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cicada-bones · 4 years

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The Warrior and the Embers

Chapter 27: Army and Escape

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At dawn, they returned to the site to retrace their steps, hoping for a fresh perspective with the new day.

After some deliberation, Rowan had decided to give a few of his weapons to Aelin, only as a precaution. No matter how much it irritated him to shirk tradition, he didn’t know what they might be walking into. And Aelin seemed to have a knack for finding the thorniest patch of brambles – and then gleefully jumping in.

They thoroughly searched the area where body had lain, now only a pale sooty mark in the earth, for long minutes and found absolutely nothing. That is, until Aelin spotted something they had missed the day before – a tiny droplet of dried blood on a nearby rock. Just enough for Rowan to catch a trace of the male’s scent and use his winds to trace the demi-Fae’s path back towards the sea cliffs.

They now stood atop the cliffs, shielding their eyes from the sun’s glare as they scanned their surroundings for any trace of the demi-Fae, where he had come from, and the creatures that had killed him.

There were thousands of caves lining the bluffs, some submerged, others resting high above the water, cut into the cliff face itself. A danger to ships of all sizes, but useful for hiding any manner of things. Particularly the various creatures who used the tide to their advantage in hunting the beasts of the sea.

Though Rowan definitely knew of a few that wouldn’t turn their nose up at a Fae, either. Yet it was mid-day, so he was reasonably sure that nothing would bother them that they couldn’t easily handle.

The beach was nearly a hundred feet below their feet, hardly more than a spit of land lined with rocks and crashing surf. The scent off of the sea wind was fresh and clean and bracing – full of salt and scorching heat.

But it had also wiped away any remaining trace of the male’s scent. It wandered out of the trees, onto this overlook, and stopped dead. Either the male had dropped here out of nowhere (which was theoretically possible – presuming he could shift into some kind of flying creature) or he had doubled back on himself, arriving at this point and then returning from where he came – presumably the spot in the woods where they had found him lying dead.

Either way, there was nothing else to be discovered by standing here. And as they were so exposed, out of the shadowed shelter of the trees, Rowan was rather anxious to depart. But before he could say anything –

Aelin was leaning over the cliff edge, her face twisted into a frown, and Rowan’s hands were automatically reaching out to steady her, taken aback by the degree to which his stomach was twisted by panic.

She just gave him a withering look. “I’m trying not to be insulted,” she said. “Look.” And she pointed over the lip of the cliff edge just over to their left, where the sharp point seemed to have softened somewhat. A sagging curve – as if worn down by some kind of pressure.

Rowan gripped her arm tighter as they both leaned slightly farther over the edge to glimpse a hidden, crumbled stone staircase.

The path was so ancient that there were hardly any steps now – just lumps of rock and sand, peppered with obstinate brown shrubs. It led down towards a slightly calmer section of the beach, hidden by the curve of the cliffs, where the water was just clear enough that a break in the barrier reef was visible.

A space large enough for small ships to pass through. The perfect place to surreptitiously enter the country – and remain undetected by the surrounding inhabitants. Even those that lived and worked on the seas.

Rowan was still looking over at the inlet, his mind whirling with all the possibilities, when Aelin began to speak, her words sounding as though she were already in the middle of a thought. “The bodies were dumped in streams and rivers,” she said, crouching in the dirt and sketching a crude map of the body sites – apparently from memory.

Rowan squatted next to her. “The sea was never far off,” he said. “They could have dumped the bodies there. But – ”

“But then those bodies probably would drift right back to shore, and prompt people to look along the beach. Look here,” she said, pointing at the area towards the center of her map - presumably where they were currently sitting. “There are countless caves along this section of the shore. “It’s an easy access point from – ”

Aelin swore.

Rowan knew that they were both thinking the same thing. Adarlan. “We’re leaving. Now.”

“Don’t you think they would already have attacked if they’d seen us?”

He stood, pointing up at the sun. Aelin seemed skeptical. “If we’re going to explore, then we’re going to do it under cover of darkness. So we’re going back to the stream, and we’re going to find something to eat. And then, Princess,” he said, a wild grin twisting his face, “We are going to have some fun.”

···

By the late afternoon, Mala had apparently decided to take pity on them because just before sunset, rainclouds appeared on the horizon, thundering and crackling with enough of a vengeance to conceal their every sound as they strode across the beach and began to thoroughly search each of the caves.

It didn’t take long. They had barely made it through half a dozen before they found themselves lying side by side on their stomachs on a lower shelf of the sea cliffs, scouting the next stretch of beach before they continued their search. Rowan called a wind towards him, pulling the sights and scents of their surroundings along with it.

The wind whispered of trodden sand and dead fish, of cloth and steel and sweat and the hum that always surrounded closely-pressed bodies. The unmistakable sign of a large host, barely hidden from sight. A stone settled in Rowan’s toes.

A few armed men crossed over their line of sight, clothed in crimson and gold. The colors of Adarlan.

The soldiers passed over the sandy beach from a nearby copse of trees, and entered a massive cave mouth, its size partially concealed by convenient camouflage with the surrounding rock. The wind whispered to him, heavy with the knowledge of heavy booted feet and urine and boredom and pain and the cold damp hollowness of a large, buried space. Big enough to conceal an entire battalion of soldiers.

The creatures had not been dropped here on their own, to wreak havoc on their own prerogative. They had been accompanied by an army – large enough to wipe the area clean of both demi-Fae and humans. Efficient and disciplined.

Aelin turned her head towards him, her eyes slightly wide, and whispered, “The crab-monger. In the village. He said – he said he found weapons in his nets. They must be taking ships and then getting close enough to swim through the reef without attracting attention. We need to get a closer look.”

Her eyes twinkled unexpectedly. “I knew you’d be useful someday.”

Rowan snorted, hiding a grin, and shifted to his hawk without another word. She was watching him carefully, and he had to resist the urge to brush his feathers across her cheeks as he spread his wings and soared out over the cliffs and glided across the water. Nothing more than another animal, hunting for a meal.

He carefully flew out over bluffs, keeping his movements cyclical and seemingly random, all the while approaching ever closer to the cave mouth. The soldiers had now entered the cave and the beach was empty, but his wind told him that a few more men rested just within the antechamber, keeping watch over the entrance.

Rowan rested on a rock, waiting patiently, searching for the right opportunity…

Then a slight hint of movement from the sentries, a small distraction, and Rowan was soaring up and through the cave mouth, keeping his small body as close to the dark ceiling as possible. Hopefully appearing to any wandering eyes to be an animal searching for shelter from the rain. The advantage in facing mortal soldiers – they didn’t know how to recognize a Fae’s animal form even if they tried.

The cave mouth opened up into a vast cavern, barely lightened by a handful of dull torches. It spread out in the darkness, stretching into strange and twisted offshoots – some of which appeared to be even larger than this one.

Below him, a few dozen soldiers lounged about, resting on crates and boxes and stone shelfs, talking, eating, brawling, training, and doing all those things a sedentary army did to entertain itself. The soldiers seemed to have been carefully chosen for this group – all were experienced, and from what Rowan could see, highly disciplined and very well trained.

Rowan kept as quiet as he possibly could, while he called the wind towards him from all through the caverns. Soon he realized that the was not one large space, but an interconnected network of caves and tunnels, spreading along the shoreline and into Wendlyn. They spread through the earth like feelers, some so deep and dark that he doubted they had been touched by any creature larger than grubs and beetles for millennia.

The soldiers occupied perhaps a quarter mile of this expanse with their dining, sleeping, and recreational spaces, leaving much of the caves barren and empty. The sounds of their grotesque laughter occasionally echoed through the space, their joy etching violence in Rowan’s bones.

He spread out over the space, weaving between the stalactites. Now that he was deeper inside the cave, he was no longer so worried about detection. The expanse was too dark, and far too large and complex for anyone to notice more than a strange black blur if they happened to see him. Which was unlikely; none of the soldiers were paying much attention.

Rowan began to count, using the eyes of the wind far more than his own. There were eighty-six men distributed through the main cavern, and another sixty-four spread out between the four main offshoots to the left and right.

Along a narrow passageway directly to the back of the main space, Rowan counted another eight, with thirty-two more sleeping in the improvised dormitories sectioned off alongside the tunnel.

But then Rowan narrowed his eyes. The wind spoke of ten more soldiers, loitering at the far end of the long, twisted passage. Their voices were quiet through the soft stone, though their tone was harsh. The breeze passed him pieces of sentences: The general…how much longer…I hate guard duty…Narrok is…but why…I don’t like them…me neither, but…General Narrok cannot…but he is one of them too…

Rowan was advancing down the tunnel, using the stale air to propel him forwards and keeping his wings tight to his body, reducing the effects his presence to the bare minimum. Soon, the space opened up slightly, and Rowan hid himself in a back corner between two dark planes of rock.

The soldiers were all resting just before another entrance, to a tunnel that seemed to curve and delve deeper into the earth, a catacomb beneath their feet.

Faint whispers drifted up from the sunken space, but the soldiers paid them no heed. So, Rowan cautiously pulled a feeler of wind towards them, a foray into darkness. What it brought back sent lightning through his bones.

Iron chains clanked, darkness whorled, and fear bloomed with the stench of copper and vomit and rotting things - the scent of the demon-creatures mixing in with the scent of the dying.

There were four creatures in that small room, hovering over the body of a demi-Fae female, who was lying on a stone plinth and murmuring incoherently, already close to death.

Even from such a distance, protected from the creatures by a thick layer of stone and earth, Rowan felt his entire body shy away from the creatures. His bones ached as his power twisted, and writhed, aching with the inherent wrongness of the demons. Everything in his body was telling him to fly far, far away, and never to return. To go back to Aelin and take her away from this place.

The demi-Fae female twisted and flipped, and Rowan heard the creatures shift in delight, feeding on her fear and pain like honeyed wine. Draining her dry.

And Rowan knew what would happen next. The demi-Fae would dry up into a withered husk, and the general would order one of his lieutenants to collect the body and dump it in the surrounding countryside, leaving it to rot.

The female gasped, and Rowan’s heart wrenched. He threw his power over to her without thinking, and felt something deep in his gut flinch as his ice and wind struck against an impenetrable iron shield.

And in that jolt, he slipped slightly on his perch, sending a small cascade of pebbles clattering down the stone surface of the cave. He stilled instantly, but on the uneven stones the pebbles fell for long seconds.

He clearly heard a guard say, “What was that?” but apparently, they decided to overlook the small discrepancy, and once again fell into idle chatter.

Rowan knew he had to leave, but still – he hesitated. Wracking his mind for some solution, some way to put the female out of her misery, to provide her with an escape from the visions of fear and pain that were consuming her. But there was none.

So Rowan turned and flew away, ashamed and disgusted with himself, even though he knew there was nothing he could do.

As he flew, he thought. The demi-Fae were not being brought all the way here only for the creatures to feast – if it were only a matter of hunger, the creatures could feed and dispose of the bodies without bothering to drag them all the way into the caves.

No, there was another purpose here – knowledge. Experimentation. And with what Aelin had told him yesterday…Rowan cursed silently.

He returned to the main cave and began to survey it, scanning for weaknesses and possible strategies. There were exactly two hundred soldiers distributed through the cavern systems, with General Narrok and his three lieutenants at the army’s head, each of them leading their own platoon within the company.

They were well armed and stocked, and – Rowan cursed again. Each of the soldiers was dressed in iron, head to toe. They knew their enemy better than he had thought.

And – Rowan flapped a bit closer. And there were small, strange marks carved into the metal, dotting it with whorls and crosses. His eyes scanned over the army, and he began seeing them everywhere. Leaping out from corners and entrances, all carved into the stone of the cave walls.

He tentatively sent his magic over towards the marks, a brush of an invisible finger, and they zapped him with an icy spark that jolted down his spine and rendered him temporarily stunned.

His suspicions were confirmed. They must be those symbols Aelin had explained about yesterday – not ward stones, but akin to them. Charged with a similar, ancient power. Wyrdmarks.

The King of Adarlan knew his enemy, and he had sent an army here to destroy it. Rowan couldn’t help but feel the strange misfortune that had guided the king to lead his forces directly into the path of his oldest enemy, and his greatest foe. The Heir of Terrasen – she who had hidden under his nose for so many years, and she whom he must be desperate to destroy.

For the only place this army could be heading towards was the fortress. Mistward. Where the demi-Fae lay in wait – a feast ripe for the taking.

Rowan longed with his whole being to reach out with his power and suffocate the whole lot of them. To rip the air from their lungs and watch as they twitched on the stones. To keep Aelin and all the other demi-Fae safe from their clutches.

But he couldn’t. If he tried, he would certainly die.

Rowan carefully drew himself up and wove among the stalactites once more, exiting the caves and returning to the stormy evening and the hunted princess waiting for him atop the cliffs. So lost in his thoughts that he didn’t notice the dark figure resting just inside the lip of the cave mouth, its black eyes glinting with malice, and its black talons flashing in the starlight.

Rowan flew above Aelin, circled once, and then headed off into the woods – a clear direction to follow. Rowan led the princess a quarter of a mile through the trees, waiting until she was far enough away from the caves that he could stop her before she tried to run in there, heedless of the danger, fire and magic filling her palms.

He shifted and leaned against a gnarled old pine, waiting for the soft sound of her padding footsteps to mark her appearance.

Aelin’s brows were furrowed, her scent touched with worry.

He spoke before she had to ask the question. “There are about two hundred mortal soldiers and three of those creatures in the caves. There’s a hidden network of them all along the shore.” Her face tightened, but she remained silent.

“They are under the command of someone called General Narrok. The soldiers all look highly trained, but they keep well away from the three creatures.” Rowan wiped at his face, realizing that in his Fae form, his nose had begun to bleed. “You were right. The three creatures look like men, but aren’t men. Whatever dwells inside their skin is…disgusting isn’t the right word. It was as if my magic, my blood – my very essence was repelled by them.”

He examined the blood on his fingers. “All of them seem to be waiting.”

“Waiting for what?”

Rowan’s face darkened, and he cocked his head. She should know better than he. “Why don’t you tell me?”

“The king never said anything about this. He – he …” Aelin stared into the distance, her voice trailing off. Then she refocused. “Send word for Wendlyn’s forces—warn them right now.”

Rowan shook his head. “Even if I reached Varese tomorrow, it would take over a week to get here on foot. Most of the units have been deployed in the north all spring.”

“We still need to warn them that they’re at risk.”

“Use your head. There are endless caves and places to hide along the western coastline. And yet they pick here, this access point.”

A pause. “The mountain road will take them past the fortress.” Panic blossomed on her face and in her scent, her wildfire reaching through the iron bars to soothe her. “No – not past. To the fortress. They’re going after the demi-Fae.”

Rowan nodded slowly, his gut twisting as a vision of the sentries, of Luca, fighting atop the fortress walls passed behind his eyes. All so young. He shook his head of the unwelcome images.

“I think those bodies we found were experiments. To learn the weaknesses and strengths of the demi-Fae, to learn which ones were…compatible with whatever it is they do to warp beings. With these numbers, I’d suggest this unit was sent here to capture and retrieve the demi-Fae, or to wipe out a potential threat.”

Aelin only lifted her chin and said, “Then right now – right now, we’ll go down to that beach and unleash our magic on them all. While they’re sleeping.” She began to turn, heading back for the caves, but Rowan grabbed her elbow.

Aelin looked at him in surprise and disgust. “If I had thought there was a way to do it, I would have suffocated them all. But we can’t – not without endangering our lives in the process.”

“Believe me, I can and I will.” Rowan could see that she wasn’t listening, that instead she was turning to the bloodlust, the desire for revenge. He clenched his jaw.

“No. You physically cannot harm them, Aelin. Not right now. They know enough about those Wyrdmarks to have protected their whole rutting camp from our kind of magic. Wards – like the stones around the fortress, but different. They wear iron everywhere they can, in their weapons, in their armor. They know their enemy well. We might be good, but we can’t take them on alone and walk out of those caves alive.”

Aelin shook off his head and began to pace, running her fingers through her golden hair. Rowan hesitated, the words resting on his tongue. But Aelin saw them anyways.

“Say it,” she demanded.

“Narrok is in the very back of the caves, in a private chamber. He is like them, a creature wearing the skin of a man. He sends out his three monsters to retrieve the demi-Fae, and they bring them back to the cave – for him to experiment on.”

The news passed over her face like a shadow. “I tried to cut off her air – to make it easier for her,” Rowan said. “But they have her in too much iron, and…she won’t make it through the night, even if we go in there now. She is already a husk, barely able to breathe. There is no coming back from what they’ve done. They’ve fed on the very life of her, trapping her in her mind, making her relive whatever horrors and miseries she’s already encountered.”

Her words were frozen, her fire guttered. “It truly fed on me that day in the barrows,” she whispered. “If I hadn’t managed to escape, it would have drained me like that.”

Rowan growled viciously in confirmation, unable to form any words.

Aelin scrubbed at her face, tipping her head back so that the rain washed over her cheeks. As if she sought to cleanse herself of their mark. Then she took a long breath and turned to face Rowan, her eyes hard. “We cannot kill them with our magic while they are encamped. Wendlyn’s forces are too far away, and Narrok is going after the demi-Fae with three of those monsters plus two hundred soldiers.”

Rowan nodded as she continued. “How many of the sentries at Mistward have actually seen battle?”

“Thirty or less. And some, like Malakai, are too old, but will fight anyway – and die.” Rowan turned to walk deeper in the woods, needing to move, to get back to the fortress so that they could begin to prepare. So that they could put more distance between them and the female currently writhing on that stone plinth, and he wouldn’t so anything so stupid as go after her.

If he went, Aelin would die. So he walked.

Aelin was dazed, lost in thought a few feet behind him as they slowly began to make their way back to the fortress. But they barely made it a hundred feet before an all-too-familiar stench wafted towards him on a salty wind.

Rowan’s entire body stilled, and he raised his fist to tell Aelin to stop, his nostrils flaring. A demon was close.

Rowan silently unsheathed a blade from his vambrace, shifting his muscles into a subtly defensive position and scanned the trees ahead and behind. The winds carried a warning: tiny stream…old oak…dark limbs, rancid stench…walking slowly…dark eyes forwards…towards where the warrior and the wildfire stood still…

“Only one.” His voice was near-silent, his mind whirring like a wound clock, cold and calculating as he pulled up a skeleton of a plan.

Aelin drew her dagger just as quietly. “That’s not reassuring.”

Rowan pointed. “He’s coming dead at us. You head to the right for twenty yards, I’ll go left. When he’s between us, wait for my signal, then strike. No magic – it might attract too much attention if others are nearby. Keep it quick and quiet and fast.”

“Rowan, this thing – ”

“Quick and quiet and fast.” He had no other choice than to believe it.

Aelin’s eyes flashed at him. It fed on me and would have turned me into a husk. We could easily meet that fate right now.

You were unprepared, he said back. And I was not with you.

This is insane. I faced one of the defective ones, too, and it almost killed me.

Scared, Princess?

Yes, and wisely so. But then she seemed to sigh, either accepting that they had no other choice or rising to his teasing. Regardless, she nodded, slipped silently into the trees, and vanished.

Rowan wrenched his gaze away from the empty space where the princess had just been standing, and moved to his position on the left flank, ducking behind a large evergreen.

The demon still hadn’t entered his view, though with his wind he could track its movements through the undergrowth. It had not shifted from its previous path, and was heading directly for the space between him and Aelin – the spot they had only just left.

Rowan steadily manipulated the air to pull their scents through the trap, hopefully guiding the creature forwards, without arousing any of its suspicions or revealing their true hiding places. Then, he threw the remnants of their scent out towards the sea, where he hoped the salty wind would wipe the air clean of their trace. He knew it was likely a wasted effort, but he tried anyways.

The demon took another slow step, and with the slightest crumple of dried leaves, it appeared in Rowan’s field of vision.

The creature was a man, with black hair and black eyes. A man with a haunting, ethereal face, and a stone collar around his neck. Though Rowan had been in the barrow fields when Aelin had faced this creature, and though he had just discovered all four of them hiding away in their nest, deep in the darkness of the caves, this was the first time Rowan had seen one of them with his own two eyes.

Blood began to trickle down from his nose, lining the curves of his lips in red. The creature took another step.

It was a man, and yet, it was also something as far from human as physically possible. The strange, silky-smooth movements, the curved black talons, sharper than steel. The smell that had now deepened, turning from a faint hint into an unbearable reek of death and decay and soul-rot that Rowan was forced to breathe through his mouth.

He knew Aelin was capable, knew that she was as safe as she could be, but still – it ached to be even a few feet from her with that creature stalking towards them. The wind told him that she was crouched behind a mossy oak, facing away from both him and the creature. Her breaths were steady, but her heart thundered.

It took another step forwards, now standing directly in between him and Aelin. Rowan flashed his dagger towards her – a clear signal to strike.

But she did not move.

He flashed it again. Still – no reaction.

Panic began to seep into his very bones. In some small part of his mind, he could still sense Aelin – hidden behind that tree. But her presence had dulled and warped in his mind until he could no longer tell, no longer knew, was not sure –

And then the creature turned its head to face Rowan, and the screaming began in his mind.

Nothing, absolutely nothing in all his imaginings, could have compared to it. Every other time he had heard Lyria’s voice, had listened to her begging, had witnessed her screams of agony – had been nothing but a pale imitation.

Lyria appeared before him, in all her remembered beauty. She was on her knees, her eyes sparkling with tears as she grasped at his traveling cloak, begging him not to go. Her voice cracked. Rowan left.

And then she was dead, her stiff weight a stone in his arms. The scent of their dead child a ghost between them.

But then she was alive once more – thrashing and screaming in pain as invisible fingers tore at her clothes and sunk blades in her flesh, weeping blood. Crying for Rowan to come, for Rowan to help her – for her mate to come save her.

But he hadn’t. And now he couldn’t.

Tears were streaming down his face of their own accord as he fell to his knees, the blade in his hands slipping between his fingers, slicing as it went. And the sharp sting cut through the visions, distracting him just enough to allow him to grasp onto the pain like an anchor, and pull himself free.

The apparitions melted around him, dripping away to reveal that the trees nearby were empty. The creature was gone.

Aelin.

And Rowan was running headlong through the forest, heedless of any danger, towards the princess of flames.

He found her just as she pivoted, making to strike at the creature’s exposed side while her other arm made to slash at its throat. A fluid, perfect maneuver.

But then she froze.

The demon smiled, and Aelin’s blades clattered to the earth.

“You,” it said, darkness pouring from it like a waterfall of whirling black smoke, until it covered both of them completely in its dark cloak. “Your agony tasted like wine.”

Rowan fought through the screams, battered against the fear and agony that threatened to down him once more. In the back of his mind, Rowan knew that the only reason he was able to remain upright was that the majority of its attention was focused on Aelin.

Rowan threw his magic at the darkness, seeking to blow the it away, to suffocate the creature within or to force Aelin from the demon’s thrall. But the smoke did not shift, his wind passing through it like water in a fisherman’s net.

Rowan was screaming her name, desperate and frantic, but it felt almost soundless in the strange hollow air.

So Rowan breathed once, and then tore through the darkness with his steel and wind, his canines bared and growls thundering in his chest.

Rowan ripped Aelin from the creature, but she did not even look at him. Her gaze was still locked with the demon’s black eyes, her face blank and her fingers clawing at Rowan desperately. To get free, so that the demon and the suffering and the guilt could have her, could consume her.

