#Drawn Together Aqua

[larathefox]

Info about my Drawn Together OC

[soysaucetime]

We all pretend to be the heroes on the good side

does anyone remember that one trailer for KH3 where they showed a quick shot of Aqua (evil) in the realm of darkness........... I lost my mind back then over 3 seconds of content

[zombiegangster]

The Gang Who Are The Guy's Friends

[luxmoogle]

Have you ever drawn Aqua and Cinderella interacting? I love them together <3

;)

[dollsahoy]

The "white cherry blossoms and leaves outlined in red on an aqua background" fabric of the skirt is something I've had since 2007, and the "peach background with badly drawn white cats with red outlines and a slightly-greener-then-aqua bow, vintage style" fabric on the bodice I got in 2010. Both of them were small pieces that I had put into a place with other small pieces of fabric...then kinda forgot about...

So, when I rediscovered them while looking for fabrics to make test versions of this dress, there was some nostalgia, and I happily put them together for this dress. I knew this pink haired Licca would be a good doll to wear it, too

[princess-sof-time]

Sorry A-chan, I took the "send all the requests you want" as a personal challenge hahaha hope you don't mind ❤️ you can take revenge on me when I open requests if you want

I was hearing Idol (again xd) and then I got an idea, could you write for Ai, Aqua and Ruby with a crush that is a really big fan of Ai and know a lot of her songs and all, but also is really smart and already suspect that she usually lies, but also like that part of her, pretty please 🥺❤️

I can't wait!!! My little revenge, hehehe 🤪

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: .☽ . :☆ﾟ. ──────

🄰🄸 🄷🄾🅂🄷🄸🄽🄾

• Ai was drawn to the reader, who was a devoted fan and knew all of her songs and career details. It was evident that he was a genuine admirer. But what most captivated Ai was the remarkable intelligence of the reader, who already suspected that she used to lie from time to time.

• While other fans might be disappointed or outraged by the lies, the reader seemed to appreciate that part of Ai. He understood that she was more than just a picture perfect idol. This understanding and acceptance of Ai's duality awakened a special bond in both of them.

• There she found herself enchanted by someone who knew her so well, someone who could see through her lies and still admire her. This unique connection fueled their curiosity and interest in getting to know the reader better.

• As Ai took the stage for yet another performance, her eyes met. She felt a shiver run over her skin as she realized the deep connection they shared. It was a powerful feeling, based on love and mutual understanding.

• Ai couldn't wait to explore that relationship with the reader, to open up and reveal the true essence behind the masks she wore. Together, they could embark on a journey of mutual discovery, where music and sincerity would be the soundtrack to her love story.

🄰🅀🅄🄰 🄷🄾🅂🄷🄸🄽🄾

• Aqua was amazed by the reader's dedication, who knew Ai Hoshino's songs inside out. It was evident that the reader was a true fan, capable of accurately quoting lyrics and details from Ai's career. But what truly impressed Aqua was the reader's sharp intelligence, not only appreciating the songs but also suspecting Ai's occasional lies.

• This intelligent and perceptive perception of the reader enchanted Aqua. She watched as he understood the complexity of her mother, accepting her in her entirety, including her imperfections. While others might feel disappointed or rejected, the reader seemed to find beauty even in the darkest parts of Ai.

• Aqua felt a special connection with the reader, a bond that went beyond their shared love for Ai's music. She longed to explore this connection, diving into deep and passionate conversations about Ai's art and personality, sharing their own perspectives, and discovering more about the reader.

🅁🅄🄱🅈 🄷🄾🅂🄷🄸🄽🄾

• Ruby was fascinated by the reader's crush on her mother, Ai Hoshino.  It was impressive how he knew every song, every detail of Ai's career.  However, what most captivated Ruby was the perceptive intelligence of the reader, who already suspected the lies that Ai told from time to time.

• Ruby admired the reader's ability to see through the lies and appreciate her mother in her entirety.  He understood that Ai was a complex and multifaceted person, and this appealed to Ruby deeply.  She saw in the reader someone who not only loved Ai's music, but also understood her essence as a human being.

• The connection Ruby felt with the reader went beyond fandom.  They shared a special bond, based on their love for Ai and their ability to see beyond appearances.  Ruby couldn't wait to open up and explore that connection, delving into meaningful conversations and revealing her own personal journey alongside the reader.

Pinterest: Credits of used icons : jijii_ ame, hikki, Scarlett

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: .☽ . :☆ﾟ. ──────

[violettduchess]

A/N: Cyran and Gilbert tied for second place in my poll. I was originally going to put them together in one headcanon but the styles were too different and it felt very disjointed, so they each get their own little fic.

Suitor: Gilbert, prompt: strawberry

An entry for Aqua and my Summer Days Sultry Nights CCC

WC: 854

Oh how excited you are, running through the dark stone halls of Obsidian, your treasure cupped in your hands. An angel on a mission, flying on invisible wings. Up the winding staircase you go, heart hammering, breathless with anticipation at showing him your miracle.

You burst through the dark Mahogany doors of his study. He’s at his desk, black quill in hand. You can tell by his posture he’s been here for hours: the tired roundness of his shoulders, the lax lay of his left hand beside the parchment he's perusing. The sound of your entrance turns his head and the sight of you is like the warmth of a sunbeam through glass on a cold winter’s day. He sets his quill aside without a second glance, holding out his arms in invitation.

“My Häschen comes bearing gifts,” he murmurs as you slide onto his lap, hands still cupped protectively. He anchors you against his body with one arm, bowing his upper body to rest his forehead against your shoulder, breathing in your scent like it’s as essential to him as oxygen. 

“Look, Gil.” Although he could stay curled against you for eternity, he raises his head to look down at what you have brought him. Slowly you open your hands to reveal the riches you’re holding: A single, large, perfect strawberry. It still glistens from the water you washed it with, its size and ruby red color speaking volumes about the abundance of flavor it carries. He also knows the other reason you are smiling so brightly.

“It…..is from here?” You nod eagerly. You have been experimenting with gardening, working hard to try and find a way to get crops to grow in the arid Obsidian climate. How many nights has he come to bed to find you asleep, surrounded by botanical treatises and guides and lexica. Determination drove you and now you have managed to unlock the soil’s secret to provision. At least for strawberries.

“For you.” You hold it up in offering but he tilts his head. “Have you tried any yet?” Your silence confirms his suspicion. He reaches for the precious fruit, plucking it from your palm with deft fingers. “Seeing as how this is the first one, I believe the one who devoted so much time to its care should be the first to taste, oder?” 

His eye is an even richer red than the strawberry and all you can do is smile in sweet defeat, knowing he won’t take no as an answer. Your gaze never leaves him, as if you were nothing but a speck of iron drawn by magnetic force. Not even when he raises the strawberry to your lips. “Open,” he commands, although his voice is practically a purr, soft and near the edge of rough. Your lips part and he holds the fruit to them. He watches, a man hypnotized by the white of your teeth as they sink into the flushed, succulent fruit, pale red juice immediately running from the broken flesh, over the curvature of your lips, across your tongue. 

“Mmmm,” you sigh as you’re hit with the full-bodied taste of the strawberry. It’s  the sweetness of summer, of sunshine, of long days and warm nights. It’s cool wind and cooler water. Shoeless feet tickled by green grass. It's fireflies and full moons. It's bare skin and sweat. Your eyes close as you savor the sensation. Gilbert watches your face, the euphoria that has your body going lax in his arms, the way your eyelids drop, stealing your gaze away from him. Your soft exhale of pleasure. Something hot and jagged suddenly bolts through him. He doesn’t want you looking like that, sounding like that, for any reason other than him.

He takes the half-eaten strawberry and sets it on his desk, rising suddenly, with you lifted into his arms. Startled, you cling to his neck as he carries you over to the large black velvet couch. “Gil?” Ever so slowly, he lays you down on your back, his expression alight with sharp intent as he leans over you. “I will have my taste now.” 

