#every night sylas briarwood wakes up

[ravenquingvax]

Okay but I rewatched The Feast Of Realms again and I can't get this stupid scenario out of my head now - Fuck you, Scanlan Shorthalt.

Fuck you.

Anyway-

So remember how when Grog picks "chenga" for the safe word when Vax goes off to do hot rogue things, Scanlan comments on how he personally uses "mommy"?

I can't stop thinking about what if, while panicking and thinking he's dying, Vax accidentally said "mommy" instead of "chenga" before he passed out?

Like. Just, imagine you are Sylas Briarwood in that moment.

You live a pretty uneventful life in the castle you took over with your sexy wife who works for a god in the making and the teenage girl your wife forcibly adopted.

Then one day you get invited to an important state dinner and your wife decides to take the opportunity to make sure nobody pays Whitestone a visit and to ensure there's nothing to worry about.

Now you probably don't get to do lots, your wife is too paranoid about your health and safety despite you being a very big and strong vampire now.

You expect this all to be boring and quite uneventful, maybe dangerous even giving how you have to avoid direct sunlight now.

Then you get ambushed by mortals on the way over and your wife lets you stretch your legs to deal with the poor bastards.

You think, great! This is probably the most I'll get to do during this.

Then you arrive at the dinner to find the brother of your adopted daughter is still alive and angry at you + he has friends now.

And while you charm the Sovereign, your wife decides to passively torment the boy for fun.

Then when the boy meltsdown, you and wifey take that as your que to leave - you have not only secured your safety from the state but now the boy has lost trust and respect from the Sovereign.

But getting to your guest room you find a spy has broken in and that he looks like the pretty girl who was here with the angry boy, but this spy tries to play servant and even flirts with you and your wife.

You decide to have him for dinner and even get a lil handsy with him, possibly as foreplay for fun times with the wifey afterwards 👀😳👀, but then he escapes and yeets himself out a window.

So of course you give chase, only for this motherfucker to call you mommy of all things before he passes out in a bloodied fountain.

Like, how do you react to that???

[blorbologist]

For a prompt, if it interests you: Cassandra has a bad day (sickness, or just exhaustion) and says she wants a member of their family that is gone now. And of course, Percy and or Vex giving the hugs she deserves after that.

Sorry about the flight, and hope this strikes your fancy - ghost

As soon as the Briarwoods are gone, Cassandra changes rooms.

Cass’ childhood bedroom used to be the nursery. Just about every de Rolo had lived in the lavender room for a year or two, with the little washroom to the side and soothing view of the sunrise. Cassandra had stayed until she was four, at which point the idea of getting a big girl room of her own held little appeal compared to being nearer mother and father.

Given she was the last of the brood, Johanna had brushed away her tears, tantrum turned exhausted whimpering, and promised she could stay, if it helped her. 

So they moved a bed in, redecorated, moved the baby things to a spare room. 

Oliver had teased her so relentlessly about it, for a week - until Whitney socked him in the nose and Ludwig helped her stuff him in a closet, and all three were grounded. A door down from mother and father’s quarters, down the hall and to the right of where the rest of the brood slept. 

(There had been talk of her moving out of it, soon - Julius was hoping to wed, soon, and it was implied the hasty marriage was due to certain circumstances. Cass only connected the dots years too late to harass him about it.)

All that to say that the nursery was declared Cass’ room and broadly considered such by the whole family.

Delilah and Sylas had more practical motivations. 

They’d moved into her parents’ rooms, a door down. Keeping Cassandra in her old bedroom, once they recovered her, was convenient. All her things were already there - dusty and neglected and untouched by anything alive - and she was near at hand. If she was needed, or needed a reminder. 

It was awful. 

She could hear them murmuring - sounding so much like her parents with the walls between them, the scheming and saccharine love muted to something familiar without words. If Cassandra closed her eyes (often closed, to not see the dying city beyond the windowglass) she could - she’d think - 

Cassandra often slipped out. 

