#Bones ''King of Women Appreciation'' Fall

[bonefall]

longtime dc fan and i think a lot of people are angry because alex is obviously one of the most culturally relevant instances of misogyny in media. that being said being more culturally relevant doesn’t mean it’s the worst instance of misogyny and i think bumble definitely experiences more profound misogyny in the way the actual content is presented, if that makes sense

I get you, and that's a charitable way of looking at it.

I think what's rustling my jimmies is that like, there was a couple of WC fans being mildly dismissive of Alex in that note minefield, after dozens of comments of "fuck you how could you let the fridge woman lose" and "Bumble didn't deserve to win ANY rounds" and "how could A CAT experience misogyny." But then WE get blamed for the toxicity because THEY were butthurt that the Funny Cat People have the 'audacity' to win something they feel entitled to.

Like, we've gotta be endlessly charitable as we get openly insulted because they're upset about Alex losing, a very well-known and culturally relevant character with a legacy so massive we have a whole term named after her. But condemnations of "She's just a cat, letting WC into this poll was a mistake, Bumble can't even be a victim of misogyny" only started coming around once I started talking about it.

as if it's OUR fault people got passive-aggressive or even OPENLY aggressive towards us, and that we're "just as bad" for retaliating

But like you said, it's not a "Most Culturally Relevant Misogyny" tournament, it's a "Canon Misogyny Victims" tournament. And you're not even supposed to give a shit that Bumble died. The fat, woman abuse victim is beaten to death by a dictator, and your takeaway is meant to be, "It's so sad that Clear Sky is being blamed for murdering her, now they're all preparing for self-defense against a homicidal maniac, oh nooo :("

And I think that DOES make her deserve the win here! Alex is a MARTYR. Everyone with a brain agrees what happens to her is bad. It happened in her canon because it was bad. We talk about her and keep her memory alive. Bumble gets dismissed entirely out of hand because she's "just a cat in a kid's book" as if that doesn't make it worse, and as if the kid's book didn't treat a domestic abuse survivor like a moron for even asking for help.

Anyway, just to reiterate, I love DC fans. It's not all of you guys. Alex was done dirty and deserves justice-- and it's even kind of a shame that all she became is "The Fridge Woman." I haven't even heard people talk about how she was a wary, responsible person who was still ready to rock with Kyle's new weird glowstick powers, or that she was a journalist, or that she just got brought back in another edition as a Green Lantern only to be revealed as an illusion and re-absorbed back into Kyle's mind. Nope. Even her fans just remember her as The Fridge Woman.

[em-writes-stuff-sometimes]

ñuhus prūmӯs (my heart) │Chapter 8: Missive

terms of endearment ‘verse: see my Masterlist for the correct series order!

Chapter 1 │Chapter 2 │Chapter 3 │Chapter 4 │Chapter 5 │Chapter 6 │Chapter 7 │Chapter 8 │Chapter 9 │Chapter 10 │Chapter 11 │Chapter 12 (COMPLETE!)

Synopsis: Childbirth is the duty and dismay of all highborn women. Together, you and Daemon experience the trials, tribulations and triumphs of expectant parenthood. Daemon solves a problem.

(Set post-episode 7, though Daemon never married Laena or Rhaenyra.)

Thank you to @angelqueen04​​​, @ewanmitchellcrumbs​ and @ajthefujoshi​ for holding my hand throughout the drafting, teehee!

Triggers: incest, age gap, purity culture, detailed depictions of pregnancy, violence.

Fucking useless, he thinks. Then again, what was I expecting?

The High Septon is a rambling, tedious man of fourscore and one summers, closer to the grave than he is to the land of the living. Daemon’s surprised that he’s still functioning. It had taken some time for the lackwit to sink himself into the chair opposite him, so brittle are his bones in his dotage, and fix his milk-glazed eyes in his direction. Even longer for him to finally dispense with the pleasantries and focus on the goal at hand.

Questioning him had taken every iota of his sparing patience. The man had repeated the exact same avowal as he had to the others: that he was “praying night and day for the Princess in the wake of such an abominable event”, that he “knew not” who the now-dead men emblazoned with his fucking Seven-Pointed Star are, that they could not be agents of the Seven, that the Faith Militant “are extinct as they have been since the reign of your grandsire, the blessed King Jaehaerys”.

Yes, he snorts, because men who fuck their sisters are ‘blessed’. As long as a cleric speaks and waves a bit of ribbon in front of them first.

The dullard had fainted away when he’d unveiled the proof of his claims, the rather excellent pickling he’d had the healer woman perform on the head of one of the two remaining bodies in your old chambers. He supposes the sight would have been rather garish.

The dead man’s eyes are wide open from the shock of Mallery’s sudden impalement, alert and startling from within the eerie discoloured liquid. And, most importantly, the carving of the star is on full display to all who may cast their gaze upon it. He’d had to get the servants to take the damned jar away, the severed head bobbing about comically as they’d departed, and wait for the old man’s attendants to rouse him.

At any rate, he’s come to appreciate that no answers will spring from this avenue of interrogation. He departs the High Septon’s chambers—in the Tower of the Hand, of all places—with as much information as he had possessed prior to his visit.

Fuck all, that is.

Daemon finds Largent and Breakbones standing around in the middle bailey, clearly trying to be as inconspicuous as possible. Their respective sizes rather prevent the accomplishment of that objective. Even with faces carefully blank and posture forbidding, the two attract many a curious eye from passers-by.

“Anything?” the Strong lad asks when he nears, shifting away from the wall with a grave disposition.

He offers a cynical half-laugh in response, striding onward. The pair fall into step on either side of him, a singular unit marching onward to the Holdfast.

He’d been taken aback by the sudden appearance of Harwin Strong earlier this morning. It transpired that Rhaenyra was alerted to the attack—and he is chagrined to admit that he’d entirely forgotten to alert her himself—and had been making ready to fly to King’s Landing. Naturally, Viserys had issued summary directives that would bar his eldest daughter access to any means of transportation off Dragonstone.

Thinking of that row still gives Daemon the urge to hit something.

“I’ll not have my heir caught up in this contemptible plot, Daemon,” his brother says between weak coughs, groaning as the fit abates. He slumps forward into the chair while the Maesters coax leeches to latch upon the mutilated skin of his back. “What if Rhaenyra is to be the next target? Allowing her into the city would only make that easier, would it not? Nay, it is best she stays on the isle, away from all this mess.”

“So, you acknowledge that your city isn’t safe, do you?” He paces in Viserys’s line of sight. “If security’s such a concern for you, then do something about it! Double—triple the guards! Recruit more men for the City Watch! Rally troops from the fucking Crownlands—”

“And what good would that do other than engender panic?” Viserys sighs. “No. I’ll not bring upheaval to the capital to allay your rage, brother. There’s been no new attempts, and you’re managing well enough on the search.”

Well enough? He’s man enough to admit he’s floundering, though he’ll never admit to such a thing before the sycophants from Oldtown. They’ll probably go running to old Otto to crow about Lord Flea Bottom’s failures while they clamber to lick the shit from his arsehole. No. Whoever this cunt is, he’s an apparition, a ghost in the wind.

Daemon is impressed by his own ability to refrain from yelling at the King and getting himself thrown out. He takes a breath and tries again. “My wife could do with her elder sister’s comfort. Would you not provide her with that?”

He tries not to think upon how tearful and reticent you have been as of late, a return to the you that had filled his waking hours in the days immediately following the threat on your life. Something is wrong, and he knows not what—only that you need as much soothing as he can garner.

“She has her siblings and stepmother here,” Viserys says. He cannot help but to scoff at the pronouncement. The only ones you willingly spend time with are your half-sister and youngest brother, and it’s unlikely you’ll find succour in the ramblings of a witchling or a child. “She has you. Will Rhaenyra really make much of a difference? I think not.”

This time, he almost follows through on the urge to strike the King. It is not uncommon for Kings to favour their heirs above all else—who better than he to know that truth?—but he’d thought for one foolish moment that perhaps you might be exempt from it this time.

He is wrong.

“Fine, then,” he just barely grits out from between clenched teeth. “I’ll take my leave, Your Grace. I have a hunt to continue.”

Breakbones’s voice interrupts. “What exactly have you learned thus far, my Prince?”

Daemon glances dubiously at him. He admires the enthusiasm with which the man has readily proffered assistance in the task of searching out the primary conspirator—no doubt the very reason Rhaenyra elected to send him, being among those of her confidants with the soundest pretext for paying visit to King’s Landing—but it seems foolish to speak of details out here. Ordinarily, he’d take the man to task for it. But the steps traversing down to the royal residences are perhaps the most private he is like to get until safely in your rooms once more, dotted with the occasional guard along the way. Moreover, he is not overeager to remind you of the attack in your condition.

“Nothing of note,” he says, taking the next several steps onward to ensure he’s firmly out of earshot of the last watchman before he continues. “An alias and a pin. Rumours, but nothing concrete.”

Withdrawing his sole piece of evidence from the pouch at his belt, he rolls the brass insect between thumb and finger consideringly, feeling the crevices and sharp edges that make up its metalwork anatomy. The piss-coloured stone defining the last segments of its abdomen—he suspects it’s more likely glass than anything of real value—appears amber in the daylight. He watches as it passes from his own hand to Strong’s, the man holding it aloft and squinting.

To the unenlightened, the trinket may bear the likeness of a bee or a beetle. If not for the pseudonym extracted from that scum in the brothel, he too would have assumed as such. He’d confirmed it by spending evenings after you had fallen asleep poring over dusty old illustrations from stained old tomes on entomology from scholars long since dead. Hadn’t that been an exciting venture.

The man is taking far longer to examine it than is the norm. Daemon’s heartbeat quickens. “Do you recognise it?” he asks.

“Yes,” Strong murmurs finally, frowning and turning the pin over in overlarge fingers. “I… I’ve seen it before. ‘Tis a firefly, is it not?”

“That it is.” A sick, swooping excitement curdles in his gut. This is what he has been waiting for. Finally, someone has recognised this blasted thing. Finally, someone knows it by name. “How do you know that?”

Breakbones appears to stare at some fixed point beyond him, lost in his own thoughts. “My brother, Larys.”

Clubfoot.

Larys Strong is an unsettling being—Daemon hesitates to call him a man—who always seems as though he can discern every last secret a person is concealing with a mere glance. He’s the worst sort of creature. One who hides himself behind oily amiability and glib half-speak, each and every encounter ringing with some unknown threat.

The lad before him looks back down to study the item in his grasp.  “As a youth,” he continues, “he was fascinated by them. Used to capture them in jars and shake them until they were stunned, then—pull them apart with Mother’s needles. He wanted to know how they made their light. He’d… pin the pieces to shavings of wood and present them to Mother as a gift.” The memory seems to disconcert him, for his face twitches with the effort of suppressing some unknown emotion.

Ice trickles down Daemon’s spine.

Viserys had ignored his incredulity after he’d discovered that Clubfoot had been named Master of Whisperers. “He has a talent for gathering intelligence, and his House is loyal,’” the King had said.

His House is loyal—but what of him?

“That”—Daemon jerks his chin toward the pin—“was found on one of the attackers.” He stares at Breakbones assessingly. “Would you say your brother still has his… fascination?”

“Wait—you think Larys is behind this?”

Before he has the opportunity to respond to Strong’s obvious perturbation, Largent grunts. Fuck. Daemon had forgotten he had been standing there.

“Seen ‘im around the city at night,” the knight says, the bass notes thrumming through the rock beneath his feet. Hells, but the man’s a fucking giant. “In some of the more crooked places, too. Could be doing ‘is job. Could be up to no good.”

That sounds about right. The Master of Whisperers is a position that brings with it a necessity to lurk about in unsavoury alleys and disreputable establishments, a spider spinning its web of informants across King’s Landing. It could be used to disguise dealings that have little to do with the Realm.

In this moment, he is almost certain.

“The mastermind calls himself ‘the Firefly’.” Daemon’s legs are already itching with the urge to bolt back up the steps and to the middle gate, through, past, onward to the outer yard, to the Great Hall, to the Small Council chamber, where he is no doubt sitting, watching, waiting— “Tell me he’s not capable of it,” he demands of Strong. “Swear it, and I’ll be merciful.”

Breakbones’s jaw works for what seems like hours, face flushing with the strain of the conflict he is like to be wrestling with, a brother made to decide if he can live with the consequences of standing aside so that justice might prevail upon his own blood. Daemon might have found it somewhere in himself to be sympathetic, perhaps any other time, but not here, not now, not at the prospect of finally coming face-to-face with the scum who is responsible for the way you had looked that night, covered in gore and trembling and so fucking terrified—

“I… I cannot,” the man finally says, defeated. It is all the acceptance he needs.

As Daemon strides back along the path he has just traversed, he allows the conviction to fill his body like smoke and ash fills the sky after a conflagration.

Larys Strong is privy to the movements of the royal family, he thinks, mind whirling. The Master of Whisperers knows everything that occurs in his city of employ. It’s the point of the fucking job. He’d have known that Daemon was away, that you were alone, that few would hear you in chambers so far from—

How difficult would it have been for scum like him—someone with a network of spies that spans an entire city—to pass the order to strike along to the cutthroats?

The pieces fall conveniently into place—or perhaps he is making them fit. Truthfully, he cares little about seeking proof of the matter from the mouth of Larys Strong. For the crime of association alone, Daemon is willing to see him pay. And, if nothing else, his death will send a message that the Rogue Prince is cleansing the city piece by wretched piece.

The thud of boots on stone pound in tandem with the drum of his beating heart, the rhythm of bloodlust kindling the fuel in his veins to living flame. Someone will die today. He feels this settle with assurance into the very hollows of his bones, as sure as he had been standing before you in the great winds of Dragonstone with blood dripping from your hand and your lip in consecration of a pledge made before the gods of Old Valyria.

Avy amīsilun. I will protect you. The vows had been struck, and they must now be defended.

Daemon only vaguely notes the scattering of the court like ants as he marches through the main walkways, to the empty Great Hall and onward, flanked by Breakbones and Largent.

The Kingsguard manning the doors to the Small Council chamber make their usual racket at being ordered to step aside—“the King and his Council are within, you cannot enter!”—but they are no match for him when his blood is up. He watches dispassionately as Largent forces them to step aside for their Prince, shoving them bodily to the floor with an almighty clang of plate armour. The heavy oak doors burst open from the power behind his shove, and the occupants within erupt.

“Your Highness!”

“My Prince, really—”

“Prince Daemon—”

“What is the meaning of this?” Viserys’s voice just barely cuts over the din. He looks especially ghastly in the light pouring in behind him, creating a halo of brightness that ought to accentuate something of grandeur—of beauty—but instead only serves to highlight the decay of the man who calls himself King. “Brother—”

There he is. Daemon doesn’t give a fuck about his brother’s outrage, not when Larys Strong sits at the end of the table right in front of him. It’s almost surprising that he’s not hanging off the Queen’s leg. Or worse, the Hand’s. Though he’s done well to craft something of concerned impassivity from his features, there is a smug little almost-smile that plays at the very corner of his mouth.

He knows. He knows and he’s mocking me—

“Forgive me, Your Grace,” Daemon says. “But your Master of Whisperers has just been implicated in the plot against my wife’s life. Largent”—he jerks his head toward the finely-garbed form of Clubfoot—“take him.”

Several things occur at once: Otto and his bitch of a daughter spring from their seats, yelling orders at the Kingsguard within the chamber; said guards advance with blades extended, barring the way forward; the remaining milksops at the table begin squawking as they are wont to do, contributing little other than pointless noise.

And, in the midst of all of it, Larys Strong is calm, an immovable stone object with lips carved into a smile.

“Stay your hand!”

“My Prince, this is all too—”

“Preposterous!” Alicent says, seeming so wroth that Daemon would not be surprised if her heart were to suddenly give out from the strain of forcing so much blood to her face. She makes a grandiose sweeping gesture with her arm. Supercilious bitch. “Lord Strong is a member of the Small Council and a loyal servant to the King! You cannot cast aspersions upon his name without—”

Larys himself interrupts.  “Might I enquire as to the charges against me, my Prince?”

A chill creeps across Daemon’s neck. The man sounds as nonchalant as a noblewoman at high tea, tone casual and polite.

“Why?” he asks, automatically stepping forward. The Kingsguard block his way, but he cannot look away from the man before him. “So you can make sure to dispose of any tangible proof? Shut the fuck up.”

More squawking. Perhaps I should have directed that last part to the entire room.

The King appears apoplectic, though the colour casts an almost healthy sheen across his waxy, grey-sheened visage. “You will explain yourself, Daemon, or I will have you thrown out of this chamber!”

How typical of his brother to side with anyone—anyone—other than him. Daemon wonders for a moment if he could get away with shoving the guards aside, striding over to Viserys and throttling him, punishing him for the negligence he has paid to his family, to you.

Instead, he scoffs, hand falling to rest upon the pommel of Dark Sister. “The Lord of Harrenhal himself has traced a vital piece of evidence back to Strong, here.” The deliberate phrasing lands as intended. The others glance uncomfortably at each other, no doubt concerned by the prospect of contending with another nobleman’s accusation against one of their own. “I’ll be remanding him for questioning.”

“If you will not divulge this supposed ‘evidence’, then there is no further reason for your presence,” Hightower says. He gestures at the Kingsguard. “Guards!”

A true weakling, relying on the steel of other men to enforce his will. The guards lock blades, hindering the way.

“Why, Otto”—Daemon glares at the Hand—“one might find it suspect that you are so keenly interested in obstructing the Princess’s justice. Is there anything you ought to be hiding?”

The Hand is a craven, but there is nothing tying him to this plot. He would know—he’d wasted far too much time in corroborating this. Nonetheless, it is thoroughly enjoyable to watch the man squirm like an enemy soldier pinned to the ground through the ribcage, twitching and writhing in place.

“Absolutely ridiculous—”

“Enough!” Viserys exclaims. Otto falls silent immediately, sitting down in a pathetic display of deference to the half-withered man at his left. “Daemon,” the King says, “you will obey the directives of this Council or you will be removed.”