So with rage and panic flowing freely within him, Rowan pulled her body even closer and bit her between her neck and her shoulder.

Even with a demon before them, surrounded by pain and darkness, it was exactly the same as before. Her blood was nectar on his tongue, spiced and bright with her fire and her fear.

Aelin’s body jerked, and he let go. But all he wanted to do was bite her again, to bite her all over, and Rowan realized that this time wasn’t the same.

It was stronger.

Aelin gasped, finally awake and aware, and Rowan crushed her body to his, still hauling them away, while the demon lingered by the tree, barely a few yards from them.

Rowan sketched a snarl. The demon only laughed.

And Rowan knew that this was a fight they could not win. In the dark, with such limited weapons, against an enemy that did not need mortal steel to kill them – they were outmatched. Rowan’s magic was useless. Aelin’s fire might be able to mark it but he couldn’t know until they tried, and with Aelin in such a state, Rowan didn’t want to waste the time it would take for a try.

“We have to run,” Rowan breathed in her ear. Another laugh from the creature, who stepped closer. Rowan pulled them farther back.

“You can try,” it said.

Rowan had barely a second’s warning before Aelin threw out her magic in a wall of flame between them and the demon. The creature hissed, and Rowan didn’t take the time to figure out whether it was in pain or only annoyance before the pair of them turned, and fled into the forest.

Aelin’s magic had bought them time, but it was barely a minute before they could hear the creature crashing through the trees behind them. Rowan knew these woods, knew which paths to take and how to hide their trail – both with his winds and with the land. The creature fell farther behind. But it did not stop, did not give up.

And Rowan knew that it wasn’t because of fear of detection, or because of a need to remain hidden and unknown to the demi-Fae. No, the demon was chasing Aelin. Her specifically. The pleasure of feasting on her fears would be unmatched by any other they could find, here or across the sea. Even by Rowan.

They ran for miles through the trees, veering away from the fortress where Rowan feared that even the ward-stones would be unable to protect them from the demon’s magic. All the while, Rowan searched his mind for any way, any solution that would leave them both, or at least Aelin, safe and unharmed.

He considered leaving her and going after the demon himself, but his magic had no effect on the creature – ice and wind doing nothing against darkness. Only Aelin’s magic would do anything, and Rowan would not allow her to go up against that creature until she had full access to her might – that iron gate unlatched.

For at the moment, she was too weak for Rowan to be sure that she could overcome the demon. So they ran, and Rowan forced the despair back by inches.

Aelin’s breaths were ragged, and Rowan felt his muscles begin to twinge under the weight of the steel he carried. They wouldn’t be able to keep up this pace for much longer.

“He won’t stop,” Aelin panted, rain pouring down her face, which was silver in the moonlight. “He’s like a hound on a scent.”

Rowan bared his teeth. If she told him to leave her, to shift and save himself, he would lose it. “Then I’ll run him down until he drops dead.”

Lightning illuminated a deer path atop the hill, and Aelin turned her head, her eyes glinting. “Rowan,” she breathed. “Rowan, I have an idea.”

···

Rowan was sure that Aelin had a death wish. But he went along with her insane idea anyways – he didn’t exactly have a better one to offer.

His wings were slick in the pelting rain as he circled, leading the creature around and around with the scent of Aelin’s tunic. He flitted from tree to tree, making sure to mark each of them with both their scents. He could just hear the creature a few hundred feet behind him, stumbling through the underbrush.

Rowan could see Aelin’s fire, bright orange through the gray rain, at the top of the hill at his back. An invitation for the skinwalkers. Rowan shook his head. That morning, if he could have told himself that he would be purposefully drawing the skinwalkers towards Aelin in some inane plan she’d concocted –

He sighed, smothering the fear in an affectionate disapproval.

Rowan could faintly hear the “screee” of the blade on the whetstone, and the sounds of murmured voices, and knew that the first part of her plan was drawing to a close. And soon, Aelin was sprinting through the underbrush, a mile up from where she had told him to lead the creature. A mile to run before they would be safe from both the skinwalkers and the creature.

Rowan’s hawk screeched as she approached, warning her that the demon was near, and that he was waiting for her by the place where the ancient road bent around a boulder.

The road ran right, but Aelin went left, her eyes bright but her face determined. Rowan shoved a fierce wind over the road, pulling Aelin’s scent with it and leading the skinwalkers right into the path of the demon.

Aelin threw herself behind a tree, only a dozen yards off the road and forced her body into stillness, a hand clasped over her mouth, smothering the gasps that racked her lungs. Rowan dove and shifted, enveloping her body in his, attempting to cover up her scent with his own.

Though her body trembled, and her scent stank of fear, it was a relief to once again have her close – a thorn removed.

Five pairs of feet slithered along the road, passing them without stopping and continuing on to follow the false scent – right into the waiting arms of the demon.

Rowan waited only a moment for the skinwalkers to be out of earshot before he tugged at Aelin’s sleeve, urging her upwards. We have to climb, he silently said. And in a few deft movements, Aelin was clambering up the trunk, foot after foot, until she stalled on a wide branch near the top, at least fifty feet up.

Rowan sat beside her, pulling her next to him, needing to feel her heartbeat on his skin. And also to hide her scent from the monsters below.

Only a minute passed before the screaming began. The otherworldly shrieks and roars of two deaths facing each other, and discovering which, of the two of them, were the stronger.

They fought for the better part of a half an hour, until the shrieks turned from desperate to victorious, and then faded into the rainy night. But Rowan and Aelin did not let go of each other once, nor did they dare close their eyes until dawn graced them with her golden light.

Relief flooded Rowan, but it was immediately followed by despair. Yes, they had escaped this one danger, but a whole army of them was on their way to Mistward, and there was nothing Rowan could do to stop them.

···

Masterlist / Ao3 / Previous Chapter / Next Chapter

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shiningso1o · 4 years

Text

Reborn § Cal Kestis x Reader [2]

Summary: You are a Bounty Hunter, tasked with catching Cal Kestis for your boss, Sorc Tormo. However, plans change, and it's up to you and Cal to fight alongside one another. On a quest to find the sacred Jedi texts, you and the Mantis crew run into trouble—trouble by the name of the Empire.

Warnings: Mild violence, mild threat, injury

Before, the Jedi Temple had been glorious. Renowned for their impressive architecture, the Jedis revelled in any opportunity to show off this feat. This resulted in tall, spiralling towers, stained glass windows and intricate arch designs. Cal Kestis had the good fortune to visit a few of these in his first year as a Padawan. It was when they first taught the young trainees of the force, and the legacy of the Jedis. Cal could remember staring idly up at the grand structure, marvelling in all it's glory and the sheer energy that it radiated.

But all that he could see now was ruins.

Debris surrounded him; tangerine-coloured boulders and lone pillars settled on the hot sand in collective solitude. All that was left of the temple was the mid-section, standing victoriously amongst the rubble. Cal ventured further into the area, where a tall ceiling had managed to uphold itself despite the destruction around it. Painted onto the stone were murials and images, suggesting stories of great Jedi warriors, but the paint was cracked and faded, flakes of it covering the ground.

The further Cal strolled, the colder the air grew. Tatooine's climate was still humid and unbearably hot, but the thick walls served as barriers to the sun's relentless heat. The only light came from the open area behind Cal; darkness clung to the walls more and more desperately as he moved closer to the back of the building, where he assumed he would find what he was looking for; the sacred Jedi texts.

To his right, he sensed an echo, and promptly moved towards it. Lilac energy exuded from the object, which, upon closer inspection, he recognised as a lightsaber. Cal hesitated before he did anything, fearing that what he would see—what he would feel—would reach into the darkest parts of his fears and unsettle him.

Behind him, BD-1 beeped quizzically, and his confusion unintentionally spurred Cal on. He hovered his hands above the weapon, shut his eyes and summoned the force. What he saw was beyond disturbing. Flying lasers; orders shouted; lightsabers ignited; panicked cries; the temple on fire—all as if it were playing out in slow motion. Cal felt the fear of the Jedi as she fought back against advancing troops, defending the order alongside her friends—for her friends. He felt the devastation as all hope was lost, and then guilt as the Jedi abandoned her lightsaber and seemingly fled. Cal opened his eyes and shivered. These things always seemed to get to him.

"A Jedi abandoned her lightsaber after failing at defending the temple against Stormtroopers," Cal stated in response to BD-1's questioning beep. Another few beeps and trills sounded, echoing throughout the temple. "I know. It was a dark time."

Cal stood from his crouching position and continued his trek. If the Empire hadn't acquired them already, the texts should be somewhere around the back.

Recently, he had been training with Cere. He was technically already a Jedi, but figured that a little more training from a genuine Jedi master wouldn't hurt, even if Cere had experienced some problems with the force in previous years. Claiming the Jedi texts would only further his knowledge of the force, allowing him to enlighten himself with all the possibilities it could bring. Perhaps, he would often ponder to himself, if a new Jedi order is miraculously created in the future, I will be strong enough to protect and properly teach any force-sensitives. The crew may have chosen to destroy the holocron and put the fates of the Jedi in the force's hands, but Cal still believed that a new hope would eventually emerge, and only wished he could be a part of it.

If he was being entirely honest, Cal had been feeling hopeless after his encounters with the Empire and the Holocron. He no longer reminisced over Master Tapal's death, but new concerns plagued his mind. Memories of Darth Vader arose every now and again through the force echo of his lightsaber, and his nightmares consistently reminded him of the torture and suffering that Trilla Suduri endured, only to be killed mercilessly. Finding and studying the Jedi texts would not only give him purpose, but the reassurance that he was on the right path, as well as a distraction from his anxieties.

There had been no word of any Inquisitors appearing recently, but his anxieties in question came from the fact that the Empire was beginning to tighten their defences. On top of that, Cal was painfully aware of the large bounty on his and his friends' heads. Almost every bounty hunter in the galaxy was bound to be searching for them—it certainly wasn't the most comforting of ideas.

Cal slipped through a doorway and into a room at the far end of the temple. It was small in width and length, but the ceiling reached high above his head. Across from him was a podium; sections of it were broken and crumbled, but the majority of it remained proudly. Once more, a lilac energy surrounded it, bright and demanding in the darkness of the room. Cal approached the echo and allowed the force to flow through him. He couldn't get much from it, re-opening his eyes almost as soon as he shut them, but the feeling was potent. It felt of education, prosperity and enlightenment.

"This is where the Jedi would read from the texts, sharing their knowledge with each other," Cal said, not even having to wait for BD to ask of his findings.

Eyes scanning the room, Cal searched for where the texts could possibly be. A box in the corner of the room caught his eye, and he wasted no time in investigating. Just as he approached it, BD-1 jumped off his back and scuttled across the floor. The droid beeped excitedly as he scanned it. Thanks to the soft green light that BD-1 emitted, Cal could see the box clearly. It was large, wider than it was tall, and big enough to fit a few books. This is it, he thought. Cal brushed his hands over the box, stroking the cold, hard wood, then held his breath as he pushed it open. He was surprised to find it unlocked, and the lid swung back on its hinges faster than he expected. BD-1 climbed onto the side and flicked his torch on, illuminating the contents of the box.

Ash.

Just like the temple, what used to be a remanent of the Jedi legacy was now nothing but soot and dust. Cal reached into the box and pulled out one of the books. It was barely still intact—merely a flimsy spine, blackened cover and charred pages. As he moved it around, desperately searching for any sign of salvation, more and more sections of it broke off, falling to the ground and becoming indistinguishable from the grains of sand.

Cal sighed in defeat and placed it back into the box. BD-1 said something about not giving up, but Cal didn't have the heart to reply. He outstretched his arm so BD-1 could climb onto his back and straightened himself. What a waste of time, Cal thought. He took one last look at the room before exiting.

He felt the disturbance in the force before he saw it. Stormtroopers lined the entrance to the temple, guns aimed towards him. At seeing Cal appear, they immediately began to fire. Cal hadn't been expecting this; he knew that the Empire had besieged a town nearby, but didn't suspect that they would be notified of his presence so fast. A few blaster bolts managed to hit him, burning through his thin clothing. He slowed the troopers temporarily, giving him enough time to ignite his lightsaber and defend himself. The affect wore off almost in an instant, and Cal cursed at himself for letting his guard down and allowing his force powers to weaken. He began deflecting the lasers and took a few troopers down. But he was steadily losing energy, and more troops were being called in by the second. The stormtroopers were pushing closer with every passing moment, and he had nowhere to go. He was losing.

Somewhere from the side, there was a flash of red light. One of the troopers collapsed to the floor, then another, and another, until the entire squadron was dead. Cal's eyes glanced around the room, trying to seek out his saviour.

To the left, someone jumped down onto the ground from an opening. They stopped to contemplate the lifeless stormtroopers, then turned to face Cal. Except, Cal couldn't see their face, as it was almost entirely concealed by a hood, a pair of goggles and a mask.

Cal didn't know how to react as they advanced towards him, walking with almost a dutiful sense of purpose. Are they going to hurt me? Cal deliberated. Surely not, they just saved me. Maybe they just want to talk. All of his confusion faded away as the person pointed their own blaster towards him, making their intentions clear. They began to fire, to which Cal blocked as accurately as his tired body would allow him.

A few of the deflected bolts struck the attacker. They hissed and stopped shooting, momentarily grazing the wound with their gloved hands. Cal studied their actions warily, watching as they reached into the pocket of their loose-fitting pants and pulled out a spherical object.

"See you later," they said. Their words caught him off guard. He barely had time to respond before the sphere was thrown onto the ground. It rolled for a few seconds, bumping into Cal's feet. And then, it split open, and sparks of electricity flew out of it. Cal felt the shock waves pulsate through him, before he collapsed to the ground.

You waited for the boy to still completely, and then approached him, pulling your goggles off to get a better look. Huh, a Jedi, you mused. So this is who the Empire wants.

In all your time as a Bounty Hunter, you'd never hunted a Jedi before. That was mainly because the Empire preferred to deal with these warriors themselves, but now, for whatever reason, they were desperate. You speculated just what could be so special about this specific Jedi for the Empire to need extra help, but found no answers.

A sudden pang of anger erupted in your chest. If you'd have known that the target was a Jedi, you would've declined the offer. Oh well, too late now, you thought. Besides, it's good money.

Upon observation, you found no sign of the BD-unit that the Jedi carried on his back. The thing must have escaped, you realised. You didn't mind—how much damage could a droid do?

You sighed, staring down at the Jedi once again. Your eyes grazed over his pale white skin, made even paler by the contrast of his bright auburn hair. His face was dotted with an abundance of freckles, and a prominent scar rested across his nose. He was young, from what you could tell, somewhere in his late teens, but slightly aged by tired, sunken eyes. The guy probably had a difficult past, you reckoned, what with the whole Order 66 thing. Now he's being hunted by the Empire. The familiar pang returned, but you pushed it down. You had a job to do, and you were going to do it.

#star wars #jedi fallen order #cal kestis #cal kestis x reader #cal kestis x you #gender neutral reader #cere junda #greez dritus #nightsister merrin #merrin x reader #fanfic

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kumeko · 4 years

Photo

Title: earth angel

A/N: For @desibrucewayne, for the @dc-secret-santa. You wanted Talia/Bruce, Cassandra, Damian, and time travel. I hope I delivered on it!

…

Damian grimaced at the sand at his feet. His feet were sinking into the soft, loosely held together sand dune. Around him was more endless sand, a golden yellow as far as the eye could see. He glanced at the hot sun distastefully, his skin already starting to burn mere minutes after appearing on the soft sands.

The soft sands of a desert. Damian was in a desert. This was no hallucination or illusion. He was in the desert. And apparently in full Robin costume. At least he wasn’t alone; Cassandra Cain stood next to him and judging by her body language, she was just as confused as he was.

How could they have fucked up this badly? His brow furrowed as he considered it all. “How did we get here?”

“I am not sure.” Cassandra nonchalantly took off her cowl and shook her head. She ran a hand through her sweaty locks with a frown. The costumes were able to handle temperature changes but nothing this extreme. “Weren’t we meeting Stephanie?”

“Stephanie?” Damian closed his eyes, trying to remember what had just happened. It was impossible to forget Stephanie’s blinding purple uniform, as ugly now as it had been when they’d first met. As Batgirl, she’d waved to them from a roof, gesturing for them to come closer. Behind her, he had spotted a blue-skinned boy approaching her. “There was some kind of alien with her.”

“Alien?” Cassandra blinked before her lips parted in a soft ‘oh’. “Klarion was with her. And you attacked him.”

“I thought he was attacking her,” Damian defended himself, crossing his arms.

“He wouldn’t do that.” Cassandra paused. “Usually, at least.” She gestured at their surroundings. “That explains this—he has teleportation powers.”

“Teleportation?” Damian ground his teeth. He hated magic. There was no good way to counter or negate it. “Can that nitwit teleport us back?”

“Probably.” Cassandra rubbed her neck. “Though that depends on his mood.”

“So we have to rely on Stephanie to make him do it?” His eyebrow twitched. That idiotic beam of sunlight didn’t know how to threaten anyone. Then again, if there was someone who was persistently annoying, it was her. Maybe Klarion would summon them back just to get her to shut up. He pulled out his communicator. It would be faster to just call the Batcave and get a helicopter. “I’ll just send for—it’s not sending any messages.” He tapped the screen but that didn’t change the status. “It’s not connecting to the satellite.”

“That’s odd. Bruce planned for locations like this.” After considering it for a moment, Cassandra pushed her hair back, tying it in a ponytail. “We have to find shelter. It isn’t good to be out like this.”

“I know that.” Damian snorted derisively, pocketing the communicator. If there was one good thing about their teleportation, it was that he recognized the area. “One of my grandfather’s old bases is nearby. We can wait there.”

“I do not want to fight all of his men,” Cassandra frowned.

“It’s abandoned,” Damian answered, already heading toward it. “It won’t be a problem.”

-x-

“I thought you said it was abandoned,” Cassandra whispered as she peeked over a sand dune.

“It’s supposed to be,” Damian snapped back as he stared at the definitely-not-abandoned base. There were jeeps and camels leaving it. People were walking in and out at steady intervals. Hell, there was even a patrol.

Someone had taken over his grandfather’s base.

He wasn’t sure if he should want revenge or want to laugh at the old fool for leaving the place so vulnerable.

“That doesn’t change anything,” Damian continued, memorizing the patrol pattern. Fortunately, the employees here were incompetent, leaving gaping holes in their security. Perhaps a lesser man would fail to find a way, but this was child’s play for two would-be-assassins. “If anything, this will make sending a message easier.”

“We will have to be careful not to be spotted.” Cassandra pulled her cowl back over her head. The jaggedly-pieced together Batgirl outfit was truly frightening in the dark alleys of Gotham. In the bright sunlight of the desert, it was just extremely out of place. “There is nowhere to hide the bodies.”

“You’re wearing all black,” he pointed out snidely.

“That is not a problem,” she replied instantly, already getting to her feet. “I can handle that much.”

-x-

“This is strange,” Damian muttered as they slowly stalked the hallways of the base. It had been almost child’s play to get in and they didn’t even have to take out a single guard to secure their entry.

That said, there was something truly unsettling about how Cassandra managed to disappear while they snuck in. He should have been able to spot her the entire time. It was black on gold.

“What is?” Cassandra asked, slipping to a wall and peeking around the corner. There were many intersections and bends in the hallway. Occasionally they’d pass by a stone chamber filled with food or other supplies. So far, there were no signs of a communications room.

“This place.” Damian gestured at the rigid stone walls. They all looked perfectly cut and clean. “The walls look like they were made recently. They haven’t been used in years.”

“They cleaned up?” Cassandra suggested, poking her head into yet another dark chamber. “There’s only ammunition in this one.”

“But there’s no way to hide that much decay—” Damian stopped talking. Behind him, he could hear footsteps echoing through the hall, quiet and intimidating. “Someone’s coming.”

“Hide,” Cassandra urged, grabbing his hand and dragging him into the chamber.

“We can take him,” Damian grunted, but he reluctantly crouched behind a barrel of guns. With bated breath, he waited as the footsteps grew louder and louder, a large shadow appearing on the walls. With the only light torches, the primitive cave felt more primal than it ought to be. Finally, when the shadow took over the entire wall, a man appeared in front of their chamber.

Batman, Damian thought, his eyes growing wide. Father.

There was no mistaking that cowl, though the design was an old one. Even the build fit correctly. “It’s not bad enough they’re taking grandfather’s base, they’re also copying Father?” he growled, pulling out a dagger.

“Wait.” Cassandra grabbed his hand, stilling it. “Not yet.”

“And let that insult walk by?” Damian hissed. He yanked his hand free and quickly slinked off to follow the imposter.

“Damian!” Cassandra quickly chased after him. Or rather, considering that they didn’t want to alert anyone, they both quietly slinked down the hall. The torchlights flickered and Damian hung back as far as he could, trying not to get caught before he interrogated and slit the imposter’s throat.

Fortunately, he wouldn’t have to wait long. The copycat was coming to a stop before a chamber. All Damian had to do was follow him inside and no one would be the wiser.

Cassandra caught up to him as he hid around a corner. Don’t she signed, glaring at him.

Watch me he signed back, watching as the imposter stood in front of a door.

After a moment, his mother appeared at the door and Damian bit back a gasp. When had she—that explained the base’s use, but she had been dismantling Ra’s bases the last he’d heard. What was she doing here? And why did she look so different? As his thoughts derailed, she stood on her toes and pulled off Batman’s cowl. It was only a profile, but Damian recognized him immediately.

That was Bruce Wayne.

A younger Bruce Wayne. A younger Talia Al Ghul.

He had gone to the past.

-x-

“This is the past,” Damian stated, if only to hear it aloud. His parents were in the chamber down the hall. Was he even born at this point? All of this because a blue demon couldn’t control his powers properly. His hand curled into a fist. When he got back, he was going to beat that demon until he was black and blue.

“It seems so. That makes things…difficult,” Cassandra replied. An understatement, truly. “I do not know if Klarion can bring us back.”

“Why can’t he?” Damian growled, pacing back and forth in the ammunition chamber they’d hid in earlier. They needed a place to think, to comprehend, but perhaps they should have picked another. His fingers were getting an urge to grab several of the daggers here.

“Stephanie said he could not control his powers properly,” Cassandra replied slowly, rubbing her neck. She sat cross-legged on a barrel, watching him. “We will have to find another magician. Maybe Zatanna can help.”

“Her?” Damian frowned. He had never been overly impressed with her work. Then again, none of the ‘heroes’ were adept magicians as far as he was concerned. Perhaps he should have stuck with his mother, after all.

His mother.

The image of her embracing Bruce flashed across his mind and involuntarily, he glanced at the direction of her chambers.

“She can connect us with others.” Cassandra leapt off the barrel. “I will find a way to contact her. You find a vehicle.”

“You don’t order me around,” Damian snapped but it was too late, Cassandra had already disappeared down the hall. He clicked his tongue as he rolled his eyes. And people complained about his communication skills.

Still, there wasn’t a flaw with her plan. Even if Zatanna could teleport them, it was better if they didn’t stay here. He wasn’t sure if they’d accidentally contact his parents and change the course of history. Change the course of his existence. He would just have to steal one of the jeeps he knew his grandfather kept out here.

