#forced captivity tw

[greywoodrpg]

𝕝𝕖𝕠𝕟𝕚𝕖 𝕞𝕠𝕟𝕖𝕥

she appears as though she was born twenty-seven years ago but is actually thirty, is a vampire and lives in wolf crossing as a front desk manager of the majestic cabins, and is in no coterie. she looks an awful lot like lizeth selene.

"You’re a weapon and weapons don’t weep."

tw: death, forced captivity, murder, blood, violence

Born on Valentine’s Day in 1993, Léonie, the middle child of three siblings, adored her family despite their modest means. She enjoyed helping at home and had a passion for drawing and playing the piano. Patient, smart, and caring, she loved people but from a distance, opting for movies, books, and staying in her own little world. At 15, she formed a deep bond with a girl named Sophia who had just moved to town. Despite Sophia's outgoing nature, she chose to spend all her free time getting to know Léo. Navigating high school together, Léo discovered her feelings for women, particularly for Sophia. Wrestling with her emotions, she briefly dated men to bury her true desires. However, at age 20, a pivotal moment occurred when Sophia kissed her on New Year's Eve, revealing a long-unspoken love. Despite their connection, Sophia harbored fears that prevented her from fully embracing her identity. To protect Sophia's secret, Léo posed as her friend and eventually as her roommate. Though Léo yearned for marriage and a family, her love for Sophia eclipsed these aspirations. At 27, a traumatic event changed Léo's life. After a violent encounter in a bar, she woke up in a stranger's house, transformed into a vampire with an insatiable thirst for blood. Trapped in a cycle of feeding, she struggled to resist her newfound nature, manipulated by an older vampire who aimed to mold her into a monster. He convinced her that others would hate her, fostering dependence on him. Used as a weapon to kill innocents, the threat of starvation and harm kept her compliant. Two years later, she escaped, discovered by a witch who offered guidance, a daylight charm, and details about Greywood. A year later, feeling ready, she moved to this mysterious town to start anew. Torn between her past and the haunting reality of her existence, she wanted to find Sophia again but knew it was too dangerous, opting to let her family think she was dead, she’s now hoping to never be found.

“what power did she attain when settling in greywood?”

She can sense and experience a person's emotions and feelings through mere touch.

penned by... em

[absolute-flaming-trash]

Pairing: Yandere!Alastor x Reader

SFW

Word Count: 2'627

Warnings: Yandere behaviour, Implied forced relationship, Implied captivity, Toxic relationship, Possessiveness, Invasion of personal space, Non-consensual touching.

Additional Notes: Do be kind, I have not written for this man before and find him exceedingly difficult.

Every week at the Hotel, there was something new Charlie had planned.

Trust exercises. Ice breakers. Activities meant to bring everybody closer together as a group. To try and get people to open up and show a side of vulnerability that - she believed - would help sinners take one step closer to salvation.

Most of them were awkward, and a lot of them never went as planned. A fact she realized and, after a near mental breakdown, had her promptly take advice from Vaggie and agree to try something different.

The task was very simple compared to the previous activities. She requested everybody to think about redemption and what it meant to them.

Thinking about the definition itself took little to no effort.

Redemption (noun): The action of saving or being saved from sin, error, or evil.

But it was clear that Charlie wanted more than just a quote from the dictionary. She wanted residents of the Hotel to mull over it while looking deep down into themselves so they could share their stance on the matter later on.

That was the tricky part.

From how you saw it, “saving yourself” from sin was easy enough to accomplish. ‘Just don’t be a dick and avoid the bad shit.’ was the first thought that came to mind, but where you hit a snag was based on what Charlie had shared about Heaven. According to her, even so much as breathing in Hell was enough to solidify your place in the inferno, yet she made it clear that actively resisting sin wasn’t something to go unrecognized.

It took a lot of effort, energy, and courage to do so, and it was hard to disagree even if Heaven didn’t see it that way.

Error was a bit harder. In your opinion, nobody could be saved from that, at least not entirely. Eventually, inevitably, you or someone else would do something wrong, it was just a matter of degree. It could be something as minor as bumping into somebody by accident or as major as Angel relapsing for what felt like the hundredth time, but it would happen and it was only a matter of time.

Charlie did bring up a rather good point, though. Apologizing when you realized you had done something wrong was the best thing someone could do, and it was the first step in the right direction.

You had to give her credit where it was due for that.

But evil was a different matter entirely.

Evil lurked everywhere in Hell. Across every street, around every corner, evil was out in the open for everyone to bear witness and see. None of it was hidden. None of it was meant to be hidden.

What would be the point? You and every other sinner were already in Hell - and many would argue that hiding it would be counterintuitive to being there in the first place.

Charlie tried to plead the case that everyone had good in them. A good that could be tweezed out if given the right chance, and the right environment, which the Hotel was perfect for.

You wish you could agree.

Evil was in the hotel itself, not that Charlie was fully willing to see it.

You believed she was careless there. Little Miss Bleeding Heart wanted to see the best in people, and by god did you ever want to know what it was like to see through such rose-tinted glasses, but you knew you never could. Not in this place.

Stepping a foot into the building was the worst thing you’d ever done because it showed you just how wrong you were about evil being so out in the open. It still had the ability to lurk, something you learned the moment you shook hands with Alastor.

You could see it on his face upon meeting him for the first time - the way Alastor’s perpetual grin widened upon seeing the goosebumps that lined your arms when he clasped your hand in his. No comment was ever made on the matter, but the way his lips peeled back to reveal the black of his gums before he pressed a brief kiss to your knuckles said enough.

Something utterly sinister reeked from him in a manner you couldn’t describe, so you took your own advice and applied the same thing you did when it came to sin.

Avoidance. As much as you could, at least.

Some moments were easier than others. The distinct metallic clack of Alastor’s microphone against the floor combined with a surge of radio static usually bought enough time for you to make whatever excuse you needed in order to leave before he arrived.

Other times you weren’t so lucky, and Charlie’s group meetings were usually to blame in that regard.

At first, you made a great deal of effort to put as much distance between yourself and the Radio Demon as you could, which worked for a time. Unfortunately, Alastor caught onto what you were doing much faster than you would’ve liked.

He reveled in it. You knew he did. After a while you had the gnawing suspicion he was purposefully going out of his way to make you as uncomfortable as possible for his own entertainment. You saw no other reason as to why he’d consistently move so close to you that you could literally feel him breathing down your neck.

Lately, he had adopted the skin-crawling habit of locking eyes with you the moment you stepped foot in the room and patting the seat beside him - reserved specifically for you. Accepting the gesture felt like swallowing nails, but being openly rude to Alastor was something that you knew better than to do.

Instead, you began to find excuses for skipping the meetings entirely and have Angel or Husker fill you in later, which was exactly what you were doing now.

“To be honest I wasn’t payin’ much attention,” Angel said while he scrolled through his phone, resting his chin in his upper left hand while his lower right swirled alcohol around in a glass. “Was the kind of thing that could’ve been sent in an email.”

You traced your finger around the rim of your own glass, its contents untouched. “Still, I want to know what I missed.”

“He’s right, it wasn’t anything special,” Husker replied, slinging a cloth over his shoulder from behind the bar. “Same old bullshit about salvation with a new coat of paint on top.”

A pang went through your chest, but you pushed it down. “So nothing new?”

Angel scoffed and looked up from his phone. “Trust me, dollface, you did yourself a favor.” He downed the rest of his drink in one go. “What were you doing anyways?”

“You know…” You replied with a shrug, glancing down. “I went out.”

Angel smirked, raising an eyebrow. “Out?”

“Yeah.” You tapped your nails against the edge of the glass. “Things were feeling a little claustrophobic, so I went out for some air.”

Husker made a noise in the back of his throat. “Yeah, I know how you feel, kid. This place is a mess.”

Angel tilted his head, placing his phone down on the bar and leaning forward a bit. “So where’d you go? Anywhere fun?”

“Where indeed~.”

All your movements went rigid. After a few seconds, you slowly turned your head to look over your shoulder to see Alastor standing barely a foot away from you, staring down at you with a tight, closed-lipped smile. You hadn’t heard him coming in the slightest, which you immediately could tell was intentional.

Whether he’d used his shadow or had actually stalked up behind you wasn’t something you wanted to think about, and if Angel or Husker picked up on the immediate tension, neither of them said anything about it.

“Hey, Smiles.” Angel greeted with his usual flirtation, placing the elbows of his upper arms on the bartop as he turned to face Alastor. “Fancy a drink? You look a little stiff” He gave Alastor a very long once over, “and I’ll have you know I know a few ways I can help relieve some… tension.” 

Alastor’s lips curled back to reveal his teeth, the muscle in his cheek spasming for a moment.

Mentally you were kissing Angel on the cheek for the save as you slowly picked your coat up off the bar and slipped it on, concealing the goosebumps already present on your skin. Husker gave you a glance from the side and gave a very slight shake of his head, silently advising you against your unspoken desire to leave.

“I assure you, such a thing is never going to happen.~”

“You sure?” Angel rested his lower right arm on his hip. “I have a few tricks that can loosen you up.”

The leather in Alastor’s gloves audibly squeaked as his grip tightened around the staff of his microphone and his attention immediately shifted back to you, ignoring Angel entirely.

“My dear,” His voice dripped with such a saccharine sweetness it made you feel sick, “Could I speak with you for a moment?”

Fewer combinations of words could instill such a unique feeling of encroaching dread all at once, but you refused to let it show as you nodded and turned your body on the bar stool to face him fully; waiting for him to say the first word.

His eye twitched ever so slightly.

“Privately.”

That made you swallow.

“Sure.” You slid off the bar stool, doing your best not to appear as reluctant as you felt.

“Lovely.~” He said, promptly turning on his heel and walking towards the staircase - expecting you to follow.

You glanced back towards Husker and Angel, each giving you looks of grim sympathy and confusion respectively before you took a deep breath and forced one foot in front of the other, following Alastor up the steps.

You thought he would talk along the way. Engage in some form of idle chit-chat where he’d be pulling the strings, or even hum along to the countless jazz tunes that he played in the halls over the Hotel’s sound system.

But no such music played and he remained silent. A few minutes into the walk you gathered enough courage to glance up at him and found his eyes locked straight forward, not even sparing you so much as a glance.

You averted your gaze, the hem of your sleeves suddenly the most fascinating thing you’d ever seen.

Eventually, he came to a stop, and he held out the end of his microphone to prevent you from going any further down the hallway.

“Here we are!” Rather than producing a key from his coat, a green flash emanated from the lock when he placed his hand on the handle and opened the door.

He all but leered at you as he gave a small bow that didn’t feel genuine in the slightest.

“After you.~”

Like the alleged gentleman he was, Alastor held the door open for you, eyes never leaving your form as you walked inside his suite.

The smell of dampness and soil hit you immediately.

Alastor’s suite wasn’t the worst thing you’d seen in Hell by a mile, however, it was still eerie beyond words. The skeletons that hung along the walls and mantlepiece of his fireplace became less complete and increasingly disorganized as they led further into the room - which itself gave way to a swamp-like environment halfway through. Undoubtedly a result of whatever hoodoo, voodoo bullshit he was capable of, and while it still wasn’t the worst you’d seen, it served its purpose thoroughly.

It creeped the shit out of you.

“Now, then.” Alastor clicked the door shut, his body half-facing yours as his hand still lingered on the doorknob. “I'm sure you have a good explanation for what you’ve been doing.~”

The immediate dryness in your throat was hard to ignore. You knew what he was talking about, and you knew that he knew, but you still attempted to buy some time as you tried to figure out what to do.

You cleared your throat. “I was just catching up with Angel and Husk-”

He chuckled, the sound like that of a radio shifting stations. “Don’t be coy.” His head turned towards you with a sickening, ossified crackle that bent his neck in a manner that made your stomach lurch. “You’ve been avoiding me, and I’d like to know why.”

Fuck.

“I haven’t.” Lying to Alastor was a mistake, but you still decided to risk it since it wasn’t entirely false. “There’s just been a lot on my mind recently.”

“Hmm.” Interest and something much worse flickered behind his eyes as he faced you fully with another crack of his vertebrae. “Such as~?”

You shook your head, looking away from him. “That’s private.”

There was a quick flash of red, and the tip of his microphone turned your face back towards him - the cool metal of the edge digging into the skin of your cheek. You had to bite back a grimace.

“Not when it concerns me.” His tone was sharp, a stark contrast to the faux politeness he was putting on before. He kept the tip of his microphone where it was to prevent your eyes from looking anywhere but him. “And trust me darling, when it comes to you, everything concerns me.”

His words twisted in your gut. “...I’m not sure what you mean.”

Alastor tutted, his smile widening once more. “Don’t be stupid, darling, it’s unbecoming of you.” The way he said it was patronizing, like he was scolding a child. “You know precisely what I mean, so I’m going to ask again, as much as I hate repeating myself.~”

Cool metal was replaced with the warmth of his hand as he tilted your head up and brought his face frighteningly close to yours.

“Why are you keeping yourself from me?”

It was an odd sensation. Being backed into a corner, both metaphorically and physically. A frightening one that all but yanked on your instincts to do whatever it meant to get the fuck out of there, but you knew that was the worst thing you could do.

