#and heavy dark thunderclouds

[not-poignant]

this may be a strange detail to love, but I really loved the way you incorporated the weather, the climate, the clouds and the rain in eversion. it's left a real impression on the story for me. so now, whenever there is a rainstorm outside, i feel homesick for eversion and i want to re-read it again. thank you for your stories!

Honestly, anon, it makes me so happy that you've pointed this out, because the ability of the weather in that story to create ambience and mood (especially given it's a dystopian / advanced climate change weather system) was one of my favourite things to write.

I remember sometimes feeling like the weather was its own character in the story, sometimes quiet, sometimes very imposing. That it had changed enough that people are just now naturally growing tropical species in their gardens, or having to genetically modify plants to be able to handle the increased humidity and rain.

Idk, I'm obsessed with clouds (a cloud photo I took outside is literally my userpic here), and weather systems in general, and while I like incorporating weather overall, I think Eversion was the first time I could really exaggerate it and lean into it. And that was very much a personal indulgence and I didn't think many other people would think much of it.

So anyway, getting this ask makes me extremely happy, because I personally don't think it's weird at all, and I'm just sdalfkjsa so glad it came across! <3

[novaursa]

The Last Dragonslayer (1/2)

- Summary: When young Luke came to Storm’s End as his mother’s emissary, Aemond wasn't the only one there to greet the young Prince.

- Paring: female!reader/Rhaenyra Targaryen

- Note: Reader is a Dragonslayer (a warrior) that saves Rhaeyra's child and fights for her. This is based on the request below, with my own twist in it, and it's the result of the votes that ended yesterday:

- Rating: Mature 16+ (last part will be rated higher)

- Word count: 8 000+

- Next part: 2

- Tag(s): @sachaa-ff

- A/N: male!reader/Rhaenyra Targaryen is currently under construction. It will be posted once the second part of this work is out. Also, for more of my works visit my blog.

The storm rages fiercely over Storm's End, the winds howling through the stone walls of the castle like a restless beast. You stand in the shadowed alcove, your eyes tracking the young prince as he dismounts from his dragon, Arrax. The creature’s scales gleam wet in the flickering torchlight, its eyes wide with agitation. The beast feels it, the looming presence of something much older and much deadlier. You know without looking that it is Vhagar, the monstrous she-dragon that casts her shadow over the stormy skies.

Lucerys Velaryon, the boy prince, has the look of a cornered deer as he glances around the courtyard, his gaze inevitably drawn to the dark silhouette of Vhagar looming ominously in the distance. His heart beats wildly in his chest, his breath coming in shallow gasps. The dragon he rides is no match for the ancient beast that waits, almost as if it hungers for the boy’s fear.

But it is not Vhagar that makes Arrax twitch nervously, shifting its massive claws on the slick stone ground. No, there is something else—another presence that unnerves both dragons. A primal fear ripples through the air, a fear that runs deeper than any rivalry between dragonriders.

You know what they feel. It is the Banshee, your mount, your companion. She lies in the caves beneath the castle, her leathery wings folded, her shriek an unspoken warning to all dragons that a Dragonslayer is near. You’ve ridden her across the skies of Essos, and now you have brought her to this cold, storm-battered land, a place so different from the sunlit shores of your origin.

As Lucerys is escorted into the great hall, you follow silently, a shadow among the guards, your steps barely a whisper against the stone. The hall is dimly lit, the flames flickering in their sconces as the storm rumbles outside. Lord Borros Baratheon sits upon his chair, his face a thundercloud of displeasure, while Aemond Targaryen stands off to the side, his single eye gleaming with malicious intent.

“Prince Lucerys Velaryon,” Borros announces with a voice as heavy as the storm, “sent by your mother, the Queen.”

Lucerys takes a breath, standing tall as he faces the Lord of Storm's End. His voice is steady as he presents his mother’s terms, but you can see the tremor in his hands, the boy struggling to maintain his composure under the weight of the situation.

Aemond steps forward, his presence dark and threatening, a cruel smile playing on his lips. “You’re a brave boy to come here alone, nephew,” he sneers, his hand hovering near the hilt of his sword. “But bravery only goes so far. You owe me an eye.”

The demand hangs in the air like the threat of lightning. Lucerys’ eyes widen, his breath catching as the terror grips him. He steps back, his hand instinctively moving to his sword, though you can see he knows it is futile. 

Aemond’s voice drips with venom as he draws closer, reaching for the sapphire in his empty eye socket. “Don’t be afraid, boy. It’s a simple thing, really. Just a payment for what was stolen from me.”

Your movement is like a shadow across the floor as you step out from your place against the wall, your boots making soft, deliberate sounds against the stone. Aemond’s attention snaps to you, curiosity flashing in his eye as he sees a figure unlike any other in this hall.

“Who are you?” Aemond demands, his voice tinged with both suspicion and interest. The hall seems to quiet, even the storm outside pausing as if to hear your reply.

Lord Borros rises from his chair, turning his gaze to you, and his expression is a mixture of awe and unease. “This is the emissary from the Free Cities,” he says, his voice uncertain. “She arrived a few days ago, from across the Narrow Sea. An emissary, she claimed, from an ancient order.”

You tilt your head slightly, regarding Aemond with those eyes of yours, eyes that many have said carry the weight of ancient knowledge, of secrets lost to time. When you speak, your accent is thick, your voice smooth, yet carrying a hardness beneath it, like a blade wrapped in silk. “The boy will return to his mother,” you state, your tone leaving no room for argument.

Aemond’s eye narrows, his curiosity turning to annoyance. “You think to order me around in my own land? I am a Targaryen, the blood of the dragon. And you—what are you?”

“I am Y/N,” you say simply, letting the name hang in the air, as though it should explain everything. And to those who know, it does. “And I have no interest in your games, dragonrider. The boy leaves. Now.”

Lucerys looks at you with wide eyes, relief and confusion mixing on his young face. He knows not who you are, nor why you would intercede on his behalf, but he knows better than to question the chance at survival you offer.

Aemond, however, is less easily swayed. “You do not command me, woman,” he snarls, his hand finally gripping his sword hilt.

Your eyes lock onto his, and there is a cold, ancient fury in your gaze that makes Aemond pause, just for a moment. “Do you hear that?” you ask softly, almost a whisper.

He frowns, confusion crossing his features. But then he does hear it—a low, keening wail, barely audible over the storm, but there nonetheless. It is a sound that twists something deep in his chest, a primal fear that is older than his bloodline, older than even the dragons themselves.

“That,” you continue, your voice never rising, yet commanding all attention, “is a Banshee’s call. Do you know what it means, dragonrider?”

Aemond doesn’t answer, his grip tightening on his sword. But you see it, the flicker of doubt in his eye, the instinctive fear that his ancestors would have known all too well.

“It means,” you say, taking a step closer to the prince, “that the Dragonslayers are near.”

Silence falls heavy in the hall, the only sound the storm raging outside and that distant, eerie wail of your mount. Aemond’s confidence wavers, just for a heartbeat, and you seize the moment.

“Return to your mother, boy,” you say to Lucerys, your tone softening slightly as you address the prince. “And tell her the Dragonslayers have not forgotten.”

Lucerys doesn’t hesitate. He turns and strides from the hall, the guards parting before him. Aemond watches him go, his eye flicking between you and the retreating prince, torn between pride and the icy fear that grips his heart.

As the doors close behind Lucerys, Aemond turns back to you, but you are already gone, melted back into the shadows of the storm. The Banshee’s wail echoes in his ears, a sound that will haunt him long after this night has passed.

And in the distance, through the storm and the dark, Lucerys Velaryon rides his dragon into the night, the words of a stranger echoing in his mind as he returns to his mother—a warning, a promise, and a name that will not be easily forgotten.

The storm's fury is unrelenting as Vhagar takes to the skies, her wings cutting through the tempest with the power of a creature that has lived through centuries. Beneath her, the world is a blur of rain and lightning, the roar of the wind nearly drowning out the beat of her wings. Aemond’s eye is fixed on the smaller silhouette ahead, the young prince Lucerys and his dragon, Arrax. His pride, his rage, they drive him forward with a singular, furious intent.

"Do you think you can escape me, boy?" Aemond mutters to himself, the thrill of the hunt coursing through his veins. His grip on the reins tightens as he urges Vhagar onward, the ancient beast responding to his will, her massive form gaining on the fleeing dragon.

But then, something shifts.

It begins with Vhagar. The she-dragon, who has known no fear in over a century, falters mid-flight. Her great head swivels, nostrils flaring as if sensing something that doesn’t belong in this world. A deep, rumbling growl escapes her throat, a sound of unease that Aemond has never heard from her before.

"What is it, girl?" Aemond calls out, his voice straining against the storm, frustration creeping in as Vhagar slows her pursuit. He yanks at the reins, but the dragon resists, her great body twisting in the air as if trying to turn away from something unseen.

Then it comes—a sound like no other. Piercing, shrill, it cuts through the storm with an unnatural clarity. A cry that chills the blood, a scream not of any living thing, but of something that should never have existed. Aemond feels it like a knife in his gut, a primal fear that shakes the core of even a Targaryen prince. Vhagar responds with a bellow of her own, but this is not a sound of defiance—it is one of terror.

Through the torrential rain and flashes of lightning, Aemond sees it. Emerging from the swirling clouds above, the Banshee appears, its form massive and menacing, a creature out of nightmares and ancient legends. It is larger than any dragon, its wings long and leathery, resembling those of some dark, twisted bat. Its body is sinewy and powerful, covered in scales as dark as midnight, its maw filled with razor-sharp teeth that seem made to tear through dragon flesh. Eyes that glow with a sickly green light fixate on Vhagar, and in that gaze, there is nothing but hunger.

A hunger that could swallow the world.

The Banshee shrieks again, and this time, the sound is closer, more intense, reverberating through the storm as if the very heavens themselves are crying out in fear. Vhagar roars back, but her voice wavers, no longer the dominant force of the skies. She tries to pull away, her vast wings beating furiously as she begins to ascend, desperate to escape the horror that has locked its gaze upon her.

And there, atop the Banshee, you sit. The storm whips around you, yet you are steady, your body moving fluidly with the creature’s every motion. Your eyes are fixed on Aemond, a cold determination set in your features as you close in. The distance between the two monstrous creatures shrinks with every heartbeat, the Banshee’s speed unnatural, as if it is not bound by the same laws of the world as other beings.

"Vhagar, no!" Aemond shouts, desperation creeping into his voice as he feels his mount’s fear, her once obedient nature slipping through his control. He pulls harder on the reins, but the ancient dragon does not heed him. She banks sharply to the side, attempting to flee, the instinct to survive overpowering all else. 

"Stay and fight, damn you!" Aemond roars, but his voice is lost to the storm and to Vhagar’s terror. For the first time, Aemond realizes that he has lost control. Vhagar, the greatest of all dragons, is fleeing like a hunted beast.

From behind, Lucerys and Arrax, seeing their chance, dart downwards toward the safety of the clouds below. The boy doesn’t look back, but his heart pounds with both fear and gratitude, his only thought now of returning to Dragonstone and the safety of his mother’s arms. The storm swallows them, the smaller dragon vanishing into the darkness, seizing the slim opportunity for escape that has been granted by the terror you’ve unleashed.

You see this, the boy’s escape, and though you could chase, though you could end him as well, your focus remains on Aemond. This is a message, a warning, and it is Vhagar who must carry it back. 

Aemond’s face twists with a mix of rage and helplessness as he feels Vhagar’s massive body turning, wings beating harder now, not in pursuit, but in retreat. You let out a command, your voice carried by the storm, not in words that Aemond understands, but the Banshee does. She dives, a predatory speed that belies her size, closing the distance between them in seconds.

Another scream from the Banshee, and this time, Vhagar shudders violently, nearly throwing Aemond from her back. The ancient dragon, who has seen countless battles and burned entire cities to ash, is utterly broken by the presence of this creature from a bygone era. She dives desperately, fleeing into the clouds, seeking any refuge from the horror that chases her.

For a brief moment, as you pull back, allowing Vhagar to escape into the storm’s embrace, your eyes meet Aemond’s. In that gaze, he sees something that shakes him more than the sight of the Banshee or the fear in Vhagar’s eyes. He sees the cold, unyielding power of an order thought extinct, a legacy that has returned from the shadows of history. 

And then you and the Banshee vanish into the storm, your form melding with the darkness as if you were never there. Only the lingering echoes of that terrifying scream remain, fading into the storm, a sound that will haunt Aemond for the rest of his days.

Vhagar continues her frantic flight, the once-proud dragon now reduced to a fleeing beast, her rider clinging to her, his pride shattered, his mind reeling. Aemond’s thoughts are a whirlwind of anger, fear, and humiliation. He came to these skies with the intent to prove his dominance, to assert his strength, but now he returns with the bitter taste of defeat and the knowledge that there are forces in this world even dragons fear.

And far below, Lucerys and Arrax race through the storm towards the safety of Dragonstone, the boy’s heart pounding with relief and terror. He will make it home, but the memory of this night will stay with him—the night he was spared not by his own hand, but by a mysterious stranger on a creature of nightmares.

The Dragonslayers have returned. And the dragons of Westeros will never be the same.

The skies over Dragonstone are dark, heavy with the remnants of the storm that raged over Storm's End. The air is filled with unease as the guards and retainers of the castle stand vigilantly on the battlements, their eyes scanning the horizon. They know who they are waiting for, though they dare not speak of the dread that gnaws at them.

Suddenly, through the mists and rain, a shape emerges. A dragon, smaller than most, with wet and weary wings straining to keep it aloft. Arrax lands heavily in the courtyard, his scales slick with rain and his breath labored from the flight. The beast's eyes are wide, pupils darting in a way that betrays its fear. 

Atop him, Lucerys Velaryon sits slumped in the saddle, his small form trembling, soaked to the bone. He barely has the strength to dismount, nearly collapsing as his boots touch the ground. His hands are shaking uncontrollably, and his eyes—those eyes that should be bright with the fire of youth—are wide and haunted, filled with the terror of what he has just endured.

From across the courtyard, Queen Rhaenyra breaks from her retinue of Queensguard, her heart seizing as she sees the state of her son. “Luke!” she cries, her voice cracking with fear and relief as she rushes to him, her skirts billowing as she nearly stumbles in her haste.

“Mother,” Lucerys gasps, his voice a whisper against the wind. He’s shivering violently, his teeth chattering as the cold and fear clutch at him.

Rhaenyra reaches him, wrapping him in her arms, her grip firm and protective as she pulls him close, heedless of the rain that soaks through her own clothing. Her heart pounds in her chest as she feels the tremors racking his small frame. “Gods, what happened?” she whispers, her hand cupping his face as she tries to meet his eyes, searching for any sign of injury, any indication of what has terrified her son so deeply.

Lucerys buries his face against her shoulder, his breath hitching as he tries to find the words. “I—I saw him, Mother,” he begins, his voice shaking as badly as his body. “Aemond was there… at Storm’s End. Vhagar was with him.”

Rhaenyra stiffens, her blood turning to ice at the mention of Aemond and his dragon. “Did he harm you?” Her voice is fierce, though a mother’s terror lies just beneath it. “What did he do to you?”

Lucerys shakes his head frantically, clutching at her arms as if grounding himself in her presence. “He… he wanted to take my eye, Mother. He said… he said it was a debt. But…” His words trail off, his breath catching as he struggles to explain the horror he witnessed.

Rhaenyra’s grip tightens, her eyes narrowing with a mixture of rage and fear. “But what, Luke? What happened?”

Luke pulls back slightly, his wide eyes meeting hers, filled with a confusion that mirrors his terror. “She… she saved me, Mother. A woman… a stranger. She stopped Aemond.”

Rhaenyra blinks, her mind racing. “A woman? Who was she? What did she look like?”

Luke swallows hard, his voice trembling as he continues, “She… she wasn’t from here. She looked… different. Like no one I’ve ever seen before. She had an accent I didn’t recognize. Lord Borros called her an emissary from the Free Cities.” His voice drops to a whisper, as if saying the next words might summon the creature back. “And she had a… a beast with her. Not a dragon, but something else. It was… it was terrifying, Mother. The dragons, even Vhagar… they were afraid of it.”

Rhaenyra’s heart pounds faster as she listens, trying to make sense of her son’s words. “A beast? What did it look like?”

Luke’s eyes glaze over slightly as he recalls the image burned into his mind. “It was… huge, bigger than any dragon I’ve seen, with wings like… like a bat’s. And its scream, Mother… it was like nothing I’ve ever heard. It made the storm itself seem quiet. And she was riding it… commanding it.”

Rhaenyra’s blood runs cold, her mind racing through the possibilities, but nothing matches the description her son gives. A creature that could frighten Vhagar, the largest and oldest of the Targaryen dragons? It sounds like a nightmare given form, a horror from ancient times.

“Are you sure of what you saw, Luke?” she asks gently, her tone softening as she brushes his wet hair from his face. “Could it have been… something else? A trick of the storm?”

Luke shakes his head vehemently. “No, Mother. I saw it. I heard it. She told me to go, to return to you. And when I left… Aemond was chasing me, but then the creature came after him instead. Vhagar fled, Mother. She was terrified.”

Rhaenyra’s eyes widen, a shiver running down her spine at the thought. If Vhagar, the mightiest of all dragons, could be driven to flee… what manner of beast had her son encountered? And who was this woman, this stranger who had saved her child from a fate worse than death?

A feeling of unease settles over her, a realization that something far greater and more dangerous than she had anticipated is at play. The knowledge that ancient powers, long thought to be myths, might have returned to the world shakes her to her core.

But for now, all that matters is her son. She pulls him close again, holding him tightly as if to shield him from whatever darkness lies out there, whatever force has set its sights on the Targaryen bloodline. “You’re safe now,” she whispers, trying to convince herself as much as him. “You’re home, and you’re safe.”

But even as she says the words, her mind is already racing ahead, planning, fearing, wondering what this new player on the board means for the future of her house, for her claim, and for the survival of her children.

The night is still and heavy with the remnants of the storm, the winds howling softly through the dark corridors of Dragonstone. Rhaenyra is deep in a restless sleep, her mind troubled by the events of the day, her dreams haunted by the image of her son, drenched and trembling, speaking of a beast that defied all she knew of the world.

But suddenly, her sleep is shattered by a sound so primal, so raw, that it feels like the earth itself is tearing apart. The roar of dragons, rising in a cacophony of fear and fury, echoes through the stone walls of the castle. It’s not just any dragon’s roar—it’s the sound of dragons in terror. Rhaenyra bolts upright in her bed, her heart pounding in her chest as the walls seem to tremble around her.

She hears another roar, louder this time, unmistakable in its ferocity—the Cannibal. The ancient, wild dragon’s scream is so powerful that it seems to shake the very foundations of Dragonstone. The deep, guttural sound reverberates through the castle, making the torches flicker as if the flame itself is afraid.

And then, cutting through the night like a blade, comes another sound—a wail, high-pitched and unnatural, unlike anything she’s ever heard. It’s the cry of the Banshee, echoing through the skies above the island, a sound so filled with dread that it makes her blood run cold.

Rhaenyra leaps from her bed, pulling on a robe as she rushes toward the door. Her heart races, a mix of fear and adrenaline driving her forward. She flings open the door, her voice breaking the silence of the corridor. “Daemon!”

As if summoned by her cry, Daemon Targaryen appears, already dressed and armed, his face set in a grim expression. He doesn’t need to ask what’s happening—the screams of the dragons and the wail from the skies tell him all he needs to know.

“They’re afraid,” Daemon says, his voice rough with tension as he strides toward her, his eyes blazing. “The dragons are terrified, Rhaenyra. Whatever it is, it’s here.”

Rhaenyra nods, her breath coming in shallow gasps as she hurries to follow him. The two of them rush through the castle, Daemon’s men falling in around them, their faces pale as they hear the screams that fill the night. The ground beneath their feet seems to tremble as if the very earth is trying to recoil from the presence that has arrived on its shores.

They reach the courtyard just as another roar shakes the air, but this time it’s different. This time, it’s a sound of submission, of retreat. In the distance, high atop Dragonmont, the dragons that make their home in the ancient volcano are pulling back, their massive forms retreating into the dark, smoke-filled caves, away from the open sky. Even the Cannibal, the most feared and untamed of all the dragons, has gone silent, its defiance turned to fear.

Rhaenyra’s eyes follow the direction of the retreating dragons, and there, near the rocky coastline, she sees it—the Banshee. It stands on the blackened sand, its vast wings partially spread, casting an ominous shadow that stretches out over the churning waves. The creature is even more terrifying than she had imagined from Lucerys’ description, a monstrous form that seems to absorb the darkness around it, its eyes glowing with that sickly green light that cuts through the night.

And before the Banshee, standing with an air of calm command, is the woman—Y/N. She stands tall, her presence as formidable as the beast behind her, her eyes fixed on the castle. Even from this distance, Rhaenyra can see the confidence in her stance, the ease with which she controls the horror at her side.

Daemon’s hand moves to the hilt of his sword as he stares at the woman and her beast, his eyes narrowing in a mix of fury and awe. “Is this the creature the boy spoke of?” he asks, his voice low and dangerous.

Rhaenyra nods, unable to tear her gaze from the sight. “It is,” she whispers, her voice tinged with fear and a growing sense of foreboding. “And that… that is the woman who saved him.”

Daemon takes a step forward, his gaze shifting to Caraxes, who is visible in the distance, his great head peeking out from the entrance of his cave. The Blood Wyrm, who has faced down dragons and men alike, recoils, his body pressed low to the ground as if trying to melt into the rock itself. He refuses to come forward, his instincts telling him that this is not a foe he wishes to face.

Rhaenyra watches as Daemon's knuckles turn white around the hilt of his sword. “Even Caraxes is afraid,” he mutters, almost to himself. “What manner of beast is this? And who is this woman?”

Before Rhaenyra can respond, Y/N takes a step forward, moving with a grace that belies the danger she embodies. Her voice carries across the distance, strong and clear despite the howling wind. “I come not as an enemy, but as an emissary.”

Rhaenyra feels a shiver run down her spine at the sound of the woman’s voice. There is something in it, an authority, a power that feels ancient, something that commands respect and fear in equal measure. She steps forward, placing a hand on Daemon’s arm to still him, her eyes never leaving Y/N.

“You saved my son,” Rhaenyra calls out, her voice steady, though her heart is pounding in her chest. “Why?”

Y/N’s gaze meets hers, and for a moment, Rhaenyra feels as though she’s being weighed, measured by a force that sees far beyond the physical. “Because the time has come for old debts to be paid, and old alliances to be rekindled,” Y/N replies, her accent unfamiliar, each word carrying an air of inevitability.

Daemon steps forward, his posture rigid, every muscle coiled with tension. “What are you?” he demands, his tone edged with suspicion. “And what do you want from us?”

Y/N regards him calmly, her eyes as unreadable as the stormy sea behind her. “I am the last of the Dragonslayers,” she says, her words cutting through the air like a blade. “And I seek what was lost to time—an alliance, forged in blood and fire, that will reshape the fate of the Seven Kingdoms.”

Rhaenyra’s breath catches at the mention of the Dragonslayers. The name is one of legend, spoken of only in whispers, a myth more than a reality. Yet here stands proof, undeniable and terrifying. “An alliance?” she echoes, her voice a mix of intrigue and caution. “With whom?”

Y/N’s gaze sharpens, and a ghost of a smile touches her lips. “With House Targaryen,” she says, the name carrying weight as if it alone could alter the course of history. “If you will accept it.”

The words hang in the air, filled with promise and threat alike. Rhaenyra and Daemon exchange a look, the gravity of what is being offered sinking in. The roar of the dragons has died away, leaving only the sound of the wind and the waves crashing against the rocks.

The Banshee shifts behind Y/N, its wings rustling like the ominous whisper of death itself. Rhaenyra takes a deep breath, stepping forward, her voice firm as she speaks. “Come inside,” she says, a queen’s command, but also an invitation. “We will speak more.”

Y/N inclines her head slightly, a gesture of acknowledgment, before turning to her beast. With a simple, fluid motion, she mounts the Banshee, the creature responding to her touch with a soft, almost affectionate growl. “I will come,” she says, her voice carrying across the distance. “But know this, Queen Rhaenyra—what I bring is not just an alliance, but the power to change the very destiny of your house.”

With that, the Banshee lets out one last, bone-chilling wail that echoes across the island. The creature takes to the skies, its massive wings beating against the wind as it rises into the air, carrying its rider away from the shore and into the stormy night.

Rhaenyra watches as the dark silhouette disappears into the clouds, her mind racing with a thousand questions, her heart heavy with the knowledge that whatever comes next, it will be like nothing Westeros has ever seen.

Daemon stands beside her, his eyes still fixed on the sky where the Banshee vanished. “We must be ready,” he says quietly, his voice laced with both determination and unease. “Whatever she brings, it will not be easily controlled.”

Rhaenyra nods, her gaze steely as she turns back toward the castle, already thinking of the steps she must take, the alliances she must forge, and the preparations she must make. “Then we shall be ready,” she replies, her voice firm with resolve. “For House Targaryen will not be brought low, not by dragons, and not by beasts.”

Together, they walk back into the heart of Dragonstone, the weight of their decisions pressing heavily upon them, the storm outside now a mere whisper compared to the storm that is yet to come.

The great hall of Dragonstone is eerily quiet, the only sound the occasional crackle of the fire in the hearth, its flames dancing in the dim light. The storm outside has settled into a steady, rhythmic beat against the stone walls, as if the very island holds its breath, waiting for what comes next.

Daemon Targaryen stands by the fire, his eyes fixed on the flames, deep in thought. The warmth of the fire does little to chase away the cold unease that has settled in his bones since the arrival of the stranger and her beast. Rhaenyra sits at the head of the table, her posture regal and composed, though her gaze is sharp and searching as it rests on the woman before them—Y/N, the self-proclaimed last of the Dragonslayers.

