#Because to them they hear a culture get called ancient (= dead) and have no baggage about it. Why would they?

[bijoumikhawal]

the problem with personally relating to a culture in a sci-fi series is people will say things slightly off color and I'll wanna gnaw on rocks about it

[phoebepheebsphibs]

NOT THE SHAKY LINES AROUND DRAXUM TOO (That alone gives me angst pangs 😭) HHHHHHHHHHHHHHH I'm perfectly normal about this guy what do you mean :')

HECK YEAH HUG UR SON GOAT DAD

This does beg the question though- have you thought about where Draxum was during the invasion? (within the lore/au/etc of this story/comic, at least?) Why WASN'T he there when Mikey almost died?

food for thought :3 and fun

I love this comic so much 😭 uyghjdfqwseuhghugsivyjbhkjdcvb

(Real quick cuz I love this detail— but if you look closely you can see that the shaky lines surround just Draxum in one panel… but then spread to Mikey too when he starts crying.)

I heard one theory that Drax was out of the country getting magic supplies and junk… I like that idea, of him traveling to Japan to learn about ancient Yokai culture and legends…

But personally I think he was just. Busy. Or trapped. Similar to how Cass was there, she just wasn’t “there” there. I assume that he was either at the school, at his apartment, or down in the Hidden City somewhere. He probably wanted to find the guys but got caught up in the Krang attacking wherever he was, and didn’t get a chance to call them or check in until a fair amount of time after everything was done.

{For my comic of Draxum’s Nightmare, however, I like to think that he was doing nothing in particular. He was relaxing, enjoying his day, plotting some mad scientist stuff, and didn’t even hear about the Krang attack until hours after it was over. He was maybe in the Hidden City shopping and renovating his lab, doing some fine work, maybe getting a new robe too, and of course filing paperwork with the Council of Heads so that he was no longer a wanted (goat) man. And then when he goes home to his apartment, via portal of course, he turns on the TV and sees the news. His heart drops as he realizes what he missed. Draxum is not a begging man, but he actually begins to pray that they all made it through safely or survived, because of course they’d be in the middle of it. His phone blows up with texts from April and Mikey and Donnie and Raph and probably not Leo except for a meme that says “I lived, sheep man!” with him giving a peace sign while he lies on a stretcher with a leg cast and arm cast and enough bandages to qualify him as a mummy. But they lived. They are okay… mostly. They didn’t need his help after all. Sure, it might’ve been easier if he was there, but there’s no point in dwelling on the “what ifs”, especially since it all worked out. Splinter calls. Cassandra calls. Mikey calls. He goes to help them and hears about the entire battle… not like he was worried, he’s seen what they can do— MIKEY DID WHAT.

Oh.

Oh heads.

And his greatest fear haunts him. Because… he wasn’t there. And one small mistake could have cost the life of the one Hamato that saved him… changed him… accepted him. When no one else did. When everyone saw him as either a failure or a villain… and he could have lost that one precious child.

And he could have helped, he knew what to do! He knew how to use that kind of magic and he’s had experience opening portals to other dimensions!! HE COULD HAVE DONE IT BUT MIKEY DID AND HE HAD NO IDEA HOW TO DO THAT AND IT SHOULD HAVE KILLED HIM—! …Mikey should be dead at this very moment.

And Draxum would never have had a chance to say goodbye.}

I hope you enjoyed that haha

:D

[spotsupstuff]

hi! ive been noticing your posts for a while now and ive been thinking about getting into rain world... would you mind telling me a bit about it? if not that's okay! im just curious cuz all these characters you've been drawing look really really good and it's kinda getting me hooked!

hmm hmmmm.... well what could i say... i'll talk about what i love about it because rain world is a wonderful game that i will never stop recommending to people, i think

i adore how "unfair" to usual game standards RW is. it makes it feel like there isn't really a point when you can call yourself a pro, when someone else can call you a noob after youve familiarized yourself with the controls. there isnt really an measurement of skill, sure you can look into some absolutely insane movement techs but the wonderful thing is that they are, at the end of it all, not important

i adore that the moment you accept the fact that this is just how this ecosystem works, you get to find such strange kind of joy out of it. i adore that the game is so loose about so many things including its lore because i can look at this "accept it when you die to become happier" thing and say that it could potentially mirror what the characters in the game (Ancients) should have figured out

i adore the religion in the game, the fact that it takes inspiration from Buddhism, i adore the karma symbols, what they mean, how they are written, how i can interpret them. the fact that i can look at this game and see something so very close to my own believes about life makes me so so happy

i adore the settings, the design, the vastness of the world both pictured and not, the impossibilities hiding in this world. the feeling of everything being so much it makes me want to cry everytime i take in how simply Giant the iterators are

everything is so big but small at the same time. the most breath-taking things become common and insignificant. the most insignificant things affect the most significant, holy ones, reducing objects and people of Unimaginable power and importance into nothing but desolate scrapheaps of nonsense. and yet these unnoteworthy scrapheaps circle back to being something precious but only to us. even though hes a wrackage, even though he is nothing more but trash now, we still love him because unimpressive things deserve to be loved too

i like to think that with some things in this game, something whispers "you're nothing. i love you. what happens to you affects me. you are nothing and i hope others will see the worth in you and love you too"

i adore the designs, i adore the glow of the overseer in the dark in the Monk campaign, i adore and fear the power of the rain, Moon's and Pebbles babbling and buzzing of their innards. i adore the glances we get of their cities, of the past, of the dead yet dear culture, whispers of history, the form of writing, even those stupid ads in Metropolis

i love hearing the opinions of both Moon and Pebbles. hearing from Suns makes me smile even though i want nothing else but to square up with them. thinking of No Significant Harassment and his easy humour even in such a place- his seemingly endless care, his struggles, anger, despair, mischievousness- the confusion and helplessness of something like them, a god brought to his knees- another glorious hard to comprehend impossibility

rain world is so wonderful and the more deeper you try to think about it and figure out what's happening where, why and how the more fun it is going to become

the best thing with RW you can honestly do is just dive in there and make your own opinions on all of these things. i hope u'll be able to take my wonder with you and use it to develop your own unique ideas of it!

n here's two fools vibin together

[alatismeni-theitsa]

my fav byzantine fact is when they would destroy everything that had to do with pagan religion and even killed people who weren't christian <3

Did you forget that Polytheists oppressed, persecuted and killed Christians first, for THREE HUNDRED years.

Hiding in the catacombs, getting murdered, honoring the Christian martyrs... you think Christians did these things as a hobby? 😂In the Roman Empire policy towards Christians was that they would be punished if they refused to worship the emperor and the gods. Christians were actively forced to worship gods they didn't want to worship. By the Polytheists.

Sorry to offend your little uwu cute ancient polytheists but 1) they did bride kidnappings 2) they threw "deformed" kids off cliffs 3) religious stories and depictions of rape were A Thing, endorsing a Rape Culture in many ways (I had a whole post with scientific papers about that) 4) pederasty (with young boys!) existed 5) gay men were literally called "those who drag shame with them" 6) cheating was socially acceptable for Greek men while the less the woman came out of her house, the better 7) slaves were far lesser than them compared to when Christianity came 8) oh and... THEY KILLED PEOPLE WHO WEREN'T POLYTHEISTS. Aka the Christians.

Don't get me wrong, persecution of any type is abominable. I want people to let other people worship in peace. I just listed all the above because you seem to ignore there was great hostility between Polytheists and Christians (which ultimately led to many deaths) for a reason. And the Polytheists started it. The first religious persecution ever in the Helladic area was that of Christians. By the Polytheists.

My point is....Before you completely cancel another group for doing something, maybe consider if "your" group has done it too, and maybe... did it first? Christianity has a long list of bad things but Hellenic Polytheism has a grim past, too, filled with the same crimes if not some more. There was a reason people were becoming Christians in droves*. Underprivileged groups finally saw the prospect of a better life compared to the Polytheistic faiths they were in. The first European to get baptized was a Greek young woman.

*It's estimated that there were fewer than 10,000 Christians in the year 100. Christianity grew to about 200,000 by the year 200, and then to almost 2 million by 250.

I said that I hate that people were killed for their faith (!!!), and this goes for Polytheists too (!!!). I also detest any destroying of buildings and manuscripts (which indeed happened). But, in this case, what would you like me to do??? Start beef with the long-dead Leonid dynasty or something? 😂 Which dynasty do you want me to spank? Tell me and I'll dig them uuup

Okay, hear me out... I will throw away the whole of the Byzantine Empire for the Polytheists it killed if you throw the whole Roman world away for the Christians it killed. Let's cancel EVERY culture for killing Polytheists, Hebrews, Christians, Zoroastrians and Muslims. (note: Persecution of Christianity is still going on in some countries, and it never stopped) Yes?

Also, no, Christians did not destroy everything related to Polytheism. Did you seriously come to my asks with the knowledge of a bitter scorned 16 y/o who read one single sentence from their history book?

The reason ancient Hellenic Epics and other classic works have survived is mainly that Christian Hellenes passed them down and copied them in their libraries and monasteries. The Greeks/and Eastern Romans they were actively reading and discussing the ancient works, and based their own research and philosophy on them. Arabs in the middle ages translated tons of still-existing (!) ancient manuscripts from Greek to their language. The reason Europe remembered these works, too, was the Hellenes who brought the still-existing (!) ancient manuscripts with them in the freaking 15th century to Europe after escaping Constantinople.

[persianatpenn]

Love: Persian Style

Photo: Majnun dead upon Layla's grave

Love. That thing that makes your knees weak and palms sweat (hopefully there is no vomit on your sweater already lol). When we think of ancient Persia we may just think of warriors, kings, and stories that are so tremendous they change our lives. But we must not forget that in Ancient Persia, and indeed in other cultures, Love or عشق, is almost more powerful than war (So much so that it may lead to war). Love in ancient Persia was beautiful, anxiety-inducing, sad, funny, and everything in between. I am going to tell you 2 great Ancient Persian Love stories that will prove it.

Story 1: Majnun and Layla

The story goes that there were two young lovers, Layla Al-Aamiriya and Qays Ibn al-Mullawah. The young man, Qays, wrote poetry for Layla and was considered to be of a “simple mind” which made people call him “Majnun” or crazy. But Qays was determined to be with Layla (some may say he was crazy…in love) so he approached her father and asked for her hand in marriage. Her father had heard about his mental state and refused the request. He then arranged a marriage for his daughter to a rich man in the village. Upon hearing this news, Qays fled from his home and went to the desert. There he lived alone and some say they saw him writing poetry for Layla still and reciting them vocal into the desert abyss. Layla was moved to Arabia by her husband but was still unhappy that she had lost Qays. One day she fell sick and shortly after died. Once Qays found out about this he searched for her grave, carved lines of a poem he had written, and died there heartbroken. 

Story 2: Khosrow and Shirin

This story takes place in Armenia where a young prince named Khosrow was a successful young man, destined to succeed his father and rise to the throne. One day he had a dream about his grandfather who gave him many gifts and promises, including a horse named Shabdiz and a beautiful wife named Shirin. Soon after a friend of Khosrow tells him about an Armenian queen named MahinBanu, and her beautiful niece…Shirin. The young prince falls in love with the idea of Shirin, as she is in his dreams. So the friend of Khosrow goes to Armenia to find Shirin. He finds her and describes the prince to her. She falls madly in love with his description and decides to escape Armenia to Persia to find the prince. As Shirin is doing this, Khosrow and his father have a falling out, so he flees to Armenia. Now because they are both fleeing to opposite places, Khosrow then sends his friend to fetch Shirin from Persia. But during this time, Khosrow receives news that his father has died so he goes back to Persia (while Shirin is coming back to Armenia) and claims the throne for himself. They keep missing each other. As Khosrow is king he gets overthrown by a general in his army and has to flee to Armenia where he finally sees Shirin but she refuses to marry him until he takes back his throne. He travels then to Constantinople to ask a king to help him take back his kingdom. The king agrees but there is a catch. Khosrow must marry the king’s daughter if they succeed. They succeeded and Khosrow married the daughter of the king but still loved Shirin. However, Shirin began to fall in love with a young sculptor and that made Khosrow very jealous. So he sent the sculptor on an impossible mission in the mountains, sent fake news that Shirin had died, and this sent the sculptor into a depression that made him leap from the mountain to his death. Shirin then had the wife of Khosrow poisoned. With nothing standing between them, they could finally be together…or so they thought. The son of Khosrow and the king’s daughter fell in love with Shirin also and killed his father and forced Shirin to marry him. She commits suicide instead. They end up finally being together in death by being buried together.

There are several love stories in ancient Persian culture, some similar to these but some starkly different. But through them, they tell of the same nuances and complicatedness of Love. Love is complicated. Love is kind. Love is strong. Love is scary. Love is crazy (sometimes) Love is beautiful. These stories show us that some things remain consistent through time, how we love is beautiful and full of awkward feelings that can drive one mad, or bring one peace. Whether it's love for a partner, a family member, or a friend, all of it can be in a word…Complicated.   

—عبد المسیح

[starpros-sunshine]

if you want something to talk about then . um. maybe.

Maybe indeed. Maybe I may be inclined to talk about all and nothing for the clutches of boredom have me within their cold dead hands yet again and I am using up the ask from god knows when for this one instance. I actually have no clue why I never answered this to be frank it's a rambling free card...huh maybe that's why....topics topics topics...Ah! Well I've been thinking about the enstars choreos again.

Fine has some of the choreos with the least full body movement, if that makes sense? I think the choreo with the most dancing was Tempest Night?? I'm not sure but I think it's fairly high up there. I don't really know where I'm going with this tbh I just think it's interesting. Alkaloid is one of the more intensive units methinks they move around A LOT.

And then there's Eden and knights and 2wink and I think Crazy:B too although their earlier mvs couldn't really be compared to the choreos of most of the other units (Bless HiMERU for finally learning how to dance unrelated ikik but still) and Ryuseitai is one of the higher places in that ranking too I believe.

Undead is somewhere down there with fine because 50% of their choreos is just them behind their mics and then there's Trick with Treat where they literally just stand there and move their hands and Kaoru is....I do not know how to describe it but he is vibing I suppose. Koga too.

Sometimes I think about that one Immoral World clip that Korka (I think??) tagged as ''he put his entire kogussy into this'' or something like that and well yeah I suppose he did do that huh...King <3

and Kaorus voice there's that one moment idk which one but his voice can get so deep it's really nice to hear I'm sorry I talk too much again but it is it is really nice to hear also big fan of undead lyrics it's like if Risky Venus had finesse...thought I do suppose Risky Venus is about gambling so it's technically a completely different thing.

Actually why's it called Risky Venus if it's about gambling hold on.

!!!!!!!!

I HAVE MADE A DISCOVERY!!!!

So, in the ancient roman gambling game Tali the luckiest throw is the Venus throw because the woman was just such a big part of the culture at that point and supposedly she was also a victory goddess (I only found that on a wikipedia listing so take this into as you may). That's so awesome woah,,

That's such a good play on words that is Such a good play on words,,,,hhnmnnnnggg I don't think I can be coherent enought for this to make sense rn but you get what I mean

[majestyrising]

PLight Clan

Naming Scheme? I do sort of have a name for this group. 

I’ve taken to calling them Ahmimcqueh.

If you can trust the people online this is Nahuatl and means “they are not dead”.

Granted I don’t speak ancient Aztec so I can only hope that is actually what it means but I came across it while looking up Nahuatl terms for “zombie” and I thought that this is definitely what the princess would brand her people as. Both because her people’s culture will live on now, and because she survived both the original assault on her family and the hundreds of years trapped between life and death.

I’ve even got a name for this Light/Plague Princess: Tilmātlilhuicatzin. Literally means Heaven-Cape.  

I’ve been looking into a lot of Aztec things because I’ve decided that it what I’m basing them on for visuals. For things like architecture, clothing and language. Just adapted to a fantasy setting with dragons and magic. I’m thinking of introducing other dragon groups inspired by indigenous cultures too. Not a one-to-one recreation, but you can tell what inspired them, be it fashion, architecture and so on. I don’t have any like concrete ideas forming here but I just think it would be really neat to see a wigwam or longhouse made from the golden pinetrees that grow in Light territory. Not sure how widespread I want to take this, but at the very least the neighboring clans will be Native American inspired.

(if I come up with any would you want to hear?)

As for your question on what the neighboring clans think – I’ve got nothing.

My timeline that I’ve established is very very short. Basically after Tilmātlilhuicatzin is woken up there is a mini montage of her modernizing herself, luckily the archeologists who are studying her transported her to Earth. In the process of her stasis-coffin being sold by corrupt treasure hunters she kills them all and makes her way back into the main Archeologist’s camp. She learned the Earth Flight Language while alive and it has changed very little over the years so she’s still able to communicate with them. And she even joins the Earth Archeology Team when they go back to loot/excavate more, pretending to be a fellow archeologist who specializes in dead languages. She makes it to the capital, finds her dead parents and flips out. The archaeologist team flips out when they realize what she is. Luminax flips out. They discover some more undamaged stasis-coffins and they open them – bringing a few more dragons back to ‘life’. Tilmātlilhuicatzin and her people spend a good chunk of time in Earth Flight, getting used to the modern age. But it isn’t home, and Tilmātlilhuicatzin doesn’t want to spend the rest of her life as a museum piece, offering a look into a bygone era. She bids her friends in Earth goodbye, and her people return home.

Living in the footsteps of an undead abomination isn’t ideal, so after packing up all the treasure and artifacts they can from the capital and other ruins they head up the stairs. I’ve got a headcannon for this region, so I chose it over going towards the sea and the Daylight Sanctum.

But beyond this trip home I’m not sure what I want to do.

Historical Beef yes I love it and will use it going forward, but I want her to rebuild more and then be recognized. Not like… she shows up two towns over and they’re immediately calling for her death.

I will say that I think the modern Light Clans are more accepting of her faith. Her people are pious enough and the Gods have clearly blessed them what with a lot of the priests bearing emblems of Light or Plague. Tilmātlilhuicatzin and possibly only one other bear both. (I like to think of emblems as literal gifts from the gods. A sign of divine favor for their blessed children.) Modern Light seems rife with false prophets, mystery cults and demigods so their belief doesn’t really… stick out. Even when the other clans start to take a stand against her people it isn’t entirely motivated by religion, so much as it is her upsetting the status quo they’ve all benefited from.

[cielrouge]

YA SFF Books by Black Authors 

A Song Below Water by Bethany C. Morrow: About the strength of black sisterhood set in Portland, OR, best friends Tavi and Effie discover their true supernatural identity when Effie starts being haunted by demons from her past, and Tavia accidentally lets out her magical siren voice during a police stop.

A Chorus Rises (A Song Below Water #2) by Bethany C. Morrow: Teen influencer Naema Bradshaw is an Eloko, a person who’s gifted with a song that woos anyone who hears it. Everyone loves her — well, until she's cast as the awful person who exposed Tavia’s secret siren powers. When a new, flourishing segment of Naema’s online supporters start targeting black girls, however, Naema must discover the true purpose of her magical voice.

A Song of Wraiths and Ruin by Roseanne A. Brown: Inspired by West African folklore in which a grieving crown princess, Karina, and a desperate refugee, Malik, find themselves on a collision course to murder each other, despite their growing attraction.

Akata Witch by Nnedi Okorafor: Sunny Nwazue, an American-born albino child of Nigerian parents, moves with her family back to Nigeria, where she learns that she has latent magical powers which she and three similarly gifted friends use to catch a serial killer.

Akata Warrior (Akata Witch #2) by Nnedi Okorafor: Now stronger, feistier, and a bit older, Sunny Nwazue, along with her friends from the the Leopard Society, travel through worlds, both visible and invisible, to the mysterious town of Osisi, where they fight in a climactic battle to save humanity.

Bad Witch Burning by Jessica Lewis: For fans of Us and The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina comes a witchy story full of black girl magic as one girl’s dark ability to summon the dead offers her a chance at a new life, while revealing to her an even darker future.

Beasts Made of Night by Tochi Onyebuchi: After he eats the sin of a royal, Taj, a talented aki, or sin-eater who consumes the guilt of others whose transgressions are exorcised from them by powerful but corrupt Mages, is drawn into a plot to destroy the city, and he must fight to save the princess he loves and his own life.

Beasts of Prey by Ayana Gray: Two Black teenagers, talented Beastkeeper Koffi and warrior-in-training Ekon, must trek into a magical jungle to take down an ancient creature menacing the city of Lkossa, before they become the hunted.

The Belles by Dhonielle Clayton: In the opulent world of Orléans, where Beauty is a commodity only a few control, Belle Camellia Beauregard will learn the dark secrets behind her powers, and rise up to change the world. 

A Blade So Black by L.L. McKinney: A whimsical and butt-kicking Alice in Wonderland retelling featuring a black teen heroine who battles Nightmares in the dark and terrifying dream realm known as Wonderland. 

Bleeding Violet by Dia Reeves: 16-year-old Hanna reunites with her estranged mother in an East Texas town that is haunted with doors to dimensions of the dead and protected by demon hunters called Mortmaine.

Blood Like Magic by Liselle Sambury: Set in near-future Toronto in which, after failing to come into her powers, 16-year-old Black witch Voya Thomas must choose between losing her family’s magic forever or murdering her first love.

The Bones of Ruin by Sarah Raughley: Set in Victorian England, African tightrope walker Iris cannot die; but soon gets drafted in the fight-to-the-death tournament of freaks where she learns the terrible truth of who and what she really is.

