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thewolfseries · 1 year

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Rotherwood: House of Hell: True Paranormal #1

Houses are living things. I’ve said it before. They see, hear and breathe. Sometimes, I think, they breathe in what we put into them and when they exhale, they put out whatever they took in to begin with only now it has changed into something new, be it an echo of happiness or silent screams of sorrow. Sometimes, I feel, they take in something awful and then breathe out something truly hellish. This toxic cloud of negative energy-or whatever etheric matter is made of- moves, slinking from room to room, drifting on the edges of our consciousness until it can feel inside of our minds, taking on twisted forms and degenerate shadows plucked from our fears and worries. Or maybe, just maybe, could it be that something once lived that was so vile, so cruel and inhumane, that the very fabric of whatever lays beyond this life rejects it and it becomes trapped here, with us, walking side by side, waiting to prey again?

Such could be the place with a location in Kingsport, Tennessee.

Sitting on the very banks of the Holston River, high on a hill, sits a majestic manor home with red bricks, dark shutters and breath-taking thirty-foot high Doric columns that line the front porch, giving anyone who stands on that porch a commanding view of the river and the lands beyond. At three stories tall, this stately home is in fact, the source of all of Kingsport or what would be the town later on. Its intricate ties to our home city make it a source of great pride and haunting creeping dread for those that live near it. Some of us bear the scars quite literally from the house and its long and sordid history. It even has a name, a name pulled from the works of Sir Walter Scott: Rotherwood. Rotherwood, as so many places like it began, did not begin with malice or evil but its fate and often those who are tied to it, was doomed the moment the first brick was laid.

In the later part of the 18th century, a young man named Fredrick Ross and his family inherited a large parcel of land of several hundred acres along the north and south forks of the Holston River. The land ran from Bay’s Mountain to almost the Virginia border. Ross and his family were very wealthy and were respected in the area. Ross himself would later go on to lay out the town of King’s Port/Rossville, which obviously later became the Kingsport we know today. Like most wealthy families in the south at the time, Ross did own slaves. He also had several indentured white servants as well but he was not known to be a cruel man. He treated his slaves well, considering the circumstances of the immorality of the institution of slavery. Unlike many southern slave owners, he did not engage in wanton cruelty.

In 1818, the work on the majestic plantation house that was Rotherwood was finished. Taking the name from Sir Walter Scott’s Ivanhoe, the house and grounds were truly the showplace and entertainment center of the entire region. With curved driveways, column lined porches, hanging floral gardens, and even a pool on the roof, Rotherwood was every bit the dream home of the Ross family. Ross had several children but everyone remembers his daughter Rowena the best. With her raven hair and fair complexion, she was considered to be the most beautiful creature in the entire area and she had an education and manners to back it up. Well-liked and kind to everyone she met, slaves included, Rowena had many young men chasing after her hand in marriage but there was only one gentleman that caught her affections and held them close.

Ross himself was beyond happy with his daughter’s choice and went on to build another Rotherwood across the river from the main house for his daughter and her soon to be family. He relished the idea of being a grandfather and the new house was completed. It was an exact replica of Rotherwood itself but instead of red brick, the entire house was done entirely in white. Unfortunately, it never was lived in because it burned to the ground not long after it was completed. Perhaps that was an omen of things to come. Perhaps not but what did happen next was nothing short of devastating. Perhaps this event on a day of joy was what started the downward spiral of Rotherwood into darkness.

On her wedding day, Rowena and her family and the groom and his family had gathered before the ceremony, laughing and rejoicing. The groom and several of his friends decided to try their hand at fishing before he married his beaming wife to be. Taking a small boat out onto the Holston, the men were in plain sight of the house and as Rowena watched, her life changed and fate dealt her a cruel hand.

The Holston River is notorious for its dangerous currents and eddies and somehow, the boat the men were in capsized, spilling them into its icy depths. Everyone on shore watched in horror as the men floundered in the water, the surging currents pulling them down. Miraculously, three of the four men made it back to shore but to Rowena’s devastation, her true love did not surface again. In fact, his body was never recovered.

Rowena was devastated by his loss and fell into a deep depression. The once vibrant beautiful young woman became a virtual recluse, secluding herself away in her third floor bedroom, looking out of her window at the river, silently mourning her lost life and love.

For the next two years, Rowena saw no one but gradually began to come out again, socializing in small bursts until a man happened to cross her path and again, she felt the pull of love calling to her. This rich young man was from Knoxville and while he was not her first true love, she was willing to try again. She was able to marry this man. Fate however struck once again, another shock wave of grief slamming into her as her new husband died not long after their wedding vows from yellow fever. Once again, Rowena fell into a depression and this time, it did not break for more than a decade.

One last time, Rowena tried to be happy and she did marry again and this time, her life seemed to be on the right track. She even had a daughter with her new husband and for six years, she finally seemed to find happiness but something was just never quite right. It is unknown how or why but what is known is how her story finally came to its tragic end. What is known is this. During a vacation back at Rotherwood to see her father, Rowena said that she had seen the ghost of her first love, her true love. She had said that she had heard his ghostly voice calling to her and had seen his pale white hand reach out from the dark waters of the Holston and beckon to her.

That night, she slipped into her wedding gown, the garment flowing behind her like angel’s white wings as she made her way silently outside late at night, barefoot, following the trail to the shores of the river before slowly and calmly wading into the water, walking until the water was up to her neck and finally, she vanished below the surface, taking her own life.

From that point the fate of Rotherwood was doomed to be a bleak one. The once happy Fredrick Ross was himself in a deep depression over the loss of his daughter and in the years leading up to the Civil War, he made several business decisions that seemed to backfire, huge losses and failed investments that cost him dearly. His overseer, Joshua Phipps, was also his bookkeeper. Strangely, he never seemed to understand why his employer’s ventures were failing.

Ross saw only one way out of the failing plantation and made a heart breaking decision. He sold Rotherwood plantation to the only person that he knew could afford it and the losses it had taken: Joshua Phipps. Before he completed the sale, however, Ross made one decision that was a harbinger of the hell to come. He freed as many of his slaves as he could before transferring ownership to Phipps. These freed slaves settled further away from Rotherwood into Hawkins County in a place named Zion Hill. Among those that were freed were the ancestors of the future singer and actress, Diana Ross, whose family had taken the Ross family name as their own because Ross himself was a kind man. Ross had freed the slaves because he knew what was coming, the storm that was incarnate in a man named Joshua Phipps. Ross left his once happy manor and grounds and the remaining slaves he could not free in the hands of Phipps and left by carriage to his fate. He would die years later as a broken man.

Phipps, on the other hand, would have a short but unforgettable tenure as lord and master of Rotherwood plantation.

Even before his death, Phipps was known in his day for his malice, his cruelty and his irritable nature. The only thing that held him in check as overseer of the slaves and grounds was the hand of his employer, Ross. Now that Ross was out of the picture, Phipps had total control of the manor and the slaves and it is not hyperbole to say that hell was unleashed the day he took control.

Rotherwood began to change; slave cells were added inside the basement with dirt walls, dirt floors and no windows with only one opening. The “field slaves” were forced to huddle into the small room at night. Iron bars were set into the one opening with no glass or protection from the elements. On the third floor, a whipping post was built into the walls.

Virgealia “Jill” Ellis of Kingsport spoke to the Douglass Alumni Blog about her experiences working at the plantation as a child and the treatment her family had experienced while under Phipps’ cruel hand.

(Virgealia “Mama Jill” Ellis)

“I grew up on the 2,500 or so more acres of Rotherwood land. My mother, Inez Looney was the cook and my father, James Looney, was the chauffeur, the butler and the mansion maitre’d. As a child, I had to go into this area [the slave cells] almost every day because the food mother canned was stored in the basement and the laundry facility was also in this area. The stench was embedded in the ground—the darkness and the dampness was sometimes overpowering. One could imagine hearing the moaning, the wailing, the crying of the slaves, their misery and despair. If a slave was maimed, he was shot like an animal because he was of no more use. In the front room of the third floor facing the river, was the whipping post. Slaves were shackled to the post to be whipped. The blood stains are still embedded into the wood floors of that room…during days of heavy moisture, the wood would expand and the blood stains would show up again…” (Douglass Riverview News and Current Events, 2016).

Phipps built the post into the house because he enjoyed hearing his slaves scream. In fact, he was known to be so vicious with them, to beat them so furiously, that neighboring plantations and landowners reported hearing the screams of the slaves echoing off of the mountains as Phipps would torture them. Astoundingly, Phipps was not alone in his evil. He had a mistress on the side (his wife knew about it and was too scared and powerless to stop him) who was a slave herself, a half black woman who was reported to be as cruel to her fellow slaves if not crueler than Phipps himself was.

His evil did not stop at the slaves and his treatment of them. Phipps was just as cruel with his own family and had a strange request about his death. As recounted by a former slave in October of 1975, a woman named Aunt Vic Phipps told Edward Stewart in article about Rotherwood just how far his evil went. Aunt Vic was a slave before the Civil War and she told Stewart about hiding in the reeds and ditches so when slave traders would come, she would not be sold away from her mother. Aunt Vic told Stewart that Phipps was often overheard stating that when he died, he wanted to be buried standing up on the top of the hill at Rotherwood, so he could always be looking down into the bottoms and see the slaves working. (Kingsport Times, 1975).

(Aunt Vic Phipps).

Phipps had a daughter, Pricilla, who had fallen in love with a young man, a farm hand. The Civil War had struck and her young suitor was called off to battle. Phipps hated the young man and had him murdered in action, telling his daughter what he did and why he did it. Pricilla herself died from depression and grief at the age of twenty, a widow. There was a short battle on the grounds of Rotherwood during the war but as fate would have it, there was one last nightmarish tragedy set to unfold on the grounds, one that would leave its scars, physically and echoes of terror for years to come.

In the summer of 1861, Phipps himself fell ill. The doctors could not explain his condition. He was feverish, almost delusional. Afraid of contagion, the cruel man now debilitated by sickness, was moved out and quarantined into the carriage house. A young slave boy was assigned to keep watch over him and to fan him to keep him cool. For days, Phipps lingered, half awake in fever with labored breathing until finally, death came for Phipps in a way that only a man of his nature could deserve. In fact, no one has an explanation for his death or the circumstances in which it occurred. Can a man be so evil that death itself manifests directly and comes to take him from this world? Maybe.

One sweltering afternoon, the slave boy was fanning Phipps as he was assigned when suddenly Phipps for the first time in days snapped fully awake. His eyes roving wildly in their sockets seem to fixate on a point high in the air above and behind the young boy. Turning to see what his master saw the boy himself let out a blood curdling scream of absolute horror.

A sickly buzzing cloud had begun to form in mid-air, wriggling and swarming and it took the boy all of two seconds to realize what it was: hundreds of flies.

The cloud of flies got thicker and thicker until finally the entire cloud itself descended onto Phipps, covering his face, crawling and running all over his his forehead, their tiny hairy legs poking into his open eyes, as they rammed themselves up his nostrils, into his ears and finally down his open screaming mouth. The swarm was so thick that Phipps finally started to suffocate, choking to death on the living buzzing flies. Unrelenting, the flies kept coming as the young boy, scared out of his mind, watched his master quickly go into spasms as his tormentor and owner’s lungs filled with the insects as Phipps finally died with a buzzing death rattle.

Finally regaining his senses, the boy bolted off to the house to get help. When he returned with family and the doctor, Phipps lay dead, his eyes staring up, his mouth slack and frozen on his face was a look of terror.

There wasn’t a fly in sight. They had vanished as though they had never existed at all.

His death was something out of the books of hell but Joshua Phipps was not to be gotten rid of so easily. His funeral, even today, is something of legend around locals who’s great-great grandparents were there and who passed the story down to their descendants. One such descendant, folklorist and historian Dr. Nancy Acuff, personally confirmed that what is about to be typed was true, as told to her from the first person account of her great great grandfather who was present at the event and told her father and then to her.

The funeral of the most hated man in Kingsport was more of a social event of the summer than the somber occasion it should have been, though I do have to wonder just how upset Phipps’s wife and remaining family were, but that’s neither here or there.

The funeral casket was to be pulled by two large horses, up and around to the cemetery plots on the grounds. During the funeral, it seemed that a storm was coming the wind picking up the skirts and clothing of those around and making the black covering on the casket move ever so slightly, just enough to make one wonder if the man himself were really dead.

As the procession up the hill began, the two horses began to struggle, digging deep furrows into the earth, as though the simple cart and casket were too heavy for them to budge. Unable to move the casket, two more horses were attached and slowly, the hearse began to move again, each horse straining to make the wheels turn with its unnatural weight. Overhead the sky began to grow from a promise of rain into a churning sky as thunder began to snarl. Just before they reached the cemetery, a bolt of lightning snapped down out of the black clouds, cutting a tree in two, knocking the trunk violently across the path, blocking the road. The onlookers were worried and began to mutter about evil and God as the pallbearers simply picked up the casket and carried it to the open grave side where the pastor stood waiting to lay the man inside to rest.

As the pastor began to give Phipps his final words, the river below the gathering began to bubble and churn, as if it were boiling, the currents moving so fast the water itself was muddy. The thunder above grew worse and a movement drew the eyes of the crowd.

The casket, under its dark cloth, was moving.

It was vibrating, as though something inside wanted out, badly. They heard the scrabbling of what sounded like claws against wood and with a roar, a gigantic black dog blasted out of the casket, bolting out from under the black cloth as the attendants screamed in terror. The dog snarled at them with its gleaming eyes before bolting off across the grounds and vanishing into the woods.

The casket itself was unharmed. It seemed to be an impossibility. Shaken and now thoroughly scared, the onlookers rushed the pastor who himself was shaken ashen white. Finishing the rites, Phipps’s coffin was hastily buried and as the onlookers moved to go back down the hill, the first drops of ice cold rain began to fall. There was another sound, some would swear to later to their children and neighbors, a sound that mingled with the thunder: the sound of laughter and they said the voice belonged to Joshua Phipps.

Two weeks later, Rotherwood was still moving on, though without one of its cruelest taskmasters, it was somewhat quieter. The remaining family began to whisper of things moving in the shadows of the house, of hearing animal feet running through the hallways and most horrifying of all, that the laughter and sound of Joshua Phipps stalking his way around the home as he would appear at night at the foot of the bed and yank the bed clothes off, keeping anyone from sleeping. But it wasn’t only the family that had these troubles. The slaves were coming in droves to the point of a riot to claim that the ghost of Joshua Phipps had risen from the grave along with a giant black dog to torment them every night. Fed up with such reports, the new overseers and the family to calm their own fears agreed that Phipps’s grave would be dug up to prove once and for all that the man was truly dead.

Opening the grave turned out to offer more mysteries and terror than anyone imagined. The coffin was still there and once opened, it was empty, all but a few large black animal hairs. Stunned, no one knew what had become of his body as the dirt on the grave had not been disturbed. Not longer after, violence struck Rotherwood again as the slaves, unable to bear the torment from their unseen attackers, revolted, destroying Phipps’s headstone, desecrating his grave and finally, at last, killing their last torturer, Phipps’s equally cruel mistress, the mulatto woman. They beat her to death and what happened to her body is unknown.

Rotherwood itself was purchased by the US government in 1940, and Mrs. Ellis and her family moved away to North Carolina. Years later, Mrs. Ellis would resettle in Kingsport and share her story. But it wasn’t the end of Rotherwood. Passing through several owners, the current owner is a prominent OBGYN at the local medical campus. She began to renovate and restore the home to its former glory. She has fully succeeded in her goal, turning her home into a stunning memorial to the past as well as once again giving Rotherwood an inhabitant to call it home. Even in modern times, however, Rotherwood still holds darkness in its heart.

During the renovations, the owner and her friend were both at the house as workmen were working on plumbing and wiring in the basement, where the former slave cells were located. One of the workman claimed that his partner suddenly looked up from his work and froze in place, his skin going white and his eyes widening like a deer in headlights. Without preamble, his partner began to scream and run, fleeing up the stairs as if he was running for his life. Astounded, the owner, her friend and the workman watched as the man leaped into the work van, spun gravel out and fled, leaving his tools, and his partner and a stunned owner behind.

Later, the man was calm enough to tell everyone what had happened. He said he had been working and he had looked up when he felt someone staring at him. When he did, he saw a man materialize out of the wall, dressed in a dark suit. Next to him was a gigantic black dog with glowing red eyes, its mouth open, fangs exposed, snarling deep in its throat. The man had looked him, and grinned a sadistic smile and pointed at him. Instantly the dog had leapt for his throat and that’s why he ran, because the dog that no one else could see was chasing him down like a rabbit. He said the dog followed him up out of the basement, to the van and even a little bit down the road before vanishing into thin air. The workman said he would never set a foot on the property again and he never did.

This hound of hell and the apparitions of not only Joshua Phipps, but also that of Rowena Ross, Pricilla and the spirits of slaves murdered on the grounds are said to wander the property. Most of them are harmless, save Phipps and his hound of hell. During thunderstorms, one can hear the hound baying, almost screaming and Phipps is there, unseen, laughing his cruel laugh.

Rotherwood, once a beautiful and happy home was left to die in darkness only to be reborn as a home again, but this time, scarred for what it had breathed in over the years it had been used as both a refuge and a hellish nightmare come to life. What it breathed out was worse than any ghost but rather a monster that still makes local people uneasy about it and the Phipps surname.

There is one last anecdote that I was told by Dr. Acuff years ago when we investigated another local haunted place called Sensabaugh Tunnel (mentioned on this blog). We were standing outside of a river culvert tunnel, often called the Minor Tunnel by local enthusiasts. Sensabaugh Tunnel itself is not haunted and has no connection to Rotherwood but the minor tunnel or rather the land it was built on does and the connection is one drawn in blood.

Back when Rotherwood was still a working plantation, there was a movement locally to help escaped slaves get to Canada as part of the Underground Railroad. Escaped slaves would move under the cover of night and make their way down what is now Big Elm Road, right next to the Holston River. They would hide in the natural enclosed valley that is where the minor tunnel would later be built and wait on a ferryman to come and take them across the river so they could continue their journey to freedom.

One evening, a slave and his wife and three children had escaped a local plantation and had nearly made it to the hiding spot when the slave owner who had discovered them missing finally cornered them on horseback. Despite pleading for their lives, the slave owner brutally murdered them all, shooting the husband and wife plus her two other children. The youngest child was a baby and it lay screaming, covered in blood in its mother’s arms, the bullet having missed it barely. The slave owner coldly picked up the child and slung it over and over into the rocks lining the valley, smashing its brains out and tossing its body aside.

Many in Kingsport know the story or at least the rumors. They know that something bad happened there but Dr. Acuff told me the full story with the understanding that I never reveal the slave owner’s name because his family still lives in the area and are deeply embarrassed about what their ancestor did. I know this man’s identity and I feel justice was eventually served but his connection to Rotherwood will never be undone, nor will his deeds.

Updated November 2022:

I drive past Rotherwood once in a while when I visit my family back in Tennessee. I see it sitting on top of that hill, its windows looking out on the river down below. I know the secrets inside of its walls and now, dear reader, so do you, for better or worse. We should be always be mindful of what we put into a house or anywhere really. They breathe. They exhale. They see. They wait. Sometimes what they breathe out or give birth to after we are gone, isn’t what we put into them but rather a twisted mutation, an aberration, an abomination of our own warped natures that will echo forever within the halls of the damned.

#paranormal #haunted #ghost story #historical

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borealis-strange · 3 years

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Chapter 1: We are the uncool kids

Summary:

Felix would have liked to study in the city, where he had lived all his life, not because he did not like Valparaíso or because he did not like his uncle, he simply did not like the idea of being so far from home for three years. He was mortified by the idea of new companions, but there was no specialized magic academy in the capital and Delta was the one that his mother trusted the most, so he couldn't complain too much, he didn't have many options.

Notes: This is “Lilly of the valley” but I decided to change the name. Still, I’m not convinced with this either so I might also change it Suggestiones are accepted.

This is a story I have been planing for the longest time (almost two years) and finally I had the courage to start writing it and most importantly posting it.

I really appreciate if you’ll could give this story a chance and support it.

Also, if you want to be in the tag-list just comment it :}

So anyways, I hope you'll enjoy it :)

Felix stared bored out of the train window. He watched the trees go by quickly and leaving behind several high hills. He sank into the chair and kept looking out. He glanced at his mother, who returned an expressive and comforting look.

Felix was going to Valparaíso along with his mother to study advanced magic with Johannes Delta, a recognized magician, not only for his great experience in spagyrics but also for being the son of the best alchemist in history.

The only good thing is that he could still return home on the weekends and even be able to visit his father like he always did. A few days ago he had received a letter from his father, he said that he was going to visit him very soon for his birthday, and even that time he could stay longer.

He watched as the speed slowed down as things stopped going so fast next to the train and he saw the station approaching. When the train finally stopped pulling him out of his thoughts, he got up from his seat, took his things and looked through the window one last time. He walked around the train car and lined up behind everyone waiting to get off.

He descended the steps of the train and walked down the platform. When he left the station, he observed the town in the distance: Valparaíso, a rather small coastal town, with picturesque buildings made mainly of wood and all following the same common facade with slight variations in exterior colors and designs. Its streets were made of stone, several tall lanterns descended along the roads, and the sky was bright and clear blue and there were few clouds in it. Valparaíso was just as Felix remembered it.

They walked freely and calmly through the stone streets where no cars passed.

The walk was a bit long, about twenty minutes, and finally, they spotted her in the distance.

"It’s that one," his mother said to Felix. She pointed forward.

Delta's academy was a simple two-story brick house with a red tile roof with a huge front yard full of shrub flowers.

Delta was practically already waiting for them from the wooden porch, sitting in a lawn chair while he read a book. As soon as he saw them he got up from his seat and went to the metal fence to let them pass.

-It is an honor for me that you are here and to be able to receive you as a valuable student - Delta said making a small bow.

-Leave the formalities aside Delta - Felix's mother said laughing slightly - We are family -

- You could be my family but Felix is my student and I cannot leave aside formalities - Delta said with a smile and exaggerated hand movements.

As his mother talked to Delta, Felix just stood there not knowing what to do. He knew his uncle's home / academy but he didn't want to go in uninvited either.

Felix just watched the garden and all the plants that Delta grew. He didn't recognize most of them, they were probably for making potions and medicines, something Delta specialized in.

Shortly after, a black car pulled up in front of the gate, drawing everyone's attention. A dark-haired man in a smart suit got out and went to the trunk. A raven-haired boy came out of the passenger seat in a bad mood. He also went to the trunk and helped his father.

-That must be Marshall-Commented Delta as she approached to receive his new student.

Marshall was a boy with a robust build, his long hair was all over his face and he had an unfriendly face. He wore a thick cloth coat, even though it was not a cold day.

Marshall lumbered over with his large leather suitcase and a violin case.

-Mr. Evans-Delta greeted Marshall's father by firmly shaking his hand. -It is an honor for me that your son here with us-

Felix couldn't make out what Mr. Evans said, but he didn't really care. He just watched as Marshall showed disinterest in the conversation.

-I think it is time for me to return. - His mother drew his attention - Remember, be good, make friends and learn many things-she looked at him with teary eyes -See you on Friday-

They both hugged, it was a long and warm hug. When they separated her mother saw him in the eyes, she brushed a little hair from her face and smiled.

-Is something wrong? - Felix asked.

His mother laughed.

-Nothing ... It's just that you remind me a lot of your father. You're just like him-his mother whispered.

Her mother gave him one last kiss on the forehead before walking over to the fence to leave.

Felix watched his mother walk away from her as she said goodbye to him.

He sighed heavily, he would certainly miss her. Maybe there were times where she didn't see her until late at night when she left work but that didn't matter to him, she was always there for him, to remind him of how loved she was.

-Are you guys ready? - Delta said once their relatives were out of sight.

Delta accompanied them inside the house.

The interior of the house was rustic, with a strong smell of wood and flowers. The living room had a fireplace with an armchair and a small coffee table. Felix could see that there were several portraits next to the fireplace. Felix guessed his former students.

Delta guided them to the second floor. Where each one was shown their respective room.

The room was large, enough for two people, with white walls. There was only a bunk bed, a bookcase, a desk and a wardrobe. It was quite bland but luckily Delta had previously told him that he could decorate it during his stay there, which was a relief, he didn't know if he could last three years looking at the same boring walls. He even considered bringing his green bedspreads from his house.

Felix placed the suitcase on the bottom bunk (though she will probably keep the top one) and began to pull things out of it. At the moment he would only take care of her books and the stuff he needed to study, then he would put his clothes away.

He arranged her books and notebooks on the shelf in no particular order. He also made room for his future partner, he didn't want to be inconsiderate, much less start a fight on the first day.

Just when he finished putting away her books Delta called to them from downstairs.

-Felix! Marshall! Come! - Delta yelled.

Both boys left her room at the same time to go down to the living room.

Delta was with two guys who still carried suitcases. One of them was small, almost the same height as Felix, with straight, short dark brown hair. His face was dotted with countless freckles.

The other was tall and thin; He appeared to be one of the southern healers (or at least his parents) because of his light hair and light brown skin and cold gray eyes.

-This is Lucas- Delta pointed to the taller boy - And this is Milo-

Milo waved to them while Lucas just stared at them without saying anything.

Delta and the boys went up to the second floor of the house

-Milo, you share a room with Felix - Delta reported - And you Lucas with Marshall -

-Why don't you unpack your things and go down to eat in a while? - Delta said before leaving them alone.

All the boys entered the rooms that were assigned to them

Back in the room, Felix quickly climbed onto the bed above the bunk. Milo just looked at him strangely.

-Sorry - Felix said with a small smile - But I’ll sleep in the top bed.

Milo just stared without saying anything and started pulling things out of his suitcase.

The room was flooded in a deep silence, where only Milo could be heard moving his books and other things.

"Should I say something?" Felix thought "We will share a room for three years, I should ask him something"

-And… What kind of magic do you have? - Felix asked. Yes, it was a generic question but it was the first thing that came to mind.

-Pyromancy. Nothing special - Milo answered sadly - And you?

-Alchemy -

-Alchemy!? - Milo exclaimed and turned to see Felix - Where did you get it?

Felix knew his magic was… unique but he didn't expect that kind of reaction.

-I inherited it from my father-he answered without giving it much importance.

-That 's great! Imagine the great things you will do one day! You could even be like Augusto Delta! -

-Yes, I know-He sighed heavily at the mention of his grandfather-It's what Delta usually tells me "One day you'll be as big as your grandfather was" - said Felix in a mocking tone - But I don't know if I want to be. My father was "destined" to be the greatest alchemist in history and never followed in his father's footsteps-

Milo looked at him pityingly.

"Probably because he knows I'll be another wasted talent," Felix thought bitterly.

-So ... what do you want to be? - Questioned Milo.

-I don't know, Felix said while he shrugged. I haven't thought about it. How about you? -

-I don't know either. I just know that I'm not going to be like my father-he said as he laughed underneath.

"Sure" Felix thought "I won't be like my father either"

______________

-Guys, the food's ready! - Delta yelled from the first floor.

The four of them ran down the stairs.

The table was already set, with the cutlery, plates and glasses.

Delta told them that the food was in the kitchen and that they served as much as they wanted, that there was no problem.

The meal was a traditional Valparaíso dish, vegetable and fish broth, popularly known as "golden broth" for the type of fish used in its preparation.

The meal passed in a long awkward silence interrupted by the occasional question from Delta. The questions were as generic as possible “What do you like to do? Do you have a favorite subject? Do you have siblings? "

Delta just wanted to get to know them better but they all answered in a monotonous way. Everyone except Milo.

Milo did answer all the questions excitedly enough and told a couple of stories about him. Occasionally she would tell an anecdote about him with his older brother, such as the time they accidentally stained a dress of his aunt and were at 12 at night trying to wash it without her noticing. Or when they tried to rob their school cafeteria and ended up accidentally breaking a door. According to Milo they were never caught because of the door, but Felix was almost certain that, at least, they were suspended for a couple of days.

He also talked about the fire duels, he listened to them on the radio whenever he could, since he did not have television in his house. He showed his energy and his great passion for this sport.

-You should see them! - Milo exclaimed as he tapped the table - They're the best thing in the world. Someday I want to go see them live and feel the fire on my face - He said making exaggerated gestures with his hands.

-I don't think you want to feel the fire on your face - Marshall pointed out amused - The only thing you'll get is to get burned.

-What if they burn me!? - Said Milo while he raised his hands in the air -I will have a scar like the true pyromancer masters - He said while giving small blows to his chest.

_________

Felix couldn't sleep well that night. It was common when he was not in his house or in an "unfamiliar" environment. Part of him wanted to go down to the kitchen for some hot milk, that always helped, but he didn't want to wake Milo. So he just stared at the ceiling thinking about irrelevant things.

He didn't know when he fell asleep, he just woke up to Milo's loud alarm.

-What time is it? - Felix asked hoarsely.

-It's seven in the morning- Milo said energetically as if he had been awake for hours.

Felix lay back on the bed and rubbed his eyes a bit.

-Don't we start classes until 9? -

-Yes, but it is important to start the day early - Milo said happily.

Felix didn't care much about it and tried to go back to sleep. The downside is that he would have to put up with that for the next three years. He made a mental note to speak with Milo to come to an agreement later.

Unfortunately for him, he couldn't get back to sleep. After half an hour he resigned himself and decided to get up.

He went to the wardrobe to decide what to wear. He had to wear something that will leave a good impression on his new classmates. He thought about wearing his traditional magician's robe, but he preferred to reject that idea, it seemed a bit exaggerated to him besides that they were a bit too large and he was not going to make a fool of himself on his first day.

In the end he opted for a green wool sweater and his usual black pants. He headed to the bathroom to freshen up a bit before going downstairs.

He looked at himself in the mirror and looked closely at his reflection. He saw all the little spots she had on his face, his messy golden hair and what stood out the most about him: his red eyes. Neither of the boys had mentioned anything about it but he couldn't get too many illusions, he had only shared a meal with them.

Felix finally went down to the first floor. The air was filled with a sweet aroma like that of a bakery, making Felix's stomach growl slightly. To his surprise, not only was Milo in the kitchen, there was also Lucas, who was making breakfast.

-Good morning Felix-Lucas said when he saw him with a big smile-In a few minutes breakfast will be out.