“Fine.” Daemon turns to face the target of his wrath. “Tell me, Strong. What does ‘the Firefly’ mean to you?”

Breakbones shifts uncomfortably at his back. Larys Strong affects affability, though it rings obsequious and sinister.

“It is an insect,” the man says in a tone that is almost crooning. It is fucking eerie. His head tilts and his eyes grow hazy, staring far-off as though in a daydream. That same unnerving half-smile lingers still. “I quite enjoyed studying them as a boy—”

Daemon has had enough of the prevaricating. “Someone who calls himself ‘the Firefly’ ordered the attack on my wife,” he snarls, straining at the steel barrier, “and that someone is you!”

He is pushed back once more, and he is about ready to throw a fist or two at the exposed slivers of jugular peeking out from all that gold in front of him. It mightn’t incapacitate the guards, but it will certainly delay them long enough for him to rearrange Clubfoot’s insides with Dark Sister.

“My Prince!” Larys’s hand flutters over his chest like a maiden, the very picture of overdramatised surprise. It boggles him that he is the only one to see this act for what it is. “I have never been anything but loyal to the Princess. What cause would I have to commit such an atrocity?”

Words. They’re all just words. Daemon is about to snap a demand for Larys Strong’s arrest when he takes notice of a gem glittering golden in the sunlight streaming from the window. A gem that is nestled upon the man’s cane.

Surely not—

He relaxes against the guards’ hold on him, stepping back with hands raised. As he had expected, it prompts an ever-so-slight lowering of their blades, a sure sign that they perceive the immediate danger to be over.

They are wrong.

Daemon strikes quickly, throwing his weight at the guard closest to him so as to knock him off balance. The man topples like a tower during a siege. Largent and Breakbones surge into the fray behind him, fending off the rest. It is all the opening he needs. He is able to snatch the cane from its resting place propped against the table and stare for a scant few seconds. Though he dimly registers the occupants of the table scrambling away—all save for Larys Strong, sitting so still it is as though he intends to blend into the chair—he cannot care, so fixated is he upon the metalwork adorning the handhold.

Wings warped out to reveal the inner body. Three ridges demarcating the abdomen. Antennae curving downwards from the head. And that fucking gem, warmer in colour than the pin, but so similar in cut that they can only have been made for the same purpose.

“You fucking liar—” he might whisper, might shout. As he brings the cane down over the cowering form of Larys Strong, the wood breaks apart on impact with the man’s head. It splinters into two sharply pointed parts. How fitting would it be for him to meet his end impaled by the proof of his involvement in your attack? “You will die for this!”

Daemon raises his arm high, preparing to pierce the jagged end of the cane through flesh. Larys Strong’s watery blue eyes are wide, reflective and crystalline in a way that belies true shock, horror, unadulterated emotion. Blood streams from the point of impact atop his scalp, matting his hair bloody and striping rivulets of crimson along the pale of his temples. He is nestled as far down into the seat as is possible, arms lifted to shield his skull from further assault, and it is the first sign of fear he’s shown since Daemon walked in.

“Enough! Guards!” the King roars.

He revels in it, in the fact that this man knows he is about to perish at his hand, is about to meet whatever gods he believes in for daring to harm his wife and children, for daring to harm what is his. He brings the makeshift lance down with all his might—

A harsh blow to his gut preludes the unyielding grip of whichever of Viserys’s dogs have managed to bypass Largent and Breakbones. He can do naught but wheeze as he is seized firm and hauled back, struggling against the guards’ hold to no avail. He growls like a beast dragged from its meal, frantic and feverish, unhinged in a way he has never felt before.

Maegor the Cruel reborn, Daemon thinks wildly. Let them see the horror that lurks within the blood of the dragon—

“Viserys—” he tries to say, but it takes on a decidedly inhuman cadence, brutish and bellowing.

“How have you the audacity to enter this place in such a manner? I do not recall granting you leave to slaughter members of my Council on a whim!” The sound of his brother’s voice shatters the spell of madness, and he finally absorbs the scene before him.

The Small Council members are huddled in the corner of the chamber, ashen-faced and trembling. The Queen cringes behind her father, eyes tear-bright and fearful. Otto looks upon him with alarm and revulsion in equal measure, and he is sure there is a moue of satisfaction twisting the very edges of his expression. Cunt.

The sheer disappointment contorting Viserys’s expression would have once been enough to bring up stinging bile in the back of his throat. But this—this rotting creature before him, pockmarked and deformed, elicits nothing but contempt and the faint taste of regret, bitter and stale from things left unsaid.

Defend your daughter. Defend my wife.

Defend me, brother.

“If there is truth to your accusations, let there be a trial,” the King says. “There will be nothing further from you this day, Daemon. Begone from my sight.”

His brother dismisses him with a scoff and flick of his remaining hand, turning away from him as he always does. Daemon jostles the guards away from him when they release their punitive grasp on his arms, sneering at the way they immediately grip the pommels of their sheathed blades in silent warning.

“Are you well, my Lord?” the Hightower bitch asks, standing over Larys Strong with a finger gingerly tipping his head this way and that, taking stock of the injury.

The man looks past the Queen and stares directly into Daemon’s glare, cool and calculating. Though he is clearly shaken, there is something distinctly unsettling about the notes of impassivity that reveal themselves in the subtle arch of his brow, the bluntness of his regard, the flare of his nostrils. His gaze shifts to somewhere behind Daemon, smirking. The creak and slam of the door heralds Harwin’s intemperate departure. Whatever the man had seen in his younger brother’s eyes had clearly been enough to rattle him.

Clubfoot smiles up at Alicent. It is an unfriendly thing. “The Prince has… much rage in him over the harm done to his lady wife. Perhaps I would be free of it if he were only present at the outset of the attack,” he says mournfully, so obviously mocking in nature that even Otto himself glances uncertainly at the man. “But I do not take offence, Your Grace.”

Daemon seethes. How dare he—bastard—

His feet carry him forward without thinking, only to be grabbed firmly at the shoulders by the guards. He shrugs them off with a huff. “Make no mistake, you cunt,” he hisses. “You might have been shielded by these useless fucks today. But you cannot hide behind them forever. One day soon, you’ll be alone. And one day soon, I’ll have my revenge. Bisir kīvio Jaehossi Uēpossi Arlȳssī sēten.” This I vow by the Old Gods and the New.

“Daemon!”

“And you,” he says, turning to the King. “Long have I watched your weakness rule you. Long have I stood by as you’ve run this family into ruin. This man”—he points to Larys—“is responsible for the harm done to your daughter. My wife. And so, I also promise this: if you do nothing… you are no brother of mine.”

Silence reigns for a beat; two; three. All he can hear is the sound of his own breath being forced from bruised lungs, heavy and gasping.

“Guards,” Viserys says finally. For a moment, Daemon is hopeful. He looks triumphantly to Larys Strong, ready to see the man taken up and borne forth from the room. Then, the King sighs and looks down. “Remove my brother from this chamber.”

His hope turns to ash.

The first thing he does after Viserys’s lackeys all but throw him from the room is find some parchment. In truth, it’s a simple matter of venturing to the storeroom adjoined to the Council chambers—he ignores the faint pulse of interest at the recollection of the last time he had been in here, the taste of your slick and the clench of your cunt as he’d fucked you into the wall to the sound of those droning lackwits mumbling to each other—and retrieving what he needs.

“… gone too far, Your Grace. He cannot be allowed…”

“… assault a member of the King’s Council is unheard of! He must be…”

“… will be dealt with, I assure you, my Lords…”

Daemon bites his tongue so hard that the taste of iron fills his mouth, fingers flexing at the trails of dialogue that can be heard from within the meeting itself. Of course they’re more concerned with the fact that he’d struck Larys Strong than the discovery that had provoked such a thing. He grits his teeth and leaves, not wishing to hear further proof of Viserys’s disloyalty.

Every test, every obstacle, every affliction brought to life by my desire to see my brother finally choose me. Viserys had failed me in all, and he has failed me now. No more.

He doesn’t bother to venture forth from the hall. Instead, he retraces a path from long ago, ascending the dais upon which rests the greatest emblem of the Conqueror’s victory over Westeros.

Needs must.

The throne is an uncomfortable seat, but serviceable enough for this particular purpose, he supposes. He sets the open inkwell and pounce pot on the misshapen armrest, laying the parchment over his knee and dipping the quill lightly.

“Milord—”

“What?” He does not bother to look down at Largent, loitering at the base of the pulpit uncertainly, the hulking giant having followed him unerringly throughout his self-appointed task. As he speaks, he scrawls his message black upon blanched paper. It lacks refinement, but perhaps that’s for the best. “What will they do—mount the steps and drag me off?”

The Kingsguard, newly returned to their station at the Council doors, can hear him. He’s sure of it. They do not react, do not even move, but he knows his jibe meets its mark. Snorting at his own question, Daemon discards the quill carelessly and sprinkles powder over the wet ink, tapping the excess all over the floor.

He rolls the parchment up and holds it out, wiggling it jauntily in the City Watch captain’s line of sight to coax him forth. When the scroll is in his palm, Daemon leans forward. “Take this to the madam of The Gilded Doll,” he murmurs. The chill of menace pinches at the flesh around his eyes. “No other. If this falls into the wrong hands, I’ll gut you. Understood?”

“Yessir.” If he’s confused by the order, it does not show on his face. Largent abruptly revolves and marches his way out of the room, the beating of leather soles on hard stone fading with every advancing step.

Daemon slouches upon the Iron Throne. There is a sense of deep weariness slithering through his veins like poison, drawing the vitality from his limbs with every pulse of his blood. It is different, this sensation, so unlike the pent-up explosivity that threatens to obliterate everything in his path whenever he loses in a row with Viserys.

Against a prince turned heir turned king, I lose always. Always.

All the weight of his thirty-six years of existence seems to bear down upon his shoulders. He imagines it is what a brother’s warm embrace might feel like, heavy and overbearing. Pinching at the bridge of his nose, he tries to relieve the sudden ache. Tension presses insistently behind his eyes, forcing him to shut his lids.

He takes stock of what he knows.

Larys Strong tried to engineer the deaths of his unborn babes. By extension, your own. He used an alias to recruit three assassins of little repute, waiting until he was sure Daemon would be away to strike against you. And, when confronted, he’d had the audacity to make bold pretence of innocence before the King and his stooges, covertly deriding Daemon’s powerlessness before the governors of the Seven Kingdoms.

But why? Why? He cannot think of the motive. What would a creature like Larys Strong have to gain from this depravity?

Harwin’s words from earlier spark an intriguing thought. “He’d… pin the pieces to shavings of wood and present them to Mother as a gift.”

The man has no allies at court save for Alicent and Otto. Though Daemon despises them, even he cannot accuse the Queen and her father of encouraging such a plot. They’re too grasping, too arrogant, too soft to risk discovery of such a thing, even if they have the most to gain from it. That Larys has taken it upon himself to gift the Hightowers with the elimination of the greatest threats to their claim on the Throne seems quite possible. He’s like a barn cat proudly presenting a kill at the feet of its master, oblivious to the disgust and disdain.

Either way, Clubfoot has made himself an enemy. Fuck Viserys, and fuck his Council, too. Daemon doesn’t care what they have ordered of him. Clubfoot will not live long enough to regret what he has done.

He leaves the pilfered instruments on the Throne—let the King dispose of them himself, the useless cunt—and makes his way back to you, seized by the need to see you safe, to reassure himself that no other has sought to harm you during his pursuit of justice. As they had before, the promenading nobles and bustling servants give him a wide berth, ogling him with wary eyes and whispering to each other. He takes the opportunity to glare at a select few, to sneer at their flinching reactions when he passes them along the way to the royal wing of the Holdfast.

You are exactly where he left you that morning.

Daemon lingers in the doorway, ignoring Marbrand’s presence in the entry beside him, and watches the scene within your chambers. He observes young Daeron chattering to the healer at the table as he fiddles with the various flasks, pots and implements strewn across the surface. He sees the grin on Ūlla’s face at the excitement in the boy’s voice, nodding and contributing her own conversation in hushed volume while she passes instruments to him. He surveys the cheerful dispositions of Jeyne Cressey and Bethany Follard, your newly-appointed ladies-in-waiting—girls whose presence had been given little explanation or fanfare—as they sit on the chaise with their stitching, gossiping idly among themselves.

He watches you.

You are propped up against the headboard with legs curled under you, heavy-lidded and focused on some minute detail on the sleeve of your gown, or perhaps the mattress beneath you, or maybe even the stone floor further away. He does not know. Your fingers stroke listlessly, absently at the taut flesh of your belly, arms pressed to the bulk of your own self as though you are afraid your babes will disappear from your womb should you let go. There is something ethereal about the picture you make; immensely swelled, distant, turned so deeply within yourself that you seem content to let the world move on without you.

“Nuncle!” Daeron waves, sparing but a glance before preoccupying himself once more with the woman’s trinkets.

He offers a nod of acknowledgement to his nephew as he makes his way to where you sit. Daemon is careful to lower himself slowly, hand outstretched and ghosting featherlight along the back of your hand in greeting.

You lift your gaze, a look of vague question twisting the arch of your brow. The fog clears from your eyes when you realise who has come to disturb your trance. “Kepus.” It is sighing, dreamy, as though it had taken a great effort to expel the sound from your chest, almost a question and yet not.

Something is wrong. The words replay themselves like snatches of long-forgotten melodies ringing in his mind, the warning bells sounding for a cause unknown. It has been days now. This is more than the fear or despondency that had characterised your behaviour in the aftermath of the attack. He is no closer to determining the cause.

“Dōnītsos.” Sweetling. His voice remains low and calm despite the turmoil swarming within like hatchlings through their first flame, loud and squawking and chaotic. He is wary of these strangers, these new ladies of yours, mousy and guileless though they seem, and so he keeps to his mother tongue to avoid prying ears.

“Mirros avy ivestragon eman. Vīlībāzmo bē issa.”I have to tell you something. It’s about the attack.

“Skorion massitas?” you ask, blinking in unhurried revolutions as though you are batting cobwebs of disuse from your lashes. What has happened?

He takes hold of your hand, light and cool to touch, squeezing it in his grasp to moor you back to reality. You stare blankly as he imparts the barest of details. The pin. The whorehouse. The long list of those he’d interrogated—and not kindly, at that—from the cooks to the pageboys to the maids who had dared venture near your rooms that night. The High Septon. Breakbones. And, finally, the threatening smile of Larys Strong as the knights of the Kingsguard had hauled him from the Small Council chamber.

Your bottom lip trembles in the way it did when you were a babe squalling for comfort, throat working in tandem with your reflexive swallows. It is tempting to feed his thumb into that rosebud mouth, let you suckle your anguish away with the salt of his skin as your infant self had done, hot wet tongue and spit and tears, in need of something only he can provide.

“Skorio syt…” Why…

Your breath escapes with a shudder, palm flying low upon your belly, and he brings his free hand up to join yours at the locus of activity stirred up by the twins. A flurry of movement greets him, firm thumps and hard kicks that curve the corners of his lips up despite the gravity of the conversation. Their motions seem to ground you. Trust my little dragons to settle their muña where I cannot.

You take a deep inhale and try again. “Skorio syt ziry kesir non gōntoks? Zijomy vēttīlaksir emon daor.” Why would he have done such a thing? I have no quarrel with him.

“Gīmion daor,” he says softly. I don’t know. There is no need to frighten you with tales of butchered insects and a young boy’s obsession.

You shiver like a baby bird left out in the cold as he slides further onto the bed, helping you shuffle close enough that you may latch onto the parts of him within your reach and press your face into his neck, huffing against his skin. This is where you prefer to be as of late, swaddled tight and held close, trembling waif of a girl curled under the wing of your beloved uncle.

“Papa. Yne mīstos daor.” It is muffled, muted, but he hears it all the same. He did not stand for me.

Your voice is high, mournful, so startlingly young. For a moment, he is twenty-five summers and you are seven and you have just split flesh after tripping over Caraxes’s tail. For a moment, he is hushing you as you sob with the Maester’s every stitch, streaming nose snuffling while he cups your eggshell skull to his chest to shield you from the blood and pain and fear as best he can.

He does the same now, only your bones are steel rather than glass and you smell of rose oil and the swell of your breasts and belly push against his body in triplicate, a woman grown and his wife, his wife. “Gīmin,” he says gently, hand to your middle and hand through your hair. I know.

“Ziry otāpton.” I thought he would. You nuzzle into him like a cat seeking the warmth of a fire. “Skorio syt yne amīsagon… olvī jorrāelos daor?” you ask, voice breaking. Why doesn’t he… love me enough to protect me?

“Ziry ajorrāelō daor,” Daemon replies resolutely. You don’t need him. “Yne aemā.” You have me. He strokes your middle. “Īlōn aemā.” You have us.

‘I’ll be your father,’ he wants to say. Why not? What is a father but his daughter’s guiding star, the one man to map her journey from first breath to last? Father, uncle, husband… all of them words to denote pride of place in your life, a standing he has alone claimed since his return from the East. You are his small fey princess, his baby full of his babes; he is your disciplinarian and confidant and comforter and lover. A distinction of title means little. If it is the firm hand of a father—a papa—that you need… well, does he not already provide it?

He will be your papa, your kepa, your husband. The man who corrects you and instructs you and fucks you, the man who raises you up even as he raises the children who slumber still in the safety of your womb. He’ll be all that Viserys has failed to be and more.

You sniffle, teary poppet with lilac-bloom eyes staring up at him. “Kesīr buqan.” I hate it here. And, though the capital is arguably the greatest spectacle of Targaryen strength, your confession is a sentiment he shares. Your little hand holds tighter to his shirt as you continue. “Henujagon jaelan. Mazumbille jagon jaelan. Ñuhe rūhossa Zaldrīzdōrot sikagon jaelan, luon ȳghon issa. Jagon kosti, kostilus—”

I want to leave. I want to go home. I want to have my babes on Dragonstone, where it’s safe. Can we go, please—

“Sh.” As he smooths the stray hairs from your forehead, you arch into the touch like one who is starved of love. He tries not to think of the ways his brother has failed you. “Aōle qūvyrzy iqighō daor. Hembīli.” Don’t make yourself upset. We’ll leave.