Alastor was a predator, a creature designed to prey on those he deemed weaker, and turning your back on a predator would almost certainly trigger a series of events that would not bode well for you.

So you did the next worst thing.

You told him the truth.

“Because I can see you.” The words felt wrong to say out loud. “I can see you for what you are, I can feel the absolute malevolence that radiates off you in waves, and it’s suffocating.”

Saying any more was a horrendous idea, but you couldn’t help but add one last thing.

“And if I want any chance at leaving this god-forsaken place, I can’t be around you.”

The silence that stretched on afterward was deafening.

Mentally, you were bracing yourself. Alastor had killed people for far less, and you expected nothing different for saying something so daring to his face.

You could see it too, the anger that simmered underneath his gaze. You expected the red of his sclera to flash black and his antlers to extend with his body in a grotesque display before you were ripped to pieces while he laughed.

What you didn’t expect was for his eyes to narrow into slits and his expression shift into one that was far more genuine than you wanted it to be, and it was then you knew that being saved from this kind of evil was never going to happen.

“Oh, my dear, you don’t need to worry about something silly like that.” Alastor all but cooed.

“After all, what makes you think I’d ever let you leave?~”

© absolute-flaming-trash 2024. Do not repost, modify, copy, or claim.

[serickswrites]

Stone-Cold

Warnings: captivity, torture, restraints, forced to watch, hurt/comfort

Caretaker sighed as they sat in the dark, cold cellar. They sat stroking Whumpee's hair as Whumpee slept fitfully in their lap. They took care to make sure the chains on their shackles didn't clink with the movement. Whumpee desperately needed sleep and Caretaker would do what they could to make it happen.

The hours of watching Whumper torture Whumpee had been almost more than Caretaker could bear. Almost. But if Whumpee had to endure, they would endure. It was the least they could do. Though it was hard. Quite possibly the hardest thing they had ever done. But they would keep doing it until they could find a way to get Whumpee out of there. One way or another.

"Let me hold you, Whumpee," Caretaker had whispered to Whumpee as Whumper shoved them off the torture table. They had held their arms open to Whumpee as Whumpee crawled towards them, sobbing with each movement. "Shhhh, shhhh, I've got you. You're safe here, Whumpee, I've got you," Caretaker said as they wrapped their arms around Whumpee.

Whumpee sobbed wordlessly as Caretaker held them. Held them and rubbed soothing circles on their back. Held them and murmured comforting words in their ear. Held them because that was the only thing that could be done.

Once Whumpee fell asleep, Caretaker allowed the tears they had been holding back free. They sobbed as they sat there in the stone cold dark hoping that they could find a way out soon, for Whumpee's sake.

[remembrancer-of-heresy]

The thirst to subjugate (Part 2)

Summary: You find yourself under the wing of Corvus but soon realize that his love is killing you.

Corvus Corax/fem!Reader, Alpharius and Omegon/fem!Reader

Warnings: yandere, obsession, power imbalance, masturbation, forced captivity

Word count: 1463

Song: Hatari, CYBER - Hlauptu

@kit-williams, It was only at the end of the fic that I realized that I was very impressed by your yandere Corvus. I didn’t think it would be so enjoyable to describe him almost as Perturabo. In the next chapter there will be twins.

You always knew how to notice small details. When the pipes began to leak, small details were hidden in the shadows from prying eyes. As one of the serfs began a secret affair, the officers hid information from their subordinates. Or how one of the Space Marines often looked at the young soldiers, apparently not understanding his actions.

But you didn't think you could tell your primarch's mood. It was surprising even for you. But what was even more unusual was that he detained you. And then on other days, talking to you on abstract topics. It was as if he was trying to make friends. The thought alone was ridiculous, but you couldn’t resist it. It was so nice and cozy with Corvus.

Safely.

Although at some moments when he looked at you for a long time. Stroked your hair or hugged you. It was a bit strange. It was as if his care and desire to get closer to you were overflowing. He consumed you, craved your connection so badly.

But you couldn't refuse. He is your primarch. And he's your friend. You saw him as a brother. Desperately denying your suspicions about his feelings. But when “Alpharius” paid attention to you and you told Corvus about everything... it was no longer possible to ignore it.

You could no longer be in the serf section. Walk freely along the corridors. Even carry out your usual duties. Corvus said it was dangerous and he must take care of you. The Alpha Legion is alarming and they will probably want you. You never asked why his brothers brother needed you.

“But Corvus, what about my family? My parents, younger siblings, my friends. I can’t leave them.”

You pronounce every word firmly, putting a clear meaning into them. You are glad to be friends with Corvus. But he shouldn’t take you away from your family, or appropriate you as a thing. He's a primarch, he can do it. But if he values ​​your friendship, if he values ​​your connection, then the lord of the Raven Guard will retreat. But Corax’s face takes on a martyr’s expression and you want to howl from the melancholy that suddenly washes over you.

“But aren’t I your family too?”

His voice slides through your insides, opening your veins. Suffering and pain fill your soul with warmth. You want to get rid of these emotions. They are not yours. You whimper, allowing the primarch to embrace you, wrapping your arms around his massive shoulders.

“Of course you are my family, Corvus.”

You can't say no. You can't resist. You allow yourself to be surrounded by care and love. Hide in the dark, away from the light, where the monsters lurk. Corvus promises to be your savior, and you want to believe.

Your new chambers are so different from your previous life. It's spacious here. You never thought you could live in a room like this. But it's so empty here. There is no usual laughter and conversations. Human warmth. These chambers are yours and only yours.

It was warm at home. The darkness was dispelled by the light of bright lamps. You constantly heard the sounds of the ship working. A pleasant feeling of something alive, even though it was made of metal. But in the new chambers, even the smallest sound becomes loud. There were few lamps here and they were switched off according to a schedule. The portholes were not intended as security. It was almost always dark here. And it's cold.

You didn't have anyone. You haven't seen the serfs, the servitors. There were no Space Marines here. You only had Corvus. He made sure to get you food and clean clothes without using other people. Without drawing attention to you. The most important thing is that you had him and you could spend time as before. You even had too much time now as he once said.

It was suffocating. It was scary. This tormented you and you didn’t notice how you began to feel depressed. But even in those moments when you really wanted to be alone. Corax was nearby. He stroked the top of your head, wiped away your tears and cooed. Cooed over you like a crow over a baby bird. Saying that you will be safe here.

And you so wanted to fly away to freedom.

***

You were drowning in your bed. It was too big for you. All black and disgustingly soft. And too many blankets and pillows. It's like a nest. But you almost liked it. They enveloped your little body so much. As a child, in the most terrible moments, you always hid under the covers. And it seems as if your bedroom should become a real fortress against nightmares. Not a single monster will be able to see you under this heap of fabric.

But he sees you.

Watching.

Waiting.

You snuggle up to the pillow at the head of the bed, pulling the blanket up to your chin. You need to close your eyes. Need to hide. Run away. But you can't help but look. The chambers are pitch black and yet you can see it sitting at the far end. Hunched like an old man, it was huge and feathered. Black eyes that your brain shouldn't see shine brightly in the room.

But worst of all were the sounds. Heavy breathing, which the monster tried to hold back behind clenched teeth. But it still echoes in your brain. As well as obscene sounds of self-pleasure through clothes. It doesn't touch you, but you still feel so helpless.

When did it start? You couldn't even count accurately. It’s just that at some point you realized that while you were sleeping you weren’t alone. You were being watched. It studied your peaceful face, listened to your breathing. It touched you with their eyes.

And once, when you were lying half asleep, you clearly felt a hand running along the curves of your body. How someone else's nose buries itself in your curls. How it licked your open shoulders and neck. It almost kissed your lips but then stopped as if it was too soon. And this terrible heavy breathing.

You wanted to wash away this terrible feeling and convince yourself that it was just a bad feeling, fear of the unknown, stress. Anything! Just let it not be real. You should be safe, not afraid of anything. 

Corvus promised you! He did it. He took your life and you believed him. But why are you scared? Why do you tremble like this? It's not fair! He promised to save you...

From others, not from himself.

A long groan is heard in the chambers and the lord of the crows finally unleashes its lust. If before it came when you were sleeping, now it watches you while you are awake. But everything is also in the shadows.

You whine in horror and perversion. It freezes and rises sharply. The haze in its eyes dissipates and it tries to curb his inhuman nature. You hiccup from such changes. Doesn't he understand that you see him? That it is hidden from the eyes of other people, but not from you. You know what it did, you know what its thoughts were. Thoughts that he cannot turn into reality. For now.

The Raven Lord rushes towards you and you whine and cover yourself with a blanket. You hunch under the fabric, pressing one of the many pillows. Animal fear has curbed you and you are trying to bury yourself. Further away. Deeper. Where he won't get you.

And still you feel his clawed paws on your body.

“Hush, hush,” the primarch cooed softly, as if he was not the reason for your behavior. - “Everything is fine, you are here with me. No one will touch you or offend you.” - you think you hear the rustling of feathers.

"C-corvus, please" - you desperately and quietly sob. -"Stop it. I beg you. Y-you said we are family but I'm scared."

You sniffle and burst into tears that have been accumulating for all the time he... loved you from a distance. It was unbearable. But Corvus didn't think so. You felt him smile tenderly, touched by your hysteria.

 “My dear, don’t cry, don’t be afraid. You're safe. And if not, then I will hide you even further.”

Corvus presses you to the bed, hugs your body. And you become unbearably hot from his mass and the blanket. But you won't dare to show yourself. You are again a little girl who is afraid of monsters. Only this time the monster loves you. The cold voice in your ear sends a flock of chills down your spine.

“No one will find you.”

But he was wrong.

[traumawhomst]

Don’t mind me I just can’t stop thinking about forced transformation (mostly magic transformations) with yanderes

I love it all honestly, I love more instant transformations, done so quickly you can’t even fully grasp what’s going on much less fight back or argue. Waking up in a body you don’t recognize much less understand.

Or even long term transformations weeks months maybe years, slowly watching who you thought you were shift and change with no way to stop it. Forced to try and escape only to watch it all happen.

Which is less traumatizing is debatable as well, would you rather loose yourself over time watching the inevitable creep closer, but have time to at least grieve and come to terms with it. Or loose everything in a blink of an eye but spared the agony of watching yourself disappear with no way out.

Then you have, of course, the yandere who did this to you in the first place (not always though) who’s more happy than empathic while it happens and after. Excited to teach and watch you grow and change. You’ll understand why they did this, they promise, in time.

I do love when the Yandere is the only you can turn for comfort during this time. They’ll happily let you cry on their lap, soothing you as best they can while your body is wracked with pain. You hate them but at this point you hate being alone more. Not to mention the fact that if you want to understand or know your new self they are the only ones who can teach you.

Not to mention when it’s finally done and over with they don’t even really have to keep you locked up. People from your old life won’t recognize you, won’t believe that you didn’t chose this, and even if they did you still can never be the person you were before. They’d even be sympathetic when you come back, defeated and broken, explaining that it was a necessary lesson. You can only trust your own kind now, but thankfully they’re here ready to teach and understand.

[ashintheairlikesnow]

Rue the Day

Bones in the Ocean Masterlist

CW: Creepy whumper, blood, restraints, magical whump, nonhuman whumpee, multiple whumpees, defiant whumpee, threats of death

“The rabbit is excellent tonight, wouldn’t you agree?” 

Guilford Wentworth sipped from his wine glass. When Kira didn’t answer right away, he smiled, and his teeth seemed stained slightly red. Kira fought back the way her stomach flipped and bile seemed to rise in her throat, fighting to find its way out. 

She had to stay calm. 

“Miss Losna?” Wentworth’s smile widened, giving the lie to the carefully practiced false concern in his voice. “Are you quite all right?”

Kira cleared her throat, blinking rapidly and forcing herself to sip from the wine as well. She kept her eyes on Wentworth, because if she looked at the display behind him, she may not be able to hold the scream back any longer.

There as a whimper, half-suppressed, and Kira set her jaw and told herself to ignore it.

“I am fine,” She managed, and her voice was calm where her heart beat with frantic, frightened wings within her chest. “Rabbit is not my-... it is not a meat I often dine on, is all. The taste is… new to me.”

“Oh? My apologies. I would have chosen a different entree, but I had heard you come from… well, shall we say humble beginnings, and I thought rabbit may be familiar to you.”

His mockery strengthened her nerves. Kira stabbed a bite of rabbit viciously, trying not to think about how the meat had been coated in a bright red berry sauce that tasted too dark and rich. She chewed, and tried not to taste copper.

Because of course there was no copper.

There couldn’t be.

It was all in her mind, all because of-

“I was not raised on rabbit, Lord Wentworth,” She said coldly, and forced her eyes down to the pale ivory ceramic of her plate, painted with a beautifully oceanic blue. Images of mermaids and sea serpents cavorting in stylized waves, blocked in some spots by the rabbit. Just to the edge of the plate, she saw a handful of painted sirens, looking at the other creatures with… melancholy, perhaps.

The whimper came again. 

Kira’s teeth worked the rabbit to nearly nothing before she swallowed. There was something to that soft sound of pain that struck her like a hammer to a gong, her despair ringing in the air so loudly she could nearly hear it. 

