt. Hungry.

Yeah, he was addicted.

Dragging a few fingers in-between your glistening folds, scissoring them shamefully open to spit. Once. Twice. 

Some of it splatters strayly onto the start of your thighs, which Gojo glady licks up all over again to stream out a thick wad back onto your silt. Until your cunt was drooling translucent dredges of everything he has to give, he smears his messy thumb in easy rotations around your clit. Filthy. 

“So gorgeous- so good f’me.” Gojo titters, biting down teasingly on the very edge of your panties. And he can’t hide that fucked-out little groan when pulls it back, back, back to just snap! it meanly right on your cunt. “Fuck- you taste as s-sweet as you smell, mmm–”

You’re yelping when his long tongue draws a slow circle around the edge of that first ring of muscle, just barely pushing back against how your gummy walls are trying to hug him. To milk him for everything he has.

“S-such a tease-” you whine, fingers tangling into his cloudy white hair. Soft - the silken tresses smoothed over your palm, slotting between your digits when you pull his mouth roughly onto your pussy. “Jus’ want you on me- ngh!”

“Ohh ya can still t-talk easy, huh?” Gojo raises an amused brow from in-between your legs, that won’t be possible soon with how he’s going to have you. “Well then, don’t you dare beg me to go easy on you, girl.”

And he keeps the panties on - fuck, he keeps the panties on when mashing those ragged, rosy lips of his in a steamy make-out with your cunt. It’s as if he was breathing you in, so close that you could feel every clench of Gojo’s jaw, every grind of his chin into the very base of your pussy. 

“Sh-shitttt-” he spits, stray wisps of white covering his eyesight. Dragging you on his tongue through pure instinct. “Shit wait- ah you’re so fuckin’ so-”

Unable to even finish his sentences with that usually-sharp tongue of his. No, that tongue right now was too occupied with the steady, repetitive drag along your snug channel. Bullying into your sodden sensitive spots, thrusting back and forth back and forth back and-

And his fingers, oh those infamous fingers were straying back onto the sensitive nub of your clit. Drawing tight, tempestuous circles that have you keening at the dual stimulation, thighs stuttering to an embarrassed close. 

“Open.”

It’s just like before - and Gojo’s using that annoyingly baritone tone of his that hits you at your very core, that makes your omega snap open your legs for him.

Even you’re surprised at how pliant your body acts before your mind right now - and so is Gojo. though, his expression doesn’t show it, every bit of that feral animal that scared everyone out of this room not too long ago. 

“That’s it- that’s it–” he can’t hold back, hands glued to the globes of your ass to pin you still against his mouth. “Ha- so fuckin’ different when ya listen to me, so fucking sweet.” Breathing in deeply, “Were ya giving off this scent so Nanami could do this, too?” 

Thwack!

Another mocking slap against your clit - not enough to make you cry, but with just enough buzzing jujutsu to make your batting lashes teary - forces you to find your words. 

And fuck, Gojo swears there’s no sweeter music than the sound of your voice - especially when you’re moaning like that. 

Voice breaking into a whine, accompanied by a few raw clenches of your pussy around his furious tongue. “N-no fuck- don’t know-” your hips arch into the most perfect curve he’s ever seen. One that makes his mouth water, cock straining against his pants. “Toru- jus’ want you, wanna cum- wanna- want you so bad.”

Fuck - and who was he to not go along with each and every one of your pretty whims?

Pussydrunken already. He’d read about this - but he really had no clue how potent an omega in heat was, never having spent a rut with one. That little special occasion was always saved for you but, ah, that was a story for another time.

“M’gonna cum- hah- so- close-” 

Right now, he couldn’t think of anything other than how gorgeous you would look when you cum. How delicious - your sweetened scent raising up by a few notches, taking over his sentences. 

He feels his cock just throb at the mere thought.

Which is why Gojo’s pulling away with one final, sodden kiss on your pussy. You feel the curvaceous curl of his smirk against your cunt, and a deep, filthy inhale. 

