#good question though thank you. i like to ponder

[bunnyjesters]

It has been shown in the pilot and intros that pain doesn’t actually seem to exist for the characters. Like Ragatha had a cleaver to her face and nothing happened and she just laughed it off. Gangle’s mask breaks but it doesn’t hurt. Just makes her sad. The only thing that hurts is abstraction…BUT an exception to that is Jax. Jax actually seems to react to physical stuff like being choked or being hit by that one Gloink. It’s almost like he actually feels pain.

What’s your take on it? And how would Pomni (your Pomni) react to this knowledge?

ackshually ☝️🤓

goose did confirm that all of the characters can feel pain, the intro video where that happens to rags i feel is more of a pilot of a pilot episode and not really canon to the actual show. i think it’s not exactly the same pain we might feel in the real world but definitely some sort of simulated experience, the same way that eating and sleeping keep them “sane” despite them being digital avatars and it not being entirely essential.

that being said, i think pomni reacting to jax in pain depends on where their relationship is at. obviously she’d be upset by it but if he’s being pretty actively mean to her she probably could justify it as karma or something — if this is post corn comic — which i find absolutely fucking hilarious that i can use that as part of my fanon timeline, i think it might cause her a little bit more distressing + would proactively try to find a solution

[dancingbirdie]

Okay so on Astarion, I was reading this fic about him not knowing Tavs true intentions with him and it bothering Astarion a lot, so what if he goes to some mage or magic user and asks them to show Tavs true intentions to him, when he does the vision he sees is just... being snuggled. It's Tav on top of him and the both of you are falling asleep, his hands are under your shirt softly petting your skin as your sleepy self is contently snuggled up to him. I just start crying about him finding out that Tavs DASTARDLY and EVIL plan with him, their greatest desire from him... is to simply be held. 🥺

Hi @goblin-creatcher! Thank you so much for this BEAUTIFUL prompt. I, uhh, kind of took it and went a million miles an hour with it. This is honestly one of my favorite things I've ever written. I hope you enjoy it as well! xoxoxo

Something Imagined / Something Real

Word Count: 3.9K

Rating: Mature

Pairing: Astarion x f!Tav

Warnings/Tags: Brief but detailed description of rough consensual sex, descriptions and references to Astarion's trauma/trauma responses, minor Act 1 and Act 2 spoilers, FLUFF, angst

Suggested Song Pairing: Slow Dancing in A Burning Room (Stripped) - cover by ST LUNA

Summary: Astarion has been suspicious of Tav’s true intentions toward him. He persuades Gale to cast a spell and reveal her motivations. ANGST and FLUFF ensue. A rewriting of Astarion’s confession scene from Act 2.

The sun had just begun to set on the campsite when Astarion decided to put his plan into action. He had waited until Tav departed with some of the other party members before making his way over to the wizard. Gale was too busy reassembling the bookshelf inside his tent to notice Astarion’s approach. It wasn’t until he gave a polite cough that Gale jumped and whirled to face him. 

“No, no, no,” he began all at once, hands raised in a sort of shooing motion. Astarion stared at him in confusion. “I can respect Tav’s indulging in your need for blood, but as I’ve said before: I taste terrible.” 

Astarion scoffed. “Charming. Actually, wizard, I was coming to request your aid in a different, though somewhat related, matter.”

“Really? Care to elaborate?” Gale responded, still somewhat wary. It wasn’t often he found himself alone with the vampire. 

“Testy, I see,” Astarion crooned teasingly. His knee-jerk response to people treating him like a monster, to behave in the most false saccharine sort of way. 

But he drew up short, censoring himself before saying anything else he might regret. He knew he needed to get on the wizard’s good side if he had any chance of getting the answers he sought. 

“I was hoping you knew a spell to reveal someone’s true intentions. Their… motivations for behaving in a certain way, so to speak,” he finished more seriously. 

Gale pondered the question for a moment before answering. 

“Hmm… yes, there is magic to determine that sort of thing… Although it’s been some time since I practiced it…” He trailed off, rubbing his chin in thought. 

“Why are you asking for such a thing?” he asked suddenly. 

