#because after the deaths of both his wives

[koroart]

Fellas — is it gay to realize how beautiful your best friend is while he’s staring at the sunset ? 🤔 ( WIP )

[vampcubus]

𝐊𝐍𝐘 𝐒𝐋𝐄𝐄𝐏 𝐇𝐂𝐒

a/n: i've been fussing over these for weeks just take 'em ;-;

:ఌ¨ ♱ 𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐀𝐂𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐒 : inosuke, tanjiro, zenitsu, kyojuro, and tengen + wives.

:ఌ¨ ♱ 𝐂𝐎𝐍𝐓𝐄𝐍𝐓 𝐖𝐀𝐑𝐍𝐈𝐍𝐆𝐒 : sfw, references to marriage and children.

𝐈𝐍𝐎𝐒𝐔𝐊𝐄 𝐇𝐀𝐒𝐇𝐈𝐁𝐈𝐑𝐀

— Inosuke is not used to sleeping with other people, and you can tell he’s never been cuddled either. He tenses up and wriggles away the first time you attempt to spoon him in your sleep.

“You really don’t want to cuddle, Inosuke?” you sighed dejectedly.

“Why would I?!” 

You make a sad face and shuffle back to your own bedroll. With Inosuke’s usual total disregard for personal space, you’d thought he wouldn’t mind if you swooped in for a cuddle. He’s very much like a cat in that regard, he only wanted to be touched on his terms.

There’s a moment of silence before you hear grumbling and shuffling, and the next thing you know he’s pressed to your side, the fur of his mask tickling your chin as he tucks his “face” into the crook of your neck.

— Refuses to sleep any other way after that.

— He’ll act betrayed when you take naps without him when he’s readily available. “You took a nap without me?!” his heart is shattered, how could you?

— God forbid one or both of you are injured and get put in separate rooms because as soon as he wakes, he’s sneaking out to crawl into your bed with you. No amount of scolding from you or Shinobu is gonna keep him away for long.

— Tends to spoon you subconsciously, either slipping a leg between yours or wrapping it around you n holding onto you like a backpack. 

— He moves around a lot in his sleep, so prepare to wake up with a foot in your face or from getting kicked. Especially if he’s having particularly engaging dreams, you may or may not be mistaken for some all-powerful beast for Inosuke to conquer in dreamland.

— Inosuke is so god damn hyper in the morning and it can be a lot, especially since he wants you to be up too so you can start a new day together. It’s hard to keep up with his enthusiasm, and sometimes you just turn over and cover your ears with a pillow to drown him out. Most times that'll get your blankets yoinked, and you’ll be beaten to death (not really) with that same pillow.

“HEY DON’T IGNORE ME! WAKE UP!”

— Though sometimes he can be soft. You’ll wake up to a strange weight on your tummy and find him sitting there, staring at you like a cat waiting for its owner to wake up. And sometimes he’ll just lay back down, covering you with his body and nuzzling his face into your neck. And if you lift a heavy hand to play idly with his hair, he might just fall back asleep again.

𝐓𝐀𝐍𝐉𝐈𝐑𝐎 𝐊𝐀𝐌𝐀𝐃𝐎

— A cuddle bug that wants nothing more than to snuggle up on the futon with you after a long night of demon slaying.

— He’s the type to scoot closer if you move away in your sleep since he will wake up if he doesn’t feel you there anymore.

— Please spoon him. You will not regret it for a moment. He runs warm and is the perfect size for cuddling! Tan sighs so happily when you pull him against you, tucking his head right beneath your chin. Your comforting scent and firm embrace lull him right to sleep.

— Alternatively, he wakes up if he smells your distress, so you’ll never be alone if you have a nightmare. You don’t have to tell him what it was about, but he does insist on staying up with you to comfort you. Even when he’s struggling to keep his eyes open, he’ll pet your head and just talk to you until you’ve calmed down enough to doze off again.

— His duties as the Sun Hashira often keep him away for long periods, and he definitely misses your presence at his side when he stops to rest. It’s simply not the same without the weight of your arm strewn over his waist or the soft sounds of your breathing. He’ll even miss your snoring. That’s why he's always eager to return, all of his worries disintegrating as you gather him in your arms and murmur sweet things to him until he nods off.

— In the summer months, he’ll understand if you don’t want to cuddle, but he’ll want to at least hold your hand. 

— Settling down for the night together is a cherished ritual and he wants to be a part of it. Whether it’s taking pins or accessories out of your hair, or putting it into a protective style for sleeping, he wants to help out. He’s also damn good at giving massages and head rubs, so never be afraid to ask if you need a little more help winding down. That man lives to dote on you.

— Tanjiro rarely has the heart to wake you up early, but he makes you breakfast and leaves notes around your home if he’s gotta run somewhere. He melts into a puddle if he finds you making breakfast early in the morning, domesticity really does it for him.

𝐙��𝐍𝐈𝐓𝐒𝐔 𝐀𝐆𝐀𝐓𝐒𝐔𝐌𝐀

— You’ve married a cryptid. I'm so sorry.

— Zenitsu sleepwalks as I’m sure you can imagine. You’ll wake up to him out of bed, standing ominously in the middle of the room.

“Zenitsu honey, come back to bed,” you’d murmur tiredly after the initial shock wears off. Even asleep he bends to your will, crawling back onto the futon to sidle up against you once more. 

— Other times you’ll hear noises coming from the kitchen and find him making a whole meal in his goddamn sleep. Which is quite adorable, but also dangerous like pls you’re going to hurt yourself.

— The times he’s not wandering about, he’s snuggled up to you as close as he can get, face buried in your chest or neck, arms and legs wrapped around you.

— He snores if he’s on his back but it’s soft enough to sleep through.

— Giggles in his sleep if he’s having a good dream (he always says all the best ones are of you ❤︎)

— Zenitsu tends to sleep sprawled out on top of you. Oftentimes he returns from a long day of demon slaying, crawls right on top of you, and crashes for several hours. 

— He’s your weighted blanket <333

— Zenitsu never wants either of you to leave the bed in the mornings. He’ll cling, whine, and plead for “five more minutes.” (but it’s always much longer than that) 

— Sometimes you can coax him to release the death grip around your waist with promises of his favorite breakfast or endless kisses, other times you’ll just have to cope with being late to places.

𝐊𝐘𝐎𝐉𝐔𝐑𝐎 𝐑𝐄𝐍𝐆𝐎𝐊𝐔

— Deep sleeper!! with you anyways. As soon as he’s out, very little will wake him.

— Kyo’s definitely a cuddler! And the best suited for it too since he radiates heat like a furnace. It’s stifling during the summer months, but he truly can’t bear to be parted from you. Sleeping light or nude would be best, not like you’ll have to worry about getting cold when your husband is a literal space heater. 

— He’s an absolute dream during the colder months, and you know he takes full advantage of the weather as an excuse to snuggle every second of the day.

— Mumbles in his sleep every now and then. It’s usually gibberish or a breathy chuckle, but sometimes you can discern whispers of “tasty” and bits and pieces of your name.

— Kyojuro becomes reliant on your presence to sleep over time. It happened so slowly he didn’t realize his dependency until he found himself lying wide awake and restless out in the field. 

— He swore he could fall asleep anywhere before he met you but now… now he needs the sound of your soft snores next to his ear. He needs the feeling of your warm body against his. How was he supposed to sleep without someone there to hog the blanket? or crawl on top of him in the middle of the night when close just wasn’t close enough?

— Worst of all, you aren’t there to pet his hair and whisper sweet nothings to him as he wakes up — it’s those moments he wouldn’t trade for the world. You always treat him with such care, allowing yourself to be held hostage in bed until he also awoke, even when his profession meant his rest stretched on into the afternoon hours.

“The Flame Hashira lives!” you’d sing playfully as he blinks the film of sleep from his eyes, staring up at you with nothing but love and adoration. You’d lean down to kiss his lonely forehead, but not before purring your eagerly awaited utterance of “Good morning, baby.”

His eyes flutter closed as your lips brush over his forehead, grinning so widely his cheeks dimple.

“G’morning, darling flame,” he’d rasp in that rumbly morning voice that makes your cheeks feel warm. “Sorry to keep you waiting.”

— Kyojuro tends to nod off while he’s got his head resting on your lap during dates, especially if you start playing with his hair. He wakes up later to find you’ve also drifted off while sitting up, slumped forward just slightly. Your hair frames your face, the late afternoon sun casting an ethereal glow onto you.

— Napping together is quite a regular occurrence, especially when your duties tend to keep you up during the evening hours. If you’re a slayer too, your sleep schedules match up rather nicely, meaning you’ll be frequently found in a tangle of limbs somewhere.

— If you have children, you’ll often find them knocked out cold with their father. (he’s the type to fall asleep with a baby on his chest) it’s the kind of scene that puts tears in your eyes and makes you sink to your knees. It’s all too tempting to join the cuddle pile with your husband and children.

𝐓𝐄𝐍𝐆𝐄𝐍 𝐔𝐙𝐔𝐈 + 𝐖𝐈𝐕𝐄𝐒

— Tengen snores, but not as loud as Suma. The two of them are making harmonies while Makio and Hinatsuru hardly make any noise at all. Though the three of you can all agree you wouldn’t be able to sleep without the sound of your lovers’ snoring after a while.

— They all say goodnight to one another which is very adorable.

“Goodnight Suma.” “Goodnight Hina.” “Goodnight Makio.” “Goodnight Lord Tengen!!” “Goodnight Y/nnnnn~”

It’s back and forth until everyone is accounted for 

— You five sleep in a tangle of limbs, but it’s the coziest cuddle pile you’ll ever sleep in. Tengen’s been married long enough not to be disturbed by shuffling or moving around since sleeping with various other people requires occasional readjusting no matter how you romanticize it.

— Suma usually demands a spot at your side so she can wrap herself around you like a koala. She does drool, but she usually looks so damned cute doing it that you don’t have the heart to move her away from your shoulder. She’s always whispering to you as everyone settles down for bed, and Makio often scolds her for giggling and keeping the others awake. 

— Prepare for those two to bicker over you, oftentimes literally. They’ll hiss and argue whilst they have their arms full of you.

— Hinatsuru sings you lullabies when you just can’t seem to sleep and plays with your hair. Her fingers scratch lovingly over your scalp, smiling as your eyelids droop further under her gentle affections and ethereal voice. You always wake up with a mouthful of her hair, but it’s so worth it.

— Makio gives excellent head rubs when you have a headache, and although she may pretend that you’re a nuisance, you can tell she enjoys taking care of her partners. She’s a big spoon and likes to hold your hand while she sleeps, blushing furiously when you raise her knuckles to your lips.

— Tengen rarely manages to snag you from his wives’ clutches for a spot at your side, but when he does he wraps his entire body around you and nearly smothers you with his heat. He cutely holds things while he sleeps so expect to wake up in a headlock. And if you’re in his clutches when he goes to roll over, you’re getting rolled over as well. It’s a bit disorienting, but he soothes you with an apologetic kiss on your temple if he wakes you.

— Tengen thinks it’s endearing that you try to hold him just like he holds everyone else, even with him being so big. You don’t seem to mind his size, wrapping yourself around him like a backpack and tucking his head under your chin.

— Mornings consist of detangling and lots and lots of kisses!

[lanadelnegan]

Cherry 🍒

S7 Negan x Virgin Female Reader

Summary: You sneak into Negan’s bed in the middle of the night and seduce him into ‘popping your cherry.’

Warnings: 18+, smut, age-gap (reader is 18, Negan is mid 40's), unprotected sex, Negan taking your virginity & being sweet with you, mentions of family death, bleeding during sex, oral (both receiving), sitting on Negan’s face, breeding

Note: this is pure filth. If you’re uncomfortable with extreme age-gaps, please don’t read.

You shivered as your bare feet quietly shuffled down the cold hallway, stopping right outside the leader's bedroom door. The sounds of Negan's light snoring filtered through the cracks as you softly pushed the door open, pleased to find it unlocked. You tiptoed your way over to the empty side of his bed before sliding underneath his soft white sheets and inhaling the unique scent of him - leather and fresh linen.

You've always felt comfortable with him. Negan welcomed you to the sanctuary with open arms about a year ago when you were seventeen, after your father passed away. His men found you walking along the road one day and brought you back to Negan, who immediately took you under his wing and made you feel safe for the first time since your father died.

You're not like his wives. More like the daughter he never had and he's made that boundary crystal clear on more than one occasion. You've made several subtle advances towards Negan in the past.. All of which he has politely rejected by changing the subject or blatantly ignoring you.

Still, this doesn't stop you from quietly moaning his name when you touch yourself at night.

"Negan.." You whispered cautiously as you snuggled into the sheets. This wasn't the first time you crawled into his bed at night, feeding him lies about nightmares you never even had. However, this time.. you were determined to get what you wanted.

During your recent previous attempts, you'd remain on your side of the bed and Negan wouldn't even know you were there usually until the next morning - lecturing you when you woke up about how sneaking into his bed is inappropriate. You hated when he used that word. Like a strict school teacher.

A few moments of silence passed until you boldly shuffled closer to him, wrapping your hand around his arm and snuggling your face into his bicep. You breathed in the intoxicating aroma of his soft skin as your legs delicately pressed into his underneath the blanket.

"The hell are you doin' y/n?" He asked, his sleepy voice deeper and raspier than usual and it made your heart flutter.

"Can't sleep."

"I think we both know you're lyin', doll. You know you can't stay in here. We've had this discussion. It's ina-"

"Yeah yeah I know. Inappropriate, geez." You interrupted him, rolling your eyes in the dark.

"Exactly, so why are you in my bed?"

"My.. dreams. They keep waking me up."

"Nightmares again?" He asked, using a softer tone this time.

"No.. no nightmares this time. Just.. dreams."

Negan shifted uncomfortably next to you, scooting up a little in the bed and wrapping his arm around you in the process. "What kinda dreams, doll?"

You snuggled into the nook of his armpit, getting practically drunk off his manly smell as your hand carelessly glided over his shirtless, hairy torso until settling on his lower abdomen.

Without missing a beat, Negan placed his hand over yours, moving it higher on his torso. "Y/n.." He said like a warning, sternness dripping from his tone.

You ignored him, refocusing your attention back to his previous question. "I dunno.. they're just.. like.. sexual dreams, and then I wake up and I'm all frustrated because I don't know what I'm doing-"

"Stop." He sighed with frustration, running a hand down his face. "Fucking christ, y/n. You cannot say shit like that in front of me."

"Why not? It's not like you're my daddy or anything." You teased him, sliding your hand to his lower stomach once again. You almost whimpered when your fingertips brushed over the soft curls peaking out of the waistband of his boxers and your stomach fluttered when he didn't stop you this time.

He let out a long sigh, glancing down to your hand that teased the sensitive skin under his waistband. "Baby...fuck. We can't." He said almost painfully.

"Okay.. I get it." You said defeatedly, removing your hand and shifting to turn over before he stopped you, pulling you back in.

He sighed, like he was about to regret asking you this. "What happens.. in your dreams?"

With the moonlight beaming through the window, you managed to catch a glimpse of the lust that flickered in his gaze before his hazel eyes dropped to your lips.

"You treat me different.. like.. one of your wives."

"Yeah? And how's that, baby?" He asked curiously as his lips hovered next to yours.

"You.. kiss them." You stated hesitantly, hoping it was dark enough in the room that he couldn't see your cheeks burning red.

"Oh? Are you jealous, doll?"

"...a little." You admitted, making him chuckle.

He tilted your chin up, lightly gripping your jawline as his eyes dropped to your lips. He stared at them as if he was contemplating if he should give you what you want.

"One kiss, y/n." He said, closing the gap between you and pressing his soft lips to yours. You whimpered into his mouth, earning a slight smirk from him as he pushed his talented tongue past your lips. You couldn't believe you were finally tasting him and you savored every second of it.

He kissed you until your lips were sore, tangling his fingers through your hair and groaning every now and then, making your panties soaked.

You slid your leg over his until his muscular thigh was pressed right up against your aching center and you couldn't help but grind against it, desperate for some friction.

"Y/n." He warned, knowing what you were doing beneath the covers.

"Please, Negan."

His solid erection pressed into your stomach each time you moved your body against his and you imagined the way it would feel inside of you.

“Please what?” He said in between kisses, allowing you to use his thigh to get yourself off.

“Please let me come."

"I'm not touching you, y/n. But I can't stop you from coming."

And that was all the permission you needed to grind against him harder and bring yourself to an orgasm just from humping his thigh.

You buried your face against his neck and rode out your high, whining and whimpering as you soaked through your panties. "Oh my god, oh my god, Negannnn."

"Satisfied now, doll?" He chuckled.

"No.. I need this." You said, pressing your palm against the hard bulge in his boxers. "Please."

"You don't know what you're asking for, sweetheart."

"I do, Negan. I know exactly what I want.. And I've wanted you for so long." You kissed his neck as you rubbed his cock through the material. "I see the way you look at me. I know you want me too."

He sighed, accepting that you were right. "Maybe. But we can't always get what we want, doll."

You grinned, taking that as a challenge as you slid lower beneath the blanket, kissing his chest. "Why not?"

"Baby.."

"If you tell me to stop, I'll stop." You said, wanting to earn his consent before climbing over his legs and settling in between them. He sighed again, turning all the way over on his back to allow you better access.

You licked a line from the bottom of the trail of hair that led up to his belly button, earning a moan from him as he slightly lifted his hips in response. "Baby, you don't have to-"

"You said you wouldn't touch me, but you didn't say I couldn't touch you." You explained, pulling his boxers down slowly. You watched closely as his cock sprung free, and your mouth practically watered at the sight of it. You wondered how you'd fit it in your mouth, much less your pussy.

"It's so.. big.." You said, wrapping your hand around it. Your mouth fell slightly open at the velvety feeling of it as you stroked it up and down in your palm.

Negan was propped up on his elbows as he watched you through heavy, lust-filled eyelids. For once, he was speechless, waiting for your next move.

You lowered your head, taking the tip of him into your mouth and wrapping your lips around it softly. You sucked on just the tip as you looked up at him through your brows and watched his head fall back while the prominent vein in his neck bulged against his skin. Lowering yourself deeper, he let out a long groan when he felt himself in the back of your throat.

"Fuuuuuck, baby. Feels so fuckin' good."

You bobbed your head up and down on him until your jaw ached, wanting to make him proud. Finally, he pulled your head off of his length, and you watched as the precum leaked from his red, swollen tip. His breaths were heavy as he looked down at you. "Fuck, that's enough. You're gonna make me come, sweetheart.

"I want to taste you, Negan.. please?" You begged, looking up at him innocently.

"Yeah? You want me to come in your mouth?"

You nodded as wrapped your lips around his thick length again, tasting the bead of salty precum. You moaned at the new taste, sucking firmly over and over until you felt more of his warm liquid spurt out, coating the back of your throat. You moaned around him again, not taking your mouth off of his cock until you swallowed every drop.

Sweat ran down the side of his face and his chest rose and fell heavily as he watched you. "Goddamn. What happened to my sweet, innocent girl, huh? When did you learn to suck cock like that?"

"Just now. That was my first time." You shrugged, shuffling up his body until your legs straddled his waist and you pulled your shirt over your head, tossing it on the floor and exposing your perky, bare breasts to him.

You pinched your own nipples teasingly as you bit you lip and stared down at him.

"Fuck, you are so beautiful.” He said, watching you play with your nipples.

"You don't wanna touch?" You pouted, sticking out your bottom lip.

"Of course I wanna fuckin' touch you, y/n. You have no idea. I wanna touch every inch of you." He sighed, leaning up on his elbows again until his face was inches away from your chest. "But, I can't."

"Then don't use your hands.. lick me instead." You insisted.

He looked up at you through his brows before his gaze returned to your breasts. You leaned forward, brushing your nipple against his beard until it hardened even more. When it brushed his lips, he instantly took it into his mouth and groaned, sucking it gently. After a few moments, he switched to the other one, flicking his tongue against it. Your head fell back while your fingers intertwined in his slick, black hair.

"Negannn." You breathed out, and he finally pulled away.

"Take those panties off and sit on my fucking face. Now." He demanded, laying flat on his back.

You eagerly obeyed him, quickly removing your panties and climbing over his face before lowering yourself down slowly. You hovered over him lightly, not wanting to press all the way down until his hands roughly pulled you closer.

"I said, sit." He said before burying his face in your cunt. The tip of his nose pressed against your clit as his tongue devoured your dripping hole and he moaned with approval.

You lifted slightly, being too sensitive too his touch, but he leaned forward, taking your clit between his lips and sucking. You cried out as your orgasm instantly rushed through you and you soaked his face. You came hard and fast, but he didn't mind as he moaned loudly, lapping up your juices. You tried to climb off of him, but he held you in place, still licking you like his life depended on it.

"Negan.." You blushed.

"Hm?"

"That's enough." You giggled.

"I'll never get enough of this sweet pussy, doll. You wanted me, now you've fuckin' got me."

His words made the butterflies somersault in your chest. You hoped he meant it. You hoped he loved you the way you loved him.

"Lay down for me." He said, finally letting you climb off of him.

You did as he said, getting comfortable on your back as he crawled over you and settled between your legs. Looking down, you noticed he was rock hard again and he rubbed the tip of his cock teasingly in between your wet folds.

"Negan.. I need to tell you something."

"Hm? What is it, doll?" He asked, leaning over you and holding himself up with his palms on either side of your head on the mattress.

"I-I've never done this before."

He smirked, looking into your eyes. "I know."

"What do you mean you know?"

"I hear everything in this place, y/n. I've heard you talking about me to your friends." He pressed his lips to yours before looking at you again. "I've heard you moaning my name at night in your bed while you touch that pretty pussy. I know everything about you, doll. I pay attention, even when you think I'm not."

You blushed at his words as you stared up at him speechless, making his smile widen. "So adorable when you're embarrassed."

He kissed you again, so hard that it took your breath away and in that moment, you knew you were head over heels in love with this man. You just wondered if he felt the same.

“What else happens in your dreams, baby? Do you let me fuck this little pussy?” He whispered in your ear, causing a chill to run down your spine.

“Y-yes.” You managed to choke out, making him chuckle.

He leaned back up, placing one of your legs over his shoulder as the other fell open for him.

“You ready for me to break you in, sweetheart? Pop that sweet little cherry?”

"Fuck, yes. Please." You whined, scooting closer to him until the tip of his cock brushed against your sex.

Negan chuckled lowly, pressing the head of his cock right against your hole. He watched you intensely as he pushed just the tip in, stopping before he went any further.

“You good, baby?” He asked, making sure you were good to continue. Once you nodded, he slid slightly deeper, feeling resistance before pushing through with a force.

You cried out at the sudden ripping sensation, making him stop again.

“No.. keep going.” You urged him, already aching from how he was stretching you, but you needed him to fill you completely. So he did, pushing himself all the way in with one swift thrust.

Your mouth fell open silently as he pressed against your cervix and let out a growl.

He fell over you again, kissing your lips as he thrusted into you at a steady pace. “You did it, baby.” He praised you softly. “I am so fuckin proud of you.”

He moved slowly, making you deliberately feel every inch of him. He repeated this motion until your face was on fire and your lower abdomen tingled.

"Fuck, y/n. You are so fucking tight." He said through gritted teeth, looking down between the two of you as he leaned back up on his knees.

"Oh fuuck, look. at. that, doll."

You leaned up on your elbows, looking down and widening your eyes when Negan pulled out of you, revealing his blood covered cock.

His thumb reached down to swipe a trail of your blood off his dick before bringing it to this mouth. You watched him enamored as his eyes rolled to the back of his head at the taste of you and he moaned with satisfaction. You blushed hard at the sight of Negan tasting your blood.

“Who do you belong to?”

“Negan.” You answered without question, following it with a moan as he pushed back into you without warning.

“That’s right, doll. This pussy? Is mine now. Understood?”

“Y-yes sir.” You cried, as he pumped into you faster.

"Ow. Ow, fuck. It hurts."

“I know baby. I know. You want me to stop?”

“No.” You said quickly. “Please don’t stop. I want it harder.”

He smiled down at you proudly as his hips bucked into you harder and your eyes clenched shut as your fingers gripped the sheets.

Looking down between the two of you again, he groaned at the sight of your blood completely coating his cock and leaking out of you with each thrust.

You whined and whimpered, desperately wanting to come again. He grinned knowingly, pressing his thumb to your clit and making your body shutter. "You gonna come on my cock, sweetheart?"