Felix walked over so he was cooking. They were pancakes, neatly stacked on a china plate. They were all fluffy a light honey color, they certainly looked delicious.

-Did you make everyone breakfast? It was not necessary -

Lucas nodded and went back to what he was doing on the stove.

-There is no problem. I like to do it. It is also a bit out of habit, in my house I always cooked for my brothers and my father -

The three boys fell silent. Milo and Felix set the table to feel that they were not leaving all the work to Lucas.

Soon after, Delta came down wearing an elegant gray wizard's robe.

-Boys! - Delta exclaimed when she saw them - What are you doing up so early?

-Making breakfast-Lucas replied as he carried the stack of pancakes to the dining room.

Delta brought a tray of chopped fruit and a jug of watermelon juice.

They all sat down and began to enjoy breakfast.

Lucas's pancakes were the best thing Felix had ever tasted in his life. They were sweet and fluffy, and perfectly golden.

Everyone ate quietly but it seemed that Lucas was in a hurry.

-Excuse me for a moment-Lucas said when he finished his breakfast and got up quickly from the table.

Milo and Felix looked at each other but didn't question him.

Minutes later, when they were already putting the table together, Lucas came down with little jumps.

Behind him came Marshall, still in his pajamas and practically asleep.

-Marshall, you should get up earlier - Delta scolded - This way you won't have time to eat breakfast and get ready -

Marshall completely ignored him. He went into the kitchen to grab an apple and went back up to the second floor.

Delta snorted annoyed.

-You guys go out, I'm going for some things -

Felix went up to his room quickly to grab his notebooks and went out to the patio with the others.

The backyard was quite spacious, almost the same area as the house, and like the front yard, it was full of flowers and shrubs.

The area where they will take class was already prepared; it was a wooden table with eight chairs and a small blackboard in front of it under the shade of a tree with small yellow flowers.

The boys sat down and Felix took a moment to appreciate the beauty of Delta's garden. As the rays of the sun filtered through the branches of the tree that moved slightly in the light spring breeze. The entire Delta garden was slightly herbal from the large number of plants it grew.

Delta with an oak stick with a crystal sphere at the end in one hand and books in the other arm, and Marshall behind him.

He placed the books on the table and his staff on it. While Marshall sat next to Lucas.

-Alright guys, let's get started- He said with a big smile on his face. - You were selected for your magical abilities. I will help you find your greatest potential with your magic and use it wisely. I know that one day you will achieve great things -

"First, I will give you your schedule with all your subjects that we will have this course"

He opened his notebook, took out some sheets, and handed them to his students. It was a table with all the subjects and their schedules.

-Magic is something that is found within all living beings on this planet, but only some have the ability to manifest this magic. To manifest magic you need a wand, your most important tool as a magician. It is your way to transmit the magic that you carry within. It is also your weapon and your shield, with it you can defend themselves from any danger. So it is important that you always carry it with you -

-And why don't you have a wand? -Lucas asked innocently.

-Because this staff is my wand. These staffs have the same properties as a normal wand, but these gems - He said as he pointed at them. On the staff were seven small gems embedded, all of different colors. - help to focus my power and make stronger spells -

-CAN WE SEE IT IN ACTION !? - Milo exclaimed

-No. There is no need to do that. - Milo grumbled - But maybe one day I will.

The class passed normally. Practicing spells and taking notes. They mainly "refreshed" their memory of spells and basic concepts. In addition to explaining what their course would be like. During the first weeks they would study all the bases of magic and then travel around the country and study with specialized teachers in each of their branches.

_____________

-Can you believe it? -Milo exclaimed once the class finished -We will travel to The Serenity! I will learn to be a true pyromancer! - He spoke as he punched the air pretending to create fire.

Felix chuckled a little at Milo's excitement.

-Wow! -

-What? -

-You have fangs like a vampire! - Milo almost yelled in delight.

Felix quickly covered his mouth with one hand.

-Is not true! -

-Of course. - Milo reproached - I just saw them -

"No. No. No, ”Felix thought as he looked away from him. It was too early for them to notice. He remembered all the times he was teased about it at his school. He believed that in this place it would be different. He didn't want to change schools again.

-But I think they are great - Milo said with a shy smilw - They make you look more threatening and more ... unique ... You know? Besides that you have a nice smile.

Felix was puzzled. That was the first time someone hadn't insulted him because of his fangs. Maybe this was the right place.

#golden magic #My writing #my story #original story #originalcharacter #magic

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kiatheinsomniac · 4 years

Text

Huntress I

[ I ] [ II ]

(Y/n) stood before the tall, barred gates of the Doge's extravagant Venitian home. The marvellous building stood tall above the series of murky canals and was decorated with beautifully intricate architecture such as detailed carvings into ledges, windowsills and balcony doorframes. The cold iron of the gates wound and swirled together into a twisting design and was painted a shimmering gold at the top. It was nothing short of wonderous with its polished white walls and glimmering tall windows, each corner decorated by a staggered brick design. Even the gardens were splashed with colour from vibrant flowers and tidy orange trees - though, these bore few petals or fruits at this time of year. The shining sun only made the white mansion stand out even more, making the marble building glow almost in the autumn sunlight.

(Y/n) wore a large rimmed black hat on her head that shadowed her face and rested on her neatly braided hair. Her (h/l)-length (h/c) locks were tied back into two incredibly voluminous faux braids that could not seem to decide if they wanted to tumble along her back or rest on her shoulders. She wore a white blouse with a black corset that covered her stomach and was tucked under her breasts - this laced up at the front and had straps going over her shoulders. She wore black trousers that hugged her legs and tucked into worn-out leather boots that reached mid-calf. A thick grey cloak was wrapped securely around her to chase away the cold. She clutched a bag in each of her (s/t) hands. Various weapons were strapped to her: a sword at her hip, a dagger in a sheath on her thigh and a crossbow slung over her back with a black strap.

The two guards posted at the gates eyed her (and her weapons) warily, never having seen a woman dressed like this before.

"I'm here to investigate a murder by request of the Doge." She stated simply, placing down one of her bags and reaching into her pocket for a somewhat crumpled piece of paper, holding it out for the guard to take. Both humour and suspicion danced in the armoured man's brown eyes.

"He sent for a woman to investigate the murder of his niece?" The middle-aged guard scoffed in disbelief, not even bothering to examine the letter that the woman offered him as proof of her being invited. He simply brushed her off as a common thief with a lot of guts and a ridiculous story.

"He sent for a witch hunter." She put simply, tilting her chin up so that her (e/c) eyes were illuminated by the light and all the seriousness and impatience that they contained, simmering like a cauldron ready to boil over. She had heard the disdainful remarks too many times before in her unorthodox line of work, "And I have travelled a long way so unless you intend on paying my fare back to where I have come from and explaining to your master why I did not meet with him, I would suggest you take a look at this wax seal and allow me entry, signore." She spoke with a voice that was both sweet and venomous. The guard snatched the paper from her hands, outraged by the woman's determination and calm demeanour, examining the letter before huffing as he recognised the official seal of his employer. Upset that he had been wrong and now had to allow this stranger to triumph, he pushed the gate open, holding it while the confident woman briskly walked over the gravel garden path and to the door of the flamboyant marble manor, the stones crunching under her feet and mixing with the patrol of guards and a crowd somewhere in the distance a few streets down.

She lifted the door-knocker and let it heavily fall twice in a row before waiting patiently outside, albeit eager to sit by the warmth of a crackling amber fire after such a long and tiresome journey. A brunette maid opened the heavy wooden door and ushered the (h/c)-haired woman inside, having been told by the master of the house that a witch hunter would be coming to investigate the murder that had sent chills through all of Venice as word had quickly spread of the unusual condition in which the body was discovered during the late hours of the morning.

"Right this way, signorina." The meek maid spoke quietly. The soles of their shoes tapped against the polished checkered floor as they were led through the centre of the lavish home.

The mansion seemed to be built in a circuit-like fashion. It was square, tall and had a garden in the centre of it. (Y/n) tilted her head up to catch a glimpse at the sky seeing as the grey-tiled roof also followed this circuit pattern. It was a nice day for Autumn; fairly cold but sunny nonetheless. She lowered her head, now shadowed by her hat once more, and kept on following the olive-skinned servant as she led (Y/n) along the route that ended with the door of a study.

(Y/n) could hear faint sobbing and slowed her pace to peek into what looked like a living room. There was a married couple, nearing their fifties, dressed all in white - the colour of mourning. The woman had a veil over her face and held a handkerchief to her mouth as she sobbed. Her husband had a distant look in his eyes as he consoled her by rubbing her back with his hand as she watched the flames of the fire dance in the fireplace. (Y/n) concluded that these were the parents of the murder victim.

"The Doge is in there, signorina." The servant spoke, eyes lowered, before scurrying off. She was a youthful girl, very young, but clearly good at following orders and fulfilling her job.

(Y/n) raised her fist to knock on the door; the knock fit her aura: firm and authoritative.

"Enter!" A voice called from inside, it sounded tired and weary. (Y/n) used one hand to push open the door as the other held both of her bags at once. The Doge was a man nearing his elderly years. His hair was dappled with streaks of grey and he had wrinkles adorning his forehead and under his eyes which were shadowed by dark rings, born from lack of sleep. He examined her odd state of dress and numerous weapons then inferred who she must be.

"You are the witch hunter?" He spoke, rising from his seat to greet her.

"Indeed." She bowed her head to him before placing her bags down. "But allow us to get straight to business - you believe that your niece was killed by a vampire, no? That is what you described in your letter to me."

"Yes, almost all of Venice believes there is a vampire prowling its streets with the odd killings that seem to be occurring by night." He answered.

"I would like if you could gather the witnesses you spoke of - I'll need to question them. Where is the body being kept? I understand that my journey has kept me for some time." She spoke as she lifted both of her bags once more, ready to be led to the crime scene.

"Poor Elizabetta is being kept in the wine cellar - a horrific smell began to plague the house." He explained as he began to lead her downstairs.

"When I am done, you should bury the body - a corpse is terrible for the health of the living and, if not for the manner of her death and situation at hand, it would be very disrespectful to not have buried her by now." The hunter explained as they made their way down the winding steps that led to the cellar. As they made their way across a corridor, (Y/n) scrunched up her nose at the familiar stench of death, reaching into her pocket for a handkerchief to cover her nose and mouth with. The scent coiled like a serpent through the air, looking for its next victim from the shadows of the dimly lit cellar.

Candlelight from wall-mounted torches flickered across the walls, licking along the uneven edges of age-old cobbles that built up the narrow, low-ceilinged, winding staircase which led down into the basement. (Y/n) could feel it grow colder, unlike the mansion above which was heated by various fireplaces which the servants attended to.

Eventually, the staircase turned into a very short corridor with an old wooden door at the very end of it. It was made of old planks and had worn iron keeping it all together.

"I can't bear to see my little Eliza in that state, please." The Doge held open the door for (Y/n) who nodded her head in solemn understanding for his grievances.

As soon as she stepped inside, the smell was enough to make her feel as though she could vomit. It made her hold her breath for periods of time just to avoid having to take in the horrendous stench. There were barrels and bottles of wine in neat shelves on either side of the room but in the middle, right opposite the door, there was a table covered by a cloth with the shape of a body under the sheet of fabric.

(Y/n) pushed the cloth back to reveal a young woman. She may have been beautiful once but now her skin was deathly pale and rotting in areas. Her hair was tangled and she was utterly devoid of life - a decomposing shell of the rich young woman she had once been. Her eyes were closed out of respect and the inner corners swam with tiny maggots. (Y/n) was not unfamiliar with such grotesque sights but that did not mean that they did not make her feel utterly disgusted.

Wanting to leave the corpse as quickly as possible, she inspected the two puncture marks on her neck. She had seen these many times before - the distinct bite marks of what had been a vampire's meal. She used one hand to reach into her bag for a small vial, popping off the cork with her thumb before pressing it against one of the punctures. Thick blood, no longer red but a sickly, thick brown, oozed out like mud and into the tiny glass bottle. The fact that there was even blood remaining gave the Witch Hunter a better insight as to what had happened: either the vampire had killed someone else that night and only needed a little more fill from this particular victim or the creature was in a hurry. What would cause them to rush? Being discovered? They were too sly to worry about such a thing and, after a meal, would be fast enough to not even be seen by the human eye anyway. So, if they were in a rush: why?

Once she gathered all that she needed physically, she noted what the victim wore - a white chemise and nothing else. With all of that done, she re-covered the body with the sheet, grabbed her bags, and made her way outside again.

"Thank you, Doge. My apologies that my work has postponed her burial." The witch hunter spoke to convey the fact that she no longer needed to examine the body.

"She will be buried in the morning." He spoke in a flat tone, the tone of someone in immense emotional pain.

"May I ask a few questions as we walk?" She prompted.

"Whatever you need to capture the unholy beast that did this to my poor niece." He replied, "It is why I sent for you, after all."

"She was wearing only a chemise - does this mean that she was killed in her sleep?" (Y/n) quizzed as they made their way all the way back up the narrow, winding, stairwell.

"She had just come back from a ball - she was invited by a friend of hers. They say that she had been dancing with an unfamiliar man that evening and he offered to escort her home. Both of her friends (who I have here for you to question as witnesses) claim that they did not see the man as dangerous; they claim he was incredibly polite and charming and he seemed to truly care about whether or not Elizabetta got home safely." He began, "He must have escorted her home then come inside to kill her when she was changing - we found her wearing nothing at all and dressed her for the sake of dignity for your inspection." (Y/n) hummed thoughtfully.

"You are sure that she did not elope with the vampire?" She quizzed, one of her braids falling from her shoulder.

"Do not insult my Eliza that way!" The Doge spun around to look down at (Y/n) who was standing two steps lower than he was, "She was a pure girl!"

"And, as your witnesses have described, vampires can be very tempting, Doge." She spoke with a tone that showed he had to understand what he was saying despite what he believed about his niece, "She may have thought she was allowing him willingly when really, he was controlling her, leading her mind away so she would want to agree when, truly, she knew better." The Doge turned back around and continued on up the stairs once more.

"Say what you will, I will not believe that Elizabetta was involved in such an atrocious act." He grumbled as they both re-emerged at ground level. "Follow me, I shall lead you to Eliza's room where she was found then you may question her friends who were there the night it happened."

"Thank you," (Y/n) replied to show she had heard him. He led her up one of the staircases of the inner garden to take her to the upper floor which was a corridor and balcony looking down onto the garden with all the doors to the rooms in plain sight.

"This one is hers - aside from moving her body, nothing else has been tampered with as far as I am aware." He explained. Again, he stood outside and allowed (Y/n) to investigate without getting in her way.

What was most prominent in the room were three pieces of furniture: the large forest green canopy bed on the slight platform in the far-left corner, the large silver-backed mirror that rested on the vanity opposite it and the white carpet.

The carpet was an exception, however. The mirror and bed stuck out because they were such expensive and lavish pieces of the room. This carpet stood out because it was stained the light brown of dried blood in the middle.

(Y/n) looked around the room some more. Behind the door was a big black banner bearing a crimson cross. It seemed familiar and she took a few seconds to think it over. The same banners had been present in the Doge's study on either side above his large desk. A family symbol perhaps? A political one? She did not know.

(Y/n) examined the bloodstain on the floor as her first piece of evidence. It was dried and it only made her wish that she had been able to travel to Venice much sooner, perhaps she would be able to be closer on this vampire's trail.

There was a terrible aura in the air, one of despair and hopelessness that seemed to linger. Was it simply the destruction that had been left by the vampire? Or perhaps it was the victim's ghost lingering? (Y/n) glanced around the room: she could neither see nor sense a ghost.

She got up to open the window, intending for the wind to cleanse the terrible energy that still lingered from the supernatural murder. She popped the latch and pushed the glass open only to spot bloody fingerprints on the window.

"Doge?" She called, turning back to face where he waited just outside the door.

"Yes?"

"Did you find the window open at the same time the body was discovered?" The Doge entered the room and stroked his chin thoughtfully.

"I cannot say — it was her friends who got here first, perhaps they can tell you?" (Y/n) cast another glance around the room.

"I believe it's time I began my interrogation."

#ac #assassins creed #assassins creed II #ezio auditore da firenze #ezio auditore #young ezio auditore #ezio auditore da firenze x reader #ezio auditore da firenze/reader #ezio auditore x reader #ezio auditore/reader #au #vampire au #vampire #huntress

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retroateez · 4 years

Text

Prophecy - Chapter Ten

i’ve been so excited to introduce this character purely because i’m absolutely whipped for him,,, hope u enjoy xx

wc;3542 Prophecy Masterlist

The next morning, you and Yeosang prepare yourselves for the final hurdle of your journey, the mage believing that you'll arrive just before sunset.

"Why can't you just teleport us there?" you ask him as you wolf down a bowl of porridge at the bar downstairs. "Or are you just trying to torture me?"

"It drains too much of my energy to move two people such a long distance," he explains. "There's a cost with magic."

You nod, finishing your breakfast as Yeosang double checks you haven't forgotten anything.

"What do you think happened to that bear?" you look around cautiously as you exit the tavern, scared that the beast will come lumbering around the corner and separate your head and your shoulders with ease like a mangled children's toy.

"I don't know," Yeosang shrugs. "somebody might've hunted it."

The mage's hypothesis does nothing to soothe your worries, still anxiously peering into the woods around you. You cast your mind back to your dream, remembering the image of the wounded bear, wanting nothing more to put your new mecidinal skills to use and patch him up. You have to keep reminding yourself that it was merely a dream, that the bear was fine and there was no gushing cut on his neck.

Still, you stay glued to Yeosang's side as he marches along the dirt path, ignoring your pleas to play another game to take your mind off the poor beast lurking in the forest.

More hours pass, consisting of nothing other than walking, except for Yeosang pausing momentarily to gather various plants along the side of the road. He spends countless minutes explaining the uses of hellebore petals, moleyarrow plants and nostrix leaves, tearing them apart and rubbing them between his fingers like they're spun from solid gold.

Of course you take no notice of what he's saying, which, of course he notices.

"These'll be on your next alchemy exam!" Yeosang declares. "Just to spite you for not listening to me!"

You huff and storm ahead of him, crossing your arms heavily to make a childish statement, which doesn't faze the mage in the slightest. Chuckling at your antics, he catches up to you and slings an arm around your shoulders.

"Awh, is little Iris sulking?" he teases you, and you press your lips together in an effort to completely ignore him.

He reaches round to poke your cheek, and you meet his ribcage with your elbow in response, smirking when you hear him exhale a small grunt of pain.

"I'm not sulking," you stick your tongue out at him. "Are we nearly there yet?"

Nursing his freshly bruised torso with a pout, he nods at you and points to his left with his free hand.

"See that tower?" he mumbles through the pain, and you nod when your eyesight lands on a pointed roof just on the horizon. "He lives there."

Seeing your destination within reach lifts your spirits back up, and you slap Yeosang on the back in encouragement, dismissing the way he doubles over and coughs into his knees.

"Hurry up, teach!" you call. "We've got an astrolomer to see!"

-----

The home of the astrologer is more beautiful than you could ever have imagined. You're stood at the beginning of a winding, cobblestone path, which leads to a wooden door in the main building of the house. Comprised of stone bricks, the primary feature is the tower. Taller than you can comprehend, the tower is circular, a few arched windows dotted in place of the brick. The main building is square, and honestly it would look like a completely normal house if not for the gigantic spire connected to it.

Ivy meanders up the stone walls, growing out of an overwhelming amount of undergrowth surrounding the entire structure. The amount of greenery is stunning and you can feel the excitement radiating off of Yeosang at the sheer thought of how many rare plants could be hiding in all that foliage.

Looking up, you spot a faint orange glow in the very top window of the tower, and you suppose that your certain somebody must be home.

Yeosang leads you along the curved footpath, marvelling at the growths of flowers and ferns spread out throughout the astrologer's garden.

"I might have to borrow some of these petals when we leave..." Yeosang trails off, lightening flickering around his pupils uncontrollably.

You roll your eyes at him and lift an arm up to knock confidently on the door, but the mage lightly grabs your arm and pulls it back.

"Just go in," he instructs you. "If he's up in the tower he won't be able to hear you anyway."

"But that's rude!" you counter. "You can't just charge into somebodies house!"

"Why not? It's not like we mean any harm!"

"Well he doesn't know that, does h-"

"Ahem."

Lost in your bickering with Yeosang, neither you nor the mage notice the wooden door swing open, and you certainly don't notice the man standing on the other side.

And you're not sure how you missed him, because you've never seen anyone as beautiful as him. Sure, Seonghwa, the kingsguard, was exeptionally handsome, but in a tall, dark way. And Yeosang was pretty, but in a soft, comforting way. But this stranger was something else, something entirely ethereal like he's stepped straight of a children's fairytale book. and you couldn't do anything except for stare at him, mouth agape from having your speech abruptly interrupted and being absolutely bewildered.

You scan over his face, and you're aware that he knows you're watching him, and he's aware that you're aware of that. But you really don't care.

His hair is inky black, mirroring the night sky on a clear night and you've half a mind to run your fingers through it and see if you can map out the constellations within the strands.

"Can I help you?" the stranger speaks and your knees would've buckled if you weren't frozen to the spot, your mind completely boggled. You're embarrassed, to be frank. One person shouldn't have such an affect on you, but he does and you don't know how to handle it.

"Hello!" you blurt. "Help?"

His eyes snap to you questioningly, and it's only then you notice the way they sparkle a gorgeous amethyst purple. You don't think he could get any better. The concern he's glaring at you with is outshined by how beautiful his everything is and you momentarily forget how much of a fool you look. That is, until Yeosang grabs you by the arm.

"Are you okay?" he asks. "You've gone really pale."

You keep your gaze fixed on the astrologer, whose overgrown, midnight black hair falls into his eyes when he moves forward a bit to get a closer glance at the mage.

"Yeosang?" the stranger says. "It's been so long!"

Like old friends, the stranger leaves the safety of his home and approaches Yeosang, giving you the opportunity to recollect yourself. But instead you continue to study him. From his side profile, you see he's got quite a big nose, high, slender cheekbones and the most heart-warming smile you've ever seen in your entire life. You can't see much else except the oddly pointed tip of his ear peeking out through his hair.

"This is Iris," Yeosang points the stranger towards you, and luckily you manage to pull yourself together enough to wave politely and utter a meek 'hello'.

He's dressed in a white shirt, quite similar to Yeosang's (do they all go to the same tailor?) and black, leather trousers. A few buttons on his shirt are undone, his collarbones exposed and glittering in the sun, and that's almost the final straw for your poor heart.

The astrologer extends a palm towards you, and grins widely, clearly having forgotten about your instantaneous, smitten demeanour. You notice a prominent freckle on one of his cheeks, and you can hear the sound of your heart shattering into a million pieces.

"Wooyoung," he shakes your palm firmly and you swear you feel lightening shooting through your entire arm when your hands connect. "Jung Wooyoung."

"Nice to meet you, Wooyoung." you smile shyly.

"Likewise, Iris" he's still grinning down at you, but you avert your eyes nervously and you miss the crimson that seeps into his cheeks.

"Anyway..." Yeosang rudely snaps you out of your daze, shooting you a confused look that you pretend not to notice. "We came to ask for your help, Wooyoung."

Wooyoung nods, motioning for the two of you to follow him into his house hurriedly. The main section of the building is very typical, stone brick walls and a cobblestone floor with some type of furred rug thrown over it. There's a lit hearth to your left, a large, wooden table and accompanying chairs, as well as a small designated area for cooking. The only thing remotely out of place is the bottom of a endless, spiralling staircase off to the right, which you assume led to the top of the tower.

You and Yeosang sit down at the table, watching Wooyoung bolt the door numerous times. From the handle all the way down to his feet, there's latches, locks and bolts littered down the door.

"Scared of a break-in?" you crack a joke, realising very quickly there's an element of truth to your poor attempt at humour.

"Something like that." Wooyoung nods grimly, and Yeosang glares at you, kicking you under the table as a warning to keep your mouth shut. After all, you still need to convince Wooyoung to help you, and you're definitely not helping.

Wooyoung turns to face you and Yeosang once he's finished locking the door. He smiles a little, resting his hands on his hips.

"What can I help you with?" he questions, directing his attention to Yeosang.

"We've run into a little... predicament," Yeosang explains through gritted teeth, side-eyeing you to hammer home the fact this entire thing is your fault. Wooyoung follows Yeosang's death stare and stifles a laugh at the way you flush bright red, reclining further into the stiff back of the wooden chair. "Somebody agreed to help King Hongjoong with matters we know little about."

"And what matters would those be?"

"Divination matters."

You expect Wooyoung to smirk, to nod straight away and agree to help you and an old friend. But instead, his face drops a mile, crossing his arms and a deep frown that doesn't suit him etches into his features.

"I'm sorry, 'Sang. I can't help you. It's too dan-"

"I know it's dangerous for you," Yeosang interrupts the astrologer, standing up from his seat at the table. "But the king'll protect you if you're on his side, you don't need to worry about that."

Wooyoungs's gaze narrows, and his nostrils flare outwards in anger.

"The king would kill me in a heartbeat, mage." Wooyoung spits harshly, his violet eyes laced with poison. "They'd sell my blood and display my ears like some kind of freak attraction fror wanderers all over the galaxy to come and gawk at, so no, I don't quite think you do know it's dangerous."

A moments silence passes between the mage and the astrologer and you can only sit, bewildered. You have no idea what happened to Wooyoung in the past, but it must be equally as dangerous for Yeosang too, especially as a mage?

"They're still after you, aren't they?" Yeosang asks quietly, flicking his gaze up to Wooyoung long enough to watch him nod solemnly.

"I've only been home for about a week," the astrologer whispers. "I was planning on leaving again tomorrow night, they keep managing to track me and I don't know how."

You sit on the chair, looking back and forth between the men and you're not sure what you're supposed to do. It's clear they're both thinking quietly to themselves, and your curiosity outweighs your reason, so you go for it.

"Who's tracking you?" you ask shamelessly. "And why? Are you a mage too, Wooyoung?"

Wooyoung keeps his lips sealed, looking at Yeosang nervously. They have a silent conversation, Yeosang's icy blue eyes boring into Wooyoung deep lavender ones until they finally reach a mutual conclusion.

He tucks his raven black locks behind his ears, drawing your attention to the unusually pointed tips. With the hair out of the way, you can see the glittering jewellery decorating his entire outer ear, all the way from the lobes up the shell. You also notice a scar, already healed but you can tell it was once a painful, angry red. The scar starts where the bottom of the lobe attaches to the face, and runs up to the forward helix. The longer you look, the quicker you realise just why life is so dangerous for the astrologer.

"You're an elf, aren't you?" you breathe before Wooyoung can begin to explain.

You stand up, reaching out to gently glide your fingers across the scar, and you feel for him, you really do. You don't even know him and yet it's like every emotion he's ever felt in his entire life hits you in all one go.

He inhales sharply, moving back instintively and letting his fair fall back over his face like a curtain for him to hide behind.

"Yes," he confirms. "I'm Elven."

"The people that are tracking you," you ask hesitantly, after all, you've only just met the guy. "Did they give you that scar?"

There's a flash of bitterness in Wooyoung's eyes, a momentary lapse of rage and pent up, unresolved hurt and you regret asking.

"Yes." he repeats. "They would've done a lot worse to me. I was one of the lucky ones." His piercing gaze is locked onto Yeosang, and the mage wears an unreadable expression.

"We need your help, Wooyoung." Yeosang says suddenly. "You can bargain with Hongjoong for your safety, and we'll see to it that you're safe."

"I don't thin-"

"Please," you butt in the conversation. "If you play your cards right, you could get so much more from the King than you think. You can get eternal safety and protection from him just by offering him the tiniest piece of information that he needs."

The elf considers your words for a few seconds, scowling as he ponders every possible way you might be planning to trick him. His eyes flick between you and the mage as he thinks carefully. He knew Yeosang well enough to tell that his intentions were true and pure, but you complicated things slightly; he didn't know you at all. He had no idea where you came from, how you even met Yeosang, whether you could be trusted or not. Hell, he didn't even know if you were human. You intrigued him. There was something off about you, but he couldn't quite figure it out. Yet on the other hand, he yearned for safety, wanted nothing more than to be surrounded by people who cared about him and offered him protection. He was tired of running for his life and dealing cards with danger at every turn.

"Before I agree, what exactly do you require from me?"

-----

Yeosang had explained the entire situation to Wooyoung in minute detail, even including the day he found you lifeless on the beach, much to your embarrassment. He informed the elven astrologer about the prophecy and how no other in his field had managed to prove useful thus far.

"Then they're clearly not very good astrologers." Wooyoung sniffs, lifting his nose into the air proudly.

He had taken you both up the spiralled staircase to the top of the tower, where the majority of his work took place. The room was circular and dimly lit, but in a comfortable way. There was a huge, round window in the back wall with a telescope positioned in front of it, the scope itself aimed straight up into the clouds. Wooyoung's bed was pressed against the opposing wall, the blankets a mess and strewn half upon the floor. Papers were stuck to the wall and littered across every surface in the room, and stacks of books covered almost every inch of the stone floor.

Were all elves this messy?

"I wasn't expecting company..." Wooyoung motioned to the clutter with an embarrassed smile, trying his best to shove a wad of papers into his desk drawer.

"So what does an astrologer actually do?" you ask, studying the various drawings of planets and diagrams plastered all over his walls.

Wooyoung paces over to you and plucks one of them into his hands, turning it upside down and showing it to you.

"I study the stars and the planets, and relate their positions and relativity to how they affect the events that happen to us, in our world." he explains, and his violet eyes begin to glow with enthusiasm. "This one for example, you see that miniscule dot?"

He points to a tiny circle he'd drawn on the paper, and you nod.

"That's one of our moons, and because it is positioned exactly there, at an incredibly specific time, it caused a torrential storm down here on our planet."

"That's bullshit," you scoff in disbelief. "There's no way that something up in the sky can do something like that here."

"Is that so? Then maybe you'd like to explain why this diagram is dated the exact same day you washed up outside Yeosang's home? Just after a brutal storm, no less?" Wooyoung raises his eyebrows at you, challenging your logic and almost begging you to try and argue with him.

"It's merely a coincidence." you insist, crossing your arms and turning away from his smug smirk.