Astarion had been prepared for this question, of course. No one did anything for free, no questions asked. He delivered his explanation perfectly, as he’d been rehearsing in his mind.

“One might say our dear sweet Tav and I have been growing a bit… closer these days, but I can sense a master manipulator when I see one. I just simply want to ensure their intentions toward me - toward the party - are true,” he replied with mock innocence. 

“Ah, yes,” Gale nodded. “I gathered as much when the two of you slipped away from the tiefling’s party a few nights ago.” 

“But,” he continued on,”I needn’t think you should worry when it comes to Tav. She seems about as transparent as they come. I’m sure any intentions she has toward you are true.”

Yes, but the best actors always mask their motivations behind innocence and transparency, Astarion thought to himself. I should know. I’ve been doing it for centuries.

After the party’s unfortunate meeting with that Gur in the Sunlit Wetlands, Astarion realized he would have to take potential threats from Cazador even more seriously. He wasn’t about to lose his freedom, not now that he finally had some small taste of it. 

It didn’t hurt to be more suspicious of everyone he encountered, even the sweetling Tav. Anyone could be an operative sent by Cazador, and the best ones would be as skilled as he was in the art of manipulation. It was well-known at this point that the person he’d grown the closest to on their journey was their brave party leader, Tav. Unlikely as it may be that she was scheming for his master, Astarion’s paranoia wouldn’t let him indulge in interactions with her a second longer unless he knew how she truly felt. 

Given Gale’s hesitation, Astarion knew he would have to kick his acting up a notch. Press on that wizard’s heartstrings. Touch the one nerve he knew he was sensitive to.

“Gale, darling, from one literally damaged soul to another, indulge me just this once,” Astarion beseeched him. 

The wizard glared at him a moment, before finally relenting with a heavy sigh. “Fine. Fine. But I want it known that I don’t agree with this so-called solution one whit,” he grumbled, pinching the bridge of his nose. 

“Yes, yes, noted and formally documented, on my word as a former Baldurian magistrate,” Astarion replied cheerily. “So, let’s hop to it then, shall we?”

“What, right now?” Gale asked, shocked. “Shouldn’t we be, I don’t know, a little less conspicuous?” 

“What better time than now?” Astarion responded. “Tav’s out gathering firewood with Wyll and Karlach. They won’t be back for some time. As for Lae’zel and Shadowheart, well…” he paused, gesturing over his shoulder. 

Said two were engaged in a heated sparring session on the outskirts of the camp. Snarls and curses could be heard emanating from both warriors as they tried, and failed, to gain the upper hand against their opponent.

“That lovers’ dance could go on until morning,” Astarion finished. 

“Fair point,” Gale admitted begrudgingly, grimacing at the sound of swords clashing violently. “Very well. Let’s get started.” 

Clearing his throat, Gale began to utter a series of phrases completely foreign to Astarion. He watched as the wizard began moving his hands in a wavelike pattern, forming a circle before them. Suddenly, a mist began to form from seemingly thin air, taking shape according to the boundaries Gale’s hands were creating. The mist grew more and more opaque until it appeared before them like a clouded mirror. 

As the fogginess of the ethereal magic began to clear, the “mirror” became a confusing blur of scenes whipping by, too fast for Astarion or Gale to really comprehend. There were flashes of Tav and Astarion, together and separate, but they disappeared too quickly to ascertain their context. It was as though the spell was shuffling through the entirety of Tav’s thoughts, assessing each one at breakneck speed. 

Finally, the spell slowed to a halt, stopping on one scene in particular. Astarion was struck speechless by what began playing out in the foggy portal before them. So distracted, he didn’t even notice Gale’s tight cough, or how the wizard suddenly became intensely interested in a copse of trees nearby, rather than the revelation the spell was revealing.

Not that the scene was especially profound, objectively speaking. In fact, to anyone else, it might be viewed as the least revelatory thing possible that the spell could have shown. Boring. Inconsequential, even. But to Astarion, it was almost earth shattering. 

He saw himself - he could see his face! - with Tav, lying tangled together in some immaculate four-poster bed. 