You’re about to tell him that he left the strawberry on his desk when his body drops to press you into the softness of the sofa, his hands sliding up to hold your face as he lowers his head, his mouth capturing yours with all the swift resolve of a triumphal conqueror. He licks the leftover juice from your lips languidly, leaving not even a millimeter of them untasted. You gasp as he guides you, tilting your head so he can plunder your mouth, devouring you until he has lapped up every single essence of strawberry that lingered there. He is merciless, chasing that ghost of summer flavor until you are left breathless beneath him. 

He breaks contact for a moment to look down into your face, now painted in shades of want and yearning and red-hot desire. And he smiles, satisfaction riding the blistering current of pleasure that rushes through his body. 

Much better, he thinks. And then your hungry hands are in his hair, pulling him back to you and all thought is abandoned, much like the poor, half-eaten strawberry.

Tagging: @aquagirl1978 @alexxavicry @queengiuliettafirstlady @rhodolitesrose @ikemen-writer @bellerose-arcana @thewitchofbooks @aria-chikage @redheadkittys @tele86 @dear-mrs-otome @firestar-otomeobsessed @curious-skybunny @rhodoliteschaos @kpop-and-otome @writingwhimsey @mxrmaid-poet @silver-dahlia @wendolrea @otomefoxystar @nightfoxqueen @myonlyjknight @queen-dahlia @aceuuuuu @scorchieart @bubblexly @joiedecombat

[aihoshiino]

Do you think Aqua will end up with Kana, Akane, Ruby, or no one? I doubt it’ll be any other options besides those four, unless Aka is really trolling us lol.

HERE COMES AQUMELT WITH THE STEEL CHAIR -

But no in all seriousness and genuinely no bias, I think an AquKana or single Aqua end. Kana is both of the creators' favourite character and she has been consistently prominent and uniquely important in almost all major arcs, even ones that maybe arguably shouldn't have been hers lol. Her feelings for Aqua have been floating around unresolved since our second major arc and while Aqua has never straightforwardly said so because if he ever tried to straightforwardly express his feelings then he would die, there's a pretty hefty mountain of evidence both implicit and explicit that Aqua has very strong romantic feelings for Kana in turn.

At the very least, that "mutual pining" tension will need to be addressed before the series ends and the fact that it hasn't yet is telling, at least to me. It's also kind of... Structurally Loaded imo that born Akane and now Ruby have gotten moments of romantic resolution with Aqua (or well, Ruby's is in the process of being excruciatingly drawn out but still) but we've yet to have one for Kana, all while her graduation arc and the finale of the manga is looming on the horizon.

That suggests to me that Kana's romantic resolution is being saved for last and typically in romances structured the way OnK does, the one who gets their resolution last is typically the "winner", so to speak. So all that together I think forms a decent bit of ground to stand on while arguing for an AquKana end.

A single Aqua end is also pretty likely imo! Aqua has been paralleling and projecting onto Ai in a lot of ways across the story but especially in the Movie arc and I think it would be really interesting for him to echo her in that regard, too; in thinking he needs to chase romantic love to be saved only for his salvation to come on the form of platonic, familial love. I'd personally love to see that but Akasaka is ultimately a romance guy at the end of the day so whether he'd fully commit to that is kinda up in the air.

Maybe AquMelt can still real after all.............

[farity]

In The Red of Night, part 7

"I don't understand what she wants, though," you said, "if you don't want her, destroying my life and even taking my life is not going to change that."

Aemond stirred his coffee, "Alys is at her most dangerous when she doesn't see what's clearly staring her in the face. She thinks if my only options are to go back to her or to lose everything I love, I will go back to her." His jaw tightened, and his eyes narrowed. "And that is where the bitch is wrong."

The elevator bell rang and Gendry stepped out, holding hands with a young woman who carried herself as if she were far taller than the five feet you guessed she was at. "Hey all."

"Lord of Storm's End," Aemond said, one corner of his mouth lifting. "And the Lady of Storm's End, of course."

"Arya will do," the young woman said, embracing Aemond, "Your Highness," she smiled as she looked up at him. She turned to you, "hi, I fucking hate Alys Rivers, let's unalive her, shall we?"

You couldn't help but smile as Arya pulled you into a hug. She was tiny, but the power in her muscles was undeniable.

"Unalive?"

Gendry hugged you, then turned to Aemond. "She's gone all Gen Z with the lingo. You should have seen her in the 80s."

Arya leaned in to whisper at you. "The 80s were amazing. My hair caught fire once because I had so much Aqua Net in it."

You watched Gendry close his eyes and sigh, but his mouth was still curved in a gentle smile.

"Choose whatever guest room you want, make yourselves comfortable while you're here."

"These are stunning," Arya said, rushing to the windows. When she saw that you had followed her and were looking out at your burned down shop, she pressed her lips together. "I'm sorry."

"Me too," you said quietly. "But no one was hurt, which is good."

Arya smiled. "Well, we'll make sure someone gets hurt in the end," she said, and then turned with a flourish to inspect the rest of the place.

Aemond came up behind you and wrapped his arms around your waist. "If you're at all unsure-"

You turned in his arms. "I am not. I know what I want." Raising a hand to his face, you pressed your lips to his. "I want you, I want us."

He wrapped a hand around the back of your neck, "good. Because I want us, too, and loving you is not something I want to do for a few years or even a few decades. I want to love you for eternity."

* * * * *

"Why me?"

Aemond looked over, saw her sipping at her coffee as she studied him.

"What?"

She smiled, that gentle smile he saw whenever he thought of her. "Why me? I'm sure you've met more beautiful, more clever, more-"

"Because you saw me for me," he replied, putting down his coffee and walking across his office to where she sat on the sofa. He'd insisted on having breakfast there, not just so he could work while he had his morning meal, but so they wouldn't be always looking over at the burned down coffee shop.

The rebuild had started in a very basic way, until she decided what she wanted in more detail. But he caught the grief in her face whenever she looked at it and had decided to spend more time in his office.

"I wanted you, yes, but I have wanted others over the decades, and they were not what you were. What you are."

"Which is?"

"You understand me."

"I understand a centuries-old Targaryen prince who is a vampire," she said, eyebrows raised.

Aemond smiled and sat next to her. "You didn't know that when you met me. When you befriended me. When you came to me after that bastard dared try to hurt you." He took her hand in his, kissed the back. "You were drawn to me, not any of the things that I am, or was."

"If I don't make it-"

"Don't say that." Aemond's hands tightened on hers.

"Listen to me, please." She looked at him, "I want you to sell the land where the shop is, and split it between Katie and Bailey. They were counting on-"

Aemond grabbed her shoulders. "This is why Gendry and Arya are here, why we're starting tonight."

"I know. But I also know that you've all lived through things I can't imagine, and that Alys is determined. And she has people working for her."

"Fine," Aemond said. "But we will prevail, when all is said and done. And Alys will lose."

He kissed her, and she wrapped your arms around him, knowing he didn't want to speak of this any more. The possibility of everything going badly was there, but for now, he would only entertain life as the outcome.

She had always understood him, even from that first day, when she had no idea what she was welcoming in to her shop. When she rushed to him amidst the policemen, unaware he would have taken her on the floor if need be, and he would have drank from her.

But the more she knew, the more she accepted, and his desire began to turn into something he hadn't felt in a long time.

And he would not let anything or anyone take that away.

* * * * *

He'd dressed in his usual greys and blacks, and with Gendry and Arya wearing similarly hued outfits, you felt like a peacock in your blue sweater and the green scarf you had around your neck.

Arya had immediately fought Aemond for the chair with the best view of all the exits, and he'd given in, as long as he sat next to you.

After dinner, you were enjoying some drinks when you brought up a short vacation. "Why don't we do that, then? Get away for a while."

"I have work," Aemond snapped. "You know, the thing that keeps us fed and housed."

You considered his words, "I know, but going to Dorne for a couple of months wouldn't be bad. Leave all this behind, maybe get some inspiration for-"

"Leave all this behind," Aemond interrupted, "you mean my life, my work?" he threw back the rest of his whiskey, placed the glass back on the table with a loud thump.