“It is not the siren’s fault that your son spoke up,” She managed to say, if only so she could speak over the way the siren’s careful, determined silence had begun to break against the waves of pain. “You shouldn’t punish him for it.”

“So I should end our dinner early and go punish Ford in person?” Wentworth asked, unbothered by the scene behind him, by the sounds the siren could no longer hold back. “You have quite the cold soul, Miss Losna.” His smile widened. “Perhaps I chose you better than I realized.”

“I do not think you should do anything to your son but leave him alone," Kira bit back. "And you did not choose me." Her fork dropped with a clattering against the plate. “I answered an advertisement. You had no idea who I was before I walked up your front steps.”

“True.” Guilford Wentworth tipped his head forward in acknowledgement. "You answered my advertisement for a job."

“I wish to the gods I hadn’t.”

Guilford Wentworth laughed, a harsh, barking sound that nearly made Kira flinch. Somehow, though, she held steady. “I should be honest with you, Miss Losna. I’m not entirely convinced there are any gods at all.”

Kira sat back. Took another drink of wine, and let the room spin a little around her. It loosened her tongue and stiffened her spine, but it also set her cheeks aflame and left her unsteady. Strong, but dizzy, as if spun endlessly in a dance. “That’s blasphemy.”

“It is.” Wentworth nodded, picking up a heavy red fruit and biting into it, red juice on his chin, dripping onto his plate. Kira’s stomach threatened once again to heave itself empty, and she had to grip onto the edges of the table until they nearly cut into her palms to settle the twisting, flipping sensation. “And yet… well, Miss Losna. If there were gods, then you have to assume one of them would have noticed me, hm? I have one of their own. I live longer than men were meant to live. I haven’t aged a day since my siren was bound to me. They are supposedly a gods’ children, aren’t they?”

Kira was silent, then. 

If he wanted to give a speech, let him. She would simply try to get through this meal, and try equally not to be furious with Guilford’s son Ford, whose dismissal from the table had left her alone with this monster masquerading as man.

From the window, the siren’s soft sounds of pain lengthened into a soft wail. Even that, Kira thought with a shiver, sounded like music.

Against her will, she looked at him.

The siren was strung up like a tormented saint, arms up over his head wrapped in rough sailor’s rope that scratched up his skin and smeared it red. His toes barely danced on the floor, barely able to hold even a little of his weight. To stand normally, he had to let his arms hold all his weight, and it tore the ropes in more deeply, bit by bit. Staying on his tiptoes stretched his leg muscles to what must have been screaming agony. 

He was framed by the yellowing evening light coming through the window, nearly making him a silhouette, a suggestion of endless darkness ringed in awful light.

Kira’s eyes burned with what she resolutely denied could be tears as she saw him twisting his wrists a little, blood running in a rivulet down one arm now. The muscle in his arm twitched as the trail worked down to the crook of his elbow, heading towards his shoulder.

He was naked now, the markings that kept him in bondage to Wentworth’s wicked demands on full display. Kia’s heart beat faster than the rabbit whose remains were on her plate had ever been able to run.

Wentworth had given the order in between inane commentary about weather and what grew in the garden’s greenhouses. It had been tossed out like an aside, as if it didn’t matter at all. Areyto had - staring at Kira all the while - begun to tie himself up. He had climbed up himself into position, moved each arm and leg as Wentworth ordered. The butler Babbage, his eyes clouded and cheerfully convinced he was doing something with curtains, had finished stringing him up. 

Once the weight had become to much, Areyto’s eyes had gone blank and empty. He had wiped himself from his own body with the pain.

Or… perhaps only by the work it took to survive it.

He had no ability to die.

Not unless Guilford Wentworth allowed him to.

Servants bustled around - Nadette and Babbage cheerfully refilled empty cups and whisked away each course and brought the next as though they saw nothing. Nadette had come back puzzled as to what she had even been doing upstairs when she was meant to be attending Kira at dinner, and Kira could only pray to gods that may or may not be real that the clarity in her had lasted long enough to find Kira a way out.

They didn’t see the siren for what he was, or even seem to hear his crying.

Kira did.

And she hated Ford, in the moment, for having been here but then getting himself dismissed so she had to be here alone.

“They are,” Kira said, voice trembling a little. “The moon goddess made the ocean’s creatures, sirens, the mer people, the-”

“And yet,” Wentworth interrupted, too committed to his monologue to allow her to cut him off before he was done. Kira stared at Areyto, watching salt tears running down his cheeks, even though his face was utterly blank. “And yet. Look at him, Miss Losna. Look. Does his goddess save him now?”

Kira swallowed, but her throat felt nearly closed and it took far too much effort to manage. “No,” She whispered. “No. His goddess does not save him.”

Lord Wentworth’s fork scraped in dissonance along his plate, dragging Kira’s gaze back to him. “Clearly she doesn’t,” He said, with confidence. “A century and a half, give or take a dozen years here and there, and my siren remains mine. And he will remain mine. There is no goddess of the moon and waters, Miss Losna. There is no god of the land, no mountain deities to worship, no demons hiding in the Maitsa. There is nothing but people, and two kinds of people at that.”

Kira tried to tear her eyes from the siren’s suffering, but all she could make herself look at was the bottom of her emptied wineglass. There wasn’t enough wine in the world to make this bearable.

“The first sort of person goes on living the life prescribed. Does all the right things, says the right words, gets married and bears a few children and then dies. It’s all for nothing. It means nothing. The second sort of person is far more rare.”

Guilford Wentworth stood, and Kira’s breath caught as he picked up the sharpened blade of the knife that had been beside his plate. He turned away from her, walking over to the siren. Kira should have stood, then - stood and run - but she felt frozen. 

“The second sort of person,” Guilford said, voice lower now, “Is one who controls his own fate. Who refuses to live the prescribed life. Who takes control.”

The edge of the knife cut into the unmarked side of the siren’s body, a slow slice echoing the line of his ribs. 

“Hold still for me,” Guilford said, voice low and thick with some sickening emotion Kira didn’t dare name. The siren turned to look at him, and something in his empty face flickered back to life. There was a pleading there. A scream, but a silent one. “Hold, Areyto.”

The siren’s lips trembled as the knife left him and cut again. Blood ran down to his hip, maneuvered around and over it, ran down the inside of one muscled thigh. Kira’s heart beat so hard she had trouble breathing around it now, as if her lungs refused to expand. She took shallow gasps instead. 

Her fingers closed around her own fork, unconsciously, and she pushed herself to her feet. “Stop,” She whispered. 

“Areyto is mine.” A third slice had the siren weeping openly, unable to fight the pain everywhere within him any longer. Guilford raised his free hand and wiped a tear away with his thumb, licking it off the tip and humming, as if he’d tasted the finest wine. “As you will be. I could cut you just like this, and if he commanded it, you would hold perfectly still.”

“I said-” Her voice cracked. She moved, though, without thinking, coming around the edge of the table and heading towards him. The fork seemed to come to life in her hand, silvered metal twisting and heating up until her palm felt like it was burning. But somehow the burn did not hurt at all. “I said for you to stop. He does whatever you want, leave him be. I don’t require this showcase of your power, Lord Wentworth, you already have me held here against my will!”

“Oh, Miss Losna.” Guilford sighed, happily. “You find yourself terribly mistaken. This isn’t about you at all. I’m not doing this to show you my power over him.”

“Then-” Kira came to a stop, a few feet away. The fork in her hand no longer felt like a fork at all. She looked slowly down at it. “Then why are you-”

“Because he is beautiful,” Guilford breathed, looking back to the siren with shining eyes. “Like this. Because there is nothing I cannot do now.”

Kira had no ready rejoinder, and after a heartbeat of trying - and failing - to think of one she gave up. Standing here watching her captor torture a siren who had done nothing but run into him hurt more than it should. Sirens, after all, were monsters who sang men to their deaths, who took sailors to the depths. But Areyto was also a man, if not a human one. One worn down like river rocks, and soon enough he would be fine as sand, and then he would be nothing at all. 

The air felt heavier and heavier around her, as if any moment now she would cease to be able to breathe it. The inside of her head, by contrast, felt too light, floating away from her. 

Torn in two, she decided to hell with false politeness. 

“Why not just get it over with?” She asked, without looking away. The siren seemed to feel her eyes on him and managed to - briefly - meet her gaze. There was something pleading, there, in the darkness of his eyes. 

“It?” Guilford cut him again, and Kira watched skin twitching beneath his knife and wondered if she could simply vomit all over Wentworth to make this awfulness end. In her hand, the for had become long, straightened out. A sort of tiny spear of silver, and it burned hot enough that she knew if she hadn’t been the one to create it, her hand would be blistered and bubbling. 

She raised her chin. “It, Lord Wentworth. Whatever it is you plan to do to me. Destroying my mind, marrying me off to your son, whatever it is you’ve got tucked away to ruin lives for your own amusement. Why not just do it and cease forcing me to… wait?” 

“Ah.” Wentworth smiled. “Well, that’s quite simple, Miss  Losna.”

“It… it is?”

“It is indeed. Areyto? Would you care to explain?”

The siren cut his eyes back to Guilford, staring at him with such open, baleful loathing that the sheer force of the expression took Kira’s breath away. Then the pain overtook his ability to hold the expression and he slumped into sullen silence, seconds ticking past. 

“Areyto.” Guilford Wentworth’s eyes narrowed. “Tell. Her.”

Areyto’s mouth opened without his say-so. Kira watched him as he spoke, rote and lifeless, voice thin and rough with pain. “The magic-... must be written with free will, or… or it is too weak to hold me.”

Kira blinked. “But-... wait. You-... you enthralled your first magician-”

“I had the thrall lifted,” Guilford said, voice going a little softer. He looked away, then, over towards the grand floor-to-ceiling windows. “Every ten years. For two days, I had it lifted. And she strengthened the spell.”

“Why?”

“Because,” Guilford said, almost gently, lifting his own knife just under the siren’s chin, nicking his throat just to watch the blood run from there, too. “If she didn’t, I would ensure my wife would throw herself off the roof.”

Kira took in a breath.

There was only one monster in this room.

She moved all at once, pushed by a swell of emotion that felt like being sucked under by the riptide, and reached up as high as she could. The burning-hot silver in her hand sliced through the ropes that held the siren as if they were made of butter, not heavy hemp, and the siren dropped to the floor all at once with a cry.

She turned, stepping between Guilford and the siren, lifting her chin. 

“You have no such way to force me, Lord Wentworth.”

To her shock, though he did step back from her, Guilford Wentworth did not react with fear or anger. 

Instead… he laughed. “Of course I do.”

“Oh?” Kira shifted, unconsciously moving closer to Areyto, who had not moved from the floor. She could hear him growling, a sound somehow utterly animal and deeply musical, a bass note held unending. Blood smeared under his hands, soaking into the shining wood under him. It was a deep, oxygen-rich burgundy, darker than Kira’s own - a reminder that despite his appearance, he wasn’t human. 

Not that being inhuman meant he deserved any bit of this.

She faced Wentworth head on, chin high, with every ounce of courage she had in her. The wine had gone entirely to her head, but her voice stayed steady and strong. “And what, exactly, will you do to make me obey you and help you make an empire for yourself when I would happily tear out your throat with my own damn teeth if they weren’t so blunt?” 

Behind her, the siren made a new sound.

It wasn’t quite open laughter - he was in far too much pain. But the soft sound, the huff of breath with the barest edge of volume to it, set stronger steel in Kira’s spine just the same. Warmed something in her that had frozen over before. 

“I won't lift a finger to stop you, Miss Losna.” Wentworth moved away, picking up his wine glass and taking another sip. 

Her lip lifted in a snarl at the smug lie he told so easily. “You speak like a man who hasn’t barred all the bedroom windows to keep me inside,” She responded, voice tight.

Wentworth’s smile did not waver or fade, but something in it tightened. “I will not stop you,” He repeated. “But everyone else here will.”

“You will have them… attack me? Do me harm?”

“No. I will have them do themselves harm.”

Kira froze. “What?” Her voice was a whisper. 

Wentworth shrugged. “Every single one of them will die, by their own hand, as soon as you step off of my property. Their deaths will not be quick or clean, and they will be because of you.”

Kira’s jaw worked, her eyes moving to where Nadette and Babbage still stood by the kitchen door, both of them smiling politely and seemingly unaware of the confrontation by the window. “You lie.”

“No, my dear, I do not. The order has already been given.” Wentworth sighed, voice gentling. “It was given as soon as I knew you had already met my siren. If you leave, they will die. You will consign three dozen servants to their deaths, including my butler and of course your own sweet maidservant… even the stable boy will hang himself in the barn. Every one of them will die in some way, and they will know why they do it but be unable to stop. So.” He lifted one hand, twirling his finger in pointed down. “I suggest, Miss Losna, that you drop your weapon, or I will command the first death. Which of course will be the lovely young Nadette.”

Kira hitched in a breath, fear washing cold across her. She stared at Nadette’s smiling face, where she stood across the room, and thought of the terror in the girl when she had grabbed her arm and said I don't want to be here. “I-... You wouldn't. How would your life ever continue-”

“I will. If you refuse me, and I lose my siren’s power, then my life will be short and brutish regardless. I have little to lose, if the creature is lost. So leave and know your selfishness will be their cause of death. And know, also, that I will ensure you are charged by the king with every single murder. After all, I have no magic. But you do. Or so the king will believe. Drop the weapon, Miss Losna. Now.”