You nodded as tears flooded your eyes and his finger started working over your clit more intensely.

"Yes, yes. Please make me come."

He fucked you fast and rubbed your clit in perfect circles, watching you come undone around him. Once your walls were done convulsing around him, he fell over you again, kissing your neck and groaning in your ear. "That's it. That's my good girl."

Wet noises filled the air as he fucked you unforgivably hard. "You gonna let me cum in this pussy, baby?" He asked, biting your earlobe.

You couldn't speak, so you nodded as your vision went cloudy and his thrusts became more erratic until he stopped suddenly, pushing himself balls deep inside of you as his dick pumped you full of cum and he growled in your ear.

"Fuck, fuck, fuuuck, baby." His thrusts started again, soft and light this time as he pushed his seed deeper inside of you. He kissed your jawline, then your lips, before pulling back slightly to look into your eyes.

"Y/n... I love you. I love you so much, sweetheart. And goddamn I love this pussy."

[a-hazbin-reader]

Alastor X Reader Headcanons

✅️Romantic ❌️Platonic

TW: Implied Abuse, Murder, Implied Gore, Period Typical Treatment of Women, Implied Sewerslide

Description: Alastor X Singer!Crime Family!reader who has known him in life and death and what their complicated relationship might be like, as canon compliant as I can bring myself to be

You grew up in crime family with an emotionally unavailable mother and violent dismissive father

Sure you were well fed, well dressed,well protected(despite the socially acceptable beatings from your parents) and educated but you were in a prison all of your own

You were your family's precious songbird with a voice like no other and a cage of steel around you, you often had small shows in clubs, bars, wherever your father could make it happen

Your father loved showing you off to his associates, friends, anybody who would listen really, in those moments you were his little girl who could do no wrong

Behind closed doors however

Because of your father's bragging all of his gross old friends took an unnecessary interest in you as well

Also did you know you're engaged to some brute who's nearly twice your age?? Some radio show producer who's had 3 wives before you and more women on his arm than you can count

But it's fine, you're fine

Is what you tell yourself until one day your fiance takes you to a radio station so you can sing there and you hear a familiar voice in one of the radio booths

Nofuckingwayisthatwhoyouthinkitisohfuckitshimitshim

You couldn't resist listening to one of your favorite radio hosts live but you also didn't want to interrupt so you stood and watched from afar as Alastor worked his magic

He was more handsome and magnetic in person, it was so unfair, you were completely entranced by him

Don't worry he noticed you too, amused by your gooey awestruck gaze

You could've stayed and listened to the whole show if your fiance hadn't suddenly yanked you away by your arm, reminding you that you were also here to work

You have a small wave and mouthed "big fan" as you were pulled away, ecstatic as Alastor gave a slick smile back

Now it was his turn to be intrigued, finishing up his show and exiting his booth to go and find where his delicious looking little fan went

Only to find himself happily surprised by your singing, deciding to sit and stay on his break, listening in appreciation for your voice

After that you two simply clicked, drawn to each other even if you both didn't understand it

You sneaking off every chance you could to talk and spend time with him and Alastor perking up anytime his door opened

It escalates from there, Alastor secretly sending you flowers/letters/anything you even glance at, you reciprocating by leaving little gifts/letters on his desk. The two of you having discreet rendezvous at night

It wasn't romantic at all and you two weren't in love, just really good friends

Who sometimes had moments of intimacy like snuggling, touching foreheads after a long embrace, a dozen almost kisses, a few kiss kisses

And when you inevitably found out that he's a cannibalistic serial killer he was worried he would have to hurt you, worried that you would be disgusted in him. That you wouldn't want to see him again

Imagine Alastor's surprise when you just sigh and start helping him clean his mess, almost nonchalant with the gore until you explain that your family has a violent history

Okay so maybe it's love maybe it's not, you two don't put a label on it or even discuss it really, you just enjoy the moment

Alastor hates your fiance, he hates that he doesn't treasure you, that he openly cheats on you, that he's rough with you, that he thinks he owns you

Safe to say that your fiance and Alastor hate each other but that's just fine because you hate your fiance too

Things were blissful between you two and you were even discussing running away together, your family and fiance starting to catch on to the relationship

You and Alastor began to finalize plans, picking a day to meet up and start your new lives

Except Alastor dissappears suddenly and doesn't return any of your letters, doesn't show up for his radio show and you can't find him

And one day you're caught by your father and fiance,checking Alastor's radio booth again, the two of them taunting you by telling you Alastor took a bribe and ditched you

You're forced to marry your fiance less than a month later, only making it a little longer before you take your own life, drowning in heartbreak and rage at the betrayal

You're not surprised when you find yourself in hell but damn it still feels like a punch to a gut

You know Alastor is there too, you know who this rising radio demon is but you don't want anything to do with him, you're still so angry

And he's angry at you too, thinking you moved on from him so easily, hurt that you never even looked for him(He's 100% creating scenarios in his head and hurting himself)

So it takes quite awhile before you two even cross paths, let alone hash things out, like a years and years sort of thing

Expect a lot of run ins that end in snarky comments and unnecessary romantic/sexual tension

It's not until one particularly explosive argument that you two realize that you've been getting the truth mixed up

But once it's settled then it's like nothing ever changed, except that you two have way more time together and you don't have to sneak around anymore

It's an open secret that you two are together even though neither of you have confirmed it or even put a label on it

You just always happen to be on his arm, canoodling at every chance and backing each other up in fights(verbal or physical). Every successful fight is rewarded with eskimo kisses

But you two are definitely practically husband and wife, a power couple even

But then one day he dissappears again

WHY

Maybe you two had a fight before he dissappears and he storms off for a walk. Maybe not

And then seven years go by and you fear that somehow you've lost him again, but for good this time

So you spend that time quietly mourning him and struggling to move on

You don't even find out he's back again until you hear him back in his radio tower, fighting with Vox

🙄😏 that man...

You're not even mad that he hasn't come to see you yet, simply relieved that he's alive and back

Okay you're a little mad, a little hurt

You're calm when you find out he's staying at some new hotel instead of coming back home, coming back to you

Okay you're not exactly calm, your friends would say you're simply hysterical behind closed doors

So you're livid when you find out he's staying with Lucifer's daughter and her friends because it's so obviously just a power grab for him

Fine

You definitely don't go over and cause a scene but you definitely do corner him at some point and let him have it

He's so fucking happy to see you that he's not even paying attention to what you're yelling about or why you're crying. He just pulls you in for a long hug, shutting you up with a rough kiss.

No you're not cupping each other's cheeks, foreheads pressed together as he apologizes over and over again for leaving you again

He won't do it again, not if he can help it

You find out that he's managed to dig himself a hole with a bad deal but that's about all you can figure out and he can't exactly tell you

But you manage to find it in yourself to forgive him(it's hard to stay mad at him), accepting that his time and attention have to be somewhere else for now

Then there's another extermination and one of your friends tell you to check the tv(something you probably don't normally do)

The moment you see Alastor facing off against Adam you're off, fighting and racing to get to him, to help him but he's gone by the time you get there. Lucifer and his daughter fighting him

But you know he's not dead this time, he wouldn't leave you again, not a third time

He promised

So you find him panicking in his busted radio tower and hold him until he calms down, promising that you two will find a way out of his deal

Maybe just hold his head to your chest and stroke his hair a little longer?

You were both reluctant to break apart, Alastor genuinely seeming remorseful as he nuzzles your forehead, telling you that he will visit you soon, that he's sorry for everything

Still he smiles 🙃

When he leaves to go back to the hotel you find yourself more tempted than ever to follow him, your heart aching to be near him again already

Maybe you should check in or at least offer to work there, they don't have an entertainer yet, do they?

Alastor when you show up:

"Darling, what are you doing here?"

I HAD TO GET THIS OUT OF MY SYSTEM OKAY!?

Bonus! Charlie when she finds out about Alastor's boo:

[bumblesimagines]

Imagine:

Being the Frey girl betrothed to Robb Stark

Request: Yes or No

Did not intend for this to be long

~~~

It was supposed to be the perfect day. Many little ladies dreamt of their weddings, dreamily wondering about their future husbands and the family they'd create together. Your dreams of the perfect wedding had been brief, crushed quickly under the boot of your father, Walder Frey, and you were forced to accept that you'd be marrying out of duty rather than true love.

There'd been some hope and a spark of relief when your sisters had rushed to your bedchambers, giddy and eager to speak of your betrothed: Lord Robb Stark of Winterfell. He had visited briefly and been allowed his pick of the litter, but when he provided no response, your father chose for him. You knew of the Starks of Winterfell. They were an honorable family and close as could be. And from the accounts of your sisters, Robb was a handsome man. Young, handsome, eyes blue as sapphires, pretty brown hair, and incredibly polite. You hadn't seen him as you'd been occupied the day of his visit, but everything your sisters told you filled you with glee. An honorable, kind husband who you'd surely fall in love with.

Or so you thought.

You'd been there when one of Walder's men had requested his time and spoke of Robb. The words that followed had sent you reeling, stomach twisting and heart shattering. Robb had a lover. A healer from Volantis named Talisa Maegyr. Your father's rage had been brief, calming when the man assured him Robb still planned on wedding you. He hadn't broken his promise to House Frey, and that had been enough for your father. You shouldn't have been surprised. Walder himself had fostered many bastards throughout his countless marriages.

"A man has needs." He'd said, curling his bony fingers around his ale and bringing it to his mouth. He cared little for the tears forming in your eyes. "I cannot fault him for that."

You spent the rest of the day weeping in your room with your sisters around you, murmuring comforts and trying to brighten your day.

"You'll be Lady Stark and Queen of the North soon, dear sister." One had attempted, a brush delicately going through your hair. "His mistress will be just that. A mistress."

But it hadn't been that. No, you wept because a mistress before the wedding had even been planned meant a loveless marriage where you'd have to battle for your husband's attention, battle to ensure you had his child first. You'd seen firsthand how much a loveless marriage affected a bride. Your father had many wives after the death of your own mother, each of them young and full of light that dimmed with each passing day until they were a hollow and empty shell. You wept for what could've been a happy future far from the grim place you called home.

But the sadness turned to bitterness and anger over night. The Stark's prided themselves on being loyal and honorable, sticking to their oaths and promises even if it meant putting their own happiness aside. Why couldn't Robb done that for you? Why had he taken a lover so quickly after the announcement of your incoming wedding? He hadn't cared about how shameful it would be for you. How humiliating. You'd be known as Lady (Y/N) of Winterfell, the woman who'd been cast aside before ever meeting her husband.

The wedding date had arrived sooner than later, something you loathed. You stared at the reflection in the mirror as both maids and kin tended to you. They brushed your hair, powdered your face, and tightened the wedding dress to your body while fawning over how beautiful of a wedding it'd be. They praised you at the end, gushing over how pretty of a bride you'd be. They hadn't thought to realize that Robb would be envisioning his little healer in your place when you walked down the isle.

You ensured to keep a stoic expression throughout the ceremony, not even mustering a smile for your husband when he lifted the veil and took in your appearance. His eyes, as pretty as described, had widened considerably and flickered over to the pews where his family sat. The ends of his mouth had quirked up into a smile and he muttered a soft 'my lady' before turning to the Septon. You would've scoffed if it weren't for the stare Walder gave you.

The ceremony went by in a breeze and you kept your stoic, cool composure, even when your father had lowly whispered for you to smile after being seated. He no longer had control over you. You relished in the thought. The only good thing that had allowed for you to have an appetite as Starks, Freys, and other allies celebrated. You spent most of the celebration searching for her until you noticed Catelyn Stark speaking with a young woman who stared at Robb hopelessly. Talisa, you presumed from the frankly exasperated look on Catelyn's face. She was pretty, you'd give him that.

"Are you feeling well?" Robb asked quietly and reached for your hand, delicately placing his over it and staring at you with knitted brows. You pulled your hand away swiftly and set it on your lap, eyes moving onto your beloved sisters to keep your emotions in check.

"No." You answered after a brief pause. Robb was handsome, incredibly so, but his presence alone irritated you. You had to act quick before the bedding ceremony took place, a tradition your father insisted on keeping alive. "I feel unwell, Lord Stark. I'm afraid I'll be retreating early."

"Shall I go with-"

Rising from your seat, you shook your head, still refusing to meet his eyes. "No, My Lord. That will not be necessary." You carefully lifted your dress and breezed past your father, ignoring the glare he speared into your back as you glided down the steps and toward the exit.

Slipping out into the familiar halls, you exhaled deeply and released your gown. It dragged along the stone floor, dark gray clashing with white. You itched to get out of it as soon as possible. The thought of burning it crossed your mind but it felt too childish, too improper of a lady.

"My Queen." A voice echoed down the hall and you halted. Queen of the North and Lady Stark of Winterfell. Right. Your new titles. No longer one of Walder's many overlooked daughters. You looked over your shoulder, spotting her auburn hair first, a signature trait of the Tully family. Catelyn Stark.

"My Lady." You greeted her, turning to face the older woman. She smiled sweetly, gazing at you with the warmth of a mother. Catelyn grew closer and took your hands into hers, smile turning into a shamed smile.

"I am deeply sorry for what my son has done." Her voice sounded sincere, full of guilt and shame. She shook her head. "I taught him better than that. He knows better than that. But rest assured, that woman will not cause problems for you."

You'd nearly forgotten. Eddard Stark had returned home from the war with a bastard son called Jon Snow and raised him as a trueborn alongside the rest of his children. You remembered the murmured rumors of how Catelyn detested him and had fostered a particular dislike for bastards. Perhaps that dislike extended to mistresses.

"She may share his bed, that is true. But he is my husband now, and as his wife, I have duties that I will not forget. I can assure you, Lady Stark, I will give your son an heir and do what needs to be done for House Stark to prosper, just as you have done these many years." Her eyes softened considerably, fingers lightly squeezing the palms of your hands.

"Oh, sweet child." Catelyn cooed gently and brought a hand to your cheek. You yearned for your mother's embrace, her soothing words. You pressed your lips together to keep them from trembling. "You shall make a wonderful queen and a wonderful wife. I... I will ensure Robb does his duties as husband. You need not stress over Talisa."

"I appreciate it, Lady Stark. I'm afraid I'll be heading to my- our bedchambers for the rest of the night. Please assure everyone that I am well." You pulled your hands from hers and lowered your head in respect to the monarch before turning and resuming your walk down the hall.

Another deep breath and you reached the one of the many guest bedchambers. Most of your belongings had been packed up for you, likely already sitting in Robb's tent out on the field. You dismissed the servants that offered to help you ready for bed, only agreeing to have a warm bath drawn so you could relax after the day's events.

Slipping out of your wedding dress, you watched it slump on the cool floor and stepped out of your shoes. You released your hair and ran your fingers through it as you dipped one leg into the bath and then the other. The water dug into your skin, easing away at the tension in your muscles. A soft sigh of relief escaped past your lips, shoulders dipping below the surface. You leaned your head back against the wall of the tub, eyes fluttering shut and mind forgetting about the day.

You would've stayed in the tub for the rest of the night, even slept in it, if it hadn't been for the sound of the door creaking open. Your eyes snapped open and you lifted your head, gazing down at the water as heavy boots stepped across the room. Robb passed by the tub, shedding his coat and draping it over a chair. You brought your knees up to your chest when he turned.

"I thought you would've been asleep by now." He spoke softly, undoing the buttons of his vest. "Are you feeling better?"

The consummation. You nearly grimaced. "No."

"Should I call for a maester?"

"It's likely nerves, My Lord."

"We're husband and wife now. You may call me Robb." He gave a boyish smile and you turned to look at the towel perfectly folded on the stool beside you. You reached for it and let it unravel outside of the tub, eyes jumping back to the Stark. Robb's fingers had paused on the last button, attention trained fully on you but when he noticed the icy look, he turned his back. You stood, the water sloshing around as you dried yourself and retrieved a nightgown.

"I would like to sleep in my old room tonight. It's likely the last time I'll see it."

"I'd like to believe that, (Y/N). But I am no fool. I am your husband, you may speak openly with me." Your jaw clenched at his words. He claimed to be no fool yet remained oblivious to your anger. "And I hope you'll grow comfortable enough to sleep at my side."

Picking up a candle, you lifted it to the lantern keeping the room lit and pulled away once the fire flickered onto the end of the wax. "I believe your lover would prefer otherwise, My Lord. I bid you goodnight."

He blinked. "(Y/N)-"

"I bid you goodnight."

[prickly-paprikash]

Something cool about Blue Eye Samurai is how sex is juxtaposed with the end-goals.

I really love how our three protagonists are all obsessed. And that obsession defines them, torments them, and are subsequently reborn through their obsessions.

Mizu, of course, is obsessed with the concept of revenge. It's not even about getting even or getting justice as some might use to justify the bloody road taken—it is simply about seeking satisfaction for Mizu. She cuts a bloody swathe across Japan because of what the Four White Devils did to her mother and herself. She does not concern herself with the ramifications of her wrath but merely charges forward, leaving behind a trail of viscera and gore behind her.

Like I said before, her vengeance and obsession with satisfaction is not painted by the show as wrong. It is how she allows it to affect others along the path. It's why the episode with Madame Kaji is so enlightening; Mizu should not tackle this quest as a vengeful revenant; an onryō. She has let the world define her as a monstrosity and so she embraced it, when Swordfather and Madame Kaji knew what the correct path was to satiate her need for vengeance. Treat her sword as the Artisan's tool it truly is. Treat her body the way an Artist would treat their canvas.

Madame Kaji and Swordfather are both outcasts, for being a woman and a blind man. Yet they found strength in their exclusion, becoming single-minded in their fields of art. Because sex is art and swordsmithing is art. It's what makes Mizu's body writing scene so fucking good.

Artistic vision becomes stagnant when one pulls from only one source. They become rigid and unbending when Mizu, like her namesake, must be fluid. She has shown fluidity in her use of her gender and her morals, but cannot apply that same flexibility towards her goal. Throughout season one, she was becoming an uninspired artist, merely painting the world in hues of scarlet. In a world that forces Women to be either Wives or Whores, Mizu chose to be a Warrior—but a warrior fights for a cause, whether it be just or otherwise. A soldier fights in an army. Mizu is neither of these things. She is an Artist first and foremost, and her medium is Death. Sex, something Mizu was at first hesitant before her failed marriage, and something she actively avoided afterwards, is what gives her a new perspective. Like an Illustrator studying life to better draw their intended worlds, taking inspiration from wherever one can find it.

Taigen and Akemi are also equally affected by the artistry of sex, as befitting of Mizu's fellow protagonists.

Akemi is quite obviously Mizu's narrative foil. Mizu chases after revenge like a bloodhound whereas Akemi longs for freedom like a bird in a cage. Both are fierce women who are unsatisfied with their lot in life, with their sex and gender being used against them in their lives. Literally, the episode "The Tale of the Ronin and the Bride" is a fucking triple entendre:

Mizu is the Ronin as well as the Bride.

The play showcases the tale of the Ronin and the Bride.

It is also Mizu as the Ronin and Akemi as the Bride.

And when Mizu finds her center as she melts down her blade and engages in body writing, this scene of enlightenment is juxtaposed with Akemi laying with her new husband Takayoshi. Both, in this moment, are taking control of their lives through sex. They are both taking control of their futures through the ways Madame Kaji taught them. Mizu and Akemi are both rebels against this oppressive society, and are both talented artists with their body. Whether that be sex, politicking, or ass-kicking.

Taigen, like the two women before, finds freedom through it but in a more subtle manner.

Where Mizu and Akemi are narrative foils, both using sex as a form of art and escape, Taigen finds liberation through his awakening.

Like the closeted bisexual man he is, he begins his journey of self-realization when he first encounters Mizu at the Dojo.

Every single battle these two have is purposefully rife with sexual tension. All his life, Taigen has been taught that a man must live with honor. That he must take control of his life and his identity, or he will have failed and that he is better off dead than to live with such shame.

Taigen is just as much a victim of the Patriarchal society around him. Mizu rails against it violently. Akemi seeks to run away from it all. And Taigen, with the privilege given to him by his manhood, chooses to become a perpetrator, enabling the vicious wheel of society to keep moving forward.

His obsession with honor leads him to hunting down and even protecting Mizu. Mizu is no doubt the better warrior, but even she knows she owes so much to Taigen. The blockhead not only did everything to protect her in the valley, but also sealed his lips shut even under the duress of torture. His obsession with honor becomes an obsession with Mizu.

His regrets over tormenting her over her looks and ethnicity as a child. His shame in having lost so decisively in his own dojo. Taigen was a man born with nothing and climbed up to the top with every advantage he could muster, and suddenly it's all ripped away by this one vengeful spirit passing by.

Taigen learns to surrender control around Mizu. He begins to discover his own sexuality and purpose around Mizu, redefining what honor really means to him now that he, as a man, has a budding attraction towards the man who beat him.

Mizu's Vengeance. Akemi's Freedom. Taigen's Honor. In all three, Sex becomes a catalyst in redefining what each of these concepts truly mean to them all. It's not just sex of course, but it is undeniable how the writers keep juxtaposing sexual acts and thoughts with massive character moments.

It changes how Mizu chases after her Vengeance. It recontextualizes how Akemi can be Free. It showcases the absurdity of the Honor forced upon Taigen.

It's so fucking refreshing seeing Sex not used as fanservice or shoe-horned in just to further a stale, poorly written cis-heterosexual romance; but used as a plot point that cannot be ignored. An impetus that fuels the narrative.

Moving forward, I'm curious as to how sex will be used.

The next few ideas aren't as sound or organized because I'm neither Asexual nor Genderfluid, so please if anyone reads this who understands it better, feel free to point it out.

I think it'd be cool if Mizu met the inverse of Madame Kaji. A person who is apathetic to sex. Sure, Swordfather has shades of this, but I'm tired of the person with disabilities also being on the Asexual spectrum. And I'm not saying that Ace or Graysexual people with disabilities don't exist! But they always tend to be written as having some form of disability (Varys from ASOIAF) or a Robot.

Just as artists need a variety of sources to pull inspiration from, I hope in the next seasons we get to see different perspectives on sex and gender. In London, it feels like Mizu finding the other half of herself, and with that having a better way of tackling her own identity. Whether it be gender, sex, combat, etc.

Basically what this inane rambling amounts to is that Blue Eye Samurai tackles sex and violence and revenge and obsession in ways that most media has yet to truly do. So that was pretty cool.

[hilsoncrater]

the levels of repression in both house and wilson…yet they are opposite of one another. house routinely makes gay innuendos (whether sexual and/or romantic) towards wilson, yet wilson doesn’t take him serious at all.

and this constant rejection from wilson is both a buoy as well as a giant wall. house pushes their relationship time and time again. wilson refuses to let the nature of it change. house brings up a romantic getaway, wilson shoots him down. house sabotages wilson moving out, wilson doesn’t stay. house allows himself to be The Other Woman regardless of how bonnie or wilson’s other ex-wives feel. in a way, it boosts his ego and makes him feel special. he is allowed to have wilson in this way.

amber is an extension of house; she is house in a woman’s body. house can accept it because he has expressed before that if wilson were a woman, they would’ve been married already. so why can’t the same be true for wilson? let him find a woman version of house. house loves wilson so much that he goes into a risky surgery to try and save amber. this is his Place simply because wilson and him cannot escape the confines of compulsive heterosexuality.

and it is compulsive. wilson never feels good enough or secure enough in a relationship outside of his and house’s. he cheats, he lies, he manipulates. all because at his core, wilson’s insecurities render him into a selfish person. he has affairs and he prioritizes house over his wives, because he doesn’t feel like his own wants/needs are met by his wives. or that they should/deserve to be met. he doesn’t know how to communicate them!! he maybe even feels guilty for having them. because even to house, he communicates these desires in metaphors or pranks or whatever other indirect way he sees fit. but the difference between house and his wives is that wilson has no tangible, legal sense of obligation to house. if house doesn’t meet his expressed needs, fuck him!! they don’t owe anything to each other!! the rejection will sting less.

wilson chases women on such a compulsive level that it’s nearly a reaction to whatever house has done. it’s affair after affair. wilson moves in with his patient during the time house is on a ketamine treatment. house, his patient who seemingly no longer needs vicodin. no longer needs him. if wilson is no longer needed, he parasites to the next host. why? because he doesn’t know who he is on his own. why? because he has trouble expressing his own core needs as a person. and as a result, these core (repressed) needs seep out sideways.

so why threaten this sense of safety he gets with keeping house at a platonic level? if they were to entangle into a relationship, wilson would be wrapped under an Obligation Gauze. there is a fear he’d lose house because, historically, all of his relationships end in loss. because, historically, he cannot express his needs to his partners due to his fear of rejection.

and then wilson becomes terminal. and then death becomes bigger than an anxious fear of loss/rejection.

“i need you to tell me that you love me.”

wilson, my brother in christ. house cannot say those words to you because for all the years you’ve known him, you’ve denied him it. the only way house can tell you that he loves you is by burning his home down and faking his death. he is nothing without you. you know it as well as he does. these things remain unspoken because that is the way you’ve molded the relationship to be.

wilson has house on a leash. house runs as far out as possible until the leash yanks him back. when wilson finally trusts house enough to let him go off-leash, house is too conditioned to act as expected.

and this conditioning in house is not just wilson’s doing. it’s primarily house’s own doing. his own self-loathing chains him to wilson’s side. as an addict, yes, but also as a support system. house hates himself so viscerally that it affects every interpersonal relationship he has, including with wilson. but wilson never, ever leaves no matter how bad it gets.

also. who else other than wilson gives him a sense of bodily autonomy? not stacy, not cuddy, not his fellows. wilson doesn’t pity him. wilson enables him. wilson lies for him. house will selfishly keep wilson forever because wilson is all he reliably has.

so house can push and prod wilson into gay romantic/sexual innuendos, but when wilson yanks that leash, he’ll drop it. it’s a buoy for reality checking where he is with wilson. it’s a giant wall for enabling his self-hatred thought process that even his boy best friend has limitations to his love for him (or at least what is acceptable). addict line of thinking.

they both eat each other up like an ouroboros. where does wilson’s repression end and house’s begin?

[ironbatpaperturtle]

THANK YOU FOR THE 10 FOLLOWERS, 7 OF WHICH ARE BOTS LMAOO.

The drawings look off but thats because my brush and color process dictates my artstyle LMAOO.

Now onto the event:

This is an AU wherein the Angels are a tad bit controllive. Luckily everyone that goes to haven haven't experienced this. Well everyone other than Adam. At first the Angels and Seraphims loved Adam. He was nice, loyal and dedicated to heaven and God.

But that was years ago, a millenia infact, they still loved him of course BUT that was until he started acting like a brat with a penchant to be as noisy as possible with the rock songs he plays. Oh well, nothing a little tweaking can't fix.

Angels are known for creating, why not include fixing?

So a meeting was held and the angels and seraphims all agreed to fix him. (Lets exclude my bestie Emily) An added bonus was that the father of humanity would be more dutiful and less . . . expressive. Not anymore.

So they planned to lure him in a place where the sinners have no authority to enter.

And proceeded to fix Adam.

Years later another meeting with Lucifer about the extermination was held and Lucifer was frustrated.

Not only was his relationship with his dear Char Char more unsteady than usual. He hasn't gotten laid in 6 years, 69 days and 3 minutes! (Y'know gone wife)

He now has to deal with a meeting with the first man. Long ago Lucifer would be thrilled, because teasing the man was so much fun. Sure Lucifer couldn't see his expression from the mask, but Adam yelling and creative insults was enough to calm and make Lucifer happy.

But that was 100 years ago, no WHY ARE COUNTING long ago, yeah.

It's like the man has 'matured'. He never gets mad or insults Lucifer, even when Lucifer would tease him. Even when Lucifer would boast about how he stole both of Adams wives, which usually gets a reaction, was replaced with silence that made Lucifer shift in his seat.

"Soo" Lucifer shifted in his seat, watching as Adam wrote something on the paper before sliding it too Lucifer. "Y'know we don't have to keep having meetings after an extermination"

Adam gave a quite hum, putting a thumb on his masked chin to emphasize his thinking, before putting it back down and shaking his head.

Even how he shakes his head looks practiced, Lucifer looked down on the written texts before summoning a fountain pen. A crown perched ontop, wrapped around it was what looked to be a kids writting (it was a gift from Charlie when she was still young), and signing.

When he slid the paper back to the first man, Lucifer raised a questioning brow as the man seemed to be unbashly staring at the pen.

"What an unappropriate item to use when writing such important documents"

Lucifer scoffed, rolling his eyes.

Oh please as if the angel wasn't yelling curses and giving hushed promises of death under his breath directed at Lucifer years ago.

"You weren't exactly the most appropriate person when were together in this room" it took Adam tilting to the side for Lucifer to digest what he actually said.

Save face, a aired laugh, "wait what did I sa--"

"Lucifer"

The fallen angel stopped talking, attention fully on the first man. That too, hes never heard his name uttered by the man in 100 years 'king of hell' or a hum was what signalled Lucifer that Adam would talk.

"As a matter of fact, I actually have something unappropriate with myself today" with that the first man began removing his mask.

OH SHIT OH SHIT OH SHIT

Can fallen angels experience anxiety attacks? The last time Lucifer saw Adams face was in Eden. Before he and Lilith were cast out.

What if the man looks completely different, like the sinners with animals features or maybe Adam would still look human? Honestly Lucifer didnt even know that the first man was wearing a mask, he could've sworn it was his face, especially with how he would slurp smoothies with it, again years ago.

What Lucifer didn't expect was the for the first man to have six eyes. On the right was what looked to be a stylish 'A' and on the left was a regular pupil.

But heavy eye bags on each one.

Six eyes, all emotionless staring right at Lucifers soul. Lucifer felt sick.

"I currently have piercings"

[sweetadonisbutbetter]

Omi gosh I fell for your Adam post instantly!

What about him after getting trapped in hell or something, he gets to meet a sweet fallen angel??

Like, she was so concerned because she knew how bad it felt to be damned to hell and falling from grace so she did her best to make him feel better!

(They're both unaware that they'll be smitten with eachother in the future and would have matching wedding rings)

hhh fallen adam and fallen reader tearing my hair out (lovingly) this is the inspo for adams look! EDIT: I GOT THE ARTIST!!!! ARTIST IS SCOUT_ISH IN TWT!!! THANK YOU SO MUCH HUNTERS-TRASHBLOG FOR TELLING ME!!!! also reader will be slightly thicker/implied to be chubby!! but other than that, everything is kept ambigous so you can imagine yourself!! adam 4 the chubbies teehee

Bewitched | Adam x Fem! Reader

Relationship: Romantic Warnings: None!

Adam grimaced as he looked at himself through a broken piece of mirror. Long gone was the golden halo, now replaced with horns that mimicked his exorcist horns. His handsome face was no longer human, now looking like his mask. When he first arrived, he thought it was one, and tried with all his might to remove it, his face being a different color than his maroon body. The realization that this was his body now dawned upon him in the moments afterward. He turned to look at his back, knowing that under his shirt were stubs, stubs where his once golden wings were. Instead of wings, he had a tail, similar in color to the rest of his body. Overall, Adam hated his new look.

He knew that no matter how much he looked at himself or avoided his gaze, he would still look the same. The truth of his reality that he kept running from, he was the very thing that he hated, he hunted, he killed. He was now a sinner. Fallen from grace, no longer in favor of the heavens. Truly left with no hope of ever being in God's good graces. This was the harshest truth Adam had ever faced, and it hurt more than his fall and even more than his wives leaving him. He didn’t know how to comprehend it at first, all his death, which was far longer than his life, he had only ever known Heaven. 

He didn’t know what to do with his afterlife now. Not to say he was put together in Heaven, but after his divorce from Eve things never really improved; But now that he was in the same place as the people he saw below him? That fact alone wasn’t making things better. His first few days in Hell were spent with him licking his wounds, and gathering his thoughts. Adam couldn’t keep to himself forever, returning to the same alleyway that he was calling his temporary home. But where would he go? He knew he wouldn’t survive this place, especially if the sinners found out he was the one who led the exterminations. Which led him to the one place he had been avoiding since his fall. 

The Hazbin Hotel.

He couldn’t return after he was the reason why the place was destroyed and why they no longer had a friend. But nowhere else was safe enough for him to run to. He was snapped out of his thoughts at a can being kicked. He turned to the sound and saw you. 

Adam felt his breath catch as his heart stopped. The mere sight of you made it seem like he was back at heaven gate, that warm feeling of the sun against his skin as angels sang him his welcome. You glowed in a place that seemed to thrive on the depravity and sin of humans. Your natural hair framed your face in a way that he felt that if there was a halo, you would be otherworldly. You were full in all the right places, with the tummy to show it was real. You were dressed pretty modestly, which was odd in a place of debauchery, but not too much to seem like a prude. Your eyes were warm, with golden specks in them, almost as if you were from heaven. Once Adam realized that he was ogling a sinner, he snapped back and tried to glare at you.

“What do you want?” He snarls. He sees that you flinch back, and at that moment he begins to soften but keeps his tone. You look him over, and no matter what he tells himself, he knows that you aren’t doing it to be judgy. You have this look of concern on your face as you take in his form. He scoots back away from you, unsure why you are staring at him as you are. 

“How long ago did you fall?” You ask, catching him off guard. Questions begin to swirl in his mind as he looks at you dumbly. How did you know he was from heaven? Did you see the battle? Did you know who he was? How did you know he fell? Thoughts swirling in his head, Adam couldn’t even ask you all of them. “Ah, it must have just happened. Sorry, didn’t mean to scratch at a new wound.”

“How did you know?” was all Adam could ask. You give him a small smile before you turn. With you back to Adam, he takes a brief moment to look at your ass before looking at what you were showing him. It was a pair of wings, with some stubs under your main pair. Adam’s breath hitches as he sees that the stubs are healed as if they had been that way for years. Knowing that he got his answer, you turn back around and give him a sad smile. Now new questions form in his head, starting with what you asked him. “How long ago did you fall?”

“Hm…A long time ago.” You say, shifting slightly as your wings retract. Adam nods as he takes in that he wouldn’t be the second-ever angel to fall. It made him feel less alone and relieved that he didn’t have to relate to Lucifer on something. You clear your throat causing him to look at you. “You don’t seem to have a place to stay…looking at the sight of this…alleyway. I could take you somewhere.” 

You reach out your hand for him to take, which he does. You lead him somewhere as you both make idle chatter. Throughout the walk, Adam couldn’t scratch the feeling that he knew you. This strange feeling of deja vu washed over him as he tried to realize where he knew you from. 

Unbeknownst to him, you knew exactly who he was. He was the first man and the first ever to enter heaven. You never got to meet him, having fallen by the time of his death for covering for Lillith and Lucifer. A part of you felt guilty, having hidden the first-ever affair. However, you wouldn’t trade it for the chance to stay in Heaven, knowing that you would get your niece Charlie. Not hiding the fact that it still haunted you, you saw this opportunity as a way to amends for hiding the betrayal. As you led him to the Hotel, you couldn’t think of how you would one day tell him how you knew him, however, you decided to focus on getting back on his feet. 

You talked about how hell is, not aware of Adam behind you slowing down. You felt his hand leaving your own, look behind you, and see him with this look you cannot describe. He was looking down at your hand and then his own. You walk towards him and wave your hand in front of him, causing him to lift his head to look at yours. 

“Is everything okay?” You ask, concerned. He doesn’t say anything as he nods. 

“Yeah…sorry. Thought I saw something. You were saying?” He says, shaking his head and grabbing your hand. You flush and turn away, before continuing to talk and lead him to the Hotel. 

What Adam had sworn he had seen was the formation of a little red string going pure white before disappearing. 

In the OG writing reader was going to be in lvoe with adam alr but it didn't make sense so i scrapped it teehee

[sukunas-wife]

Why was the servant girl smiling`?

I forgot to elaborate I’m Sorry 😭

But here’s a snippet of

✨Y/n’s Shrine House History✨

🤫 Read closely

Sealed Series History

First of All the Shrine was opened to Honor Y/n as a dirty, she was worshipped for being able to bare Lord Sukuna’s heir. In the shrine she’d previously used a reverse cursed technique to heal pregnant women if they sustained any non visible damage to their reproductive organs and the fetus.