There is nothing left for you here. There is nothing left for him here. It is all too easy to agree to your desperate pleas. How amusing it is to think that Dragonstone—the fortress he had once associated so strongly with emptiness and exile—is where his heart and yours now lie. For the first time in days, he can see the trace of a smile warm the curve of your lips, and the sparkle in your eyes can almost be mistaken for happiness.

Daemon sits with you in the stillness of the afternoon, surrounded by your ladies and your young brother and your healer—the last vestiges of familiarity left to this place, this home turned battleground—and indulges in the simple joy of those pulsing movements emanating out from within your belly, the sound of Daeron’s laughter, the beat of your heart against his skin and the feel of you real and whole in his arms.

This is the family I’ve made for myself, he thinks. You and he and the lad and his babes, something tangible and ever-growing and precious. This is mine.

In Daemon’s practised opinion, the Crafty Fox is one of the capital’s finest taverns. Situated on the corner between Eel Alley and the Street of Steel, it is often a loud and boisterous environment, easily accessible through entrances along both street-facing walls and constantly filled with patrons from various stations in life. It is a rare sort of place, one where the divide between noble and lowborn blurs in a haze of ale and laughter and smoke. Popular, cheap and long-standing, it is the worst sort of establishment for conducting meetings of a clandestine nature.

Which is precisely why it is also the perfect location.

The shadier locales will undoubtedly be manned by Clubfoot’s little informants, and so he has chosen to meet his quarry in a location few would guess or expect. With his hair pulled back and his hood keeping his face from the view of inebriated passers-by—he’s even wearing a fucking hat for good measure! The shame of it—Daemon knows from experience that no one here will notice that they stand in the presence of the Rogue Prince. It is the best camouflage for the enterprise he intends to conduct this night.

Where the fuck are they? he thinks to himself, pressing along the perimeter and scanning around the open hall, searching for a familiar face. What did her missive say? Ah, yes—I’ll recognise one of them.

He casts about for the former serjeant of the City Watch, the one he’d had to let go after that unfortunate business with the whore in the brothel some ten summers back. But try as he might, he cannot see anything. Too many soldiers and apprentices and shop owners and youths are in his way.

One of the drunkards blocking his view sidles along, opening a path directly to the two men seated in a rare quiet corner, a looming beast hunched over his rickety table and all but squashing the slim form beside him into the wall.

There.

Daemon does his best to affect the casual, ambling gait of a man in his cups, navigating a meandering trail through raucous clusters of bodies, sweaty and stinking of drink. It is a familiar scent, one that evokes the memory of years past.

Sidling along, he finds himself standing before his intended targets. “The air’s cold tonight,” he says loudly, deliberately, echoing the agreed-upon phrase from the message and drawing the attention of the two men.

They look up from the wood-grain surface of the table. “This is true,” the smaller one replies, slow and equally careful to pronounce the words. The correct response.

His speech is coarse, utterly typical of the lower classes in Flea Bottom. Satisfied that he’s found the individuals he has come to meet, he slides onto the stool opposite them, glancing this way and that.

“Evenin’, ser,” the man adds.

He looks like a rat, Daemon thinks. With a pinched face and tawny sprouted hairs on his jowls that look more like the whiskers of a rodent than the beginnings of a beard, the observation is apt. The man ogles him from behind his prominently pointed snout, grinning a strange little half-smile that unsettles him greatly.

“The White Wyrm?” he asks, just to confirm. Fucking ridiculous name. It seems her years as his paramour served for more than coin and pleasure if her new epithet is anything to go by.

This time, the former serjeant responds, shifting in his seat. His knees knock against Daemon’s below the table. Gods above. There is an audible creak, the sound of wood threatening to snap under immense weight.

“Yep,” he grunts, bass cadence thrumming through the floor. He could be Largent’s kin. He takes a swig of the tankard before him. “She said you was lookin’ for a couple good ones.”

“Are you good?” is Daemon’s immediate counter. He cannot keep the notes of scepticism from his voice.

The man sneers. “You tell me, Rogue.”

Ah. He’s not forgotten the dismissal, then.

“Not here,” Daemon hisses, eyes tracking to those nearby. There is no reaction from anyone within range, no suggestion that they have been overheard. He turns furiously back to the man before him. “I’ve been assured that you are worthwhile prospects. If that is no longer the case, I’m happy to let her know—”

“Hey, now, we was only jokin’, wasn’t we?” the smaller man says, glancing rebukingly at his partner. The larger man shrugs, leaning back. The chair groans again.

“Good man.” Cheers and laughter begin to erupt across the room. Daemon leans forward, voice dropping to a hush. The two men crowd in closer so as to hear him. “I have a task for you,” he murmurs, looking about furtively. “It’s—risky. If you get caught, there are no gods nor men that will save you.”

“Sounds fun.” The smaller man beams as he gestures to the man beside him. His parted lips reveal the gaping holes in his mouth, bloodied gums speckled with grey. Daemon cannot tell if the teeth have been knocked out or if they’ve fallen out.

“You’ll do it?” he asks. I haven’t even discussed the particulars.

The larger man stares assessingly at him, brow raised. “We’ll do anyfing, if the coin’s good enough.”

A buxom wench appears at his shoulder, tits half-out and practically staring at him by their own power. She smiles in what he supposes must be her idea of enticement, the pockmarks of a long-healed sickness or injury stretching unflatteringly with the contortion of her skin. When she opens her mouth as if to speak, Daemon waves her off with a stern glare and a shake of the head. He has no need to get soused tonight. The woman makes an offended noise and trounces off.

He turns back to his audience of two. Daemon tips his chin in acknowledgement, continuing the exchange as if no interruption had occurred.  “If you’re successful, I’ll pay whatever price you deem necessary.” The larger man nods, clearly satisfied. “Now. Before we get to the details—what should I call you two?”

The pair look to each other for a moment.

“He goes by Blood, these days,” the smaller man finally answers, something dark and sinister crossing over his expression. “Me? You can call me Cheese.”

Read it on AO3: 

https://archiveofourown.org/works/44058132/chapters/115715053

Taglist (😭 thank you!):

Now in the comments!

[witch-and-her-witcher]

OMG omg omg I finally updated/posted something! 😍😍😍 (I snuck out and hung out with fictional characters when I wasn't supposed to. 🤫)

The White Wolf's Blizzard, Chp. 9!

Nimble, deft and slender fingers slid along the rich linens covering the informal mattress raised off of the floor on pallets. Keen eyes took in the façade of extravagance and saw right through to a room tarted up like a courtesan but lacking the depth and details of true class. Candelabras with chipped gold paint, revealing the lack luster metal beneath, much like the jewelry worn by the women in service in the establishment.

Geralt could see the clear disdain on Yennefer’s face as he entered the room, placing his swords beside the door and forgetting the final button of his tunic he meant to clasp. The noble line of her nose and sharp jawline were amplified, both jutting upwards with her contemptuous assessment of the bordello. Her thick, raven locks were pulled back in intricate braids from her face and gathered at the nape of her neck with multiple bands, each about a hand’s width apart until the end between her shoulder blades.

Any softness of youth that had been in her face at the Temple was gone, replaced by harsh, dignified lines of a mage’s focus required to harness their depths of chaos. Paired with her tamed locks, Yennefer looked fit to advise a king.

She looked as stunning as his last memory of her, if not more so. It was easy to forget the hurt Yennefer had caused Geralt then, his last memory falling asleep with her soundly in his arms – only to wake the next morning to find not only had she left his bed without a word but vanished from the Temple grounds completely without so much as a goodbye. In his inexperience and immaturity, Geralt had felt she owed him something before departing so resolutely from his life.

Now, he could appreciate she owed him nothing. Yennefer was as brilliant as the Obsidian star twinkling at her delicate collar bone. She was meant for the company of royalty, not a mutant nobody.Geralt cleared his throat. “Yen, what –“

“A long way to travel for a mid-tier brothel, isn’t it?” She cut him off, standing from where she had been sitting on the large, ornate palliasse. The sour guards had discarded her in this room to wait for Geralt to dress and join her, wanting her a safe distance from their delicate parts she had already maimed.

The condescending tone caused the young witcher to bristle instinctively. “You’ve seen many to judge?”

(Follow link to read further.)

[th3n0v1c3]

A Fool's Dream

Xerxes IV marched through the halls of the palace ignoring all the finery that decorated them. Soft rugs, flower vases that depicted battles, murals of past kings. For a warrior culture, the palace of Almyra was surprisingly artistic. Or so was the first reaction of Xerxes’ wife and queen. At her wide-eyed amazement, he’d laughed and asked if she thought Almyran kings ruled from a cave on a throne of bones and she mumbled that bones had not been part of her vision.

Normally he liked to take it slow and appreciate his home, but today he didn’t have the time. Throwing open the door to one of his son’s private rooms, he scowled at the sight that greeted him. Khalid sat up at the entrance of his father. Surrounding the prince were three young, beautiful women. All of whom weren’t wearing anything. Scrambling for their robes, they murmured a greeting to their king before scurrying out. To Xerxes annoyance, Khalid sighed as he ran a hand through his hair. At the very least, his son had the decency to throw a blanket over his bare body.

“Father,” Khalid leaned an elbow on his knee as he spoke, “to what do I owe the pleasure so early in the morning?” Resisting the urge to growl, Xerxes stared coldly at the young man.

“Son, please tell me you know what day it is today.”

“Of course I do, Father. It’s the 10th of the Garland Moon, year-”

“You know that is not of what I spoke.” Khalid hesitated now to respond. He recognized the warning tone in his father’s voice. Letting his head fall slightly, he spoke more clearly.

“The bride from Fódlan arrives today.”

“ Your bride, boy.” Xerxes rubbed the bridge of his nose with his fingers. “I expect you to be ready. And enough of this nonsense.” He gave Khalid a hard look and his son bowed his head.

“As you wish, Father.”

“Better do it before your mother catches wind,” Xerxes grumbled more so to himself before leaving. The door slammed shut behind him.

Interested? You can read more here .

[ufevents]

GANGGYN

( content warning: death )

at first glance, emperor yumi would appear to be sleeping soundly in her bed. at first glance, she looks comfortable and at peace.

her personal priest takes a seat at her side and tearfully checks for a pulse once more, now accompanied by misu and minister dani. she looks up at them and shakes her head, then closes her eyes and weeps. “i’m sorry, there’s nothing i can do,” she manages.

“it’s okay, gayeon,” misu assures her, though her words sound hollow. she approaches, and with a closer look...yumi is pale, becoming more and more like the image of death by the second. 

misu takes her mother’s already-cold hand. “mother...” she breathes, and she observes; watches the way the esteemed emperor’s skin grows taught around her bones in mere minutes, her appearance far more skeletal now than when misu first took her hand.

“goddess...” dani mutters in disbelief. misu simply frowns, and somehow, doesn’t look surprised.

“princess...ah, emperor?” gayeon says, her cheeks still wet from tears, but eyes full of questions.

“it’s gleerium,” misu repeats, voice unwavering, full of confidence.

“with all due respect, emperor, how do you know that?” dani asks.

“it’s the same way in which they murdered drewitt. etlia didn’t even hold a proper funeral for him because he was nothing but bones within a few days. alfan and the others didn’t want to disturb anyone that saw his body.”

“how did you know it was gleerium then?” dani questions once more.

“they found the assassin and plenty of information to confirm his affiliation to gleerium,” misu practically snaps, patience clearly wearing thin, but she soon sighs and releases some of her tension.

“what is it...a form of dark magic?” gayeon asks next.

“yes...magic that both poisons and drains life force simultaneously. we don’t know much about it. perhaps the archsage or one of his students may be able to help us.”

“if you would allow me, emperor, i would like to be the one to try to find our answers,” gayeon requests, and misu is quiet, considering. “i have experience with magic, as well as a personal stake in the matter. if i failed to prevent this magic from taking yumi’s life, i would like to redeem myself by learning about it as the source of her death.”

“very well,” misu agrees with a nod, and gayeon bows in gratitude.

“it isn’t your fault, gayeon,” dani attempts to reassure her, and gayeon bows to her as well.

“i appreciate it, minister dani.”

silence falls upon the women and the disintegrating former emperor, before dani finally speaks up: “emperor misu, what is our next move?”

“i’m not certain,” she admits, then thinks in silence for several moments more. “i believe we must follow alfan’s example and not hold a funeral; at least not a more public one. perhaps those closest to her...” more silence, and then: “dani, what is the state of our army?”

“certainly been better. much of it is spread throughout ganggyn to deal with the monster threat.”

“well, i would like an organized army. please find some way to accomplish it.”

“emperor...?”

misu does not acknowledge dani’s concern, and instead says, “may i have a moment with my mother, please?”

both dani and gayeon linger for a moment, before dani nods and leads the way out of the emperor’s bedroom. 

it’s only now that misu cries openly. “mother, what happened...?” she whispers, and then she drapes herself over her mother’s body and weeps.

THE ZORATORI ALLIANCE

hawk king daak’s castle is not nearly as impressive as any other castle in deyuis, but that much makes sense: he is not really a king at all. maybe it can compete with faeryn’s relatively humble home, but it certainly cannot touch the rest of the zoratori council’s magnificent forts. still, as is the case for most structures in kesthe. 

daak doesn’t exactly have a throne room either. instead, it is more of a very large and impressive office, ceilings remarkably high, plenty of room for any bird to stretch their wings. 

now, however, he sits at a desk, perhaps surprisingly, scattered in parchment, making him look far busier than he actually is. maybe it’s intentional.

of course, the young and troubled hawk cannot visit the hawk king’s “throne room” without guards, so they lead him there. it’s only when daak takes one look at the young hawk that he nods to the guards to let him go and leave them be for a few minutes.

“i heard we have a problem,” daak addresses the other hawk, and already sighs. 

“yes sir,” the young hawk replies, nodding several times. he recounts the same tale he told the guards outside the hawk’s makeshift palace, and daak listens closely. he sighs once again in the end.

“we had an agreement,” and he sounds both disappointed and exasperated, as if he both expected this result, yet still hoped for better. he turns his attention to the other hawk, looking him right in his eyes. “thank you for telling me,” and then he looks back down at his desk. “it looks like i’ll be paying our dear friend skrarrenniek a visit.”

“i didn’t mean to cause any problems, sir––”

“oh young one, we always have problems.”

[sugawara5]

random things that could happen with the bsd characters on a walk

this is literally 70% crack please don't take this too seriously also a bit of suggestive content and cussing

Atsushi Nakajima: You'll probably be approached by every single cat in the neighborhood and Atsushi will stop to pet them. It's cute until they're all scratching your legs and laying dead rats at your feet. Dazai Osamu: At least two women will come up to you both, slap him out of nowhere and tell him that they're gonna cut his dick off if they ever see him again. If you're attentive, you'll see Akutagawa at every street corner stalking you guys. Akutagawa Ryuunosuke: If you're lucky enough to walk with him, it'll probably be at night. He'll want to grab your hand but forgets he coughed blood on it earlier so you feel a slick, cold thing touch your palm and instinctively slap it away. You realize it was his hand and there's an awkward silence for the rest of the walk. He cries about it later. Chuuya Nakahara: Will try to impress you so hard, especially using his ability. 100% will beat up any guy that would try and approach you. Accidentally punches someone you know that was coming up to you to say hi. The rest of your "walk" is spent in the hospital where your friend is bedridden with 4 broken bones and a bloody nose. Kunikida Doppo: There's a strict schedule. You'll have 11 minutes and 46 seconds to complete your walk, or on weekends 30 minutes and 56 seconds. While walking, you'll try to talk to him about something but it always just ends with him complaining about Dazai's dumbassery. Ranpo Edogawa: Prepare a route for your walk before hand and make sure not to pass any sweet shops unless you want your wallet emptied. He'll hold your hand like a kid and skip along the path- but will leave you without a second thought if he sees a stray cat cause he wants to give it to Fukuzawa. Yosano Akiko: Literally the best person to go on a walk with. She'll pick up a flower and put it in your hair cause she thinks it'll look pretty on you. Don't get hurt though. Not even a grazed knee cause the moment she sees it, she'll bring her chainsaw out. Fukuzawa Yukichi: Will fucking dip your ass if he sees a barking dog. Have fun trying to keep up with the DILF. Peepaw can run faster then you might think. (blame tik tok for that nickname btw) Gin Akutagawa: She doesn't talk much but will quietly whisper things to you if you're close to her. Ignores Tachihara like a fucking plague and if you run into her brother you're going to get stabbed-unless you happen to be Dazai Osamu. Which of course, you'll never be. Michizō Tachihara: He's gonna try and get into your pants at a park bench at one in the morning. Some drunk girl stumbles by and asks if she can join you guys. You leave after Tachihara says yes. Ichiyō Higuchi: Bisexual queen and anyone can tell. She simps for the Akutagawa Siblings while you guys walk but you can't blame her cause you're doing the same thing. Links your arms together. Kouyou Ozaki: Spends the whole time talking about Kyouka and how cute she is, probably starts tearing up about it cause she wants her back home. You once said she was acting like Killua's mother from Hunter X Hunter. She almost decapitated you. Ogai Mori: Elise tags along always and people comment on how you guys look like a cute family. Mori doesn't appreciate you replying with, "I rather die than marry an alternate universe Dino." Elise thinks you're fucking funny as hell. Fyodor Dostoevsky: God complex motherfucker will death stare anyone who just as much as jaywalks and call them a "sinner". Rats follow him around and he has a throne in the sewers with "Rat King" spelled out above it in red spray paint. Unfortunately for you- it actually looks aesthetic so he takes you there for your walk. Nikolai Gogol: You'll probably end up dead but it'll be the best fucking walk you ever take. Starts talking about how everyone's a bird in a cage and probably farts every few minutes cause he ate beans for lunch. Randomly moans cause he thinks its funny. Sigma: Takes you to somewhere cute like a library and would try to kiss you at the end of the walk. But he gets nervous, trips, and falls on his face. Gogol's

recording it all behind a bush to send to Fyodor later. Edgar Allen Poe: Karl's usually in his coat so whenever you go near him he smells like a whole ass zoo cause Karl's a fucking player and as railed various she-racoons from all over Yokohama. Your walks look like a fucking pandemic with social distancing and shit. Mark Twain: Just like Tachihara, if he likes you he's gonna try and rail you somewhere. Gets cockblocked by Hawthorne who throws a whole ass cross as his head and knocks him out. He later proposes to you cause the only way Hawthorne will let you fuck is when you get married. Jouno Saigiku: He's not going to open his eyes. No matter what. You don't know if he's sleep walking or actually awake and listening to you. But it's YOU who trips and falls- into his arms. It's romantic till he drops you on purpose cause he needed to scratch an itch.