Quickly, he snuck to the chamber’s exit and peeked outside. The coast was clear, as usual. It was no wonder his grandfather’s plans failed so spectacularly, if this was the skill his henchman showed. From his memory of the layout, the jeeps were kept two floors below. He’d have to access the stairwell to reach them discretely.

Damian glanced to his left one more time, to his mother’s chambers.

He should go.

He turned left.

-x-

Love was blind, Dick had declared once.

Damian finally understood what he meant. His parents were blind. Utterly, completely blind. He was mere meters away from them, hiding in a darkened corner of his mother’s chambers, and somehow neither Batman nor Talia had noticed him.

It was impossible.

He was never going to fall in love.

Yet, despite that, he couldn’t leave the room. His parents were sitting on the balcony, eating dinner on a small round table. It looked so informal. Bruce was holding Talia’s hand as she talked, a small smile on his face. He looked light, unburdened. Talia leaned closer, a coy expression as she gently swirled wine in her glass.

Damian watched, transfixed. He didn’t know what to make of this sight, of this woman who was not his mother, this man who was not his father.

Of this relationship that no longer existed.

-x-

Damian whirled the keys around his finger as he stood next the jeep.

“You weren’t spotted?” True to form, Cassandra reappeared next to him, holding an old school radio.

“I took care of it.” He jabbed a thumb at the wall. Three of his grandfather’s followers were knocked out, bound and gagged against the wall. “You can tell Dick I didn’t kill anyone.”

“I knew you wouldn’t.” Cassandra smiled at him and squeezed his shoulder. Damian tried not to feel too pleased about it. Swiping the keys, she headed to the jeep. “Let’s go.”

“I could drive,” he grumbled but he went to the other side of the jeep anyways. “You contacted Zatanna?”

“Not while we’re here,” Cassandra replied. The jeep hummed to life as she turned on the ignition and she winced. It was a sound they couldn’t muffle. “Ra’s might monitor it.”

“I doubt he was wise enough to set that up,” Damian sniped, still utterly disappointed by the lackluster guards in the area.

“Don’t underestimate your grandfather.” Cassandra slowly crept out of the garage, keeping the lights low.

“Maybe when he proves himself.” Damian glanced back as they quietly rolled out of the compound, in the direction of his mother’s chambers.

He knew the story well enough, of his mother’s lies, of his father’s fears. It was a story that would be replayed now.

Yet, he hadn’t known his parents’ joy. His parents’ love. They looked happy, truly happy, for that one meal and while he was never one to think of what-ifs, they haunted his mind now. If he had revealed himself, preventing his mother’s lies, how would it all have changed? Would they have stayed together? Would their relationship change?

Would he have changed?

No, there was no need to dwell on it. Just like the desert around him, the possibilities were vast. Damian was who he was now, and he didn’t intend to change that.

“I’ll call Zatanna,” he said, fiddling with the radio. The sooner they got out of here, the sooner he could put it all out of his mind.

#cassandra cain #damian wayne #bruce wayne #talia al ghul #batman #dc comics #fanfic #I reject what comics have given me and go with Damian being a little in awe of Cassandra #and maybe a little bit of a crush #and being too much of a snob to admit either thing #they'd be great sparring partners #tim steph and dick all make bets on who wins

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yourcutelittlegayfriend · 4 years

Text

Fight for Love

___________________________

Sett x Fem! reader

part 2

*warning small fight with small violence*

Masterlist

______________________

After closing the deal between you and the yordle, he led you to where the fight is.

While walking your friend turned to you and said.

"You know you don't exactly have to fight, we can find another ways that don't involve you fighting to buy supplies ya know." They said a worried tone laced in their voice.

"Don't worry buddy I got this and I want to fight anyway it's been a long time since I get to punch someone in the face, Ezreal's face was too soft anyway." You said re-assuring them.

"Ok but you have to promise me that you won't get hurt to much." They said knowing it's gonna be hard convincing you to change your mind.

"Don't worry I won't." You lied knowing Pit fights doesn't always end well.

Walking around the busy streets of Noxus hearing the loud voices of vendors yelling their merchandise, a couple of beggars here and there but a few alleys past by you started seeing more people looking shady, wearing cloaks or heavy metal/leather clothes with weapons in their person if you look close enough.

Suddenly you came across a large clearing with a large wall in the center with a gigantic metal gate as the entrance that was heavily guarded by two armored man holding Large axes instead of spears back in Demacia.

Kled turned to the both of you and said to wait while he talks to the guards.

You both comply and watch him as he started screaming his ass off to their faces your friend continued to look at him while you look around, you can see people looking at Kled and whispered to each other.

'he must be famous or something.' you thought.

Looking at the wall you can faintly hear over the wall screams and cheers, it made you so curious to know what's happening inside that you closed your eyes and opened your secret sense.

your ears followed the sound, disregarding Kled scratchy voice, the guards grumbling and the people around you and continued through a small crack on the metal gate.

From what you can hear your mind traced images of people shouting inside and heard clashing of metals that caught your interest as figures who looked like they were fighting was draw in your mind.

You had this ability ever since you were a toddler you called it Visions you mostly used this when you find yourself in a pickle or when you get chased by Demacian Soldiers, (friend's name) said that it wasn't magic they said you were using echo-location or something like following sounds and all that.

Opening you eyes you smiled feeling excited to what's to come, (friend's name) turned to you.

"So what did you saw?." They ask.

"Alot of fighting, maybe blood and also more fighting." you smirk at them.

"Yeah you're in your element alright." they deadpanned at you before shaking their head.

"Hey girly the fights inside! Let's go." you hear Kled scream at you and you see the Metal gate raising up behind it was a long pathway leading inside.

"We're coming!." (Friend's name) screamed back getting a bit irritated.

the two of you walk towards him and proceed to enter not minding the stares of the two guards give to you.

After entering the Metal gate slam down making the torches on the wall the only light source, walking for a few seconds you see a small entrance with a light shining through it and you can also hear the shouts of the people getting louder and louder as you near the entrance.

Passing through it the light blinded you for a moment before you eyes gotten used to it was the moment your eyes widen and your mind gathering everything.

It was a large arena with alot of people sitting or standing on the stands screaming and cheering with their might towards the platform in the center.

You see two large build man fighting against each other with their sword and axe clash together, you can also hear the grunts thanks to your hearing.

"Well that's a bit violent." your friend mumbled.

"That's the point dum-dum." you answered.

After a bit Kled ordered you to stay at the stands before leaving the two of you disappearing somewhere with Skaarl.

watching as the two men fight before suddenly the baldman with an axe bash his head on his opponent making them lose their composition using that chance he kick them in the stomach making his enemy lay on his back as he didn't hesitate to put his axe in their shoulder.

You can hear the man's screams of pain but it was easily cover up by the people's screams of glee around you as if violence was a common entertainment for them.

"Well that's something, they allowed weapons now, nice." you commented.

"Seriously?." (Friend's names) remarked at you but seeing your face emotionless they didn't add more and leave you be.

"LADIES AND GENTELMAN YOUR WINNER!! AGUL THE SLAYER!!!." a man on a more smaller platform on the side of the stands shouted on the top of his lungs announcing the Victor of the fight.

"DO YOU WANT MORE!!!!." he screams with his arms opened as people chanted 'MORE' or 'YES'. While Agul the 'slayer' motioned the people to yell more too while the poor man who lose got drag to another entrance from to opposite side from where we came in.

"NOW WHO WANTS TO CHALLENGE THE GREAT A- huh?." The man who you believe is the host was pulled down by someone as the waist height wall covered the person, the two spoke in hushed tone well to you it was but for the others they didn't hear anything.

"Huh!? You sure-?." But he was cut off by a scratchy voice.

"YES NOW SHUT IT BOY!." the voice you guess was Kled and you also recognize the hat popping out on top of the wall.

"ok you got it a deal." he stood up straighten his clothes and you see Kled rose up with the help of Skaarl and see him wave to you.

"What was that?." (Friend's name) ask confused by the sudden commotion.

"Kled happened." you blunty said still looking at the one eyed yordle with your left eye brow raised.

"Oh".

"LADIES AND GENTLEMAN LOOKS LIKE WE HAVE ARE OWN VERY FIRST VOLUNTEER OF THE DAY THAT IS ALSO PERSONALLY SUGGEST BY KLED THE CANTANKEROUS CAVALIER." He announce before continuing.

"(Y/N)!!!!." He finishes dramatically.

people murmured around you looking for the person named (Y/N).

sighing in irritation before standing up and going down a few stairs before jumping to stand on top the wall that seperates the battle ground and the stands where people can watch in a safe distance.

You raise your hand looking bored as you show yourself to the people, you can hear them talking about how your gonna lose or wondered if you can actually fight but you didn't care you were used to people trash talking to you anyway.

"OH! A LADY HOW EXCITING LET'S SEE WHAT YOU GOT!! PLEASE ENTER THE BATTLE AREA AND SHOW US A GOOD FIGHT!!." he scream more along with the people.

you scoff and said to yourself.

"Oh I'll give you the show you'll never forget." you smiled before jumping down and landing on the ground with no problem before walking calmly to the cement covered sand where Agul stands menacingly.

"Hehe your think you can beat me little girl? why don't you just run away and play somewhere else you don't have a chance in this fight". He taunt you as people chant his name and not yours but you know your friend is rooting for you.

"Oh I don't 'think' I can beat you." you smiled at him while he laughs at you as his pride grew more.

"Cuz I 'know' I can beat you ,now let's cut this sweet talk and fight I'm getting a bit bored." you finished with a fake yawn.

He glares at you and grips his axe before throwing it aside.

"I'll make it fair for you then." he smirks.

"Oh! What a gentleman!." You giggle before frowning.

"but you might wanna need it." you said.

He growl before running towards you his large feet stomping the ground feeling it shake under your bare feet.

"This is gonna be fun" you smirk.

____________________________

______________________

Just like the first part pls visit Lol's website to support them and Lol isn't mine the champions the plots etc but the story is mine.

I hope you enjoy this😘

EDITED: 01/18/20 I found some typo and fix them a bit srry.

#league of legend sett #league of legends #sett x reader #x reader #x fem reader #x reader insert #readerinsert #long reads #League of Legends x reader #lol sett #lol sett x reader #lol x reader #league of legends x reader

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starsandlittlebats · 4 years

Text

Scar tissue

read on ao3

Parings: Aelin x Rowan

Warnings/comments: language, flashbacks, yall have no idea how long it took me to find the perfect type of flower for the third flashback. 20 mins is how long

Summary: Aelin and Rowan spend the night reminiscing about their scars, old and new, painful and less so

Words: 2831

Aelin ran her fingers over the neat line of stitches that graced her cheekbone.

“It’s going to scar, isn’t it,” She groaned, glancing towards Rowan with a mournful look. He didn’t say anything, but flashed a grin at her nonetheless.

“Oh gods, it is.” Aelin threw herself onto the sleeping mat. She huffed a sigh again and shook her head slightly.

“You know what? I think it’ll make me look rugged.”

“Sure will.”

“Oh shut up.” Aelin picked up one of the embroidered cushions from the sand and flung it at his face with surprising accuracy. Plucking it out of the air, Rowan threw it right back before lowering himself down beside her. Smiling slightly, Aelin leaned her head on Rowen’s shoulder, and the pair fell into a comfortable silence.

Moonlit waves crashed on the shore, the rhythmic boom and roar providing accompaniment to the wind that hissed through the marram grass on either side of the dunes. Bright diamond stars hung suspended in the sky, faltering only slightly as grey specters of cloud passed over them. But in their little bubble of calm made by Rowan’s shields, it was a perfect night.

The pair had been meaning to get away from court life for weeks now but had only just found the time to escape to the little cove Aelin had found on her last visit to western Terrasen. And a little - well, a lot - of wind wouldn’t do them any harm was what Rowan had claimed minutes before Aelin had almost quite literally been blown off a cliff face and into a gull’s nest. Which the birds had strongly disagreed with, as evident by the nasty gash on her face.

Rowan absentmindedly brushed his fingers over the cut and Aelin shivered a little under his touch, leaning into it.

“So,” she mumbled, “What about you?”

“Hmm?”

“You never talk about your scars.”

“That’s because I don’t have any stories that even live up to pissing off a seagull.”

Aelin let out a snort. “Nah, you’ve been around for centuries, I’m sure Lorcan’s bitten you or something over the years.” She leaned over, pulling his arm onto her lap and lightly ran her fingers over a jagged line at the crook of his elbow.

“What about this one then.”

“That’s, uh, nothing.” Rowan’s blush was all-too visible in the half-darkness. Aelin raised her eyebrows.

“ Did Lorcan bite you?”

“No! Gods no, this happened about... a century ago,” Rowan’s brow furrowed as if he was thinking hard, “Me and the cadre found a bee’s nest high up in a tree - Lorcan had the brilliant idea to turn it into a competition; who could get the honeycomb the fastest, no magic, no shifting allowed.”

Aelin poked him, “Go on.”

_______________

Rowan stared up at the tree’s canopy, narrowing his eyes at the humming, brown smear high, so high up in the branches. Really, he was a fool for even accepting the challenge, and after watching both Fenrys and Gavriel fail, he really should be reconsidering, but gods dammit he would not look like an idiot.

“Careful.”

Rowan glanced over to where Fenrys was glumly picking bee stingers out of his skin. He just nodded and grabbed the first branch, hauling his way up the tree. Rowan swiftly fell into a rhythm, always keeping three limbs on the branches and feeling the rough bark scrape slightly against his skin. He kept climbing, up and up until he was forced to slow down, the limbs starting to creak dangerously under his weight.

The nest was only a few feet above him now, the humming relentless. Gingerly, he reached up, gently slipping his hand inside and feeling the nest start vibrating violently. A sharp sting pricked his thumb and Rowan winced slightly, before slowly wrapping his fingers around what he hoped was the honeycomb. Another series of pricks pierced his skin, this time painful enough to cause Rowan to hiss and yank back his hand.

The very air seemed to be alive with furious buzzing and Rowan hurriedly backed away before anymore of the creatures could find him. There was a pain in his knee, his neck, his cheek, spurring on the male faster.

Then suddenly - weightlessness.

It took Rowan a good second to realize that he had missed a branch and was now plummeting towards their camp. He twisted in midair, and had just splayed his fingers to release a net of wind to slow his fall when he slammed into the ground. There was a burst of pain, a red haze, and then nothing.

_______________

“And then when I woke, it turned out that I had won, but they’d used the honey to dress my arm, so I never actually got to eat any of it.” Rowan traced a finger across the jagged line. “The bone snapped clean in two. I didn’t live that down for years.”

Aelin snorted again, shaking her head slightly.

“You’re such an idiot,” she laughed softly, the sound only building as Rowan swatted her on the arm.

“Right,” he said, “My turn.”

Aelin raised her eyebrows again, but didn’t shift away as Rowan reached over, brushing her hair aside and touching a thin line on her neck. She screwed her face up and frowned.

“Huh, yeah, that one was wayyyy back when I was still Celaena. Arobynn thought it would make an excellent training exercise if he paid someone to kidnap me. Gods, that was years ago.”

_______________

The hood was ripped off Celaena’s head, taking a good few strands of hair with it. Even though she was still groggy with whatever drug they’d used to bring her here, a bolt of fury raced through her spine. Wherever here was.

Celaena swiftly assessed the situation, dank stone walls lit by a guttering torch - heavy manacles weighing her down to the floor - a large oak door - no other exits. Ah, shit . She managed a smirk at the decidedly rat-like man standing in front of her.

“And who do I have the pleasure of meeting at such a late hour?”

The man studied her for a second, but said nothing. Smart.

“So,” she said, stretching luxuriously in the chains and hearing them rattle, “What do you want with me?”

Her smirk grew at the flat look he threw her way.

“Arobynn Hamel owes me money. A lot. You are here as insurance in case he tries to pull something.”

Celaena mentally cursed Arobynn - why did she always get dragged into his messes? There was an abrupt silence as Celaena subtly tested the chains, feeling for weaknesses. The left manacle felt like it could give a bit of leeway and Celaena bit back a grin as she began to slip her hand free - before freezing. The knife pressed to her neck spoke volumes and this time she didn’t even try to smile, the blood rushing in her ears almost blocking out his next words.

“I know exactly who you are Saedothien, try anything and I’ll cut your throat -”

She never got to hear the end of that sentence, sharply kicking him in the groin and snapping her head back, away from the knife. But not fast enough. The man tripped forward, unbalanced, the metal slipping and biting deep into Celaena’s neck.

“ Shit! ” she snarled, ripping her hand free from the shackles with another groan of pain. Her captor had recovered enough to lunge again with the knife. Firmly shoving back the pain like she’d been trained to, Celaena’s free hand shot out, jabbing him in the throat and sending him spluttering back before grabbing his wrist. She twisted hard until there was a crack and he dropped the blade with a loud clatter and a yell of pain.

Almost automatically, Celaena kicked the knife towards her, scooping it up and jamming it into a keyhole. The heavy silence that coated the room was sudden and abrupt, Celaena picking the lock, always keeping one eye on the man who was crumpled to the floor, moaning slightly.

There was an audible click and Celaena shrugged the manacles off, rolling her soldiers and wincing at the soreness. Gingerly, she touched her neck, fingers coming away red as the pain she had pushed away rushed back. Celaena grimaced, glancing at the hand she’d pulled free of the chains and the twisted thumb that had started to throb. Blood loss and broken bones was not how she’d planned her Saturday night. Cleaning up this mess was going to take longer than she thought.

_______________

“What did you do to Arobynn when you found out he’d set it up?” Rowan asked.

“It involved a lot of screaming, broken objects, and at least one thrown knife. Though that last one was Arobynn, I probably shouldn’t have smashed his favorite two thousand crown sculpture on the floor.”

“He deserved it.”

“Oh definitely, that man had terrible taste in art.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

Aelin sighed, “Yeah, he did deserve it, although I had to pay back that two thousand crowns. Too busy being the devoted prodigy, I guess.”

She pressed her lips together, laying back in the sand and staring hard at the stars until their light started to blur. Rowan settled beside her and Aelin shifted to face him. There was another long silence with the wind and water filling the gaps of their conversation.

You okay? He asked in their silent language.

Yeah, just… thinking.

“Right, your turn,” Rowan said out loud and Aelin glanced over appreciatively at the change of subject. She placed a hand on an area of puckered skin on his thigh.

“Tell me about this one then.”

This time it was Rowan’s turn for his expression to falter and a shadow for pain passed over his face. Aelin knew that expression well - an ache bloomed deep in her chest for her mate and his pain.

“Lyria,” he said finally, “I was getting flowers for her - rare ones to impress her. Zantedeschias. But the only place they grow is in Kirfall Forest, which is also where the white bears live.”

_______________

Silver fur, savage claws, and fangs that just screamed ‘do not mess with me’. Incidentally, that was exactly what Rowan planned to do to the hulking creatures that prowled below. And in the middle of that clearing the cobalt and ivory blossoms of the Zantedeschias. Rowan wheeled back around, catching the updraft on his wings and studied the area for one last time before angling his wings and diving, shifting in midair and slashing with blades that were already grasped in white-knuckled fingers.

The roars that rang through the clearing were almost enough to make the male kneel over with shock. Almost. One of the beasts lunged at Rowan, fangs bared, and Rowan rolled away, shooting a blast of ice-kissed wind to send it sprawling back, landing a powerful kick on the head of the second. Rowan leaped high into the air, but before he could land the next blow, he was swatted out of the air, fangs tearing at his thigh. Rowan yelled with a mixture of pain and frustration as he fell hard, suddenly unbalanced.

He rolled, taking the brunt of the fall on his shoulder, and slashing upwards at the belly of the creature. Knocking its hind legs out from under it as he rose, Rowan cast jagged daggers of ice at the beasts, sending gusts of wind to guide their paths.

A series of muffled thuds told him that they’d reached their marks. The petals of the flowers taunted him with their closeness as he cut down three, four, five creatures before some semblance of sense stuck them and the rest of the pack fled into the waiting forest.

The silence that followed was abrupt and absolute, Rowan breathing heavily as the male strode across the clearing, limping on his injured leg and still warily eyeing the treeline. Rowan bent down to retrieve the flowers, but swore viciously as the pain in his thigh doubled at the movement. A growl slipped through his clenched teeth, but he eased the flowers out of the soil as carefully as he could nonetheless.

Even his wound seemed to lessen somewhat as he scrutinized the blossoms, imagining how Lyria’s face would light up as she saw them. That though alone made it all worth it.

_______________

“Did she like the flowers?”

“Only after she finished yelling at me for being so stupid to go to Kirfall Forest. She actually planted them in the garden - turns out they actually spread like weeds. I wonder if they’re still growing there...”

Aelin smiled slightly. “Well, maybe for our next holiday we can go find out.”

He raised his eyebrows at her, “You know that literally the whole court would want to come.”

“Family day out.”

Rowan rolled his eyes to the heavens. “I want to know about… this one next,” He touched an area of crisscrossing lines on Aelin’s upper arm.

“Oh, I fell off a cliff.”

“Of course you did. Why am I even surprised at this point?” He flashed a sharp-toothed grin at her and Aelin jabbed him in return.

“Shut up, do you want to listen to my daring tale or not?”

“Do go on, I’m intrigued at how my ethereal mate can get herself into so many life-or-death situations.”

“ Shush you buzzard, right, me and Aedion were about eight…”

_______________

Aelin grinned wickedly as she stared over the edge of the cliff.

“It’s not even that high Aedion.”

Aedion raised his eyebrows.

“That’s not a good idea.”

“Don’t be a wuss.”

“I’m not - fine.”

By some small miracle, the pair had snuck away from the party of adults that had taken them to the local beach in search of something more entertaining. Or - more accurately - Aelin had dragged Aedion up the nearest cliff in search of an adventure, despite his avid protests.

“Okay, so, on the count of three, we jump.”

Aelin seized Aedion’s hand and squeezed it hard. He squeezed it right back, this time shooting a reassuring grin at her that seemed to be more for himself than her.

“One, two, three-”

They launched themselves off the edge and into nothingness. Aelin dared to glance down, the glorious blue of the water filling her whole world. Beside her, Aedion gave a woop and her face had just begun to split in a smile when they slammed into the ocean.

Aelin went under in an explosion of bubbles, salt filling her mouth as she plummeted down, down, down. Her vision was a blur of brilliant silvers and blues so enchanting that Aelin barely noticed it when she hit the sea bed, rough stones and sand scraping across her exposed arm. She clawed her way to the surface with strong strokes, exploding back into the world and fresh air. Gasping and blinking water out of her eyes, Aelin twisted, eyes searching for Aedion who broke the surface next to her with a loud breath.

They locked eyes and Aelin started laughing, head dipping below the water, and Aedion only stared at her for a second before joining in. The two children clung together in the water, laughing, and shaking with a mixture of nerves, adrenaline, and mirth.

The water below them began to rise, the pair being carried along with the unnatural wave and around in sight of the beach that they’d left behind. Aelin swallowed at the sight of her mother, glaring, tight lipped, and fingers splayed in front of her to control the bulge of water. They were dumped unceremoniously onto the beach, spitting out sand and shivering as the cold began to set in.

Aelin touched her throbbing arm, wincing as her mother strode over, anger lining every inch of her posture. She winced.

Uh oh.

_______________

Aelin touched her arm, running her fingers over the scar as she finished her story. Rowan shook his head.

“So what I’m taking from this is that you were a horrible child. Poor Aedion.”