“Nah.” he smiles a glistening smile up at you - grin glossed all over with a sheen of your sweet, sweet juices. And the rest of his face was almost-obscured with a curtain of his white bangs, but you still think you could peek the glow of his inhuman eyes through them. Powerful. “Don’ think you’re c-cumming anywhere other than on my knot first, pretty girl.”

And he’s so tall that Gojo’s blocking out the dim meeting room lights when he stands up - slow, smug, making you spend each passing second in such anticipation. 

Face expressionless - almost hypnotized - when he shrugs his shirt off. Lips parted into a soft oh! eyes half-lidded, heaving he slides his belt off almost lazily. 

It clatters! to the ground, and he’s sliding down his drenchingly wet boxers with it - leaving a gleaming trail of precum down the front of his toned pelvis. Letting his achy cock finally spring free, he hisses when it hits the too-cool air. 

And you do, too - though, for much different reasons. 

Because Gojo’s so unfairly big - fitting, for an alpha of his stature. Blushed the prettiest pink at his rotund head that matched his cheeks right now, gradiating down into creamy tufts of white at his thick base. Showing the starting of his knot swelling. It made you wonder whether he tasted as sweet as he smelled. So hard it looked painful, curving into a long, solid shaft that glides a wet smear across his washboard abs. It makes your omega just preen, rabid to have him inside you right now now now-

“Heh, impatient lil’ thing, aren’t ya, sweetheart?” Gojo huffs out in a heady bout of laughter. “Can practically feel yer omega ngh- calling out to me, is this what you want?”

You claw ferally at the milky display of his back, branding him in your own way. “Yes- please-” 

A sudden rip! makes you realize you still had your panties on - up until a few seconds ago, at least. Jostling him ever-so-slightly closer, you mewl when the rounded tip of his angry cock nudges against your pussy lips. Melding into a slight kiss that already makes him stream steaming hot ropes of precum.

And if you were in any better state of mind maybe you’d have noticed the way the light above flicker, fizzing with electricity just as much as you were right now. 

“Heheh- oh y-you made me like this, ya realize?” he chuckles out - but his voice didn’t show even a hint of humor. It’s like he was out of control, out of rationality with each languid drag in-between your folds. Babbling, “You threw me into- fuck fuck fuck this is all- your-”

Honestly, Gojo’s so utterly shocked he managed to grit even half that sentence out. 

Because every sloppy second has him grinding upwards in the tiniest of ruts into your sung cunt, tiny, mindless grinds that make a low ah! ah! ah! rip from his throat. 

“Open that mouth f’me, sweetness-”

As soon as you do, you’re feeling a thick, glossy stream of saliva slosh onto your lolling tongue. Mouth wrenched shut until you swallow - and you do. Happily. Filthily. 

That’s enough to make Gojo lose it. 

And he’s plunging headfirst into your toasty insides, shoving back that tiny bit of resistance before your elastic walls are milking him so well. Greedily swallowing up every one of his generous inches, and it only seemed like more was to come.

“Oh shit- ohhh sh-shit-” His eyes are rolling to the very back of his head, mouth hanging open, that tiny trickle of drool splatters onto your skin. 

“T-Toruu—” your cunt was addictive, and so were those moans of yours. Craning your neck upwards, “Kiss me, please.”

For a second, he’s leaning in - making it seem like he was about to smear that firmly placed gloss all over his lips onto yours. But Gojo only sneaks a peck at the corner of your mouth, then the other - and then one on the tip of your nose. 

“I will I will-” he’s musing, giggles bursting from his lips. “Once we’ve mated, can’t get too greedy at once now? Can I?”

But oh how his actions spoke otherwise, because Gojo’s powerful hips absolutely refused to stop until he was well and fully buried into the hot depths of your cunt. Sheathing himself in all your soppingly wet walls, the sheer tightness was enough for him to throw his head back, heavy balls squeezing. In and out in and out. 