"Aemond, I wasn't saying-"

"Maybe we should get the bill," Arya said, signaling to Gendry. "Call it a night."

"No, I want to clear things up," Aemond continued, and you shrank back into your chair. "You want me to leave everything behind so you can get inspiration? I've paid your employees' wages for six months, I'm putting my best people in charge of renovations, so you can continue your little fantasy of owning a coffee shop."

"Aemond." You touched his arm and he pulled away.

"You were barely breaking even, baby. The selling points were that the shop was nearby, open and available." He laughed then, a nasty sound full of bitterness. "Much like its owner."

Your hand had struck his cheek before you'd realized it, and you stood, the world around you going still.

"You fucking asshole," Arya spat, throwing her water at Aemond's face. "Let's go, Gendry," she said, and when Gendry didn't move, she threw her napkin at his. "Well, fuck you, too, then!"

She grabbed your hand while you and Aemond stared at each other, and pulled you until your feet began to move. You followed her, your blood pounding in your ears, and a few minutes later, you were leaving the area in a cab she'd hailed.

* * * * *

"That was harsh," Gendry said later as he and Aemond sat at a nearby bar.

"Maybe," Aemond muttered, twirling the shot glass in his fingers, "but true. You don't know her very well but whatever we had wasn't going to anywhere." He signaled to the bartender for another one. "She is what she is, and as badly as I feel for her, I'm not going to stay with her out of guilt."

Gendry tapped his fingers on the table. "Is that all there is between you?"

Aemond shrugged. "I feel responsible, I mean, her shop didn't burn down because of faulty electrics. It's been fun. It's always fun at the beginning." He stared at his shot glass as if he could find all the answers to his inner turmoil in the carved glass. "But before she gets any ideas about spending the rest of her life with me, maybe it's better to just be honest with one another."

Gendry's tapping continued, and Aemond gave him a look. "I heard there's a new bar down the street."

"Count me in," said Gendry as he settled the tab on the table screen. "All I know is that I am not setting foot in Bar-A-Theon. This generation's fucking desperate," he mumbled as Aemond smiled.

"That's what you get when one of yours marries a Greyjoy."

There were few people on the street, Aemond noticed as they walked the couple of blocks to the next bar, as well as others who weren't quite people.

"One, three, six," Gendry said in High Valyrian, and Aemond looked at him.

"One?"

Gendry pretended to look at his phone, "blue cap, bomber jacket."

"Ah."

"Good thing you have me, innit?"

"It's always good to see you, Gendry."

* * * * *

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This fic

@toodlesxcuddles​  @sophie-looks-at-stuff   @sageloves-stuff @snh96 @iloveallmyboys​

Thank you for reading, for your likes and reblogs, they all mean so much to me!!!

My Ko-fi

[lunarcrown]

Hii! I’ve just created a tumblr account but I’ve been obsessing over the HTP AU since the start! You and Aqua have done an amazing job, and to cope I’ve drawn a bit of Fanart lol. Bx and Alisker are my absolute faves, fingers crossed we get to see more of them? 👀

THIS IS SOOOO COOL!! OH mY GOD WOWOOWOW FIRSTLY welcome to tumblr! and second HOLY SHIT THIS IS NEAT!! I LOVE the drawings of alisker and bx together and how in WUV they are and the ONE WHERE ALISKER IS HOLDING BX LIKE HE WEIGHS NOTHIN hes just a little big fellaaaaa AND ALL THE EYES ON ALISKERRRRRRR the COLORS and that trippy background????? ASTOUNDING! It fits the writing SO WELL when it was describing how the eyes looked like someone had a handful that they just placed anywhere! THANK YOU SO MUCH!!

[kiseiakhun]

this post, https://www.tumblr.com/kiseiakhun/747865134888861696/when-his-comics-were-first-published-in-1994-the?source=share combined with knowledge of state sponsored publishing to create this idea. Atlantean fetish books directly sponsored by the Atlantean government. (Atlantean porn, officially brought to you by Aquaman) Atlantis doesn't have the same conventions about sex as humans & therefore might be more willing to attach the state to this. Also this way they get to control what's being published about them & gives them a ready made market to propagandise to.

(also they would try the reverse in Atlantis. also sponsored by the atlantean government to get the population to be more accepting of humans)

(re: this)

Hi anon I want you to know I showed this ask to all my Servers the day you sent this because I am so enamoured with it. Can we get married.

Now I'm sidetracked about how Atlanteans would have paper... like you can't make paper underwater and I can't think of any equivalent methods that would work in the ocean. Maybe a water-curing resin? Paper gets part of its strength from how cellulose shrinks and sort of links together as it dries so a natural plasticizer would seem like an equivalent... maybe they could just hack off pieces of fallen wood and polish it, but that takes wayyyy more skill and effort and time compared to paper making. Hm. Maybe they could mine volcanic stone? Maybe they just import cotton paper from the surface (thick cotton paper doesn't fall apart when it's wet like wood-based paper. At least not as easily). Maybe they draw on rocks with silverpoint. HMMMM. @pluckyredhead @aqua-dan do they address this in the comics?

I'm thinking so hard about this because drawn porn, at least, would need paper. Written porn in theory does not need paper, though it's wild to imagine people dictating their erotica to surface transcribers. Like do you think there's a specific job for that or do you have to podfic your porn yourself if you're a writer? Do most Atlanteans even know how to use their vocal chords to talk? All of their communication is telepathic.

Video porn is easy; we already have waterproof cameras, though I think equipment would have to be modified to withstand pressure at the deeper end, ALTHOUGH I don't think most of Atlantean society lives in the depths, Garth is regarded as something Exotic™ because he comes from a deep-sea kingdom Garth should have bioluminescence don't @ me.

Anyway yes. I think Atlantis would have to have different conventions about sex because water transmits vibrations so much better than air. Like... if you're fucking people Know. Everyone will Know. They can literally feel you fucking through the air. When you fuck everyone else fucks with you. I bet Atlantean orgies are a really popular porn genre. I bet surface people fetishize it. I bet Atlanteans are really intrigued by how people on the surface can just keep sex a SECRET and hidden/forbidden romance is really popular.

Okay so now the question is, is Atlantis propaganda porn vanilla (for them), a way to show Proper Sex, or is it wild freak shit to show off the ingenuity of their populace? What do you think they show in their Fucking videos. What do they import.

[larathefox]

someone has a new obsession

[ferret-milk]

SPOILERS FOR OSHI NO KO CH 143

Oh god I can’t take it anymore. I know they were separate people before they got isekaied and they still harbor those experiences, BUT THIS IS TOO MUCH!!!! AAAAAAAAAGH!!!! I can’t handle this type of incest. They grew up together most of their child hood together as siblings. As fucked up as it was. I don’t get how Ruby can just completely change that. How can she not still see at the very least a sibling. Barf aaaaagh this incest romance is just too much for me. I was fine with them kissing for the movie but the motivation Ruby had behind it is waaaaay too weird. She’s not seeing it as a thing for work but actual romance. ITS JUST SO GROSS AAAAAAAAGH

I like that they act like siblings here so what comes after it is weird

Ew, it’s sweet in a sense but Ruby’s motives behind it are just too weird

I really like this panel. The way aqua is drawn, his expression is similar to that of the doctor. It also really helps to show us how he can’t move on, at least visually.

🤮

OH GOD!!! I may be a little dramatic right now but I just can’t handle it eeeeew. It’s so grossss I cannnt

[skania]

Do you think there's toxic trait in aquakane's relationship? I keep seeing people saying that they are toxic and unhealthy for each other...

Honestly...? I guess it depends on people's takes on what constitutes a toxic relationship, but when I see Aqua and Akane, I see two people genuinely trying to do right by each other to the best of their capabilities.

Aqua is a broken man reborn into a broken teenager, he is toxic to himself because he thinks he doesn't deserve happiness and he closes himself off, hiding his true self behind a veil of lies. Akane is a brilliant girl who quite literally thought acting was the only thing she was good at. She is much better off than Aqua in the mental-health department by now, but she is painfully unaware of her own worth; a clear example of this is the way she is willing to let herself be "used" by Aqua as long as the choice is hers.