Aelin gave him a light punch, “I was an excellent child. I just dragged Aedion into my schemes. And to be fair, there were a lot of schemes.”

Rowan snorted, “Remind me never to let you two go off to a cliff side alone.”

“He enjoyed it really. Even if we were both grounded for the better part of three months.”

After a long pause, Aelin spoke again.

“If you could, would you get rid of them?”

Rowan considered this for a long second. “No. No, I wouldn’t. They remind me who I am and who I was. And nothing in the world would make me give up these -”

He shifted to reveal Aelin’s claiming marks. A ball of warmth ignited in her chest as she stroked them, feeling Rowan’s skin heat at the contact.

“I love you so much.”

“I do too, scars, bruises, pain and all. Everything that makes you up is brilliant and beautiful.”

“Now you’re just being sappy,” Aelin laughed.

“I sure am.”

#throne of glass #rowaelin #aelin galathynius #aelin x rowan #rowan whitethorn #tog fanfic #my fanfiction #ao3 #fanfiction

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basically-i-write-shit · 5 years

Note

mmmmmmmmmm iwayama? omega yamaguchi gets lost and wanders into another packs territory? could be fluffy, could be dark, whatever your mood! please have fun with it :)

Anon I like your style.

Tadashi isn’t where he’s supposed to be. He knows that much. He looks around the neighborhood he’s in, nerves clear in his scent. He’d gotten lost on an outing with his pack, and now he had no idea where he was; he knew that there was the possibility he could be wandering into pack territory, or a lone alpha could be nearby, and it’s getting dark, and– how does he always seem to find himself in situations like this?

Cackling laughter from inside a bar startles him and he stumbles into one of the patrons smoking out front. He apologizes quickly and turns the next corner he sees– a residential street. God, he’s never going to find his own way back to his shared apartment with Tsukki. The beta is probably worrying his head off right now, and Tadashi’s just having a leisurely stroll.

“Oh my, who is this pretty thing~?”

Tadashi pales. There’s three sets of footsteps behind him, and he knows he’s fucked. This street is old, and there aren’t many street lights– so if anyone wanted to jump him, it wouldn’t be hard. He searches for any house lights on the street but it’s ten o’clock on the school night in a suburban neighborhood.

So, basically, he’s fucked.

“He’s definitely not one of ours,”

“Smells pretty…”

Tadashi muffles a whimper and crosses the street. The footsteps follow him.

“Matsukawa-senpai, I want to have him.”

“Think you can take him, Kindaichi?”

“I–”

“Oi! You three, get back over to The Rook right now.” Another voice cuts through the three now dangerously voice, an alpha command, and Tadashi feel his knees go weak. There’s silence for a moment before grumbling, and the footsteps fade in the other direction. Tadashi sighs in relief and starts off the same direction he was going, when there’s another alpha command. “Omega. Come here.”

…And, well, there’s no omega in the world who can ignore an alpha’s Alpha voice.

Slowly, feverishly, Tadashi turns and walks the short distance back to the alpha that had saved him from the other alphas. He bares his neck submissively.

“You’re either lost or stupid to be wandering around such a rowdy part of town alone right now. So which is it?” The alpha crosses his arms, glaring up at Tadashi– he’s shorter than the omega by a few centimeters yet his biceps look like they could crush him.

“I– I…lost.” Tadashi stumbles, suddenly not able to find his voice. “My phone is dead, I…can’t call anyone…”

“Right. Well you should’ve gone into the first shop you found instead of wandering around. Come with me, before you get yourself knotted by one of my idiot pack mates.” The alpha says sternly, and Tadashi shivers. He nods.

“I- I know…I was stupid…” He murmurs. “I’m sorry.”

“Sorry doesn’t stop you from getting killed. C’mon.”

The alpha turns and crosses the street and Tadashi looks after him stupidly. He turns back to Tadashi, and the omega stumbles after him.

“I– How do I know you’re not going to hurt me?..”

“Well, I just saved you from a group of drunk alphas, so…”

Tadashi’s cheeks flush. “Right…Sorry…”

“Got any numbers memorized, or are we going to have to wait for your phone to charge enough to make a call?”

“I…I know the first digits, but I can’t remember the last four for some reason…”

“That’s alright. I have a charger.” The alpha says. Tadashi, following behind, can see he has tattoos; one of a chess piece, though which one Tadashi doesn’t know, on his forearm and on the back of his neck some sort of ivy that dips into the back collar of his shirt. He leads Tadashi to an apartment building down a different street, and he should feel scared being led off by an alpha he doesn’t know, but he’s not.

Once inside, they head straight down the hall and he’s led inside.

“I- I never got your name…”

“Iwaizumi Hajime,” The alpha replies. He slips a bag Tadashi hadn’t noticed off his shoulder, hanging it on a coat rack as he slides his shoes off “Does the Seijoh pack sound familiar to you?”

“Ah, no..? I don’t think so…” Tadashi hums, brows furrowing a moment, before something pops into his head. Oh. Yeah. Seijoh is the pack that Kageyama left. He probably won’t mention that. “I- I’m Yamaguchi Tadashi, by the way.”

“Nice to meet you.” Iwaizumi offers a hand expectantly. “I’ll get your phone plugged in.”

Tadashi jumps to grab his phone from his pocket and give it to Iwaizumi, who takes it and wanders farther into his apartment. Tadashi slides his own shoes off and follows awkwardly behind. While Iwaizumi plugs his phone in for him, Tadashi looks at the pictures hung up on the wall. Iwaizumi isn’t smiling in many of them, instead glaring at the others or the camera, but there’s one or two where he’s genuinely smiling. His smile’s…pretty.

“How did you get lost, anyway?”

Tadashi startles.

“O- Oh. The other pack members my age went out to karaoke . We were walking home, but Hinata ran off after a cat, so we were looking for him…and I got lost…” He says, cheeks flushed. “It’s kinda embarrassing…”

“Wow…I…I can’t believe somehow two of you got lost in the same night.”

“Yeah…I…” Tadashi chuckles, blushing deeper. “We’re meant for each other, I guess.”

Iwaizumi laughs a bit, and Tadashi’s eyes widen. Shit this alpha is way too pretty. He catches himself before his staring borders on too long.

Iwaizumi sits down and motions for Tadashi to join him at the kitchen table. He does with a shy smile.

“I just wanna thank you– uh…I really was in a pretty bad spot.” He murmurs. “I should’ve been more aware of my surroundings, and I’m lucky that you hel– helped me…”

“I’m really sorry about my packmates. They’re not usually so predatory, but they’re terrible drunk.”

“Well, thank you again.” Tadashi gives a quiet bow in his seat, and when he looks up Iwaizumi is smiling at him. His cheeks flush.

“If you give me your number, I’ll make sure to have them also apologize for harassing you, once they’re sober.”

“O- Oh, you don’t have to..!”

“I would like to, though. And they’ll listen to me when I tell them– I’m higher up in the pack than they are.” Iwaizumi’s chest puff out proudly. “They’ll get in trouble for their behavior, I’ll make sure of it.”

“No, no, that’s not necessary–”

“No, no. Alphas shouldn’t be so disrespectful to omegas, so I’ll be talking to them.” He says.

Tadashi nods, biting his lip. A silence envelops them, awkward and long, and finally it hits Tadashi what’s happened.

“Holy shit…”

Iwaizumi hums, lifting his head to see Tadashi running his hands through his hair, eyes wide. “…You alright?”

“I– Oh, fuck.” He shakes his head. “I’m an unmated omega walking around at ten thirty at night in an area I don’t know without a phone to call anyone. What the fuck was I thinking?”

“Hey– Hey, come on.” Iwaizumi frowns.

“I– I should– go–”

Tadashi tries to stand, but Iwaizumi clears his throat and uses his alpha voice, “Yamaguchi sit down. You’re fine.”

When Tadashi sits down again, he’s somewhat calmer, the alpha’s voice having calmed him only somewhat. His cheeks flush deeply and he looks down at his lap. Iwaizumi comes over, crouching in front of Tadashi.

“I know I was kind of a dick earlier. You’re not an ass.“ He says, making the omega look up at him. “You got taken in by a well-meaning alpha and you’re going to be home soon.”

“Right….” Tadashi looks up and makes eye contact with Iwaizumi and his cheeks burn suddenly. Iwaizumi’s cheeks are also pink, and they’re all of a sudden moving forward, about to kiss, when Tadashi’s phone dings awake and they jump up eyes wide.

“L- Looks like your phone is– is charged–”

“Right!” Tadashi hops up, but he accidentally headbutts Iwaizumi and the alpha falls to the ground. Tadashi immediately stoops down to help him, stumbling over his own words, not knowing what to do. He apologizes profusely, embarrassed to hell.

This is how Iwaizumi’s roommate finds them when he enters, which is even more embarrassing. Eventually, Tadashi gets ahold of his pack and Suga picks him up. Tadashi leaves Iwaizumi with a bruised nose and a phone number, a promise to repay him for all the trouble he’s caused.

–

Ok so I got hallway through the other version of this but then I decided I wanted to continue that one creepy fic so enjoy both.

The night is Tadashi’s only solace.

Ever since the incident at the stream (which resulted in some bruises and a few more days – weeks? – of that fuzzy, sand-like feeling), he hasn’t been allowed to walk around alone. He’s given up on the stream. He– he doesn’t know what got him here, anymore. He’s tried to sneak off to the stream at night, but the nights have been dark and cloudy– he thinks something about the light against the water might be the way out.

But he doesn’t have long. Not everyone falls asleep until a few hours after sundown and start waking up at the beginning of sunup.

So he stays awake until he hears the last whispers of his new pack and sneaks out the front door. Every night like clockwork, he does this. Walks along the stream until he fears he’ll be too far away to make it back before everyone wakes.

Tonight he decides to take a detour. After all, he’s not getting anywhere. Instead, he decides to wander around the rather large village. No one should be out, and he’s not been allowed to walk around ever since the incident at the stream, so he hasn’t seen much of the village.

…Not that he can see much. He’d stolen a candle from the kitchen and lit it on one of the torches in the hall on his way out, but the light doesn’t reach far. He can see the ground and about two feet in front of him, but that’s it. The buildings are all the same brick and mud, the streets a crude cobble.

He’s alone. Thank god.

“Well this isn’t going to end very well for you.”

Tadashi whips around to his left side, eyes wide. The stranger in front of him has a dagger buried in his waist band and a bow and quiver of arrows hanging from his shoulder.

“I– I–”

“You’re the pretty little omega Karasuno took in. Sawamura says you’re not allowed to walk around alone.” Tadashi doesn’t know how to respond, because the alpha gets closer and closer. Fuck. Fuck, fuck fuck– “I think I know of a way to make this a little less painful for you…We don’t want Sawamura or Sugawara to find out about this, hm?”

“N- No! No, don– don’t– don’t wa- -want that.” Tadashi shakes his head vigorously, baring his neck. Why do all of the alphas have such strong scents?

“I think I have a proposition that will leave us both happy, then. I don’t tell your pack, and you…” The alpha leans forward, his brown eyes locking on Tadashi in a steely gaze. Tadashi shivers. “…And I get a little toy.”

Tadashi’s eyes widen and he whimpers. “Wait wait wait, now–”

“It’s either that or you’re going to be on even harder lockdown.” The alpha says with a raised eyebrow. Tadashi sighs, defeated.

“…Alright. A- And you are..?”

“Iwaizumi Hajime.”

“I’m–”

“Startlight. I know.” Iwaizumi grins, his scent growing stronger and headier, and Tadashi grows light headed. He almost drops his candle. “Now. Am I going to drag you back to Karasuno and get you punished, or am I going to get to have some fun?”

“I– I…do what you want…” Tadashi breathes. Flashing his sharp canines, Iwaizumi scoops Tadashi easily onto his shoulder and heads to the back of the building the alpha had been leaving when he’d caught Tadashi.

“I’m going to have so much fun with you.”

#haikyuu!!#iwayama #iwaizumi hajime #yamaguchi tadashi #tadashi yamaguchi #hajime iwaizume #fluff #omegaverse #alpha/beta/omegaverse #alpha/beta/omega #alpha/beta/omega dynamics #omegaverse dynamics #alpha/omega

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per-ineptia-ad-astra · 5 years

Text

Star Trek Episode 1.17: The Squire of Gothos

AKA Come Away O Human Landing Party

Our episode begins with a nice relaxed scene on the bridge, everyone hanging out, drinking coffee, and charting a course through a great big patch of nuthin’. They’re headed to Colony Beta Six to deliver some supplies. What kind of supplies are not specified. Hopefully not more plague medicine.

McCoy, leaning on Kirk’s chair as is his wont, picks up Kirk’s comment about how this place is a ‘star desert’ and starts talking about deserts and the imagery the word evokes, mirages and sand dunes and all that, with a surprising amount of fondness for a man who grew up in Georgia. Spock helpfully points out that the definition of ‘desert’ is “a waterless, barren wasteland” so he doesn’t really get why McCoy would be waxing poetic about such a place, which is a surprising lack of fondness for a man who grew up on a desert planet. McCoy just rolls his eyes and says that he couldn’t imagine any mirage “disrupting [Spock’s] mathematically perfect brainwaves” anyway, which Spock takes as a compliment.

All the conversation about deserts comes to a halt when Spock suddenly picks up a large “space displacement” up ahead. The navigator says they must be in some kind of light warp (???) or they would have noticed it earlier. Their sensors seem to be registering a planet, and sure enough there’s one on the viewscreen up ahead, clear as anything. Which is super weird, because this whole section of space has been explored and documented and they’re pretty sure there wasn’t a planet here last time. Strange as it is, though, Kirk says they’ve got no time to explore, they’ll just have to make a note of it so someone else can come check it out. Well, I’m glad to see you learned one lesson from last week, at any rate.

Uhura tries to notify someone over subspace radio about the strange case of the mysteriously appearing planet, but she’s getting interference, and thinks the mystery planet might be a natural radio source. What a nuisance. So Kirk tells Sulu to get out of range of that thing, and Sulu starts to—but then, suddenly, he disappears. And I mean really disappears. There one moment, gone the next, accompanied for some reason by an extremely over the top “BOING” sound.

Kirk rushes over to see what happened to his navigator, only for him to freeze in place and then vanish as well, also with a boing. Spock is so busy looking into his scanner he completely fails to notice any of this, even with the boinging, until the remaining helmsman yells out. Man, if I were that helmsman, I’d be getting out there, just in case whatever that was has an area of effect.

Spock whips round to find that the captain and one of the helmsmen have noped off into thin air, which calls for a bellow of “EMERGENCY! FULL REVERSE POWER!” I don’t really know how that’s going to help, but okay.

After the titles, we get a ‘ship’s log’ given by Spock to fill in for Kirk (how this differs from a captain’s log, I don’t know): they’ve misplaced their captain and helmsman and they’ve been circling around this weird mystery planet for four hours now, scanning it with everything they’ve got, but they haven’t picked up so much as a sneeze. Scotty says they’ve checked all over the ship and haven’t found the missing men anywhere, not stashed under a bed or in a closet or anything, which means that if they’re anywhere around here they’ve got to be on that planet. Of course, that’s assuming that they’re anywhere nearby on a cosmic scale, or that they’re currently on this plane of reality, or that they didn’t get zapped outside and are now floating slowly away through the vast emptiness of space, but none of those are really productive options so yeah, let’s look on the planet.

The other helmsman, DeSalle, immediately wants to beam down there with a search party, a suggestion that McCoy jumps on as well, but Spock reminds everyone that he’ll be making the decisions around here, thank you very much, we went over this enough last episode. He’s got a pretty good reason for being hesitant about that search party, as we learn when he asks the blueshirt who’s come in to sit at Sulu’s spot (for...some reason) what his readings about the planet show. The blueshirt, Jaeger, says that the planet has no detectable soil or vegetation, extremely high temperatures, a toxic atmosphere swept by tornadic storms, continuous volcanic eruptions, and is deadly to any life form as they know it without oxygen and life support systems. So that’s fun. Asked how long two humans without any of that protective gear could survive down there, all Jaeger can say is “not very long.”

This cheerful conversation is interrupted by a startled cry from Uhura. A message has suddenly appeared on one of the smaller viewscreens: “Greetings and Felicitations.”

[ID: Uhura sitting at her console with Spock standing behind her chair, both looking up at a viewscreen that reads ‘Greetings and Felicitations’ in ornate gothic text.]

That font does not bode well.

Spock tells Uhura to send a message back asking whoever this is to identify themselves. A moment later the viewscreen displays new text, as Spock reads out in a hilariously serious-yet-puzzled voice: “Hip-hip-hoorah, tallyho!”

Well, this is turning out to be a pretty weird day, alright. Spock tells the bridge he’s open to any theories at all, because really, what could anyone suggest that would be stranger than what’s already happened? McCoy points out that if someone’s sending them messages, there must be some kind of life on that planet. For once, Spock agrees with him, and orders the transporter room to be prepared. Scotty all but jumps into frame to volunteer for the landing party, but Spock tells him no, neither of them can be spared from the ship. Wait, you’re saying the person in charge of the ship isn’t going to be the first to beam down into dangerous, unknown territory? Spock, I don’t know if you’re really cut out for this command business.

Spock orders DeSalle, the helmsman, to lead the party, along with Jaeger, for his geophysical knowledge, and McCoy, because let’s be honest he’s gonna go anyway so you might as well let him and make things easier for everyone. They’re to go equipped with full armaments, communications and life support gear. “If those peculiar signals are coming from Captain Kirk or Mr. Sulu,” Spock says, “their rationality is in question.” Generally I’d agree, although really, with Kirk, anything’s possible.

The landing party soon meets up in the transporter room, equipped with full life-support equipment, which is...breath masks. Just breath masks, nothing else. Not even goggles or, hell, even a hat and scarf. Budget cuts hit hard, huh.

Spock comes in to see them off, and Uhura reports from the bridge that no more messages have come in, but she’s managed to pinpoint their source, so the landing party is going to be beamed there. Spock tells them to contact the ship as soon as they arrive, like your parents reminding you to call them when you get there, and to use the laser beacon if necessary. So...laser beacon. That’s a thing. I guess.

So the landing party heads down, but when they materialize, it’s not in a toxic, infernal hellscape...it’s in a nice grove with some trees and bushes.

[ID: McCoy, Jaeger (a slightly older white man with light brown hair) and DeSalle (a white man with dark brown hair) standing in a sandy clearing surrounded by trees and bushes, with a green sky in the background. All three men are wearing breath masks attached to devices on their belts, and looking around in confusion.]

“wtf, I know I’m a better geophysicist than this”

A quick reading reveals that the air is also quite breathable, so they take off their breath masks. As one might expect, they’re all pretty baffled. McCoy asks Jaeger (mispronouncing his name in the process) what the heck, what’s up with all those storms you were talking about? Jaeger can only shrug, with the half-confused, half-annoyed look of any expert who’s predicted something bad only to have it inexplicably averted.

DeSalle tries to calls the ship but his communicator isn’t working at all, and neither are the other two. As instructed he tries to use the laser beacon, but it seems something’s blocking it, so he says they’ll need to find more open ground.

The three of them separate a little bit to go looking around, but DeSalle quickly spots something and calls the other two over. It’s...a castle? Or possibly just a large and castle-like house, I’m not really sure.

[ID: Broad stone steps leading up to a stone building, with a large banded wooden door, torches on either side, and assorted gargoyle-like decorations.]

Well that definitely has no business being here. But once you see an inexplicable castle-house, there’s pretty much only one thing to do: go inside. The front door is unlocked, so the three of them slowly creep in.

Through the door is a small balcony overlooking a large, fancy room filled with as many historical-looking things as they could raid from the Desliu prop stores.

[ID: The interior of a lavishly decorated but old-fashioned room, with some assorted couches and chairs, suits of armor, a large globe, a bust of a man in a tricorn hat, a row of flags, and various other decorations.]

Also there’s this weird thing on the wall.

[ID: The mounted head of what appears to be some strange gray-skinned creature with big green googly eyes.]

seriously, what IS that

McCoy is like “where in the entire fuck are we” but no answer immediately presents itself. They start to head down the balcony stairs, but get distracted by the sight of something in an alcove to one side. It’s...Salty?? Yes, the ol’ salt monster themselves, apparently dead and now on display. McCoy looks about as happy to see them as you might expect.

[ID: McCoy, DeSalle and Jaeger pausing on the stairs, phasers at the ready, looking at the still form of the furry gray-skinned salt monster tucked into an alcove.]

“oh man, I had a really bad day the last time I saw this dude”

Inexplicable as it is for Salty to be here, they don’t show any sign of being a threat anymore, so after a moment the three of them carry on. Not for very long, though, because they soon see something even more interesting—Kirk and Sulu! Dang, things always turn up in the most unexpected places after you lose them, huh. Only one small problem: they’re...frozen. Well, kind of frozen. You can definitely see George Takei moving a bit there.

[ID: Kirk and Sulu standing on a balcony in stiff, awkward poses, lit from above by a strange greenish light.]

The landing party naturally rushes forward. McCoy does a scan of the petrified goldshirts and says, “There’s no reading. They’re like waxworks figures.” That’s a disturbing thing to find out, but before they can contemplate it very much, the door suddenly slams shut all on its own. Oh great. Now we have to worry about ghosts too. As if this day wasn’t stressful enough already.

Just as suddenly, there’s the sound of music. They all turn to see a man playing the harpsichord on the other end of the room, a man who definitely wasn’t there before. He’s, uh...interesting.

[ID: A white man with brown hair and thick sideburns, wearing tall boots, green trousers, a fancy blue coat with gold leaf embroidery, and a white cravat, sitting at a harpsichord and looking over his shoulder at the camera.]

“I must say they make a perfectly exquisite display pair,” the man says, in pretty much exactly the kind of voice you’d expect from a guy who looks like that, “but I suppose you want them back now.”

He waves his hand and the strange green light shining over Kirk and Sulu goes out, and the two of them seem to wake up. Sulu starts moving at once, but Kirk just kind of stays in position for a moment with only his eyes moving around in confusion before he straightens up.

“Welcome to an island of peace on my stormy little planet of Gothos,” the guy at the harpsichord says, but everyone ignores him for the moment. Kirk and Sulu climb over the railing to join the landing party, and Kirk tells them to fill him in on just what the frell is going on around here. McCoy tells him that the two of them disappeared and they’ve been looking for them for four hours—which, as far as ways the sentence, “You disappeared and we’ve been looking for you for--” could end, is pretty good, all things considered; better than, say, “You disappeared and we’ve been looking for you for ten years.”

“You must excuse my whimsical way of fetching you here,” Ruffles over there continues, “but when I saw you passing by I simply could not resist.”

Kirk, still looking real dubious and a bit like he has a headache, goes over to introduce himself, which really sends Ruffles into full-on “OH HO HO HOW WONDERFUL SMASHING BRAVO” mode. When Kirk asks him who he is, he says that he’s “General Trelane, retired, at your service,” and tells them to make themselves at home and all that before going back to the harpsichord.

The landing party does a huddle, and DeSalle tells Kirk about how they’re out of contact with the ship, leaving them pretty much trapped here. Trelane interrupts to say that he’s delighted to have visitors from “the very planet that I’ve made my hobby.” Oh boy. It is never a good sign when someone tells you they’ve made the place where you came from their hobby.

Trelane says he’s surprised, though, because he didn’t think they were capable of such voyages. Jaeger quietly points out to Kirk that this place is about nine hundred lightyears away from Earth, and it all looks about nine hundred years out of date, indicating that maybe Trelane’s been looking in on the ol’ home planet without realizing his information is on a bit of a delay.

