starcrossedstacks

[starcrossedstacks]

Prompt: Obsession

There she is. Every Thursday, I feel like I'm holding my breath until 2:15. The shop door chimes and my chest tightens like it's being compacted. Today's book is "The Heart is a Lonely Hunter," and Christ, isn't that just perfect?

I grab her tea before she asks - gyokuro, steeped wrong, steeped exactly how she likes it. Some nights I lie awake thinking about how she ruins perfectly good green tea. I've started drinking it her way at home, trying to understand what she tastes in it. Trying to understand her.

She's working through my shop's books like she's hunting something, and I'm watching her like I'm hunting her. Fourteen books in three months. I know because I've reread every single one after she returns them, fingers tracing where hers have been, finding the dog ears she tries to smooth away. The margin notes she lingers on. I know her fingerprints by now - they leave marks on the teacup, on the pages, on my thoughts.

Today she's wearing that green sweater again. The one with the loose thread at the sleeve that she keeps pulling when she reads something that gets to her. I want to reach over and still her hand when she does it, but I stay behind my counter like a coward. Like a guard at his post. Sometimes I think about locking the door after she comes in. Just us, the books, the steam from her tea.

I've stopped bothering to look busy. Let her catch me staring. Let her see what this is doing to me. But she just reads, sips, and turns pages with those damned fingers, and I'm dying by degrees behind my register.

--

There she is. No. No she isn't.

2:15 comes and goes. I check my phone, then the old clock above the mystery section, then my phone again. My hands are restless, rearranging teacups that don't need rearranging. Each time the door chimes, my head snaps up so fast it hurts.

2:25. The gyokuro I prepared sits cooling, untouched. I'll have to throw it out soon - I've steeped it exactly how she likes it, ruined perfectly good tea for nothing. She's never been late before. Not once in three months of Thursdays.

2:35. She walks in, and the relief hits me so hard I have to white-knuckle grip the counter. Her hair's messy, like she's been running her hands through it. No book tucked under her arm. She's been crying - I can tell from across the room, and something twists in my chest, violent and protective.

Today she doesn't go to the shelves. Doesn't take her usual chair. Just stands there, looking lost, looking at me.

"The usual?" I manage to ask, already reaching for fresh leaves, even though my hands are shaking slightly.

[starcrossedstacks]

Prompt: Generals, War

Lamplight spills across scattered papers and empty mugs. General Marcus has his head propped on one hand, squinting at supply lists that need approval. He doesn't look up when General Rivera enters and doesn't need to. After a year of shared command, he knows her footsteps.

She settles into what they both pretend isn't her chair, pouring two measures from her private store of brandy. His hand brushes hers as he reaches for the glass.

"The cavalry requisitions again?" she asks.

"Chen has excellent tactical instincts, but the same can’t be said about his math capabilities." He pushes a worn ledger toward her. She leans closer, hair falling forward as she studies the numbers. "Ana," he says quietly, testing her name for the first time in all their months of shared command. She finds she likes how he says it - careful, like something valuable.

A burst of laughter from the courtyard makes them both start. Night patrol, changing guard.

She stands abruptly, chair scraping against stone. "The grain calculations are wrong," she says, her voice steady despite the tremor in her hands. "I'll speak to Chen in the morning."

[starcrossedstacks]

Prompt: Unique Magic

Channeling my magic through movement has always been led by combat's symphony: the whisper of robes, the sharp intakes of breath, the rhythm of boots against earth. But as the Lich's spell spreads like spilled blood across the chamber, even my heart's rhythm, the beat I was born fighting to, goes quiet beneath my ribs.

As I freeze, my soles slide silently across stone. My curls whip past my face, but I can't hear it cutting through the air.

A horrific mimic of a smile tears across his stained-paper skin as I falter, panic rising in my chest without any drumming heart accompanying it.

I scream into my head to break the silence, *Focus, Octavia! *

I stomp my feet once to orient myself and try to clear my racing thoughts.

My fingers sketch patterns in the air, beginning with the isolations every thread-dancer knows in their bones. First finger, then wrist, then elbow - each joint moving independently. It feels hollow without the crystalline chime of forming threads, but I know through muscle memory that the spell must be weaving correctly.

The magic unspools from my fingertips like liquid light. A quick flutter of my fingers multiplies the strands while a deliberate curve of my wrist sets them into their final position, creating a deadly lattice between the Lich and me.

Through the threads, I can sense every twitch, every preparation for his next spell. I don't need to hear his incantations when I can read his movements through my weave. The threads tighten with my next turn, and I use them like puppet strings, forcing his arm wide as his spell misfires.