[nastybuckybarnes]

Of Kings and Beasts  -  Four

Pairing: King!Bucky X Princess!Reader X King!Steve

Summary: Born a bastard of the King of Orlen, you’re thrusted to the West to marry the Kings. However, the greeting you get is anything but warm, and your life with the King is far from enjoyable. He knows it isn’t your fault his husband is gone, but that fact alone won’t prevent him from taking it out on you.

Warnings: Language, Kinda Slow Burn, Injuries, Fluff, SPOILER AND TRIGGER WARNING: miscarriage, 

Word Count: 3K

A/n: I took a nap so this is a little late, but I hope you guys enjoy!!! Also, I sprained my good wrist at work yesterday lmao so now I’ve got a brace on each wrist. Anywho, here you go! Have a wonderful night!!

THIS SERIES CONTAINS SMUT AND VERY DARK THEMES THAT MAY BE TRIGGERING TO SOME AUDIENCES!!! READ AT YOUR OWN RISK!!!

Part One

Part Two

Part Three

~*~

You spend nearly every free moment with the King now.

He is at your door every morning, waiting to escort you to breakfast, of which he provides all the conversation. Afternoon tea is spent together as well as dinner, all of which you go to simply because you do not have the energy to fight.

However, you would be lying if you said you weren’t starting to enjoy his company.

He tells you tales of his battles and stories of him and Steven when they were children. He explains the story of how he lost his arm but doesn’t let you see more than his metal fingers.

You find yourself missing him in the moments when he is not with you. And he feels the same. Although you haven’t said a word to him, your presence is one that he longs to have in the moments when you are not with him.

He hasn’t come to you at night yet. Still far too ashamed of his behaviour, and for that you’re grateful. You’re not sure if you could handle being with him in such a way again. Not yet, anyway.

“I hope you like the flowers I sent you. I do not know which types are your favourite, but my mother was partial to daisies so I thought perhaps you may like them as well.” He looks nervous as he pours you a cup of tea.

“If you do not, I shall have them taken back and new ones will be brought until I figure out which are your favourite.” You bite your bottom lip, wanting to speak the single word to tell him which flowers you prefer, but after so much silence you’re not sure you’d recognize your own voice.

He hisses, the teapot nearly dropping down to the table, and you jump, looking up at him in surprise.

“I apologize. My shoulder has been acting up with the coming winter. It does not do well in the cold.” You raise your eyebrows in question and he sighs. “They did their best to fix it, but the nerves are not all proper and there is a fair amount of damage beneath the scarring.”

You hesitantly rise to your feet and walk over to his side of the table, your fingers trembling as you reach for his left shoulder. He stands tall, eyes focused on you as you cup his shoulder through the fabric of his shirt.

Your eyes ask the question that your lips cannot, and he nods. Your shaking fingers move to the buttons of his shirt and you slowly pop one open, then another, and another, until he stands before you with his shirt open.

A shaky exhale leaves your lips as your eyes roam his muscular torso. He’s built beautifully, and you can’t stop yourself from touching the warm skin of his chest.

He inhales sharply and your eyes snap up to his, hand jumping off of his skin.

“Your touch... it feels nice,” he whispers in explanation, smiling softly at you as you lift your fingers back to his chest. You press your hand against him, his heat warming you to your bones, and the thrumming of his heart pounds against your palm.

Slowly as to not startle him, you move your hand up to his left shoulder, pushing the fabric of his shirt away and down his arms in the process.

Your eyes widen a bit at the scars covering where metal meets flesh, and you can’t help but feel sorry for the man before you.

Soft fingers brush over the angry skin and James sighs, his eyes falling closed. He hasn’t felt the softness of a woman’s touch in... years.

One of his hands instinctively comes to your waist and you freeze for a moment before realizing back into his touch.

This is easily the most intimate moment the two of you have shared.

You slowly lean forward and press a gentle kiss to the scars, repeating the action when you hear the noise of appreciation coming from his lips.

After a moment more and a few lingering kisses, you pull back. His other hand has found your waist and his thumbs are rubbing gentle circles against your hips.

“This is how we should’ve started our marriage,” he whispers, his eyes shut tightly. He peaks one eye open in time to catch you nodding.

“How I have treated you... it is something I am not sure I will ever be able to properly apologize for. I do hope that one day we will grow to love each other. I... You have not spoken, and yet I am already finding myself entranced by you.” You raise your eyebrows in surprise and he chuckles, one of his hands moving to the small of your back. He pulls you flush against his chest and you gasp softly, the warmth of his body seeping into your skin through the layers of your dress.

“I should have been gentle with you.” His nose dips down and traces gently over your throat.

“I should have treated you like the delicate flower you are. Instead... I deprived you of sunlight and water and forced you to wilt. I only hope... that with the proper care... I can nurse you back to the beautiful bloom you once were.” His lips press a kiss to your throat and you sigh, fingers splayed on his hard chest.

You slowly bring one hand up, shaky fingers threading through his thick hair.

“I-” The door bursting open cuts you off, much to the King’s dismay.

“What is it?!” He snarls, glaring at the intruder. Natalia and Samuel stand in the doorway, Nat smiling widely at the two of you.

“He’s here.” Your stomach drops and you look over at your Husband.

The anger on his face melts away and he takes a half step away from you.

“He... You’re sure?” You can hear the hope in his voice. The absolute unfiltered desperation. Nat nods, Sam copying the motion.

“They’ve brought him to see Doctor Banner, but he was awake and on his feet. From what I gather, he escaped from where we went searching and walked back. He’s... he’s here. He’s alive.” Glossy blue eyes turn to you and you smile softly, nodding at him.

“I promise I will come and get you as soon as I know he is in stable condition. I know he is beyond eager to meet you, so much so that he will put his own health aside.” He leans forward and presses a sweet kiss to your forehead before running out of the room, following behind Sam.

Natalia stands in the doorway, her arms crossed over her chest and a small smile on her lips.

“Come. Wanda has drawn you a bath in preparation for the King’s return.” You and her walk to your chambers in silence, you pondering all that has happened in the span of a few minutes and what awaits you with the return of the King. Nat, on the other hand, is proud of the change in the dynamic of you and James. It’s about damn time he realized what he has in front of him, in her opinion.

The bath is lovely and smells of lavender, however, it does little to ease your nerves.

What if King Steven doesn’t like you? What if King James goes back to treating you badly? What if-

“Stop worrying, Your Majesty. King Steven will love you. And if his behaviour today is anything to go off of, King James will not go back to how he used to be.” You look over at Nat, fear in your eyes and she smiles gently.

“What happened with the King today?” Wanda asks curiously.

“When we got word of King Steven’s return, Sam and I ran to find James. We... interrupted what looked like a tender moment between the King and Her Majesty. And before he left he kissed her in front of both of us.” Wanda raises her eyebrows, a smile on her face.

“Well, I would agree with Nat on this one then. King James has truly been different towards you. One might even say that he has been kind.” You nod in agreement, happy to have gotten one of your questions answered.

“Come now, let us get you dressed.”

You step out of the tub and Nat inhales sharply, her eyes on your rounded tummy.

“Your Majesty...?” You wrap yourself in a towel and give her a nod, letting her know that her assumption is correct.

“Have you told his majesty yet?”

You shake your head ‘no’ then sigh, gently stroking your stomach.

They dress you in a lilac gown that is fairly tight around your midsection. Tight enough to show off the little bump you’ve grown if anyone were to look long enough.

"The Kings will be thrilled! You must tell them today!” Nat exclaims, her face alight with glee. The edges of your vision get blurry and you shake your head, both at her and to try and clear your sight.

“It is up to you, your Majesty but I would recommend doing it soon.” You simply nod, one hand on your stomach gently.

A knock on the door nearly startles you out of your skin.

“The Kings have asked for the Queen,” a male voice says. You exchange nervous glances with the two women, however, they smile encouragingly despite the situation.

You take a deep breath and lift your head up high, determined to make a better impression on King Steven than you did on King James.

Natalia walks with you towards King Steven’s room, the room that the Kings shared before one of them was lost.

As you’re descending the staircase you stop, hand gripping the railing so tightly you’re surprised it doesn’t break.

“Your Majesty?” Nat questions, confused and concerned.

You open your mouth to tell her you need Doctor Banner, but nothing comes out. No, instead, you collapse right there on the stairs.

“Your Majesty!” Nat shouts, diving down to stop you from falling down the stairs any more than you already have.

“Someone help!” She shouts, holding your head gently in her lap to protect your neck.

Guards are rushing in, shock colouring their features as they see their Queen on the stairs unconscious.

“Pietro, carry the Queen back to her chambers and have Wanda gather water for her. I need to find Doctor Banner.”

~*~

There are tears in the King’s eyes as soon as he sees his husband.

Steve sits on his bed, eyes trained on the doorway while doctor Banner cleans some of his wounds. As soon as the two are in the same room Steve is on his feet.

“Buck,” he whispers. The brunet takes slow steps forward before reaching out and cupping his cheeks.

“Steve.” It comes out almost like a whimper and the blond frowns.

“I’m here, my love. I’m back.” They embrace tightly, the brunet’s shoulders shaking as he tries to control his sobs.

“Your Majesties... I need to tend to King Steve’s wounds,” Doctor Banner says softly. James pulls away and nods, sitting down on the bed beside his husband.

The two simply gaze at each other for a long moment before Steve finally speaks.

“Is she here?” James nods, a small smile on his lips. “She is. And she is everything we’ve wanted and more. I fear I have not been kind to her, but we are rebuilding our relationship.” Steve nods, his hand held tightly in both of James’.

“The King will require much rest before he sees anyone. I know it is hard, but he has undergone a lot. I will have food brought to him, but right now all he needs is rest.” The two Kings nod, content to spend time with each other and forget about the world, if only for one night.

Any semblance of peace is shattered, however, by Natalia throwing the door open.

“Doctor Banner, it’s the Queen. Sh-she’s taken a fall.” The doctor is on his feet quickly.

“Send for the midwife immediately,” he says, gathering his things and running out of the room.

“Wait, midwife?” James asks, rising to his feet. Steve follows suit and soon enough they're all sprinting through the palace towards your chambers.

Before the Kings can enter, Nat is pulling the door closed. Right as she does, a scream comes from behind the wood.

“What the Hell are you doing?” James demands.

“I do not believe this is how she would want to meet her husband for the first time. Allow her space.” The King shakes his head.

“My wife is in there, and she is carrying my child. I have every right to be in there with her, especially if she is in danger. I have only just got my wife back and I will not lose her.” Nat sighs but steps aside, allowing the two men into your Chambers.

You’re on the bed, one hand clutching your stomach while the other grips the bedsheets tightly.

“What's happening, Doctor?” Steve demands, moving to your side quickly. He gently takes your hand in his and you squeeze it instantly.

“It does not look good, Your Majesties. I cannot tell whether it was the fall or the stress on her body, but I can no longer hear the heartbeat.”

A sob bubbles out of you at his words and the Kings are moving quickly.

Steve climbs onto the bed behind you, propping you up on his chest and smoothing your hair gently away from your face.

The way he’s instantly able to care for you in a way that James still has trouble with causes the brunet pain, but he pushes that aside and kneels beside your bed, taking Steve’s place in holding your hand.

A heartbreaking cry of agony leaves your lips, the back of your head digging into the blond King’s chest as the Doctor urges you to push.

“Is there anything that can be done for the pain?” Steve asks softly. The doctor shakes his head solemnly. “We can only give it time and hope that she is able to push swiftly.”

Tears rain down your cheeks and James is reminded of the events that occurred to cause your pregnancy.

“I’m sorry, (Y/n),” he whispers, pressing a kiss to your knuckles.

~*~

Hours after your pain started does it finally end, with you bloody and sweaty and childless on your bed, your husbands both sitting by your side.

Steve presses gentle kisses to your clammy forehead while one of his arms wraps around your upper torso. You grab at his forearm with your free hand, bottom lip wobbling as the reality hits you.

You look to King James, fear evident in your teary eyes.

“W-will you have me beheaded for losing your heir?”

The first words you’ve spoken in weeks and he’s nearly crippled with guilt by them.

“Beheaded? Of course not. No one could have anticipated this. You need only rest and recover.” That’s the voice of King Steven, and for a moment you find yourself feeling embarrassed at the fact that this is how he’s meeting you for the first time.

“I will never be able to apologize enough for the pain I have caused you,” James whispers, raising his hand to wipe a tear off of your cheek. You subconsciously flinch away and Steve stares at you in shock before turning his gaze to his husband.

The look on his face is enough for the blond to put the pieces of the puzzle together.

“I know you do not know me, but I promise you that all I want is for you to be happy and healthy. Heir be damned.” You sniffle and nod, pulling your hand out of James’ grip and holding onto Steve tighter, anchoring yourself to him.

You cry yourself to sleep, body and mind exhausted after the trauma of the day.

The two Kings, however, do not sleep.

“What have you done to her?” Steve asks bluntly. The brunet closes his eyes tightly and shakes his head.

“You need to understand that I... I wasn’t myself. You were gone and she was meant to be for both of us.”

“Answer the question.”

“I... forced her. And I struck her. And by the Gods the words that came from my mouth... I will spend eternity in hell for all that I have done to her... all the pain I have caused.”

If you were not asleep against his chest, Steve would be on his feet beating his husband to a pulp.

Instead, he takes deep breaths to reign in his anger, determined to keep his cool with you so near.

He wraps both arms protectively around your figure, pressing a gentle kiss to the top of your head then closing his eyes tightly.

“I cannot excuse my actions, but if you will listen, I will attempt to explain them. Although there is nothing I can say that will ever make what I did right. And I regret every moment of what I did.” The blond slowly opens his eyes, giving his husband a glare.

“We will have words. Until then, she is my priority. I cannot bear to look at you knowing what you’ve done. Leave us.”

The brunet doesn’t argue, knowing that he’s getting far better treatment than he deserves considering all that he’s done to you and the pain he’s caused. He rises and leaves silently, avoiding the knowing eyes of Natalia as he heads towards his chambers, spending yet another night alone.

Steve presses kiss after kiss to the top of your head, his heart heavy with what little he knows of what you endured.

How the man he thought he knew could treat you so poorly is beyond him, but he’s determined to make up for it, even if James cannot.

[rocorambles]

Ignorance is Bliss

Pairing: Kageyama x reader, One-sided Atsumu x reader 

Genre/Warnings: Yandere Kageyama, NSFW, Toxic Relationship, Misogynistic Behavior and Thoughts, Mind Break, Implied Manipulation

Summary: Atsumu learns the hard way how true the saying ‘ignorance is bliss’ is and he wonders how much simpler life would have been if he had never gotten involved with you. 

From what Atsumu knows of Kageyama Tobio from their high school tournament interactions, from what his cheerful orange-haired teammate tells him, and from their encounters in the professional circuit, he thinks he has a pretty clear picture of who the blue eyed setter is. So imagine his surprise when he meets you at a hangout Hinata has organized. 

You’re not the only female at the event, with many other attendees choosing to bring their significant others, and Atsumu has a blast trying to pair up all the unfamiliar faces with past and present opponents and teammates based on appearances and personalities alone. He’s on a roll, but pauses when he gets to you. 

There’s a wide grin spread across your face, your eyes excitedly shining as you vigorously nod at something Hinata is saying before you erupt into a boisterous, stomach busting laughter that echoes throughout the entire room. You’re wild, cheerful, fun, and if he didn’t know Bokuto was single, he’d automatically assume the two of you might be a couple with your similar radiant and untamed personalities. 

Maybe Tanaka, the baldy from Karasuno? No, he’s married to that pretty manager he was always obsessed with since highschool. 

Kuroo? The messy haired businessman seems like someone who wouldn’t mind a wild lover, but it seems unlikely from the way the cat-like man hasn’t even looked your way once the entire time. 

Before he can think of another guess, he freezes at the sight of Kageyama walking to your side, intimately pressed against you as he moves some food from his plate to yours, a slight upward twitch of his lips and an unfamiliar softness in his eyes as he gazes at you. 

No freaking way. 

When Atsumu thinks of the type of woman Kageyama would date, he thinks of sweet, well-mannered girls, caring and nurturing motherly types who would be patient enough to deal with the admittedly emotionally and socially challenged athlete and take of their idiotic, but well-meaning boyfriend. 

He doesn’t think of women like you. A woman loud enough to rival both Bokuto and Hinata. A woman as warm as the sun. A woman who can so easily ignore the stubborn setter’s barked commands for Hinata and her to quiet down and behave properly. 

Atsumu doesn’t miss the scowl, the hint of disappointment in blue eyes when you ignore the dark-haired setter. 

Looks like even though Kageyama’s “King of the Court” title hasn’t been used or brought up in years, some things never change. And Atsumu wonders how long the two of you will stay together before Kageyama’s need to be in complete control and authority destroys everything between the two of you. 

Not long, he thinks, as he weasels his way into the conversation, intent on getting to know you better so that when you come crashing down from Kageyama’s tyrannical rule, he can be the one to catch you and show you a life, a relationship where you can truly be loved and appreciated for exactly who you are, a kindred wild spirit like himself. 