Yuji was actually able to grown in y/n’s womb because while the cursed child was forming in her womb when it would take a physical toll on her body she would use a reverse curse technique to improve/stabilize her position.

It’s a bit in the Sealed series how a man heard of her legend and went all the way to Sukuna’s Palace, to try and find any trace instead finding the prison realm cube washed and worn away from the palace but not by much, freeing her his only request was that she bless his pregnant wife because she hadn’t been able to bare child before, (story line: the lady was physically abused as a child leaving bruising and damaged on her uterus y/n heals it and the child who also had minor organ issues)

Anyways~

The Shrine was originally open for all husbands and wives to enter together freely. It was a place of peace where you could find hope, to prove there was light in the dark. In this Case how a child so small and sweet can be born from a Curse. When Yuji was born, you presented him to the public in a bed for all to come admire but not touch. Everyone brought gifs to honor the “Prince of Curses” admiring his soft sleeping face. It made it hard to believe even Ryomen Sukuna was once a child.

Hints, the reason everyone (eunuchs, servants) was asking if Yuji was with Y/n?

The cursed man had entered the shrine 3/4 months after Yuji had been born. After having seen Yuji presented to the public.

This cursed man was striving to be on Par with Sukuna and when he learned Ryomen Sukuna had been given a direct blood heir by a human woman (eventually) turned curse. He decided that same woman would give him his heir. Walking into the shrine freely greeted by eunuchs and servants as he made his way to the main room. There you sat in the middle of the platform reading over a booklet of finance your hand maid had left you with while she left briefly. Hearing the sanctuary doors close you looked up and there stood 6’4 terrifying, bulky man who was in the process of becoming a curse by corrupting, twisting and breaking his own soul.

He looked down at you and the room was filled with a dark aura. It was suffocating, the man immediately reaching out for heavy breathing frothing at the mouth like a rabid dog, when he said “So you’re the woman who carried Ryomen Sukuna’s child, then you’ll do the same and honor me.”

Y/n rushed to get up and run, but what’s your height to 6’4? Not easy- luckily for you Uraume was entering the room after Sukuna sent him to get you. Froze the man in place and immediately called for Lord Sukun, Uraume tried to pull you away when in came enraged Sukuna, almost obliterating the man leaving him there laying close to death a half curse can be. There stood Sukuna bloodied standing over his body, heavy breathing and snarling, he very much tore the limbs off the man leaving him there screaming and squirming in fear. Before he could crush the man’s head in with his foot, Yuji started screaming from the next room. Both of you in panic something had happened to him or was happening you all left them man on the floor rushing to find your prince. He was fine, your handmaiden had just woken him and he lost it realizing neither of his parents were with him.

After this, Sukuna hunted this man down and couldn’t find him. He posted Sorcers/Eunuchs at your shrine and forbade any man from ever entering the doors, the only exception being Yuji.

7 Years Later

When the man had yet to return you eased up on the security a bit letting the sorcerers who stood outside on guard go. Keeping your servants/eunuchs who working inside mixed with sorcerers and non sorcerers.

One day a girl who 15ish came to work at your shrine, young Yuji didn’t trust her the few timeshe had seen her.

Why?

Because she’s a fraud and was working with Cursed man. How did he recruit a child?

He didn’t-

she was a curse user who specialized in transfigurations and became smitten with him. (She’s like 32)

Sadly he had no interest in her. He wanted Ryomen Sukuna’s wife to bare his first child. She sneaks in at “15” the years he plans his attack. Plays servant well enough to be seen as normal and she can slip him in using the private ways the servants use to get in and out unnoticed to the public eye.

Why was she smiling?

She was smiling because she was “Cursed Man’s Accomplice” and was fulfilling her role. Even if she was jealous of y/n being the woman to carry his heir. Her Lord was accomplishing his desires, maybe after she’d have entrance into his life affairs. (More specifically romantically)

Wrong- She wasn’t exactly the strongest or resistant so when she was caught off guard in Yuji’s unstable Domain Expansion and attack. In short she was killed. Sukuna took care of Cursed guy the way he should.

Don’t know what the sealed series is but found the lore?

Here’s a link to Part 1

Perm: @sakuxxi @mercymccann @simpforyoubitch @certainduckanchor @domainofmarie @najiiix @bakugou-katsukis-wife @amitiel-truth @souyasplushie @mylovelessnightmare

Sealed: @needsleep3000 @lunafrisk303999 @ang3lz-lov3 @christinerose380 @dl-yum @yumieis @bellinghambby22 @samatokisunfinishedcigarette @amitiel-truth @kundere20000000 @r0ckst4rjk @maybe-a-bi-witch @kouyoumarryme @wannabewolf @lunaizhere @futureittomainn @raiiny-night @3ve88

@t4naiis @blkmystery @the2ndl @too-pretty-to-live @v-sh @officialjellydoughnut @catmouseggy @f1uveryysblog @icantsleeplol809 @wsp1st @ivysenpai3 @babyqueen17 @lupita97lm @oh-gods-its-a-dragon @nxxrxm @avyannasstuff @nameless-mushroom-warrior @fullwriterpoem @nanamisbigassschlong @queen-luna-007 @alonelyvagabond @pupbistro @clxvrs @dangerous-girls-world @saiyara05 @isagivinny

[mclennonlgbt]

(JUST LIKE) STARTING OVER WAS DEFINITELY FOR PAUL – a compilation

A meaningful wordplay As you know, John attached great importance to the lyrics of his songs. He liked to smuggle in word games and hidden meanings. Let's look at a fragment of the lyrics of "(Just Like) Starting Over". It's time to spread our wings and fly Wings was Paul's band in the 1970s.

Don't let another day go by

"Another Day" is a song by Paul and Linda that was released as the A-side of a non-album single in February 1971. It was Paul's debut single, following the Beatles break-up in 1970. (Sidenote: giving credits to both himself and Linda, Paul broke up the Lennon-McCartney partnership, angering Allen Klein).

my love

"My Love" is a 1973 song by Wings. The single was viewed as Wings' first significant success.

2. The demos

In the first demo, John uses the word "walrus":

Everyday we used to make it love so why can’t we be making love – it’s easy. The time has come, the walrus said, for you and me to stay in bed again, it’ll be just like starting over

The walrus is a famous motif from Beatles songs. In the song "I Am The Walrus" (1967) John declares that he is the titular walrus, a year later in "Glass Onion" he stated: „And here’s another clue to you all – the walrus was Paul”. In "God" (1970) John sings: "I was the walrus." In an interview from 1969 or 1970, George jokes: „And if you are listening, I am the walrus too”. Regardless of which Beatles was the walrus, John is for sure giving us an interesting clue here.

As for „in bed”:

Here's another fascinating demo... This requires no comment. It's just that John suddenly referred to "Why Don't We Do it In the Road", a song by Paul from the Beatles era.

EDIT:

The whole fragment is:

Just take your clothes off honey, and stick your nose in money.. why don’t we… do it in the road?! (Laughs) A little hotel where we used to screw A little place down in Montauk Just you, me, the cook and the servants too

As @i-am-the-oyster pointed out (the screen is theirs) - it's a 17 minute drive from Paul's house in the Hamptons to Montauk Motel.

3. John explaining who the song is for

„I’m not aiming, I am not aiming at 16 year olds. If they can dig it, please dig it. But when I was singing and writing this and working with her, I was visualizing all the people of my age group from the 60s. Being in their 30s and 40s now, just like me, and having wives and children and having gone through everything together, I am singing to them! I hope the young kids like it as well, but I’m really talking to the people that grew up with me and saying: „Here I am now, how are you? How’s your relationship going? Did you get through it all? Wasn’t the 70s a drag? You know, here we are, let’s try and make the 80s good, you know, because it’s still up to us to make what we can of it. It’s not out of our control”. I still believe in love, peace. I still believe in positive thinking when I can do it. I’m not always positive but when I am, I try and project it”.

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rqxPx2Tvf6A

Let’s point out that the song which convinced John to come out of retirement was „Coming up” by Paul. You want a love to last forever One that will never fade away I want to help you with your problem Stick around, I say

(…)

You want some peace and understanding So everybody can be free I know that we can get together We can make it, stick with me

BONUS (this is not evidence or premise, but maybe Paul understood that the song was addressed to him): Paul's reaction to the song after John's death.

„…Time passed. Paul locked the door of his home studio and played (Just Like) Starting Over, the first single from Double Fantasy. Top volume. For days”.

- Christopher Sandford, „McCartney”

EDIT:

(it's also @i-am-the-oyster's reveal): One Sweet Dream podcast did an interview where May Pang agreed with the host (JL)SO was for Paul and emphasised that it wasn't about Yoko -- it's a patrons-only episode so I can't link it, but it's April 2023, around the 1h29 mark).

[deathmetalunicorn1]

Hello author its me the on who requested the Love after death in both part and the others... I finally have courage to reveal muself and no longer anonymous.

First of all before i request another one (sorry for being greedy) i wanted to thank you for responding to my requests especially the angsty ones, you never failed me to give a comfort and motivation, i cannot thank you enough for that.

And now for my request if you remember my other request about ei reader x ror characters that you can't write due to being unfamiliar to the character?

I will ask you instead to write a ror x demi godess freader. She commonly use a weapon like lu bu when fighting but once her weapon breaks or she found a very strong opponent she use her katana. She summon it like in the gif in below.

Now the fun part is how would the ror charcters react? Would they ended up having a nosebleeds, ended up shy or tease them?

Gods

Thor

Poseidon

Shiva

Rudra

Budhha

Zero

Beelzebub

Loki

Ares

Hermes

Aphrodite

Humans

Kojiro

Adam (platonic)

Hercules

Jack

Lu bu and chen gong

Raiden

Qin shu huang

You can choose who to write because i know there is a lot of them😅😅😅😅

Ahh~ my sweet love, your angsty requests have been so much fun to write! I don’t mind you asking for another, you’re not being greedy, I’m just happy that you are patient while I write all these requests plus my own original works.

I do have one question however….

Why in the world does she have a sword between her titties?! I actually looked this up and watched the scene where she does this, and I’m just flabbergasted that she had it there!

-As a demi-goddess, you had the choice of fighting for either side, as both Zeus and Brunnhilde had approached you to fight, both knowing your skills as a fighter.

-You were initially going to refuse both of them, but after Zeus tried to command you, while Brunnhilde asked you, you chose to fight for humanity, not liking being commanded to do anything, something Zeus regrets as he lost a good fighter because he was so pushy with you!!

-Your opponent was strong, which excited you, as that meant you didn’t have to hold back!

-You swung your halberd with ease, and your opponent, Kand, a minor earth god, managed to snap the blade clean off, breaking your halberd.

-The other fighters and the audience in attendance called out in worry for you, as they didn’t want to lose someone like you, beautiful, powerful, and smart, you really were the whole package.

-Kand laughed at you, pointing a finger at you while he held his belly, “Can you still fight me Y/N?! Now that I’ve broken your only weapon!!”

-You glared and brought your hands up to your chest, “Who said that was my only weapon?”

-What could only be described as a black hole, opened at the top of your chest, on your cleavage, as you tilted your head back.

-A sword began to emerge from the black hole, glowing brightly as your hand lifted to the handle.

-Your eyes snapped open, glowing with power as you pulled out a beautiful katana from the magic black hole between your breasts, clutching it as the light faded.

-Kand was gawking, pointing rudely as his eyes were wide, “Where the heck did that come from?!”

-You charged at him, fast enough that it looked like you disappeared, before reappearing behind him as he fell, his head rolling off his shoulders.

-You pouted lightly, “It’s rude to ask a lady questions like that.”

-The crowds went wild, roaring loudly.

-Thor- Was stunned on how quickly the match ended, able to see that your katana was your true weapon, you were good with the halberd, but there was something natural about you holding a sword. He blinked once or twice, confused on how you were hiding that sword.

-Poseidon- Eyes widened only just slightly before relaxing as he watched you pull your sword out, before his amusement grew with how easily you took care of that weaker, cocky god. It made him curious about how strong you actually were.

-Shiva- Immediately turned to his wives, who were cheering for you, “Can you really hide stuff in your chest like that?” they just giggled, like they had a secret as Parvati spoke, “That’s a woman only secret~” but all three were impressed with your skills.

-Rudra- Eyes went wide when your halberd broke, but when the sword started to emerge from your chest, his jaw dropped, mouth hanging open before you pulled that out, completely stunned on where you got that sword!

-Buddha- Smirked, moving his lollipop to the other side of his mouth, finding it alluring and could instantly tell that your sword was your true weapon as you ended the fight so quickly after pulling it out. Then had to ruffle Zerofuku’s hair after the boy asked him if he had anything like that between his chest.

-Zerofuku- Was confused as to why you had a sword between your chest. He looked up at Buddha who had a big chest, wondering if he had anything between his own which got his hair ruffled by the taller god.

-Beelzebub- Was more intrigued with the magic that appeared there first, curious as to what it was. Froze, eyes wide when he saw you pulling the sword from your body, unable to look away.

-Loki- Looking disrespectfully, gawking with his tongue lolled out, full blush on his face as he could only gawk in awe. He wanted to get a closer look~

-Zeus- Cheering loudly, leading the charge of the cheers of the arena. He had never seen anything like it and he was so excited!!

-Ares- His whole head was bright red, staring shamelessly, blood dripping from his nose as he couldn’t believe what he just watched, gripping the arms of the chair tightly.

-Hermes- Amused by Ares’ reaction just a bit more, but was stunned with the magic that you used and even more so when he saw how big the actual sword was.

-Aphrodite- Giggled softly, hiding her mouth behind her hand, amused to see the reactions of others, but as a large chested woman herself, she knew well that any woman could hide things between or under her boobs, like knives~

-Hercules- Lifted a hand to his face to hide his blush, embarrassed to stare at you in such a way, but couldn’t take his eyes off of you, especially when you handled your opponent so easily.

-Kojiro- His face was bright red, watching you pull that from your chest, but he immediately focused on your form, his eyes widening as he saw you move, being one of a handful that was able to keep up with your moves.

-Jack- Was staring before he started, his cheeks warming as he turned, being a gentleman, not wanting to gawk at a young lady such as yourself in such a way. Was impressed with your skills with the sword however.

-Lu Bu- Could sense the power radiating from you, a feral grin appearing on his lips, wanting to fight you himself. However, he was one of the few that wasn’t bothered where you had your sword stashed.

-Chen Gong- Unlike his lord, as soon as you pulled that sword out he flew back, blood spurting from his nose, twitching on the ground. He didn’t even see the end of the fight.

-Raiden- A bright grin on his face as he watched you pull your weapon out, delight on his face as he found it attractive, “What a woman!” cheered loudly with the rest of the crowd.

-Qin Shi Huang- A bright smile on his face as he watched the scene, amazed by the magic that had appeared, wanting to know more about it, but very pleased watching the show.

-Adam- The time from when you pulled your sword out to being announced the winner was only about five seconds, but he was instantly glaring, exerting his pressure to those around him as he glared at them, ready to throw hands and lay waste to those who would say anything impure about his precious daughter!!

[sugerplumig]

Please don’t take my sunshine away🍎 Lucifer x daughter reader (angst)

First post! I’m excited (A/N this is prob gonna suck but ima try my best!)

Tw: cringe, blood, death, screaming?

~You are my sunshine. ~My only sunshine

I could hear my fathers lullaby lull me to sleep as he rocked me around the room.

~You make me happy..

I could feel him as he kissed my forehead

I could feel him.

I could feel his Love.

~When skies are grey

If only i’d clung onto this moment a little longer.

I could’ve seen the look he gave me as I dozed off.

~ You’ll never know dear, how much I love you.

A look of sadness. Maybe Regret? I’m not sure.

-Please don’t take my sunshine away.

“I love you dad.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t say it sooner.”______________________________________________________________

A scream of terror was made that would make anyone freeze. As both Charlie and Lucifer looked up at the sky, they were almost frozen from where they were standing. There eyes full of fright.

My face and body was bloodied from Adams hands and he punched again and again. After Alastor disappeared to who the fck knows where, it was up to me to fight Adam off. And I did, I did dad I tried my best I promise! But I lost and I.. I feel numb.

I looked up to see Dad and Charlie on the other side of me, Adam holding me by the throat with an angelic blade.

“Adam drop her. She did nothing to you, it’s me you want right?”

Dad spoke harshly to the man.

”How about no. Because you know what after you took BOTH MY WIVES away from me it’s only fair I took your DAUGHTERS AWAY FROM YOU TOO!”

The man laughed a little to happily then looked at me. My eyes widened as I saw the blade about to make it to my chest.

“NOO-“AGHHHHHH!!!”

My screams of pain covered the scream of my father and sister trying to stop Adam. Even the fallen heavenly king could only watch and his daughter was being beaten and stabbed.

(after adams dies by nifty. I’m tired.)

“Y/NN!!”

Dad screamed as he scrambled over to me and tried to stop the bleeding from my chest. Charlie and Vaggie were there too and I could see Charlie crying into her girlfriends shoulder

“D-dad.. c-can you do me a.. favor.? I slowly asked, blood gurgling in my throat.

“OH COURSE.. A-umm.. A-Anything love.. tell me..”

His eyes watering looking down at me..

“Co..could you sing me our lullaby? I want to hear it one last time”

He smile sadly and nodded.. holding my head like he once t

did before and started to sing.

~You are my sunshine

~My only sunshine

I could faintly hear him start singing the song as my eyes got blurry

~You Make me happy

I could feel him as he kissed my bloody hair, pushing it out of my face

I could feel him

I could feel his Love.

~When skies are grey

If only I had stayed just for a moment more,

I would’ve seen Angel, Husk, Nifty Vaggie and Charlie all sniffing and crying

~You’ll never know dear how much I love you I saw a look in dads eyes before I fell forever asleep.

One of saddness. Maybe Regret?

I suppose we’ll never know

~Please don’t take my.. sunshine away..

“I love you Y/N…”

“I’m sorry I didn’t say it sooner”

[e1dritchjackal0pe]

𝔗𝔬 𝔅𝔢 𝔏𝔬𝔳𝔢𝔡 ℑ𝔰 𝔱𝔬 𝔅𝔢 ℭ𝔬𝔫𝔰𝔲𝔪𝔢𝔡

Summary: Because of a past refusal, the god who once fostered and protected your village has cursed the land and left it in constant darkness and bloodshed. But years after the island's condemnation he visits the priestess in her dreams, claiming that he is once again willing to take a sacrifice in exchange for the people's salvation.

You are left to grapple with your reality when that sacrifice is announced to be you.

Notes: 26k words, so . . . grab a snack? Also, this has not been proofread yet so sorry for any errors and misspellings. Banner is credited @saradika

Warnings: MDI - 18+ content! AFAB, Sacrifice AU, violence, horror elements, the reader is drugged physically for ritual purposes but it doesn't affect her in the Dreaming? illusions to death, an animal is harmed but does not die, a small teaspoon of stalker Dream (sorta), hints of possessive Dream but he's also soft. Oral (F!receiving), he's a switch, a bit of soft dom Morpheus I suppose, sex outside but there is no voyeurism involved, unprotected sex.

The memories of your mother are vague at best. Like gazing up at someone while being submerged under water. But what you could remember, quite vividly at that is the wild fables and stories of gods and heroes that she would tell you, sending you off to sleep with images of great serpents slicing through the waves of the seas or the behemoth hound snapping at the tormented souls of the underworld with its many heads. And she taught you of the nymphs of the ocean and the wood, and the great gods that cloak the skies with heavy storm clouds and bind the souls of lovers together. 

But perhaps one of the most important to your isolated village, the one who was vital to the people's survival was the deity Morpheus. Dream of the Endless, the King of Dreams and Ruler of Nightmares. The heavenly benefactor that assured you all prosperity and wealth. He was benevolent and caring, and to commemorate the god, murals were created in his image. Some portrayed him as both beast and man. With the lithe physique of a human, the textured, taloned feet of a bird and great wings pridefully expanding from his back, stretching high in a reaching arch and a head that you could not discern if it was intended to mimic a bird or insect. The protrusion from his face reminded you of the proboscis of a mosquito but it was jointed and colored like ivory like a bleached spine. 

But on occasion the paintings depict the god as a striking statuesque man, clutching a group of blood red blossoms in one hand and fragments of pale sand poured through the fingers of an opposing upturned palm. And he seems to have his wings in this form also. And they are always with feathers the color of the night sky. 

Your mother had told you that he was a kind ruler. But even kindness is not without its conditions. 

The people had spoken of an offering that must be made to the Endless to appease him, an exchange for his watchful eye and shelter. A sacrifice must be given. A human one. The thought had terrified you as a child. But the villagers - even your own parents seemed to accept the requirement without any qualms. No complaints were made from the people. It was taken as a fact of life. The same as how the sun rises in the east or how fire burns when touched. No one fought when the shrine guards came in the morning. When the dawn was but a smudge of lavender in the horizon, knocking on doors and collecting any woman who was of age regardless of it they were already wives with families and duties. 

Not even your father or mother had protested when they came to take her away to the temple. And you had latched yourself onto her hips, refusing to let go even when she assured you that this was a good thing. That it was a great compliment to be even considered for the choosing. And that if she was selected as the offering - to join the Dark God that it would bring honor not just to the village but to your house as well. But you had refused to listen, shaking your head while your tears dampened the fabric that covered her body. The hierodules had to tear you from her hips, and your father had to secure you in his arms as she left with the guards to the join the other women who had been collected from their homes. 

The next passing days for you had been melancholic and distressing to say the least but the village was a kaleidoscope of colors and festivities. And despite the joy that thrummed across the air, the world seemed to be holding its breath, waiting the day for the Choosing when the head Priestess would reveal the offered woman that Endless had deemed worthy enough to be his sacrifice. 

The ceremony had been held near dusk and a heavy quiet had fallen over the collective as you all look up to the priestess, desperate to hear which womans name she would utter. The anticipation was stifling as you all awaited who would become his bride, and your fingernails had dug into your father's hand so harshly that it must have stung, but he did not flinch or jerk away once, far too enamored with the event. And when the sister had revealed the Chosen the crowd had cheered and some gasped, but you had cried. Cried with relief and joy. 

But on that day the Priestess decided to deny the dark god of his sacrifice and that decision would mark the fall and despair of your village for years to come. 

And now you stand where your mother once did. But instead of the cover of a gentle twilight, the unforgiving heat of the sun wafts over you, engulfing you in a sweltering heat and pounds down on the crown of your skull. Voices clamor from down below, the frenzied cries of desperate people, and it has the women standing at your sides shivering like startled doe's. You could not blame them in the slightest. You too wanted to quiver and sob to expel your fear, but you could not bear to show any vulnerabilities. Not to the hungry crowd, too terrified in their own right to empathize with your distress.  

The ritual is only in a few days' time and the atmosphere that looms across the village with a heavy sort of anticipation is a conflicted sort of energy. There was an obvious air of excitement, prickling at your skin and nearly leaving you breathless but there was also the underlying thrum of . . . fear. It pained you to look out to the masses and see their jostling bodies, waiting with bated breath to hear the name of the Endless' intended. To hear if he would finally accept a sacrifice again after so many years of anguish and terror. 

They had decorated the thresholds of houses, and the columns of buildings with rich tapestries and fine wreaths just as had been done in the past. The people- your people frolic about in special fabrics- deep reds and blues to herald the Endless. Gorging themselves on the five-day long feast: the meat of boar and quail and an abundance of fruits. The flow of wine and spirits did not stop. It had only progressed if the slurred shouting and rumbunctious laughter that had reached you from behind the thick walls of the commune was any indication. Celebrating their lives. Celebrating your death. 

Despite your circumstances you had been nothing but pampered since your forced participation. Fed only the finest meals and bathed in expensive oils and perfumes.  You have been chosen by an ancient; a harsh voice hissed cruelly from the depths of your mind. The voice of the old sister. The woman who had sealed your awful fate. The one who claimed that the mind walker -the dark god himself had come to her in a dream and had spoken to her she had reiterated animatedly, sharp piercing eyes nearly rolling back in her skull from her mania. Her body had quivered from her passion and the other women that had been selected and forced into a reluctant row had nearly flinched back at the intensity of it. You all clung to each other, hands gripping the other for support. Something to tether yourselves to the ground. All of the eligible women had been wrangled up, torn from the arms of their families. Even women with husbands and children were taken away, no one was spared in the wishes of finally appeasing the god. 

You had scanned the clamoring crowd in the hopes of finding someone who would be willing to help. Someone who would disagree. Perhaps a stranger would show pity or sympathy, but you found no one. They were all hanging on to the demented rambling of the old priestess. Their silence was palatable. The crazed joyous eyes of people with hope. Hope of reprieve from the decade long curse that had tainted the village. And unfortunately, one of the maidens- one of you that stood in that horrid line was the answer to their prayers. And when you found no sympathy, you looked past the commotion and the roofs of houses to the sea in the distance and imagined yourself taking to the dark waves and escaping under the tide and froth. Emerging somewhere new and wonderful. 

Of course, there would be no freedom for you. Not when her horrid eyes strayed from the desperate crowd and pinned you in your place the air had been expelled from your lungs with a harsh gravity. The realization of your fate. 

And then as if to perpetuate her point further, to drive the knife in deeper and twist, she lifted her crooked finger up in the air and pointed. Right at you. And the other girls that were clinging to your body for support and comfort had jerked from you as if you were dirty and blemished, sobbing with cries of relief while they fled in search of their mothers and fathers in the crowd. But some of them had sank to the dust and clasped their hands together as if in prayer, kneeling at your feet like you were sanctified. 

"The Endless has found his Chosen." She crooned and the people had roared in a victorious cry.  

They took you kicking and screaming, ignoring your cries of protest while they carried you off to the Sisters commune to prepare you and the townspeople looked on, watching you feverously with a horrid sort of enthusiasm. Relief you recognized. 

You had been forced into decadent silks and decorated with jewelry that at one time you would have dreamed of wearing, but they might as well as have been hot iron with the way that they felt against your skin. Restricting, disgusting. 

They paraded you around for days, making you the pinnacle of the festival while you watched them all sink into their basest desires, influenced from alcohol and the intoxication of relief. You tried not to blame them. To see past your pain and hurt and summon some forgiveness. After all, they were only afraid. The same as you had been, the same as you are now. Fearful of the Night King and his spirits. The horrible kakodaimon hoard that serve at his command and wreak havoc should their emperor be denied of his sacrifice. Some are little more than mischievous deities, entertaining themselves with otherwise harmless pranks: Stealing shoes and tying the hair of women into knots while they sleep unaware. The stuff of tales and bedtime stories. But he has other creatures. Monstrous, evil things that steal infants from their cribs and drain bodies of their lifeblood and chew bone. 

The same horrid beings that have been tormenting the village for a decade now, arriving in the night to snatch up any poor soul who had been foolish enough to be caught outside during the dark. Many have died during the years since he's unleashed his army of terrors upon the village. The dark creatures snatching them up in their gnarled claws, as lethal as a sharpened daggers and carrying them off with the swift whisper of wings. All because he was refused. 

And now finally you sit underneath the stars again, after being forced behind barricaded doors and huddling underneath the table and hoping that the creatures wouldn't break through the door and tear themselves inside with gnashing teeth to feast upon your flesh. Clinging to the hope that you would survive until daybreak when the blessed sun would rise from the horizon and banish them away. If only for a little while. 

For the first time since you were a child you may embrace the dark and breath in the warm night air, feeling it sooth your lungs like a balm. You're as full of wonder as you are paranoia. Waiting for one of the nightmares to leap out of the shadows and steal you away. But even the weight of the silver and diamonds adorning your body and the deafening laughter of the feast couldn't tear your eyes away from the black expanse that loomed above. Stretching out like a horrible, beautiful black void that threatened to eat you alive. And you nearly felt crushed with how small - insignificant it made you feel. The unforgiving stretch of the cosmos looming above seemed to force your own mortality upon you with a harsh sort of grace. And it angered you that the dark god had stripped this sight from you for so many years. He had taken so much from you all and now they all once again chant his name as though he was a savior and not the reason for their strife and agony. Celebrating his image like he was a humble god that had not punished them and their children with beasts and terrible dreams. All because he was not given a woman who had been promised to him. 

You had never felt so bare in your life, having been forced on the plush velvet cushions of a palanquin to be carried around on the shoulders of the temple guards and displayed around the village. There was no shelter from the prying eyes of the townspeople who had watched you with the same sort of desperate hunger as a pack of starved dogs, shameless and pitiful. They had been pelting you with the vibrant blossoms of violets and dark seeds, and the abundance had begun to collect atop the cushions, and you had been tempted to sweep the offerings off the side of the vehicle but as if sensing your intentions one of the priestesses had swiftly swiveled her head to glare at you from her place beneath you. You had been tempted to defy her regardless, to hold eye contact with her as you did so, but despite your petty desire you held yourself back. 