You stand before them, calm and composed, the flickering firelight casting shadows across your face. Your expression is inscrutable, your eyes reflecting a depth of experience and knowledge that stretches far beyond the walls of this ancient castle.

Daemon finally speaks, his voice low, but filled with the weight of old memories. “When I was a boy, I used to sit at my wet nurse’s feet as she told me the tales of old Valyria. Stories of dragons soaring above the world, of their might and majesty… and of the terror that once threatened them.” He turns his gaze from the fire to you, his eyes narrowing slightly. “She spoke of the Dragonslayers, warriors from an ancient order, born from the fear and hatred of those who had no other means to fight back against the dragons. It was said their beasts were as fearsome as the dragons themselves—monstrous creatures that could strike terror into the heart of even the most battle-hardened Targaryen.”

He pauses, his lips curving into a wry smile that doesn’t reach his eyes. “But those were just stories. Tales meant to frighten children and remind us of our place in the world. When the Doom of Valyria came, the Dragonslayers were said to have perished along with the dragons. Swallowed by the same flames that consumed the Freehold.”

Daemon’s smile fades, replaced by a hard, calculating look. “So you must excuse me, Lady Y/N, if I find it difficult to believe that I now stand face to face with a ghost from those old tales. A Dragonslayer, here to negotiate with the very people her kind once hunted. It seems… unlikely, doesn’t it? Like a dragon holding court with a woman who eats dragons.”

Rhaenyra watches you intently, her fingers lightly drumming against the arm of her chair as she waits for your response. The tension in the room is felt, the air thick with unspoken questions and unvoiced fears.

You meet Daemon’s gaze without flinching, your expression unreadable as you consider his words. When you finally speak, your voice is steady, carrying an authority that demands attention. “You are right to be cautious, Prince Daemon. The tales of the Dragonslayers are shrouded in myth, and much has been lost to time. But make no mistake—those tales were born from truth. My order existed long before Valyria rose to power, and our purpose was never simply to destroy dragons.”

You pause, your eyes flicking between Daemon and Rhaenyra, measuring their reactions. “Our purpose was—and still is—balance. The world must be in balance, or it risks falling into chaos. The dragons of Valyria were a force of nature, powerful and wild. But when they were allowed to spread unchecked, to conquer and dominate, the balance was threatened.”

Rhaenyra leans forward slightly, her brow furrowed in thought. “And now? What is your purpose here, in Westeros? You say you seek balance, but what does that mean for my house? For my children?”

You turn your gaze to her, your expression softening slightly as you consider your words carefully. “The balance is delicate, Queen Rhaenyra. It is not my intention to see the dragons of Westeros wiped out. That would tip the scales too far in the other direction. The dragons are a part of this world, just as you are, just as I am. But if they are allowed to overwhelm this continent, to destroy all in their path, or if they are allowed to die out entirely, the balance will be lost. And when the balance is lost, it is not just the dragons that suffer—it is the entire world.”

Daemon’s eyes narrow as he considers your words, his hand resting on the hilt of his sword, though he makes no move to draw it. “So you would see yourself as some kind of guardian, then? A protector of the balance? And what if that means turning against the very dragons you claim to protect?”

You meet his challenge with a steady gaze. “If it comes to that, Prince Daemon, then so be it. But understand this—my purpose is not to hunt dragons for sport or to seek vengeance for old wrongs. My purpose is to ensure that the world does not fall into chaos. If that means working with the dragons and their riders to maintain the balance, then that is what I will do.”

Rhaenyra exchanges a glance with Daemon, her expression one of deep contemplation. “And what would you ask of us, then?” she inquires, her tone thoughtful, though there is a note of steel beneath it. “What role do you see House Targaryen playing in this balance you speak of?”

You take a deep breath, your gaze steady as you address both of them. “House Targaryen is at the center of the storm that is coming. The dragons you command are both a weapon and a symbol, and their power must be wielded wisely. I offer you an alliance, a way to ensure that power is used to preserve the balance, rather than disrupt it.”

Daemon raises an eyebrow, his skepticism still evident. “And if we refuse?”

You smile faintly, a hint of something ancient and knowing in your expression. “Then the balance will be lost. And I will do what must be done to restore it, with or without your cooperation.”

Silence falls over the room, the weight of your words sinking in. Rhaenyra’s eyes flicker with a mix of emotions—fear, determination, and something akin to respect. She finally rises from her chair, stepping toward you, her gaze unwavering.

“You speak of balance, but know this—we are not easily swayed, and we do not take threats lightly,” she says, her voice strong and clear. “But if you are truly here to preserve this balance, then we will consider your offer. For the sake of our children, and for the future of this realm.”

You incline your head slightly, acknowledging her words. “That is all I ask, Queen Rhaenyra. Consider my offer, and know that I am not your enemy. Not unless you make me one.”

Daemon watches you closely, his hand still resting on his sword, but for now, he remains silent, his thoughts unreadable.

Rhaenyra turns to him, her expression one of quiet resolve. “We will speak more of this, Daemon. But for now, we must be cautious. This alliance may be what we need to ensure the survival of our house.”

Daemon nods slowly, his gaze still locked on you. “Very well,” he says, his voice low and thoughtful. “But know this, Lady Y/N—if you betray us, if you threaten what is ours, you will find that dragons are not so easily tamed.”

You smile slightly, a knowing glint in your eyes. “Nor are Dragonslayers, Prince Daemon. But I hope it does not come to that.”

With that, the tension in the room begins to ease, though the underlying unease remains. The fire crackles softly in the hearth, and the storm outside continues to rage, a reminder that the true storm has only just begun.

The night has settled over Dragonstone with a profound stillness, the earlier storm having finally exhausted itself. The air is cool and crisp, carrying the scent of the sea, and above, the sky is a vast canvas of stars, twinkling like distant, forgotten fires. The castle itself is quiet, the flames of the torches flickering softly in their sconces, casting long shadows across the ancient stone.

Rhaenyra finds herself drawn to the open balcony, her steps light as she moves through the corridors, her thoughts still heavy with the weight of the day’s revelations. As she approaches, she sees you standing there, your back to her, gazing up at the night sky with a stillness that almost seems inhuman. The soft light of the stars bathes you in an ethereal glow, and for a moment, Rhaenyra is struck by your presence. There is something otherworldly about you, a beauty that is both mesmerizing and unsettling, even to one of Targaryen blood, who is no stranger to the idea of beings who are not entirely of this world.

Your figure is tall and graceful, your hair catching the faint light as it moves gently in the breeze. Your clothes, simple yet elegant, seem almost to blend with the shadows, as if you are a part of the night itself. There is an air of timelessness about you, something ancient and enduring, and it stirs a deep curiosity within Rhaenyra, a need to understand the enigma that is Y/N.

You speak before she can announce her presence, your voice soft but clear, carrying the weight of knowledge and memory. “It is said that my people came from those stars,” you begin, still gazing upward, your eyes tracing the patterns in the sky. “Long ago, when the world was young, their ship crumbled down in fire, crashing into what would become the Valyrian Freehold. Can you imagine it, Rhaenyra? A ship that sails among the stars, crossing the vast emptiness between worlds?”

Rhaenyra pauses at your words, her breath catching as she considers the image you’ve painted. The idea is both wondrous and terrifying, something beyond the scope of anything she has ever known. She steps closer, her eyes moving from your figure to the sky above, trying to see what you see.

“It’s a beautiful thought,” she says softly, “but also a frightening one. The idea that something so vast, so unknowable, could exist out there. Or worse, that there might be nothing at all. We would be so small… so insignificant.”

You finally turn to face her, your eyes meeting hers with a look that is both kind and ancient, as if you hold secrets that span the ages. “That is the truth of it, isn’t it? The vastness of the universe, the endless expanse of stars… it can make one feel so very small. All the battles we fight, all the kingdoms we build… in the end, they are but whispers in the wind compared to the forces that drive this world and all the others.”

Rhaenyra’s gaze softens as she looks at you, the intensity of your words resonating deep within her. She takes another step closer, her voice tinged with gratitude as she speaks. “I wanted to thank you… for what you did for Lucerys. You saved my son’s life. For that, I am in your debt.”

You incline your head slightly, acknowledging her thanks with a faint smile. “What I did was just,” you reply simply, as if there could be no other course of action. “The boy’s life was not meant to end that day.”

Rhaenyra studies you, her curiosity growing, fueled by the mysteriousness that surrounds you. She has faced dragons and men alike, but there is something about you that captivates her in a way she does not fully understand. “You said you were the last of your kind,” she begins, her voice gentle but probing. “Does that mean you have no family left?”

You turn back to the sky, your expression unreadable as you consider her question. “There are a few others of my order,” you say after a moment, your voice touched with a hint of melancholy. “They are scattered across the world, trying to survive as best they can. But they are not of my blood. My true family… they are gone.”

Rhaenyra feels a pang of sympathy at your words, a sudden connection to the pain you carry. She knows the weight of loss, the emptiness it leaves behind. “I am sorry,” she says quietly, her voice filled with genuine compassion. “To be the last of your kind… it must be a heavy burden.”

You nod slightly, your gaze distant as you continue to stare at the stars. “It is,” you admit, your voice softening with the weight of memory. “But it is the burden I was born to bear. The last of my bloodline, the last of those who once stood against the might of dragons. My family was everything to me… and now, they are nothing but memories and dust.”

Rhaenyra steps closer, standing beside you now, her gaze also turning upward to the stars. She feels a strange sense of kinship with you, this woman who has seen so much, who carries so much pain within her. “I understand what it is to lose those you love,” she says quietly, her voice filled with a sadness that mirrors your own. “I have lost many, and I fear I may lose more before this is over.”

You turn to her, your eyes searching hers, seeing the strength and sorrow within her. “That is the way of the world, Rhaenyra,” you say softly, your tone both comforting and resigned. “We are all bound by the same fate—loss, pain, and eventually, death. But it is what we do with the time we have, the choices we make, that define us. We must find the strength to carry on, even when all seems lost.”

Rhaenyra nods, her heart heavy with the truth of your words. She takes a deep breath, trying to steady herself, to find the resolve she needs to face the challenges ahead. “I will do what I must,” she says, her voice filled with quiet determination. “For my family, for my children… for the future of this realm.”

You give her a small, understanding smile, a flicker of something almost like pride in your eyes. “You have the strength within you, Rhaenyra Targaryen,” you say, your voice firm with conviction. “I see it, just as I see the stars above. You are meant to be more than a queen—you are meant to be a force that shapes the world.”

Rhaenyra feels a surge of emotion at your words, a mix of fear, hope, and a deep, unspoken bond with this woman who seems to understand her better than anyone. She looks back at you, her gaze filled with both gratitude and a growing respect. “And what of you, Y/N?” she asks softly. “What is your place in this world, now that you are the last of your kind?”

You turn away from the stars to meet her gaze once more, your expression resolute. “My place is wherever I am needed,” you say simply. “I will do what must be done to preserve the balance, to ensure that this world does not fall into chaos. Whether that means standing beside you, or against you, remains to be seen.”

Rhaenyra nods slowly, understanding the gravity of your words. She feels a deep respect for you, for the strength and resolve you carry, and she knows that your path and hers are now intertwined, whether by fate or by choice. 

For a moment, the two of you stand together in silence, gazing up at the stars, each lost in your own thoughts, yet connected by the shared understanding of the burdens you bear. The night is a vast and heavy dread of what lies ahead, but in this moment, there is a sense of calm, of quiet resolution, as if the stars themselves have blessed this fragile alliance.

The morning sun has risen over Dragonstone, casting a warm, golden glow across the ancient stone walls and the restless sea beyond. The storm of the previous night has left the air fresh and crisp, with only a few lingering clouds on the horizon. The castle is stirring with life, as servants go about their duties and the guards stand watchful at their posts.

You are standing in the courtyard, the early light catching in your hair, giving it a strange, almost ethereal sheen. You are calm, composed, your posture relaxed as you watch the sea, seemingly lost in thought. The events of the previous night, the tension, and the conversations have left their mark, but you show no outward sign of it. You stand there, a figure of quiet strength, almost as if you belong to another time, another world.

Luke approaches you cautiously, his small feet making soft sounds against the stone. He is dressed in simple, practical clothing, appropriate for the heir of a noble house, but his expression is one of nervousness and gratitude. His young face is still pale from the fear of his encounter at Storm's End, but there is also determination in his eyes, a resolve to confront what haunts him.

He stops a few paces away from you, hesitant at first. “Lady Y/N,” he begins, his voice small but earnest. “I… I wanted to thank you. For what you did at Storm’s End. You saved my life.”

You turn to him, a gentle smile curving your lips as you look down at the boy. There is a kindness in your eyes that seems to ease his nerves, though the depth of your gaze still holds a mystery that he cannot quite grasp. “You owe me no thanks, young prince,” you say softly, your voice steady and warm. “I did what was just.”

Luke swallows, glancing down at the ground for a moment before looking back up at you. “But… Aemond,” he continues, his voice trembling slightly at the name. “He won’t forget what you did. He’ll come after you. He won’t stop until… until he gets what he wants.”

You regard him with calm assurance, unbothered by the warning. There is a quiet power in the way you stand, as if the threats of men and dragons alike hold no sway over you. “Let him come,” you reply, your tone even, as if discussing something as mundane as the weather. “Aemond Targaryen is not the first to seek revenge against me, nor will he be the last. I have faced dragons before, and I have survived them. If he wishes to challenge me, then he will learn that some battles are not so easily won.”

Luke looks at you with a mixture of awe and confusion, struggling to understand the depth of your confidence. He is young, and the world is still a place of fear and uncertainty to him, but your words carry a weight that he cannot ignore. “But… aren’t you afraid?” he asks, his voice barely above a whisper.

You tilt your head slightly, considering the question with a faint smile. “Fear is a natural thing, young prince,” you say gently. “But I have learned that there are things far greater and more terrifying than a man or his dragon. We are all small in the grand scheme of things, and what we fear today may be forgotten tomorrow. What matters is how we face that fear—whether we let it control us, or whether we rise above it.”

Luke nods slowly, taking in your words. There is a wisdom in them that speaks to him, even if he doesn’t fully understand it yet. He looks up at you with a newfound respect, feeling a little braver, a little stronger in your presence. “I’ll remember that,” he says softly, his voice filled with a quiet determination.

As you and Luke speak, Rhaenyra watches from a distance, her eyes flicking toward you every so often. She stands near one of the arches that lead out to the courtyard, her gaze following the interaction between you and her son. There is something in the way she observes you—a mixture of curiosity, admiration, and perhaps a touch of something more that she doesn’t fully acknowledge, even to herself.

Rhaenyra notices the ease with which you speak to Luke, the way your presence seems to calm him, to give him strength. There is a grace in your movements, a calm assurance that draws her attention, almost as if you are a beacon of light in the chaos that surrounds them all. She sees the way Luke looks up at you, his young face filled with awe, and she cannot help but feel the same pull, the same captivation.

She remembers the conversation from the night before, the way you spoke of balance, of the vastness of the universe and the insignificance of their struggles in the grand scheme of things. It had left her feeling both humbled and intrigued, as if she were standing on the edge of some great revelation, something that could change everything she thought she knew.

But now, as she watches you with her son, she sees another side of you—a protector, a guide, someone who understands the fears of a boy and can ease them with nothing more than a few well-chosen words. It is a quality that Rhaenyra cannot help but admire, and it deepens the connection she feels toward you, a bond that is growing stronger with each passing moment.

Luke takes a deep breath, standing a little taller now as he looks up at you. “Thank you, Lady Y/N,” he says, his voice more confident this time. “For everything.”

You nod, giving him a reassuring smile. “You are a brave young man, Luke. Never forget that. The world is a dangerous place, but you have the strength within you to face whatever comes. Trust in that.”

Luke smiles, a small, genuine smile that lights up his face, and then he turns to go, feeling a little more at peace with the world. As he walks away, he glances back at you one last time, as if to hold onto the strength you have given him.

Rhaenyra steps forward as Luke leaves, approaching you with a mixture of caution and curiosity. “He admires you,” she says softly, her voice carrying a note of gratitude and something more, something she does not name.

You turn to her, your expression thoughtful as you meet her gaze. “He is a good boy,” you reply. “He will grow into a strong man, one who will carry the weight of his name with honor. But he is still young, and the world is full of challenges he has yet to face.”

Rhaenyra nods, her eyes lingering on your face, taking in the details of your features, the way the light plays across your skin. There is something almost hypnotic about you, something that draws her in, and she finds herself feeling a connection that she cannot fully explain. “I can see why he admires you,” she says softly, her voice tinged with both respect and something deeper, something that stirs within her like the rising tide.

You hold her gaze, your expression unreadable, but there is a softness in your eyes, a recognition of the connection that is forming between the two of you. “And I can see why you care for him so deeply,” you reply, your voice gentle, almost tender. “He is your son, your legacy. You have given him strength, Rhaenyra, just as you will need to give him guidance in the days to come.”

Rhaenyra nods again, feeling a surge of emotion at your words. There is a bond forming between you, something that goes beyond mere friendship or alliance. It is a connection born of shared understanding, of mutual respect, and perhaps even of something more, something that neither of you is ready to name just yet.

For a moment, the two of you stand there in the courtyard, the world around you falling away as you share a quiet, unspoken understanding. The sun continues to rise, casting its golden light across the castle, and in that light, the bond between you and Rhaenyra grows stronger, deepening with every passing moment.

And in the distance, the sea continues to churn, its waves crashing against the shore, a reminder that the world is vast and full of challenges. But in this moment, on this morning, there is peace, and there is a connection.

[healinghyunjin]

Blossom

Pairing: Kim Seungmin x Reader (fem)

Genre: crack, smut, fluff; historical!AU, magic!AU, fuck-or-die(ish)!AU, enemies(ish)-to-lovers!AU, 18+

Word Count: 6.5k

Warnings: swearing, explicit sexual content, unprotected sex, outdated sexual norms/attitudes, public sex.

Author’s Note: After another ~long~ hiatus... I'm back! The premise of this fic is heavily inspired by a super old, now deleted AO3 fic I once read for a now dead fandom (showing my age here for you children lol). I love navigating these forced interaction scenarios - so please let me know your thoughts! Feedback and reblogs are love as always - and I now have a Ko-Fi that I would really appreciate contributions to as well (linked in my Bio)! Thank you for your support~

Summary: But what this ritual required of you, the High Sorceress, was not just some spellwork or incantations - no, this ritual involved you losing your virginity. To your King - to Seungmin. On the High Table. In front of the entirety of the royal court. 

You were sure you looked like a thundercloud - dark skirts swirling, white sparks crackling from your fingertips - as you stalked through the castle towards the royal chambers.

“Milady!” Changbin chased after you, your long-suffering knight trying his best to head you off. “His Majesty is in a council meeting right now,” he huffed out. “Maybe we can seek an audience another time?”

“I don’t ‘seek audiences’ from His Majesty, Bin,” the title grating in your mouth. “I talk to Kim Seungmin when I want to talk to Kim Seungmin - especially when he wants to pretend like I don’t exist.” 

You were laying it on a bit thick. But you were the High Sorceress. You had no insignificant amount of pride yourself, and nothing made your temper flare like Seungmin outmaneuvering you - exactly like he’d just done. 

You arrived at the heavy wrought iron doors of Seungmin’s private chambers and, with a swish of your palm, sent the doors flying open, almost rattling off their hinges. A tableful of lords turned around to gawk at you - but you only had eyes for the man at the head of the table. He leaned back in his chair, watching you stalk into the room with a barely concealed grin. “And there she is.” The faint note of humor in Seungmin’s voice made you want to wring his neck.

“Your Majesty,” you greeted in the frostiest voice you could muster up. 

Seungmin smirked. “You only use my proper title when you’re fit to rip my throat out, Lady Sorceress.” 

You ignored the barb. “We have an urgent matter to discuss, my lord.”

One of the old, stodgy lords piped up in a reedy, disapproving voice. “What can take precedence over matters of council and state, Sorceress?”

“Matters of national security, Lord Park.” Seungmin rose to his feet, making everyone else jump up to theirs as well. “Council is adjourned, my lords.”

You held your head high as the councilmen streamed out of the room around you, some barely bothering to disguise their resentment. Seungmin sauntered his way around the table, coming to stand right in front of you. You scowled as you inevitably had to tilt your head back just to look into his amused face. 

“You’ve been avoiding me, my witch.” 

“I wasn’t avoiding you,” you snapped back, cringing at how petulant you sounded even to your own ears. 

Of course you’d been avoiding him. Ever since he’d slapped those scrolls down on your worktable a week ago now, you hadn’t been able to think about him without flushing, let alone be in the same room as him. It would be for the good of the people, he’d announced crisply, looking so tall and prim and regal as he towered over you sitting on your little garden stool. I’m sure you won’t see any harm in it. You’d scanned through the parchment, ignoring the scribe’s careful translations to parse the ancient runes yourself. It outlined an ancient magical ritual to replenish the barrier wards for your nation if they ever fell - which they had. But what this ritual required of you, the High Sorceress, was not just some spellwork or incantations - no, this ritual involved you losing your virginity. To your King - to Seungmin. On the High Table. In front of the entirety of the royal court. 

Seungmin snapped you out of your thoughts with a brief “Ahem,” quirking a skeptical eyebrow at you. “I haven’t seen you in a week. Every time I’ve gone to your rooms since the day I gave you those scrolls, you’re conveniently ‘not there,’ and that poor fool,” he flicked a thumb over to point at Changbin, “is stuck trying - and failing - to make excuses for you.”

You shot a glare over at Changbin - he didn’t look sufficiently embarrassed of himself, but you would deal with that later. “Well, I’m here now, my lord. And I’d appreciate it if you could tell me how you unilaterally decided to add ‘Publicly Deflowering the High Witch’ to your agenda for this evening?”

You’d hoped to embarrass Seungmin, browbeat him - like you’d clearly done to Changbin, judging from the choking sound that came from next to you. But you’d underestimated your enemy. 

Seungmin sighed, clasping his arms behind his back. “Because we don’t have a choice in the matter, my dear witch. If you’d allowed me the chance to actually talk to you this week, I could have convinced you of that, and you'd have had time to prepare yourself. But - you didn’t, and so, I had to force your hand.” You shuffled uncomfortably under his piercing stare as he continued. “I know you translated the runes yourself - you know just as well as I do that this ritual needs to be done soon. Now, if we don’t want the Eastern Army taking advantage and invading us as soon as they muster up the forces. But unlike you, my lady - I don’t have the luxury to pretend like this problem will go away if I ignore it.” 

And that was exactly what you hated most about Kim Seungmin. He was smart and logical to a fault - enough so that he’d trained himself to not let pesky emotions get in the way of doing what needed to be done. You on the other hand… the less said the better on that front. 

Before you could snark something back at him or even just bristle up, Seungmin stepped away from you, rubbing his hands together. “Now that that’s been settled, I’m sure you have no more objections. Anyways, you have a busy afternoon ahead of you, Lady Sorceress. I’ve sent several maids to your chambers to help ready you for this evening - I’m sure you remember how exact the runes were in terms of preparation.” Seungmin wasn’t even bothering to hide his grin as he dismissed you with a wave of his hand, striding out of the room. 

That patronizing bastard. You briefly contemplated throwing a fireball at his laughing back - but being executed for treason wasn’t exactly the way you intended to go out. 

With a deep, soul-weary sigh, you turned on your heel to leave, resigning yourself to your fate. 

Of course, if you knew exactly how the rest of your afternoon was going to be spent, you might just have thrown that fireball at Seungmin and gotten it over with. 

After that useless showdown, Changbin frogmarched you back to your rooms, handing you off to an actually intimidating keeper - Chaeryeong, your personal maid. But, to your even greater chagrin, she wasn’t alone. As promised, an army of maids descended on you, all charged with different vicious tasks - stripping your skin bare and smooth with hot sugar paste; kneading various herbal, floral unguents into your skin before dunking you into cold and hot baths; brushing your hair out until it fairly gleamed in the fading sunlight. By the time you were passed off to Chaeryeong for her final inspection, you almost didn’t recognize yourself in the mirror. 

Chaeryeong clicked her tongue approvingly as she walked around you, tightening the laces on your virginal white chemise. “You finally look presentable, milady.”

You bristled. “Are you saying I usually don’t?”

“Last week I had to pull a twig out of your hair before sending you down to supper. There isn’t a single dress of yours that doesn’t have mudstains, milady, and you think a splash of cold water every morning or two is enough to care for your skin.” Chaeryeong looked scandalized.

You rolled your eyes. “Well, I’m glad one of us is satisfied with this situation.”

“You’re not?” 

“Why in the name of the Goddess would I be?”

“Sleeping with a man who’s young, tall, handsome, powerful, wealthy,” Chaeryeong giggled as she counted off each word on her fingers, “isn’t the worst thing in the world, milady.” She flicked you a mischievous glance as she smoothly slid to stand behind you. “Especially when the man in question has a major soft spot for you.”

You scoffed. “Kim Seungmin doesn’t have a soft spot for me, Chae. He can't even be in the same room as me without snarking at me - and I can't remember the last time he actually said anything nice to me.”

Chaeryeong’s fingers stilled in your hair as she stared you down in the mirror. “You really believe that, don’t you?” You arched an eyebrow at her in response. She let out a deep sigh. “For such a brilliant witch… you really can be dense.” She shook her head before reaching over to grab flowers to weave into your hair. “I hope you realize - the one thing standing between him and war is you. Most men - especially a King - would have just tossed you onto that table and had their way with you. And maybe they would have begged your forgiveness and understanding afterwards - maybe, if they were worried about you cursing them into oblivion. No one else would have spent a whole week waiting to try and convince you into doing this willingly.”

You opened your mouth to snap something back in your defense... and realized you had nothing to say. 

“See,” Chaeryeong murmured softly. “Sometimes it feels like you’re… willfully blind to His Majesty’s kindness towards you. He’s always treated you with respect - and made sure you’re treated with respect. I wouldn’t take that for granted, my lady - or ignore what’s behind that mask he puts up all the time.” 

