Tumgik
#beneath the light of an azure moon
Text
Find the Word
tagged by @darthenra (thanks!)
rules: find a drabble/poem/blurb of your manuscript or other material containing the word or word form given to you! good luck <3
my words were: spirit, journey, sleep, mirror
spirit/journey (from an untitled collab)
Bianca stood up, taking Rin’s outstretched hand to help her up and steady her. “He may have a bit of a point there,” she admitted, leaning down a bit to wrap an arm around Rin’s slender shoulders. The Auri girl was so small, and while she may have been sick, Bianca knew that her spirit was anything but fragile. “Still, I have faith that we can make that journey, just like we’re making this one.” She guided Rin over to the sofa and gently eased her down onto it, taking care not to jostle her too much.
sleep (from The Last Night of the World)
“Ah, Estinien,” he murmured, setting down the paper he had been holding. “Could you not sleep? I can have another blanket sent up to you if you’re too cold.” Estinien rolled his eyes.
mirror (from Beneath the Light of an Azure Moon)
Estinien dressed himself absentmindedly, changing out of his nightclothes and into a simple tunic and breeches. He gave himself a cursory glance in the mirror, briefly combing his fingers through his long white hair before pulling it back into a messy ponytail. If the old man wouldn’t even fix his own hair, he reasoned, there wasn’t much point to making himself particularly presentable. Giving himself one last glare in the mirror, he exited the room.
tagging:
@rexxles @steamboat-baby @notalazysod @axl-ul @sincerelyada @ashley-woods @kaiusvnoir @radiowrites
your words are: moon, river, bright
13 notes · View notes
saintreinette · 10 months
Text
considering repurposing azure moon into something original...
0 notes
cafi-catfish · 25 days
Text
Soulslike AU
Once upon a time, Wukong looked up to the sky with eyes full of light and aspirations. His soul sang with dreams and desire to touch the heavens. To become part of the Celestial Order, one of the many stars illuminating the mortal world - the brightest, the biggest, outshining all the others.
Not just for himself, at first. For his subjects, his lands, his moon that kept him warm on cold nights. But it was hardly magnanimity that was at the top of everything. Behind the desire to give to others sprouted just as much a desire to take, to appropriate only for himself.
In canon, Wukong is humbled and shown the right path where cruelty has no place. In this AU, Heaven fails to catch the skittish monkey. In his greed, the Sage ceases to see boundaries. There is not a single living being who can stop a wild animal who thinks he is a god. There are no rules. Only greed.
With unlimited power, Wukong continued to climb forward. Further, higher. Why stop there? Why worry about the pitiful lives crunching beneath his claws and teeth? Ahead, at the very top, lies the forbidden poisonous fruit. The deities and other celestial creatures meet the blood-intoxicated monkey in all arms. Even with sweat dripping down their necks and weapons in their trembling hands.
The Celestial Realm loses with a cacophony of alien screams and falling debris from buildings.
Many years pass before one wanderer meets one child in a devastated world.
Tumblr media
Wukong hardly had a plan, but his treacherous actions were clearly sequential. Heaven fell first, then the bloody gaze traveled lower. Dragons were a race that had been despised by the Sage long ago. Only the most skittish and the most unsightly survived, hiding their brightly colored skins at the bottom of the seas and oceans. One of the first places Wukong decided to visit with his bloody march was the palace where the staff was located, whose iron he was using to take lives.
Ao Guang was the one who decided to fight back against the madness that enveloped the King's mind. He fought desperately, with the realization that he could not win the battle. This gave enough time for those who also realized their own and the world's hopelessness to escape.
Nailing the dragon's body with his staff, Wukong kept the old man awake long enough to show him what happens to those who go against the Great Sage. Mei, being the youngest and most confident at her misfortune was a gift of fate to Wukong. With her help - Wukong could give a perfect lesson to the surviving worms that called themselves dragons about the foolishness of the idea of fighting back. Having shackled the girl, he left her at the very shore, with no way to get back out to sea. The bayonets-strong ribbons glinting in the sunlight from every attempt to break free of the shackles-clenched the bulky body with scorching pain. She remained there, still struggling to break free, unable to see the light of the sun that had long ago hidden the stench of death Wukong had brought.
Tumblr media
And Sun Wukong, the Monkey King.
Tumblr media
He wears a Macaque scarf and a cape made of Azure Lion skin.
(if you find any errors in the text, I apologize in advance. English is not my first language)
208 notes · View notes
irvcbl · 1 month
Text
୨ৎ the sun and the moon | xavier — shen xinghui
Tumblr media
shen xinghui / xavier x reader
in which you can never touch the sun, and you can’t even be the moon — just a star who watches from lightyears away.
→ content includes… ANGST., hurt/no comfort, reader is not mc, unrequited(?) love
→ song suggestion… “heaven” by mitski
inspired by mitski’s live performance of “heaven”, in which she dances with a lone stagelight.
̣̣̣︶꒷˚̣̣̣︶ ͡𑁬♱໒ ͡ ︶˚̣̣̣꒷︶†︶꒷ ˚̣̣̣ ꒷︶†︶꒷˚̣̣̣︶ ͡𑁬♱໒ ͡ ︶˚̣̣̣꒷︶˚̣̣̣
There’s a window in your apartment building that you’ve lovingly named “moongazer”. It sits above your coffee table that you tend to scoot to the side to lay down on the plush fur of your carpet to stare up at the stars and the moon with Xavier, your good friend who lives in the complex across the street.
The record player on top of a short bookshelf played something light, almost otherworldly, as the two of you laid in comfortable silence, side by side as moonlight kisses your skin at the late hours. Fingers graze against each other, pulling away like they’ve been touched by hot fire each time skin meets skin. It was as hot as the love that burned in the pit of your belly each time you locked eyes with him, the gentle blue unable to wash out the flames that ignited within.
“Do you think the Deepspace tunnel will let us travel to Stelle one day?” you asked him one restless night, curled up in a blanket next to him in your special spot beneath the moongazer. Xavier averts his gaze away from the stars when you mention your own little planet.
“Probably,” he hummed softly, his hands playing with the hem of the blanket. “Would you want to go?”
You looked him in the eyes, your heart threatening to beat out of your chest. Stelle was the star you named with him, one you wish to visit. “If it means you’ll come with me, then yes.”
The knight only lets out a soft chuckle, a smile painting his rosy lips as he looks back up the moongazer, counting the little dots that grace the night sky.
It’s been weeks since that night.
Perhaps even a month or two?
From the balcony of your apartment, two shadows dance across the street, twirling and holding one another close. You know who it was, and why they were dancing.
Linkon New Year was soon as well as Azure’s Echo Day , and Jeremiah—a mutual friend of your’s and Xavier’s—had texted you once or twice about Xavier’s “newest mission”. There’s something apparently suspiscious about an upcoming masquerade on Azure’s Echo Day, and that meant him and his work partner has to learn to fit the part and learn to waltz. They’ve been at this for a week now, dancing the nights away together like it was a scene out of La La Land.
You haven’t heard from Xavier since the end of January.
Before this dance practicing started, you asked the hunter if he’d like to spend the New Year with you, only to be met with a blank stare and an “I’m busy, sorry”.
You figured it was just work—being a hunter is a sacrifice, after all—but as you watch them sway to the music you can’t hear, you begin to think that it’s more than work. The way he wraps his arm around her waist, pulls her in, and dips her down seems more than just work.
It’s affection.
He’s never danced with you like that. Maybe some playfully cha-chas or poorly done TikTok dances, but never waltzing.
It’s clear to you that Miss Hunter was a special case.
No longer able to bear the sight, you pinch the bridge of your nose and close the curtain to the windowed-door that showed you the world outside and the supposed coworkers that danced the night away.
The moon was full tonight, thankfully. You joked with Xavier many nights that it was made of cheese, and he promised he’d bring you a slice one day. The memory makes bile creep up your throat knowing he’ll never fulfill the promise, and would probably give it to her before you.
In the dark of your apartment, only the light of the moon peers in to bring you company. The solace you find in the moonlight does little for the ache in your chest, sadly, and you can only weep as you reach out toward the moonbeam with a shaky hand. Its featherlight touch tickles the tips of your fingers, kissing it gently as if trying to comfort you.
Like the duo just a short walk away, you dance. The coffee table is shoved to the side along with the couch, now pressed against the wall as you spin in circles in the living room, acting like the moonbeam was your own little prince as your arm circles around the intangible light. It’s unmoving, forcing embarrassment to fester in your mind as you dance your pas de deux. The only music that plays is the sound of your tears meeting the floor.
You don’t know how long you dance with your partner, but you fail to notice the spectator as you sway yourself into a daze. The watchful eyes try to glare holes into the curtains that hide you away from its gaze, tracing the silhouette of your figure that rocks back and forth, taking note of how your hands were placed as if you were truly dancing with someone. The missing partner was evident, but your anguish was not.
He wonders why you dance alone. Why were you dancing at all? Will you be at the masquerade to?
He really hopes not.
——
dearest,
my hand slipped. might make a part two. probably not because i’m only slightly a masochist sadist.
⁺♪ sincerely, valentine ♰
66 notes · View notes
n0tamused · 23 days
Text
"Amoris"
Tumblr media Tumblr media
A/N: I miss my husband y'all. Made this as an oc x canon thing but I took out any names or descriptions so it can be read as x reader. We all deserve soft Nanami
Content: blind reader, female reader, post Shibuya - Nanami lives, they're enjoying their time in Malaysia now, soft Nanami
Word count: 978
Warnings: Scars? Besides that, nothing.
Tumblr media
Long arms of midnight blue embrace the once azure skies, taking them into their slumbering hold. A soft light emanates from the young moon hanging overhead, drawing and calming the breathing waves that swallow up the beaches lick by lick.
The sight is one of its kind, and one the two dreamed off for years beforehand. They could only dream about how refreshing the salty air would be, and how the sound of the sea would lull them to sleep every night, how the summer rains will water the plants hanging from their windows and how lovely it would be to hold hands through all of it. 
Nanami’s calloused hands draw the long curtains over the window after catching one final glimpse of the view outside, humming along with the tune that plays on the phone radio. When he turned to face the bed he saw her sitting comfortably against the headrest, a young little tabby kitten taking much interest, and taste, in her fingers as it let out playful yowls and meows, nibbling at her digits. His beloved giggled, her eyes pointed downward but staring at nothing, the small little scars that sprawled around her eyes had faded, but they were still there, and proof of what hardships she faced. Long lashes flutter shut as she gives up on trying to get the kitten off of her hand, simply letting one fingertip stay lodged between its small pointy teeth, feeling how he tried to chew and bite. “Kenntoo” she called into the air, hearing him move about, his humming following him along. He always seemed to make it a point to do his activities a bit louder than he needed to, simply to let his presence be known to her so she knew he was still there. 
“Yes, my dear?”
“It’s time to go to sleep, I hardly got hold of you the entire day today” says (Y/N), breathing in deeply and letting her sigh fall heavy from her lips, as if to make a point. The kitten in her hands lets out a meow that sounded more like a squeal instead, making him turn his head to the two on the bed. “See? Even he agrees, he’s calling you over- Na Na Miiiii” she teases, barely hiding a smile from her lips as she feels the kitten's body, turning it around to face away and lifting it up into the air. Her smile widens as she feels Kento’s big hands take the kitten from her, inevitably touching her own hands. “You both seem so needy today, I can’t have been absent for that long, right?” The bed dips beneath his weight as he takes a seat beside her stretched legs, and the kitten is promptly placed into his lap for a short while. Big strokes over the little furry head and body leaving the kitten purring loudly. She nudges his hip with her foot when she finds it, asking for more attention to be cast to her.
“We had a perfect chance to sleep in this morning, yet you got up so early. And for what?” she points her words at him, curling her knees to her chest before scooting closer to where she felt him, one hand stretching out and landing on his bicep first. Then the hand crawled up to his shoulder, holding herself there. “Besides the kitten surprise, what else do you have going on?” she asked with a soft sigh, squeezing his shoulder as if that would squeeze and answer out of him. He chuckles, letting the kitten jump to the floor before he turns his body towards her, taking her hands in his. “What could I have going on? I can’t keep anything from you, even the cat was hardly any surprise”  “Only because he was meowing from his box” “Pfft”
“But no, seriously. You’ve been working a lot.. and I miss you, Ken” Her voice had mellowed out, and with his guidance she made his lap her seat, her hands climbing up his chest before cupping his cheeks. The feeling has her smiling bigger, her heart catching up in her throat. One hand can feel the scarred skin from the burns he had sustained, and the other is met with smoother skin, both equally warm to the touch, both his cheeks lead up to the brows she mapped out with her fingertips before moving to his temples. He falls silent, holding his words on the tip of his tongue as he lets her touch his face.
Her fingers go to his hairline, carding through the golden locks before dropping to his earlobe, and with a fingertip on each side she traces the high cheekbone up to the base of his nose, and then a single finger goes to his lips, and he swears he can feel his heart leave him completely. It escapes his chest and runs to her embrace. Finally, he moves, taking hold of her wrist to keep it still while he kisses her fingertip, and gently he turns her hand over to show her palm so he could place kisses onto it. “I missed you too, so much” Kento replied, taking the other hand to and making her cup his cheeks again while he turned his head and kissed this hand and then the other, maneuvering them how he saw fit, showing love to each hand that held him so delicately, much delicately than he believed he deserved. 
Nanami pulls her closer in his lap, and before he could initiate it, he already felt her  soft lips find a corner of his own. Both of them burst into a quick chuckle that gets muffled by a proper kiss, now landing on his lips and it quells their feelings of yearning. 
“Mm, let’s get to bed now, hm? And I can tell you what I was up to today, alright?”
Tumblr media
I didn't write in a while, so I hope this is alright <3
Ⓒ n0tamused. Do not repost, translate, edit, and/or copy any of my works. Likes, comments, and reblogs are appreciated.
48 notes · View notes
miggylol · 8 hours
Text
I've enjoyed the polls of this type I've seen, so...
19 notes · View notes
vmdwriter · 3 months
Text
In the Silence of the Forest
In a forest untouched by human stride, A solitary tree on a hill does hide. Behind, the October moon's muted gleam, A girl approaches, lost in a silent dream.
As raindrops fall, the clock ticks on, Washing away the pain, the battle won. Alive but bound to impending fate, The rain recedes, the hour growing late.
Her eyes, once a mirror of the azure sky, Now pale, under the moon's watchful eye. The October sun ascends the morning sky, Casting light on a tale that never said goodbye.