They did eventually lower you from their shoulders and back down onto the earth, and a few women had emerged from the boisterous crowd -servants perhaps - to hand you food and drink. You had not wanted to accept it, too prideful to take what they had given you and make them believe that they had managed to placate you with a meal and wine, but eventually your stomach had won and you hesitantly abandoned your dignity. It had been too long since you had last had a decent meal, having survived off of measly scraps for too long. You had gorged yourself on the figs and fish and honey cakes, chasing it with the rich wine when you had become parched and soon your head had become light with the influence of the fermented liquid, and it allowed you to ignore the cajoling throng of people and the sisters' that observed you. 

The priestesses surrounded you like a group of statues, pillars of death. Silent and watching. Guarding. They observe when the villagers approach you, eyes glinting hauntingly like they're waiting for one of the people to lash out and attack you.  You hoped someone would and finally put you out of your misery. But instead, they all crouched down low at your feet, whispering their gratitude like you had asked for this purpose and placed bundles of red flowers on the earth to surround the palanquin. Even a child had approached you, thanking you for the salvation you offered. It had nearly broken you and tears had threatened to spill down your face. It almost disgusted you to look at them. Soft, delicate blossoms that were a harsh scarlet. Red like blood. Poppies you had realized. The flower associated with the Endless. It made you nauseous to be surrounded by his symbol. And suddenly they were not so pretty anymore and there were too many. Overflowing at your feet and pilling up so high that it felt like the people were trying to build a wall around you.  

"Why must I do this?" You gasp, feeling as though you were being crushed. The sister to your right is the one who speaks but she does not turn to look at you, instead focusing on the roaring pyre that the villagers dance around under the guide of the drums and flute. "Because it is your purpose." The answer is cold and matter of fact, sparing you no sympathy. It is a sentence that you have heard uttered one too many times in the passing days, almost as though they believed you would come to accept your circumstances if you heard it enough. You just could not understand why they would be so easily swayed to accept the god who had turned his backs on them so long ago. Abandoned them and tormented them because of his own hubris. Scorned because the head priestess before had not given him her own daughter. 

He had plagued your village for too long. Ravaging men and women and children with horrid dreams and dying crop. Except for now. Ever since the choosing ceremony, when you had been selected the gardens had blossomed seemingly overnight, overgrown with a prosperous harvest and the hunt had been successful after many moons of coming up with little more than measly rabbits. 

They would always return to his dark embrace after the horrors that you have all been forced to endure. It did not matter if he demanded one maiden or a thousand, they would spare as many women that he demanded. Even if it meant finding shelter under the punishing hand that caused all of their pain. 

But it still does not explain why he had accepted a sacrifice after so many years of silence and refusal. After turning his nose up at every attempt to reconcile and give an offering he makes his presence known now. But what had changed? Why you? Surely the god that presides over dreams and walks amongst the subconscious must know that you are no longer a chaste woman. A tainted old maid is what they would whisper about you. There was no sense to any of this. 

"But why me?" And the fragile strings of jewelry draped around your neck clink against each other, but it is an annoying sound that has your nails digging into the rich tapestried cushions. It is the one to your left that speaks now. Her voice is deceptively soft, bubbling like a gentle stream. "We do not question the Endless. " She responds. And although her voice is much more welcoming than her sister's her words are just as indifferent. " You will be our salvation. Our forgiveness. You will save us. " 

Any bit of protest had died in your throat before you could get them out. You focused on the festivities instead, watching the people chant and sing old songs. And dancers leapt around the fire, dressed in furs and leather and colorful fabrics to mimic figures from folklore and the very monsters that had massacred your village for years. Wearing masks fashioned from old hides and animal pelts, brandishing the horns taken from cattle and deer. They playfully leapt at the crowd that encircled the fire as though they were going to swipe. And some had constructed costumes to imitate the dark plumage of the raven, one of his coveted animals. 

This was twisted. A mockery of suffering and pain. Pissing on the memory of the people who had fallen victim to the dream god and his nightmares. 

How could they all forget so easily? 

You could feel the sting of anger simmering within your chest, prickling at your fingertips. It made it difficult to breath around the weight of it all. You continue to watch them all despite the rage and sorrow that it induces. The horrible way they galivant around and clap and cheer. It's disgusting and awful. Even the children. The poor children participate, lunging at the false monsters with wooden swords and some are dressed as the dark creatures themselves.  

To get some sort of reprieve you looked to the night sky, staring up at the full moon as though its goddess would hear your silent plea and save you from your fate. Whisking you from this starving mob and your doomed fate to her hidden island to frolic with the nymphs free from your crude duty.  But the glowing deity did not appear, and you were left to stare at the lonely dark void of the night while the stars winked and fluttered as though their light might dim and die. It was foolish to believe that the goddess of virtue would appear for a woman like you. 

But then you could feel it. A magnetic pull that tilted your head from its upturned position, and your eyes lower onto something gleaming with a pale light. Two shimmering pieces, shinning much like the moon hanging above.  It is a pair of eyes you come to quickly discern. Reflecting the bright glow of the pyre in a way that is decidedly not human. Those are the eyes of a beast: An owls may do that, or a wolf's or a cat. Not a human. But the face that they belong to is very much a man's. 

It is difficult to make out the features of his face past the way that the heat of the open flames warp the surrounding atmosphere and the smoke twists and coils into the open air like deadly serpents. But you can comprehend the sharp jut of high cheek bones and pale milky skin almost as though he was cut from a fine marble. His expression is not a joyous one or celebratory like the other villagers, instead it is stoic and serious. The intensity of his glare has you pinned in place. It is you; you realize. He's staring at you. 

The world suddenly feels weightless, like you're suspended in a vacuum. You had heard a story from an old hunter once. One who had miraculously survived a lightning strike and he had been shunned by many of the others for his scars. After all he must have done something to warrant the strike. He must have scorned the Lord of the Sky himself. But you had spoken to him regardless and he had told you that he had felt it before it had hit him, even though it was only for but a second. His hair had stood on end and his skin had tingled strangely before his body was flooded with a numbing white-hot heat. And you could feel that sensation prickling over you now, like the whisper of a thousand fingertips brushing you all over. It made you shiver, and you adjusted yourself in your seat in an attempt to banish the feeling, but it never faded. If anything, the steady pulses persisted and seemed to thrum with even more intensity nearly making you gasp aloud. You wanted to look away from the strange man, but you could not seem to will yourself to turn your gaze from him, and some strange part of you did not want to. He was gorgeous in a haunting sort of way, but you could not figure out why. There was an unearthly quality to his countenance, like he was he was not a man but wearing the face of one. 

It was then you noticed the color of his robes. Black. But that was not right. No one else was allowed to sport the Endless' color, no one else apart from the head priestess was allowed to wear his color, as a way to display her connection and loyalty. It was considered an extreme offence for any other person to bear a cloth in his shade. A punishable offence that would often result in public ridicule and the removal of the criminal's dominant hand. Some have even claimed that the accused may be haunted from night terrors for the crime until the passing of their natural human life. So who would be bold enough to flaunt around in public in such dark robes? 

He must be a foolish man. Or at least an arrogant one. And as though he could hear your thoughts the corner of his mouth quirks in just the faintest hint of a smile. So delicate that it could be mistaken for a trick of the light. But you could see it in his otherworldly eyes too. It looked as though that it did not suit him, but he also wore the expression beautifully. It was an odd juxtaposition, and you did not know what to make of it. He looks like no one you had never seen before but is also painfully familiar, like an old memory. 

Oddly enough no one else seems to notice his presence at all. A phenomenon that could be blamed on the alcohol and high spirits but what couldn't be wrote away by reason was the way that a drunk seemed to stumble through the strange man, causing him to vanish like a plume of smoke and the pale shimmer of his eyes was the last to fade, piercing some buried part of you before disappearing entirely and with it something clicks into place. 

The sensation that had spilled over you leaves with him, releasing you from its hold and allowing you take a deep breath that you had not known you needed. That awful wonderful stare. . . Could that have truly been the nightmare masquerading as a man? They have been known to do such a thing before. Using the guises of people and loved ones to lure vulnerable victims out for slaughter. Then another thought trickles down to the forefront and it has a cold shiver skipping down the notches of your spine. What if it had been the nightmare king himself? Come to see you, his intended bride? 

Surely you were hallucinating. It has never been mentioned before that the deity has ever made appearances before the ritual. None of the other past offerings have spoken of it. If it has happened, then none have ever cared to mention it. 

It had a troubled sinking feeling plummeting in your gut and it stayed with you throughout the night until the priestesses had collected you from your place and ushered you back to your temporary quarters where the servants prepared you for sleep. Insisting that you bathe, pouring luxuries oils into the steaming water and combing your hair before bed. They fret about like ghost. Silent and always moving so they are often little more than glimpses in your peripheral vision. They hardly speak. Only enough to offer commands that are loosely guised as suggestions or to whisper softly amongst themselves. 

They do not like you; you could easily tell. If the unabashed away that they gossip quietly while in your presence is any indication. But one of the women in particular does nothing to hide her distaste. Watching you with scorn in her eyes and a scowl on her lips. Neither of you had made any efforts to verbally communicate your hatred for the other, instead opting to passive aggressively telegraph the fact with petty gestures. Such as when she had decided to harshly pick through your hair while preparing you for the first feast. Clawing at your scalp with the teeth of the comb harshly enough to sting and throb for the entire night. The apology that she had given you was pathetically fake, contempt framed around a smile and feigned concern. She did not do it again when you had accidentally spilt hot tea across her hip when she was selecting your jewelry. 

But even now you could feel the heat of her glare against the crown of your skull and the grip that she had on your hair was harsher than necessary, but you simply did not have the energy to reprimand the action. Not after being paraded around the feast all night like a prized brood mare, sluggish under the weight of silks and pearls that decorated you. 

You feel her leaning over your shoulder before she speaks, the heat of her body irritates your skin and you find yourself tensing and trying to lean from her presence, but she is gripping your hair in a tight grip that keeps you from shifting. "You do not deserve to be touched by a god." She hisses, venom tainting her words. 

"Clearly you do not either," you snap just as harshly, gripping the sides of the basin so that you do not twist out of her hold and lash out. The other maids do not so much as glance over at the altercation, simply going on about their duties as though the both of you do not exist. "Or else you would be the one bathing in oils and dining on fruits and wine. " The hold on the back of your scalp goes slack somewhat, allowing you enough leeway to peer over your shoulder and meet the heated gray of her eyes. "How does it feel to know that your god has no desire for you?" 

She does not respond even though you can tell that she is actively biting her tongue to hold down her barbed words. It irritated you. The way they all acted as though they truly loved him. It was not affection they felt, but fear. You loathed the lying and the pretending all in the sake of appeasing the horrid god, and yet you could not find the courage to voice your opinions. It was a fruitless endeavor you knew to try and speak to these people. As tortured and hopeless as they were. And as much as you wanted to ridicule them their actions were not unfounded. You had seen firsthand what the Endless was capable of when he was denied of promises. You had watched you own mother be dragged away by venomous claws and terrible simpering fangs. There was no room for argument. At least not a sensical one. 

And so, you had remined silent for the remainder of your bath and until the servants had retired for the night, settling underneath the soft linens, but you were unable to relax. Not when you could still feel that man's eyes searing into your skin. Not from the fear of falling danger to the night terrors and horrible dreams, even though you have been quite fortunate, having not experience a single nightmare in quite some time. But that dark figures presence felt like a bad omen. An awful warning for the things to come. What if he sends his demons to come and haunt you and drag you away in the dark? What if he means to punish you? You wrack your brain to try and remember if you could have ever possibly scorned the dark god but come up empty. Granted you have never particularly harbored pleasant feelings towards the deity but not a single soul in the village has since the day that he chose to curse it, tainting it with beasts and painful dreams. Sometimes tormenting the people with dreams so intense and horrid that some have passed away in their sleep, suffering from weak hearts or fragile lungs. Other have been driven mad from the vividness and the persistence of the nightmares to the point that they have lost all sense of self and reality, some noy just taking their own lives but even the lives of others in the midst their distress and agony.

He was a dreadful god whose love was built with conditions and lies. Boasting the promise of prosperity and protection but the only thing you need protection from is him. 

An airy coo breaks you from your troubling thoughts, drawing your attention to the corner of the room where a familiar black shape trots out of the shadows, almost as though he had materialized from them. 

"What are you doing here you silly thing?" You could not hold in the short disbelieving laugh that escapes you in a huff, affection growing within your chest. You are not even sure how he could have possibly gotten inside the Sisters' commune and found your quarters, especially considering that the trek from your cottage to the village was a decent walk. He must have found an open window or slipped inside when no one was looking. You would not put the feat past him, he always seemed to be skulking about. 

You prop yourself up on your elbow to welcome the cat as he leaps onto your mattress, leaning into your hand with the tilt of his head. And you are thankful for the familiarity and the calm that washes over you at the feel of his long fur against your palm. It is a great comfort to have your companion back with again after being away from home for so long. But when your affection became too much, he slipped out from underneath your hold and retreated to the foot of your bed with a petulant flick of his tail, deciding to watch you with the piercing blue of his eyes instead. 

"Oh, my dearest apologies, " you jest, pulling your blanket up higher around your shoulder and try not to take it personally as he moves from you. "I did not mean to offend you." 

He blinks slowly, a very simple gesture but it always felt like it was done with an air of judgement. But then again, the animal always seemed to carry himself an imperious sort of way, even though he is but a cat, he manages to be rather expressive when he wants to be. 

"Have you been taking care of yourself?" You ask as though you would get an answer. You hate the thought of him being out so late with the possibility of those dreadful creatures roaming the ground and skies, ready to snatch and gouge with deadly claws. You know that he could fend for himself. He is a feral cat at best, coming and going as he pleases. Often vanishing for concerning periods of time before reappearing at your doorstep as though he had never left at all. But not even the beasts - the regular forest dwelling kind or the godly ones are the only threats that roam the dark. People could be just as awful. You honestly do not how he has managed to survive as long as he has with all the dangers lurking about. It was the same thing that you had wondered about on the first day that you saw him wandering around the tall grass that surrounded your home while you were out tending to your stubborn garden. But the second thought and the most startling was the realization that you were even looking at a cat at all. There had not been a single feline spotted on the village since the morning after the failed ritual all those years ago. All of the cats had but vanished from the island without a trace. Gone as though they had not been here at all, like they had all piled onto a boat and paddled to the mainland or a giant hand had descended from the sky and plucked them from their homes and alleyways. But now there was one there, slinking through the tall grass, a whisp of black against the dead golden reeds. 

It had you pausing from your task of searching for an unblemished vegetable that had not been tainted by worm bites or disease (which was proving to be a pointless endeavor) to watch the cat on its little journey. But despite your awe you had noticed the lethargy that seemed to slow its movements considerably. The usual feline grace that the animals typically carry themselves with was replaced by sluggish and jerky movements. The cat was all but stumbling between the tall stalks of grass. And in your worried study of the animal, you noticed a series of angry red slivers peeking through the thickness of his fur along its side. Four angry red wounds that would have been difficult for a human to endure, but for a cat you could not imagine the tole it was taking on its body to remain conscious. Especially through the pain no doubt. 

It had been entirely upon reflex to jerk up from your place on the ground, concern overshadowing your tact and making you forget that it may be a feral and undomesticated creature. And your worry did not prove to be unfounded when the cats head swung over in your direction, freezing in its walk to assess you. The both of you held a long exchange of stares and you had wondered if you should try to approach it, but then it had bolted. Lurching forward on wobbly feet and your heart had jumped in your throat, entirely frightened that he would flee to the cover of the forest and succumb to his wounds. But the cat had only made it a few paces before it was crumbling to the dirt and collapses on its side. 

You had barged through the gate of your garden leaving it to creak on its hinges while you approached the cat's body, hoping that he had not given into the trauma of the lacerations. But a glance over with your eyes confirmed that it was thankfully still breathing. You had whispered your apologies when you had noticed that he was watching you as well with a tired glassy stare, scooping him up as gently as you could and carrying him into your house to provide as much care as you could. 

The cat's body was already making efforts to build scabbing, the thick red having coagulated along the edges of its wounds. But the blood was still flowing too much for your liking, staining the linens that you had folded near the hearth for the animal to rest on. You were going to have to sew. Unfortunately, due to the infertility of the soil and the bad luck with yielding a healthy garden you had little herbs or flowers for medicine. And truthfully you did not know much of cats and which plants and medicines that should be avoided or would help him recover from his ailments, but with no one to confide in you did your best. Making sure to cleanse the slashes with fresh water before you began to stitch. Having no choice but to settle for the needle and thread that you used to make repairs on your clothing. 

"I'm afraid you aren't going to like me much after this, but I don't think we have much of a choice. " You had said, as you knelt down on the floor of your kitchen, settling in front of the animal with your thread in one hand and the needle in the other. It had peered at you from the corners of its eyes, too weak to move its head, but you had seen something flashed in its weary gaze that seemed a lot like irritation. 

You had tried to be as nimble and delicate as possible, doing to your best to focus past your anxiety to steady the mild quiver of your fingers, especially when they had become slick with blood. You tried to softly sooth the cat as gently as you could muster whenever he would jerk from pain. And thankfully you were finished before you realized, and you wrapped a strip of clean cloth around his middle to keep it clean from dirt and possible infection. 

He had laid there for several days, only moving when you had to change his dressings. And in the beginning, he had hardly eaten or drank, and you had feared for the worst. That despite your best-efforts illness had gotten ahold of him and stripped him of his appetite. But on the second day of you trying to persuade him to at least drink it seemed he had grown tired of you tapping your fingertips along the edge of the bowl or the way that you would defeatedly try to spoon-feed him water from the divot of a spoon and had lapped at the water from the edge of his linens before looking up you with a pointed glare. It took even longer to get him to eat, sharing with him pieces of rabbit that you had managed to trap. 

And since his presence in your home the beasts outside had been more active than usual, as though they could smell the blood of his wounds and had taken to clawing at your door. And on some nights, you could hear the muffled thump of footsteps skulking along your roof. They had never been so eager before. So persistent. Typically, the thing that mimics was the only one that stayed so close to your home, often screaming throughout the night like an animal. It even cried like a distressed woman or an anguished child. Sometimes it's true voice slips through the glamour.  The sound of thousands speaking in unison, of men, women and children. Stolen souls forced to speak through the maw that devoured them whole.

As terrible as it sounds a part of you has grown used to its presence. It had become routine almost, hearing the awful imitations pouring from its mouth from behind your front door. And you have spent many a night underneath the latch that you had made in the floor of your house, sleeping in burrow dug underneath the wooden planks with a dagger clutched to your chest. But when you had the cat in your home the activity seemed to increase, and you had spent every night spent underneath your floor with the cat delicately placed in the corner on his own bundle of blankets where he would lay without moving, too weak to shift or turn.

And they had returned the next night too with the number greater than the last, stalking around the perimeter of your house. Hissing and chortling in the night like a pack of demonic rabid wolves. It had been most cruel when a familiar voice had spoken from the other side of the front door, too distorted and inhuman to truly be your loved one, but similar enough to taunt you. A mockery of your father's voice begging you to let him inside. And even within your room underneath the floorboards you could still hear it. It talked for hours and spoke as both your mother and father until tears were prickling at your lash line and threatened to fall, and you had done what you could to distract yourself. Staring at the floor above you, finding shapes and faces in the patterns and shifting shades of the wood. 

It was the first time that the cat had even attempted to seek out any sort of contact. Weakly perking up from his corner and settling on the length of your legs from above your blanket and he had stared up at the floorboards above you with a startling air of intent. The voices crooned out and the rasp of talons scratched along the walls of your house. Then mercifully the voices had stopped. Seemingly all at once a peaceful hush had fallen over the atmosphere and you finally felt as though you could breathe again. The monsters had not returned that night. Or on any other night. It was as though they had vanished entirely which you knew could not be true because you could still find evidence of their existence in the forest while you hunted or washed your linens in the nearby stream. 

His health had steadily risen over the next few days. The wounds on his side had healed up nicely and he had quickly grown more restless. And he had taken to occupying himself by investigating you home and snooping around the rooms until one day he had slipped out from the front door when you were not paying attention and vanished into the tall grass. You did not heal him with the intent to keep him. A part of you assuming that he may have had a family eagerly awaiting his arrival somewhere on the island, but you could not lie to yourself that it had been nice to have company even if it was just a cat. 

You had not seen him for several weeks after that and a part of you had feared that he may have fallen to one of the beasts in the wood. And the more optimistic side of you had hoped and imagined that he had found his family. Life had returned to its monotony without him at your side and you were once again alone while attending your chores. But there had been some promise, such as the abrupt but not unwelcomed revival of your garden, which had now begun to sprout bits of life again. You had been shocked when you had seen a green hue returning to the withered remains of the mint and thyme and beginnings of a humble pods growing along your fig tree, promising the growth of fruit. And then one day he surprised you with his return, trotting from the golden meadow while you were beating a rug of the dust and grime that it had been collecting and you had smiled and greeted him like an old friend. And he would begin accompanying you as you went about your chores, always sticking by you closely and observing, even if you ventured all the way around the other side of the island to hunt for oysters and scallops, though the harvest you returned with was always slim. 

And you tried your best to name the creature, but he would not accept any of them. Not Akakikos or Thales or Arye. They were all promptly ignored when you had even tried to address him as such, and you were met with looks that could only be described as unimpressed. Of course, you could not find it in yourself to blame him. You did agree that none of them seemed to suit him all that much. But you could not call him nothing and so you had aptly christened him as 'Cat' which had been even less enthusiastically received as the others. But he would follow you everywhere despite the displeased looks that he would give you every time you addressed him as so, accompanying you when you washed your laundry in the nearby stream, and when you visit your parents' empty graves (you had never found their bodies) to tell them of your day. But he had especially surprised you whenever he would trot alongside you on your strolls down the shoreline of the ocean. It had shocked you to say the least, when Cat had wadded in the gentle waves after you, unaffected by the way that the water lapped at his paws.

A strange cat indeed. 

It struck you suddenly, the realization that you would never see your home again. As empty and cold as it could be. Forced to live on the outskirts as a pariah, assuming that you would fall to your death underneath the claws of a nightmare. Many had perished living so close to the wood, and they surely had no intention of you surviving the forest on your lonesome.  But you did and you made your vacant house your own, even with the bad blood-stained memories haunting the walls. You accepted your life alone rather early on and have even learned to love it in all of its solitude and freedoms. But they have once again bent you to their wills, selling you off like a lamb for slaughter to appease a selfish god. 

You cannot fight of the stinging lump that has risen and lodged itself in your throat. Not this time. And it burns and pushed up tears that spill down your cheeks and stain the bedding. You could not stop yourself from mourning everything. The loss of your life, the waning humanity of the townspeople, the bloody deaths of your loved ones. You tried to clamp your teeth shut to conceal your sobbing, worried that the guards posted outside of the door may hear you. And even more crippling was the sudden painful awareness that tomorrow was the night of the ritual. You had been ignoring the date, too distressed to acknowledge it. But it was coming. It was coming at there is nothing that you can do to stop it. 

There is the brush of something soft against your face, and it is not until your opening your eyes that you realize that you had even squeezed them shut. You look past the blur of your tears to see register two vivid blue irises watching you. 

Your heart ached at the sight. Torn between a flicker of affection and your unignorable grief. But you smiled regardless of your tears and stroked his chin with your fingertips. It always surprises you when he chooses to crouch down against your chest, snuggling into your body. He was not always one to seek out affection, often preferring to lie somewhere near by while watching you finish up your routine chores and tasks. His favorite spot was the window seal of your kitchen where he would perch and observe you while you would knead dough or slice the vegetables for stews. But whenever your sleep was fitful, and you would wake with a layer of cold sweat dampening your clammy skin and the anguished cries of your parents still echoing in your ears he would scurry into your bedroom if he was not already there and curl up with you as he is now until you were able to fall sleep once again. 

It troubled you to think of how he would fair for himself in your absence. You had been taking care of him for many moons now and you could only hope that in your effort to keep him from starvation that he had not grown to become too dependent of you. You could not bear the thought, that in your attempt to help and offer companionship that you had unwittingly ushered him closer to death. Would he go back to being alone after the Priestesses had sent your soul off to the nightmare god and all, but your lifeless body remained? 

Would he once again wonder aimlessly with no one to care for him? 

You could only hope that he would find someone else. 

"I'm sorry." You whispered into his soft fur and clutched him closer to you and you remained that way until your grip of time had slipped and the only thing that told you that it was still the same night was the darkness that encompassed the room, most of the candles having long since burnt out of their wicks apart from one that was little more than a pinprick of light. Even with the pull of sleep turning your limps into heavy, useless extensions and the weariness burning at your drooping eyes you could not allow yourself to fall unconscious. You were desperate to keep as much time between yourself at the ritual as possible, even though it was a fool's errand of course, as the moon was still drifting along its path in the sky and the sun was still on its way to rise over the horizon. Tomorrow would come regardless of your distress and fate. Time was cruel and it stopped for no one. But still you could not let yourself sleep even with Cat embraced in your arms, and his body thrummed with a rare bout of purring. . . It was loud. Oddly so and you opened your eyes that you were not aware that you had even shut. And when you looked down, Cat was absent from his place against your chest even though he had just been there a second ago. 