As she put the final touches on your hair, you couldn’t help but reflect on Chaeryeong’s words. You had extraordinary freedom and liberties as the High Sorceress…but no, that wasn’t exactly right. You were given extraordinary freedom and liberties as the High Sorceress - by your King. If it wasn’t for his unwavering support for you - against the Council, against any and all reactionary forces - you wouldn't hold any of the power you did. Sure, he riled you up, jerked you around a bit - and you still hated just how easily he could outwit you. But you were being childish to fixate on that - to lose sight of the forest for the trees. 

“And here’s the final touch.” Chaeryeong sidled up to you with a long scrap of silk in her hands - your blindfold. “You’re not allowed to see His Majesty until the ritual starts.” Her quick fingers made short work of fastening it around your head - and being the jerk that she was, she put it on properly tight, making sure you couldn’t see a thing. “Maybe that’ll teach you to let yourself lean on him for once,” she mused, before pulling you up out of your chair with none too gentle hands. 

Chaeryeong, as always, was right. You were completely unmoored by the loss of your sight, limiting your magical abilities too. You were forced to rely completely, like a baby, on Chaeryeong to guide you through the halls to the oldest wing of the castle - and you only realized that you were in front of Seungmin when the two of you came to a sudden halt, a reverent “Your Majesty” coming from her lips. 

This was it. 

Chaeryeong subtly pulled you down into a curtsy, pinching you in the back to make sure you stayed low as she stepped away from your side. From the sound of her sharp footsteps receding down the hall and the lack of any other noise around you, you presumed she’d left - and you were now alone with your King. 

“You may rise.” Seungmin’s amused drawl sounded from somewhere high above your head. Disoriented by your imposed blindness, you stumbled a little as you stood up - but you were caught by warm hands encircling your arms, steadying you on your feet. “How low the high have fallen, hmm?” Such a tease, you thought. But the gentle tone of his voice, the circles his thumbs were rubbing into your arms… he was helping ground you, to put you more at ease - which only made you feel more guilty. 

“My lord,” you started softly - earning a harsh inhale in surprise from Seungmin. “I… I owe you an apology. My behavior earlier today - for this entire week - has been immature and not fitting for a ranking member of your court. Forgive me for my negligence.” You made to dip into a curtsy again - but Seungmin’s grip on your arms tightened, keeping you from lowering yourself. 

There was a heartbeat of silence before Seungmin responded, his voice more tender than you’d ever heard it. “I don’t know what prompted this… change, but - you don’t need to apologize. I knew we both knew this is what must be done, and I knew we were going to eventually do it - but that doesn’t make it any easier for you. You didn’t want this with me, and I know that.”

Why did that last statement sound a false note in your heart? You ignored it in favor of speaking out. “But I’ve spent the past week shirking my duty. You had to force me back in line.”

“And that is my responsibility as King, my sorceress. No harm done.” You could tell that he was leaning down closer to you, his voice loud and clear in your ear. “And remember - neither this kingdom nor I will ever forget this sacrifice.”

There was an oddly charged moment of silence after that statement - which was abruptly broken by the sensation of the ground suddenly falling away from under you. You gasped as surprisingly sturdy arms lifted you up until you were cradled against a lean, hard chest. “Seungmo!” You squeaked, the childhood nickname slipping past your lips. “S-since when were you strong enough to do this?”

There was a pause - you were positive that Seungmin had rolled his eyes at you. “Just because I don’t have bulging biceps like that bodyguard of yours doesn’t mean that I’m a weakling, witch.” 

“Well, it won’t be good to kick things off with you tripping over your feet carrying me in,” you muttered sulkily. 

You couldn’t hold back a shiver as Seungmin tsked, his warm breath ghosting across the sensitive shell of your ear. “Such disrespect for your king? Bold, given that you’re at my mercy for the next hour.” 

“Next hour? That ego of yours is still clearly giant.”

Seungmin let out a husky laugh. “It’s not the size of my ego you should be worried about right now, sweet.” You thumped a useless fist against his chest - even as your core involuntarily clenched and slickened.

There was a ear-ringingly loud blast of trumpets, followed by the creak of the gates to the ancient hall being pushed open. The murmurs and chatter of the crowd awaiting your arrival fell silent, an almost eerie hush settling in as Seungmin strode into the hall. Even with the enormous fire spluttering away in the ancient hearth, the room was always chilly; gooseflesh pimpled your arms, and you almost automatically burrowed closer into Seungmin’s neck for warmth - at least, that’s what you told yourself. The sharp raps of Seungmin’s footsteps against the flagstones came to a halt, and you were securely sat onto a hard surface - the High Table. Your sacrificial altar, you mused to yourself cynically. 

You jumped a little as you felt gentle fingers clasp your hands, giving you a firm squeeze. Those warm fingertips then ghosted across your cheeks, twining through your hair as they searched for the knot of your blindfold. Your heart was bounding in your chest, blood roaring in your ears as Seungmin leaned into you, that familiar, titilatingly musky scent of his flooding your senses as he worked to unravel the tight knot, until the blindfold finally came free. 

You blinked your eyes open to mellow, golden light - and the sight of Seungmin standing over you, watching you carefully with a small, soft smile. The great hall was awash with candlelight, long tapering candles and sticks of smoking perfume burning all around you, throwing the faces of the crowd of onlookers beyond you into shadow - but bathing Seungmin in glorious, warm light. He looked impeccably regal as he stood above you in his smart black leather doublet and swan white shirtsleeves, his royal purple ermine-edged cloak clasped around his throat. His hair was up, brushed off his forehead, and the gold of his royal circlet shone out bright against the ink black of his hair - but the brightest of all were his eyes, warm and deep brown, steady and clear as he - your King, you truly felt down to your bones for the first time - held your gaze. 

Taking a deep breath, you let yourself fall back, the ancient stone of the table icy against your spine. While you couldn’t see any of the spectators surrounding you and Seungmin - the vaulted ceiling of the great hall the only thing in your line of sight - it felt like you could sense their gaze prickling across your skin, weighing you down. But before you could let your mind wander too far, Seungmin was there, leaning over you with those broad, square shoulders, blocking your sight of anything but him. You felt your cheeks flame as his hand came up to cup your face, and  your heart skipped a beat as he pressed a petal soft kiss to your forehead, breathily whispering into your skin. “It will be good, my sweet. Trust me.”

Maybe Chaeryeong was onto something… You searched his eyes, finding so much affection and reassurance beaming back at you that you blinked your own shut - before giving him a brief nod. 

He let his lips drag over to your temple, then down to your cheek, leaving open mouthed kisses in his wake as his lips trailed lower and lower, down your jawline, down your neck - and lower. Your mind reeled, your hands fisting the flimsy material of your gown. This was supposed to be brief and impersonal - you’d even readied a lubrication charm in preparation for the inevitable. But you should have known that Seungmin wouldn’t just do an adequate job like that. You were fighting for your life to stay silent as he added his teeth into the mix, working the thin, sensitive skin of your throat until you felt the sickly sweet pain of a bruise forming. His hand slid down from your cheek so he could softly thumb at the mark - his mark - marring your skin, and when he pressed down just right on the bruise, you whimpered - and watched as his eyes darkened to black. 

From there, he was insatiable. Your hands flew up to his shoulders at the swipe of his tongue against your hardening nipple; they desperately slid to clutch at his hair when he took it whole into his mouth, the wet heat tantalizing even through the cotton of your chemise. He palmed your neglected breast hard, the soft flesh spilling through his fingers. A whine finally tore itself free from your throat, and Seungmin snapped his head up to look at you, lips twisting into a triumphant smirk. “I thought you weren’t going to enjoy this, Lady Sorceress.” His fingers came up to tweak your nipple - hard - as he mouthed carelessly at your other breast, his eyes watching you hungrily as you writhed under his touch. The pleasure carried you away on a hazy cloud of lust, into the dreamland of dangerous possibilities. What would it feel like to have this dumb chemise out of the way, so his fingers and lips could traipse your naked skin? What would it feel like to have the heat of his bare skin pressed up against yours - the weight and friction of his hard chest crushing into your sensitive breasts?

Your attention was yanked back into the land of the living at sudden, discordant noise: gasps and murmurs, you quickly realized, rippling through your audience - for your King was dropping to a knee at your feet, hands sliding with promise up your legs under your chemise. You shot up onto your elbows, staring down at him in horror. “Your Majesty,” you hissed. “This is wanton.”

Seungmin arched an eyebrow. “I’d rather be wanton than have you in pain at my hands.” You felt a traitorous flutter in your chest. “And most importantly - when you have the kingdom’s most powerful woman laid out in front of you... you worship her.” 

Those large, long-fingered hands of his found purchase in the soft skin of your inner thighs, forcing them spread and keeping them spread with that hidden strength of his. He let out a small groan at the sight of your swollen folds, dragging a single, deliberate fingertip down the length of your slit. At the very first touch of his soft lips to your sensitive bundle of nerves, you choked out a moan - and startled as the candles around you all simultaneously popped. From between your legs, Seungmin laughed darkly. “Looks like I won’t need to ask you whether I’ve done a good job,” he said, the sensation of his breath and lips against your core making you squirm with stimulation. His hands slid up to your hips, anchoring you in place as he lapped languidly at your cunt, tongue flicking in and out of your aching entrance, nose rubbing up against your swollen little pearl. 

There was no chance in hell you could stay quiet any more. As a moaning keen spilled forth from your lips, your eyes flicked up to the shadowy figures in the crowd watching you. You’d thought they would be judgmental - critical, gossipy, as people always were in situations like this. Instead… there wasn’t a face you could make out that wasn’t flushed, expression glazed over. Seungmin slid his arms under your legs, yanking you down the table until the base of your spine rested on the very edge of the table, your core putty under his mouth as he supported your weight - and you watched as some woman in the crowd whimpered, biting her lip in response. 

Your head lolled back onto the table, and you started shuddering in Seungmin’s hands. 

“I guess I was wrong about needing an hour.” With a final kiss to your folds, Seungmin rose to his feet, leisurely wiping his mouth on the back of one hand, the other drifting down to the laces of his trousers. “I didn’t anticipate just how thoroughly you would enjoy my attentions, my witch.” Tease. His eyes danced with mirth as you whined in annoyance. You felt the blunt tip of him dragging through your folds, its weight catching deliciously against the tight ring of your entrance. “I’ll start slow,” he murmured, a hand coming up to brace himself above your head. And from the first breach of his length into your walls, you knew you were in trouble. 

“Big,” you gasped out. Seungmin let his free hand run loose over the flesh of your thighs and hips, kneading and caressing and soothing. “Relax for me, sweet - it’ll be easier if you let me in.” His voice was breathy and soft, eyes so warm - daresay loving - as he leaned in over you, covering your body with his. You gave him a small nod, breathing deeply and doing your best to let your body sink into the stone under you. As he carefully, firmly worked the rest of his length into your tight cunt, you couldn’t help but whimper, eyes squeezing shut at the deep, deep stretch of him, your spine arching off the table as your body contorted to accommodate him. “Beautiful,” he murmured, pupils dilated with lust. “Made to take me.” 

And as the sting and discomfort started to morph into the burning, insatiable stretch of pleasure, you were inclined to agree with him. 

“Let me know when I can move, sweet,” he asked, the flat of his hand rubbing soothing circles into your lower belly. “Please,” you rasped out - and the delightedly vicious grin that curled his lips in response only sent another surge of fire through you. Your limbs ached to twine around him, pulling him down into you, imprisoning him between your legs - but you were determined to maintain some public decorum. Seungmin made the decision for you though, salaciously bold as ever as he leaned forward into you, splaying your legs out wide, knees almost to your chest. He tested the waters with a rapid snap of his hips in and out - and the two of you stared at each other with wide eyes at just how deep it all felt in this position. Seungmin’s hips started rocking back and forth, almost as if on their own volition - almost as if they were enchanted - and your hands desperately scrabbled for purchase on the unyielding stone as he started pounding into you. 

Your hips canted up into his, trying to answer his thrusts with your own. And you were clearly doing something right, judging by his drawn out groans. “Mine,” he moaned. As he bore down on you, every thrust ground delicious friction into your bundle of nerves - and Seungmin’s hips were driving into yours at such a punishing pace that you were overwhelmed by stimulation. You were sure the two of you were making an absolute mess, the squelching sounds of him pumping into you only growing louder with every thrust. Just with his lips and nose and tongue, the friction and sensation and pleasure had all already brought you close to the cliff of your peak. You knew it wasn’t going to be much longer now before he dragged you over - but there was something positively strange happening to you. Your pleasure was merely riding the edge of some deeper, powerfully visceral sensation that had you gasping, shivering with every plunging stroke. But Seungmin, your ever-wise, your ever-aware Seungmin, had cottoned onto what was happening to you - and wrapping you tightly up into his arms, he only picked up the pace of his hips. “Let go, sweet,” he eked out. “I’ve got you safe, here - let go, my queen.” And before your mind could even process what he’d just given away, you felt yourself clenching up, eyes squeezing shut and nerves singing in pleasure as you hit your release - the pain of your fingers digging into the broad expanse of his back, the spasms of your tight cunt triggering Seungmin’s release simultaneously, spurts of his hot, thick seed flooding into your core, serving as a balm for your aching walls as he collapsed into your waiting arms. 

Before you could let the waves of pleasure carry away your mind with it, however - your eyes shot open at the gasps and shouts coming from around you. Gold - that was all you could see - a golden bubble encasing you and your King. Seungmin lifted his head up from where it was pillowed on your chest, a look of pure wonder on his face as the two of you watched the bubble slowly float and collapse inwards, coalescing into a glowing yellow orb hovering above all of your heads. The hazy whorls of incense and candle smoke in the air took on a bright golden hue - before it all whooshed outwards in a rapid gust of wind, rattling the windows of the hall as the orb and its golden mist exploded out into the sky . You recognized the magic for what it was - the largest, purest barrier charm you’d ever witnessed. 

You and Seungmin had pulled it off. A giggle of delight squeezed out of your chest, and you let your gaze snap back down to the man resting on his elbows over you. Seungmin was watching you with a small, mysterious smile, panting slightly as he tried to catch his breath. And as you looked back at him… you felt a wave of emotion wash over you, as powerful as if the ground had literally shifted under your feet. An almost unbearable fondness filled your heart as you beheld him - your King, your protector…your lover. 

You had been right about one thing - there would be no going back from this, at least for you. But now you found yourself wondering… why was that such a bad thing?

Ignoring the shuffling footsteps around you as your audience slowly started to disperse, you let your arms wrap around Seungmin, relishing the feeling of his muscles bunching under your touch as he slid his arms in turn around you, helping you to sit upright. His dark eyes were fixed on the place the two of you were joined as he slowly extricated himself from you, the feeling of his sticky seed trickling out from between your legs strange and foreign. That ever intelligent, searching gaze then slowly scanned your body, looking you over head to toe as he tucked himself away in his trousers, before his eyes fluttered shut. Seungmin let out a slow exhale before blinking his eyes open again - and you were startled to see that professional mask of his slide back into place. 

“Up you go,” he murmured, arm sliding around your back as he helped you off the table, supporting you as your legs quailed under your weight. With a few deft pulls, he unfastened his cloak, wrapping it around your shoulders instead. You were thankful for the warmth it provided - and the coverage, you realized, as you noticed the servants hovering at a respectful distance from the two of you. “Give me a second,” Seungmin said before turning away to address his valet and knight-at-arms. 

One of the maids stepped forward, a fan in her hand to put out the few lingering candles. Before you could even hesitate on what to do, she dipped into a low curtsy, bowing her head - to you. “Your Highness,” she breathed out, an almost reverent look on her face as she glanced back up at you. Awkward with the unfamiliar courtesy, you smiled hesitantly, tilting your head at her in acknowledgement. 

How had you misjudged this situation so badly? Part of your hesitation leading up to all of this had been because you’d thought that you’d be made out to be a slag - no better than the King’s kept woman. Why hadn’t you appreciated the power inherent in this? With the spectacular care with which he’d pleasured you, with the demonstration of your magic in front of the whole court, Seungmin had marked you - just as he’d told you with those hungry eyes - out to be the most powerful woman in the kingdom. 

You snapped out of your thoughts to see Seungmin making his way back to stand in front of you. You frowned to see that mask of his still in place, a strange awkwardness in his manner as he addressed you. “I can help you back to your rooms now. Or,” he turned to gesture behind him, “one of the servants can take you if you prefer.”

You arched a critical eyebrow at him. “Could we go to your chambers instead?”

His eyes widened for a second, before you watched understanding wash over his face. “Ah yes, that was careless of me - there’s too many stairs to get back to your chambers. You can rest in mine as long as you need.”

Wrapping an arm loosely around you, he let you lean on him as the two of you walked out of the hall. His rooms weren’t too far away, the royal chambers taking up a significant portion of the ancient wing of the castle. But an awkward silence reigned over the two of you, Seungmin stoically looking straight ahead as you limped along beside him. 

Something had clearly changed in you - because for once, instead of being the reactive fool you normally were, you saw the situation - and his reaction - for what it actually was. Seungmin was taking his turn to be the awkward overthinker - a role he’d grown out of once he’d become King… except when it came to a few specific things he couldn’t stay purely rational about. The things he cared about the most, the things that mattered most deeply… in this case - you. 

You sighed. You’d probably need to gift Chaeryeong a necklace or something after all of this was over. 

You bided your time until Seungmin finally shut the two of you into his chambers. He’d turned away to lock the doors behind him - and startled when he turned back around to find you standing right in front of him. As you stared up at him, watching his lips twitch in discomfort… you came to a shocking realization. 

“You never kissed me,” you breathed out, even more surprised as you said it. He’d kissed you literally everywhere else - but he hadn’t touched your lips. You gazed up at him with wide eyes. “Why?”

Seungmin shifted uncomfortably. “It felt too…intimate.”

What? “You took my virginity - in public. We unleashed a magical force field together,” you deadpanned, trying to get a laugh out of him - and failing, as Seungmin continued to look at you stoically. “I’d say that’s pretty intimate, my lord.”

He shrugged, hugging his arms around him and hesitating for a second - before bluntly, in Seungmin fashion, getting to the heart of the matter. “The reality is that… freely given sacrifice, prophecy, whatever you want to call it - I took something from you that you didn’t mean for me to have.” It was a testament to Seungmin’s poise that his voice stayed even, his eyes stayed steadily on you as he spoke. “I wanted you to have something - a part of you - you could still give away of your own will.” He sagged heavily into the doorframe, finally breaking eye contact as he trailed off. 

Poor baby. Your heart fluttered. “That is… quite thoughtful of you, my lord,” you choked out, taking a small step forward. Then another. And another, inching towards him. “So - that means it’s alright with you for me to do this, right?” Reaching up, you twined your arms around his neck, pulling yourself up onto your tiptoes to press your body into his. His hands reflexively grabbed your waist, steadying you even as his eyes widened in surprise - before fluttering shut as you pressed your lips to his. 

His mouth was divine heat - soft, pliable against yours. He gasped as you nipped at his lower lip, and you seized the chance to lick into his mouth, deepening the kiss until your head was whirling, ignorant of where you ended and he began. 

When you finally pulled away for air, his lips chased yours for a second before he caught himself. You giggled, beaming up at him. “How low the high have fallen, hmm?”

Seungmin let out a low warm laugh, such fondness in his eyes that you couldn’t help but shy away. “I have much, much lower to fall still, don’t worry,” he murmured as he bent down over you, his hair falling into his eyes as he smiled. In a single, smooth movement, he flipped the two of you around so he had you pinned up against the wall, his body pressed firmly into yours. 

You cleared your throat. “Y-you really like having me against hard surfaces, don’t you?”

He shrugged, focus elsewhere as his fingers busied themselves with the laces of your chemise. “Seems like it’s the only way to keep you good for me, witch mine.” You whined as his hand accidentally grazed your sore, tender nipple, the sound making his eyes snap back to yours. A dark, wicked smile curled his lips before he crashed his mouth back onto yours, long fingers working your breast deliberately, possessively. You responded with enthusiasm, tangling your own fingers into his silky hair, until the spell was broken - for you at least - by loud noises from outside his chambers. 

You pulled away from his lips with a loud smack. “What’s that?”

“Never mind that,” he rasped out, pulling you in tight against him. “Worry about it later.” Your breath hitched as he nosed his way into your neck, pulling at the loosened neck of your chemise to expose your collarbone for him to feast on. 

Steeling yourself, you pushed your hands firmly against his chest. “Seungmo, I want to worry about it now.” He groaned, rolling his eyes, but let you go without a fight, releasing you from his embrace. Turning on your heel, you tugged him along to his balcony. The sounds had seemed to come from the royal gardens, which were sprawled right below Seungmin’s chambers. Pulling your cloak - his cloak - more tightly around you, you stepped out onto the balcony - and froze, as an astounding sight brought the two of you to a standstill. 

Wherever you looked - below you, around you - every single plant and tree was in abundant bloom. Regardless of season, of age - fruit and flowers were everywhere, swinging in the breeze, littering the ground. You turned to Seungmin in shock - only to see him looking back at you with loving, wondrous awe. “That’s all you,” he murmured, brushing a fond hand against your cheek. “My powerful, mesmerizing sorceress.”

You flushed. “No, it’s not.” You stepped closer to him, wrapping your arms around his waist. “It’s us.” You tiptoed up to press a kiss into his cheek - and promptly hid into Seungmin’s neck as whoops and cheers rang up to you from the gardens below. 

Seungmin laughed, tucking you into his side as he led the two of you back inside. “Well, you know what this means,” he said.

You quirked an eyebrow at him. “What?”

Shooting a dazzling smile your way, he caught you up in his arms once again, the heady sensation already warm and familiar to you - before peremptorily throwing you onto his bed. 

“The fate of the flora of this kingdom is in our hands, Lady Sorceress.” He intoned in a faux serious voice - made only the more ridiculous by the sight of him crawling on all fours towards you on the bed. “We have crucial work to do, milady - and we must start posthaste.”

You threw your head back in laughter before wrapping your limbs around him. “Yes, my lord - let’s start immediately.” 

Fin.

~

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[foxynez]

Relief - Black Noir x Female Reader

Summary: Noir returns home after killing the humans on Vaught.

Warnings: Smut, Rough Sex.

"Are you alright?" you asked as Noir stormed into the apartment and slammed the door shut behind him. Noir didn't answer, only growled in frustration as he slammed down his daggers on the kitchen counter.

Frowning, you got up from the couch and walked up to your boyfriend.

"What's wrong, baby?" you asked and placed your hand on his chest plate. "Didn't the mission go as planned?"

"Shut up," Noir growled between gritted teeth and grabbed you, his hands tight around your biceps. His voice was gritty with a wildness that would have scared you, if it didn’t send a bolt of electricity straight between your thighs.

Without a word, Noir flipped you around and roughly pinned you to the counter, making you gasp for air as he pressed his powerful torso against your back. That's when you felt the hard bulge of his clothed cock press against your ass. You released a needy whimper as you felt its thick girth pressing against you, and Noir responded with a growl in your ear, his hands still gripping your arms like iron bands.

Then he released one of your arms, sliding his rough, gloved digits up underneath your dress and down your side and across your back. You shivered harshly, your skin electric wherever he touched. You glanced over your shoulder, but was only met by the darkness of his mask. Silently, Noir stuck his foot between yours, forcing your legs apart as he continued to pin you against the counter. The air caught in your throat as you felt the tip of his cock nudge between your legs. You hadn't even noticed him taking his cock out.

He didn’t give you much time to prepare – Noir pushed your panty aside and lined himself up with your entrance, and then thrust deep into your core. You cried out loudly, and the noise was immediately muffled as Noir placed his rough hand over your mouth. Your moans and cries were muffled against his palm, and somehow that made it so much more hotter.

His other hand gripped your hip tightly as he thrust into you. Your walls were already beginning to tighten – there was something about him taking you from this angle that made his member feel even longer and fuller, and you were stretched almost to the point of pain.

The pace of his thrusts became rougher and faster, and you angled your hips to meet his more completely. You released another muffled, wild cry as the tip of his cock began to hit you in just the right spot, sending ripples of ecstasy through your body. You had never been taken quite like this before, and it left you feeling weak and overwhelmed with pleasure.

Noir’s movements began to slip into an uneven pace as his cock began to throb. He jerked his hips forward against your ass and it sent you hurdling over the edge. You keened loudly against the palm of his hand as your walls throbbed violently around his pulsing member.

The world whited out for a brief moment, your body covered with a heavy thundercloud sending bolts of pleasure throughout your nerves. As it began to fade and you came back into yourself, you realized Noir had released his grip on your mouth.

"Are you alright?" Noir asked softly and you could hear the concern in his voice.

You nodded and smiled as he took of his mask, his brown eyes looking at you for any trace of pain or discomfort.

"What was that about?" you asked as you turned around and pressed your cheek against his chest, and wrapped your arms around his torso.

"I had a rough day, needed to blow of some steam," Noir mumbled and wrapped his arms around your smaller frame, his nose nussling your hair. He didn't dare to tell you the truth, that all the killing he'd done today had turned him on so much he had returned home with a painfully hard cock.

"I love you, y/n," Noir whispered against your neck.

You smiled against Noir's chest. "I love you too, Noir."

[buggysangel17]

The Bride of A Warlord

Summary: You have arrived to what you now call your new home, it was scary and confusing, but at least you have someone else to keep you company. Characters: Dracule Mihawk x Wife!Female Reader (Amihan). Perona Word Count: 1,198 Chapter Warnings:  Alternate Universe-Canon Divergence (I am still in episode 20 of OP Anime so please bear with me on the fucked up timeline of events here)

Masterlist | Series Masterlist || Send Me An Ask?

You were consumed by a cocktail of fear and excitement.

But that was only natural to feel in your current predicament. Taken from your home due to circumstance that was no longer in your control. You turned to what you now call your husband. Dracule Mihawk was a man not to be trifled with, one of the Seven Warlords and dubbed the Greatest Swordsman in the world.