Atsumu doesn’t see you much after that since both the Adlers and Jackals are incredibly busy with pro season, practicing, and traveling, but the two of you text back and forth constantly, hitting it off right away just as Atsumu knew you would. He’s quick to lunge for his phone with every ping, eyes constantly checking for new messages, chortling and smiling like a giddy fool in love with every text you send his way. 

The conversations start off amazingly, no usual awkward small talk or niceties usually associated with getting to know someone, and Atsumu feels like he can truly be himself, unfiltered as he rants to you about something stupid Osamu did that annoyed him, sends a dumb inappropriate joke your way, shyly tells you about his hopes and dreams. And his heart soars as you match his sincerity and openness, revealing more and more of who you are to him, making it harder and harder for him not to fall in love with you. 

But as time goes on, he swears you’re changing, and he’s not sure if it’s for the better. 

When you see him at events, practice games, and real matches, your ear-splitting grin turns into tiny demure smiles, your bone-crushing bear hugs you greet him with become polite bows, your rowdy laughter that could rival Kuroo’s hyena howls become soft giggles hidden behind a hand you raise to cover your mouth. 

Even your messages are changing and he glares at the properly punctuated and grammatically correct sentences you send him now, his crass jokes responded to with a boring and safe “haha” or completely ignored. 

You’re different now and Atsumu hates it. 

He hates the way Kageyama seems to proudly beam at your politer mannerisms. He hates what a perfect polished couple the two of you make. But mostly, he hates how he can feel you slipping further and further away from him. 

It’s not a surprise when he receives the expensive, high-quality letter in the mail, but it doesn’t mean it hurts any less as the blond setter stares down at the beautiful winding cursive scrawled across the card in front of him, grimacing at the picture perfect engagement photos Kageyama and you had taken together and chosen to incorporate in the wedding invitation. 

The selfish child inside of him has half a mind to toss it all into the garbage, forget about it, forget about you. But then he remembers that fateful day and he knows he owes it to that raucous laughter and toothy grin he memorializes and reminisces on to suck it up and celebrate your big day, usher in the next chapter of your life while you end the portion of your story with him. 

The wedding venue is disgustingly cookie cutter perfect and Atsumu internally retches at how boring and normal everything is, so unlike the woman who had intrigued him and who he thought he knew.  

What happened to your dreams of eloping in a jaw dropping national park? 

What happened to your disdain towards getting married in a church by a pastor? 

He grimaces as he stiffly stalks down the aisle and plops down in a pew, waiting for the ceremony to start, waiting for this whole thing to be over, waiting to go home and forget any of this ever happened. 

It’s easy to zone out as the background music plays, as the speaker drones on and on, and he only looks on in mild interest as the groomsmen and bridesmaids make their way down the aisle, some familiar faces walking past him. But nonchalance turns to something nauseating, something terrifying within Atsumu when he stands up with the rest of the guests as you make your way down the red carpet. 

Is that really you? 

Logically he knows it must be you, facial features, body, and every other physical attribute matching exactly what he remembers of you. But your eyes…

Had they always been so empty? 

No. He knows they hadn’t and he briefly closes his eyes, remembering how vibrant, how fiery those two orbs used to be, feeling sick to his stomach when he opens his eyes and truly looks at you, looks at how vacant and lifeless your eyes are, looks at how perfectly trained and almost robotic your prim and proper steps are. 

It’s like you’re nothing more than a living and breathing doll and a sinking suspicion begins to build in his gut as he scrutinizes the black-haired setter carefully watching you as you make your way towards him. And Atsumu thinks he might throw up when he can’t help but notice how similar the look Kageyama is giving you is to the look Kita had given his German Shepherd when the dog had obediently performed a trick for his master.  

He knows it might be a crapshoot, knows it might be too late now that the ring around your fourth finger chains you to the blue-eyed setter, but regret and guilt for not noticing earlier and love for the woman he remembers drives him and he continuously messages you in earnest long after the wedding. He talks to you like nothing’s changed, hoping one of his awful jokes will elicit some type of reaction from you, praying that the photo he snaps of your favorite onigiri from Osamu’s restaurant sparks something in you, ignoring the painful sting he feels at your politely austere responses, not letting your emotionless replies deter him. 

But it’s no good and he can’t help how off his game he is when they play a practice match against the Adlers, can’t help the way his temper is even shorter than normal, can’t help how he lets his emotions inhibit his skills every time he sees Kageyama across the net. And when he’s finally benched and told to cool his head, all he can think of is what awful things had Kageyama done to break you down so thoroughly, slumping down in his seat with a towel over his head, mind spinning with its wild imagination. 

He’s so lost in his head that he doesn’t notice the sound of a whistle marking the end of the match, doesn’t notice the slight commotion as the two teams bow to each other, doesn’t notice the figure making its way towards him. But he does notice the way another pair of shoes enters his field of vision and he lifts his head, body instantly tensing as blue eyes regard him. 

“Come over for dinner tonight. She misses you.” 

You missed him? 

Hope blossoms in Atsumu’s chest and his heart is racing as he rings your doorbell, a bouquet of your favorite flowers in his hands. But he droops a bit at the impersonal cheery greeting you welcome him with as you beckon him in, graciously taking the flowers from him without even a second glance or spark in your eyes when you see the assortment he had painstakingly chosen, treating him like he’s just any visitor and not a close friend who you haven’t seen for months.

And suddenly Atsumu wonders if he really should have come, feeling lightheaded and disoriented as he watches you flutter around the kitchen, a pretty pink pristine apron wrapped around you as you hum to yourself as you slave over the stove, urging the two men to catch up while you cook dinner. 

It all feels surreal, like a dream. Bad or good? He can’t decide. It’s jarring to see the woman who always insisted on ordering in greasy junk food, who did everything in her power to never step foot in the kitchen, who always went on and on about equal rights for men and women, become a perfect stay at home housewife, tending to the needs of her husband before hers, serving Kageyama and him so obediently, so submissively. And yet, there’s something oddly...enticing about the whole scene playing out in front of him as twisted as he knows it sounds and he feels disgust at himself when bitter pangs of jealousy strike him. 

How can he be jealous of Kageyama? How can he even entertain the idea of being okay with this role you’ve been forced into? How can he be jealous when deep down he knows something’s not right? Knows that you would never have easily or willingly let yourself be molded into something so against everything you believed or thought? Knows that your spirit and mind have been thrashed and tweaked so much that you’re completely broken and mindless, a docile little puppet for Kageyama to completely control? 

But he can’t deny the longing and awe he feels as you gracefully set the table, ladling plates with piping hot delicious food, charmingly smiling as both men compliment the meal, fawning and hovering over them as you make sure their cups and plates are always filled, shooing them over to the comfy living room as you prepare dessert and coffee for them and wash the dishes. 

Atsumu’s throat goes dry when you literally kneel in front of both of them as you place the tray laden with mouth watering pastries you had just baked, coffee, milk, and sugar in front of both of them, eyes unable to look away from the way your neck naturally arches downwards in submission. And he almost whines when you stand up from your humble position on the floor. 

But he’s jolted back to his senses at the brisk command Kageyama directs at you, disbelief and fury grounding him when you don’t hesitate to obediently kiss your husband good night and retire to your room as ordered after wishing Atsumu a pleasant evening

The door to your bedroom has barely closed before he’s lunging at Kageyama, fists bunched up in the front of his shirt. 

“What the fuck did you to her?! She’s a grown woman. You can’t just order her around like a slave-”

He’s cut off as he’s abruptly shoved away and there’s a tense silence in the air as Kageyama scoffs and straightens out his shirt. 

“She isn’t just any woman. She is my wife. All I did was bring out her true potential, which is why you are going to stop talking to her. I didn’t put all this work and effort into perfecting her for you to come and ruin all her progress. She isn’t the same woman you knew, Miya. She’s a married woman now. A woman married to me. So do us all a favor and forget about her.” 

Panic builds in a frenzy inside the blonde setter’s chest. No no no. He can’t just give up so easily. He needs proof. He needs to help you. 

“There’s no way she willingly just changed. What the fuck did you do?” 

Bone chilling tension once again floods the room and Atsumu nervously shudders at the cruel smirk that spreads across Kageyama’s face. 

“Does it matter? The results are all that matters. Isn’t that what you used to say when Kita-san used to talk about process? Plus, it didn’t seem like you minded all that much when my ‘slave’ was kneeling in front of you.”

Bile rises in Atsumu’s throat and he can’t think, can’t breathe as he’s forcefully shoved out the front door, unable to deny the harsh truth of Kageyama’s words, unable to stop imagining the horrors you must have gone through. The rest of the night is a blur as he somehow makes it back home, shaky hands washing his face, brushing his teeth, body shivering and trembling from something other than the cold as he curls up under his covers. 

But safe in his own environment, his own home, his own bed, his mind wanders and he thinks back on the night. He thinks about how perfectly the back tie of your frilly apron accentuated the curve of your waist, hips, ass. He thinks about how nice it felt to be taken care of, to have everything being done for him as he sat back and relaxed. And his hand slips underneath his briefs as he thinks about how utterly angelic you looked on your knees in front of him, head and eyes demurely turned down, as he wonders if Kageyama has you trained just as well in the bedroom. 

If he had simply asked, would you have crawled between his thighs? 

He groans as his hand wraps around his cock, thumb playing with his tip as he imagines your tongue swirling around his head, spreading his pre-cum and your saliva everywhere as you greedily taste and lap at his length. And as he begins to stroke himself, he imagines it’s your throat taking him all the way in, he imagines your doey eyes peering up at him from underneath fluttering lashes, seeking approval, making sure you’re pleasuring your lover, your husband. 

God, it’s so easy to imagine replacing Kageyama, imagine being your husband, imagine having you as his perfect slutwife and his back arches, eyes seeing only white and stars, body pulsating with pleasure as he cums harder than he’s ever had before at the thought of using your body as he pleases every night, at the thought of you eagerly serving him day in and day out, at the thought of fucking you raw, breeding you, impregnating you with his seed, letting everyone know exactly who you belong to with your swollen pregnant stomach and leaking tits as your bear his children. 

But he chokes out a sob as thick white spurts splatter across his hand, a few teardrops leaking from the corner of his eyes as he buries his face in his pillow, self-loathing and disgust curling inside of him at his traitorous thoughts, a silent plea for forgiveness and a desperate prayer for you to at least be at peace echoing in his head as he cries himself to sleep.

[pocketseizure]

The Flower Thief

A young boy comes to Hyrule and meets a princess with a terrible destiny.

Or, Ganondorf visits Hyrule for the first time as a child and falls in love with the green and beautiful land, even as he is warned away by the woman who will become Zelda’s mother. 

This story was written for Ties of Time, an Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask fanzine, which you can find on Twitter (here). The story is also (on AO3).

. . . . . . . . . .

Ganondorf had never been beyond the mountains separating the desert from the plains. The road from the fortress to the waystation was, if not well-traveled, safe enough for a child in the company of an escort. He’d crossed the bridge leading to the canyon pass a few times, always pausing to peer down through the railings at the great river rushing along the gully below, but this was the first time he was allowed to accompany a caravan through the Gerudo Valley pass and into Hyrule.

He thought he knew what to expect from Hyrule. He’d heard all manner of stories from travelers, and he was given Hylian books to study as he learned the language. Yet as the red earth and dry gravel gave way to healthy swards of grass, he could not open his eyes wide enough to take it all in. There was so much green, so much luxury. 

The climate changed as the caravan traveled east. The mornings were cool but not cold, and the days were warm but not hot. The sun was veiled by clouds that drifted like floating islands across the blue sea of the sky, dappling the light into gentle shadows.

Ganondorf was not prepared for the rain. Everyone took notice when the afternoon became dark and the air grew heavy, but no one seemed concerned. He was familiar with the storms that pummeled the open desert, fierce and veined with jagged lightning, and he was afraid of what the blanket of clouds might portend. He was even more afraid of the disdain of the adults, however, so he held his tongue. If he cried when the first drops fell on his skin, each tiny splash as soft as the finest silk, his tears went unremarked.

Vast fields spread before him as they rode east. Brightly colored wildflowers pushed their way through the tall grass on leafy stems, and the wind was fragrant with the sweet smell of growing things. The caravan turned north at the first ranch they encountered, skirting along the low fence marking its perimeter. Ganondorf was amazed to find that the crooked and neglected fenceposts were made of wood. He realized that, to the local farmers, timber must be far more common than stone. As their party joined the main road, the trees grew larger and the flowers became even more colorful. The early summer greenery seemed almost blasphemous in its profusion. Stalks of young wheat swayed in the breeze, and cows dotted the rolling plains.

At last, upon ascending the crest of a low hill, Ganondorf saw Hyrule Castle, its spires stretching bravely into the sky. This architectural feat would have been impossible in the desert, where the gale winds would quickly strip the tiles from the towers if lightning didn’t strike them first. The town spilling down from the castle walls was just as bold. Roads and houses spread along the wide valley of a river with no regard for how disaster might strike and send the water roiling from its banks at any given change of the weather. Hyrule was, he thought, a miracle.

Once the road approaching the castle town began to grow crowded, one of Ganondorf’s aunts pulled him aside as they watered their horses. “You must dress as we do,” she said. “The people of this kingdom are guided by superstition, and they will not look kindly on someone that they cannot fit into the stories they tell themselves. You will be in danger if anyone learns that you are different from us, and we may not always be able to protect you,” she warned him as she twisted his hair into a high ponytail and secured it with a jeweled band.

Taking care not to be noticed, Ganondorf exchanged his robes for loose pants and a sleeveless tunic. He had learned to appreciate being seen as special, but there had always been a part of him that wanted to dress like the girls his age. The thought occurred to him that perhaps it was only in Hyrule that he could be normal. Ganondorf resolved to use this situation to his advantage. He would break off from the group as soon as it was expedient to do so.

The women shed their travel cloaks in Castle Town as they merged into the throng of people converging in the central market plaza. Zora and Gorons jostled for place among the Hylians in front of the stalls, and Ganondorf spotted the leafy foliage of a few Deku Scrubs and even the broad shoulders of a Moblin. Almost no one paid any mind to the group of Gerudo that gradually split apart as they went their separate ways. A few people paused to cast glances in their direction, especially men, and Ganondorf’s companions seemed to enjoy the attention.

Ganondorf kept his own cloak drawn around his narrow shoulders. The bearded faces of Hylian men were strange to his eyes. He was disturbed by their large and clumsy hands, whose thick fingers sprouted coarse hair. Ganondorf didn’t want to attract their notice, and he was much more interested in seeing than being seen. He watched a team of laborers eating at the base of a tree emerging from the paving stones of the plaza, throwing their breadcrusts into a bed of flowers overgrown with weeds. In an alley leading away from the market, a woman emerged from her townhouse to throw water onto the cobblestones before whisking the puddle into a drain with a broom. And then, wonder of wonders, a fountain burbled its lazy jet of water toward the sky with no other purpose than to provide a pleasant breeze for the cat napping on its stone rim.

All of this was fascinating, yet Ganondorf was not satisfied. He wanted to see something even more rare and beautiful. If the town below the castle was filled with marvels, he could scarcely imagine what treasures might be contained within the castle itself.

It was not difficult to sneak past the guards posted along the outer wall. They were slow and he was small. Just to be safe, Ganondorf used his modest measure of magic to quiet his footsteps while shifting the color of his cloak to reflect his surroundings. He had a fair amount of practice evading the watchful eyes of his mothers and aunts, and he liked to think he was skilled at avoiding detection. Or perhaps it was simply the case that the soldiers standing at the castle gates did not expect anyone to enter. Perhaps they assumed that no one would dare.

The courtyard on the other side of the outer wall was surprisingly pedestrian. Wooden crates were piled near the servant entrances, and a small moat ran between uneven patches of grass that had been trampled by men and horses alike. Ganondorf challenged himself to make his way beyond the castle’s inner wall, which was somewhat trickier but not beyond his abilities. There wasn’t much to be seen here either, nothing more than a few narrow walkways lined with mossy stones sunken into the spongy earth between overgrown shrubs.

Ganondorf was disappointed. The curving rows of proud cypress trees surrounding the Gerudo fortress and the tiled mosaics glittering under its shaded awnings were much more impressive. Ganondorf paused at a muddy puddle lingering in the shadow of the castle’s mold-spotted wall. He debated whether to continue on or turn back, wondering if perhaps Hyrule’s beauty lay more in its wilderness than its towns. He decided that he had seen what he’d come to see. There was no need to remain here.

As he turned, Ganondorf caught a breeze that carried a sweet fragrance unlike anything he’d ever encountered. Intrigued, he followed the scent along the inner wall of the castle until he found himself at the gate of a secluded courtyard garden. 

Tall bushes with glossy leaves separated the garden from the bare stone of the castle walls. Each of the bushes bore a profusion of white flowers as large as his palm. The scent was stronger here – richer than jasmine and as fresh as the sky after the rain.

Before he was aware of what he intended to do, Ganondorf found himself slipping his knife from the sheath at his belt to cut the thick woody stem of one of the flowers, whose petals spread elegantly from the golden shimmer of the nectar at its center. He had never seen anything so beautiful before, and he wanted to hold it. He sliced through its stem and watched as tiny beads of sap welled from the incision. As he withdrew his hand, clutching the flower alongside his knife, Ganondorf heard the soft murmur of a woman’s voice, quiet but resonant.

“He’s a good man, I think,” the voice said as it grew louder. “My honored mother wouldn’t have chosen him if he weren’t, Hylia rest her soul. He’s kind, and he has a strong will. And that’s the problem; that’s precisely the problem. He will make a good king. But then what need will there be for a queen?”

Ganondorf watched as a young woman stepped into the garden. The deep chestnut of her hair was accented by her dress, which was dyed with an indigo as deep as the sky at twilight. A white-haired woman of the same age trailed along behind her, as silent as a shadow. 

“Tensions are mounting at our borders,” the woman continued, “and Hyrule does not need a king. Hyrule needs peace. I will do what I can, yet I worry about the signs in the stars…”

Ganondorf knew he should flee, but the princess was so beautiful in her garden that he couldn’t help but stare. It was like a scene from a fairy tale. He was transfixed.