“Ohhh fuck-” Two hands of his roughly attach themselves to your hips, pitching up your needy whines when he drools down your pussy even more thoroughly. “You sure do make it f-fuckin’ hard though-”

You whine when your ass hits against something bulging and hot, whirling those dazed eyes of yours down at the intrusion. 

“Shit-” you’re gasping, eyes widening. And the sheer awe in your eyes is enough to make him grow, blood pumping to every thick inch of his cock until he was expanding even girthier, molding your pliant walls to his size. “That’s your knot- I-I-”

“I-I-I-” Gojo mocks, in a voice octaves higher than usual. Fucking the rest of that sentence with a harsh roll of his hips, knocking bruisingly at your cervix. “C’mon now ah- tell me- you can t-tell me anything.” Kissing softly at your ear lobe, zaps of jujutsu making you jump. “M’your best friend, right?”

How ironic.

All you can gift him in response is a few soft whimpers that only make him wilder.

“Fuck!” you’re keening when another one of his slams leave you gasping for air, feeling like he was clashing into your very womb. Glissading a deep, wet glide of his fat, curved tip across your spongy cervix, his breath hitches at the slight recoil. “I want it-” 

Your words make him almost falter with his ruthless pace, and you take it upon yourself to just drag him down by his muscled shoulders. Until he was hunching over you, abs flexing against your front, “I want your hah- knot in m-”

And you can’t even finish the sentence - you don’t know if you want to.

Because just that syrupy jumble of words is enough to make Gojo Satoru snap. 

To cut you off with a rough growl, teeth bared at you, in a split-second he has you limp legs thrown over his shoulder. Biceps flexing in such a mouth-watering way when he makes them lock at the ankle, bending down, down, down into the meanest little mating press your joints would allow. 

The change in angle has you scrambling - has him scrambling to crash his leaky head into your swollen g-spot. Hitting that bulging bullseye with no regrets - over. And over. And over and over and-

“Oh, marry me sweetheart.” he’s panting into your mouth. His pulsing girth rummaging your insides so good, dragging every ridge and thumping vein on his shaft against your sweet spots. He was so big that you felt like your syrupy cunt had already forgotten what it felt like without him pounding into you. Suckling wetly at the corner of your lips, “Marry me marry me- oh, fuck- gonna give you m-my knot. Don’ think I could go on hah- l-living without ya, pretty.”

He was feral - eyes glowing a blazing blue, sparks of lightning bolting down his milky skin. And you swear with each speeding cadence of his, the lights flickered on and off. 

Every slippery smack of his tight, cum-filled balls has you seeing stars, yearning for the additional burning stretch of being plugged by his knot. 

You’re throwing your arms over his neck, reeling him in like he was your prey, though his hips were devouring you. “W-we’re not even dating and you want me t-to be your hngh-”

“-wife!” He kisses every inch of your face, down your neck, over that soft scent gland of yours - now so overstimulating his senses with your sweet scent that he’s almost forgotten what his own smelled like. Buzzes of electricity skimming down your skin with each touch. He’s groaning, “Be my wife- please- fuck, I need you to be my wife.” Planting an almost-french kiss on that one sweet spot. Once. twice. “M-my mate- sh-shit-”

And you already knew Gojo was close with the way his pretty eyes are almost fluttering shut, the way his hefty balls clamp. Twitching in desperation, his thickened base pumps in even deeper - harder. As if he was trying to rut every single inch into your clingy depths. 

Every single inch.

“Mhm–” you moan, feeling the staggering stretch of his even hotter cock shape your walls. “I wanna- wanna be your-”

You don’t even bother finishing your sentence - and neither does Gojo let you.

Because it only takes a few more sloppy jackhammers before he’s finally sinking his taut knot into you. The stretch is so insane you feel your eyes roll to the back of your head, being plugged so suddenly full. 