“Lord Wentworth-”

“Drop the weapon,” Guilford said, voice lower than ever. “And say, yes, my lord. Or Nadette will drink the vial she carries in her pocket, and you will watch her die in agony.”

Kira stood still for a long moment.

The bit of silver clattered from her numb fingers to the floor. 

When Wentworth's eyebrows raised and he leaned forward, one hand cupped behind his ear as he waited, she swallowed and managed, in a trembling voice, “Y-... Yes, m-my lord.”

“Good girl.” Wentworth's voice was sickly sweet and low. His smile widened once more - too wide, grotesquely stretched. “Sit back down, we still have to enjoy our dessert.”

Kira felt her feet moving without her, drifting back to her chair. Her mind raced and the world around her felt suddenly unreal as she settled, staring down at her plate until Babbage whisked it away and disappeared back into the kitchen again.

Kira looked over at the siren, where he still knelt on the floor.

“You, too,” Wentworth said, beckoning the siren with a single crook of his finger. Areyto pushed himself uncertainly to his feet, struggling to stay upright. His ribs were still bleeding, the smell of it overwhelming and making Kira’s stomach flip again. Or maybe it had never stopped. 

Areyto sat back in his chair, still naked - the servants didn’t seem to notice. Kira couldn’t see anything past his bright eyes and the red of his blood. The sight of him felt real in a way nothing else in this house of horrors did. 

“You will not leave your room again unless summoned,” Wentworth said, imperious now. “If you are found anywhere else, even once, I will begin ordering deaths. If you care about the lives of anyone but yourself, Miss Losna, you will go where you are bid and do what I tell you. And you will bind my siren back to me with all the magic you can use.”

Kira kept her eyes on the siren.

She had no idea what was served for dessert. She heard nothing Wentworth said after that. At some point, she was given leave to return to her rooms and she fled to the stairs, feeling a stab of guilt at leaving the siren once again alone with this monstrous man. But it was not enough guilt to stop her.

Once she had closed the door behind her, she flung herself on her bed, screaming into the heavy soft pillow.

How had she already begun to think of this as her room? This bed as her bed? How could she have been so well encircled and not realized he would use the servants against her?

She screamed again.

This time, she kept it up until her throat burned with it and her voice began to give, going hoarse and rough. She held the pillow against her face until sparks danced behind her closed eyes as she fought for air. Finally, she threw the pillow away, watching it thump onto the floor.

Then she turned to where it had been and saw the crumpled paper there. Kira swallowed, picking the folded piece of paper up and slowly opening it. 

Young Master Ford, Young Miss Nathalie, and the twins all have rooms without bars on the windows. 

Master Ford will come to you at midnight with the siren. 

Miss Nathalie will, too.

Nathalie. Kira felt something in her settle. That would be the eldest daughter from the painting, Ford’s younger sister. Clearly she and Ford felt similarly, if they were going to help Kira and Areyto, or even just Kira…

No.

She wouldn’t leave here without the siren beside her. Areyto needed rescue more than she did, in the end, and it wasn’t his singing that made her believe it. It was her own conviction. Her own certainty.

Kira pushed herself off the bed, then, setting her shoulders with resolution and heading into the bathing room, hoping against hope she could somehow manage to get this dress off all by herself.

She was sorely in need of a bath.

-

Taglist: @grizzlie70 @burtlederp @finder-of-rings  @theelvishcowgirl  @whump-for-all-and-all-for-whump @bloodinkandashes @squishablesunbeam @mj-or-say10   @apokolyps   @wildfaewhump   @shrimpwritings @there-will-always-be-blood @latenightcupsofcoffee @angelsproject @loony-whumptoons

[chaotic-orphan]

INTOXICATING FEAR (IX)

Much Needed Alone Time

Read part one here

Continued from here

TW: overall content warning, very uncomfortable, forced self-harm, self-harm, mentions of self-harm, explicit self harm, gory self harm, blood, cuts, knives, cutting, explicit detail of blood/wounds, gross depictions of blood, torture, threats of violence, hopelessness, sadistic whumper

This one is even a bit squidgy for me at parts so take care of the warnings and of yourselves! Enjoy!

*~*~*~*~*

“Wakey wakey, Kit,” Ambrose sang. That was his only warning before a slap echoed around the room and Kit’s eyes shot open in shock. Ambrose was crouching in front of Kit, pale red lips tilted up into a half smile as Kit jerked forward. He didn’t get very far though.

Kit’s arms were kept restrained awkwardly behind him, bound tightly wrist to wrist. Kit frowned at Ambrose in question.

“Where’s Superhero?” Kit asked, voice erring on cautious. If Ambrose had managed to subdue or God forbid kidnap Superhero… or use him as his own little puppet toy plaything, then there really was no hope for either of them.

“Oh, don’t worry your pretty little head about Superhero, Kit. He had to nip out on an errand which gives us some much-needed alone time,” Ambrose said, his voice too high and pleased with himself as he spoke, but his eyes… Kit swallowed the lump in his throat at the pain they promised. “Ah, there you are. There’s my scared, timid little Kit. You forgot yourself before, it’s okay. You can admit it, it’s only the two of us here after all.”

“I didn’t forget myself,” Kit snarled, bearing his teeth at Ambrose and jerking forward in the chair as far as he were able to. “I am done playing by the rules of your sick twisted games.”

Ambrose tilted his head to the side, dark eyes drinking in Kit’s threat. “Did seeing Superhero make you brave, Kit?”

“He’s going to see right through you,” Kit sneered, “and when he does, I’ll be there. Watching as he beats the—”

Ambrose jumped at Kit, one hand going to his throat while the other pressed a knife against Kit’s cheek. Ambrose wrenched Kit’s head up, so he was staring directly into Ambrose’s eyes with that cute little defiant look. Ambrose revelled at how still Kit went once Ambrose introduced the knife to his face.

“You won’t be able to watch if I pluck out those pretty little eyes, Kit, would you?” Ambrose mused. Kit shook his, trying to shake free Ambrose’s grip, but Ambrose tightened his hold and pressed the knife in deeper until Kit stopped moving. “Ah, ah, ah, Kit. Play nice or my hand might just slip.”

“Take my eyes!” Kit spat, his voice taking on a feral growl to it, as he struggled furiously in his restraints. “Take whatever the fuck you want because you will fuck up sooner or later and it’s only a matter of time until Superhero finds out who you really are! So go ahead!”

Kit craned his neck up further, pressing into the knife that Ambrose held. Daring him.

Bold.

Ambrose pulled away, dropping all contact from Kit. Kit let out a scoff as he dropped his head and rolled his shoulders.

“Yeah, thought so.”

“You know, Kit,” Ambrose said with a sigh, pressing the tip of the knife against his index finger and twirling it thoughtfully. He turned his back to Kit, walking towards the front door.

“You’re right. I didn’t really think the whole sickness thing through, if Superhero comes back and you’re still as feverish as you were, well,” Ambrose said inclining his head, with a wan smile: “he’d probably recommend a hospital or a healer… both of which I have no need of.”

Kit remained silent. He glared at Ambrose as he continued.

“So, while you were out of it, I was trying to think of a way to get Superhero off our backs and I had a little lightbulb moment, Kit,” Ambrose said, and looked over his shoulder at Kit with a grin, “you wanna know what it was?”

“I’m sure you’ll tell me anyway.”

“You’re so un-fun, but I will,” said Ambrose, turning to face Kit now. “Sometimes stress manifests itself as illness, Kit.”

“Well, I am sick of you, so that makes sense,” Kit grumbled. Ambrose laughed.

“And sometimes, it manifests as mental illness.” Kit’s brows furrowed in question. Ambrose smiled. “Don’t you want to have a guess at what I mean by that?”

“Not particularly.”

Ambrose shrugged. “Good. So, we can begin then.”

Kit tensed in the chair as Ambrose walked purposefully towards him, around the chair and out of sight. Kit turned his head, but Ambrose pushed it back, so Kit was forced to stare forward.

“Hey! Hey! What’re you—”

“Oh, not so brave now, are we?” Ambrose asked, sarcasm dripping from every word.

When the cool metal pressed against Kit’s wrist he jerked forward, trying to get away but Ambrose said: “stay still,” and the sludge like command melted Kit’s brain until he was forced into immobile submission.

The metal pressed against Kit’s wrist again and to Kit’s surprise, Ambrose cut him free of the ropes or whatever was tying him to the chair. He still couldn’t move but for some reason being free didn’t exactly make Kit’s heart sing with joy. Something like dread settled at the bottom of his gut instead as Ambrose walked around the chair again.

“Now, Kit, illness… sickness, physical sickness can be treated by a healer or a doctor but mental illness? Especially from stress, perhaps… oh I don’t know, work related stress from being a hero, for example. That is treated by time away from the stressors.”

Ambrose paused to let his words properly sink into Kit’s brain. Ambrose didn’t speak again until Kit’s wide eyes met Ambrose’s with a panicked kind of hatred.

“No,” Kit said. “No! You can’t—”

“Oh, yes, Kit. Yes, I can.”

“Superhero would never… he wouldn’t—” Kit blubbered before furious eyes met Ambrose’s dark ones. “He would check on me every day—”

“Would he? A good soul like Superhero? Or would the guilt of having maybe pushed you too hard, or not having seen the signs earlier prevent him from coming regularly?”

“Wait, Ambrose. You can’t do this!”

“Oh, I can,” Ambrose chuckled.

Kit’s mouth screwed up desperately, his breathing coming out a bit faster than necessary. “But— but I won’t be as fun if you can’t fuck with me when I’m at the hero tower, and you won’t learn about anything or be able to take down the heroes from within, or— or—”

“Oh relax,” Ambrose said with a wave of his hand. “This isn’t going to be permanent, Kit. Just a long enough break away from the stressful environment of being a hero. Some good old-fashioned R&R with yours truly will set you right.”

Ambrose bit back a grin when he saw tears gather behind Kit’s eyes as he struggled to try and fight Ambrose’s compulsion.

“Please, Ambrose. Please! Anything but that, please. I’ll be good, I’ll do whatever you want. Please, I’ll stop fighting you. Please just don’t— don’t—” Kit cried, cutting himself off with a heartfelt sob, sniffing as the tears started falling down his cheeks.

Ambrose moved closer, cooing at Kit’s pathetic display of desperation. He pressed a cold hand against Kit’s cheek and brushed the tear streaks away with the coarse pad of his thumb. A sympathetic smile on his stupidly too-red lips.

“It’s okay, Kit. Everything will be fine. Come on, walk with me to the bathroom. The blood will be easier to clean off there.”

To Kit’s horror his body obeyed Ambrose’s command. Every neuron in Kit’s brain was firing at him to stop, to not go with Ambrose, to fight, to regain control over his own body – but it was all in vain.

Kit stood from the chair and followed Ambrose across his living room into his bathroom. Ambrose turned on the light, and turned to grin at Kit, holding out a hand.

“What?!” Kit barked, wiping the angry tears from his eyes.

“Well, you have two choices Kit, you either; step into the bath or hold your arms over it,” Ambrose said, leaning his lower back against the sink and crossing his long legs. “The choice is yours; it doesn’t really affect me.”

“Is it?” Kit asked, coming to stand in front of Ambrose, his heart thundering against his ears. If he could stall for time and wait for Superhero to come back, he could catch Ambrose in the act. He’d know that Kit was suffering at the hands of a fucking tyrant.

The corner of Ambrose’s lips quipped up. “Knock yourself out, Kit. Enjoy the freedom.”

“Except it’s not freedom cause either way you’re going to make me do one of them, aren’t you?”

“Well obviously,” he deadpanned. “But I can wait if you want. We can wait until your precious Superhero comes back and instead of hurting yourself you can hurt him too. Would you like that, Kit?”

“You said you wouldn’t read my mind anymore. Takes the fun out of it, have you changed your tune?”

Ambrose rolled his eyes and stood to his full height, stepping forward and knocking Kit back a step with his shoulder. Kit’s eyebrows rose in surprise as he stumbled back, forgetting that Ambrose was taller than him.

“Honestly Kit, I try,” Ambrose said with another step. Kit matched it with one backwards, still glaring up at him. “But sometimes it’s so rare that you think anything in that little noodle of yours, that the thoughts are too loud for me to ignore.”

Ambrose pressed a finger into Kit’s forehead and tipped him back another step before Kit batted his hand away.

“Real funny, Ambrose. Hah-hah!”

“I try,” Ambrose said, flashing a charming smile. “But you’re right. I have decided. In the bath is better than out.”

Without pausing Ambrose pressed his palm flat on Kit’s chest, fingers spread and shoved Kit backwards. Kit hadn’t realised how close he was to the bath, so it came as a surprise when his thigh hit the edge. He shot his hands out to steady himself too late, failing to grab hold of Ambrose and gravity had him in its claws. Ambrose getting further away as Kit fell, his head smacking off the tiles as he landed awkwardly in the tub.

“Motherfucker!” Kit cried, rubbing his head with a scowl as it pounded from the whack.