These personal issues have consequences, of course. Aqua does lie and manipulate those around him—but he never manages to do this to Akane. Whenever he thinks he is hiding something, Akane figures it out and plays along not because he has manipulated her into it, but by choice. The one exception was the GPS tracker, but Aqua set this up at a time when his intentions towards Akane were less than pure. It doesn't define their relationship. At the contrary, it shows what their relationship could have been like, because the contrast Aka draws is very clear: Aqua originally meant for the GPS to allow him to use Akane as a tool, but in reality it allows him to save Akane's life.

Meanwhile, Akane is good at drawing boundaries when she considers that they need to be drawn (telling Aqua that he needs to decide for himself and that they can't be codependent on each other, pointing out how wrong it was to place a GPS on her and that their relationship was supposed to be one between equals), but she isn't very good at putting herself first, so some of her boundaries are kind of there more for Aqua's sake than her own. Akane was willing to go meet Kamiki, without hesitation, if it meant ensuring Aqua's happiness; she knew she could be in danger, but protecting Aqua mattered more to her than her own safety.

And I think that's when their issue lies, actually. Because I don't think Akane stopped to think that if something were to happen to her, Aqua would break. Likewise, Aqua cut ties with Akane to keep her safe, but he didn't stop to think that Akane won't be able to be happy if he sacrifices himself for his revenge.

They're both self-sacrificial people to a fault. They both underestimate just how much they matter to each other—and to those around them, for that matter.

So yeah, personally I can't bring myself to see their relationship in and of itself as toxic. It had the ingredients to be toxic, but when they were together, they genuinely supported each other, listened to each other, comforted each other and made each other happy.

Now, if people want a perfectly healthy, well-adjusted relationship, Aqua needs to both, come to terms with his trauma and get his revenge out of his system. It'd also be nice if Akane realizes that she can't set herself on fire to keep other people warm.

But these are issues that Aqua would have with anyone, actually. If anything, Akane being able to read him so well is what circumvented Aqua's penchant for lying and being manipulative. Lol.

[birdie-told-me]

Red Sky at Night (D&D Fic, ~7.5k words)

Fandom: Dungeons & Dragons (homebrew setting)

Rating: Explicit Summary: On the final morning of the holy festival of Truatonalia, Faustine, a priestess of Truatoni is drawn to the seashore. What she finds there is unexpected

Contents: M/F; tiefling female x water genasi male; oral, handjob

Header art by vampariart!

Faustine is intensely aware of the approach of the festival’s third day: the Veneration of the Sea. The closer it gets, the more she feels that tug, deep within her, to venture down the rocky cliffside to the shore, to immerse herself in the crashing surf, allowing the salt water to overtake her. Twice, now, she has felt the elemental power of the Storm Maiden coursing through her, having been struck with divine lightning in both the holy Grove and the Temple, and received boons thereafter. She imagines submitting to the power of the sea would carry a similar terrifying thrill, the same new empowerment afterward. 

The sea is both refuge and restlessness. 

It is a constant, ever-present. The sound of waves crashing upon the cliffs beneath her window had been her first lullaby. The smell of it on the air is a familiar comfort. The sea featured in her earliest hopes and dreams: a promise of freedom, carrying her away from all of her unhappiness. 

It is a mystery, ever-changing. Its churning waters reflect the Storm Maiden’s moods: sometimes peaceful, sometimes violent. Its currents tug on the hearts of those connected to it, pulling them from the stability of home, imbuing them with wanderlust, yearning to embark on its rippling waters.

Naridius carries the sea with him. On his ship it hadn’t been as obvious, surrounded as they were by the thing itself, but here in the city, it clings to him even as it releases everyone else. His skin, his hair, even the air around him - he smells of a fresh salt breeze. His skin is the color of the sea on a warm, inviting summer day, and glistens enticingly with droplets of water, as if he has always just emerged from beneath the surf. His hair is a riot of seafoam: pale, tumbling curls forming a corona around his head, setting off the lovely aqua shade of his skin, giving him the look of a cresting wave. She longs to run her fingers through it. 

She knows the Maiden would not begrudge her this, but resisting the lure is a habit borne of years of practice even before she swore her life to the goddess. Faustine has always been an expert at resisting temptation. Too cautious has she been, seeing Fierna’s phantom smirk behind every opportunity for pleasure. Too frightened to give in and allow herself to slip for even a moment and open the door for infernal influence. (Not to mention, of course, the thought of baring herself in such a way. Being seen beneath the swathes of fabric she always keeps her body concealed by). She has trained herself to be as remote and untouchable as the clouds.

But, she thinks, what if I want to be touched?

She has grown accustomed to it, lately, and she must admit, she craves it more now that she knows what she was missing. So many years of her life spent isolated, contact with others limited only to the most necessary of functions. Now she travels among friends who do not flinch when she reaches out a hand to touch them, even if said hand does not carry a spell to bolster them. She is still cautious, always watching for the slightest indication that her flesh is an unwelcome presence among theirs. But she has not seen one yet. And Naridius….

He had asked her to dance on the first night of the festival. Despite having invited him earlier in the day to come find her, she had still been surprised and a little flustered. She is not graceful - never was lithe and delicate, and now even less so since separating body and spirit, never fully fitting the two back together even after leaving the Astral Plane - but he did not seem to mind her stumbling feet and her flushed cheeks. He had offered his hand, and when she took it, pulled her against the solid planes of his body. 

Never had she been pressed so intimately against another. She hardly knew how to process the feeling of his muscle against hers, his hand resting on the curve of her hip, his sturdy shoulder under the hand she had drawn up to steady herself. A faint buzzing filled her ears, and she is quite certain her face went slack for a moment as she felt his warm breath against her skin. But the lively music wound its way to her ears, sparking her senses back to life and drawing a smile to her lips. She cannot pretend that their dancing was in any way polished or worthy of spectators, but she found that she did not care. It was enough to feel the rush of joy as she clutched him to her, allowing him to twirl her through the crowd. She tilted her head back and offered her delighted laughter to the heavens. She reveled in the feeling of him moving with her, against her, alongside her, as the music swept them up. He was close enough that his lovely curls brushed against her cheek, releasing a burst of his clean, fresh scent, and she wished she could breathe him in forever.

Inevitably their dance had ended too soon - duty had called her away, and Naridius had melted back into the crowd. She found herself cold and irritable, resenting her friends and their silly foibles for drawing her away from the moment of happiness she had managed to snatch. Perhaps she was harsher than she ought to have been with them, but she found it difficult to tolerate their continued foolishness as she enviously noted other couples slinking away from the crowd with clasped hands and furtive caresses. Her night would not end with such a tryst.

(In fact, her night had ended with a shadow fiend stalking her through the city streets and trying to kill her instead. But such is the life of an adventurer.)

The second day of Truatonalia had been a whirlwind worthy of her goddess. Official duties beginning very early in the day, blessing and cleansing and above all trying to retain a dignified yet approachable manner. And once the ceremonies were over, she was pulled from event to event, presiding over games and races and contests, all the while spending every spare moment shoring up what support she could from the various noble houses, wheedling and charming and complimenting and persuading. It was a relief when the evening performance finally came around and she could simply let loose and confront her problems with spellcasting and trident.

But now, in the silent predawn hours of the third morning, she feels that tug again. An urge to head down to the shore and submerge herself. While she has proven herself inconsistent at best when remembering the official rituals and ceremonies Maurina taught her, her individual veneration of the Storm Maiden has always been guided by urges like this: an insistent feeling that she ought to be doing something, allowing her intuition to guide her through the Maiden’s desires. And in this time, at the height of her patron’s power, on her holiest of days, who is she to deny a calling? 

She forgoes the heavy regalia she wears at most ceremonies - the robes of fine-woven chain and the fearsome breastplate. She does not need her shield. There is a moment when she lingers over the trident, but ultimately she decides to go empty-handed, trusting in the goddess to protect her. Instead she dresses only in the gauzy linen stola she had worn to the cleansing ceremony. The air is balmy enough she does not wrap a palla about her before she sneaks out of the villa. 