And then you’re hurtling headfirst into your high - toes curling, white-hot pleasure flashing behind your eyes, your spine bowing so sluttily into his. And Gojo-

Oh, Gojo had his mouth sagging open the moment he felt his massive knot intrude against your silken sweet walls, stretching that snug channel around all of him. And he wishes he had the willpower to look down at the heavenly sight, he wishes he could do anything but sink his teeth down hard into your precious scent gland as he cums and cums and cums. 

The lights burst, shards deflecting off the limitless he’d coated over the both of you. 

Teeth breaking skin, metal tasting on his tongue, scents tangling together into one now.

You do your best to bite him back on his heady neck, breaking through Gojo’s milky skin to reveal a set of pretty pink indents.

Finally yours. Finally his. 

“O-oh, pretty girl–” he hiccups, voice cracking. Hips not moving even the tiniest second of momentum while he stuffs your tight pussy full of his potent seed. “My wife- my mate.”

And Gojo almost bawls when the tight lock of his knot prevents him from plunging into you as deeply and thoroughly as he wanted to right now. Sobbing down big fat tears that splatter! against your lips while he kisses your mind dizzy.

You could feel the syrupy slosh of his cum inside you with each one of his dragged-out grinds, milking your orgasm for as long as possible. Unmoving. Unapologetic in how he was spitting out such voluminous loads of milky white seed that overfilled you. 

“Shit- so much-” you’re whining, still clinging to him. And you don’t think he even hears you right now, mind blanking. “I feel so full, Toru-”

But you didn’t have to babble out those words for him to know, somehow, he just knew. Knew every single thing about you, but couldn’t dredge up the words to respond.

Too pussydrunken to do anything but bite you on your scent gland all over, he kisses a wet trail up to your lips, “Now you- really hafta m-marry me heh.”

Bang! 

Gojo’s fist comes crashing down on the rickety table - it’s too much for him.

Those ringing squelches and the way you were sucking out every single drop of his cum makes his sensitive shaft twitch. Tears blimping up into his eyes again, more and more velvety ribbons ooze out. “My wife- my wife my wife my wife- my mate-”

It’s just about all he can say - like a mantra. Over and over against your lips, until the peaks of your pleasure turn into mere tingles, until Gojo’s own knot is softening down. Slightly.

Just enough that he can pull out-

“Toru, what-”

“Shhh, pretty girl-” He’s kissing your puffed-up clit with another spank from his trembly fingers, and then an actual kiss. Mouth slotting over the mess he’s made below. Grazing all over like a creamy gloss. Filthy. “Rut’s just started.”

His ravenous tongue drags out your overstimulated high, and you’re clinging onto a lock of his snowy hair for dear life. 

“Please-” you beg, voice shot. You don’t even know what you were begging for, but god was Gojo Satoru happy to let himself be used. “Please please please, Toru-”

Oh, his fingers tighten on your thighs - imprinting neat patterns of crescents. Animalistic, in how Gojo just drags your twitchy body forwards.

His eyes were drooping shut, gaze crazed - frantic where he looked you right in the eyes from down below. Head craning to ram his stretchy tongue even deeper, quirking up deftly like he’s wanting to bruise his taste buds along your walls. 

Slurping at and collecting the creamy mess on his tongue - only to spit it back into your sloppy hole. Messy. 

Even with the dark, lightless room - with only those stray sparks of power to accompany you two - such loud squelches echo across his own ears. And just by the noise Gojo could tell how wet you were - as if you weren’t drooling over the lower half of his face, up to his cheekbones, already. 

Sticking to your inner thighs in an obscene drip! drip! drip!

It’s so shameful and you love it. 

And you love that you’re so cockdrunken that you aren’t even sure when you’re cumming - if you’re cumming. Whether those sudden crashes of pleasure were because of your nth orgasm tonight, or because of the way Gojo kisses you with another thwack!

Adrenaline and electricity coursing through your veins, ears thundering with your rapid pulse. Oh god, you never knew a heat could feel this good - this maddening. 