“I will have your room prepared as soon as possible.” Mihawk spoke, interrupting you from your train of thoughts.

All you could do was nod. You were taken from your own home, miles away from what you had once been so familiar with, a place that you had deemed had become your own prison. Any form of freedom you would take, even if it means being under the circumstantial marriage with one Warlord such as Mihawk.

“Yes, Sir.” You nodded, having no right to complain or react negatively for a short wait.

Even without looking at him, you’ve noticed his sharp yellow eyes glued fall to you. Turning to looking up at him, you noticed his narrowed eyes, a frown that was something you had gotten so used to rest on his lips.

“You will call me by my name, I do not agree to have you calling me of anything else while under you are under my care.”

You gulped, but nodded your head in agreement. This man, as handsome as he was, still scared you. Having caught firsthand the destruction his sword could make to your entire island should his will make it.

“You are not here as my prisoner, you can freely explore the castle should you wish to do so. All I ask is you not to leave unless you tell me or have me to accompany you, is that understood?”

“Yes—Mihawk.” You responded quickly.

As you step off the grandiose boat onto the rocky shore of Kuraigana Island, your heard races with anticipation and uncertainty. The sea breeze carries the scent of salt and new adventure, but it’s the sight before you that leaves you breathless. Your new husband’s castle, looms high above, perched on a ragged cliff that seems to defy gravity.

The castle is a dark, imposing fortress, its jagged spires reaching towards the heavens like the fingers of a giant’s skeletal hands. The stone walls are as grey and foreboding as the thunderclouds that hover over the island. You can’t help but shudder at the stark contrast between the castle and the vibrant, tropical island that surrounds it.

Your arrival has not gone unnoticed. From the castle's towering parapets, you catch glimpses of shadowy figures watching your every move. As you start to climb the narrow, winding path that leads to the castle gates, your footsteps echo in the eerie silence.

The closer you get, the more details you can make out. The castle is adorned with intricate, Gothic architecture, with gargoyles leering down from the eaves. The windows are narrow and slit-like, like the eyes of a predator, and they seem to be keeping a watchful gaze on you. The walls are covered in ivy and moss, as if nature itself is trying to reclaim this imposing structure.

You can't help but feel a sense of unease as you approach the massive, iron-bound gates. The air feels heavy with centuries of history, and you can't shake the feeling that the castle holds secrets, both wondrous and sinister, within its ancient walls.

As the gates slowly creak open, revealing the cavernous darkness beyond, your heart pounds in your chest. You have entered a world unlike any you have ever known, a world of mystery and danger. And as you step across the threshold, you can't help but wonder what awaits you in this forbidding castle on Kuraigana Island.

As you step through the imposing gates of Mihawk's castle, your heart is still pounding with trepidation. The exterior of the castle had filled you with a sense of foreboding, but as you cross the threshold and enter the grand foyer, you are struck by a stark contrast.

The interior of the castle is a complete surprise. The space is bathed in warm, inviting light that spills from ornate chandeliers hanging from the high ceilings. Elaborate tapestries hang on the walls, depicting scenes of epic battles and exotic landscapes. The polished marble floors beneath your feet reflect the glow of the many candles that line the corridor leading deeper into the castle.

Your husband, Mihawk, takes your hand and leads you forward, his expression unreadable. His grip is reassuring, grounding you in this unexpected change of atmosphere. You exchange a glance with him, and for a moment, you both share a silent understanding of the paradoxical nature of the castle.

The air inside is fragrant with the scent of fresh flowers, and the walls are adorned with vibrant paintings and delicate porcelain vases filled with blossoms.

As you explore the interior of the castle, you discover cozy sitting rooms with plush sofas and grand dining halls set with opulent feasts. The contrast between the grim exterior and the opulent interior is almost surreal, and you can't help but marvel at the transformation.

Mihawk guides you to a balcony overlooking a breathtaking garden bathed in moonlight. The sight of it takes your breath away, and you realize that the castle holds a world of beauty and wonder that you could not have imagined.

As you stand together on the balcony, surrounded by the enchanting sights and sounds of the castle, you can't help but feel a glimmer of hope and excitement for the future that awaits you here, in this magical, enigmatic place.

It wasn’t your home, no, far from it, but with this new found freedom, all you could think of right now is what the world could possibly be able to give you now.

“You have a guest along? That’s surprising from you.”

You tensed, immediately finding yourself stepping closer to the man you now call your husband. Turning to the owner of the voice, the sight of a pink-haired girl over a decade younger than you had floated towards your direction with what you think were ghost accompanying her.

“Not a guest.” Mihawk explained his gaze was on you, you tensed as his hand had rested on the small of your back. “My wife.” He introduce without much of a hesitation in his tone.

“Wife?!” The girl gaped and was immediately all over you, questioning you and your life decisions and how much of a sour sport Mihawk was to her especially as he had left her all alone in the castle.

“You have a daughter?” You inquired.

“No, just an unwelcomed guest.” He explained earning the offense of the girl that you now learned was named Perona. “But she will keep you company for the instance that I will be out for a while.”

You nodded turning your attention to the package that came with now living in the same home, in the same castle, and in the same Island as your new husband. It was a chaos that you were slowly but surely coming to enjoy as time goes by.

[awkward-walking-potato]

Tangled Hearts, Torn Leather

I hope you enjoy it @forgetmenot-bluepurple

The Xavier Institute was no stranger to strange pairs. In a mansion full of mutants, where fire met ice and metal bent to will, unusual combinations were a given. But there was one pairing that had everyone scratching their heads, students and teachers alike.

On one side of the equation was Kurt Wagner. The resident ball of sunshine, Kurt was all smiles, faith, and friendliness, with an unwavering optimism that seemed to glow as brightly as his golden eyes. He made friends easily, never once losing his warmth despite the harshness of the world.

On the other side, there was you. The leather-clad enigma with heavy boots that thudded ominously in the hallways, a perpetual scowl beneath your dark, tousled hair. You had an aura that screamed "keep your distance"—a tough exterior built from years of dealing with your own battles. Piercings glinted on your face, a spike-studded collar hugged your neck, and tattoos curled up your arms like snakes. If Kurt was a beam of sunlight, you were the thundercloud that blocked it out.

It wasn’t that you went out of your way to scare people; it was just how you carried yourself. You’d had to be tough for so long that it became second nature. But your intimidating exterior kept most people at bay. Students parted for you in the halls, teachers gave you wary glances, and even some of the X-Men looked at you with a mix of respect and caution.

So when people saw you and Kurt together, it was like watching fire try to befriend water. But it worked. Somehow, it worked.

It had started as a slow friendship—passing comments here and there, small gestures that eventually grew into something more. Kurt had been one of the few who hadn’t flinched when you walked into a room, who hadn’t made assumptions based on your appearance. He treated you the same as everyone else, maybe even kinder. And that had intrigued you, then warmed you, in a way you hadn’t expected.

Now, as you sat on the edge of one of the stone walls overlooking the mansion’s sprawling grounds, you found yourself lost in thought, the cool breeze playing with the edges of your jacket. Kurt was perched beside you, balancing easily despite the height, his tail flicking back and forth as he talked animatedly about a book he’d just finished.

You nodded along, your gaze fixed on the horizon, but a small, almost imperceptible smile tugged at the corner of your lips. His excitement was infectious, even if you didn’t always share his enthusiasm for the same things.

People would be surprised to know how comfortable this felt—being here with him. But then, people didn’t know what went on behind closed doors. They didn’t see the way Kurt could get you to laugh, a real, deep laugh that made your sides hurt. They didn’t see the late-night conversations where you’d let your guard down, revealing parts of yourself you’d long hidden away. And they certainly didn’t see the way he’d reach out, unafraid, to touch your hand, your shoulder, or your cheek, soft gestures that spoke of a bond deeper than any words could.

“They’re looking at us again,” Kurt said suddenly, his golden eyes shifting toward the mansion. He had that knowing smile on his face, the one that told you he was amused by all the attention the two of you got.

“Let ‘em look,” you replied with a shrug, your voice low and rough around the edges, but there was no bite to it.

“Does it bother you?” he asked, his tone gentle as always.

“Nah,” you said, though you didn’t need to explain. He knew you didn’t care what others thought. But you cared what he thought, even if you didn’t say it outright.

Kurt shifted closer to you, his shoulder brushing against yours. “I’m glad,” he said, softer now, as if it were just the two of you in the world. “I’m glad you’re here. With me.”

That brought the smile back to your lips, fuller this time. “Me too, blue,” you murmured, the nickname rolling off your tongue easily. “You’re not so bad to hang out with.”

Kurt chuckled, a sound that always warmed you, even on the coldest days. “I’m honored,” he teased lightly, but there was something earnest in his voice.

For a while, the two of you just sat there in comfortable silence, watching the sun dip lower in the sky, casting long shadows across the grounds. The students were probably still whispering about you, wondering how the punker and the sweet German mutant had found themselves in each other’s company. But you didn’t care. The truth was, no one else had to understand what was between you two. It was something private, something that belonged only to the two of you.

“Hey, Kurt,” you said after a while, your tone more serious.

“Ja?” He turned to you, giving you his full attention.

“Thanks,” you said simply, your voice softer than usual. “For, y’know… everything.”

Kurt’s smile softened, his golden eyes warm with understanding. “Anytime, mein freund,” he replied. Then, after a pause, he added, “You’re important to me.”

The words were simple, but they carried weight. And you knew, in your own way, that they were true for you too.

You reached out, your hand finding his and giving it a light squeeze before pulling away, not one for too much overt sentiment. But Kurt knew. He always knew.

Together, the two of you stayed there until the sun disappeared, a dark cloud and a golden light intertwined, stronger together than apart. And as the first stars began to twinkle in the night sky, you knew that this—whatever it was—was real. It didn’t matter what others thought. It only mattered that, somehow, in the tangled mess of life, you and Kurt had found each other.

[live-tweeting-hotg]

closer to gods [a.t. x reader]

summary: when Aemond decides to bring you back to King’s landing as his captive, you learn just what it means to be closer to gods than to men.

pairing(s): Aemond Targaryen x Rhaenyra’s daughter!reader

content & warnings: 18+ content (minors dni), porn with little plot, pure pure filth, light bondage, sub/dom dynamic, incest, dub-con, fingering (fem receiving), p in v, creampie, loss of virginity, unprotected sex (wrap it before you tap it), cockwarming, multiple orgasms, overstimulation, size kink, light breeding kink, light corruption kink, mentions of blood, unsavoury and unrealistic activities on a dragon, i was gonna tag dark!aemond but this is probably just him being himself

wc: 1k

a/n: this is a loose sequel to another fic, my prince, but can be read as a standalone.

Aemond’s arms wrapped lazily around you as Vhagar bounded into flight. Ignoring your protests, he had taken the liberty to bind your arms behind your back with his belt, deeming it a “necessary precaution”. You are the daughter of the Rogue Prince, he had said, smirking as he tied you up. Who knows what you’re capable of? You were powerless to do little else except to huff and lean back into his arms.

Vhagar surged up, clearing the heavy thunderclouds and you emerged into the blue, cloudless realm of the high skies. You breathed a sigh of relief, letting yourself relax a little. Aemond drops his chin onto your shoulder, breathing into your ear softly. “Does the ride please my princess?”

You huff and his smirk grows. “Don’t sulk, my love. I’m sure you’ll make an… exquisite… wife.” His palm sweeps up lightly over your breasts, and your eyes shoot open.

“Aemond,” you warn him sharply.

“Yes, princess?” His tone is laced with false innocence. The pressure builds as he kneads into you slowly, making you bite back a moan. “You were saying?”

“This is… unbecoming.” you try again, your words trailing off into a gasp as you feel his lips dance against your neck.

“Perhaps so.” His voice teems with a darker intent that sends a jolt of fear through you. “But who’s here to stop me?”

You see the dagger too late. With a flick of his wrist, Aemond cuts through the leather protecting your front, his hand ripping off the remainder of your smallclothes. You gasp, head reeling, before his fingers are rolling your exposed bud in a way that has blood rushing to your cheeks. “Stop,” you gasp out, hands straining weakly against your bonds.

“No.” His other hand dips to the front of your waist, cutting through your breeches to ghost a finger along your folds, letting your slickness coat him. He exhales in a soft laugh as you gasp again, shakily. His lips drop to your ear and his voice pierces you icily. “I only intend to take what is mine.”

His fingers enter you, fucking into you languidly, forcing a strangled moan out of you. “This is improper.” You have to choke the words out.

He hums thoughtfully against your neck. “Improper, princess?” His fingers curl cruelly inside you, and your hips grind against his hand before you could stop yourself. Dropping your head back, you bite on your lip to suppress another moan, feeling a dull edge of pain as blood began to trickle thinly down your jaw. Aemond tuts unapprovingly against your ear, twisting your nipple sharply and making you cry out. “My wife means to keep her little whines from me. Do you not find this improper?” His fingers roll deeper into you, stroking slowly along a particularly sensitive spot. Another finger enters you, stretching you out, and you almost choke on the fullness.

“You’re so fucking tight, princess,” Aemond groans. His thumb finds your clit and rips out the first real moan from you. You fight against your bonds again, futilely, and you wonder if he had planned this when he tied you up so tightly. “I wonder how your cunt would feel around my cock.” You hazily register his stiffness twitch behind you. A few more strokes along your clit and he feels you squeezing tightly around his fingers. “Aemond,” you moan out weakly. His name is a prayer on your lips.

With his hand buried in your cunt, Aemond Targaryen groans out against your ear. “Go on, princess. Cum for me.”

As if on command, your eyes roll back and you buck against his hand. Distantly, you feel yourself gush onto Aemond’s fingers as you convulse weakly around him. You moan brokenly, tears streaming down your cheeks, letting the fine, thin air rush across your cheeks and into your open mouth. His fingers freeze and pull out suddenly to grip your hips with a bruising strength that he had previously tried to suppress. Vhagar dives down, sensing her rider’s agitation, jolting you weightlessly upwards. You feel Aemond fumble with something behind you as he lets out a string of obscenities. “Fuck, princess, I’m sorry, I intended to wait, truly, but you’re so fucking— I can’t— I’m so sorry—”

The sounds barely reach you, and you briefly wonder what his words mean, before Vhagar sweeps upwards again, forcing you to land heavily downwards— down onto Aemond’s unsheathed cock. You cry out in surprise, wordless, as he tears past your maidenhead, cunt still dripping in spasms from your last orgasm, pain mingling with an ungodly fullness, and Aemond pulls you closer to his chest. He fills you to the brim, the head of his cock kissing your cervix. You feel him twitching within you, and you realise he is too big, stretching you too wide, he would split you in two if he took you—

“Princess…” He moans against you, eyes closed in pure relief, groaning as he felt your walls spasm around him. “You are truly fucking perfect.” You whine out loudly this time, back arched against his chest, your tits bouncing freely as Aemond lifts your hips to rut into you, setting an unrelenting pace. You cry out helplessly, your heightened sensitivity almost painful, but Aemond only tightens his grip on your hips. You flail again against your bonds, and he moves one hand upwards to pin your arms against his chest. “Behave,” he chides coldly, and his mouth finds its way back to your neck. “What would my dear uncle say if he saw me take you like this, hmm?” His voice drips with arrogance, but you can’t quite bring yourself to care.

Your throw your head back to look at Aemond, with the dark of his eye blown wide, mouth hanging lightly open, ruining you, fucking you senseless, and you lean against him to whine into his mouth. “Aemond… please…” You weren’t sure whether you were begging him to stop or to fuck you harder.

“Begging already, my love?” Aemond laughs mirthlessly. “Wait until I get you in a bed.” He drops his hand to rub your clit roughly, until you’re pulsing around him, lips parted silently as another orgasm is ripped from you. Aemond pumps into you roughly, chasing his own high, until you feel his seed, white-hot, spill into you. Your eyes prickle with tears, unused to the overstimulation, and Aemond kisses your head softly, his cock still twitching inside you. His cum is spilling out of you, trickling down your legs, and you know he has ruined you irrevocably. “I’ll wed you like this, my love,” he sighs contentedly against you. “with my seed dripping from your thighs and your belly swollen with my heirs.” He grips your hair and forces you to meet his eye. “I’ll drag you to the sept myself.”

Your vision clouds hazily and you mumble incoherently against his chest. Aemond hums against you, his hands propping you up, and you realise a moment too late that his cock is still hard inside you. Panic makes your skin tingle. “Aemond, please, I can’t—”

Your words are suffocated when he rolls lazily into you again. “Don’t pass out on me, princess.” His words are cool and soft. A promise. “I will fuck you back into consciousness.”

[sketches4mysw33theart]

Omnia Redit Ad Pulverem

Omnia Redit Ad Pulverem ~ Everything Returns To Dust

Henry Winter (The Secret History) Story

Warnings: Minor TSH plot spoilers, murder (ofc)

Synopsis: The murder of Bunny, from the eyes of Henry Winter's partner

It was quiet. Too quiet. We'd all heard the fateful thump around 30 seconds before, but still, we stood there staring at the edge of the ravine like rabbits poking their noses out of their warrens. Twitching in the silence, waiting on tenterhooks for the oncoming predator. Charles risked a look at Camilla, but her thoughtless eyes remained on the slippery tracks that led over the drop. Besides that, we were as still as a photograph.

Of course, it was Henry who moved first. It was always Henry who moved first. He broke the heavy quiet with the snap of a twig beneath his polished shoe, sweeping the tumbling locks of hair that hung over his forehead back into place as he tentatively approached the edge. "Careful," Camilla called, reaching out a hand as though to stop him. He waved her back without a glance and poked his head over the ravine.

For an infinite moment, Henry stood there looking over the edge, his body a mass of black, a tumultuous thundercloud in the otherwise clear countryside sky. With a heavy exhalation, he stepped back again and turned to face us all. He confirmed our worst wish with a curt nod.

It was like a green light for us. Everyone moved at once, I to place a hand on Henry's arm, Camilla to grasp Charles' sleeve, him to lean close and whisper to her in response, Francis to press his knuckles into his forehead with a loud groan, Richard to blink stupidly as though someone had turned on the overhead light in a dark room and turn to look at us all in bewilderment.

Only Henry remained still. He was staring ahead, seemingly at nothing, the swaying silent trees of the ravine's forest reflecting in the circles of his glasses, menacingly disguising the icy blue of his eyes.

The clearing was full of murmurs from the others, who were shuffling on their feet, tentatively making their way to the edge. I stayed by Henry's side, watching him curiously as he stared off into nothingness for a moment. His guarded face gave nothing away, and his shielded eyes made my guts feel like ice.

I wanted to do something - say his name, shake him, turn back time. But, I could do none of these things, and so I stayed staring at him with a heavy weight in my stomach as the others edged their way closer to peep down into the Hell that waited below.

When Henry did move, mere seconds later, it was as though someone was pressing play on a VHS. He sprung to life, immediately turning to look over the edge, his chin deliberately pointed, eyes glittering. Gently but with intent, he tugged me back with a hand on my sleeve, away from the edge, away from the grooves in the dirt where Bunny's desperate hands had tried to take hold. Staying where I was put, I lightly wrapped my fingers around his wrist, a little support, and glanced at the others.

Francis had gone pale and refused to get too close to the edge of the ravine. He made a show of poking his head over, but he couldn't have seen much and did not leave it over there long enough to see more. The others looked on with the same morbid curiosity that I'm sure was glistening in my eyes, but their high inquisitiveness pushed them towards the edge while the protective nature of Henry kept me back from it.

And, yet, he wanted me to go with him to make sure the deed was done. I knew. He'd turned to give me a pointed look as he'd mumbled the necessity for someone to go down for a closer look. But I was glad that Camilla was so ready to volunteer. She had a stronger stomach and a steelier heart than me. She gave me a fleeting smile as she walked deliberately past me, leaving a little pat on my hand as she went.

Instead, I sat on the dew-damp trunk of a fallen tree by the ravine's edge with Francis, who was cradling his head in his hands, glazed eyes staring over the infinite edge and alternately busying his mouth with a flaming cigarette and mumblings of woe. Being closer to the edge, I could see, with a sickening twinge to my stomach, Henry approaching Bunny, searching for a pulse, luridly rolling his head about, bringing to ghastly light the one trickle of blood on the otherwise unblemished face. Those same fingers that explored the spaces between my own so gently now prodding harshly at cooling flesh, the hands which guided me through crowded places and up steep stairs tightly gripping a fistful of sandy hair to move the head. Camilla stood several feet behind him, watching warily but maintaining a full view of Bunny over Henry's shoulder.

Bun's eyes were open, a glacial lake reflection beneath his broken glasses of the ravine, the sky, our cloud-like faces floating above. It was a miracle Francis didn't lean far enough over to see. Not that miracles had helped any of the rest of us.

With an unsteady hand and even less steady words, I tried to comfort Francis, but I didn't think he could even hear me. He did, however, hear the approaching footsteps as Henry and Camilla returned.

They didn't say anything in response to our flood of questions. They didn't have to. "Has everyone got everything?" Henry asked briskly after moments of pregnant silence, sweeping the clearing with his falcon-like eyes.

We all bumbled around the clearing for a few seconds, checking for any dropped belongings before moving back as one into the safe dankness of the wind-swept forest and heading back to Henry's car.

Although I had been privy to the rituals my classmates had been trying to achieve, I was wary of them. Not only were they dangerous, even in print, but they were also incredibly complex, with historical recounts that were sketchy at best. But, more than that, was Bunny's surprising eagerness to be involved.

I had known Henry and Bunny the longest of anyone from the Greek class, having met them both on our collective first day at Hampden, when they were introduced to one another as roommates in freshman year. I'd also had the incredible misfortune of being pulled into the Corcoran clan that same day, who had come to help their boy move in but were seemingly ready to do so themselves.

Now, I may not have understood much in the world too implicitly besides Greek and Henry's secret smile, but I could say for sure that I knew Bunny. I knew what he was capable of. And, more to the point, what he was not. As such, I had chosen not to take part.

Yet, when things had gone pear-shaped, as I inevitably knew they would, it seemed that I was the only person Henry wanted to see. The night after the murder of the poor farmer, after Henry had slept for long-lost hours, he came to me with thunder clouds in his eyes and trembling lips.

I'd sat him down with whiskey-laced tea and listened in fearful incredulity as he'd recounted, with alarming clarity, the events of the previous night. From the drive up to the country house to the gathering of the four on the moonlight-drenched grounds, the roaming through the woods like vengeful sprites to the eyebrow-raising carnality of events, the final, damning image of an innocent man lying at Henry's feet with his life ripped from his limp body to the unfortunate discovery of Bunny on Henry's sofa.

I was speechless. My teacup was twitching between my quivering fingers, untouched by my parted lips. As he drew to the end of his story, Henry sighed heavily and collapsed back into his chair, his elbows resting on the armrests but hands lost beneath my small dining table. His eyes were closed, nostrils flaring, but there was an uncharacteristic smile on his lips.

I had no comfort to give and, quite frankly, did not want to provide any. Not that Henry wanted it either, I don't think. He simply wanted someone who would listen and, in time, understand. That was how it always was between us. Henry may have been only a few leagues behind Einstein in brains, but I was capable of giving him a run for his money when the situation arose. So, we listened to one another, and we understood that, no matter the act, we had done it for the right reasons.

And yet there was no reason for what had happened. Not even any fault. It was simply an accident, albeit an unfortunate one. I asked him some questions, about the ritual, about the state of the others, about the possibility of a next time. We discussed the matter as though we were discussing classes the next morning or going over homework we had yet to do. With the calmness of an ocean, the conversation drew naturally to a close, and we then began to decide whether we should eat out that evening or order something.

I was worried that a headache may come upon Henry in the days after, potentially the worst he'd ever had. But, on the contrary, he seemed content with what had happened. Almost thrilled by it. As though it were some predetermined fate finally coming true. But, that was not the case with what happened next.

I feared from the first that Bunny would present the biggest problem in the situation. The police of Hampden town were bumbling cartoons, the teachers of the college slow and old, the townspeople confined and unaware of others. But Bunny was not. For all of his idiocy, he had a social smartness, a warped understanding of people that simultaneously awed and frightened me, but never more so than during those arduous few weeks. If anybody would sniff this out, it would be him.

And, of course, I was right. What I came to understand rather quickly, though, was that I didn't in fact know Bunny at all. Some of his reactions I had predicted - the anger, the hurt, the pettiness - but his persistence, his narrow-mindedness, the aim of his trajectory and the fragility of his mind I did not. I came to fear him, more on Henry's behalf than my own, and could barely stand to be in the same room as him, let alone remain chummy and nonchalant with him.

I knew Henry had a plan. But he didn't reveal it to me all at once. Only hinted at it, reminding me of the terrible things Bunny had done and dropping little lines such as, 'Don't you want it to all go away?'.

Eventually, though, it came out. Although I insistently disagreed with Henry's diabolical solution from the first moment he hinted towards it in my presence, he pulled his scrupulous trick of drawing me around to his side. Convinced me there was no other solution. It was easy for me, he said. I was not involved in the triggering murder, and I had an alibi to prove it - I was possibly the only one of us in the Greek class to have friends outside of the Lyceum, whom I had met in high school and moved to Hampden with.

And, as time wore on, I was able to reason, with terrifying clarity, with Henry's point of view. Bunny was becoming unbearable. Initially, the jokes were easy to brush off, but when he knew what had truly happened, he was like a bloodhound free of its leash.

Henry, whom Bunny blamed primarily for the mess, managed, in some strange twist, to avoid the heat of his petty wrath. Although it was Henry he was most angry at, it was everyone else who took the brunt of his emotions. It was only because of my closeness to Henry, I believe, that he spared me the misogyny he so delightedly dished out to Camilla. And yet, despite him not knowing I knew, it didn't mean that I was completely out of the firing line.

I found him popping up miraculously wherever I happened to be, trying, as I discovered later via Richard following one of Bunny's drunken rants, to catch me messing around behind Henry's back with an old friend who just so happened to be, in fact, meeting with Francis regularly.