The Cost of Knowing by Brittney Morris: A gripping, evocative novel about Black teen Alex Rufus, who has the power to see into the future, and whose life turns upside down when he foresees his younger brother’s imminent death.

Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi: 17-year-old Zélie and companions journey to a mythic island seeking a chance to bring back magic to the land of Orïsha, in a fantasy world infused with the textures of West Africa.

Children of Virtue and Vengeance (Legacy of Orïsha #2) by Tomi Adeyemi: After battling the impossible, Zélie and Amari have finally succeeded in bringing magic back to the land of Orïsha. But with civil war looming on the horizon, Zélie finds herself at a breaking point: she must discover a way to bring the kingdom together or watch as Orïsha tears itself apart.

Cinderella Is Dead by Kalynn Bayron: 16-year-old Sophia would much rather marry Erin, her childhood best friend, than parade in front of suitors. At the ball, Sophia flees, hiding in Cinderella’s mausoleum. There, she meets Constance, the last known descendant of Cinderella and her step sisters. Together they vow to bring down the king once and for all.

The Cost of Knowing by Brittney Morris: A gripping, evocative novel about Black teen Alex Rufus, who has the power to see into the future, and whose life turns upside down when he foresees his younger brother’s imminent death.

Crown of Thunder (Beasts Made of Night #2) by Tochi Onyebuchi: Taj has escaped Kos, but Queen Karima will go to any means necessary--including using the most deadly magic--to track him down. 

A Crown So Cursed (Nightmare Verse #3) by L.L. McKinney: Alice is ready to jump into battle when she learns that someone is building an army of Nightmares to attack the mortal world, before she learns of a personal connection to Wonderland.

Daughters of Jubilation by Kara Lee Corthron: In Jim Crow South, black teen Evalene Deschamps finds her place among a family of women gifted with magical abilities, known as jubilation - a gift passed down from generations of black women since the time of slavery.

Dread Nation by Justina Ireland: The Civil War is over, but mostly because the dead rose at Gettysburg—and then started rising everywhere else. Fighting the undead is a breeze for Jane McKenne, an Attendant, trained in both weaponry and etiquette to protect the well-to-do. But the fight for freedom? That’s a different story.

Deathless Divide (Dread Nation #2) by Justina Ireland: After the fall of Summerland, Jane McKeene hoped her life would get simpler. But nothing is easy when you’re a girl trained in putting down the restless dead, and a devastating loss on the road to Nicodermus has Jane questioning everything she thought she knew about surviving in 1880’s America.

A Dream So Dark (Nightmare Verse #2) by L.L. McKinney: Still reeling from her recent battle (and grounded until she graduates) Alice must cross the Veil to rescue her friends and stop the Black Knight once and for all in Wonderland.

Early Departures by Justin A. Reynolds: Jamal’s best friend Q is brought back to life after a freak accident … but they only have a short time together before he will die again.  How can Jamal fix his friendship without the truth?

Fate of Flames by Sarah Raughley:  Before they can save the world from the monstrous phantoms, four girls who have the power to control the classical elements: earth, air, fire, and water must first try to figure out how to work together. 

For All Time by Shanna Miles: Tamar and Fayard, two Black teens, are fated to repeat their love story across hundreds of lifetimes, from 14th-century Mali to the distant future, as they struggle to break the cycle.

The Gilded Ones by Namina Forna: Inspired by the culture of West Africa, a feminist fantasy debut traces the experiences of 16-year-old Deka, who is invited to leave her discriminatory village to join the emperor’s army of near-immortal women warriors.

The Good Luck Girls by Charlotte Nicole Davis: The country of Arketta calls them Good Luck Girls--they know their luck is anything but. Sold to a "welcome house" as children and branded with cursed markings. When Clementine accidentally kills a man, the girls risk a dangerous escape to find freedom, justice, and revenge.

Kingdom of Souls by Rena Barron: Set in a West African-inspired fantasy kingdom, Arrah comes from a long line of powerful witchdoctors, yet fails at magic. When Arrah trade years off her life for magic to stop the Demon King from destroying the world—that is if it doesn’t kill her first.

Legacy of Light (The Effgies #3) by Sarah Raughley: After Saul’s strike on Oslo—one seemingly led by Maia herself—the Effigies’ reputation is in shambles. Belle has gone rogue, Chae Rin and Lake have disappeared, and the Sect is being dismantled and replaced by a terrifying new world order helmed by Blackwell. If the Effigies can’t put the pieces together soon, there may not be much left of the world they’ve fought so desperately to save.

Legendborn by Tracy Deonn: In this King Arthur retelling, Black teen Bree Matthews infiltrates a secret society of powerful magic wielders to find out the truth behind her mother’s untimely death.

Mem by Bethany C. Morrow: In alternate reality Montreal (1925), a young woman’s personality is the result of a startling experimental procedure, leaving her to struggle with the question of who she really is.

Miles Morales, Spider-Man by Jason Reynolds: But Miles Morales accidentally discovers a villainous teacher's plan to turn good kids bad, he will need to come to terms with his own destiny as the new Spider-man. 

Oh My Gods by Alexandra Sheppard: Half-mortal teenager Helen Thomas goes to live with her father—who is Zeus, masquerading as a university professor—and must do her best to keep the family secret intact.

The Opposite of Always by Justin A. Reynolds: After falling for Kate, her unexpected death sends Jack back in time to the moment they first met, but he soon learns that his actions have consequences when someone else close to him dies.

Orleans by Sherri L. Smith: Set in a futuristic, hostile Orleans landscape, Fen de la Guerre must deliver her tribe leader's baby over the Wall into the Outer States before her blood becomes tainted with Delta Fever. 

Nubia: Real One by L.L. McKinney & Robyn Smith: When Nubia’s best friend, Quisha, is threatened by a boy who thinks he owns the town, Nubia will risk it all—her safety, her home, and her crush on that cute kid in English class—to become the hero society tells her she isn’t.

A Phoenix First Must Burn: 16 Stories of Black Girl Magic, Resistance, and Hope edited by Patrice Caldwell: Filled with stories of love and betrayal, strength and resistance, this collection contains an array of complex and true-to-life characters in which you cannot help but see yourself reflected. Witches and scientists, sisters and lovers, priestesses and rebels.

This Poison Heart by Kalynn Bayron: In this contemporary fantasy inspired by The Secret Garden, Black teen Briseis has a gift: she can grow plants with a single touch. Up against a centuries-old curse and the deadliest plant on earth, Bri must harness her gift to protect herself and her family, when a nefarious group comes after her in search of a rare and dangerous immortality elixir.

A Psalm of Storm and Silence (A Song of Wraiths and Ruin #2) by Roseanne A. Brown: As the fabric holding Sonande together begins to tear, Malik and Karina once again find themselves torn between their duties and their desires.

A Queen of Gilded Horns (A River of Royal Blood #2) by Amanda Joy: After learning the truth of her heritage, Eva is on the run with her sister Isa as her captive, but with the Queendom of Myre on the brink of revolution, Eva and Isa must make peace with each other to save their kingdom.

Raybearer by Jordan Ifueko: In a West African-inspired empire, Tarisai is raised by The Lady and sent to kill the Crown Prince once she gains his trust. Tarisai won’t stand by and become someone’s pawn—but is she strong enough to choose a different path for herself?

Redemptor (Raybearer #2) by Jordan Ifueko: For the first time, an Empress Redemptor sits on Aritsar's throne. To appease the sinister spirits of the dead, Tarisai must now anoint a council of her own, coming into her full power as a Raybearer.

The Ravens by Danielle Page & Kass Morgan: The sisters of Kappu Rho Nu share a secret: they’re a coven of witches. For Vivi Deveraux, being one of Kappa Rho Nu’s Ravens means getting a chance to redefine herself. For Scarlett Winters, a bonafide Raven and daughter of a legacy Raven. When Vivi and Scarlett are paired as big and little for initiation, they find themselves sinking into the sinister world of blood oaths and betrayals.

Rebel Sisters (War Girls #2) by Tochi Onyebuchi: Though they are working toward common goals of helping those who suffered, Ify and Uzo are worlds apart. But when a mysterious virus breaks out among the children in the Space Colonies, their paths collide.

Reaper of Souls (Kingdom of Souls #2) by Rena Barron: After so many years yearning for the gift of magic, Arrah has the one thing she’s always wanted—at a terrible price. But the Demon King’s shadow looms closer than she thinks. And as Arrah struggles to unravel her connection to him, defeating him begins to seem more and more impossible.

A River of Royal Blood by Amanda Joy: A North African-inspired feminist fantasy in which two sisters, Eva and Isa must compete in a magical duel to the death for the right to inherit the queendom of Myre.  

Slice of Cherry by Dia Reeves: In Portero, Texas, teens Kit and Fancy Cordelle, daughters of the infamous Bonesaw Killer, bring two boys with similar tendencies to a world of endless possibilities they have discovered behind a mysterious door.

Siege of Shadows (The Effigies #2) by Sarah Raughley:  After Saul reappears with an army of soldiers with Effigy-like abilities, threatening to unleash the monstrous Phantoms, e-year-old Maia and the other Effigies hope to defeat him by discovering the source of their power over the four classical elements, but they are betrayed by the Sect and bogged down by questions about the previous Fire Effigy's murder.

The Sisters of Reckoning (The Good Luck Girls #2) by Charlotte Nicole Davis: The blockbuster sequel to an alternate Old West-set commercial fantasy adventure.

The Sound of Stars by Alechia Dow: Set in the near-future, in which a captive teen human and a young alien leader—bonded by their love of forbidden books and music—embark on a desperate road trip as they attempt to overturn alien rule and save humankind. 

War Girls by Tochi Onyebuchi: Set in a futuristic, Black Panther-inspired Nigeria, sisters Onyii and Ify, separated by a devastating civil war, must fight their way back to each other against all odds.

Vessel by Sarah Beth Durst: When the goddess Bayla fails to take over Liyana's body, Liyana's people abandon her in the desert to find a more worthy vessel, but she soon meets Korbyn, who says the souls of seven deities have been stolen and he needs Liyana's help to find them.

The Weight of Stars by K. Ancrum: After a horrific accident brings loners Ryann and Alexandria together, Ryann learns that Alexandria's mother is an astronaut who volunteered for a one-way trip to the edge of the solar system.

White Smoke by Tiffany D. Jackson: Black teen Marigold and her blended family move into a newly renovated, picture-perfect home in a dilapidated Midwestern city, and are haunted by what she thinks are ghosts, but might be far worse.

Wings of Ebony by J. Elle: Black teen Rue, from a poor neighborhood who, after learning she is half-human, half-goddess, must embrace both sides of her heritage to unlock her magic and destroy the racist gods poisoning her neighborhood with violence, drugs, and crime.

Witches Steeped in Gold by Ciannon Thomas: In this Jamaican-inspired fantasy debut, two witches from enemy castes—one seeking power, and one seeking revenge—will stop at nothing to overthrow the witch queen, even if it means forming an alliance with each other and unleashing chaos on their island nation.

Within These Wicked Walls by Lauren Blackwood: An Ethiopian-inspired Jane Eyre retelling in which an unlicensed debtera, or exorcist, Andromeda, is hired to rid a castle of its dangerous curses, only to fall in love with Magnus Rochester, a boy whose life hangs in the balance.

Yesterday Is History by Kosoko Jackson: Black teen Andre Cobb undergoes a liver transplant and as a side effect winds up slipping through time from present-day Boston to 1969 NYC on the eve of the Stonewall riots, delivering a story that is part romance, part gay history, and part time-travel drama, exploring how far we have and haven't come. 

[pelideswhore]

Hector, Andromache and The Bath

Recently (ie: yesterday) I reread Book 22 of the Iliad, which deals with Hector’s death at the hands of Achilles and what follows. After Achilles kills Hector, he drags his corpse on his chariot around the city, so Hector’s family and people can see. Andromache, not knowing what is happening, hears the screams of her in-laws and joins them on the wall, then faints at the sight of her dead husband.

What has caught my attention, and that of many others reading, is the mention of a bath which Andromache has had her maids run for Hector. To quote Alexander Pope’s translation,

Her fair-hair’d handmaids heat the brazen urn

The bath preparing for her lord’s return

In vain: alas! her lord returns no more!

Unbath’d he lies, and bleeds along the shore.

As this post by @battlinghurricanes clearly shows, we have no idea what happens to this bath. It is never mentioned again. From a storytelling standpoint, this makes sense because the bath is of no importance to the fall of Troy. It does nothing. The fact that Homer mentions it nevertheless proves its symbolic importance.

Before I start with the analysis, I will say that all the sources I used deal with Ancient Greek culture and not Ancient Trojan culture. It’s practically impossible to find anything relating specifically to Trojan culture that isn’t solely about the war. Since Homer was Greek himself and the target audience was Greek also, this shouldn’t pose too much of a problem for the analysis itself. However if you read ‘Greeks did so and so’ in this post, yes, i do know Hector is Trojan. I say Greek because the sources I used are about Ancient Greeks.

With that out of the way, we can get straight to the analysis :)

As far as I can remember not a single person is actually described bathing in the Iliad. Since it deals with a war, this makes sense, but is also kind of annoying because it makes it hard to know the general practices of bathing around this time. I’m going to use the Odyssey as a comparison instead because it’s a Homeric epic dealing with a similar, if not the same subject. Multiple times in the Odyssey, the appearance of men after they exit a bath is likened to gods. An example is Telemachus after Nestor’s daughter bathed him:

Meantime, fair Polycaste, youngest born of Nestor’s daughters, gave Telemachus the bath; and after he had bathed she shed a rich oil over him, and in a cloak of noble texture and a tunic robed the prince, who, like a god in presence, left the bath [...]

Later, when Odysseus reveals his true identity to Telemachus (as his father), Homer makes Telemachus use the same word (homoios) to compare him the gods again:

‘O stranger, thou art other than thou wert; thy garb is not the same, nor are thy looks; thou surely art some deity of those whose habitation is the ample heaven.’

Here, Odysseus was actually blessed by Athena, who gave him a glow-up of some sorts. The fact that having a bath is considered the parallel of literally being blessed by a god shows the importance of it—you can practically consider it a holy ritual.

To bring this back to Hector’s situation, Hector is already described as godlike before he steps foot near a bath. Priam calls him ‘divinely brave’, Hecuba does something similar:

‘O Hector! late thy parents’ pride and joy,

The boast of nations! the defence of Troy!

To whom her safety and her fame she ow’d;

Her chief, her hero, and almost her god!’

Even pre-bathing Hector is compared to a god, shows that in his nature, Hector has the divine qualities of a protector and a provider.

Throughout the entire Iliad, water is a very important theme. Everyone knows the wine-dark sea and the rivers Scamander and Simois. In the books before this one, the water theme escalates though. Once Achilles hears of Patroclus’ death, his mother (the Nereid!!) and a whole army of sea nymphs come to console him. Loads of water stuff going on here. When he gets his new shield, there is a sea depicted in the middle and a river around it. After this, Achilles fights a literal river. As you can see, most of these symbols are more closely related to Achilles than anyone else, which makes sense when you consider his mum is a water nymph.

This takes nothing away from the importance of this rise in symbolism. Water remains related to Hector as well. His only son is named after a river (in case of confusion, yes, Astyanax is actually called Scamandrius). Troy, his city, is a coastal city and two rivers cross through it. Water is important.

Those bodies of water associated with Achilles and Hector are natural, wild, free, untamed. Which, yes, makes no sense when talking about water, but you know what I mean. The bath, which is associated with Andromache, is on the other hand a ‘domesticated’ body of water. While Hector is out there fighting in the dangerous waters, Andromache is preparing for his return, running him a warm, homely bath. Here the bath depicts the contrast between Hector’s life as a warrior and his life as a husband and father.

My next point leads into a similar direction as this. Bathing was considered a luxurious practice, which displays Hector’s high rank and his luxurious lifestyle. In this scene it is even specified that Andromache’s handmaids heat the water, meaning she was readying a warm bath for him. While bathing in warm water after lots of physical work is soothing for the muscles and even back then was considered appropriate for this cause, the concept of warm baths was tainted by effeminacy. Masculine men were expected to bathe in cold water. In the Odyssey, Odysseus even goes so far as to say that a warm bath “from [his] members took away the sense of weariness, unmanning body and mind”. Even Caesar*, who lived centuries after the Trojan war would’ve taken place, considered warm baths effeminate. The fact that Hector can afford to take this risk of being ‘weak’ during a war shows the closeness between Hector and Andromache and the fact that he can be vulnerable around her.

*if the Romans, and hence Caesar, didn't draw their heritage from Aeneas, a Trojan, I wouldn't be bringing this up

Another detail to this bath, is that, because baths, especially private baths, were considered luxurious (as stated above), Greeks wouldn’t bathe often. This definitely doesn’t apply to Hector for an abundance of reasons, but the Dardanians were even said to only wash three times in their life: at birth, marriage and death. Hector’s family symbolises the same things. Astyanax as birth, Andromache as marriage and, now, Hector as death. In Vans’ (@godsofhumanity) analysis of Book 22 (find the link on this post), she also points out the similar symbolism of Hector circling the city three times before his death. That too, symbolises birth, life (instead of marriage) and death. (that’s only like a teeny weeny part of the analysis, but the entire thing is great. Go read it. there’s even a whole lot of Achilles slating in there and i know you guys like that smh. ALSO give feedback!!! yes it’s free to read, but show some appreciation for her work!!)

Like I said above, bathing the corpse belongs to the funeral rites you owed the deceased (understandably), and in some cases it was one of the few occasions you would bathe at all. As we all know, Hector was deprived of his funeral rites because Achilles refused to give back Hector’s corpse and even mangled it (i still love him leave me alone). Because of this, he couldn’t be bathed for his funeral like any other esteemed member of society would be. The bath gone cold depicts the cruelty of Achilles’ decision to refuse Hector his funeral rites.

This leads me to the end of my analysis: It has to be said that Achilles does repent and give back Hector’s corpse towards the end of the epic. Hector gets his funeral pyre, meaning, yes, he gets his death-bath. Andromache’s bath might’ve gone cold and stayed empty for days, but eventually her husband is returned and she is able to bathe him. Perhaps, she never drained the water. Perhaps, she waited.

Perhaps, when he came back, she even bathed him in the cold waters that symbolise the merciless nature of the war he died in.

[blackswaneuroparedux]

Anonymous asked: I love your long posts which make for great reading and I wish you could do more because you’ve got such a range of astonishing interests. I’m hoping because you’ve served in the military you would have studied military thinkers. Do you think the Art of War by Sun Tzu is way overrated by everyone? I studied him a bit for my masters but I still couldn’t get my head around him. Interested to know your thoughts. Thanks!

“To lift an autumn hair is no sign of great strength; to see the sun and moon is no sign of sharp sight; to hear the noise of thunder is no sign of a quick ear." - Sun Tzu's Art of War, Chapter IV - Tactical Disposition, Clause 10.

Sounds cool, doesn’t it?

But what the hell does this quote really mean? Do you know what it means? Can anyone else tell me?

Look, I enjoy a good Sun Tzu quote as the next person. Only recently I was exchanging thoughts with a fellow blogger whose studying Thucydides, Clausewitz, and Kissinger for an advanced course at the US Naval War College. Even he prefers Sun Tzu over Clausewitz. I can see why too. If you can make sense of chapter one of Clausewitz’s tome On War you deserve a Nobel Prize.

Unlike my very learned fellow blogger, there are lot of folk who don’t know Sun Tzu at all. They can quote him, but almost certainly out of context. As someone who partly grew up in the Far East and even learned Chinese and Japanese (a pitiful but functional degree of fluency) I’m embarrassed (not hard since I’m English) when I hear other Western compatriots romanticise and elevate Eastern icons to mythic status that the Chinese themselves have never done.

I am even more bemused than embarrassed after having hung up my military uniform for ‘civvy’ corporate clothing at how badly abused Sun Tzu’s book is in the corporate world. In my workplace I grit my teeth at corporate high flyers who mistake a balance sheet for a real battlefield by quoting Sun Tzu out of their arse, and then as self-styled ‘corporate warriors’ work themselves up in a lather of testosterone induced self-importance to crush their corporate enemies into the dust.

This is why the The Art of War by Sun Tzu has invited a jaundiced eye roll. And rightly so. I can see why many view Sun Tzu as over-rated because many easily impressed people go all woo woo over anything ancient and Eastern.

It’s become a familiar trope to say the art of ‘strategy’ as a science began 2,500 years ago with the writing of The Art of War. I would dispute this. Not that the writing of Art of War was the earliest written but whether I would call it a manual of strategy per se - more on this below in my answer.  However you rate or overrate the Art of War it’s important to have perspective and remember this book is written in 512 BC. Other than the bible and some religious books, there are not many books that can survived thousands of years and still remains a steady bestseller and enjoys a wide influence in military academies and army staff colleges today and even as far into board rooms.

The question behind your question is just as interesting to me: why did Sun Tzu and his Art of War gain such traction in the West?

Sun Tzu (544-496 BC) wrote the original text of The Art of War shortly before 510 BC. During most of the past two thousand years, the common people in China were forbidden to read Sun Tzu's text. However, the text was preserved by China's nobility for over 2,500 years. The Chinese nobility preserved the text of The Art of War, known in Chinese as Bing-fa, even despite the famous book-burning by the first Emperor of Chi around 200 BC. The text was treasured and passed down by the Empire’s various rulers. Unfortunately, it was preserved in a variety of forms. A "complete" Chinese language version of the text wasn't available until the 1970s. Before that, there were a number of conflicting, fragmentary versions in different parts of China, passed down through 125 generations of duplication.