The benefits to her room being the nursery - the door had been very, very carefully selected to be a silent thing, to avoid waking de Rolo babes. Once or twice she took to the window, instead, torn between hoping her balance would hold and wishing for a fall from grace. 

It was automatic - down the hall, turn right, second door left. It had been Julius’ room, before. Always quiet, regardless of his presence or absence. If he was there he was hunched over histories and missives, ink clinging beneath his nails. And if he desired noise - some rowdy time in town, or company - he kept it far from his room. 

So it was fine, if Julius’ room was dead silent. It didn’t mean he was dead. He could be having a perfectly wonderful time being a scoundrel in his off-time, to return with his hair a rat’s nest and a boozy blush on his cheeks to grin at his little sister reading in the corner. Tell her some child-appropriate version of his latest misadventures, carry her to bed regardless of the time. Toss her on it if it was light out, tuck her in and kiss her goodnight if not.

Cass could pretend it was normal. It was fine. They were fine. She was loved. She is loved. She is loved.

After - after. She packed up her things and moved to a new room.

Not the Briarwoods’ - her parents’ - the Lord and Lady’s rooms. 

Not the empty - the family - the de Rolo’s quarters.

Just a room she had little memory of, with a bed scavenged from guest rooms and not a single reminder.

Healing Whitestone is exhausting, especially when she herself cannot take time to heal. You need rest for a broken leg - keep weight off it for the bone to set. Feels like a heart and mind have similar skeletons.

One night, she just - she needs the quiet. The servants are so loud, compared to Delilah’s undead. The city is so bright, below. Vox Machina are too much, far too much, animating the castle like a perverse necromancy and their laughter and discussion almost sounds like the gasping of ghosts if there’s too-little too-much space between them.

It’s muscle memory:

down the hall,

 turn right,

 second door left.

This isn't Julius' room, she realizes first. 

There’s a person in here, she realizes second.

There’s a bear here, too, she realizes third.

Oh. Vex’ahlia and Trinket. 

Both look up, adjust their gazes down as though expecting someone taller - the other twin, perhaps, or her brother? - and blink. The movement is so synchronous it’s almost disconcerting - Vex just as wild a thing as the animal lounging by the hearth. 

(That’s another thing - the fires are lit, now. Delilah never bothered to have any rooms but her own kept warm. Cass tried, found the cold kept her awake better. Insulation against the nightmares.)

“Oh,” says Cassandra. 

“I’m - my apologies, Vex’ahlia,” says Cassandra, turning on her heel. 

“Darling - Cass?” Vex tries. “Do you need anything?”

Her first instinct is to lie.

It’s a terrible instinct, one that should have been beaten out of her. Delilah could scarcely be lied to. She did not appreciate it. Sylas could be lied to, yet he might cast his gaze to her on a whim and wrench the truth from her anyways. And then he would smile and that was worse. 

(The devils she knew. She did not know this one, but for the fact Percival looked to her with good regard. Which, given his state of late, could be just as well a strike against her as a glowing review.)

Vex’ahlia beats her to it, tilting her head. Her hooked smile pulls to the opposite side. “I’m not busy - just doing the books. You’re welcome to sit with us. I do understand this room’s fireplace is one of the nicer ones, and it’s been so terribly drafty in the other rooms.”

That is a lie. There are rooms a plenty with two hearths, now kept alive by servants eager to return castle Whitestone to a warm living thing. The broken windows have been boarded up until a glazier can be commissioned. 

Vex’ahlia must know it’s a lie, because she turns back to her ledgers to let Cass decide for herself. 

A quil hums against the parchment. Occasionally it whispers as Vex flips through, looking for one expense or another. The faint scratch as something is crossed out, the chime of quilltip to inkwell. Trinket rumbles, growwa’s as he rolls to warm his other flank to the fire.