That was the first shock that coursed through him, nearly causing his knees to buckle. He was seeing himself for the first time in over 200 years. Or at least, he was seeing himself as Tav saw him. And… the person he saw… Well, he was gorgeous. White blonde locks, curled and tousled in a devil-may-care sort of way. A strong, patrician nose that suggested good breeding. High, sharp cheekbones. Full lips, upturned in a thoughtless grin. Red eyes bordered by long, sweeping lashes. Delicately pointed elven ears. Smooth alabaster skin, without blemish or spot. 

Astarion could scarcely believe his own eyes. 

The second shock to his system was the nature of their activities. He would have been less surprised had the vision shown them fucking. Him taking her roughly from behind perhaps. His name a cry of ecstasy from her lips as he pistoned in and out of her with a feral sort of determination. 

Fantasies of lust, of total domination, now those were things he was familiar with inspiring in the minds of the victims he had taken as lovers. It was what he strove for, in all honesty. Desire like that all but ensured he would capture his prey and live to serve another day for his master. 

But nothing of the sort was occurring between vision-Tav and himself. Instead, they were just… embracing? What in sweet hells was this?

She lay halfway on top of him. Her hair was mussed, perhaps from sleep or perhaps from previous lovemaking. One hand was drawing absentminded shapes across his chest, her lips trailing behind, leaving kisses in their wake. He watched as vision-Astarion chuckled softly, as his hands slipped beneath her sleepshirt to caress her waist, as he placed an innocent kiss on the top of Tav’s head. Eventually, she reached for his hand. They both watched their fingers intertwine, blissfully content.

It was the purest, unadulterated expression of affection that Astarion had ever seen. Something in his heart quaked at the sight of it. He wanted that moment. He envied, he hated, vision-Astarion for enjoying such apparent happiness.

So absorbed in the vision and its implications, Astarion failed to notice the soft padding of feet that indicated someone’s re-entry into the camp. 

“If the two of you are quite finished poking around in my head,” an angry voice suddenly spat from behind them, “I’d appreciate you preserving what little privacy I have left and shutting that damn spell off.”

Mortified, Astarion and Gale turned to see Tav, arms crossed and visibly seething with rage. Gale quickly dispelled the magic with a flick of his wrist. A blush was slowly but surely rising up Tav’s neck to reach her cheeks. Whether from rage or embarrassment, Astarion couldn’t be certain. 

“Tav, let us explain-” Astarion started.

“It was his idea-” Gale blurted at the same time, pointing at Astarion. 

Both paused, glaring at one another. But Tav would have none of their feeble attempts at backpedaling. 

“The explanation doesn’t matter. Whose idea it was doesn’t matter. The fact is that both of you violated the privacy of my mind, which I’ll remind you, has ALREADY been violated by having a bloody tadpole forced inside of it!” Tav shouted. At their words, the camp became enveloped in a heavy silence. Even the crickets ceased their chirping.

Astarion cringed inwardly, knowing the other party members could plainly hear this altercation and had likely stopped whatever it was that they had been doing to listen in. He noted the sounds of swords clanging together had ceased. He was certain Lae’zel and Shadowheart at least were aware of what was happening. Nosy bastards, all of them.

But what disturbed him even more was the realization that Tav’s eyes were welling with tears. She was too proud to acknowledge them or wipe them away. Such was her nature. But they were there nonetheless, and the knowledge that Astarion had brought her to the point of tears was enough to spur a rush of utter self-loathing inside him.

Without another word, Tav turned on her heel and marched stiffly out of camp, toward the direction of a nearby creek they’d identified as a water source earlier in the day.

“I can’t believe I let you convince me to perform that spell,” Gale said as she disappeared between the trees. He dragged his hands down his face. 

“How could we have been so doltish, forgetting that all of our privacies have already been violated with this tadpole business?”

Astarion didn’t have an answer to that. At least, not one the wizard could possibly understand. 

The thought hadn’t occurred to Astarion, he realized, because violations of privacy had been something so intrinsic to his being for over 200 years. He didn’t even recognize it as something abnormal. Like a fish unaware that the water surrounding it is, in fact, water. 