Indeed at the beginning of the twentieth century, there were two main textual traditions in circulation, known as the (Complete Specialist Focus) and (Military Bible) versions. There were also perhaps a dozen minor versions and both derived and unrelated works also entitled Bing-fa. Of course, every group considered (and still considers) its version the only accurate one.

When I last visited China before the Covid pandemic for work reason, I had time off to go to a couple of museums that housed the fruits of a number of archeological digs uncovering the tombs of the ancient rulers of China in which sections of Sun Tzu’s works were found. These finds have verified the historical existence of the text and the historical accuracy of various sections. I understand new finds are still being made.

The first complete, consistent Chinese version was created in Taipei in the 1970s. It was titled The Complete Version of Sun Tzu’s Art of War." It was created by the National Defence Research Investigation Office, which was a branch of Taiwan's defence department. This version compared the main textual traditions to each other and to archeological finds and compiled the most complete version possible.

This work was completed in Taiwan rather than mainland China for a number of reasons. Mainland China was still in the throws of the Maoist Cultural Revolution, which actively suppressed the study of traditional works such as Sun Tzu. The mainland had also moved to a reformed character set, while Taiwan still used the traditional character set in which the text was written. Only today is the study of Sun Tzu in mainland China growing, interestingly enough, through the translation of Sun Tzu into contemporary Mandarin. Based on the archeological sources we have today, we are reasonably certain of the historical accuracy of this compiled version that is the basis of what most people use today.

Surprisingly, the Art of War only came to light in the West around the 18th Century.  

Historians believe it was first formally introduced in Europe in 1772 by the French Jesuit Joseph-Marie Amiot. It was translated at the time by the title “The thirteen articles of Sun-Tse”. Joseph-Marie Amiot (1718-1793) was not just a Jesuit priest but also an astronomer and French historian, as well as fervent missionary in China. He was one of the last survivors of the Jesuit Mission in China (he died in Beijing).

Many of the historical problems with understanding Sun Tzu's work can be trace back to its first Western translation in French. A Jesuit missionary, Father Amiot, first brought The Art of War to the West, translating it into French in 1782. Unfortunately, this translation started the tradition of mistranslating Sun Tzu's work, starting with the title, The Art of War (Art de la guerre).

This title, copied the title of a popular work by Machiavelli (a criminally underrated writer on military strategy), but it didn't reflect Sun Tzu's Bing-fa, which would be better translated as "competitive methods."

We cannot say what effect being translated by a Jesuit priest had upon the text. It was unavoidable that the work's translation reflected the military prejudices of the time era when war was both popular and Christian. It was also unavoidable that most future translations would reflect some of the first translation's prejudices. However, war was on the verge of becoming much less Christian in the West since this time was the era of the French Revolution (1789).

The work might well of slipped into obscurity after its initial publication, but it was discovered by a minor French military officer. After studying it, this officer rose to the head of the revolutionary French army in a surprising series of victories. The legend is that Napoleon used the work as the key to his victories in conquering all of Europe. It is said that he carried the little work with him everywhere but kept its contents secret (which would be very much in keeping with Sun Tzu's theories).

However, Napoleon must have started believing his own reviews instead of sticking with his study of Sun Tzu. His defeat at Waterloo was clearly a case of fighting on a battleground that the enemy, Wellington, knew best. Wellington’s trick at Waterloo was hiding his forces by having them lie down in the slight hollows of this hilly land. This is exactly the type of tactic Sun Tzu warns against in his discussion of terrain tactics.

After Napolean, Sun Tzu's theories made their way into western military philosophy. Many of his ideas are reflected in the ideas of work of Carl von Clausewitz. who defined military strategy as "the employment of battles to gain the end of war."

The first English translation of The Art of War is less than a hundred years old. Captain E. F. Calthrop published the first English translation in 1905. Lionel Giles, an assistant curator at the British Museum and a well-known sinologist and translator, attacked this early translation, and he published his own version in 1910. It soon began to be read alongside Clausewitz’s 8 volumes of turgid German military prose.

It wasn’t long before military thinkers were ditching Clausewitz for Sun Tzu because no one could get past Chapter One of Clausewitz’s On War. The “Clausewitz is dead, long live Sun Tzu” school was first championed by the influential British military theorist B.H. Liddell Hart in the 1920s.  Basil Henry Liddell Hart (1895-1970) was a captain in the British Army. He was a very influential military theorist and historian, and author of several books such as The Future of War (1925) and Strategy (1954). Having witnessed first-hand the mechanised onslaught of the Great War, Liddell Hart sought a philosophy of warfare based in the prudent use of technology, psychology and deception - and the avoidance of the 'total war' catastrophes of preceding decades.

The main idea of Liddell Hart is to bring the set of principles of warfare in a so-called ‘indirect approach’ to the enemy. His advocacy in his scholarly work of an ‘indirect strategy’ over direct, frontal operations, was a reaction to the high casualties of the Western Front in the First World War. But his ideas were not simply about physically outmanoeuvring an opponent. Instead he pushed for a psychological scheme: to strike from unexpected directions, to generate strategic dissonance, and to induce paralysis. Hart’s well-known thoughts are “Only short-sighted soldiers underestimate the importance of psychological factors in time of war”, “Originality is the most important from all military virtues”, and “The principles of war could shortly be condensed in a single word: concentration”. 

Liddell Hart believed that distilling historical insights of strategy and operations would offer the chance to avoid the costly disasters of modern war and ensure a more cost-effective route to success. He imagined technological solutions in the form of air power and mechanised land forces outflanking and shocking an enemy at the tactical level. This would be complemented by taking indirect strategic ‘ways’. Like his contemporary J.F.C. Fuller, Liddell Hart considered concentrations of air and armoured forces driving deep into enemy territory to destroy their ‘nervous system’. The psychological aspects of this were central, since acquiring an advantage demanded moves that were unexpected, with precise attacks at the most vulnerable points. As the most influential military writer of the modern age, revered and reviled by three generations of strategists, armchair and armipotent, his controversial theories of armed attack laid the foundation of the famed German Blitzkrieg.

Hart’s championing of Sun Tzu’s work as articulated through his own works got a new lease of life as the world gingerly settled into the ice bath of the Cold War. The rise of Communist China, against all the odds having defeated the well disciplined nationalist armies of Chian kai-Shek, was a wake up call for the West. There was a general befuddlement among western military analysts to explain the secret of Maoist success. There was an intellectual inquest in the 1950s and 1960s for some way to explain (and, it was hoped, learn to counter) Maoist military doctrine. Sun Tzu was seen as one of the historical and cultural sources of some particularly Chinese or Asian way of war, and his work made its way into Western discussions of counterinsurgency and asymmetric warfare.

Into the breach - and with fortuitous timing - appeared a new translation of The Art of War that was to become the defining translation right down to our day. Liddel Hart provided the foreword to Samuel Griffth’s 1963 translated copy of the Art of War. It was to quickly become a key text in US war colleges and this version is still to this day favoured by most of these institutions. We also studied Griffith’s translation at Sandhurst alongside Liddell Hart’s ideas.

There is no question that Griffith’s translation has become the standard go to translation to this day in military circles - that is until James Clavell’s more populist and looser translation came along in the 1980s. One can see why. Griffith’s translation provided a number of historical Chinese commentaries on the text. It should also be noted that Griffith’s strengths was his immense experience in the military and knowledge of military history as a brigadier general in the U.S. Marine Corps.

However, this was also his version's greatest flaw. Like many other critics I have the impression that Griffith did not really believe or understand all of Sun Tzu. Indeed he would often explain away Sun Tzu's direct statements without making it clear that this was his commentary and not what Sun Tzu wrote. The other main criticism and this one is stylistic and therefore just my opinion, Griffith was also not much of a writer. By our standards today, much of Griffith’s language can seem awkward and dated.

Looking back it feels ironic of the US military were wrapping their heads around Sun Tzu as way to get inside the Chinese communist mind (of Mao the military strategist especially). Unknown to them Mao had desperately tried everything to get hold of a copy of the Art of War from the Chinese Nationalists. Cambridge historian and doyenne of intelligence history, Christopher Andrew in his book The Secret World: A History of Intelligence, wrote that the theory that Sun Tzu’s The Art of War was critical to mastering contemporary warfare is propagated through the use of a tantalising anecdote: “During the civil war between Communists and the Kuomintang regime [Mao Zedong] sent aides into enemy territory to find a copy of it.” The ancient text, ostensibly, was of such vital importance that Mao was willing to risk men’s lives to obtain it, while Chiang Kai-shek vowed to protect it all costs. It’s a questionable anecdote at best as there are no historical evidence of it.

We can say that the notion that Sun Tzu’s slim treatise is considered both potent and slightly dangerous - providing the master key to unlocking victory in war through the ages - is a compelling myth that refuses to die. Mao most likely never ordered a clandestine operation to pilfer the text, nor did Chiang Kai-shek give any thought to shielding its contents from prying eyes. Both men certainly read it long before the start of their civil war, both most likely had ready access to it during the conflict, and neither man won or lost based on adherence or divergence from its teachings. But undoubtedly it set the hearts of Western military theorists aflutter in trying to unlock the secrets of Eastern military thought.

Sun Tzu and his ideas in a reincarnated form took hold of the wider public imagination in the 1980s. The 1980s was synonymous with Japan. With the perceived rise of Japan as a global economic power and the changes in post-Mao China, there was a Western (meaning American) search for more explanations. What was the secret of Asia’s rise? How were Japan and China ‘doing’ this?

In Western business circles it was for a time trendy to read it because of the perception that it was part of what made Japanese businesses so successful during the 70s and 80s. Management gurus and other corporate consultants certainly latched on to it and touted it as a way for Western businesses to re-orient their entire management and business philosophy. I don’t know if that ever actually was the case in Japan - my father who worked in both China and Japan in the corporate world at a very senior level said it wasn’t - but what is true is that in the West as the Japanese economy languished into the lost decade of the 90s so too did interest in Japanese business practices, and thus Sun Tzu.

The idea that The Art of War was a kind of how-to guide to ‘strategy’  was made especially popular by Hollywood in the 1980s. Oliver Stone’s iconic film ‘Wall Street’ seemed to typify the ‘greed is good’ New York capitalist scene of the 80s and 90s. Hollywood mirror imaged the rise of the corporate raiders and junk bond kings like Ivan Boesky and Michael Milken. Hollywood sent thousands of American businessmen off to read Sun Tzu to look for ‘leadership secrets’. This is part of a general Western fascination with ‘timeless Asian wisdom’, the American idea that ‘the mysterious East’ is possessed of secret knowledge. American and European businessmen were enamoured of the idea that “a battle is won or lost before it ever begins”, a saying that reinforced traditional American business attitudes about a winning mentality and a ‘can-do’ spirit being two keys to success.

Because Japan and China were trendy in the 1980s and 1990s it also influenced Western popular culture, not just fashion (think Kenzo) but also comic books (manga) and anime. In this Eastern friendly climate it led a number of popular fiction authors to release their ‘own’ versions of the work to capitalise on its newfound popularity. These versions were more about the pop culture of the era than Sun Tzu. Unfortunately, though popular, none of these versions took advantage of the work completed in Taiwan creating a definitive version of Sun Tzu's text by this time. These versions were based either on old English translations (the Calthorp and Giles versions) or incomplete Chinese sources. However, all of these versions remain popular today, despite their questionable sources and poor quality of translation.

In 1983, James Clavell updated The Art of War translation of Lionel Giles and published it in a very popular version. This started a very common practice in English translation: creating a ‘new’ version from other English translations instead of going back to the original source. Authors today continue to follow this practice, which only perpetuates and exaggerates the problems with early translations.

Thomas Cleary, another well-known author, did his own The Art of War translation with historical commentary in 1988. Again, his name recognition did much to increase awareness of Sun Tzu, even if his work did nothing to improve the general quality of the translation.

Looking back the whole Sun Tzu as a business model fetish in the 1980-90s was really pretty silly, rather like 80s shoulder pads. Of course, there are some similarities in leadership regardless of profession, but the basic goals and working environments of war and of business are so wildly different that applying Sun Tzu to business is superficial at best.

So to me the problem is not that Sun Tzu is ‘overrated’ per se, the problem is that every half baked author out there try to apply its principles to every problems that mankind have. The Art of War, as the title suggest, is not The Art of Managing your Business, the Art of Winning in Competition against your classmates, The Art of picking up Women, The Art of Living Life to the fullest. It is, and only is, The Art of War. It is ‘overrated’ only if you expect it to answer every problems in your life.

The Art of War is not the word of God. It is a war manual advocating common sense with pithy aphorisms - and a very good one.

It’s not that I think the Art of War is over-rated it’s that the more common problem is that many people vastly under-rate Sun Tzu. By misreading Sun Tzu thoughts and ideas, I believe many are in effect under-rating the problems which Sun Tzu is addressing, namely war, or the continuum of conflict resolution where divergence in interests of multiple parties extends to the possible use of lethal force on a massive scale. A lot of people trivialise this problem with idiocies like “what if someone threw a war and nobody came” (clue, they would win, then hunt down and enslave or kill everyone too foolish to contest the issue, as has happened countless times in human history) or “ban war” (said ban apparently enforced by throwing flowers at soldiers).

Understanding that war is a very real and intractable problem is necessary to fully appreciate the genius of Sun Tzu’s work, especially where it avoids fixed and easily definable tactics specific to the Warring States period and instead illustrates timeless concepts of out-thinking the enemy at every level of conflict. That the text is still mostly readily applicable or at least reasonably insightful after thousands of years is a testament to the inability of humans to push warfare beyond the fundamental aspects of conflicting interests and continuum of forcible resolution Sun Tzu addresses.

Still, the particular translation matters far less than having an appreciation that, in war, you have an active opponent who is trying to out-think and counter any moves you make, and having an appreciation of non-dualistic philosophical reasoning more characteristic of Chinese classics generally. The classic symbol of Yin-Yang (and a number of derivative versions) illustrates apparent dualism as being a part of a deeper structural unity which does not permit a fixed division into separate parts.

Hence the difficulty of applying the principles of the Art of War to artificial ideas of “winning/losing” (or war/peace, right/wrong, us/them) as categorical absolutes rather than negotiated possibilities in a continuum of desirability/costs. And it is very difficult, no one should sugar coat that. Humans sort and construct their perceptions of reality by appeal to such gross simplifications. Binary logic is an immensely powerful tool in many areas because it leverages the ability to simplify complexity and then build valid inferences based on fixed premises. But at some point you have to go beyond that to have a more fluid response to reality as it is. Which Sun Tzu does for the reality of war.

I would recommend anyone to read it. At the end of the day it’s a book of highly general aphorisms that effectively synopsise the essential insights that apply to all kinds of human conflicts. Turning an enemy's flank has the exact same effect in 2500 B.C. and in 2000 C.E. and it has the same effect in the boardroom, or public market as it does on the battlefield. Deception and intelligence are still used in exactly the same way, whether conquering foreign lands, or stealing market share from a competitor. It's a book about common sense; but common sense must seem profound to those who have none.

Overall, I think Sun Tzu’s Art of War is a worthy read and not overrated because in our society of over educated achievers, common sense is in as short of supply as it has ever been; if this book can provide the meaningful framework for educating very bright people in down to earth common sense, that can only be a good thing.

The value of the book then is to drive home the fact that, in human conflict, there really is Nothing New Under the Sun (Tzu).

Pardon the pun and thanks for your question.

[booklindworm]

A rant against Karen Traviss' understanding of history and her FAQ answers

Did you base the Mandalorians on the Spartans?

<cite> No. I didn't. </cite> Fair enough.

<cite> I really wish history was taught properly - okay, taught at all - in schools these days, because history is the big storehouse that I plunder for fiction. It breaks my heart to hear from young readers who have no concept even of recent history - the last fifty years - and so can't see the parallels in my books. You don't have to be a historian to read my novels, but you'll get a lot more out of them if you explore history just a little more. Watch a history channel. Read a few books. Visit some museums. Because history is not "then" - it's "now." Everything we experience today is the product of what's happened before. </cite> Yeah, I do to. Please, Ms Traviss, go on, read some books. Might do you some good. And don't just trust the history channels. Their ideas about fact-checking differ wildly.

<cite> But back to Mandos. Not every military society is based on Sparta, strange as that may seem. In fact, the Mandos don't have much in common with the real Spartans at all. </cite> You mean apart from the absolute obsession with the military ["Agoge" by Stephen Hodkinson], fearsome reputation ["A Historical Commentary on Thucydides" by David Cartwright], their general-king ["Sparta" by Marcus Niebuhr Tod], the fact that they practically acted as mercenaries (like Clearch/Κλέαρχος), or the hyper-confidence ("the city is well-fortified that has a wall of men instead of brick" [Plutarch, Life of Lycurgus])...

<cite> A slightly anarchic, non-centralized, fightin' people? Sounded pretty Celtic to me. Since I went down that path, I've learned more about the Celts (especially the Picts), and the more I learn, the more I realise what a dead ringer for Mandos they are. But more of how that happened later... </cite>

The Celtic people are more than one people, more than one culture. Celtic is a language-family! In the last millennium BC nearly every European ethnic group was in some ways Celtic, and they were not one. Later, after the Germanic tribes (also not one people, or a singular group) moved westwards, the Celtic cultures were still counted in the hundreds. Not only Scotland was Celtic! Nearly all of Western Europe was (apart from the Greek and Phoenician settlers on the Mediterranean coasts). The word “Celts” was written down for the first time by Greek authors who later also used the word “Galatians”. The Romans called these people “Gauls”, and this word was used to describe a specific area, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean, the Cévennes and the Rhine: “Gaul”. So the Celts, the Galatians and the Gauls were all part of the same Celtic civilisation. "Celts, a name applied by ancient writers to a population group occupying lands mainly north of the Mediterranean region from Galicia in the west to Galatia in the east [] Their unity is recognizable by common speech and common artistic traditions" [Waldman & Mason 2006] Mirobrigenses qui Celtici cognominantur. Pliny the Elder, The Natural History; example: C(AIUS) PORCIUS SEVERUS MIROBRIGEN(SIS) CELT(ICUS) -> not just one culture "Their tribes and groups eventually ranged from the British Isles and northern Spain to as far east as Transylvania, the Black Sea coasts, and Galatia in Anatolia and were in part absorbed into the Roman Empire as Britons, Gauls, Boii, Galatians, and Celtiberians. Linguistically they survive in the modern Celtic speakers of Ireland, Highland Scotland, the Isle of Man, Wales, and Brittany." [Celtic Culture: a historical encyclopedia. by John Koch] "[] the individual CELTIC COUNTRIES and their languages, []" James, Simon (1999). The Atlantic Celts – Ancient People Or Modern Invention. University of Wisconsin Press. "All Gaul is divided into three parts, one of which the Belgae live, another in which the Aquitani live, and the third are those who in their own tongue are called Celtae, in our language Galli." [Julius Caesar, De Bello Gallico] <= I had to translate that in school. It's tedious political propaganda. Read also the Comentarii and maybe the paper "Caesar's perception of Gallic social structures" that can be found in "Celtic Chiefdom, Celtic State," Cambridge University Press. The Celtic tribes and nations were diverse. They were pretty organized, with an academic system, roads, trade, and laws. They were not anarchic in any way. They were not warriors - they were mostly farmers. The Celts were first and foremost farmers and livestock breeders

The basic economy of the Celts was mixed farming, and, except in times of unrest, single farmsteads were usual. Owing to the wide variations in terrain and climate, cattle raising was more important than cereal cultivation in some regions.

Suetonius addressing his legionaries said "They are not soldiers—they're not even properly equipped. We've beaten them before." [not entirely sure, but I think that was in Tacitus' Annals]

Regarding the Picts, in particular, which part of their history is "anarchic"? Dál Riata? the Kingdom of Alba? Or are you referring to the warriors that inspired the Hadrian's Wall? Because no one really knows in our days who the fuck they were. The Picts’ name first appears in 297 AD. That is later. <cite> Celts are a good fit with the kind of indomitable, you-can't-kill-'em-off vibe of the Mandos. Reviled by Rome as ignorant savages with no culture or science, and only fit for slaughter or conquest, the Celts were in fact much more civilized than Rome even by modern standards. </cite> That's how the Romans looked at pretty much every culture that wasn't Greek, Roman, Phoenician, Egyptian, or from Mesopotamia (read, if you want, anything Roman or Greek about the Skyths, the Huns, Vandals, Garamantes...).