"Is she always this annoying?" He points his question to the mage who sighs at your bickering.

"I've told you Iris," Yeosang purposefully avoids the question and instead decides to lecture you. "There's no such thing as coincedences, everything is determined by fate, especially when the stars and planets are involved."

You roll your eyes at him and decide to ignore the lesson.

"So will you help us or not?" you turn back to Wooyoung, who's evidently having an internal battle with himself.

He wants to help, he really does. Honestly, he'd like the company and it would give his work more purpose than it does when he's constantly on the run. Plus, he could try and bargain for protection from Hongjoong in return for his work.

The thought of even stepping through the Ateez kingdom walls makes his stomach churn.

"What about the witch hunters?" he asks quietly.

"You're not a witch, they won't care, will they?" you tilt your head slightly in confusion.

"They'll take anyone who isn't human or has even a single ounce of magic blood in them." Yeosang explains. "Especially elves."

"I'll take us directly into the castle, straight to Hongjoong. The bastards aren't allowed into the castle grounds unless they're requested, so we'll be okay." The mage reassures Wooyoung, who's standing there still looking unconvinced.

He looks at Yeosang, and then to you and the pleading expressions you're both wearing. He doesn't know what life'll be like for him once he was properly avoiding the people chasing him. He could be dead in a matter of days, truthfully.

"I'll need a few things before I get started." he sighs.

"You'll help us?" You grin, almost throwing your arms around him in a hug.

"Yes," he nods. "But I'm doing it for me, and to ensure my own protection. Not for you, understand?"

Yeosang nods. How could he have expected less from the reserved astrologer? It's a a miracle you even managed to convince him to help. But like he said, he was only doing it for the safety Hongjoong would have to give him for his work. Yeosang supposed he would probably do the same if he was in Wooyoung's shoes.

"I'll have to spend the next few days gathering things I need," Wooyoung says. "You're welcome to stay here, I have a guest room downstairs. Besides, there's information I'll need from you regarding the nature of the prophecy."

You let Wooyoung and Yeosang discuss the situation, pouring over the notes on the table, while you sit and watch the sunset through the giant window. Yeosang had been reluctant to show you or even tell you very much about the prophecy, claiming to protect you from such dangerous things. Which you thought was ridiculous, but you didn't want to argue with him, so you let it go.

Hopefully now with Wooyoung by your side, you'll be able to decipher the prophecy quickly, fix the whole mess you created and be on your way, back at Yeosang's shack complaining about how difficult alchemy is.

Hopefully.

Proud of his skilled craftsmanship, he surveys his work with a smile; the second cog is complete, as is the third. There are more cogs yet to come, but the machine is coming together exactly as intended. He refers back to the blueprints, content that the process is progressing smoothly. Of course, something or some One could throw a spanner in the works at any moment. But he's prepared. After all, One must be ready for anything, and everything all at once, whether it be planned or not.

Chapter Eleven

#ateez #ateez au #medieval!ateez #god i'm so whipped for elven wooyoung #you have no idea #hongjoong #yeosang #san #mingi #wooyoung #yunho #jongho #seonghwa

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the-coffee-story · 4 years

Text

Partners in Crime

Chapter 2 - After Hell

Smoke was still rising from the ruins of the former family home like an army of tired ghostly soldiers leaving the battlefield when four detectives and an immensely lanky doctor arrived. The chief firefighter was relieved to see them.

"Glory hallelujah, Evans!", he said as he walked over. The ground was crunching beneath his feet. "It's a twisted story. I hope you guys can solve the mystery."

Evans sighed as he stroked his black beard. He was tired. "Where are the bodies?"

"That's nothing for you, October," Violet told the junior of the group who was walking next to her. He rolled his dark eyes. "Suuuure."

"Don't be such a mum, Vi." Coffee laughed, tossing a few white blonde curls out of his pale freckled forehead.

"I'm not being a mum. I'm just...pretty sure a teenager shouldn't look at burned corpses."

October giggled.

He was indeed still a teenager (seventeen, to be exact!) and had a thing for ugly sweaters and wearing multiple layers of jackets. His dark skin was patched white and his chocolate brown afro had bright strands of curls. Vitiligo. But the thing about him that usually immediately caught your eye was his smile. His eyes had a habit of shining like diamonds whenever he got excited. Everyone who met him instantly wanted to adopt him.

The bodies were in what used to be the bedroom. The roof had collapsed. Violet saw a tiny burned hand sticking out from under a pile of bricks and flinched.

"The family living here had two daughters," the firefighter explained. "We assume this was the younger one."

"How...how old?", October asked, his voice cracking a little.

The firefighter sighed. "Three."

Suddenly they heard footsteps. The group turned around to see a young woman enter the - well, technically it was still kind of a room. Her brown eyes were wide open and she was clutching a shopping bag like it was a rock in a storm at sea.

"Wh-what happened?", she stuttered. "Where are the Walthers? Are they.... are they safe?"

October immediately slipped in front of the pile of bricks before she could spot the burned hand underneath.

"Come with us, Miss," Violet said, giving Coffee a nod to come along. Together they led the woman outside.

"What's your name?", Violet asked, trying to lead the conversation away from the inevitable.

"Alecto Fisher." She nervously clutched her handbag. Coffee started laughing but quickly pretended to have a coughing fit when he saw his partner's glare.

"What is your relationship with the residents?", he asked, trying to look professional.

"We-we got along well, sometimes we bought each other's groceries and I babysitted Alicia sometimes..." Her eyes were wide open. "Where is she? Where are they? Why are we leaving the house?"

Violet swallowed hard and glanced at Coffee. He gave her a nod.

"The family died in the fire last night," she finally said. Alecto gasped. "Any help came too late. We're investigating their deaths."

Tears welled in Alecto's dark eyes. "But...who would do this? They-they were amazing people! They were so kind! Wh-why-"

"Alecto, I think you should sit down for a bit," Coffee said. "You don't seem like you're well."

Captain Obvious, Violet's glance said as they led Alecto to a rock on which she collapsed.

"I can't believe it," she repeated. "I can't believe it!" Her red lips were quivering.

Evans and October came out of the house.

"She's a family friend," Violet explained.

"Ah. I'm Detective Evans." He nodded. "Miss...?"

"Fisher, Alecto Fisher."

"Thank you. Miss Fisher, have you seen anything suspicious tonight?"

She shook her head. "No, nothing. I was asleep."

"Any witnesses for that?"

"Uh - James Parker, my neighbour."

"Okay." He dug through his pockets and found a business card which he handed to her. "Miss Fisher, this is my number. If you see anything suspicious please call me."

She nodded. "I will." Then she got up. "I...is it okay if I go....?"

"Of course."

She nodded and scurried away.

"Where's the Doc?", Violet asked.

"Here," they heard his voice from behind the garden wall. "Come, take a look at this."

They came over to find him standing next to a huge red pentagram in the driveway.

"This isn't good, is it?", October asked.

#partners in crime #chapter 2 #yes

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boxboysandotherwhump · 4 years

Photo

This first Chapter of ‘The forest and its teeth’ was proofread by the amazingly sweet @haro-whumps. Thank you a lot for this and all the things I learned from your comments. They were also a delight to read while editing <3

Tag list: @broken-horn @finder-of-rings @haro-whumps @voidwhump2 (if you don’t want to be tagged in this pls let me know)

First a hunger plagued our world, equal to none. We searched and searched, desperate for a solution, and as we finally found one a forest of flowers swallowed our world whole.

Wastelands and cities blossomed into a garden, Eden. The planet became a manmade god of roots and spores. Unfathomable. Merciless.

And we were cast out of our own creation, like we were cast out of the garden. The forest was no place for humans.

The world may have forgotten hunger, but we would always know about the creatures that lurked in those omniferous woods. Creatures with mouths bigger than our own. We knew that we were the ones who put them there.

The warm summer breeze carried a whiff of lavender from the safe zone’s border into the village and made Charlotte’s translucent blouse cling to her sweaty skin, tickling her pale thighs as she strolled through dusty streets.

People laughed as they hurried past her and Kaja, carrying fresh bread, flower garlands, and pieces of fruit to the marketplace. The Bromberg twins chased after a roly-poly, screaming as the poor creature scuttled up a rooftop, escaping its fade as a chitin-shelled pony knock-off. Charlotte felt giddy just thinking about tonight’s feast. She’d seen Mara run around the orphanage with a strawberry bigger than her head today, declaring it the undefeatable champion among the offerings.

Kaja chattered beside her, overflowing with life as they slowly made their way out the village center. Charlotte had always found her effervescence oddly infectious, and wished she had more in common with the blonde, toothy-smiled woman than just blue eyes and their love for dancing. But where Kaja was all round, warm cheeks with a heart soft as her belly, Charlotte had always been rough edged, restless, untamable, much like her unruly copper curls.

“I wonder how big the watermelons will be this year. Hey Charlotte, say, do you think six people will fit in one this time?!”

“Six toddlers maybe,” Charlotte jested. “You should know the mutation cycle needs more than a year to double plants in size.”

Her eyes flitted over the forest, its endless expanse encircling the village’s border. Some colossal trees in the far distance cast the land under them in darkness, colored patches on maps eternally midnight-black.

“But what is our knowledge worth anyway?”

“Party pooper.” Kaja grinned, long skirt puffing as she twirled around. “We’ve got a festival to organize. There’s no time for long faces.”

Charlotte huffed. “That’s how I always lo-“

“Miss Kaja, Charlotte. Hello!” Boomed Micha’s voice from up ahead, earning him a smile.

He leaned in the bakery’s doorway, flushed cheeks hidden under his cap’s brim. A few black curls stuck up from underneath it and he was covered in specks of flour, white smudges all over his apron and forearms.

Kajas face lit up as they strolled over to the small red house, tucked between the streets curve and a grassy hill, solitary and half swallowed by ivy. Only the display window’s nook was meticulously cut free and filled with cream pies and cookies.

“Hey Micha,” Kaja beamed, “Say, what have you planned for tomorrow?”

A bright smile split his lips and his eyebrows raised conspiratorially as he leaned closer, voice dropped into a whisper. “That’s a secret.”

Charlotte huffed a laugh. “Give us a tip?”

“Nah.” Micha flicked his cap’s brim up. “‘m not gonna spill. Y ’all’ll see tomorrow.”

“Okay mister mysterious. Tomorrow then,” Kaja said, skirt swishing around her ankles as she twirled away, Charlotte right behind her.

Micha flushed red as his brick house, gawking after the two as they strode up the hill road.

“Yeah. See ya.”

Nudging Kaja’s shoulder, Charlotte couldn’t contain a snicker. “Mister mysterious, hm?!”

The tease tinted Kajas cheeks pink. “So what?! Wait till we’re at the farm and you see snail boy again.”

Charlotte bristled, upper lip curling as she hurried ahead to the roadside where little stone steps parted the bushes, cutting their narrow path through thick underwood up to the snail farm.

“He is just- We are just trading books sometimes!”

The old two story house stood proud on its little plateau, encircled by roots so massive they nearly reached its shingle roof. Its bricks were laid one at a time, many summers ago, and little extensions had grown over the years, some extra rooms that stuck out from one side, the kitchen with its thatched roof. The grass surrounding it was short, completely gone in some muddy patches were it had fallen victim to the snail’s insatiable hunger. They roamed the forest floor, finding every new sapling, eating every fresh blossom, and kept the ever growing woods at bay.

Every few days Sahar would herd them onto the orphanage’s grounds, reading while the snails feasted. He would sit in a patch of shadow, nose buried in a book - just like he was sitting now, rested against the root beside the tiny staircase that lead up to the plateau. His short hair stuck up every which way and his dark boots were covered in grass stains. The big silvery-white scar on his right arm was barely visible in the shade.

Charlotte watched with a smile as Sahar pushed a snail’s head down gently, away from the fruit pieces beside him, snickering as it retracted one eye, offended.

“Really Asmodea?! Didn’t I just feed you an hour ago?”

Kaja knocked on the low wooden gate to their front yard and made Sahar flinch. He had always been jumpy, Charlotte wondered.

“Hello. Say, are Moira and Ansgar there?”

The book slipped from his hand as he jumped up and his voice barely carried over the short distance. “Ah, uhm, hi. Yeah I- I’ll go get them. Come in. The- the snails don’t bite.” His nervous smile faltered. “Well, without having teeth and all -uhm-“

He bit his lip, stopping himself, before he hopped over the root and vanished behind big wooden sliding doors into the house.

Charlotte had never been inside the house before, had only ever seen the grey bearded farmer and his wife down in the teahouse chatting with others or when they had to run some errands, back before Sahar had seemingly appeared out of thin air. Since then, he’d been the one to handle their errands, readily shooed this way and that.

Ansgar had simply dragged the boy into the teahouse one day declaring him his new hireling and not bothered to explain where he had come from or how a mere child had survived the outsides?! Eight years later the question still remained, lingered over the dimly lit marketplace like teapot steam, but the people had given their inquisitions up. Their storm of curiosity had burst against the couple’s stone set silence.

Charlotte had barely followed the discussion about the snail riding they planned to organize at the orphanage tomorrow, she was too preoccupied by Sahar entering the living room while he balanced five cups and a teapot on a tray, setting it carefully onto the table. Its wooden surface was worn smooth over countless shared meals and long evenings filled with games and chatter.

A faint eucalyptus smell tickled her nose as Sahar timidly slid a cup over to her and she couldn’t help but wonder how on earth they had gotten their hands on eucalyptus? The last delivery of it had been years ago.

Charlotte watched Sahar drag a stool over from beside the high, over-cramped bookshelf, so small he had to kneel on it to be on eye level with the rest of them, and took a first tentative sip.

Chamomile?! Had her nose played a trick on her?

“We really should get going.” Kaja smiled apologetically. “There’s just so much left to organize. But we’ll come back for another round of tea soon. Right Charlotte?”

She shot Kaja an irritated look and caught Moiras knowing grin. The woman’s slim observant eyes crinkled with her crooked smile. Moira’s greying, artfully pinned locks swished softly as she turned to Sahar. “I’ll bet our little barista will gladly serve you again? Right, Sahar?”

He fidgeted with his tea cup, not looking at anyone as a faint blush rose to his cheeks before mumbling softly, “Yeah.”

Ansgar coughed slightly as he stacked their cups in two neat little piles on the tray. “There’s really lots t’ do. But let’s take ya down the road a bit.”

#the forest and its teeth #post apocalyptic whump #whump series #whump #whump writing #whumpblr #post apocalypse #mutants #mutant whump #post apocalypse story #sahar loves his snails

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fromthadiningtable · 5 years

Text

BEST OF LUCK

(Set in an AU with Victorian era! Harry) You love another from afar, but your hand is already promised to a very snarky and at times, pompous Mr. Styles. Your mother and father are rooting for the relationship wholeheartedly while you pine for some distant, beautiful creature. Will you condemn yourself to love someone who’s affections you can’t reciprocate? Or will you finally admit the truth and live your life as you’d wish?

Warnings: angst ??

A thick fog covered the ground, hovering in a ghostly fashion like some restless spirit waiting to be seen. The sun was just breaking into the morning sky but the fog and the blanket of clouds blocked it from coming out into full view, casting a faint yellow glow in its place in the eastern sky. The birds in their respective trees on the edge of the expansive land in front of you, sang their tune, letting you know that the day was finally beginning. Though empty, the glittering fields standing in between the woodlands held some sort of story, a past that needed recollecting. You’d recall playing with your cousins, tumbling down the small hills and getting dried grass all over your clothes and in your hair. The woods held all of your secrets and magic that you had created in your childhood, and they’d never utter a word.

Your family’s home stood behind you nearly two hundred yards away, each soul still sound asleep in their bedrooms. The brick farmhouse was beginning to show its age, the once deep red hue was now a peach color and the black shutters were beginning to chip away from the many storms and years that plagued it. The glass in the windows was even aging, apparent from the ripple-like appearance it had. The roof had patches of shingles that were either missing or disheveled. The chickens in the coop behind the house were clucking and like the birds in the trees, were ready for the day to start. The grass beneath you was damp with dew, you let your feet relish in the feeling, squelching every time you dared move them. You looked down and saw the dirt and grass clippings caked to your feet, knowing your mother would have something to say when you decided to meander back to the house. But for now, in your white nightgown and your hair tied back with some string, you would be one with the ground and the sky that threatened to brighten at any moment. When you had these little meetings with the earth in the early morning, you felt invincible like nothing could tear you away from it.

That was true until she came.

To others, she may have just been a passing figure like a ship in the middle of the sea when all is quiet and dark. To you, she was always present in your mind, never ignored. Your heartbeat quickened when she came around the side of the house, carrying feed for the chickens that were still continuing on with their noise. Her golden hair cascaded down her back in waves, tied back much like yours was but with a white ribbon. Simple accents like this always drew your attention for the fact that that it seemed so effortless on her part. A ribbon, a different colored garment or even a slight blush on her cheeks, it always causes you to take notice.

As she neared the chicken coop, her eyes never met yours. Desperation was all you could feel, desperation for her to look up and see you sitting in the grass almost like a child, for her to meet your eyes and smile. Only on two occasions could you remember her smiling at you, a genuine smile, not those smiles she would exchange when she passed you in the house or when you swapped pleasantries throughout the day. A real smile was what you longed for. The type of smile that would send you over the moon if she dared let her guard down for even just a moment.

She never wavered though. She always kept about her business and didn’t give you a second thought, at least that was what it felt like. You knew in the deepest parts of your heart that even if she did happen to glance up one day and acknowledge your existence, you might just die on the spot which could be even more damaging than the fact that she was in her own world without you. The longing you felt to be under her skin, to smell her hair and meld your bodies together, it drove you insane.

Her name, was Elle. Elle didn’t come from a prominent or wealthy family, you weren’t even sure she had a family at all. There always seemed to be a loneliness buried under her warm exterior but you couldn’t be sure. If she was lonely, her demeanor never let on.

She tip toed around the chicken coop, being careful not to step on any of the birds running underneath her feet, spreading the feed around and letting it run through her fingers. She smiled to herself and your heart fluttered inside of its cage — did she know you were watching? Or did the thought of another cross her mind and cause this look of delight?

After spreading the rest of the chicken’s breakfast around the ground, she wiped her hands on the apron tied around her waist and looked up to the sky. Her nostrils flared as she took in a deep inhale and shifted her body from side to side, allowing the farm air along with the forest scent fill her nose. You stared unashamedly — mesmerized by every movement and facial expression she made. Elle was a beautiful girl, there was no doubt about that but it was more so her elegance even while doing the most trivial jobs, that had you wrapped around her finger. There was an innocence about her and worldliness all in one. It seemed like nothing bad could touch her while at the same time, daunting things had been seen by those bright blue eyes of hers. Of course, this was merely an assumption made due to lack of conversation and even eye contact for that matter.

“Y/N!” You nearly jumped out of your skin at the shrill voice that came from your right side. You clutched your heart and immediately turned to see your mother standing over you, already dressed for the day and probably disapproving of your nightgown clad body.

“Mother!” You said quickly, secretly terrified that she had read your mind or even worse — saw you staring at Elle. You scrambled up to get off of the ground and brush the earth off of you.

“What in God’s name are you doing out here again? I mean goodness child, it’s barely dawn and you’ll catch a chill.” You loved your mother dearly but the nagging was incessant. You knew it was all an act of love but sometimes you just wished you could communicate with her in only looks rather than words. It sure would save a lot of time.

“I was just —“ you tried to defend yourself but got interrupted.

“Ah ah — none of your excuses. Harry is on his way and we must be hasty to get you ready by the time the carriage arrives.” She granted you a look of disapproval as she grasped your wrist, not too forcefully but firmly. Your heart sank at the sound of his name. Harry. The man your father had hand picked for you to marry, the man you could stand for a mere five minutes until your blood was boiling and you would have to flee the room. A good man, your mother would always remind you and you suspected she was trying to convince herself rather than you. Really, he wasn’t a terrible human being, but you had other predelictions and those didn’t happen to include Harry. He was agreeable at times, but had a bad habit of making passive comments that had hints of poison hidden behind them.

“Pardon me mother but Harry, really? On such short notice I — “ for a second time, but it wouldn’t be the last, she cut you off.

“Yes, child, today! We discussed this earlier in the week, your father and I, and you as we sat and ate dinner the other day. You seemed very partial to it. Why the sudden change?” She rambled on. The truth was, you really didn’t remember the conversation she spoke of at all. This happened often, you’d be off deep in some day dream, a long reverie and your mother would be going on. However you wouldn’t hear it, her words were muffled as you sunk deeper into your fantasy. You would simply nod and act like you’d hung on to every word she said.

“No change mother,” You squeaked out, snapped out of your trance, fearful of being found out again. “I’m actually quite looking forward to it.” You lied right through your teeth, your jaw aching from clenching it tight.

Guiltily, you followed your mother up the path to the front of the house. Walking by the garden in the back, you took one last glance at Elle. She was checking the vegetable patch for any tomatoes or peppers that may have sprung up over night. You held your gaze until you rounded the corner of the house, the orange brick nearly swiping your arm as you lacked attention to it.

“Come on!” Your mother grabbed your hand, apparently you weren’t walking fast enough for her taste. The scene would probably appear ridiculous to an onlooker, a grown woman being dragged to the house by her mother to force her to dress for a man she would never love. Such was your life as of now though, and there didn’t seem to be anyway to change it.

The giant slate shaded front door stood in front of the two of you as you came around the house. Your mother let go of your hand and looked down the gravel curved driveway for what you assumed must be Harry.

“Is he coming soon?” You asked, praying the answer was no and that he’d arrive later or hopefully never, you thought privately.

“Y/N I didn’t startle you out of your daydreams for my health, yes he’ll be here within hours — maybe minutes!” Your mother rolled her eyes at your question. She was a loving woman really, she just had a patience as thin as freshly, frozen ice and her neuroticism seemed to grow with age.

Your stomach began to turn at the thought of your soon-to-be-betrothed arriving at any second. The anxious feeling would always begin in your hands, a slight tingle and then your chest would begin to ache. It would start to course throughout your veins and always affect your stomach the worst — not necessarily nausea but a butterfly sensation that would cause feelings of impending doom. It wasn’t necessarily the man himself who caused this panic inside of you but rather the thought of never having Elle and forcing a feeling towards someone, no matter how incorrigible the person might be. None of it seemed fair but then again, your father always told you nothing ever would be.

Your mother pulled open the large door and waved you inside, heading straight for the staircase in the foyer to get you upstairs and dressed.

“Mother really, I can do it myself,” You huffed, not wanting her to think this was disrespect but rather an attempt at some alone time with your imagination.

“Nonsense, you never pick out anything proper.”

You wanted to scream. In some ways, she wanted you to be independent but in many others, she was suffocating. You’d been alive for two decades and some change and had enough sense to pick out your own outfit for meeting a suitor. You knew she would never let up though, so letting her have her way was easier than the alternative.

She frantically rummaged through your closet and chest of drawers, a desperate attempt to find something to make your second meeting with the man perfect. You almost scoffed to yourself at the thought of any interaction between the two of you being perfect.

“Try this one,” Your mother chose a light baby blue frock, practically tossing it behind her and almost hitting your face. You glanced up towards the ceiling, asking whatever god there was to please rescue you from this entire day.

“The color’s too much,” you had to admit, holding the dress up to you in the mirror and frowning at its garish flare against your skin.

“Alright, well — lets see,” she continued to throw around every item of clothing in the room frantically. After a few minutes of waiting on another piece of fabric to come flying at your head, you decided to take a seat on your bed. You sighed as your body sunk into the mattress, the dull ache in your gut still nagging at you.

“Now I think this one will definitely do,” she carried a cream dress out of the closet, smiling at the item of clothing like it was your matrimonial garb. You did have to admit that it was a simple but pretty gown that seemed to pair with your skin tone and wasn’t too gaudy. You rose up from the bed and reached a hand out to touch the fabric softly. You rubbed some of the cotton in between two of your fingers, your mother staring at you, waiting on approval.

“Well go on, try it on,” handing the dress to you, she began to pick up some of the others and return them to their proper place in the room.

You removed your clothes, never ashamed of your mother being in the room as you had an unspoken bond regardless of the bickering and nagging. Once stripped, you slipped into the creamy colored linen and turned to your mirror against the wall. You couldn’t be sure but you swore the woman in the mirror was almost smiling and had a twinge of confidence gleaming in her eyes. This dress would do.

Your mother turned to you, and smiled broadly. She spread her arms out and approached you, embracing you fully.

“You look absolutely beautiful, how is he going to resist?” She giggled and gave your cheek a quick peck.

“Now let’s do something with that hair.” She fussed, and you laughed to yourself, knowing that her comments always followed with another gouge at you. However, this was just how the two of you operated and it would probably always be this way. It wasn’t conventional but nothing in your life even closely resembled conventionality anymore.

———

You took a deep breath while doing one more look over yourself in the mirror. Your anxiety had been a small seed at first but grew quickly driven by the incessantness of your mother and the earlier sighting of Elle. Now your trepidation had exceeded itself and you found yourself constantly checking the window to see that black and gold ornate carriage rolling down the gravel past the forestry on both sides of the house in a familiar fashion. You’d seen many carriages coming down the road, whether it be family or close friends of your parents and even friends from your schooling in earlier childhood years, but those visits had never caused such a frantic and confused feeling inside of you before.

You’d been pacing the room for some time and decided to take a seat in the chair beside your window, grabbing a book by your bed that you’d been working on finishing. As you got sucked into the story, you didn’t even notice that the carriage had come crunching down the gravel road and was nearly halfway to your door.

“Darling! Y/N!” You faintly heard your mother call from downstairs. Your head fell into your hands and you realized it was finally time, time to face the music and begin this silly charade. After resting your head for a moment and trying to gain some courage, you looked outside with a short glance. The carriage was still coming down the gravel driveway and stopped just before the front door of your quaint little home. The driver halted the horses and stepped down off of his seat to open the door for the man of the hour. You’d only met him once before at a gathering in town, however the meeting was short lived and hadn’t gone well. You hadn’t really given him much thought until your parents had decided he would be your husband.

You saw one black boot step out of the carriage, and then a full body followed. His large green overcoat seemed too heavy for the weather and his curls were in a wild arrangement all over his head. He was brushing something off of his coat and you prayed he wouldn’t look up and see you peeking out of the window, spying from a distance. A white ruffled blouse was popping out from under the coat and his pants were perfect with no wrinkles in sight. This was a well put together man and you had no idea why he’d agree to marry you, a girl who couldn’t even make up her mind half of the time. He was speaking to the driver, probably giving instructions, and then your mother yelled more shrilly from the first story again.

“Y/N! Are you deaf?!”

You muttered curses to yourself and finally stood up, walking towards the door like it was the gallows and you were being marched towards your death. You felt a hard lump in your throat as you swallowed and sweat began to pool under your arms and near your forehead. You heard a firm knock at the front door and braced yourself for your mother to be overly zealous.

“Mr. Styles! What a pleasant day we’re having, made even better by your arrival.” She spoke calmly but you could sense the excitement she was holding back.

You took the stairs step by step, painfully slow, an act of self torture.

“It’s lovely to see you Mrs. Y/L/N, my day is already pleasant seeing you as well.” His English drawl was thick and he allowed every word to practically drip out of his mouth like honey. He didn’t enunciate but every word he spoke was clear, he was thoughtful with his speech.

You only had a few more steps left but you dared not look up from them. You feared you might fall or worse, your eyes would meet his and he’d have delusions of grandeur about the two of you together. You knew your mother was waiting for this to be a fairytale, for you and Harry to exchange only a glance and fall in love, having the perfect wedding and a child following soon after. It was embarrassing that she had this much hope, but only you felt this because your secret was still safe.

At the bottom of the stairs, you allowed yourself to glance up but never make eye contact at first. Luckily, Harry and your mother were still in conversation about the weather and catching up about their whereabouts like old friends. You had to admit, he did look quite dashing. His hair, wild but tamed in certain places and his dimples deepening into his cheek as he smiled at your mother’s pleasantries. His eyes gleamed and his teeth were almost blinding, and that jawline could slice any young woman’s heart in half. You felt like you had betrayed Elle by thinking of him like this, and a pang or guilt surged throughout you. You shook it off to be in the moment and not seem distant.

“Well might I say, you look stunning.” Harry turned from your mother to you, your cheeks instantly felt hot as you noticed his eyes wandering your entire body until he eventually met your gaze.

You tried your best to force out a smile and nodded your head slightly towards his direction. “Thank you, Mr. Styles. Lovely to see you.” You said curtly, the less conversation — the better.

“Y/N here has been elated since finding out you were coming to visit.” You could’ve slapped your mother for saying such a thing, she had to know that was a lie.

“Is that so?” He put his arms behind his back and turned on one heel to face you better. A fire grew within your belly when you noticed the triumphant smirk on his face, thinking he had you like putty in his hands.

You paused for a moment and decided now was the time to put on the sarcasm. Your first meeting with Harry had been quite the back and forth and it seemed it was going to be just the same this time. You suspected he knew this marriage wasn’t ideal in your eyes but for some reason he took some sick joy in the fact that you weren’t happy about it.

“Oh yes, elated doesn’t even begin to cover it.” You charged back at his smirk with your words. You both held each other’s stare for a few seconds, seeing who would break first.

Your mother looked back and forth between the two of you, gradually growing uncomfortable at this unspoken challenge. “Well I’ll leave you two to it then,” she said, too cheerily. She gave your back one pat and smiled at you quickly before going off into another part of the house. Now it was just and you Harry, staring each other down and allowing the silence to say more than you could.

“Is there any particular reason you’re not fond of me, Miss Y/L/N?” He finally asked, his eyes like laser beams directed right at you. His stare wasn’t harsh though, he did have soft eyes and expressions most of the time but a curiosity was burning behind those green, almost sea glass colored eyes. Most women must find him perfectly charming and handsome, a perfect match but you weren’t budging.

“No particular reason...besides all of them,” you smirked this time at your quip and absent mindedly shrugged, trying your very best to irritate the man and then maybe, just maybe, he’d leave.

Harry filled the air around you with a click of his tongue. “Such a shame.” You waited for a second part to his reverb but only received more intense eye contact, the two of you locking eyes, almost grappling, to see who would gain the upper hand.

“What’s the shame?” You shifted your feet slightly, growing tired of standing in the same position.