Two teenagers traverse the mystical scene, Briefly stopping, the tree a space between. Unaware of the story that whispered by, They move on, beneath the October sky.
Years later, a tale unfurls its root, A story of the tree, the rain, and the mute. October's symphony, a haunting refrain, In a forest untrodden, where echoes remain.
29 notes · View notes
adriftpoetry · 6 months
Text
Moonlit Unity: A Celestial Poem
Beneath the endless tapestry of night's embrace, Where stars in silent symphony do trace, A beacon of hope in the midnight's swoon, We all, as one, gaze at the same moon.
Across the world, in varied tongues we speak, Yet under Luna's gaze, our hearts do peak, A common thread that binds us in its tune, We all, as one, gaze at the same moon.
In distant lands where daylight fades to gray, And in the lands where sun's first light holds sway, In joy and sorrow, in each high and low, The same moon's glow we all come to know.
Its gentle face, a universal grace, A constant in the ever-changing space, It whispers secrets to the restless sea, A silent friend to both you and me.
Through stormy clouds and skies of azure hue, It offers solace when the day is through, A timeless witness to the world's cocoon, We all, as one, gaze at the same moon.
In dreams and wishes, whispered to the night, In moments of despair, it lends its light, A silver lantern in our darkest hour, A reminder of our shared earthly bower.
Though separated by vast lands and sea, This moon above unites both you and me, In unity, our differences maroon, For we, as one, gaze at the same moon.
So when you feel alone in life's cruel stream, Remember, my dear friend, it's not a dream, That as we navigate life's ebb and swoon, We all, as one, gaze at the same moon.
-adriftpoetry
28 notes · View notes
1up-girl · 6 months
Text
Love Stayed With Me (2023)
Words: 9.2k Pairing: Zelink Rating: T (Heavy Angst, Suicidal Ideation, Eventual Happy Ending)
Or, read on Ao3 here:
[Spoilers for Tears of the Kingdom]
The obsidian of night begins to bleed through the silver veil of memory; ink through fine cloth. And when the world morphs back into shape around him, he finds that everything has grown colder—the sharp evening air rolling up against the seashore has very little to do with it.  
In the breathless hush, he watches as the last remnants of her humanity dissolve into nothing more than droplets at his boots. Dread stretches its wretched fingers up through his chest, dragging its mournful cloaks across him just as deliberately as the soft stretches of morning that shall soon come to unfurl across the Akkala shore, and though the sentiments are threading together in his mind, the unbelievable truth of things declaring itself, his heart doesn’t need to be told. It’s known for a while now:
Zelda is gone, and Link cannot follow. 
He gasps, and the blunted sea air that quickly fills his lungs feels a little like acid in his throat, and his breath catches so violently that he’s left suffocating on nothing but midnight. Gone. It’s only a moment more before everything is blurring again, his chest so tight he half believes that if he were to look down, he’d find a blade driven clean through it. 
Gone. She’s gone . Forever lost. Dead to anything that still walks the earth beside him. 
There is a dark and hollow place that Link has wandered once before—he walked its paths just over a century ago, when the blunted sting of loss and failure sank its fangs deep into his chest as he learned of his companions’ fates. That bleak day found him numb, left him piloted by nothing but adrenaline and a divine need to keep his charge safe. But this path Link walks is darker, and far more hollow—feels as though someone has taken a scalpel and carved him out, has left him with nothing more than a few aching bones and a half-beating heart. And when the feeling only threatens to subside, something more sinister sprouts up beneath it; he finds himself wishing for a blow to the head—something, anything —to make everything just stop.
There’s the faintest glimmer of hope as resilience tries to speak up past the sickening twist of his stomach, but its effort is in vain—it can’t hold its ground against the rumble that lifts Link’s frantic eyes to the heavens; the Light Dragon—no, his Zelda —serpents across the indigo of night with an electrifying roar. I’m here, Link , she seems to wail out across the eastern sky. I’m here. Come find me. 
I’m here, Zelda. I’m…I—
Her call spades its way down through his body, and Link is lost. Her cry sends him to his knees among the taunting altar of azure flora. He can’t bring himself to look down at them—he’s lost if he does, lost to the memories of them tucked beneath plaits of golden hair, lost to the bouquets he’d assembled with his own hands on their anniversary. Lost to the blissful days spent hand in hand as they rebuilt their kingdom. So instead, he fixes his gaze upon her foreign, begrudgingly magnificent form as it sails across the full moon, the spun gold of her mane glittering against a navy sea. Even torn from her humanity, her beauty is unmatched. 
Link has always carried her love proudly—quietly, yes, in the soft way that his soul calls out to her amongst the swell of life around them, but never without the deep honor it brings; he’s worn it as a badge of a courage, a piece of regalia far more precious than anything the monarchy placed upon him a lifetime ago. In this life, her love means more than any chain or tunic or sword. Her love. Nothing but an echo now—but even so, he crumbles beneath its might as grief and guilt coil up around him, their crushing grip so tight a vice against his chest that he thinks his ribs might shatter, the weight of her love so unbearable that a simple breath seems so far out of reach. Those three, familiar words crawl across the dry cavern of his mouth as he watches her go, and they slip from him, again and again, each iteration far more desperate than the last: I love you, I love you, I love you .  
He’d give his other arm to unsee it all. He hates knowing the truth. That he knows what her fear looks like, what it sounded like. Hates that the last thing she’ll ever know of him is his panicked face reaching for her, his singed fingers just a whisper’s distance away. He hates that he knows what her body looks like contorting in agony as the stone steals the last bit of humanity from her and he hates that he knows that her last moments were spent placing confidence in him— the kingdom’s cherished Hero, the favored swordsman. Her favorite swordsman, whose failure deep below Hyrule Castle sealed her to a fate worse than death.
For the first time, in a long, long time, Link sobs. 
His cries are almost as primal as her own lament some miles above the surface, and they burn their way down his throat with enough strength to knock him flat onto his back. He presses a hand to his head as he tries to stifle the growl that tears through him when it isn’t the leather of a glove that comes to meet his skin, but the intricate grooves of Rauru’s perfectly sculpted hand. 
Gods, he wishes he were dead. He wishes the Goddess would steal what little breath remains in his lungs—that she’d tear the spirit she’d so neatly set inside his corporeal form and leave him as nothing more than empty husk upon the sand and let the tides carry him away.
If there really is a Goddess, she’d let me take your place.
A lifetime ago, he’d spent many sullen hours tempering his frustrations; he’d swallowed every curse to the Goddess down as they both silently watched on while the Princess trembled in the frigid Spring waters. None of it matters now—he’ll blaspheme Hylia to hell and back as long as he has to watch Zelda glide further into the night through a net of fluorescent petals, his gloved hand stretched out to grasp at nothing but briny air. Her name forms in his mouth like it’s the first time he’s ever dared to whisper it, two syllables crackling like dying embers at trembling lips. It has slipped from him before as a sigh against her ear and a prayer against her thighs. It is nothing but a eulogy now. 
I’m so sorry. Please, forgive me.
It had all once been so beautiful, so full of promise; how had it all gone so horribly wrong? 
Link doesn’t know how long he stays there, face turned up towards the grieving stars, but when sleep finally comes to claim him beneath the flowers’ vigil, he’s crying her name until the moment it all goes dark. 
*
He’s never thought it possible, but Link finds that Zora’s Domain is even more miserable than he remembers it to be. A beautiful architectural feat, yes, but far too cold and wet and slick and not particularly comfortable for one without gills and a buoyant epidermis. And if those things had already deemed it less than hospitable long ago, the sludge blanketing it has him reeling even half a mile from the town’s perimeter. 
If he hadn’t been so swept up in the shadow of his grief, the revelation that Prince Sidon has become engaged in their time apart might come as more of a shock. Link thinks he may have heard Yona’s name dropped before, but never in the languishing tones he’d expect in a lover’s voice. But who is he to judge? When his own love, a glorious love that’s imprinted across every hint of his being—threaded in each word, each touch, each look—once carried on as silently as the passing night? 
The future Zora queen is kind and outgoing, already fully acclimated to the clamor her new title brings. Yona’s chartreuse skin is a lovely pop of color against a sea of muted tones, and Link wonders if she carries a shade that’s more commonly found in her homeland, a land he’s hardly heard of that sits across the sea—a place he and Zelda had once spoken of seeing someday. She will never see it.
Yona greets Link with a warmth that he’s been starved of—she must notice it right away, because she’s soon sprucing him up while she tends to her ailing companions in the infirmary. She provides him with a fresh piece of Zora armor and a hearty meal that he finds himself struggling to finish (when was the last time he’d been properly nourished?) and asks him to visit her soon-to-be spouse at the recently established ‘Mipha’s Court’ on the mountainside.
The reunion with Sidon is, understandably, not the most amiable of interactions. Given the torrent of mud spilling out overhead and the sorrow weighing down Link’s heart like a most wretched anchor, it’s hard for either of them to show any normal levels of enthusiasm. If the matter of the sludge isn’t disheartening enough, Sidon inquires as to the rumors about the missing Princess, and Link finds himself biting down upon the truth. 
“Nothing yet,” Link says, vision blurring as he tries to lose focus on Sidon’s gentle, trying smile. 
Sidon’s face falls. “I see.” 
The rest of Link’s time spent in the domain passes in a hasty blur, the blues and greens of Upland Zorana and the luminous stone of the mountains and the damp purples of the subaqueous caves all smearing together. He moves through each motion as if wallowing in a dream, and somehow, after what feels like the hundredth expedition across Lanayru’s peaks, Link eventually finds himself scaling the great waterfall that opens up to usher him to the sky once more. He nearly fumbles from the billowing deluge when he catches sight of the length of a great beast migrating further south.
Wellspring Island is a most peculiar conglomerate of fractured stone. From the surface, he doesn’t give it too much thought—it’s a piece of an island chain, just like all the others he’s grown accustomed to—but when Link finds himself at the waterfall’s mouth to see Sidon already forging a path ahead, he’s overwhelmed at just how far up the archipelago extends. The sun is already bidding its farewell, its departure signaled by a swell of pink that cuts across the turquoise palette of the drifting ruins. Link follows, squinting up against its light, wet footsteps noisy as he comes up behind the Zoran prince. He notices, rather quickly, that his body has grown feather light once more, gravity nearly sapped at such an altitude, and he thinks that the experience might be something rather entertaining if not for the vile stench of muck slamming into him and the insistent grief that threatens to drown him entirely. 
Sidon is speaking again, something about the task at hand as he designates an approach to the matter, but Link misses it—he’s a little distracted, glancing about the atmosphere for a glimpse of a flaxen mane. He only nods when his companion turns his copper glance on him and flashes that charming smile, and they set to work. 
He’ll figure it out.
Link scales the ruins further, oxygen growing thinner with each new foot of altitude gained. He wonders for a moment, after he’s captured a bubble and ridden it up to a higher ledge, about what height he’d need to reach in order to slip from consciousness entirely. He wonders if he’d come to on the long way down to the surface—if he’d even notice the earth swallowing him whole. 
The ascent towards the temple drains Link of what little energy is still clinging to him as dusk makes itself known across the sky. It takes longer than he anticipates, irritation ruffling him each time he passes a column to find the mechanized eye of a soldier construct flaring up as it registers his presence. A heavy sigh falls from him when he comes across the temple’s entrance — now it can start. He notes the structure's five gargantuan faucets, like a colossal pipe organ floating in the atmosphere. There must be a fog swirling about his brain, because Link finds that the layout of the half demolished temple doesn’t register so easily in his mind. He’s thrown off by the uneven surfaces, poorly adjusted to the scope of everything. It’s hard to persevere when his body wants nothing more than to shut down. He’s grateful for Sidon’s nudging commentary to keep him on track. 
The engineer behind the Domain’s afflictions is a grotesque little creature, and Link finds himself enjoying his assault on it a little too much. It feels different now; each time he thrusts his weapon into the side of the anomaly it creates, a genesis of sludge and poison that Link is downright angry to be wasting his time with, the spearhead practically sparks with fury. They go on this way and that, the scourge catching its breath as Link navigates through the small, noxious waves that it splatters out against him, and when he watches its monstrous head scamper away across the temple’s atrium, he takes great pleasure in piercing its skin, over and over again, pinning it to the stone before its form shatters apart to leave a Secret Stone in its wake.
Link’s heard it three times already—the tale of the Imprisoning War. He hears Sidon’s ancestor speak, tries to distract himself with the way her voice rings vaguely with the darker tones of the prince’s elder sister long passed—it doesn’t work. All that he sees is Zelda, all that he hears is of her dedication to him. Link feels something tighten around his heart when he hears tell of how the Sage of Water bends the knee under Zelda’s acclaim just as all the others have. It comes as no surprise when Sidon vows to fight at his side, and Link is soon feeling that familiar surge of energy tingling through his fingers as their bond is forged. But this time, Link’s eyes are drawn to the back of his hand—to where time manipulation sits nestled right in the center of it. He’s suddenly lightheaded again, and it’s neither the sludge nor the elevation that makes it so: it’s her vow that’s been aiding him this whole time, protecting him. She’s everywhere, in everything. Her affection for him transcends time and space, her love like the stardust that’s painted the cosmos for an eternity. The thought smears his vision with fresh tears.
“Let’s head home!” Sidon’s excitement sounds distant—buzzy, as though Link’s head is submerged in the reservoir.
Link sniffles. “Nice work.” The swordsman quickly clears his throat and stretches cramping fingers, his grip still tightly clamped around his weapon and his jaw clenched. The compliment rings just hollow enough to wither Sidon’s enthusiasm down to a sliver of concern. 
“Is something troubling you, Link?” 
The swordsman finds his tongue thick with an unfamiliar venom, far too eager to dole it out to a Sidon who most certainly does not deserve it. Link may have a talent with swords and weapons and combat, but he’s learned that he’s powerless to one thing in particular—he can’t fight the way grief manipulates him, contorts every thought and ache until he no longer recognizes himself. Instead, he grits his teeth and shakes his head, glancing out across the horizon as dawn breaks against it. Sidon’s eyes soften, his usual optimism shining through the silence. 
“Don’t worry, my friend—you’ll find her! After all, is there anything you cannot achieve? And when all is said and done, we shall have a splendid dinner, the four of us. Won’t that be lovely?”