Violations of privacy were a part of life, at least for him. So much so that his request for Gale to perform that magic hadn’t even occurred to him as an overstepping of boundaries. To Astarion, it had simply been a matter of survival. He had needed to know another potentially manipulative person’s true intentions, and so he had found a means to uncover it and maintain the upper hand. 

Belatedly, he also realized that Gale’s hesitation to cast the spell had had nothing to do with being inconvenienced for the evening, but because the wizard had known that it was improper to do to another person. If he had misread that, Astarion wondered, then what other truly benevolent behaviors had he mistaken as pragmatic manipulation?

“I need to go find her,” Astarion murmured, clenching and unclenching his fists in an uncharacteristic fit of uncertainty. 

“Yes, you do,” Gale asserted. “We both owe her a sincere apology… if she’ll even accept it.”

“I’ll see if I can convince her to come back to camp,” Astarion replied, making to leave in the direction Tav had stormed off. 

“Wait,” Gale said, a hand on his shoulder. Astarion turned to meet his gaze. 

“Look, well, I’m obviously not an expert in healthy demonstrations of affection. But I do think it’s obvious from what you saw in that spell that Tav well and truly cares about you. In perhaps the purest way possible. Treat that carefully.”

Part of Astarion wanted to laugh aloud in utter hopelessness at the wizard’s advice. Someone cared for him? Truly and purely? No hidden games, no strings attached? Oh certainly, that wouldn’t be a problem for Astarion at all. Obviously, his 200-year existence as a master-manipulator-fetch-hound for a power-hungry vampire lord had perfectly prepared him to respond to this situation in a healthy manner. Obviously.

But all that was too much to reveal to someone he barely knew and too heavy to say aloud. Rather than giving some smarmy retort, Astarion opted instead to give a stiff nod and continue walking toward the edge of camp. He had no idea how he could make things right with Tav, but at the very least he could try. 

***

He found Tav sitting on a fallen tree near the edge of the creek bed. Her legs were drawn up to her chest, arms wrapped around them as she rested a cheek to her knees. In the waning twilight, she reminded Astarion of some misbegotten gargoyle perched on the roof of a temple, solitary and so very sad. 

Her ears twitched as she noted his arrival. Astarion wasn’t trying to be stealthy. On top of everything else, the last thing he needed to do was scare her. 

“Can I join you?” he asked softly, wincing to himself at the awkwardness of the question. 

The reality was that there was no way to broach this conversation without some stilted beginning, and he hated it. Navigating tricky conversations was normally something he excelled at. But as he was quickly finding, when it related to Tav, nothing in his past life had prepared him to respond to her well. 

“If you’d like,” Tav answered tonelessly. 

Knowing it was probably the best response he was going to get, Astarion swallowed thickly and moved to sit down on the log next to her. 

“I… wanted to… apologize for what you saw, back at camp,” he began.

“Apologize for doing it, or apologize for getting caught?” Tav asked as she turned her head to look at him, resting her other cheek on her knees. 

Astarion balked at the question. Her piercing gaze unnerved him. He hadn’t really thought that far. 

“Both, I suppose?” he answered honestly, although it sounded more like a question to Tav. She huffed a laugh.

“You know, part of me really wants to yell at you. Scream in your face. Tell you off proper,” she mused.

“So why don’t you?” Astarion asked, perplexed. 

Tav didn’t respond at first, just sat there studying him. As if by staring at him long enough, she could project the answer into his mind. 

Astarion didn’t interrupt her, much as he would have liked to. Part of him always bristled when people gazed at him for too long. It was unfair that they could study him, when he hadn’t been able to so much as glance at his reflection in over 200 years. 

Finally, Tav released a heavy sigh, her body curling further in on itself. She closed her eyes as she spoke.

“Because then I would be just like every other bastard in your life who’s mistreated you.”

Astarion flinched in surprise. Those had not been the sort of words he’d been expecting. The truth of them cut deeper than had she raged at him like she wanted to. It left him feeling even more vulnerable, and that in turn made him want to retreat into the comfort of viciousness.