Worry broke through the exhaustion that sapped your bones and you were up in an instant, sitting up in the bed with the linens pooling around your waist while your gaze roves around the room and it does not pause until it finds a familiar shape in the darkness, watching you from a shaded corner. His eyes reflect the light from the dimming candle, and they bore into you with that pale shimmer. An unsettling chill trickles down your neck and raises the hair at your nape. The gleam of them disturbs some part of you, but you cannot place why. It is a look you recognize but it feels wrong and alien. 

Its eyes. There is something wrong with its eyes. 

"What are you doing over there?" You ask, and your voice is little more than a whisper, low from sleep and unease. But he does not so much as blink, continuing to stare steadily and the candlelight wobbles on its wick and the cats shadow flickers. It is a strange shadow, much too big for a creature so small.  

Then without any warning he shoots up from his place, trotting across the expanse of the floor and slipping from the door that had been left ajar.

Had it always been open? No

You hardly question it before you are scrambling from the bed to take after him, harshly whispering for him to come back as you pick up what little bit remains of the candle to light your way before hesitantly peek your head between the open gap of the threshold and door, scanning the hallway. But there is not a single guard in sight. The hierodules that had been stationed outside of your quarters were absent. Another peculiarity that is brushed aside when you catch the tip of Cat's tail vanishing amongst the heavy shadows that blot out the hallway and you chase after him regardless, shielding the tiny flame with your hand lest it blow out from the hasty speed of your walking. 

You are being watched you can tell, and your mind distantly supplies that it must be the murals observing you. The painted eyes of the old priestesses and spirits that adorn the walls in robes and vines made from strokes of scarlet and hunter and cerulean. But you could not let yourself look to their judgmental and buoyant faces. 

"Come here!" You hiss lowly through gritted teeth and cast a wary glance across your shoulder to briefly study the black void behind you, hoping that there is nothing lurking within it. 

And you walk for what felt like forever, chasing after the cats wavering tail that turns around twisting halls that do not seem to end, never catching up no matter how quickly you shift your pace. And it is not until you come across another bend in the corridor that the suffocating walls finally seem to open up into a massive room of dust and stones, and the light from the candle casts a glow across the space that was much too abundant considering the modest size of the flame. But he is nowhere to be seen, almost as though he has vanished from thin air. 

The air is damp here, clinging to your skin like the spray of the ocean's waves but much less pleasant. It is much more akin to the sweat that covers you when under the influence of a sickness, you decide. And the aged earthy aroma that permeates the air is even more troubling. Musty and cloying like rancid grapes. It has your nose wrinkling, and you suppress the urge to gag while you investigate the room. It takes a moment for you to make sense of what you are seeing, making out the details of the great room from underneath the oily yellow glow of the candlelight. 

There are large rectangular divots that had been crudely chiseled or dug into the stone near the base of the floor and the many burrows line above each other and descend up along the wall and towards the high tenebrous ceiling. But nestled delicately within each one is some sort of lump, gently wrapped in a rich red clothe. 

That nasty sense of unease washed over you again, prickling at your skin and your heart skips a beat at the sudden burst of fear. But there is curiosity too. It emerges from the recesses of your mind and seems to take a hold of your body, nudging you towards one of the burrows, and with each step you forget why you are even here. The search for your wayward cat completely discarded. Your focus is completely arrested one the form hidden underneath the vibrant silks, and that apprehensive part of you dislike how large the hidden shape seems. 

You mouth has gone dry and your tongue sticks uselessly to the roof of your mouth and a part of you wonders if you would be able scream should you need to. You feel helplessly trapped within your body, like a reluctant passenger, once again forced to be paraded around in a vessel that you did not want to sit upon. And all you could do was watch and feel as your shaky had rose over the red silhouette. You felt the silk underneath your fingertips, too soft and too smooth. Like water. Like blood.  And your mind ceaselessly chants no, no, no even as your body refuses to yield to its commands and your fingers pinch the cloth in a hold and pull it back from the shape. And the blood in your veins seems to freeze despite the way that it races, and the pit of your stomach drops like a stone. 

You want to look away, but your head is locked in place and every muscle has coiled inside of your body tightly. You are paralyzed and pinned where you stand, forced to stare down at the gaunt remains. The sunken eyes and withered, leathered skin pulled taught around its bones like the skeleton is trying to break free from its own body. And brittle hairs still collect around the skull, that once probably shimmered yellow like the rays of the sun but was no lackluster and dry, frayed in its braids. Pinned in place underneath the wring of a ceremonial crown. Vine leaves and olive branches that is embellished with the bright blossoms of poppies. The crown you would be forced to wear tomorrow to symbolize your union with the Endless.  

A shaky exhale rattles out, a dry rasping sound that you would have easily blamed on yourself and the fear squeezing your body in a harsh grip if not for the way that you see the mummified bride's chest quiver unsteadily. She is still alive with her body forced into some sort of permanent sleep. You cannot help but wonder how long she has been held captive here. A hostage in this awful, animated state. And all of these other shapes swaddled in red silks are other sacrifices. And they too are all still awake you realize once you hear the dry whispers of their breath echo across the chamber. 

You want to scream. You can feel it rising and clawing at your throat, but it never escapes, balling up harshly in your chest and just sitting there. But whatever spell had been casted over you finally slips and you stumble back from the burrow and the mummified bride, and your knees shake and give, and you fall onto the chilled floor, dropping the tiny candlestick on your decent. Your knees scrape the rough granite, erupting with streaks of red but you can't be bothered to care, too focused on crawling away from the looming walls, towards the center of the room while your eyes search from the entrance, but it is nowhere to be found. You spin on your knees ignoring the sting, expecting to find the threshold, but all you see are the cold painted walls, adorned with stars and poppy fields and strange beasts with wings and horns and some have the faces of men and the bodies of beasts. But even worse are the open tombs carved into the walls, and they suddenly seem like gapping, hungry mouths and the red silks that adorn the bodies seem more like lashing tongues. 

The candle flickers unsteadily, melted wax pouring around the weak flame, threatening to drown it and douse you in darkness. You make to crawl towards it before it before it can be snuffed out, but your stopped short by a pair of gleaming eyes watching you. The dark fur tells you who it is but your gut lurches at the sight of the cat. And some buried instinct tells you that something is not right. 

The eyes you realize, are tinged with a faint scarlet around the edges, staining the pale silver glow. And it was wrong. That was not the right color. This was not your cat. How did you not notice before?

It was an imposter. The face too narrow, its shadow too big. Too sharp. 

Your heart flutters like a startled bird and your breath seizes in your lungs when the red silks bound around the brides starts to drip and flow down from the stones like liquid. Blood. Their garb has shifted into blood and is pouring and merging into a massive pool around the edge of the wall and it steadily grows. 

The brides labored breathing whistles across the air, raising in volume until it hurts, harshly grating in your ears in a shrill pitch. And the sound mutates into a chorus of screams that you swear you can feel dragging over your skin like claws. You cover your ears with your hands to muffle the impact of the tortured shrieking, but it offers you no solace from the pain. And all the while the cat - the thing - stares at you from its place on the bloody floor, stained by the very red that is closing in on you from all corners, but you cannot find it in yourself to look past the agony to find strength and collect yourself from the cold granite. 

The red pours around the remaining bit of the candle and the small flame at the end of the wick hisses and sputters at the liquids touch. The light emitting from it dims considerably, threatening to enclose the catacomb in a void. And the cats shadow seems to expand underneath the waning fire, stretching in a jagged way that looks like arms trying to tear free from cloth or skin.

And the cat - a mere extension of the true monster - steps forward while its eyes burn brighter. And the blood is upon you, threatening to touch you. Nausea churns in your stomach and all of the muscles in your body draw taught. You are forced to watch as the creature grows closer, and all you can do is try your best to prepare to fight it, as pathetic as your odds no doubt are. And the brides screaming warbles and shifts into a painful mocking laughter as though they could sense your thoughts. And it makes you feel like an animal caught in a cage. A bird pinned between jagged teeth and the jaws are closing in. The walls and shadows move in closer and their joyous howling and giggling rises in a crescendo, celebrating your anticipated death. You brace as best as you can, balling your hands into fists so tightly that your nails break the skin, watching as the monstrous shadow builds up and prepares to lash out with obsidian talons. 

But the killing blow never comes. Instead, a pair of steady arms wrap around your body, encasing you against the comfort of a chest. And a rush of scents washed over you with its presence, and you struggle to place what it reminds you of. The musk of the soil after fresh rain, the salt of the sea, a calm breeze on a summer night; light and floral and earthy, but those descriptions also do no service to the fragrance that engulfs you. And with it something magnetic dances across your skin and it steals your breath away and your body threatens to melt against theirs. 

Your mind can hardly catch up with what you are seeing. The bloody floor of the burial chamber dematerializes from underneath you, but you do not fall but your body tenses in preparation regardless. The walls shake with a tremendous groan, splitting under the seize and giving under spills of sand and the murals bleed with the fractures. And the air is electric with something heavy and alive and angry, and it courses across your skin and siphons the air from your lungs from the gravity of it. Even the beast made from shadows lurches back as if it was struck and hisses underneath the heat of the rage permeating the atmosphere, clawing against the wall that was rapidly disintegrating and losing tangibility. And the beast screams along with the brides as they vanish from existence. One final baleful cry that rattles your bones and shudders over you before it drowns out completely and with it the catacomb all but vanishes and instead of the blood-soaked stones you are looking down at the expanse of the night sky with stars spread out underneath your feet. 

You brain fails to register that you appear to be hovering over a cluster of distant galaxies and you are left to stare down dumbly at the dark mass of the sky, taking in the stretch of the rich splashes of blues and stellar remnants and stardust gathered like clusters of diamonds and the scale of it nearly makes you forget about the press of someone's body along your back. Their arms around your waist in a tight hold, but there is also a sort of reluctance in their grip made known by the rigidity from the muscles of their arms and the narrow gap left between your bodies. But even between the space you can feel the low heat of them radiating against you. A part of you wanted to look over your shoulder, to discover the face of your savior but some pull in your gut warned you not. That you would not like what you would see. And so, you keep still underneath their embrace, staring off into the quiet breadth of the cosmos where comets drop across the darkness like crystalline tears. Seconds pass without either of you moving, as still as statues. As though if either of you so much as breathed the delicate emanation that cocooned the both of you would shatter. But despite your hesitation there was a prickle of curiosity tugging at you, and you could not deny the pull and you made to slowly turn your head in an attempt to sneak a glance over your shoulder. 

You barely manage to twitch a muscle of movement before they seem to shed their initial diffidence and nestle their face near the nape of your neck, and you can feel the tip of their nose brush against your ear like they mean to hide their identity from you. Their chest expands against the flat of your back, and it takes a moment for your overstimulated brain to realize that they are drawing in a breath, taking your scent into their lungs and holding it there like its oxygen. For some reason it sends of thrum of heat over your body, and combined with the steady, pulsating hum of otherworldly power that courses through the air, it makes you feel as though you may collapse. That you might come apart and burst into flames. There is no chill of fear and disgust does not rise in your stomach like nausea instead their presence feels welcomed. And despite the foreign sensation of their touch, there is also a sense of familiarity to it. Like finally falling into the arms of an old lover. 

They move their head from your by just a few scant inches, and a strange part of you mourns the loss. You wished that the hover of their lips would land on your skin, but they do not. The circle of their arms seems to press you in closer, like they cannot bear even the possibility of you parting.

For a moment the cosmos seems to halt, the intersperse collection of individual galaxies and stars pausing in their rotations and the night holds its breath and so do you. Then a sound purrs out, a heavy baritone that pours across the silence of the universe and fills you with honey and warmth. A deep, smoky cadence that you can feel curling inside the cavern of your chest and running deep across your bones and the nerves and sinew of your entire being. 

"This dream is over." 

You wake with a start. Sucking air into your lungs with a strained gasp while your hands reach around the bedding in a mindless scramble, struggling to orient yourself, but eventually you are able to at least prop your body up on shaky arms. Your eyes rove across your surroundings, no longer taking in the breathless view of stardust and nebulas but the dull clay walls of your vacant quarters and apart from yourself the bed is empty. A quick press of your hand against the stuffed mattress confirms that Cat - you're Cat had been there at some point in the night, the heat still trapped within the fabric from where he sat next to you. And you had shakily removed from yourself from the bed and searched the room for him. You had even approached the door, pressing your head against the wood and contemplated opening it but you could hear one of the guards shuffling behind it, trying to find some reprieve for their aching feet. And so, you returned to the bed with that dark voice still echoing in your ears. You could not sleep. Not even if you wanted. Not with that shadowed creature lurking and that familiar stranger invading your mind. The Nightmare Ruler, your brain supplied without forgiveness, and the thought sent a shiver down your spine. 

And you lay there for hours, now awaiting the sunrise despite the threat that it posed, clinging to your own body with shaking arms as you stare into the darkness, waiting to find something looking back. But soon the maids are pouring into your room and scattering around the foot of your bed, and they must have noticed the panic on your face as a hint of curiosity bleeds through their blase expressions, apart from that single one who always seems to be plotting your demise. 

"Is something the matter? You look troubled." And even in your tired haze you know that it is the voice of the one who openly dislikes you. The one with the sable hair and venomous words. Euthymia, you had learned her name to be. She makes no effort to hide the delight in her tone and in turn you do not even try to school the scowl that takes over your features, pinning her with an open glower, but it does nothing to extinguish the joyful gleam in her eyes. The other servants are ushering you out of bed, already cooing and gushing over the prospect of preparing you for the day ahead and you suddenly feel as though you have been tossed into a lake of ice. The five-day long celebration is coming to a close. The ritual is tonight. 

They ignore your distress, urging you to shed your slip and climb into the bath full of steaming water and oils to prepare you for the ritual. And they had patted you dry when you had gotten out of the tub so that they could dap at your skin with lotions and perfumes. Running marjoram in your hair and something faintly sweet but heady and spicy beneath your jaw. Even spreading fragrances across your inner thighs and palm oil around your breasts. It had an embarrassed heat prickling across your face, and you nearly scoffed at their presumptuousness. And then they were guiding you to kneel on the cushions placed before the large, polished bit of bronze propped along the wall, using the reflection so that you may observe the process as they worked. You were in a fog as they combed your hair and set it and pinned it in a way that they deemed worthy, but you cannot stop thinking of that velvet timber and the feeling of being watched by concealed eyes prickles along your body. And you try to ignore the sensation, telling yourself that it is just paranoia. 

But you could not dwell on your troubles for long before you had taken notice of the strip of fabric from the corner of your eye. And a better look had confirmed it was indeed that dreadful gown that had been laid out along the cushions. You stared from your peripheral vision and each time your head moved even the slightest degree out of their disliking one of the maids would jerk it back into place, scolding you underneath their breath, but your eyes did not stray from the pieces of clothing once. It would have been a gorgeous thing if not for the horror that is comes with it. A vibrant scarlet and intricate gold and black stitching and embroidery. But you could not marvel over its beauty, instead you eyed it warily as though it was poisonous. And perhaps it was.

It truly disturbed you. That horrid red thing that signaled the final chapter of your life, and you could hear the anguished cries and manic laughter of the brides from your nightmare echoing out from the depths of your mind. You could not suppress the way you shuddered. Was that meant to be your fate? A captive in her own body, suppressed underneath a spell of eternal slumber while her body wasted away in a forgotten tomb? You had heard rumors of what happened to the nightmare king's brides after the ritual. Presumptions truly, fabricated speculation that had no true foundation as the priestesses are very private about the affairs of the ceremony that do not require the presence of the villagers. And the townspeople are typically guided out of the temple after the connection between the Chosen and the Endless has been successfully tethered.

Most speculations were good natured enough. Painting the role of becoming one of the Dream King's brides in a lavish light. Something to be envious of, with many saying that to be one of his Chosen was to spend eternity of nights in endless pleasure, with the world at your fingertips. 

But there had been other more sinister whispers, idle gossip that the unconscious brides were taken to a subterranean set of tunnels built underneath the temple. Dug to house the women as they slept on, not killed so as not to sever the link between them and the dream god but kept animated and sleeping within the icy tombs of the catacombs. Kept that way so that the deity could torment them in the halls of kingdom for all eternity. Feasting on their souls and flesh. But many refuse to believe the rumor, even your own father had rebutted the very possibility, as he was a firm believer that the Chosen were simply killed off after the ritual and their bodies were burned so that the ashes could be released upon the winds and lifted to the gods along with the plume incents and smoldering herbs. 

But neither option fared well for you. 

"You had seemed quite distressed when we came in. Did you have a nightmare, my lady?" Euthymia asks, voice sickly sweet with false sincerity. "How strange that the Dream King would allow his Chosen to be harassed by his spirits." And she pats the juice of crushed mulberries onto the rise of your cheeks to add color to your skin, but the push of her fingertips was much too harsh. You were tempted to lunge at her but restrained yourself. 

"Not at all. In fact, I had a rather pleasant dream. " You reply cooly, not allowing her to see you shaken and you tilt your head, pretending to admire the way that they had dressed your hair and decorated it with flowers and pieces of jewels. " It was a rather pleasurable one." 

"Pleasurable?" Comes her nonplussed response and her hand pauses, simply hovering. 

"Oh, yes." You speak lowly, like you are sharing a scandalous story, and your tone is all smooth and honeyed. " It was not a nightmare that visited me, but the Dream King himself. " And you cannot help but internally gloat at the way that some part of her seems to waver, visibly deflating underneath your lie. " He had crawled between my thighs you see and ravished me with his tongue in ways that no mortal man ever could." Even the other ladies had halted in their routine, stopping to listen to your hastily spun fib. And you casted your gaze downward to your hands demurely, like you were shy or embarrassed that you had lost your manners. Scandalized, the other maids had bent towards each other and exchange giggling whispers, but Euthymia was less than enthused. And for the remainder of your time together she had been tightlipped and scowling, and you were surprised that a storm cloud had not been following her every move with how bothered she seemed to be. 

But you could not deny that she made a good point. Why had you suffered from a nightmare at all? It had been sometime since you had. You could hardly recall when it had been last. Perhaps you truly had done something to anger the god. But that had been him, had it not? The one who had come to your aid and taken you in his arms and spoke to you with that smoky cadence. It must have been if the way that he had ended your dream so easily was any indication. And that primordial vibration that had surrounded you both; it was the same that you had felt at the pyre when that strange man was watching. 

And perhaps tonight you would get the answers that you seek, but then you might not want them. 

The rest of the day pours in a distorted stream, and you hardly register slipping into you into that disturbing red garb and you barely notice when the priestesses and temple guards arrive to collect you from the maids and guide you to the dinning haul of the commune where you are assisted down to the sunken floor in the center of the room as some sort of center piece, once again forcing you to sit underneath the eyes of hundreds. You feel exposed, as though you were not wearing clothes at all. Stripped for them to criticize and leer at. You were sure that every person in the village was here to enjoy the banquet. Even the servants were allotted freedom from their duties for the final night of the ritual and were free do dine alongside their masters as equals. 

And once again they had provided you with the best meats and fruits and wine available. The finest of the bounty collected over the farms and orchards for you to gorge yourself on like a swine before its slaughter and because of that you could not bring yourself to eat despite the hollow pit in your gut that begged you to do so.  And you could feel the Priestesses dozen eyes boring into from their place from above, no doubt taking your refusal to eat as not just an insult to themselves but to their god as well. Good. 

But the townspeople did not seem to care, laughing freely and enjoying the festivities without pause and you had been forced to sit as time waned and the sun drifted closer and closer towards the edge of the earth, no matter how much you wished and willed for it not to. And once the townspeople had finished indulging on mead and wine and satiated their hunger, the shrine had collected you once more to climb upon the palanquin that awaited outside, surrounded by servants who prepared to march you across the town from the strength of their shoulders to the Temple of Morpheus where death awaited you. You had tried to struggle against the shackles of the hierodules hands that had seized your arms and shoulders like bands of steel. But you could not shake yourself from their grip and they were mercilessly placing you upon the extravagant cushions of the human-powered vehicle to be suspended high in the air. 

And the townspeople congregated around you as you were carried from the walls of the commune and into the streets, lighting the way with burning torches. And many people had once again adorned themselves in the beastly costumes and danced and cavorted around the palanquin and through the crowd. The Sisters' lead the collective. And you had noticed in the head priestesses' hands, she cradled an obsidian bowl covered by a lid decorated by strokes of gold. A harmless item that on its own would have done nothing to inspire fear in you, but you had heard hushed conversation of its contents before. Some sort of vapor that smoldered from the extract of the poppy flower, and it would serve to tether you to the gods. Or in this occasion one god in particular. 

And once again blossoms and seeds were being tossed over the procession in a celebratory display. In the hands of men and women and children alike people carried votive offerings for the Endless, such as figurines of animals and carvings of a humanoid figure.  And in the cavalcade, musicians were present, playing from a kithara and an aulos, and a lyra. But even over the cheering and commotion and music you could hear a soft repetitive ruffle along the low breeze. You had jerked your head up to search the sky, nearly straining a muscle in the process but the pain had faded into the background at the sight of a dark bird coasting along the current. And a faint iridescent sheen had gleamed on its feathers from underneath the dimming sunlight and the Priestesses - and in turn the crowd had all rejoiced at the bird's appearance, as it no doubt heralded good fortune. 

But you did not share their positive reactions. You heard all the stories, that the ravens were the dark god's familiars, serving as his eyes and ears when he himself could not be present. Your anxiety had not time to settle no matter how much you tried to swallow it down and the presence of the circling bird did nothing to quell the bubbling fear in your gut and bones. 

And soon the procession ventured from the village and the pale marble of the temple seemed to rise from the hill behind the security of its protective wall. It was the only building that had been spared in the initial siege from the Oneiroi when the Nightmare King had abandoned the village in his scorn. It is just the same as when you had last saw it as a child. The ghostly white columns that reminded you of the remains of a skeleton, and the sculpted pediment that depicted beastly creatures in various poses; lashing out and snarling while some seemed to be frozen in the motion of dance. But in the center was a more human figure. No doubt the Endless himself. And the scene was painted in blues and black, with hints of red and gold embellishments.  

And the closer you got to the temple the more your anxiety climbed, until you trembled where you sat, staring into the vacant eyes of the god's sculptured image. And even those they were not real they seemed to bore into you and flay you open until all of your emotions and shaky breaths poured out. Even the sheer fabric of your veil did little to lessen the feeling. 

It was not until you felt hands circling the shape of your arms that you came to and were able to discern that you had been lowered to the ground of the courtyard and were being pulled from your knees, and you were wordlessly guided up the temple. But you did not feel the stairs underneath your feet and the music and laughter sounded as though it were coming from miles away, carried in on a foreign wind. And even when you stepped upon the landing and two of the sisters spun you around to face the crowd down below that had not felt real either. It was like looking at a tapestry of faded figures and blurred colors. 

Then the head priestess stepped in front of you in a flash of black, blotting out your vision of the crowd like the moon obstructing the sun in an eclipse, but you were thankful for it. Then her voice broke out in a shrill bellow, the passion expelling from her cracking it around the edges. " Tonight marks the emergence of our return to grace and glory from underneath the compassion of our god! " She cried and the crowd cried along with her, waving their torches animatedly to show their elation. " No longer will we be shunned by His Sovereignty for we have been given a chance to correct a wrong that should never have happened! To bow our heads in humble plea and return to him which was stolen all those years ago!" 

It made you nauseous the way they spoke of you. As though you were some frivolous token to be bartered. How they did not see you or any of the women before you as human beings with lives and wants and futures but as a cow to be slaughtered. A coin to be exchanged for lavish fabrics and abundant crops. And you could feel the stinging heat of anger filling your chest and pushing out heavy breaths from your lungs. But when the Head Priestess had shifted and moved from out of your vision it left you to make eye contact with the cheering masses; her voice had faded into a low, distant drone. And inside their crazed sort of jubilation, you could see every other emotion that you had felt since the Endless had descended his hoard upon the village in incessant torment: Loss, pain, fear, hunger, sorrow, confusion. 

Many lives have been lost since the day that he had seemed you all unworthy of his gratitude and sanctuary. He had turned the land barren and dry and the animals that had once flourished here have all been culled by his nightmares and their numbers have suffered and dwindled greatly. But as much as you sympathized with these people, understood their plight, you did not owe them anything. Certainly not your life. Especially since they had casted you from your home without so much as a backward glance, forcing you live along the forest all because you were not a kept woman. 

And in five years' time there would be another there would be another girl here, standing just as you do now, willing or unwilling to bear the collectives sins, to pacify the Endless for the good fortune. It would be a ceaseless loop. History repeating itself one poor soul at a time. 

A part of you considered fighting free from the sisters' hold. Of running down the steps and out of the temple grounds without looking back. But even if you happened to make it past the massive crowd of desperate villagers and to the sea, there were no ships, no small rowboats left for fishing. All of the seafaring vessels had been all but demolished by his spirits to keep all of the locals who wronged him trapped on the island to endure the full brunt of his punishment. And even those who have managed to hide the construction boats - avoiding the Ruler of Nightmares many scrutinizing eyes and pushed their watercraft into the dark waves while underneath the shine of the sun, when his influence was claimed to be at its weakest had all disappeared into the heavy wall of fog that surrounds the coast. Only the remains of their boats would float back to shore, sometimes with blood staining the waves.

You truly were left to the fate that these people and their god spared you to. 

Then the head priestess was spinning around in a flurry of robes, and you could not evade the fervor of her gaze, could not flee from, still immobilized by her sisters and their rigid hold of their hands. The gleam in her eyes was detached and wild; the darkness of her pupils swelling, eating up the colored rings around their borders until they were nearly gone. It was the expression of someone who could not be reasoned with. Poisoned by power and hope. But you did not waver underneath the weight of her fixed stare. 