Ambrose shrugged leaning back against the sink again, arms folded across his chest. “I did give you the choice to get in the bath of your own accord. This one’s on you.”

“Maybe I want to lean over it,” Kit grumbled, fumbling to right himself. When he settled Kit glared up at Ambrose from the tub. “Well, we don’t have all day. Force me to do whatever you want; I don’t care anymore.”

“Kit,” Ambrose chided. “Don’t have that attitude, come on. Make it fun for me. Struggle a bit.”

“What’s the point? You’ll just use your powers on me and get what you want eventually. Let’s just cut through the bullshit.”

Ambrose shrugged. “Fair enough.”

Ambrose leaned off the sink and handed Kit the knife. “Kit, I want you to take the knife and roll up your sleeves and cut your wrists.”

Kit felt the blood drain from his face.

“What?” Kit whispered as his hand reached for the knife against his will. “Wait! Ambrose, you can’t want to kill me I thought—”

“Oh hush, Kit. Don’t be dramatic. Make the cuts horizontal. Not deep enough to bleed out, or need stitches, but enough to leave scars.”

Kit was rolling up his sleeves as Ambrose spoke. “Ambrose, wait please. Please! Wait! Stop! Why can’t you do this to me? You cut me! Make them believable? Please?! Ambrose please, I – I don’t want to do this.”

Ambrose crouched so he was eye level with Kit, looking into Kit’s too bright eyes that were already tearing up at the mere thought of Ambrose’s command.

“What makes you think I care about what you want, Kit?”

Kit let out a sharp hiss as the blade sliced through his skin. Kit didn’t look down. He didn’t want to see what his body was doing to itself. Instead, he stared at Ambrose as he cut and Ambrose stared at Kit, never dropping eye contact for a second. Black eyes drinking in every twinge of pain flashing across Kit’s face, savouring every morsel of emotion that bled through his features.

Kit was doing a good job of keeping his face impassive. Until the third cut. Kit sucked in a sharp breath as he banged his leg against the wall of the bath, wrenching his head up to stare at the ceiling and breathing slowly out through his mouth with a pained hum.

“Alright there, Kit?”

“Never bett— AGH! Fuck!”

This time Kit looked, and he wished he didn’t. Sticky blood surrounded his wrist, thick and dark and gloopy. Kit couldn’t even tell where the cuts were because the blood from the last cut had washed over them all, leaving streams of blood racing down Kit’s palm. Splashing down onto the snow-white acrylic bottom of the tub.

Kit was going to be sick, but there was no time as his arm mechanically moved back to slice again. Kit looked up pleadingly into Ambrose’s black eyes, looking for any sign of sympathy or empathy, finding nothing except his own pathetic reflection staring back at him. Kit bit his lip to stop crying out on the last cut before Ambrose moved.

“Okay, Kit. That arm has enough. Mo—”

“Wait,” Kit croaked, licking his lips. “Waitwaitwaitwait, wait…”

Ambrose paused, tilting his head, eyebrows arching at interruption. He didn’t punish Kit though or chastise him, so Kit took that as an opportunity to continue.

“The… the blood— my knife will slip. I need to—”

“Okay Kit,” Ambrose said softly. “We can wait while you fix yourself.”

“Thank you,” Kit breathed, dropping the knife onto the tub floor with a clatter. Kit’s hands were shaking violently as he wiped the blood on his tracksuit bottoms, biting his lip to quiet the pained whimpers.

Ambrose clicked his tongue and said, “Kit stop. You’ll ruin them. Use the water.”

Kit blinked up owlishly at Ambrose, eyes glazed over as if the thought of using the bath hadn’t occurred to him. Kit nodded dumbly and reached over to the end of the bath, turning on the cold tap. The water was freezing. Before Kit could talk himself out of it, he gritted his teeth and plunged his arm under the spray.

Kit let out a startled gasp of pain, making his other hand a fist and beating it off the side of the bath because the cuts stung under the icy water. Kit bit his lip and rubbed the sticky coagulated strings of blood from his arm and hand. He did his best to not watch them slither like snakes down the drain and instead focused on turning the tap off.

Kit looked down at his arm to see fresh bright red blood surface in his cuts. None of them too deep. Exactly what Ambrose wanted. Exactly what Ambrose commanded of him, and he obeyed like a good little puppet.

Kit pushed himself back to the middle of the bath trying to push that though from his mind. His damp tracksuit clinging awkwardly to some places as he scooted across. Kit found Ambrose’s eyes with his own as he wiped the fresh streams of blood on his tracksuit, half to dry his hands, half to fuck with Ambrose just because.

Kit grabbed the knife and got comfortable, balancing his knees against the inside of the bath, feet planted on the bottom of the tub. He cocked a brow at Ambrose, as if to say I’m waiting, and Ambrose had to laugh inwardly at the gall.

Ambrose’s lips quipped up at the simple defiance. “Okay, Kit. Now cut your other arm.”

Ambrose relished Kit’s shaking hand as he drew the knife over his skin. He wanted to record all of Kit’s micro reactions in his brain just so he can think back on this moment whenever he was feeling down. It was intoxicating.

To watch Kit’s hand tremor, his body fight against Ambrose’s power and not be able to do a single thing to stop him. He could feel Kit’s mental resistance trying to fight Ambrose’s compulsion off him as he made the second cut. Ambrose drank in his expressions, every muted wince that he tried so hard not to show Ambrose.

It was pure turmoil he put Kit in, and it was addicting. He could watch it all day, and never get bored but that was just with Kit. Most of his other victims had a weak constitution and gave in a few days into Ambrose’s mental assault, in hopes that Ambrose would get bored and let them go. Some of them stopped fighting him out of sheer weakness, but not Kit. Never Kit. How long had it been now? Weeks? Months? And Kit was still fighting him.

Even if it wasn’t fighting Ambrose’s powers mentally, it was his little looks of defiance, his unwillingness to concede even if it would make life easier on him. No… Kit was a fighter and Ambrose couldn’t get enough of it. Finally, someone to match him, to challenge him. To say no and make everything difficult just because. It was obviously an illusion, but to Kit it seemed to be some semblance of control that he could pretend to have.

His favourite part was coming up now… ah yes. After the third cut, Kit bit his lip to stop the sudden cry. A deeper cut. He brought his head up and stared Ambrose directly in the eyes, that defiance still evident through his pain filled, glassy eyes on the verge of tears. Even when he wanted Ambrose to show mercy, he refused to ask.

It felt like Christmas and Kit was a gift for Ambrose to toy with, to batter and break and fix and break again, but a toy doesn’t give you that same satisfaction. The euphoria of seeing Kit’s white knuckled grip tight around the handle of the knife as he sliced through his flesh against his will and tried to hide the pain in his expression. Or more aptly, trying and failing to hide it, made it all the sweeter.

Ambrose leaned forward. “Two more, Kit. One deep, one shallow.”

“Nn— no,” Kit whispered, his hand shaking harder now. “No…”

“Remember little Kit, what you are. You’re my little puppet. My plaything, you don’t get to say no to me. Now, deep enough to hurt but not deep enough for hospital.”

“Fuck you,” Kit whispered venomously as he sliced through his arm, deeper this time. Kit cried out loud this time, craning his neck back to glare at the ceiling and Ambrose leaned closer. Observing the strain in Kit’s neck, the veins popping out of his throat. His jaw that was clenched tight enough to grind his teeth. His voice that came out like a pathetic animal’s cry.

“FUCK! Ughh!” Kit groaned, stamping his foot against the wall of the bath again, trying to exert the pain in his arm and transfer it to the bath.

“Look at it, Kit,” Ambrose said, and Kit shook his head.

“Go fuck yourself, Ambrose.”

“Kit. I said, look at the mess you’ve made.”

Kit fought the command like he always did but eventually his head turned down against his will and his eyes fixed on the massacre of blood on his arm again. Ambrose watched as Kit visibly paled at the sight with a soft smile. Kit made another cut while he looked at his arm and then Ambrose plucked the knife from his hand. Kit glared up at him. Ambrose just grinned.

“Clean your arms with the water, then change out of those clothes and put them for the wash. I’ll get the blood out of them, Kit. Don’t worry.”

“You’re so gracious,” Kit spat. Ambrose looked over his shoulder at Kit.

“Kit, slap your cuts for me.”

Kit barely registered the command, but the sharp sting had him letting out a diminished howl through gritted teeth.

“You fucker!” Kit screamed after Ambrose, but Ambrose had already walked out of the bathroom laughing at the good of it. “I hate you!”

“I know, Kit.”

*~*~*~*~*

Continued here

The Orphanage (plz lemme know if you want to be added or removed <;3) - @nameless-beanie @andithewhumper @annablogsposts @whumpasaurus101 @0eggdealer @rejectedbytheempty @sleepy-pearl @n3rv0usn0v4 @whumpatize-me-captain @steh-lar-uh-nuhs @sunshiline-writes @burningkittypoet @honeyed-euphrates @sacredwrath @theonewithallthefixations @acer-gaysimpstuff @m3rakii @xxgalgurlxx @princess-bubble-blossom

[whump-tr0pes]

Honor Bound 6 - 31 (Headache/Migraine) - @badthingshappenbingo

Red X for posted, white X for requested! Send in your requests! If you don’t see a prompt here that you already requested, please send it again!

~

This is a series. Start here, continued from here.

This is a sequel to Honor Bound, Honor Bound 2, Honor Bound 3, Honor Bound 4, Honor Bound 5, and the prequel Vera.

AO3

Masterlist

Contents: sick fic, past captivity, unsure of reality, past forced confession, past offscreen murder of a child, self-hatred, past hallucinations, past murder, fear of taking pills, so much angst

~

The cloying sensation of pain reached Gavin through heavy waves of nausea and exhaustion. He squeezed his eyes shut and winced as the pain sharpened to a hot, pulsing point behind his left eye. A chill shuddered over his shoulders, down his spine, back up into the tight muscles of his neck. His own clammy fingers pressed against his forehead in a feeble attempt to relieve the pain.

There was no relief, down here in the basement.

He was a little warm, at least, under the three blankets he had earned with his confessions. They hadn’t been wild and desperate, like the confessions pried out of him by the drugs or the razor-sharp edge of Schiester’s knife. Each one had been deliberate. He had known the bargain he was making with each one.

“My coming back was my fault. Not theirs. I… I sh-should have died. It wasn’t their fault.”

“I… I shot Gray. In the chest. Back when I was… when I was still fighting them. I shot them in the chest and left them to die.”

“Wh-when I was sixteen, my mother offered me a child… I see it was a test, I see that now, but at the time I just saw a plaything that I knew I should – that I knew how to hurt. I… I killed her. Quickly. I—”

Schiester had backhanded him across the mouth before he could finish the sentence.

Each confession had been worth it. Each one had come with a beating that had left Gavin screaming in pain, but each was worth it. He had confessed his crimes to someone who would punish him for them, and properly, not with easy forgiveness. And what was more – each confession earned him a blanket that held off the cold. Still, despite the blankets over him, he shivered with cold sweat.

He didn’t try to raise his head or look around. He simply lay still, frozen in place with the pain, trying and failing to cease to exist. Terror was a steady thrum alongside his heartbeat, as he knew at any moment his tormentor would return and use this agony against him. There was nothing he could do to stop that now. He could no sooner stop the pain than he could stop the sluggish beat of his own heart, matching the dull thud within his own head. Each breath whooshed softly into his nose, huffed softly out of his mouth. His body was a heap of mechanical processes that carried on, even as his every reason for living had abandoned him here. His life was simply a serious of moments extended by the sadistic whims of the man still keeping him alive. Schiester made his commands, and his body obeyed. Nothing would stop the pain. There was no such thing as relief in this basement. There was no ice, no rizatriptan, no mercy.

Isaac had stopped looking—

“Gavin.”

Gavin cried out and flung himself upright. Isaac stood at the side of the bed, one hand outstretched and almost touching him. Gavin quaked with each panting breath as his arms shook under him and finally collapsed. Pain seared behind his eyes as he stared up at Isaac, who was starting to blur with tears.

“Are you alright?” Isaac murmured.

“You… g-got me out,” Gavin croaked. His mouth was so dry. His left eye felt like it was starting to melt out of his head.

Isaac sat carefully on the side of the bed, hand still outstretched. His fingers gently brushed through Gavin’s hair – Gavin realized then that it was soaked with sweat. “Yes,” Isaac said heavily. “I… I got you out, Gavin. Bad dream? Or…?”

“Migraine,” Gavin said, and pressed his face against the pillow. “Isaac, I—” He shoved a hand against his own mouth and dry heaved.

“Gray brought your rizatriptan,” Isaac said, rising again. Gavin groaned as the bed jostled. “Let me go get you some.”

“A-and water,” Gavin said weakly. “Please.”

“Sure,” Isaac said as he left the room.

Gavin trembled and clutched at the pillow beneath his head. As much as it pained him, he forced himself to look around, to take in the sight of the room – the peeling paint on the walls, the curtains lit by the sun slanting into the windows, the warmth of the light, the size of the room. It looked nothing like the cold, dark basement that had been his prison for what had felt like months. It felt nothing like the cramped, cruel cell where he had been kept. When Isaac entered the room again with a glass of water and a pill pinched between his fingers, the tears in Gavin’s eyes spilled over.