A moment later the spell was broken, but it was a moment too long. Ganondorf pulled his foot back to retreat, but the princess’s Sheikah attendant was on him like a cat at the slightest hint of movement.

“What have we here?” she murmured, her voice as soft as velvet. “Such a pretty girl, with such a sharp blade.” The Sheikah bent his hand so that the bones of his fingers twisted. Ganondorf dropped his knife but managed to hold on to the flower.

“A girl after my own heart,” the princess remarked with laughter in her voice. “Bring her closer, Impa, if you will.”

The Sheikah released Ganondorf, but not before giving his hand another painful squeeze. The warning in her touch was clear. Ganondorf understood that he was trapped, utterly and completely. He waited for panic to rise in his throat, but it never materialized. He realized that he might be forced to remain here, with soft grass under his feet and the delicate scent of white flowers lingering in the air. Perhaps such a fate would not be so terrible.

“On a tour of the castle, were you?” the princess prompted.

“Who sent you?” the Sheikah hissed with narrowed eyes. “Tell us and you might survive.”

The princess raised her hand, and the Sheikah fell back.

“How do you find my castle?” the princess asked as she gestured to the flower in Ganondorf’s hand. “Do the gardenias please you?”

Ganondorf knew that neither force nor speed could extricate him from this situation. Words were the only thing that had any chance of saving him, but his tongue was like lead in his mouth. He could only gaze at the princess, who seemed to glow in the pale sunlight. His fingers tightened on the flower.

The princess saw this and smiled. “It seems a shame for us to keep all of these gardenias to ourselves,” she remarked, switching to fluent Gerudo. “We can stand to part with one. I hope you will consider it a gift, but take care not to touch it. Its petals will blacken at the slightest contact with your skin. The flowers cannot survive after they’re removed from the plant.”

She began to reach out, perhaps intending to draw Ganondorf’s hood away from his face, but she allowed her hand to drop to her side. “We will release you,” she told him, “but you must not be caught on your way outside the castle. Nothing will protect you should one of the soldiers find you within these walls.”

The princess smiled again, but her eyes were like ice. “There is nothing here to be stolen that cannot be freely given,” she said, “but remember always, child – Hyrule does not take kindly to thieves.”

Ganondorf did not need to be told twice. He turned and ran, bending to snatch his fallen knife from the grass as he fled from the princess and her garden.

He was careful not to touch the gardenia as he made his scurrying and surreptitious way back outside the castle, but the flower’s petals were already tinged an unhealthy shade of gray by the time he was able to stop to catch his breath. They had begun to curl at the edges, and their sweet smell had grown sour.

Now there was no reason not to touch the flower. Ganondorf stroked its smooth white petals and touched his nose to the golden center of its blossom as he crouched against a dirty wall in a back alley of the market. Even as its petals spoiled before his eyes, the gardenia was divine in its beauty.

Ganondorf used his knife to cut away the rest of the wooden stem and tucked the flower into an inner pocket of his tunic. He wanted the fading flower and the memory of the castle garden to be close to his skin. The furious beating of this heart had slowed now that the danger of being caught had passed, but Ganondorf was still haunted by the cold eyes of the princess.

He would have to be more careful next time.

[dragonmartellstark]

The couple had three children, but also a large number of grandchildren:

Loreza Hightower- she was Lady of Highgarden by marrying her cousin, Willas Tyrell. She was considered beautiful with long brown hair and bright eyes inherited from her paternal family. She is sweet and adventurous being a very pretended young woman, but her parents wanted a good marriage for her.

In 289 a. C., a marriage was negotiated between the heir of Highgarden, Willas Tyrell and Loreza, both were 15 years old when the agreement was signed and the girl undertook her journey to Altojardín where she was well received by her mother-in-law and aunt, Alerie Hightower and her mother-in-law, Olenna Redwyne. The wedding took place in 290 a. C., Willas treated his wife with respect whom he quickly fell in love with and Loreza loved him too.

Loreza gained the appreciation of her brothers-in-law, Garlan and Loras, but she had a tumultuous relationship with her sister-in-law Margaery, both had a certain rivalry and used to criticize each other. It wasn't until Margaery was engaged to Lord Jaime Lannister and had to leave for Casterly Rock, great news for Loreza that she only saw her sister-in-law on a few occasions.

In 310 a. C., her mother and her daughter, Jeyne, passed away, these deaths being a great blow to Loreza that she never recovered from the loss of her beloved mother and her little girl. In 311 a. C., her father-in-law Mace Tyrell and her father, Baelor Hightower, pass away, being another blow after the sudden death of her mother and daughter. Loreza and her husband become Lords of Highgarden. In the role of her as Mistress, she was an animal lover building some shelters, she also helped her husband with some problems in politics by achieving an alliance between the Tyrells and the Freys.

In the year 331 a. C., Willas Tyrell died after a hunting party and her death destroyed Loreza even more, plunging into a great depression for losing her parents, her husband and her young daughter, closing herself in herself. Two years later, Loreza, sick with tuberculosis, fearing for her life, and two months later, she died at the age of 59.

Willas Tyrell- He was Lord of Highgarden and Lord of the Domain at the death of his father, being considered a generous man and breeder of all kinds of animals.

He married Loreza Hightower, her maternal cousin, and he had a happy marriage with her, both of them very much in love with each other. Loreza was of great help to Willas with some alliances with other royal houses, among them the Freys.

Mace Tyrell passed away in 311 a. C., becoming Mace the new Dominion Lord. His lordship was called "kingdom of fauna" because of the breeding of hawks, horses and other animals that Willas and Loreza were raising. He also stood out for his commercial relations, reaching a peace with the Lannisters after the marriage of his sister, Margaery with Jaime Lannister.

In 331 a. C., after a hunting party with his sons, Willas' horse had a terrible fall and the man was left under the horse that broke several bones with the weight of him. He was rushed to his home where within hours he died from his injuries at 57 years of age and his wife, Loreza, would pass away just two years after he was buried together.

The couple had six children and only one would die in infancy:

Lady Alerie Tyrell, she was the second wife of Alyn Ambrose with whom she had three children. Five years later, she was widowed and married Lucas Tyrell, with whom she had two daughters.

Lord Lambelle Tyrell, was Lord of Highgarden after the death of his parents and also Counselor of the Edicts of King Rhaegar I Targaryen. He married Walda Frey "la Blanca" and they had two children.

Lord Donnel Tyrell was Lord Consort of the Blackcrown when he married Alysanne Bulwer and with her he had ten children, the first five of which bore the surname "Bulwer".

Olenna Tyrell, she was lady of the Arbor by marrying Horas Redwyne, her cousin whom she hated and they had no children. Olenna widowed in 319 a. C., and she married for the second time with the somewhat older Ronnet Connington being a better marriage and they had three children.

Elia Tyrell, was Septa of the Faith of the Seven in Antigua.

Jeyne Tyrell passed away in her childhood the same year as her grandmother, Elia Martell of her being buried alongside her in Oldtwon. 

Manfred Tyrell- He was Lord of the Oldtown after the death of his father. He was known as a Dornish-looking but very attractive young man, captivating many women who wished to marry his.

He married Desmera Redwyne in 299 a. C., both got along well even though there was no love between them, but Manfred always had his wife in mind for everything, being his great support both at work and in personal life. During her marriage she had a few lovers, but the most famous was Walda Frey "The Beauty" who was Walder Frey's great-granddaughter and she was with her for two years, but Walda was engaged to another man ending her romance.

Manfred kept in his protection some artists including painters, dancers, actors and writers achieving a cultural impact in the Domain. He was also known for his conflicts with the Faith over different religious issues such as the priests or the followers of the God R'hllor whom Manfred accepted into his court for a few years.

Manfred's life had a severe setback when in 320 a. C., her wife, Desmera Redwyne, died of an infection after cutting her hand with a hunting arrow. The death of her wife was (surprisingly) a severe blow to the Lord of the Lighthouse and he went so far as to tell Maester Normund Tyrell how much this death affected him, referring to her as "my sweet and brilliant Desmera." Thirteen years later, his older sister, Loreza, would die another hard blow for him.

Manfred Hightower would end up dying in 339 a. C., with 61 years of respiratory attacks in his bedroom. He was buried alongside his parents and his wife.

Desmera Redwyne- she was Lady of the Oldtown by marrying Manfred Hightower who was one of her distant cousins. The engagement was made in 297 a. C., and the wedding was celebrated two years later in Oldtown being a colorful ceremony. The couple liked each other from the first moment and had a great friendship, although they never became in love, but it is known that Manfred came to show affection to his wife.

Desmera did not get involved in the lordship of Oldtown only dedicating himself to gardening, sewing and her children who little by little were reaching the world. The lady of the Lighthouse was little known, but those closest to her describe her as charming, maternal and calm, even her husband described her as sweet and conciliatory being her shoulder to cry on.

Her life remained quiet until one day in 320 a. C., while she was in a hunting party with her husband and her children, Desmera was wounded with an arrow in her arm, bleeding a lot. The maesters looked for a way to help her by closing her wound, but her seams were badly done and she opened again bleeding more. In the end, Desmera Redwyne died that same year of a wound infection, at the age of 37. Her death was a severe blow to her children and to Manfred who did not remarry, keeping the memory of his wife and his best friend.

Desmera bore Manfred three healthy children:

Lord Garmond Hightower, was Lord of the Lighthouse, of the Port and defender of the Citadel at the death of his father. He married Janei Lannister three times, who gave him a daughter; He in second marriages with Jeyne Westerling without children and in third marriages with the widow Joyeuse Erenford with her he had two sons.

Lady Lily Hightower, married Martyn Lannister and with him she had a daughter, Rowena.

Lady Minisa Hightower, remained single, became elderly and was the caregiver of her nephews and great-nephews.

Addam Tyrell- she was the right hand of her older brother Manfred hers and a skilled banker managing to create her own bank, but it was sold after only three generations.

At first, he wanted to marry one of his cousins, Elinor or Alla Tyrell, but they were already engaged and his cousin Megga Tyrell remained, who was stout and unbearable singing, but he agreed to marry her because according to her uncle, Humfrey Hightower : "Fat women are more pleasant." The wedding took place in 300 a. C., being a bittersweet event and Megga tried to get the attention of her husband. On their wedding night, Addam admitted that he had enjoyed the company of his new wife and that he wanted to share a bed with her again soon.

Megga bore him a total of nine children and Addam especially loved her sons, while her wife loved her daughters more. Her favorite son was Galadon, to whom he inherited his bank and some jewels to his other children.

Addam watched his entire family die little by little starting with his mother and ending with his older brother, Manfred, to whom he was always attached. The deaths of her family were a severe blow, but she remained strong so as not to decay and perish. After the death of his parents, Addam visited his maternal relatives along with his family being united with his uncle Oberyn Martell who was very sorry for the death of his sister.

The visits were continuous, sometimes staying five months in Dorne. During one of these visits in 344 a. C., Addam did not realize that there was a rattlesnake in his bedroom and it bit his neck while he slept. The venom of the snake was lethal and Addam died in a matter of minutes, while they tried to save his life by dying at 60 years of age.

Megga Tyrell- she was Margaery Tyrell's companion when she traveled to Casterly Rock to marry Jaime Lannister. She shortly after she returned to the Highgarden where she married Addam Hightower.

Despite her robust appearance and less handsome than her other cousins, Addam Tyrell agreed to marry her because her other cousins ​​were engaged to marry in early 300 a. C., Megga became pregnant and gave birth to her first daughter, Lysa Tyrell.

The couple was very passionate enjoying both the bed and the flirtations, Megga continued to give him more children something that was well liked by her brother-in-law, Manfred Hightower to ensure the offspring of the Hightower House. Megga was not very motherly leaving her children in charge of wet nurses or nannies, but it is known that she had a soft spot for her daughters seeking good marriages or positions within the Targaryen court.

In 344 her husband Addam died after being bitten by a snake during a visit to Dorne. Megga became a wealthy widow and settled in a house near Highgarden where she spent her money on treats and gifts for her favorite grandchildren. Megga gained much more weight in those years and she could hardly get up being helped by her servants. One day in the year 364 a. C., Megga suffered several heart attacks that were getting stronger and stronger until her heart stopped, thus passing away that same year at 78 years of age.

The couple was very passionate and had nine children:

Lysa Hightower, was the wife of Ben Bushy to whom she bore a son, Baltasar Bushy.

Luthor Hightower, died during childhood of tuberculosis.

Galadon Hightower, was the second owner of Tower Bank inherited by his father. He married Talla Tarly and they had an only child.

Talisa Hightower, was a prostitute behind the back of her parents, but after being discovered she was forced to become a Septa.

Sarra Hightower, Septa of the Faith of the Seven in Antigua.

Melissa Hightower, married Victarion Greyjoy being his third wife and gave him four sons.

Mace Hightower, Maester, Astrologer, and Alchemist.

Alyssa Hightower, joined the Silent Sisters.

Victaria Hightower, married Edric Dayne and bore him four children.

Jonnel Hightower, died during adolescence after receiving a sword blow to the head.

La pareja tuvieron tres hijos, pero también una gran cantidad de nietos:

Loreza Hightower- Fue Señora de Altojardín al casarse con su primo, Willas Tyrell. Era considerada bella de largos cabellos castaños y ojos brillantes heredados de su familia paterna. Dulce y aventurera siendo una joven muy pretendida, pero sus padres querían un buen matrimonio para ella.

En 289 d. C., se negocio un matrimonio entre el heredero de Altojardín, Willas Tyrell y Loreza, ambos tenían 15 años de edad cuando se seño el acuerdo y la chica emprendió su viaje hacia Altojardín donde fue bien recibida por su suegra y tía, Alerie Hightower y la suegra de esta, Olenna Redwyne. La boda se celebro en 290 d. C., Willas trato con respeto a su esposa de la cual se enamoro rápidamente y Loreza también lo amo.

Loreza se gano el apreció de sus cuñados, Garlan y Loras, pero tuvo una relación tumultuosa con su cuñada Margaery, ambas tenían cierta rivalidad y solían criticarse. No fue hasta que Margaery fue comprometida con Lord Jaime Lannister y tuvo que partir a Roca Casterly, siendo una gran noticia para Loreza que solo veía a su cuñada en pocas ocasiones.

En 310 d. C., falleció su madre y su hija, Jeyne siendo estas muertes un gran golpe para Loreza que nunca se recupero de la perdida de su querida madre y su pequeñita. En 311 d. C., fallece su suegro Mace Tyrell y su padre, Baelor Hightower siendo otro duro golpe tras la repentina muerte de su madre e hija. Loreza  y su marido se convierten en Señores de Altojardín. En su papel como Señora fue una amante de los animales construyendo algunos refugios, también ayudo a su marido con algunos problemas en la política logrando una alianza entre los Tyrell y los Frey. 

En el año 331 d. C., falleció Willas Tyrell tras una partida de caza y su muerte destrozo aun mas a Loreza sumiéndose en una gran depresión por perder a sus padres, su marido y su hija pequeña, encerrándose en ella misma. Dos años después Loreza enfermo de tuberculosis temiéndose por su vida y dos meses después falleció a la edad de 59 años.

Willas Tyrell- Fue Señor de Altojardín y Señor del Dominio a la muerte de su padre, siendo considerado un hombre generoso y criador de todo tipo de animales.

Se caso con Loreza Hightower, su prima materna y con ella tuvo un matrimonio dichoso estando ambos muy enamorados el uno del otro. Loreza fue de gran ayuda para Willas con algunas alianzas con otras casas reales, entre ellas los Frey.

Mace Tyrell falleció en 311 d. C., convirtiéndose Mace en el nuevo Señor del Dominio. Su señorío fue llamo “reino de la fauna” por la crianza de halcones, caballos y otros animales que Willas y Loreza estuvieron criando. También se destaco por sus relaciones comerciales llegando una paz con los Lannister tras el casamiento de su hermana, Margaery con Jaime Lannister.

En 331 d. C., tras una partida de caza junto a sus hijos, el caballo de Willas tuvo una terrible caída y el hombre quedo abajo del caballo que le rompió varios huesos con su peso. Fue llevado rápidamente hasta su hogar donde en cuestión de horas falleció por sus heridas a los 57 años de edad y su esposa, Loreza fallecería solo dos años después que el siendo enterrados juntos.

La pareja tuvo seis hijos y solo uno fallecería durante la infancia:

Lady Alerie Tyrell, fue la segunda esposa de Alyn Ambrose con el cual tuvo tres hijos. Cinco años después enviuda y se casa con Lucas Tyrell con el cual tuvo dos hijas.

Lord Lambelle Tyrell, fue Señor de Altojardín tras la muerte de sus padres y también Consejero de los Edictos del rey Rhaegar I Targaryen. Se caso con Walda Frey “la Blanca” y tuvieron dos hijos.

Lord Donnel Tyrell fue Señor consorte de Corona Negra al casarse con Alysanne Bulwer y con ella tuvo diez hijos los cuales los cinco primeros portaron el apellido “Bulwer”.

Olenna Tyrell, fue Señora del Rejo al casarse con Horas Redwyne, su primo al cual odiaba y no tuvieron hijos. Olenna enviuda en 319 d. C., y se caso por segunda vez con el algo mayor Ronnet Connington siendo un mejor matrimonio y tuvieron tres hijos.

Elia Tyrell, fue Septa de la Fe de los Siete en Antigua.

Jeyne Tyrell falleció en la infancia el mismo año que su abuela, Elia Martell siendo enterrada junto a ella en Antigua.

Manfred Tyrell- Fue Señor del Faro tras la muerte de su padre. Era conocido como un joven de aspecto dorniense, pero muy atractivo cautivando a muchas mujeres que deseaban desposarse con el.

Se caso con Desmera Redwyne en 299 d. C., ambos se llevaron bien aun que no había amor entre ellos, pero Manfred siempre tuvo presente a su esposa para todo siendo su gran apoyo tanto en el trabajo como en la vida personal. Durante su matrimonio tuvo unas cuantas amantes, pero la mas famosa fue Walda Frey “La Bella” que era bisnieta de Walder Frey y con ella estuvo durante dos años, pero Walda fue comprometida con otro hombre acabando su romance.