Link’s glance fixates on an antiquated slab of crushed stone, his eyes cloudy and distant as long-held dreams of their future together shatter apart. Gods, how he’d like to crumple apart up here, rest his elbows upon blue ashlar and sob into his fists—collapse just a few feet to the side, slip from the edge and let gravity finish the job.
Sidon only smiles sadly. 
*
Deep within the Tanagar Canyon, Link shares the truth with Impa. Carrying the burden all on his own has become far too difficult, and if anyone deserves to know the truth, it’s her. She might be the only one he can manage baring even a fraction of his soul to, guilt and all. When he spots the realization flickering in her dark eyes as he reveals the devastating truth, the muscles beside her eye twitching as her mind pieces everything together, it’s like there’s a knife twisting in his side. 
“Can you reach her?” Impa asks after a long moment, her voice gravelly with more than just age.
Link swallows hard, biting back tears beneath her watchful eye. At her side, Cado must notice the effort—he feigns interest on a spot of stone elsewhere.
“I...I think so,” Link finally manages. “I don’t know.” He doesn’t like the way Impa’s forehead creases in response.
“ Link !” she bursts out, breaking fully, her jaw trembling open in a silent sob. “Go be with her, boy.” She sounds wounded, as though he’s struck her. 
“I know, I…” he swipes at his face. “I have to. She…she has the sword. I have to go, but..I don’t know… I don’t know if I can do it.” 
For a moment, he thinks she might lean up to strike him. “And have you not managed difficult tasks before?” In spite of her age, the spitfire of her youth bleeds to the surface, and new tears sprout up at the corners of her eyes, hot and angry. “If this… if this is all there is for her…for you both…” she doesn’t finish the thought. Perhaps it isn’t even fully formed. Link gets the point.
In truth, part of him wishes the feelings would go—that maybe, when this is all over, he could convince Purah to restore the Shrine of Resurrection—to place him in that pool and wipe his fondest memories from him again. (Perhaps, he thinks, there's a way for her to keep them from ever coming creeping back.) The mere thought of Zelda—her golden head scintillating beneath a sun that’s wholly eclipsed by her smile, her reddened nose beneath watery Hebran sun, the gentle touch of her lips against his ear— 
Link crumbles, tears slipping from his downturned face to blot against the cold stone when they hit the rotunda’s floor, and it’s all the permission the Sheikah need to soon follow. Sobs and murmurs and soft prayers ricochet off the temple’s walls, splattering across Link’s ears to yet again remind of the cold, hard truth.
Impa, on the other hand, only allows herself a few moments of melancholy before sun-spotted hands are wiping away at her tears, and her intellect, as sharp as ever in her old age, is snapping back into shape. Determination flashes across garnet eyes, and in them Link sees hypotheticals and conjectures swirling about. He thinks his tears could start all over again; denial has claimed her much in the same way it had once done to him. He can’t be around to trace grief’s next steps again with her—he can’t be around to wither in her blind resilience. 
He takes the rest of the afternoon off at Impa’s request and seeks a moment of solace in a glade on the Salari Plain, in the small clearing where the Serenne Stable once stood. If he hadn’t known it once sat there, he would have never guessed—overgrowth has concealed all traces of its foundation, new grass shrouding the soft echoes of its base that once imprinted upon the ground.
Link lays himself supine atop the grass, and as he shoves his hands beneath his head and sighs to the heavens, he wishes he could get his mind to just stop. He’s so tired of thinking—wishes his brain would allow him a few moments of peace. Instead, thoughts wash over him in the same way the clouds roll across Hyrule skies. He finds himself drowning in the ifs and shoulds and coulds .
“What do you think about this flower—black and gold?”
“Purah can sure be a little intimidating, huh?”
“I think Paya and Tauro have feelings for one another.”
Gods, living without her is the hardest thing he’s ever had to do. Each time a new thought strikes him, it’s her bright face that pops into view. It happens with each bit of knowledge that he learns, each observation that he makes, no matter how insignificant. He knows how her brow would crease and the edges of her lips would tip up in joy or how she’d cock her head to the side in contemplation of such matters—it’s all a hopeless dream now. How long will it take for her voice to fade from his memory, he wonders? How many years will pass before he loses the tempo of her pulse against his skin, the waltz of her heart as they twine fingers in the candlelight?
Link shoots up from the ground to keep from choking on a thought: if there is a Spirit Realm in which departed souls reunite, she won’t be there to greet him. There’s nothing more for her, nothing but the darkest of sleeps as she wanders the skies for the rest of time. It’s all his fault.
He presses palms against his eyes and weeps until evening.
*
Zelda had loved Akkala in the fall. 
They’d spent the last two autumns tucked away in the northeastern crook of Hyrule. He’d surprised her with the trip both times, planned just early enough that they’d return to Necluda in time for the winter solstice. Both times were spent among the rich foliage, snuggled up beneath tentative storm clouds with cups of hot chocolate between their chilled hands. He’s carried fond memories of the region, but more tragic ones have replaced it in recent weeks. He decides, as he makes his way across the Ukuku Plains, that he will not dare to look at that wretched peninsula.
Link initially heads for Tarrey Town at Purah’s suggestion. He doesn’t even remember why she tells him to visit in the first place—but he soon wanders in, his step a little aimless, eyes glazing over a painted face upon the town’s entryway. (Something bitter has him wondering if this is a town or a cult.)
But the town is thriving, its population grown exponentially since the last time he’d passed through it. Hudson’s construction company has encroached upon the land just across the lake, a site fully built and ready for production. He’s recognized by several townsfolk including the Great Leader himself— Hudson and his wife, Rhondson, greet the traveler as an old friend, and he soon meets their daughter, the latest addition to the - son family, Mattison. He expects the child to be interested in a character such as himself with his array of weapons and shields, but what Link does not expect is becoming her keeper for the day—but he’s set to depart in just over twenty four hours, and there is not much else for him to do in the meantime, so a babysitter he becomes.
He learns that Mattison is preparing for a departure of her own—just as every Gerudo born beyond their borders, she’ll be making her pilgrimage to Gerudo Town any day now. She’s been keeping busy, threading her interest in her mother’s native tongue throughout the town; she tries to teach Link a few words, and though he already knows their meaning, he plays along. When they’re finished with her lesson, she asks him to color beside her on the balcony tucked against her bedroom. She takes her browns and her yellows and her reds and imagines the desert town—she’s not too far off, but Link won’t offer any advice on the matter; he doesn’t want to have to explain how he knows such things. She’s a bright child, with all the creativity and resilience that her parents carry between them, and when she’s finished with her art, he watches her curl up against a pillow and settle down for an afternoon nap. Link finds himself smiling when tiny snores fill the air. 
And then it feels like something inside of him is snapping in half.
He hadn’t ever said it—not explicitly, at least—that he’d hoped to someday watch his own child fall asleep in the noonday shade.  That he wanted to teach a child with wheat hair and jade eyes how to read and write, how to forage and cook and help around the house. That he wanted to see his Zelda lounging in their home, a book in one hand with the other settled atop her pregnant belly, wanted to see her eyes light up when he returned home from the market with another little one giggling upon his shoulders. Grief persists as it always does—as it always will, for as long as he breathes—but regret sidles up a little bit closer as he watches Mattison’s chest rise and fall. 
Time had slipped away much more quickly than he’d realized, but they had duties to attend to, and thoughts of marriage and children were something to be saved for a different life, one that would follow after. But he saw the way she spoke of her students, of the way she would come home in the evening and recount their silly tales and their unfiltered comments—they would ooh and ah and insist that the Princess and the Hero from her stories surely must have married at the end of the tale. He remembers the way she would blush and lower her eyes and that’s certainly an idea and—oh Gods above, how could he have never asked her?
Before the misery has a chance to swallow him whole, the sound of heels clicking against wood pokes at Link’s ears, and he turns to find Rhondson craning her head over the last few steps, a smile spreading across her lips when she finds her daughter fast asleep. She dampens her footsteps, tiptoeing across the balcony and crouching down to brush a stray lock of fiery red hair behind her daughter’s ears.
“Is she behaving?” Her whisper darts over to Link. 
“Yeah. She’s a great kid.” 
Rhondson smiles warmly.  “I think so, too.” She’s quiet for a moment while something plaintive fills her expression. “They grow so fast.” 
Link doesn’t say much, his eyes focused on the sight of Rhondson’s fingers as they work through her daughter’s hair. 
“It’s funny—we grow knowing our parents love us so very much. But it isn’t until you’ve had one of your own that you truly understand the depth of that love.” Rhondson pulls her hand away and begins to tidy up Mattison’s crafts. She huffs a whisper of a laugh and glances over at him. “You’ll know what I mean someday. Promise.”  
Rhondson means so well—but Link would give just about anything to get her to walk away.
“Can I bring you anything for lunch?” Her voice cuts through the static. 
Link shakes his head, any hint of an appetite fully extinguished by the familiar anguish of grief. 
“Alright, then. You let me know if you need anything.” She’s gone just as quickly as she’d appeared. And though she’s gone, her words continue to ring in his ears for the next half of an hour, every iteration just as trenchant as the first time she’d delivered it. 
You’ll know what I mean someday. No, he won’t know. He won’t ever know. He will never get to press a kiss to his daughter’s head, won’t ever get to comfort a small, teary boy. Zelda will never know the great, maternal love that Rhondson promises; the one she wears with such pride.
Existing, in its purest form, has never hurt so much.
When Mattison wakes from her nap, she wastes no time in zipping out to the square, missing the way Link hastily wipes at the wet corners of his eyes when she springs up from the ground. She sets out to test her neighbors’ knowledge of Gerudo vocabulary, though nobody seems to be truly as invested as she: he finds it sweet. But Link can’t think too hard about it, can’t think too hard about sweet children, smart children— of children who wish to explore the world. So he lets himself fade away a bit, in the same way he’s done over the last few weeks. 
Their day together culminates in a hot air balloon ride overlooking the eastern sea with her parents beside them. 
“Never forget that we are standing beneath the same sun.” Her mother's voice is as soft as cashmere, as delicate as lace. Link’s eyes are fixed out across the horizon, seeking out those impossible dreams that shall never come to pass. Wondering if the Light Dragon can appreciate the sun’s soft glow against its scales in the way he once did.  
“The only distance that matters is the distance between our hearts.”
His throat burns.  
They land upon the ground just as fate arrives at the town’s entrance donning glinting armor and a scimitar: Mattison’s time in Tarrey Town has come to an end. Hudson watches his daughter go, and even though she will be closer to woman than child the next time they reunite, he can take comfort in knowing that their paths will cross again someday—Link wants to share this with Hudson, wants him to see just how much fortune has smiled upon him in comparison. But he says no such things, only excuses himself and seeks out a patch of shade behind one of the houses to take several deep breaths.
Everything feels a little more muted once Mattison is carved out of the picturesque town. There is a longing that settles over it, one that carries a familiar ache—the one Link had felt when they had to leave the peaceful dream of their autumn excursions. Melancholy raining on him like blossoms off their vines, bidding him farewell with plaintive kisses as reality knocked them from their private corner of the world. He sees that same wistfulness in her parents, in her friends—he’s only a little comforted by their misery.
When Link crosses paths with Rhondson again, she greets him with a proposition: a fifty percent discount off of a new property, to be completed upon the hillside just south of the town. It isn’t until she’s tapping a finger against a roll of architectural plans than Link realizes he hasn’t returned to Hateno since discovering Zelda’s fate—he doesn’t anticipate returning to it anytime soon. He knows that he’s doomed if he goes back and rests his head upon the pillow and finds the scent of cherry blossoms still lingering there. 
He spends his hour twisted in either direction—to reject is to remain complacent in his grief. But building a new home might imply something far more worse: accepting. Progression. A new life without her, one that he doesn’t want. But when it comes down to it, Link has more rupees than he knows what to do with, so he hands them over to Rhondson and pays the property a visit. 
Grantéson waits for him on the patch of grass overlooking the sea, and even through the mist of grief, Link can tell that the purchase is a steal. They glance through a catalogue of units, Grantéson offering suggestions and pricing the solutions he comes up with. It all starts very small—a single room, a kitchen, a place to store his weapons. But as he glances through the catalogue, other units begin to catch his eye— a prayer room…a garden...a private study. 
“You big on reading?”
“Yeah.” Link lies. 
So it’s added to the plan, for no real reason other than it’s something she would want if she were still here. The plans grow and grow, and soon, Link finds himself agreeing to an outdoor dining room that seats four and a balcony across from the study that holds a small pond. Grantéson’s eyes twinkle as he looks the schematics over while Link studies the empty plot of land with a dim smile painted across his lips.
He wonders if he’ll ever return to see the final product.
*
Lookout Landing is in a state of panic when he returns to it. He catches sight of Rito warriors circling overhead as they retrieve information for the Zora emissaries contemplating matters between the settlement’s palisades. The Goron children have abandoned their sport in favor of the latest gossip that’s circulating: Princess Zelda has been spotted at the castle’s walls. 
Link’s stomach drops at the thought, and when he spots her through Purah’s telescope, he ridicules himself for the soft gasp that escapes him. Every part of him knows that it’s an imposter that’s beckoning to him, one the deserves to feel his holy blade piercing its chest, but even so, when he finally reaches her after a long and frustrating chase through Hyrule Castle’s iron limbs, he could fall to his knees when it turns those jade eyes on him. His Zelda’s voice was always so full of promise; this one holds a threat. It speaks of days past, suggestive inflections all too telling as it concocts a replenished sanctum before his very eyes. It’s an incredible facade— he has half the mind to wonder if its skin would feel just as velvet soft, if her breath would feel just as warm against his neck, if she would sigh if he touched her in certain spots. And though he knows of its deception, he can’t keep his stomach from twisting when the puppet disintegrates into tendrils of red and black, hardly even registering the venomous words that the phantom behind the ruse spits at him. 
Link’s fueled by pure rage as the spectral being divides itself, and in spite of all of the thoughts he’s had over the last few weeks he won’t allow Ganon to be the one to end him; he refuses to go by his damned hand. So Link fights as he always does, as though it’s all he’s good for. It isn’t an easy fight by any stretch of the imagination, gloom sickness working its way into his lungs and blotting his vision. 
He catches sight of the teal forms of his allies around him as they launch their own attacks, puppets in their own right. They work in a flurry, their colors swirling around the dark wine of Ganon’s creations. Gods, this would be so much easier if he had brought the Master Sword. It’s a dangerous thought to have in the middle of combat—it nearly freezes him up entirely. Not now, he thinks, narrowly avoiding a thrust from a gloom spear that surely would have decided the matter.