Each step builds my interconnected web further - a slide of my foot draws threads across the floor, a hip roll sends them spiraling upward, and quick isolations of my shoulders shoot them outward like arrows. Now that my web is set, I think back to my mentor's first lessons, that gravelly voice repeating over and over: "One two three four, one two three four..."

I fall into a familiar rhythm of movement, mentally counting as my arms create sharp angles, geometric patterns of thread multiplying around us both. I have to trust it is all laid correctly, I can't hear their usual humming or tings as they cross and touch.

The Lich tries to step backward, but my foot is already sliding into a sweep, threads following the arc of my leg to tangle around his ankles. My hands flow into waves, rippling from fingertip to shoulder, and the threads respond by pulsing with constricting force.

In this deadly silence, we're bound together in a dance he never chose to join - every move I make forcing an answering movement from his corpse-rigid form.

[starcrossedstacks]

Prompt: Dark, dusty library + Enemies

I shouldn’t be in the library this late, especially not in the rare manuscripts wing. Losing the position still stings - watching my rival sweep in with his relationship-driven credentials and cold smirk, claiming the curator role I had been working towards for years. What’s worse is how he has wielded that power over me, giving me just enough access to keep wanting to come back. Every interaction with him in the library has felt charged with something that feels ominous, much more dark than a professional rivalry. I’ve seen how he handles the tomes in the library - all delicate reverence, obsessively caring for them down to the last detail. Lately, I feel like I’ve seen his eyes lock and his posture change when he looks at me, too. I shiver, uncomfortable with the thought. I climb up the old, dusty wooden ladder to get to the high shelf I need. The ladder creaks with every step. I stretch toward the top shelf, the leather spines blurring together in the dim light between the stacks. As I grip the worn ladder rail a bit tighter, the whole thing shifts - just slightly, just enough to make my breath catch and my stomach flip. I feel a hand on my waist instantly, the grip sure and almost possessive. I take a sharp inhale as I feel him step closer, effectively trapping me between the rungs of the ladder and him.

I slowly turn and look down at him. His nearly black eyes are dark and intent, and a lock of dark hair has fallen across his forehead. His thumb traces a small line against my sweater, and I can see the corner of his mouth upturn when my breath catches. ”Careful,” he murmurs, leaning closer. “These old ladders can be… dangerous.” His other hand comes up to brace against the ladder, and the space between us feels charged enough to spark and engulf this whole library.

[starcrossedstacks]

Prompt: Magical Baker

The rosemary-honey cake sat in front of Poppy in her candle-lit kitchen, its verdant green layers crowned with honey-crystallized herbs, half-eaten after multiple attempts to conjure a vision. Usually, it was instant, her eyes closing as a warm haze showed her scenes of joy, challenge, and romance. Hundreds of weddings and years of visions, all manifested as cake designs in the pages of her sketchbook. She’s seen lovers grow sweeter after uniting through hardship, families weave together to create new tapestries, and children’s birthdays with clumsily made cakes by caring parents. But today? Nothing. There wasn’t the usual spark of magic when Princess Sylvan and Prince Rowan shared their first bite. Just intense emptiness, enough that Poppy was barely able to hide her little gasp behind a coughing fit. Her fists were clenched, glaring at the cake like it was to blame. The piped roses on the side of the cake were starting to wilt, just like her confidence. Of all of the times for her gift to stop working, it had to be during the most important wedding of her career. Not only were Sylvan and Rowan from two of the most powerful neighboring kingdoms, but their marriage was critical to ending a decade-long feud. Poppy should have known something was off when Rowan couldn't look her in the eye or when Sylvan seemed keen on getting out of the consult as fast as possible. After the vision failed, it wasn’t like she could really confront them. What could she say, “Excuse me, lord and lady, I understand your marriage is the only thing keeping the region from all-out war, but something is terribly wrong with your future prospects?” Poppy sighed and dug her fingers into her hair. She had one week to come up with a design, but she had never done it blind. She had the experience to make a design, but would it be obvious it wasn’t fueled by her visions? If it didn’t, what would happen to her? Exhausted, Poppy started her usual cleanup ritual: filing her sketchbook away, cleaning dishes, and wiping down the tables. When she came back from putting the plates away, she noticed it - a tiny slip of crumpled parchment. She tugged it free from the honey it sat in, expecting it to be a scrap from a sketchbook. Instead, it had quick scrawl on it: ”not much time

help”

Poppy’s eyes raced across the paper, once, twice, three times as her mouth dropped open.