Manfred mantuvo en su protección algunos artistas entre ellos pintores, bailarines, actores y escritores logrando un impacto cultural en el Dominio. También era conocido por sus conflictos con la Fe por distintos tema religiosos como los sacerdotes o los seguidores del Dios R'hllor a los cuales Manfred acepto en su corte por unos años.

La vida de Manfred tuvo un duro revés cuando en 320 d. C., falleció su esposa, Desmera Redwyne de una infección tras cortarse la mano con una flecha de caza. La muerte de su esposa fue (sorprendentemente) un duro golpe para el Señor del Faro y llego a decirle al maestre Normund Tyrell lo mucho que le afecto esta muerte refiriéndose a ella como “mi dulce y brillante Desmera”. Tan trece años después fallecería su hermana mayor, Loreza otro duro golpe para el.

Manfred Hightower acabaría falleciendo en 339 d. C., con 61 años de ataques respiratorios en su dormitorio. Fue enterrado junto a sus padres y su esposa.

Desmera Redwyne- Fue Señora del Faro al casarse con Manfred Hightower que era uno de sus primos lejanos. El compromiso se realizo en 297 d. C., y la boda se celebro dos años después en Antigua siendo una ceremonia colorida. La pareja se agrado desde el primer momento y tuvieron una gran amistad, aun que nunca llegaron a estar enamorados, pero se sabe que Manfred llegaba a darle muestras de cariño a su esposa.

Desmera no se involucro en el señorío de Antigua solo dedicándose a la jardinería, a la costura y a sus hijos que poco a poco iban llegando al mundo. La señora del Faro era poco conocida, pero sus mas cercanos la describen como encantadora, maternal y tranquila, incluso su marido la describió como dulce y conciliadora siendo su hombro en el que llorar.

Su vida siguió siendo tranquila hasta que un día del 320 d. C., mientras estaba en una partida de caza junto a su marido e hijos, Desmera fue herida con una flecha en su brazo sangrando mucho. Los maestres buscaron una forma de ayudarla cerrando la herida, pero las costuras fueron mal hechas y volvió abrirse sangrando mas. Al final Desmera Redwyne acabo muriendo ese mismo año de una infección por la herida, a los 37 años de edad. Su muerte fue un duro golpe para sus hijos y para Manfred que no se volvió a casar, manteniendo el recuerdo de su esposa y su mejor amiga.

Desmera le dio tres hijos sanos a Manfred:

Lord Garmond Hightower, fue Señor del Faro, del Puerto y defensor de la Ciudadela a la muerte de su padre. Se caso en tres ocasiones con Janei Lannister que le dio una hija; En segundas nupcias con Jeyne Westerling sin hijos y en terceras nupcias con la viuda Joyeuse Erenford con ella tuvo dos hijos varones.

Lady Lily Hightower, se caso con Martyn Lannister y con el tuvo una hija, Rowena.

Lady Minisa Hightower, permaneció soltera, llego a anciana y fue la cuidadora de sus sobrinos y sobrinos nietos.

Addam Tyrell- Fue la mano derecha de su hermano mayor Manfred y un experto banquero logrando crear su propio banco, pero este fue vendido tras solo tres generaciones.

En un principio quería casarse con una de sus primas, Elinor o Alla Tyrell, pero estas ya estaban comprometidas y quedaba su prima Megga Tyrell, que era corpulenta y de canto insoportable, pero accedió a casarse con ella por que según su tío, Humfrey Hightower: “Las gordas son mas placenteras”. La boda se celebro en 300 d. C., siendo un acontecimiento agridulce y Megga trataba de llamar la atención de su marido. En la noche de bodas Addam admitió que había disfrutado de la compañía de nueva esposa y que deseaba volver a compartir la cama con ella pronto.

Megga le dio un total de nueve hijos y Addam quiso especialmente a sus hijos, mientras que su esposa quiso mas a sus hijas. Su hijo favorito fue Galadon al cual le heredero su banco y a sus otros hijos algunas joyas.

Addam vio a toda su familia morir poco a poco empezando con su madre y finalizando con su hermano mayor, Manfred al cual siempre estuvo unido. Las muertes de su familia fueron un duro golpe, pero se mantuvo fuerte para no decaer y fallecer. Tras la muerte de sus padres, Addam visitaba a sus familiares maternos junto a su familia estando unido a su tío Oberyn Martell el cual estaba muy apenado por la muerte de su hermana. 

Las visitas fueron continuas permaneciendo a veces cinco meses en Dorne. Durante una de estas visitas en 344 d. C., Addam no se percato de que había una serpiente de cascabel en su alcoba y esta le mordió el cuello mientras dormía. El veneno de la serpiente fue letal y Addam falleció en cuestión de minutos, mientras le trataban de salvar la vida falleciendo con 60 años de edad.

Megga Tyrell- Fue dama de compañía de Margaery Tyrell cuando esta viajo a la Roca Casterly para casarse con Jaime Lannister. Poco después volvió a la Altojardín donde se caso con Addam Hightower.

Pesé a su aspecto robusto y menos agraciado que el de sus otras primas, Addam Tyrell accedió a casarse con ella por que sus otras primas estaban prometidas casándose a principios del 300 d. C.. La noche de bodas fue un éxito y Addam admitió que le gusto compartir el lecho con Megga. Durante la noche de bodas, Megga se quedo embarazada y dio a luz a su primera hija, Lysa Tyrell. 

La pareja fue muy apasionada disfrutando ambos la cama y los coqueteos, Megga siguió dándole mas hijos algo que era bien visto por su cuñado, Manfred Hightower para asegurar la descendencia de la Casa Hightower. Megga no fue muy maternal dejando a sus hijos a cargo de las nodrizas o niñeras, pero se sabe que tenía debilidad por sus hijas buscándoles buenos matrimonios o puestos dentro de la corte Targaryen.

En 344 falleció su esposo Addam tras ser mordido por una serpiente durante una visita hacia Dorne. Megga se convirtió en una viuda rica y se instalo en una casa cerca de Altojardín donde gastaba su dinero en caprichos y regalos para sus nietos favoritos. Megga engordo mucho mas en esos años y a penas podía levantarse siendo ayudada por sus criados. Un día del año 364 d. C., Megga sufrió varios ataques en el corazón que cada vez eran mas fuerte hasta que su corazón se detuvo falleciendo así ese mismo año con 78 años de edad.

La pareja fue muy apasionada y llegaron a tener nueve hijos:

Lysa Hightower, fue la esposa de Ben Bushy al cual le dio un hijo, Baltasar Bushy.

Luthor Hightower, falleció durante la infancia de tuberculosis.

Galadon Hightower, fue el segundo dueño del Banco Tower heredado por su padre. Se caso con Talla Tarly y tuvieron un unico hijo.

Talisa Hightower, fue una meretriz a espaldas de sus padres, pero tras ser descubierta fue obligada a convertirse en Septa.

Sarra Hightower, septa de la Fe de los Siete en Antigua.

Melissa Hightower, se caso con Victarion Greyjoy siendo su tercera esposa y le dio cuatro hijos varones.

Mace Hightower, maestre, astrologo y alquimista.

Alyssa Hightower, se unió a las Hermanas Silenciosas.

Victaria Hightower, se caso con Edric Dayne y le dio cuatro hijos.

Jonnel Hightower, falleció durante la adolescencia tras recibir un golpe de espada en la cabeza.

[comfyswitcherblanketfort]

Geralt and the Minotaur p3

Y’all this could get hella complicated if I go hard with all the character sub ideas and all that but I’m here for the relationship so its gonna be bare bones on combining the canon bc I’m just not that skilled as a writer 😂 

Pairing : Geraskier

Warnings: talk of human sacrifice, talk of cannibalism, ye ole impending death, mention parents death, imprisonment, public humiliation (kinda), we got major soft boys falling for each other vibes too

part 2 here!

__________

Geralt woke with his head still resting on Jaskier’s thigh, though he was now lying on his side, resting his head against Geralt’s hip just above the dagger tucked in his belt. He had draped his arm over Jaskier’s waist as they slept, holding him closer, and Jaskier’s arm was resting on Geralt’s chest. It was still dark and, from the sounds of it, everyone else was still asleep save a few soldiers at the helm. The waves had settled to a gentle lapping at the hull and Geralt found himself completely relaxed and at peace for the first time in weeks. His hand rose and fell in a gentle rhythm with Jaskier’s breathing and every now and then the blue eyed boy would sigh, bringing a soft sleepy smile to Geralt’s face. He didn’t dare move, lest he break the spell, but someone else woke from a nightmare with a scream that shattered his illusion. 

Jaskier hummed and nuzzled into Geralt’s hip before he was fully awake, making the prince blush furiously and gasp. Sure he’d fallen asleep with friends and romantic interests back home, but that sensation was… different. 

“Is it morning?” Jaskier mumbled, not moving to sit, but at least the nuzzling had stopped. 

“Probably,” Geralt answered, resisting the urge to run his hand over Jaskier’s shoulder, “still early.”

“You haven’t been lying awake all this time have you?”

Geralt forced a breath out his nose in amusement, “Only a few minutes or so.”

Jaskier sat up, laying his arm over Geralt’s, keeping it wrapped around his waist as he moved to be able to inspect the young hero’s face, “You still look… weary.”

Geralt frowned, shifting so he was leaning on his elbow over the boy’s legs, still very much resting on him, “I wonder why?”

Jaskier smirked, “Is it true you’re a child of Poseidon? Why not sink the ship and we can all ride horses made of sea foam back to the mainland?”

Geralt cast his eyes down to the deck, “They’d just come back for more. It doesn’t matter who’s son I am or what favor I do or don't have.” 

"Pull the weed at the root." Jaskier nodded. 

Geralt hummed in agreement, sitting all the way up to lean against the mast next to the brunette, "What about your family? Anything exciting waiting for you at home?"

Jaskier hooked his arm around Geralt's and rested his head on his shoulder, "Doesn't matter." 

"Does to me." Geralt mumbled, a little taken aback by the physical affection. When Jaskier rolled his eyes he laid his hand over his knee, "Humor me." 

They sat and waited for the sun to rise over the water as they discussed Jaskier’s life. His parents death, the farm he worked for his uncle, the mundane little things like how often he gets sent to the market and who cuts his hair. They learned each other's birthdays as a joke, but the hopeful side of Geralt still repeated it to him a few minutes later just to be safe. Jaskier asked him about life at the palace, if it was as grand as everyone believed. Geralt felt squeamish admitting he didn’t know, seeing as he'd only really lived in the lap of luxury. Sure his trek to Athens was dirty and many nights he slept in barns, but most of his 20 years were spent in bright white togas and tunics with colorfully stitched hems. Jaskier didn’t seem bothered, he just asked more specific questions about the beds and the fountains. He pontificated for a while on the poor musical choices made in a performance at the amphitheater last summer and did his best to explain to Geralt how to delicately pluck a harp using a lock of his white hair as a prop. Joking was easy, being earnest wasn’t quite effortless, but it was easier than with other people, and Geralt lamented that they’d only met yesterday. 

“Do you think you’d’ve given me the time of day?” Jaskier asked.

Geralt grinned, giving the brunet's leg another squeeze, “You wouldn’t have given me a choice.”

Jaskier rested his chin on Geralt's shoulder, his hair fluttering into his eyes and glowing gold as the sun began to peek over the waves, "Probably not, no." His voice was soft in Geralt's ear, the warmth of his breath made the hairs on the back of his neck stand at attention. 

Geralt turned to look at him, their noses brushing. He was about to ask Jaskier something reckless and naive, no doubt born of desperation, but the moment was broken by shouting. 

"LAND" Echoed from various soldiers and strangled sobs broke out in response. Reality was once again stubbornly planted in the forefront of Geralt's mind and he forced himself to pull away. His heart beat furiously in his chest as he stood to get a better look. 

Someone gripped his elbow and spun him around, staring up at him with wide eyes full of terror, "You can do it, can't you? You can get us home?" The harsh whisper seemed to carry over the whole group, commanding their silence and attention as they formed a circle around him. 

Vessimir's parting words echoed in his head, he was a leader now, he had to act like it. His year of lessons and training and taking notes were over and he knew right then that even if they made it back, he'd never have a day of peace again. 

With a glance back toward Jaskier he nodded, "I will bring us home or die trying." 

The person's grip on his elbow tightened and he stared back at them with what he hoped was reassuring confidence for a moment before they released him, "Do you have a plan?" 

All his preparation could never have braced him for the absolute devastation on the group's faces when he hesitated. In the fraction of a second he took to open his mouth they knew. Only Jaskier seemed to accept the facts and take them in stride. 

"All I know for sure is that we need to make it out and back to the docks by dawn." Geralt's admission was met with curt nods from some and fresh tears from others, "I'm sorry." 

Jaskier pipped up, stepping into the center of the small crowd with Geralt, "You volunteered to try to save us. We need no apology." He sent a glare to someone about to speak in protest, cutting them off, "It's more than we've had in the last 18 years and I, for one, am grateful." 

Geralt gave him an appreciative nod but their theatrics were drawing attention from the soldiers. He shooed everyone away, not sure he could handle another altercation this close to the soldiers homeland where they'd have something to prove to onlookers.  

As they drew nearer to the shore they heard shouts of laughter and music, saw banners waving in the wind and people dancing around the port. They were throwing a festival. A festival of revenge and dominance over their enemies, where people who would have been sacrifices delighted in the activities. It made Geralt's stomach churn. 

Jaskier stood next to him as close to the bow as they were allowed, "Twisted, isn't it? And they wonder how we so readily believe they eat their brethren." 

Geralt took his hand, searching for anything to ground him as the fear crept up his neck and threatened to strangle him, "Monsters never think they're monsters." 

"You like being cryptic don't you?" Jaskier sighed, keeping his eyes forward as the festivities grew clearer and clearer. 

Geralt only shrugged in response. 

Soon enough they were all corralled by the soldiers with shouts and shoves. They tied Geralt's hands first, yanking on the rope so it burned into his wrists. The man was watching his face, waiting to see him wince or twitch. He gave them nothing. The end of the rope was then tied to Jaskier and so on until they were all lined up, hands bound in front of them and linked like sausages. 

When they docked there was a heavy drum roll, fitting for the captives in line behind Geralt trembling. The plank was lowered by soldiers in what had to be ceremonial dress and when they stepped back the drummers hit one last beat, leaving the whole crowd silent. 

At the front, surrounded by soldiers and standing on a throne made to be carried, was King Minos. His eyes were cold and calculating, and it was clear he was declining in health, but he still invoked fear with his gaze. There was no doubt to any rumors anymore. Geralt was sure this man was capable of absolutely anything. 

The Queen sat in a similar throne, next to them was their daughter, walking but flanked by guards. She didn’t take her eyes off Geralt as they prodded him down the plank. Her eyes were soft, betraying the rest of her face set in a hard mask of disapproval, and she made no effort to hide her ogling. Geralt stared right back, never one to back down from a challenge, until they were ushered past the royals into the crowd. The citizens were far more animated. Some threw food scraps at them, some jeered and gestured rudely, others spat, though they all blamed the 14 young men and women before them for the death of a prince before they were even born. 

They marched through winding streets and up set after set of switchback stairs to reach the palace dungeons. The guards were having their fun with Geralt in the lead, shoving him around when they needed to change direction and tripping him when they passed a large crowd. 

When they finally reached their cells they were shoved in, two to a cell, and the rope was cut. They had to hold their arms through the bars for the soldiers to cut the knotts. They took the rope with them when they left, leaving only bread and water on the bed and one torch lit hanging outside each cell. It was dreary and cold, and Geralt could hear the others crying.

Jaskier broke the loaf of bread in half and tossed it to Geralt, taking a long pull directly from the pitcher of water, “Eat. No arguments.”

__________

part 4 here

tag list: @hailhailsatan @so--many-fandoms

hmu if you want tagged 💕 I will cry tears of joy in my coffee

[poptod]

The Breeding Kings, pt. 16

Description:

Notes: WC: 4.5k

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The next day, you packed up and headed off on the road again. Ahk once again returned to periodically checking the map, as you had no guide except the river Euphrates and the lush greenery that bordered it. The trees and bushes allowed for a little more shade than the vacant valley did, something you made sure to appreciate, as well as the presence of drinkable water that flowed so near and readily. Yet even now you could see the river was at a relative low point––rings of water levels built up darkened sediment near the shore, and there were many visible rings descending down into the riverbed.

Only your strained breaths were audible from either of you despite the birds chirping overhead. A long night's sleep was nice, but it wasn't enough, and Ahk surmised that it would take a long while of resting till he'd be prepared to truly 'get going' again. Fortunately, he actually knew where you were going now––he found the map, pulled it out, and traced along the Euphrates down to the city of Babylon.

Ahkmen heard about Babylon in his classes, as well as from a few dinners his father hosted. He'd actually met some of the city officials, a fact he stewed over for a while, testing the bitterness of having to hide from people, and from his identity, once more.

As always, you were interested in what was to come; with what you could discover in a corner of the world you'd never been to. Ahk reminded you with a chuckle that you probably had been there before when you were first emigrating to Egypt. You responded that you didn't remember it.

"Let's see," Ahk hummed as he thought, staring at the ground attempting to remember what his teacher, Setet, taught him. "It's not actually called Babylon anymore, but the change is recent, so not everyone's been updated."

"So what is the name now?"

"Karanduniash. But it's interesting, how this came to be," he said with a grin he couldn't stop from spreading. You began to smile as well as you noted his fluster.

"Tell me about it, Aganu," you said, knowing you were allowing him to indulge in a little history.

"So... the original name was Babylon, in the Mesopotamian land at first. Then there was a King––Hammurabi, from the, uh.. Assyrian, or... no, Amorite land. Under his rule Babylon was built into a city that rivalled Nippur and eventually surpassed it in size and strength. Hammurabi was... an incredible King," he looked upwards, "and a bad man."

"I think that it is what you need, to be a good King. Not care for others," you said in a quieter tone.