“That you’re not fond of me,” he boldly took one step closer to you. You stuck your chin out and raised an eyebrow to signal for him to elaborate.

“Well Miss Y/L/N, it’s just that...I’m quite fond of you so,” his smirk returned this time, the deep dimple dipping back into his cheek once more. He shuffled slightly, coat swinging behind him, trying to get closer to you.

You cleared your throat. “That is a shame Mr. Styles. I’m afraid however it’s really arranged marriages I’m not fond of, rather than you.”

“Arranged marriages are what the people of this world thrive on. My parent’s for example have had a happy arranged marriage fo’ twenty-five years.”

“Well good for them, I just don’t foresee the same for myself. Love is what truly counts in my eyes.” You crossed your arms, letting him know you were hard pressed and not budging on the subject.

He scoffed, saw your eyes widen and then tried to play it off as a cough. His smugness aggravated your nerves, you could feel it like a prickle on the back of your neck.

“You don’t share the same sentiment?” Your voice was edgy.

“Not exactly, no,” all the while he spoke, he was still looking you over and hiding a smile, which was still more of a snigger.

“Hmph, well to each his own I suppose,” you sighed deeply and rolled your eyes, not giving any inclination that you were worried about him noticing.

“Shall we go to the parlor?” He stepped back away from you and gestured to the room off to the left of the foyer. You didn’t respond with words but simply just nodded, it seemed conversation wouldn’t be conducive for the two of you today. The sound of your walking towards the parlor reminded you of the dreaded ticking of a clock, letting you know that time is slipping right through your fingers. Once in the room, your eyes flitted to the family paintings on the dark wooden walls. Staring back at you was your great-grandfather, a war hero, and aunt Sophia, who had been a midwife for nearly all her life. Your grandmother was above the fireplace, giving you a tight lipped smile. Your heart always softened at her portrait, you were close with her when she was alive and shared many fond memories together. Though grandmother was a stubborn woman, set in her quirky ways, she understood you and you wondered if you could have ever opened up to her about Elle and this marriage you opposed.

Harry was also looking around at the paintings and treasures on the shelves, walking slowly throughout the room and running his hand along the back of chaise opposite you. Your eyes fixated on his slender fingers and pondered what it might feel like to have them running down your back softly or tucking a stray hair behind your hair. Again, you shook those type of pleasant thoughts about him away. You’d only ever felt that way about Elle’s beautiful fingers, not quite as long as Harry’s, but dainty and gentle.

“The dress looks lovely on you, if I hadn’t reiterated that before.” Harry came around the side of the chaise, taking his green coat off and laying it beside him as he took a seat on the striped cushion. You tried not to let your expression change as you noticed his chest peeking out from under the white ruffled blouse. He had some kind of necklace on, a long silver chain you could barely see. His collarbones were noticeable as well as a few tiny chest hairs near his sternum.

“Thank you, nice of you to say,” you said, now smoothing away wrinkles of your dress in your lap.

“You say that as if I don’t always have nice things to say Y/N.” His expression was still one of complacent joy, a small smile on his face showing his front teeth slightly.

“You don’t seem to recall our first meeting, do you?” You remained standing, leaning on a matching striped high backed chair.

“I thought we got on quite well if my memory serves me correctly.” He sat up straight, getting ready to defend himself. You laughed, amused at his statement.

“I think our memories serve us in different ways, Harry.” You were more calm this time, getting used to the back and forth between the two of you.

“My apologies if your memories of me aren’t pleasant, I’ve been told I can be —“

“Difficult?” You interrupted, because whatever adjective he had in mind would be much too self serving. He laughed at this, a genuine, hearty laugh that filled the room all the way up to the ceiling.

“Was that amusing to you?” You asked him, genuinely confused.

Harry stood up now and began to take another lap around the room.

“Everything about you just confuses me Y/N, and yes, amuses me as well.” His hands were behind his back again as he inspected an old manuscript of the Bible on a bookshelf near the far window.

“Hm, good.” That was all you could manage to get out but this pleased you as it would confuse him even further. You were glad he wasn’t under the illusion you felt the same way and that you puzzled him. You’d rather be a mystery than understood.

“It’s not good,” this time he looked at you but his brow was furrowed and he seemed defeated. “It’s frustrating.”

“I’m sorry I...” You trailed off, realizing after saying it that you weren’t really apologetic. Frustrated? You thought, perfect.

“No....no, you’re not.” He pulled himself away from the shelves and looked deeply into your eyes, trying to decipher your code. Slowly, he began to walk toward you.

“But that’s what I like about you, you don’t seem to care.” His mouth was halfway turned into a smile, not in a smirk but more so in a satisfied manner.

Damned if I do, damned if I don’t, you thought. When you acted interested, he loved it and when you pushed away, the reaction was the same. How could you ever win?

He was now standing in front of you, towering like a giant in fairytales you’d read as a girl. There was a foot or two between your bodies but you knew he would want to close that gap in a matter of minutes. Your breath hitched in your throat at the thought of close contact, thinking of his fingers once more. Heat rose to your face, embarrassed of the thoughts you were having about him once again. Would he know you were thinking about him? Would Elle look in through the window and never see you in a different light like you so desperately wanted?

Goosebumps began to rise all over your arms and a shiver tumbled down your spine as he lifted a hand to your face, curling his index finger under your chin as you looked down at the wooden floor. A lump lodged itself into your throat as your anticipation grew. Gently, he tipped your face to look up at his. His eyes twinkled and the dimple nearly did you in, that knowing smile having you almost in pieces on the floor.

“You will love me one day Y/N,” he leaned down closer so you could feel his breath on your cheek. “Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow but when you finally do, best of luck.” You were at a complete loss for words. His boldness terrified you and had you under a spell simultaneously. You cleared your throat to break through the tension in the air and clear both of your heads of whatever thoughts you were having. He removed his hand from your skin and you felt a longing to know what his touch felt like again. Stop this, you scolded yourself.

He stepped away from you, you felt like all of the air had been sucked out of your lungs. Anger and excitement coursed through your bloodstream. The triumphant grin on his face said it all, he was going to get his way. The question of all would be, would you let him?

Harry stopped in the door frame and turned to you for the last time that day.

“I’ll see you tomorrow Miss Y/L/N, I must cut our visit short for today. Just trust, I’ll be back.” his back was to you once more and you felt your eyebrows knit back together. His words weren’t threatening but rather an assurance on his part that he wasn’t going anywhere. You could be mysterious and off putting but he’d still come back time after time, and that frightened you. You walked over to the window and saw Elle, picking flowers in one of the fields beside the house. Her back was facing you, bent down picking your favorite wildflowers that always popped up in the pastures this time of year. She reached up to tuck a stray hair back into the ribbon holding it together, then wiped her brow. What I would give to know what she’s thinking, you thought. On the other hand, you didn’t even have to know what Harry was thinking at all. There was a strange comfort in that.

Suddenly, your mother appeared behind the chaise, watching you stare out of the window. You cleared your throat again to break up the awkward silence, hoping she wouldn’t notice Elle in your line of vision.

“Don’t mean to interrupt dear, did everything go alright with Harry?” She said, messing with the necklace she had chosen to wear today.

“Swimmingly,” You meant for it to come off as sarcasm but she wouldn’t take it as such.

“How lovely! Listen dear, I need you to come help the new caretaker and show her the upstairs rooms. Come on now,” she was already heading into the foyer, not even looking back to see if you followed.

“New caretaker?” You called to her, feeling as if your heart had sunken into the deepest places of you, sorrow was coming.

“Oh yes, I forgot to mention. Elle’s mother is very ill, she’ll be leaving us tonight after supper.”

“Oh,” The only monosyllabic utterance you could manage to force out at this news. As you heard your mother scurry away to another room, you sank down onto the floor. You wanted to crawl into a hole in the ground and never peek out, even for your favorite meal. Elle was leaving and Harry had no intention of ever doing the same, and you had no control over any of it.

(Please leave me some comments/feedback!! I would love to know what you guys think of Victorian era!Harry and yes, there will be more parts and they will be longer including flashbacks!! Hope you guys enjoyed x)

#personal #writings #harry styles #harry #harry styles fanfiction #harry styles imagine #harry styles preference #harry styles au #harry styles x y/n #harry styles x reader #harry styles fic

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taylart-x · 5 years

Text

Whumptober- Day 7

Day 7: Isolation

Fandom: Thunderbirds Are Go!

Characters: Virgil Tracy, Scott Tracy, John Tracy, Gordon Tracy, Alan Tracy, Grandma Tracy, Jeff Tracy, Lucille Tracy (mentioned)

Disclaimer: I do not own Thunderbirds or any of the characters from the show (or from TAG). I just want to make cool stories :)

Also, this is a continuation from my previous story for Day 29, Numb. Enjoy >:)

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The funeral had been nice. There were flowers, and good music. Mum would’ve been happy with it.

Yet he still felt nothing.

There had been tears as her casket was lowered into the ground, he had silently cried as his mother’s body disappeared forever. But his grandma already had her arms full with John and Gordon, John standing silently and watching with tears gathered in his eyes, and Gordon sobbing against her. Dad had stood next to Scott, his arm around the eldest’s shoulders, his other holding Alan up against his side.

Virgil stood between them all, with only his own arms around him for comfort.

It was fine, the others obviously needed the comfort more. Virgil shouldn’t be selfish.

As they travelled home, he silently stared out the window of the car, watching the landscape change as it rolled past his eyes. Alan and Gordon were both sleeping, Alan’s head supported by his booster seat, and Gordon’s head leaning on John’s shoulder. John had his headphones on and was watching some sort of documentary. Scott was also sitting silently, but he had headphones on too, blocking out the world around him, even though his cheeks were still stained with the evidence of his misery from earlier.

Even Grandma and Dad were sitting silently, although Virgil suspected that Grandma was napping where she was seated. Dad was stoically staring out through the windscreen, hands white knuckled on the steering wheel.

But Virgil’s heart had been emptied again. It was like the hospital all over again.

He had felt the pain, the heartbreak, the all consuming sorrow.

And then it was gone.

When they arrived home, Dad got out of the car and rounded it to open the side door to unbuckle a quietly snoring Alan onto his hip. John gently shook Gordon, startling the young boy, but he quietly told him where he was and helped him out of the car. Scott went around to Grandma and carefully roused her from her slumber too. She woke much more gracefully than Gordon.

The family silently filed into the house, which seemed so much emptier than it had only a few months ago.

Dad went to put Alan to bed, Gordon following after him as he was shepherded by John.

Only Dad returned from the hallway, John having also gone to bed.

Scott followed Grandma into the kitchen, and Virgil heard the jug be flicked on, the water gurgling as it was heated.

Dad breezed past where the young musician was stood frozen in the entryway. The Patriarch of the Tracy family didn’t even spare his second eldest a glance.

No one had said a word to him since before the funeral, where Grandma had asked if he wanted anything to eat and had given him a hug.

Which also happened to be the only human contact Virgil had had all day.

A new tar slipped down Virgil’s face, but he wiped it away before anyone saw it.

Not like they noticed him anyway.

No, he shouldn’t think like that. Everyone was grieving, he shouldn’t be so selfish. They needed to take care of themselves first. And the younger boys needed the comfort from the adults. They had just buried their mother. Virgil shouldn’t be so needy.

With a decision made, Virgil moved out of the entryway and to his room that he shared with Scott. The eldest would probably end up on the couch next to their father anyway. He liked to keep an eye on Dad, and he hadn’t told Virgil why yet. But Virgil knew.

He had smelled alcohol on his Dad’s breath in the past week.

And he had watched Grandma empty a few of the bottles down the sink.

He knew.

Upon entering his room, the young artist stripped out of his dress clothes and collapsed onto the bed. Without even bothering to brush his teeth, he crawled into bed and curled up beneath the covers.

Tomorrow would be better.

It had to be.

-+-+-+-

He got up at sunrise after a nightmare fuelled night. Usually he would seek out Scott. It wasn’t unusual for Virgil to cross their room and crawl under the covers after a nightmare.

But Scott wasn’t there last night.

So Virgil ended up waking up early and sitting in front of his window that overlooked the farm for a few hours, watching the sunrise. A new day. Maybe it will be better.

As he entered the kitchen he immediately knew that his optimism had been ignored by fate. A thick grief hung over the family. Gordon was silently staring at the bench, his cereal sitting untouched in front of him. John was in the corner, cup of tea in hand and eyes staring off into empty space, lost in his own mind. Scott was watching Dad like a hawk, not letting the older man doing anything without the eldest’s knowledge. There was the faint scent of whiskey on Dad’s shirt.

Grandma was eating some toast and reading a magazine, though her eyes were flickering up and checking on the people around her before she returned to her magazine. Alan was curled up against Grandma’s chest, bright blue eyes wandering over the colourful pages in the magazine.

Virgil quietly made his way over to the toaster and slipped a couple pieces of toast in. No one said anything to him; he didn’t even think they had noticed his entrance. Usually his dad would give his hair a ruffle, and Grandma would give him a kiss on the cheek. There wasn’t even the usual grunt of acknowledgement from John.

It made the 13 year old feel very much alone.

Isolated within his own family.

The toast popped and Virgil snagged it before someone else could claim it, as they usually would, but no one made any move to do so. He spread some Marmite on the toast, along with margarine, and headed out to the porch where he sat and ate his breakfast.

His stomach was still clawing at him after the toast.

And not in hunger.

His heart was in his throat as he reentered the kitchen a couple hours later.

It was empty.

Everyone had disappeared to go about their days. He knew he would e able to find Grandma in the garden, and John was probably on the roof. Dad had to run into the city today, and as Virgil remembered, he heard the car drive off. Scott as probably with him. Alan and Gordon he could hear in the living room, some sort of T.V. program on.

Grandma would go and check on them and John in about 15 minutes, make sure they were okay, and eventually end up cuddling the both of them. It’s what had been happening for weeks now, ever since Mum got hospitalized.

And she had been giving him these cuddles too.

So what happened?

Why did Virgil not deserve the love and comfort anymore?

No. He shouldn’t think like that. That was selfish. His younger brothers needed their grandma more than him. They were younger. They probably missed Mum more. He could deal with the echoing loneliness. He just needed to stop being so selfish.

Without speaking a word to anyone, he made his way upstairs and back to his room. Once there he curled up back under his blankets, clutched his mum’s favourite jersey to him and cried. He cried for hours, raw sobs tearing their way out of his throat, his tears soaking into the cloth clutched in his white knuckled hands. One of the last things he had of his mum.

Eventually, Virgil feel asleep, still holding onto Lucy’s jersey, cheeks red and splotchy from the crying, and eyelashes sticking together. He slept all the way through dinner and into the early morning, which is when he finally woke form his exhausted sleep.

On soft feet, he exited his room and climbed up into the attic using the ladder always left down for John so he could stargaze. Fortunately (or unfortunately) for Virgil, his next youngest brother wasn’t sitting on the roof tonight. That meant that Virgil could quietly sit and watch the world wake up. As soon as he heard each of his family members enter the kitchen, he made his way down from the roof and slipped back into his room.

He fell asleep again soon after.

-+-+-+-

“Have you seen Virgil recently? I need to talk to him about something,” Scott asked John a few days later.

“Nope, I feel like I haven’t seen him in ages. He’ll be around here somewhere,” the red head responded, but there was a crease forming between his brows.

When was the last time he had seen Virgil?

The last he could think of was the funeral, but surely that wasn’t right? That was around a week and a half ago, almost two weeks.

He had seen his older brother since then. Right?

Oh God.

Scott had already left, moving outside to look around the trees. Virigil loved to perch in them to get a better angle on something he was drawing, or just to observe. No one else seemed to notice just how much Virgil took in. All the little details as he quietly watched on.

The second eldest wasn’t anywhere to be seen.

“Hey Gordy!”

The seven-year-old looked up from where he had been playing with his aquarium lego set on the front porch, carnelian brown eyes shining in the sunlight. “Have you seen Virge anywhere? I can’t find him.”

“I haven’t seen him in ages. Maybe he’s in your room?” the young blond answered with a shrug of his shoulders.

“I didn’t even think to look there. Thanks Gordon,” Scott replied, carefully stepping around the lego creations and bricks scattering the wooden deck.

He quietly made his way down the hall and knocked softly on their shared room. The door was closed. The door was never closed.

Scott truly felt bad. He had realised he had been ignoring his next youngest brother over the past week and a half, in favour of supervising Dad and watching after the other kids. All of them were reeling after their mother;s death, and the little ones had been screaming themselves awake at night with nightmares, and in those moments of sheer panic had called out for their mum.

Who wasn’t there to give them kisses and hugs anymore.

Dad hadn’t even heard these pleas for help from the couch, so Scott had gotten up to sooth the boys, tell them it would be okay, and even rock back to sleep in Alan’s case.

He hadn’t done it for Virgil at all though.

And he tended to get some of the worst nightmares of all of them.

Shit, he had been neglecting his brother. He hadn’t even said hello to him in a week and a half. Hadn’t seen him since the funeral.

When no one responded to his knock on the door, he did it again, hoping to garner some sort of response. Virgil was probably mad, being ignored by his big brother for almost two weeks, and Scott couldn’t blame him.

He would be pissed too.

“Virge, please open up, I haven’t seen you in days.”

Nothing.

“Please, V, I get you’re probably mad, and you have every right, but let me in, just yell out, let me know you;re okay.”

After once again getting no response, Scott decided to open the door, damn the consequences.

What he found caused him to pause.

The curtains were drawn, even though it was late spring and the mugginess of summer was starting to make itself known. The sunlight that did manage to filter through the curtains gave the room an eerie look. Dark, but in the middle of the day.

There was a lump on the bed, back turned to the door, and moving with each breath. Scott slowly approached the mass and sat on the edge of the bed, looking down at his feet.

“I’m really sorry, Virge. I haven’t been fair to you. I haven’t been here for you through something that has been hard for all of us. I’m so so sorry.

Still, Virgil gave no response.

Usually he would’ve said something by now. Either anger, or disappointment, or acceptance, but something would be made clear.

Virgil never gave the silent treatment.

“Virge? You okay?”

Still nothing.

Scot reached out a hand and gently shook the boy’s shoulder. “C’mon Virgil, please, just talk to me.”

He managed to roll Virgil over and onto his back, which is right when his stomach dropped.

Virgil was pale and gaunt, deep hollows under his closed eyes, and his black lashes splayed over his cheeks accentuating this. His skin was waxy and had a greyish hue to it. His usually shiny hair was greasy and limp over his face. Scott tried shaking him again, trying to get any sort of reaction from the younger. “Virgil? Virgil!”

Someone came running into the room as Scott continued yelling and shaking the unconscious boy, desperately hoping for a response he wasn’t going to get. His arms were grabbed by someone behind him, and someone older than him sat where he was, trying to rouse Virgil themselves.

It soon registered that Dad was holding him, his strong arms a source of comfort for the panicking 15 year old. Grandma was sitting on the bed, feeling Virgil’s forehead and rubbing circles with her thumb into Virgil’s hand. She turned back around to Dad, tears in her eyes and her voice hoarse.

“He needs a hospital.”

#thunderbirds #thunderbirds are go #Virgil Tracy #Gordon Tracy #Scott Tracy #alan tracy #John Tracy #grandma tracy #jeff tracy #death #mother's death #whumptober2019 #whumptober prompts

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replicant1955 · 5 years

Text

Everland

There is a land that lies on no map. Neither is it recorded in any history. But it is a land which everyone knows. It is the land that you see in the shadows of a summer afternoon as it slowly slips, first into evening, then into night. It is the land of a winter storm, the land of a sudden snowfall, the land of unexplained noises in an empty house. It is the land of scribbled notebooks forgotten in a trunk. It is the land of empty wardrobes and wide eyed wonder. It is the land of memory. It is the Everland. And this is Charlotte’s.

It was a lovely summer’s day.

Charlotte was not happy. The mobile signal at her Grandma’s was terrible. It was like trying to talk on a motorway. In fact the lack of any mobile signal required her to walk out of her bedroom, out of the house, go down the hill and stand by the gate into the bottom field (the one with all the cows) before she could talk to her friends.

And she couldn’t e-mail, text, instagram or facebook them, unless she had an afternoon to spare for one photo.

She gazed with dismay at all the electronics spread over her bed. What was she going to do all summer without broadband and a decent mobile signal? She looked around her bedroom, hoping for a miracle. But everything remained the same. The floor remained wooden and old, and bumpy. The window remained small and tilted with wobbly panes of glass. The wardrobe remained large, dark stained and mysterious. The rug remained the rug and the quilt remained the quilt. And the single plug socket looked as lonely as ever, especially as it was already coping with her television and her clock.

What had her mother been thinking of when she said, “You can go to your grandma’s as usual this summer”. Every summer holiday for as long as she could remember she had spent a month at her grandma’s house deep in the country. And she had enjoyed it. The freedom to go wherever she wished: the chance to wander through fields and woods for as long as she wanted. The many mysteries of an old house with so many corners it felt that it had been built backwards and upside down. And the comfort of her own bedroom (not shared with an annoying younger brother) with its wide bed and little window that admitted early morning sunlight with a capacity that belied its size. And the garden with its twisting paths that disappeared into tiny glades and streams; the fields that stretched out forever, empty except for distant clouds; the river that ambled its way through the tiny village, covered in squabbling ducks and stately swans. She had loved it all. But most of all she had loved having her grandma and granddad to herself.

But this year was different. This year she had her phone, her tablet, her school friends, the many plans that they had made texting in classrooms when lessons had become too boring to even pretend to pay attention. And now, now she was in the electronic equivalent to Siberia, exiled from everything and everyone who was vitally important to her continued existence.

Her mother had been sympathetic but uncomprehending, her mind fixed more on free time with her new boyfriend than with a knowing daughter commenting on anything and everything. And her kid brother thought the lack of an older sister for a few weeks was the opportunity of a lifetime. She shuddered at the possibilities for mayhem he would find without her to warn him.

Her grandma had been so welcoming that she felt that she couldn’t raise the subject with her. And Granddad, well he had just smiled and nodded and turned back to the chair he was fixing with a slight shake of his head at the inadequacies of modern carpentry.

So she was stuck, and annoyed and grumpy. And as her mother often said: nobody did grumpy like Charlotte.

Finally rousing herself from her bed of misery she took her phone, wandered downstairs to the kitchen, smiled at her Grandma who was deep in some major cooking effort intended for the village fete and announced that she was going to walk to the corner of the lane to phone her friends. Her grandma smiled and nodded and turned back to the ongoing battle with her pastry.

The path from the kitchen door wandered round the corner of the house, round the front door which no one used (for good reason as it opened under the stairs) and then down the overgrown front garden that led to the lane. The front garden was largely grass and twisted trees which bent in odd shapes beneath their indeterminate ages. Here and there small flowers broke through the green; daisies and cowslips and others which she could not name. The garden was home to mole hills and busy bees and numerous birds that nested in its high hedges.

In its shadows there were reputedly five wells, each used and then capped and forgotten. Many times she had looked for them all but she had never found the tops of more than four, each with its grey concrete hat and a small grating down which you could throw stones and listen for the distant splash.

The house seemed to nestle comfortably into the garden. Charlotte was not really sure where one ended and the other began. The lawns that stretched up to its old brick and stone walls and white painted windows; to its unused doors and empty flower pots. It was a house comfortable in its old age, happy in its many years. When she had asked her Grandma how old the house was she had simply smiled and replied, “As old as you want it to be” and carried on with what she was doing. So Charlotte had had to make up her own mind.

There was a small stream that ran through the garden, close to the house, so Charlotte sometimes liked to imagine it as a mill with its big water wheel and the dark stones grinding newly harvested corn in the warm dusty shadows.

Or perhaps it was once a tiny castle? The walls were a mixture of stone and brick, as if someone had used whatever was to hand to build it and some of the stones had time worn carvings so it could once have been a castle.

Or perhaps a farmhouse with its dark low oak beams and its red tile roof, bent beneath its weight of moss. She looked back at its tiny windows, ivy climbed walls and idly smoking chimney and wondered. The house looked old, very old. It looked like it had always been there, like somehow it belonged there and nowhere else. It looked right.

She paused for a moment in a circle of sunlight. She thought about her grandparents. In a way they were stranger than the house. If she pictured her grandmother she always thought about her as being silver. She always wore a silver necklace with a single dark bluestone stone. Sometimes she almost shimmered. Somehow she reminded her of forests, of moonlight, of fairies. She was tall, slim, unbent despite her age (something else she wouldn’t discuss). She moved with a casual grace and had an innate calm about everything, up to and including a nosy talkative granddaughter. Charlotte had never heard her raise her voice. Her face was thin and angular but she had a generous smile and Charlotte never doubted her love.

And she had a bow, with REAL arrows. When Charlotte had first seen the bow, hanging unstringed high up on the wall of the living room she had ached to take it down and hold it. It was never talked about so finally she had asked her granddad whose bow it was. He had smiled and said, “Your grandmother’s”. He was silent for a while after he said that but then he had added, “But she has not used it for a very long time.” On learning this Charlotte had immediately rushed away to ask her grandmother about the bow and could she have it but she would only say: “When you are older and taller I will teach you to use it”, and despite constant badgering over the whole of that holiday would not be drawn further on its’ history, when she could shoot it or even why she had a bow in the first place. After all, as Charlotte had said constantly, her mother didn’t have one.

And her grandfather: he was as different from her grandmother as chalk and cheese (a meaningless saying of her mother’s: of course they were different). Where her grandmother was tall and slim her grandfather was small and round. Where her grandmother seemed to be almost a creature of the forest more at home in woods and fields her grandfather seemed to be a creature of the earth, happiest buried in his workshop, with his many tools and machines and fires and files. He always looked as if he would happily burrow into the earth to dig up metals and make things.

But he clearly loved her grandmother and he loved Charlotte as well so she didn’t mind. She didn’t even mind his pipe which he smoked in the evenings – always out of the house because her grandmother objected to the smell. He would sit there and blow smoke rings to amuse her and tell her stories of wizards and dragons that lived in the earth and collected hoards of treasure.

Strange but nice she concluded and satisfied that she now understood them both she moved on to consider other things.

Slowly she wandered out the gate, always open and now hanging down on its hinges, into the lane and then down to the field, partly skipping from sunlight to sunlight, gazing at the shape of the clouds and listening to the birds rustling and chatting in the hedges.

At the bottom of the lane she stopped by the wide metal gate and gazed at the wide field with its distant herd of quietly munching cows. The day was surprisingly warm and she settled on the old stump in the shade of an oak tree to read her texts.

Reception was as bad as always and her messages took ages to load, especially as they were full of pictures of the exciting things her friends were doing and from which she was currently excluded. Bored with waiting she walked to the gate to look into the field. It was then that she saw the owl. It was gliding slowly and silently across the field, looking down, its head moving slowly from side to side. She supposed it was hunting. She watched as it criss-crossed the field several times in long slow transits. It was almost hypnotic, the way in which it flew, low and silent across the sunlit field. Gradually she became more and more interested in the owl, ignoring her phone and its’ insistent bleeping.

Finally it glided to a perfect landing on a nearby post and, to Charlotte’s surprise turned in her direction. For a moment it looked at her steadily and Charlotte realised with a sense of shock that something was different. It was wearing goggles! From the middle of its’ flat white feathered face there extended two polished brass cylinders, each fitted with a lens at the end. As she watched, the lenses extended and retracted, each of the owls eyes growing larger and then smaller in turn. For a moment girl and owl stared at each other in seeming mutual amazement and then, with an irritated chattering of its beak, the owl launched itself back into the blue sky and slowly flew off in the direction of the distant wood.

Charlotte sat there, puzzled, amazed and wondering if she had really seen what her eyes had shown her. An owl wearing binoculars! What in heaven’s name: (another saying of her mother’s) was going on. Then, as if the day hadn’t had enough of impossible things she heard a sharp whistle at her feet and looked down.

What she saw in front of her was even more bizarre. Sitting in a small four wheeled vehicle with a tiny steam engine at its’ back was a small grey field mouse. It looked strangely at home in its’ tiny red leather seat and with its claws gripped tightly on the steering tiller. There a small stream of white smoke coming from the chimney at the rear of the vehicle and she could hear the boiler bubbling away. The mouse looked up at her with its bright black eyes, lent its’ head to one side and and very reasonably said, “Well that was a close escape if I say so myself. Thought he had got me at one point.“

Charlotte looked down in amazement. Talking mice driving steam cars. Whatever next! Then,as if there was nothing strange in its talking or in her obvious staring the mouse continued, “You don’t mind moving your feet do you? I’m not very good at steering yet. “Not daring to think too much of the strangeness of conversing with field mice Charlotte realised that her feet were blocking its path. “Sorry, “She said and moved them back.”Thank you” it replied and then, with a cheery, “Goodbye” .it trundled off along the lane followed by its plume of white smoke, finally turning beneath the hedge.

For a long time Charlotte sat on the stump, phone and friends forgotten. Finally she got up and walking slowly along the lane shaking her head, went back home to tell her grandmother what she had seen.

Somehow summer no longer seemed so boring.

Doug

#prose #original story #writerscreed

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alydiarackham · 4 years

Photo

(Cover by me)

Bauldr’s Tears: Retelling Loki’s Fate

Chapter One

“Loki Farbautison,” the deep, quiet voice resounded through the white marble courtyard. “You have been accused of murdering an Aesir—a willful and wicked act that cannot, through any cunning, be undone. Do you deny it?”

Slate gray clouds hung low, blocking the sun. Icy wind whipped between the pillars, tugging at the long, black, draping clothes and loosened blonde hair of the crowd of courtiers who hugged the perimeter. All of their pale faces, stark eyes, turned toward the center of the yard, where a young man stood alone.

He also wore black, with tatters hanging down from his shoulders and long sleeves. His long, colorless, shackled hands did not move, nor did his lean form shift. His curly, dark brown hair ruffled in the wind, strands falling down across his white brow.

He slowly raised his head. Beneath ink-dark eyebrows, striking eyes lifted to the far end of the courtyard—eyes like a gray dawn; alive, but distant. The courtiers focused on his angular, handsome face, noble nose, cheekbones and chin, and firm, quiet mouth. They watched him unblinkingly, waiting for his answer.

He took a breath, and slightly lifted his right eyebrow.