“N-not fucking going back,” he rasped. He dropped his head and muffled a sob against his pillow as Isaac sat beside him once more.

“No way,” Isaac said, every word sounding strained. He held the pill to Gavin’s lips, and Gavin took it, willingly.

Schiester could have drugged me this way.

The thought was a brick in Gavin’s stomach. He could have put it in my food. He didn’t have to fucking… inject it. But… An entirely different thought crossed his mind that brought a chill to his heart. This could all still be a hallucination. This could just be how he’s keeping me drugged.

As Isaac tipped the glass of water to Gavin’s lips, Gavin hesitated. Isaac froze with the glass still held out. “You alright?” Isaac rasped.

Gavin trembled as he raised his gaze to Isaac. Isaac’s eyes were brown, not blue. And he hadn’t hurt Gavin at all. Not yet. But Schiester could be playing the long game. After all, he’d been playing the long game by letting Gavin think he had escaped to the north safely back in May. This could all just be another fucking joke to him, like faking the hanging after he murdered Lucy and Topher.

Isaac swallowed hard. “Gavin?” he said softly. “Is… What—”

Gavin raised a shaking hand and dug the pill out of his mouth. It was already beginning to disintegrate and leave a gritty residue on his tongue. He stared at it between his fingers, then looked back to Isaac again.

Isaac’s eyebrows pulled together. “Gavin, what are you—”

“What happens to me if I don’t take this?” Gavin breathed. Light pulsed on the left side of his vision.

Isaac’s eyes widened. “What happens…? Nothing, Gavin, nothing happens to you. Except maybe your migraine doesn’t get much better. I don’t…” He reached out to gently stroke Gavin’s cheek.

Gavin flinched at the contact. Isaac jerked his hand back like Gavin had bitten him.

“Gavin,” Isaac said, realization crossing his face. “No. This isn’t… come on, Gavin, this is—”

“Prove it, then.” The words barely made a sound as they passed Gavin’s lips. He reached over to the nightstand and rolled his fingers together until the sticky pill dropped onto the wood. He nearly threw up then, just from the effort of holding himself up with his head pounding so ferociously. Shaking, he returned his gaze to Isaac – or the specter that could be wearing Isaac’s form. He braced for the collapse of the illusion: the sneer of contempt, the flash of violence in Isaac’s eyes, the snap of his fingers as he ordered the guards who must be currently outside of Gavin’s vision to step into the cell with him and hold him down and hurt him—

Instead, a horrible, guilty brokenness crawled across Isaac’s face. The lines around his eyes deepened, and a terrible sadness tugged at his mouth. He held his hands out, at his sides, empty and harmless. His eyes swam with helpless tears.

“I… w-won’t make you take anything you don’t want to, Gavin,” he said weakly. “I was just trying to help.”

Gavin’s throat tightened, and he could feel nothing but heat and pain. He squeezed his eyes shut and grasped at the relief of the momentary darkness. Then, he blinked his eyes open and reached for Isaac. Isaac’s shoulders fell, and he let Gavin take his hand.

“P-please,” Gavin whispered. “Please, I just…” He sobbed weakly and whimpered when that only ratcheted up the pain in his head.

“Here,” Isaac said, tears falling down his own cheeks. He guided Gavin to lay down again and stretched out beside him. “No… no pills. Just… I can just be with you. And hold you. Would that be… would that… help?”

“Yeah,” Gavin croaked, his throat still tight. He could barely see out of his left eye, and every heartbeat was agony. Still, Isaac was here. Isaac had his hands on him, and was pulling him close, and was holding him. He buried his face in Isaac’s chest and let out another broken sob.

Even as he shivered and twisted in Isaac’s arms from the pain, his heartrate slowed. The Isaac holding him was solid and real, even nothing else in the world was.

Something prickled in the back of Gavin’s mind. He swallowed hard, swallowed back the terror and pain that quivered beneath his skin; the Isaac holding him was real, because Daniel Schiester would never, ever have allowed Gavin Uriah to say no to him. The pill lay on the nightstand beside the bed still, beside the untouched water glass.

Continued here

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[chronosdawn]

I've been thinking about Naga!Wriothesley lately (GN!Reader. Tw: kidnapping, forced captivity).

You couldn’t remember quite how you ended up in the quiet sheltered cave he called a den—a strange, light blue bioluminescent moss creeping down the rock walls, like stars plummeting towards the Earth. You could remember the ship though, a small cruise vessel that had been halfway through its tour around a set of remote islands—a long overdue reward after months of overtime. You could remember the storm too, the shouts of the crew as the boat had rocked violently from side to side, throwing you into the railing with bruising force before everything went dark.

When you finally awoke it was to aching lungs and the taste of seawater in your mouth, a large, dark shape hovering over you. You'd thought him a man at first, only to be proved horribly mistaken when a thick, serpentine tail had trailed over your legs, pinning them to the ground as you cried out and thrashed at him.

It’d taken a while for you to come to grips with the fact you’d been kidnapped by a creature that was supposed to be nothing but fiction, although the way Wriothesley tells it, he’d found you passed out on the beach and taken pity on you, bringing you back to his den before something worse had found you—something hungry.

You hadn’t believed him at first, not with how he’d coiled around you each night while you shivered from a mixture of fear and cold—his exposed chest and scales leaching the heat from you. But as your eyes had adjusted to the low-light of the cave, you’d started to notice his scars, the brutal scratches down his throat, the long-healed over gouges carved across his night-black and silver scales. You heard things at night too. A strange chittering passing by the entrance to the cave, a distant chorus of howls carrying on the wind, the slow, dull thuds of something large and heavy trudging across the landscape. It was enough to have you curling into him, clutching at his arm as he wound it around your back, bringing you further into his chest and tucking your head beneath his chin—a deep sleep-rough voice murmuring that you should go back to sleep.

You’d never actually seen what other monsters roamed the island—Wriothesley had made sure of that by using strip of woven vines to secure your hands to a small curving projection in the rock wall whenever he left the cave to hunt. He was always careful to keep the razor-sharp edges of his claws away from your delicate skin, no matter that make-shift rope itself was wound tight enough to chaff at your wrists with even the slightest movement. Recently, you’d stopped struggling as much, those nighttime sounds wringing in your ears each time you thought about trying to slip your hands through the binding. You were pretty sure he’d noticed too, if the way his hand lingered on your cheek before he left was any indication.

Once, when the feeling of scales brushing against you had become worryingly familiar, you’d asked Wriothesley if there were any other humans nearby—a way for you to go home. It’d been hard to make out his expression with only the light from the moss and the faintest trickle of sunlight seeping through the bushes that covered the cave’s entrance, but you’d thought the look he’d given you might have been something akin to pity. Not anymore, he’d said simply, and his tone had left you too scared to ask what had happened to them. You were half-sure you already knew anyway, for sometimes when you slept, you dreamt of Wriothesley carrying through the forest, his shoulder digging into your stomach, as he silently weaved his way through the trees.

The images were hazy, like you were half-asleep even dreaming, but you could still make out the strange off white-structures half-buried in the earth, the curves of a partially shattered ribcage jutting from the soil like out-stretched fingers. You could never quite decide whether it looked the hand of someone desperately reaching for help, or whether perhaps it was reaching for its next unsuspecting victim to grab and pull below, the maw of a shallow and hungry grave.

Whether the images were real or imagined, you had no way of knowing, and the more nights you spent curled up with Wriothesley, the surer you were that it didn’t matter anyway. Something dangerous definitely lived outside the cave, and if the monster who’d found you first was gentle enough to wipe away your tears when you thought of all your friends and family back home, who would rub some kind of crushed plant into your skin to numb the pain of your bruised ribs, of the friction burns around your wrists, then you saw no reason to push your luck any further.

[shes-some-other-where]

June of Doom Day 4, Day 23

“Does that hurt?” | Punishment | Rules

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Contains: forced labour, captivity, restraints, vague reference to dubcon/noncon sex

WC: 880

Violet, ochre, and rose

Five years had changed everything . . . and nothing. A heavy red sun still rose each morning in a glow of gilded haze. It sank every evening, ushering in the blanket of night.

A servant girl who had once been much more than a maid rose with the dawn and worked into the dusk, hands chapped, eyes downcast. Glittering golden chains glinted at her wrists and throat—thin and dainty, hardly worth a first glance, let alone a second.

If ever anyone wondered why a lowly chambermaid wore riches alongside her rags, they never voiced their questions. They knew, after all, how a maidservant with a winsome face might curry favour among the elite. How a lovely, young thing might wile her way into winning trinkets and gifts . . . and, perhaps, more.

The maidservant worked, and every day was the same: dust and rags, skin and sweat. The chafe of beautiful shackles on her wrists. An elegant collar upon her throat.

Once every week, when the castle fell into rest or merriment, she slipped through quiet corridors, her arm gripped tightly by a stone-faced royal guard. Few words were exchanged between the guard and the girl he accompanied. His eyes roamed, disgusted, over her dust-darkened dress, her unkempt hair, her broken and grimy fingernails, her encircled wrists and throat.

He knew, as did she, the true purpose of her seemingly innocuous decorations.

The guard laughed to see them dance jauntily against her skin with each jolting step, and he leered openly to see what else painted her skin, so starkly visible if one knew what to look for and where to look: hidden by locks of tangled hair, disguised by cheap cosmetics, situated under nervously adjusted shawls or corset straps.

She wondered: if he were given the opportunity to do more than just look, would he, too, leave blooms of violet, ochre, and rose upon her skin?

“You know the rules,” he said, pausing before a locked, heavily reinforced door. It towered, imposing, over them both. “One hour.”

She nodded. The rules never changed. These days, nothing ever did.

The guard unlocked the door, and the maidservant stepped inside. A drooping, lank-haired figure lifted his head at her approach.

“Hands,” the guard said before she could greet her brother properly.

Glowering, although this was merely their weekly ritual playing out as usual, her brother stood and held out his arms, allowing the guard to lock his wrists into manacles and secure them with a chain to a ring in the floor.

The maidservant tried not to let the scene bring her to tears.

He hadn’t tried to escape in over a year now, and still they punished him. He lived locked away, always chained by one ankle, and when she visited to offer her company, they shackled his hands, too. It had been that way since the last time he’d attacked a guard; he’d lost two fingers as punishment, and the privilege of being permitted to shave his own prematurely silvering beard himself.

Now, that job fell to her, and so she had to face the pain of visiting her tormented brother who was not only perpetually silent but also chained up like a feral dog.

Quietly, she prattled about her day, once the guard produced the razor blade that her brother had previously used to try to kill his captors. The guard watched and listened, smirking, as she repeated the same hushed, mundane stories she always did.

“There’s to be a festival,” she said absently, concentrating on drawing the razor as smoothly as she could over her brother’s skin. The balls and celebrations meant little to her these days. Servant girls, if in attendance, were only there to serve and to please.

The guard dropped his dagger, the metal clattering on the floor, and she jumped, nicking her brother’s skin and drawing blood.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered as her brother hissed in pain. She tugged a handkerchief from her pocket and pressed it against the welling blood, flicking her gaze up momentarily to glare at the guard. There was no doubt in her mind: he’d dropped his dagger on that on purpose, knowing it would startle her. “Does that hurt?”

He shook his head, a wordless lie to answer her foolish question. Silvery circles ringed his eyes as he studied her. He had kept his word, as far as she knew, learning to control his visions, but they still took a toll on him, as did his fate to remain imprisoned underground, allowed only to speak to share what he saw with the prince.

His skin, too pale; his eyes, exhausted; his body, visibly weak . . . 

And a gaze that vacillated between tired resignation and deep, deep bitterness.

Still, he lifted his chained hands as far as they would go, pointing toward her neck. The maidservant’s face burned. She knew what he was asking, echoing her question: Does that hurt?

She shook her head, also silent now, pressing a hand against the bruise left behind by a vicious, hungry mouth, a new one since her last visit. Her answer was true enough. It didn’t hurt, not physically. But its very existence produced an ache that was not of the body. An ache of the mind—an ache in her very soul.

June of Doom Masterlist

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@juneofdoom

All my writing is original. Feel welcome to interact/comment/reblog. Pls don’t steal or repost.

[jordanstrophe]

Behave, 11

CW: Whumper hospital, forced medical treatment, hurt/comfort, whumper turned caretaker, protective affirmative whumper, stitches, needles mentioned, (it’s mostly fluff) 

[Masterlist]

Whumpee stared at their hands, bruised and shaking uncontrollably. Down their arms were countless needle marks, a band aid accompanying each one. They crossed their legs on the bed as shivers crawled up their spine. They felt cold and drowsy since waking up. 

The door unlocked as whumpee’s spine snapped into posture. They winced when it pulled at the stitches along their ribs. Inhaling through their teeth, they held their breath and closed their eyes.

“No hiding behind the door, not under the bed, or cowering in the corner.” They repeated through their head. Rules the doctor gave them when they got tired of bending over and grabbing their ankles to pull them out. 

It hurt their back, they said. 

So lost in thought, they hadn’t noticed a cold shadow over them. They opened their eyes just in time for someone to grab their face from each side and wrenched their head high. 