You moan, and he’s eagerly lapping up every sweet bead of slick you have to offer, like a man that hasn’t had an ounce of water in weeks. Brows furrowed, jaw sagging open-

“Shit shit shit-” he’s rasping out, and the very slide of his fingers across your skin sends waves of powerful jujutsu - somehow bunching at your clit just right. “M’cumming- m- m’still cumming fuck- won’t- stop-”

Just as soon as your orgasm is ending, Gojo’s is just starting. Like he’d been holding back on this from the moment he’d started eating out your overspilling pussy - happily. 

And exactly on time, too, because you barely even have the time to catch your breath before Gojo’s standing on his two unsteady feet. Just splitting you open on all of his red, raw inches - uncaring for your little mewls and those tears. 

Because you were sucking him up madly. 

Spearheading his swollen cock into you like he was trying to fuck another orgasm out of you. His strokes are long, harsh, showing off all the years of strength he built up boasting the title of the strongest. 

And this hastily put-together mating press has his cum just overspilling out of you by now, dribbling down in wet globs that made you wonder how much more he could fill you up. It seeps in a white circle underneath your ass, slicking you back and forth along the wood at each harsh ram. 

Again. And again. And again and again and-

“Made me this- hngh- this way, y’know?” he spits into your mouth - followed by a slurred string of swears. Every time his heftily smacking balls clench, you could feel the table creak under pressure. “Sat next to me with that fucking skirt- smelling so fucking- ngh- good- do you even know how delicious ya are?”

You can’t answer - because he’s back to squeezing in his staggering knot into you. Sparks exploding out from the corner of his scrunched-up eyes, forehead knocking into yours.

Gojo kisses you like he couldn’t get enough, letting you taste all the sin from just before. 

“Three weeks away, huh?” That accusatory little inflection in his words isn’t lost on you, only growing stronger and stronger as his staccato grows sloppier. “Have your- hah- heat in three weeks and fuck- I could just- smell it on you-”

It’s incredible. Sliding your frenzied bodies across on another, stinging with skin-on-skin and how your gooey walls constricted around him.

“Showing off in that scent and that skirt-” His eyes are almost bulging out of his head now, hips stuttering like just the very thought of that pile of fabric at the corner of the room drove him mad. “-fuck that skirt- always fuckin’ hated it. Hated how Nanami loves hngh- it. Made me lose fucking control a-and you know what?”

One of his hands curls around your throat now, the other taking hold of your left - kissing your ring finger pointedly. “I’ll do it all over again if it means I’d get to have ya like this, my mate.”

And just then he’s coating your melty insides in a creamy sheen, that overworked divot right at the end of his dick was firmly pressed up against your g-spot. Plugging you with his knot, and you swear you could see a little inflation forming where he was filling you to your limits. 

Cumming and cumming so hard it’s like he couldn’t stop - didn’t want to stop until his body practically forced him.

Gojo’s biting down hard exactly over those deep indents on your scent glands when his gushing spurts of seed turn into almost-painful blanks. 

Over and over, he’s cumming nothing. 

“L-love you, Toru-” you’re babbling out, reeling him in to peck the corners of his smirking mouth. 

Utterly fucked out of your mind enough that you don’t even register the loud boom! from somewhere in the distant grounds of Jujutsu Tech. Barely even care that the overpriced meeting table is now sagging on one side, just about in splinters. 

“Aww, m-my c-cockdrunk baby–” he titters shakily into your glossed-pout. “Love you, too, always have always- will-”  Patting the bulge on your stomach, before kissing you gently, “Ever since I th-threw ya into heat the ngh- first time ya met me.”

Oh. 

And later, you’ll learn that that almost-deafening boom was the generator for Jujutsu Tech, mysteriously bursting after a sudden spike in atomic pressure in the surrounding area. You’ll find out that every piece of furniture in the surrounding buildings had moved about six inches in your direction, and that the now-ruined table was an irreplaceable heirloom.