Cass, wordless, settles in a chair. Breathes in the woodsmoke, shed bear fur, Vex’ahlia’s perfume. 

It’s not quite quiet. 

But maybe that’s better.

[zacksfairest]

For the ask meme: UH, Vaela and Percy. Zaresh and the Briarwoods, for that matter.

Ugh. UGH!!! I hate you, Beth'ika. Stop encouraging me.

This got too long lmao

Vaela and Percy is a brand new concept that is haunting my every waking thought. It's only upon watching The Legend of Vox Machina that I'm seeing... potential.

Both of them have suffered terrible torture at the hands of people they were supposed to be able to trust. Vaela more so in that regard, but Percy and his family had welcomed the Briarwoods into Whitestone with open arms, as allies. It was very much a betrayal.

So while Vaela's was a more personal betrayal, Percy's was more vast, the Briarwoods killing his whole family. The scope of their loss and pain evens out in the end, which I find fascinating.

And in line with that, they are both on the run and in hiding. What better bond is there than "you watch my back, I'll watch yours"? Percy would not be forthcoming with what he's running from, but neither would Vaela for that matter. But they can see their own paranoia and fear mirrored in each other. The way they each see each other scanning a tavern before they settle in for the night, searching for any familiar faces; the way they look over their shoulders when walking a crowded street; the way they both flinch away from touch.

Vaela would likely be the first to come clean, when Percy catches sight of the horrible scars that ring her wrists—not the least of them, but the among the more visible. Percy is filled with righteous rage over this, but promises Vaela that Zaresh will never touch her again so long as he draws breath.

(There is something I want to add here but it's a potential TLoVM spoiler lmao)

Vaela does not find out about Percy's whole deal until he comes upon someone who associates/had at one point associated with the Briarwoods and he gets all smokey and whips out that plague doctor mask and tortures/brutally murders this person. Vaela is horrified and bolts, having flashbacks to Zaresh. Percy is charming and gentlemanly and kind—just as Zaresh had been.

And here Percy is now, violent and terrifying and sadistic, just as Zaresh turned out to be.

Which would of course be the point where the Briarwoods would somehow scoop Vaela up for their new friend Zaresh. Zaresh who had been hired by the Briarwoods to find a runaway noble, only to come upon his long lost prized possession. Two birds with one stone here. He gets Vaela back, and this noble boy will come running for her.

And come running Percy does, enraged and oozing black smoke.

AND NOW FOR ZARESH AND THE BRIARWOODS.

As I just said, it would be a delightfully similar arrangement to the one he had with Cobalt. Zaresh comes upon Whitestone for some easy prey, and he's heard some rather nefarious things about the Lord and Lady of this land. It intrigues him, and he can't possibly resist anything intriguing.

Word reaches the Briarwoods that townspeople are dying, and not due to the dealings of their underlings. They are equally intrigued and somehow arrange to have him brought to the manor.

And Zaresh swoops in with all of his dazzling charm, and immediately recognizes the predatory gleam in Sylas' eyes, the cunning smirk upon Delilah's lips—and he is immediately drawn to them

And the Briarwoods see his act for what it is, and they are delighted.

Picture the scene with Vax, except no charm is needed here. Zaresh has to fight a bit more for the dominance he craves than he does with Cobalt, but both Sylas and Delilah are amused by it.

"Play at the powerful drow hunter you think yourself to be, little one," Delilah thinks as she runs her fingers through his snow white hair, as Sylas drags his too sharp teeth along the flesh of his shoulder. "That power you hold is an illusion I allow you to indulge in."

At the talk of what Zaresh has lost, the Briarwoods strike a bargain: find the wayward de Rolo and bring him back. In return, we will help find your lovely wood elf.

After all, this would just mean more playthings around the house for everyone, right?

[sparxwrites]

(the stardew valley au for critical role that no one asked for, but i wrote anyways, bc i’m a sucker for found family / healing narratives, and because the idea of percy and cass learning to love each other and themselves, whilst working a farm and making friends with the locals, was too good to pass up. will i write more of this? who knows.)