That really bums Trelane out because he so wanted to make them all feel at home, but he bounces back pretty quickly. When Kirk addresses him as General, he says, no, call me Squire-- “yes, I rather fancy that.” Okay, Squire, why are we imprisoned here? Trelane insists that they’re not prisoners, they’re guests! And he wants to hear all about “your campaigns, your battles, your missions of conquest.” Kirk says that their missions aren’t for conquest, they’re peaceful—well, y’know, most of the time. Romulans notwithstanding. Now, can we please go back to our ship?

But Trelane won’t hear of it. He insists that they stay and have a “repast” with him while they tell him all about their feelings on war and killing and all that jazz. “Did you know,” he asks them, “that you’re one of the few predator species that preys even on itself?”

Oh lord, not this “humans are the only species that kill their own kind!!” nonsense. Predators prey on each other ALL THE DAMN TIME. You think that, say, a lion, in direct competition with other lions for food, territory, and mates, is going to go “well I could have all of that lion’s stuff if I killed him, but of course I would never sink to such lows”? Animals will kill each other, they’ll kill each other’s children, hell, chimpanzees will wage full on war against other chimpanzees. Humans are just the only ones that feel bad about the whole thing. I suppose Trelane could mean humans are one of the only sapient species that does it, except that doesn’t track either—the vast majority of aliens we see in Star Trek seem to be fine with it. Even Vulcans got a whole lot of killing each other in before they settled down.

Kirk reacts to this statement with more or less the same expression that I did.

[ID: Kirk with a distinctly unimpressed look on his face.]

DeSalle has his hand on his phaser, but Kirk tells him to hold off for the moment, and to put it on stun rather than kill. Trelane overhears DeSalle’s name and gleefully asks him if he’s French. DeSalle admits he has some French ancestry, and Trelane promptly rattles off a whole bunch more French, then tells DeSalle that he “admires your Napoleon very much.” DeSalle looks appropriately perplexed about all this.

Kirk introduces the rest of the crew. Trelane gives Sulu an extremely overwrought bow, prompting Sulu to mutter, “Is he for real?”. Then he turns his attentions on Jaeger and starts shouting in German and goose-stepping in a circle. Oof. Jaeger stiffly tells him that he’s a scientist, not a military man, so cut that shit out, but Trelane just says “we’re all military men under the skin.”

He then turns to admire himself in the giant mirror hanging on the wall. Unfortunately said mirror also shows him DeSalle sneaking up on him with a phaser. DeSalle, I’m going to guess that stealth isn’t your strong suit, so here’s a beginner’s tip: don’t try to sneak up on people while they’re standing in front of large reflective surfaces. Trelane promptly turns around and freezes DeSalle in place with a gesture. He doesn’t seem upset about the attempted sneak attack, though, instead taking the phaser from DeSalle before unfreezing him and then gushing over the phaser like a kid with a brand new Nerf gun. It doesn’t take him long to figure out which setting won’t kill and which one will, and he promptly starts shooting it all over the place, destroying Salty—who just can’t catch a break—and another taxidermied monster, while raving about how this awesome gun could kill millions!

At that point Kirk grabs the phaser away from him and says, so what, are we going to be your next targets, is that it? Trelane says that’s just typical of humans, they don’t understand something so they fear it. Really? Really? You were literally just firing a lethal weapon in their direction while talking about how great it would be to kill a lot of people with it. At that point I think we’re in territory where fear is pretty reasonable.

Trelane goes on to “anticipate [Kirk’s] next question,” which he presumes is going to be about how he’s doing all this stuff. He explains that “we—meaning I and others--” yes, thank you, that’s what ‘we’ usually means—he and others have perfected a system by which matter can be transferred to energy and back again. Kirk asks if it’s like their transporter and Trelane sneers that the transporter is just a crude version of their much better and way cooler technology, because unlike the transporter their tech can not only move energy around but change its shape.

But Trelane’s tired of answering all these questions now; he wants his guests to relax and enjoy themselves. Kirk is immediately like “well, I would really enjoy leaving, so bye” and starts herding everyone out of there. This really pisses off Trelane, and, deciding that Kirk needs “another demonstration of my authority,” he vanishes Kirk with a sweep of his hand. Kirk suddenly finds himself somewhere barren and dark, filled with clouds of vapor that have him choking and coughing in seconds. Then, just as suddenly, he’s back in the room. Trelane tells him that that was a sample of what the atmosphere on this planet is like “outside my kindly influence” so he and the rest of them better behave from now on unless they want another taste of that.

After the break, Spock gives another captain’s log for Kirk—specifically a captain’s log this time, and not a ship’s log. I don’t know what the difference is. Maybe Spock just got more ambitious in the interim. Anyway, they’ve orbited the planet fourteen times now and still haven’t found or heard from the missing crew. They also still don’t have communications, but they have gotten their sensors working again by diverting power to them. Oh, huh, that actually worked this time.

Said sensors have located this one tiny little Earth-like spot down there in the midst of all the kill-you-in-minutes stuff. Scotty is, appropriately, extremely confused by how the heck that spot is there, but Spock is not, at the moment, terribly concerned about that; however the spot got there, it’s evidently there now, so we’re gonna work with that. He tells Scotty to fine-tune the sensors to detect any lifeforms that might be down in the oasis and beam them up. Scotty points out that they have no guarantee that any lifeforms down there will be the crew, but Spock counter-points out that if the crew are on the planet, that’s the only possible place they could still be while also still being alive, so they can either see if this works or continue doing nothing.

Meanwhile, Trelane is showing off all his battle flags and going on about how cool armies are while the landing party stands around looking distinctly annoyed. They might have escaped dying in a toxic hellscape, but listening to this guy talk is almost as bad.

Eventually he goes back to the harpsichord, leaving them free to confer. Sulu wonders to Kirk just who exactly Trelane is, anyway. McCoy says the question is more what he is—he did a scan of Trelane and got nothing. No signs of life, no signs of recently deceased life, no signs that anything was there at all. Jaeger also points out that the fire in the fireplace looks like it’s burning but isn’t giving off any heat. Oh my god, he has electric fireplace capability! We’re really in trouble now, lads!

The combination of the faulty fire and the fact that Trelane’s historical knowledge is almost a millennium out of date leads Kirk to the conclusion that Trelane is not omniscient. He’s clearly capable of making mistakes. And if he can make mistakes he has vulnerabilities, and if he has vulnerabilities we can exploit them, and if we can exploit them maybe we can defeat him. It’s a slim chance, but that particular line of logic has served Kirk pretty well in the past.

Trelane interrupts them to say oooh, are they making their little plans? How wonderful! Kirk tries to say that actually they really aren’t, but Trelane waves him aside, saying that he’s not mad at them—on the contrary, he loves this whole martial deception and strategy thing, it’s one of the many things he just admires so much about their species. Welllll, in that case, Kirk says, you must admire our sense of duty, too, right? Our sense of duty that’s making us really need to return to our ship to actually do our jobs?

Nice try, but it doesn’t work—Trelane’s having far too much fun to let them leave now. Kirk asks how long they’re going to have to stay, then, and Trelane says, “Until this is over.” Asked “until WHAT is over” he just brushes the whole thing aside: too many questions, enjoy the moment, etc, etc. Kirk persists that there are four hundred men and women up there on the Enterprise who need their captain and crewmates back. Unfortunately, Trelane fixates on precisely the wrong part of that sentence and immediately flips out because WOMEN?? DID YOU SAY WOMEN??

Oh dear. Yeah. Trelane is absolutely amazed to find out that there are members of the, ahem, fairer sex in the crew, and starts going on about how, “Oh, how charming. And they must be very beautiful. And I shall be so very gallant to them.” Great. He’s one of those guys. What a surprise.

He’s all ready to bring down all the female crewmen here and now, but Kirk has now really had enough and tells him that this game is over. Trelane is all set to throw a big temper tantrum, but McCoy’s communicator suddenly beeps, and he says he’s receiving a transporter signal. I didn’t know that was a thing that the communicators did, but apparently it is.

Well, looks like the party’s over, thanks, as Kirk says, to Mr. Spock. Trelane pitches an absolute fit about how he hasn’t dismissed them yet and he won’t stand for this, but the group is beamed up all the same. Spock comes into the transporter room to meet them, and if he’s at all relieved to see Kirk back after having been mysteriously gone for several hours on a planet with little hope of survival, he, of course, doesn’t show it. Kirk doesn’t offer much explanation, either, sending everyone back to their jobs as soon as they step off the platform, then asking Spock how they were able to pick up the landing party on sensors through all the radiation. Spock says, well, they didn’t—they just scooped up everyone in the vicinity. Which means, as McCoy points out, that Trelane really isn’t any kind of life form as they know it, since he didn’t get beamed up as well.

No time to stand around and think about that one, though—Kirk orders them to hit the gas and get away from this obnoxious planet as quickly as possible. Everyone returns to the bridge, where some random redshirt has the conn (why must Scotty be so often denied his command?). As Kirk takes over, McCoy goes to hang out by Uhura’s station, and she asks him what the heck was going on there. McCoy gets about as far as saying, “Well, there was a--” before giving up entirely, and really, who could blame him.

They’re all set to skedaddle when who should suddenly appear on the bridge but Trelane himself, startling everyone. Well, mostly everyone. Kirk just sees him and immediately looks extremely tired.

Trelane looks around the bridge and asks where the weapons are—don’t they display their weapons? Well, you know, there’s not a lot of empty wall space on the bridge, so what are you gonna do. Anyway, he tells Kirk not to worry, he’s only a bit upset with him. The person he’s really upset with is this Spock fellow who took away his playmates. Trelane wants to know just which one of these people is Spock, and Spock obligingly gives himself up. Sadly, this does not prompt a Spartacus-like scene where everyone else on the bridge starts yelling, “No, I’M Spock!”

This revelation is surprising to Trelane, who scoffs that, “Surely he’s not an officer, he’s not quite human.” Wow. Rude. Spock tells him that indeed he has a Vulcan dad, and Trelane asks if Vulcans are a predatory species. “Not generally,” Spock tells him, “but there have been exceptions,” with an expression that indicates that he might be willing to make one of those exceptions right about now.

Trelane expects Kirk to have Spock appropriately punished, and Kirk says that on the contrary, he commends Spock for his actions. I might have gone with, “Oh, yeah, sure, I’ll punish him. We have to go far away to do that, though...so we can...put him in time out...” but that works too. He then tells Trelane to get off his damn bridge already so they can leave, but Trelane won’t hear of it. They’re all going to come back with him because he has “an enchanting sojourn” planned.

Just like that, they’re all back at Trelane’s place—all of the original landing party plus Spock, Uhura, and a yeoman who was on the bridge. There’s now a large dining table in the middle of the room, which Sulu and DeSalle find themselves seated at. Despite nothing else seeming to have changed, Trelane boasts that “the décor of my drawing room is much more appropriate and tasteful, don’t you think?”

“No,” Sulu cheerfully tells him, because Sulu does not have a single fuck to give this episode.

DeSalle promptly jumps up to have a go at Trelane, which only results in him getting frozen again while Trelane coos over the impressive savagery of humans and all that. Kirk tells him to let DeSalle go, which he does, leaving DeSalle to be quickly grabbed and led away by the much more collected Sulu, admonishing him not to try that shit again.

Well, never mind that display of bad manners, Trelane says—let’s eat! He’s quite anxious for them all to sit down and sample the victuals. The men glance at Kirk and he gives them a nod, so they sit down. No, you fools, don’t eat the food! If a mysterious and powerful entity living in a place that shouldn’t exist offers you food, do not eat the food. That’s how you get trapped in the Otherworld forever!

But Trelane isn’t paying much attention to his dinner guests anymore, because he’s suddenly remembered that there are ladies here and insists on being properly introduced to them. Kirk begrudgingly introduces him first to Uhura, whom Trelane starts fervently admiring in terms that...well, let’s just say it starts with “a Nubian prize” and only gets worse from there. Then he starts in on the yeoman, one Teresa Ross, with “is this the face that launched a thousand ships” etc, etc, and tries to go for a kiss, but Kirk wearily grabs him by the arm and pulls him back.

He then formally introduces Trelane to Spock, whom Trelane is rather less enthused about. He thinks that Spock’s tone is “challenging” (it’s really not any different from Spock’s normal tone) and asks if Spock is in fact challenging him. Well, since you asked, Spock says, “I object to you. I object to intellect without discipline. I object to power without constructive purpose.” Kirk listens to this little speech with an expression I can only describe as “smitten.”

[ID: Kirk listening and smiling as Spock, offscreen, says, “I object to power without constructive purpose.”]

Trelane comments that Spock does have “one saving grace after all. You’re ill-mannered. The human half of you, no doubt.” Gee, thanks.

He then goes back to bothering the women, asking—well, ‘asking’--Ross to dance with him while Uhura plays them some music. Uhura protests that she doesn’t know how to play a harpsichord, but Trelane says that of course she does, makes a sound effect happen, and suddenly Uhura starts playing with a surprised look on her face. Personally I would freak right the fuck out if someone just up and inserted an entire skill into my head, but she seems pretty chill with it. The poor yeoman, who most surely did not expect her day to wind up going this way when she woke up that morning, gets swept into a dance with Trelane.

I’m not quite sure how to take Trelane’s attitudes here. His information about humans is very dated, so it makes sense that his outlook towards women and black people (and Japanese people and German people, for that matter) would be likewise dated. It’s not a thing that the episode really calls out, though; at most there’s some exasperated eyerolls and polite befuddlement. Now, I don’t mean to come over all “if a work of fiction doesn’t explicitly and firmly condemn bad behavior that means it supports it!!” but it’s a little trickier when you’re dealing with a work that doesn’t necessarily have a great track record with those things to begin with. When you’ve got a show that’s unironically said some rather discriminatory stuff, it makes it more difficult to tell where the line is between that and a character who’s intentionally been written to be offensive in a way that we’re not supposed to approve of. I mean, some of Trelane’s behavior is quite obviously supposed to be outdated, especially what he says about Uhura; it might be more uncomfortable today but I’m sure it was always intended to be uncomfortable to some degree. But a few of the things he says aren’t real dissimilar from things that get said quite seriously throughout the show, so it’s, y’know, kinda weird.

While Trelane is distracted, McCoy and Sulu get up from the table to come talk to Kirk. Sulu wants to know how long they’re gonna be putting up with all this, and Kirk says they’ll have to put up with it until they can think their way out. In the meantime, they’ll just have to go along with Trelane’s hospitality—such as it is. Speaking of that hospitality, McCoy’s noticed a distinct flaw in it: all of Trelane’s dinner, as nice as it looks, is completely and utterly tasteless.

[ID: McCoy, Spock, Kirk and Sulu gathered in front of the large, ornate fireplace. McCoy, holding a glass of brandy, is saying, “Well, you should taste this food.”]

“And this brandy just tastes like apple juice! What’s up with that.”

Spock comments that actually, this makes sense; the flavorless food and drink indicates that Trelane “knows all of the Earth forms but none of the substance.” In other words, he may have observed what their food looks like, but has no idea at all what it should taste like. Kirk points out that this means Trelane isn’t infallible. I thought we already had that conversation, but okay. He also thinks that Trelane must have some kind of device or machine that’s helping him do all this.

Meanwhile, Trelane and Ross are still dancing, which Ross, understandably, does not look super happy about. He stops and says that her dress “hardly matches this charming scene,” and magics her into a fancy new pink one. She doesn’t look super happy about that, either, and really, who would be? The idea of someone being able to just instantly change you into whatever clothes they want you to be wearing is disturbing enough on its own even without all the other stuff Trelane seems able to do.

Trelane then pauses to preen in the big mirror on the wall, and Kirk notes that Trelane seems to have a thing about that mirror and never gets very far away from it. He figures this is just because of Trelane’s enormous ego, but Spock thinks there may be something more to it. Is there something special about that mirror, maybe? The two of them talk about what kind of machine Trelane could have that could do all this. Spock says it would have to be extremely sophisticated. “Like a computer,” Kirk says, “only much more.” ...Sure.

Kirk then asks if the device that’s keeping this whole area in livable conditions could be inside the house. Spock doesn’t think so because anything that could do that would surely be too big to fit in there. Kirk’s glad that Spock agrees on that one because it leaves him free to act. “If I’m not mistaken,” he says, “I think I can turn his lights off at the source.”

He then turns and starts loudly dissing Trelane, talking about how his actions are “those of an immature, unbalanced mind.” Trelane, hearing this, stops dancing and starts getting upset, but Kirk says he’s only just getting started. He wants Trelane to leave his crew alone, then pulls Ross away from Trelane and says that she’s not to dance with him or accept his gifts because Kirk doesn’t like it. Trelane is excited about this apparent display of jealousy, which, like ‘savagery’ and ‘killing things’ he seems to regard as an admirable trait. When Kirk says that he’s “had enough of [Trelane’s] insulting attentions to [Ross]” Trelane responds, “Of course you have. After all, that’s the root of the matter, isn’t it? You fight for the attention, the admiration, the possession of women!” Oh geez.

If Trelane wants a fight, Kirk says, then he can have it, and then he smacks Trelane across the face with Ross’s glove. Trelane gleefully asks if Kirk is challenging him to a duel. “If you have the courage,” Kirk tells him.

Oh boy, a duel? An actual duel? Trelane, practically beside himself with excitement, runs over and grabs a box from the mantelpiece. Inside it are a couple of pistols. “A matched set,” he says, “just like the pair that slew your Alexander Hamilton.” (Insert your own Hamilton joke here.) He then informs Kirk that “Captain...I never miss.” Kirk looks rather rattled, as if he wasn’t expecting to have to fight with guns, geez, how primitive, although I really don’t know what he would have thought they were going to duel with.

(Given that Hamilton died in 1804, and that dueling was falling out of favor in England by the 1840s and in America by the 1850, where it pretty much died off (even in the South, where it was way more popular) after the Civil War, we can estimate that the time period Trelane’s been looking at is roughly the first half of the nineteenth century. (Maybe someone with better historical knowledge than me could narrow it down more—or maybe not, I kind of doubt they were meticulously accurate with their period references here.) The earlier comments about this being nine hundred years out of date would therefore place the show in the twenty-seventh century, four centuries later than what they would eventually settle on. The best Watsonian explanation I can come up with for this is that they overestimated just how much of a delay Trelane’s information was on, and that Jaeger, being a geophysicist and not a historian, didn’t realize that his whole get-up was five hundred years out of date instead of nine hundred. A bit weak, but it’s better than “we forgot what century we were in,” which is the only other thing I can think of.)

After the break, Kirk narrates a “delayed log” (presumably meaning he made it after all this was over, although it’s still in the present tense so who knows) about how they’re all prisoners of Trelane and are weaponless and powerless--’cept for this gun—and the only way out is to play his games. Kirk has chosen this game, and now everything depends upon him and this ancient dueling pistol. Man, I bet Sulu’s feeling jealous right now.

They get into position and Trelane, still all giddy about getting to fight a real human duel, says that as the one challenged, he gets the first shot. Kirk is like, “...no? You don’t? That’s not how this works?” Not that they’re really following any dueling rules at the moment, but that one’s going a bit too far. This is like when my brother used to insist on setting up both sides whenever we played Battleship together. Trelane immediately starts throwing a fit and says that it’s his game and his rules, and if Kirk doesn’t like it, he could be persuaded...as he points the pistol at Spock. Okay, okay, Kirk says, you go first, geez.

So Kirk stands there, waiting, as Trelane prepares to fire. There’s a long, tense pause...dramatic music...and then Trelane fires harmlessly into the air (well, harmlessly in this instance. Please don’t fire guns straight into the air above you in real life) a move known in dueling as deloping. It can be done as an attempt to avoid actually killing anyone should you get dragged into a duel you don’t want to be in, but it can also be taken as an insult, implying that your opponent isn’t even worth shooting. I couldn’t find any examples of it being done by godlike beings toying with their victims, though, so I don’t know what the regulations on that one are.

[ID: Kirk, standing the foreground with his back to the camera, facing off against a grinning Trelane, who has just fired his gun into the air with a puff of smoke.]

“YOU’RE NOT WORTH THE POWDER!”

Trelane grins and says his fate is now in Kirk’s hands, and hold his arms out all ready to be shot. Well, that looks far too easy. Kirk evidently thinks so as well, because instead of shooting Trelane, he shoots the mirror. Unusually for mirrors, it promptly explodes. Not sure how that’s covered under the whole “break a mirror and get seven years of bad luck” rule.

The lights in the house start flickering on and off—yes, that includes the candles and fireplace—while electricity sparks from the broken mirror, which sure enough, appears to have some kind of machine behind it.

[ID: The remains of a large mirror in a gilded frame, now completely shattered, with most of the glass gone and complex machinery visible underneath.]

As Trelane starts yelling about how Kirk’s ruined everything, DeSalle says the subspace interference is clearing, and Kirk tells him to try contacting the ship. Trelane says that they’d better go back to the ship and prepare for their fates because they’ve earned his wrath and they’re “all dead men, you especially, captain.” Then he disappears.

Well, that’s a bit odd, but never mind that right now—let’s get out of here. Again. Hopefully it’ll stick this time. They’re all beamed up, and everyone heads to the bridge, where Kirk tells Sulu to GTFO. Then he takes a moment to look over a PADD someone’s handed him, because a captain’s life is never free of paperwork, even while fleeing from godlike beings throwing a temper tantrum.

Uhura asks if she should make a full report on all this to Spacefleet Command (goddammit, Gene, could you just pick a name for Starfleet and stick with it) but Kirk says not yet. He wants to wait until they’re out of range before sending out any kind of signal that could potentially be picked up by Trelane. Spock asks if they even know what Trelane’s range is, and Kirk admits they don’t, but he’s going to make an educated guess that it’s about where they first came into this solar system. Are they in a solar system? I thought they just found this one planet out in the middle of nowhere.

Yeoman Ross, still in the dress Trelane magicked her into, takes the PADD from Kirk and asks if she can go change. He smiles and says, “Yes, I think you might.” He doesn’t say, “Sorry I had to yell some nineteenth century views about women at you to provoke a creepy dude into dueling with me,” but there doesn’t seem to be any residual awkwardness between them, so I guess she’s fine with it.

They’re about to go into warp, when suddenly there’s a planet in front of them—so suddenly, Sulu only just barely avoids crashing into it. Sure enough, it’s that damn Gothos again. All their instruments show they’re on course, but as soon as Sulu tries to leave, it shows up in front of them again. And again, with them barely avoiding a crash each time. Even after pulling away from it the last time, Sulu says they’re still accelerating...or maybe the planet is still accelerating towards them (what, do you not have a speedometer on the helm anywhere?). It seems that Trelane isn’t about to let them escape that easily.

Kirk’s had enough of this shit. He tells Sulu to decelerate into orbit, and orders the transporter room prepared—he’s going to go down and talk to Trelane until he lets the Enterprise go. If they haven’t heard from him in an hour, he tells Spock, they’re to leave as quickly as they can. Which, I mean, they can’t leave at all right now, so who knows whether that order will be any use. McCoy, predictably, objects to this plan, and Kirk, predictably, ignores him.