But for now, all you register is soft. 

Warm. 

With a gasp you realize you’re in a bedroom - Gojo’s bedroom.

“Did- did you teleport-”

“Mhm-” he pants, and in the dim lighting you could spot his leering grin. Satisfied. Pussydrunken. And you could feel his knot swell up hotly, halfway through to its previous size. 

You sputter, trying so desperately to find the words. Difficult, when Gojo still had you wrapped around his thick cock, all the way up to his fat, drenched base. Swiveling his cock in slow, sultry grinds for how much he couldn’t ram exactly how he wanted to right now. “Wh-why didn’t you do this before–?”

“Because-” he licks over his mating mark on you. “-wanted to show off what animals we were.” His grin grows wider, as does his tired cock. And that dangling blindfold around his neck ends up around your wrists, tying you up pliantly for him. “What animals we will be.”

---

Right now, all Nanami can think about is you you you- Yet,he doesn’t expect to see you for about the next week. Or, at least, that’s the hopeful side of him - knowing Gojo, and the state he’d left the meeting room in, he won’t see you again for a month. 

Possibly not walking.

Perhaps, that’s for the best. Looking down at his swollen, throbbing cock - one fist wrapped around its thick base, the other around his shaky phone, he clicks on that familiar app. 

Shit, his rut is near. Now, actually. 

Nanami sighs, it’s hard pretending not to be animals.

A/N. Was soooo giggling writing about how the table was some heirloom.

Plagiarism not authorized.

[kyuu-collection]

flashing your tits at rockstar!rin while you’re standing front row at his band’s concert. obviously his eyes blow freaking huge and his face is the brightest shade of red ever. what you weren’t expecting though, was the lazy smirk that laid across his lips. his thumb and pinky extended, signaling a little “call me” and winking your way. you weren’t planning on leaving the concert as a groupie, but after he fucked you silly that night, how could you not show up to all of the band’s concerts and events?

[kyuu-collection]

gojo satoru was spoiled, sure. but he wasn’t used to being cared for.

he had people who answered to him. people who revered him, feared him, respected him. his clan, his school, his students. everything he wanted, he could have. everything he needed, someone got for him.

but then there was you.

you, who didn’t flinch when he joked too loudly or smiled too wide. you, who didn’t tiptoe around his legacy like it was made of glass. you, who leaned into him instead of away, who called him “satoru” like he was just a man, not the strongest.

and when you touched him, it wasn’t reverent or worshipful or like you owed him anything. it was simple. kind. natural.

like reaching to fix his collar on a windy morning.

like putting his favorite tea on the stove before he even asked.

like dragging him to bed when he passed out on the couch, glasses skewed, mouth slightly open.

“come on,” you’d mutter, soft but firm, “sleep properly, sato.”

and he’d blink up at you, half-lidded and drowsy, and feel something sweet settle in his chest.

you didn’t do these things because he asked. you didn’t do them because he was gojo satoru. you just… cared.

it rattled something in him.

once, you made him lunch and packed it for him in a neat little box. he opened it during a break at jujutsu tech, laughing at a text from you about something dumb his students did.

inside, there was his favorite food. a little sticky note with a doodle. a stupid pun you’d written.

don’t fight anyone on an empty stomach!!

he sat there, chopsticks halfway to his mouth, and just stared.

he thought about how no one had ever done that before. not like this. not with that silly, mindless affection. not because they wanted to make his day better.

and that night, when he came home, he found you on the couch in your pajamas, phone in hand, hair messy from the way you curled up against the cushions.

he walked over without saying a word, dropped to his knees in front of you, and laid his head in your lap.

you blinked down at him. “…long day?”

he nodded, face pressed against your stomach, arms winding around your waist.