The path down the cliffside is one that her feet remember from years of childhood antics, and so she picks her way down easily. Even the few times she stumbles over scattered pebbles or slickened rocks, the wind itself seems to lift her and prevent a fall. She closes her eyes and smiles into the breeze as it pushes fallen locks of hair from her face: this is how her goddess shows her love. 

When she reaches the bottom, the sea is gentle and the tide is low enough to have revealed a minuscule beach - no more than a narrow bar of sand and some flat rocks. Soft waves rock back and forth, lapping at her feet with only the barest of splashes. She removes her sandals and steps in, wading out into the brine. The water lifts the gossamer fabric of her skirt and saturates it until one can hardly tell the difference between cloth and sea. It clings and drapes around her legs and she cannot resist the contented smile that tugs at her lips: she is clothed in seawater. Her tail loosens from its habitual coil around her ankle, and she allows it to float behind her as she wades deeper, up to her hips, where her fingertips can skim the surface of the water as it ripples around her. She swirls her fingers in a semblance of somatic spellcasting, leaving eddies and ripples in their wake.The water is warm as it slips and slides against her, rising up from hips to waist as she ventures deeper and deeper. Tendrils of seaweed brush against her legs. With a laugh, she tilts her head back to the sky and raises her arms in exultation, droplets of water trailing from them in streamers. The official public rituals for the festival are so rigid and unyielding; this spontaneous private ritual feels more like true worship, delighting in the Maiden’s domain on a personal level.

A sudden noise startles her, and she whips her head around to spot its source, instinctively crouching so that she is nearly immersed in the water as she scans the shore. He is easy to find, even in the dim predawn light; his bright, dewy skin picks up and scatters the last reflected glints of moonlight. He seems as surprised by her presence as she is by his. From this distance, she cannot quite make out the expression on his face, but his posture is hesitant, weight rocked back on one foot, hand raised slightly in surprise, as if to fend off an attack.  For a moment she wonders if she should be upset that he has interrupted her communion with the sea, but she finds she cannot bring herself to be. 

“I - I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean - “ His voice calls out from shore, more hesitant than she has ever heard him. He is backing up, his hands now both before him in a placating gesture. “I didn’t know you were - I just -“ She is struck by the realization that she doesn’t want him to leave. She feels that same tug deep in her belly that drew her to this place, drawing her to him. Her legs straighten to her full height once more, water sluicing up off her as she emerges, holding her hands out to him in a pose that mirrors his, beseeching. 

“Wait!” She winces at the tone of command in her voice, and softens it. “You can stay.” 

She picks her way carefully back to shore, somehow more difficult in this direction than it was on the way in. The rocks feel slicker and the tide slightly higher, while the waves beat with more intensity now, kicking up little splashes against her sides. He is rooted in place, watching her approach. He has not spoken again, but his hands have dropped limply to his sides, and his lips are parted. Only when her feet touch sand rather than rock does she let her own hands drop, tilting her head as she watches him in turn. The silence is heavy, and she cannot think of the proper words to break it, so she takes another tentative step toward him instead. 

The tiny strip of sand is barely large enough for them both to stand on, but he does not back away. He, too, seems caught up in the hazy atmosphere, unwilling or unable to cut through it with a word. The only sound around them is the steady rushing of the sea, and the rustling of a gentle breeze. The air around them feels thick and charged, as if a storm is about to break. 

He is staring at her. His eyes dart back and forth, from horns to lips to eyes to décolletage. She is suddenly very aware of the way her dress clings to her, translucent and waterlogged. There is but a momentary twitch of her fingertips, ready to call a swirl of fog to cover herself, but she defiantly forces herself to allow him to look. She wants him to look. She wants to keep looking at him. The expression on his face is one of…adoration. Nobody has ever looked at her with that expression before, and the realization is a bittersweet twinge that catches in her breast. 

The hand he lifts is slow enough to give her time to back away. She does not. His fingertips graze her cheekbone with such tenderness it feels much like the caress of a gentle breeze. She closes her eyes and tilts her head, leaning into that touch so that his fingers tangle into the curls at her temple and his palm cups her cheek. Like this, she can feel the rough calluses of his sailor’s hands, can hear the rasp of his breath so close to her, can sense the heat of his body leaning infinitesimally closer. She opens her eyes to find them locked to his. She has stared down dragons and her heart did not race as fast as it does now. 

“Can I - ?” He starts to ask, and she has not even registered the words themselves before she is nodding and he is drawing her closer with the hand still wrapped in the long strands of her hair, his other hand cupping the back of her neck as his lips meet hers with a frizzle of lightning that whisks her breath away. She is dizzy. She is floating. She steadies herself by grasping on to his broad shoulders. Their bodies align so naturally, curve against slope against plane. She cannot press herself close enough, though she tries, molding herself into him the way water fills a vessel. Her arms drape atop his shoulders and she finally, finally threads her fingers through those seafoam curls that have been enticing her for weeks. They are as luxurious as she had imagined. 

She does not know how long they stand like that, entwined together, with the rising waves lapping at their ankles, but it is not long enough before she must pull her mouth away, panting and gasping. They part just enough that she can see how wide his pupils have grown, black overtaking so much of his eyes that they almost resemble her own. His cheeks are flushed and for some reason the pink at the tip of his regal nose causes her heart to swell so much she can hardly contain herself. She grins, a smile broad enough he can surely see the sharpened canines she is usually so careful to conceal. A huff of startled laughter escapes him in return. His eyes are wide and his jaw a little slack, but he does not make any move to escape her embrace. Instead, he moves his hands, careful as he untangles them from her hair, and brings them to cradle her cheeks reverently before bestowing the most chaste of kisses upon her. 

“Come sit down,” he says, his voice roughened and deep. He trails his fingers down her arms until they interlace with her own, and he draws her toward one of the flattened rocks framing their little sand bar. She obliges, though her brow crinkles and her mouth twists into a moue of displeasure when their bodies are no longer pressed together. The distance between them serves to remind her of the state of her dress - the air rushes in to the empty space and chills the soaked cloth, causing a wave of goosebumps to ripple over her. 

The rock he leads her to is conveniently sized and shaped, large enough for them both to recline on, low enough to step onto without trouble, and situated up against the cliffside such that one could comfortably lean against it. She does not know enough about stonecutting to tell whether it has been formed naturally or purposefully carved out, but she finds she does not really care. If this is a place for trysts, it must be only fitting that she has been called here, and a partner as well. There is no room for serendipity during the holy days. In the pause as she steps onto the stone and seats herself, she takes a moment to consider why the goddess would arrange such a thing. This does not feel like a command - the itching feeling at the back of her mind when the Maiden desires her to do something specific is not present. This feels more like…approval. Encouragement? Relief rushes over her and loosens the tension in her limbs she didn’t realize had crept in: this is still her choice - she can walk away if she wants to. 

The sight of Naridius kneeling beside her is enough to remind her that she wishes to stay. His lips are swollen and his tunic is askew. Her fingers carding through his hair have left it wild and untamed, and as he leans in toward her, she is struck again by that thought that he is the sea itself, a foam-capped wave come to engulf her. She had come here this morning to embrace the sea and she decides to do just that, pulling him to her so that she can reach his lips once again. The fine silk of his tunic crumples as she clutches at him, but he does not seem to mind; he is too busy complying with her unspoken plea. 

His mouth is warm and gentle against hers, his kisses soft and lingering as he cradles her face between his palms. While she finds this perfectly lovely, she can feel the restrained tension in him beneath her hands. She pulls back for a moment and looks at him directly, taking in the whole of him. Instantly, he also draws away, putting more space between them, and for a moment she is hurt before she realizes that he is following her lead, taking things slowly to make sure she is comfortable. He is holding back for her. She licks her lips, uncertain of how to encourage him. 