So Kirk leaves the bridge, but before he can even make it to the transporter, he suddenly finds himself in a dark courtroom where Trelane sits high above him, judge’s wig and everything. He tells Kirk, “The prisoner may approach the bench. Any demonstrations shall weigh against you with the court, and this time my instrumentality is unbreakable.” Then the shadow of a noose appears behind Kirk. Well. That got dark.

Trelane then reads out a list of charges: “The high crime of treason against a superior authority, conspiracy and the attempt to foment insurrection.” Kinda surprised he didn’t add “and being a big mean jerkface” on there. He asks Kirk how he pleads, and Kirk says he’s not here to plead anything; he’s here to get his ship back. Trelane only bangs his gavel angrily at this, so Kirk tells him to take all his anger out on him, since he was the one who lead the others and destroyed the machine. He’ll admit to the charges, fine, anything, if Trelane will just let the Enterprise go.

When Trelane still doesn’t seem swayed by this, Kirk marches right up to the bench and tells him that they’re living beings, not Trelane’s playthings. At that point Trelane really flips out and yells that this trial is over, Kirk is guilty on all counts, and “in accordance with your own laws” he’s going to hang from the neck until dead. Which is obviously anachronistic nonsense. You only get the death penalty for going to Talos 4 these days.

After the break, Spock gives a captain’s log saying the hour is almost up and there’s still no word from Kirk, so as per his instructions they’ll have to leave soon. Wait, the hour is almost up? Like five minutes have passed since he went down there. Was there like fifty-five minutes of Trelane shouting that we skipped? I mean, not that I would complain about skipping that.

Down in the courtroom, Trelane throws off his wig and robe and cheerfully says that wow, he experienced actual rage—which he didn’t even think was possible! This whole experiment has been a success! Oh, are you still angry, Kirk? What’s that about?

If Kirk had any hope that this sudden shift in mood might prompt Trelane to call off the hanging, no such luck—he’s fully intending to carry it out, and asks Kirk if he has any last requests.

[ID: Kirk standing in a dark room with his hands on a wooden railing in front of him, glancing back at the shadow of a noose on the wall behind him.]

“Uh...I commend my soul to any god that can find it.”

Trelane wants Kirk to get on with it and put his head in the noose, to which Kirk is naturally like, “I’m not putting my head through that thing get out of here.” But Trelane informs him that he has no choice, and the noose starts moving over to him of its own accord, while Trelane laments that this is all so easy it’s tiresome.

Before things can segue into a Punch and Judy sketch, Kirk says that that’s Trelane’s trouble: he doesn’t think and he misses opportunities, like the experience of being angry right now, which he could never have accomplished without Kirk because he’s a bumbling, inept fool. Wow, don’t hold back, Kirk. Tell us how you really feel.

Kirk says that Trelane could just hang him, if he wants to be boring like that, but there’s no sport in it. There’s an opportunity here for a new experience: “the terror of murder, the suspense, the fun.” This intrigues Trelane, and he asks what alternative Kirk has in mind. “A personal conflict between us,” Kirk says. “Not like the duel before, but the real thing. The stakes? A human life, mine.”

This gets Trelane really pumped, and he starts waving a sword around excitedly. Kirk tells him that that’s the idea, but it’s still not enough sport to just kill him with a sword. So Trelane thinks for a moment and then decides on “a hunt, a royal hunt, predator against predator.” Kirk will go hide in the forest outside, and Trelane will hunt him down. Lovely.

Now he’s talking, Kirk says—but if Trelane is going to make it worth Kirk’s while, he’ll have to up the stakes. If Trelane agrees to free the Enterprise, Kirk will give him a contest he’ll remember. Trelane huffs about how Kirk just can’t shut up about that dang ship of his, but he agrees. Then he magics Kirk outside and tells him to go hide.

Kirk wants to notify the Enterprise before the game starts, and Trelane’s disembodied voice tells him, “At your convenience.” So Kirk pulls out his communicator, but only gets static. He tries anyway, telling them to get the ship out of there while he buys them some time, but he’s barely even finished speaking when Trelane appears and starts attacking him with the sword. Man, that’s not convenient at all.

The two of them tussle a bit, and then Kirk runs off into the woods. He gets some headway, but stops to try to contact the ship again, and Trelane catches up to him. So off Kirk runs, with Trelane running after him and telling him he’s got to try harder because this is too easy.

Kirk runs through a clearing, and a moment later Trelane runs through it after him. As he stops to look for Kirk, Kirk suddenly comes in swinging on a nearby branch and kicks Trelane hard in the chest, causing him to go flying and drop his sword. Kirk grabs the sword and swings it at Trelane—but Trelane vanishes, leaving the sword to pass harmlessly through thin air. Then he reappears, crowing, “Touche, Captain, touche! You scored first! But after all, I never played this game before!”

It’s not looking like Kirk has much of a chance if Trelane’s gonna cheat like that, but he’s not giving up yet. He throws the sword away, only for Trelane to magic it back into his hand and start attacking Kirk with it. They circle around a nearby tree, Kirk fending off the sword with a branch, but eventually the branch breaks against the sword and Kirk has to run.

He makes it back to the house and tries to get in through the front door, but it won’t open, so in desperation all he can do is try to call the ship again. Trelane comes running up and Kirk turns to try to escape, but iron fences appear first on one side, then the next, leaving him cornered. He reminds Trelane that he promised to let the Enterprise go, but Trelane says that no, this game is so fun he’s gotta bring everyone else back to come play it too. Four hundred people to chase through the woods one by one. How many of them would die before he finally got bored?

Trelane orders Kirk to kneel, but Kirk tells him he still hasn’t won, and refuses to back down despite Trelane’s repeated demands. After all, he’s got nothing to lose now, and anyway he’s far too tired and pissed off now to be afraid. So he grabs Trelane’s sword and breaks it over his knee--geez, cheap sword—throws it away, and then smacks Trelane across the face a couple of times for good measure. Trelane rages that Kirk cheated and didn’t play the game right, and Trelane’s gonna show him—when suddenly a female voice firmly calls his name.

Two spots of glowy green mist have appeared above the ground nearby. Trelane runs over to them and protests that they said he could have this planet for his very own. Another voice, this one male, tells him that all this has gone far enough. “But you always stop me when I’m having fun!” Trelane whines, but the orbs tell him that he’s been disobedient and cruel and it’s time to come in now.

Trelane says that he doesn’t wanna come in, and he’s not gonna, cause he’s a general and he doesn’t have to listen to them. Dad Orb tells him that’s enough. Trelane insists he hasn’t done anything wrong and besides, he hasn’t studied finishing his predators yet. But this isn’t hardly studying anything, the orbs tell him; if he can’t take proper care of his pets he can’t have them at all. Anyway, he can’t go around treating them this way because “they’re beings, they have spirit, they’re superior.” He’ll understand when he grows up. Trelane pouts that he never gets to have any fun, and Dad Orb tells him to cut that out or he’ll have his planet-making privileges revoked.

“But I was winning,” Trelane protests, “I would’ve won, I would’ve...” He repeats it petulantly over and over as he slowly fades away.

The orbs then address Kirk, who has been watching all this with a sort of “you know what, this might as well happen” expression. They apologize and say it’s their fault for indulging their child too much, and they would have stopped this all much earlier if they’d realized how vulnerable the humans were. They’ll maintain the life-supporting conditions on the planet while he gets back to the ship, and then with another apology, they vanish.

Kirk stands there for a moment looking extremely tired before trying to call the ship. This time Spock finally answers, and Kirk tells him they’re free to go so beam him up already and let’s leave this dumb planet behind.

This does leave open the question of what that whole business with the machine was about. For all the focus there was on it, and Trelane’s angry reaction to Kirk destroying it, he doesn’t really show any reduction in his abilities after it’s taken out, and Trelane’s parents didn’t seem to be using any such thing when they showed up. So what did Trelane need it for, really? How many of his powers came from the machine as opposed to being inherent to his kind, whatever that is? Whatever the answer, we’re never gonna find out.

Some time later, the Enterprise is finally approaching Colony Beta Six, and as Kirk sits on the bridge Spock comes up to him and says he’s wondering how they’re going to classify Trelane for the record. “Pure mentality? Force of intellect? Embodied energy? Super being?” Are those preexisting classifications? If so, I’m really curious what the exact definition of “super being” is.

Kirk suggests ‘God of War’ which, as Spock points out, is not very helpful. “Then a small boy,” Kirk says, “and a very naughty one at that.” Spock notes that that’s going to make for a strange entry (though really, it should hardly stand out among all their other entries), and Kirk says that, well, he was a strange small boy. But then, he figures, he was probably just doing his equivalent of typical small boy pranks just like Spock might have done as a kid—dipping little girls’ curls in inkwells and all that. Although given the attitude Trelane had towards his ‘pets,’ he seems more like the kind of kid that would pull wings off flies or fry ants.

Spock looks half scandalized and half confused, understandably so since dipping little girls’ curls in inkwells as a prank was anachronistic enough in the 1960s, let alone in the 2300s. Or the 2700s. Whatever century we’re in. Kirk apologizes and says that he should have known better, and Spock gives him an “uh, yeah” eyebrow, and the episode ends.

As you might well have noticed, this plot of this episode bears a striking resemblance to that of Charlie X: the crew are at the mercy of a young person with incredible powers and no real understanding of life outside their own, who they ultimately only escape from because a guardian with even greater powers comes to collect them. In both cases the protagonists, for all their ingenuity and bravery, wind up unable to really do anything except stall for time. Trelane’s fading cry of “I would’ve won, I would’ve...” even echoes Charlie’s last cry of wanting to “stay...stay...stay...”

The difference, of course, is all in the tone; Charlie X is more or less a horror story, while The Squire of Gothos is much more comedic. Trelane presumably had the capability to do things just as horrific as Charlie did, but even at his most threatening his antics are obnoxious rather than terrifying, and no one takes him seriously, even when literally being held at swordpoint by him. The idea of a race of beings so powerful that even their children could treat us as little more than interesting toys could very easily be played as a full-on cosmic horror story, but by invoking highly recognizable human behaviors so closely—Trelane whining that he never gets to do anything fun, and being sternly told to stop playing and come inside, etc—it becomes funny and whimsical rather than threatening. It’s an interesting example, I think, of how much just changing the tone can alter a story.

Trek Trope Tally: We’ve got another case of Godlike Beings, with Trelane and his mysterious parents. Next time, Kirk’s gonna make like Steve Irwin and wrestle a giant reptile in Arena.

#star trek #star trek TOS #star trek season one #1.17 The Squire of Gothos

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sulevinblade · 5 years

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(Talesfromthefade) things you said when you were drunk, for the DWC?

OH MY GOD this was a little idea that got away from me in a big big way but I’m still pretty happy with it. For this and for “cafune - the act of running your fingers through the hair of someone you love,” from @contreparry! For @dadrunkwriting!!

Alistair/Leohta Aeducan, T for language, dumb suggestive jokes, and alcohol use, 4k+ words (awaaaay from me, I wish I had time to edit it but uh I spent the entire time writing it instead).

On the cusp of the party’s visit to Orzammar, Alistair learns what kind of drunk Leohta can be, and shares a little lesson of his own. Light angst, serious fluff.

He finds her standing on the rocky beach, well away from the dim glow provided by the Spoiled Princess’s small windows. It takes a moment for Alistair’s eyes to adjust to the complete dark–the night watch Templar doused all the torches at the dock, as clear an indication as anything that no one else would cross Lake Calenhad tonight–but even if he’d had to follow her blind he could’ve found her by the sound.

Bloop.

Normally finding Leohta by sound means the clank or grind of armour, the grunts or barks of Leon, or even her rare laughter at something Zevran said (it was always Zevran making her laugh), but tonight the sound is completely unfamiliar. It’s still enough to guide him, though.

Bloop.

Last he’d seen her, she was swapping some of the coin they’d made selling things to the Templar quartermaster for three large bottles of deep pink liquid. It seemed a bit of a racket to Alistair, that they should collect the mages’ items as they cleared the Tower only to sell them to the Templars who would then in turn sell them back to the Mages, but surely if that wasn’t how the economy of the Circle usually worked, Wynne would’ve said something. That was Alistair’s hope, anyway, as he’d watched Leohta count the coins before they left, then again at the tavern’s bar. She’d tossed the bag back to him before collecting the bottles and heading outside, and he in turn had left it with Zevran.

Bloop.

“You have known our illustrious leader the longest among any of us. Has this always been a habit of hers?” Alistair squinted across the table, trying to determine Zevran’s game, but succeeded only in giving up his own. “You think I see this as a weakness I can exploit, but I would think even you would see that if I were going to do so, I would have done it by now and certainly would not draw attention to my plans by involving you.” His eyes only narrowed further–how does Zevran make talking down to him still seem so seductive?–but Alistair did sit back in his chair.

“I haven’t known her all that long, really, but I don’t think so. Why d'you ask?”

“My Antiva makes the finest wines in Thedas, so it is not uncommon to see those there who overindulge, but there are many types. Leohta, she is young and exploring her limits, yes, but she is also trying to drown things she does not want to feel. Her limits are low and the things she seeks to kill are very large. It is a dangerous combination.”

Alistair glanced again toward the door. Of course she hadn’t come back inside, that’d be too much to ask for, but what was he supposed to do?

“If it is too much for you, I will go after her, but she should not be alone.” Both of their chairs scraped back at the same time but Alistair was the first to stand, something that for some reason brought a sad smile to Zevran’s face. Alistair could only look at it for a moment before looking away. "I know you do not think much of me, Alistair, and while that is entirely your loss, I do know that one thing we have in common is how much we care for her. Go see to her, my friend, before her sorrows are not all she drowns. It is probably for the best; I am not much of a swimmer myself.“

Bloop.

So now here he is, approaching carefully, pretending to be taking in the constellations while Leohta hurls rocks at the water like she’s trying to knock the waves down before they can reach the shore. The night is perfectly clear; Kinloch Hold is merely a dark space in the sky where the stars are missing, but everything else is black sky and white twinkles. He clears his throat in case she somehow hasn’t noticed since he doesn’t fancy getting one of those stones thrown at him, but she only pauses for a moment before bending to search the area around her feet for another suitable candidate. One bottle is already empty, stuffed mouth down among the pebbles and into the sand underneath them, and as Alistair finishes closing the distance Leohta gives up her search and instead tips to land on her backside, legs out in front of her and a second bottle in her hand. He knows they’re not small but her stature makes them seem even larger; it makes the sight of her lifting one to her lips almost comical but the effect is spoiled by how long it stays there. Maker’s breath, Zevran was right when he talked about drowning.

"You planning on coming up for air any time soon?”

There’s a pop as she breaks the vacuum she’s created, then a dry laugh. She still isn’t looking at him. It makes his chest hurt, how badly he wants her to turn her head. “Breathe through your nose and you can use your mouth for whatever you want.”

“You’re spending too much time with Zevran, saying things like that.” Sighing, Alistair drops down crosslegged at her side and extends a hand. “What are you even drinking? I’ve never seen anything that color in a tavern before.”

“One of the Templars told me about it. I guess–” there’s a pause and she bunches up her eyebrows, apparently trying to put the pieces back together, “I guess the mother started making it as a tribute to her daughter and now of course it’s all very sad but the owner still makes it as a specialty. Sweet mead made with roses.” She passes over the open bottle, not bothering to wipe the top, and the expression on her face, like she’s sharing a secret, distracts him so much he can’t be bothered either. She wasn’t kidding when she said it was sweet but the roses are strong too, floral and delicate. He passes the bottle back after just one mouthful.

“I’ve never had a mead like that before. It’s very… different.” Leohta seems to accept that answer, nodding before lifting the bottle to her lips again.

“There’s nothing like this in Orzammar. Not even in the palace. Not even to make it. No honey, no roses, and when there is if you said you wanted to make something like this with it, you’d be laughed out of the kitchen.” She holds the bottle in front of her contemplatively, swishing the contents back and forth gently and tilting her head in time with the motion. Alistair’d almost think it was a contented sort of gesture but then she sighs and drops her head back, hair falling over her shoulders as she lifts the bottle skyward. “Nothing like that, either. No stars, no sky. Some of the caverns are so high the ceilings are invisible, but you still know they’re up there.” Slowly, she lowers the bottle but keeps her gaze fixed upward.

“Do you miss that?” It’s not something he’s given a lot of thought to but it’s hard to imagine. Even within the walls of the Chantry there were windows. The sky was always there, or not-there maybe, when compared to a ceiling of stone. Trying to imagine life without it or everything it held–the sun, the moons, the clouds and stars and birds–was virtually impossible, but here was Leohta not just imagining the opposite but living it.

“Dunno. I still don’t understand all this. What keeps it up there?” Her hand waves up at the stars but only briefly; even sitting down she’s unsteady without both hands to support her. “With the stone, you know that even if you can’t see the ceiling, it’s still held there by the stone. Nothing floats, nothing rises or sets.” Watching her profile, he can see the way it hardens as her train of thought jumps the track. “Nothing changes.”

He shifts a little, the pebbles grinding softly underneath him as he leans to try to catch her eye. “You changed.”

This time when she looks over at him, it gives him a chill. The stone she’s been so contemplative about has found a home in her eyes, the set of her mouth. They seem cold and stiff and almost lifeless, soft evening blue turned to lapis lazuli. Still beautiful but hard. “I left, and not by choice. You wouldn’t know how much I’ve changed, Alistair. You have no idea what I was like before we met.”

“I suppose not, but I do know you’ve changed in the time I’ve known you.” He keeps his voice softer now, speaking carefully to avoid that stony shift becoming somehow permanent. He hasn’t seen her look like that since before Ostagar, and to lose all the little ways she’s softened since then would be the greatest waste. “Do you miss that? Or her, I guess. Do you miss who you were before?”

Her laugh is a single humorless sound that moves her entire body, shaking her shoulders and flexing her stomach. “What does that matter? She’s dead. Worse than dead.” There’s venom in her voice but Alistair doesn’t flinch since for once he’s certain it’s not directed at him. He watches as Leohta stands, a wobbly process that involves repeated planting of hands and feet before she can push herself vertical. There’s a powerful temptation to offer her help but the set of her jaw makes him stay his hand, even if whatever effect she might be going for is already ruined by her own unsteadiness. “Nobody mourned her, nobody misses her, but it doesn’t change the fact that she’s dead. Bhelen killed her as sure as he killed Trian. The prince is dead, the princess is dead. Princess Aeducan is dead.” Her voice is raising, getting louder and more raw the longer she speaks, until finally she’s yelling out at the water. “Princess Leohta Aeducan, second born and best beloved daughter of House Aeducan, is dead!” She punctuates the last word by throwing the empty bottle into the water but it’s a bad throw, short and shallow. The bottle makes only a small splash then floats, reflecting the moonlight as it bobs its way back toward the shore.

Alistair rises, brushing at the back of his breeches, and makes his way up to stand beside her. He’s well within punching range, possibly a dangerous gamble, but if the way she’s carrying herself is any indication, it wouldn’t hurt very much right now. Plus, if she punched him, at least it’d prove she was feeling something. “I’d mourn her but like you said, I never did get to meet her. I’ve met Warden Aeducan, though, and I think she’s pretty great. Accomplished a lot, too.”

She’s bent back down and is sorting through the stones at her feet, tucking some in the bend of her other arm. Standing back up is a careful process but she’s shaking her head the entire time. “They’re not gonna think so.” Her voice is normal again but her profile is still stony.

Bloop.

Was this was he was like heading into Redcliffe? Of course, he hadn’t gotten drunk on sickly sweet mead to deal with it, but he’d had his turn as the prodigal royal-but-not-really. The main difference was he never wanted it, but she spoke so little of her life before the Grey Wardens. Was the crown of Orzammar what she’d really wanted? Not that it really mattered now. “Seems to me they had their chance to appreciate you and they blew it.”

“Oh, no. That’s the thing. Up until the end, they loved Princess Aeducan. That was the whole problem. She was too well-loved. Luckily, I’m not.” Leohta stares out at the ripples from her last throw but the fight’s going out of her. It ought to be a comfort, less risk of being punched, but instead it just hurts more. He curls his hands into fists at his sides to keep from reaching out, swallows the words that’d tell her just how deeply loved she is and not only by him, as much as he might wish it were so.

“We could go back to Denerim without going to Orzammar.” Aaaaaaaalistair, what’re you doooooooing? He ignores the voice in the back of his head, prepared to make an argument for mounting their assault without the help of the dwarves, but Leohta shakes her head. She’s drunk and she’s still got better sense than you.

“Just because I don’t want to go back doesn’t mean we don’t have to. Being a Grey Warden isn’t supposed to be fun, hasn’t been so far, why start now?” She seems to consider the matter closed as she turns her attention back to the rocks she’s holding, sorting through them as though looking for a particular one. They start to slip away and clack into the pebbles below and with a frustrated sigh she picks one, letting the remainder drop. “This is supposed to be, though. How the fuck do you do this?” Another windup, another bloop.

“Wait. What are you trying to do?”

“Make it…” She shakes her head, the word apparently lost, and instead makes a bouncing motion with her hand.

“You’re trying to skip stones… by heaving them at the surface of the water with all your might?” And there’s the punch he was waiting for, exactly as painless as expected. It’s not even hard enough to stop him laughing.

“I saw you and Zevran do it in Redcliffe before we left and it seemed to calm you down so I thought I’d try. You made it look easy, but if you’re just gonna laugh then forg–”

Alistair intercepts her before she can start to walk away. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry. It’s just that I never would have guessed that’s what you were trying to do. I thought you were mad at the lake or something.” She’s looking up at him, wary, so he holds his hands up in innocence. “If you still want to try, I can show you.”

“No more laughing?”

“No more laughing. Warden’s honor.” When Leohta seems satisfied with his intentions, Alistair finally looks away from her, crouching down. “The first thing you need is the right kind of rock. It needs to be pretty flat and you want a triangle shape if you can find one, but flat will do for now.”

She’s crouching as well. “I thought it would be better with a round rock, like a ball.” She’s quiet, almost chastized, and Alistair has to duck his head and cough into his fist to hide the grin it conjures.

“No, that’ll break through the water and sink. A flat rock will bounce better. Something like these.” He shows her the three he’s found, all rounder still than he’d like but they should do the trick. She holds up a couple of her own and really, they’re no better, but they’re only for learning. “Yes, those will do. Now.” Alistair drops to his knees and crooks his fingers around one of the stones. “You have to hold it like this, because the important part is that you get it to spin. That’s what makes it skip.”

Leohta’s squinting at his hand, then she tries it out herself. Her hands are smaller so she can’t quite circle it the way he does, but Alistair hopes it’ll work out. “Like this?”

“Just like that. Now, the other trick is not to throw it up but to flick it. You want it to stay flat so you have to kind of–” He turns his arm out at the elbow and flicks the rock out onto the water. Four hops, not his best work but not bad.

When he looks back at Leohta, though, she’s entranced. She watches the ripples so long he has to clear his throat to get her attention back, but this time every trace of the stone is gone from her face. She looks eager, determined, but also a little embarrassed. Surprised to have been caught, probably, but it’s a charming expression nonetheless. She turns to face the water again, weighing the rock in her hand, then moves her arm and throws.

It splashes and sinks just like all her other attempts. Leohta curses softly and starts to turn away but Alistair catches her wrist.

“Hey, no way. You’re not giving up after one attempt. C'mon. We’ve got two more rocks, so two more tries, then I guess I can let you give up.” He starts to move before she can start to argue.