Although he could find no proof, Bunny poked this sore spot like a red button, enjoying my furious rebuttals of his accusations. Not even Henry's warning voice or waning bank account could cease Bun's glorified barking.

At first, Henry had insisted I stay away from the ravine. A white knight gesture. I hadn't been involved thus far, and Henry stressed to me after another debate on the topic that he didn't want me getting involved in this either. I was adamant, however, that I be there by his side. I understood the gravity of the act far more than I believed he did. For days he argued and beat back my insistence that I be involved, until one evening after yet another of Bun's onslaughts, when I'd collapsed in near-tears onto Henry's sofa. Then, finally, did he relent.

And that was how I found myself walking with my head down and fingers tingling, away from the ravine on a late Sunday afternoon, feeling the unseasonal biting chill in the air and thinking, surprisingly, of nothing in particular.

My friends seemed to be having the same experience, walking silently beside me. Out of habit, more than anything, I slid my hand into the crook of Henry's elbow, a comfort in all hard times.

He barely acknowledged the touch besides a squeeze of his inner elbow, a Henry-esque reassurance. I clutched on tighter as the clearing in which we had left the car came into view, no longer illuminated in a weak spring sun but covered in cloudy shadow.

With Richard now in tow, I elected to perch myself on Francis' knee in the front seat. Despite a rocky start, we eventually got on the road, pulling mercifully further and further away from the ravine.

We drove back in silence, a painful comparison to the noisy car rides we normally embarked on, talking and tittering like children. In a way, it was a blessing. My mind was pulsing, and idle chatter might have made it snap.

I occupied myself with the window, careful not to block Francis' view even though he was distracted mercilessly chewing his thumb and unconsciously drumming the fingers of his other hand on my hip with his eyes closed and head leant back against the seat rest. There were warm lights in unfamiliar, welcoming homes as we drove past, twinkling scenes of families eating, playing, and watching television together, all flying past the car window in dream-like snapshots. I was starting to feel a little sick, but fortunately, we made it into town sooner than I realised.

Somewhere along the way, much to everyone's utter surprise, it started snowing, as though, in another torture from the universe, we were thrust back to better times - watching the first snowfall of the previous winter through the windows of the Lyceum, Henry and I choosing to walk, arm-in-arm, to school during the petering end of a snow storm, a snowball fight with myself, Bunny and some of my old friends, watched over by a disgruntled Marion, saying goodbye to one another before we all departed for our separate Christmases. By the time we got back into town, it may as well have been December. This did nothing for my glacial mood.

We all left the car at Francis', where Richard and the twins would make their way home. Camilla, Charles and Richard all left Henry's car with awkward attempts at goodbyes and shocked shivers and groans at the sudden fall of snow. When, finally, Francis had made his sullen way out of the car to reluctantly grab a bucket of soapy water and cloths with which to clean the car, brushing wrinkles from the arms of his suit as he went, I sat back in the front seat and let out a loud sigh.

It seemed a silly question, but I had to ask it anyway. "What are we going to do?" I turned to Henry with eyes that I didn't realise had widened, and he looked back at me momentarily with a vulnerable look that didn't sit right on his set features.

Quickly, he diverted his gaze, looking instead out of the windshield upon the flakes of snow that were beginning to fall at an alarming rate. I knew, somehow, that he was thinking of how this would affect his prized rose bushes.

Pragmatically, he said, "We'll clean the car, and then we'll go home." By home, of course, he meant that I would spend the night at his place. Home was no longer my pokey apartment in an off-campus Hampden building, not far from Charles and Camilla's place.

"But, Henry," I was staring now out of the window too, "look at this snow."

"I know." He was quick to respond, and for the first time, I thought I saw a glimmer of fear fleet across his face out of the corner of my eye. After a moment, he glanced back at me, and I must have looked some kind of state, because he reached over and clasped the back of my hand in his, closing his fingers over to stroke at my palm.

"It'll pass. We'll go to the nice café tomorrow, the one you like, yes?" I managed a smile, one that just managed to satisfy his piercing gaze, and he nodded. "Good. Look, here's Francis. Let's get this done."

Henry and Francis sorted the car with little help from me - I sat inside it watching with awe as the snow fell like a cinematic Christmas morning. Snow, of course, wasn't uncommon in Hampden, but in April? There may as well have been a hurricane blowing through the sleepy mountain town.

It was late when we eventually left Francis' apartment, after a long, anxious discussion on Francis' part and a troubled phone conversation with Richard. I felt terrible leaving poor Francis alone, but I was crazed with fatigue and his fearful ramblings and defensive arguments were elevating my fragile psyche into a paranoiac state.

In the car, Henry held my hand tightly the whole way home, an unusual (but not unwelcome) gesture. I stayed with my forehead against the chilling glass of the window, watching the condensation form from my breath and the snow, still falling steadily, with a numb feeling.

Henry bundled me inside quickly despite the thick darkness, and we pulled off our coats and shoes in silence. Neither of us mentioned the snow, the unsettled faces of the others disappearing into the night, Francis' trembling hands as we left him in his armchair, Bunny at the bottom of the ravine. Truth be told, I barely thought of these things. I barely thought of anything.

We moved through the dimly lit hall, Henry holding a lit oil lamp aloft to illuminate the familiar way. It threw strange shadows onto the walls around us, morphed shapes that danced and twirled as though they were teasing us, moving in closely and then dashing away as we came towards them. God, I was tired.

Henry left me in an armchair in his front room, momentarily in the peace of darkness as he moved to the hallway to collect another lamp. My forehead fell to my hand, cradled between my thumb and middle fingers which massaged the tight skin. I stayed there, massaging my head, when Henry came back into the room, placing one lamp down and lighting two others to illuminate the room. The candles were almost burnt down, I knew, but Henry didn't take the time to replace them yet. Instead, he came instantly back over to stand over me, smelling now of fire and oil.

With a gentle, firm hand, he gripped my wrist and pulled my hand from my face. Now lit by the ominous lamps, I could only see part of his face but, standing out like a thorn among roses, was the scar above his right eye.

I thought he was going to speak, and I watched him thoughtfully waiting for his words. But, instead, he kissed me fiercely, honey on his lips and fire on his tongue, hands anchored on my shoulders and forcing me into the chair, demanding me to stay. I took his aggressive affection and matched it, gripping on to his shirt with vice-like fingers and yanking him closer. He almost fell on top of me with his ferocity, only managing to balance his weight with the grip of his fingers on my shoulders.

Then, like water to fire, Henry released me as gently as he did not kiss me. "Are you okay?" I asked immediately. He took a moment, scanning my face with his shielded eyes, running the thumb of the hand he'd moved to my face along the bone of my cheek.

Bending his knees, he kissed my eyelids, then nodded curtly. Outside, a sudden wind was gaining momentum, blowing someone's hanging shutter back and forth against the wall, and I jumped at the sudden noise.

Unstartled, Henry moved his hand back down to my shoulder and said, "It's only a shutter. I'm going to get a drink. Would you like one?"

Despite my lethargy and the lateness of the hour, I stayed up with him, a glass of whiskey in both of our hands and the noise of the silence putting things into place.

We were quiet so long I thought Henry had slipped off to sleep. Or that I had, and lingered in some terrible dreamscape. My head lay almost flush against my shoulder, eyes fluttering shut, body heavy against the thick, worn cushions. The glass of whiskey was almost out of my hand, my grasp was slackening so.

Then, another gust of wind attacked, and the shocking 'thwack' of the shutter forced a breath of consciousness into my body. I was drowsy and half mad with tiredness, and in my state, momentarily thrashing against the sofa cushions, I mumbled Henry's name.

I felt him next to me, his leg mere centimetres from my own, the warmth and familiar smell of him, and quickly I came to my senses. Batting my eyes open properly, I looked up to Henry.

He was staring thoughtfully at his glass of whiskey, holding it up to the flickering light and watching the amber liquid turn into spun gold. He mumbled almost unintelligibly, "Omnia redit ad pulverem."

I stared at the side of his face, sharp and buttery gold in the soft light. For a moment, I didn't even recognise him. Then, the shadows fell back into place, the lamp's final revolution quelled by the fierceness of the strengthening wind flowing in through the open window, and Henry was back, the shutter outside silenced, the room like twilight once more.

He turned to me with a smile that didn't reach far. "Let's go to bed." With not a word, I agreed, and together we moved to Henry's room while outside the snow fell onto the unsuspecting spring ground, onto the rose bushes in Henry's garden, onto the colossal roofs of Hampden College, onto the budding trees around the town, onto the river that ran through, onto the yellow rain slicker and stiff flesh of someone I had once loved and who I would never see again.

I thought the fitful sleep I had that night, tossing and turning beside Henry, who lay awake until dawn with a book in his lap and his hand clutching my wrist, would be the worst of my life. As ever, I was wrong. There were worse nights to come. Far worse.

[justjams2003]

Thundering return

Cha~ idfk hello:) I want more dark Thor >:( Please somebody, I need it. Or mob boss Thor, anything where he is doing something criminal >:(

Pairing: Dark!Thor x slave!wife!reader

Warnings: Mentions of previous rape, manipulation, stockholm syndrome type situation, violent sex, degrading, praising.

Summary: Thor comes home lustful after a heavy battle in need for a release. (Basically just smut)

Word count: 1.6k, not edited also it’s 1:30 am

When you first got hear, the sound of a storm made yours body quiver with fear. Fear of Thor, of his return. A clear sign that his mood is unstable and most likely you will be forced into the cross fires of that anger. You will be used to relieve that frustration, in any way he possibly sees fit.

After all, your marriage was forced. Your father and the all father coming to agreement. You were seen as one of the most beautiful maidens, creatures to have lived, right under the gods of course. And so you were married off and Thor was in complete defiance.

Yet still, he was over protective of you. Not allowed out without him by your side or a select view guards. Not allowed to make eye contact with any man nearby. Not to speak without his before-decided permission. All outfits had to be seen by him before any other could see.

It confused you at first, his quick mood changes. One moment he’d be cherishing your whole being with such devouring eyes. Protecting you at all costs and making sure not another would even think of upsetting you. You were happy about the marriage, having heard many good things about him.

But at nights when thunderstorms were booming loud and he took you without question, you put up a fight. As any other would. That would only upset him more. But soon he convinced you and made you realise this is how he shows his love. He’s tired and angry and then he turns to you to comfort him.

To you, he goes to you for relief. You can’t go on without him. He is the reason you have all these lavish gowns and feasts upon feasts. People protecting you from the horrors outside of the castle walls. You have the most handsome prince in all nine realms relishing your body. And so you realised how much you need him. Giving yourself to him fully and allowing yourself to be happy here.

So when thunderclouds began to form late in the afternoon, your heart raced wildly. Finally he is to return from his battle. He’s been gone at least two weeks now and it has been hell for you. Beyond lonely as you are usually to accompany Thor everywhere.

And so when you awoke just slightly past midnight with a huge boom and clap of thunder you immediately grew wet with anticipation. Urgently your closest maiden rushes in, slamming the doors open. “His Majesty has returned and demands your greeting at once,” she says, already helping her exit.

Thor is first in the greeting hall. His blonde hair is dripping wet, similar to how you are feeling. His eyes are filled with a dark cyclone. Just then as those tempestuous blue eyes land on your figure, a massive lightning bolt hits the ground. Illuminating the everything behind Thor, making him seem like only a dark shadow.

“Wife...” His voice is dripping with lust and yet his eyes filled with anger, jealousy and an emotion indescribable to you. Then you realise. Thor’s fighting company is right behind him. The Warriors Three, Sif and even Loki. They all respect you and fear you far too much to even look at your form.

He had called to you and you came without even thinking. Leaving in only a night gown, one made of satin and silk. Perfectly falling over your curves like a waterfall smooths over rocks. Thor grabs you, right by the waist. Pressing your body as close to him as you can.

You follow his lead, wrapping your arms around his neck and shoulders. Bringing him in even closer. “We will discuss this in the bedroom.” He states, with a low growl into your ear. “For now you will stand behind me as I greet my friends for the night.” He commands to you, his voice low and trilling.

And so you listened and followed his every word. Waiting as he allows your maid to leave, commanding her to start with feast plans. He greets his friends with joyous laughter and an adrenaline filled hug. And finally when they were all gone, he turned to you.

His eyes switching from fire to lightning. He does not speak a single word but simply grabs you closer by the neck once more. His lips grapple around yours, his hands dropping mjolnir with a thud. Causing you to jump slightly and he easily takes that as an opportunity to do both pull you up to wrap your legs around his waist and devour his tongue into your mouth.

His hands squeezes onto your waist and the other holding onto your ass for dear life. Bruises will most definitely be left there within the next hour. Soon, not even sure how it was that soon, you reach the bedroom. He throws you down on the bed without much care.

“You whore!” Is his very first words, watching your every move and every curve in his body. Again a bolt strikes, he also begins removing his clothes. His cape falling, chain-mail clattering to the floor. “I spend two weeks away, surrounded by women throwing themselves at me.” His voice gruffs out as he continues.

Each time he wants to put extra care to a word thunder would boom or lightning would strike. “And I had to keep myself away from them. For your sake! To keep you happy, keep our image clean.” He explained, as if it is such a big thing to do.

But to you, it does. To you it is the most obvious thing in the world. You weren’t allowed around a select few men, not allowing you to be seduced. Thor doesn’t have that same privilege. Having to keep his mind pure without someone there to help him. Sure to others it makes no sense, but you’re so in love it only makes sense to you.

“Then the first thing you do, is show up in that! In front of Loki even!” Thor is sacred of losing you, to anybody. Especially to Loki, not that he had done much to deserve such treatment. “That...” he mumbles out, finally dropping his pants. Allowing his massive girth to show fully.

He purrs, crawling onto the bed and fiddling with the night slip. “This is not much to cover yourself with,” he seems to chuckle. Then, just to show how much stronger he is than you, he rips the garment right from your skin. Another bolt hits when he sees your body in full.

The blue light creating shadows on your perfect curve. The colour just sending thrills down Thor’s spine, his colour lighting up your body. He lets out a corrupt chuckle. “By Gods, you my dear are so perfectly crafted,” he mutters, taking in to see each part of you.

“I quite like seeing blue on you,” he announces, his cock right on your clit. Both of you slippery and so ready for each other. “Oh fuck,” you moan out feeling him rub himself on you. Feeling just how big he gets from seeing you. Then his mouth is all over your body.

Kissing and sucking on each part of flesh that will be seen when wearing any garment. Leaving hickeys that will turn blue by the morning. So that everyone can see who exactly you belong to. The whole time rubbing his girth up and down your clit and vulva.

At that point you were coming close, he knew how to get you there even if it is with just his cock. Meaning that he knows damn well just how close your are becoming. He removes himself from you. His dark eyes lit with joy at the whines that leave your mouth.

“You dark get to whine, you pretty little slut.” He warns you, flaring his nostrils with annoyance. “This is for me and me alone. You are to take my cock like the good scant pet you are.” He commands, lifting your legs around his waist, lining himself up with your hole.

“Yes, my prince,” you’ve been trained well. Knowing exactly how to respond to him. He smirks at this and thrusts himself deep inside you. He moans out, burrowing his face in your neck. “So tight for your husband,” he mutters out. You can’t help but wince and also moan from the sheer size of him.

Even after each time it is still so hard to take him all in. Your legs wrapping around him to bring him in even deeper. Have himself close to you just to ground yourself. Your head lolling back as he pounds into you. Your mind going numb from the pure pleasure.

In between he leaves praises and then calling you exactly the opposite. And finally when Thor feels himself coming closer, he lifts you up higher. To get himself deeper in you. Perfectly hitting your pelvic bone, hitting your clit just right.

“Tomorrow you will have my cum leaking out of you.” He commands, knowing full well this will go on for most of the night. Cumming deep into you over and over again. Just like now, hot liquid spewing deep inside of you, allowing you to do the same with him deep inside you.

Thor used you in every way he could that night. Leaving marks all over you, leaving your body a hot, gushing mess. And finally when he decided rest is needed, to have you looking for the feast. “You’re sleeping naked from now on.” Is the last thing he says to you.

A/N : So I missed the birthday post...because I kept coming up with new ideas. But I promise I am like,,,,, 5000 words away from being finished? It’s worth the hype, to me at least, I have bee planning it for like 3 years now. Anyways, I am a whore for dark!Thor. Which, doesn’t really fit in my story so here we are. (Thank you for all the followers btw and to everyone still supporting even though I am so inconsistent.) 

[suguwu]

lover be good to me: part one

You meet Kita Shinsuke on a rainy summer day, with a sea of hydrangeas swirling at your feet. You know him instantly, as only a soulmate can. He seems like a good man. Like a good soulmate.

But it's your wedding day.

minors and ageless blogs do not interact.

pairings: kita shinsuke x f!reader, oc x f!reader

notes: this fic has been a long time coming—it's basically my baby at this point. i'm so excited to finally get to share part one with you! i am so thankful for everyone who has sat thru me yelling about this to them. and a million thank yous to my beta, between your enthusiasm for this fic and all your help with it—i don't know if it could have been done without you!

title and part title are from hozier's "be" and "nfwmb"

tags for this part: soulmate au (first words), this is a very reader-centric story, very significant reader x oc, slow burn, hurt/comfort, pining, alcohol consumption, anxiety.

see main fic tags here.

wc: 13k

The hydrangeas are in full bloom.

You can see them through the window: the sea in each blossom, the radiant blue of them veined through with white, ocean and foam detailed in petals. They nod with the rain, weighed down by the fat droplets. 

There are two men that keep passing through the sea of hydrangeas like ships, leaving little eddies of blooms in their wake. They must be vendors considering they’re weighted down by boxes, though neither seems bothered by their load. 

You watch them for a moment. They’re both efficient, unbothered by the slow, steady drizzle. You rest your chin on your cupped palm, eyes drawn to the shorter man. There’s a few strands of hair peeking out from beneath his hat, the hazy gray of it—black-tipped like thunderclouds—an odd contrast to his lean, toned body. 

He makes his way through the courtyard, and you lean forward to keep him in sight, your nose almost pressed against the foggy window pane. He steps carefully around a drooping hydrangea bloom, his calm face visible for the first time, and something threads through you for a breath unraveling too quickly for you to place. 

He ducks beneath the eaves and out of your sight. 

Just in time, too. The rain picks up drumming gently against the ground, carrying a few loosened petals with it. The other man—broader and taller but no less graceful for it—spits out a curse. He hurries forward until he too is gone from view. 

“Told you it would rain,” Abe says from behind you, making you yelp. She presses in next to you. Her breath billows over the window pane blooming hazy against it, a marine fog. 

“You did,” you say with a laugh. “So did the weather channel. Almost a full week before you did.”

She scoffs. “Yes, but that’s their job. Mine was sheer instinct.”

“And listening to the weather channel?”

“Must you slander me?”

“Yes,” you say, smiling, but your gaze returns to the courtyard where the hydrangeas are bleeding petals under the rain’s heavy cut. 

“Are you nervous?”

You meet Abe’s gaze in the reflection of the window pane. Her dark eyes are warm and soft, and maybe a little bit sad. 

“Should I be?” you ask.

She wraps a small hand around yours and you realize you’ve been tapping your nail against your water glass, a crystalline symphony. 

“No,” she says firmly. “You shouldn’t.”

Warmth blooms in your chest, sprouts like flowers between the cracks in the concrete. You lean into her. She sighs, long and put-upon, but she tilts towards you, opens her body to you. It’s an invitation you know well. You rest your head in the crook of her shoulder and stare out the window.

“Yeah,” you say. “You’re right.”

“Always am.”

“That’s debatable, Natsu.” 

She grumbles but starts to pull away without comment when the kimono stylist calls out for her. She pauses for a moment. She leans in and adjusts your shiromuku carefully, her fingers deft. Then she squeezes your hand softly, familiar and warm, like a song you’ll always know. You squeeze back. 

You watch her reflection in the window until it blurs at the edges. She’s already bickering with Yoshikawa by the time it fades entirely from the foggy windowpane, their voices carrying. You’re sure that they’re curled together over Yoshikawa’s phone, flicking through the itinerary you’ve already forgotten most of. 

There’s movement beyond the window and you perk up as the man from before walks by. He’s kept under the eaves by the increased rain, and you can see the way it’s dampened his hair to something closer to slate.

There’s a gleam of amber above the boxes he’s carrying; the briefest flash of his eyes, bright and keen. He sweeps by the window almost close enough to touch, and you press your fingertips against the cool pane without thinking. 

It’s this closeness that lets you see his phone—a flip phone, of all things, with a little charm you can’t quite make out dangling from it—slip from his pocket. You wince as it drops out of view. 

He keeps going though, utterly unfazed. The rain has overshadowed the noise you realize, and you’re darting outside before you even know it, the shoji rattling slightly from your force. The summer humidity rolls over you, so stark against your aircon-chilled skin that you shiver with it. 

“You dropped your phone!” you call out after the man, hurrying along the engawa to scoop it up, careful of your shiromuku’s hem. The tiny charm is a stylized stalk of rice, you realize, the little panicles at the top colored with shimmering golden paint. It’s cute. A little at odds with his utilitarian flip phone, but cute nonetheless.

Ahead of you, the man goes still.

He’s turning around when his name unfurls inside of you. 

The movies hadn’t said it was anything like this.

There’s no passion ripping through you like forest fire, no lightning strike sizzling his name into your very bones. It’s slow and soft, like slipping into bathwater after a long, hard day, the heated kiss of it a balm against all of your bruises. Like the bloom of the first crocuses, a promise of spring after the long winter. 

“Oh, Shinsuke,” you breathe, and you think you’ve never known a name so well, that each curve of it was made to fit upon your tongue. 

The man—Shinsuke—stares at you. And then his lips tilt into a faint smile, tender like the oncoming dawn; a watercolor sky burgeoning with sunlight, a world coming awake. You think you could build a home in the way he looks at you. 

“There you are,” he says softly. “I’ve been waiting.”

You know.

You’ve known for years that he’s been waiting for you; it’s been scrawled on your skin this whole time. He has always, always been waiting for you.

Your soulmark pulses faintly. For a breath, you think you can see it glow despite the heavy layers you have on.

“Shinsuke,” you say again. It’s a helpless little sound, the edges of it catching in your throat like burrs. You need to say something else. You know you do. You know what you have to tell him, but he’s looking at you so softly that the words keep getting lost. 

Your grip on his phone tightens until the little rice charm is cutting into your skin.

His smile starts to fade. It curls in on itself, wilting at the edges, like the last of the summer flowers.

He’s been looking at only you, you realize. Just you. Your face, most likely, but it feels like something more—as if he’s seeing down to your marrow, as if he’s flayed you open beneath his tender gaze. He’s only been looking at you. Nothing else. 

He’s been looking at you, but you think he’s seeing the rest now. Your careful makeup. Your pristine hair.

Your lavish shiromuku—carefully embroidered with the elegant sweep of cranes’ wings and with delicate petals unfolding into bountiful chrysanthemums—that fits you perfectly, the heavy silk of it as white as driven snow.

You couldn’t find the words for it, caught up in the gentle sun of his joy as it pooled golden around you, but he’s finally seeing what you couldn’t say.

It’s your wedding day.

***

Your soulmark appears when you’re twelve, all without you even noticing. 

Summer is in full bloom in Toyooka; the wet lick of a heatwave has settled oppressive over the countryside. It’s relentless. Even the rice fields seem to feel it, the verdant green ripple of them becoming a honey-slow shiver under the wind’s gentle touch. 

In the heat the cicadas’ call goes lazy; the storks only come out in the earliest parts of morning. They wade carefully through the still waters of the rice paddies, their beaks flashing in the weak sunlight as they needle down into the murk. 

The rental house is tucked carefully between two farms, a lone house amid the rippling rice plants. It’s old but well-maintained, a perfect little hideaway for your mother to finish her study. In the heat, she keeps the shoji doors open wide to let in the dancing, citronella-scented breeze. The first day you wander around the house to weigh the papers down with a mish-mash of items: the fruit bowl, pilfered from the kitchen counter under your father’s nose; encyclopedias long outdated; a pair of petal-flecked garden shears. 

It helps it feel like home.

Abe and her mother have come to Toyooka too; your mothers spend their days bent close together, talking in a language you know by heart but still can’t understand. Caught up in their research, they leave you to your own devices.

Away from all of your other friends and the bustle of the city, you and Abe roam free like a pair of stray cats. You spend the days without chores wandering through town, your arm hooked through hers, both your tongues stained sky blue from the Gari-Gari Kun popsicles from the conbini. The grannies wave at you as you pass by them; the two of you wave back with sticky fingers. 

You flit in and out of the rice paddies, scooping up tadpoles from the murky water. The farmers grow used to your presence quickly; they greet you cheerfully, accepting the onigiri you bring with little nods. 

After you splash through a paddy to coo over them, Watanabe lets you feed his ducks. He pours the feed from his hands into your smaller ones with a grunt. His hands are strong but aged, the dark skin on the back of his hands papery in the sunlight, wrinkled like old parchment. He teaches you both how to sprinkle the feed into the water just right so the ducks go arrowing across the water, little ships without sails. 

The days are long and short in the same breath.  

At night, Abe’s flashlight flickers in her window like a firefly, long after you are both meant to be in bed. You flash your own message back, little secrets wrapped up in ribbons of light, never mentioned after dawn. The two of you are woven together as only childhood friends can be.

And it’s Abe that sees your soulmark first. 

It’s midday and the clouds are rolling in across the clear blue sky hanging heavy and low, a gray promise of afternoon thunder. The two of you trace shapes in the clouds, shaded under a massive camphor tree, bumping into each other’s arms as you go.

There’s a rabbit in your cloud, the puffy edges of it extending into fluffy gray ears that wisp and sway with the growing breeze. You’ve just traced along the little curve of its nose when Abe—who has been burbling away like a spring brook, her chatter weaving a spell around the two of you—goes silent. 