"Perhaps so," he said, trying not to think about his father. "But nonetheless, under his rule, the whole of south Mesopotamia came under his rule."

"Where is the map?"

"Oh, here," he said as he pulled it from one of the side pockets, handing it to you. You jogged up the thin path to walk at his side, jostled slightly by your heavy bags as you stretched open the papyrus, displaying it for both you and him.

"So... here," you said, pointing to the southeastern land, separated from Africa by a strait.

"Yes. It's quite a lot of land, actually," he said before you rolled the map back up. "Anyway, Babylon has more recently come under rule of the Kassites. I've no idea where they're from so no need to ask. What I do know is that Babylon is still being fought over by the Kassites, Hittites, and Elamites, but all we really need to be worried about are the Elamites."

"Why? They are bad people?"

"Not inherently, but I don't trust their armies," he said, recalling several lessons about the sacking and raids of Mesopotamian cities by Elamites, and the torturous art that had come out of those tragedies.

"Ah, like Egypt," you then responded.

He wasn't sure why, but he detested your answer. Not that he could refute it very much––his father took rule over a vast amount of southern Canaan, and he didn't exactly do it politely.

"These lands have always been fought over," he said.

"It is dry and hot here," you said flatly, earning a chuckle from Ahk.

"Yes, and fertile, and beautiful. I have seen men lust over everything from women to... wine, and their cities, looking for those features," he said, carefully watching your thoughtful expression.

"I hate that," you said after a moment's silence.

"Understandable."

"I hate this world. I want to be... years and years from now, th.." you stopped for a moment, attempting to remember the word, ".. thousand! Thousand years, things will be good."

"I'd like to think that," he said, chuckling. "My father... lives in an old world. Sometimes I don't think he even knows other people aren't just empty vessels that relate to him. I think that's part of our problem, in this world. A lack of empathy."

"Many of the people we see are very kind," you said. He froze for a moment as he thought over his response.

"... I guess you're right," he said. "Maybe it's only rich people then."

You belted out a laugh, keeling over partway in a fashion that had Sephys meowing loudly at you in worry. She attempted to climb up onto your back only to fall off when you stood up straight. That only spurred you on more, till you were wheezing, and Ahk was laughing without even knowing it.

"She cares about you," he laughed as you trekked on.

"She put her claws in me!"

In the night you repeated your setup of camp, now settled into a routine that could pass by without words. You both gathered wood, and while you lit the fire, Ahk waded out into the river in hopes of finding fish. Once he caught one, you would cook it and he would set out the blankets and tarps to shelter you from any elements.

This particular evening was darker than usual, as the moon had disappeared and abandoned the stars. You gazed up, your neck kinked painfully but your eyes unable to tear away from the display spanning across the dome of the earth. Silence deafened the land with nothing but the steady, almost slow flow of the river near to you. Lightning bugs drifted about just as the stars did, but remained quiet and placid, only moving greatly when you disturbed them.

Distracted, you raised your hand upwards, waving it through a particularly large swarm of them that lazily drifted away as you moved. You giggled, catching Ahk's eye in time to see him slip in the water.

"I like this, here," you said as your hand fell into your lap.

"You want to stay here?" He asked, pulling himself out of the water with his makeshift spear in hand.

"Not for all time, you know that," you tutted.

"I do. I just want you to be closer to my home. It'll make it easier to see you."

You froze, but Ahk, involved in his fish-hunting, didn't notice your stunned silence.

"You are.. not staying with me?"

He looked up and his heart was instantly crushed by the weight of your worried brow. Freezing doom spread over him as he was overtaken with the thought, go back, go back, go back.

"Uh... well," he stuttered as he backpedalled, "I didn't... think you.. wanted me to?"

Nice cover, dumbass, he thought, bitter at his own lies. He despised lying to you, an ironic fact considering how much he always lied to you.

"Why do you think that??" You said in a voice that trembled, approaching him with the most heart-wrenching eyes he'd ever seen you bear. You took his hands and held them to your chest. "I want you near me. Always."

He stared at where your skin met, short-circuiting from your sudden earnestness. In truth he knew he needed to go back to Egypt. He longed too terribly for his home to never return, and that meant leaving you behind in wherever you decided to stay, a reality he had come to terms with after long days spent travelling. Staring into your eyes now, though, he knew abandoning you would be near impossible. Not just because his chest would ache in longing for you; you would hunt him down and beat an explanation out of him.

"Really?" He managed to choke out.

"Yes. I think you do know that," you said with a small, playful glare.

"Maybe," he mumbled.

"Get your fish, Aganu," you said, returning to the fire.

He nodded, wading back out into the river with his spear in hand. It took a little while, but by the time he caught a sizable enough fish, the fire was at a perfect point, the flames low but hotter than even bonfires. You roasted his catch slowly, once again tantalizing all three of you––you, Ahk, and the cat––back towards the fire.

You ate in silence, enjoying the crackling fire and the soft river that accompanied it. You finished first, and when you did, you cast the bones aside and reached for the wooden lute that got you through the Shamiyah desert. Soft notes joined the water and fire, matching the strange rhythm of the sizzling wood and ash. Ahk slowed his chewing to hear a little better, and eventually his food fell from his attention, which was becoming rapidly interested in you. It reflected an overall change in himself over the last several months––not that he noticed, since he thought he was always this smitten, but it was there with or without his acknowledgement.

The following day was filled with the monotonous footsteps sagging along the earth as you walked, heading towards the first signs of civilization since Mari. It was only in the day after that, and rather early in the morning, that you found the city towering above the flat landscape, Babylonian marvels of architecture jutting out into the clear sky. There were no walls surrounding the city itself, but a wall was visible surrounding what appeared to be either a palace or a temple, though you couldn't tell from your distance.

"That is Babylon?" You asked, sudden excitement speeding your gait.

"No, we haven't passed Rapiqum yet, so that must be Rapiqum," he said as he recalled a small, marked city on the map.

"Rapiqum?" You repeated. "You did not say on it."

"Not much to say. Invaded by Hammurabi a while ago and now it's part of Babylonia," he said, sighing.

As you got closer, the river got wider, and you both soon realized that Rapiqum was on the eastern bank––not the western, which was where you had been walking for the past couple days. You let out a long, exasperated sigh, your shoulders slouching as you paused in the middle of your step.

"How do we get it with this river?" You asked in a whine.

"... carefully?" He tried hesitantly, earning a small slap on his shoulder.

"We can not get boat in Rapiqum if we do not get boat to get TO Rapiqum," you said slowly, spinning around in slow circles as you searched for any huts or buildings on your side of the river.

"No shit," he muttered beneath his breath. "We can try and go back to a narrower part of the river and wade across."

"The water is too – too high," you said, motioning with your hand that the water level would come up to your chest.

"Right. Or, we could try and build a raft out of reeds and such," he suggested.

"We need more than what is here," you said, and you were also right on that, as there was only a small grove of reed plants in an outlet of the river.

Both of you stood for a moment, scratching your heads and tapping your chins in hopes of generating a better idea. There were few resources, most of them already culled by the nearby city's inhabitants, and most of them likely struggling from the apparent drought.

"Shit. I have an idea," he said, interrupting the silence. You looked up from staring at the ground.

"What is it?" You asked.

An hour and lots of reorganizing of your bags later, you were seated upon his shoulders, carrying one of your packs with Sephys inside. Her claws dug into your shoulder but you dare not move, too frightened of causing Ahk to slip in the water. It would do you no good to be bruised and for all of your belongings to be soaking wet. Even more precarious were the rocks he crossed––muddy, slippery, or overgrown with slick algae. The rocks shuffled around with the gentle current, so Ahk had to avoid tripping over those as well.

"Is this real as a good idea?" You asked, your voice wavering when he stumbled partway.

"I never said it was good, I just said it was an idea," he chuckled nervously.

Despite the rocks, the tide, and their waged war against Ahk's balance, he managed to get you to the other side and bowed his head to let you off. You nearly fell onto the ground, but you picked yourself up quickly as Sephys ran off.

"You are okay?" You asked, kneeling down as the shoreline was much higher than the water itself.

"Yes, I'm alright," he said with a dismissive hand. "Just need to get the other bags now."

He sighed, allowing himself a second's peaceful rest before he straightened again.

"Go Ahk!" You cheered him on, bringing a momentary laugh to him.

Three trips later and both of you were sitting on the dry, eastern bank, your legs held to your chest and Ahk's dangling so his toes just barely skimmed the water. He was still breathing heavily, surrounded by the bags he hauled across the river. Sweat formed on his brow, just enough of a sheen to cool him down in the noon sunshine beating down upon the land. He lay back, his hands behind his head, and his eyes closed in blissful rest.

Winds blew that carried the scent of flowers, twisting into and playing with the unruly curls upon his head. His hair hadn't grown an extraordinary amount, but it was certainly visible in matted, overgrown locks. Oh, well––just another piece of memory to connect to the blisters on his hands and feet.

"I am hungry," you stated, turning from the river to him. "We can go to the city now?"

"Alright," he said, but he didn't move. You waited for a minute before tiring of his game.

"Aganu!"

You kicked him in the shin––more of a push, really––and he let out an undignified yelp, scrambling to sit up.

"You are so mean," he gasped.

"Come, come," you said with a grin, tugging at his ankles.

He tried to shake his way out of your grasp, laughing when you pulled at him, crawling in between his legs and setting yourself on his hips, trapping him against the ground. It was then he halted his struggle, breath growing suddenly short as you smiled wickedly above him.

You fake-punched his chest, lightly pounding your fists onto either of his pecs.

"Get up, get up, get up," you said, and he shook his head against the grass.

"This is your method of getting me up? By pinning me to the ground?" He chuckled, turning away as he was unable to meet your eye any longer.

"You are a strong man," you said, still rapping your knuckles on his chest. "You can get up with me."

"Can I?"

He sat up, almost bonking his nose with yours in an act that burst both of you into giggles. Giddiness swarmed all round his head, blurring his racing heartbeat and the heat in his face.

"You are getting up now?" You asked when you both calmed down.

"If you get off me," he said.

You promptly did so, and the two of you threw your packs back over your shoulders, and marched off towards Rapiqum.

Since you had to go upstream in order to cross the river, you now had a good length of time before you would make it to the city. It was still visible in the flat, barren lands, acting as a beacon of hospitality the likes of which you hadn't seen since departing Jericho. Although, now it seemed less grand to you than it would've had you come out of the desert straight to see Rapiqum. You had water, you had a decent amount of food in your stomach, and neither of you had any outlying wounds.

"Now, we're in Babylonia, don't forget. Don't be surprised by the amount of people you see, and especially if they're racist," he noted, growing a little quieter as you reached the outskirts of the city, where the first distant homes were set up alongside soldier's barracks.

"Racist?" You repeated with a confused look.

"It's... confusing, but no one really likes each other. Babylonians don't like the Hittites, Kassites don't really like the Hittites, the Hittites hate the Babylonians, and.. you know. Everyone," he rambled on with vague hand gestures.

"And.. what do they think in Egyptians?" You asked slowly.

"I can't imagine they like us much either. I mean – me. I don't think they'd like me if they found out my ethnicity. Or you. Good thing we're wearing desert clothes," he said, looking you up in down in the scraps of cloth you wore to protect yourself from the heat and the sand. He was in a similar state.

"Yes," you said, but the look of worry remained, and didn't cease for a long while.

Streets formed in the rocky earth, leading into the city in convoluted pathways that whirled around homes and businesses. You and Ahk soon found yourselves amidst crowds that lined every street, most everyone standing as though they were in line––and, as you came to find out, they were.

Glancing to each other with questioning faces, you silently agreed to follow to wherever the people were lining up from, which led you first to the wall that encircled the largest building in the city. It must've been a temple that actually accepted the prayers of the commonfolk, or a palace home in which an overseer ruled the city from. The only gate in the wall was guarded by tall soldiers, beside whom stood a smaller man, bent over a large book enclosed with leather pages. He was muttering a recitation to the crowd piled into the gate opening.

"Come along," Ahk whispered, helping you pass in front of him with a hand on your back. He stared for a second longer before he followed after you.

The other side of the city was entirely empty. A couple stray dogs wandered around the abandoned streets, upon which empty carts and half-rotten bits of food lay on the sides, forgotten and left to rot. Several of the houses had sizable crates leaned against the other walls, most likely used by someone without a home.

Your pace slowed till you walked slowly down the streets, pressed into each other as your eyes flickered back and forth at the ruin. Ahkmen had never seen a city so quiet, and it struck a nerve in him, causing him to wring his hands.

Inside, some of the structures had bits of furniture and food––mostly dried fruits, some nuts, and every now and then part of a loaf of bread. You and Ahkmen both lit up at the sign of bread, but neither of you indulged. Something wasn't quite right, and there was some sort of answer within the long line of people streaming into the walled fortress. Ahk earned your confirmation before he set off back towards the other side of the city, your hand in his, and concentrated eyes searching the tops of roofs he passed.

When he found a building tall enough, he climbed the rungs of the shabby, wooden ladder, helping you up before he headed for the next ladder leading to the next highest roof. Long, wooden poles built into the building's roof aided in getting him up, and soon the both of you were peering over the encircling wall.

From your spot you could see the entrance from the other side, where the back of the scribe still recited verses to the citizens who watched on with blank, tired faces. The group in front of the listeners was walking forward, entering the large building where you could no longer see them.

"Should we try and get into the temple?" Ahk asked, gnawing on his bottom lip.

"It is if we want to know what is going here, or if we want to take their food and go," you said, turning your head from the walls to him.

"Yeah," he sighed. He waited a moment before he said, "do you want to know?"

You nodded almost sheepishly. A slow grin spread across his face and he chuckled, nodding as he moved from his knees to his feet.

"Very well then," he said, pulling you up, "let's get ourselves in, shall we?"

He gestured to the ladders and you giddily jumped your way down, landing on solid ground far faster than Ahkmen did. You both hurried over to the line, where you were promptly told by both guards and citizens that you had to go to the back, with no exceptions. Shrugging, you decided the wait couldn't be too bad, and two hours later, you were finally in the next group.

The sun had nearly set by then, and you could swear the bags on your shoulders were bruising you with their weight. You stepped towards the guards, preparing yourselves for the long spiel (that was apparently necessary), before the guards asked you a question that Ahkmen didn't quite hear correctly.

"I said, what sector do you live in," he said when Ahk asked him to repeat himself.

There was only one problem, Ahk realized, standing between him and understanding the guard. Ahkmen didn't speak the language the man was using.

"Uh..." Ahk cast a terrified glance to you, hoping that your tongue would work better than his numb one could. The guards were huge. He could hide him and his bags in one of their shadows.

"Um.. sector... 1..?" You tried, attempting your best at a casual expression that looked more like you were in immense pain.

"... you live in the temple?" The guard asked, raising a single brow.

Since when do they know Akkadian? Ahk thought, fear dripping like ice down his spine.

"Yes, we.. are here for cleaning," you said.

"Ah," the guard said, recognition in his eyes. "Go around the back. That's where the kitchens are."

You bowed and offered a small thanks, though you only half understood what he last said. While you might've known a passable amount of Akkadian to get by, you were by no means fluent, and had a hard time understanding people. Your heart thumped painfully in its' cavity as you wandered into the walled temple, scurrying around to the back like you weren't supposed to be there.

Well, technically you weren't supposed to be there, but you were assured that if they did put you to cleaning, you'd be able to get done whatever needed to be done. Ahkmen on the other hand was less confident in himself, and paled sickly when you came to the small door leading into the plain, sandstone temple, where remnants of paint coated the walls, bleached by the sun.

The inside was dark––dark enough that cleaners weren't especially necessary, since you could barely see the floor, much less the tiny specks of dirt and sand trailed in by visitors. Tall, thin poles led up to platforms that burnt tiny fires that illuminated, above all else, the ceiling, and the ornate paintings of the night sky that had yet to fade. Ahkmen stared up in awe, having to tear himself away when you moved quickly on. Rapiqum wasn't noted on most maps––it was a relatively small town, so the massive temple grew to greater suspicion in Ahk's mind, and he payed closer attention to the minute details he could see in the dim lighting.

Most of the paintings, while intricate, were shoddily made with lines that were almost never kept straight. It seemed more to be the work of a single man over many, many years, rather than the collective artworks a government could scrounge from its' more artistic citizens. The complicated halls which led to dead ends, small empty rooms, and occasionally right ways, eventually brought you to the center room where people from outside were filing in and out at an even pace.

While the hallways were lit by torches or bits of burning incense, this cathedral was lit by the light of sunset streaming through high-up windows. Beams of yellow and orange light streamed in, reflecting on the dust and smoke crowding the air, swirling round the rising curls of incense smoke.

You and Ahk hid behind the archway, watching someone obscured from view speaking to the citizens. His voice was low and frail, scratching against Ahk's ear as he rambled on in a similar fashion that the scribe at the gate did. The next group of people watched him in silence, and at the end of the long spiel––of course in Akkadian, which neither of you knew well enough to translate––the people formed another line that led up to the man. One by one they earned something and eagerly left, looking human for the first time. The old man must be handing something out, but from your nearby angle, you couldn't even see his face.

Ahkmen silently motioned for you to follow him. You did so, and he led you through the hallways encircling the center of the temple. Even the slowest drawn breaths sounded in echoes around you, an effect that left the old man's voice reverberating like ripples in water, repeating after itself in canon.

His face was slowly revealed the nearer you got to the temple's entrance, exposing first his raised hands, moving to a book not all unlike the one the scribe at the gates had, and eventually the the ashen face of an elder who looked already past death. Without even thinking, Ahk shot his hand up to cover your mouth when you began to breathe too heavily in the overwhelming shadows of the arches. He then pulled the both of you away from the arches, pressing your back against the furthest wall absorbed entirely in the dark.

Swallowing through a tight throat, he pressed his chest to yours, allowing his face to slot next to yours. He felt your breath catch, and felt how it released with nothing more than a warm shhh in your ear.

"What is he giving them," he whispered, barely audible even in his own head.

"Bowls... from a well," you breathed out. "Water."

His brow furrowed.

Water?