“Whumpee are you okay!? Were you hurt?! I swear if they bent a single hair the wrong way!” Whumper shrilled. The jolt whumpee let loose almost freed them from whumper’s grip. 

Whumper turned their cheek left, then right, looking for a bruise, a scratch, anything that looked unnecessary. They were mostly looking for something to validate their anger. 

“Well!? Answer me!!” Whumper cried.

Whumpee looked up, the second their eyes made contact, they broke the silence with an almost inaudible sob. Whumper immediately let go as whumpee leaned forward until they were resting their forehead against whumper’s chest.

Whumper’s eyes went wide as they awkwardly wrapped their arms around them. “I’m sorry... I’m not trying to scare you, I just-” They whispered, stroking their hand down the back of whumpee’s hair. They stopped when they realized they could feel heat.

“Are you-... Are you burning up? How do you feel?” They ushered, crouching to their level a little more. Whumpee sniffled and rested their chin over whumper’s shoulder until they calmed. For once they weren’t resistant, defiant, scared even.

“I’m s-... I’m fine. I feel alright.” Whumpee spoke through a tired mutter. 

“You were going to say scared, weren't you?” Whumper edged.  

"No. I wasn’t.” They huffed a laugh in irony. 

“I was going to say I’m sorry.”

They could feel whumper’s head snap down at them. “Excuse me?” Whumper mimicked their laugh, but more out of disbelief. 

“The last time I saw you, I said I hated you.” Whumpee pulled their head from whumper’s chest and met their eyes. 

“I-... Didn’t mean it.” They wiped a few tears from their eyes and sniffled. 

Whumper felt their chest swelling with guilt. And the last time they saw them, they had forced a blood draw as they struggled and retaliated. It bruised worse than the rest ever had. 

“Don’t be.” They sighed, cupping their face and resting their forehead apologetically against theirs. “Don’t be at all. You’re sick.” They hummed. 

They couldn’t help but smirk a little too mischievously. 

“Does this mean you adore me?”

“-Okay that’s enough.” Whumpee broke the gesture and pulled away.

“I’m your favorite, right? Beloved? Cherished?” They heartfully teased.

“You’ve ruined it.”

Whumper laughed and sat next to them, pulling them against their shoulder and running their palm down their arm. 

“I won’t let them hurt you.” Whumper murmured. “I won’t lose you again.”

---

As of that morning, the doctor had added an addition to whumpee’s room: a camera that followed their every move. If they walked to one side, the camera would hum until it found them. 

The doctor slumped their feet on the desk and gnawed away at a sandwich, watching the scene between whumpee and whumper play on like entertainment.

They wondered if it was real, whatever bond they had. Maybe one was manipulating the other. Maybe one of them was breaking.

Maybe they both had. 

[Masterlist]

@serialobsesssor @fishtale88   @bluesoulpeace   roblingoblin285    @echo-of-umbra @whump-bunny  @pretty-little-whump @akaijisatsu  @whatiswhump @shannon-foraker   @whumpkitty @suspicious-whumping-egg @whatwhumpcomments  @whumpdreamz  

[absolute-flaming-trash]

Pairing: Yandere!Chrollo x Reader

SFW

Word Count: 721

Warnings: Kidnapped reader, Captive reader, Forced relationship

Out of all the holiday seasons that came and went during the year, this one was your favourite by far.

Not for the festivities or the brash, obnoxious yet oddly endearing holiday traditions that made their way over from the Western world. Those certainly had their place, yes, but you loved it for an entirely different reason.

The lights.

Colours of every shade, limited only by imagination, were strung up on buildings all across the city - wrapped around the rails of balconies and other anchor points like luminescent vines. Trees that lined the streets were specifically decorated with white and blue, mimicking the ice and snow around them and making the scene seem just that much brighter.

It made it all seem so ethereal. How enchanting such a simple thing could make a night otherwise illuminated only by lights belonging to office buildings and private homes. It was almost enough to make you forget why you had the view you did. Who you shared it with.

You didn’t want to go back inside the hotel room yet. Even with some protection from the balcony, the cold bit at your skin making gooseflesh pepper your skin. Your toes had gone numb ages ago, but you couldn’t yet tear yourself away.

In the distance, someone was playing carols over a loudspeaker. The sound made your lips quirk up ever so slightly and you closed your eyes to take it in for a moment. While classical music was all but ruined for you by this point, there was something about the orchestral version of songs that still managed to make you feel… home. Nostalgia stirring in your chest for something that would never be the same again. A place that never existed anymore.

Such a moment was interrupted by warmth wrapping itself around you from behind, hands encircling your waist and reminding you just how thin your nightgown really was.

Your silent wish that he wouldn’t speak and simply look at the view with you was quickly crushed when you felt his hot breath right next to your ear.

“Twas noontide of summer,” Chrollo began, “and mid-time of night; and stars, in their orbits, shone pale ‘ore the night.”

“Must you always do that?” You asked, cutting his recitation off before he could complete it fully. A beat of silence followed, one long enough that the temptation to reopen your eyes to look at him pulled at your subconscious, but you pushed it back.

You felt one of his hands leave your waist in favor of your arm, the goosebumps disappearing under the warmth of his palm. Part of you wondered if he delighted in the little ways your body betrayed you when it came to him. What he provided.

“Do what, my dear?”

“Make it worse.”

There was another beat of silence as Chrollo’s fingers tightened around your bicep in a light squeeze. You opened your eyes that time, the lights coming back into view, but this time it felt different.

Tainted.

He squeezed your arm again.

“You’re cold. Come back in, there are plenty of blankets for you.”

A frown threatened to tug at your lips, but you hid it well. At least you thought you did. If there was one bright side to being the object of Chrollo’s affection, it was learning the skill of hiding what you truly felt.

Not like it mattered much, anyway.

“Do I have to?”

Another squeeze on your arm. Firmer. Non-negotiable.

“You’ll catch cold.”

A surprising reason, you thought. With how much he lingered and leered, you figured he’d delight in any occasion that would result in you depending upon and relying on him more.

Attempting to think about any other reason as to why he wouldn’t want for something like that only served to give you a headache, so you nodded once - turning your body to face his.

“Excellent.” You could hear the pleasantry in his tone hidden underneath his otherwise deadpan expression. The hand on your arm slid off to reopen the balcony door while the other moved to the small of your back, guiding you back inside.

The warmth from the room that greeted you was ironic in a way. Most defined the winter night air as biting. Harsh, even.

Yet the supposed reprieve of the indoors had never felt less welcoming.

© absolute-flaming-trash 2023. Do not repost, modify, copy, or claim.

[serickswrites]

Charisma

Warnings: restraints, captivity, torture, forced to watch, water torture, waterboarding

"Sit," Whumper ordered Team Leader.

Team Leader's hands were bound tightly behind their back and they avoided glancing over at their team. They couldn't look at their faces. Couldn't bear to see the worry, the pain, and the fear. They had to be strong. For their team.

Team Leader sat on the chair carefully. They turned their gaze to Whumper, letting all the rage and hate they were feeling fill their eyes.

"Your team would follow you blindly anywhere, Team Leader. Such charisma," Whumper scoffed. "Let's see if they will follow your orders now."

"For?"

Whumper smiled. "If they don't make a sound while I do this, I won't hurt them. Heck, I won't let you die. But if they speak? Well, we will play musical chairs."

"Fine." Team Leader wouldn't let Whumper hurt the others. They would take whatever Whumper did.

They finally looked up and over at their team. Smallest Teammate shook in their restraints, though the look on their face made Team Leader think that Smallest Teammate was so rage filled right now, it was a miracle the restraints were holding them back. Teammate One's eyes were filled with tears. And Teammate Two just stared blankly ahead.

"Don't speak. Don't shout. Whatever you do, just please, be quiet. Whumper won't hurt you. And I'll," they swallowed, "I'll be fine."

Whumper kicked Team Leader's chair over backwards. Team Leader hit the ground hard, but didn't cry out. If they didn't cry out, the team wouldn't know they were hurting.

Whumper dropped a filthy, damp towel on Team Leader's face. "This is going to be fun."

And before Team Leader could get a good breath in, Whumper blasted Team Leader's face with cold water from a hose. Team Leader sputtered and choked around the water.

They could hear Smallest Teammate's growls and Teammate One's cries of protest. But they couldn't muster the energy to try and get them to stop. They could only hope that Whumper would keep hurting them and not the rest of their team.

"I was going to let up. But now that Smallest Teammate's sweet dulcet sounds are in my ears, I'll keep going. That's way more fun!" Whumper's voice was barely audible as they increased the water pressure.

It was all Team Leader could do to keep breathing. To keep calm. They had to, though they felt as though they were drowning. Felt as though their world was ending. They had to stay strong for their team.

[cpt-winters]

...more Team Leader snippets, please?

Ask and ye shall receive

Forced to Watch *Team Leader Edition* (Part 2, Part 3)

Leader cracked an eye open at the dull thud of Whumper's boots hitting the stairs. He squirmed to sit upright, propping his back up against the wall. "I'm not going to talk, Whumper," Leader warned as they drew nearer. He winced as he straightened up. "You'll never get those coordinates," he said firmly, not daring to let the pain leak into his voice.

Whumper calmly crouched in front of Leader, a roll of duct tape in hand. "Oh, I don't need you to talk anymore," they said with a tinge of glee that Leader tried to ignore. "We're trying something new today."

"Wh-...mmf." Leader didn't get the first word out before Whumper started taping his mouth closed. With his ankles and wrists already bound, the only protest Leader could offer was a steely glare as Whumper wrapped further unnecessary layers of tape over his mouth and back around his head.

Whumper stood up and stepped back, admiring their handiwork for a second before grabbing the chair tucked away in the corner and dragging it into the centre of the room. Leader cringed as the metal legs scraped against the concrete floor.

"Once provided with sufficient motivation, I'm sure your team will be more than willing to tell me what I want to know." Whumper smiled but gave no further elaboration as a handful of their henchmen poured into the room. One set up a tripod directly opposite the chair, mounting a camera atop it as the others moved towards him. Leader's eyes widened as he realized what Whumper meant by 'sufficient motivation.'

A moment later, the henchmen had him pinned face-down on the floor as they undid his restraints and hauled him over to the chair. Any movement proved almost impossible as their iron grip on Leader's limbs barely faltered, despite his intense struggles. He managed a kick to one of their stomach's before being fully secured to the seat. The victory of the blow was short-lived, only earning him several hard wacks across the face.

Leader let out a muffled groan as warm liquid trickled down from his nose, leaving a crimson trail over the tape covering most of his lower face. His stomach churned as a little red light on the camera steadily blinked as Whumper stepped closer. Leader shirked away, angling his face to the side as it burnt with shame at the thought of his team watching this.

"How long do you think they can watch before they give me what you refuse to, hm?" Whumper brought their knife to the side of Leader's face, gently gliding it down its side, not yet piercing the skin. The touch was ghostly light, a mockery of what was to come. "Will they watch you break, Captain?" Whumper chuckled before their hand roughly seized Leader's jaw, forcing their eyes to meet. "Maybe you can handle that..." Whumper pondered. "But can your team?"

[inkblot22]

The Infection I Don't Want

I don't have any words. Don't look at me. In all seriousness, I definitely love the savior trope. I tried to give it a cute little twist. Idia feels funny in this one too. Also sorry if the formatting is weird. I write these in Docs and then I transfer them to tumblr and for some reason in this fic's document I used Amatic SC and I have bad vision to begin with. No clue why I love torturing myself. Dividers by @/cafekitsune. This fic gets a little heavy. If you start feeling unwell, stop reading. I won't take it personal, promise.

This fic is aimed towards afab readers, but uses they/them pronouns. Mentions of periods and wombs. I may have been a bit less impersonal with this one, but the reader doesn't go on my weird love rant that I have in my self-insert Idia fic so there is that.

This fic is DEAD DOVE, DO NOT EAT. TW for mentions of pregnancy, pregnancy symptoms, DIY abortion which could also be read as miscarriage, I guess, abortion, Idia is incredibly mean in this and possibly OOC, Ortho being unintentionally creepy, parasites, sort of misogyny relating to periods, shock collars, electric shocks, captivity, implied forced marriage, implied forced medical procedures. PSA: don't try anything the reader does in this fic. It's an excellent way to get sepsis, and you don't want that, I promise.

Part 5 of the Pants on Fire series.

You don’t want to admit it, but a bit too much has changed about you. In the past few weeks, you’ve noticed plenty of things, but the largest and most blaring was that your period never came. Before when you would have it, Idia would sulk and pout, acting like you were bleeding on purpose, throwing a heating pad and a blanket and a pillow and the necessary products at you so you’d be comfortable in your distress. He kept talking about figuring out some technology to rid you of that pesky trait, and you really can’t think of anyone who likes having a period, so if he had, you wouldn’t have fought him on it, 

It’s too late for that now. For the last few days, you’ve been waking up early and vomiting. The smell of Idia’s favorite noodles makes it worse. Your poor tummy is constantly roiling, and you can hardly keep anything down. Ortho has been staring at you incessantly. You think he’s being annoying, really, and Idia’s been getting on your last nerves as well. 