<cite> They also kicked Roman arse on the battlefield, and were very hard to keep in line, so Rome did what all lying, greedy superpowers do when challenged: they demonized and dehumanized the enemy. (They still used them in their army, of course, but that's only to be expected.) </cite> They were hard to keep in line, but they most definitely did not kick Roman arse on the battlefield. Roman arse was kicked along the borders of the Roman Empire, such as the Rhine, the Danube, the Atlas mountains, etc. And mostly by actually badly organized, slightly anarchic groups, such as the Goths or the Huns (BTW the Huns were not a Germanic people, even though early 20th century British propaganda likes to say so). Though they were also decisively stopped by the Parthians. Who were very organized. Ah well. <cite> While Rome was still leaving its unwanted babies to die on rubbish dumps - a perfectly acceptable form of family planning to this "civilisation" - and keeping women as chattels devoid of rights, the barbarian Celts had a long-standing legal system that not only gave women what we would think of as equal rights, but also protected the rights of the elderly, children, and the disabled. They had a road network across Europe and worldwide trade long before the Romans ever got their act together. And their science - well, their astronomical calculations were so sophisticated that it takes computers to do the same stuff today. </cite> See? You even say yourself that they weren't actually anarchic. Also you're not completely right: 1. women (of most Celtic cultures, with one notable exception being the Irish) were not allowed to become druids, e.g. scientists, physicians, priests, or any other kind of academics, so they did not have equal rights. Also, as in other Indo-European systems, the family was patriarchal. 2. the roads they had were more like paths, and did not span the entirety of Europe; the old roads that are still in use are nearly all of them Roman. Had the Celtic inhabitants of Gallia or Britannia built comparable roads, why would the Romans have invested in building a new system on top? 3. world-wide? Yeah, right. They traded with those who traded with others and so were able to trade with most of southern Eurasia and northern Africa, as well as few northern parts (Balticum, Rus), but that's (surprise) not the whole world. 4. most people use computers for those calculations you mention because its easier. It's not necessary. I can do those calculations - give me some time to study astronomy (I'm a math major, not physics) and some pencils and paper. 5. and - I nearly forgot - the kids didn't die. That was a polite fiction. The harsh truth is that most Roman slaves were Romans... <cite> So - not barbarians. Just a threat to the empire, a culture that wouldn't let the Pax Romana roll over it without a fight. (Except the French tribes, who did roll over, and were regarded by the Germanic Celts [...]) </cite> WTF Germanic Celts? What are you smoking, woman? Isn't it enough that you put every culture speaking a language from the Celtic family in one pot and act as if they were one people, now you have to mix in a different language-family as well? Shall we continue that trend? What about the Mongolian Celts, are they, too, proof that the Celts were badass warriors? I think at this point I just lost all leftover trust in your so-called knowledge. <cite> [...] as being as bad as the Romans. Suck on that, Asterix... </cite> Asterix was definitely a Celt, and unlike the British Celts, he was not a citizen of the Roman Empire.

<cite> Broad brush-stroke time; Celts were not a centralized society but more a network of townships and tribes, a loose alliance of clans who had their own internal spats, but when faced with some uppity outsider would come together to drive off the common threat. </cite> They might have tried, but they didn't. The first and only time a Celtic people really managed to drive off some uppity outsider would be 1922 following the Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1921*. The fact that France, Spain, Portugal speak Romance languages and the British (or Irish) Isles nearly uniformly speak English should be proof enough.

*Unless you count Asterix. <cite> You couldn't defeat them by cutting off the head. There was no head to cut off. </cite> You mean unlike Boudica and Vercingetorix. Oh wait. Tacitus, in his Annals, said that Boudica's last fight cost 80,000 Britons and 400 Romans their lives. He was probably exaggerating. But it definitely stopped much of the British resistance in its tracks. <cite> To the centralized, formal, rather bureaucratic Romans, for whom the city of Rome was the focus of the whole empire, this was a big does-not-compute. The Celts were everything they didn't understand. And we fear what we don't understand, and we kill what we fear. </cite> While that is totally true, it's also completely off the mark. The Romans demonized the druids, not every Celt, and they were afraid of what was basically an academic network. That had nothing to do with war. <cite> Anyway, Mandos....once I took a single concept - in this case, the idea of clans that operated on a loose alliance system, like the Celts - the rest grew organically. I didn't plan it out in detail from the start. </cite> That's really obvious. Maybe looking at some numbers and remembering that you weren't planning a small, local, rural, medieval community would have helped, too. I mean lets have a look at, say, Scotland (since you specifically mentioned the Picts): they still have less than 6 mio. people all together, and that's today. Mandalore is a sector. A sector of Outer Space with at least 2000 inhabited planets. How do you think that translates? It doesn't. <cite> I just asked myself what a culture of nomadic warriors would value, how they would need to operate to survive, and it all grew inexorably by logical steps. The fact that Mandos ended up as very much like the Celts is proof that the technique of evolving a character or species - find the niche, then work out what fits it - works every time. It creates something very realistic, because that's how real people and real societies develop. </cite> Celtic people were usually not nomadic! And, once again, non of them were predominantly warriors! It's really hard to be a nomadic farmer. I believe the biggest mistake you made, Ms Traviss, is mixing up the Iron Age (and earlier) tribes that did indeed sack Rome and parts of Greece, and that one day would become the people the Romans conquered. And apart from the Picts they really were conquered. <cite> So all I can say about Mandos and Spartans is that the average Mando would probably tell a Spartan to go and put some clothes on, and stop looking like such a big jessie. </cite>

I'd really like to see a Mando – or anyone – wearing full plate without modern or Star Wars technology in Greece. Happy heatstroke. There is a reason they didn't wear a lot (look up the Battle of Hattîn, where crusaders who didn't wear full helmets and wore chainmail* still suffered badly from heat exhaustion). [Nicolle, David (1993), Hattin 1187: Saladin's Greatest Victory] *chainmail apparently can work like a heatsink CONCLUSION You're wrong. And I felt offended by your FAQ answers. QUESTION You're English. You're from England. A group - a nation - that was historically so warlike and so successful that by now we all speak English. A nation that definitely kicked arse against any Celtic nation trying to go against them (until 1921, and they really tried anyway). A nation that had arguably the largest Empire in history. A nation that still is barbaric and warlike enough that a lost football game has people honestly fearing for their lives.

Also, a Germanic group, since you seem to have trouble keeping language-families and cultures apart. If we were to talk about the family, we could add on the current most aggressively attacking nation (USA) plus the former most aggressively attacking nations (the second and third German Reich), also the people who killed off the Roman Empire for good (the Goths and Visigoth), the original berserkers (the Vikings) and claim at the very least the start of BOTH WORLD WARS. Why did you look further?

Some other sources:

Histoire de la vie privée by Georges Duby and Philippe Ariès, the first book  (about the antiquity) I read it translated, my French is ... bad to non-existent

The Day of the Barbarians: The Battle That Led to the Fall of the Roman Empire  (about the Huns) by Alessandro Barbero

If you speak Dutch or German, you might try

Helmut Birkhan: Kelten. Versuch einer Gesamtdarstellung ihrer Kultur, Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Wien

Janssens, Ugo, De Oude Belgen. Geschiedenis, leefgewoontes, mythe en werkelijkheid van de Keltische stammen. Uitgeverij The House of Books

DISCLAIMER

I’m angry and I wrote this down in one session and thus probably made some mistakes. I’m sorry. Or maybe I’m not sorry. I’m still angry. She can’t know who reads her FAQ and at least two of her answers (on her professional website) were offensive to the reader.

[deejadabbles]

Heres some post-canon-Atem-stays-AU headcanons bc I will forever be in denial that the ending of ygo ever happened.

First off can we all address the fact that Atem would have an accent!?! He knows Japanese bc of Yugi but once he has his own body back, his muscles and brain are used to different speech patterns, therefore we get an accent! The first time the gang hears him talk and this (adorable) accent they're floored but love it, it kinda helps further cement that he really is his own person apart from Yugi (not that the gang really needs that but still).

I think this would also lead to Yugi asking Atem to teach him some Ancient Egyptian. He says it just because he's interested but really he wants Atem to feel slightly less alone now that literally no one else speaks his language.

Also. Contrary to what some (*cough*Kaiba*cough*) think, Atem knows how to work modern tech. Like, come on he shared Yugi's body for years, he knows how to work a phone and computer. Now, he may be a bit of an old man and prefer not to use some modern things, but he's competent at least.

(okay okay but can we entertain the idea of Atem making "back in my day" jokes bc he thinks it's funny and Honda n Jonouchi take to calling him "old man" and it's just a big running joke between everyone?? that'd be great.)

Another misconception I think Atem would prove wrong is that he actually doesn't have all too much trouble adjusting to being a "commoner" and having to live a normal, rather un-luxurious, life. Again, he spent years watching Yugi interact with the world and live in it as someone who wasn't royalty, or even rich, and did that with no context of his previous life.

So yeah when Atem returns to earth with his own body he doesn't like...expect to have everything provided for him, or be waited on hand and foot like some ppl expected since he was royalty. Sure, he may not actively think "oh, I have to get a job in order to live now" on his own (mostly bc I think he's just still amazed he's alive at all, a lot of things don't come to mind), but when the subject comes up Atem isn't astonished or taken aback by the idea or anything weird, logically he knows he has to provide for himself now and knows at least the basics of how to accomplish that in modern times.

Okay but seriously can we all take a minute imagining Atem getting a fast food or clerk job to get by until he figures out what he wants to do next. Jou and Honda thought he'd be too prideful to "stoop that low" as ppl say, but Atem's fine with it. If dishing out fries to shitty customers or ringing up cigarettes at a gas station ensures that grandpa and Yugi don't have to carry him through life he's fine with it.

That being said, I can see Atem just being...forgetful that he has to take care of himself sometimes. He's not ignorant of the modern world, but he also has his memories back now, so I can see him laying in bed for a good 10 min before he finally remembers "oh yeah servants aren't coming to dress me, okay lets do this". And sure he knows the basics of life from his time with Yugi, like cooking and doing laundry for himself. But there's times where he just runs out of clean clothes bc he forgot to do laundry, things like that, but hey that's stuff even us non-ex-royals do as Adults so that's okay.

My point is that Atem adjusts to the modern world and not being royalty really well. He's just a forgetful dork sometimes.

Okay but going back to my "Atem gets an entry-level job" headcanon. Now I'm thinking about Kaiba finding out that Atem got a fast-food job instead of coming to him for work. Next thing Atem knows Kaiba storms in (probably cutting the line because of course he would) and starts this melodramatic speech about how no one has the right to employ the rival of Seto Kaiba besides SETO KAIBA himself.

Atem, who was already chewed out by a customer for getting the wrong sized drink, is having NONE of this and is completely ignoring him, trying to serve the next customer in line. When all Atem will say to him is "sir if you wont buy anything please leave" the petty giraffe known as Kaiba slams a pile of bills on the counter ....this then leads to Atem matching his pettiness! You know that tiktok, it's basically that. Atem takes the entire stack of bills, looks Kaiba dead in the eye, and tells him to get his own chicken nuggets.

Next thing we know Atem's managers are trying to pry them apart because Kaiba hopped the counter. There are nuggets and fries everywhere, someone threw a large coke, the customers are filming. It's a big mess.

OMG imagine the headline "Local billionaire has melt down at McDonald's"

Okay, moving on from that, sorry I just had to get that outta my head.

Once again I'm going to drive home my "touch starved Atem" headcanon by saying that Atem actually likes not being royalty in his 2nd life because Yugi and his friends aren't afraid to show him affection. This boy craves touch so much and is loving the fact that no one thinks it's offensive to hug him. Atem's the type that once he's comfortable with someone, expect hugs for every hello and goodbye. He's also known for putting his hands on shoulders and sometimes playing with hair (only if the other is comfortable with it of course!).

The hair-playing thing is because he has these precious memories of brushing and styling Mana's hair when they were younger (and once or twice being able to beg Mahad to join their hairstyling sessions). Now he loves doing it because he equates it with affection and unconditional friendship. He especially loves playing with Ryou's hair since it's so long and soft, and even bought Ryou these tarot card themed hairpieces just so he could style his hair with them.

After experimenting with alcohol a bit, Atem finds that he likes some wine cooler-type drinks but sometimes he'll crave a beer, since that was the drink of choice in ancient egypt. He weirds ppl out though because he prefers them warm, cold beer is too harsh on his sensitive teeth and he's just not used to it. Also, it took a long time to find a beer brand he likes because most aren't up to the quality he had "back in his day" lol.

At first Atem only knows how to cook basic things (again, what Yugi knows) but he soon realizes that he enjoys cooking. He gets a Pinterest account just so he can save recipes he wants to try (he starts saving other things though, he likes aesthetic boards and interior design!). The whole gang ends up loving this because he cooks meals for them sometimes and they're so good! While they're still in high school he makes Bentos for everyone about once a week and it's the highlight of their week <3

He does get a bit sad though, when he tries to recreate meals from his culture and they just don't taste quite right.

oKaY I WAS going to go on about what career I think Atem would eventually pursue, but they got really long and this is already long so I'm going to put them in their own post. All I'll say right now is: college student Atem and later, professor Atem.

That's all for now, expect more in the future though because I will never not support Atem stays AUs <3

[bokettochild]

I absolutely want to hear about it! I love it when people talk about their special interests because they’re always so passionate and that makes it more interesting! I’m trying to write my own novel on the side, but I haven’t worked on it in a while. But I always love talking about that kind of stuff! :)

Well, I did warn you :)

The idea I wanted to pursue is that there is a world, not like ours, and not quite like any other either, This place is called Lofdar, and in it there is a great empire over which many lords and ladies, dukes and duchesses and any other number of nobles are fighting for.

The king of the empire has been absent for some time and many believe him to be dead, after all, he was quite old when last anyone saw him and it just makes sense that he'd've passed on by now. He does have a son, but his son is also absent and no one knows what's become of him over the years.

Hence a power struggle.

In the midst of all the fighting, there is a young boy (because girls are hard to write despite my being one) who is living in the country with his grandmother and two younger brothers. His paternal grandfather is a high lord and his father a great knight, but because the family is so busy, they allow their children to be raised by this kid's maternal grandmother, as is custom.

Kid is a bright little thing, although a bit odd and not quite human, although he's not entirely aware of that. As far as he knows, he just looks weird, and while he gets lots of flack for it, his grandmother and brothers are very supportive and he's relatively happy.

This kid (who's name is Leleo) is really close to his grandmother and brothers, and spends a lot of his days nerding out with his siblings about anchient heroes and legends, and his nights stargazing on the roof of his house until his Nana finds him, scolds him, joins him, and then sends him off to bed.

He's only just beginning to learn about his Nana's culture (because she and his mother aren't exactly human either) when invading forces from one of the other provinces attack their town. His Nana entrusts him with getting his siblings back to their parents, as well as anyone else he can help, while she joins the other village people in trying to defend themselves (being inhuman, Nana is still quite strong and spry and puts up a darn good fight).

Leleo takes his brothers to their parents, but only after reports of the attack have already reached them. The village was destroyed and most of the inhabitants taken as prisoners/slaves by the invading troops, Leleo's Nana among them.

This kid is obviously heartbroken and begs his knight father to try and save her, after all, they still have a chance while the enemy is behind their lines and they can't just abandon her, right?

Wrong.

Leleo's father makes it clear that it isn't worth it for one woman, much less one town, and the lord, Leleo's grandfather, tells him on no uncertain terms that he should consider it a blessing his witch of a grandmother is no longer bringing a curse on their land.

Naturally, this upsets our little hero (who's like twelve) but he knows better than to speak back (and is more than a little scared of his grandfather, since he knows the man hates him as well as his Nana).;p He doesn't listen to them though, even if he keeps his mouth shut about it.

See, this kid knows all the ancient legends and stories, including those about the fabled prince of the kingdom who will defend any innocent victim and all that jazz. Kid gets it in his head that he just needs to find the prince to get help in rescuing his grandma and the village people. He is, however, convinced that he needs to do something to be worth the Prince's time, since this man must have a lot going on, and so he embarks on a quest to find one of the fabled blades of the Heroes of Unity, which if he can collect, will prove that he is, at the very least, someone people should listen to instead of disregarding and talking over because he is a child and not human.

So, our tiny little hero sets off alone on a quest to, in a round about way, save the only adult who ever given a fig for him. Naturally, he's clueless and walks right into danger and get's captured himself, but that's the jist of how this whole book/series would start out.

I've been working out a plot and motivation for years since I created Leleo. Granted, he has gone through a few names, some truly anime level BS backstory writing and a ridiculous amount of trauma in that time, but I'm finally happy with how this is all starting, I just need to get the energy to write it and find an audience who isn't already sick of it lol

There's a ton of lore I worked out, past heroes, histories, customs, cultures, regions and provinces, other characters, their histories, their traumas and cultures and supporting characters. Honestly, I've tried so many world-builders for this and my brain is still full of rot. If you were in any way interested by this, I will 100% welcome questions, because I am happy to share it!

[pa-panda-heroes]

blue hour.

demon!au!dabi x reader nsfw; find the sequel here

Inspired (sorta) by this post. This was initially a 400 followers celebration fic but took so long I got to 500, plus it’s Halloween!! 🎃🎃🎃

i listened to Mothica’s song Blue Hour while i wrote this and honestly fell in love with it. hence the name! please go give her a listen!

Minors, go away. This content is not for you.

Warnings: brief description of kidnapping, tiny mentions of religion (nonspecified tho!) and human sacrifice, injury + blood mention, foul language, brief cremation, Dabi being horny (hehe), Dabi absolutely 100% not using magic on you nope, thigh fucking, orgasm denial, biting, dirty talk, degradation?, spanking, overstimulation, dumbification if you squint?

Words: 14k+

Summary: Kidnapped and held as an offering to an ominous demon, you thought your death was near. Soon enough you find your captor dead and the demon you were offered to becomes your savior. Dabi clearly has plans for you, but what are they? Or was everything just a dream?

Your heartbeat thrummed within your ears, sweat sweltering and becoming a thick layer on your skin all over, making the fabric of your clothes cling to it ever-so-uncomfortably. It felt like you were being smothered from head to toe in fabric. The cooled blood that began just above your temple and trickled all the way down your face and neck had dried by now, acting as a crusty reminder of the reason behind the throbbing in your head. Trees swayed in the chilly winds that passed, making the cool air even colder - yet here you were, sweating like there was no tomorrow. You were bound by the wrists and ankles to a musty wooden pole in a forest you’d never seen before, the sky dark yet bright for the blue moon. The stars looked so free, so beautiful, so serene tonight. Yet you didn’t feel it.

Your breathing was quick, panicked, and hurried to the extent that you’d take in more oxygen by breathing less. Your poor, puffy lip was numb from having been chewed on so much, to the point where you couldn’t remember whether you were a chronic lip biter or not; but you sure were, now. That is, until he gagged you by tying an old handkerchief around your face. You struggled against your scratchy, dry restraints so much, they began to dig into your skin and bleed, sending a trail of blood down your arms and a jolt of burning, throbbing, stinging pain through your nerves.

You were far from alone.  

The only other human body you knew of was the one who put you in the position you currently find yourself in after a night of dancing, booze, and sweat. The inebriation from the alcohol made you an easy target, you guessed. God damn it all.

The night began with your celebrating a friend’s birthday at a club, drinking, dancing, and making merry. You had regretted agreeing to go at first after having a long, agonizingly tiring day at work, which gave you the burning desire to wrap up after a bath and lay in bed until the next day when you’d have to get up again. But as the night progressed, you were glad you tagged along; after all, it was an unexpectedly nice release after a bad day.  

Now you were regretting it again.

If only you hadn’t gone to the club.  

If only hadn’t agreed even if begrudgingly to go.

If only you hadn’t left your apartment.  

You made the mistake of trying to find a bathroom on your own and ended up in an alleyway. The last thing you saw was a filthy dumpster before it all went black, and upon waking you found yourself bound in this horrifying forest.

Around you was a circular dirt clearing bordered with a solid line and filled with various marks made upon it, ones that you’d never seen before. They looked to be of a lost, long-dead language - the language your masked captor was evidently speaking as he sat on his knees with his hands in the air before a makeshift altar of a sort. There was some distance between him and the altar, probably about two meters, that being the same distance he sat from you as you watched in horror.  

He was going to kill you, but not before torturing you - or other things. For some hideous purposes that looked a lot to do with a demon or something. All because you were a virgin that just so happened to cross his path.

You tried making noises, tried screaming, but it made no difference. He wouldn’t stop his hideous chanting and no one could hear you anyway. The thick forest swallowed your every scream and the gag held back your every cry. More tears run down your cheeks at your predicament, your struggling against your binds only digging into and stinging your skin as piping hot blood continued to trail down your tender wrists and ankles. It felt like frostbite was setting in. Was it actually, or was it your nerves? 

A pillar of black smoke began to rise from the ground in front of your masked captor, who then bowed with his forehead to the ground. Your own heart was beating in your ears so quickly you thought it would explode any minute. If only it would - you wouldn’t have to endure this any longer. 

“What... the hell do you want?” you hear a voice boom, distorted in such a way that made it sound like it echoed a thousand times. “Filthy human.” 

“Your favor, my lord. I offer you this virgin.”

You try screaming again, your throat beginning to feel scratchy and dry. It almost felt like it was bleeding. Could it be bleeding? Your mind was almost a haze, now. 

You can see a form emerge from the ground where the black smoke stands, and you’re stunned and scared into total silence as you see the silhouette of two large wings and a pointed tail. Other than that, the silhouette appears mostly human. But it’s not.

“My favor, eh?” you hear the voice again. The silhouette swings his arm and with it vanishes the smoke, and the reality that this... thing isn’t human finally settles in your heart. His hair is black and spiky, there are pieces of what look to be burnt flesh under his minty eyes and the lower half of his face, bound to the unblemished skin by silvery staples that seemed to spit steam. Three dotted piercings adorned his nose, and plenty more his ears. His wings reminded you of a bird’s with feathers and all, and they were a flat charcoal in colour, albeit they seemed a little worse for wear and severely burnt. The demon’s horns poked out from each side of his forehead and curled around like that of a ram’s. He wore a dark, simple cloak.  

You almost wondered if he had goat hooves for feet.

He looks down on the human who summoned him, literally and figuratively, it seemed. His eyes narrow viciously at the man, before jolting to you - and you, honest to all that exists, feel what you can only think of as a bolt of lightning course through every nerve - no, cell - of your body before it feels like your heart stops beating. You can feel the blood coursing in your veins, and it’s ice-cold, all of this forcing you to tense every muscle you’re able. He looks away and you’re instantly back to normal, slouching in your restraints.  