“thank you,” he mumbled.

you snorted. “for what?”

he didn’t answer. just closed his eyes and breathed in the scent of your laundry detergent, your skin, your home.

he’d always had everything he could ask for. but until you, he didn’t know what it meant to be loved for nothing. for free.

and god, did it make him want to give you the world.

tori’s notes ᝰ.ᐟ i love satoru 😔

[kyuu-collection]

—The other woman

❥ Your 'bestfriend' flirting with them

❥ G. Satoru, G. Suguru, N. Kento, F. Toji, R. Sukuna, I. Shoko, Uraume

smau masterlist // A.N. This is in the bestfriends pov!

Taglist 💞: @mikorinstan @bestwomanalive @linaaeatsfamilies @fayeriee

@fushiguroooozzz

[kyuu-collection]

Satoru thinks you might actually enjoy tormenting him at the worst of times.

Of course, not like, physically. Just with your brattiness that always seems to blossom the second Suguru steps out of the house. Like his presence alone is the only thing keeping you from touching base with that inner gremlin, and now that he’s gone? Now that it’s just the two of you?

You're insufferable.

Because you're in the bedroom - his bedroom, Suguru's bedroom, your shared bedroom, whatever it is - and you're throwing a tantrum. While he’s brushing his teeth.

“You don’t even love me,” you announce with a dramatic huff, flopping onto your back, doing a little leg kick. “You think I’m ugly. You only wanna be with Suguru. You only want me - ”

His brain breaks. Briefly. He’s standing in the doorway, blue toothbrush hanging from his mouth, staring at you as some foam drips down his chin.

It’s not the words themselves - he knows they’re not true. Knows you like to stir the pot and that you like the attention. But there’s this tiny, razor-edged part of him that whispers, what if you’re saying it because you actually mean it a little bit?

And he hates that part. Wants to knock its teeth out with his toothbrush.

Because he does love you. Horribly. Desperately. In ways that make him stare at the ceiling at 2 a.m. and wonder if he’s hallucinating this whole relationship. If he touches you wrong - if he holds on too tight - you’ll remember you could do so much better than them.

But you’re sprawled across his bed with your lower lip pushed out and your voice all wobbly and teasing, and now he’s walking. He doesn’t even decide to walk. His body just moves, like his soul’s been yanked forward on a leash.

He presses you into the mattress with one hand, climbs over you without ceremony, toothpaste still threatening to drip down his chin.

You blink up at him with that stupid, perfect face. Lips parted. Eyes wide. Waiting.

So he does what any emotionally stunted man would do: he squishes your cheeks together and mumbles, “You serious right now?” around a mouthful of mint.

You make a noise. Possibly a protest. More likely a suppressed giggle.

Doesn’t matter. He’s already hiking your legs up over his arm and swatting your ass a few times, because clearly you’re asking for it. The little wiggle you do after confirms it.

God, you’re so annoying. He’s obsessed with you.

And then - because he’s disgusting, and this is love - he spits his toothpaste into your mouth.

You screech, attempting to launch yourself away from him, spitting the remainder of the toothpaste onto the bed, whining and crying about how gross he is while he's full-on laughing - legitimately, head thrown back and utterly unrepentant.

He snorts. “That’s what you get,” he says, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “Start shit, get spit.”

You’re hitting him with a pillow now. He takes it. Deserves it.

But he also sees the way your eyes shine a little at the corners. The way you’re laughing, even as you call him a freak.

He sobers slightly, tilting his head while you glare up at him.

“You really think I don’t love you?” he asks quietly. “That I want Suguru more than you?”

You hesitate. That kills him a little.

“Don’t play like that, baby,” he says, softer now. “Not when I’m already hanging on by a thread.”

You stare up at him like you didn’t expect that answer. Like maybe you thought this was a game. Like maybe you're realizing how serious it is for him.

And he realizes, maybe you needed to hear it.

So he rolls over, pulls you into his chest, still a little minty and damp, and mumbles: “Now brush your teeth before I tell Suguru what you said.”

But he kisses your temple right after. Murmurs an I love you. And while you get up to get ready for bed, he's putting a note in his phone to buy you flowers tomorrow.