“You can - “ her voice is husky and raw. She tries to make a gesture to encompass the two of them, and gives a helpless little shrug, unable to even begin to find the words to tell him everything she wants. “If you want. Don’t worry.” 

He hesitates, weighing her words, so she underscores them by drawing him close once more, pressing her fingers firmly into his flesh. This time, he surges back into her like a wave crashing upon the rocks. No longer confined to gentle caresses of her hair and cheeks, his hands roam their way down her body, electrifying her skin in their wake. Every place he touches sears with heat - her throat, her ribs, her hips. The chill on her skin dissipates as he replaces it with delicious warmth that seeps through her, soaking in to her muscles and pooling deep within her very core. 

His mouth strays from her lips and down her jaw, her neck, her collarbone, alternating between kissing and sucking and licking. She gasps at a spot that sends a jolt through her, and he rewards her by lingering there, running his tongue over it again and again as she moans her encouragement. But then he is moving on, raining kisses across her collar and to the spot at her shoulder where her fibula pins her dress in place. He pauses and shoots a glance up at her, but makes quick work of unfastening the pin as he sees she is already nodding, reaching for the brooch at her other side. 

The sodden linen of her stola sticks to her skin, so he must strip the fabric away in order to reveal her breasts, and the exposure causes her nipples to tighten into peaks in the open air. Her tail flicks nervously as he stops and stares, and she almost moves to cover herself once more, but she allows him to continue unimpeded. Now his movements are slowed by reverence rather than reluctance. He is caressing and stroking the sides of her breasts, murmuring praises to the softness of her skin, the firmness of her flesh. He presses his lips to the exposed column of her throat and sucks that same spot that had stolen her breath before, while his thumb grazes across a nipple. The air she sucks in is a sharp hiss, and her back arches instinctively, offering him more access. He accepts her offer, granting her a deluge of attentions as he rolls the hardened nub between his fingertips, pinching and squeezing first one, then the other, as she writhes beneath him. The sharp, insistent burst of pleasure tinged with pain contrasts so keenly with the sensuous rolling of his tongue along her neck. Her hands roam, searching for something to clutch on to, sliding over the broad musculature of his arms and shoulders and chest. 

Their legs are a tangle, hers still wrapped in gauzy seasoaked fabric. She can feel little splashes spraying her feet as the sea churns beneath them, waves crashing more insistently upon their rocky refuge. Naridius, emboldened, bestows her with a searing whirlwind of lips and tongue against hers that she hurries to follow, returning his intensity with her own. There is a perplexed wrinkle on his brow when he breaks away from her to catch his breath, and his hand comes up to cup her jaw, thumb pulling down at her lip so that her mouth drops open for him. She is confused until she realizes he is peering at her tongue. Before the mortification can even begin to creep through her, he is grinning, returning to his ministrations, unperturbed by the revelation that the tongue that slides against his is forked in two. 

It takes her a moment to catch up, overwhelmed as she is by the dizzying series of emotions this conjures. She tries to cut them off and focus only on the sensations as he works his way back down her body with both hands and mouth. The wonderful frisson of lightning under her skin in every place he touches. The building warmth that is smouldering and pulsing within her, shooting sparks through her veins. The solidity of his body as it presses against hers. She is mostly successful, though tears do still prick at her eyes as she registers the words he is whispering against her skin: murmured homages to her beauty, her power, her perfection. This last, spoken as his questing mouth finds a nipple and engulfs it in the most delicious wet heat she has ever felt, sucking and licking and scraping his teeth against it, making her writhe with pleasure. 

He is terribly attentive, lingering in each place or with each motion that draws a gasp or a twitch or a moan from her, until she is squirming and desperate and ready to melt. She ceases to notice where precisely he has aimed his regard, drowning as she is in bliss. It does not matter which part of her he encounters; each of them is met with the same intent adulation. She is free to float upon a sea of sensation, basking in his worship.

He makes quick work of the girdle that cinches her dress at her waist, and she hurries to help him tug away the garment once its ties are released. She is fully exposed, no barriers between her skin and the outside world. However, she barely notes this momentous occasion, distracted as she is by the feeling of his mouth moving down her stomach and over hipbones, fingers pressing in to the flesh of her thighs, urging her to allow him access to the depths between them. When her legs part instinctively, he bolts forward to lavish her with even more rapturous attention. 

This is the overwhelming, elemental force she came down to the shore to experience. She is surrounded everywhere by the essence of the rising sea - the brine of it filling her nostrils, her ears rushing with a roar that evokes the wildest of squalls, her blood pulsing with the rhythm of her waterborn partner between her thighs as his curly seafoam head bobs and retreats back and forth in time with the waves that beat against their rocky refuge. Her hands bury themselves in his hair and her tail winds reflexively around him, attempting to draw him closer, to hold him in place as he does something with his tongue that shoots bright white lightning through her entire body. The wordless gasps and pants that emerge from her meld into and are swallowed up by the sounds of the seascape. The waves are high enough that the water has begun to break over the ledge of their stone more consistently, sending salty surges of seawater lapping against her skin in counterpoint to the lapping of the skilled tongue occupied at her most intimate parts. 

She cannot help the blasphemous words that flash through her mind: divine, glorious… ecstasy. 

While his mouth has dedicated itself to a single spot, his hands have not been idle. They work their way over her thighs and hips, kneading, squeezing, pressing, stroking. Teasing fingers swipe over the more sensitive parts of her skin, drawing closer to where his lips and tongue continue their clever work, causing her to shudder and clutch at him. This appears to spur him on, his efforts redoubled as one arm hooks her knee over his shoulder and the other tugs at her hips to change their angle. 

Her horns clatter against the stone of the cliff as she throws her head back. She didn’t know it could feel even better, but somehow it does, the new position of his tongue against her pressing so perfectly her vision begins to blur. Those nimble fingertips draw patterns and circles around her entrance, tempting her with the prospect of delving within, but he withholds them. Coherent thoughts have ceased to flow through her mind, replaced only by a litany of Ohs and Pleases and Mores that fall from her lips like scattered drops of rain, but a sudden thought does break through the haze with striking clarity: If he is the Sea, then you are the Storm. 

The Sea may be master of its own currents and tides, but the Storm may descend and enact its whims upon it, changing courses and churning up the waters. Her hands cannot quite reach his from this distance, but her tail wraps its way around his wrist and leads him to the place she most needs to feel him. His startled hum of approval reverberates through her as he wets his fingers with the slick moisture that has gathered there. The foot she has draped over his shoulder presses in to his back, urging him on, while her hands, still threaded through his riotous curls, position his mouth exactly where she wants it. 

He concedes to her demands, finally dipping his fingers inside her just as she has arranged his head to her liking. The combination of sensations overcomes her, and she cannot help the immediate rocking of her hips or the scraping of his scalp with her nails as her fingers clench, scrabbling for something to anchor her as she feels herself start to come apart at the seams. He continues his onslaught, steady as the pulsing waves surrounding them, and it is not long before she is cresting, breaking on the rocks alongside them, swept up in the tide that has welled up within her. The lightning in her veins buzzes through every part of her, setting her lips and fingers and toes tingling, contracting her muscles, searing through her vision with a blaze of white. She can only gasp and allow it to wash over her. It is not unlike the times she has been struck by holy lightning, only this time there is no pain, just throbbing waves of pleasure that shock their way through her over and over. 

He does not pull away until she has settled. Her limbs loosen and her fingers unthread from the locks of hair they had wound around themselves, and finally his tongue stills. When he lifts his face to look up at her, it catches at her heart, sending a sharp ache darting through her breast. He is so beautiful, with his wide, dark eyes and his tousled hair and his slickened mouth. The expression of exaltation as he stares at her is too much for her to bear. 

She tugs at him and pulls him so that their bodies align once more, face-to-face, and presses her lips languidly against his. She can feel the hardened flesh of him against her hip. While he does not press her to do anything about it, she understands that he remains wound tight, has not reached the same heady release as she has. Though she can admit to herself that she finds the prospect daunting, she finds that she still wants to try. Wants to do for him what he has done for her, to fill him with the same rapturous delight. She licks her lips and murmurs against his cheek,

“I’d like to return the favor. Will you guide me?”