When it’s all over, Link and the sages (who have rather impeccable timing) reconvene atop the wooden balcony beside Purah’s quarters to assess the situation. They’re only slightly rattled, which provides Link a little more comfort than he expects it to, but they’re quickly shaking off the simmering ache of adrenaline to draw up new strategies. 
They speak of Zelda, deducing information that Link’s discovered long ago. He can feel the sharp sage of Riju’s knowing glance as it settles upon him, can’t help focusing hard on the splash of white paint underneath him, the royal crest of Hyrule lying flat beneath his boot. He clears his throat and draws his focus back as Sidon’s voice bursts with a revelation about a fifth sage. Purah assigns them each a bit of research, and though Link’s a little too numb to comment, autopilot mechanisms kick in to suggest that he’ll need to head south to Faron for his part. 
When they break formation, Link nearly jumps from his skin when he feels something wrap around his wrist; it’s Purah, her scarlet eyes determined and apprehensive.
“And you need to get that sword. Now.”
*
A deep breath out into the early morning air. Something simmers low in his body, like a firecracker preparing to burst up into the night sky, and quivering fingers tug mindlessly at the bottom of a tunic that’s been threaded together with a love of cosmic proportions.
Link has spent the last few hours on the steps of the Typhlo Ruins Skytower with his head tipped up towards the sky. As skilled as he is with his body, it’s as though he’s inhabiting it for the first time, his limbs too long and his torso screwed on a little too tightly and his stomach tucked in a perpetual somersault from the moment he’d opened his eyes. The small ache in his neck has him seeking comfort on his back, but it’s impossible for him to remain that way for long—dread quickly begins to fill him up, and he’s at risk of drowning in it completely if he doesn’t hop back up to his feet. He takes a long walk around the perimeter, eyes glancing up the clear blue of the sky every couple of steps. 
Deep breathes, in and out, in and out. 
It’s nearly an hour to midday when his pace slows and his legs deaden and his face pales. 
The Light Dragon is slowly winding across the eastern ridge, glowing as she emerges from the ivory peaks of Hebra. Link thinks he might choke on the heart lodged in his throat. 
I can’t do this , he thinks. And how can he? How can he rise to meet her as she is now, how can he come to land upon a coffin that lives and breathes? To touch her back and yearn for the architecture of her soft spine when he only comes across corrugated skin? He watches as she grows closer and closer, her speed achingly slow as she moves across the sky, as if she’s giving him a moment to gather the courage that has coursed through his veins since the moment he’d been brought into this cruel world. 
“For you.”
For him. Everything has been for him, for their people. If he does not go, it’s all been in vain. 
The spark in his step explodes beneath his feet, sending him into the tower, sending him up into the stratosphere once more as the cold air bites at his body. He doesn’t breathe at any point on the way up, and only when he’s dangling from the paraglider does he finally remember to do so. 
For Zelda. 
He’s trembling. If he’s not careful, he’ll lose his grip and land in the swamp below. Tighter. 
The first thing he takes care to notice is her eyes. Kaleidoscopic, haunting—wild and wide, hardly even registering his approach—so vastly different from the sleepy eyes that he would once press kisses against when she’d stir in the mornings. He doesn’t feel the sob bunching up behind his sternum, ready to burst as he grows closer and closer, and soon, he’s landing gently upon her nape—isn’t she always the softest of places for him? Trembling fingers move to touch her, and Link closes his eyes as he tightens his fist, buttercup fur slipping up between his fingers. 
He recognizes this.
Link lurches forward and collapses against her, burying his face into her mane. Her smile flashes against dark eyelids, and up in the skies, he sees it all so vividly: her head nuzzling up against him while he presses kisses to her neck as her gentle locks fall across his face.
A soft smile breaks through his tears. If the Light Dragon notices him, she doesn’t acknowledge his presence—there’s no mumble of approval, no shake of her head, nothing. His cries are soon bursting into hiccups, and he rubs at the back of her neck. He’s flooded with memories, everything crashing into him like waves against the great cliffs of Lanayru, image after image knocking about in his mind. Everything jumbles and blurs, and Link cannot tell where he begins and where she ends. Her smile, her laughter, her tears, her old fears long put to rest. Zelda: beside the sea, riding across the plains, at the edge of their bed with a twinkle in her eye. This aching hardness, this unbearable weight that’s pressed down so heavily on him for weeks, dislodges and parts through the cloudy thoughts
Who then, if he is set to rest in the ground, will carry that part of her legacy on? The history books will tell of her—of her good nature and her resilience and her undying devotion, but what scholar knows all of her? Her most secret desires, her gripes and her quips and her mischievous sense of humor and every other thing that cements his love for her? If he goes, that part of her follows—if he goes, how can he remember her?
No, he cannot forget her of his own accord. He refuses.
“I’m here, Zelda,” he whispers through tears, stroking her still, ashamed that he’d even once thought to try and push her love away. “I’m here. I’m so sorry.” Though he should know better, a small part of him expects her to respond. A growl, a purr. Anything. 
Atop her head, the Master Sword gleams, beckoning to him with wisps of gold and royal blue from beneath a layer of fur that’s twined around it. He hears its whispers in the same way he had a century prior, the way his soul has again and again throughout time and space. Its voice is airy and thin and soothing—familiar, threaded through his own soul. How wonderful to see you again , it sighs. Link moves towards it, and as his fingers coast along the hilt, the world goes silent. The sky looks on with bated breath.
Extracting the blade is no easy feat—Zelda buckles at the first hint of its removal, her body bending and crumpling as Link tries to tear it from her. His stomach lurches when he feels both feet lift off from beneath him, and when he anchors himself upon her, he tugs again, harder this time, guilt seeping into him when he draws blood from her. I’m sorry, I’m sorry . He grits his teeth and braces for a fall. A tremendous screech pounds against his eardrums as it fills the atmosphere, her jaw flung open and her body stiffening beneath him.
Everything goes stark white.
When Link opens his eyes again, he finds that the sky he’s spent months exploring is no longer here. Encapsulated by a celestial bronze, the air is still and silent. The fur around the blade quietly unwinds as easily as reeds bending beneath the gentle push of a stream, and Link feels something warm throbbing in his chest: she knows he’s there. She knows. Beneath the sweet glow of light, Link pulls the sword, as easily as he’s always done. He raises it to the sky, and colossally low tones vibrate up through his legs as the Light Dragon—as Zelda— hums in approval.
“And when you two next meet the Demon King…you will have my strength to help you, through her.”
Link opens his eyes, and it’s like being roused from a dream. He finds himself back in reality, in the sharp air of the South Hyrule skies. Sunlight has already faded; he’ll return to Purah in the morning. For now, he will rest. Link seeks refuge in the brilliant gold of Zelda’s mane and closes his eyes as her gentle, rolling breath trembles below him like a lullaby. He falls asleep, cheeks stained with old tears.
Beneath the dragon musk, her scent still lingers.
*
The world is safe again.
They save it, together. Link hasn’t yet come to terms with the fact that this is their last stand. He’s replaying the last few moments in his mind—Ganondorf’s draconic form disintegrating into a blaze of malice colored rays, the blood red sky yielding to the soft pink of late afternoon. And then, all goes quiet.
He knows what the legend dictates—Zelda is gone, and she won’t be coming back. And yet, Link can’t shake the image of the Light Dragon darting across the sky to reach him in his hour of need. Even as he stands in the wake of his victory, drenched in blood and dragon froth, Zelda is all he thinks about; she’s still in there, trapped, not completely erased as he’d feared. How might the Zonai have known the truth, anyhow? Perhaps they were not as all-knowing—not as godlike as they were claimed to be. And, even if they had been, who knows better of challenging the Gods than the Hero of Legend? 
He knows he ought to squash the small ribbon of hope that wraps around his heart. It only tightens. 
The Light Dragon glides along the wind unphased as though she hasn’t been snaking about the skies to aid her hero, unbeknownst to her as he may be. 
And then, just as he begins to accept that this really is the end, his hand begins to glow.
It must be a dream. A vast space of sea green. Rauru. His wife, Sonia, who Link recognizes only from the faint hues of someone else’s memory. The Light Dragon slumbering beneath them. Raised hands, a warmth that rises through his body and erupts from his fingertips. Her . One last, knowing look. Shifting clouds that are soon shattered by the sudden, violent rush of wind.
The dream is no more, and Link is falling. 
Panic slams into him when he realizes the endless sky is beneath his feet. And if that isn’t enough to stop his heart, the sight of someone familiar falling a distance below him might just be enough to. Her name rips through his throat, the air burning as it quickly fills his mouth. It only takes one sight of her before he’s crying, shifting his weight to try and match her speed. He closes the gap between him, tears flowing more evenly as he takes in the sight—her eyes gently closed, short hair billowing in the wind, arms gently outstretched as though she were napping beside the pond behind their home.
“Zelda…Zelda…” he’s whispering her name against the striking wind. A prayer. A blessing. And when he reaches her, and his skin comes to lay across her own, he begins to weep. He pulls her into his grasp, crying into her hair. “I’ve got you. I’ve got you.”  
It is a shock of landing when they hit the water, but Link pushes past it and quickly opens his eyes to find her golden locks splaying out around her. Beneath the lapping waves, he presses his lips to hers—oh Gods, he isn’t imagining this after all—and pulls her to the surface. 
When he rises from the pool, it is more than just her limp form he carries with him. It is a renaissance of warmth and light that follows in his wake, the promise of a new life together draped across his arms. Link thinks he might explode if he dares to look away from her; he catches her soft inhalations, examines the tiniest hint of color splashed across her wind-bitten nose and admires the length of eyelashes fanning out across her cheeks. And when his feet have carried him away from the murmuring water, he kneels among the forget-me-nots and gently sets her down.
He watches her, his heart low and ready to burst, and when her eyes flutter open and he finds their illustrious color sliding across him, the soft lilt of the pond behind him crescendos into something symphonic, his heartbeat percussive and his breathe reedy and and the soft whine tying his tongue like the slightest shimmer of strings trembling to life.  
Link cannot move. And Zelda, it seems, is almost as starry eyed as he is: less so, he ventures from the fact that she’s able to find some semblance of voice.
“Link? How are you…?”
There’s hardly a hint of power behind her inquiry as it trails off, and yet it strikes him like lightning puncturing a muddy haze of rose, and in the haze, every thought grows heavy on his tongue, each one far too tentative to push their way free—apologies and declarations and details of his journey and every single ache that’s riled up in him since the moment she was torn from his side. But still, nothing comes.
“I’m not still dreaming, right?” 
How many lifetimes has she spent dreaming of him, waiting for him to bring her home? Link clamps his lips down around a new swell of emotion, his face crinkling up as he fights to suppress it all. Zelda speaks again, and as she presses on, Link finds that he can’t tear his eye away from the small sight of her pulse flickering as her voice flexes its long rested muscles. 
“Oh, Link— you really did it!”
In place where words should be, soft shudders sprout, and he lowers his head to hide fresh tears. Zelda turns to face him as a familiar color returns to her face. 
“Oh, Link…I’m home!” Her voice is like something tugged up from a dream. 
Home .
He steps forward and crumbles into her, open mouthed sobs huffing against her bare shoulder.
“Oh…oh, Link…” he hears her crackling voice against him.
He pulls away to study her once more—she’s real. She’s real . 
“I thought I lost you.” He finally manages. Zelda’s face is dressed with concern—he won’t realize until much later that it’s the first time she’s seen him swept up like this, broken and yet wholly complete. Before he can say anything else, she’s pulling him back to her, catching his lips between hers, their tears melting into one another’s. “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry,” he whispers. Link runs fingers along her jaw as gently as though he were running them across porcelain. 
Zelda shakes her head. “Nothing—” she presses her lips to him again, kisses his tears away, places another one on each subtle freckle across the bridge of his nose. “You have nothing to apologize for. I prayed for a kinder day, every day. I prayed for you to find me. And here—here you are.” Her cheeks are flushed, her voice hitched and unsteady. 
Oh Goddess, how he loves this woman. 
“How are you… how—?”
“I don’t care.” She swallows hard. “I don’t care . I’m with you again. That’s enough for me. It will always be enough.” Zelda closes her eyes and leans into the glide of his fingers across her face. They wander across her jaw and across the delicate slope of her nose and up to the curve of her ear, fingers soon grasping at a gold; even knotted by pond water, it feels like bliss against his skin. He watches her hair poke up through his grip in the same way it had done over the skies of Hyrule.
“You’re real. It’s you…I can’t…” he murmurs, leaning forward to collapse his forehead against hers. Her hands come to rest around his neck as she leans back, and the burn of them against him is so familiar and so lovely and something he’d never thought he’d get to feel again that he cries, new tears staining both of their cheeks. “I thought I lost you. I thought you were gone… I thought…I…” 
Zelda’s lips part gently, and beneath wrenched brows she asks one, quiet question.
“Are you okay?”
He’s crying a little harder now, bare chest shuddering as he presses his cheek to hers. Link hears the way emotion swells up in her inquiry.
“I wasn’t, no.” Link doesn’t offer much more than that; but Zelda hears everything, verdant eyes soon glistening in the late day sunlight. She makes a soft, sympathetic sound. 
Zelda wipes at her eyes with the back of her hand. “And now?” she whispers softly, tilting his face to hers to study in the misty eyes she’d once believed she’d never see again.
“I’m so happy.” His voice breaks so crisply on the last syllable it’s hard to believe he speaks the truth. But he’s smiling, mouth twitching slightly as he controls the surge of emotion. “I won’t be able to survive losing you like that again.”
Zelda threads her fingers through his and squeezes. “You won’t lose me again. I promise.”
A novel thought crashes into the disorder of  Link’s mind. Something that he suddenly can’t hold to himself, something that will tear him in two if he cannot voice it now. 
“Marry me, Zelda. Please.” It’s unpolished. A little harsher than he hopes for it to be. He doesn’t care anymore—Hylia will have to reach in and set regret inside of him with her own hands. “I’m sorry, I don’t have a ring…but it can’t wait. I can’t wait.”
Zelda takes his hand and places a kiss upon his knuckles before she sets her chin upon them, fresh tears streaming down her cheeks. “I’ll never need a ring to be yours.” Her smile breaks through the soft sob, a kind sun poking its head through the veil of clouds after a storm. “Yes—yes, of course I’ll marry you.” 