“I don’t need you to pull any punches,” he scoffed, glaring at her. “Go ahead and say what you will.”

She straightened up at his tone, opening her eyes and returning his glare. 

“No. I don’t want to,” she said testily.

“I don’t need your pity,” he hissed. “It’s insulting.”

“Gods damn it all, Astarion!” Tav exclaimed suddenly, causing him to jump in surprise. She threw her hands up in defeat. “I’m not doing anything out of pity! I don’t want to rage at you, because I know that whatever I say right now, I won’t mean it come the morning!”

Astarion blinked. Once again he was left feeling flat footed by the turn of the conversation. Sensing his surprise, Tav continued on with her deluge of words.

“You hurt me tonight, and I’m angry at you - and at Gale, for that matter - for what you did. But you’ve shared enough of your… history… with me, that I realize your behavior is just… just a byproduct of centuries of abuse and manipulation you’ve endured! And I won’t be another abuser in your life. I won’t,” she asserted. 

Astarion continued staring at her, as if she were some otherworldly creature that had just wandered across his path. He watched as Tav inhaled a deep breath, releasing it shakily. She turned away from him to peer out into the forest, uncertain. She opened and closed her mouth several times before actually speaking. As if whatever she was about to say was more intimidating to her than anything else she’d said tonight. 

“I… care deeply for you, Astarion,” she said quietly. “You obviously saw that in the vision. I’m not playing any games. There’s no hidden motive. I’m not trying to manipulate you.”

She turned to look at him again before continuing, her breathing a bit unsteady. 

“I didn’t sleep with you that night of the tiefling party as some sort of maneuver to gain your trust. Although I understand if that was your motivation for doing so.” 

Astarion’s expression morphed into one of guilt. But Tav nodded soberly, as if she had already expected it, before continuing on. 

“It’s okay. I’m not angry. But I’m putting all my cards on the table now, so to speak. Actually, your decision tonight forced my hand, but I had been planning on telling you soon anyway. So, there you have it. The truth of my intentions. What you do with that information is up to you.”

She turned back to gaze out at their surroundings. Like she was giving him the opportunity to bolt away without her watching him. As if she expected him to flee from her confession. 

But Astarion didn’t flee. He remained seated, staring at her in complete wonderment. 

“Why?” he asked quietly.

She looked back at him again, confusion evident on her face. 

“Why what?”

“Why do you care for me? You’re so… well-adjusted. And I’m well… this,” he finished lamely, placing a hand on his chest. 

Tav pursed her lips. “It would be a mistake to misconstrue my empathy for you as me being well-adjusted. Everyone has their own demons, Astarion,” she murmured. “Mine just look different from yours.”

Astarion mulled her words over in his mind, considering them. He leaned forward to brace his forearms on his knees, his head drooping slightly. 

“I…,” he started, unsure. “That vision… what it implied… You deserve something real, Tav. You’re incredible… truly.” 

Tav closed her eyes, bracing for the fallout. Even though she would accept his decision, whatever it was, she didn’t think she could bear to watch him deny her. It would hurt too much. 

“Look. When we met, I had a plan. A nice, simple plan,” he blurted all at once. Rising swiftly to his feet, Tav watched as he began to pace before her, near to bursting with frenetic energy. 

“Seduce you, sleep with you, manipulate your feelings so you’d never turn on me,” he counted off, laughing half-heartedly. “It was… easy - instinctive. Habits from two hundred years of charming people kicked in. All you had to do was fall for it. And all I had to do… was not fall for you… which is where my nice, simple plan fell apart,” he finished, stopping to stand before her. 

She held his gaze, speechless. 

“I want you,” he whispered fervently. “I want what was in that vision… I want us to be something real.”

Never in a million years had she thought he would respond to her like this. She opened her mouth to speak, but Astarion cut her off with another sudden exclamation. 

“I just don’t know what real is,” he confessed, his tone a touch hysterical. Tav knew from his body language that being this transparent was completely out of Astarion’s comfort zone. 