Then one of the sisters was gripping you by the nape of your neck, the movement unexpected enough to pull a startled cry from your lips. It did not give you time to register the obsidian bowl being lifted to your face, the lid being removed to release plumes of smoke. Even through the veil you could feel the warmth of the vapors caressing the skin of your cheeks. It is all so abrupt that you inhale a large lungful in the midst of your struggle, and the scent of it overwhelms you. Stuffing your mouth and nostrils full of something sweet and floral, tinged with the musk of the earth. It reminds you of flowers, of incents but also not at all. And your lungs are too busy heaving around the unexpected rush of smoke and your mind too confused and scrambled to feel or focus on the world around you, and the Priestesses voice was the last coherent thing to break through the fog: "Do not fight this, my dear. " Her voice crooned. Too sweet, to gentle for her cruelty. "To you we give thanks for your sacrifice for our prosperity." 

And in your distress, you tried to think of anything to keep yourself grounded and present. Anything to keep you here in your body, terrified of crossing over and falling into the Nightmare King's gnashing teeth. So you think of your list of chores awaiting you at home; tending to the garden now that life was coming back to the soil, setting more traps in the forest, plucking wild strawberries from the small cluster that you had discovered growing in a small grove, seeing Cat again - the little beast refuses to eat unless you prompt him to (there is no one else to take care of him) - and walking along the beach during the sunrise. Feeling the sand and water underneath your toes and watching the sunlight reflect and dapple the surface. But soon the thoughts were drowning out underneath the impression of the fuzz and haze that blanked your mind. You felt as though your soul was rising from the casing of your body and floating up to the sky above the temple, but you could still feel your knees making contact with the cold marble floors, though the feeling was far off and dull. But there was still anger simmering through your veins. Hurt and betrayal. What were you mad about? 

And the world around you is a rush of colors and blurred shapes and muffled sounds. But you do not want to focus on it regardless. You can't when the weightlessness is pulling at your fingertips and threatening to take you away with it (but you can't leave, what about him?) and deposit you among the stars, and the only thing that gives you even a scrap of connection to your own body is the repetitive pulse of your heartbeat coursing in your ears. The floral sugar and salt of the smoke still coats your tongue, and you can feel it in your lungs, heavy and syrupy. And the drag of your relaxed limbs seems to pull you down now instead of up, with the thrum of your heart doing little to center you anymore. But its less of a pulse now and more of pound -an angry crash. That's not right, is it? 

You try to blink. To get some scope of reality, but it's difficult to keep your eyes past the blurred sting. Are you crying? No, that is not right either. It is no longer a steady beat, but a deafening layered rumble, muffled but also painfully loud. You can faintly see past the red sheer of your veil glimpses of black and blue streak across your vision, with peeks of flashes of tiny pale dots.

It is all to distorted and airy. Too muddled for your mind to make something tangible but then your body is being tossed by some unforeseen force. A sharp, unrelenting pull that moves your entire being like it weighs nothing and the air is snatched from your lungs, and you choke on something. Some deeply imbedded survival instinct awakens and your body flails, limbs dragging and reaching through the thick atmosphere in attempt to grab ahold of something. Anything to orient yourself and make sense of what is happening to you, but your hands come up empty. Your lungs twitch, trying to draw in a breath but instead they burn, and the sting is so potent that it licks a trail up your throat and the pungent taste of salt blankets you tongue.

Water, some faint thought breaches the cotton that stuffs your skull. You're in water. 

And your body moves on its own, arms and legs kicking to propel in what you hope is the direction of the surface. In a glance upward you notice the distorted expanse of what must be the waves, and through the commotion above you see that glimpse of those burning pinpricks of light again and with no other alternative, fueled by an animalistic sort of fear you swim towards it. You can only hope that you make it up in time, with your lungs aching and burning like smoldering embers within your chest. You can already feel your limbs growing sluggish from the lack of oxygen and the heavy tow of your ceremonial robes, but you try your best to keep moving, dragging yourself forward with weak arms and legs. But death still hangs heavy in the back of your mind. And for the second time tonight you're terrified that this may be your final moments, with your legs flailing uselessly and the darkness clouding at the base of your senses like a layer of winter ice. It makes it difficult, but it is sheer instinct and panic and hope that burns at your muscles, reviving them of their vigor and pressing you onwards. 

It is your hands that break through the surf first, quickly followed by your head and you could have sobbed with relief if you were not busy trying not to remain afloat and actively choking on the water in your throat. And you push yourself forward, even as the waves toss you in their angry roll against the shore. But blessedly under the current that threatens to drag you under and drown you it also serves to propel you forward towards the beach, jostling your body with their great power and you feel like a child's toy that had been lost over the side of a boat. It is on the pale crest of an angry wave that you meet the shore, being carelessly discarded on the sand and the rush of water pelts across your back, soaking you one final time before retreating back into the ocean behind you. 

You gather as much as strength as you have left to prop yourself up on your hands and knees, carrying yourself across the beach with wobbling limbs while your abdomen and chest shiver and heave in a violent fit. The muscles of your body squeezing you tightly to expel the sea water from your lungs in a shaky grip that has you gasping and wheezing. And even though your lungs sting like a raw wound as you suck in a ragged inhale, the dim feel of oxygen filling your lungs is wonderful, like a healing ointment smoothed over a fresh burn. You allow yourself to collapse onto your stomach once you escape the reach of the sea, but it is difficult to see, to hear and even still hard to breathe with the thin fabric of your veil clinging to the shape of your face from the weight of the water pulling the material down, pressing it against the divots of your nostrils nearly waterboarding you with each breath. 

You blindly yank at the veil, tearing it and your Stefana from your head with an angry huff, carelessly tossing it. You do not see where it falls but you can hear it land with an unattractive wet plap. You blink freely now able to take in your surroundings now that, that cursed thing is no longer tainting your vision. You deduce quickly that you are on a beach. Obviously. But it does not appear to be the one that you often find yourself strolling down on your free time, fantasizing about distant lands or the Isles of the Blessed, or the islands where the sirens live and lure sailors to their deaths. The sand was far too pale. Too soft. And when you moved it seemed to glitter like snow underneath sunlight. But it was a glance upward that confirmed your awful reality. The sky above was not yours. The scattering of stars not sparing enough and the expanse of it was not simply a dark backdrop but splashed with vibrant rich nebulas of azure and silver and pale golds against the black velvet of space. The stardust seemed to shift as though the heavens were a living breathing thing. And the constellations above you are unrecognizable. There is no Orion, lunging forward to strike or brace against the blow of a foe, and the scattered knot of the Pleiades is absent from the sky.  

Your heart sinks to the base of your gut and a heated rock seems to lodge itself in your throat, rising with the threat of tears all from the bruising reality that you are no longer home. Not just the island, or your house, but the entire plain of your existence. Plucked from everything you have ever known by the hands of your people to appease a monster. Heartlessly thrown into the deity's domain. Forgotten and used. 

You remembered the tales told by your mother and the words that had been passed down from priestess to priestess across the centuries that spoke of the Nightmare Ruler's world: The Dreaming, it was called. The place that served as the cradle of the universe's collective unconsciousness, housing the minds a mortal, beast and god alike while they slept. An extension of the Endless himself. The entire realm was a dream in its own right. That means that you must be able to wake from it. Perhaps you could will yourself awake if you concentrated enough. You have been never much of a lucid dreamer. Only able to do small feats of altering landscapes or changing the color of your dress. You had never been aware enough to wake yourself. But maybe here in the Dreaming you would be able to conjuror some sort of exit. 

You centered your attention down to a single thought: Waking up. Of feeling the drag of consciousness slipping back into your physical body and opening your eyes. And you pushed that thought until your body responded with the ferocity of it, your muscles tensing under the strain of it, and you are left gasping, the same as you had when you crawled ashore. You think of your body, still and induced in that horrific stasis, being purified underneath the smoke of incense and wrapped in the red silk and voile fabric by the Priestesses to be carried and stuffed down in the catacombs like a forgotten relic. You thought of waking suddenly. Of tearing yourself from the cloth and fleeing home and dropping to your knees to burry your fingers in the soil there and crying with the relief that would swell within your chest and blossom with the joy of being home. 

And you had found that in your desperation you had actually crumbled to your knees, but you did not feel the gentle earth beneath your hands but sand.

You take to pinching at your arm in a pathetic attempt to try and escape the Dreaming, twisting the flesh between your fingertips until it stung but to no avail. 

And a low, heavy wind rumbled across the beach, howling over the waves and the field of crimson blossoms and golden wheat, punctuating the silence and the loneliness that hung over you like the aftermath of a tempest. Defeat weighed down your shoulders as you watched the thrashing ocean with a sense of detachedness. Then something in the air seemed to shift, pulsing with something alive. That distantly familiar alien thrum and you could feel it against your skin; a magnetic pressure that reminded you of a brief night in the cosmos, held in a tight embrace. You did not have to turn to confirm who the presence was. You did not know if you had the strength to. The fear and gravity of the beings pull nearly seized your lungs, and you clenched your hands into fist to bear the feeling of it. And then that velveteen rasp speaks out, moving down your body like a flow of water and smoke and you can feel the hum of it in your bones.  

"I had no intention of your arrival being so distressful. Had you not struggled your coming would not have been so violent. " His tone is a placid timbre, but you swear you can detect sympathy - perhaps a sort of regret - tinged into the edges of his words. But it does little to placate you. His detached surprise at your anguish only serves to mutate your sorrow and defeat and it gives way into anger, searing at you like a burning fire that needs something to burn, and chars any remaining pieces of your self-preservation and wit, making you forget that you were in front of deity that has seen eons come and go in its lifetime and was currently holding your mind and possibly your soul hostage. But you did not care. Not now, with your entire life in an upheaval. And even then, you still can't bring yourself to look at it - the source of that primordial electric pulse. To confirm all of your fears, that home was truly out of reach, that you were entirely out of depth and in a plain that you did not belong in. There was a safety in your delusions, your self-imposed ignorance. And so you stared at the angry, rolling waves and pretended that they were your own, not daring to turn yet. "What was your intention? " You inquired, not even bothering to hide the scorn in your broken voice. Not caring of the consequences. " That you'd just steal me away from everything I've ever known, and I'd be content with it?" 

"Look at me. " 

It is a simple set of words, but the conviction of it beats across the very fabric that binds and creates the Dreaming, rippling over the sand, shifting stars and stirring the already tumulus waves to threatening heights and the power of it runs through your unconsciousness as well, tingling across your body and it commands you to move. An unwelcome reminder of your mortality and the scope of the deity and his domain. You turn slowly, helpless to ignore the order even while you dread looking upon him. Wondering if he would wear the skin of a monster to punish you for your ire. Perhaps contorted limbs and bloody jagged teeth or stretched flesh and the lifeless abysmal gaze of that otherworldly helm.

There is none of that. No cloak made of nightmares or terror. Just a man. But that is not right either. 

Regardless of the glamour he had casted this was no man. Ignoring the information as told by the naked eye all of the minute tells became glaringly obvious, such as the way his skin was too soft and free from blemish or flaw, like the statues crafted in his commemoration; the messy tresses of his hair that appeared as though they were spun from the night sky itself and the impossible blue of his eyes that mimicked the shade of a crystalline sea, or perhaps they were a reflection of the very nebulas above you now. He is so beautiful that it is almost cruel. You have to wonder why he chose you specifically. That he has been watching over you since the night at the pyre. Long before that even. That, that same voice had spoken to you during your sleep and commanded you to wake, and once again you are unable to ignore it, standing from your place on the sand. 

The brunt of his gaze is too much- scrutinizing. You felt like you were stripped bare. Every nerve, every want or worry or promise that you had ever made was laid out across the shore for him examine. You quailed underneath the breadth of it, the sheer intensity was maddening - that there seemed to be no secret that you could hide from him. The entirety of your mind held within the webbing of his domain for him study and toy with.  

"Why do you fear me?" He asked, and you could laugh or cry at the question but neither would do proper service to express the severity of your emotions. The turmoil and confusion. He sounded so sincere. Just as perplexed as you even though his stance was devoid of any body language. Rigid and exact, with an almost clinical posture. But you could see it in his eyes. A small, fleeting glimpse of his own confusion, a slight furrow of an eyebrow, but it vanished just as quickly as it had appeared, erased and blotted out by that aloof expression. 

You were not even sure how to respond, and for a moment your mouth hangs open silently while you collect yourself and find your voice: " I - just - all of the death. " You finally answer lamely, trying to swallow around the dryness of your throat. " The slaughter and starvation. The disease. The suffering." 

"They broke their promise. " It was said so simply. As though it was enough to justify the atrocities and it made nausea bubble in your gut, and hatred too. 

"All because of a woman." You cannot contain the way you scoff, shifting on your feet like you do not know whether to approach him or step away and create more space, your body prickling underneath weight of his aura and his unwavering observation. "You had hundreds slaughtered because you were not given one woman." 

"That is the price for bargaining with an Endless and taking back your word." He replied easily. A simple matter of fact for him, like it was a natural law, a part of his nature that should be expected and understood without consequence, that all failures to comply could not be faulted on him. It was just another tough reminder that this was no mortal that you stood before and that he could not be expected to obey or sympathize with the jurisdictions of your human morality.  

And there was a shift in his expression, something steely and resolute, and the distance between your bodies seemed to close in even though neither of you had placed a single step until there was only a scant space left between you. " I will do the same for you. " 

There was no past tense used. And perhaps under different circumstances you could have seen it as an intimate declaration of love, but it was uttered with a conviction that you could feel and the threat - the promise was hauntingly clear. That he would lay waste to the remaining people of your village if you refused. And although his body remained unmoved, the pressure of his influence hummed and molded against you and robbed you of your breath. It felt like you were standing within the deluge of a summer storm, caught within spires of stardust and the heat of a nova. 

"Their crime is no longer yours to bear. " He said calmly - soothingly like he was trying to placate you. " You will not be harmed. " 

"Is that really true? " You ask, still full of disbelief and contempt and this time you do venture to take a step back and blessedly he allows you, and you cannot help but be thankful that he does not shift the sands to draw you in closer.  "They tell stories of what you do to your tributes once you have them, I'm sure you've heard. That you mold yourself into the likeness of a beast and hunt them, chasing them down the halls of your palace and tearing them limb from limb for eternity: A cycle of death and pain." 

And that pale animal gleam from the bonfire burns alight in his eyes and it does little to quell your steady stream of anxiety, but his indignation does not seem to be aimed at you specifically. " Is that truly what you believe?" And there is a gentleness to him, the annoyance receding as though he was more perturbed than angry, and a part of you nearly regrets having told him, but you squash that scrap of emotion before anything can come of it. "That I am some heartless monster than means to torture you for my entertainment."  

"Well, what else am I supposed to be led to think?" Surely a being of his scope, of his age and power must realize the severity of his actions. The violence and heartache that has bleed across the island and tainted the soil at his command. The senseless slaughter and starvation, forced to helplessly watch as your loved ones succumbed to it. The horrid, twisted sleepless nights and soiled dreams, and then you can hear it again, that twisted vacant laughter, rushing blood and mutilated shadows. " Especially after you sent your nightmares out to trouble me." 

"I promise that I have done no such thing" He assured, but it did little to soothe your frazzled state. " I gave them all specific instruction not to harm you, but they are not without their own free will, and I have delt with it accordingly." He spoke of his creatures as though they were misbehaving children. Simply spoiled and wayward, and not cruel, sadistic beasts. And perhaps he truly did not mean for one of his Oneiroi to haunt you in the night. After all, he did arrive to banish the spirit from your unconsciousness, to wrap his arms around your body in a secure embrace before ending the dream. But regardless of the fact, you could not forgive him.  

"I don't care. I want to go home." 

"Is that truly what you are clinging to? Those empty cold walls, vacant of family or companionship?  Or is it them? The very people that so freely discarded you. Abandoned and out casted you as though you were a leper." 

He was right of course. You were already well aware of the fact, but it did not make it sting any less to hear, and the old memories that rose up were less than welcome. A painful reminder that even your own father and mother had rejected you, not physically but the emotional disconnect had been there. A rift had torn between your dynamic like a gaping, festering wound that had never truly healed.  They had never looked at you the same, the both of them loathing you for marring the family name and social standing. And the other villagers would all murmur and stare in disdain whenever you had ventured into town to collect fruits or fresh meats at the local market, all because you had slept with a man as an unmarried woman. And your alienation was palpable. But you did not want to give him the satisfaction of admitting it and caving in. 

"No- they didn't-" 

"But they did, didn't they?" You could not stand his confidence. How he held his head high with that resolute air of certitude and kingly ego, how the air pulsed over you and tingled at your flesh like a balm. "Leaving you all in alone in that quiet little house, hoping that you'd fall prey to one of my nightmares." 

He steps forward crowding into your space with that pale wicked gleam in his eyes and the stars hanging in the sky behind him seem to warp towards his person, as though they were trying to leave their heavenly cradle to follow him. You heart speeds from apprehension surely, but you don't find yourself leaning away from his body or trying to flee. You are stock still, hardly able to spare any pieces of your attention on anything other than him. And then he is lifting a hand to brush against your cheek, featherlight but somehow still reverent in its glide and you can feel the life radiating from it. Ice and heat simultaneously, cosmos and earth. 

"I can give you everything you crave. The life you've always dreamed of having." His voice that dark velvet purr, draping around you temptingly.  "You will want for nothing." But you are hardly hearing his words anymore too preoccupied with the tender trail of his curled fingers; his knuckles tracing a blaze of warmth down your throat, slipping down dangerously close to the bit of your chest exposed by the low hang of the garment. But his hand pauses in its descent, stopping just a few inches from the valley between your breasts, and you cannot hide the way that your body shivers at the contact, a heat stirring within you. "But it is a decision that must be made of your own accord." 

And then he is backing away from you, allowing the atmosphere to clear of its electrical charge and for oxygen fill your lungs, but your body mourns the loss of his touch regardless of your returned breath. And it is then that you are able to realize what he had said, and some bit of hope blossoms, and now it is you who makes after him, following his path as he glides through the field of red and gold. 

"Wait? I can go home if choose to?" 

"No." 

"But you just sai-"

He turns to you so quickly that it is surprising, whipping around in a stream of darkness, and in the distant stars held within the fabric of his chlamys adjust with the movement. "You are a part of the Dreaming now. There is no place for you in the mortal realm - not anymore." 

The revelation has the same effect as a pail of ice water being doused over you. Unforgiving, paralyzing. And this time you do not have the ability to respond, far too busy grappling all of the emotions that are clamoring for the forefront.  

"Your home is here now. " He insists, lips pursed in a petulant sort of way. " Regardless of if you decide to take your place alongside me, this is where you must stay. Even if you were to leave this instant, time within the Dreaming does not abide by the same laws of your world. You would return to a point not of your own. Lost in a time entirely unfamiliar." 

And the chasm that has been threatening to break seems to grow deeper, fissures and cracks breaking at the foundations. And you vehemently want to deny him. To call him out for lying. Surely, he must be, how good can the Nightmare Ruler's word truly be? Is he a being that can possibly be trusted? But if he is correct, telling the complete truth and you were able to return to your realm would you be able to survive it? The sight of your home now years, if not decades old crumpled and dilapidated from the unforgiving pressure of time might break you. He must notice that vulnerability wearing down on you, because something in his gaze softens and you wished that he didn't look like he cared because some horrid part of you - the same one that had preened underneath his touch - is comforted by his attention, left wanting for it even and you are finding it difficult to be revolted or angry anymore. You would like to blame it on remnants of that perfumed smoke being still in your system, but truthfully you have not felt its influence since you had been dunked into the ocean. The brackish water and chaotic waves seeming to have strained it from your system. Or perhaps it had been the Dreaming itself that had done so, assisted with the fact that you may not even be tethered to your body at all anymore, the effects of the smoke too distant to reach your spirit that has drifted too far from its body. Maybe you truly do belong to his realm now. And you wait for that coal of anger to burn again, but it never comes, leaving you feeling hollow and broken. Exhausted even while you stand in a world fashioned from dreams. "I'm just tired . . . " You mourn weakly, watching the reeds and blossoms sway in the soft wind. 

"Then let me ease your burden. " His voice is much closer than it had been before, and when you jerk your head up, startled from the proximity of it, the point of your nose nearly brushed against his. You are immediately drawn into the all-consuming center of his gaze, and it feels like you are being held within it, called to the edge of something yawning and consuming, beckoning you to jump and you do not think that you have the strength to pull back from it. And you found that you did not want to. 

He has not made any means to move, leaving it to you to close the distance and you do, the hesitation thawing. He tracts you as you draw near, seeming to hold a breath that he did not need, and he appears tense, rigid like he was physically restraining himself with a practiced sort of patience. And it might have frightened you earlier, but the fervor in them does nothing to dissuade you now if anything it only serves to motivate you. Inside those pale irises you see cyan and indigo and sapphire flaring like nebulas drawing you in like a flower leaning towards the sun, and for a moment you swear you caught a glimpse of something else lurking inside of them, a glimmer of his true self perhaps; something vast and entirely beyond you. It felt ancient and ever-expanding, ignited and twisting and looming. And you felt like you were on the horizon of making sense of it and both entirely too far, slipping through your muddled understanding like sand and smoke, scorching like a harsh ice. 

It is the whisper of his nose brushing against yours that draws you from your fixation, a delicate sensation but it was blessedly enough to bring you back to the present, assisted by the rich rumble of his voice. "Come back to me. " 

"I nearly fell in, " you murmur back. And it was not a lie, you had nearly lost yourself in the paradox and cosmos that created him but it was also said in an attempt to jest. And you succeeded it seemed if the light, barely there rise at the corner of his mouth way any indication. It all feels fragile, unsure but not unwelcome. Like life returning to the earth after a harsh winter, blossoms breaking through sheets of snow, guided by the tender thaw of sunlight. 

"May I touch you?" He asks, tilting his head to just barely skim the fulness of his lips against yours, not kissing you but just enough to leave your skin tingling in their wake. It is a simple question, but it is enough to have that burning ache coming alive again, taking root deep in the base of your abdomen and you find yourself nodding. Frustratingly enough he does not move, ever a pillar of restraint and he leans his head back when you tilt to close the distance between you. And you catch the smug air that surround him, and you would have snapped at him if you had the gall to, if you did not want him to just kiss you already.

"Use your words. " That dark honeyed resonance tramples any semblance of a barb that you had even fleetingly entertained. The Dreaming has long since gone quiet, seeming to betray its creator's appearance of undisturbed control with the febrile energy that tangled around the both of you, fueling your own growing need with its charge. And you were unable to withhold the plead that leaves you, a floaty sigh: "Please touch me." 

You do not compute him nearing, eliminating the remaining space that divided you to press his lips against your own, suddenly they just are. It is soft, explorative but not without longing. And the sheer need behind it has your knees going weak, and if not for the appearance of an arm around your waist you feared that you might have actually fallen. Your body thrums with a sort of unsuppressed elation, a syrupy heat spreading across your limbs and dripping down your spine, settling between the cradle of your hips from the swipe of his tongue against your bottom lip, silently asking for your permission. You thread your finger through the silken tresses of his hair and lightly scratch across his scalp. You can only feel the groan rumbling against your lips when you allow him to lick into your mouth and you immediately decide that you need to actually hear it. You are sure that the sound of that husky timbre breathing out in a rapturous moan will haunt you for the rest of eternity, and you could not wait to hear it. 

He cups your face in a single hand, securing your head with the curl of his fingers, allowing him to slant the plush of his mouth against you in an angle that let him to pull you in closer, enfolding you into the warmth of his chest. And the remaining doubt and restraint that had seemed to hold you two back was quickly beginning to melt, giving way to carnal sort of urgency. And already you are left panting, sweeping your hands across any part of him that you can, gripping the watery flow of his robes to center yourself through it all. 

You had not felt yourself tipping but your back is now pressed against the textured terrain of the Dreaming, the crushed stalks of reeds and flowers lightly digging at your skin, though it does little to take precedence over your current focus. And he is pulling away from your mouth to duck his head neath your chin, nipping and sucking at the skin there until its tender and you can tell by the way that he tucks your flesh between his teeth and licks that he is leaving marks in his wake, staking his claim upon your body and the mere idea of it has you lowly keening into the night; your body going lax underneath his. All things considered; he has not done much but your brain is already clouding with want, eyes glazing over. And then the heat of his mouth is sealing over your breast, the silk texture of your robe only adding to the pleasure as his tongue circles around your taut nipple. You can't help the way that you arch into it, seeking out more mindlessly but it is not enough. It is does little more than tease you, even with the way that he has draped himself over you he has himself suspended in a way that keeps you from being able to achieve the friction that you desire, stoking that heat inside you with eat nip and suck from his teeth and mouth. 

You can hear him chuckling from above you, the vibrations of his low smug amusement tingling across your chest, adding to your pleasure. If you were not so preoccupied with thoughtlessly trying to grind against his abdomen like a whore, you might have snapped at him for it, but instead you are removing your hands from the rich earth to sweep through his unruly hair, holding him against you instead, melting underneath the feel of his tongue. 

He does not let you have that for long either, releasing the swell of your breast and ducking from your grip, nuzzling a path down the plain of your abdomen and taking your thighs into the smooth glide of his hands, ignoring your protesting cry as he licks at your stomach from over the barrier of the silk. And once again you find yourself cursing that dreadful fabric, swearing into the night while you squirm in his hands. 

"Easy, sweet thing. " He coos, the image of patience. And if not for the wild, glow twinkling in both of his eyes like a beast you would not even think he was affected in the way that you are. That burning light serves as a reminder that he is not normal man, that you are rabbit ensnared within the jaws of a wolf, a mortal lying with a god. But it does not frighten you anymore. Instead, it douses fuel over an already steady flame. And you find yourself hoping to be consumed, taken between the teeth of this dark, cosmic deity and eaten alive. 

His descent does not stop, the point of his nose dragging down until it stops over your mons pubis and your whole body tenses in anticipation, waiting for him to move just a bit lower, to bundle your skirts in his hands and take you into his mouth. But he does not do any of that. He simply hovers there. His clutch on your thighs tightens, threatening to turn your flesh tender and you swear that you can feel the points of talons pricking at you, but it is too dark from the cover of the moonless night to see if he truly has grown claws in his passion - if they have drawn blood. Not that you would have minded if they had. You wanted it. Wanted his claim visible on your body, open to be seen by anyone who may gaze upon you. A trickle of concern does make it through the honeyed smoke of your want, as fleeting as it is, and it is quickly forgotten. Casted aside at the sound of a soft repetitive panting filling the silence. It does not take you long to realize that it is coming from him. He is breathing in your scent, hovering over the heat of you to take lungful's of your arousal. 