Then she shrieks and grabs your arm.

“When did it come in?” she asks breathlessly. She’s shaking you too hard for you to see what she’s talking about, but there’s only one thing that tone could mean. 

You freeze, your heart pounding in your ears. For a moment, you consider closing your eyes, as if that will keep it from being real. As if that will rewrite your fate. 

You think of all the quotes you’ve scrawled in your notebooks late at night, and hope for all of them and none of them. 

Abe gives you another little shake. “I can’t believe you didn’t tell me! It’s so early! How long have you had it? Has anyone said it yet? What do you—”

“I don’t know!” you say, shaking her off and scooting backwards, pulling your arm towards your chest. 

She scowls. “How do you not know?”

“I didn’t notice it.”

You hadn’t. Maybe it was the sleepy haze of summer days running together.

Maybe you hadn’t wanted to see it.

Now that you know, it’s easy to see your mark. It’s already settled into your skin, the kanji tucked carefully into the tender flesh of the crook of your elbow. The characters are neat, precise little things, delicate at the edges. It shimmers silvery in the sunlight. A winter moon’s glow inked into your skin.

Abe plants her hands on her hips. “You didn’t notice your soulmark?”

You shake your head. “You know I would tell you!!”

She huffs. “I guess. You really didn’t know?”

You yank on a tuft of grass. “Nope.”

“Idiot,” she says, but it’s fond. She nudges closer to you despite the heat. “Who doesn’t realize their mark was written?”

“Me, I guess.”

“Guess so. Lemme see,” she says, making grabby hands at your arm; you let her yank it close with a sigh. She peers down at your mark with heavy concentration.

“You look like Granny Takada right now.”

She pouts. “Do not!”

“You do,” you tell her. “You’re all squinty.” 

“Do you want me to read it to you or not?”

You take a second too long to answer, the words caught in your throat, tangled on your tongue. Abe glances up. Something passes over her face; it’s too quick to know, a fleeting summer storm. She drops your arm with a sigh.

“The kanji are complicated,” she complains. “Too hard to read. Leave it to you to have a soulmate like that.” 

“Hey! What’s that supposed to mean?” you ask, wrinkling your nose even as you relax, your muscles uncoiling. 

She snorts. “Nothing, nothing,” she coos, smacking your hand away when you swat at her. “Let’s go, it’s gonna rain. We can’t track mud inside again.”

“That was you, not me.”

Abe ignores you, popping up to her feet and rocking back on her heels. She takes off before you can stand her braids streaming behind her like kite ribbons, and you yelp out a protest as you scramble to your feet. 

“Nat-chan!” 

“Keep up!” she shouts, halfway to the rice paddy that edges the little meadow, and you take off after her.

The skies open on the two of you when you’re almost back to the rental, the rain relentless and heavy as only a summer storm can be. You both shriek but the water is warm, and you giggle at the way Abe’s bangs are plastered to her forehead even as you keep running.

You tumble into the genkan just as the first lightning strike splits the sky. You’re practically tripping over each other. Abe knocks into the getabako, jarring a pair of your father’s shoes, their well-worn soles rolling upwards like the barnacled hull of a capsized boat. She grunts with the impact.

“Quiet,” you hiss.

“I’m being quiet,” she hisses back, just as your mother rounds the corner and fixes the two of you with an unimpressed raised brow.

Abe’s mother peeks around the corner too, her lips thinning as she sees the water dripping from the two of you. “You’re soaked,” she says. “And you’re making a mess of the genkan, Natsumi.”

“Sorry,” she mutters.

Her mother sighs. “Weren’t you supposed to be back earlier? Before the rain?”

“We got distracted because her soulmark came in!” Abe says, pointing to you with no remorse. 

You gape at her. 

“What?” she says. “It’s in a pretty obvious spot.” 

“Natsumi,” her mother says, exasperated. “You’re always jumping in feet first.”

Abe grumbles, but goes quiet when her mother eyes her.

“Chieko,” your mother says. “Do you need umbrellas for the walk home?”

“If it’s not an inconvenience.”

“Of course not.”

You and Abe engage in a rapid-fire round of mouthing things to each other as your mothers search for umbrellas, too close to risk actual words. Abe speaks fast, even in exaggerated slow motion, and after you think she says something about snails, you decide it’s too incomprehensible to keep trying. You wave her off with a quick tilt of your head. She scowls but stops, crossing her arms with a soggy squish. 

The scowl disappears from her face as soon as her mother steps up beside her, handing her one of your umbrellas. She traces a finger over the nearest little cat design, petting lightly at its fabric ears. 

“Let’s go before you catch a cold,” Chieko says. “Say goodbye.”

“Bye,” Abe says, her voice stilted.

“Bye,” you parrot. 

“Alright then,” Chieko says after a moment. She looks at you, considering. You bite the inside of your cheek, running the tip of your tongue against the pinched flesh. 

She sighs. “You’ll figure it out,” she says softly.

You should have known that she wouldn’t offer congratulations. The relief spreads over you like a balm, soothing the scrape you hadn’t even known was there. 

You nod. 

“See you tomorrow,” your mother tells her.

She and Abe disappear out the front door and into the downpour; Abe throws you one last look before the door closes behind them. You look away. 

Your mother is quiet for a moment. “Do you want to talk about it?” she asks.

“I—I don’t think so.”

She considers you. “Alright,” she says. “I’ll get you a towel and then you need to go change before you get sick.”

“Okay.” 

She disappears down the hallway without another word. 

You look down to your soulmark. At the thin kanji of it, the gleam of them like spiderwebs caught in a moonbeam, an ethereal silver. When you touch it, tracing a fingertip carefully against the crook of your elbow, it just feels like skin. As if it’s always been there. As if it’s always been a part of you. 

Upside down, the kanji are difficult to parse. You run your fingers over them once more, and then your mother is there with a towel. You yank your fingers away as if burned. She doesn’t react, just handing you the towel and corralling you upstairs to dry yourself off. 

Dinner is quiet that night and you go up to bed early, tired from the ups and downs of the day.

You’ve just finished brushing your teeth when the flickering catches your attention. You spit out the last bit of foam and rinse out your mouth before padding over to your window. 

A little light bobs up and down across the way; at moments, you can make out the vague outline of Abe’s face when she brings the flashlight up with a sharp jerk that almost hits her chin. She’s cycling through the attention-getting code you’d made up a few years back. 

You consider pulling your shade down entirely. 

Instead, you pad over to your dresser drawer and pull out your own flashlight. You settle into bed with it heavy on your lap. You pull at the edge of the faded sticker slapped below the switch, tearing a little piece of it off. You flick it on for a second. Just enough to let Abe know you’re there. 

It’s not your normal greeting, and Abe’s window stays dark for a long, long moment. 

Mad at me? she finally flashes, little pulses of starlight in the dark.

You are. Soulmates are different for the two of you. You’ve grown up hearing all of the jargon for your mother’s study, and you know that she has too. You know the low rate of soulmates meeting, and you know the distant look in your father’s eyes as he wraps tender fingers around his blackened mark. 

It’s different, and you thought she knew that. 

Sorry, her flashlight blinks out. I am.

You think of how she complained about the kanji of your mark despite being the most proficient in your classroom. 

Mad at me?

You wonder how you would have told your parents that you’d received your mark when you can barely acknowledge it yourself. 

You raise your flashlight.

No, you send off. Not anymore. 

Good, she immediately sends. 

You talk until your eyelids are drooping and your jaw is cracking with non-stop yawning. It’s easy to say goodnight, knowing you’ll see each other in the morning. You pull down your shade and climb into bed.

You fall asleep with your hand cupped over your soulmark.

***

It takes you three days to finally ask what your mark says. 

Evening is coming to life, the sky darkening into plum, the faintest hint of cotton-candy pink lingering on the horizon. As your father sets the table, you’re unable to resist the quiet call of what fate has scraped into your skin. 

He blinks, trading a look with your mother, but then he smiles softly. 

“After dinner,” he tells you. “Okay?”

You nod.

It’s your mother who reads it to you later, the two of you whispering together on the engawa surrounded by the flicker of the summer fireflies. You curl tight into her side, a rib returned. 

“There you are,” she reads softly, stroking a thumb gently over the kanji. “I’ve been waiting.” 

Her voice is a honeyed drip, sweet and steady, and though she is smiling, you think she sounds sad. She shifts to press a hand tight over her stomach as if it’s the only thing holding her together, as if she’s suddenly too big for her body. You know her mark is there. The kanji has gone sour and black, an eclipsed moon. 

“I don’t know if I want them to wait for me,” you whisper to her. 

She presses a kiss to your hairline. “You don’t have to know, tadpole.”

You bite the inside of your cheek. 

She shifts beside you. “You don’t have to wait for them, you know,” she tells you.

“Really?”

“Really,” she says.

“Do you think I’ll meet them?” you ask, kicking your feet and looking out into the night. A firefly flares bright, and you consider running to catch it. You’ve always been quick enough. The fireflies have always been trusting enough. 

She nudges a knuckle against your cheek. “The chances are low,” she admits, because she has never lied to you about soulmates. “And that’s not necessarily a bad thing.”

“Why?”

She sighs. “You’ll understand when you’re older.”

She still has her hand pressed hard against her ribcage. 

You bite your lip and don’t ask anything else. 

The two of you stay curled together under the stars, watching the trucks trundle down the road as the late-working farmers return from the paddies. Eventually, she ushers you inside, and when she thinks you aren’t looking she knots her fingers in your father’s shirt. The fabric winds tight around her fingers, cutting into the softness of her skin. Her shoulders are trembling. Your father cups the back of her head and brushes a kiss to her hairline. 

You go up to your bedroom without a word because even this young, you know there are things you aren’t meant to see. 

Not long after that night your mother and Abe’s mother publish the study. It’s a culmination of years of grueling research on soulmates, of half-written notes on napkins when you go out to restaurants, of simmering arguments between her and Abe’s mother, of death threats and poisonous words. 

It covers the concept of soulmates like kudzu, winding over the romance of it and smothering it beneath statistics and a dissection of societal impact alike. 

It gets a nickname soon after publication, and your mother’s smile is a melon rind curve, bitter at the edges. 

They call it the Heartbreak Study.

***

Summer comes to an end.

You leave Toyooka on a rainy afternoon, the light drizzle sending water droplets racing down the train window. The storks huddle together in the paddies, their wet feathers gleaming like the moon. Abe is warm at your side curled into you, already half-asleep from the underlying hum of the train. It picks up speed and the rolling green of the countryside blurs like a watercolor, smearing across the horizon as you head back to the city.

It feels like you’re leaving more than the countryside behind.

Still, the city is a comfort, the bustle of it a familiar song, and you’d missed the neon lights that dot the streets like little flowers. With the return of school just around the corner it’s nice to settle back into the rhythm of city life, so different from the steady, unyielding heartbeat of Toyooka. 

You unpack your clothes and yourself too, slotting everything back into your city life, trying to fit back into it like a well-worn pair of shoes. 

“Oh,” Yoshikawa says lazily the next day, when you and Abe find her sprawled out on a bench by the conbini, sucking on a popsicle. She peers up at you, her long hair flowing around her shoulders like weeds in the current, softly swaying with each little movement. “You’re back.”

“She got her soulmark!” Abe says, dragging you forward by your wrist to display your mark. 

“Natsu,” you groan, ignoring the way she tugs at your wrist to pull you even more into Yoshikawa’s space. “Really?”

“What, you weren’t going to tell her?”

“Yeah,” Yoshikawa drawls, her dark eyes sly. “Were you not gonna tell me?”

“Shut up, Yocchan,” you say. “You know I was going to tell you.”

“You sure?” she asks, propping herself up on her elbows. “Doesn’t quite sound like it.”

“Yocchan.”

“Fine, fine, I’ll stop teasing. Can I see?” 

You hesitate for a breath. 

“You don’t gotta,” Yoshikawa says, biting into her popsicle with a loud crunch. Her lips are blue with it, the same color as the mid-morning sky. It drips down her elegant fingers, catches on the small scars littered across them. She licks at them absently, but her gaze is keen.

“It’s fine,” you say. “I’m just…still getting used to it.”

She hums. 

“Great,” Abe says, using her grip on your wrist to tug you forward again. “Look, look, look!”

Yoshikawa pushes herself the rest of the way up slowly, tucking her popsicle between her teeth as she reaches for your arm. Her fingers are sticky against your skin. She’s quiet as she reads your mark, her brow slightly furrowed. 

She lets you go after a minute, and you try not to fidget.

“Romantic,” she says. She lays back down on the bench.

Abe makes a strangled noise. “That’s all?”

Yoshikawa blinks slowly, but there’s a smug curve to her lips. “Is there something else to say?”

Abe stamps her foot. “There’s so much to say! She got her mark! The first of us! The first in our year!”

“Nah, Sasaki got his right before the break.”

“He did?”

“He did?” you echo. Relief blooms in you, rooting in the cracks of you, and you let out a tight breath you didn’t know you were holding. 

“Yeah,” Yoshikawa says. She closes her eyes and raises her face to the sun. It bathes her, turns her golden, an offering at the ending summer’s altar. “Our moms are friends. Heard them talking about it.” 

“Oh,” Abe says, pursing her lips. She glances at you, and you don’t know what she sees in your face, but her eyes go soft. “I guess it’s better that way. It won’t be as big of a deal. It’ll be fine.”

“You think so?” you ask. It comes out smaller than you meant it to. 

She nudges you with her hip. “Yeah,” she says, her voice gentle. There’s a promise in it. “I do.”

Yoshikawa hums her agreement as she bites off the last of her popsicle, ignoring Abe’s wince. She sucks the stick clean and glances at it. “Oh,” she says mildly. “I won.” 

“What?” Abe cries out, practically clambering on top of her to grab the stick. “How do you always win?”

Yoshikawa grunts under her sudden burden, stretching out one long arm to keep Abe from grabbing the stick. “S’not my fault you have bad luck.”

“C’mon, you already had a popsicle today!”

You watch them struggle, Abe doing her best to blanket Yoshikawa’s lanky frame with her tiny one. The laughter bubbles out of you, spills from you like an overflowing urn, loud and unrestrained. 

They turn to you in unison, brows raised. 

“Let’s go to the park,” you say, laughter still sweet on your tongue. “Don’t want to waste the day.” 

They eye you for a moment. They look at each other and shrug. 

“Conbini first,” Abe says. “I want something.” 

“You can’t have my popsicle,” Yoshikawa says.

“I don’t want your stupid free popsicle!”

“You were just trying to grab it!”

“Well I don’t want it anymore! I want mochi instead!”

This time you swallow down your laugh, let it spread warm through you like bottled sunshine. You follow the bickering pair into the conbini. They wait for you at the door, and you link pinkies with them both so they can drag you down the snack aisle.

For the first time since getting your mark, it feels like everything is going to be okay.

***

School starts up again.

It’s still warm, the last dregs of summer lingering in the air as you walk languidly to school with your friends. Abe flits ahead, her dark hair shimmering under the morning sun, and you think of a little darting fish on a reef, a quicksilver flash of scales. She greets other classmates easily. They always have a smile for her, and she falls into step beside them for a moment, chattering away. 

But in the end she always turns around and waits for you and Yoshikawa.

She’s off in the distance when Yoshikawa glances down at the silver peeking out of the crook of your elbow, exposed by the summer uniform’s short sleeves. 

“No wrap?” she asks. 

“No wrap,” you say.

You’d thought about it, but wearing a wrap screams that you’ve gotten your mark. With yours tucked tender into the crook of your elbow, you might be able to get away with it. At least you hope so. You know how many eyes will be on you when people realize, and you shift on the balls of your feet, pressing closer to Yoshikawa.

She hums. “Alright.”

You know that tone.

“Do not cause any problems,” you warn her.

She blinks slowly, like a smug cat with a patch of sunshine all to itself. “I would never. Do you want some toast?”

“Do I what—”

She pulls a handkerchief filled with toast out from her bag, little oily spots of butter bleeding through the hand-embroidered cloth. “Toast,” she says, holding it out.

“Don’t try to distract me,” you say irritably, but when she nudges the toast in your direction you slip a piece free of the handkerchief. You’ve eaten breakfast but no one makes bread like Yoshikawa’s mother, a hobby she’d picked up in her year abroad as a teen. Any of her loaves crackle perfectly under the bread knife, each slice thick and hearty, woven through with herbs and spices. 

“I would never.”

“Liar,” you mutter, sinking your teeth into the toast.

“So mean,” she says, but she’s smiling.

“Hurry up!” Abe shouts back to you both, her hands cupped over her mouth to unnecessarily amplify herself. 

Yoshikawa ignores her, sauntering along as your fellow students pour past you both. She moves like a river current, languid and flowing, and immoveable from her path. 

“You’re the worst,” Abe tells her a few minutes later, when you’ve finally caught up to her. 

“Uh huh.”

“Don’t ignore me, Yocchan!” 

“I’m not,” Yoshikawa says, holding out the toast again. She always brings enough for all three of you. “You just say it so much that it’s lost all meaning.” 

Abe grumbles, but she snags a piece of toast. It crunches beneath her teeth, a crackling symphony. “This is bribery, you know,” she says through her mouthful, scrunching up her nose. 

Yoshikawa shrugs. 

“C’mon,” you say, poking at them both. “We’re gonna be late.”

Abe links arms with you. Your mark flashes bright with the movement, glimmering like snow in the moonlight, all prismatic ice. 

She hums, shifting her arm just enough that your elbows are interlocked, hiding your mark as she tugs you towards the school gates. “Let’s go then,” she says. 

Yoshikawa falls into step on your other side. She leans over and softly bonks her head against yours, her long hair a veil for you both. You press together for a breath, then she pulls back and links her arm through your other arm as you enter the school grounds.

You make it two whole periods before someone notices. 

It’s Hasegawa, of course, her deep brown eyes going wide as you reach into your bag for your textbook. She says something to her seatmate, and Honda’s eyes snap to you.

You keep arranging your supplies. You set your pencil down next to your notebook and line them up as precisely as you can, nudging it back and forth until it’s perfectly aligned as they whisper to each other. They keep glancing at you until Yoshikawa leans back in her seat and flashes them a razor-edged smile. Honda squeaks, and they both go quiet after that.

But there’s no escaping it. You can feel eyes on you all day, and murmurs follow you everywhere. You barely eat at lunch, pushing the pieces of your bento around as Abe and Yoshikawa crowd you on either side. 

You almost make it to the end of the school day, but then Ueda and Nakajima stop you in the hallway. You bow to your seniors as they look you up and down. 

“We heard you got your soulmark,” Nakajima says, swaying in place just slightly, like kelp caught in a current. “Is it true?”

“Yes,” you say, trying not to fidget with your sleeve.

“When?” Ueda asks, frowning.

“Over the break.”

“Early to be getting your mark,” she muses. She doesn’t have hers yet, you think. Only a handful of people in her year do. 

“They say the earlier the mark manifests, the stronger the soul bond,” Nakajima says. 

It’s a common belief, one of the oldest wives tales there is, but you’ve spent too long listening to your mother. You know better. Still, your stomach twists.

“What does yours say?” Ueda asks.

You bite your tongue; the pain flashes through you like lightning, bright and sharp and bitter. The bitterness lingers, fills your mouth until you have to swallow it down. It stings the whole way. 

Ueda waits.

When you tell her, it feels like each word is being torn from you, as if they’d rooted into your very flesh. 

(You suppose they have.) 

For a breath, Ueda’s face twists. You think of the first hint of rot in ripe fruit, when the scent goes too sweet, a promise of decay. It isn’t the first time you’ve seen jealousy over a mark, but it’s odd to have it directed at you. 

I didn’t ask for this, you want to tell her. I don’t know if I even want this.

“Oh, how lovely,” Nakajima murmurs, moon-eyed. “You’re lucky to have such a devoted soulmate.”

You smile, but you think it’s a poor imitation of one, soured at the edges as it is. “Yeah,” you say, because she’s looking at you expectantly. “I am.”

“Well, congratulations. Right, Machi?”

“Yeah,” Ueda says, flashing you a tight smile. “Congratulations.” 

“Thank you,” you say, the words ash on your tongue. 

Nakajima tilts her head, bird-like, but Yoshikawa comes to your rescue, calling out your name from down the hall. You bid your seniors a quiet goodbye before hurrying to her.

She slings an arm around your shoulders, squeezing lightly. 

“Okay?” she asks.

“Yeah,” you say. “I’m fine.”

She hums her disbelief but leaves you be.

With her by your side, smiling pleasantly and radiating danger, the day passes without anyone else approaching you. Abe joins you again, looking proud of herself in a way that means she caused a problem, and you wonder what you did to deserve both of them. 

They come home with you when school ends, waving to your parents as you head up to your room. You collapse face-down on your bed and Yoshikawa laughs, low and deep and a little bit sad. 

She and Abe curl up around you like cats. They talk about everything and nothing, filling up your room with their presence until you start to go lax against them. They shuffle closer as you do and they’re warm against you, like sunbaked stone. You sink into that warmth and breathe out deeply.

The next few weeks will be filled with questions, with murmurs behind your back, with everything that comes with getting your mark so early. You know that, but there’s one other thing that you know, too.

With them, you know you’ll make it through. 

***

The school year blurs past in a watercolor of seasons. Fall gives way to winter, curling up under the biting cold; spring chases away winter in a riot of color, the sakura buds unfurling as your upperclassmen graduate, each bloom inset into the branches like a little jewel. As summer beckons, the days warming as the promise of rain hangs heavy in the humid air, Kimura gets her mark.

She’s only the third person in your year to get hers and she’s coy about it, wrapping it in a ribbon, the burgundy silk luscious against her skin. It’s as eye-catching as she meant it to be. 

It’s elegant in its own way, though the ribbon wilts slightly as the day goes on, mostly from the way she keeps touching it. She strokes along the ribbon as she talks with her friends. You’re not sure she realizes it.

A few people glance your way, their eyes flickering to your elbow, but their attention is as fleeting as the first snow. Their gazes return to Kimura, to the bruised burgundy of her ribbon.

Something loosens in you, unravels from where it’s been knit tight around your ribs. 

Honda gets hers next, and then Watanabe gets his. 

Slowly, mark after mark comes into being, words unfurling across skin. As more of your classmates receive their marks, yours fades into the background. It becomes common and you sink into that commonality, having long waited for the spotlight on you to cease.

Your mark fades into the background, like a star just after dawn—known only to those who know where to look. You try not to think of it. Sometimes you even succeed.

In your second year of high school, there’s Takao.

He’s a quiet boy. Stoic, even, his face almost stony as he introduces himself as the new transfer student. But he has a dandelion tuft smile, downy soft and fleeting, carried off by the wind not long after it blooms across his lips. 

You like it, his smile. 

You watch Kimura—your class rep, a position she’s held since middle school—get to her feet. Takao is setting up his desk when she approaches, methodically laying out his supplies. He keeps them in neat rows and you can’t help but smile when you see that his eraser is a battered little Keroppi, its round eyes almost flattened into a straight line on one side.

The class’s chatter softens, a few people glancing towards Kimura and Takao. You can’t see her face, but her fingers are trembling, just a bit. He looks unbothered. There’s not a trace of nerves in him, until you realize that the tips of his ears have gone faintly pink.

Kimura’s voice doesn’t carry when she greets him so you don’t hear what she says, but you see the tension bleed from her after Takao speaks. 

Not soulmates, then.

She relaxes, and from the way her hands are moving she’s starting to outline the classroom expectations. You shift in your seat, starting to turn away, when a flash of movement from Takao catches your eye.

He looks at you from beneath the fan of his eyelashes from across the classroom. He has a small spray of fading freckles, you realize, speckled over the bridge of his nose like a cluster of stars. He gives you that smile again. It takes a moment to realize you’re staring, and you look away, your cheeks hot.  

“You’ve got a crush,” Abe sing-songs at lunch a few days later, jabbing her chopsticks into your bento and stealing a piece of pickled daikon. 

“I don’t,” you say, moving your bento away as she tries to steal another piece. 

Yoshikawa snorts. She’s sprawled out on the grass next to you and Abe, her long skirt caught up around her calves. There’s grass caught in her black hair, the verdant blades swaying as she moves, as if floating in the whirling eddies of the darkened sea.  

“If you’re gonna lie,” she says, turning over onto her stomach, “at least do it well.” 

“I’m not lying!”

“Liar.”

“Such a liar,” Abe agrees. “You stare at him all the time.”

“No I don’t!”

Abe’s grin goes sly. “I didn’t say who,” she tells you. 

“I—it doesn’t matter who, I don’t stare at anyone!”

Yoshikawa raises an eyebrow. “So you don’t stare at Takao.” 

You scowl down at the ground, ripping up a small chunk of grass. You rub the blades between your fingers until they’re a fine pulp, and the scent of a freshly mowed lawn permeates the air.

“See?” Abe says. “Told you.”

“Are you going to talk to him?” Yoshikawa asks, peering up at you. She’s sly-eyed, her gaze keen despite the way she yawns. 

“Not yet,” you say. It takes you a moment to realize that you’re cupping a hand over your mark, rubbing your thumb over the thin skin just above it.

Yoshikawa smiles, warm and soft and knowing, and doesn’t say anything else. Instead she moves closer to you, curling around you like a crescent moon, her head padded on her discarded blazer. You settle into the cradle of her.

Abe is grinning wildly. “I knew that you had a crush,” she says, popping another bite of your rice into her mouth. 

“Oh, like we haven’t seen the way you moon over Takeda!” you say.

She shrugs. “She’s cute.” 

You huff and reach over to steal some of her tamagoyaki. She yelps, scrambling to pull her bento away as you snatch at the last piece. “Mean!” she says, watching as you eat it, the fluffy egg practically melting on your tongue. “I want the rest of your daikon!”

“Get your own!”

She reaches for your bento and you swat at her. The two of you bicker for the rest of lunch, only ceasing when you return to the classroom and take your seats.