[ao3]

Cassandra was the one driving when they finally arrived. In the passenger seat beside her, Percy was curled up, sleeping shallow and fitful – seatbelt off, knees drawn up to his chest, eyes rolling under the thin, bruised skin of his eyelids. The faint, green glow of the truck’s dials made the pale skin and sharp angles of his face look sickly, threw the purple of his newly-acquired scars into sharp, unpleasant relief.

Outside the truck, now the engine was off, it was eerily silent, and oppressively hot without the air conditioning running. Used to the steady traffic noises of the city, and the relative chill of Maine, mid-spring rural Alabama was alien in every possible way. She could remember vacationing here as a young child, but that was years ago, distant enough that she had only had hazy memories of a quaint farmhouse, overgrown fields, running through grass well above head-height in a muddied sundress as Julius called after her in alarm.

The farmhouse she’d parked behind looked significantly more dilapidated than the one from her memories. Parts of the roof were bowing in, and there were weeds growing through the cracks between the stones. The fields looked much the same, though the darkness and the unfamiliar sounds of nighttime animals added a layer of unknown menace to them.

Or perhaps, she thought, that was just her. She’d never been afraid of the dark as a child, after all, but now…

“Percival,” she whispered, tearing her eyes away from the night outside the window, and looking back to her sleeping brother. “Percival, wake up. We’re here.” When he didn’t wake, just twitched in his sleep, she reached out and shook his shoulder. “Percy-”

There was suddenly a hand around her wrist, fingers digging in hard enough to bruise against the sensitive tendons on the underside. She managed not to cry out, but only by merit of biting her lip nearly hard enough to bleed as she wrenched free of Percy with as much strength as she could muster. He didn’t try to hold her, but she recoiled from him nonetheless, as he stared at her, uncomprehending and confused, with the blank, terrified eyes of a cornered animal.

“…Sorry,” he breathed, after a half-heartbeat. Recognition returned to his eyes, and the tension draining out of him as his shoulders slumped. “I didn’t mean to- I- bad dreams. Sorry.”

Cassandra said nothing, stayed with her back pressed against the driver’s seat window. Though there was guilt in his eyes, her wrist still throbbed as she rubbed at it gingerly. She hadn’t noticed initially, when he’d arrived to drag her away from the Briarwoods’ clutches, but there was something different about him. He’d always been the strangest out of all of them, Percival, but now… there new violence, a new instability to him now that unsettled her.

Not that she hadn’t changed, too, in the years they’d been apart – just in a different way. Perhaps she was a hypocrite, for being so hesitant around him, when there was little doubt she was barely recognisable too.

When it became clear she wasn’t going to respond to his apology, Percy winced, and then sighed. “Did anyone see us arrive?” he asked, eventually. scrubbing the sleep from his eyes with unsteady hands. Despite his nap, he looked like he’d barely slept, eyes red-rimmed and the bags under them just as dark as they’d been before.

“Brother,” said Cassandra, quiet, exhausted. She’d been driving for over twelve straight hours. She just wanted to rest. “Don’t you think you’re being a bit paranoid? We’re half a country over, surely they’re not going to have trailed us that far.”

Even as she said it, though, she thought of Percy’s new scars, the hunted-rabbit look in his eyes and the tremor to his hands. Of Lady Delilah’s jewellery heavy around her own throat, and Lord Sylas’ hand clamped tight enough to bruise around her shoulder.

“Did anyone see us arrive?” Percy insisted, a note of almost-terror to the urgency in his voice – and, not for the first time, Cassandra wondered what the hell had happened to him whilst she’d been in the Briarwoods’ care.

She sighed, scrubbing at her own face and struggling to keep control of herself in the face of grinding exhaustion. “No. No, I- the property’s a little ways out from the town. I turned the headlights off, though, as soon as we got close. Unless anyone was waiting for us, we shouldn’t have been seen or heard.”