“Is there a point in answering?” He spoke lowly, each word elegant and precise. Vapor issued from his lips. The crowd seethed. Their murmurs rumbled like low thunder.

And the first one who had spoken—a tall, white-bearded king garbed in night, seated in a wooden throne on the dais—slammed his hand down on the armrest.

The blow shook the air.

His single sapphire eye blazed, and he gritted his teeth. His wizened brow knotted around his eye patch, and his fists clenched.

“You murdered my son,” he snarled. “You, who we took in as one of our own. You, who have been our…our friend for countless centuries. You have betrayed us.” The one-eyed king paused. His voice roughened. “You have betrayed me.”

The court murmured and groaned. Some shielded their eyes, others leaned their heads against their loved ones’. Loki Farbautison twisted his left hand and lifted his shoulder. His chains clinked. As if he could not help it, he glanced to the king’s right, where a magnificent, golden-headed prince stood, clad in dulled gold armor, and a heavy thundercloud of a cape that hung from his shoulders to his ankles. For an instant, Loki’s gray eyes met the prince’s burning blue ones. But the prince’s brow twisted, his eyes closed, and he turned his lion-like head away, pressing a hand to his mouth and over his bearded jaw. Loki swallowed, and turned again to the king. He raised his eyebrows.

“What can I say?” he asked.

The king would not look at him. His hand flexed, and he stared fixedly at something to his right.

“You make no defense, you will not answer for your conduct,” the king said hoarsely. “Therefore, we must acknowledge that there can be no question of your guilt.” He shut his eye, and closed his fist. “You murdered my son, a prince of Asgard. There is only one possible consequence.”

The court held its breath. The blue-eyed prince turned to hide the tears that spilled down his face. The king lifted his chin.

“Loki Farbautison,” he declared into the silence. “You are sentenced to death.”

Loki’s long-lashed eyes closed. Overhead, a groan of thunder rolled through the clouds.

And it began to snow.

Three Months Earlier…

Thunder growled around the thick wooden walls of the house as Marina Faroe crept from the sitting room toward the library, holding only a lit candle in her right hand. As her stocking feet slid across the floorboards, she bit her lip and prayed she wouldn’t trip over any of the boxes she had left out. The darkness hung thick and heavy around her, unwilling to flit away as her candlelight intruded. With her free hand, she pulled her long cashmere wrap closer around her very slight form, though the movement made her stiff arm ache from her thumb to her elbow.

She slipped through the pokey corridor, and then her feet padded onto the deep red, tapestry-like carpet of the library. She crossed the room, then reached up and pushed her candle down into a wooden candlestick standing on the carved mantle. Then, she knelt, groped for the matchbox, and leaned into the fireplace to snap flame from a single match, then light the tinder and logs inside.

It was difficult—the last three fingers of her left hand stayed curled close to her palm, and her wrist refused to extend more than halfway, leaving all the work to be done by her right hand, and the forefinger and weak thumb of her left. Besides which, it hurt.

However, after a few minutes of quiet struggle, a small fire danced against the rough-hewn stones, warming her narrow face, and lighting her hazel eyes. She dusted her right hand off on her jeans, then pushed her sleek, unbound black hair out of her face. Taking a breath, she lifted her head, folded her arms, and glanced around the room.

Deep bookshelves covered all the walls, except for the door and the wide fireplace. Empty cardboard boxes sat against the north wall, their former contents now lining the shelves. Ancient, leather-bound manuscripts, their spines ragged, their pages yellowed, sat in uneven rows, the titles illegible in the flickering half dark. But Marina knew them all—knew them like weathered faces of old friends. They belonged to her dad’s collection: volumes of Norse poetry, Viking travel records, maps, folklore, songs and legends. Some had been inscribed by hand, in now-faded ink. Others were first editions of research published a hundred years ago. She had read every one.

Marina sighed, bringing her knees up to her chest and wrapping her right arm around them, leaning back against more unpacked boxes as the scent of burning pine and the crackle of the flames filled the silence.

She glanced up at the softly-ticking, intricately-carved Swiss clock sitting on one side of the mantle. She could barely see its face by the light of the candle—it was past ten. Her delicate mouth hardened. The storm had knocked the electricity out, so she couldn’t charge her dead cell phone, and she hadn’t set up her landline yet. She couldn’t have called her mother in New York at nine-thirty. Even if she had wanted to.

She shifted, pressing her left arm against her stomach, turning her head to consider the empty shelves on the south wall. Tomorrow, she would set her dad’s collection of rusty Viking swords on the middle ones, along with his glass cases of beaten coins. She would heft the small, stone idols of Odin, Loki, Thor and Frigga to the very top shelves, so they could be studied, but never touched. And in the far corner, across the room, she would stand the three-hundred-year-old half-tree up, so that all of the wide-eyed, gaping faces and squatty bodies of the dwarves carved into it could be seen in the firelight. And over the mantle…

She got up. Thunder rumbled again, shaking the upper stories. Marina stepped nimbly through the maze of boxes on the floor, and bent over one in the back. She pried the lid open, then reached in with her right hand and pulled on a thick, gold-painted frame.

Carefully, she slid it up and out. Firelight flashed against the glass. She straightened, and held it up. For a long while, she just stood there, gazing at the broad picture within the frame. Then, she turned, moved back to the mantle, and, grunting, managed to lift the picture up and set it there, and let it ease back to rest against the wall. She stepped back and gazed at it, keeping her left arm pressed to her chest. She took a deep breath, and her lips moved to mouth the words penned beneath the strange drawing. Words she had whispered thousands of times.

“Stien til Asgard…”

Silence answered her. Silence that had always been interrupted before by a deep, eager voice forming words of explanation—a bright eye, a roughened hand reaching up to point at the illuminated edges, a smile bordered by a dark, graying beard…

A tear escaped her guard. It spilled down her cheek. She swiped it away, swallowed hard and tightened her jaw—but the flutter of the candle’s flame drew her gaze back to the picture. Marina’s arms tightened around herself as thunder once again grumbled overhead, and the spring rain broke loose, and lashed the outer walls.

Chapter Two

Marina took a deep breath of cool morning air, thick with the scent of rain, and shut the front door behind her, as the sunlight warmed her whole body. She stepped down the short landing and turned back to glance up at her new house. “New” being a relative word—it was actually only new to her.

She could see it better now than she had when she had moved in. Yesterday, it had been cloudy, and she had ducked her head and hauled boxes inside between spats of rain. But today, golden sunshine bathed the whole house, and she stopped on the brick pathway to look for a moment.

Three stories, all dark weathered wood, with a peaked roof and simple, sturdy bric-a-brac around the thick-pillared porch, and upper windows. Marina narrowed her eyes at those dusty, flaking windows. They needed cleaned and sealed and painted. And she was fairly certain that the deep-green, hardy ivy growing up the north side had already slipped its inquisitive fingers in through the windows of the second story.

She took another deep breath, and glanced around at the rest of the yard. The lush, dew-gleaming lawn needed mowed, the rosebushes flanking the path had twisted and sprawled out of their bounds, and the iron-wrought fence surrounding the whole half-acre needed re-painted. And she didn’t even want to look at the snarled knot that was the vegetable garden on the north side.

She paused, listening. Birds chirped in the motionless boughs of the towering pines and oaks that surrounded and filled her property, but aside from that quiet, cheerful sound, all remained silent. She nearly smiled. So different from the rushing, wailing, flashing, seething streets of Manhattan.

She turned, adjusted the collar of her draping sweater wrap, and strode down the uneven walkway between the rose bushes, her boots tapping on the bricks. She pushed the squeaking iron gate out of the way, turned and opened the door of her dad’s pickup truck—a sturdy, new red Ford that had carried everything of hers up all the winding, sweeping roads from New York to here: an empty house by a tiny town near the Bay of Fundy.

She opened the door and crawled up into the cab—it was like climbing a tree. Her dad had been a lot bigger than her…

She settled, pulled her purse strap over her head and set her purse in the passenger seat, slammed the door, and started the big diesel engine. It grumbled to life as her keys jingled, and she gingerly pulled the truck out into the dirt road, sitting far forward in the seat and steering with just her right hand.

As she drove, the sunlight flashed through the trees and against the left side of her face. Marina rolled the window down, to let the fresh air in. She bit her lip, hoping she could remember the way back into town. She’d driven through it yesterday, late, but it had been in the rain…

She didn’t push the truck faster than twenty five, and she didn’t listen to any music as she maneuvered the road that wound through a canyon of pines, her left hand resting in her lap. She only came to one fork in the road, hesitated for a moment, wincing, then turned right. After a few minutes, though, she breathed a sigh. Here it was.

Marina doubted this little town appeared on most maps. But it had a medium-sized, stone post office that she could see from here, a wide, sunlit main street lined with a few quaint shops, a two-pump gas station, and a general store at the far end that she hoped would have what she needed.

She pulled up in front of the broad-windowed, brick general store and parked, then opened the door and slid down out of the truck. Her boots crunched on the gravel as she stepped up onto the sidewalk. She glanced to the right and realized that the store snugged up right next to what was probably the only restaurant in town—a white, pleasant little deli with the name Theresa’s painted in curly writing on the window—and the hanging sign said Closed.

Marina pushed the door of the general store open. A bell jangled over her head. She eased inside and let the door click shut behind her.

The shop was small, dimly-lit, and packed with rows of loaded standing shelves. White and maroon checked tiles made up the floor, and jars of old-fashioned candy almost covered the cashier’s counter off to her far left.

Before she had taken three steps, a middle-aged man in a plaid shirt and jeans stepped out from behind one of the back shelves.

“’Morning,” he greeted her, smiling. “Can I help you find anything?”

“Um,” Marina adjusted her purse strap on her shoulder and glanced around. “Paint?”

“Interior or exterior?” he asked, coming closer.

“Exterior,” she answered. “I’m painting my window frames.”

“It’s a nice day for that,” he commented. “Yeah, come this way.” He beckoned, then started back the way he had come. Marina followed him.

“Is there a specific color you’re looking for?”

“They used to be deep green,” Marina said. “Almost all the paint is gone now, but I think that’s right—some sort of pine green.”

The storekeeper paused and glanced back at her, brow furrowed.

“Which house are you painting?” he wondered. “I’ve sold paint to pretty much everybody in this town, and there’s nobody with pine green windows.”

Marina almost smiled.

“I’m new in town—just moved in yesterday,” she said. “I bought the Stellan house.”

The storekeeper, now standing in front of a rainbow of paint swatches on the wall, stopped and looked at her.

“You mean…” He raised his eyebrows. “You mean that old, Danish-looking house on the edge of town?” he pointed. “The one where that author lived for all those years before he went out into the forest and…”

“Yeah,” Marina nodded, then shrugged, smiling. “What can I say? It was cheap.”

He laughed, then turned to search the swatches.

“Ghosts don’t bother you, huh?”

“No such thing,” Marina said quietly, the smile fading from her face.

“Tell that to the people around here,” the shopkeeper answered, reaching up to pull a couple swatches off the wall. “Especially after most of us have seen or heard more than one weird thing in those woods.” He turned and gave her a pointed look. “Word to the wise: don’t go out there at night. No matter what you think you see.”

Marina frowned at him, alarmed, but he was perfectly serious, so she nodded once. He faced the swatches again, and pulled down one more, then handed them to her with another smile.

“Feel free to take these home and see how they look.”

“I think I’ll actually pick one out now, if you’ll give me a minute,” Marina said, taking them from him.

“Okay, sure,” he nodded. “Take your time. I’ll just be up here organizing some stuff by the counter.”

“All right,” Marina said, and he left her alone in the aisle with three swatches of green. Marina watched him go, her brow slowly furrowing as she rubbed her thumb up and down the pieces of paper.

The overhead radio clicked on, playing oldies. She blinked, and forced herself to look down at the different shades.

After ten minutes of debate, she decided, and took the swatch up to the counter. The shopkeeper eagerly mixed the paint for her, then helped her load up a basket of other supplies she would need, such as paint stirrers, brushes, and scrapers. She bought two gallons of dark green paint, all the other supplies, and a glass bottle of soda, and hauled all of her purchases to the front door. Two bags she carried in the crook of her left elbow, and the other two in her right hand. She heaved the door open. The bell jangled.

“Need help?” the shopkeeper called from behind the counter. Marina shook her head.

“No, thanks. I’ve got it.”

“Okay,” he answered. “Nice to meet you, Miss…?”

“Feroe,” she answered, slipping out. “Marina Feroe.”

“Jim Fields,” he replied. “Have a good day!”

“Thanks,” Marina said, letting the door shut.

A crisp gust of wind blew through her clothes and hair as soon as she stepped down off the sidewalk, and she fumbled in her purse for her keys. She managed to dig them out, bite the side of her cheek and use the keyless entry to unlock the truck. It beeped. Grunting, she heaved the door open and swung her right hand bags up onto the passenger seat.

The bags on her other arm slipped.

She gasped. She scrambled to catch them, scrabbling around her swaying purse—

Her left hand wouldn’t obey.

One bag slipped and smashed onto the ground.

Her soda bottle shattered.

She wanted to scream something foul. Instead, she gritted her teeth hard, threw the remaining bag up into the truck, and got down to pick up the bag of paint brushes that was now filled with soda.

“Wait, wait—careful!” a voice called out. “Don’t cut yourself.”

She jerked, startled, and glanced up. At first, all she saw was a pair of work boots and jeans—then she saw the rest of him.

He wore a long-sleeved, blue shirt stained with dirt, as if he’d been working in a garden. He had collar-length blonde hair that lit up like gold in the sunlight. He hurried toward her, his boots thudding on the paving. Her face heated and she looked back down at the mess.

“I won’t,” she mumbled. “I’m just…stupid…” She twisted her left arm and pulled it toward herself, cursing her useless fingers. She reached out with her good hand and pulled the plastic back, trying to fish the brushes out.

“Wait a second—stop,” he urged—his voice sounded like an afternoon wind, warm and deep. It brought her head up again…

And she froze. He knelt right across from her, startlingly near. His face was flawless—pale but ruddy, with soft, strong features and jaw line. His fine hair hung like flax around his brow and ears, and his quiet mouth formed a small smile. But she saw all of this peripherally—for Marina was instantly captured by his eyes.

They were the color of the highest summer sky—pure blue, and brilliant as jewels, and fathomless. His dark right eyebrow quirked, and his smile broadened. He glanced down at the mess. His brown eyelashes were as long as a girl’s.

“I can get those,” he assured her, reaching down with both dirt-covered hands and swiftly pulling the brushes free of the tinkling glass. Marina’s mouth opened to protest, but nothing came out. Her face got even hotter.

“Here,” he said, holding the brushes out to her and giving her another bright grin. She managed to take them from him, and then he scooped the bag up and stood. Marina’s eyebrows raised. He was tall, his shoulders broad. He trotted over to a metal trash can and tossed the mess in. It clanged when it hit the bottom. Marina got to her feet, then realized she was staring at him. She turned quickly, leaned into the truck and stuffed the now-sticky brushes into the cup holder.

“Planning a project?” he asked, and she heard him come back toward her. She turned back around, wishing she wasn’t blushing so hard.

“Yeah,” she nodded, glancing up at him. He dusted his palms off on his jeans, his friendly look remaining.

“I’m painting some windows,” she added, shrugging, still keeping her arm close. He stuck his hands in his pockets and cocked his head.

“That’s a big job. Need any help?”

Marina’s eyes flashed and she frowned at him. He suddenly laughed.

“I’ve forgotten my manners,” he said. “My name is Bird Oldeson. I’m kind of the town’s handyman.” He met her eyes again, and inclined his head.

“Oh, I see,” Marina nodded. Absently, she noted that he had an accent—it sounded almost English, but with a gentle lilt that she couldn’t identify. She held out her right hand.

“Marina Feroe,” she said. “I just moved here.”

He gave her a look of startled pleasure, then took up her hand in a gentle hold. His fingers were warm.

“Nice to meet you,” he said. Marina allowed herself a little smile.

“Nice to meet you, too,” she answered. Then, she turned and climbed up into the truck.

“I meant what I asked you,” he said as she shut the door.

“What?” she asked, glancing out the open window as she turned the truck on.

“If you need any help.” He wasn’t really smiling now—he gazed at her with raised eyebrows. She shook her head.

“No, I think I’m okay,” she said. “Thank you, though.”

“You’re sure?” he pressed, his voice quieter. Marina paused, studying him, then nodded again.

“Yes,” she said. “But really—thank you.”

He gave her a half smile, then bowed his head again.

“I’m sure I will see you again.”

She didn’t know what to say to that, so she broadened her smile a little, then put the truck in reverse, pulled out and headed back alone to her old house.

Marina leaned the shaky ladder up against the north wall of the house. It rattled as it hit the sunlit siding. She took the heavy clippers in her hand and gazed straight up. Before she did anything with the paint, she had to get the ivy off the windows of the second story. Which was going to be tricky.

She clamped the handle of the clippers between her teeth, grabbed one of the rungs of the ladder and set her feet. Then, taking a breath, she started to climb, only occasionally using her left hand for balance. Once she reached the top, she wrapped her left arm around the ladder, took the clippers in her hand and began snapping at the ivy.

The long tendrils fell down in waves, but more and more lay beneath, like a thick carpet. Her arm got sore, and the ladder wobbled, but she worked for several hours without stopping.

Finally, her shoulder couldn’t take it anymore, and she sighed, wiped the sweat off her forehead, and started down.

She gathered up the trimmed ivy and hauled it around to the sagging mulch pile near the garden. Then, she came back around, put her hand on her narrow hip and gazed up…

To see that it hardly looked like she’d done anything. She gritted her teeth, frowned fiercely at the remaining ivy, snatched the clippers up from the grass and started up the ladder again.

Marina thrashed. Her sleeping bag tore. She jerked awake, sweating, her heart hammering. She stared at the dark ceiling of the study.

Jerking gasps caught in her chest and she shivered all over. Weakly, she lifted her head and glanced through the door. Gray light of dawn seeped in through the sitting room windows. She swallowed and eased her head back down onto her crooked pillow—and grimaced.

Clenching pain ran up and down her left side and shot through her shoulder, down her arm, twisted through her elbow and clamped down on her wrist. Her arm shuddered, and she pulled it against her chest. Her whole back ached, and she felt like she had a fever.

For an hour, she lay there, breathing deeply, forcing her muscles to loosen, mentally kicking herself. She’d overdone it today. She should have stopped after tearing the whole wall of ivy down, and not tried to tackle the rosebushes by the front walk. She’d known that when she started that last job, but she hadn’t listened to herself. Now she was paying for it.

Tears leaked out and ran down her temples. She knew what it was like to wake up fully rested, without any pain. But she couldn’t remember the last time she had.

And the last time it hurt this much had been about a month after it happened.

She sat up, groaning and gritting her teeth, squeezing her eyes shut. She stayed still a moment, regulating her breathing, trying to stop shivering. Then, she pushed her sleeping bag off herself and crawled to her feet. The ruffle of her long white nightgown tumbled to her ankles. She wrapped her arms around herself, chilled.

“Such an idiot, Marina…” she muttered. She crossed the rug and left the study, turned down the hall and fumbled with the lock on the front door. If she could just get some fresh air, the ache in her head might go away, at least…

She pulled the thick, heavy black door open. Its hinges squeaked.

Fresh air gushed in to meet her, and she closed her eyes and took a deep breath, letting the door go as it swung further open. She stepped up and leaned sideways against the wide doorframe, letting the breeze cool her hot forehead. Sighing, she finally opened her eyes, and gazed out at her gray front yard, hung with early-morning shadow. She lingered on the ragged rose bushes, whose branches still hung wild, disordered and tangled all over the other flower beds and the path.

Then, she caught sight of something on her front step. Frowning, she shuffled out, bent with a wince, and picked it up.

She fingered the flimsy sheets of a small newspaper of ads and coupons. Her mouth quirked as she straightened. The people in her new town didn’t waste any time trying to sell things to her…

Her eyes focused on the front page. She frowned.

Right in the middle sat an ad for Svenson’s Plumbing, Carpentry and Landscaping—and it listed its employees: Richard Smith, Harry Williams, and Bird Oldeson.

Marina absently pulled her left arm against her stomach, and stared at the name as her unsteady hand held the paper. Then, she clenched her jaw, muttered a Danish curse word under her breath, and turned and went back inside to find a light, hoping the ad listed Svenson’s hours.

Chapter Three

With each lap she made around the house, the aching in her muscles eased, and her left side relaxed. She wandered through the green, sunlit lawn, following a crooked brick path that led her between the overgrown rows of herbs, and beneath a leaning arbor laden with grape vines. Her heels tapped on the dull stone as she passed into the deep shadow behind the house, cast by three towering oaks. She glanced over the half-sunken benches and toppled bird bath, all swallowed by vines and weeds. A little robin alighted on the back of one of the benches and cocked his head at her. She paused, and watched his bright eyes. He chirped once, then fluttered up and away, darting into the forest and out of sight.

A chilly gust of wind issued from the reaches of the woods, and rustled through her hair and clothes and the boughs of the trees. She wrapped her arms around herself and narrowed her eyes at the deep, tangled green shadow beyond the benches, the line of pines and the sagging wrought iron fence. She turned, and resumed her walk.

On the other side of the house, she came again to the rose garden, all in disarray. Many bloomed—red, white, peach and maroon—but they snarled together like an evil fairy’s curse. One rosebush in particular made her frown: it bore no buds, and it leaned menacingly up against the house very close to the sitting-room window, just as the ivy had done on the opposite side. She paused and stepped closer to the plant, glancing it up and down. Thick, wicked thorns covered all its branches, and even its leaves. It needed to be cut back, or torn out—but she was afraid it would slice her to shreds if she tried.

Far off, a low rumbling arose through the silence, obscuring the twittering of the birds. Marina’s head came up, and she listened. Then, she took a breath and braced herself, and started back around to the front of the house. She picked through the border garden, kicked at a large weed, and halted in front of the steps, her arms still folded, gazing toward the road, toward town, at the approaching pickup truck.

The truck’s brown paint gleamed in the brilliant sun, and shovels, ladders and other tools rattled around in the bed. It pulled up in her driveway next to her own truck, and the throbbing engine cut out. The next moment, the door creaked open, and the tall, winsome form of Bird Oldeson hopped out onto the gravel.

He wore a tan t-shirt, worn jeans and boots, and gave her a smile that lit the day up even brighter. She reflexively returned it.

“Beautiful morning, isn’t it?” he called, striding toward her, his vivid blue eyes glancing all around at the sky, then the gardens and trees, as the light made a halo of his hair.

“Yes,” she nodded. “I think the rain did some good.”

“Oh, always,” he grinned, coming up to stop in front of her. He held out his hand. “Good to see you again, Miss Feroe.”

“Thanks,” she nodded, and barely took hold of his fingers. She let go right away, blushing, but he didn’t act like he noticed. He stuck both hands in his pockets, then looked her house up and down.

“Well, what is it you need done?” he asked, then met her eyes. She smiled crookedly and glanced behind her.

“The question is,” she said. “What do I not need done.”

He laughed. The ringing sound made the birds flutter.

“All right, let me rephrase,” he amended. “What do you need done first?”

“Well…” she sighed, frowning as she studied her house, then faced him again. “The windows. They leaked during the thunderstorm. The rest of the stuff in the garden can wait a while, but I don’t want my furniture ruined if it decides to rain again soon.”

“All right,” he said, scrubbing a hand through his hair as his brow furrowed. “You have the paint already, I assume—but the windows will probably need sealed, maybe even adjusted, since they’ve gotten crooked as the house shifts.”

“Okay, do whatever you need to do.” Marina folded her arms and cocked her head. “Are you paid by the hour?”

“Yes.”

“All right, go ahead,” she gestured toward the house. “Bring me any paperwork or questions or whatever—I’ll just be down here, trying to get this rose garden under control.”

He nodded again, catching her eye and giving her a soft, bright smile that warmed her to her core.

“I’ll get started right now,” he said, and turned and strode back to his truck, his boots crunching on the sand. Suppressing her own smile, Marina faced the house again and headed back toward the roses.

All day, Marina sat on a short stool with her back to the sun, letting it warm her, as she cut the overgrown roses back away from the path with a set of sturdy clippers. She had managed to find her work gloves, so she was able to thrust her hand into the thorny mess without tearing up her skin—though working with her left hand remained a challenge. Her long braid hung over her shoulder, and her jeans and loose shirt got dirty, but she didn’t care. Birds crooned and twittered in the bushes and in the branches of the bordering trees, and a quiet wind rustled the leaves.

Behind and above her, Bird Oldeson perched on a ladder, leaning up against the front of the house. His hammer clacked, the wood of the window frame creaked as he pried and pulled, and the ladder rungs squeaked with each step as he effortlessly ascended or descended to resume or go get a tool. She didn’t look at him—she just listened to the patter and tap of his rhythms, and the thud of his footsteps.

When she had gotten halfway down the row of roses, she paused a moment, sat back and winced at her stiff muscles, then wiped the sweat from her forehead with the back of her sleeve. Bird’s hammer tapped three times, rapidly. Then, he began to hum.

She froze, then twisted on her stool and glanced up at him.

The sunlight caught half of him as he leaned against the ladder and the wall, deepening the color of his clothes and skin, and blazing against his hair. His hands moved swiftly, deftly, over the loose windowsill as he secured it. He held two nails between his lips, his attention fixed on his work. And he hummed a soft, strange tune that carried through the midmorning air like a breeze.

For a long moment, Marina didn’t move or even breathe as she listened, studying the way he moved, trying to remember if she had heard the song before. He used one nail, then the other, and then with his liberated mouth, he began to sing, quietly. She blinked. It was another language—something like Swedish or Danish…But she couldn’t tell.

Then he paused, turned his head and looked down at her.

For a moment, her eyes locked with his, and she saw nothing but the shade of the sky. Then he smiled, and Marina’s face flooded with heat. She quickly turned back around and began hacking at the bushes with a vengeance. For a few moments, he was silent behind her, and her blush started to hurt.

His hammer tap-tap-tapped again. He resumed his lilting hum. And she let herself start breathing—but she did not let herself turn around and stare at him any more.

“Ow! Crap!” Marina hissed, jerking her hand back and shaking it out, then prying her glove off. She sucked in air through her teeth as she rested her right hand on top of her left, watching a long line of blood bloom from her wrist to her forefinger knuckle.

A thud issued from around the corner of the house. Then, Bird came striding around into the shade, his brow furrowed, his eyes finding her hand.

“What happened?”

“Oh, this stupid rosebush,” Marina halfway gestured to the gnarled old plant leaning against the house. “It bit me.”

Bird put his hands on his hips and studied her, then the rosebush.

“What were you trying to do?”

“I want to cut it down and then pull it out,” she answered, wincing at the sting that darted up and down her hand now. Bird glanced at her, startled.

“Why?” he asked.

“Look at it. It’s not blooming, and it doesn’t look like it’s planning to,” she answered. “Plus, I think it’s trying to climb into my window.”

He shook his head.

“I think you have the wrong idea.”

She frowned at him.

“What do you mean?”

He knelt down in front of it, and reached out toward its thick, wicked branches. Marina flinched back…

But he didn’t recoil. Instead, he gingerly moved the branches, feeling them, studying their form. Then, he turned, and picked up her clippers from the grass, and began strategically cutting at the small, withered branches.

“This bush is a different kind from the ones along your walkway,” he explained quietly as he clipped. “Those were bought in this part of the country—they were bred for this weather. But this one…” he paused, and pulled a few dead leaves off and flicked them aside. “This is from somewhere else entirely. A different climate, different soil. Picked up on some faraway travels, I suppose. And see, it’s a climbing rose, and those are not.” He gestured back to the others. The pain of Marina’s wound faded as she watched him, measuring what he said.

“It’s had to survive far harsher winters than it was meant for, and a lot less sunlight than it needed,” he went on. “But it did what it had to in order to survive—it leaned up against the house, near the fireplace here, see? The warmth and shelter of the house has kept it alive. And the one who built the house was wise enough to plant this bush on the south side, away from the brutal north wind—and that same person nursed it and fought off frost and bugs for probably twenty or thirty years before the bush got strong enough to fend for itself. But it wouldn’t leave the house then, even though it could.” He sat back on his haunches, his arms unbloodied, even though he had been elbow deep in the teeth of that bush. Bird glanced up at Marina, holding her still with his gaze.

“It’s a late bloomer,” he said, giving her a crooked smile. “But I think, if you’ll have a little patience with its difficult attitude, it might turn out to be the prettiest rose you’ve got.”

Marina looked at him for a moment, marveling at the way his speech flowed from practical to decorous, and how he talked about the rosebush as if it were a person.

“Okay,” she found herself saying, answering his smile. “I’ll see if I can keep from killing it.”

He grinned, and stood up, then stepped closer and eyed her cut.

“Are you all right?”

“I’m fine,” she answered, nodding. “I’ll just go clean it up.”

“Are you sure? It looks like it hurts,” he said, watching her face.

“Ha,” she laughed, a bitter gall rising in her throat. “Believe me, I’ve had a lot worse.”

His brow tightened and concern lit up his eyes. She forced a smile and stepped around him, heading for the house. And as she pushed open the door, she almost swore she heard him murmur something soothing to that rosebush—but she couldn’t understand a word.

Chapter Four

“There you go—what do you think?” Bird asked breathlessly as he hopped down from the third rung of the ladder and trotted across the grass over to her. Marina stood up from her garden stool and dusted her hand off on her jeans, then reached up and adjusted the crooked chain of the necklace that hid under her collar. She shot him a startled look.

“Are you finished already?” she asked. “It’s only been two days!”

“Yep,” he said triumphantly, folding his strong arms and facing the house. Marina glanced past him and up, and let her eyes wander over all of the now-perfect-and-painted windows.

“Looks great,” she nodded. “Very pretty.”

“Good,” he nodded. He heaved a deep breath. “That means I have time for that herb garden.”

Marina blinked.

“The what?”

He strode around the house, past the bushes and toward the side of her vegetable garden.

“Your herb garden,” he repeated. “You’ve got a lot of stuff growing—asparagus, rhubarb, spearmint, dill, garlic…You just can’t see them because of all the weeds.”

Marina frowned, dropping the clippers from her left hand into the dirt and following him.