Out of the corner of your eye, there’s a flicker of movement. When you glance over, Takao is already watching you. There’s a smile tucked sweet into the corner of his mouth, a sliver of a thing. 

It’s you who looks away first.

You’ll talk to him eventually, you think, cupping a hand over your soulmark once again. 

Just not yet.

***

Not yet lasts longer than you thought.

You and Takao trade glances across the classroom for one week, then another, and then another still. Each look is a fleeting thing, like a shooting star streaking across the sky. 

But you don’t speak to each other. 

You learn the sound of his voice through others when he speaks to your classmates and teachers. It’s quiet, steady, with a warm rasp to it that makes you think of billowing smoke. He blushes to the tips of his ears when it cracks. It’s cute in a way that makes you ache.  

You learn the sound of him, but never for yourself.

Still, you gravitate towards each other. He offers you a tangerine one morning, his smile small, soft, and earnest. When you nod he uses his fingernail to split open the peel, unfurling it in a smooth motion. The peel curls bright around his hand. He separates out a segment and gives it to you, his fingertips damp with sticky juice. They leave shy little imprints across your palm. 

The fruit bursts across your tongue like sunshine, golden and warm. Takao is watching you with hopeful eyes. You grin, and hold your hand out for another.

He sits down next to you to share it. The classroom is full of chatter, but the two of you are quiet, wrapped up in your own world. Suddenly, it’s not so much that you’re scared of speaking, but that maybe you don’t quite need it. Not yet.

It would be nice, you suppose, but as time passes, you and Takao find ways to fit together without speaking. Instead, you learn the tilt of his mouth and the crinkle of his nose and the way his fingers run through his hair. 

It works. It’s not quite enough, but it works.

And so not yet lasts just a little bit longer, the two of you steering away from the cliff’s edge looming in the distance. 

Another month goes by. 

You spend hours with Takao, the sight of you together a common thing to the point where your classmates ask you where he is when they’re looking for him. You can usually tell them. You’re incredibly aware of each other, caught in each other’s gravitational pull. 

Sometimes it feels like you’re destined to only orbit each other, to never truly touch. 

But sometimes you almost speak.

It’s a golden afternoon, the wind rustling through the leaves like a lullaby, filling the space between you both. You’re tucked together on one of the benches in the school’s yard watching the flow of students as they head to their clubs. 

Takao is sunstruck, haloed in gold, and it makes his dark eyes even deeper, an obsidian sheen. You’ve seen it before, but there’s still something about it that makes your stomach flip. 

He shakes his head, trying to get his hair out of his eyes. It doesn’t work, and he does it again. You think of a wet dog and try to stifle your laugh. 

When he does it for a third time, you reach out and brush your fingers through his hair, sweeping it back from his face. He turns into the touch, just slightly.

Someone shrieks out a laugh, and you look up to see one of the girls in the other classes batting lightly at her boyfriend. He murmurs something to her, and her smile grows wider. 

Your stomach twists, coiling tight as you watch them banter with each other. The gaps between your ribs seem to grow, until the empty space is what you’re made of. 

You want, you want, you want. 

You wonder if you’ll ever have.

Takao senses your change in mood but you say nothing, and the two of you separate not long after. 

Your father is watering the plants when you come home. They fill the windows of your home, the sun streaming through the verdant leaves, leaving emerald patches of light on the floor, nature’s stained glass. 

He’s quietly humming to himself, each note off-key, but he stops as soon as he sees you. He eyes you for a moment. 

“What’s wrong?” he asks.

“Nothing,” you say.

“You were better at lying when you were little,” he tells you.

“Thanks.”

“You’re welcome. Now what’s wrong?”

You tell him. It spills out of you like an oil slick, coating everything it touches. You tell him about Takao, about the silence, about it all. You hadn’t realized how much the quiet was eating away at your bones. 

“So what is it, exactly, that you’re worrying about?” your father asks when you’ve finished. It’s a sharp question, razor-edged, but his eyes are soft.

“What if he’s not my soulmate?” you ask him.

He blinks. “Does that change how you feel about him?”

You take a moment to consider. You think of Takao’s smile, and the way his fingers linger against the palm of your hand when he hands you the erasers to clap; the way he lets you take pieces of his bento, all without a word. 

“No,” you say. “I don’t think so.”

“There you go, then.”

“But if he’s not my soulmate—”

“You know the statistics as well as I do,” he says.  “If Takao isn’t your soulmate, that doesn’t mean you can’t be with him.”

“They’re waiting,” you whisper.

“That doesn’t mean you have to,” he says gently. “You’re allowed to make your own choice.” 

You’re not sure that you are.

“What if he is my soulmate?”

Your father puts down the watering can. You see a flash of his soulmark. It’s blackened, a charred smudge against his skin, and when you glance up at his face, there’s something old in his expression. For a breath, you don’t know him at all.

It’s gone as soon as it came, like a shadow beneath the summer sun. He smiles at you. “Then your mom and I will have to meet him, won’t we?”

You balk. 

He laughs, a sound that shimmers in the air. “I’m joking, tadpole,” he says. “And if he is—you’ll figure it out. There’s no point in guessing before you even know.” 

You fidget with your sleeve, rubbing your thumb over the fraying hem of it. 

There are worse things than losing something you never had, you think.

“Okay,” you say. “Okay.”

But things are easier said than done.

It’s not easy, not with Takao. It’s hard to find the words when you’ve spent so much time living in the space between them. 

You find yourself on the rooftop with him during lunch. It’s unseasonably warm, thick puffy clouds sitting high in a robin’s egg blue sky, and you’re sitting side-by-side, close enough to touch. Close enough, but not quite.

Takao hands you some anpan; you give him one of your onigiri, peeling the packaging open for him. He nudges against you, a silent thank you, and something in you breaks. 

“This is stupid,” you blurt out, loud enough that a few heads turn your way.

You clap your hand over your mouth immediately. 

He blinks, staring at you with his lips parted, and your cheeks start to heat. And then he laughs, the sound like woodfire smoke, billowing out of him in low, slow tones. It sweeps over you, settles on your skin, and though your cheeks heat more the sight of him sparks something in you. 

He laughs freely and warmly, his eyes crinkling at the edges. It doesn’t stop; if anything, it flows more strongly, like a river to the ocean. You find yourself swept up in it, laughter bubbling up inside you. 

When it spills out of you and joins his, it sounds like a song. 

“I cannot believe that’s what you said,” he says, and oh, you’ve ached to hear his voice when it was meant for you. You drink it in, swallow it down, something for you alone. “Of all the things.”

He laughs again, short and sharp with delight, but your smile is wilting, going brittle at the edges.

You finally have Takao, only to lose him a moment later.

You’re not soulmates. 

***

It changes things. 

You don’t mean for it to happen, but it does. Suddenly, the language between the two of you is different. Too used to speaking without words, neither of you are prepared for actual speech. You stumble over conversation, the words caught in your mouths like pebbles in a wave, spinning over and over until they’re worn down to nothing. 

“You’ll figure it out,” Abe says, lounging upside down on your bed, tapping away at her controller, her brow furrowed as she smashes at the buttons. “You just gotta adjust, that’s all.” 

You sigh. It’s not something you can explain, really. How one space was filled and another emptied. It leaves something in you aching. 

Yoshikawa hums from where she’s sprawled on your floor, barely paying attention to the tv as she hits combo after combo, much to Abe’s annoyance. “Soulmate stuff is weird,” she says. “But it’s up to you.”

“It’s up to him, too,” you remind her. “Not everyone wants to date someone who isn’t their soulmate.”

“I don’t think you have to worry about that.” 

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” Abe says. “He likes you. It’s kinda gross how much.”

Your cheeks heat. “Shut up.”

She sticks her tongue out at you. “Make me.” 

You throw a pillow at her face, relishing her little yelp as she tries to scramble out of the way and almost falls off your bed. 

“Brat,” she says, tossing the pillow back. “He does, though. Like you.”

“I know,” you say, something vast filling you.

“Is this about the waiting thing?” Yoshikawa asks, putting down her controller and turning to face you. She hooks her chin over your knee, looking up at you with knowing eyes. 

You bite at your bottom lip. 

You know the rates better than anyone; you’ve spent your whole childhood hearing a language all its own. Percentages, probabilities, and all manners of complicated academic jargon, all focused on stripping away the whimsy of soulmates. 

Your mother has only ever wanted to understand. But in that coveting, that hunger, she pressed understanding upon you as well, until you’re caught up in yourself, a tangled skein, so knotted that the beginning can barely be found. 

“What if I do meet them?” you ask. “And they really have been waiting?”

Yoshikawa hums; it reverberates through you. “Dunno,” she says. “But what if you don’t meet them?”

You glare. “Thanks, that’s helpful.” 

“Yeah, Yocchan,” Abe pipes up. “Super helpful.”

Yoshikawa tosses another pillow at her. “I don’t see you offering anything!”

“I already said it’ll be fine!” 

“No you didn’t.”

“Yes, I did!” 

You laugh, the sound light but loud. Your friends pause, looking incredibly pleased with themselves. 

“Oh good,” Abe says. “You’re back.” 

“What do you mean?” you ask.

“Nothing,” she says, but you think there’s a bit of sadness to her, in the waning moon of her smile. “Are you gonna play with us now?” 

She shoves a controller at you and you take it with a huff. “Get ready to lose,” you tell her.

“What else is new?” Yoshikawa asks, moving away from you to grab her own controller again.

“Shut up, Yocchan,” Abe says, scowling. “You’re the worst.”

“Love you too.” 

You ignore them both to pick your character, but you can’t help the smile that plays across your lips as they continue to argue with each other. Abe curls herself around you, sticking her tongue out at Yoshikawa. You shift to give her room and your mark catches the light, reflects it back like morning dew. 

For a moment you stare down at the words that have already changed your life so much. Sometimes you wonder how much more they can take from you.

“It’s my choice,” you say. You freeze, not having meant to say it out loud, but Yoshikawa just hums, settling warm on your other side

“Yeah,” she says with a little hum. “It is.” 

But it isn’t just your choice.

You can’t quite understand Takao’s smile anymore. The nuances are lost in the space between the two of you, a language half-forgotten. The structure is there, but you’ve lost some of the words. 

You can’t quite understand his choice, either.

“I’m sorry,” he tells you, a scant few weeks after you realize you aren’t soulmates. The tips of his ears are pink, the color of the early dawn, and his eyes are glassy. “It’s just that—”

“We’re not soulmates,” you finish for him. Your heart is thrumming behind your ribs, a hummingbird battering against its cage. “Right?”

He winces. “Yeah.”

“I didn’t think it would matter.”

Maybe you should have known that it would.

He winces again; his hands tighten on the strap of his school bag. He stares at you, looking helpless, and you hate that you want to cradle his face in your hands. That you want to make it better for him. 

“It—”

He cuts himself off. His lip trembles, wobbling like a spinning top, and it comes to you all at once. It’s written in the space between you, in a language you’ve both been speaking for months, one that’s all your own.

Takao’s lying.

“Tell me the truth,” you demand, clenching your fists. 

He looks away. “We’re not soulmates,” he says. “That’s all there is to it.”

“Liar.”

“Please don’t make this harder than it needs to be,” he says. “Please.”

“Then tell me the truth.”

“I’m telling you the truth.”

“Fine,” you say. “Fine.” 

When you walk away, he doesn’t come after you. 

***

You hide yourself away among the hydrangea bushes that line the library, settling yourself in a sea of powder-blue petals. You curl up, pulling your knees up against your chest, and cry quietly until your uniform skirt is damp. 

“Well, that’s not good,” Abe says.

You glance up to see her and Yoshikawa leaning over the hydrangea bushes, looking down at you with tender expressions. You immediately cry harder, starting to sob aloud.

“Oh shit,” Abe says, pushing through the puffball clusters of flowers and dropping to her knees beside you. “Don’t cry, don’t cry, it’s okay.” 

“Takao?” Yoshikawa asks.

You nod. 

She smiles, sharp and mean. “Abe, stay with her. I’ll be back.”

You shoot to your feet, grabbing her by her uniform sleeve before she can take off. “No!” you yelp. “No, Asako, don’t do anything!”

“Why not? He made you cry.” 

“He just—it’s okay.”

“It’s not.” 

“He doesn’t want to be with someone who isn’t his soulmate,” you say softly. “That’s…he’s allowed to make that choice.”

She clicks her tongue. “He didn’t strike me as the type.”

“Me either,” you mumble. “I think he’s lying.”

“Why would he lie?” Abe asks, tilting her head.

“Don’t know,” you say. “But it just…it just seemed like he was. Please leave him alone.”

You don’t know how to explain it. You’re not sure you can. It’s a strange little language, the language that forms between two people who haven’t spoken to each other, and you’re not sure anyone who hasn’t created that language between themselves and another could even begin to understand the alphabet of it. 

Yoshikawa hums; her sly eyes are narrowed, the deep brown of them darkened to almost black. “Fine. But if he makes you cry again, all bets are off.”

“Yeah,” Abe says, nudging you up to your feet. “And we know where you hide, so no point in trying to keep it from us!”

Your laugh is watery, but it’s light as it leaves your lips. 

Abe loops her arm through yours. “Let’s go,” she says. “It’s lunchtime and Yoshikawa has a good bento today.”

“And it’s not for you,” Yoshikawa says lazily, stuffing her hands in her pocket as the three of you start to walk. “So don’t even try it.” 

You laugh again and they bicker all the way to the classroom. You’re in the middle of grabbing your own bento when you feel eyes on you and when you look up, Takao startles, looking away quickly. You bite your lip as the tips of his ears go pink once more. 

He glances at you again, and his eyes linger on your face. When his lips curl down into a small frown, you realize he knows you’ve been crying. He looks away as the twist of his lips goes pained. 

Yoshikawa steps in front of you, blocking your view of him. “C’mon,” she says softly, chivving you towards her desk where Abe is already sitting. “Let’s go.”

You follow her after one last glance in Takao’s direction. 

It develops into a routine over the next few weeks. You get used to the feeling of eyes on you all over again. Takao’s gaze feels silken against your skin, and though you shouldn’t, you bask in it. Maybe you’re too used to it; it reminds you of the beginning, when all you had was fleeting looks and quiet gazes. 

But now he looks away every time you look up, though his ears always give him away. 

Still, there’s a comfort to it. It doesn’t go away, even as you simply circle around each other, caught in each other’s orbit once more. This time, at least, you know that you’ll stay this way. 

Except two months after you go your separate ways, you’re assigned to work on a project together.

Your hurt has waned; it’s a healing bruise, now, only flaring to life when you press on it. The hopeful look on Takao’s face barely even causes an ache. You stay in your seat, but he gets to his feet and comes to you as the teacher leaves.

“Hi,” Takao says, fidgeting with the strap of his school bag. “I’m—if you want to switch partners to someone else, I understand.”

“Do you want to switch partners?” you ask.

“Not really,” he blurts out, and this time, his blush is bright, the apples of his cheeks dusted in heated red. “I mean, no. I don’t.”

“Okay,” you say slowly. It feels nice, somehow, looking at him, at his small, timid smile and the way the sun catches golden on his skin. “I guess I’m fine with it.”

“Okay,” he says. “Okay, I’m—I’m glad.”

“Let’s talk after clubs,” you say. “We can figure out our topic then.” 

He nods. He stands there for a moment; it’s only when you raise an eyebrow that he jolts and heads back to his desk. When you look over, he’s got his hands pressed against his face. You think you see him mutter “idiot” to himself.

The smile tugs on your lips without you even realizing it. 

***

“I miss you,” Takao says, fifteen minutes into your third project session. “I miss you so much.” 

You go stiff. 

The project has gone well so far. You’ve found yourself falling into easy communication with Takao, but you’ve kept it strictly to the project, rarely going into your lives outside of school. Still, it’s easy in a way it hasn’t been in a while. You find yourself smiling, and sometimes he even makes you laugh. 

“Okay,” you say, sounding wooden even to yourself. “I—I don’t know what you want me to say to that.” 

He winces. “You don’t have to say anything,” he says.

You mean to say okay, but what you say instead is—

“I miss you too.”

Takao blinks. And then a smile is spreading across his lips, slow like the dawn and just as warm. “Really?” he asks.

Your cheeks heat, but you nod. 

“Do you think we can be friends?” he asks, almost shy.

You bite your lip. “I think…I think we can try.” 

“I’d like that,” he says softly. “I’d really like that.”

You smile at him, slow and sure. “Me too.”

He smiles back, and the two of you turn back to your project.

You find that it takes time to learn how to be friends with Takao. It’s not like Abe and Yoshikawa with the fluid ease of childhood friends, forged by years and years at each other’s sides, memory after memory built into a firm foundation. Nor is it like your other friends.

Takao seems to inhabit a space all his own. Maybe he always will. It seems right that he would; it doesn’t surprise you that he carved himself a place in your world without even trying. 

It takes time. Eventually, even Abe and Yoshikawa warm up to him, until the four of you are spending summer nights together, popsicles melting down your fingers in the heat. You laugh through sticky lips and sit side-by-side despite the heat.

It feels good to have him back in your life, and high school goes by in a whirlwind of seasons, the years melting together until you graduate. He’s by your side when you do ,along with Yoshikawa and Abe, the four of you taking pictures on the school lawn surrounded by your peers. 

The four of you spend as much time as you can together before you head off to college, just a few scant weeks after graduating. 

It’s easy with Yoshikawa and Abe; the three of you are woven together, a tapestry of home. College is just another stitch, with the three of you attending the same one. You find a cute apartment just off campus, in a slightly worn building with wisteria dripping down the sides like honey. Yoshikawa and Abe like to hang laundry from the balcony; they says it comes back with a floral scent. The dishwasher is broken more often than not, the rooms are tiny, and you love it. So do they, and the three of you build a home together.

With Takao, it’s harder. You drift away from each other in college, pressed in on all sides by classes, studying, and local friends. It feels hard to find the time to breathe, let alone text Takao anything other than a fleeting check-in or a picture of something that reminded you of him.

Unlike before, it feels natural. It isn’t without its edges but they’re dulled, so that they press against your skin instead of cut. He simply fades from your everyday life until the ding of his text message is a surprise instead of a given. 

When he walks back into your life in your third year of college, it’s like getting hit by a lightning bolt.

***

The izakaya is tucked away at the edge of the city, sandwiched between two small apartment buildings that have ivy spidering up the side of them. You watch as a sheet billows on a clothesline, rippling like water, the clothespins holding firm despite the strong breeze. 

The fat tabby lazing on the edge of the izakaya steps doesn’t even lift its head to look at you. It’s sheltered under a verdant fern frond, part of the little forest of plants clustered around the entrance. Some of the plants are spilling out of their pots, sprawling out in great clusters of leaves, the tiny flowers dotted in them barely visible in the light of the nearby vending machine. 

You crouch down by the cat unable to resist, and it blinks itself awake slowly, turning slate gray eyes your way. It sniffs at your knuckles when you reach out to it. It rubs its cheek against your hand once, and then gets to its feet, stretching mightily as your friends laugh from just inside the entrance. You try to pet it again but it pointedly turns away and curls up again under the frond, further in than before, a little forest deity hidden amid lush scenery. 

You stare at it for a moment longer, looking at how its cheeks squish up against its paws. 

“Pouting doesn’t affect Momo,” someone behind you says.

You look up, and then go still.

“Hi,” Takao says, warm like the early morning sun. “It’s good to see you.”

“You too,” you say, as if he hasn’t knocked the breath from you. “How have you been?”

“I’ve been good. You?”

“Are we really going to do this?” you ask, standing up from your awkward crouch. 

He smiles, and you think he might be swallowing down a laugh. “Do what?”

You scowl at him. “You know what,” you say. “The small talk.”

“It’s polite.”

“Is that your main concern? Politeness?”

This time, he does laugh, low and sweet. “No,” he says, his eyes glittering. “You are.”

Your cheeks heat. “You can’t just say that.”

“Just did,” he says. “Are—are you here by yourself?”

“With friends.”

“Do you think I could steal you away for a drink?”

“Yeah,” you say softly. “I think you can.” 

He smiles at you. “Good.”

He ushers you into the izakaya. It’s warm inside despite the open windows, and the scent of fried food lingers in the air. People’s chatter fills the room up to the rafters, little laughs peppered in like champagne sounds, little pops of joy. There’s another cat curled up on a barstool tucked away in a corner, a ball of white fluff that makes you think of dandelions. 

Yoshikawa sees you first; when she sees Takao behind you, she raises a single elegant brow before turning back to your group of friends. She says something with a lazy roll of her shoulders, and suddenly, all of your friends are trying very hard to not look at the entrance. 

“Oh my god,” you mutter.

Takao laughs, the huff of air stirring against your nape. “They’re pretty obvious,” he says. “Should we go say hi?” 

“Later,” you say.

He follows you to the bar. He’s close, and under the scent of fried food you can make out the faintest hint of his woodsy cologne. 

You sit side by side, close enough to feel each other’s warmth but without touching. The bartender brings you your beers, and you look to Takao as he taps the neck of his bottle against yours. 

“It’s so good to see you,” he breathes, his dark eyes soft.

“Yeah,” you say. “It is.” 

One drink turns into two until you’re both sliding closer to each other in your seat, pressing into each other’s sides. You barely keep yourself from curling into him. He leans in close when you’re speaking, so that his voice is rumbling low in your ear. 

You share some takoyaki and then one of the biggest okonomiyaki you’ve ever seen, the pancake stuffed to the brim with filling and heavily topped. When the food arrives, so does the white cat, meowing quietly at your feet as it winds its way around the rungs of your barstool. Takao holds you steady when you lean down to pet it, his hand firm on your lower back. 

By your third beer, Yoshikawa and the rest of your friend group leaves. She gives you a little wave on her way out the door. 

“Sorry,” Takao says. “I didn’t mean to take up your whole night.” 

“It’s okay,” you say. “It’s been…really nice.”

“Just nice?”

“Great,” you admit. “It’s been great.”

He smiles, and it’s that same dandelion fluff smile you remember, sweet and fleeting. 

“Good,” he says, taking a sip from his beer. You watch the way his forearm flexes. “Listen, do you want to meet up again?”

“Yeah, I would.”

His eyes crinkle. “Great,” he says.

You bite down on your smile. 

The two of you finish your beers between lazy chatter. It’s comfortable, as if you never fell out of touch. 

When you leave, Takao waits as you pet the white cat once more, delicately bumping your knuckles against its cheek as it rumbles out a purr. It meows pitifully when you stop, opening its blue, blue eyes with a disgruntled look on its face, and you laugh to yourself, kneeling to give it a few more pets. 

You look for the tabby as you exit the izakaya but it’s gone, likely curled up amid some of the planters further back. You and Takao both stop at the sidewalk, carefully making sure you’re out of the way of any pedestrians, and for a moment, you just look at each other.

“See you soon?” Takao asks.

“Yeah,” you say. “See you soon.” 

“Good,” he breathes, with his eyes so soft that it makes your cheeks warm. 

You say goodbye, and each of you heads home. When you glance back Takao is already looking back at you from the street corner. You give him a little wave, and he jolts before hurrying off.

You smile your whole way home.

***

“It’s so hot,” you complain, flopping down next to Takao on the park bench. “Can we go to the conbini?”

“Popsicles?” he asks.

“No, I want onigiri.”

He raises a brow. “How does that help with the heat?”

“It doesn’t,” you tell him. “The aircon does.”

He laughs. “Oh, of course.” 

You head to the closest conbini, practically swimming through the humid summer air. The air is so thick that you could cut it; there’s rain on the horizon, promised in the encroaching gray-blue clouds hanging low in the sky. 

Inside it’s blessedly cool, the aircon hard at work. The two of you scour the aisles, picking out varying snacks and pointing out new flavors to each other—you try to make him buy a cream stew Gari Gari Kun popsicle, but he refuses—before you head to the cashier.

You settle in at one of the tables, opening your drink as Takao unwraps one of your onigiri, handing it to you before he busies himself with his own food. He gives you a little swat when you reach out for his snacks, making you retract your hand with a laugh. As you pull back, you wonder when the two of you fell back into rhythm.

It’s close to the one you had in high school, but not the same. There’s something new twining through the rhythm, a swirl of notes that resonates through you. It’s an easy flow, a soft ebb and tide, like the calmest of seas. 

“Hey,” Takao says gently. 

“Hmm?”

“Where did you go, just then?” 

You blink and take a sip of your peach tea. It lingers sweet on your tongue as you meet his stoic gaze. His mouth tilts, just slightly, something tucked up secret in the corner of his soft lips. 

For a moment, you just look at him. He meets your gaze easily; he lets you look your fill, as patient as ever.

“Sorry,” you say. “Nowhere important.” 

“Okay.”

You shake your head. “You’re so—” you break off.

“I’m so?”

You bite at your lip. “You,” you say. “You’re so you.”

His smile is small, but it grows, as steady and sure as the sun’s rise.

“I hope so,” he says, almost flippant, but there’s something soft in his gaze; it brushes over you like silk.

“Shut up,” you tell him.

He just laughs, quiet and low.

The two of you chat as you eat, talking about Yoshikawa’s upcoming art show at a trendy new gallery. You’ve been waiting patiently ever since the curator first picked her up as a featured artist. It’ll be nice to go with Takao, for the four of you to be side-by-side again, something that’s becoming as constant as it was in your high school days. 

When you’re finished Takao takes all the wrappers and folds them up neatly, creasing them until they’re practically origami. You bite down on your smile.

The summer air rolls over you as you step back into it, licking across your skin as only wet heat can. You shudder with it. 

Still you meander through the nearby park, ducking beneath low-hanging branches hanging heavy with fruit, the citrus of them permeating the air. It’s quiet, with just the distant shouts of the playground and the whisper of the leaves in the stirring breeze to accompany you both. 

You find yourself at the koi pond without meaning to and Takao wordlessly heads to the food meter as you settle yourself on the rock wall that edges the pond. The surface ripples, orange and gold scales muted in the murky water like a sunset covered by clouds. You trail your fingertips over the surface, and giggle as they mouth at them. 