“It’s not giving up, Alistair, it’s accepting the inedible. Inedibibble. Ined… remind me to compliment the tavernkeeper tomorrow. His stuff is good.” Her voice gradually gets softer, a delayed reaction to where Alistair has taken up a position just behind her. It’s extremely convenient for him: she can’t see how his face is burning up from the presumptuousness of being so close to her, but it’s also the best position to show her how to move her arm. He wraps his hand around hers and lifts her arm into position.

“From here, you have to flick your hand out. Try to imagine the rock spinning out from the inside of your thumb and taking all that energy with it. The harder you can flick it, the more it’ll bounce and the more hops you’ll–all right, that’s it, you and Zevran are officially being separated because that’s not even dirty and now you’ve made it dirty. I hope you’re happy.” The woman in front of him is struggling to contain her laughter, he can tell, and as much as he wants to keep her focus on him, it’s hard to be genuinely upset. She doesn’t laugh nearly enough and especially not around him. The fact that whatever is so funny is lost on him is a far distant concern.

Alistair waits for her to compose herself then takes a moment to compose himself in turn when she settles back into a proper posture that puts her in contact with him from shoulder to hip. She’s nearly as tall as he is when he’s on his knees like this, a fact he’s thought about many times but never quite in this situation. Leohta gives herself a little shake, tossing her hair in his face as she does. He tries to blow it out of the way but there’s just too much. All right then, one thing at a time.

“Now. Just remember, angle your hand back and then flick. That word is ruined for me now, I think. You’ve ruined flicking.” In front of him Leohta snorts and Alistair make a private vow to forbid Zevran from using that word. He wants it to be their joke even if he doesn’t understand it. “Do you think you can manage?”

“To flick? I’ve done all right for the last few years anyway.” She giggles and clears her throat. “All right. Angle my hand back,” and her hand is moving inside of his so he loosens his grip, “then forward and flick!”

Alistair peers over her shoulder and sure enough. Blip, blip. One hop, but it’s one more than she’d managed before. He puts his hands on her shoulders and squeezes. “There you go! Well done, Warden Aeducan.” She lifts one hand to pat his but he can tell she’s still looking at the ripples.

After a moment, he releases her shoulders and, feeling a little bolder by the fact that she hasn’t elbowed him away yet, reaches forward to comb his fingers through her hair. It’s a practical gesture–even as he’s speaking, her hair is getting in his mouth–but hardly exclusively practical. Her hair is thick and her scalp surprisingly warm underneath it. In front of him she’s gone very still; he thinks she might even be holding her breath but then again, so is he. He focuses on his own hands until he’s gathered her hair at the back of her neck, but then the tension in it changes and oh.

Alistair looks up and she’s right there, her head turned to look at him. Maker’s breath but she’s close, her mouth gently open and her eyes searching his face. Her breath smells like honey and roses and his hand is still in her hair, it’d be so easy and it might be perfect but she’s been drinking and that’s not right. Or might it be OK, with her looking at him like that? The motion of her lips is so mesmerizing that it takes him a moment to realize she’s speaking to him.

“Alistair.” And like that, the moment is over, or at least set aside. “Would you do that again?”

“Of course.” She could ask him to fetch the moons from the sky right now and he’d say yes, but… “Wait, do what?” He didn’t do anything other than have a whole lot of thoughts in a very short span of time.

“Touch my hair. That was nice.” She’s leaning more of her weight against him now and it’s nice but also just starting to make him concerned. Still, he already said yes, so Alistair releases her hair from where he’s holding it and threads his fingers through it again, starting at her temple, mindful of and parallel to the little braid she’s so meticulous about. As he does it, her eyes drift closed but her face is relaxed. It’s not quite a smile but he’ll take it. “Again,” she murmurs as his hand comes to rest on the back of her neck.

Alistair laughs softly but he complies with her request, stroking his fingers through her hair again. And again, and once more, until she leans forward completely and drops her head onto his shoulder. Her breath is warm on his neck as he gives her one last stroke, then stops to reach out away from her. She grumbles softly in protest but he hushes her. “I’m just getting your other bottle. It’s bought and paid for, no sense leaving it here.”

“Why, where’re we going?”

“I don’t know yet about myself but you are doing to bed. Sleeping standing up is only good for horses and probably Sten, and sleeping on your knees is good for no one. Now, come on, up you get.” He hooks the hand holding the unopened bottle of rhodomel under Leohta’s knees, his other arm coming up behind her shoulders. She grumbles again as he starts to stand and he pauses before beginning to walk.

“You’re carrying me like a princess.” The humor in her voice warms him but now he feels a little more confident about deflecting it.

“I’m a Warden carrying another Warden like a Warden. No princesses here. Well, except for the tavern but I’m certainly not trying to pick that up. I could throw you over my shoulder if you wanted, but you have to promise not to throw up on my back.”

“No promises.” She slumps against his shoulder as he starts to walk. It’s only a few steps from the beach to the door but he takes his time. Who knows what Orzammar will do to her, or what she might do to Orzammar? The answer is liable to be complicated but this, for as unexpected as it is, feels strangely simple. She might not even remember it in the morning, but it’s not a feeling Alistair’s going to forget any time soon. “Alistair.”

“I don’t have a free hand to pet you, but if you can stay awake until we get inside, maybe I’ll give you scritches once I get you upstairs.” He’s trying to figure out how he’s going to open the door when she shakes her head and answers.

“Thank you for coming out tonight. I’m sorry I’m–”

“None of that now. You have nothing to be sorry for, and if anything I should say thank you for having me.” Alistair manages to hook the latch with his pinkie then wedge his foot into the gap, kicking the door open as he maneuvers her inside. “You may not have found it so, but I think being a Warden can be a little bit fun, if you’re with the right person. Or people,” he continues, scrambling to cover for himself while trying to ease the door’s closing with his foot. Once he’s got both feet back on the ground, he looks down at the woman in his arms. Fast asleep, looking as young as he’s ever seen her and more peaceful than she has possibly the entire time he’s known her. The inn’s main room is empty, the fire doused, and he’s almost loathe to speak again and interrupt the silence, but he does.

“Or person. Just the right person.”

#my writing #dadwc #dwc #alistair theirin #leohta aeducan #alistair x f!warden #alistair x f!aeducan #alcohol #but also fluff #and feels #leohta's such a mess #oh and yes she and jonah gave their mabaris the same name #it's a thing

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gerudospiriit · 7 years

Text

Patience

Pairing: Nabooru and Ganondorf (Nabsgan)

Rating: T for suggestive shenanigans

Word Count: 4356

Basically, just Ganondorf and Nabooru sort of fluff. I wrote this a few years ago, so it’s not the best but I don’t know it’s kind of cute and you know...teenagers and hormones. I just really like to think about them as teenagers and figuring this couple-y stuff out, okay? (Also, crap title. I couldn’t think of anything.)

Again, might have posted this to my previous blog, but I don’t think I did because it wasn’t finished? I just found it in my documents, finished it, cleaned it up so here you go.

“We really need to be more creative with our date ideas,” I complained as I fell back onto the ground behind me. I slipped off my red shoes and buried my feet in the sand. I smiled to myself at the feeling of the warm grains against the bare portions of my skin. To me it was one of the best feelings in the world. I stared up at the cloudless, blue sky above, feeling my grin grow wider. Nowhere in the world could ever top the desert’s beauty in my eyes.

Currently, Ganondorf and I had snuck away from the Fortress on one of our “dates,” which either meant trekking out to the Spirit Temple or to a secret oasis we had found a few years ago. This particular excursion brought us to the latter. A small, clear pool of water sat in the center of the area with a few palm trees growing around it. Besides the colossus, this was the only place we had discovered where the winds of the wasteland are calm or with any sign of water. It was the perfect place for us to be alone together without someone finding us and becoming suspicious of our "unscheduled outing."

I heard a soft chuckle from above me. “And what would you suggest we do, Nabooru?” Ganondorf questioned as he sat down next to me, placing his palms in the sand behind him and leaning back, eyes also directed toward the desert sky above. “There really isn’t much else to do in the desert, you know…”

“Maybe you just need to be more creative.” I turned over on my side, resting my head in my hand as my elbow propped it up. Ganondorf sent me an exasperated glance, to which I responded with a cheeky grin of my own. “Don’t give me that look. You know I’m right. We do the same thing every time we can sneak away because you’re too lazy to think up something original.”

Ganondorf’s agitated stare immediately became a playful glare. “Is that any way to speak to your king, Nabooru?”

Pushing myself back into a sitting position, I flipped my fiery, red hair and pointed my nose skyward haughtily. “Excuse me, but last I checked your coronation wasn’t for a few days. You’re not the king yet. Just a spoiled prince.” I returned my gaze to him, smirking.

“Oh, we’re pulling that card again, are we, Nabs?” He pushed himself upright into a proper sitting position as well. Even sitting, Ganondorf was nearly a head taller than I was, causing me to crane my neck slightly. His yellow eyes were narrowed at me, but the playful smirk remained, giving his true demeanor away. “At least I’ll become a king. You will still only be a worthless brat.”

I poked my lower lip out in a childish pout, crossing my arms over my chest. “You’re so mean to me, Gan." It took all my will power to not giggle at my ridiculous act.

Ganondorf simply chuckled at my antics and leaned down so his face was mere inches from my own. “Me? Mean? Never.” Without warning, Ganondorf closed the small gap between us by gently pressing his lips to mine. I smiled a bit against his lips and returned the kiss, draping my arms around his neck.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t long before Ganondorf pulled away, causing me to actually pout this time. “In all seriousness though,” he began as he picked me up and placed me on his lap, “do I really not satisfy your needs any longer?”

I snorted in what the Hylian women would deem a "most unladylike" manner and gently punched him in the shoulder. “How do you expect me to take you seriously when you word things like that?’ I asked with a raised eyebrow. When he smirked at me, I knew he had done it on purpose. “You’re worse than the Hylian men sometimes, you know that?”

“Trust me, Nabs. I am much better than any Hylian man could even dream of being,” he said, slowly running a hand up my side. An involuntary shiver ran up my spine, causing Ganondorf to smirk once more. I felt a blush creep into my cheeks, and I mentally scolded myself for such a silly reaction to a simple touch.

After a few seconds, I regained my composure and turned in his lap so I was straddling him. Ganondorf’s eyes widened slightly in surprise, and now it was my turn to smirk. “Well, I wouldn’t know either way now, would I?”

“That could easily be changed.” Ganondorf wrapped his arms low around my waist, tracing invisible circles on my lower back, just above the top of my pants. He leaned down and placed a gentle kiss on my shoulder, causing a small gasp to escape my lips. As his lips kissed their way to my neck, I instinctively tilted my head to give him better access to the more sensitive column of flesh, biting my lower lip to hold back any further sounds that threatened to escape.

I finally found my voice again and muttered, “I…Ganondorf…not out here…someone could see…” I knew it was a lackluster excuse since, as far as I knew, we were the only ones that knew about this spot. But, to be honest, I was simply unsure of whether I was ready to take things further. I was only sixteen, just barely considered an adult in Gerudo culture. Ganondorf was eighteen, and I was fairly certain he had experience in this area. And for some reason, knowing this only made me more nervous. Jealous, too, but mostly nervous.

The only response I received was a simple, noncommittal grunt from Ganondorf as he continued to kiss different places on my neck. However, when I let out an annoyed groan, he finally pulled away. “Alright, fine.” He pecked my lips and rested his forehead against mine. “You know, if you weren’t so adorable, that probably wouldn’t have worked.”

I quickly pulled back as I scowled at him. “I most certainly am not adorable,” I hissed, crossing my arms over my chest.

“Oh? You’re not?” Ganondorf asked, his tone dripping with amusement. He leaned back on his arms once again, and I could tell he was trying not to laugh at me. “Then how would you describe yourself?”

“Tough,” I answered immediately and without much thought. “And clever. Oh! And, of course, a better fighter than all the men of the Hylian guard as well as the best warrior among our people.”

Ganondorf stroked his chin as his eyes slowly scanned down my torso and then back up to my face. “I suppose I can’t argue with those. But you missed a few.”

I rolled my eyes. “Have I now? Oh please, great Ganondorf, inform me of my mistake! How could I possibly make it through life without your guidance and wise appraisals of me?”

With a raised eyebrow, Ganondorf simply shook his head at my sarcastic gusto. He straightened up once more, draping his arms around my waist. “Well,” he began slowly, “you forgot beautiful. No, stunning…” My eyes widened slightly as he leaned forward, his lips brushing the shell of my ear. His smirk was more than evident as he whispered, “and a constant temptation."

At this point, my face could have served as a torch from the heat surging in my cheeks. I felt my mouth open and close a few times as I tried to spit out a clever comeback, but nothing came. Instead, I buried my face in his shoulder and let out a groan. “You say some of the stupidest things! Idiot!” For good measure, I punched him in the opposite shoulder.

He laughed as his arms tightened around me. “Well, maybe if you wouldn’t randomly straddle me, I wouldn’t say such, as you so eloquently put it, stupid things.”

I huffed indignantly as I turned my head toward him. “Well, maybe you should be more mature and not make everything I do mean something it doesn’t,” I pointed out bitterly, hoping I had managed to quell the blush in the period of time my face had been hidden. “It’s just a lot easier to hold a conversation from this position.”

Ganondorf raised an eyebrow at my statement. “Maybe for you it is.”

“What do yo-“ I suddenly stopped myself understanding what he meant, making an o-shape with my lips. I could feel another blush attempt to make its way into my cheeks again. I was so sick of him making me react this way, like some lovesick fool. It was embarrassing and not to mention so unlike myself. I’m usually bursting with confidence and can handle anything.

Hmm…confidence. Now there was an idea…

“You know,” I said, adding a seductive edge to my voice that made Ganondorf raise an eyebrow in question, “if I wanted really tempt you, you wouldn’t be able to talk at all right now.” I wrapped my arms around his neck and pressed my chest into his more, a small smirk curling the corners of my lips. I rolled my hips against his once and leaned forward, letting my lips just barely brush his. At the back of my mind, a little voice was protesting against my behavior since these actions were very much against how I would ever act around a man; how I ever wanted to act around a man. I usually found this sort of behavior degrading. But, at the moment, I was sort of enjoying it, and hearing that soft, low groan of pleasure slip past Ganondorf’s lips definitely only urged me on.

I decided to justify my actions by the fact that we were pretty much a couple, and he wasn’t just some random man off the streets. Yes, that should shut that nagging voice up.

Without warning, I placed my palms on the front of his shoulders and gave him a quick, hard shove, causing him to fall back into the sand behind him with grunt.

I slowly leaned down so my face was level with his once more and placed a soft kiss on his lips. I felt him smile as he returned it, a large hand gliding up my spine to rest on the back of my neck. I felt my skin tingle along the trail his fingers followed. I had to admit, I was amazed and annoyed by the fact that all he had to do was touch me in the right places to make me melt. A longing for more of that touch began to materialize in my mind, which both unnerved and excited me as I felt any inhibition I had possessed previously begin to slip away.

After pulling away from his lips slightly, I placed gentle kisses along his jaw down to his neck. As I was doing so, Ganondorf's chest rose and fell beneath by hands as he chuckled, causing me to pause my ministrations. My questioning golden eyes darted upward. “Weren’t you just saying that we shouldn’t be doing this here, Nabooru?”

I scoffed and nipped at his neck playfully. “Maybe I changed my mind. Am I not allowed to change my mind now?”

Ganondorf just laughed. “I suppose it’s still allowed,” he responded, lightly stroking my hair. “But we should probably be heading back soon or people will start to wonder what we’ve been up to.”

I pushed myself up again and tilted my head back to look at the sky. The sun had begun to sink lower and would soon set. By the time we made it back to the fortress, the sun would most likely be dropping below the horizon. I scowled up at the sky as if I could freeze the sun in its current position , giving us more time to be alone together. But it was probably for the best; in the last few minutes I had gone from not wanting to do much more than kissing to imagining Ganondorf ripping my clothing off and taking me right there in the desert sand, not caring if anyone happened to find us.

Was this normal? I had learned all about sex as part of our lessons and from stories from the older girls but had never had even an inkling of interest in it. And yet now, with Ganondorf pointing out the prospect of actually having sex, it was all I could think about.

Before my thoughts could unravel further, I rose to my feet and walked over to my shoes. “I suppose you’re right. Aveil already hassles me relentlessly when I disappear for anything. I think she may be suspicious of us…”

Ganondorf stood up as well and stretched his arms over his head. As he did so, the muscles in his arms were more defined, at which point I focused all of my attention on slipping my feet into my shoes. “You didn’t let something slip, did you?” I heard him ask with a soft laugh. Seconds later, those same muscled arms I was admiring mere moments ago were around my waist and I was pulled backward into a hard but warm body.

Well, so much for trying to somewhat avoid him…

“Just what are you implying?” I asked, turning my head a bit to glare at him. “I’m not a blabber mouth like some of the other girls…”

“That’s not what I was implying at all.” Ganondorf gently kissed my temple, and I could feel his smirk as he did so. “I just figured you might have uttered something incriminating in your sleep…You did say Aveil was suspicious, and the two of you share a room, yes?”

With a groan, I pulled out of his arms. “Can we just go back now, please? I’m tired of you making ridiculous comments like that!” I huffed as I headed in the direction of the fortress. I heard Ganondorf chuckle once more behind me before jogging to catch up.

------

Sleep now escaped me. More than it usually did.

For the past few hours, I had been lying in bed, staring up at the dark ceiling. Not a sound could be heard throughout this part of the fortress except for the soft padding of a guard’s shoes as she made her rounds. Any other day it would have been the perfect setting for me to fall asleep in. Even Aveil had fallen asleep earlier than usual, so I didn’t have her keeping me up. Although, tonight I think I would have welcomed the distraction from my thoughts.

All I could think about was what happened with Ganondorf earlier…with a few twists, courtesy of my imagination. Wondering what it would have been like if I would have submitted to our desires...

I groaned and brought my knees to my chest as I futilely attempted to avert my thoughts from anything to do with our prince. As expected, it didn’t work. All my brain seemed capable of focusing on was that man…his kissing abilities, his touch, and not to mention that well-toned body. What I wouldn’t give to see him without clothing…

Flipping over onto my stomach, I buried my face in my pillow. It didn’t remain there long, for a different sound from the hallway drifted to my ears. Footsteps, but heavier than the usual ones of the guards. They stopped near the curtain separating our room from the hallway. I propped myself up on my elbow, ready to tear off my thin blanket, grab the blade hidden beneath my bed, and fight whatever intruder might have managed to get into the fortress.

The curtain was pushed to the side, allowing torchlight from the hall to filter in. A larger figure stepped into the room, a silhouette outlined by the light behind it. I could tell that whoever it was happened to be male, and I squinted to make out the person standing in the doorway, letting my arm drape over the side of the bed and find the hilt of my blade. However, once my eyes had adjusted to the small amount of light, I realized taking action would not be necessary.

“Ganondorf, what are you doing in here?” I hissed, trying to keep my voice down to avoid waking Aveil. Realizing I was currently half exposed, I yanked the blanket back up to my chin. “You shouldn’t be in here…”

He didn’t answer me but instead approached my bed. Leaning down, he pressed his lips to mine. Caught off guard, I kissed back for a few seconds before coming to my senses and pushing him back. Despite the darkness, I could tell he was smirking at me. “That’s a lovely way to greet me. I figured you’d be...excited to see me after having to part so inconveniently earlier today…” he muttered as he climbed onto my bed and hovered over me.

I clutched the blanket tighter to my chest and shied away, trying to sink into the bed below. “I…we can’t here,” I managed to stutter out as his lips found my neck. I bit my lip to suppress a soft moan. “We’d wake Aveil.” To be on the safe side, I glanced over at my best friend, relieved to find that she still slept soundly.

Ganondorf stared at me for a moment before slipping off the bed again. “You’re right. Let’s go.” He started for the door, but when he didn’t hear me make a move to get up, he paused and turned back to me. “Well?”

I swallowed the lump that had formed in my throat, feeling my face heat up in a blush. I was just thankful it would be too dark for him to see it. “I’m..er…Kind of not wearing any clothes,” I told him feebly.

“Just wrap your blanket around you,” he said nonchalantly, waving my comment off with his hand. “It’ll be fine.”

I knew it would be useless to argue with him at this point. I sighed, and, making sure my blanket was securely wrapped around me, I stood. I padded along behind him out into the torch-lit hallway, cautiously glancing around for any sign of the guards. Noticing Ganondorf had gotten ahead of me in my hesitation, I scurried to catch up with him, being sure to stay close.

After taking several twists and turns through the fortress (I was being sure to keep an eye out for any movement), I mumbled, “Ganondorf…where are all the guards? I figured we would have seen at least one…”

Without stopping, Ganondorf glanced back at me with a smirk. “I may have distracted them a bit by telling them there was an emergency outside…”

“Ugh…seriously?” When he nodded in confirmation, I simply shook my head. “Idiot...”

Ganondorf chuckled and paused before an ornately painted door, which I assumed led to his room. I felt my heart beat quicken in my chest, and I bit my lower lip as he pushed the door open and motioned for me to enter. I tentatively stepped into the room and felt my jaw drop slightly. His room was gorgeous. Not only was it bigger than most of the other living quarters, but it was also lavishly furnished with weapons and intricate tapestries spanning the walls. The remnants of burnt incence filled my nostrils. The bed was what really caught my eye though. It was more than twice the size of my own bed with red silk sheets. Plump pillows lined the headboard, completing the inviting sight.

When I heard the click of the door closing, I jumped and nearly dropped my blanket, caught off guard as I admired the room. I heard Ganondorf snicker as he walked by me, stopping on the side of his bed. “Well, what do you think?” he asked as he held his arms out.

“It’s…definitely lovely.” I smirked at him. “Definitely fit for an almost king.”

Returning my smirk, Ganondorf said, “Pretty big talk coming from the girl only covered by a blanket…”

I glared at him. “And whose fault is that? Hm?” I questioned, moving closer to him. “If I remember right, you were in such a hurry that I wouldn’t have had time to dress.”

Before I could even attempt to move away, Ganondorf had closed the gap between us and placed his hands on my hips. “Ever think I may have done that on purpose?” His right hand slid up my side and up to my shoulder. His fingers slid beneath the fabric and gently massaged the bare skin. I stared at his chest, unable to make eye contact. “Perhaps I rushed you to make things easier for me?”

I bit my lip and instinctively gripped the blanket tighter. “Why does that not surprise me…” I muttered.

“I wish you would relax, Nabs,” he whispered in my ear before kissing my cheek. Ganondorf’s hand slipped into my hair and he slid his fingers through it. “I won’t make you do anything you do not wish to.”

“I…I know…” I shifted my gaze to meet his again. I was surprised to see sincerity in his eyes. I had expected him to be his normal, perverted self, using that charm and charisma of his to get me to drop this blanket and crawl into bed with him. And, a large part of me wanted to indulge such an idea. Let the sheet fall slowly from my shoulders, teasing him, before releasing the fabric from my clenched fists. Show him my "bedroom eyes" as I heard some of the other girls mention in hushed conversation. Allow my confidence to take over as I pushed him on the bed and crawled on top, whispering how I would prove that I am better than any other woman he had had before me.

But, I did not move. My feet remained rooted to the stone floor as if someone had shot an ice arrow at them. I chewed my lower lip so hard it nearly bled. My hands ached from gripping the blanket so tightly around my thin frame. I didn't understand: why was I so scared? I knew Ganondorf wouldn't hurt me, physically or emotionally, and I cared deeply about him. Was it a fear of failure? Messing things up between us? Not feeling like the right moment?