“Being… close to someone - any kind of intimacy - was something I performed to lure people back. For him. Even though I know things between us are different, being with someone still feels… tainted. Still brings up those feelings of disgust, and loathing. I… I don’t know how else to be with someone. No matter how much I’d like to,” he finished, staring at her with beseeching eyes, willing her to understand.

Tav rose to her feet, coming to stand before him. 

“I don’t want you for your body,” she whispered. “Or to perform any acts of intimacy. We can be together, without sleeping together, for as long as you need.”

“Really,” he asked softly, his voice pitched low, rough with emotion.

“Really,” Tav asserted, giving him a small smile. “Would it be all right if…” she paused, conflicted. He eyed her curiously.

“Could I hug you?” she whispered.

The fact that she asked before doing so caused a well of emotion to spring up inside him. Eyes watering, Astarion nodded. 

Slowly, Tav moved forward to wrap her arms around his waist. Her head nestled into the crook of his neck and shoulder. A perfect fit. He felt her exhale a deep sigh.

Tav hugging him was a sensation unlike any he had ever felt. At least, any he could remember feeling. The act of being touched, embraced, without any desire for something more. She just wanted to hold him, feel him close to her. It was incomprehensible to him, but utterly enjoyable, at the same time. 

Slowly, ever so slowly, Astarion raised his arms to return Tav’s embrace. Drawing her even closer, he bowed his head to rest his cheek against her hair. It was soft, like the finest silk. He closed his eyes as he inhaled deeply, appreciating her sweet, floral scent.   

She made to pull away after a moment, not wishing to overwhelm him. But Astarion gripped her more firmly, a silent urge for them to stay that way a little longer. 

“This… this is nice,” he whispered. 

He both felt and heard Tav hum contentedly in response. 

It wasn’t identical to the vision from Tav’s mind that he had seen, but Astarion reveled in their embrace nonetheless. It felt like the beginning of something new. And for the first time in his very, very long life, Astarion felt excited at the prospects of what would come next. 

[writingdumpster]

secret wife

pairing: Bob Floyd x fem!reader

warnings: none, all fluff

summary: When you go to pick up Bob at the base the dagger squad finds out that Bob's been keeping a wife from them.

word count: 1k

A/N: Thanks for 3k followers!

Bob pulled his phone out of his locker as the guys all piled into the locker room behind him. There was a text from you awaiting Bob. 

I’m waiting in the lobby for you. Don’t take too long. xoxo

“Did you guys see the hot girl in the lobby?” Coyote asked as he walked into the locker room. Bob smirked to himself as he started to take off his flight suit. 

“Who do you think she is?” Fanboy pondered. 

“I was gonna find out after we got changed,” Rooster said. 

“Don’t bother. Bet she’s a recruit’s girlfriend,” Payback suggested. 

“Who do you think?” Asked Hangman. 

“I don’t know,” Payback responded. “But I know what a woman in love looks like.”

“I don’t believe that,” Hangman teased Payback. 

“I’m married,” Payback pointed out. 

“So you tell us, but we’ve never seen your wife,” Rooster taunted. 

“Her picture is on my dash,” Payback said. 

“Could be anyone,” Fanboy joined in. 

“You’ve met her, Fanboy,” Payback said. 

“You can’t prove anything,” Fanboy teased. Bob was quietly enjoying the conversation as he grabbed the rest of his things. He slipped his bag over his shoulders and closed his locker. 

“See y’all tomorrow,” Bob said as he headed out to meet you in the lobby. When he rounded the corner his smile widened as you stood to greet him. You were wearing paint stained jeans and an old t-shirt that used to be Bob’s, but it had been years since that was true. It was yours now, just like he was. 

“You changed out of the flight suit,” you said forlornly when Bob walked up. 

“It was all sweaty, angel,” Bob told you.

“I wanted to take it off you though,” you whined. Bob gave you a cheeky grin. 

“You want me to put on the white uniform when I get home?” Bob offered. He leaned down and kissed you tenderly before you could answer. 

“The hot girl is your girlfriend?” Hangman practically shouted from behind Bob. He turned over his shoulder to see the whole squad watching the two of you. 

“Wife, actually,” Bob said. “Been meaning to introduce ya.” 