“But I…” she tried, blushing in spite of herself. “I…I can’t pay you for—I mean, I can’t afford—”

“Don’t worry about it,” he waved her off as he paused in front of a small section of earth that had been plotted out with now half-buried bricks. “My work day just ended a few minutes ago, and the rhubarb has been crying to me all afternoon.” He glanced over his shoulder at her and flashed a grin. She paused, and raised a sardonic eyebrow.

“Crying to you,” she said flatly.

“Well, maybe crying is the wrong word,” he shrugged one shoulder.

“Probably ‘sweetly requesting’ would be better. I could say the same thing about the asparagus, just take the ‘sweet’ part out—asparagus get all stuffy-acting when they’re asking favors.” He turned back toward the garden. “The spearmint I just had to ignore—they’re pushy and overpowering, as you know, unless you keep them at a distance. I can personally only take them in small doses. And the dill is just plain saucy about it, and the garlic is downright loud, making a lot more fuss than the situation actually warrants, so you see…”

Marina was already grinning and shaking her head too hard to hear the rest, and he trailed off, grinning at her. She calmed down, pressing the back of her wrist to her mouth, hiding her smile.

“So you see,” he finished. “They’re all whining about the weed situation.” He canted his head. “Want to help me get them to shut up?”

“Sure,” Marina shrugged helplessly and beamed. “Can’t have my herbs complaining, can I?”

“Is this really how you like to spend your Saturdays?”

Bird glanced up at her over the tall stalks and green leaves of the white lilies. He then continued to pull up weeds from between the feet of the elegant flowers and toss them to the side. His arms were dirty up to the elbows, as were the knees of his jeans, and he had a smear of dirt across his forehead.

“Look who’s talking,” he answered, then sent her a twinkling glance. Marina chuckled, and sat back on her stool. She peeled off her work gloves and tried not to wince as the worn leather came loose of her left hand, then brushed a strand of hair out of her face.

“You’ve been done with the house for a week now,” she pointed out. “But you keep coming back to work in this garden in the afternoons, even though I’m not paying you, and now you’re here on a Saturday—”

“Would you like me to leave?”

Marina stopped. He met her eyes, perfectly serious, his eyebrows raised.

“No!” she said quickly, sitting up straight. Her face heated up—again, and she stammered. “I mean…No, I’m not telling you to leave. In fact, I like…I mean, I appreciate…” she pulled her arm toward her, then swallowed. “I was just wondering why—”

“You have one of the best gardens I’ve ever seen,” Bird interrupted seamlessly, still weeding. “And one of the oldest. I know you want to fix all this up, make it look nice—but that’s a lot of work. Lucky for you, I love getting my hands covered with dirt.” He tossed a dandelion over his shoulder. “Plus, you just moved here, and you don’t know anybody.” He sat up, and dusted his hands off. He looked at her squarely, then gave her a quiet smile. “And I won’t let anybody sit alone in a great big house if she looks like she needs some company.”

For a moment, she just gazed back at him, her cheeks still flushed—but a soft glow guttered to life in her chest.

“Really?” she murmured.

His eyes flickered.

For just an instant, she almost frowned. Then, his expression cleared, and he nodded. She ducked her head, smiling again, and shrugged.

“Well…” she managed. “Thanks.”

He was silent for a second. Then, he cleared his throat.

“’course, I may have to say something about the weird color of green that you picked to frame the door…”

She threw a clod of dirt at him. He ducked, laughing.

They continued working in companionable silence, and so the heat in her face faded—but the warmth deep inside her did not.

“How’s work today?” Marina asked, taking a long sip of her cherry limeade, then pushing aside the remnants of her sandwich wrappings and leaning back in the red-padded diner chair. She canted her head at Bird, who sat across from her at the tiny two-person table right next to the sunlit ceiling-to-floor front window of Theresa’s.

“Busy this morning,” he admitted, his brow furrowing as he poured more catsup out onto his fries. “Mr. Petrson cut down a line of oaks by his driveway—we had to pull out the stumps.”

Marina studied him. He sullenly clenched his jaw.

“You all right?” she asked.

He shook his head, still not looking up.

“It’s the oaks.”

“What about them?”

“They were healthy,” he said, putting the catsup down with more than necessary force. His jaw tightened. “There was nothing wrong with them. And they had to be at least a hundred years old.”

Marina frowned.

“Why did he cut them down, then?”

He shrugged.

“Don’t know. Didn’t like them blocking the view of the bay, I guess,” he muttered. He shoved his food basket away and sat back abruptly, crossing his arms and looking out the window. He huffed, and shook his head.

“What right does Petrson have to take them down?” He ground his teeth. “A century they’ve survived, through ice and snow and drought—and he fells them in one afternoon. They’re his elders. He should have some respect.”

They went silent. Marina bit her lip, and glanced outside at the empty main street. Bird stayed petulantly quiet. Marina hooked her thumb through the necklace at her throat and pulled the chain out of her collar, and fingered the pendant. She glanced at him—he still stared out the window.

“I was thinking of planting an oak off to the side of my house,” she said, tilting her head, and glancing back at him.

He looked at her out of the corner of his eye, his mouth still tight. Then, the hardness in his face melted into warmth, and he smiled.

“I can probably get you a good deal on a sapling,” he said.

“Good,” she smiled at him, the weight of his mood lifting off her like clouds opening up to the sun. She sat forward. “Actually, I—”

“What’s that?”

Marina halted. Bird’s bright blue eyes had sharpened in a keen stare at her—no, at her necklace.

“Oh, uh—this?” Her brow furrowed and she glanced down at the pendant. Something lodged in her throat. She had to fight for a moment to find her voice again. “My…My dad gave it to me. It’s—”

“Mjollnir,” he finished, his eyes still fixed on it. Marina’s eyebrows shot up.

“You…You know what this is?”

“Sure I do,” he nodded. “Could I…?”

Before he could finish his question, or she could answer it, he had reached out and taken hold of her pendant. Their fingers brushed. She gasped, and almost jerked back—then stopped herself to keep from pulling it out of his grasp.

She held very still as he leaned forward, until their heads were not six inches apart. His forehead tightened and his eyes narrowed as he held the pendant with his first two fingers and his thumb. Marina risked a glance down at it—it was a decorative interpretation of Thor’s hammer, made of silver, slightly tarnished.

“The designs on it are beautiful—very delicate,” he observed quietly. “Is it an antique?”

“I think so,” Marina answered, unable to summon much volume with him so close. “But I can’t remember. I’ve worn it for several years.”

He didn’t answer—just ran his thumb over the “T” portion of the hammer.

“You’re…” she ventured. “You’re interested in old Norse myths?”

He halfway smiled.

“Ever since I was born.” He lifted his bright eyes to hers. “Are you? Or was this just a present?”

“No, I…” she started, her heartbeat starting to pound in her throat. “I mean, my dad and I are Old Norse scholars. Well, I…I am. My dad…was.”

He raised his eyebrows.

“Scholars?” he repeated, mercifully leaving the subject of her father alone. “In what capacity?”

“Archaeology, mostly,” she said, absently realizing that he still had hold of her pendant, and had not leaned back. “And…And literature. Dad collected manuscripts and antique books.”

“Really?” he sounded pleased, astonished.

“Yeah,” Marina answered, surprised.

A slow smile bloomed on his face.

“Would you...I mean, could I see them?”

“Um…” she swallowed hard, but she couldn’t think clearly at all with his fingers just inches from her face. “Sure—?”

“I mean, I won’t if you don’t want me to,” he said hastily. “I just think all that stuff is so—”

“No, it’s okay,” she cut in. “Sure. Sure, you can see it,” she nodded, finally realizing that she meant it. She smiled at him. “Would this evening work?”

He dropped her pendant and leaned back, grinning.

“I’ll be there with bells on.”

“What a fantastic library,” Bird remarked quietly as he stepped through the door, his tea cup in hand, and slowly gazed from one corner of the room to the other.

“Thanks,” Marina said, following him in. It was still halfway light outside, but since there were no windows in the library, so it was dark except for the standing lamp, the fire in the fireplace, and the candles she’d lit on the mantelpiece. She put her hands in her pockets and shoved a half-full packing box with her toe.

“Sorry about the mess,” she said. “I tried to straighten a little this afternoon, put more stuff up on the shelves, but there’s so much. And, you know, I’ve been outside mostly for the past couple weeks…”

“Sure,” Bird said lightly, stepping further in to study the spines of the books on the far wall. Marina paused by the fireplace, watching him in the gold half light. It was chilly this evening—he wore a dark blue sweater and nice jeans and boots, and he had combed his hair. He seemed softer, stronger—and older, somehow. But more vivid, alive—close. He sent a casual glance over at her, and her heart suspended. He smiled.

“You sure you have enough shelf space for all this?” he asked, gesturing to the remaining full boxes and taking a sip of tea.

“Ha, I hope so,” Marina smiled crookedly. “I’d hate to leave something homeless.”

He came closer, and leaned over one of the boxes. Then, something in his face changed.

“What are these?”

Marina stepped up next to him and looked down.

“Oh—a few of the artifacts my dad came across on our…on our last dig.” She paused, forcing that familiar, wicked pain back down her throat. She wrapped her arms around her middle and straightened.

Then, Bird bent down and picked one up. Startled, Marina tried to say something to stop him, but nothing came out. He carefully lifted one of the small, squatty stone figures up out of the box, and held it in front of him.

“Loki,” he stated. Marina stared at Bird.

“You recognize him?”

His eyes never left the statue, which he held almost gently.

“Well,” he said quietly. “I recognize that it’s supposed to be him. Being punished by the snake, right?” he glanced at her. For a moment, she thought she saw the skin around his eyes tighten. She nodded.

“I actually think he deserved it, don’t you?” she murmured. “For killing Bauldr?”

He was silent for a long time.

“But that brings Ragnarok, doesn’t it?” he said. “Makes Loki so angry that he wants to destroy everyone and everything.”

“Yes,” Marina said carefully, studying Bird’s profile. “I suppose so.”

For a while, they were quiet. Then, Bird took a low breath.

“Kjóll ferr austan, koma munu Múspells,” he murmured. of lög lýðir, en Loki stýrir; fara fíflmegir með freka allir, þeim er bróðir Býleists í för.

Surtr ferr sunnan með sviga lævi, skínn af sverði sól valtíva; grjótbjörg gnata, en gífr rata, troða halir helveg, en himinn klofnar.”

Marina couldn’t take her eyes from him. The Old Norse words flowed easily from his lips, lilting with his deep voice. When he stopped speaking, she could swear he could hear her heart pounding. But if he did, he didn’t show it—he stared at the statue. So she took a breath of her own.

“O'er the sea from the east there sails a ship,” she translated, hushed. With the people of Muspell, at the helm stands Loki; After the wolf do wild men follow, And with them the brother of Byleist goes.”

Bird turned to look at her, fixing his gaze on her. The firelight flickered against his eyes. She swallowed, but he waited, so she went on.

“Surt fares from the south with the scourge of branches, The sun of the battle-gods shone from his sword; The crags are sundered, the giant-women sink, The dead throng Hel-way, and heaven is cloven.”

She stopped to catch her breath. He watched her.

“You memorized the Edda?”

She lifted her eyebrow.

“You memorized it in Old Norse,” she countered.

He suddenly chuckled.

“Yeah, well…” he bent, and put the Loki statue back. “I’m a geek like that.”

“You’re not a geek,” Marina said quietly. He straightened, and met her eyes. She cleared her throat and looked the other way, hiding her blush yet again.

She sensed him open his mouth to say something—but then he stopped. She turned, and frowned at him.

He was looking at the framed artifact above the fireplace.

“What’s this?” he whispered, his voice entirely different—enough to make a chill run down her spine. He stepped around her to stand right in front of the mantle. He set his tea down next to one of the candlesticks, then didn’t move.

“I actually found that in the back of an old library when I was fifteen,” Marina explained. “I just thought it was interesting, and so the librarian paid me with it, instead of money, for straightening all his archival shelves.” She came up next to Bird and turned her gaze to the subject of her narrative. It was an old piece of parchment, three feet by three feet, its borders illuminated with ships and sea monsters and intricate, twisting knots. In the center had been drawn, in black ink, a broad stone gate, with an arched top—and in the center of the arch stood a carving of Mjollnir, Thor’s hammer. Through the center of the gate, a great, gnarled tree stood. And all around the gate stood a thick, thorny forest dotted with disembodied eyes—and a few wiry wolves with lolling tongues lurked between the rocks and shrubs.

“Looks frightening,” Bird remarked. “What’s the inscription, there at the bottom?”

“Stien til Asgard,” Marina said. “It means—”

“Gate to Asgard,” Bird finished. She blinked.

“You…You didn’t just memorize the Edda, did you?” she realized. “You know old Norse!”

“Yes,” he nodded absently, then pointed at the drawing. “What did your father have to say about this?”

Marina said nothing for a long moment. It was getting harder and harder to ignore that old pain, that shadow reaching up to smother her.

“He thought it was a real structure,” she managed, taking a deep breath. “Another dig site to investigate—maybe a place for ritual sacrifice or something.” She glanced down at the floor. “He seemed to think it was around here somewhere, actually.”

Bird looked at her sharply.

“He did?”

Marina lifted her head, and nodded.

“Yeah. Which is why I came and bought this house.” She paused, and gazed up at the drawing again. “Of course, neither of us believe it’s the gate to Asgard, but…” she shrugged tightly. “He was interested in it. It was almost enough to…” Her throat closed up, and she couldn’t keep going.

Bird stayed quiet for a long time. She didn’t look at him. Then, he drew himself up, and turned toward her.

“Hey,” he said, his tone easier. “There’s still some light out—want to go see if we can find a good spot for your oak?”

“Yeah,” Marina sucked in a deep breath, blinking tears back and tightening her arms around herself. She forced a smile and a glance in his direction. “Sounds good.”

Read the whole book on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Bauldrs-Tears-Retelling-Lokis-Fate-ebook-dp-B071JM6YCW/dp/B071JM6YCW/ref=mt_kindle?_encoding=UTF8&me=&qid=1572839008

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let-me-love-you-loki · 5 years

Text

Waking Up in Vegas--Ch. 9

Chapter 9: Now We’re Partners In Crime

Dean, The Night Before, 5:00 AM

She has the most beautiful laugh. I think I could spend the rest of my life listening to it. The sound ran through my body like an electric shock. The look on her face was more beautiful than the most priceless art. God knows I thought she was the most exquisite thing I’d ever laid eyes on.

She yawned just as we stumbled in the door of her hotel room. Everything about her was tousled and soft. There was something innocent and fragile about her in that moment.

“Time for you to go to bed,” I said, surprised at how lucid I sounded. I’d been up for twenty-four hours and could feel the exhaustion starting to settle into my limbs. Passing out next to her sounded like a dream come true.

Mera looked up at me with a hazy smile. “You’ll stay,” she said. I wasn’t sure if it was supposed to be a question or a demand, but I didn’t care.

I smiled and dropped a kiss on the top of her head. “Yes.”

Shyness slipped over her as she looked around the room, took in the single Queen bed. I brushed my fingers along her jaw, watching her sink into my touch. Heat flooded into my blood at the sight of her, the knowledge that in a few moments she would be pressed up against me, wrapped in blankets and my arms.

“Go on in the bathroom and get changed, darlin’,” I whispered, trying not to let the heat rushing through me latch on to the desire to do more than just sleep. “I’ll be right here waiting.”

She looked back at me over her shoulder as she slipped into the bathroom. As soon as the door shut, I let loose a breath that had grown stale in my lungs. There was a sudden anxiety blistering in my entire body. My thoughts could barely get past the idea of holding her tight against me, skin on skin, the sound of her sighing my name as we became man and wife in truth.

It was all I could do to will away a hard on as I stripped down to my boxers and climbed into the bed. The sheets were crisp and cool. I imagined them wrinkled and warm with body heat.

Mera, Afternoon, 1:45 PM

Dean’s arm held me close against his chest. His heart beat a steady drum beneath my ear, soothing me to near euphoria. I luxuriated in the feel of his body next to mine—the solidness of muscle, the rough rasp of calloused skin, the heat of his limbs. It was like being lost in an infinite forest with the sensation of the earth all around—this grounding, central thing that was everywhere and nowhere at once.

“What happens now?” I whispered.

His chuckle rumbled through his chest. “Whatever you want, Mera.” His fingers slipped through my hair, nails scratching my scalp. I let out a faint purr of happiness. “We can stay here in this bed all day, have room service, and then disappear until the next show. We can do anything.”

I let my mind linger on the idea of staying in bed with him. The chance to explore the body of the man who I now called my husband was more than appealing. Electricity spiraled up my spine as I thought about the possibilities.

Dean sat up, his back resting against the padded headboard, dragging me with him. The next moment found me straddling his lap, only the thin material of the sheet between us. His blue eyes turned sapphire and navy as they traveled over the length of me. My hair fell over one shoulder, and he tucked it behind my ear. The way he looked at me, his hazelnut locks mussed, his gaze like a physical touch, it made me weak inside.

“You’re the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen,” he murmured, his palm settled against my cheek. His thumb brushed the fullness of my bottom lip, dipped along my chin, beneath my jaw. There was something in his gaze that was haunting and wonderful.

“Dean…”

He shook his head, quieting whatever I might have said. Silence settled for a moment, then shifted with his bright smile.

“Get dressed. I want to show you something.”

I quirked a brow, leaning into his touch.

His lips turned upward in a smirk, his dimples showing. “Don’t ask. It’s a surprise.”

Dean, Afternoon, 2:20 PM

I gave the cab driver an address in one of the neighborhoods outside the tourist-ridden part of the city. My leg bounced with anxiety as we sped away from the hotel, Mera sitting next to me, our fingers entwined. The further we got from the strip, the more I mulled over the reality of our situation, the more I let the truest parts of me come through. There was the Dean Ambrose everyone saw in the ring, and then there was the one who was just a messed-up kid from Ohio.

That was the man I was as I sat next to Mera in that cab. The man who had once been a boy afraid of being abandoned, who scratched and clawed to just make it out of the neighborhood alive. I hadn’t even finished high school. She had two degrees and carried herself like she came from something safe and wholesome.

The man that I was grew more terrified with every moment. I loved her with every fiber of my being. Since the moment I’d laid eyes on her, there was nothing I could do to get her out of my mind or to keep her out of my heart. Even when she had been off limits—the woman on my brother’s arm, his childhood sweetheart—I hadn’t given up the love I felt for her. I’d held it inside, let it drive me through every breath, a desperation to make myself into a man who deserved her—even if I could never have her.

“Dean?” Her voice came from somewhere far away. She came into focus, looking up at me with those haunting eyes with worry creasing her brow. “Are you okay?”

I forced a smile, drew her hand up to my mouth, let my lips linger over her knuckles. “Just thinking.”

She opened her mouth, closed it again. Warmth radiated from her body as she curled against my shoulder. “You’ll tell me when you’re ready,” she stated plainly, sweetness in her tone.

A genuine smile settled on my face. Somehow she knew what to say to assuage the fear that gripped my heart. It was as if this woman had been formed for me—the softness for my ragged edges, the care for my recklessness, a guiding star for my nomadic soul.

“We’re here,” I said before I could delve too deeply into the thoughts crowding my mind.

I paid the driver, spilled out to the sidewalk. The Nevada sun was high overhead, bright against the concrete and stucco. Heat shimmered above the pavement. It was the dry heat of a desert day, broken only by the oases of shaded porches and in-ground pools. Mera slipped her hand into the crook of my arm as I lead her up a narrow driveway to a two-story house set back from the road.

The house was made of sand-colored brick with a red terra-cotta roof. A balcony edged in white banister looked out over the street. Verdant grass and a dotting of palm trees made up the front lawn. The double garage was shut tight.

I dug a set of keys from my pocket as we walked up to the door. It was painted burgundy with a brass knocker, white decorative shudders on either side. My breath hitched in my chest as I turned the key, pushed the door inward. Before I could let myself think twice, I swept her from her feet. Her arms went around my neck.

The question was clear in her eyes. I took a breath, grinned sheepishly.

“I closed on it last week.” My feet moved, carrying us both over the threshold. “Welcome home, Mrs. Ambrose.”

She looked around the foyer. The house was devoid of furniture and had the sharp scent of fresh paint. There was new carpet, hardwood, tile. A remodeled kitchen and a new wall around the back garden with its patio and pool. It was the kind of place I imagined living the rest of my life in, growing old within these walls. And I wanted to live those years with her.

“That is… if you want it to be.”

Mera, Afternoon, 2:41 PM

It was bare, but beautiful. Everything about it radiated the same aura that came from Dean. There was nothing extraneous… even if it had been fully furnished, I had the feeling that everything would be just like him. Laid back comfort without a desire to be glitzy or overdone. After all, for someone who made the kind of money he did, the place was downright small.

Silence stretched out, my eyes taking in every part of the house that I could see from Dean’s embrace. It was so light and airy inside, the walls painted with a color that seemed somewhere between off-white and faint grey. The carpet in the front room was watered slate and looked brand new. Polished hardwood led off down the hall toward what I assumed was the kitchen. A set of stairs led up to the second floor behind a long wooden counter, shelves sitting empty behind it.

“You don’t have to… I know it’s a lot…” Dean stammered. I could feel his hummingbird heart against my chest.

I took a quick inventory, began making a mental checklist. “It’ll take us forever to move in here. We’re on the road so much and my stuff is all in Florida. And how much space is there upstairs? Coordinating all of our furniture… it’s going to take months, Dean.”

Slowly, he lowered me to my feet. He brushed his fingers along the side of my face, tucked my hair behind my ear. Hope burned in his bright blue eyes. Dimples popped into being as he smiled.

“You mean it?”

I met his grin with one of my own. “It’s you and me against the world, remember?”

Tag List

@bethany99stuff-blog @houndsofjxstice @lunatictoosweet @xbutterflius-effectusx

#waking up in vegas #dean ambrose #dean ambrose fanfiction #seth rollins #mera reynolds #wwe #wwe fanfiction #multi-chapter #real person fanfiction #ofc #oc #smut #romance #angst

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deathbyvalentine · 5 years

Text

Dreams

Dream #1

There are three types of magic. Mirror, self, blood. Mirror is done by copying the abilities of someone else, mundane or otherwise. You can never be original. Everything you are is a mimic of someone else. Self magic is internal. You can only effect yourself. Transform, disappear, become stronger or weaker, taller or smaller. You’re both the magician and the assistant. Blood magic naturally caused the most suspicion. You bled and imposed your will on the world, reality bending, other people no obstacle, nothing more than dolls. It hurt you but it could hurt others more.

Will was the most important part of magic. You had to know what you wanted. Internalise the desire so deeply it became like a second heartbeat. That type of surety took practice. A lot of it. It was why children could be so dangerous. All of the desire with none of the planning. They felt things so strongly. Usually adults could have that trained out of them.

It usually fell to families to teach their children, especially as it tended to be hereditary. Not reliably, not one hundred percent of the time, but enough that it was a trend. Of course, if you weren’t a Superior and you ended up with a kid that was, well, things got messy for you real quick. It wasn’t like the population knew about them. Only the government. So what usually happened was a tragedy, followed by some men in black suits showing up at your door and telling you your kid now belonged to them, legally. They could send you letters, time to time, but they probably wouldn’t.

The government said it was for safety purposes and they were mostly right. What they didn’t mention was how it was a hell of a recruitment scheme.

____________________________________________________

Dream #2

The school was like nothing she had ever seen before. The stone was light and sandy, giving it a clean and bright look. There were turrets and archways, stone carvings and gardens overflowing with garish flowers. She touched the petals of one, making sure that they were real. The petals felt like velvet underneath her fingertips. It had been years since she had seen them. The camp grounds were all grey concrete and chainlink fences rattling in the wind.

Cora clicked her fingers at her from up ahead, impatient as she always was. Abigail hurried to keep up, her new shoes clickclicking on the pathway. Everywhere, there were students in smart blazers, reading, talking, sharing food. Many turned curiously to watch her passage and she felt her cheeks begin to burn under their scrutiny. She could see her fumbled introductions already, her instant marking of herself as an outsider.

Back at camp, it was easier. They were all outsiders. They were all weird and lacking in various people skills. Tina preferred to chew the end of her ponytail rather than have a conversation. Ellie stared at her shoes. Kitty giggled madly whenever she got nervous which was frequently. Maybe this was why she had been picked. Best of a bad bunch. Not that she had wanted to be picked. They had not only had to threaten her, but Tina as well. It was for Tina’s sake she had agreed - she couldn’t bare to see her with another split lip.

She went over the briefing one more time in her head. The elites were those in the drama club. They were clever - she would have to keep up with them. They liked reading, especially the classics and Gothic romances. They didn’t socialise with those outside the group so she would have to integrate herself quickly and efficiently. The ringleader was Alistair. He had black hair and blue eyes, a short stature. He was very possibly a genius. He didn’t play well with adults or those he perceived as rivals. He liked lacrosse, Oscar Wilde and pistachio ice cream. He was posed to inherit the company from his father well, soon. His father had been sick for some time and couldn’t have much longer left. But he hadn’t inherited it yet, which begged the question what exactly had he been funnelling money into?

Privately Abigail thought it was likely to be some teenage boy thing - girls or cars or a gambling addiction. But The Network didn’t want to take that chance so here she was, being lead to the central office to pick up her student welcome pack. A boy opened a door for her and she bowed her head, his proximity alarming. Even more so when she raised her eyes and realised it was exactly the boy she was meant to be observing. A moment of electric eye contact and he was gone, out the door, leaving Abigail blinking in his wake.

______________________________________________________

Dream #3

The sounds of the forest mixed with the sounds of the sea. Twigs cracked, animals moved through thick leaves and waves crashed against the rocks below. The rocks were a mixture of natural and ancient stone bricks abandoned by over ambitious builders. Once, there was meant to be a castle here. If you broke cover from the trees without tumbling down the incline, you could get a little more light, the moon reflecting off the shifting sea. Inside the forest though, it was almost pitch, the leaves conspiring with each other to keep the moonlight out. Occasionally a fragment would make it to the path and sit, stubbornly illuminating its patch.

The path lead to a house that had been abandoned for more years than it had been occupied. There was no glass in its window frames, no furniture in its rooms. Only some old ashes and the smell of salt prevailed, the wind carrying in the occasional leaf or misguided insect. The roof had holes in it, letting in rain and the cries of the lonely seagulls above. In short, it was a perfect place to hide. Nobody came here and nobody loved it.

She knelt in the centre of the room, flensing knife clenched tightly in a fist. In smooth, practiced motions she ran it down the length of the bird, stripping feathers from it with alarming ease. The feathers wouldn’t be wasted. The chest ones would be stuffed into her coat to help keep her warm. The flight ones, spectacular in the common way pheasant feathers inherently are could be sold at markets for noble’s pretty hats. She doubted they would buy them if they knew they came from so uninteresting a bird as a pheasant but a key feature of the nobility was not knowing where anything you adored came from. She worked like this for some time until something unexpected made her head jolt up, cat-like eyes narrowing.

She heard voices. Bandits, most likely. Who else would know about this little ruin? She had no time to hide herself or her work. Standing with the small knife presented boldly, she waited to defend her prize.

__________________________________________________

Dream #4

Their wedding day had been uneventful. It had rained, as they knew it would, making the town hall steps slick with water. Their relatives had held newspapers over their heads as they threw the handfuls of rice. Pigeons had fluttered over and begun pecking at the grains. Luckily Lucy had decided to wear a hat that day, protecting her fine blonde pin curls from being utterly ruined. And of course, the entire Shelby clan had worn their flatcaps, so all in all, they got off pretty lightly.

They had ran off, hand in hand, laughing. They would be expected at the Garrison later for the reception, a party for the ages. Tommy Shelby finally married! But for now Lucy wanted to steal a few minutes of him just for herself, before she had to share him with the entirety of Small Heath once more. They walked until they had reached their destination. A small food van, with a tarp making a veranda, white plastic chairs and tables sheltering under it. They had met here, when they were teenagers. She had been still growing into her new height and form, graceless but with the future promise of grace. He had been as intense then as he was now. She had felt his eyes on her from across the queue. His look had been enough to make her cheeks hot.

Now look at them. They shared a skin full of chips, picking companionably at them as they chatted, legs tangled underneath the table. Inspecting his face he definitely looked content, if not relaxed which was really all she could hope for. She had long since given up trying to make him switch off, but she could maje him wind down a little.

The peace was short-lived. A taxi pulled up across the street and out came Ada, cello case clutched in her arms. She didn’t notice them. In the window of the taxi, another woman sat. She was older by some margin, possessing expensive lipstick and golden curls that tumbled from her head like Rapunzel’s. Lucy felt Tommy’s attention sharpen like a knife beside her. Ada leant down to the window and kissed the woman, making Lucy’s heart lurch in surprise. It wasn’t the fact it was a woman. It was the fact not a single one of them had known about her. Ada straightened and the taxi pulled away. Before she knew it, Lucy had stood up, placing a hand on Tommy’s elbow and whispering in his ear ‘woman’s business, I’ll take care of it’ and marching over to wrap an arm around Ada and hiss angrily at her. Another day like any other.

_______________________________________________________

Dream #5

It was the day the ships came in. The sky arcing above them was so blue it made your eyes water, not a single cloud daring to mar it. The red containers stacked one on top of the other reached up towards it but ultimately failed, only carving out a small section of it for its own.

The first ship was huge, as all of them would be. Its hull was painted black, the upper decks the traditional white. It towered above them, the workers standing on the brick dock to look up, shielding their eyes from the sun with a hand. The ropes trailed like tentacles from a jellyfish and they surged forward to grab hold of as many as they could. Slowly, one by one they were siezed, and then the real work began. They took (very almost in sync) steps forward, struggling with every single one. The ship, reluctant, began to move down the canal towards its final docking destination.

Occasionally a man would lose his footing and plummet into the canal. They would be safe, if they were smart. If you kept hold on the rope you could float along, dragged by the ship until the job was done and you could be rescued. Let go and you risked being sucked beneath, trapped by the mound of metal, hopelessly drowning.

______________________________________________________ Dream #6

The fields either side of the path were lush, spotted with daisies and lazily humming bees. It was a hot day and the cool entrance of the forest beckoned. She wouldn’t be the only one taking refuge in there today. She imagined deer, geese, dogs all lying together and sleeping in the shade, protected by the trees. She hoped to join them soon, but first...