"Your coronation."

Ganondorf blinked several times in confusion, as if I had just spoken a foreign language. "Yes, what about it?"

"It's only a few days away, right?" I looked up at him hopefully, receiving a nod in answer.

"What if we...held off until then?" I twisted the blanket nervously in my hands, but held his gaze. My confidence had to come in handy somewhere tonight. "Think of it as my gift to you. To us. The first step in your reign, and the next step in our relationship. It's symbolic or something. What do you say?"

He studied me for several long moments. I couldn't read the expression he wore and it made my chest tighten so much I thought it would collapse on itself. I prepared myself for a slew of answers: "Don't bother; I'll find someone else to warm my bed. Goddess knows there are many takers." Or, "I will not wait that long. It's now or never," among other possible responses that threatened to rip my heart straight from my chest.

"Very well."

"Very well?" I repeated. I felt like I had heard his response from a thousand miles away. "Really?"

He smiled and nodded, pressing a gentle kiss to my forehead. "Of course. I like the idea. It feels...right. Perfect. Exactly how I want our first time together."

I could have toppled over as relief rushed over me, tensed muscles turning to useless goo. I breathed a heavy sigh and rested my head against his chest. I wanted to hug him, but, for obvious reasons, this would suffice. As if reading my mind, he wrapped his arms around me and gently stroked my hair.

"I'm sorry if I...made you uncomfortable," he mumbled. "I just...uh...got a little excited and carried away."

I smiled up at him, shifting onto my tiptoes to press a soft kiss to his lips. "Well, to be fair, I didn't exactly help today...out at the oasis." I bit my lip, skeptical to go on. "That was real, though. I...do want to go further. You make me happy, and you mean so much to me. I want us to last."

Without warning, Ganondorf scooped me up into his arms. I started to protest, scrambling to keep the blanket from slipping, only to be cut off by his lips pressed tenderly to mine. I calmed instantly and returned it, smiling.

When he parted, he said, "I can say the same about you, Nabooru. This all did seem...rushed. Your idea is much more romantic." Part of me wondered if he was teasing me. But, as he put me down, his amber eyes still held the same sincerity as earlier.

"You should probably get going though." He bent down to peck my lips one last time. "Goodnight, brat."

I stuck my tongue out at him before heading toward the door. I poked my head out and, finding the coast was clear, I glanced back at him. He had moved back over to his bed, leaning back on his hands.

"Goodnight, my spoiled prince."

#legend of zelda #fanfiction #nabooru #ganondorf #nabsgan #ocarina of time

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networkingdefinition · 5 years

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Maple Quotes

Official Website: Maple Quotes

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• A lone maple leaf resting on sand Have you ever been out for a late autumn walk in the closing part of the afternoon, and suddenly looked up to realize that the leaves have practically all gone? And the sun has set and the day gone before you knew it, and with that a cold wind blows across the landscape? That’s retirement. – Stephen Leacock • A river is the most human and companionable of all inanimate things. It has a life, a character, a voice of its own; and it is as full of good fellowship as a sugar maple is of sap. It can talk in various tones, loud or low, and of many subjects grave and gay…. For real company and friendship there is nothing, outside of the animal kingdom, that is comparable to a river. – Henry Van Dyke • A sad sort of vulnerability was wafting from her, making the night smell like maple syrup. – Sarah Addison Allen • A solitary maple on a woodside flames in single scarlet, recalls nothing so much as the daughter of a noble house dressed for a fancy ball, with the whole family gathered around to admire her before she goes. – Henry James • A withered maple leaf has left its branch and is falling to the ground; its movements resemble those of a butterfly in flight. Isn’t it strange? The saddest and deadest of things is yet so like the gayest and most vital of creatures? – Ivan Turgenev • After the keen still days of September, the October sun filled the world with mellow warmth…The maple tree in front of the doorstep burned like a gigantic red torch. The oaks along the roadway glowed yellow and bronze. The fields stretched like a carpet of jewels, emerald and topaz and garnet. Everywhere she walked the color shouted and sang around her…In October any wonderful unexpected thing might be possible. – Elizabeth George Speare • Again the blackbirds sings; the streams Wake, laughing, from their winter dreams, And tremble in the April showers The tassels of the maple flowers. – John Greenleaf Whittier • And again it snowed, and again the sun came out. In the mornings on the way to the station Franklin counted the new snowmen that had sprung up mysteriously overnight or the old ones that had been stricken with disease and lay cracked apart-a head here, a broken body and three lumps of coal there-and one day he looked up from a piece of snow-colored rice paper and knew he was done. It was as simple as that: you bent over your work night after night, and one day you were done. Snow still lay in dirty streaks on the ground but clusters of yellow-green flowers hung from the sugar maples. – Steven Millhauser • Anne reveled in the world of color about her. “Oh, Marilla,” she exclaimed one Saturday morning, coming dancing in with her arms full of gorgeous boughs, “I’m so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers. It would be terrible if we just skipped from September to November, wouldn’t it? Look at these maple branches. Don’t they give you a thrill–several thrills? – Lucy Maud Montgomery • Around in silent grandeur stood The stately children of the wood; Maple and elm and towering pine Mantled in folds of dark woodbine. – Julia Caroline Dorr

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'Maple', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '68', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_maple').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_maple img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); ); • But truth be told, I’m not as dour-looking as I would like. I’m stuck with this round, sweetie-pie face, tiny heart-shaped lips, the daintiest dimples, and apple cheeks so rosy I appear in a perpetual blush. At five foot four, I barely squeak by average height. And then there’s my voice: straight out of second grade. I come across so young and innocent and harmless that I have been carded for buying maple syrup. Tourists feel more safe approaching me for directions, telemarketers always ask if my mother is home, and waitresses always, always call me ‘Hon. – Sarah Vowell

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• Catch a vista of maples in that long light and you see Autumn glowing through the leaves…. The promise of gold and crimson is there among the branches, though as yet it is achieved on only a stray branch, an impatient limb or an occasional small tree which has not yet learned to time its changes. – Hal Borland • Consider the many special delights a lawn affords: soft mattress for a creeping baby; worm hatchery for a robin; croquet or badminton court; baseball diamond; restful green perspectives leading the eye to a background of flower beds, shrubs, or hedge; green shadows – “This lawn, a carpet all alive/With shadows flung from leaves’ – as changing and as spellbinding as the waves of the sea, whether flecked with sunlight under trees of light foliage, like elm and locust, or deep, dark, solid shade, moving slowly as the tide, under maple and oak. This carpet! – Katharine Sergeant Angell White • Do you think I’m wonderful? she asked him one day as they leaned against the trunk of a petrified maple. No, he said. Why? Because so many girls are wonderful. I imagine hundreds of men have called their loves wonderful today, and it’s only noon. You couldn’t be something that hundreds of others are. – Jonathan Safran Foer • Everyone had a Japanese maple, although after Pearl Harbor most of these were patriotically poisoned, ringbarked and extirpated. – Barry Humphries • For anyone who lives in the oak-and-maple area of New England, there is a perennial temptation to plunge into a purple sea of adjectives about October. – Hal Borland • For hours she had lain in a kind of gentle torpor, not unlike that sweet lassitude which masters one in the hush of a midsummer noon, when the heat seems to have silenced the very birds and insects, and, lying sunk in the tasselled meadow grasses, one looks up through a level roofing of maple-leaves at the vast, shadowless, and unsuggestive blue. – Edith Wharton • For watching sports, I tend to drink Guinness; early evenings always begin well with a Grey Goose and tonic with plenty of lime; and on a cold winters night, theres nothing quite like a glass of Black Maple Hill… an absolute peach of a bourbon. – Martin Bashir • Freezing concentrates sugar (maple sugar), alcohol, and salt solutions as efficiently as heating distils water or alcohol from solutions. Open pans of maple sugar can have the surface ice removed regularly (each day) until a sugar concentrate remains. Salts in water, and alcohol in ferment liquors can be concentrated in the same way. – Bill Mollison • I always feel at home where the sugar maple grows…. glorious in autumn, a fountain of coolness in summer, sugar in its veins, gold in its foliage, warmth in its fibers, and health in it the year round. – John Burroughs • I always go to the lowest common denominator for that ingredient. So if I think squash, I try to think what it means to me — and if it doesn’t mean anything to me, I’m not gonna do well when I cook it. So [squash] means to me: fall, maple syrup, cinnamon, and things just come into your head so you can narrow the vortex and make it a bit smaller and you go with something because there’s no time. – Geoffrey Zakarian • I always have a good quality extra virgin olive oil. A cheap quality oil will end up cheapening your dishes. And I love sweetening my dishes with maple syrup. It has a bit of a bitter kick at the end that works wonderfully in savory dishes. – Nadia Giosia • I am passionate about tea, running, the idea that we are bound only by the limits of our imaginations, and maple syrup. – Misha Collins • I ate breakfast in the kitchen by candle-light, and then drove the five miles to the station through the most glorious October colouring. The sun came up on the way, and the swamp maples and dogwood glowed crimson and orange and the stone walls and cornfields sparkled with hoar frost; the air was keen and clear and full of promise. I knew something was going to happen. – Jean Webster • I drink maple syrup. Then I’m hyper so I just run around like crazy and work it all off. – Rachel McAdams • I grew up trying to play for the Toronto Maple Leafs, not Team Canada. Didn’t even know it existed. – Adam Oates • I happen to know everything there is to know about maple syrup! I love maple syrup. I love maple syrup on pancakes. I love it on pizza. And I take maple syrup and put a little bit in my hair when I’ve had a rough week. What do you think holds it up, slick? – Vince Vaughn • I have a maple leaf tattoo over my heart, quite literally, and my two favorite things on Earth are being in Canada and making movies. – Jay Baruchel • I like Toronto a lot, it’s a good city. The only thing that really annoys me about Toronto is that you’re turning Maple Leaf Gardens into a grocery store, which is absolutely nothing short of disgusting. – Rick Wakeman • I remember it as October days are always remembered, cloudless, maple-flavored, the air gold and so clean it quivers. – Leif Enger • I sit where the leaves of the maple and the gnarled and knotted gum are circling and drifting around me. – Alice Cary • I think maybe, if I could be a Canadian super hero, I’d have some kind of freezing power and some sort of maple syrup weapon. Could be a little sticky. – Nathan Fillion • I thought of my mother as Queen Christina, cool and sad, eyes trained on some distant horizon. That was where she belonged, in furs and palaces of rare treasures, fireplaces large enough to roast a reindeer, ships of Swedish maple. – Janet Fitch • I used to go to Maple Leafs games all the time when Nic shot To Die For here in Toronto. This is a great city. I love it here. – Tom Cruise • I was cutting and threading pipe in the tunnels to get water into the shower rooms for athletics. I was repairing old metal windows, fixing cement walls where rain was coming through, and drying out the maple gym floors in hopes of removing the warping. – Tom Baker • I was just getting acquainted with the wood. I wanted to see if it was maple or pine. – Kurt Rambis • If it’s not 100 per cent pure maple syrup, it can’t be called ‘pure maple syrup. – Nancy Greene • If you’ve only got one day to live, come see the Toronto Maple Leafs. It’ll seem like forever. – Pat LaFontaine • I’m not from a maple producing area and so my maple syrup credentials are very much of the eating side. – Nancy Greene • I’m very proud to be wearing the “C” for the Maple Leafs. It puts a smile on my face everyday – Mats Sundin • In New York and New England the sap starts up in the sugar maple the very day the bluebird arrives, and sugar-making begins forthwith. The bird is generally a mere disembodied voice; a rumor in the air for two or three days before it takes visible shape before you. – John Burroughs • In spring when maple buds are red, We turn the clock an hour ahead; Which means, each April that arrives, We lose an hour out of our lives.

Who cares? When autumn birds in flocks Fly southward, back we turn the clocks, And so regain a lovely thing That missing hour we lost in spring. – Phyllis McGinley • In the long dusks of summer we walked the suburban streets through scents of maple and cut grass, waiting for something to happen. – Steven Millhauser • It is a poor observance of our first century as a nation if we run up a flag of surrender with three dying maple leaves on it. – Charlotte Whitton • It is a vast wilderness of rocks in a sea of light, colored and glowing like oak and maple in autumn, when the sun gold is richest – John Muir • Leaf fans loyalty is unshakeable. The fans keep coming back and it hurts, I have been there. I have lost in game six to go to the finals with the Maple Leafs, against Carolina and what a great final that would have been. – Curtis Joseph • Lyric night of the lingering Indian Summer, Shadowy fields that are scentless but full of singing, Never a bird, but the passionless chant of insects, Ceaseless, insistent. The grasshopper’s horn, and far-off, high in the maples, The wheel of a locust leisurely grinding the silence Under a moon waning and worn, broken, Tired with summer. – Sara Teasdale • Many of the artifacts of my house had become potential devices for my own destruction: the attic rafters (and an outside maple or two) a means to hang myself, the garage a place to inhale carbon monoxide, the bathtub a vessel to receive the flow from my opened arteries. The kitchen knives in their drawers had but one purpose for me. – William Styron • Maples are such sociable trees … They’re always rustling and whispering to you. – Lucy Maud Montgomery • Maple-trees are the cows of trees (spring-milked). – Henry Ward Beecher • Much can they praise the trees so straight and high, The sailing pine,the cedar proud and tall, The vine-prop elm, the poplar never dry, The builder oak, sole king of forests all, The aspin good for staves, the cypress funeral, The laurel, meed of mighty conquerors And poets sage, the fir that weepest still, The yew obedient to the bender’s will, The birch for shafts, the sallow for the mill, The myrrh sweet-bleeding in the bitter wound, The warlike beech, the ash for nothing ill, The fruitful olive, and the platane round, The carver holm, the maple seldom inward sound. – Edmund Spenser • My end goal in the piano is to play Scott Joplin’s ‘Maple Leaf Rag. – Miranda Leek • My first semester I had only nine students. Hoping they might view me as professional and well prepared, I arrived bearing name tags fashioned in the shape of maple leaves. – David Sedaris • My love of maple syrup. I’ve been known to knock back a can over a couple days: A swig here, a swig there, and next thing you know it’s gone. It’s a habit I have to stave off. I don’t want to lose all my teeth. – Rufus Wainwright • My uncle, Mr. Stephen Maple, had been at the same time the most successful and the least respectable of our family, so that we hardly knew whether to take credit for his wealth or to feel ashamed of his position. – Arthur Conan Doyle • No clouds are in the morning sky, The vapors hug the stream, Who says that life and love can die In all this northern gleam? At every turn the maples burn, The quail is whistling free, The partridge whirs, and the frosted burs Are dropping for you and me. Ho! hillyho! heigh O! Hillyho! In the clear October morning. – Edmund Clarence Stedman • October turned my maple’s leaves to gold; The most are gone now; here and there one lingers: Soon these will slip from the twigs’ weak hold, Like coins between a dying miser’s fingers. – Thomas Bailey Aldrich • Oh! to be a child again. My only treasures, bits of shell and stone and glass. To love nothing but maple sugar. To fear nothing but a big dog. To go to sleep without dreading the morrow. To wake up with a shout. Not to have seen a dead face. Not to dread a living one. To be able to believe. – Fanny Fern • One day the ‘Maple Leaf’ will make me King of Ragtime Composers. – Scott Joplin • Our lives are like islands in the sea, or like trees in the forest. The maple and the pine may whisper to each other with their leaves … But the trees also commingle their roots in the darkness underground, and the islands also hang together through the ocean’s bottom. – William James • Spring has many American faces. There are cities where it will come and go in a day and counties where it hangs around and never quite gets there. Summer is drawn blinds in Louisiana, long winds in Wyoming, shade of elms and maples in New England. – Archibald MacLeish • That`s a maple leaf, Canadian, not just for being too European but too Canadian. Not so subtly putting [Ted] Cruz`s face inside that maple leaf there. – Chris Hayes • The approach to that movie wasn’t, ‘Lets make this movie about Amsterdam and maple syrup.’ The concept was, ‘Lets go to Amsterdam. Amsterdam is fun.’ So we flew to Amsterdam with our cameras and we saw what happened and then we got back and we sat down and we said, ‘What’s the movie here.’ That’s when we realized that the movie was ‘The Maple Syrup Saga’. – Casey Neistat • The ash her purple drops forgivingly And sadly, breaking not the general hush; The maple swamps glow like a sunset sea, Each leaf a ripple with its separate flush; All round the wood’s edge creeps the skirting blaze, Ere the rain falls, the cautious farmer burns his brush. – James Russell Lowell • The food that’s never let me down in life is porridge, especially with milk and maple syrup, which is delicious. Paris isn’t a porridge place, but I can buy it in London when I’m there and bring it back with me. – Marianne Faithfull • The gaps are the thing. The gaps are the spirit’s one home, the altitudes and latitudes so dazzlingly spare and clean that the spirit can discover itself like a once-blind man unbound. The gaps are the clefts in the rock where you cower to see the back parts of God; they are fissures between mountains and cells the wind lances through, the icy narrowing fiords splitting the cliffs of mystery. Go up into the gaps. If you can find them; they shift and vanish too. Stalk the gaps. Squeak into a gap in the soil, turn, and unlock-more than a maple-universe. – Annie Dillard • The morns are meeker than they were, The nuts are getting brown; The berry’s cheek is plumper, The rose is out of town. The maple wears a gayer scarf, The field a scarlet gown. Lest I should be old-fashioned, I’ll put a trinket on. – Emily Dickinson • The rinsed foam swirled into one drain that always clogged come October when the maples dropped Canadian propaganda over everything. – Daniel Handler • The scarlet of the maples can shake me like a cry Of bugles going by. And my lonely spirit thrills To see the frosty asters like a smoke upon the hills. – Bliss Carman • The spirit of the year, like bacchant crowned, With lighted torch goes careless on his way; And soon bursts into flame the maple’s spray, And vines are running fire along the ground. – Edith M. Thomas • The stripped and shapely Maple grieves The ghosts of her Departed leaves. The ground is hard, As hard as stone. The year is old, The birds are flown. – John Updike • The sugar maple is remarkable for its clean ankle. The groves of these trees looked like vast forest sheds, their branches stopping short at a uniform height, four or five feet from the ground, like eaves, as if they had been trimmed by art, so that you could look under and through the whole grove with its leafy canopy, as under a tent whose curtain is raised. – Henry David Thoreau • The summer ends and we wonder who we are And there you go, my friends, with your boxes in your car And today I passed the high school, the river, the maple tree I passed the farms that made it Through the last days of the century And I knew that I was going to learn again Again, in this less hazy light I saw the fields beyond the fields The fields beyond the field – Dar Williams • The very uprightness of the pines and maples asserts the ancient rectitude and vigor of nature. Our lives need the relief of such a background, where the pine flourishes and the jay still screams. – Henry David Thoreau • The wilderness is near as well as dear to every man. Even the oldest villages are indebted to the border of wild wood which surrounds them, more than to the gardens of men. There is something indescribably inspiriting and beautiful in the aspect of the forest skirting and occasionally jutting into the midst of new towns, which, like the sand-heaps of fresh fox-burrows, have sprung up in their midst. The very uprightness of the pines and maples asserts the ancient rectitude and vigor of nature. Our lives need the relief of such a background, where the pine flourishes and the jay still screams. – Henry David Thoreau • The woman is not just a pleasure, nor even a problem. She is a meniscus that allows the absolute to have a shape, that lets him skate however briefly on the mystery, her presence luminous on the ordinary and the grand. Like the odor at night in Pittsburgh’s empty streets after summer rain on maples and sycamore. – Jack Gilbert • The world of life, of spontaneity, the world of dawn and sunset and starlight, the world of soil and sunshine, of meadow and woodland, of hickory and oak and maple and hemlock and pineland forests, of wildlife dwelling around us, of the river and its wellbeing–all of this [is] the integral community in which we live. – Thomas Berry • There is a beautiful spirit breathing now Its mellowed richness on the clustered trees, And, from a beaker full of richest dyes, Pouring new glory on the autumn woods, And dipping in warm light the pillared clouds. Morn on the mountain, like a summer bird, Lifts up her purple wing, and in the vales The gentle wind, a sweet and passionate wooer, Kisses the blushing leaf, and stirs up life Within the solemn woods of ash deep-crimsoned, And silver beech, and maple yellow-leaved, Where Autumn, like a faint old man, sits down By the wayside a-weary. – Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • There were so many miracles at work: that a blossom might become a peach, that a bee could make honey in its thorax, that rain might someday fall. I thought then about the seasons changing, and in the gray of night I could almost will myself to see the azure sky, the gold of the maple leaves, the crimson of the ripe apples, the hoarfrost on the grass. – Jane Hamilton • There’s nothing people like better than being asked an easy question. For some reason, we’re flattered when a stranger asks us where Maple Street is in our hometown and we can tell him. – Andy Rooney • This fastest of all games [hockey] has become almost as much of a national svmbol as the maple leaf. – Lester B. Pearson • This hill crossed with broken pines and maples lumpy with the burial mounds of uprooted hemlocks (hurricane of ’38) out of their rotting hearts generations rise trying once more to become the forest just beyond them tall enough to be called trees in their youth like aspen a bouquet of young beech is gathered they still wear last summer’s leaves the lightest brown almost translucent how their stubbornness has decorated the winter woods. – Grace Paley • To her bier Comes the year Not with weeping and distress, as mortals do, But, to guide her way to it, All the trees have torches lit; Blazing red the maples shine the woodlands through. – Lucy Larcom • We don’t want you convicted for condiment theft. You go to that prison, you’ll meet big-time operators. Maple syrup stealers. – Deb Caletti • We must keep these waters for wild rice, these trees for maple syrup, our lakes for fish, and our land and aquifers for all of our relatives – whether they have fins, roots, wings, or paws. – Winona LaDuke • We would much prefer to see ownership in the hands of the Maple Group, if only because we would much rather see Canadian ownership of our stock exchange. What we are first of all interested in is making sure that Montreal is able to preserve that niche or expertise. – Jean Charest • When April winds Grew soft, the maple burst into a flush Of scarlet flowers. The tulip tree, high up, Opened in airs of June her multitude Of golden chalices to humming-birds And silken-wing’d insects of the sky. – William C. Bryant • When you were a kid, if you went to the Montreal Forum or a hockey game at Maple Leaf Gardens, which I did, there was a great feeling. The new stadiums don’t have it. Why don’t they have it? Building codes. – Frank Gehry • With the fans and the Toronto Maple Leafs organization, the way I’ve been treated here has been awesome. – Mats Sundin • Writing an informative yet compact thriller is a lot like making maple sugar candy. You have to tap hundreds of trees – boil vats and vats of raw sap – evaporate the water – and keep boiling until you’ve distilled a tiny nugget that encapsulates the essence. – Dan Brown • You cannot imprison me!” He bellowed. “I am Hyperion! I am-” The bark closed over his face. Grover took his pipes from his mouth. “You are a very nice maple tree. – Rick Riordan

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'a', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '4', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_a').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_a img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); );

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'e', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '4', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_e').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_e img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); );

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'i', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '4', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_i').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_i img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); );

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'o', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '4', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_o').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_o img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); );

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'u', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '4', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_u').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_u img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); );

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equitiesstocks · 5 years

Text

Maple Quotes

Official Website: Maple Quotes

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