Today, you woke up, vomited, and just sat in the bathroom for a moment, coming to terms with the fact that you could very well be pregnant. You feel conflicted. On one hand, you don’t want to talk or think about this. You’re stressed enough as it is. On the other hand, you absolutely don’t want this. You don’t want this creature in your stomach. You know it's there. You can’t feel it, but how often can you feel something before everything goes absolutely wrong? You can’t. 

But it’s unimportant. A knock comes at the door and you scramble to your feet, flushing the toilet and rinsing out your mouth before opening the door. It’s Idia. He gives you a look and starts stripping, turning on the shower and handing you a hair tie.

“You look sick.  What’s wrong with you?”

“O-oh, I… I don’t know. I feel fine.” You’re not sure how to tell him, so you lie. Maybe you won’t have to tell him. You pull his hair into a bun and he hops into the shower. 

You stand there for a moment and he peeks his head around the door at you, “What are you doing? You want to join me?”

“Huh? Oh, no. Just thinking.”

“Go see if Ortho can get you some aspirin or something so you can start acting normal again.” He mutters.

You leave. It’s fine. Idia’s dorm room is always cold. He keeps it like that on purpose. If you’re cold and he doesn’t provide much more than these stupid skimpy pajama sets that are cute but are also thin, so you’re more likely to cuddle up to him or wear his hoodies. At least he has good taste in that.

You don’t really feel like undertaking the task of looking through his closet, so you take a seat in Idia’s gaming chair, which is still warm from him sitting in it, and sigh, laying a hand over your belly. He said that Ortho was here, but he must be out getting breakfast, since you didn’t immediately hear his high voice  shrilling in your ears, “Good morning!”

You like Ortho just fine. He’s not your ally, but being around him is better than being around Idia. You wished he’d been gone for longer. You sigh and your head begins to hurt, “Hi, Ortho.”

He giggles a little and puts down the takeout bag, smiling as he turns back to face you. And then he just stares, chartruse eyes boring into you.

“Ortho, is there a problem?” You can’t hold your tongue about this any longer. You have a headache and honestly you just want to take a fat nap and let the world, small as it has become for you, deal with itself.

Before he can respond, Idia strolls out of the bathroom, lazily greeting Ortho, “Hey, Ortho.”

“Hello!” His voice is just so grating. You want to throw something.

“Mmm.” Idia glances at you, walking over and nudging your shoulder with the back of his hand, like he’s shooing an animal, “Go lay down.”

“I don’t-”

“Did you ask Ortho for-”

“Would you stop interrupting me?” You snarl, turning to look at him.

He stiffens ever so slightly, then hunches down and digs through the takeout bag Ortho brought in, “Are you acting like this because you’re on your period?”

“Did you really just ask me-”

This time, it’s Ortho, not Idia, who interrupts you, “Oh, they won’t be having a period for a while.”

Idia freezes. You freeze. Ortho goes back to what he was doing, humming as he makes the bed. Idia turns to narrow his eyes at you, his eyes sliding down to look at your midsection and feet, and his eyes roll back into his head and he’s hitting the ground. Maybe if you cared more about him, you’d check to make sure that he was fine, but as it is now, you don’t really have the energy or wherewithal to do so. You rush into the bathroom and cower near the toilet, like there’s a tornado or something outside. You’re distressed.

He doesn’t know it, but Ortho just vocalized the actualization of all your fears, the culmination of your meager existent, all rolled up into this… this parasite in your stomach. You swallow your incoming hysteria and make a decision. You’re going to get up. You’re going to get a change of clothes. You’re going to take a shower. And you’ll be fine. You’ll figure this out. You always have before. You’ll do it again.

When you exit the bathroom, Ortho is blowing air into Idia’s pallid face, and Idia is groaning. You ignore the pair and go to the closet. You grab a change of clothes, the rabbit-themed set of pajamas, you walk into the bathroom, you turn on the water. About as soon as the stream hits your back, you’re screaming. Sobs break from your chest like a hammer going into ice, smashing its way out despite every effort you make to keep it together. You’ve barely got the peace of mind to quickly wash yourself, and when you exit- the water is cold, too cold for comfort- you dry. You feel twitchy, after crying so hard. You tug on the spaghetti strap shirt, the bunny face stretching against your skin, and then you’re staring at the hanger.

You remember reading something, a long, long time ago. You were far too young to be reading this type of thing, the gorier parts of feminism and women’s rights, but… you remember a passage. The wire twists apart easily as you remember the story. A woman, desperate to be rid of the parasitic growth in her womb, just as desperate as you are now, used a wire coat hanger to remove it. It’s been so long that you can’t remember how it ended for her, but you remember the rest very clearly. The bent end, no longer crooked after you bent it, slips into your opening so easily. You can barely feel it. then the door opens, you freeze,  and you hear Ortho scream.

“Idia!” He yells, and there are footsteps and a moment of silence.

You look up at Idia’s honey-colored eyes that are glued to the wire hanger sticking out of your body, see the way both of the Shroud boys are looking at your current unfinished action, see the slow spread of crimson into Idia’s long hair, starting at the tips and spreading like, well, like fire, to the roots. There’s that familiar three-tap warning, and then you drop the hanger, clutching at the collar as the strongest shock you’ve ever felt hits you like a truck. It’s worse than the time you didn’t want to hang out with him, worse than the times you’d stray too close to the door. It forces you to your knees, sets your body into convulsions that shake the twisted hanger out of you, makes you foam at the mouth.

Somewhere under your anguish, you think you hear Ortho robotically say, “BPM reaching critical levels.”

The current stops and your body stops convulsing, relaxing so hard that your world, small as it has become, goes black. When you awake, you’re reliving a distant memory: you’re bound, hands and ankles, on the bed. You’re dressed again, one of Idia’s hoodies draped over you like a blanket, and Idia is just staring at you, holding your collar. He looks pissed, but his hair isn’t red, at least. He’s noticed you’re awake, but he’s not saying anything. He turns slightly in his gaming chair and throws the strap of leather on his desk, the wiring fried. There are holes burnt into the leather, and Idia stares at it blankly before he starts typing away on his tablet, his own voice coming through the device.

It sounds about as burnt out as the shock collar looks, “I bet you feel pretty bad, huh?”

You don’t dignify that with a response. It doesn’t matter to him, since his fingers fly as he keeps typing away.

“You’re a fucking moron. Only someone stupid would try to-” He doesn’t finish the sentence and hits the desk, standing up and pacing. You can’t see him, but you can hear him panting. 

You try to de-escalate, sort of. The shock collar isn’t around your neck anymore, but you really don’t need him to work himself up again, “The word is ‘desperate.’ I don’t want… I don’t want this. This thing growing inside of me, I don’t-”

“You’re not the only one with a parasite.” His voice is quiet but seething. It breathily cuts through the air like a knife, aiming for your soft parts, “You just have the privilege of being able to get rid of yours comfortably.”

“Really? So you putting this thing in me isn’t as bad as I think it is?”

He paces back into view and you notice something missing. Someone missing. You lift your head a bit to look around and Idia takes a heavy seat at his desk again. This state is rare. It takes him a while to relax when he gets like this, but you’ve only seen it aimed at others, like that time his account got temporarily banned because one of his party members was hacking. At least that had an easy solution for him- you’ve never seen him grin as much as when he had the poor guy swatted and watched through the CCTV cameras around the poor fool's house.

“We’re going home. I’ll fix your little problem twofold, since I’m the only competent one between the two of us.” He types out, his recorded voice not lagging once.

“What? And what do you mean you have a parasite?”

He doesn’t look at you, but you think you see him wipe his cheek with his sleeve, typing with only one hand, “Ortho is gonna come back with some burn cream. I lost my temper and you got hurt. Not that you didn’t deserve it.”

“I didn’t deserve any of this. I asked you if you had a condom.”

He doesn’t respond to that statement, instead typing, “I don’t love you. You know that, right? Love is for the idealistic masses, those who aren’t capable of keeping their feet on the ground. You’re just someone who has taken up a space in my mind. So the solution to yours won’t be permanent. Seven knows my parents will be getting on my case about providing them an heir eventually.”

“So I’m just here for eventual marriage security?”

Idia doesn’t respond. Ortho strolls in, placing a tube on Idia’s desk and goes out of your line of sight, seemingly to tidy or something. You don’t really care. He’s not your ally. He’s never been.

Idia sighs, then goes back to working on something on his desk. You don’t know how much time passes, but he loops it around your throat and unties you. It’s sitting a bit lower on your neck, just against your collarbones. There’s a three-tap warning, but no shock afterward. Just the flat look on Idia’s face.

“I should start calling you ‘baby’, kitten. It’d be so much easier for you to understand your position.”

“That’s not funny.” You say, “I never asked you to bring me here.”

Idia shrugs, “Well, I don’t think of you as a pet. With the way you act, you might as well be a pest.” He grins, sharp teeth on display, “Maybe I should put out some glue traps… or start dosing you with raw garlic and ivermectin.” 

He starts laughing, and you feel your eyes well with tears. You tell yourself it's the pregnancy hormones. Idia laughs harder at your expression.

“Aw, kitten, I’m just teasing. Come sit with me.”

“But I-” That three-tap warning from your new collar cuts you off. You stand up and start walking the two steps between the bed and Idia’s desk. When you reach your hands towards the collar, it zaps you. It’s quick and not too painful, but it gets you moving towards Idia. When you take a seat on his lap, he leans to bury his nose in your hair, a thrilled noise escaping him. He drops the burn cream in your lap.

He just watches you as you unscrew the lid and reach for your neck. There’s a three-tap warning again- bzz bzz bzz- but you ignore it. The second your fingers barely graze your throat with the cream, you get zapped, short and swift, but uncomfortable enough. You drop your hand and it goes away. When you look up at Idia, he takes the cream from your other hand and presses a soft kiss to your cheek, using his free hand to click into one of his many tabs for some anime streaming site.

“Good. It works.” Is all he says.

As he dabs the cream onto the electrical burns on your neck, you have to blink away the despair again. It’s settled over you like a blanket, eaten holey by moths and worms. Every move you make is accompanied by tentative fear, a worry that Idia will do something awful if you do certain things. You never once considered it would go this far, though. Ortho drops something onto Idia’s bed, a hefty-looking luggage set, and Idia pays him no mind as he tucks away some clothes. You don’t want to admit it, but you don’t want to be around any more people under Idia’s thumb, whether they know it or not.

[ashintheairlikesnow]

🥄 Force-feeding for Ryan or Danny please

CW: Not-exactly-human whumpee, iron burns, mouth whump, intimate/creepy whumper, dehumanization

Every bite burns.

His palms press into the uneven old floor, fingers scraping along the stained, ancient tile. He has to lower himself down, lapping up the broth with his tongue, holding back a whimper as it tingles, burns, throbs. His gums ache, his teeth hurt, as he forces himself to chew a bit of beef, swallowing only with effort.

Ryan closes his eyes against the sting of tears.

"Good," Abraham says, voice low and husky. "Again."

He swallows, tasting iron and copper. The corners of his mouth are torn and bleeding, his lips roughly chapped. As the liquid coats his mouth, the skin pulls apart, reopening tender spots that had only just begun to heal. Blood mixes with the seasoning.

Tastebuds slough away as the iron Abraham has mixed into the stew moves over his tongue, leaving tender, unready tissue to burn ever deeper.

He has to take another bite.

Ryan forces himself to lean down, trying to focus on the burn of the muscles in his arms as they stretch to hold his weight, and laps up a little cooked carrot.

His mouth flashes in terrible pain.

He coughs, fighting the urge to spit it out, feeling the weight of Abraham's eyes on him. Ryan and Danny kneel side by side on the floor, and Ryan doesn't dare look at his brother.

Not because of what Abraham might do.

But because he's not sure if he looks into Danny's eyes, that there will be anything there in the blue eyes that look back. Sometimes, Danny just... isn't there, anymore.

Ryan isn't convinced he will always come back.

Ryan breathes, saltwater dripping into the stew. The iron in it burns all the way down his throat. A bright, hot ache grows in his chest and even down to his stomach.

There's only a few bites left.

He can't do this.

"Please," He whispers. "Please, I can't."

"Of course you can," Abraham coos, syrupy-sweet, leaning over to run his fingers through Ryan's tangled hair, scratching along his scalp. It sends goosebumps up and down Ryan's arms, and he fights the urge to jerk backwards.

Never pull away from Abraham's touch.

"You said you were hungry," Abraham continues, falsely sympathetic, petting Ryan like a frightened dog. White hair falls against his cheek as he looks down. "Didn't you? So finish your food, Faerie Boy. Neither of you gets up until it's gone."

"Nnn-" He catches himself.

Never say no.

Ryan groans instead of answering, staring down at what's left in the bowl. It's not that much-

It's too much.

It's so, so much.

It's going to hurt so much.

"Y-yes, Abraham," He whispers, because always answer Abraham, never hesitate when he speaks to you. The rules burn nearly as badly as the iron. The rules... and the fact that he knows every single one, now.

It's just a few more bites.

He can't do this-

He has to do this.

The iron collar around his throat burns on the outside, and every single bite burns all the way down within.

Abraham makes him lick up the blood that drips from his tongue, too.