“Is this asshole bothering you, little one?” the voice of what’s clearly a demon rings.

“I-I beg your pardon, m’lord Dabi?” 

“Shut your trap, moron.” Clusters of the brightest, bluest flames you’d ever seen erupt above each of the demon’s eyes and he leans downward to grab the man by his neck, before easily lifting him in the air as the human choked. “Y’know, back in the day, sacrifices in some cultures were an honor. It was seen as a gift, a way to serve ancient -  nonexistent, mind you -  gods. People vied to become a sacrificial lamb. I’m ancient, too, you know that.”

The human man stammers and stutters, trying to say something coherent but failing out of fear.  

Dabi lets the man rest his feet on the ground as he jerks your captor to look at you, and you want to just shrink into yourself. “What the fuck is that, huh? Do you see the fear in her eyes? The bruises covering her body? The blood seeping down her arms as she fights against that rope? Does that look like a willing sacrifice to you? Call me old-fashioned, but I don’t think she is willing at all.”

You blink. What? How? Why?

“You piss me off.”

Dabi throws the masked man to the ground away from him, then raising his palm into the air and summoning flames to filter out of the ground. They swallow him hole, and whilst he’s screaming in agony and burning alive, the demon turns on his heel and saunters your way. “Well, this is quite a mess, eh, dear?” His eyebrows are pointed upward, almost as if the gentle tone behind his words is sincere, yet almost as if there is deviance behind them.

You can’t help but gulp at the look in his eyes. Smile and arch his brows as he might, he was still clearly a demon unfitting of your trust. Right? He was going to hurt you. Surely.

His hands reach up for your face and you shut your eyes tight and turn away.

Much to your surprise, fingers work away at the handkerchief splitting open your poor, stretched, and saliva-coated lips, and you nearly gasp at the relief of pressure on them, the ache in your cheeks quite apparent and downright agonizing. Not only that, but the corners of your mouth were rubbed raw, and you weren’t sure if there was saliva mixing with more saliva, or blood mixing with saliva at the site. Dabi drags a finger from the corner of your mouth up to your cheek to wipe away the tears staining your skin, and you have no strength to fight the shiver that runs up your spine as your eyes fall half-lidded.

“Fuck me, you’re lookin’ a bit worse for wear, little one,” you hear him coo. “Easy, babe. You’re alright. That ugly, scary man’s all gone.” He seems to chuckle at the irony, before a toothy smirk splits his lips. His teeth are sharp, certainly enough to puncture skin without much effort, and you shiver again.

You’re quickly relieved of your bounds, but with the little strength you have left, you’re not able to stand on your own and collapse into his chest, spent and sore. He’s warm. It’s... nice. Fuzzy. Cloudy. Soft. Where are you, again? What’s going on? Why is everything spinning?

Everything fades to black.

:·•·:

You groan and turn over in your bed, pulling the fluffy covers up closer to your head as your body ached. You were warm and settled in, nothing could make you leave the comforts of your bed, yet you knew you needed to. To explain the achy joints, you tried reminiscing the night before. You remembered that night. Parts of it, anyway. When you tried to remember the feeling of being bound or the blood trickling down your wrists, nothing came up. When you tried remembering the chanting of your captor - nothing. It seemed that any parts which could be deemed... unsavory were gone from your memory. You brought your wrists up and felt around them and-

Also gone were any wounds.

It was odd. You could remember it all happening, but at the same time, you couldn’t. Must’ve been some whacked out dream induced by the alcohol.

You had no want to, but you sat up in bed and reached over to your nightstand to switch he clock around so you could see it. It read about half an hour after midday, and you sighed. How long were you asleep? You picked up your phone from the nightstand and switched it on, your heart leaping into your throat at the amount of notifications. Texts, emails, calls, there were dozens upon dozens of them.

“How long was I asleep?!” you shriek.

“Enough to nearly get evicted.”

Your head jolts up so quickly you hear your neck crack, and you see the demon leaning against the wall in front of your bed. You can’t help but gasp and scoot away, your back banging against the headboard of your bed. It wasn’t a dream.

He waves his hand lazily. “But don’t worry, I got it covered. Congrats, you have free rent for life, now.” His wings, horns, and tail are all gone, and he almost looks human, save for the staples and scars. You guess he can’t change his appearance much. Perhaps he doesn’t want to.

The teeth showing off from his smirk look just as sharp as before, however.

Your eyes are drawn to the huggies piercing the cartilage of his ears. They’re as shiny and plentiful as you remember. Your heart rate spikes, and you begin to breathe heavily.

“That soreness is probably from you bein’ out so long, sweets,” he comments, arms crossed in front of his chest, his right ankle also crossed over his left. His voice is smooth and a clear attempt at comforting you - yet there’s something behind it.

“Th-thank you. For saving me, and... the rent... I guess.” You hoped he would leave if you thanked him. Why else would he stick around?

He only shrugs, though. “Sorry, little one, but you’re not special. That sacrifice wasn’t done right in the first place.”

‘Ouch!’

Ah, you remembered that, now. But you couldn’t remember his name.

“What’s your name?” you ask hesitantly. He’s obviously not going to kill you by now. Why would he stick around?

“Dabi.”

“That’s it?” You tilt your head. You were surprised at how... nonchalant you were beginning to feel about this. The longer he stood there, the more it felt normal.

“That’s it, dollface.”

:·•·:

He ended up not having goat hooves for feet.

You knew there was a catch to being saved by that demonic bastard.

Aside from the fact that he wouldn’t leave you alone, keeping a demon cooped up in your apartment wasn’t easy. It especially wasn’t easy when said demon was constantly on your heels, pressed right up against your back. Personal space was not in his vocabulary. Dabi was constantly up to something, and he loved to harass or scare your neighbors with his devilish form; it was just too easy. “What else have I got to do while you’re gone all day?” he’d say. “Gotta entertain myself, somehow, doll.”

Apparently, it had been a long time since someone had summoned him at all, let alone with an offering of some kind. He hadn’t seen the mortal realm in hundreds of years, and because you were offered to him, he decided to stick around you. You only agreed to it as long as he never left your apartment.

Well, technically. He wasn’t actually giving you a choice, he was going to stick around anyway. Dabi so loved giving innocent mortals the impression that they were in control when they never truly were. The demon practically got off on the idea of giving a helpless little thing like you a false sense of security.

Having him essentially stuck to your hip, you couldn’t let him cause any trouble with the human world, be it harmless pranks or downright murder; hence why you left a line of salt in front of every opening to your place one day, to keep him home. He was a curious demon, a sketchy one.

And a bit of a horny one, at that.

If the groping or peeking in on your showers wasn’t enough of a clue, the fact that he did everything else in his power to seduce you certainly was.

Demons don’t sleep. They’re immortal, they don’t need to. Yet, as you lay snuggled up in your bed at night, he always snuck in with you to poke and prod at you, the exchange usually ending with you kicking him out of bed - sometimes literally. Other times, he’d randomly lean into your ear and say the filthiest things you’d ever heard - and then some, obviously - to get a rise out of you, giving him the opportunity to tease you about unconsciously clenching your thighs, whether it was for friction or out of denial.

You were starting to think he was a damn incubus.

But no, he denied that. He looked almost insulted when you made the insinuation before explaining that incubi and succubi are one and the same, changing back and forth between male and female. First as a succubus, the demon collects... “seed,” and then transforms into an incubus to “plant” it. He could change his physical appearance if he so wished, but he never had much want or need to, save for hiding away or using his devilish form; nor could he procreate, he was so proud to tell you.

It seemed the fact that you were a virgin only spurred him on to seduce you. With Dabi being the vile and damned being that he is, you thought he wouldn’t give a damn (ha) if you consented or not at first. The thought was honestly horrifying. Yet not once had he forced you or went too far. It was “poor taste,” he once said, there being no fun in it. You wondered if his rule of consenting sacrifices played a part in his discipline.

And of course, Dabi would go on about how badly he, a demon, an unsavory being to say the least, wanted to be the one to take your virginity and “defile” you, “the pure, innocent treat that you are.”

Defile? Really?

And treat?

‘Pick better wording next time you sex-starved, pointy-tail-having, staple-wearing, horned son of a bitch,’ you thought sarcastically, shoving dishes into their proper places after having dried them. He’d left you alone for most of the day, talking to you and treating you like he was a normal human being. ‘Then, maybe I’d consider letting you get your dick wet.’

Would you, though?

Nah...

Right.

One of the plates was a little wet still, and managed to slip out of your hand and shatter on the counter in front of you. You yelped when a shard cut into your palm after you’d instinctively reached to catch the plate, failing miserably. “Dammit,” you mutter, holding your left hand up to inspect the cut. From the looks of it, no stitches were needed, but it still stung like hell.

You should’ve known better than to think he cooled his jets for the day, because in an instant he’s standing next to your left side and reaching for your wrist.

“It’s fine, just a tiny cut,” you mutter, quirking a brow as he seemingly glares at the wound. “I think I’ve got a first-aid kit somewhere... Have to keep it clean, at least.”

“Nah, don’t need it,” he mutters, before pulling your hand toward his mouth. His tongue slithers out from between his lips and drags along the cut in your palm, the wet appendage searing against your skin.

A shiver runs down your spine at the sensation, and yet another soars when you see the hungry, predatory look in his eyes, which are fixed on your wound. You can’t help the gulp that sounds from your tight throat, or the yelp that fights out of your lips when his whole mouth latches onto the fatty part of your thumb where the cut is. Your knees begin to feel weak and your eyes fall half-lidded.

Dabi sucks on the flesh there, licking the wound occasionally as well. His eyes then flicker to yours, and they burn into you like no other ever has. You feel the heat of a blush trail up your neck and to your cheeks and ears, your heart thrumming in your chest and lips slowly falling open just a tad as he licks away at the opening in your skin.

“Ah-“

The demon pulls away with a pop from one final suck of your flesh, whilst a trail of his saliva - do demons have saliva?! - hung between your hand and his mouth. “See? Take a look.” He pushes your hand towards your view, and amidst the clear wetness on your skin, you see no wound at all.

Your mind flips back to the wounds you should have had from that night.

“Back then... did you... y’know...”

“Naah. There’s spells and the like for bigger stuff like that,” he explains nonchalantly with a shrug. He almost seems proud of himself with his next line. “Tiny paper cuts like this can be taken care of with good ol’ fashioned demon spit. It’s nice, huh?”

You deadpan at him. “No, it’s totally gross.”

Dabi chuckles at you, waving a hand as if to wave you off. “Admit it. Your virgin ass enjoyed it.” His words are crass, but you know he’s only teasing and they’re not meant to insult.

Yet it still riles you up.

That heat crawls up your neck again, and you huff at him. “Shut up!” you gripe, then turning away from him to at least try to clean up the dish shards. There was nothing wrong with being a virgin! A lot of people wait for the right person, or they just aren’t ready. People have their reasons, and there’s no shame in it! Just like there’s no shame in being the opposite. As long as it’s healthy, that’s all that matters!

“Jerk! You seem to forget whose apartment you’re squatting in!” you grumble, scooting the pieces of the plate you broke together - ever so gently - with a washcloth from the sink. “I could kick you out, y’know.” You forgot for a short moment that he managed to achieve free rent for life for you, but you told yourself it wouldn’t matter anyway. It was still your apartment, after all.

“Really, now?” The demon scoffs, then leaning against the counter and crossing his arms - clearly at you. “How would you go about that, little mouse?” His tone is unconvinced and sultry, the look on his face painted with doubt.

You avoided eye contact with him and perused the kitchen for a plastic bag before marching back to the mess of plate shards and trying to sweep them off the counter and into the bag. “I’d exorcise you,” you mutter. Finding a priest in this area would prove difficult, but you could manage to find one willing to travel. You could do it if needed.

Dabi only laughs you off, though. The sound is smooth and velvety, yet you’re left to describe it as littered with smoke and ecstasy. “C’mon, doll! That wouldn’t work,” he says finally. “Besides, we both know you don’t wanna do that. You like havin’ my sorry ass around too much, eh?”

“Ha! You’re right about you being a sorry ass,” you sass with a huff before tossing the bag into the waste-bin.

Oddly enough, while you’d never tell Dabi this and end up stroking his already massive ego, you felt safer with him around. It was hard to pinpoint why. Nothing had happened for him to be called to protect you; however, you lived in a less than savory part of town, which wasn’t entirely unbearable, but shit still happens. And you’ve already been abducted once, leading to your acquaintance with this horny (I’m more ways than one) asshole. Maybe it was because you knew part of what he can do, all that aside. Push comes to shove, he’d protect you, right?

That was a nice thought to have, if a bit naive, you thought.

He was a demon, not a guardian angel of some sort. He had no obligations to you.

Yet here he was, still living with you over a month after that awful night.

Your thoughts are completely swept away when you’re pushed by the hips against the counter with your back to it, your hands instinctively bracing the edge on each side of your hips for support. The demon’s face is immediately in front of yours, his breath easily filling your nostrils with an ashen smell. You see those horns of his again and have to fight the urge to reach up and grab one, maybe even give it a tug. He’d probably cremate you for it.

Could he hear your thoughts? Previous instances somewhat insinuated that he could, but he never admitted to it - or denied it.

Dabi was right. You don’t want to get rid of him. Especially not when he’s looking at you like that. There is an intensity in those half-lidded, fiery eyes of his that has never before been directed at you by anyone, and it leaves you wishing you could read his thoughts. Are his eyes merely looking at your own, or are they bearing into your soul, calculating and appraising it?

What you can tell is that it’s full of impatience and want. Greed. Lust. And so much of it all.

You tilt your chin down a bit and look up at him with a gulp quietly. You can’t think of anything to say, and tension builds within your chest as you search; you feel as if that silence ought to be filled, yet here you are, at a loss for words as you stare at your own reflection in his glossy eyes. On the other hand, he seems totally content letting you lie in it, letting you squirm for him as he smirks.

And so you look away, bringing your hands to your chest and holding them there bashfully. The sleeves of your sweater are soft and warm and plush - just how Dabi would describe you right now.

This maneuver of yours not being what he wanted, Dabi scowls a bit and grabs your chin to essentially force you to look at him, his thumb ghosting over the softness of your lower lip. He tilts his head at you almost curiously, perhaps evaluating your reaction as it’s been so long since he has seen or felt the mortal world. Those eyes narrow at you, though not out of ire. Dabi’s thumb pokes at the crevice between your lips, and the rest of his fingers on your jaw tug downward.

Confused, you comply anyway and part your lips for him, only for his thumb to invade your mouth and press hard on your tongue, coaxing you to gag and instinctively grasp both hands on his wrist. You attempt to pull it away, to relieve the pressure in your mouth, but he doesn’t want that.

Hell, in reality, neither do you. You just don’t feel like gagging and clouding your vision with tears.

Aw, you poor dear.

With a contemplative hum he pulls his appendage out of your mouth and holds it not far from your mouth, as if planning another venture into your wet cavern. You can’t help but stare at the string of saliva still connecting your lips and his hand as it glistens in the low lighting of your kitchenette.

“Open back up for me,” he huskily demands, but it’s not cruel and dictating, so you comply, entranced as if under a spell. But you know you’re not. This time, it’s his forefinger and middle finger that roam between your teeth, and as if he had told you to do so telepathically, you close your lips around them. With an innocent, doll-eyed look, you suck his fingers and lick at them with your tongue, earning yourself hushed praises and a searing trail of touches up your ribcage and back down. You continue to lick away, occasionally wrapping your tongue around his digits or cradling them as you suck on them, coating them in your saliva as some of it trails out one of the corners of your mouth. They feel cold, as if there was a lack of circulation, and it only spurs you on to warm them with the toasty cavern of your mouth and soft plushness of your tongue.

You’re sure you’re less than apt at this, but the praise and touch you’re receiving helps you feel less... off.

Dabi leans in for your ear, his hot breath against your cartilage sending a chill down your spine before his wet tongue laps at it, and you jump in your skin at the burning, completely unknown sensation. It’s so hot it almost stings, but it’s not painful; tingly, maybe. In the process you lean away to your left a bit, at which he seems to pause. But then you lean back as if to tell him to go on, and you can nearly hear the simper he gives just before he latches onto your ear, licking and nibbling away as you tremble and whimper around his fingers. The heat at your core throbs in tandem with your racing heartbeat, creating a melody of your arousal that you hoped only you could witness.

But you knew better than to doubt the senses of a demon.

“You’re doin’ good, doll,” he breathes into your ear, aggravating the sound of blood flushing through your ears and the thump of your heartbeat. “Such a good girl for me...”

The digits in your mouth get a little adventurous and explore your wet cavern a bit, but they’re quick to push down on your tongue again and you gag around them. Tears start to pool within your eyelids and your whimper is stuck in your throat.

The demon then unceremoniously pulls his fingers from your mouth to reach down at the hem of your sweater and yank it up over the swell of your chest, leaving your torso and bra-covered breasts bare. Dabi seems to drink up the sight of you as if it were a sweet wine he hadn’t indulged in for centuries. Both his hands then trail ghostly fingers - really, they felt like spiders - up your belly and to your sternum. You shiver and a mewl fights out of your throat unexpectedly, your back arching unintentionally toward him as you clutch onto his forearms. Dabi lets out a hot breath, just thereafter his hands roughly squeeze your breasts through your bra as he grinds his pelvis against yours, the outline of his hardened cock clear as day against you. You don’t even try to fight back the moan it elicits as your head droops back at the stimulation.

Why bother, right?

The inhuman entity before you takes the opportunity to use your open mouth, his own latching into yours and tongue exploring your mouth in a battle for dominance you have absolutely no hope to win as he makes a mushy mess of you. You accidentally lacerate your tongue on the sharp point of one of Dabi’s teeth and flinch a bit, the sting on your tongue nearly coaxing you to pull away while the taste of iron floods your mouths. That tase you could certainly live without only encourages him, as Dabi growls and grips the base of your neck to hold your head in place as he quite metaphorically devours your tongue with his own, before his teeth latch onto your lower lip and you squeak in surprise as he pulls away.

“Aw, what’s’a matter, little mouse?” Dabi taunts, left palm dropping to rub against your clothed sex.

“Ah, Dabi-!” You jolt at the sudden stimulation on your clit and breathe in hard. Even if there are a couple layers keeping his bare hand from touching you, if feels damn good to have someone else touch you like this. Ripples of warmth flood through you and you feel your body temperature rocketing. Your own breath feels as though it’s on fire as it leaves your heavily salivated mouth and bloody lips in rabid succession, alongside your increasingly rapid heartbeat. Your grip on his firm arms tightens and you resist the urge to grind against him as he continues his ministrations. “Fuck...”  Your lips throbbed, yet you weren’t sure if it was from the tiny wounds he created or your blood pressure spiking.

“Hm?” The demon hums, inquisitive and high in pitch - yet maybe condescending. “‘Fuck,’ huh?” His grip on the back of your neck relaxes only slightly before his tongue pokes out of his mouth and drags along your lower lip, lapping away at the blood pooling there and drawing a slight whine from you. “What about it? You sayin’ you want me to fuck you, doll? Tell me.”

Blood rushes to your face like there was a race and your eyes wander from his bashfully, instead choosing to look at the horns cutting through his spiky black hair. He’s right, you do, you have to admit it. But admitting it out loud was embarrassing! With a gulp you elect to simply nod, but his brows furrow and he’s clearly unimpressed considering the animalistic growl that claws out of his throat.

“Hey, I’ve been locked away from you humans for so long, y’know,” he breathes, his voice dark and low. “I’m a bit behind on gestures. You have to tell me.” This time, you can tell by the almost playful tone of his voice that he’s really lying and just trying to make you admit it aloud. Dabi’s palm leaves you before moving up to the waistband of your jeans while his other hand snakes up your neck and latches onto a fistful of your hair. “C’mon, say it. Where’s all that spunk from earlier? You’re all bark and no bite, little one.”

“Y-yes, Dabi. I... I want you to fuck me.” You finally meet his eyes again, and the hunger in them from before hasn’t faded at all; it’s only deepened. What else has changed was the hunger and arousal in your own eyes.

That smirk appears again and Dabi leans into your ear. “You want me to fuck you,” he parrots, “do you? You want my demon cock to take your virginity and fill you up? You want me to fuck you against this counter until your voice gives out? You’re a slut after all, little one. Beg like one, then.”

Your thighs clench together and you gulp. This was... not how you fantasized your first time to carry out. “Demon cock” was not something you’d ever thought you would hear someone say.

But who cares? Not you.

“Yes, please. Please!” You tug at his jacket in an attempt to coax him toward you, your knuckles turning white from your grip. “Please, fuck me with your demon cock...” Your this time voice is less loud and demanding, albeit it’s more desperate and pleading. “Please.” Your voice breaks this time.

Nor was it something you thought you would ever say.

A groan rumbles from Dabi’s chest. “Good little human. Keep it up, yeah?”

You squeak as he roughly yanks your sweater over your head before working to unbutton your jeans, his lips and teeth savoring your neck all the while. Your head cranes back again, a mute gasp leaving you at the sensation of his searing tongue on your recently sweat-slicked neck as his fingers work to remove your bra before they move onto yanking your panties down. At least, you thought he yanked them down, but a quick glance to the floor revealed he ripped them off, rendering them unusable.

“I liked those!” you whine, still panting.