The breath he lets out is half laughter, half groan. His hips give a little jerk against her, but his tone is sincere.

“You don’t have to.”

“Please. I want to.” 

Another soft sound that might be a laugh as he nuzzles his cheek along hers. His voice is pitched low and she can feel it vibrate through her as he responds, lips catching and brushing at her earlobe.

“Then I would be a fool to deny you.”

This is met with a laugh of her own, and she turns her head to catch his lips again. There is a momentary pause as they adjust, shuffling positions so that he is now leaning against the cliffside, Faustine kneeling between the splayed V of his legs. He takes the opportunity to remove his tunic, folding it and solicitously offering it as a cushion between her knees and the rough ledge they sit upon. She bites her lip, touched by this concern for her comfort. Her whispered thanks are heartfelt.

She finds she isn’t sure where to begin, now that the whole of him is spread before her, clad only in his undergarment. Expanses of enticing skin and planes of perfectly-sculpted musculature call out to her, but she cannot decide what to touch first, overwhelmed by choice. He waits, patiently, allowing her the time to move when she is ready, but she can see the heavy rise and fall of his chest belying his desire. 

The water that always glistens from his skin is more pronounced now, enhanced by the spray of sea, so that tiny streams drip down in captivating rivulets that her eyes track greedily. She watches as one curves around the swell of his pectoral and she barely realizes that she has leaned forward to catch it on her tongue, swiping up to follow its sinuous path to the place where his shoulder curves into his neck. She cannot tell if the burst of salt on her tongue is from him or the seawater, but she hums in delight either way. 

The long straight column of his neck is before her now, and she laves her way up the side, collecting more droplets as she goes. With her hands braced on either side of him, the change in position brings her breasts up to skim along the skin of his chest, sending a little shiver of pleasure through her that is echoed in him as well. She pauses at this realization, before bringing her lips to close around an earlobe with the softest scrape of teeth. He shifts and sighs. She never was a very good student, but she finds that this is a skill for which she has an aptitude - her perceptiveness and insightfulness giving her the advantage she needs to fumble her way through it. She might not have the experience of having done this before, of knowing where to touch or how, but she can at least catalogue his reactions and find out what pleases him the most. 

She draws her hands up his sides, caressing his ribs, his shoulders, down his arms, reveling in the feel of the smooth muscle padded by just enough soft flesh while her mouth remains at his neck. Her lips tingle with exquisite friction as they drag over his skin. Her tongue rolls over the taut tendons he has stretched out as he tilts his head back to invite her to continue. She moves slowly, achingly aware of every minute twitch, every catch of his breath, every groan that escapes him. She finds which swirling motions of her tongue cause him to gasp, and which spot beneath his jaw makes his hands come up and fist in her hair. She passes over his chest with long, broad swipes, and finds that she can make him tremble and call out her name with a strangled moan if she catches a nipple between the two bisected halves of her tongue. His sides seem ticklish so she is more firm in her attentions to them as they lead her to the peaks of hipbones just barely jutting out from the cloth wrapped round his loins. She presses her lips reverently to the hollows they create, and his hips rock in response. 

While it cannot be said that she has ever truly been frightened in her life, she does find the mystery of what lies beneath his last remaining article of clothing to be a bit too much to tackle just yet, and so she passes over it, moving on to find what spots on the insides of his thighs are most sensitive. Hands and lips and tongue roam together down the long stretch of muscle between one hip and knee, before switching sides and making the return journey from knee to hip. The scent of him is deeper here, muskier rather than salt-sharp, and the damp heat coming off of his skin is thicker. There is a particularly beautiful curve of flesh along the inside of his leg, a lovely soft place that calls out for her to sink her teeth into. She gives in to this urge, and is rewarded by a cry that is wrested from his throat - an “Aaah!” of both shock and pleasure as his hands clutch at her head. The jolt of his hips this time brushes the cloth-covered bulge of him against her cheek, and she is struck with a burning satisfaction beneath her breast at the contact. Her tail gives an involuntary swish behind her. 

She lifts her head and looks up at him, soaking in the picture of his flung-back head and his scrunched brow and his flushed cheeks. He is drenched in seawater now, the waves having grown fiercer and the tide higher in their time here, and it only accentuates his otherworldly charm. Her fingers brush at the folds of cloth at his hips, accompanied by a tilt of the head and a raised eyebrow. 

“Yes. Please,” he hisses through clenched teeth. 

She merely hums her acknowledgment of his plea, but does not immediately act on her unspoken request. Instead she continues to run her fingers over the cloth, exploring the topography of him that has yet to be revealed. His restraint is sorely tested, and he cannot refrain from the eager twitches of his hips as she ghosts the softest of touches across him. She rises back up onto her knees proper, and straddles one of his legs, bringing her lips up to his ear and leaning into him so that they are chest to chest, skin to skin. Her tail winds around his leg behind her. She braces one hand against his shoulder, while the other works its way beneath his undergarment and presses her palm flat against that part of him she has been avoiding, surprised at the rigidity she meets. Her fingers curl around him, drawn to the shocking silkiness and warmth of his skin.

“Will you show me? What you like?” she whispers, more breath than voice. 

His hands are instantly upon the knots keeping the cloth tied in place, working at them with not a little desperation. She keeps her hand still in the meantime, wondering at the feel of him in her palm, marveling at the texture beneath her fingertips. While she is not completely ignorant of what lies between a man’s legs, no bathhouse fresco or bawdy song had prepared her for this reality. Inexplicably, she feels saliva pooling in her mouth. Her fingers squeeze just a bit and she feels an answering throb beneath them. She muffles her gasp into the hair at his temple. Finally, he works the knots free and he is unclothed, completely. 

She pulls back from him just enough that she can peer down as his hand wraps over her own, showing her how tight to grip, how to move her hand over him. The only word that comes to mind is ridiculously apropos: fascinating. Her attention is rapt, focused on this single point between them as she follows his lead in pumping, squeezing, stroking. Though mostly obscured by their entwined hands, she can see enough of him to admire the becoming proportions - this is no comedically engorged phallus in a farce, nor a demure, flaccid one on a public sculpture. She can feel the blood pumping through him, and it seems to match her own heartbeat thrumming in her ears. She turns her head to crush her lips against his and she imagines she can feel both of their heartbeats pulsing in time there as well. There is a rhythm shared between them that they are both caught up in, and she realizes that it is the same as the rhythm of the waves upon the shore. 

“Do you want to -“ he does not even break away to speak, instead allowing his lips to continue to brush against hers with the formation of every word. Affection flushes through her when she realizes he is trying gallantly to remind her of her offer to return his favor in kind without pressing her to fulfill it. 

She does want to. 

It is strangely comfortable, settling herself between his legs as she does. From here, she can more clearly see the organ that had so captivated her. It truly is a stunning sight: flushed a reddish purple with hot, vigorous blood, jutting out from his body with a pleasing arc. There is a drop of fluid at the bell-headed tip, a different consistency than that she has seen on his skin before. She wraps her fingers around him once again, careful to remember the tightness he had preferred, and brings her lips up to capture that pearl of moisture. It is bitter salt that blooms on her tongue, but she does not find it unpleasant - in fact, it seems to unlock something in her, some driving desire to wring more of this from him. 

His skin is so, so soft, and she delights in skimming her lips over it; no fine silk or velvet has ever felt so luscious against her - not even those she admired in the City of Brass. But she can feel his restlessness in the shift of his hips, the little groans he lets out. He is not in a state to endure her lingering, and she takes pity on him. Her tongue swipes along him in a broad, thick line from root to tip, leaving a trail of slickness in its wake. She experiments a few times with different ways she can wrap her tongue around him, searching for the one that makes him spasm and buck beneath her. It is when the two halves of her tongue split and run in tandem under the flared edge of the head that she is successful. His hips surge forward and his hands clutch at her head, grasping not at her hair as before, but along the curve of her horns. 