Every few steps along the path she discarded a jewel. Emeralds as big as her finger, rubies glistening like fresh beads of blood. Pearls a thousand miles from the sea, diamonds crystal clear. They formed a candy trail that she left peter out before she reached the treeline. What she was hoping was the guards persuing her would become distracted. Why chase a highway woman on a hot day when they could retire with the profits reaped from these stones? If she was really lucky, they would bicker with each other, each wanting more than his fair share.

Everybody won. She got to escape the noose and they got to retire from a thankless job. She was practically a philanthropist.

_______________________________________________________

Dream #7

It was a peaceful place. The path followed the route of the river, curling next to it like its more solid twin. Each stone in the river seemed to be a perfect grey oval, overlapping neatly with the ones around it. Jess wondered if the monks had shaped them too, arranged them. Everything here despite being natural felt arranged, perfected. The bushes were trimmed into circles. Flowers bloomed in groups of three. The gate (the only manmade item in this section) had no moss growing on it. There were no dead leaves, no wasps, no fallen petals.

The monks were almost as pristine. Their robes were shining white, broken only by a blue-grey stole and belt. The robes reached just above the line of grass, not quite touching the blades. Their hair was cut to the same length, a short sharp buzzcut. They didn’t speak above whispers and bowed every time they came close to one of the visitors.

In short, it creeped Jess out. ______________________________________________________________

Dream #8

Once upon a time, the sky might have been a colour other than orange. It might have gotten dark and light in a way that made sense rather than seeming entirely dependent on mood or whim. The ground may have been something other than a washed out yellow. Maybe. If it ever had been, nobody could remember it. It had been too longer ago.

Cynthia woke up this morning with only one eye, right in the middle of her forehead. She sat around the fire glumly, torn between letting her fringe hide the new development or not hindering her ability to see. It was a shame - she had been hoping for vampire. Ironically, none of us had really seen cyclops coming but we did know vampires were rare.

“Cheer up.” Said Frances. “At least you don’t have to hunt for razors.” She was mostly being facetious. Only the most insecure of the werewolf girls bothered to shave. It was the end of the world and there were no boys to make fun of hairy legs or unibrows. And even if there was, well, they could rip them apart now, without even blinking.

Cherie whined, her voice high and droning. Wouldn’t surprise me if she ended up being a harpy. She was convinced it was going to be siren. Wouldn’t bother me, we could dump her in the green lake and be done with it then. “When am I going to change?” “You’re only thirteen.” Frances said patiently, leaning down to tighten the laces on her paws. “You’ve got ages yet. Unless you’re an early starter and that’s okay too.” She glanced out of the corner of her eye at Tilly. Tilly had been hideously embarrassed when her transformation had came on at fourteen. She’d mostly gotten used to the beak now but still flushed when her age was brought up. “Cynthia, wanna come with me to high school?” The place had mostly been picked clean of anything useful and was little more than a ruin. Tins and pudding had been the first to go, lipstick and padlocks the next. But Frances had got into her head and idea about learning chemistry so she could make lights that didn’t need a battery, and just glowed. Preferably without giving us radiation poisoning but I got the sense she wasn’t all that fussy.

I put my bowl and spoon on the floor, stretching. My teeth bit into my lower lip, making me wince. “I’ll come with you. I wanna see if the gym has any mouth guards left.” Frances nodded approvingly and swung her backpack on effortlessly, as though it weighed nothing at all. Her biceps bulged and I admired them, not for the first time. She made it easy - most t-shirts didn’t contain them anymore.

“Time for adventure.”

#dreams #random #prose #writers on tumblr #yes these are all dreams i actually had

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ccyans · 6 years

Text

Six scenes in the life of Todoroki Rei

Rei is nineteen years old the first time she meets Todoroki Enji.

The weekend prior her mother had called to inform Rei of the possible matchup. At nineteen Rei is studying for her degree in associates nursing in Tokyo. Marriage is, if not the last thing on her mind, then nothing more than a nebulous idea at the fringe of Rei’s priority list. Her mother got married when she was Rei’s age, she knows, but despite their tendency towards tradition, neither of Rei’s parents have ever attempted to push that particular rite onto their children.

The offer is a good one though. That’s why Rei’s mother called.

The Todoroki name is old money, well respected; Todoroki Enji is only one year older than Rei but already an up and coming acclaimed hero. He wants the arranged marriage because of Rei’s quirk, which is not terribly surprising, considering Rei can’t think of any other trait of hers which would have caught his attention. The Yukimura name was held with the same prestige as Todoroki once, but these days Rei’s family is content with their little holdings in agriculture and land ownership.

Rei dwaddles over it for two days and an endocrine unit test. In the end though, well, it’s a good offer. It’s not as if she’s going in to sign an actual contract either, just a first meeting, and truthfully, Rei hasn’t been on a date in months. “Besides,” Himari from ethics class informs her, helping tie the numerous, delicate layers of Rei’s best kimono. “There’ll be free food,”

This is how Rei ends up under the roof of some beautiful, expensive tea house on her next weekend off, dressed from neck to wrist in silk and trying not to think about any errors in her makeup. It is a clear summer day and the heat would be stifling had Rei not been regulating her internal body temperature. Sunlight slants through open rice paper doors. They lead to a meticulous garden: lush greenery, golden koi in a clear pond, the sound of birdsong and the gentle click of a bamboo fountain.

Rei lives in a sharehouse with three roommates and a dog. This is way beyond her price range despite her intimacy with tea ceremonies and all the proper manners considering. She sits very still on the tatami mats through a combination of habit and nerves, even though there’s no one but her and a tray of perfect, bite sized tea cakes. She hadn’t eaten breakfast this morning. She wonders how rude it would come off to Todoroki-san if she ate the tea cakes beforehand.

… Probably very.

Rei waits.

When he finally arrives, Todoroki Enji is five minutes early and smoking slightly.

Rice paper doors slide open with a quiet shhke . Shoes on the tatami. Todoroki Enji is a tall, broad man, a trait more noticeable in person than on tevevision, with wild red hair and a sharp straight nose and two lightning blue eyes. He’s handsome, certainly, without the fire from his quirk obscuring his face. And dressed expensively too, in a sharp western style suit that strains across his shoulders. His eyes are bright like festival lanterns.

“Yukimura.” his voice rumbles, clipped and short as he takes a seat. “My apologies. There was an…incident across town.”

Hero work.

“I understand,” says Rei, polite.

This close, she can feel the heat radiating off him.

He smells a little of smoke, a little of concrete dust. In the room his presence is like a gravitational sink, pulling smaller objects inwards, and it would be hard to look away even if she tries, which Rei does not. She feels very small next to him, suddenly. Here, in the beautiful, expensive tea room with its beautiful, expensive decorations, and Todoroki Enji, who is intensely handsome, objectively intimidating, and who, Rei realizes, in a derailment of previous thoughts, is also wearing a fireball print tie.

She blinks twice. Still fireballs.

That’s…

“Ah.” Todoroki-san follows the staring down. “My original got put through a window, so this was backup,” he admits.

…Unexpected.

Unbidden, Rei can feel her lips curve into a smile. Todoroki Enji wears fireball print ties; she thinks she’ll tell Himari that, when she gets back.

“I’m sorry Todoroki-san. It… just doesn’t particularly fit your image so.”

“My image.”

”… Yes.“

Outside, the bamboo fountain clinks gently against stone. He stares at her, expression unreadable. Rei fights the urge to look down.

There’s a stretching silence.

Sunlight. Cicidas. Rushing water. Riveting.

Rei counts to twelve, and then can’t take the awkwardness of it any longer, so in the end it’s her who hesitantly picks back up the thread of conversation. “Would you like me to pour?” she asks, gesturing at the pristine tea set.

“Please,” says Todoroki Enji-san..

Alright then.

The ritual of it settles Rei’s nerves, sends her into quiet concentration, more muscle memory than thought. The whisking of the matcha, the steady tilt of Rei’s wrist as she pours. Her brothers used to joke and call her Yuki-onna, when she served them in practice, with her white hair and white skin and unearthly grace. Rei’s kimono sleeves do not drag. Her posture is perfectly level. Her breath comes out in a stream of frost.

The bowl clicks, precise but gentle, on the cherry wood table. Rei gives a slight bow.

They drink the tea. They eat the little, perfect almond teacakes, and the beautifully wrapped Sakura-mochi, bitter mixing sweet. There is no attempt at conversation; there is ceremony in this. Only when dregs of tea remain in their mugs and the empty sweets tray has been tucked away does Todoroki Enji-san say, "You are very excellent.”

Her father taught Rei’s brothers to meditate. Her mother gave Rei tea and embroidery. “Thank you,” she says.

And then once again the conversation stalls.

“You are… studying?” Todoroki Enji-san tries, finally.

The abrupt landing of the ball in Rei’s court startles her. She collects herself, and then smiles. “Yes. In nursing. I’m hoping to get an Associate’s degree and gain some experience before going back to school to become a fully registered nurse.” She pauses, expectant. Todoroki Enji-san does not follow up in that line of questioning, though, so Rei detours. “Is your hero work going well?”

“Yes.”

“The… incident earlier. Was it resolved successfully?”

“Quite.”

More one-word answers.

Todoroki Enji, Rei realizes, another five shortly burned conversation attempts later, has about the tact of a brick and the brusqueness of a charging bull, and put together his social graces are semi-nonexistent. He is looking at her very intently across the table as if in hopes that Rei can sustain this entire conversation by herself, which Rei cannot. Rei is rapidly running out of topics to start on.

Rei asks him about his thoughts on the tea-cakes, gets another one-liner, and then kind of despairs. “The flowers are lovely,” she says desperately, glancing towards the garden. “Don’t you think?” Immediately afterwards she wants to snatch the words back, because if Todoroki-san can’t manage a paragraph on his actual job it is unlikely flowers will capture his interest in any way. Next she’ll be talking about the weather. Himari is definitely going to be laughing at her, once the situation has been conveyed, but before that Rei thinks she’ll get at least some condolences, considering.

He surprises her, though.

He clears his throat, awkwardly, and then asks. “Would you like to see them?”

Rei blinks twice.

“That. That would be lovely, thank you.”

He allows her to rise first. Rei is conscious to make it as graceful as possible, and then takes little pigeon toed steps towards the garden, which in three-inch geta shoes are about the only steps she can take. She and Todoroki-san sit side by side on the bench next to the koi pond. It’s hotter here, in the direct sunlight. Steam curls off of Rei’s neck, instant sublimation. She dips her hand into the cool green water of the pond, its surface reflecting bits of sun and sky but mainly just the water plants underneath, the jewel toned flicker of swimming koi. They dart up to Rei’s hand, curious. She should have saved a tea cake for them.

After a minute of quiet sitting, Todoroki-san says, “Which flowers.” and then pauses. And then continues: “Do you like.” He seems… struggling.

Or embarrassed.

Rei stares at him through a white fringe and says, “Oh. Um. The lillies – the pink ones.”

She’s still staring at him when he snaps the stem off a lily, one in full bloom, pink and white petals unfurled and smelling so very sweet, and tucks it carefully behind her ear.

Rei touches the flower with the tips of her fingers.

“Oh,” she says, very softly.

And he’s looking at her, still. The expression on his face: struggling, embarrassed. He looks if he doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do, so Rei says, “thank you,” and she’s smiling now, she knows it, an almost giddy curve of her lips. He really is handsome. He would be even more so if he were to smile. “That’s – thank you.”

She hadn’t expected that. She hadn’t expected that at all.

Todoroki Enji looks enormously, enormously uncomfortable, but he still rallies himself up and says, “It’s a good colour. On you.” And immediately goes red in the face.

Rei watches the blush spread, high on his cheeks and to his ears, in a kind of owl-eyed fascination. He sounds as if he’s never done this before, complimented a woman, this too handsome man who doesn’t smile and whose face is plastered on billiards across the country and is one of the strongest heroes in the country, and Rei can’t help it – she laughs.

Rei is nineteen and she’s had exactly one boyfriend before, for a few short months before moving to Tokyo for college. She’s pretty sure Todoroki Enji has had exactly no significant others, period. She thinks this is what she’ll be telling Himari when she gets back: that her date has all the grace of a charging bull in a china shop, no tact, no ability for small talk, but he wears fireball print ties and tucks flowers behind her ear and can blush as red as his hair, and that he’ll be terribly, terribly handsome if she can get him to smile.

She agrees to a second meeting.

The first time he hits her she’s twenty five and there’s alcohol on his breath.

There are half downed bottles of vintage sake on the kitchen table. A chair lies smashed on the kitchen tiles. Rei never sees the backhand coming until she’s on the floor and the lights are wheeling stars above her. One moment they’re arguing. She hasn’t seen him in a week; he’s been home five days in the past month , she is saying, “your daughter’s three Enji she doesn’t recognize your face, ” and he’s pacing the length of the kitchen snarling: “ Rei be quiet, ” entire body coiled tense like a jungle cat’s, so Rei draws herself up and says, “ Todoroki Enji, ” sharp as a slap –

and loses –

Time.

The next thing Rei knows she is blinking black spots out of her peripherals, feeling something metallic bloom at the back of her throat. The lights of the kitchen hallo above her, bright white spots that mix with the October sun streaming through the window.

She makes a small, confused noise.

“Mama,” says a voice. So small. Her baby boy’s voice.

He’s tugging at her shirt, her Dabi, and he sounds – frightened. Why does he sound frightened. Rei doesn’t know. She tries to leverage herself up. It doesn’t work: her head is swimming circles and the right side of her face throbs, sharp and suddenly nauseatingly painful. Rei hisses between her teeth.

“Mama,” says Dabi. His eyes are wide, wide, wide, his father’s lightning eyes gone big and stricken, his mouth open into a tiny o.

Rei gets herself to her knees and –

Enji is standing above her.

He’s frozen to the spot, hand raised, eyes as wide as Dabi’s are. The glass bottle in his hand has shattered to the floor, weeping clear sake across blue tile. He’s still still still, all the kinetic motion in him stuttered, and the moment Rei realizes what had happened she thinks, you should be.

She’s never realized how much bigger he was over her. She’s realizing it now.

She doesn’t think she’s ever been afraid of him, not like this.

“Out ,” she says, and her jaw aches and her head is pounding and the fury in her is a rising tide, drowning out the minute panic. She points to the door. “Out.”

He leaves.

Rei slumps back to the floor. Ow.

She pulls Dabi close, because he’s hovering, biting his lip – it’s bad habit he got from her – and then proceeds to ice over the entire right side of her face. The cold soothes it. Then she goes probing around the back of her head, trying to find bumps although hoping there isn’t any.

No luck.

“Sweetie,” sighs Rei, inspecting herself in the bathroom mirror. Dabi, the little one, is still glued to one pant leg. She glances down. “Sweetie, can you get mama her phone? And your sister. And maybe your father, but only if he’s already dunked himself sober and looks suitably ashamed.”

At the hospital they tell Rei her cheekbone has been fractured, the delicate arch. Hefty bruising. Swelling at the back of her head where she’d hit the floor. The nurses give her a IV of toradol that brings the pain down to a dull murmur, and then a man comes in, dressed in green scrubs and a white coat, who takes Rei’s face into his hands and presses two fingers to the corner of the purple bruising, and tells her, “Breathe in for me, Todoroki-san.” For a split second after Rei does pain sparks lightning down her jaw but then the cool takes over, and Rei breathes, in, and out, and when the man takes his hands away it’s as if the last few hours never passed at all.

The nurses give her water; they take away her unneeded IV. Twenty minutes later Enji comes in, the children at his heels.

“Mama!”

Dabi is through the doorway and at Rei’s bedside as quickly as he can manage with Fuyumi clutching at the helm of his shirt. There he hovers, awkwardly, looking desperate to climb onto the covers but unsure if he should. Rei makes the decision for him. She lifts him up, then Fuyumi, whose eyes are round as twin moons behind her chunky glasses, still in penguin print pajamas.

She curls into Rei’s lap, a hefty wait. The lisp in her voice trips her vowels.“Mama okay?” Rei strokes her hair.

“Just a little boo boo. The doctors did a good job – mama’s just fine.”

“Sure?” mutters Dabi.

“Very sure.”

He looks at her, a little frown on his little face. He looks towards the door.

Which, inevitably, leads Rei’s attention back towards Enji.

He hasn’t changed, Enji. Same shirt as earlier, rumpled, same jacket thrown over one arm. He’s at the door. He hasn’t crossed the threshold. He looks – tired, brows drawn, mouth creased.

He has pink lilies tucked underneath one arm.

“Enji,” she says.

Fuyumi wriggles herself deeper into the blanket.

He takes the visitor’s chair, hard white plastic scraping across the linoleum tile. The flowers in hands still have dew gathered at their tips, their edges gilded in white, deepening to magenta at their centers, malachite stems wrapped in tissue paper.

For a moment there is nothing but silence. The clock in the corner, ticking.

Rei waits. She can wait.

“It.” He pauses. His fingers crinkle the tissue paper.

“It won’t happen again,” he says. Hesitates. Barrels through. “That was not right of me. I. I apologize.” His mouth is one thin grim line. His knuckles are pale around the flowers. He hates apologizing, he does, he hates being wrong. It’s hard to get him to admit that he’s in the fault for anything with that stubborness in him, digging in ground like a planted mule. It has to be wrung out of him, usually, the apology. It’s being wrung out of him right now, the apology. But he’s saying it. And it’s him, wringing it out of himself, looking at the flowers crinkling in his hands, looking at Rei, mouth tight and white at the edges, as if he thinks she won’t accept it.

She feels tired all of a sudden, looking at him.

This is the third time he’s been denied the international conference in favour of All Might, despite being number two hero nationally for two years. It grates on him, she knows. He hates being second place near as much he hates apologizing. It makes him irate, snappish, makes him go for the alcohol. Sometimes it makes him forget his own strength. His hero work is all consuming, she knows, in the ways that matter.

He apologized. He brought her pink lily flowers.

He’s Todoroki Enji, who wears fire ball print ties and tucks lillies into Rei’s hair and has a laugh like thunder rumbling. Todoroki Enji, who blushes red as his hair and who is so, so handsome when he smiles, ever briefly.

“Alright,” says Rei. Quietly. It’s that kind of moment, him and her and this foreign white walled hospital room with the children pressed close to her side. She strokes Fuyumi’s hair, once, twice. “Alright, Enji, but no alcohol.”

She takes the flowers. They smell of sugar and syrup and cold spring mornings. The dew drips sweetly onto her palm.

Rei breathes in. It’s a one time thing.

It won’t happen again.

This is a slippery slope.

It gets better, at first. He is home more often and reels his anger in more consciously and spends time with the children, so that eventually Fuyumi stops shying behind Rei’s legs or her older brother’s back every time Enji is within sightline. He is not good with them in the same way he is not good with small talk and social cues; too brisque for it, too blunt, too unused to their habits and neediness and babblbng toddler talk. But he reads the newspaper to them, sometimes, and carts Dabi around on his shoulders, sometimes, and looks at Fuyumi like he’s not at all sure what to do with her but is baffledly enamoured all the same. His focus is like a laser beam, one direction only, and it gets better, yes, but in the long term of Todorki Enji, it seems, All Might is north and Endeavor nothing but a magnet straining in a compass.

It gets better until it doesn’t.

He misses Natsuo’s birth. He’s somewhere in the west end of Japan helping with a terrorist attack. He misses the week when Fuyumi is so ill with some sudden virus she can barely stomach water, when the hospital hooks her up to a dozen softly beeping machines while Rei waits and waits, a baby hooked to a sling in her chest, her hands in her face, breathing haggard, quiet breaths into her hands. They move from Tokyo to Musutafu, where Eastern Japan’s primary hero headquarters is located, and Rei hopes that that – this’ll help. This extra time. This closeness to his work.

It doesn’t help.

All Might wins the National Enforcer’s Peace Prize; he stands as number 1 hero for the fourth year in a row. These days his name is becoming a symbol, a rallying cry, the herald of a golden age after a century of turmoil and reform. It should be a good thing, this sudden peace, but with every progressive achievement All Might makes Enji grows progressively more irate, more distant, more focused on capture rates, trying to surpass him through sheer grim willpower, and he hates being second place, Rei knows, and he hates being lessar, Rei knows, but that is not an excuse .

“ You have a family, Enji,” she snaps, one early morning before the children are due for school, and his tone when he says, “ Rei, ” is nothing short of a thunder warning. She stares at his back as he leaves in costume. She stares.

Breathe in. Breathe out.

She grips her arms, tightly.

He sweeps into the house like hurricane weather, all tension and billowing winds that slam the windows, flutter the curtains, footsteps harsh across the tatami. The children hide from him, these days. The strain in him is palpable, and they can feel it, and Rei can feel it too. When he looks at the children its as if he’s looking through them, when he looks at Rei it’s as if he’s looking through her, beyond her, past the rice paper walls of the house and beyond the walls of the manor, towards some distant endpoint she cannot see.

It frightens her, a shiver like a premonition.

Rei pleads. Rei begs, “Enji, please , Enji, this isn’t like you.”

And sometimes on good days they will eat dinner together and he will pass the soup and return with little trinkets from the corners of Japan – an origami flower here and a cookbook there and a box of jelly sweets for the children – and in the after hours of those days, the good ones, when Rei is tucking the children in for sleep, in the comforting quietus of evening with moonlight slanting silver across white-red hair and flowered futons, it will feel as if the storm warning was nothing but that; a warning, a phase, now dissipating to memory.

On the bad days he snaps at every little thing: All Might, most prevalently, and current political events, but also the alterations to his costume, and the children, and the food, and the dishes, every little particular thing and Rei isn’t even in charge of the dishes, that’s the housekeeper’s job. On bad days no matter how much Rei holds herself so very still, tries to soothe, tries to reason, tries to get him to listen, he doesn’t. “Enji, please, ” she says, and he whirls on her to seethe, “ Shut up Rei, ” a hiss between his teeth.

She watches him go. The turn of his back, as he leaves, familiar now. The sound of the training room doors slamming shut; a gong clap.

Her nails leave crescents in the meat of her palm.

Breathe in, breathe out.

This is the slippery slope:

Some days are good days and he is Todoroki Enji who has a laugh like thunder, who wears fireball print ties and tucks flowers into Rei’s hair. Some days are good days and the storm is like a faded memory. On those days she can kiss the children good night and think to herself, it’ll be better, he’ll be better now. And Rei wants it to be, in retrospect. Rei wants terribly for the Todoroki Enji who slams training doors and stares through the children and snaps at every little particular thing, who she does not recognize, to become nothing but smoke and transparent ash to be swept away.

But some days are not good days. And then most days are not good days, a balance tipping. Through it Rei tucks the children to bed, and stares at Enji’s leaving back, and pleads, and begs, and then she is twenty seven years old and she doesn’t know how she gets there, she doesn’t – but one day she is twenty seven years old and putting herself bodily between her husband and her tiny son, saying, “Enji he is seven, this is unacceptable. ” But he doesn’t listen. He hasn’t listened to her in a long, long time.

His eyes are lightning, his voice a rumble. There were warnings; how did Rei not see this coming. “ This is not a negotiation ,” he says, lowly.

He’s bigger than her. He’s always been bigger than her.

The blow is so easy to catch sight of, this time.

She doesn’t budge, digs her heels in. It takes her across the shoulder and sends her sprawling, elbows cracking against the tatami, her back hitting the wall with an ugly smack. Her vision swims, briefly. “Mama!” cries Dabi, and then none of the pain matters, not at all, because Enji seizes her baby boy by the arm and wrenches him towards the training rooms.

The door slams shut.

She is twenty eight years old and dabbing bruise balm onto her eldest’s back. The purple spreads from his shoulder down, dark, ugly splotches against his pale skin. He is curled up in her lap like a pill bug, chin on his knees, arms wrapped around his shins. The balm smells sharply of thyme and something else herbally pungent.

It is a good balm. Expensive. Quirk-made, to help coax healing. Underneath Rei’s fingers the bruises fade, blood vessels mending and the blood itself being reabsorbed.

It must hurt. She’s being as gentle as she can but it must. He doesn’t make any noise though, her Dabi, just goes very still and very quiet. He didn’t used to. At the beginning of these sessions he used to bury his face into her shirt and cry silent, ugly tears into stomach while Rei held him so very close and bit her lip until it bled. She’d scream herself hoarse at Enji’s door, afterwards. He doesn’t cry anymore though.

She doesn’t scream anymore, either.

She takes out the burn cream next. The jar is half full. They will need another one soon. This one smells of rosemary and honey, glittering avocado green – it’s too sweet for what it represents. Dabi rubs it over the back of his hands and over his shins, on top of the slightly pink, raised patches of skin. Rei slathers it across his shoulders and the back of his neck where he can’t reach. Bandages next, to keep the salve intact. They’ll take it off in two hours and wash the salve off and the burns will be gone.

Tie them, tight but not too tight. The white on the pink on the mottled purple.

Breathe in. Rei’s hands do not shake.

It is a clear July morning. Outside the sky is clear as anything; the sun streams through Rei’s kitchen window in a tessellation of light that spreads geometric shapes onto tile. Natsuo and Fuyumi would be playing by the koi pond, Rei knows, supervised by the maid. There is the distant sound of birdsong. The pale rumble of traffic on the road. On her kitchen floor Rei sits with two emptying jars of salve and a worn first aid kit, a bottle of antiseptic. The air smells equally of thyme as it does rosemary, honey, and sharp disinfectant.

It’s cloying, the smell. Too much, too pungent. She’ll need to open the windows. Dabi screws back the lid of the burn salve and lobs it into the first aid pack. Rei puts away the bandages and scissors. She closes her eyes and hears the birdsong.

Rei breathes.

It is a clear July morning and –

The air smells of honey and rosemary and thyme and hospital and –

Her son is putting a fresh shirt over half-faded bruises and –

Rei wraps her arms around Dabi’s shoulders, puts her face into the junction of her neck. He smells of honey and rosemary and thyme and burning things, the ozone. Rei breathes through it. She has to. She breathes and breaths until it feels as if she can’t, until her lungs are vacuums and this is room is a vacuum and she is going to choke, on the honey and rosemary and thyme, she is going to choke on this feeling trying to crawl its way up her throat and peel her open like a ripe fruit.

Dabi says, “Mom?” He is eight years old and hasn’t called her mama in months.

Rei breathes. It comes out shuddering, it comes out frost, a plume.

Rei has to breathe. She has to.

“I’m so sorry,” her voice shivers. “I’m so, so sorry.”

His cheek catches against her lashes, the white parted. His elbow sticks into her ribs – he needs to eat more. He’s too bony for his age. His mouth is turned down, when he twists to face her, a tiny scowl. Enji’s expression placed over Rei’s sharply delicate bone structure. “T’s not your fault.”

But it is. But it is. But he wasn’t made for this. But none of them were made for this. There’s too much of Rei’s ice in him, in his skin and insides that code ice instead of fire. The first few weeks after he was born they had to keep him in the hospital for temperature regulation, to make sure his quirk didn’t burn him out from the inside.

“It’s not ,” he insists. “C’mon, we can call the dumb old man shitty names, like – “

Rei holds him very very tightly, cuts off the syllable with a squeeze, and says nothing at all.

She breathes.

It passes, eventually. She is calm again, emptied out, her insides still. She puts the first aid kit away. There are still house chores and other tasks to be done. From the garden pond: Fuyumi laughing, clear as a bell.

The children will want an afternoon snack. Rei checks the fridge.

“Anyway,” Dabi says, determinedly, “Shitty names. I’m thinking oven brain, cuz obviously something got cook – Mom, amitsu?”

“Did you learn “shitty” from the news channel?” Rei sighs

“…. no.”

He helps ladle out the jelly and the green tea ice-cream while Rei slices fruit. Peaches. Strawberries. She chills them, and then arranges them artfully in the bowls. Red bean paste. Syrup over top. It’s a mechanical act. She doesn’t think too much about it. She doesn’t think too much about anything. Her breathing evens.

She sends the maid inside to do the dishes and hands out the amitsu bowls to the children and they eat on the bench by the koi pond. Natsu is three, thusly still getting food everywhere, messily. Fuyumi eats only her jelly and picks at her ice-cream. It is clear and cool, the air lacking the muffled humidity of the past week, swept away from yesterday night’s thunderstorm. Water drips from bowed branches and onto wet grass. Wind whistles through the trees.

“Mama,” whispers Fuyumi. “When’s Father coming back?”

Rei’s spoon pauses mid-air.

Fuyumi has left her bowl on the bench. The silver spoon, clenched in her fingers. She is six years old and too observant for her age. Is it born or is it something trained, Rei wonders. She has all ice and no fire, and for that Rei is quietly relieved. Enji won’t want her – not like with Dabi. It is the same with Natsu, three years old and still oblivious to the tension in the house. Little ice flakes flutter from his little fingers.

It shouldn’t be a good thing, that Enji doesn’t want his children. It shouldn’t. But it means they’re safe, Rei’s youngest two. And then the baby –

Enji doesn’t even know yet, about the baby. Enji is at a conference in Osaka.

“Not until Monday, sweetheart,” says Rei.

She does not think about the baby.

The garden is stifling, all of a sudden. It feels laughable. Endless clear sky above and the rain still fresh and greenery all around in jeweled watercolour, and Rei, staring unseeingly at her melting ice cream and floating jelly cutes, needing to be out.

But to where.

They finish the amitsu. Rei cleans Natsu up, changes him. She prepares the vegetables for a curry, the mechanical motion of it returning her once again to equilibrium.

Onions. Carrots. Scallions.

Eventually, Rei finds herself staring into the fridge, trying to find potatoes that don’t exist.

It is a clear July morning and –

She closes the fridge. She presses her forehead to the cool metal.

Rei needs out. Rei needs out. But where would she even go. She doesn’t have any friends here, in Musutafu. She doesn’t. Rei has three children and she’s always been so busy and after the move there’d never been any time to get herself ingrained in the local community, or go out and make friends, and anyway Enji hadn’t liked Rei going out much anyway so she didn’t, she hadn’t, and now she doesn’t even know where the market is, the market, for potatoes .