Takao presses some feed into your palm when he comes back; the heat of him lingers there. Your mark glimmers in the light as you toss in the feed, a needlepoint flash of silver. You can feel Takao’s eyes on it. But then the koi come up in great, arcing splashes, the quiet pond roiling like the angry sea in their fervor, and you laugh as you dodge the worst of it.

Takao chuckles, and he settles down next to you to hand you the last of the feed.

You curl into him despite the heat, skin against skin, a slick slide of a touch before you fall still. The koi are still churning up the water, their gaping mouths breaking through the surface, and you give them what they want. Scales flicker by, a mesmerizing firework show caught beneath the surface, and so it catches you off guard when Takao suddenly says—

“I’m sorry.” 

You go still.

“For what?”

He shifts beside you; when you glance at him, he’s staring into the distance, his dark eyes caught on something that only he can see.

“For high school.”

You breathe out through your nose. “So you’ve said.”

“I was scared.”

“So you’ve said,” you repeat.

He glances at you, then, and his eyes remind you of the vastness of the unending night sky, dark and glittering.

“I’m not scared anymore.” 

You suck in a sharp breath. He waits, ever patient.

“Me neither,” you say, curling your pinky around his, twining around him like thread. 

He cups your cheek, his touch almost reverent, and presses his forehead to yours. “Okay?” he asks.

“Okay,” you breathe.

He leans in and kisses you. It’s careful and sweet.

It feels like coming home.

He breaks the kiss when you’ve stolen each other’s breath away.

 “Our soulmates—” he starts.

“It doesn’t matter,” you say breathlessly, kissing him again. He’s smiling against your lips.  Warmth floods you. You love him, you love him, you love him. That’s all there is. That’s all you need. 

“It doesn’t matter,” you say again.

He presses his forehead against yours. “You’re right,” he says. “It doesn’t.”

Until suddenly, it does.

***

You and your soulmate—Shinsuke, you think, still tasting the honey of it on your tongue, Shinsuke Shinsuke Shinsuke—watch each other. 

The only sound is the steady fall of the rain. 

It’s picked up again, sending the hydrangeas eddying, spinning in a lazy current as their puffball blossoms catch the droplets. More petals flutter to the ground. The blue of them is stark against the dirt, and you think of what a storm leaves in its wake.

Shinsuke lets out a deep, slow breath, and you wince. His amber eyes have dimmed and the last of his smile has washed away, leaving just the dregs of emotion behind, too faint for you to read. 

You feel too small for your skin; your heart is fluttering, a hummingbird thing, trying to press through the gaps in your ribcage. You take in a shallow breath. It tastes of the earth, of drenched soil and summer heat. You choke on it. 

Shinsuke’s brow furrows as you take in another breath, even shallower than the last, and your heart is thrumming, and his eyes are so sharp, so knowing, so kind. You’re caught in the amber of them, the resin of his gaze pouring over you. 

Even the rain seems quiet now. 

His lips part.

Your ribs start to crack; your heart thumps harder against them. Too strong, too fast, too loud. 

His lips part, and you do the only thing you can.

“I’m sorry,” you gasp.

You run.

[izzy2210]

Shapeless You Look The Best

based on this amazing fucking art from @watercubebee (i love you and your art <3)

---

Read it on AO3

---

Hob is laying in something soft, too soft to be pillows, or a duvet. It feels silky on his skin, and he thinks it might be pink, but he didn’t pay attention to it when Dream threw him on it, crawling over him. 

He’s wearing what Dream called ‘the fairest lingerie for the fairest man’, a pink body with black lace details. Dream is running his fingers over it now, the edges of his form blurring in anticipation. His breathing is heavy in Hob’s ear, barely human, almost animalistic. His fingers pass Hob’s chest, and move to his waist, then down more, until his hand is firmly on Hob’s ass. “Beautiful, my love.” He purrs, and wraps his other hand around Hob’s throat. His breath falters, his eyes water, and a small smile pulls at his lips when he spots the expression on Dream’s face, the sheer focus of trying to contain his shape. 

“You don’t have to, duck,” Hob says, nuzzling the inside of Dream’s wrist, “Not for me you don’t.” 

Dream just sighs, and with that, the shape he had for so long fades, replaced with something that could be black fog, dark mist, but it’s solid, and it’s still pressing around Hob’s throat. It’s still in a humanlike shape, and his ‘hand’ slides down Hob’s back, the tendrils that may be fingers or may be something entirely else separate his cheeks. Hob’s mouth falls open, a small string of drool dripping down his chin. Dream pushes his ass up, and pulls his head closer, almost growling “You bend under my fingers so nicely, my love. So good for me today.”

Hob just whimpers, pushing his ass back, and before he knows it, his lingerie is pushed up, Dream’s dripping fingers are in his ass, and those tendrils move around so nicely.. Dream buries his head on Hob’s neck, and he hears a wet sound, a huge tongue coming out of his mouth, licking his cheek, making him whine, needy for more. 

“Please~ Please, Dream.. Pleas-” He stops begging abruptly when Dream pushes his face into the softness, his somehow still present cock pushing against Hob’s hole, Dream’s form looming over, almost wrapping around him. Hob’s tears finally fall, but they’re tears of joy, of ecstasy when Dream finally pushes in, thrusting him deeper into the gentleness that is the surface under him, which he couldn’t care less about now. 

“Ah, ah, ah~ Please, god, ah..” He moans and whines, and Dream just laughs, speeding up, the fog now almost filling the room. If Hob could open his eyes now, he’d see that there are thunderclouds in the mist, and with every thrust a lightning bolt strikes. Red stripes seep into his form for a moment when Hob clenches his ass, and he groans, the walls thundering. 

Hob weeps, snot and tears running down face, he’s the prettiest he’s ever been, Dream thinks. Right here, falling apart under his claws, he’s the prettiest. He’s the prettiest when he digs his nails in what would be Dream’s thighs, throwing his head back for Dream to bury his face in his neck. He’s so pretty when he comes, whining and sighing. 

He falls back against Dream, who wraps strings of mist around Hob’s biceps, his chest, his thighs. He moves him up and down, Hob barely able to make a sound anymore, overstimulated. He moves his hand to Dream’s cock, and strokes it while he’s clenching his hole, the other seeking support on what would be dream’s shoulder. “Mmhh..” Hob shudders, “That’s good..” He praises, and Hob sniffles, a huge smile on his face. After a particularly big lighting bolt, Dream comes as well, filling Hob up so nicely, groaning as he does so, thunder roaring. 

A few of his tendrils stroke Hob’s cheek, wiping away the tears when he lays him back down on the bed. Hob pants, Dream’s spent leaking out of his abused hole. “I..” He tries, but Dream shushes him. “Rest, my darling.” His shape stirs, and the fog collects, until he resembles something vaguely human again. “Lie with me for a while?” Hob asks, and Dream grins, although he doesn’t have a mouth to do it with. "With pleasure, my love." His form lays down next to Hob, tucking him in and stroking his hair. “With pleasure.”

[lovebillyhargrove]

Harringrove Seasons au. All credit for the idea belongs to @akioukun ❤️

Billy's not the only one who doesn't want to let go. Inspired by "Summer moved on" by A-ha, listened to on the loop (the only way to listen to great songs imo). 08/09 are my most fav months and if I could wander the August/September woods forever, I would

Song lines are italicized

***

Summer's moving on, Steve knows it is. He can feel it slipping away with every passing day, with every leaf turning its colour, with every colder night and every flock of birds leaving for warmer places. Summer is losing its hold, and the more power he gets, the less he wants it.

Bright joyful green is fading,

And the way it goes you can't tag along.

Steve's meeting Billy on the brink of the forest, where the fields spread wide, rolling down the hill like a vast canvas.

He has come prepared.

"Remember the flower crown you gave me? I kept it until the flowers wilted and then I put it in the river and let it be taken away by the current."

Billy is looking at Steve, a question in his deep clear blue eyes

"I want to give you a gift as well."

Steve is holding a necklace made of orangey red rowan tree berries

"It will look beautiful on your tanned skin. Let me put it around your neck."

Billy lets him, and it does look good.

"I love the fiery colour. Thank you."

Steve can see that Billy is pleased.

"I'll keep it. The berries will dry up, and I can still wear it."

"You are right. But wait, that is not all."

Steve gets down on one knee and picks up a big crown of red and golden leaves

"A crown for a crown. This will look wonderful on your sunlit hair."

He puts it on Billy's head, and they both smile because summer looks beautiful and just a tiny bit peacocky.

Steve's pointing at a large leaf pile, a bed of yellow, red and orange

"Lay down with me, summer."

They are laying in the heap of crunchy leaves, where it is so warm and cozy, Billy's eyelids immediately turn heavy with sleep. It's quiet and peaceful all around.

Billy doesn't fall asleep though.

They are watching the clouds sail by, slowly drifting to faraway alluring lands

The clouds are distant and silent. They have seen it all. One might think they are indifferent to the things they witness, and one might be right. Or wrong. Maybe all the rains that accumulate themselves in those dark gray thunderclouds are from all the sorrows the skies have watched unfold, and all the storms are tears, shed in compassion and anguish.

Summer and autumn have come together.

Lost in the moment.

Moments will pass.

Memories will remain as long as we keep them.

Billy is shuffling and huffing in slight annoyance.

"The silly bugs are tickling my feet."

Steve laughs and hides his face in Billy's chest, inhaling that sweet sweet summer smell

"Stay,

He's whispering

Don't just walk away."

And Billy answers, tree branches swaying and meadows singing

"I'll stay.

I'll stay another day.

A day just like today,

With the sky the bluest blue,

And forests all shades of yellow."

This is enough for Steve.

Everything around them is whispering

☀️🍂 E t e r n a l f o r e v e r e t e r n a l 🍁☀️

It echoes in Steve's uneasy heart and dulls the yearning.

Seasons can't stay.

But they always come back.

Also this and this

As always, a huge thank you to @dragonflylady77 for being the absolute best 💖

[ineffably-poetic]

an angel and a demon (poetry)

i. an angel and a demon stand on top of a wall. they are enemies yet each is reaching for the other before they know it, black and white feathers mixing as the sky eclipses into rain. the garden of eden is dark for the first time.

ii. they have not met again since the first rain, but have each watched innocence and purity fall upon the blunt sword of rock until the red blood paints the sky the color of hell. this time the rain comes heavy and thrumming as humanity wages guerrilla warfare with heaven. 

iii. this time blood is painting the wooden oak of trees upon barren ground that has seen no life for years. hammers sound through the air, disordered and the people are rancorous. the angel finds no comfort now in the feathers of the demon.

iv. palatial temples march along the streets, horse-driven dust and heavy liquor air guide the angel to a popina of worn ivory stone. there is the demon, smug like a daylily’s bloom, glowing in an angelic light that shouldn’t have reached him. he is the original sin, the vice that the angel can’t seem to hate, the center of his gravity. a temptation that never truly fades. 

v. fog and hazy forest bark enclose them, the black knight and the angel, the demon and the angel, the friend and the friend, swords never drawn, defenses never up. the angel knows this is a direct defiance, he is stepping into a pentagram, he is dancing so close to the line yet never crossing it, and perhaps he never will until it’s too late for him to walk. 

vi. they are romeo and juliet, always push-and-pull, like the moon over tidewaters that it can’t control. coiffed hair and collars meet. temptations too convincing to resist, and yet the angel knows it was no temptation it was himself and his own tempting. 

vii. a falling out, a falling demon, a falling piece of paper in St. James’ Park, too far to reach out and touch but burning nonetheless. a final game of poker before things go pear-shaped perhaps, but the angel still storms away, a thundercloud of erratic anger. The water shaped suicide pill hangs heavy in his pocket.

vii. bombs like fireworks in the night erupt, volcanoes forming deep within the angel’s stomach, and the consecrated ground burns the demon’s feet as he laughs away fear for the sake of his angel. thinking he’d rather not think, thinking he would like to rip off the wallpaper in his brain that shows that angel’s face, waltzing in the ashes. demons don't feel like this, he tells himself. yet it stays the same, yet it is not true. yet, his imagination is not enough this time. 

ix. a crossing of hands, brushing but not finding purchase, and a familiar fire that the angel can’t quite smother. you go too fast for me. 

x. a lift home that becomes dinner at the ritz that fades into wine at the austere bookshop where each corner has a dusty memory that the angel can’t bring himself to relive because they all include the demon who has planted himself so firmly in his heart, twisting roots that are too tight for the angel to let go. that fire burns again, so deep the angel has to drown it out with wine. 

xi. alpha centauri, or andromeda. it doesn’t matter to the demon. the stars are his roadmap, his path home. the angel doesn’t understand that all the demon wants is for him to be safe. 

xii. the bookshop is burning, each book a meteor hurling itself into the demon’s heart. he screams and curses god, or satan, or someone who is listening to anyone on this forsaken planet. his words feel like heat, like living fire, and it joins the burning torch he stands inside of, feeding the dying sparks of hope still left. he cannot laugh. he is a withered flower, black petals drooping. he needs some wine.

xiii. the airbase is breaking cement and asphalt, fire in the sky and in the earth and everywhere. their hands meet. 

xiv. the ritz once again, chandeliers illuminating the room as if in a dream. champagne bubbles rise up in the angel’s throat. to the world. 

xv. and the demon, in that daylily way of his, smiles. to the world. 

[steveezekiel]

CONSISTENCY AND FAITHFULNESS IN FOLLOWING GOD

6 “Now I will take the load from your shoulders; I will free your hands from their heavy tasks. 7 YOU cried to me in trouble, and I saved you; I answered out of the thundercloud and tested your faith when there was no water at Meribah." Psalm 81:6,7 (NLT)

God detests unfaithfulness.

If God rescued you in the time of trouble, or distress, He wants you to stay close to Him and be loyal to Him after.

Disloyalty is hated by God. He would not leave nor forsake you. Thus, If He was faithful in His relationship with you, He wanted you to reciprocate that.

God removed the Israelites shoulders from the burden, and freed their hands from heavy tasks. And when they cried to Him in trouble, He saved them. WITH all God did for them, He expected them to listen to Him and be loyal to Him.

God has rescued you, translated you from the kingdom of darkness to light, delivered you from the load of Sin (Colossians 1:13): a. Are you loyal to Him, in terms of following and doing His Will? b. Is your commitment to Him intact? c. If you are lifted higher than the level you are presently, What would you become? And would you be able to handle the lifting without being prideful or haughty?

Commitment and a strong decision to follow are important in walking with God.

A lot of Believers usually waiver in their commitments when comforts come. If you lagged behind in following and in your commitment because of comfort, the outcome might be costly.

God still have a lot of good things for you, because He does things progressively and systematically, thus, lagging behind would be detrimental to you, as par whatever He has in plan for you.

Following God could be tasking, because there are other things in the world that may want to take your attention away from Him—the spiritual exercises which you routinely do, to keep yourself spiritually fit and healthy.

Nothing should separate you from the love of God in Christ Jesus: 35 WHO shall SEPARATE US from the LOVE OF CHRIST? SHALL TRIBULATION, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? 38 FOR I AM PERSUADED that NEITHER DEATH NOR LIFE, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, NOR THINGS PRESENT nor THINGS TO COME, 39 NOR height nor depth, NOR ANY OTHER CREATED THING, SHALL BE ABLE TO SEPARATE US FROM THE LOVE OF GOD WHICH IS IN CHRIST JESUS OUR LORD" (Romans 8:35,38,39 NKJV).

Neither tribulations nor comfort should be able to separate you from the love of God found in Christ Jesus.

Whatever might be your situation, or circumstance, and the condition you are in presently; It should not separate you from God. Your commitment and steadfastness in God should not be shaky or tremulous. a. Some falter in their time of tribulations, which may be understood, but then, there is nothing that can be used to justify any unfaithfulness. GOD knew you can handle whatever challenge or predicament He permitted to come your way. He would not allow you to be tested beyond what you are able to handle (1 Corinthians 10:13). THUS, there should be no excuses! b. While in some people's situations, they falter at the time of comfort. THEY are unable to handle abundance. The Blessings of God on their lives caused them to derail or compromise their faith. THEY allow complacency, and apathy, thus, they become tepid, lukewarm in their faith—the fervency or enthusiasm for the things of God is lost or gone; all because of comfort.

The truth is, nothing should make you wax cold in your commitment to God. Your love for God should be intact, whether in need or abundance. At the time of despondency, you should keep on in following.

Although, the time of discouragement or bleeding might set in. At such a time, you allow the people of God, Believers who are friends and acquaintances, whom God has surrounded you with, be of help, to assist and strengthen you.

This is the essence of being in the family of Believers. When you are forlorn or distressed, you definitely would need the people to stand by you, and help at such a time.

Belonging to a local church is not only about meeting your spiritual needs. Because we live in a broken world, the challenges of life and tribulations may come, we would definitely need the care and help of other Believers. This is one of the reasons, and the essence of being a member of the family of Believers—the people of God.

If God had special interest in you, He would not pamper you or condone your shortcomings.

This usually be, If He had a huge and special assignment for you to fulfil. God pampers those whom He had little or no interest in, who's assignments are not all that strategic and significant in His overall programme for His church on the earth.

God might allow such to feed their flesh, condone and overlook some things that they might not have any excuse for not serving Him or being loyal to Him.

If God loves you dearly, He might be a little severe with you: "FOR THE LORD CORRECTS AND DISCIPLINES EVERYONE WHOM HE LOVES, And HE PUNISHES, even SCOURGES, every SON WHOM HE ACCEPTS and WELCOMES TO HIS HEART AND CHERISHES" (Hebrews 12:6 Amplified Bible, Classic Edition).

If you are a son or daughter after God's Heart, whom He welcomes and cherishes, He may be severe with you.

In God's Kingdom, His severeness or strictness, is a sign of love, not cruelty. If God loves you dearly, you just have to do His Will, whether you like to do or not. The truth is, God is stricter on those He loves and has special interest in.

There are some so-called Believers who might do some hideous things, and it would be as If God does not say or do anything about it. But If you were the one, you would be severely dealt with. You might be wandering Why your situation is always different? It is because of His love for you!

If a beloved of God missed it, in doing God's Will, chastisement awaited him or her.

God loves you, that is why you are being chastised whenever you missed it. He would not chastise, the way He does you, those whom He has little or no interest in (Hebrews 12:6,7).

Thus, follow Him without looking back, and be committed without wavering; that you might receive and enjoy all the benefits of the Kingdom He has for you.

Learn how to call or cry to God in your distresses. Know that He is more than willing to help you, He is the present help in the time of need and trouble (Psalm 46:1).

Live your life for God with all commitment and submissiveness, and without wavering, that you might be whatever He wanted you to be.

And do not take God's mercy and favour which you have received and enjoyed for granted (Romans 2:4).

You will not fail in Jesus' name.

Should there be any ailment in your body, receive your healing now in Jesus' name.

Whatever is against your health is rebuked and uprooted in the mighty name of Jesus Christ. Peace!

[definitelynotshouting]

Ahhh!!! Im so so happy you liked my analysis 😭😭. I love your writing sm <3.

I am not the same sun anon as before. If the first one is still here ill change it, and for now ill just hover uncertainly lol. Anyway! Here's some more!

-☀️

"The words slice right through the air between them, cleaving a massive chasm where the bedspread ripples and arcs. Scar freezes mid-speech, mouth hanging open in a way that could be comical in any other situation. There was a time when Grian would have been unbearably smug about that— it’s not every day you render silver-tongued Scar speechless. Now, all he can summon is a low, rolling trepidation; a gut-clenching thundercloud on the horizon, steel-grey and devouring the sky."

- There have been too many firsts lately. There was a time where this would have brought grian satisfaction, but all he feels is dread. Now every time scar reacts, or someone else reacts, it is WRONG. Another anon already beautifully talked about how none of the characters are acting like themselves, so i wont go into any detail there other than to paraphrase their point here. Before, if scar reacted like this it would mean grian did something RIGHT, now it's only another tally onto his list of wrongs.

-☀️

"It takes all of Grian's strength not to descend like a carrion bird on top of that spark of alarm, rile it up into a dread so great it would collapse Scar entirely beneath its gravity. For a moment, the idea rolls over his tongue, flits around the gilded, constricting cage of his mind; something to pick apart and chew. Something he can sink his teeth into."

- This thought is so tangible. I just adore how visceral this description is. It feels heavy and dangerous and predatory. Grian can imagine exactly what he couls do to his friends and he is so scared of himself for it.

-☀️

"It sinks into the marrow of Grian’s bones, lingering and dark, a gentle tug for truth. This isn’t some act— Scar emanates earnestness, the fathomless depths of his concern, in a wave that threatens to bowl Grian over beneath its crest. He's struck with the flashbang image of Scar kneeling in waist-high water, arms spread and voice slinking around Grian's ankles, curving over the hilt of a bloody diamond sword. He knows this siren song, in all its honeyed glory— and Scar knows it, too. The familiarity hovers just within reach, urging him to clutch at its iridescent hook."

- AH!!!! My mans can NOT understand that people care about him and are willing to put themselves on the line for him!!

- It feels like he's SO close to giving in here, to let scar KNOW him (and to admit that he cares instead of killing scar in that pond). The help is there, so long as he is willing to reach out and grab it... but then:

"Xisuma’s hesitant voice, however, buoys him back above deep water. “Grian, you aren’t… actually dying right now, are you?”

Grian grasps the distraction with both hands, letting it pull him away from danger. "

- ah yes, the age-old method: redirecting the conversation and avoiding your problems 😎. I love how the drowning metaphor kind of gets subverted here? As in, usually the surface is where you need to be, and the bottom of the ocean is what is dragging you down. This IS what's happening from Grian's pov- Xisuma is "buoy[ing]" him back to the surface so that he doesnt have to face scar- but it's not actually helping him. The surface isn't where he needs to be. The surface is devoid of substance, it is empty air, and grian has already depraved himself of enough. Does that make sense???? I am insane

-☀️

Enjoy!! :D

RATTLES AROUND IN MY CAGE. ANON YOU SPOIL ME HOLY SHIT, IM LOSING MY MIND!!!!! This is so amazing and just is really reassuring too because i was SO worried about the quality of this chapter djsbdkwndjejsj MAN,,,,,, going to stare off into the sunset for a while this is so sweet and kind tysm king i hope you are having an excellent day

[kirkwall]

OC + Random Associations

tagged by @dekarios and @gautiersylvain tysm ily <33

couldn't pick which oc so i'm doing it for rethan (bg3, they/them), amrynn (ffxiv, he/they) and adaline (ffxiv, she/her)

not sure who to tag bc i've seen so many already getting tagged so if u haven't yet feel free to say i tagged u 🫶

Animal

Rethan: scorpion, magpie, cat Amrynn: starling, italian greyhound Adaline: mayfly, barn owl, shrike, bearded dragon

Colors

Rethan: black, maroon, purple, gold Amrynn: purple, black, white, silver Adaline: forest green, royal blue, brown

Month

Rethan: october Amrynn: april Adaline: december

Songs

Rethan: i never told you what i do for a living - my chemical romance Amrynn: for your love - måneskin Adaline: cruel world - phantogram

Number

Rethan: 15 Amrynn: 4 Adaline: 13

Plants

Rethan: atropa, datura, rose Amrynn: lavender, olive tree, tobacco Adaline: snowdrops, mimosa pudica, ghost plant

Scents

Rethan: blood, leather, mint Amrynn: moss, sandalwood, sweat Adaline: dusty books, smoke, ozone

Gemstone

Rethan: diamond Amrynn: amethyst Adaline: obsidian

Time of day

Rethan: night Amrynn: morning Adaline: evening

Season

Rethan: autumn Amrynn: spring Adaline: winter

Places

Rethan: hidden places, make-shift camps, by the campfire Amrynn: the woods, taverns, on the road Adaline: libraries, a dark office, in the skies

Food

Rethan: mint leaves, stirfry, dried/salted meat and fish Amrynn: charcuterie boards, gelato, pesto Adaline: cinnamon cookies, bread, onion soup

Drinks

Rethan: water, mint tea, red wine Amrynn: beer, mate, chamomile tea Adaline: tea (black, green and rosehip)

Element

Rethan: earth Amrynn: fire Adaline: air

Seasonings

Rethan: mint, ginger, chili Amrynn: oregano, basil, garlic Adaline: cinnamon, vanilla, salt

Sky

Rethan: overcast night sky, full moon visible Amrynn: bright blue with a few clouds Adaline: dusky and overcast

Weather

Rethan: heavy fog, slightly cold Amrynn: sunny, warm with a slight breeze Adaline: heavy rain, thunderclouds rolling in

Magical power

Rethan: faerie fire Amrynn: musical spells to empower others, healing light Adaline: destructive fire and ice, corrupting light, calculated healing

Weapons

Rethan: dual daggers, hand crossbow, poison Amrynn: longbow Adaline: meticulously crafted spellbook

Candy/Sweets

Rethan: mint chocolate, tangyuan Amrynn: chocolate glazed fruit, tiramisu Adaline: werther's originals, licorice

Method of long distance travel

Rethan: hitchhiking Amrynn: his bestest boy chocobo Adaline: on dragonback

Artstyle

Rethan: realism, symbolism, street art Amrynn: post-impressionism, pop art Adaline: baroque, art nouveau, neoclassicism

Fear

Rethan: loss of control, the future Amrynn: abandonment, disappointing loved ones, missing out on life Adaline: loss of self, her powers, purposelessness

Mythological creature

Rethan: hellhound, alp, ghost Amrynn: unicorn, siren, incubus Adaline: banshee, changeling, dragon

Piece of stationery

Rethan: letter opener, paperclips Amrynn: leather notebooks and a ballpoint pen Adaline: high quality paper, inks, quills

Three Emojis

Rethan: 🗡️💸🌕 Amrynn: 🏹🎶💦 Adaline: 🐉📖🤓

Celestial body

Rethan: the moon Amrynn: the sun Adaline: black hole