“Tough luck. I didn’t.” It’s not like you need to wear panties around him anyway. He’d burn every pair you owned to mere ashes if it meant getting you to waltz around your apartment with no panties. They just got in the way.

“Daabi! Why would you-

“Oh god!”

You jump and thrust against Dabi’s hand when his fingers run through the slick of your soaked cunt, your breathing ragged, while he gathers the slick abundant there and edges toward your clit. His tactic coaxes ripples of pleasure that lull a low moan out of you.

“Ha,” he scoffs in your ear, “no gods have anything to do with it, babydoll.”

Dabi’s fingers finally work their way to your clit and circle around it a few times before rubbing in a steady rhythm around it. You moan at the combination of the bliss he gives you and the pet name, and your legs instinctively open wider for him as you mewl.

“I’m really not sure you are a virgin, doll,” he starts with a chuckle, “You’re fuckin’ soaked, you know that? Like a slut begging for my dick.”

“D-Dabi!” You flinch at the sinful words he’s spitting at you, embarrassed.

The demon’s digits leave your clit and trail back through your folds, and the wet, lewd sounds that result almost surprise you more than the fact that you want to fuck a demon. You buck your hips in hopes of encouraging his fingers back to your clit, albeit his other hand distracts you with a flick to your nipple, before it rubs circles over the sensitive nub as the rest of his hand palms at your tit.

“Ah, feels so good,” you find yourself muttering.

In response his ear seems to twitch. “Speak up.” His lips are sucking and nipping at your neck, either ignoring or enjoying the layer of sweat built up on your skin as the heat coming from his body begins to overwhelm you. Not that you mind either way. He’s definitely leaving a mark here and there as he works around your neck. Not that you mind either way.

“Your fingers... ah, feel so good!” Your head cranes backward, your hands dropping to the counter against your ass for support as your legs begin to feel weak. The shockwaves of pleasure his hands send through your nerves leaves you feeling weak and mushy.

“Good. Now hold still.”

You give a confused look, eyebrows pointed upward before you feel the tip of his digit poke at your weeping hole, eliciting a loud gasp from you when his finger plunges into your pussy with no reserve. You hiss at the sudden intrusion, you walls stretching pleasurably yet painfully as he slowly moves his finger around, letting you adjust. His other hand merely plays with your breast.

Biting your lip, you lean forward and plant your sweaty, flushed forehead on his shoulder. “Hey, it kinda hurts,” you whine.

“Just relax, doll.” Dabi’s voice isn’t as crass as it was before, nor is it entirely soothing. You figure he just doesn’t have it in him to coddle you, being a demon and all that.

You whimper as Dabi ever so slowly thrusts his finger in and out, the mixture of pleasure and pain not at all what you’d expected. When his finger hits a spongy spot, you jolt and moan for him, and he takes the opportunity to take over your mouth again in a wet, hurried kiss with a groan. Dabi swallows any and all sounds that you make, and in the process you feel the hand on your tit move downward to your hip before it swings around and wraps under your thigh to lift your knee up to his hip level. The muscles of your legs tensing and the choked moan in your throat tell him the pain is starting to very slowly fade away. At the realization, he carefully dips another finger into you and you moan, higher in pitch, into his mouth before he pulls away to stare at the sight of his fingers fucking into you for only a short moment. Dabi is then quick to shove his tongue back into your salivating mouth.

The lithe digits within your wet walls pick up pace gradually, giving you time to adjust and not barreling into you. By now there is still a barely-there stretch, and all the pain has essentially faded as the assault on your nerves takes place and you near an orgasm. Your eyes lull shut and your head cranes back, your hips almost thrusting involuntarily on his fingers as his pace keeps increasing and pushing you over the edge.

“I’m- ah, I think I’m...”

Dabi hums as if requesting you repeat yourself or perhaps simply acknowledging your sputtering, but you’re too busy moaning louder and and thrusting into the palm of his hand, to do so, as the coil between your legs tightens. His fingers graze over that same spot as before and you cry out for him, for which his fingers increase their pace even more rapidly and slam into that spot over and over and over again as he groans at the lewd, wet squelching resulting.

“Shit! I’m gonna cum, Dabi, I’m gonna cum!”

“Do it. Cum for me, babydoll.” His voice is much more authoritative and huskier, and as per Dabi’s demand you cry out almost loud enough for your neighbors to hear as your orgasm slams into you like a tsunami of pleasure crashing into your nerves. Your soft, hot walls convulse around his fingers in your release as he uses them to fuck you through your first orgasm of the night, with your hips still thrusting toward him uncontrollably as you go through your high and begin to climb down, panting.

Your head feels light in the best way possible and your legs are weak, so you whine lowly as he pulls his fingers from your heat with a pleased sigh. The second your legs give out, he catches you by the ribs before grabbing your trembling hips and lifting you onto the counter, with you latching onto him and holding tight all the while, your forehead on his shoulder and arms around his neck while your legs wrap around his hips.

Dabi drags the tips of his fingers up and down your spine, sending a jolt of calming, electric waves up your spinal cord as he repeatedly kisses your hair and ear on the side accessible to him.

“Atta girl,” he mutters into your hair.

Do you... thank him? He’s giving you a compliment, after all, right? Do you nod? Do you hum? You have the energy to do all three, but what response does he expect of you?

“I didn’t... do anything,” you mutter quietly, chest rising and falling in quick succession.

“Technically. Doesn’t matter because you will, soon.” He leans into your ear like he’s so fond of doing, his lips grazing your earlobe. “We’re not done, doll.”

Your legs twitch around him unconsciously, eliciting a deep, amused chuckle from the demon.

You see pointed pearly whites bear at you before he lifts you off the countertop and plops you down in front of him. Dabi’s hand squeezes your ass cheek, said hand then spinning you around to put your back to his chest. Searing breath on the back of your ear makes it twitch. “You’re wet and all, doll, but I’m not sure you’re wet enough,” he taunts, his hands splaying out on your abdomen and gently roaming around, fingers spread wide as they adore your body.

“For what?” Dabi’s chest against your back prevents you from turning around and giving him a confused look.

“My cock. What else?” he jabs.

Your curt reply is totally cut off and forgotten when you feel a wet tongue singe the side of your neck toward the back, and you gasp shakily.

“What to do, what to do...?” you hear Dabi whisper into your now-pebbled skin, his hands ghosting down toward your thighs.

“Oh.”

Remaining silent yourself, you could feel the damn lightbulb light up in the bastard’s horned head, but you didn’t know what exactly would entail.

Before you can ask what the hell he was on about, his fingers drove between your glistening  folds and prod around, as if measuring the lewd slick settling there. They quickly pull away after a quick hum from Dabi.

“Be a good little human and bend over, yeah?”

Without a word or thought against it you comply, bending over your countertop and leaning on your elbows a little. You gulp at the thought of your leaking cunt bearing for Dabi. You weren’t sure what he could see from this position, but you were a little embarrassed, nonetheless. With a gulp you shift your weight back and forth on your feet nervously.

Hands rub and palm at your ass cheeks as thumbs rub deeply into your flesh in a symphony of soothing touch. You sigh blissfully and spread your legs for the demon without realizing, but it’s over all too quickly when he instead moves your legs back together. You crane your neck to look at him. “Wha...?”

Wasn’t he going to fuck you from behind?

Suddenly the weeping tip of his cock slips between your thighs, gliding against your dripping cunt and through your folds. There’s no piercing despite his many others, though perhaps that was why he asked you to take him to a parlor not long ago.

Dabi’s cock manages to grace your clit and your body unwillingly jolts a little, still having been sensitive from your previous orgasm. A soft gasp leaves your swollen lips and you hear Dabi growl behind you while he pulls back from your ass end only to jut forward again. Legs beginning to tire out, you unconsciously spread them, only for his hands to push them together roughly.

“Don’t fuckin’ spread ‘em,” he hissed, hips holding still. The fingers on your thighs push deep with force sure to leave bruises while you hiss quietly at the stinging pain they bring to your nerves. But that sensation is quick to fade into something warm and euphoric yet electric and sensitive, causing your head to spin even though he’s not fucking your desperate pussy. He pistons his hips into your ass, and you mewl.

“That’s your last warning, fuck!” he grunts.

You nod vigorously, content with letting him fuck your thighs so long as he keeps grazing your puffy clit like this. His pace quickens and soon enough you hear loud skin slapping against skin, his hips jutting into your ass and balls pattering against the crevice between the soft flesh of your thighs. The quick pace and silkiness of his cock against your clit is euphoric, leaving you to wonder if it would be better than this if he were inside of you. Are you drooling? Your head droops lazily as you revel in pleasure.

The wetness and heat between your legs has increased several-fold, but it’s apparently not enough for Dabi. Your poor body rocks against the counter and your eyes are clenched shut, head fixated on the sensation of his cock grinding against your cunt and between your soft, drenched thighs. You weren’t sure if it was the position or your nerves going haywire, but your legs ached with a dreadful burn.

“D-Daaabi,” you whine pitifully, “my legs... aah, hurt...!”

A hand jumps to your navel and brings you back toward him to allow room for his fingers slithering to your cunt. Before they graze over your clit, they stop. “Cum for me, then,” you hear him command, voice deep and breathy and sending a chill up your spine. “Maybe when you’re done, I’ll take you to the bed and fuck you into the mattress. You’d like that, wouldn’t ya, doll?”

“Yes, b-but,” you suck in a breath when his hand envelops your tit, “‘maybe?’” You parrot the word desperately, your head going blank as you near orgasm.

“Mhm.” You can hear the smirk in it, and the sound of the hum rumbling in his chest is oddly euphoric for you to hear.

You hated having him behind you like this. All you wanted in the moment was to latch onto him and relish in his heat no matter how intense it would be for a mortal like you. You wanted to touch him, to be able to see him, and he was depriving you of it all - very likely on purpose.

Your moans and squeals get higher in pitch and Dabi evidently picks up on your cues, thrusting against your cunt faster and faster until your entire body tenses.

You cry out his name ever so quietly, yet before you can climax he pulls away and leaves you panting and weeping, a whine escaping your throat. “But you told me...!”

“Changed my mind.”

“You’re a jerk!” you half-gripe and half-whine, standing up to glare at him. “I was so... so close, you know! You better make it up to me!” You huff and puff from the intensity of almost cumming.

“You’re awful feisty when I’m not touching you,” he remarks cockily.

You’re going to regret saying what you said. At least, that’s what the look in his eyes tells you when he spins you around. It’s dark and already you shrink in front of him. The next thing you know, Dabi’s pushing you against the counter and mumbling something into you ear, that something being an incantation that sends a trickle of electricity though every nerve of your body. Suddenly you’re cumming hard as heavy waves of pleasure wrack your cunt clenching around nothing rapidly as whatever the demon used on you pushes you through your orgasm, your toes curling and lips shrieking, head falling back so fast it almost slammed into the cabinet if he hadn’t caught it. You don’t register that you had wrapped your arms around his waist until his hands grasp them as if holding you there.

“How’s that for makin’ it up to you, eh?”

With his voice pulling a moan out of you, your poor brain goes foggy and full and it spins within your skull as you pant away, your body feeling heavy. Dabi grabs hold of you and lifts you onto the countertop when it seems like your legs are going to give out. “Hey,” he mutters into your sweaty neck, “don’t tire out on me. I wanna fill that pussy up with my cum ‘til it’s dripping out.”

You feel heat rush from your heaving chest up your neck to your cheeks. “Stop... that! You pervert.”

Dabi chuckles at you. You weren’t prudish, you were inexperienced. “What? Stop what, hm?”

“Talking like... that.”

He only hums, though, and he’s not to comply with your request. “Ya know, if you weren’t a virgin, I’d take your ass, too. Or put you on your knees and shove my cock down your throat until you’re chokin’ on it. Fuck, you’d sound like an angel.” Dabi chuckles at his ironic comparison, seemingly proud of himself for it.

You shrink in front of him and shiver, the room feeling so cold. You glance at your bedroom door and he notices promptly.

“I’ll carry you, for a price.”

Your eyes flicker back to him and the simper he flashes you would’ve had you weak in the knees had you been standing.

“Like what, my soul?” It’s a slightly genuine, slightly snarky question.

“Your mouth.” Dabi waves a hand at your widened eyes. “Not tonight. Maybe next time. You won’t know up from down and I don’t feel like playing teacher more than I already am.”

The demon doesn’t wait for your snarky remark before he picks you up and lugs you to your bed. You let out a noise when he literally drops you onto the mattress, your form bouncing atop it before he pins you to the bed roughly, so quickly you get dizzy. He dips his hips between your legs and spreads them wide while his mouth delves into the crook of your sweat-coated neck to let him begin suckling and leaving stinging marks with sweet, little kisses peppered in between.

It seems he’s suddenly gone soft on you, but it won’t last, even if you don’t know it.

Your back arches against him, ready to finally feel his torrid body against yours so that you can relish in his warmth despite the fact that your body was soaked in sweat; you wanted so much more, you needed it. Your next moan is dealt without a care who can hear, and thereafter with you wrap your arms around his neck tightly. Dabi grabs your hips and squeezes the plump flesh before his hands roam down your thighs to your knees as he hikes your legs around his hips, with you far too eager not to comply.

“Dabi,” you breathe, and he hums with one of his hands still on your hip as the other supports his weight by your shoulder. “Kiss me. Please.” Your voice is desperate and needy, and you’re starting to think this is more than lust pushing you on.

Had he used another demonic spell on you?

When Dabi complies, his hips grind against you to allow his hardened cock to nudge the folds of your glistening pussy.

This time around, with his tongue prodding in your mouth at a slower, more passionate pace, you catch on and realize he has a tongue piercing. Your walls clench at the thought of what it would feel like licking stripes up and down your soaked cunt, wondering whether it would be cool to the touch or searing hot due to his body temperature.

Searing hot would be the answer, though you don’t know that as of now.

The demon grinds against you as he devours your mouth with his own, his weeping cock sliding through your your wet folds. On the other hand you’re careful not to cut your tongue on his teeth again, albeit he wouldn’t complain if you did; if anything he’d encourage it. Your hands splay on his hot back, and you wonder that if leaving them on his searing skin for too long will burn you. If it gave you the opportunity to roam your fingers over his muscles and caress the staples, goddamn would it be worth the burns. With a sigh into his mouth your hands move from his back to grab onto those horns you’d thought about, your grip gentle yet exploring as you try to focus on feeling the rough texture of them.

Dabi pulls away from you to pepper open-mouthed kisses among your jawline, growling all the while. “What’re you doing?” he brusquely asks between the wet gestures, and you croon. His voice was so rough and gravelly while the gestures were soft and... sweet. You almost dare to say it was heavenly.

“Just feelin’ ‘em, babydoll.”

You throw his pet name back at him purposefully, and the mockery elicits a dark chuckle from him. Ever so slowly, you were beginning to learn how to be more brazen. You were getting comfortable with him on this intimate level. You’d already been comfortable in some way with him living forcibly in your apartment for over a month, but not on this level, not like this.

The stapled hand on your leg disappears before it reappears in your hair and gives a pull - not a yank - to tilt your head back and further expose your neck. You expect him to ravage it with his mouth like earlier, but he stopped to admire his apparent handiwork. You can’t see the marks he’s left, albeit he’s apparently satisfied as he smirks.

“What’re you doing?” you mimic him playfully.

“Thinkin’ about how I want you, of course.” He said it as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

In response, you huff at him.

“Let’s see,” he begins, moving closer to you, his breath fanning the lower half of your face as his eyes bore into your soul, “chest up against the wall, or on your hands and knees... hell, maybe just your knees...” He moves down so that his breath reaches just under your jaw, his eyes still staring intensely up at you while his hand slithers to your tit, rolling the hardened bud under his finger and you mewl. “...could always put you in a mating press and fuck you like a bitch in heat... I might even let you get on top, if you’re a good girl. Decisions, decisions, eh?”

“What,” you huff, “you mean, with all that whoring and harassing you did, you never thought this through?” You mirror his smirk with your own quirked brow while you rub the horns on his head, thoroughly enjoying their soft yet rippled texture.

“Oho, that’s the problem, doll. I’ve thought about it too much.” Dabi’s teeth put on a show for you to see from his widening smirk. Next thing you know, his fingers are pinching and tugging your nipple roughly for the first time and you keen under him from the shock before his wet mouth matches onto your other tit, tongue lulling over the bud. You mewl and flick your head back, chest heaving in your panting as you feel him suction onto your plump skin and suck away with a sopping, hot mouth, his low sigh into your skin blissful.

Your hands drop to his shoulders as a result of the distraction his mouth brings. Demonic saliva coats your tit and glistens in what little silvery moonlight filters through your blinds, all while you feel the pull of your leg over his right shoulder and prodding at your weeping heat with the tip of his cock.

“Ya know what?” he murmurs into your skin, “I wanna see these lovely tits of yours bounce.” With his other hand he guides the tip in and gives a moan at how warm and slick the entrance of your cunt is around him. And tight as hell, too. Of all the summons he could’ve answered, he answered the one that, unbeknownst to Dabi, lead to you, just on a whim. And fuck, if it wasn’t worth it.

You whine and writhe underneath him, needy as can be, as your entrance clenches around the head of his cock.

“Use your words, babydoll.”

You groan at him. “Just please hurry up and fuck me!”

“Your wish is my command...” Dabi’s voice is full of tease and mockery, which makes you want to bite his tongue.

Without any warning he sheaths his cock all the way into you as a groan escapes his throat, and you jolt at the sensation of suddenly being so goddamned full, your lustful gasp resonating off the walls of your bedroom. That one hard pump of his hips sends a wave up pleasure through your nervous system and the stretch of your tight walls leaves you wanting more. He’s much longer and thicker than his fingers, and you can’t help your cunt clenching around him like it does. The subconscious movement has Dabi groaning and panting out as you clench on his cock, and he still can’t help but relish in how fucking worth the wait you are.

That stretch of your cunt is back again, sweet and sinful as before. His cock brushes against all the right places, filling you up perfectly and having you drool for more.

Dabi holds still at least, though you can tell it won’t be for long.

“So goddamned tight,” he spits through his teeth against your neck, fighting the demanding of every cell in his body to fuck you like a rabid animal. Dabi’s hot breath fans over your neck, his teeth clenching as a result of your tightness around him.

His hips slowly start pushing and pulling to gently thrust his throbbing cock in and out of you, slowly letting you adjust before he can pick a normal pace.

...is what you thought he would do.

But nay, he begins with slow and agonizingly yet blissfully hard thrusts into your wet core, his grunts being drowned out by your wails and mewls as he slams into your sopping cunt. The lewd sounds of wet skin slapping slowly against skin and hot squelching mixes into it all, creating a melody of sin only you and Dabi share, that only the two of you can hear.

You were definitely going to hell, by now. But hey, good dick seemed worth the eternal damnation. Right?

With one particularly hard thrust, Dabi bites into the crook between your neck and shoulder, unexpectedly not breaking the skin, eliciting a cry from your parched throat and your eyes shut tight. The teeth latching onto your skin feel less sharp and more human, as he’s morphed them not to tear into your flesh and draw blood. He’d never hear the end of it for getting blood on your sheets, he knew that. Besides, if he wasn’t careful it would kill you.

He doesn’t want that happening again. Ugh. That was a godsforsaken mess - literally.

With every pounce of his hips, your tits bounce on your chest like he set out to do and he was sure to take in the sight of it all very well, having waited over a month for it. The smarting pang you felt earlier when his fingers fucked you is completely gone by now, leaving you to writhe and thrust your own hips from the overwhelming fucking of your senses.

“Dabi, Dabi!” you sob, your thoughts blending together until nothing but the demon inside of you remains in your consciousness. Your nails dig into the skin of his shoulders, drawing a thick, black liquid in the deep crescents, but he doesn’t seem to mind.

“Words, babydoll,” he breathes out, emphasizing the first word with a thrust. “C’mon, you know better.” He groans above you.

A yelp and another, higher in pitch slap of skin resonates within the room amidst the wet, sloppy ones and his grunts, but it doesn’t register that he’s slapped the underside of the thigh perched on his shoulder until you feel the pulsating sting that scatters through your leg. The yelp was apparently yours.

“Faster!” Your voice is devoured by a whiny tone and squeals that fight out of you, but it’s drowned out by the rhythm of his hips against yours.

Another slap hits your senses, and you cry out, tears flooding your eyelids. All you need is a little push.

“So fuckin’ demanding... Where are your manners, little mouse?” His lips are on your ear again, almost as if threateningly. “I’d be a little more... ngh...  polite if I were you.” The covers bunch and roll under your body when it’s slid back against them from the hardest thrust he’s graced you with yet, the process bringing a shriek out of you and shock as a result of his hitting that special spot after angling his hips just right and causing your poor head to spin. With Dabi then yanking you back to where you were with the hand on your thigh above the reddening cloud of flesh, you croon underneath him as he stops fucking your dripping wet heat altogether. You’re left to stare into his fiery blue eyes directly while hot breaths flood out of you in rapid succession. His nose almost touched yours, and the look in his eyes tells you he’s dead serious.

“Hate to break it to ya, but you’re at my mercy, doll. If I don’t want you to cum, you won’t.”

“Nonono, I’m sorry! Please! Please! I’m sorry!”

A cross between a hum and growl leaves his throat, and you shrink underneath him.

“‘Please,’ what?”

“Go faster, please!”