“Should’ve left the car out by the road,” muttered Percy, dragging a hand through his hair. “Hidden. Someone might have heard-”

“What’s done is done.” It came out sharper than she’d meant – and, in the silence that hung heavy between them in the aftermath, the dark pressed in even closer around her. She felt like she was suffocating. After holding everything in for the week they’d spent running, up into Canada and then back down to the only family property that could have conceivably been overlooked by the Briarwoods’ eagle gaze, she felt like bursting into tears. “Please, just- let’s go inside. Rest. We can work out what to do in the morning.”

Percy hesitated, and then bowed his head. “You’re right, of course. Sorry. Let’s… get in. Get you to a bed.”

His attempt at brotherly affection fell a little flat, between the awkward space separating them and the something still lurking behind Percy’s eyes, but Cassandra was too tired to care. She simply nodded, and slipped out of the car before he could say anything else.

The front door was locked – though, given the holes in the roof, and the broken windows, it afforded little in the way of security to the place. Still, the spare key was in the same place she remembered from her childhood, beneath a plant pot tucked into a gap in the wood store. It was a little rusted, a little weathered, but it still fit the lock well enough when she tried it.

By the time Percy had bundled their belongings out of the truck – two duffels and a backpack, a pitiful collection of whatever they’d managed to beg, borrow, and steal on the way there – she’d managed to get the door open, with a little shoving, and was poking around inside.

The entirety of the upstairs, and most of the downstairs, was unsalvageable, she was disappointed to discover. Between the caved-in ceiling, cracked windows, and general creeping rot and plant life, everything other than the entrance hall and downstairs master bedroom was uninhabitable. The ruined kitchen did, however, have several unspoilt cans of food, and the wardrobe in the bedroom had clean, if musty, bedsheets, so she supposed it could be worse.

“In here,” she called, softly, when she heard Percy's footsteps in the entrance hall. A moment later, she heard him grunt, quietly, as he set the bags down on the floor. “This is the only weatherproof room in the whole place.”

“Marvellous,” Percy muttered, dragging a hand through his hair. For just a second, Cassandra heard the old version of her brother in the clipped irritation and dry sarcasm of that single word. “Well, at least we have a bed, I suppose. You should get some rest.”

Cassandra, already in the midst of toeing off her shoes and getting ready to collapse onto the waiting mattress, paused. “What about you?” she asked, the curiosity in her voice flattened somewhat by exhaustion as she looked over her shoulder at him.

Shrugging, Percy flapped a hand at the bed, and let the corners of his mouth twitch up a little when Cassandra slumped face-first onto it with a soft groan. “I slept on the last leg of the drive,” he reminded her. “Besides, I won’t get back to sleep, after- right now. I’ll keep watch, in case anyone comes nosing around, do a little exploring, see if there’s anything useful lying around. Don’t worry about me.”

She hummed, low in her throat, sounding unconvinced even as she pulled the blankets on the bed over her curled-up form. “Are you sure?” she asked, eyelids already fluttering. The drag of sleep, now she was somewhere soft and warm and relatively safe, was inexorable, pulling her down, down…

“Positive, Cassie,” said Percy, gently, though her eyes had already drifted shut, breathing evening out almost immediately into the steady rhythm of a deep, exhausted sleep. “Get some rest. You deserve it.”

He got no answer, other than the faint, unnerving cry of some unknown animal, far beyond the walls of the decaying farmhouse. Sighing softly, Percy settled down cross-legged on the floor next to the bags, and began rifling through them – searching for an extra layer to ward off the faint, damp chill in the air despite the heat outside, and a torch to last him until daylight finally, inevitably arrived.