Her mind stutters for a moment as she tries to decide whether this is acceptable or if she should shake herself free of him, but then he is using the leverage to tilt her head, to draw her back down, and the sensation clicks with some deep primal urge within her. She opens her mouth wide and takes him in, receptive to the merest pressure of his hands on her horns, as if she is his ship, guided by his steering oar. 

The feeling of her lips stretched around him, of his warm, hard flesh stroking along her tongue, of being filled with him in a way she has not been before, is remarkably satisfying. Her tail swishes once back and forth in languid approval. One hand braces herself at his hipbone, and the other wraps around the base of him, steadying as she moves her head back and forth. He shudders and rocks his hips in counterpoint to her motions, thrusting deeper into her mouth, his body rising as hers is falling in a dance just as exhilarating as the one they had shared nights before. 

He is speaking again - jumbled words and fragments of sentences interspersed with moans, praising her, telling her how brilliant she is, how perfect her mouth feels around him. He starts to say something rather poetic about the shape of her backside but it is cut short by his strangled cry as she swirls her tongue around the head of his phallus. She finds it easier to accept compliments like this, mouth occupied so that she does not have to stutter back her embarrassed thanks; she can merely hum and preen and duck her head to redouble her efforts, determined to earn every drop of esteem he has rained down upon her. 

She raises her eyes to look up at him, to watch his face as she licks and sucks and bobs. He meets her gaze, awestruck and full of ardor, and it sends a seeping warmth spreading under her ribs. She cannot manage a smile with her lips stretched as they are, but she hopes he understands the softening of her eyes for what it is. One of his hands dislodges from her horns and cradles her cheek, caressing her cheekbone with a gentle swipe of his thumb. 

Somehow, this serves to embolden her, single-minded now in her desire to bring him to completion. She is relentless in her pursuit, increasing her speed, moving her tongue in swirling patterns along his length, attuned to his every breath so that she may extract every possible drop of pleasure for him. She is the hurricane that their home is named for, bearing down upon him with unbridled fervor. He rises to meet her, matching her passion with his own. His hands are upon her horns once again, gripping tight as he buries himself between her lips, so deep that he catches the back of her throat. Her answering moan is muffled by his girth. She does not know if the moisture dripping down her face is sweat or spit or seaspray, but regardless, it eases her way, slickening both of their skin with lubrication so that she can slip up and down without resistance. 

Her jaw aches and she can hardly catch enough of a breath to keep going. Her lips prickle with the beginnings of numbness. Yet none of these things matter in the face of the heady intoxication that surges through her. She can hear the change in his breathing, the new quality to his gasps that hint at his nearness. Her hand sneaks up to graze the pendulous sack that hangs between his thighs, delicately testing its weight, then rolling it along her fingers, and she is delighted by his visceral reaction. 

There is a sudden frenzied haste to his movements, and he is pulling her mouth off of him, covering her pumping hand with his own to set a punishingly fast pace. She follows his lead and remains knelt in front of him, watching, waiting. Several quick strokes and his face contorts, as his member throbs in her grip. Warm ropes of pearly essence spray onto her face and chest and spatter on the ground between them, and he sags against the wall of the cliff. Bitter salt floods her mouth as the substance begins to drip, slipping between her parted lips.

She blinks. Suddenly the storm has run its course and they are in the quiet calm that follows. She rises, kneeling upright between his languorously splayed legs. Her hand is drenched in heaven knows what, and the fluid on her face tightens her skin as it cools. Leaning to rinse her hands in the churning water, she realizes that it has risen to the very edge of their stone, each successive wave threatening to be the one that covers its surface with the rising tide. She brings a cupped handful of water to her face, habitually wiping it in the motions of her ritual ablutions to cleanse it of the congealing fluid. The sky is still dim, but the horizon has taken on that hazy quality that heralds the rising of the sun. She can hear the faintest rumble of thunder approaching in the far distance and her lips curve into a jubilant smile. 

He is breathing heavily, limbs hanging limp, and a fierce little flame flickers in her chest - pride at having accomplished this - tempered by an aching tenderness. Careful of the stickiness still coating her chest, she leans forward and brushes a stray lock of hair from his damp forehead. Saltwater drips from her fingers onto his cheeks: an anointing by the sea. His lashes flutter and his eyes lock in to hers.  The smile he musters is sleepy, and he lets out a soft huff of not-quite-laughter as he takes in the sight of her glistening wet face. 

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to - “

She cuts him off with a dismissive noise made between tongue and teeth. She rises to her feet and holds out a hand to him.

“Would you like to go for a swim and rinse off before the sun rises?”

He accepts her hand, and they slip together into the embrace of the sea. 

[nihilnothings]

Aight I know some may groan considering love debates tend to go awry but considering how romance and ship teases have been a part of this fandom for too long it is inevitable that discussions for this shall arise.

Source: https://www.pixiv.net/en/artworks/109469704

Note 1: This post was partly inspired by the thoughts of a blogger who goes by Kanae who believes that is possible for the three heroines: Ruby, Akane, and Kana to represent three types of love: "Familial", "Romance", and "Admiration"

Note 2: If you're curious on their views, head over to their blog to hear their interesting perspectives on the dynamics between the Quartet (Aqua, Ruby, Kana, and Akane....though it's mostly Akane/Aqua considering how most misinterpret their dynamic a lot)

Kanae's Blog: https://skania.tumblr.com/

Note 3: Just because I defend this theory doesn't necessarily mean it comes true, I just find that this view makes sense and is coherent with the story but who knows if Akasaka might pull off something that'll throw this theory off

One of the criticisms that I notice regarding the "Akane Love Interest" theory is the fact that people find it as "derogatory" or "limiting" her scope to just that.

However, this may be considered a hot take by some, but I don't necessarily think there's anything wrong with being a "Love Interest" because she isn't just a "prize" or "narrative McGuffin", she's a love interest character with a thematic and narrative purpose, whose done a lot by progressing the plot, develop characters, and entertain the audience with her personality and character dynamics.

Seriously, it can be difficult to find "designated love interests" in shounen to ever contribute to the plot in the same way Akane does, most of them tend to not even interact with the male lead and kinda is just there as a "prize".

People need to understand that certain characters are created for a purpose, just because a character doesn't have a current overarching goal that involves a career or mending/breaking familial ties it doesn't necessarily mean that it degrades their character. If let's say that they are created as a love interest, it's not a big deal as long as they show instead of telling why they're a love interest and move the plot going. There's a narrative and thematic reason to why Akane's development is tied to Aqua in comparison to most characters with Ruby being a runner up in that department. Even with her breaking off from Aqua her goals still involve Aqua despite the fact that she can choose not to follow through but instead she chose to plunge herself back into danger and Aqua for all his talk of cutting her off is still drawn to her in spite of his efforts to hide it.

(Read this: https://skania.tumblr.com/post/720497617513201664/can-we-please-talk-about-how-silly-aqua-is)

Kind of a weird comparison but I consider her as something akin to "the Joker", where both characters are a lack of a better word "Entertaining Narrative Devices", they embody a certain theme and move the plot while having a personality which keeps the audience entertained. They also are glued to the main lead where they both are at the same wavelength yet are different at the same time alongside having goals that often tie back to the main lead.

I guess if you really want a goal then patching things up with Kana can be considered one but I feel like that isn't the same as an overarching goal of "I want to be an Idol", "I want to be an acknowledged actress", or "I want to kill my dad." Patching up with Kana shouldn't be a slow or difficult endeavor considering that both do not really have negative feelings to harbor in the first place. I guess breaking off from Aqua but the thing is she already is away from Aqua and is choosing to go back and stop him out of her own free will instead of being ordered because she cares a lot for him.

Whether or not they end up together is anyone's guess as it depends on how both of them will resolve this issue at hand during or after the revenge plot (I can safely say that the revenge plot would not be interrupted with a romance as the killer genuinely needs to be stopped considering how he's life-threatening to entertainers everywhere.)

Edit 1: Late edit but changed the wording of the disclaimer a bit to accurately represent my source's thoughts.