Dabi’s teeth are on your neck again when he picks up his thrusting into you, increasing in speed and fucking your sopping pussy like you had requested. With his hands on your hips, the demon mutters praises and moans into your neck and you sputter incoherent gibberish when you’re not gasping for air and squealing and bawling out from his almost inhuman, blissful pace. The leg wrapped around his waist clenches as hard as you’re physically able as he slams into you, and while your senses are being ravaged and brutalized, you hear faintly those wet squelching noises and the sounds of metal and wood creaking. You weren’t sure if the thrumming in your eardrums was your heartbeat or your headboard hitting the wall, but the thought of the latter rolled your eyes into the back of your head. Dabi angles his hips just right and smacks his cock into that oh-so-special spot within your soft cunt, and the jolt of pleasure and utter bliss that results brings you back to reality momentarily - yet still somehow throwing you out of your mind.

“Right there! Dabi! Oh, fuck!” You sob with a slur, your hands grasping and clawing at his back desperately. Incoherent garbling follows thereafter, and Dabi doesn’t even try to decipher it even if it is silk against his ears.

The fingers gripping onto your hips are so tightly embedded into your skin, Dabi’s sure they will leave round little bruises in their wake and he relishes in the idea, but the sting they bring you feels so damned good, you welcome it, too. The tension that builds within your cunt keeps building and building, your hot walls clenching around Dabi as you near carnal release. You’re close, so fucking close to the height of true bliss, your moans getting higher and higher in pitch as your back lifts off the mattress without you willing it. You feel that familiar tingle before-

It stops.

You sob at the utter emptiness and lack of release, your head spinning.

The ancient bastard denied you of your orgasm.

Chest heaving up and down in your panting, your wordless whine and protest at the emptiness you can feel is seemingly ignored by Dabi. The lack of warmth at your pulsating core is almost... cold. So cold.

“Wh-why...?” you whine.

The demon lets out a breathy groan. You can feel him dip his lips to your collarbone and smirk. “Just ‘cause.”

Quickly the demon sits back on his haunches and your arms droop off his shoulders. Dabi blinks at you with his hand holding your ankle to his shoulder, all the while staring you down with an intensity that has you feeling small, like an ant before an elephant. You’re so vulnerable and naked under his unwavering gaze, it’s nearly frightening. There’s something in his eyes you haven’t seen before. It’s soft but it’s predatory. He drinks in the sight of you leisurely.

You know damn good and well blood is rushing to your face, your hot breaths leaving you in weak puffs.

“Aren’t you precious?” you hear him remark with a toothy smirk. “Just for me. Right?”

You nod.

Demonically slitted eyes narrow at you darkly. “Say it, then,” he demands.

“Just...” you pant, “for you.”

Dabi’s hand pulls your ankle off him and puts your foot flat against the bedding next to his knee as he looks down at you. The moonlight striking the vibrant color of Dabi’s eyes is breathtaking, if your breath could be knocked out of your lungs further. It almost forced you to liken the sight with tinted ice, with icy waters off Iceland or perhaps glacier-dwelling seas of the Antarctic. And yet, you knew better.

The sight before Dabi was more than he’d expected, albeit just as sinful. Seeing you splashed out in bed, sweating and panting and dripping in your own essence just for him drove him wild. You were so adamant against fucking him, about retaining your innocence and saving it for the “right” person, in the beginning. And yet now, you let him do as he pleases and he didn’t doubt it would be the first time. He knew better.

“Get on your hands and knees, love.”

That was a first. “Love?” You like it more than the several others. It was smoky and gravelly and breathy all once.

Without your knowing your eyes soften and you grin the tiniest grin at the demon, knowing he won’t return the favor and be as gentle and sweet with you. He’s quick to quirk a brow at you, but you turn on your side to maneuver your body around and comply with Dabi’s command. Your breath has evened out by now, as you prop yourself on your elbows with your ass pointing out to Dabi, weeping cunt ready to be filled. It was embarrassing being on display like this again. You glance back at him with curious eyes, only to be met with silence and what felt like a dark presence. He’d gone cold on you.

You feel a hot hand on the nape of your neck and swear on whatever god you used to believe that your skin sizzled for a bit, while another lands on your left hip as his cock presses up against your folds and slithers through between your legs a couple times, gathering the slick of your essence - as if it needed to! - before he delves into your pussy once again. You croon in front of him, and the moan that comes out of Dabi has you clenching around his cock for the countless time. He mutters something untranslatable to you and pushes down on your nape, easing you face-first into the mattress. Your bedding was so soft and warm from your own body heat. Maybe it was leakage from the demon’s body temperature, you weren’t sure. Maybe it was a mix of both, intermingling like perfectly-cut pieces of a puzzle.

With a sharp moan, Dabi bottoms out in you, your mewls being swallowed by the bedding pressing against your cheek. You sigh into plush warmth, but the soft and gooeyness you feel is quickly torn away by a harsh snap of Dabi’s hips. Your gasp is cut through by a squeak from your throat, only urging him further as you already feel that coil tightening and readying to snap. You feel him shift a little against you, and you try to glance at him as much as you can before he begins thrusting into you again. That hard but slow pace makes its appearance for a short while, and hot damn is it heavenly. You moan and whine completely unabashedly. The walls of your apartment were thin and cheap, yet you couldn’t bring yourself to care.

It was just an effect he had on you.

So what if your neighbors knew your were getting railed by a demonic being from ages past?

He certainly wanted them to know.

Dabi’s pace picks up again and you already feel the ripples of pleasure soaring through your body from your clenching cunt, your grip on the fabric underneath you tightening as you fight back the urge to bite into it. Even the lewd slaps of his hips against your ass are louder and quicker, and fuck aren’t they wetter. Dabi himself seems proud of this.

Your breathing quickens and your lungs almost burn like the hand on the back of your neck, your keening and sobbing getting higher in pitch and filled with rushed air. His thrusts only seem to get deeper and harder, if it were possible, and your eyes close shut tightly as your body trembles. Dabi adjusts his hips and continuously hits that oh-so-sweet spot that makes your head cloud over totally, his head falling back at the way your pussy hugs him tight.

“Dabi!” you sob. “Don’t stop, please!” Your wording is heavily slurred and slightly hushed from the impact of his fucking your nerves and your cheek being pushed into the bed, but you manage, nonetheless. You can’t fight back the drool that droops out the corner of your mouth.

The demon chuckles. Dabi could hear you say his name like that for a thousand years straight and it wouldn’t be enough. “S’pose you’ve been a good girl, babydoll. Go on, I’ll let you cum.”

The hand on your neck moves to your shoulder and soon enough, your chest and face are removed from the sheets, albeit you’re still on all fours as he fucks into you. Thereafter you feel the piping heat of his chest against your back, a crude reminder of the seven layers of arson Dabi’s capable. His hand holds you still while he continues to wrack your body with thrusts into your wet heat. You feel his fingers rub and circle your clit after a torrid hand snakes around your ribs and down your navel, and the pace of Dabi’s fingers is almost in beautiful tandem with his fucking as he hits that special spot over and over and over again. You can feel your essence flowing down the insides of your thighs like you thought wasn’t even possible, pussy dripping onto your bedding.

Ah, fuck.

With a lustful shriek, your spongy walls convulse around his cock as he fucks you through your orgasm, your vision going white as your eyes roll into the back of your head and your body rocks back and forth, legs twitching and torso shuddering. It takes almost everything Dabi has not to cum then and there, his hiss and loud growl being evidence of that. You just feel so good, why wouldn’t he want to cum now? But no, that would be a treat for you later.

Your clutch on the bedding underneath is as tight as you’re fully capable, and your knuckles turn white while you revel in your own personal bliss, courtesy of whatever the hell Dabi is. The intensity of it all has your head spinning and body pulsating. Poor body beginning to come down from the fierce high, you wondered if Dabi would stop and let you bliss out - but nay; he continues to fuck you like an animal and abuse your clit while you cry it all out. You were drenched in sweat, your cheeks flooded with tears you didn’t know were there until now.

“Too much, too much,” you squeak quietly, so quiet you’re not even sure he could hear you. But maybe it was incoherent. Maybe you were babbling and drooling like a fucked out hole at this point. Was it getting overwhelming? Yes. Did it feel ungodly good? Fuck yes.

“You’re so fuckin’... wet, though,” he pants, before slowing down slightly. “I think you’re playing innocent. You like this, ah, don’t you?” Dabi groans as you continue to flutter, sensitively, around him. “You want me to fuck you stupid, to fuck you until you can’t take it anymore, right?”

Dabi chuckles at your lack of response and continues to ram into your soaking heat with your cries and squeaks only urging him further. An attempt to glance at Dabi is mostly thwarted by the pace he’s taken on, or maybe it’s because everything’s spinning - or is it the tears flooding from your eyelids - you manage to meet his icy, slitted eyes once, which prompts him to poke kisses at your nape and behind your ear. You feel that familiar warmth in your entire pelvis, you cunt clenching down on his cock as the waves of pleasure intensify.

“Dabi, I- nnn, it’s too mu-much,” you whine. “Please.”

“Nah, you’re okay, babydoll,” he drawls cockily, voice gravelly and breathy enough to make you cum on command. “I think you’ve got a few more for me, don’t you? C’mon.” He makes a point to hit your g-spot harder than before after he’s done talking, and goddamn does it take the air out of your lungs. You choke on your own spit when you feel that piping hot hand patted against your asscheek repeatedly.

Your shriek and wet slopping fills the room as you cum yet again, albeit this time the pressure on your nerves feels different - smoother, warmer - and the tingle in your belly is intense as your scream feels like it claws at your throat until it bleeds. Your thighs are drenched in your juices, cunt twitching and clenching in the aftermath of your mind-splitting pleasure. You mumble and whimper as he finally slows down and gives you a sliver of mercy, both of his hands now holding you up by your hips when your torso slowly droops down like it was before. Dabi chuckles behind you quietly as he comes to a halt.

“You good, doll?”

He’s definitely not sincere.

Your eyes squeeze shut and you heave and pant, the fabric in your fingers wrinkling in their grasp.

“Oi, you can’t quit on me now,” he demands. “I haven’t cum yet and I gotta make you squirt again.”

Trying to get a whole, solid word out was a struggle as a result of your heavy breathing and the overstimulation. Your head was fuzzy and the room was spinning like a damn typhoon, and for a split moment you thought you’d fallen unconscious. What spills out is garbled nonsense.

The demon hums that inquisitive hum again, urging you to speak.

You lift your cheek off the bed slightly, as you’re able. “Will...”

You’re not sure why, but the thought of Dabi skipping off after taking your virginity so unceremoniously rang into your thoughts, giving you a sense of loneliness and anxiety. Why, though? Why now?

“Huh?” He leans in so close, his horn bobs off the side of your head when he arches over you to put an ear to your lips. “Try again, love. Go on.” He sounds quite intrigued, probably the most you’ve heard him.

“Will you... hah, leave... me?”

The grin against your neck is dark.

“Whaddya mean, little mouse?”

His voice was downright excited. You were worth the wait. How long had it been since he’d had a human so obedient, so innocent yet so easily corrupted? You were his, now - whether you liked it or not was irrelevant. But he knew you would. Dabi had grown on you far more than you’d ever admit, he knew that for a fact. You were clearly enjoying yourself now, anyway. And it didn’t take magic to do all of this, save for one here and there to coax you to enjoy yourself and to bring out subconscious feelings. Like right now. You felt these things, he just amplified them to an unbearable extent. Whoops. You poor thing.

“Don’t go.”

Eyes half-lidded and droopy, you turn your head to look back at the demon, only to be met with sharp teeth shown off in a naughty grin. You blink once and you could’ve sworn you saw an image of a black, smoky aura surrounding him.

“If you can handle me, dear.”

You nod against the bed slowly before trying to push your ass against him with what little stability you have. Even if his cock was still buried in you, without any movement you felt empty and... alone.

“I thought it was too much?” he quips, hand rubbing at your reddened ass cheek in a way you have to describe as soothing. It felt so silky and mellow. Yet you knew he was far from that. “Well? I thought you were bitchin’ out on me like the virgin you are.”

“In... insi... inside,” you sputter shyly, mental clarity not quite returning, albeit you manage enough to think of that at least. You want him to cum inside, to know what it feels like to be stuffed full of his cum, to feel his cock twitching inside after his release. “C-um.”

You never would’ve thought about that before you met him. Why would you feel this way?

“Aw, what is it?” The hum that results from his scarred throat is dark. “You want me to cum inside right now? I’m not sure you’ve earned that yet.” His voice is bastardly and maybe even a little teasing, and he sighs almost happily at your squirming. “Asking me to cum inside like that the first time you get fucked - such a whore. Have I fucked you stupid already, doll? Shame, I thought you’d hold out better than that.” Dabi clicked his tongue and shook his head, though you can’t see. “Broken so early. Guess there’s no point in me stickin’ around after all, huh?”

A noise sounds from the back of your throat in protest and nearly unbeknownst to you, drool slithers out the corner of your mouth. Dabi seems to ignore your noises as his hands adjust your hips, giving you enough friction to elicit a whine from your lips. You can’t register this at the moment, but Dabi was a victim to his own whims and could be a mix of soft and downright mean in the bedroom, and there’s no telling which will arise. Sometimes he’ll want skin against skin, tongue lashing against yours, fiery pleasure; sometimes he wants to insult you and lash his hand across your ass cheek, leaving bruises or drawing blood wherever he can.

“I was gonna make you convince me,” he breathes, slowly thrusting. “But considering you’re still conscious, I think that’s enough.” Dabi chuckles behind you. Well, you were only conscious as per his meddling. He was the one keeping your consciousness pulled to the surface, preventing you from letting go of reality and passing out. “You’re most welcome to cry and beg, though, babydoll.”

Hell, that list was half-checked off. Tears stained your cheeks and blurred your vision already, and the more he fucked into you, the more they fluttered out. Your lungs burned at this point, a searing heat cutting through your chest. Anything you try to say comes out incoherently, a sputtered and garbled mess, when it’s not a pitiful sob.

You push your hips back against him in an attempt to fuck yourself on his cock while Dabi fucks your puffy cunt, drawing a condescending chuckle from him. The jolt of overstimulation beckoned you to crawl away and relieve yourself of him, but the need to have him thrusting and cumming inside you overcame it. His release and what it would feel like to have his cum mixing with your juices and dripping out of you was all you could think about, as if entranced in a spell that bound your consciousness to that one thing. The rest of your thoughts were jumbled and incoherent even to you, the drool trickling out your mouth and the rolling of your eyes into the back of your head representative of that.

As Dabi watched your pussy envelop him, he couldn’t help but envision his name carved into your asscheeks with a sharpened claw of his. Ah, the squeals and squeaks that crawl out of you would be divine in the most sinful way possible, and the threads of blood that would trickle down your skin would taste head-spinningly beautiful. Maybe next time. Dabi’s jaw clenched at the throb of his cock within your sputtering, velvety walls, the tightness in his abdomen building. Just one more...

“Fuck, little one...!”

As the demon drags sharp claws up your thigh and asscheek, it leaves red ribbons in its wake and the squeeze of your cunt and pitiful squeal tells him well that you’re enjoying it far more than you ever thought you would.

“Such a good fucking human... good fuckin’ hole,” he grunts, voice strained. His hand plants on the middle of your back and pushes hard, bowing your poor back as his other hand keeps your hips up, his cock ramming into you at a faster pace. Dabi lets out a loud groan when he sees the blissed out, tear-stained, drool-covered face of yours before his thrusting loses rhythm and he suddenly feels your pussy flutter around him hard in orgasm again, soaking him in your slick again. Finally he allows himself to find the release you’d internally begged for, fucking into you at a less than rhythmic pace as his own mind begins to become overwhelmed with pleasure.

“Ah, shit. Fuck, fuck, motherfucking-!”

Dabi soon finds his teeth embedded into your flesh and gripping it hard enough to leave a bruise or even cut into the skin as his hips move entirely on their own against you. With a strained moan he cums, thick, warm ropes of cum painting your fluttering, sensitive, and overstimulated walls as you literally cry and sob underneath him, his hips still involuntarily thrusting into you as your cunt milks him for all he’s worth.

“Fucking hell,” he bites out, body relaxing against yours as he comes down from the high, yet he doesn’t pull out. “I missed this.” His voice is breathy and littered with pants against your neck. Dabi leaves a few wet kisses to it before leaning back and slowly pulling out with a groan, leaving you empty and dripping before him. He watches as his cum begins to trickle out but is quick to gather it with his fingers and push it roughly back into your pulsating cunt.

“Atta fuckin’ girl.”

Your poor head spins and you don’t know up from down, so Dabi ushers you to lay down and before he knows it, you’re passed out asleep. Eh, he’ll consider aftercare next time maybe. With a yawn that’s more out of sudden boredom than it is exhaustion, Dabi lays down next to you and props his head up with his hand, leaning against his elbow as he watches you sleep peacefully, a complete contrast to a few mere minutes ago. With a smirk he wipes the tears off your cheeks. Those cheeks...

“I oughta answer sacrifices more often.”

[flowerflamestars]

I'm in a very angry-with-the-IC-and-Rhys-in-particular mood, and since I'm just rereading Daylight I was wondering, what is going through Rhysand's mind throughout the events of Daylight? Because it's basically his entire life CRUMBLING around him and I'd love to see the mental gymnastics he does to fit it all into his "I'm the good guy, actually" narrative. Or just his general reaction.

this is a FABULOUS question, thank you!

Daylight! Rhys is, in my opinion, the closest to a canonical (pre-acosf) character representation that I go for. He's so SO fucked up, and sublimating and burying all that trauma has, of course, failed, and it's all manifesting, in all these different directions.

To understand the level on which Rhys is losing his shit, it's important to go back to the very beginning: Rhysand, to Rhysand, is always, always the hero of the story. The down on his luck knight with truth in his heart. The struggling, just man.

He CANNOT seeing beyond himself for even a second. He casts himself in the most important role, as the only person whose personal consequences exist.

His mother, at probable great risk, takes him to Illyria to be trained- the precious, first-born, godly son of Night. To learn to fight- to learn, presumably, her culture- to see what that culture is reduced to, a harshness he will on day have the power to change. Rhys had to be, at some point, a great hope for Not High Fae denizens of the Court.

What does Rhysie learn? Illyria is harsh. Illyria is bad. Backwards and cruel.

He hates his father for...presumably, the crime of being a pretty traditional High Lord? Rhys hates the cruelties! the Court of Nightmares! the broken system!

So what does Rhys do when he has power? he fires everyone. He doesn't like them, he doesn't like whatever they did under his father...so instead of hiring new people, he removes himself entirely from a potential role in changing/mitigating those policies. See also: the Court of Nightmares, cowed occasionally, but not in any way governed by Rhys.

But he's the hero! He's destroyed the oppression! His Court of Just his Bros is made of women and Illyrians!

(Rhys removed the terribleness from his direct experience...because only his experiences matter)

So, Rhys in his head: the struggle, the hero, the man just trying to do it right.

Which brings us to Daylight....and Feyre. I know we can attribute the way the characters stop even remotely being sympathetic between acomaf and...everything else...to poor writing, but I also think there's some (maybe accidental but PERFECT) character work there: in acomaf, pre-acknowledged bond, Feyre is an important possession/ally- she's on the same level as the other members of the Court of Dreams, if the jewel of the collection, a high point in the story Rhys tells himself: HE saved the HERO OF PRYTHIAN

(which...let's not even touch on the fact that the deal he makes in acotar is CREEPY and he can only justify it later. she wasn't someone he wanted to work with in acotar- she was a vulnerable, hot young woman he fully took advantage of)

And then they're mates.

And then, slowly but surely, Feyre's personhood disappears. For two reasons: 1) Feyre is on a pedestal so sky-high it blots out everything. Good, pure, true hero Feyre whose adoration Rhysand needs like air. the happy end of his story, the prize and the salvation, the one who sees him.

and 2) ultimately, to Rhys, Feyre is an extension of him. A symbol: his happiness, his peace, his endless power, what he fought to keep.

She's his whole anchor staying sane, which isn't great, considering...ya know, everything. But the Story is Over. They are Happy.

Except- except- nothing is over. Post fifty straight years of torture, a freefall into war and fuckery, teen marriage and literal death, the consequences for all those things AND THE SHIT RHYS WAS PULLING LONG BEFORE AMARANTHA TURNED HIM INTO A CHEW TOY, are still present.

But now, he has something to protect. His golden future. His puppy Mate.

Because Feyre's safety is the safety of his power and vice versa. Anything he does is justifiable because the loss of Feyre is Not an Option. She is Happy. They Are Happy.

It bleeds into everything- and then it intensifies, because this is the breaking point.

The Az/Lucien thing and Feyre incredibly hurtful blindness? No Rhys isn't going to interfere- Az is so private anyway- if Feyre believes its a romantic bond, Feyre is right, she knows her sister, not that it matters because Elain is totally out of her mind.

Sending Cassian to Illyria? Illyria is a backwards shithole right? They're fierce fighters and that's what Rhys values them for- as the hammer of his power- and nothing else? why would there be anything else? Look at them fighting and hurting each other.

Nesta runs and Cassian is left throwing himself in battles actively trying to die and Rhys? Rhys is totally smug. A problem that hurt Feyre and his brother is GONE.

But it's not gone. Az isn't talking to anyone- and Rhys thinks this probably means Lucien is probably, finally fucking him- but even Feyre understands that Azriel knows where Nesta is. When this is proved (when Elain surfaces and they have the very fun kitchen fight) Rhys isn't happy- but he understands. Azriel has always felt responsible for broken things.

But thats not his job, it's Rhysands job, and Rhys has already made that tough choice for the safety of his own: Nesta has no place here. When she resurfaces inevitably, broke and wanting something, Rhys will stop her before she gets close enough to upset (hurt) Feyre. It's his job.