[tanoraqui]

Would Julius also take to hugging the hell out of everyone after they woke up from being dead? So sometimes it would be a sibling hug and then he would immediately be there. Everyone got used to it after he kept hugging them, even when they hadn't died, and a few have to tolerate it, being grog or scanlan. Scanlan, instead of a prank, would probably wake up to an overly strong hug, but he would still leave after accusing Julius of only liking him because he reminds him of a dead sibling. 1

2. and he would probably give one last hug goodbye to tibs before they buried him, even if hes cold. The oldest de rolo left with two siblings but incredibly in love with making a physical connection and hating losing any other people to death but always happy when they come back.            

Julius does NOT take the deaths of his friends well. Julius does not take the injury of his friends (his family) (his responsibility) well. Every blow that lands on someone other than him feels like a failure. He has to admit that Vax is quick as snake and twice as sneaky, but still, Julius is inevitably no more than a single move action behind when he stealths ahead, because it only took nearly losing Vax once for Julius to decide that THAT wasn’t going to happen, not ever again. Not ever. Like, it’s kinda detrimental to the team at some point, because Julius really is not stellar at stealth. But you could set a watch by the exactly four seconds it always takes him to twitch repeatedly, glance several times down whatever path Vax - and Vex, even when it’s both of them - have gone down, then draw his sword and quietly declare that he’s going after them and everyone else should fall in behind.

There’s a rushing in his ears when Pike is torn apart in front of them. Like the river that nearly killed him, like the Sun Tree in a strong winter wind. He saw his father’s body like that - not torn but bisected neatly, by Sylas Briarwood’s black sword. It’s entirely close enough. He can barely speak as they fight the devil, walk her back to the temple of Sarenrae (Grog carries her), go through the ritual. He’s aware, a little after she wakes up with a warm glow, that it’s partly because his throat was dry with how much he screamed when the monster tore her in two. He barely sleeps that night, nor for nights, weeks after. Can’t until he’s walked through their (temporary) place at the inn at least three times, in armor, poking his sword at shadows. Casting a light from one gauntleted hand for the first time in…years. Something niggles in his chest, in the back of his mind, as he draws on that old, once-comforting warmth. He pushes it back, and focuses on making sure nothing else can attack in the night. He joins Grog in spending that first week or so sleeping on Pike’s floor, each night when he finally relaxes (exhausts himself) enough to sleep.

[ravenquingvax]

Low key, once again, thinking about Percy and Vax hooking up after Vax gets bitten by Sylas Briarwood.

Like, it's the worse thing they could do - Drunk, angry, feeling guilty, hating themselves - but it feels right and good in the moment?

Then the shame and regret hits the next morning when Percy wakes up in Vax's bed, the bite wound having reopened and bled a bit.

Vax waking up, sore and confused, to Percy walking in with a first aid kit, coffee and a potion of numbness.

The two talking it out as Percy fixes Vax up, apologizing to eachother and making promises it won't happen again, that they won't bring it up either and agreeing nothing good could come from it.

Their relationship is shaky for a few days, the shame lingering.

And when Vax is charmed by Sylas under Whitestone Castle, Percy initially doesn't realize what happened and thinks Vax has decided to go against him in the end after what they did.

Then he feels stupid after realising that Vax was being manipulated by Sylas' magic.

And then, after Delilah nearly kills Vex and Vax nearly breaks down completely, Percy decides that he really needs to make it up to the twins.

They've been through hell because of him and he hates himself for it.

But then, one night as he works in his workshop at the keep, Vax walks in with a bottle of red wine and two glasses.

There's a look to him Percy can't read, but it suddenly feels like the night Vax was bitten followed up by them hooking up together all over again, Percy growing nervous.

They talk, Vax assuring Percy he doesn't blame him for anything that happened to him or Vex during all of this - "I fucked up and paid the consequences, okay? And Delilah Briarwood didn't have to do that, but she chose to, not you. Stop beating yourself up for things out of your control, Percival." - and that Percy needn't worry about making it up to anyone.

And Percy breaks. He's crying and struggling to speak, Vax pulling him in for a hug and comforting his friend.