It is completely debased. Dirty. But the sight of a this primordial being kneeling between your legs and drawing in the scent of you in this perverted display that you would expect from man and not a god has you moaning into the air. Your cunt throbs, clenching around nothing while you rock your hips near his mouth. His grip tightens once again, smarting your skin while he tries to pin your body even while he chases the shift of your hips. And for one moment you think that he may finally ease both of your discomfort, feed the hunger ravaging your bodies but then horribly, he is pulling from you, leaving you to pant into the open air in a confused daze. "Why did you stop? "

"Let me taste you. " He said thickly, and his eyes shimmer again like the stars suspended in the heavens behind him. "Let me drink from you- worship you." 

His words have your mouth going dry and that aching heat pooling between your thighs. Never in your life have you ever known a man so desperate to pleasure you. To practically beg for it with a barely concealed avidity. That an Endless would ask for your permission. But he is no man after all. And you are nodding once again, but he does not move until the echo of that old sentence chimes in your head, use your words, you remember, and you manage to utter a rushed, "please" out from a shaky huff.  

He rumbles in a pleased way, the Dreaming trembling lightly with the resonance of his satisfaction. You hardly have time to blink before your ceremonial garb all but vanishes, baring you to the soft breeze and then a soft warmth enveloping your wet cunt, leaving you to jerk in surprise and scramble to grab something, anything to tether you. You claw at the field, the soil, before combing them into his hair while you gasp. All the while he is completely immovable, fixed to you throughout your writhing, lapping at your slit to collect the taste of you on his tongue and drink it down with a content purr, before licking up so that he can suckle your clit into the clutch of his mouth. Prompting that heady warmth to drizzle up on top of itself within the base of your abdomen. 

He alternates between that for a few moments, completely unhurried as he switches between lapping at your slit and sucking at your engorged bundles of nerves. And then his tongue is slipping inside of you, working along the walls of your cunt in a way that has your eyes rolling and your back bowing in a taut seize. But it does not stop. Extending into an inhuman length. It is thick and textured near its base, working so deep inside that you have to cry out. The repetitive drag and pull of it ushering you to roll your hips to match its delicious rhythm, building up a rising tide, dangling you over the precipice of something debilitating. 

"Oh gods - I - " 

But he is jerking away from you leaving your cunt to squeeze around the absence of his tongue, biting into the meat of your thigh like he has to preoccupy himself or else he will bury his face back into your heat like you so desperately want him to. You clumsily prop yourself up on your elbows to look at him and the intensity of his gaze would have been intimidating if you were not in your current position. 

"Why did you stop?!" 

"When you come in will be with my name on your lips, " and something possessive layers the rich rumble of his tone. It is heavy and bears no room for argument, but you have no wish to do so. "Say it." 

"My Lor- " But his pointed glare is enough to cut you off, but you find yourself yelping from the reprimanding nip at your sensitive skin. It did not hurt but it took you by surprise regardless. 

"My name." He repeats carefully, and laves his tongue over the dull sting to soothe it, all without breaking eye contact, keeping you within the scope of his watch. And it takes you a moment to sift through his abundance of monikers and titles, trying to think past the sensation of his teeth and lips on you, but you finally manage to settle the same one that the Priestesses would often whisper with reverence. 

"Morpheus. " 

A pleased hum greats you and then blessedly he is spreading you open with his thumbs to subject you to the calculated, blissful lashing of his tongue. And you allow yourself to fall back onto the ground in a boneless heap, easily falling back underneath the sway of that fuzzy Elysian pleasure. Unrestrained moans now freely spilling from you, but you cannot find it in yourself to be the least bit embarrassed by the way you openly keen and whine in bliss. You head tips as you toss in reckless abandon, staring up almost sightlessly at the star cluttered sky. And in your drunken haze your mind oddly remarks that the twinkling stars remind you of peering eyes. But before the thought can take flight a strange sensation is enveloping you, like the brush of water rushing over you. Rolling textured waves, feathered touches and the brush of fingers. 

Hands, a distant thought supplies weakly. It does feel like hands. Thousands of them all scattered about your body. Running over your hips, your stomach, your chest, your throat. And then it feels as though a pair of mouths are taking your breasts into them, and you just barely manage to jerk your head up to confirm that Morpheus is still nestled between your thighs, slurping at your messy cunt even while those phantom hands and mouths stroke over your body, sucking at your nipples in a way that has a gutted moan tearing out of you. 

He is watching you from his place between your legs and the gleam of his eyes are nothing short of smug, taking absolute pride in the way that he is unraveling you at the seams. 

Your body moves as though it is possessed. Writhing like it can't decide which sensation it wants to arch into; the ghostly grasp of a thousand hands or the needy, warmth of his mouth. 

And the squelch of his tongue is sinful, noisily plunging into you. Its passage completely frictionless with the combination of his saliva and the way your cunt drips around the intrusion. He takes the meat of your ass into his physical hands, guiding the jerky rock of your hips into something deeper while he drinks you down, swallowing the obscene slick of your coupling down his throat. And you are babbling now, unable to recognize or understand the scattered way that you beg and cry. Lost to drift in the ceaseless ecstasy, a willing prisoner forced to take it. It feels as though your mind is breaking around the edges, fraying from the sheer scope of your pleasure, leaving you a weightless passenger, no longer held within the restraints of your own body. You soul is alight, burning and drowning in a rapture so sweet that you have no choice but to sob from it all. 

"Morpheus - " You choke around the raged heaving of your chest. And the hands on your body are joined by the phantom lapping of tongues, invisible teeth nipping at your skin and the mouths on your breasts pull and tweak at your nipples. The pleasure is too much, too great for you to fully comprehend and that wave is climbing once again, hurtling you towards that cliff. And now you are begging - pleading that he does not stop and leave you wanting. His name falls freely from you now, and endless mantra pleading for him to guide you into the sweep of fire and bliss. 

You barely feel it approaching. Suddenly your body is tensing, going rigid underneath the curl of his tongue and your thighs clamp around his head while you sob through the convulsions wracking through you. Completely swept up in a tide of heat and electricity. But he has not pulled away from your cunt, still nuzzled between the clutch of your thighs while he drinks your come with a satisfied sigh. The vibrations of it combined with the idle way that he continues to lap at you despite the sensitivity and it has your muscles twitching in response. 

"Morpheus, please. " You gasp underneath him, and he finally pulls back from you, albeit reluctantly before he is crawling over you, leaving gentle pecks across your body as he moves. And you can still feel those phantom touches across you, but they are feather light now, melting into the background as his lips meet yours in a hungry kiss. It has you moaning into his mouth, and even with your recent orgasm you can already feel a syrupy heat building up within you coaxing the gentle rock of your hips. You can taste yourself on his lips, earthy and somewhat sweet. The weight of his arousal presses against you from underneath his robes, heavy and hot and the Dreaming thrums with his want, the soil trembling beneath you both. 

You reach a hand down to paw at him through the dark fabric of his chlamys and the smoky, ragged groan that escapes him is a reward all in its own. And you were right. The sound of his breathless, rumbling satisfaction is something that you will never tire of hearing, and you are already desperate to drag more from him. But what truly has your attention is the length of him. You are unable to see it from the cover of his robes, but you can feel it, the thickness of it, the length. And you drag your thumb around its head, the cloth clinging to the shape of his cock from the precum leaking from the tip. He jerks in your hand, breaking your kiss to duck his face into the crook of your neck, sucking at the skin, prompting you to moan breathlessly. 

"I need you inside of me. " You whisper unsteadily. 

"Take what you need. " Comes his response as he mouths along your neck, taking your ear lobe into his mouth and pulling it between his teeth. Just as yours had, his robes vanish from his body, baring himself for you admire. And admire you do. Gazing upon the milky hue of his skin. The lithe muscle that ripple and flex and the added detail of blue vessels spidering underneath his flesh. Your eyes drop lower, settling on his cock, and the tip has flushed red from his arousal, and you briefly entertain the idea of taking him into your mouth, tasting him on your tongue as he had done to you. But the throbbing heat that has settled between your thighs is the only thing that keeps you from doing so. You need finally feel him and so you are gently pushing at his chest, guiding him to remove his head from your neck and to lie on his back. And he allows you to so - a god obeying your wishes. 

His gaze does not stray from you, even as he settles against the ground and allows you to climb astride his lap. Now that you are here atop him you find yourself wavering under the intimidation of your self-imposed task. It is a stupid thing to be fearful of. You have done this before. But those was a man, not an immortal deity that has seen centuries come and go, watched curiously as humanity's ancestors evolved and give way to empires the ultimately rose and fell. You are sure that he has lain with deities beyond your comprehension. Gods and goddesses, nymphs and spirits, pure divine beings from the heavens. How could you compare? How could you possibly please him? Would he want you even as a tainted woman? 

And as though he can sense your discomfort, he sweeps his hands along your hips, the action breaking through your internal struggle, and he is once sitting himself up enough to plant a kiss between the valley of your breasts. And then he is guiding you to look down on him with the gentle brush of his fingers, fixing your attention solely on him. 

"Take what you need. " He reiterates. But it is not said in a scathing or annoyed way, it is gentle, loving you want to believe, and you nearly melt against him. Those ghostly touches are back, no doubt an attempt to draw you out of your head. And it is working to stoke the fire, the fervor returning to your bones, but your mind still struggles to return you, still tangled within the confines of your insecurities. You could not manage to pin them down no matter how hard you tried to. 

"Speak to me, " he murmurs against your skin. "What troubles you?" 

"I - " you choke around the shakiness in your chest. You want to speak but it is difficult to do so around the rock in your throat, the disconnect between your head and your tongue stalling the words before they can even truly form. He begins to circle his thumbs against your hips. It is no longer sexual but completely tender, meant to coax your feelings from you rather than your desire and it does serve to ground you somewhat, offering you some clarity to articulate yourself. " I - you do know that I'm not . . . " You trail off and you attempt to meet his curious gaze, but you find your own quickly darting away, scanning the kaleidoscope fields that surrounds you like it might help you find your courage.  " . . . What if I'm not good enough?" 

His expression becomes stormy.  Something menacing and severe and it is a stark reminder of the darker side of his nature. He had been so gentle and giving with you that it had been easy to forget the depths of his anger, and for a moment you had feared that you somehow managed to offend him personally. His lips have pursed in that cross way, his eyebrows pinched, and you would have anticipated him molding himself into wicked shadows and talons, if not for the flash of something soft showing through the cosmic blue of his eyes. 

"Have I not worshiped you thoroughly enough?" He asks, but he does not necessarily sound affronted out of concern of his own pride but rather disappointed that he did not please you. The mere notion of that could make you scoff; you were certain that he ruined you for anyone else. No man would be able to touch you in the way that he had. And now you were opening your mouth to reassure him, but he is responding before you can utter a single word. " Then allow me to rectify my transgressions." 

And you whole heartedly expect him to once again knock you on your back and take you, but he does not. He keeps you secured on his lap, grip firm but not controlling and fixes you with a stare that seems to hold you open and reach inside, melting at your frayed vulnerabilities. "Now. Take what you need."  His voice has dipped into something deep and orotund, clearly enunciating to make sure that his intent is clearly broadcasted. And the intensity that he projects is enough to pull you back into the moment, his power coursing over the Dreaming and rippling at its seams. But it is more than that too. He has been nothing but gentle with you this entire night. Patient. Without judgement. And it is as though he has been plucking you apart piece by broken piece, stuffing you full of sunlight and helping you mend your shattered edges. Not fixed or magically repaired, but it is the closest you have felt to peace and adoration in a long time. And you feel like you are choking on the affection that he openly displays. The want and the need. 

You become startlingly aware of the way that your cunt drips, come smearing the insides of your thighs while that warm honeyed ache steadily thrums within your abdomen. And it is difficult to ignore it now. The sheer scope of your desire could smother you, threatening to take you under and drown you. Everything else after that is instinctual -needy. You take his face in your hands, smashing your lips to his in a bruising kiss trying your best to project your emotions into the exchange of tongue and teeth, stroking the sharp edges of his cheek bones with the same reverence that he had shown you. And you blindly reach down to take the rigid heat of him in your grip, throbbing and wet with a steady flow of precum, and he rewards you with a heady groan when you circle your thumb around the leaking slit of his cock. 

You are quick to line him up with your entrance, and without little fanfare sink down onto him. The relief that comes with the fulness of his girth tears ragged sighs from the both of you.  And you give yourself little time to adjust before your already working yourself down his length, toes curling when the blunt head of his cock brushes against that devastating spot inside of you that has you jerking from him to gasp into the night. And unable to ignore the all-consuming passion that takes you over, the pulsing, electrifying power that permeates around Morpheus you draw yourself up with the strength of your thighs, using the push you can achieve from planting your feet on the ground to bounce on his cock in a hedonistic display. 

It is debased and vulgar, fucking out in an open field, in the soil like animals. Completely lewd, but so right. 

Morpheus lies back against the ground on his own accord, reclining like spoiled royalty and allowing you to plant your hands on his chest to assist you to deepen each thrust, letting you take from him. And already his name is spilling from your lips like a hymn while you watch the Dream King with rapt attention, enthralled by every minute expression that flickers across his schooled features. The way that his eyebrows pinch together, how dim but eager pants puff past his open mouth, the dazed sort of pleasure that shows in his eyes while he gazes upon you like you're a deity that has descended down from Mount Olympus, a nymph fashioned from Aphrodite herself to encapsulate his every wish. 

And those delicious, invisible hands have returned to roam about your body in their sweet exploration, plucking at your body like it is an instrument that they have played for years. The sound of your coupling rings across the Dreaming, the smack skin against skin, your unrestrained moans. It all has that thick, deep-rooted ache spreading further throughout your body, reaching from your core and all the way to your fingertips and toes. But there is something missing, a nudge needed to push you over the edge. "Morpheus, " you cry weakly, thighs already beginning to sting from exertion, but you refuse to stop, continuing to drop yourself on his cock, working tight circles with your hips with each descent. 

You can see something smug bleeding into his features, your neediness nurturing his hubris, and his lips quirk in just the faintest hints of a barely there smile. 

"What is it, my love?" He asks, feigning ignorance and it irritates you how put together he sounds, voice having dropped into a low, rumbling cadence, but apart from that he sounds seemingly unaffected despite the glazed over quality to his gaze. You whimper around a particularly harsh thrust from him that has your back bowing, pushing your breasts into the palms of ghostly hands. Your eyes nearly go cross at the drag of his cock, but you manage to keep your concentration around the sweeping torrents of smoke and ecstasy. 

"Please!" you keen drunkenly. "Please, I need you! " 

A satisfied purr resonates underneath your palms and his pupils flash in that pale tantalizing, dangerous way and you cannot believe that the look of it had frightened you at some point. Now it only serves to pool more liquid heat down the base of your spine. A heaving mewl is all but punched out of you when he takes you by surprise, using his place along the ground to thrust up into you with wicked rolls from his hips. Fucking up into you with a ferocity that has you struggling to meet his pace, and you are hardly more than a passenger at this point. All coherence is stripped from you and your entire body feels like it has been doused in honey and fire, and the timbre of his raspy voice speaking out only serves to nudge you closer to your undoing. 

"You'll stay here with me, won't you?" 

"Yes!" You agreed in a slurred whine. 

"And you'll give yourself to me?"

"Yes!" You are near sobbing now, body jerking and writhing atop him while the phantom touches roll your nipples between soft fingertips, and his cock pumps into you with depraved, filthy squelches of your combined arousal. And that primordial energy is pulsating around the Dreaming. The same power that creates the ground you both lay upon, that fashions the field and the sky above you too, permeating from the deity that is currently fucking every shred of a possible thought from your brain. And the power feels charged now, like it is growing and expanding into something great, seeping into your skin and soaking your bones. Then a transparent grip is taking your jaw between its fingers, directing your gaze to the god underneath you, and another slips down your stomach, reaching down to drag tight circles around your neglected clit. 

"Then come." It is a command that your body cannot ignore, seizing up tight, trapping the strangled wail deep inside your lungs while your mouth hangs open in a silent scream. Your eyes roll into the back of your skull, stars exploding against the darkness there and you lose all sense of tangibility.  Your sense of time, place and self slip from perception like water pouring through spread fingers, and now you are just floating. Caught in bursting cosmos, pinned before the scalding light of the sun, caught in a torrent of arresting, unyielding rapture. And your cunt clamps down his cock like it means to milk him for all he is worth, your orgasm ushering him into his own and thankfully your coherence begins to return to you in time for you to admire him while he is subjected to the throes of his pleasure. And you are still gasping and moaning while his thrusts become sloppy and uncoordinated, observing as his eyelashes flutter and his mouth opens for a long husky moan to escape him as the warmth of his release pools inside of you. 

You all but collapse on top of him in a boneless heap and your cunt spasming weakly around his spent length but neither of you make any effort to move. Simply basking in the afterglow of your highs. It is your sense of touch and hearing that serve to orient you. The distant crash of waves rushing over the surf, the whisper of the breeze dancing across the grass and blossoms. And you can feel him underneath you. His chest is moving with a breath that you are certain is simulated for your own comfort, an attempt to appear more human. But he feels too heated and simultaneously too cold to be a person, like he has no idea which temperature to project. But you decide that it is not at all unpleasant, instead it feels good against your feverish skin. 

But you still wait for the sting of disappointment to strike you - for disgust to bleed and taint the satisfaction now that the lust has died, but it never rises to meet you. And so, you rest, satiated upon your god. Pliant like melted wax. But there is the insistent nudge of something burrowing at you. Concern, you quickly identify. And it has your sluggish mind wandering back to the root of the thought, trailing after it until it finds the conclusion which takes that shape of a memory. The memory of perhaps the only companion you have ever known, and it is bitter and sour reminder that they may not even be alive anymore. That centuries may have passed during your brief stay in the Dreaming, and that they may have succumbed to the passage of time. 

"What ails you now?" 

You want to say that it is nothing, sweep it aside and ignore it while it festers and grows. But you know now that he will not accept nothing as an answer, not when he can possibly feel your distress across the threads of the Dreaming. You feel foolish in your answer, but it is the only one that you can manage. " My cat. " 

"Your . . . cat. " He echoes slowly, and you are certain that amusement is lacing his tone. You bristle a bit preparing to defend yourself, your right for being worried, but he is nudging you from his chest so that you may see each other as you speak. 

"I can assure you that your companion is safe. He's quite content." He says. His gentle mirth still very much alive, but you do not return his light-hearted attitude, waiting with bated breath for him to answer the question that hangs heavy in the air. And a part of you fears that he may have somehow managed to converse with Death of the Endless, or that he was still connected to the passage of time that operates outside of the Dreaming and was able to deduce that the feline had long since passed, joining Teleute in the Sunless Lands. But then he is brushing a hand along his side, drawing your attention to his ribs where the skin there ripples like the surface of a disturbed lake, and a set of angry jagged scars emerge from the mirage, appearing across his pale skin, spanning from his armpit down to the notch of his hipbone. It is hauntingly familiar. The placement, the number of claw mark left in stretched healed tissue. One, two, three . . . four, you count. 

You understand what it is that he is implying. And betrayal sinks its enamel into your heart, but the bite is shockingly dull and not the unforgiving split that you were expecting. And you can tell that he is calculating something, surely waiting for you to lash out. To scream at him and demand that he take you home. Perhaps that is what you should do. But you do not. "How? Why did you- a cat?" Is all you manage, more perplexed than irate. 

"I had been injured by an old foe of mine, " he explains, allowing you to curl into his side, curiously running your fingertips over the marred flesh. And you have suppress a shudder, wondering what sort of being could be strong enough to injure an Endless. A god. "As for why I assumed that particular form, I needed to conserve energy. It was small. Familiar. It served to save much needed strength. " 

There has always been something strange about that cat and his watchful stare. Admittedly you had always swallowed down the suspicion that prickled at you whenever he had curled up within your house, but you had been too desperate for some sort of friendship to truly question anything. The barrage of emotions flooding you, making you a muddled unsure mess, but one thing that you do know for certain is that you are completely and undeniably relieved. And truthfully you are still far too tired, simply uncaring to have been tricked by the god. You are happy- actually well and truly happy to embrace the joy and serenity. 

"And then there was you, " he murmurs in your ear, devout and soft. 

The both of you remain there for an insurmountable length of time. Lounging in each other's embrace, delighting in your shared presence. Listening to the peaceful noise of the Dreaming and the warmth of your lover. And for the first time that icy gapping pit of loneliness no longer gnaws and tears at you. You finally feel at home, and the desire to flee and leave eludes you. Perhaps because you have finally found a place to belong.  

Here with him. 

[ibarkatpeoplewoofwoofbitch]

EVE AND LILITH THEORY

Okay so we don't know why lilith went missing for seven years. But what I do know is this ain't lilith

Lilith hair is slicked back in every backstory we see of her

In the photos, we see that'd show if she has her horns or slick back hair, which is covered by hats or completely cut off.

But I know for sure in this scene right here before what probably was before lilith left it looked like Eve

And here's my theorys.

NUMBER ONE:LILITH IS CONTROLLED BY EVE. (Far fetched and wrong words but you'll see what I mean)

it could be their the same penny on different sides like in brittle bones Nicky number two when the devil and God are the same people

Like the lyrics "I'm mufasa and I am scar" it's like yin and yang

In goodness, theirs evil and in evil theirs goodness.

THEORY NUMBER 2:EVE AND LILITH MADE A DEAL.

Lilith was a famous woman in hell, not just because of being queen but also because of her singing. (Can't wait to see who is casted for her I hope it's someone who can hit high notes). Maybe lilith wanted to "get away" from everything but still wanted to be in touch and see what's going on hence all the eyes everywhere in hell.

And maybe Eve wanted a family. Cause adam does not seem like someone you'd wanna spend your whole (after)life with. Eve probably wanted someone who'd love her and by lucifer loving lilith and forgets things like where charlie was even though he's not a bad guy and says vaggie as maggie. Lucifer probably dissociated so much he forgot lilith looked different but still loved lilith who was infact Eve.

THEORY NUMBER 3:EVE IS DEAD

I don't think she made it into heaven, unlike Adam. Cause by what we've seen, no one knows why people go to heaven, not even a seraphim (the highest rank of angel right below the power god has but the second highest rank.)

THEORY NUMBER 4:THEY BOTH RAN AWAY

Powerful women becoming wives arc 🤷‍♂️

THEORY NUMBER 5:EVE HAS ALASTORS SOUL.

Look I don't know much but I do know eve does that whole pretty little liars smile and shushing the mouth thing. Who better to own alastors soul then someone who smiles no matter what?

THEORY NUMBER 6:ALASTOR KILLED EVE

Look, Eve was probably the first human to fall besides Well lilith who fell with lucifer. Eve could've been one of the higher overlords that alastor broadcasted killing.

THEORY NUMBER 7: LUTE IS EVE

Yknow I thought this one was a far stretched one. Theirs 3 clues. Lutes personality was like someone who could put up with Adam. And I know Adam made the exorcist. But vaggie didn't like Adam and before she fell she didn't like killing a demon.

Lute has the same personality as Adam but is way more serious then Adam is so Adam doesn't blow anything but she doesn't get mad when he gets close to doing it and when he did she stayed by his side agreeing with him.

Lute was personally distraught by Adam's death. And of course, she isn't like this with no one else. Why didn't the exorcist get distraught that they were obviously around him?

[tvgirlcore]

how would adam in eden treat his first wife reader

Was he an asshole before eve and lilith left him?

HOOOOLY CRAP GUYS. i went down the BIGGEST rabbit hole for this (perks of being sick and having free time)… first request!!!! (AND FEEL FREE TO LEAVE MORE :)) tysm!!! and with all the background research, i cooked !!! (proofread + i tried my best to make this accurate)

˚₊‧꒰ა ☆ ໒꒱ ‧₊˚

how would adam in eden treat his first wife reader?

was he an asshole before eve and lilith left him?

(no warnings, no pronouns used, but suggested you are his wife ^_^)

— in my opinion, lucifer pretty much messed with his whole love life. i think he would be much more chill than he is now. but to try and match his character, he will be a little egoistic.

you were adam’s first wife, and to him, you meant a lot.

seriously, being the first man on earth he grew to be a bit egotistical. but, you helped tone that down from him. 

you knew he thought higher of himself, but you tried to remind him that humans should all be equal.

life was wonderful in eden. after spending time in eden with him, you both realized you were falling deeply in love with each other.

“hey, i think i’m in love with you.”

adam says with a grin, and you can’t help but reply,

“me too.”

and your relationship bloomed from there. he thought you were the most wonderful woman he would ever meet.

and as a few years passed, you became adam’s wife. 

he could hardly believe it, considering how dumb he was. you were like a goddess to him. beautiful in every way, even if you didn’t think so. he would always tell you how important you are to him.

you spent days upon days with him, and you would plan various things to do.

one of your favorite activities was spending a day in the warm sun, prancing in meadows and playing in creeks.

adam just adored you, sometimes he got a little embarrassed to participate because of his somewhat  ‘manly’ ego, but if you asked him to do anything, no questions, he’d do it right away.

“babe, there’s a bunch of flowers in your hair.”

he says, gently leaning forward to pick some of the succulents out of your hair. you two sat in the meadow, as adam hummed while doing so.

“what happens when we die?”

you say curiously, and adam looks at you wide eyed.

“oh, sweetness, don’t worry ‘bout that, ‘kay?”

you silently nodded, curling close to him. the sun was starting to set.

you two shifted on your backs to look at the stars, and he listened intently as you mumbled about the different constellations.

and soon, he knew when your speech got slower, and your hands stopped pointing up at the sky, you had fallen to slumber. and he follows quickly.

͙͘͡★

and you remained close, in love for years to come.

when it came time for death, you both succumbed.

when you made it to heaven, you were there together.

he was so happy, happy he is able to spend the rest of eternity with you.

extra / if he left you for eve + lillith (angstyyy kinda?)

when you and adam got married, you knew this wouldn’t last forever. you love him, so so much, but you knew he didn’t love you fully.

and that’s just who he was, perhaps. he was always eyeing other women, thinking he was superior to you, and seemed to become a bit short tempered around you.

and that’s when you couldn’t take it anymore. you confronted him, tears in your eyes.

and he left.

left you for eve, left her for lillith.

you knew there was no end to it, but when you became an angel, you saw just how fucked up he was.

he was even worse now, somehow, and you knew it was all his wives fault.

˚₊‧꒰ა ☆ ໒꒱ ‧₊˚

research/long blabber about adam’s backstory i looked up to understand him further even after rewatching hazbin 4 times…  adam’s first wife lilith married lucifer,, lilith and adam fought (as of religious text) demons =sinners and freedom with a life in heaven =exterminations lilith = left and kinda evil? adam =first man earliest of man and kinda worst of man? (according to lol more religious text blah blah blah) uprise because lilliths singing which adam took advantage of? alastor’s master = lillith..(theory i think) OH GOD IM SO CONFUSED anyways. lilith hates subservience (willingness to obey others unquestionably) that’s why she left adam?? adam =toxic masculinity. eve left to eat the apple from lucifer ADAMS EX-wife set lillith up? or what. first human. after his wife’s? he’s EXTRENELY cocky and arrogant in charge of annual extermination of sinners (because of overpopulation) is mean because he thinks it’s hilarious, who’s gonna stop him? adam thinks no one can change, and thinks heaven and hell is a great system. basically abuses his power..  lucifer had a baby with adam’s ex-wife and is indirectly responsible for adam losing out on paradise. adam didn’t eat the fordbifden fruit which is why he acts the way he does? god complex cuz he’s firsy man. lillith was the first woman in hazbin, lilith left because adam thought higher of himself. EVE ATE THE FRUIT of knowledge! i tried to use my brain to the max to make this so I HOPE YOU ENJOYED!!!