Cassian goes missing, and Rhysand sets upon what will become his eventual move: Illyria's value is strength. (a martial strength that belongs to RHYS). But they think they can take from him? They can destroy their own best chance? (Rhys recognizes Cassian's value to Illyria even while, you know, ordering him to slaughter Illyrians) They would threaten his power? hurt his family?

Rhys will not allow a world to exist where Feyre can be hurt.

If Illyria can't be controlled, Illyria will be put down, like the rabid creatures they are. (They were always backwards, Rhys thinks. Freeing my mother was the one good thing my father ever did)

But Cassian lives.

Rhys asks Azriel if he's been cursed. Az laughs in his face.

And Cassian is a terrible enemy to have. The strategies the loyalists are using? His, filtered through Rhys. The magical contingencies? Cassian and Az, trying to prevent bloodshed.

Feyre thinks, for a long time, that maybe the rebels have Nesta. What else could compel Cassian to even care? these people keep trying to kill him. they want to kill Rhys. the brothers suffered in the frozen mud at the hands of these monsters, what is Cassian doing?

And then the massacre happens.

And Feyre sick to her stomach, cries when she hears. Rhysand thinks about a little hazel eyed boy who'd never had a bed, a present, who'd been nothing until Rhysand plucked him up- a little boy who'd grown into a dangerous man, who'd just killed every person who ever contributed to his pain. Rhys thinks, knowing he'll have to punish Cassian for this, that it's over.

The camp lords are dead, it has to be over.

(Azriel hears and understands- because he knows damn well Cassian was something before Rhysand, and after despite him. That beneath those repeatedly broken ribs is a heart that was once so big so save him, grown strong enough now to save everyone who was like them: forgotten, abandoned, used.)

It's not over. The mountains are burning. Banners fly on northern wind in a language long dead. They're singing, the spies say, they call him dawn. Loyal-heart-as-dawn.

It's Cassians name. Not that Rhys, who never knew more than a few vile insults in the language of his mother's ancient, proud people, understood it then.

Rhysand, the long-suffering hero of his own story, has been betrayed.

He can risk no more- it's time to end this madness. It's Feyre's idea to use Elain- it's Feyre who is left crying, a betrayal Rhysand will never forget- when Elain, who they've given everything, Elain, perhaps just as broken and wretched as her eldest sister, refuses to help keep Feyre safe.

(Elain refuses to participate in what she sees as genocide, but as we've established, what consequences exist? the ones Rhys feels right in front of his face)

Azriel, Elain, and Lucien run.

Of course, if both Feyre's sisters are capable of betraying her, of course, both of Rhysand's brothers would as well. They are one in the same, aren't they? Marked by destiny, by fate for this hard and terrible work- of course it hurts. Of course- but Rhysand will stop it from hurting Feyre any more.

There's one force in the world that can stand in truth against Illyria. The Darkbringers- their ancestral, ancient conquers.

(Yes, I do think Rhys knows the shitty, shitty history of his court! He just doesn't care! He didn't do it. He's different. He's in Velaris with the common people. He has wings. He's not his father.)

(He is, in fact, far worse)

When he thinks of it, it seems perfect. Illyria will be destroyed- a loss, but a safe one. Keir, will, almost certainly, also be destroyed or at least critically weakened.

Rhysand will stand alone, the man who was willing to do anything for peace. He will rule over an emptied playing field, secure in a world where Feyre is safe.

The Hewn City empties, the armies march- Rhysand holds tight Feyre's hand, says nothing about the fact that nothing, nothing, will stop Keir from killing anyone in front of him when battle starts, and reaches once more for Cassian's mind.

His brother, his friend, his loyal right hand- he begs him to come back. To come home. That they can put down this rebellion and in his love for Cassian everything can go back to how it is meant to be, all of them together.

It does not occur to him to address the hundreds dead. The system he was complicit in and responsible for that ground a culture to dust and ash- what matters is brother against brother should never have turned, and Rhys, in his kindness, will offer Cassian this last chance for honor.

Rhys doesn't want Cassian to die- he wants Cassian by his side- but he will drown the world in blood before he'll lose his crown and hope and Feyre.

And when Cassian dies, falling to the earth in Rhysand's arms, Rhys thinks of penance.

A circle closed.

But of course- Cassian wakes. Death is not done with her right hand anymore than the contract between Lordship and land in immutable. Cassian brought the magic back, brought Illyria back.

Rhys is fighting for something personal- Cassian is fighting for a whole world and future, with everything in himself.

When the new border is drawn, Rhys doesn't despair- sure he's shaking, he's covered in Cassian's blood, his twelve thousand year old walls are smoking and the whole world smells like fucking Nesta Archeron- he's been the victim of curses before.

He won't let it keep him down. He'll be fine. He has Feyre, they're safe. Illyria is going to implode- and maybe, maybe, he'll save some of those that remain when the violence is too much, when they need a real High Lord.

They'll come home. Just like Feyre's sisters will. Rhysand's brothers. They fought for peace and Velaris has it- it is their home.

It's what they fought for, the happy ending, and it's all worth it.

It has to be worth it.

[goofygomez]

Moonlit Wishes - A Rayllum Fanfic

Hey everyone, long time no see! I've been on hiatus for a very long time, and it's very quite good for my mental health. Recently I binged The Dragon Prince on Netflix (highly recommend it) and decided to do as I do and write a fic for it.

This one in particular is inspired by @raayllum's amazing Hiatus Hoedown. This time I'm taking a crack at Day 1: Talking to the moon. Hope you guys enjoy it.

Here's a link to the Ao3 story, if you'd prefer to read it on there.

Description: Callum and Rayla discuss the differences in their cultures' way of wishing upon celestial bodies, fluff ensues.

Wordcount: 3386

----

Callum had always loved the moon, even as a child. It had always looked to him as a watchful eye, surveying the world beneath it. His mother would take him on nightly strolls along the castle to go see it, and she knew the secret passages to the highest towers without alerting the Crownsguard. She called them ‘their little adventures’. Of course, she was the Queen, so they did not really need to sneak around, but Callum found their nighttime wanderings something… magical.

They would stare up at the moon and tell each other about their days, sometimes sharing a jelly tart from the town baker until eventually, he’d fall asleep on her lap. He never did get to tell his mother how much those nights meant to him before it was too late. Nearly ten years later, that void in his heart still ached every time he looked up at that beautiful silver moon.

“What’ya thinking about?” came the voice of Rayla from behind him. He turned to see his girlfriend tilting her head at him.

“Nothing, just… thinking,” he said.

“Oh, that’s specific,” teased the elf.

Callum rolled his eyes and took her hand in his, four fingers against five. Her silver hair fell gracefully over her shoulders, a small braid poking its way through it on her left side. Her lilac eyes, bright and alert as ever, looked into his green ones, and a goofy grin spread across her lips.

“Just thinking about you… and how beautiful you are,” he said, trying his best at sounding smooth. It was partially downplayed by his voice cracking, but she giggled nonetheless.

“Shut up, you dummy.” She punched him playfully on the shoulder.

“C’mon, I wanna show you this place,” he said, gesturing behind him.

They were on the outskirts of the Katolian Capital’s forest, walking down a partially obscured path. Large, ancient trees stood like sentries on either side of them, their tops barely obscuring the silver rays of moonlight seeping through the branches, casting odd, elongated shadows over the packed dirt. Dead leaves and pine needles were strewn about haphazardly, almost deliberately to accentuate their footfalls.

Callum thought of the last time he came to this particular spot with his brother and step-father. It seemed an eternity ago that they’d played ‘I spy’ on this very path. Now, their father was dead and Ezran, newly crowned King of Katolis, had spent the first few months of his rule advocating for the union of the human kingdoms with the Xadian population, with Callum at his side. It had not been easy so far, as some wounds were still fresh in the other rulers’ minds, but Ezran had still not lost hope.

Rayla had been with them most of the time, trying her best to be an ambassador for the young king, though her status with the Moonshadow elves was still under review. Callum assured her that they would eventually be forced to lift her banishment, but some of the elder elves were… stubborn in their thinking. He just hoped they would listen to them when they arrived there next month.

After a few minutes of silent pacing, punctuated solely by their soft footsteps and the occasional chirping of crickets, they arrived at a large clearing. Just ahead of them, a small lake shimmered under the moonlight. The packed dirt on the path gave way to lush green grass, illuminated both by the starry sky and fireflies. The bank closest to them was filled with small boulders, eroded by millennia of contact with the eerily still waters.

Callum stepped back to let Rayla see the whole picture and grinned.

“So? What do you think?”

The elf glanced around the clearing with awe and wonder in her eyes. Callum did not fail to notice her disgruntled expression directed at the peaceful water.

“Don’t worry, we’re not going into the lake,” he assured her, chuckling when Rayla sighed dramatically.

“Thank the Moon,” she said, nodding. “If you had brought me to a nighttime swim, I would probably break up with you.”

“Duly noted.” He took her hand again and led her to one of the boulders, careful not to steer her too close to the water’s edge. “I just thought it would be fun to just… hang out here.”

They sat on the rock and spread out, stretching their legs slightly after a half-hour walk down the forest.

“It does seem peaceful,” she conceded, laying her head on his shoulder. “Been a while since we were able to do this.”

Callum sighed. “I know.” Between assisting his brother and Rayla’s constant trips to and from Xadia, they had not had much time to themselves as a couple. “I promise to make a little more time when you’re here.”

“At least it’s for a good cause, right?” said Rayla. “I mean, Ez needs all the help he can get. Plus, we’ve got a lot of time to… catch up once things settle down.” She looked up at him with a fond smile.

Callum thought of all the times, even before they got together, that they just sat on a patch of dirt or some rock, looking at the sky and wondering when their mission would be over; wondering if they’d ever see their homes again, or would live to tell the tale.

“I just want to know when that is. Even just an estimate would be nice,” he said half-heartedly, letting out a deep breath and leaning forward to place a caste kiss on her lips. “But this is worth the wait.”

“Look who’s all sappy all of a sudden,” she said with a grin and kissed him again. “I love you, dummy.”

“I love you, too.”

They sat there, enjoying each other’s presence for what felt like forever, but could only have been ten minutes. A soft breeze had picked up from the east, creating ripples on the otherwise still surface of the lake; distorting the reflection from the crescent moon above. He looked up once more, wondering if his mother was out there somewhere, overjoyed that her sons were following in her and Harrow’s footsteps.

Just as he scanned the sky for whatever signs she would send him, something incredible happened. Almost as if called upon by his thoughts, a shooting star streaked across the star-strewn sky, bright and beautiful. As fast as it had come, it vanished.

“Look, did you see that?” he exclaimed excitedly, pointing at the spot where it had just been.

“Uh, what am I looking at?” asked Rayla, confused.

“The shooting star, right there.” He closed his eyes and muttered under his breath. He could feel Rayla staring at him, and after a few seconds, opened his eyes to see her wide-eyed and thoroughly confused.

“Wha- What just happened?” she said, glancing between him and the sky.

“It’s a shooting star,” he said matter-of-factly. “When you see one, you make a wish. Don’t elves do that?”

“Wait, humans wish upon shooting stars?” she asked incredulously. “Why?”

Callum shrugged. “I don’t know, we just do. It’s a tradition or something.”

“Humans are weird.”

“Sure, what do you guys wish upon? The moon?” he said with a smirk, enjoying a little too much how pink her cheeks got.

Rayla scoffed. “As a matter of fact, we do,” she said, trying and failing to sound indignant.

“But the moon is there every night,” he said, glancing up at the sky and frowning. “That’s a lot of wishes.”

“We only wish on a New Moon, dummy,” she explained patiently.

“Why only the New Moon?” Callum asked, genuinely curious. It seemed logical enough that they wouldn’t wish on the moon every single night, but any insight into his girlfriend’s culture was something he did not take lightly.

“Well, the idea is that a New Moon signals the beginning of another cycle. The halfway point between two Full Moons, which is when we’re at our strongest. The Moon Arcanum supposedly… blesses us when we’re at our weakest.”

“Yeah, that makes sense,” Callum said pensively. “More sense than whatever humans came up for shooting stars, at least.”

“So… what did you wish for just now?”

“I can’t say.”

“Why? Is it embarrassing?” teased Rayla, poking him in the ribs. He chuckled but shook his head.

“No, because if I tell you, it won’t come true.”

“Well that’s no fun,” she said with a pout.

Callum shrugged and scooted closer to Rayla, taking her right hand in his and squeezing gently. They both sighed contently, almost as if they knew what the other was thinking; could sense the peacefulness and the stillness of the air around them.

“Tell you what, if it comes true, I’ll let you know,” he said, kissing the top of her head, careful to avoid her horns.

“Sounds good,” she said. “So what were you muttering before? I have good hearing but it barely sounded like words.”

“It’s like a little song you say before you make your wish?”

Rayla studied him curiously, nodding along as he spoke. She seemed to be thinking about something, debating with herself. She blinked once and looked into his eyes.

“Would you teach me?” she asked softly.

“You wanna make a wish?” he said. When she nodded, he sat up straight, facing her. He took her hands in his and grinned. “Repeat after me. Star bright, star light.”

She nodded and followed his instructions. She closed her eyes and sighed before saying, “Star bright, star light.”

“First star I see tonight.” He thought it might not count, as she had not done it before, but it was the thought that counted, right?

She repeated the phrase and her lips curved ever so slightly upwards.

“Wish I may, wish I might,” he continued

“Wish I may, wish I might.”

“Have the wish I wish tonight,” he concluded, opening his eyes and seeing her mouthing the end of the song, nodding almost solemnly. Her eyes fluttered slowly open and landed on him.

Callum heard the rustling of leaves above them, possibly from a squirrel scrutinizing them or a songbird perching on a branch. He thought of all the time they’d have as a couple, especially after their help was not as imperative in the running of Katolis, to just… be happy together. How long had he refrained from letting himself be truly content with his life? And now, being with Rayla, he couldn’t even imagine anything or anyone else for him.

He leaned forward and kissed her ever so gently. Her lips tasted of moonberries, and her violet eyes, almost glowing in the dark, closed as she melted into the kiss and he felt her hand on his scarf, not quite pulling him in but not pushing him either. When they broke apart, he was grinning.

“My wish did come true,” he said, cheekily.

“Mine too,” she replied.

-

Rayla’s footsteps were light and gentle on the soft ground; years of training to be an assassin still ingrained in her every move. Even eight years after meeting who she now knew was the love of her life, there still was a part of her that kind of missed those times when life was so… straightforward. Even so, as she looked back at Callum – now a few inches taller than he’d been when they met, and growing what could only be described as the faintest shadow of a beard – she knew in her bones that that little part of her was wrong.

He looked impressive with his fur overcoat, his immaculately woven violet undershirt (which he claimed matched her eyes) and his leather boots. He had opted not to wear his signature red scarf tonight, which she suspected was just so he could more prominently showcase his facial hair, which he was weirdly proud of.

Callum stood a little ways away from Rayla, looking up at the moon with closed eyes and a sort of… wistful expression on his face. Her mind instantly brought the memory of one of their first dates to this magical clearing in Katolis, where she’d taught him the strange human tradition of wishing upon shooting stars. Moon and Stars, Ethari had burst out laughing when she had told him. Humans were weird.

Now, her weird human was stoically standing with his hands on his hips. She cleared her throat, leaning against a nearby tree. Callum shook his head as though he hadn’t realized she was there, and grinned.

“Hey, sorry, did I space out?” he said.

“Yeah, it was daytime when you stopped there,” she replied, arching an eyebrow.

He snorted and held out his hand, which she gratefully took. “I’m sure it was less than a minute.”

They resumed their stroll down the familiar path, pine needles crunching merrily under Callum’s less graceful steps. She only rolled her eyes in response and lay her head on his shoulder, doing her very best not to impale him with one of her horns, which had also grown considerably as she reached adulthood. She knew humans had a rather short life expectancy; at least shorter than the oldest elves she knew back in Xadia, but at least their early years of development were more or less even.

She wondered in silence just how much of a difference their physiology would make down the road. Would she outlive him by decades? Would the rest of her human friends do the same…? She shook her head and pushed away those thoughts, choosing instead to bask in the moment; being here with Callum was all that mattered.

Eventually, the trees thinned, thick trunks giving way to mere shrubbery as the clearing they’d been seeking opened up in front of them. A beautiful, albeit terrifying lake, loomed ahead of them, its unnervingly calm waters barely rippling in the autumn breeze. She could see the reflection of the stars in it, flashing intermittently like little candles flickering in the night.

Wordlessly, Callum and Rayla kept following the path until they reached their favourite spot: a large boulder, far enough away from the shore that her skin didn’t prickle with anxiety every time a particularly strong current grazed the edges. Callum had attempted to help her through her fear multiple times, but the best he’d ever gotten her to do was get on a boat without getting extremely seasick.

It wasn’t as though sea travel was a major obstacle between the human kingdoms and Xadia. Most if not all the roads to and from her ancestral home were entirely land-based, so she hadn’t had to brave the murderous ocean ever since their stint with Captain Villads, which she still claimed was one of the worst experiences of her life.

“You alright?” she heard Callum say beside her, as they sat atop the boulder and looked out toward the lake. “You look a little pale.”

“Just a little… cold,” she lied, shrugging. It wasn’t a complete lie, of course. The breeze had picked up considerably in the last half hour they’d been walking, but she was pretty used to the cold when living in Katolis.

Ever the gentleman, Callum took off his overcoat and draped it over her shoulders, ignoring her protests. She grinned sheepishly at him and cuddled closer to him, the warmth of the coat enveloping her only slightly more than her closeness to him.

“Thanks,” she said, her voice soft. He moved around for a second before settling in against the rock and wrapping an arm around her.

“Anything for you,” he said. She felt her cheeks heat up, almost childishly. He had complimented her thousands of times over the years, but it still didn’t mean she was used to it.

“Y’know, there was an actual reason I brought us here tonight,” he added after a few minutes of silence.

“Oh?” she said, looking up at him curiously.

“Well, I just wanted to, uh, tell you how much I love you, and how much better you’ve made not only my life, but everyone’s,” he said, clearly fumbling for words, as though he had rehearsed this and did not want to get a single thing wrong. “You’re beautiful and kind, and strong, and…” he trailed off, looking down at her apologetically. “I’m very bad at this.”

She chuckled and sat up straight, facing him as she had all those years ago under a crescent moon. “No, go on,” she said. “I like when you get all flustered.”

“Oh, then this should be a joyride for you,” he said, assuming her same posture. “I just… wanted to show you just how much I love you. Ever since you tried to kill me that night…” He looked at her with a smirk, and it was her turn to flush. “You changed my life, and I wouldn’t trade these last 8 years for the world. You make me feel whole, even in my worst days, or when I’m frustrated by a new spell, or a council meeting gone wrong. You’re always there for me. So…”

He turned slightly to the side and shoved his hand into his pocket, struggling against what she assumed were nerves. She was extremely curious as to where this was going, but her suspicions were rising. Eventually, he pulled out what seemed to be a rather small box. It was violet, like his undershirt and her eyes.

“Rayla,” Callum said, sucking in a breath and looking at her with those big green eyes of his sparkling in the starlight. He opened the small box and Rayla could finally see that it was a silver ring. It was adorned with two tiny amethysts, glinting brightly up at her, flanking what she recognized at once as a Moon Opal. Her breath caught in her throat, tears threatening to break surface with her eyes.

“Will you marry me?” she heard him say, almost hazily; as though in a dream.

She took several long looks at him, then back at the ring, then finally landed on his face, contorted with an awkwardness only Callum could pull off as cute instead of downright constipated. She let out a small laugh and nodded slowly, watching as his emerald green eyes widened, as though he couldn’t quite believe them.

“Yes,” she said softly. “Yes, I’ll marry you, you big dummy.” She launched herself at him and enveloped him in a rather strong hug, tears now flowing freely from her eyes, because who would even judge her for it? After a few seconds – or it might have been an hour – or several moonlit nights – they broke apart. She kissed him deeply and he grabbed the ring from the box, taking her left hand with his own.

“Uh…” he hesitated, looking from her hand to her face. “Which hand do elves wear wedding rings on?”

Rayla couldn’t help but giggle. In any other circumstance, she would have rolled her eyes and playfully punched him in the shoulder. This time, however, she just shrugged. “This one.” She pointed to her fourth finger, smiling.

A little more confidently, he took her hand and gingerly placed the ring on it. She heard him breathe a sigh of relief and chuckled.

“You were really nervous, weren’t ya?” she teased, admiring the ring on her hand. “You knew I was gonna say yes regardless, so why worry?”

“I did, but it still doesn’t make it any less nerve-wracking,” he said, shrugging. “You like it?”

“I love it, it’s beautiful,” she said, leaning in to kiss him again.

They lay back against the boulder, looking up at the sky, their hands clasped and breathing deep. The New Moon stood sentry in the sky, grey and muted against the starry night, yet oddly imposing. She could feel the pull of it in her bones; the characteristic surge of energy that nighttime gave her kind. She pondered this as a thought occurred to her.

“Was that what you were doing before?” she asked tentatively, glancing up at her boyfriend. No, not her boyfriend… her fiancé.

“Yeah, I remembered that time you showed me how you guys wish on the New Moon,” he explained, laying his head on the top of hers. “I guess I wanted to be extra lucky tonight.”

“You’re a dork,” she said, matter-of-factly.

“But I’m your dork,” he retorted.

Yes, he was her dork, and she was his. Forever.