Percy doesn't understand, he's hurt Vax and gotten both Vax and his sister hurt, why doesn't Vax hate him?

And he asks this out loud, genuinely confused.

And Vax softens, "You think you hurt me that night? Perce, I really enjoyed that, but it wasn't healthy for either of us."

"But I reopened your wound!"

"Percy, I've reopened the bloody thing every night I've gone to bed since it fucking happened, that wasn't you."

And Percy just stares, dumbfounded.

It shouldn't be so shocking, really, but then Percy is laughing and it's Vax's turn to be confused now.

"Perce? You good, friend?"

And it's the "friend" that has Percy stop, wheezing and doubled over, gasping for air.

After all of it, Vax still considers Percy his friend.

And that does it for Percy.

If anything happened to Vax or his twin, Percy would never forgive himself. He loves them.

And Percy does calm down, does take deep breaths before fixing himself up.

"Sorry, I just realized I'm a colossal fucking idiot, that's all." Percy would then give a crooked grin, cheeks a faint pink and his eyes wild.

And Vax laughs, grinning back.

"Ey, welcome to the club, we have free cloaks." He jokes.

And yeah, Percy softens.

Because he loves Vax and he knows it can't ever happen.

He mentally curses Sylas out for that fact, blaming the Vampire for biting Vax and pushing them to do what they did, ruining any chance of them ever getting together.

Whether it is or isn't Sylas' fault, however, Percy is happy enough to just be Vax's friend.

Friends love eachother, he knows that, so he doesn't feel too guilty about his crush.

Though, when he does eventually end up dating Vex in the end, he can't help but wonder about if he had ended up with the other twin instead.

And seeing the way Vax reacts to them in the beginning, Percy thinks that maybe Vax keeps wondering that too.

But they'll never know now, not after Vax is killed by Vecna and Percy marries Vex.

Not after Vesper is born and Keyleth is left crying every night over a love that never had a chance to blossom, hanging onto Percy as she drunkenly rants and raves about how evil The Raven Queen apparently is.

But Percy still dreams of that night in Vax's room, Vax's hands pulling at his hair as Percy gives Vax his all, Vax letting Percy in even after Percy's past had literally came back and bitten Vax.

And Percy can't help but laugh and cry over a glass of red wine as he thinks of how of course it was Vax who Vecna would kill in the end.

Vax, bitten by Sylas.

Vax, who Percy fucked out of anger and guilt.

Vax, who was charmed into helping the Briarwoods work to bring Vecna back.

Vax, who's sister nearly died to Delilah Briarwood's hand.

Vax, who so bravely risked his life to save Percy's long thought dead sister.

Vax, who sold his soul to save his sister from The Raven Queen after he, Percy, accidentally caused her death.

Vax, that bloody charming rogue bastard who had stolen Percy's heart so early on.

Of course it was him.

The framed painting of Vax above the fireplace in Vex and Percy's office doesn't do the Half Elf any justice, Percy tells himself over a bite of dark chocolate one day.

Nobody could ever, he thinks.

Because Vax'ildan, for all his faults and flaws, had been full of love and had forgiven him.

Had forgiven Percy even when Percy's history quite literally ruined Vax's happy ever after.

Had given his blessings to Percy when Percy married the other twin in the end.

Sometimes Percy lies awake at night, Vex sleeping at his side, and Percy can't help but picture Vax there instead.

What if? What if?

But he's glad Vex is there, that she's not her brother.

Besides, Percy doesn't think he could ever make it up to Vax after everything it is that Vax had done for him.

And he isn't with Vex in place of Vax, Gods no, he loves her for her and couldn't ever replace her with anyone.

Even if Vax was still here.

But he'd be lying if he ever said he stopped loving Vax too.

That he doesn't regret not letting things develop after that cursed night in Emon.

Because he does regret that, he does still love Vax.

And that'll probably never stop.