In her face, he sees a lifetime. The dreams he’d forced himself to pave over come flooding back. He will make his vows wherever she pleases, declare his love in front of whoever she pleases— make her his wife, bring her home to Akkala. Raise a child—two, or five or ten, if she wants— and follow her to the ends of the earth. Every shattered dream is suddenly recalled, the broken parts swiftly reattaching into something even more brilliant than they had ever been. He wonders how many wonderful things he’s done in his previous lifetimes to have received such a blessing.
They’re quickly wrapped up in one another again, sinking down to the earth below them, mouths entwined and heartbeats thrashing. There will be time to talk, to parse through all that has transpired, to worship the thread that ties them together and show their gratitude at its altar. But for now, they reacquaint themselves with one another as the afternoon calms to night, bodies tangled beside the pond until the stars are twinkling high overhead. Her skin is every bit as soft and enticing as he remembers it—her love even more palpable as she whispers his name into him again and again, as though her mouth is learning its taste again. 
For perhaps the hundredth time in months, Link is left breathless. 
And the first time, in a long, long time, he doesn’t mind.
41 notes · View notes
edensrose · 1 year
Note
babyyy I'm so happy the vamp AU is out, it's so exciting!
I'd like to request a little something:
❀ character(s): Eönwë ❀ prompt(s): either (authority) or (capture), whatever you prefer~
Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media
( ❀ ) ˙ ˖ eönwë ⠀〳 hunter!reader⠀ ❜࿔
· ⊰ synopsis. after being separated from your once colleague and closest friend, you went the way of the hunter as it was your birthright. the last thing you expected was to face off the man who once held your heart — now turned vampire. and serving the very ones you fought against ( violence ៸៸ blood ៸៸ biting ៸៸ 𝒃𝒍𝒐𝒐𝒅-𝒔𝒖𝒄𝒌𝒊𝒏𝒈 ៸៸ choking ៸៸ 𝒅𝒂𝒓𝒌! 𝒆𝒐𝒏𝒘𝒆 )
· ⊰ note. anything for you darling <3 I really hope you enjoy! had so much fun with this hehe
˙ ˖ lore post ៸៸ character sheet ៸៸ masterlist
Tumblr media
“Move aside, Eönwë.’’
Hilt in hands and drawn back with the end flushed against your shoulder, your blade glistens in the shimmering silver light. You bite back a curse, to have the moon shine down on your hallowed sword was a mockery to not only you but your people. Or perhaps it was the face reflected in it that angers you more. Those once azure hues that grew dark. Those elegant features — stunning as usual, but hardened by the frost of his turn.
“I cannot.’’ 
His refusal tightens your jaw and rage spreads throughout your chest, released by a bark of laughter to the moon that he served. “And why is that? Because it is your duty to serve those demons?” You care not for the way that his grip tightened on his sword. If anything, it lit the fire in your eyes brighter. Emotions ablaze and ready to burn down anything in your path. Including an old friend. 
“I will not warn you again.’’ Taking a breath, Eönwë keeps his sword sheathed and stares you dead in the eye. Peeking from the spruce trees behind him were the towers of the palace. Dark, mighty, and proud. As though they too sought to taunt you. “If it is blood that you wish to shed I will not humour you. Turn back to the way of which you came.’’ 
He offers you barely another glance as he turns on heel. Even with his cold demeanour that felt so foreign to you, his beauty prevailed in the moonlight. His white hair perfect in every strand, his blue eyes blessed by the illuminating night. Yet it is that same icy countenance that has your lungs looping around your heart. Tightening and strangling the last sliver of hope you dared to have. 
You knew in your soul that the old Eönwë, the one who stayed up night after night alongside you to partake in stories of old — the one who smiled at you with the radiance of the sun — and the one who swore to protect you that fateful moment of daybreak. . . was long gone. He now turns from you. Walking away as though you were nothing. Abandoning you as he did on that frightful night. Beneath the same moon. 
Suddenly, the gold scars beneath your clothing felt like a mockery too. Their worth that urged you to move on diminished with his fleeting figure. A painful reminder that it mattered not what you went through, and how much you tried to make him see the light. Eönwë was long gone. What stood before you is not your old friend, nor your would-be-lover. 
What strayed before your very eyes is a demon. 
A vampire. 
And you,
Are a hunter. 
Metal cuts through the air and in your blind rage you disregard everything that was of honour within you. Attacking him whilst his back was turned; truly going back on the way of the knight that you had sworn yourself to the entirety of your life. Then again, had he not as well?
However, Eönwë was not one to trifle with. He caught your movements from the corner of his eye and in a split second his blade abandoned his sheath. The clash of two sister swords, forged under the same master and with the same material, sends a powerful gust of wind sweeping through the forest. Yet neither of your budge. Locking eyes and gripping handles. A silent reminder, and promise, that neither would back down. 
“You,’’ he breathes, brows narrowing. “Have lost all honour.’’ 
If the fire had not been lit long ago, now it raged within you. Eager to consume everything in your path — this entire damn forest if you had to. 
“Do you think I give a damn about honour!?”
The stalemate is shattered by the sheer power of your stances and beneath the twilight sky — a war of hearts commences. Gold and silver flashes spill throughout the trees. Followed by the clashing of metal. The slicing of air. Dirt sweeps from the forest floor yet neither of you pays mind. 
For every hit, he dealt two back. Swift. Unfaltering. But you could keep up. Always. For every slice, you deflect. Metal sings a song through the air. Blood paints the leaves. Still, you both dance. Swords clashing. Hearts roaring. You dash forward after a shove that left you skidding. Left, right, right, left. Your sword whistles through the air in a rhythm. And he gladly provides the accompaniment. Blocking each and every one of your deadly, rageful array of attacks. Dishing his own. Slicing your skin. As you do his. 
A symphony of silver. A cacophony of clamours. He circles and throws his feet onto a rock. Elevating his body before kicking off and bringing his blade down upon you. Unfailing, you counter. Dodge, dart, swing, strike. Crimson splatters your clothes. His as well. Yet neither of you seize. Once more your swords clash. Both of you holding stance.
“Is it worth it?” You spit. Eyes ablaze — contrasting his icy ones. “Is it worth fighting me over those demons?” 
“I could ask you the same.’’ He sneers. 
“Do not dare turn this on me.’’ You seethe. “You promised me loyalty. I vowed it to you. Yet you turned your back on me! After everything we’ve been through! You joyfully took on their fangs!’’
The whites of his widen as they gape at you. You barely managed a look of effort on his face for the entire duration of the battle. Now, he stared at you with a newfound ferocity. Despite the howling of the wind and the pounding of your heart, you still hear his fleeting whisper loud and clear. Trembling, baneful. 
“Do you think this was by choice?”
Even the breeze halted in sound. You barely heard breaths, barely decipher the slice of light until you’re fighting for your life and desperately dodging his slew of attacks. Brutal in every way. Lacking any mercy he once had for you. Still, you do not regret your words, because in your eyes it was true. Eönwë had abandoned you for the sake of vampirism. It is what you told yourself all those nights that you wept into your pillow. Reminiscing on the good old days with your fellow knight and former friend. 
Perhaps it was that swell of emotions that threw you off of your game. Your excellency in skill had depleted drastically, as did your stamina as you narrowly dodges his strikes. Slices to your skin. Heart in your hand. You double back and are sent to the ground with one last attack. Eating dirt and seeping your blood into it as you gasp for the sweetness of air. Your sword clammers to the side and you scramble to your knees. Your hand shoots out to grab the hilt — only for it to be forced into the ground by a hard boot. Wrist joints releasing a faint, yet ugly cracking sound, you suck in a breath and glance up just in time to feel the chill of his blade against your throat. The tip threatens your pulse. Taunting it with its sharpness. 
Peering down at you like the ravenous eyes of a hawk, cerulean is consumed by amber. Pupils constrict into slits and suddenly — you felt as though you would rather his cold, indifferent stare than the one of malice shining down upon you. 
“You think. . .’’ that hungry gaze trails the streaks of blood not only upon your clothes but trickling down your exposed skin. Metal is aimlessly discarded on the floor and a tight grip circles the underneath your jaw as he abruptly cranes down. “That I wanted this?”
The tremble in his voice tells you all that you needed to know. Your other hand shoots up to attack but it is ultimately weighed down by a shimmer of gold. A bangle of his magic which soon encases your second wrist as well and pulls both of them behind your back. Rendering you helpless. 
“To become one of these sickening creatures — incapable of the humanity I once cherished?”
Your voice is reduced to a series of pathetic chokes and grunts when his hand tightens around the soft flesh of your throat. Thumb bruising your jaw along with his index finger, he forces your head back to witness not only the quickening of your pulse but also the blood that drips from a wound on your temple down onto your neck.
“I would almost applaud you for your ignorance. Yet it seems that through it, you have forgotten one detail.’’ Leaning in, his cold aura brings goosebumps onto your skin. Or perhaps it was the evident loss of control in his eyes. Either way, the last thing you prepared for was the hard ground against your back. His hand sends you down, clamping on your throat to suppress any cries while his knees cage either side of you. 
“That I was your Knight Captain and General. Even now. . . did you truly think you could get away with drawing your sword on me?” 
In response to his taunt, you draw your tongue back and spit in his eye. Eönwë so much as grunts in response before his weight forces you further into the ground and his hand coerces your neck to arch. “Even now you still defy me. But not to worry,’’ Wiping his face, he cranes down until his lips meet a streak of your essence and he groans at the sweet, metallic taste of blood on his tongue after so long. 
“I will be sure to remind you of your place.’’ 
Before you can even think of protesting, pain sends your nerves into a frozen state. Your muscles feel as though they are contracting, flaring — yet the scream ripped from your throat is restricted by the choking that you suffer. His cold lips and fangs contrast the warmth of your blood rushing from the bite wound he has dealt you. With your hands still bound and crushed under the weight of your back, you can do nothing but attempt to kick your legs and wriggle your body. 
Eönwë’s free hand slips to your side. Caressing one of your ribs through your clothing with his fingers before abruptly applying pressure. A silent warning which leaves you both horrified and sends your limbs motionless. With your head limping to the side, you attempt to mask the pain. To curl your expression into one of disgust at the loud gulping ringing through your ears. Alas, the pain contorts your muscles into one of agony, and with every bite, a sharper cry forces its way past your lips. 
“Eö-Eönwë,’’ gasping, you arch your back and flush your body against his. A strange feeling swirls in your abdomen. As though his coldness brought a sense of serenity and comfort over your form. “Eönwë p-. . .please, it hurts.’’ 
Even still. He parts, admires his work with the backlight of the moon casting a shadow over his face, before finding a new spot and indulging once more. Against your skin he rumbles an order, one that you could only decipher the second time around. “Not until you admit my authority.”
Despite the absolute misery that left your vision blurry and your body convulsing in response — you bite your tongue just a bit longer. Refusing to back down. Stubborn as ever. And oh, he knew that. Which is why his next onslaught was targeted directly at your collarbone. Smearing your neck and shoulders crimson until, at last, you concede. 
“F-Forgive this foolish —’’ swallowing your pride was like downing a stone. Nevertheless, you push through. “ — one. . . it’s you, Eönwë. You are. . . superior.’’ Flicking your head to the side, you can only hope to save some semblance of face. “Please have mercy, General!”
It took a second. Maybe two. He delighted in the sweetness of your blood and wished to savour it for a moment longer. Soon he parts. With hellish stains dripping down his chin and glinting on his fangs. The tremble of his hands clutching onto your body was enough of an indicator that it took everything within him to keep from simply diving down and draining you dry. Make you bleed for him as his heart has for you. Since the day you were forced to part. Perhaps then you would be satisfied.
An angel is what you looked like. One tainted by his own instincts. Painted with that fatal crimson. Even now, you are still the most gorgeous being he has ever set his eyes on. A wounded angel, yes, but an angel no less. 
‘You have gone too far,’ a voice echoes through his internal thoughts. ‘But she will finally be yours. As she seems to want so badly.’ 
Ice encases your form, yet to you his arms were warm. Heavenly. The same hands that dealt you such agony now brought you comfort. If whiplash did not make you dizzy, then blood loss certainly would. 
And as your vision hazes out with the only thing but the glimmer of the moon being recognisable, still you hear his deep, melodious voice against your ear. “I will not let you slip from my grasp again, my dawn.’’ The tear that you shed is kissed away as you are hoisted up into his hold. He steps towards the castle, fighting back every better judgement that screamed at him to leave you be. 
“You will be mine once more.’’ 
Tumblr media
·⊰ masterlist.
·⊰ tip jar.
·⊰ get tagged for my writing. @kiatheinsomniac @m-shade @flowerchildishere @bugnug @algae-rave @qwerty-19923 @momoewn @tinkywinky27 @weird-addiction @hidden-lord-of-arda @yonjisu @doodle-pops @noldorinpainter @singleteapot @the-phantom-of-arda @floraroselaughter @wandererindreams @miriel-estelwen @cilil @asianbutnotjapanese
( ❀ ) ˙ ˖ please consider liking, reblogging and / or commenting if you enjoy my work! all feedback is greatly appreciated ♡
Tumblr media
63 notes · View notes
rggtattoos · 2 years
Photo
Tumblr media
桐生 一馬, Kiryū Kazuma 応龍 - Oryu, “Responsive Dragon” (Yinglong)
Type: Traditional
Artist: Utabori
Features: Ascending Black Oryu (Yellow/Yinglong "Responsive Dragon") holding a Pearl with Sanskrit for Dainichi Nyorai/ Vairocana (the Buddhist guardian of the year of the monkey- 1968. Kiryu’s birthday.)
Oryu - Depictions of dragons in Japan are greatly influenced by the Chinese dragon, though Japan does have its own native dragon myths. While in China dragons are primarily associated with the element of wood, in Japan dragons are also associated with water and rain. Japanese myth tells of a coral Dragon Palace in the ocean. Eastern dragons are powerful and fearsome, but mostly benevolent creatures known to protect temples and help and reward virtuous people. One of the 4 Guardians of Kyoto is the Azure Dragon, who protects the east. (The others are The White Tiger to the west, Black Turtle to the north, and Vermillion Bird to the south)  
"Oryu" is the Japanese name for the Chinese "Responsive Dragon" or "Yinglong." It is a rain deity, and lends its power to The Emperor, in one case pointing out where channels should be dug to divert flood water.
Black -  Black is associated with death in Japan, but is also used in formal settings like weddings and is considered a masculine color. Black dragons are associated with experience and wisdom.