She hasn’t called any of her Tokyo friends for years, time and distance severing that connection, and her family still doesn’t know about any of this because Rei hadn’t told them, had ignored all the warnings and said to hersel f it’ll be better, it’ll get better, like a mantra on repeat, but it hadn’t, and it was so shameful , and she would just pack her bags and leave with the children but she’d never gotten more than her associate’s degree, left gathering dust for a near decade now. Where would she get the money even, to take care of the children. She doesn’t know. She doesn’t know how she got here but she can’t stay, not in this house where her oldest son comes out of the training room with burns on his arms and her tiny daughter tiptoes down tatami halls and this baby, this baby , what will happen to this baby, will Enji want –

She breathes in, a shuddering breath. The ice, shivering down her fingertips, films over the fridge wall.

It doesn’t matter, in the end.

He’s number two hero. He’s number two hero and he wants – the children – he wants Rei’s quirk, and she knew that, she knew that since she was nineteen years old and met him at the miai. But she didn’t marry him because he wanted her quirk. She married him because he was Todoroki Enji who wore fireball print ties and couldn’t hold a conversation on his life and tucked flowers behind her ear and held their children like they were something precious– but that Todoorki Enji isn’t here now, and Rei should have noticed the warnings. He’s number two hero and he won’t let them leave. She hates him, terribly. She hates herself, equally terribly. Because now it’s just Rei, trapped weeping in this tatami house with three children and a baby on the way and nowhere to run.

Rei cries until she hears the sound of the bath, draining, the distant patter of footsteps on the floor, incoming, and then she wipes the tears away in a trickle of ice tinkling, breathes until she feels still again, and goes to prepare the curry.

There are tasks to be done.

The baby comes one cold january morning. There are thus four children in the house and exactly zero sleep for Rei. The baby cries and cries and Rei rocks it and nurses it and hums it lullabies but unlike the first three times her nerves are completely shot and Shouto’s colic is utterly inconsolable. Shouto cries, and Rei cries with him, and Enji isn’t here at all which is – a good thing. Rei wakes up at three in the morning to the baby crying completely exhausted and terribly frazzled and without energy to do any emotional processing.

By six months his hair has come in – two tone. His eyes have lightened – two tone. One day Rei just looks at him, the red and the white, the grey and the lightning, and feels the potential of it knock the breath out of her.

Quirks don’t work like that, though. It can’t.

Enji can’t have another one of her sons.

It is June and she is thirty two years old when Shouto’s quirk manifests.

Spring has just given way to early summer showers. The storm outside batters the windows. It is four in the afternoon and Rei is making teriyaki for dinner, blinking back the ache in her jaw and the exhaustion migraine sitting at her temple, when Shouto skids into the kitchen in what should have been his nap time, blanket trailing.

There are tears in his eyes. Rei puts down her knife.

“Sweetheart?”

Lightning crackles, blue-lit, and even as Rei twitches Shouto barrels into her leg.

She scoops him up and puts them both in a chair. His fine hair brushes her cheek, little hands going around her neck to squeeze tightly. He was always so scared of storms.

“Did you have a nightmare, Shouto?”

“Mmm,” he murmurs.

“What was it about?”

His response is so mumbled Rei can barely hear it. She tucks him a little closer. “Hmm?”

“Dad,” he mutters. “ Fire .”

Rei closes her eyes.

She thinks all the children dream about Enji, one way or another. Rei does, certainly. The fire, and the lightning eyes. Back when in better days she used to dream about a meeting at a teahouse, the sun dappling Rei in light.

Nowadays, in the good dreams, Rei claws his eyes out.

“It’s okay,” she says. She rocks Shouto, and he grabs her tighter. “Its – “

The billowing thunder cuts her off, swallows her words. The lightning imprints white onto Rei’s shuttered eyelids. She opens them, again, when Shouto whimpers, and –

Feels herself go so, so cold.

The frost. Not Rei’s. The frost creeps up his right cheek, a tessellation. His left arm sparks a little row of flame.

He doesn’t even realize it, her Shouto. He doesn’t, and Rei stares, and knows the fear response must have been the trigger factor. What does the trigger matter, though. He has both quirks. He’s all that Enji ever wanted.

And there’s nothing she can do about it. He’ll take Shouto away, just like he did Rei’s eldest.

He’ll take Shouto away.

Oh no no no.

“Mama?” Shouto says, peeking up, then startling, looking down at himself, and Rei seizes him by the shoulders with the no echoing in her head. “Shouto. Shouto sweetheart,” she says, urgently, and Shouto’s eyes go wide and blinking. “Can you do mama a favour?” Rei can’t imagine how her expression right now, but it doesn’t matter, because Shouto nods, slowly, and Rei says, “Don’t tell Dad, okay? Don’t ever tell Dad.”

“Okay,” he whispers.

Her grip on him goes slack, fingers trembling. She buries her face into his hair.

Rei breathes.

Enji comes home later that night. They eat dinner, civilly. Rei had barely been able to finish the teriyaki with the revelation sitting heavy in her mind. He doesn’t like the sauce over top. The comment makes her twitch – more than she would usually. Enji doesn’t notice, which is good. Fuyumi does, though, Dabi too. They side eye her worriedly over the table.

It is a very quiet dinner. All family meals are.

Fuyumi, bless her, gives a retelling about her day at school. Natsu pipes up about winning a soccer game.

“Anything else?” says Enji. His gaze flickers to her.

Rei can look back, without the iminent breakdown. It’s getting harder, but she can. Sometimes she feels absolutely nothing at all for him – blank apathy to her core – sometimes the only thing that can encompass the entirety of her hatred is dissonant screaming.

This time there’s the dissonant screaming.

He knows.

He doesn’t. He can’t.

“No,” says Rei, evenly.

The dinner goes back to silence.

Enji finds out, eventually.

Four year olds are not very good at controlling their quirk, but Rei drags on the farce as long as she can. It helps that Enji pays so little attention to the children. Rei keeps Shouto out of sight as often as possible, watches him like a hawk when she can’t, and when Dabi and Fuyumi find out by virtue of proximity, they set up a rotating Russian roulette of Distracting Enji’s Attention. The secret is kept for months, but Enji finds out, eventually.

And Rei goes so very cold.

Enji shouts and Rei doesn’t say anything at all, just stares, blankly, at a wall. She walks out of that encounter with a fresh bruise on her arm that she doesn’t notice, goes into her room and pulls Shouto close. “Mama?” he whispers, tugs at her hair, eyes flared wide with worry, and Rei just breathes, and breathes. It feels like she is regurgitating all of herself with every exhale. Every bit of bone and blood and sinew. She doesn’t notice the tear tracks until they drip onto Shouto’s fine hair.

Enji takes him away, eventually. She thinks she screams. She doesn’t remember. When she blinks again the lamp is broken on the floor, the glass from the bulb scattered at Rei’s feet.

Rei loses time.

She sits in her room by the window. She remembers that. November rains sweet little snowflakes onto the dark bark of bared trees. The grey sky, the incoming snow. The brown leaf decaying.

Her Shouto. Crying. She soothes him. But Enji takes him away again and Enji keeps taking him away and Rei already lost one, her first born, her eldest son. She can’t lose another, she cannot but Enji keeps taking him a w a y

The days pass strangely.

She feels as if she is in a dream. It is November and the skies are grey and Fuyumi is saying: “Mom, please, you need to eat.” Her moon-wide eyes, her careful hands. A soup bowl is in Rei’s lap so Rei eats, and then it is December and the snow pats the window sills like powdered sugar and her Natsu is curled up in Rei’s arms so quietly, even though Natsu shouldn’t be quiet at all, and he asks her, “mom, Dabi says – mom you’re gonna be okay right?” so Rei hums his favourite lullaby. She watches as the skies clear to velvet stars and the snow crusts into ice and her children pass, and then one day, Dabi, entering the room, except the only thing Rei sees is the lightning in his eyes and the red of his hair and her next movement is just violent motion and – v

Fuyumi is saying: “Mom, MOM!” And she’s so afraid, why is she afraid – and of course it’s Enji it’s always Enji and –

She comes back to herself, eventually.

“Oh,” she says, one day, brushing Fuyumi’s hair, and then breaks down sobbing and then Fuyumi just looks at her, so still, until Rei moves to hug her close enough to crush ribs and gasp, “Sweetie, darling, Fuyumi-chan Fuyumi-chan ,” and then Fuyumi breaks down sobbing too and then Natsu, following. It’s such a mess. All of them forget about the salmon on the stove until it burns. The fire alarm and the acrid smoke sends Rei into breakdown all over again.

“I’m so sorry,” she gasps, into Fuyumi’s hair. “I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry.”

Rei breathes. She has to.

They clean up the salmon. Rei does the dishes while Fuyumi wipes Natsu’s nose. Afterwards they sit at the kitchen table and Rei, world refocused, puts her head into her hands.

“I’m going to. I’m going to try.” Rei says.

That was what the last few months weren’t. The last few months were Rei locking herself in and everything else out. She’s almost afraid of the look on Fuyumi’s face when she raises her head, but Rei’s daughter only goes very still, and says, “Okay. Okay,” in a tired, quaking voice.

They try.

All of them do. Rei and Fuyumi and Dabi and Natsu, and little Shouto, trying the hardest of all of them. The elder three of Rei’s children do their best to run interference in quiet, discreet, ways. They’re not allowed to spend time with Shouto, not anymore so Rei glues Shouto to her side as much as allowed. He cries as much as she cries, and Rei cries so frequently and so terribly hard, as if trying to make up for the past months in her trance where she felt nothing at all, as if she has lost all sway or reason over her emotions.

Rei soothes salves that smells of thyme over Shouto’s bruises and salves that smells of rosemary-honey over his burns. He’s four. He’s too young. She wants to scream this at Enji’s face. Rei could do that, once. These days everything louder than a whisper is locked in her throat.

She dreams of clawing Enji’s eyes out. She doesn’t sleep very much.

Rei tries.

It’s not enough.

One morning she is thirty-four years old and the scream from the training rooms is deafening. Rei registers first: scream, and then: Fuyumi , and she’s out of her room in half a second and a pounding heart. She passes by Enji just around a turn, the front door slamming shut behind him. He has a conference today, of course, she remembers. But if he’s gone why is Fuyumi –

And then Natsu starts screaming too.

Rei has her answer two steps into the training room that smells distinctly of burning and smoke, and he wasn’t made for this, her baby boy, her firstborn son, he has too much of Rei’s ice in him.

“Fuyumi.” She presses her hand to her temple. Breathes. “Fuyumi call the hospital.”

The salves aren’t going to do much.

In the ambulance the paramedic asks her exactly what happened. She stares at him mutely. What do you think happened. But before Rei can do or say anything at all Fuyumi takes over, “Oh, you know, nii-san’s quirk doesn’t really work well,” she tells the paramedic. “It’s the genetic mosaicism. Some of him isn’t entirely resistant to his fire quirk, but he’s been trying to train for U.A. entrance exams so…” and looks equal parts devastated but also abashed.

Which is true, on all parts, apart from where Dabi’s quirk “doesn’t work well” and the actual reason Rei’s eldest is stuck in an ambulance.

Rei puts her hands into her face.

They’ve all gotten so good at lying through their teeth. She wants to laugh, or maybe weep. It’s a trained obedience.

At the hospital they’re given a private room. Or, Dabi is. Rei plus the remaining children, all three, spill in.

The doctors tell her the burns are quite severe but treatable. He also has a broken wrist and a concussion, which was why he hadn’t woken up at all in the training room. The doctors tell her they have a doctor with a healing quirk that will come in immediately. They ask her about the wrist and the concussion, and once again Rei stares, and once again Fuyumi takes over and tells the doctor about the how the explosive force of her brother’s quirk probably knocked him into a wall, thus both wrist injury and concussion.

The medical staff can match it with Dabi’s records. It makes perfect sense.

The doctor with the healing quirk arrives four hours later, after Rei has soothed Shouto to a nap and Natsu has bounced his way around the room enough times to drive a person to dizziness and Rei is clutching at the bed sheets in white-knuckled anxiety. He makes a note on his medical chart. He asks her a few questions. His bedside manner is good but Rei is too distracted to pay it any attention. And then he puts his hands onto her son’s chest and the burns fade, and Rei breathes.

His face looks as if he is sleeping. The red hair, feathering over his brow. The cut of his cheeks are sharp as a ship’s prows. And when was the last time she hugged him. When was the last time she touched him.

Rei grips his hand tight.

He wakes up half an hour later, stirring groggily, and barely gets out half a discontented murmur before Fuyumi’s flinging herself onto him.

“You dimwit.” Her mouth’s scrunched wretchedly and she’s looking once again on the verge of tears, but this time they’re as furious as they are worried. “You – don’t provoke him. ” And then she’s burying her face into his shirt.

“Sis – “

“Nii-saaaan!” Natsu wails, and Dabi’s next word is shut off in favour of Natsu launching into his ribs.

Rei pulls him in by the bony shoulders and Shouto ends up squished between the four of them, and she cries, and Fuyumi cries, again, because that’s the only thing they seem to be doing lately, and her eldest says, “– mom?” all uncertain, and Rei cries harder.

How did Rei get here? How did Rei get here?

This hospital room with her eldest son under the sheets and her daughter so good at lying and Natsu wailing and, Shouto, poor sweet Shouto, and Rei, herself who flinches at every little thing and jumps at shadows, who chokes on the smells of thyme, and antiseptic. Rei, who cannot look her own son in the face without feeling heat skitter across her skin, the force of a blow across her cheekbone, who is so, so very terribly sad, to the point it freezes her. This Rei who holds her silences, and cries when the emotion in her chest threatens to choke her, who cannot fight back and is resigned to it, almost, to this fate.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, ” cries Rei, for not being braver, for not leaving when they should have, and her eldest looks at her with his red hair falling over his lightning eyes. He puts his head to her collarbone, featherlight, and she feels his shoulders heave with his shudder.

“It’s not your fault,” he says.

But it is.

If she had been braver. If they had left earlier. But she wasn’t. But they didn’t. And now they’re here, the five of them, her eldest in his white hospital gown, smelling like smoke and fire, the thyme and sharp hospital plastics, and oh, he wasn’t made for this. None of them were.

Rei breathes. She has to.

Eventually, Natsu tires himself out with the hysterics. He falls asleep right there, between Fuyumi and Dabi and the headboard. “Little icepop?” mutters Dabi, and Fuyumi grabs a pillow and whacks her brother on the head with it.

“You are such a jerk,” she tells him, and then beds down to Natsu’s left. Dabi makes a face; she wrinkles her nose at him.

A nurse enters briefly to tell Rei they’ll be keeping Dabi in observation a little longer. “Oh,” she says. The nurse makes a note. Rei watches her back, as she leaves, before Shouto’s wide yawn steals her attention. His lashes flutter, the dark and the pale. He curls up against Rei’s breast with a drowsy noise, and Rei hums him to sleep, and then tucks him next to Dabi’s side, where he drools all over his brother’s hospital gown.

“Mom?” murmurs Fuyumi, eyes shuttering too. Her moon-wide eyes behind her square glasses. Rei takes the glasses off, and folds them, and places them gently on the bedside table.

The sun that filters through the thin curtains dapples them in light. Rei just watches, breathes. It’s been so long since all four of them have been at her fingertips.

She brushes the hair from Dabi’s brow. She holds his hand, tight. “Shh,” she says to Natsu, when he stirs.

The hours tick by.

Eventually, Rei falls asleep in the hospital chair.

She does not dream.

AO3

#bnha #boku no hero academia #bnha fanfiction #todoroki rei #todoroki shouto #todoroki enji #todorki fuyumi #dabi #dabi is a todoroki theory #mentions of child abuse #domestic abuse

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caddy-whump-us · 5 years

Note

⛓ + 🔨 for the emoji thing?? Character of your choice!

Finally finishing these really, really old requests–thank you for being so patient, Anon! So in this scenario, Rowan is an iteration of Ryan (tall, broad-shouldered, a little rough and scruffy, long red hair) and Elyr is the elf version of Julian. Rowan has been traveling with Elyr as Elyr’s guard and protection, as Elyr is something close to a prince.

I’m imagining the setting as being sort of like early 19th century Europe. The country of the elves is a cluster of islands (not unlike the UK but a few more islands involved) with some holdings on the nearby continent but they’ve mostly been pushed back to the islands by the humans. But the elves have the magic equivalent of an atomic bomb, so one does want to be diplomatic with them (even if they do have a cultural tendency towards peace and negotiation). Meanwhile, Braith is a young (human) duke and his particular state is part of a larger federation (ostensibly) overseen by the elected Archduke (think Holy Roman Empire or the German States before unification). I guess the rest of the ad hoc worldbuilding should be pretty clear in the course of the drabble (kinda long for a drabble tho).

And and and? There’s also bonus whump of several different kinds in this one. Enjoy, Anon!

“Ah, Elyr–” Braith rose from his chair, still with a mouthful of bread tucked in his cheek and held out his hand. “Come and sit down, have something to eat. You were comfortable last night, I hope.”

Elyr, escorted into the sunny breakfast room by the bowing and soft-footed servants, came and sat at the table. “I was, thank you.” His face was grave.

Braith, smiling, was tucking cold meats into another piece of bread. “I try to look after the guests in my house.” He pointed around at the table. “Do eat something.”

Elyr sliced bread and took fruit for himself but said nothing.

“I’m rather pleased the clothes we found for you would fit you. Though I can’t believe you’d only have the clothes on your back for such a journey.”

“It is a pilgrimage,” Elyr answered, “not pleasure-traveling.”

Elyr would have been content sitting across from Braith in his traveling clothes, so long as it ended in leaving this house with Rowan. Instead he had been dressed in clothes better suited to a half-grown boy, the only clothes that would befit a man but were still small enough to fit him.

It rankled to be dressed up like a boy in a miniature soldier’s costume, and so Elyr had left the top buttons of the jacket undone and let the collar of his shirt show through.

Braith eyed him. “A pilgrimage. Of course. We’ve even heard about the birth of your Moon Child here.”

“Then you understand why I and my guardian must continue on.”

Silence fell between them. Sunlight, filtered by leaves, moved across the table like the patterns in water. Voices, laughter from elsewhere in the house reached them. Elyr’s ears twitched and Braith set his elbows on the table and laced his fingers.

“I do understand,” Braith said at last. “But I cannot permit it.” He took up his teacup, drank.

Elyr scowled. “Safe passage is promised along the pilgrims’ routes. We didn’t set foot in your country, and we have papers that would allow us entry even if we had.”

“You misunderstand me. You, sir, I can permit to continue on. Your guardian I cannot permit.”

“That is wholly unacceptable.”

A cloud covered the morning sun. Braith leaned across the table at Elyr; his smile had vanished and his eyes were dark. “What he did is wholly unacceptable.”

Elyr held his place and his gaze. He knew; Rowan had told him. But let Braith make the next move, give him that glory if he wants it.

Braith was still and his voice was low. “He murdered my brother.”

“In open combat,” Elyr said. “In honest war.”

The cloud passed on and the sunlight streamed across the table again, glinting off dishes, glasses, droplets of water on a silver carafe, silver forks and knives, illuminating (strangely) a loaf of bread and making it seem to glow from within.

Braith sat back again. “Is war ever honest?” he asked the air.

“You could have hired him for your army. As it was, he was hired by your rivals.”

“Mercenaries.” Braith waved one hand dismissively.

“But mercenaries honestly hired and honestly paid. And I recall that you and your allies were the victors.”

Braith was silent, running one finger along his lower lip, considering, looking off into the room and the hallway beyond.

“My dear sir,” he said at last, leaning back on the table, “in my country we have an old custom of bloodmoney. Do you know it? It likely appalls your sensibilities. In my country, long ago, a killing would be forgiven if sufficient recompense could be made–in coin, in cattle, in land, or if need be, in blood.”

Elyr looked away and aside, out the tall windows and towards the gardens.

Braith went on: “I demand recompense for this death.”

Elyr snapped back to meet his eyes. “You’d have a death for a death for a death for a death until what? Until only one man remains? And he can crown himself the king of the dead?”

“I did not hope that you would understand.”

“I am many times your elder, aom. And you have much to learn.”

“He murdered my brother.”

“Where is he?”

They walked, or near-at marched, across the gravel yard, followed (and Elyr cast them glances over his shoulder at whiles) by four soldiers.

Grooms and stableboys darted around them, leading out this horse or carrying harness and bridle. Elyr was no taller than some of the stableboys and they cast an eye at him as he walked past. Braith’s coach had been drawn out and two men were tending to it. They bowed as the master of the house walked by.

“My stables,” Braith said as they drew on nearer.

“How very grand,” Elyr replied. But it was an excess of yellow sandstone in his eyes, low and sprawling, patterned with squat windows and white arched doors, and made all too ostentatious with its high cupola. One tree and only one tree, though spreading and large, cast shade over part of the roof. There was something dry and hot about this stone hall in the midst of a wasteland of gravel that displeased Elyr. Still a few birds swooped through open windows and doors to find their nests under the eaves and in the rafters, and that was some comfort.

They passed through and into the stables. And though it was cooler and darker inside, the barrenness and wretchedness that had troubled Elyr outside still troubled him. Doves were calling somewhere in the peaked roof, up among the rafters and the wooden ceiling lined like the belly of a ship set upside down atop the sandstone walls. But the smell of hay and horses was warm and alive. Despite the warmth, a stove was burning by a far wall.

The last of the servants were slipping out the doors (casting last looks as they went) and shutting them up behind them–most of the last of the servants, at least, for two or three remained. The horses made small sounds to themselves in their stalls, stamping. And the last door was closed.

It was still early, but the sun was breaking down through the squat windows, cut into beams by the dust in the air–the only light in the stables. The birds were silent now. And from somewhere among the stalls came the faint and muffled sound of a man’s pained moan.

Elyr turned, sharp, to Braith.

“Oh yes, he’s here,” Braith said. And he waved to the stablehands and they disappeared into a stall and dragged out a battered man.

He staggered: he was chained hand and foot, like a prisoner, and the iron had already bitten into the skin at his wrists and his ankles. His knuckles were bloody. One eye was blacked and swollen shut and blood (his own? another’s?) spattered and smeared his face. He had been stripped to the waist and what was left of his clothes were torn and there were wounds under the tears. But when he saw Elyr, even in the half-light of the darkened stable, he grinned and Elyr knew him–by his grin and by his red hair (tangled now, with straw caught in it).

“Rowan–” And Elyr moved to go to him, but was caught short when a soldier’s hand fell hard on his shoulder.

Braith spoke without turning to face Elyr. “I’m afraid that, while you are my guest, he is my prisoner–to do with as I like.”

He gave a sign and the stablehands shoved Rowan to the floor. Elyr’s throat tightened at the sound of Rowan striking the bricks.

But now Braith turned. “This is splendid. Bring a chair for our guest.” And two of the soldiers hurried off into the dim recesses of the stable to return with two folded garden chairs to set before them.

Braith draped himself in his chair and looked over his shoulder at Elyr. It took a shove from the soldier and a firm hand on his shoulder to set Elyr in his seat.

“Why are you doing this?” Elyr’s fingers were knotted together.

“Because,” Braith smiled, “My brother is dead, I have suffered, and to pay the bloodmoney owed for that death and suffering, I want him to suffer as I have suffered.”

A low sound, like a growl, came from Rowan even as he lay on the floor. But, it was laughter. And Rowan raised his head. “It would be easier,” his voice was cracked and rough, “to kill me.”

Braith gave him a shove with the toe of his boot. “But I don’t want to kill you.” He waved one hand in the air and the soldiers and the stablehands moved almost as one to surround Rowan.

They hauled the bleeding man to his feet and he stumbled against the chains around his ankles. To Elyr, the first blow felt as if it struck him as much as it struck Rowan–deep and low to his stomach. Rowan staggered, righted himself, and threw a grin to Elyr.

At that moment, the circle of soldiers and servants closed, with Rowan in their midst. One of them threw a punch to Rowan’s jaw and he stumbled to the far side of the circle. The man who caught him struck him again, sending him reeling again to stumble into another man. So they passed him, from man to man, around the circle, with punches and kicks. And if he fell, they stood him up again and knocked him back around the circle. They laughed and called to each other.

Rowan was silent, save for low groans when the blows hit home. Elyr was screaming–for him, perhaps for himself. “Stop it! If you beat him to death, what good will that do you?”

Braith turned to him, slowly. “Perhaps you’re right.” And he clapped his hands.

The circle opened immediately. Rowan collapsed to his knees, panting. The soldiers and the stablehands still stood around, nearby, breathing hard, some rubbing at their knuckles.

Braith rose and crossed to Rowan where he had fallen in a pool of sunlight from one of the high windows. He lifted Rowan’s chin with his boot and looked him, the blood running from his nose and from his lip, the cut in his forehead, the rising bruises on his jaw. Elyr could still see the spark of defiance in his one eye and willed himself to look away, but he could not.

And Braith kicked Rowan aside, once in the chest, then twice in the stomach after he fell. Rowan writhed.

Bratih whirled back to face Elyr (who stiffened and trembled at the rage in Braith’s face). “You are my witness. This is my justice for the murder of my brother.”

Elyr found his feet and shouted back, “I will give you all the offerings we were taking to the forest temple if you will let him go. Every last piece of silver, every opal, if you will let him go.”

“I will send you with a battalion of my own guards to keep you and your treasures safe. You will be on your way tomorrow.” His voice was low and even, but now it rose again, “But he will not go with you.”

“Please,” Elyr said quietly, breathing hard and fast, “Please.” But Braith ignored him.

“By God, but you are a mess,” he said, lifting Rowan’s head by a hank of his hair. “It’s shearing season, I think.”

Elyr buried his face in his hands. A stablehand brought out a pair of shears better suited for sheep. The blades ground edge to edge as Braith tested them. Rowan struggled in his chains. And though Elyr had his eyes covered, he could still hear the grinding blades as Braith took up handfuls of Rowan’s hair and hacked it away. Someone laughed, someone muttered.

There was silence, then footsteps, then silence again. Elyr raised his head.

Braith stood over him, with the shears still in one hand and a lock of Rowan’s red hair coiled around the fingers of his other. He held it out to Elyr. “For you,” he said, “to remember him.”

Dazed, trembling, Elyr reached out and took the lock of hair (bloodied, straw still clinging to it) and wrapped it tight around his fingers. And as Braith turned away he could see Rowan on the floor with his hair hacked away, uneven red stubble across his scalp, like a badly mown field, and blood running through it. His hair lay around him like clots of blood.

And Rowan saw him, but this time he gave no defiant grin.

“Lift him up,” Braith said.

One of the stablehands threw a rope and hook over a rafter and played out the rope until the hook hung above the place Rowan lay. The servants and soldiers hooked in the chains around his wrists and then, like sailors, hauled Rowan up from the floor to hang by his arms in midair. They tied off the rope and went to stand around him again. His blood dripped off his bare feet and onto the floor, pooling there.

Braith came back to his seat next to Elyr (who had sat again for fear of collapsing) and gave another sign. The circle closed again.

Again, each man took his turn striking at Rowan as he hung there. The chains on his ankles rattled with each blow, and he groaned. One of the soldiers took up his rifle and raised the butt of it like a club.

Elyr dropped his face into his hands again.

“No, no, little lordling.” Braith caught Elyr by the chin and turned his face to show him where Rowan hung from the rafters. “I want you to see it.”

The soldier swung the rifle around to strike Rowan in the ribs–a cracking sound and Rowan gasped for air. They laughed.

One of the stablehands took up a shovel; Elyr gagged at the horror of it. He swung the head around to strike Rowan in the leg this time–no crack, but Rowan swung from the hook. So the stablehand tried again–still no crack, but a solid sound.

Some kept to their fists, practicing their punches. Others took up tools to beat him: shovels, the handles of rakes or brooms, rifles. Braith held Elyr still and forced him to watch as they went around, taking their turns, laughing, trying to urge different sounds out of Rowan. Rowan sagged in his chains, one shoulder coming out of its socket. And still they went on, slapping at him and laughing, striking at bruises. One of them found a riding crop in a stall and took to whipping him across his back. And still they laughed.

Elyr tore his face free from Braith’s hands and Braith called out, “Oh, let him down.”

Rowan was dropped to the floor with a thick sound and, to Elyr’s horror, a familiar sound: the sound of a deer taken on a hunt dropped onto the floor to be dressed and butchered. It was the same sound–and Rowan himself had taken deer on hunts with Elyr (and Richard and all the rest). Elyr had heard this very sound with Rowan before, but now it was Rowan who was taken, perhaps to be butchered like a deer.

The circle was breaking again. One of the men was over by the stove, stirring the coals, stirring the coals to greater heat, and drawing out a glowing iron rod. And this, Elyr knew, was why they had kept the stove burning even on a warm day.

And Elyr was screaming again, inarticulate, in his own Elvish language. Braith called two of the soldiers to him.

As Elyr rushed, at last, desperate, to reach Rowan, the soldiers caught him. Braith turned Rowan over with his foot and knelt over him. One of them carried the glowing brand over. The soldier hoisted Elyr over his shoulder (as he would have carried a child) and Elyr kicked against him, clawing at his shoulder, still screaming. Rowan still lay in a pool of light, more battered now than before, struggling to breathe, bleeding endlessly, with Braith holding the brand over him. And this was all Elyr could see before the soldier carried him out of the stables again and the sunlight blinded him and the door they had passed through was shut and latched again.

A butler had been dispatched with a tray of tea to take up to Elyr late that afternoon–after he had been carried bodily and screaming back to the house, after it had taken both of the soldiers to carry him upstairs, after he had been locked in this room, after all the household heard his screams through the noontime.

But he was quiet now.

The butler knocked, unlocked the door.

Elyr was sitting at the small table at the windows, twisting the lock of Rowan’s hair around his fingers. His eyes flashed immediately to the door; his face was still dusty and streaked with tears, despondant.

The butler, soft-footed as all the servants, set the tray and tea things down before Elyr.

“What will they do with him?” Elyr asked softly.

“I’m afraid I could not say, sir.”

“What will they do with him?” Elyr asked again, harder this time.

The butler was quiet for a moment. Then: “What shape was the brand?”

“A crescent, as much as I could see it.” And Elyr covered his eyes with one hand.

“Then very likely,” the butler said, “he’ll be sold to the salt mines.”

Elyr dropped his forehead against the table.

“Where they’ll work him to death.”

#whump #prompt #ocs #elyr #rowan #beaten #chained #injuries #traumatic haircut #forced to watch #emotional whump #psychological #fantasy creature

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