Pearl - Eastern Dragons are often depicted carrying a pearl, sometimes clutched in its claws or beneath the neck. While the exact origin of the pearl is unknown, it has come to represent the dragon’s authority, the moon, the sun, and control of water.
In Buddhism the years are assigned guardian deities, with the year of the Sheep and the Monkey being overseen by Dainichi Buddha (known as Vairocana in India) Dainichi is called the “Cosmic Buddha” and represents the center, light and the sun.
(Being born in 1968, Kiryu is an Earth Monkey, who are characterized as being intelligent, frank, optimistic, fearless and lovers of practical jokes.)
Flames - Passion, Energy, desire, movement
196 notes · View notes
legolasbadass · 2 years
Text
Undercurrents
Tumblr media
Armitage Summer Splash - Prompt #29 
Trope: Vacation/holiday
Quote: “I never thought we would find a way to each other.”
Relationship: Thorin x reader
Rating: T
Warnings: Light angst (I promise it’s nothing! This is an otherwise very fluffy fic)
A/N: LB writing about forbidden love again? Who would have thought!
Thank you to @lathalea and @fizzyxcustard for organizing this event! Here is a summer splash for the Armitage Summer Splash 🤣 (I stole this pun from @lathalea, as well as the title lol)
You dismounted your pony just after dark, when the lavender sky had nearly faded to gray, submerging you in the peaceful silence of the warm summer night. All around you, the forest was strangely quiet, in spite of the racket made by trees, frogs and water. You were beginning to worry you had somehow gotten lost—or that he would not come at all—when, as though out of a dream, the distant echo of branches cracking under hooves reached your ears. A smile floated to your lips, and a few moments later, your lover’s familiar frame emerged from the thicket, breathtakingly regal even in his worn travelling clothes.
When you told him of your worries as he dismounted his pony, a soft smirk graced his bearded face. “I am afraid I may have gotten lost,” he responded in that deep, rumbling voice that never failed to make your whole body melt. “I hope you have not been waiting for me too long, amrâlimê.” 
A blush smeared your cheeks at the intimate word which you were still not used to hearing from those tempting lips. “No, not long,” you reassured him. Then, more shyly, you took a step toward him, the smell of pine and leather and musk that was uniquely his surrounding you, and said, “Though for a moment, I worried that you would not come—that someone had discovered our plan and stopped you from leaving your Halls.” 
In response, Thorin closed the space between you and brought his large, calloused hands to cradle your face. 
“I thought—I thought we would never find a way to each other,” you admitted past the sudden tightness in your throat. 
You noticed guilt brewing behind Thorin’s intense azure gaze, but he gave you no time to speak as he leaned his forehead against yours and spoke words that made your heart swell tenfold. “We will always find a way to each other.” 
You shared a soft, languid kiss beneath the moon, quite content to remain in this embrace until the end of time, but after a while, you could not help but speak the words Thorin hated to hear, but which you knew you could not ignore. 
“My father will not change his mind. He would rather die than see his only daughter wed a poor, exiled king,” you spoke bitterly, using your father’s words which you despised so. Thorin might be poor and half a world away from his kingdom, but he was still the greatest leader to have walked this earth since Durin himself, and beyond that, you loved each other more than anything, and that should have been all that mattered. 
“Even if it takes years, I will never give up,” Thorin said adamantly. “I am certain there must be something I can do or offer him in return that will make him change his mind.” 
I will never consent to this union unless Lord Thorin reclaims Erebor. 
For months now, your father had tortured you with these words, and whenever he asked you what Thorin thought of this proposition, you would find any excuse to change the subject, because how could you ever say such a thing to Thorin? You knew what his reaction would be. He would leave straight away, regardless of the danger, and you could not risk his life even for the prospect of becoming his wife. It was torture to pretend like you meant nothing to each other in public and wait weeks, even months sometimes, to spend a few moments together. But that torture would be nothing compared to the agony of living in a world without him, you were sure of it. 
As though aware of how dark your thoughts had turned, Thorin pressed his lips against yours in another tender kiss, then said, “Let us put all that aside for the moment. We escaped Ered Luin to enjoy ourselves, did we not?” 
The playful smirk that accompanied those words made you blush and chuckle. Then, in what you hoped was a seductive voice, you leaned in to whisper in his ear, “I can hear water—there must be a stream nearby.” 
“That sounds like a wonderful idea,” Thorin concurred. “It has been far too long since I have seen you naked, bunnelê.” 
“Thorin!” You exclaimed and slapped his arm, even though your whole body grew warm instantly, and you could not deny that it had been far too long since you had seen him naked, nor that you had experienced the most scandalous and deprived dreams in your prolonged separation. 
It did not take you long to find the stream. It ran through a clearing, its calm surface reflecting the starry sky and the bright full moon. The rocks on the side were still warm from the sun, and as you stepped over them and reached out toward the water, you realized with a smile that the water was just pleasantly warm.
When you turned back around to face Thorin, it was with a soft smirk as you reached for the laces of your coat. His eyes darkened considerably as he took in your every move, and when at last you freed your body from the fabric of your undergarments, exposing your curves to the silver light of the moon and Thorin’s starved gaze, he let out a low growl that made your whole body sigh with need. Heat tightened your belly, but it was the tender words Thorin whispered that brought a smile to your lips as you undressed him with careful but eager hands. 
Oh, yes, it had been far too long indeed since you had rested your eyes upon your lover’s magnificent body. From his broad, powerful chest to the slim taper of his waist and his thick, muscled thighs, Thorin’s body was the body of a warrior. And yet, it aroused in you the most tender thoughts and the desire to kiss every inch of him—to be held and loved by him until the end of time. With gentle fingers, you reached out to him, the coarse hairs on his chest equally arousing and reassuring as you caressed him, revelling in the sensations you had been deprived of far too long.  Your fingers skimmed over a scar he had suffered at Azanulbizar, and the sight of it propelled you to throw yourself into his arms. Every scar was a reminder you could have lost him, but they were also a reminder of how precious moments like these with him were, and you wordlessly thanked Mahal for this night and your lover. Your Thorin. 
You shared a myriad of tender kisses before you led him into the water. It was cold for only the slightest moment before you acclimatized to the temperature, Thorin’s strong body against yours warming you instantly. Once you had fully submerged yourself and felt refreshed, you wrapped your arms around Thorin’s neck. His wet hair stuck to his head, water rivulets dripping from the ends to stream down the valley of his chest, and when you reached out to kiss him once more, his damp beard against yours made you shiver. When you were both breathless, you pulled away, though you remained in your tight embrace as Thorin leaned his forehead against yours, his cerulean eyes even more heavenly than the starry sky above you. 
“We should come here more often,” he said, one of his large hands moving upwards from your back to caress your hair. 
“You will have to help me come up with new excuses for my absences, then. I am running out of ideas,” you admitted, pressing a chaste kiss onto his lips. “Where did you say you were off to this time?” 
“I told everyone I was going hunting,” he said, “though I doubt they will be pleased when they see that I have caught nothing but a beautiful dwarrowdam.” 
You raised your eyebrows, trying your best not to laugh. 
“That sounded better in my head,” Thorin said in response to your expression, causing you to chuckle. “I am afraid you make me lose my head, amrâlimê.”
“Then I am gladly at fault,” you replied with a soft smile before claiming his lips once more, and there was no more talking for a long while as you gave in to your longing and passion, the forest and the moon the only witnesses to your love.
Khuzdul translations:
Amrâlimê: My Love
Bunnelê: My treasure of all treasures
Taglist: @lathalea @linasofia @mcchiberry @fizzyxcustard @bitter-sweet-farmgirl @i-did-not-mean-to @xxbyimm @middleearthpixie @enchantzz @myselfandfantasy @notlostgnome 
Let me know if you’d like to be added to my taglist!💙
185 notes · View notes
a03heralding · 5 months
Text
Unbound
Tumblr media
★ Please note that this piece of writing contains spoilers for the second act of the game! ★Read under the cut for more :)
★Prompt: A moment with Shadowheart after deserting Shar ★Characters: Shadowheart. Other Characters are only mentioned in this piece ★Tags: SFW, slight angst ★This is just a short draft I wrote a few days ago and likely won't be expanding on. ★Enjoy :)
It's a little past midnight when Shadowheart breaks away from the camp. 
With her bedroll neatly tucked and footfall light, she doesn’t dare glance back at her slumbering companions. She notes how the smoldering campfire illuminates the crease in Lae’zel’s brow, how the embers pop and fall so closely to Karlach’s face she questions if the woman attracts flame, and how Halsin’s bare feet are set solidly against the soil even as he slumbers.
She moves beneath the guise of darkness, the realm that she’s outcast from; just as she has deserted Shar, Shar has in turn deserted her. The cool breeze bites her exposed skin, the long loss of the memories she once cherished now a weighted stone of regret nestled deep within her gut. She knows that one of her comrades, her fellow disciples, or perhaps even a lover long forgotten will emerge from the shadow, gifted by the cover of night and press a blade to the delicate skin of her throat. Penance for her unfaithfulness, penance for her weakness. 
Her feet are bare, enduring how the thickets tempt her skin to crawl and the pebbles jut into her soles. Even when she’s greeted by the shallows of the Chionthar and a chill lances through her body sprawling up her legs into her torso, her feet do not cease their undying march. Shadowheart’s breathlessness isn’t from the way the frosty water nips at her skin and tugs at her clothes, nor is it from the great rippling ships that pass through the night meters away from her. 
It’s the moon that sits expectantly above her. It gazes down at her and weeps its diamante tears into the black of the sky, casting its own visage onto the once azure waters of the river. She feels bare beneath its stare, not even her submerged lower waist and legs safe from the brilliant white beam Selûne skunk stripes through the water and the subsequent land beyond. Shadowheart feels the urge to say something, perhaps to solidify her abandonment of the tyrant that plucked her away from her parents and cast her long lost memories away from her. 
Though when she goes to speak her tongue lies flat in her mouth, her lips uselessly opening and closing as if she’s suddenly choking on the stone in her throat that she struggles to swallow around. 
Instead, Shadowheart weeps. She weeps for her sudden loss of direction in her life, the loss of her once cherished memories. She weeps for the sorrow her parents must have felt when she didn’t return from the forest. Then she weeps for Lae’zel, hunted and scorned by those who she once fought alongside and entrusted with her life. Then for Karlach, who doesn’t want to die but cannot live a life free and worth living. Then for each and every one of the band of merry folk waiting for her back at camp, all deserters in their own right, all wishing for a better life than the ones they’ve managed to slip away from.
Hot tears born of frustration and nurtured by both fear and anguish embark on a scalding path down the cleric’s pallid cheeks and hang suspended on her jawline. Each tear evokes the water around her to ripple, and Selûne's visage to shimmer. 
When she glances up her chest feels raw, and her eyes tender. Where Shar delights in her anguish, Selûne pities her. The water encompassing her waist becomes bearable, and the breeze dissipates in the night’s eerie silence. A gentle hand caresses her wet jaw, beckoning her to gaze upon her reflection, to see what her decisions have wrought. 
it's Selûne who guides her, encourages her to glance up at the white wisps that seep through the roots of her hair. It’s with a stuttering gasp and a glassy disbelieving stare that Shadowheart realizes that the moonlight goddess seeks to cleanse her, ready to take her into her open arms and embrace her with her blessing. And so she stoops to the water, head tilted and framed by the thickets coating the bank, her fingers combing through her silken hair as she wades further and lets the chill envelope her scalp. 
Shar leaves her just as the black in her hair does, the inkiness once inhibiting her locks slipping out into the ever black reflected in the water never to be seen again. She doesn’t need to speak; her ashen hair that crowns the top of her head and scales from the tips of her hair conveys what she tries to voice. And, for the first time in her sentient life, Shadowheart is unbound.
16 notes · View notes
zaynyapsworld · 1 month
Text
🦋 Fly and be free 🦋
In a garden of shadows,
where silence reigns,
Dances a blue butterfly,
bound by chains.
Its wings, a canvas of azure delight,
Yearn for the day they'll embrace the light.
Trapped in a cage,
yet its spirit unbroken,
Each flutter a plea,
each motion a token.
Through bars of despair,
it dreams to soar high,
To paint the vast sky with hues of the sky.
In the stillness of night,
it whispers its plea,
To the moon and the stars,
to set it free.
For deep in its heart,
a longing resides,
To roam the wild winds,
where freedom abides.
Oh, blue butterfly,
your beauty untamed,
Your essence imprisoned,
yet never maimed.
May the winds of tomorrow carry you far,
And release you from chains,
beneath moon and star.
3 notes · View notes
that-wasnt-so-bad · 1 year
Text
Chasing Daybreak LVI (Dimitri x OC ‐ Azure Moon)
Pairing: Dimitri x Easwith       Summary: Easwith Holdfréond is a childhood friend of Dimitri’s. The Tragedy of Duscur nearly took him from her, and it’s just her luck that she realises her feelings for him go far deeper than friendship during their time at the Academy. That’s what her blushes tell her when he compliments her, or when anyone mentions her staring at him for a moment too long. And when he’s not around, she feels sullen. Is it a fleeting fancy? Or are her feelings as true as her surname suggests? Does Dimitri feel the same? If he does, will it last? Or does his lust for vengeance stand in their way? Could he ever see her as more than a friend? Did he ever care at all?
(An Azure Moon/Blue Lion Route fic with my OC)
Genre: Multiple       Genre of the chapter Angstish, nothing crazy. Fluff with comfort, some emotion going around. Warnings: N/A to my recollection.
Chapters: Prologue
Act 1 -Chapter 1,Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6, Chapter 7, Chapter 8, Chapter 9, Chapter 10, Chapter 11, Chapter 12, Chapter 13, Chapter 14, Chapter 15, Chapter 16. Chapter 17, Chapter 18, Chapter 19, Chapter 20, Chapter 21, Chapter 22, Chapter 23, Chapter 24, Chapter 25,Chapter 26, Chapter 27, Chapter 28, Chapter 29, Chapter 30, Chapter 31
Act 2 - Chapter 32, Chapter 33, Chapter 34, Chapter 35, Chapter 36, Chapter 37, Chapter 38, Chapter 39, Chapter 40, Chapter 41, Chapter 42, Chapter 43, Chapter 44, Chapter 45, Chapter 46, Chapter 47, Chapter 48, Chapter 49, Chapter 50,Chapter 51, Chapter 52, Chapter 53, Chapter 54, Chapter 55, Chapter 56 Words: 5, 498 Three Houses/Three Hopes Masterpost: here AO3: here
A/N: Comments and reblogs are most welcome and greatly appreciated! Thank you for reading and I hope you enjoy :) I always read the tags but it’s difficult to reply to them. Any support is greatly appreciated, even if it’s a message in my DMs or my inbox :3  Tagging: If anyone wants to be tagged let me know! :3
14th Verdant Rain Moon
Grey-blue irises scanned the piece of paper in their owner's right hand. The ink of royal blue was in her mother’s hand, a rushed but legible cursive as if she did not wish to spend a second longer on the names upon the page than necessary.
The worst of them, written so forcefully the paper was dented and left its imprints in five pages beneath, and full stops put between the name to make a point was Rufus. Thierry. Blaiddyd.
The ex arranged courtee of her mother. Only for money. Only for power.
And, despite the numb pain of betrayal that sought to grow in her chest, it was unsurprising. After all, to her family, the man was never entirely innocent. Especially not with how he treated Dimitri. There was clearly no care. Not the same Rufus her grandfather and father knew many aeons ago.
A chest that looked so irrelevant to a noble had contained them, found by a member of Eadel staff. Large, evidently, did not mean the largest as many had thought.
“Ea,” the bed beside her lightly squeaked as bedclothes shuffled, “you’ve not put down the paper since you got here…”
“Hm…” Easwith was half slouched in one chair to relax the small of her back, her legs outstretched (bootless) on another chair with a thick cushion upon it. “I’m sorry, Alexander.” She set down the paper. “Simply something Mother wanted me to see.”
The now adult tilted his head. “What is it?”
“Her own investigation into the tragedy: documents from the western lords’ castles, report, letters, signatures, so one, so forth.” As she looked at her brother, his eyes went wide as if it was more surprising than the soft fluff that had begun to come in upon his face. “I was just looking at the names she had collected of perpetrators she had brought to light.”
“Any surprises?”
“Not one. Not to me.” Her voice was quiet. Eyes downcast. Hair slightly hiding her gaze. “But there is one that if Dimitri knew… I fear it would break him.”
“Then, how do you take down this name?” Easwith stopped her brother from sitting up at his wince. “Surely you would have to do so sneakily?”
“The man in question is already dead.” Her quiet sorrow turned to mild anger. “And Dimitri was framed for it.”
Once more, green eyes widened. Accompanied, this time, by a hitch of breath and the mouth of a name she hated more than she ever had done before: Rufus. “In what capacity? Do you know? Did she find out?”
“No idea. Nor do I wish to. I would assume he wasn’t there, but he gained a lot of power and, unfortunately, control over Dimitri as a ‘guardian’.” A scoff. “He had so many opportunities to wipe out the crested section of his family, yet he didn’t… why?”
“Maybe…” Alexander sighed. Had reaching for the crumbly, smoked cheddar of Holdfréond territory, “Maybe there was some of the kind, loving man in him left that Grandfather spoke of? From before he realised he was never going to be King?”
“Perhaps.” Even so, as much as she wished it to be true, with how he treated Dimitri? How he treated anyone that liked his nephew? She doubted it. “As much as I hate to admit it, he was smart. Maybe he regretted being part of it and kept Dimitri alive to never forget? Maybe he sensed Cornelia was up to something at least shady…”
“He was paranoid, right? More so than usual after his fall out with Lord Lonato?”
Easwih nodded. “And possibly superstitious.”
“Maybe he grew paranoid of Cornelia and kept Dimitri alive as a backup?”
“Or, following that line, he caught wind of a plan for Fearghus to be ruled by the Empire.” She leaned forward and set her feet on the floor. “When you’ve practically sold our soul for a seat, you aren’t going to give it up. Useless and abusive he may have been, but he was a proud Fearghun. He wouldn’t have given the country up. Hell, he probably would have started a civil war if any Fearghun wanted to progress to peace like Lambert did. He would have started a war against Dimitri to keep the nation how he saw it.”
“So…” Alexander sighed. “What are you going to do?”
“Aunt’’s religious, still, isn’t she?” A nod. “Do you know if she’s going to be here?” 
“I think she’s due in the hour.” A perplexed raise of sandy brows. “Why?”
“Ask her to pray for me to find the courage to tell Dimitri. He will find out one day, and I’d sooner he found out from me.” She returned her gaze to her lap. “I have sat on my hands too long by keeping secrets through fear, and it went peep tong anyway. I have no excuse to not tell him, and if I tell him today now I’ve found out… well, maybe it’ll go smoother.”
“You would have to choose your timing right.”
“Naturally…” “Ea,”  Alexander slotted his hand on her shoulder, “I know you’re not afraid of possible consequences to this now, but… if it all goes wrong… I’m afraid you’ll be the first person he’ll hurt.”
Her shoulders lowered, relaxed, and her smile was one of care. “Hey, I’ll be alright.” Easwith clasped his hand. “I promise.”
His left hand reached for her and he closed all but his pinky into a fist. With an unfaltering smile, she hooked her pinky around her brother’s. “I suppose you should start to get ready for the interrogation…”
“Yeah…”
“Don’t put on anything to impress, Mitri. Strike fear into the prisoner.” Whilst her eyes widened, Alexander looked far more serious than anyone else she had known. “Let them know that if they would sooner be tried by you, they would not be given any ounce of forgiveness for their crimes.” His hand tightened on her shoulder. “Let them see The Herald of Justice.”
“I am not the one giving out the punishment, Alexander. I abide by the punishment Dimitri will wish to give.”
“And should he choose forgiveness of those that killed Dad?”
“Then that is his prerogative. It is not up to me to change his mind. If he wishes to forgive, I will allow him that.”
________________________
Gauntlets were off temporarily, kept beneath Easwith’s arm, in the silence of the corridor. Her fingers massaged her palms nonchalantly. 
Rain was all that could be heard upon the windows and corridor roof. Verdant Rain had come in full force, bringing with it the slight chill in the air only felt when storms came in. A chill found bone yet kept skin and muscle free of its clinging ways.
With the exception of her courting dagger, kept safe and secure whilst being obviously held dear, she had no weapon upon her. No sword or bow, no quiver or fighting dagger. A preventive measure. She could not threaten anyone with a blade to their neck if she did not have one.
“Dimitri asked you to join?”
Easwith looked up just as casually at Byleth’s approach, Gilbert beside her. She bowed to the eldest and nodded to the youngest. “Indeed.”
“I have no doubt it will not be easy…”
“Certainly.” She sighed at Gilbert’s observation regardless of the accuracy. “But easier for me than him. As such, and per his personal request, I shall be there for moral support.”
She caught a small smile from the ex-professor. “Have you always been moral support?”
“For longer than I dare remember, and in multiple different ways, Professor.” Easwith was very nearly startled at Dimitri’s hand upon the small of her back, kind but clearly nervous by the way his thumb circled gently upon her skin through a small section of exposed tunic.
“Mitri…”
“It’s true, Beloved.” His smile was half wry, half forced. “I shouldn’t have asked on so many occasions…”
“They were off my own back, love.” “Would you have gone to those balls and formal events if I had not asked you to be my partner?”
“You’re forgetting no one else had any interest in knowing me aside from getting on my nerves.” Easwith sighed quietly. She raised her right hand, fingers loosely curled to trace up his left jawline, and brushed aside his fringe. “You know that if I had no interest in going, I would have told you so.”
“I know, Swith. Even so…” his words faded, replaced by a wry smile and partly disguised by the tenderness of his hands taking hers. Thumbs grazed her knuckles and his gaze met hers entirely. “I am grateful you are here.”
“And I’m thankful you still ask for me in such moments.”
There was a moment of quiet. A smile that turned downward. A shy glint in the eye that became sincere despite a nervous look down at her hands, scarred and scratched as they had become over the years. “What happened at Duscur didn’t just take from me, Felix and Ingrid… it took away from you, as well. I know you feel that when we talk about the losses, your family feel wrongly forgotten. Yet you lost half of your family to it. Your input in this is just as vital, if not more so, than others would allow.”
Her brows furrowed. As much as she wanted to speak. As much as she wanted to question… She did not believe herself the correct person to open their mouth. “I do not think I am the right choice… All these years of my family’s losses being… well, not even a thought…”
“Not to me.” Her hands were easily enveloped by his palms. “Never to me. Lord Edward was more like an Uncle than man ever was. He is as deserving of justice as everyone that died that day. I owe him at least this much.”
“You owe him nothing. He was happy with your survival being justice enough. He wanted you to smile wide again. That was all.” She pursed the right side of her lip in thought. She hated it. Hated him thinking he owed the dead lifelong suffering.  Hated how that moment changed innocent words into twisted vengeance for so many years… 
She hated the surprise that had taken Dimitri’s expression away from anxiety for asking. Why should he be surprised over a man, with his dying breath, wishing him to find joy? And not just any man… But one who knew the pain and torment of surviving where no other did.
“If you think I have a part to play, then I shall play it, Dimitri. And play it well.“
_______________________
“I cannot overlook your reckless remarks.” Eswith would have flinched at Dimitri’s tone if she were on the other side of his words. “Are you really so keen to lose your head?”
Despite her straight back and hands tightly clasped low in front of her, her left hand twitched t rest on a pommel that was not there. Her expression was hard as stone –
Strike fear in his heart. Make him see you are not the one he’ll wish to be tried by. 
– And cold as granite.
Even so, her palms clammed. Her breaths were deep. Controlled. Measured. A breathing exercise forced upon her to settle her uncomfortably palpitating heart as best she could.
“I only did what I believed was right.” The fingers of her right hand curled into her palm, her left fingers into the side of her right at the man’s words. If it wasn’t for her gauntlets, her nails would have left crescent moons upon her skin. “I swear to the Goddess, I am not lying.”
Her eyes had never been so narrow. Her face had never looked so cold. The air around her at never been so chilled, like frost clinging to glass windows. Her voice, however, was as controlled as ever. Her anger held close and tight to her chest, waiting a moment to strike like adders waiting for their prey.
“On what grounds do you suppose butchering innocents of both Fearghus and Duscur which, may I remind you, led to the near annihilation of the Duscurian people you and your superiors blamed despite lack of evidence, and causing a thirteen-year-old boy life-changing and destroying trauma ‘right’?”
“The west was long ignored by the king.” She scoffed through her nose and folded her arms at such a lame excuse. “Our voices were ignored.”
“Your voices were only spouting of war, the very thing killing ou people.” 
With the swiftness, Easwith responded, and the way her fingers dug into the bends of her elbow, the once controlled voice held barely restrained anger. No different to the tone she took with Dimitri when he thought only of spilling blood. And the Prisinor was brave enough to look at her for a second as her gaze, sharper than a bramble thorn and as barbed as her arrows, buried itself like snake fangs.  
She did not stop.
“When Fhirdiad had Plague, you had none thanks to the Capital’s lockdown protecting the rest of the populace. The East had raids set upon them when you had none. When the East and Centre were forced into a war with Sreng, you had nothing. When the East was struggling, you were just fine. A King’s job is not to mollycoddle you on how to lead your regions and your lord would have known that. Whilst he was guarding the West against the East’s mayhem, where were you to lend aid? Where were your leaders but dining on wine rather than listening to their people?”
She straightened entirely. Her arms lowered. “Do not pass the blame onto another to cover your arses and to make the bloodiest single event in Fearghun History the fault of a King. King Lambert’s focus did not need to be on you entirely, yet the moment he decided was not the way forward the only focus he had on you was gone. War was all you in the West ever cared for.”
Byleth grasped Easwith’s shoulder to stop her from taking any step forward. Not that it helped to mitigate any fury at the obsolete of petty reasonings. “What were you ordered to do?”
The prisoner took a breath. “We were told to stay away from Lady Patricia’s carriage…”
“So kill Lambert and Dimitri, kill everyone else involved in seeking peace, and let her flee the scene?  How suspect.”
“Was Lady Patricia behind the attack?”
“What? Of course not!” Dimitri was quick to act with offence at Byleth’s notion. “Why would she..,”
Easwith’s hand reaching out in front of him and resting upon his chest stopped him from moving, but it was the anger in her voice that silenced him. “Prisoner, answer the question.” Silence. “Answer it! Was she one of the masterminds behind the regicide and the resulting ethnic cleansing of Duscur!?”
He did not speak. He recoiled.
“We’ll find out the truth eventually, you know this…”
There was a knock on the door. Dimitri gave the order for the entry of the person.
“Your Ladyship.” Askwith came in swiftly, passing a letter to Easwith. “We found this in his satchel. I thought its information would be of service.”
“Thank you, Askwith.”
With a bow, she was gone and Easwith stepped away and to the window to read the words on the page. The handwriting was familiar, like her mother’s but neater. Uncle Harold’s perhaps? 
It was hard to focus on the words at first, consistently knocked from concentration by the continuing interrogation: words stating Lambert wishing and working towards peace as radical as if causing a massacre was not. Statements claiming slaughter was justice. Words that only fueled her reawakened rage no matter how much she tried to contain in, unhelped by the odd rising of voices, especially of Dimitri, that made her fingers shake.
Eventually, on the third scan of the letter, words sunk in and the ache from tensing her face into a deep-set frown of anger turned to an ache of sorrow so sudden it felt as horrific as a knot tightening in her gut and air so poisoned from the previous fury 
I know what you did at Duscur. I know the blood that stains you. I know your crime. You can no longer play innocent with me, Tobias.
You killed them. You killed my sons. You killed my sisters.
I know your blade nearly killed King Dimitri back when he was barely a teen Prince. I know you caused that blow. I know you caused one of the wounds that led to my brother-in-law’s death. I know you rendered Lambert useless by taking out his thighs so he could not fight back. I know you played a part in destroying Fearghus.
I know you are a betrayer.
I no longer know you as anyone that adores our homeland, but as a scab that marrs its existence like scorched soil after a fire. 
Pray that I do not find you before the new King does, old friend. For my life is gone because of you. And my niece and nephews cry for vengeance like banshees cry when another good soul dies for your crimes.
L.E.
“Tell me, Tobias,” she could not help the venom in which she spoke his name with the letter clasped firmly in her hand and her glare was illuminated by the lightning flash that cast its cascade of white through the window, “did you, or did you not, strike King Lambert that day to purposefully hinder him?”
Quiet. Yet she knew that behind the panic, there was fear.
“Did you, or did you not, kill any of the Ellen family that was present that day?” A swallow at the distant rumble of thunder. Her fingers curled slowly with effort as she tried to starve her bubbling anger. “Did you, or did you not, land a blow upon Lord Edward Ælfreð Holdfréond on the thirteenth day of Horsebow Moon eleven–seventy–six?” Another moment of silence. “Come on, the answers are simple considering you, an apparent old friend of Lord Luke Ellen, would have known their faces. They’re yes or no questions.”
A mumble.
“Yes or no!” The echo of her voice off stone walls caught her off guard, just as it did to all in the room, so used to her keeping a tether in rage and grief. So used to quiet and shy first impressions. Her fist had fallen upon a table just as audibly. Her hand throbbed. Hard. Like she could feel the blood rushing. A chance of a bruise she did not care enough about it to step back.
But the answer was quickly given.
“Yes.”
Finally… there was the face of someone that had led to such tragedy. One of many. 
“You took more lives that day than you know…” Even so, she returned to a tone so thought out and even it would induce fear into anyone. “Ou destroyed families, orphaned children, forced some of them into lives of crime to put food on the table, and all these years… your ilk blamed the Duscurian people. All these years, you and all that had a part to play made Fearghus so easy for the Empire to take…you are as much to blame for the nation’s near assimilation into the Empire that every family fought t be free of for so long. Would you have done those things if you knew this would happen?”
“I would have done what my lord would want of me.”
“I’m asking you not some selfish prick that holds no remorse for massacres.”
“We did what we thought was best.”
“And Fearghus fell apart in weeks after Lambert spent years trying to fix it. Fearghus’ demise in on you and all who participated in that massacre.” Her venom returned. “I suggest that if you believe in Sothis, pray that King Dimitri does not consider your murder of my maternal family a crime for my family to punish. And pray hard. I will not be so merciful.”
Easwith was swift to turn on her heel for the window, breath being caught but not quite staying, like her throat was closing up to a certain point.
Her hand was quick upon the sill of the window. The colour drained from her face. Nausea swept over her in a feverish sweat. Her hand unclasped the window and swung it open.
The wind was cool; the stone a welcome respite upon her skin. Cold. Soothing. Unlike the weakness of her legs. Unlike the burning of her eyes and as stared at the prisoner being ushered away as if sentencing was yet to be decided.
As if he was deserving of any kindness, 
“Easwith, are you alright?”
She nodded at the Professor’s question. Slow but sincere. “Yes.”
“Beloved…” Caring hands tucked hair behind her ear. “You’re white as a ghost…” He swallowed as if even uttering the words caused Dimitri pain. “Are you alright? Have you eaten? Drank anything?”
“Shakey is all.” She cast him a tight smile that fell swiftly and passed him the now crumpled letter that his eye scanned. “I looked into the eyes of someone that could have wiped out my family if we all went. Someone that cut you down without thought… One of the people that changed us into killers, because we wouldn’t be in this damn war if they never decided on the massacre to get their way…”
Despite the mirth in her words, she shook her head and found comfort in the sound of the rain and the scent of petrichor. His hand rested on hers, thumb kind and gentle. He discarded the letter into the satchel at his hip to be there for her in his entirity. Easwith allowed herself to collapse as ceremoniously as she could on weak limbs, head resting on the stone sill, and she rested her forehead against his wrist.
She cared not for the shame that coursed her veins like mild poison. 
She did not care if he saw her as a weakling. She couldn’t care less if any of them did.
If they cared so much… Their eyes would not be filled with pity at her inability to stand under the weight that had landed upon her shoulders, as sudden as a tidal wave.
“My limbs are weak, Miri. And I promised my brother I would be a sight to fear.” She exhaled through her nose, a long sigh of humiliation and disappointment. “I know this feeling will pass, but if I am to react to shock in this way every time, then surely it is best to be rid of me for someone stronger…”
“Do not speak of such nonsense.” Dimitri’s knees touched the floor. She bent her knees and pulled them into herself to allow him space to manoeuvre into a more comfortable position. Not that he decided to do so in favour of holding her face, gentler than a petal caught in the slightest wind.
“But historically, it’s true. Whenever a monarch or their spouse has been just a touch too weak in any scenario, this goes for lords and ladies also, the people they lead lose respect. They turn against them, and whom they married… If they think you are not worthy because you are soft-hearted, they would see me exiled for being softer than downy feathers.”
“Beloved,” his thumbs moved from the sides of her nose and traced her dark circles. The orbital bones were so close to her eye that his long thumbs pushed the lashes of her eyelids up for a moment. “There is no one alive as strong as you.”
“I’m not sure about that. It takes a lot to come out of a dark space as you did, especially after using so much energy trying not to fall into it for as many years as you did before it won out…”
“You believing in me and encouraging me did a lot more than you know. You made sure I ate. Drank. Rested… Looked after me. Things I should have been doing to you in return when you needed me most…”
“None of it your fault. None of this would be happening if it wasn’t for those legerbedd swícath.” Her hands turned to his cape and her fingers buried into the fur mantle. “They never should have done it. You shouldn’t have been there… you shouldn’t have… and I am so mad you were, and I’m so angry that your father ignored the warnings and took you and I’m so…ashamed that I am still so hurt by that thought alone.
“My father wouldn’t have gone if you stayed in Eadel like the agreed plan, but Lambert wanted you there and so he went because he didn’t trust anyone in that entourage. Especially not your stepmother.  I thought she was just awkward in the situation she had found herself in but… if she did anything to hurt you or your father or my father like that prisoner did; if she had anything to do with my mother—”
His hush was kind. Dimitri brought her into him, cradling her as close and tight as he dared to offer her privacy the moment the whites of her eyes began to redden. 
Easwith took little time to weave her arms firmly around him. Her eyes closed as if it would stop her tears.
It never did. But his arms held her firmly to him, and hands he had once been afraid of kept her comforted whilst her sobs escaped most violently in the rise and fall of her shoulder and quiet from her throat.
His legs loosely crossed and he perched her upon his lap before encasing her in his cape and the footsteps of others left them quietly.
Chapped lips rested against her forehead. “Do not let anyone call you weakhearted.” His chin settled upon her head. “To be able to express all these feelings when you feel them, never letting them drown you… that is the strength I wish to have.”
Easwith would have laughed if it wasn’t for how dry her throat was or the amount of sniffling she had to do to clear her nose once her sobs had stopped.
“Do you want to go into the courtyard once the sun is up?” She hummed in agreement as she relaxed into him. “Under the elder?” Another hum, this time responded to by a lingering peck to the crown of her head and gentle fingers within the mid-lengths of her hair. 
“I love you.” His words were quiet; only for her to hear. A statement so unchanging and sincere it was impossible to question. ”Regardless of what your anguish at this moment thinks is best, I am never making the mistake of letting you go. We all need an anchor in this world, and without you, I am torn away from shore and lost at sea.”
“As was I without you, though I eventually got stuck between two pillars of rock stern to bow..”
Dimitri raised her hand to his lips. She felt his smile upon her knuckles at her confession before it returned to neutrality, working alongside the earnestness in his voice. “We’ll get to the bottom of it all. Together.”
“I’m not letting go of your hand, then.”
“Nor would I want you to, beloved.” A beat to breathe. To shift her head into his neck as best she could. “Can we rest in my room until then? Where it’s cooler…” “If it will help,” he already moved himself and her to best carry her, his left arm beneath her knees and his right around her ribs. He lifted her as if she and her armour were barely heavier than a compendium for beginner cooks (which were often quite complicated to get one's head around even so) “Then I cannot disagree to join you.”
 _______________________
Her body was glad to be free of armour plate and led out upon the bed. Sweat no longer clung so desperately to her skin, but her stomach had yet to recover from its single convulsion. Limbs were still weak enough for her to feel as if she could only sit and lay down to minimise the chance of falling, but she did not quiver. 
Dimitri had also rid himself of heavy plate, all be it far away from her presence whilst she removed herself from the same confine, and had taken to sitting beside her bed: bringing the chair from her desk and setting it near her pillow.
As if cosying up to her would either crush her, or stain her reputation with rule-breaking.
As if tunics and brais were considered too nude. 
Easwith smiled at that, nearly having to stifle a barely bit-back giggle. It was just like him to worry so much over the little things as if anyone could walk in through the door at any moment and spread silly notions and rumours.
As it was, he had brought up dinner ad drinks (which were now in their stomachs) for privacy’s sake.
Her eyes watched over him without much shame. For as much as he held her right hand with his left,  and his right hand turned the pages of a book of trees as if trying to find one he could not remember the name of, she could not help but adore the studiousness upon his face. 
The vague concentration. The way his brow dipped. That itself led her eyes to follow, not the first time, his profile from his hairline to the bottom of his chin.
“Beloved,” though his cheeks were dusted lightly with a pink hue, his lips curled upward in boyish charm, “are you staring at me?”
“I can stop if you like?”
Despite the teasing words, her voice was quiet. Like the first spoken word of the day without hoarse undertones for the first few sentences. Her smile, also, was much too fond and warm to have been a tease. As if she was asking if it made him uncomfortable and she would stop if he thought so.
Dimitri brought her hand to his lips. He, most simply, rested them against her skin in a feather-light touch. “I cannot, in good faith, not allow you to do so when I cannot help but do the same.”
“I am hardly worth staring at.”
“You are more worth staring at than any other being alive.” Finally, he kissed the back of her hand, most notably where a small scar (that now nearly blended into her skin) was. ”Not only are you beautiful to me, you also have some of the most endearing expressions.”
“I have to disagree, only because all of the endearing expressions live on your face.”
The pink on his cheeks took a redder hue. “You are too kind.”  He took a breath. “Swith, you enjoy woodland, don’t you?”
“When there aren’t predators that want to eat me, yes.” She rolled slowly onto her right side, angling herself to set her head upon the top of his thigh, and pulled down the back of her tunic to conceal the small of her back. “Why for?”
“I was thinking that we could plant a few trees as part of the Estate…”
“I don’t think Fhirdiad would be big enough, love. It’s partially surrounded by the city, now.”
“If the measurements from the latest record are correct, it’s roughly a thousand acres.”
Easwith hummed in mild surprise. “Very surprising.”
“How so?”
“Eadel Castle has triple is all… very odd. We always thought you had more than us. Either way, I think that could be enough for a few if you wanted, but we’d have to beware the meadows and not take too much field away from the deer.”
Though she could not see his face, she heard his smile. “What trees do you prefer?”
“Deciduous, definitely. Beech and oak make some of the most beautiful ones, but there are so many native trees that would suffice.” Her brows furrowed. By all accounts, it was a most random topic for him to bring it up. “You’re trying to distract me…”
“Hm?”
“From earlier… It is I that should be distracting you from it all…”
“Beloved, whilst it is partly true that I wish to distract you, I also truly wish to bring a wonderful piece of Holdfréond territory back to Fhirdiad once we have achieved victory.”
“Am I not enough of a piece?” She rolled onto her back and laughed at the speechless response from the King. “I’m only teasing. If you wish to have a piece of Holdfréond woodland on the estate, I’m sure we’ll make it happen.”
“But,” his brows furrowed in concern, “what about something you would like to have?”
“I’ll have you.” Easwith’s smile was fond. Warm. Genuine. Her hand traced his cheek, grazing his skin with a tenderness that had no words to describe its softness enough. “That is more than enough for me.”
15 notes · View notes
arscaelestis · 1 month
Text
Dystopian Moon: Revelation of a Dream
Upon the farmhouse stoop we stood, beneath the azure gaze, Where Luna's sphere in daylight hung, a celestial maze. With continents and briny deeps, so stark against the blue, A sphere estranged from astral norms, presented in false hue.
"They've aestheticized the moon," he spoke, a statement darkly cast, A tapestry of power's weave, dystopian and vast. A projection in the heavens, where truth once freely roamed, Now an orb of grand deception, in silent sky it domed.
I turned away, a heart awash with anxious, pounding tides, Into the shelter of my abode, where uncertainty abides. "Why dost thou flee?" the shadow asked, a specter in my wake, Yet no solace found in walls that breathe, no refuge there to take.
The world outside, a stage of veils, where puppeteers convene, To drape the stars and script the clouds, to mask what must be seen. And we, but actors in the ruse, with sightless eyes we dance, To tunes composed by hidden hands, in ignorance's trance.
What doctrines sown among the rows of intellect's vast field, Are but the chaff of phantom minds, in gilded falsehoods sealed. The ruling kin, with threads of myth, weave cloaks of night so sheer, To swaddle firm the minds of men, in cradles wrought of fear.
And so we question bedrock truths, foundations turn to mist, As phantoms rule the firmament, by alchemists' own twist. Reality, a whispered dream, that slips through grasping thoughts, While overlords in silence scheme, in cryptic shadows wrought.
The moon, a sentinel of night, now cast in doubting role, Reflects the turmoil of our souls, the chaos of our whole. For what are we, if not but pawns in grand celestial play, Where truth is pawned for pageantry, and night consumes the day?
Our spirits, restless, seek the dawn, where certainty might dwell, Yet find ourselves on checkered grounds, betwixt our heaven and hell. The wool, so thick upon our eyes, obscures the paths we tread, With every step, the ground gives way to more doubt's web instead.
So in the dream, the moon revolved, a symbol of our plight, A globe of artifice so vast, it shunned the natural light. Yet in its counterfeit rotation, a truth begins to cleave, That even in constructed lies, the heart will still believe.
Arouse, arise, O slumbering minds, and cast the veils aside, For in the light of piercing day, no shadows can abide. The dream, though heart to heart may race, a truth within it vies, To question all, to seek, unveil, the truth behind the lies.
---------- Backstory:
I had a dream last night, wherein I found myself on the porch of a quaint house nestled in the heart of the countryside, with verdant fields stretching into the horizon. Beside me stood a figure whose identity remained shrouded in mystery. Together, we gazed upwards, our eyes drawn to the moon that hung in the broad daylight sky. This was no ordinary moon though, it boasted distinct continents and vast oceans, mimicking the Earth's surface, complete with delineated national borders akin to those on a terrestrial globe. Unnaturally, it rotated, offering a panoramic view of its transformed facade.
I remarked to my companion, perplexed, "That's impossible. We only ever see the same side of the moon." His reply was cryptic yet revealing, "They've aestheticized the moon." The implication was clear, what we beheld was nothing more than an elaborate facade, a mere projection in the celestial dome.
A wave of unease washed over me, compelling me to retreat into the sanctuary of my home. The man inquired about my sudden disquiet, but before I could respond, the dream dissolved, and I awoke. My heart raced, the anxiety from the dream lingering like a shadow, refusing to depart even as I returned to the waking world.
2 notes · View notes