“You didn’t say you have a wife!” Phoenix exclaimed. 

“Didn’t come up,” Bob said. “We’ve only known each other for a month.” Everyone gawked at Bob, thinking a month was plenty of time to let your friends know you have a wife. 

“He likes to keep me protected from his work,” you piped in when Bob failed to explain himself. Bob wound his fingers between yours. He lifted your hand and pressed a kiss to the back of it. 

“What’s your name?” Phoenix asked. 

“Y/N,” you told her. 

“I can’t believe you didn’t tell me,” Phoenix murmured. You could hear in her voice that she felt betrayed by Bob. You knew he wouldn’t notice though. You wanted to stop him from hurting her more.

“I keep my ring on my dog tags,” Bob said, pulling them up from his shirt to prove it. 

“I thought it was your dad’s,” Phoenix told him. “You always talk about him.” 

“Bobby’s told me a lot about you,” you interjected. “I was hoping you would have dinner with us. I’d like to make the pilot who saved my Bobby a good meal.” Phoenix met your eye and you gave her a warm smile. She gave a tiny nod and smiled back. 

“I’d love to, ma’am,” Phoenix said. 

“I’m her wingman,” Rooster called. “Could say that I kept Bobby safe too.” Bob blushed brightly. 

“Payback and I were on the mission,” Fanboy said.

“I saved Bob’s wingman,” Hangman added. You looked up at Bob in question. 

“They know you’re the one who makes my lunches now,” Bob said. You giggled. You always made Bob his lunches. When he was deployed he didn’t get good home cooked meals, so you made sure he had them three times a day when he was home with you. 

“Well, some of you might have to sit on the couch, but I’d be happy to cook for my husband’s friends,” you said.  

“I can’t believe that baby on board has a wife and you don’t even have a girlfriend,” Hangman teased Rooster. 

“You don’t either,” Rooster spit back. 

“No woman can hold me down,” Hangman joked. 

“He’s the one your sister would like, right?” You asked, trying to keep your voice quiet. 

“You’ve got a sister?” Hangman called out. 

“Yeah,” Bob said. “And I’m quite sure she could hold you down if she wanted.” Hangman’s eyes widened. You chuckled. 

“You’re going to set him up with your sister?” Rooster complained. 

“That’s y/n’s scheme. She wants my sister to live near us,” Bob explained. 

“She’s funnier than you, Bobby,” you said. 

“You do spend a lot of time laughing at me together,” Bob teased. He didn’t really mind though. Everytime he had come home to find you and his sister in tears from laughing so hard it had made him even more sure that he’d chosen the right person to marry. 

“Well, when do I get to meet her?” Hangman asked, a wide smirk on his face. 

“I’ll have her come over for dinner with all of you,” you said. “Next Sunday at 6:00. Don’t be late,” you told them. Then you tugged on Bob’s hand, signaling you wanted to go home. 

“Bye, guys,” Bob said. “See ya in the morning.” With that he slung his arm around your shoulders and led you out of the base. 

“I can’t believe Bob didn’t tell us he has a wife,” Payback muttered. 

“I can’t believe Hangman’s the first choice for his sister,” Fanboy said. 

“Why not? You think Bob wants to be related to any of you?” Hangman asked proudly. Rooster snorted. 

“Yes. I would have thought he’d want any of us before you.”  

A/N: There is a part two of the dinner now available

[lovebugism]

Hi there 👋🏻 I've been binge reading your stories lately and I love them all! I have a request if you're up for it. Could you write one where shy!reader doesn't like her laugh because some people think it's annoying but Eddie loves it? Totally not self-projecting by the way! 🙃 Thank you!

thank you angel! please enjoy :D — eddie comforts you when he finds out an old boyfriend made you hate your laugh (shy!fem!r, established relationship, hurt/comfort, 1k)

You and Eddie sit on opposite sides of the worn, sunken-in couch — long legs bent at the knees, socked feet wedged neatly beneath your thighs. Your bare calves rest on either side of his lap while his calloused palms rub up and down the length of them. His touch is largely absentminded as he tries hopelessly not to laugh through the punchline of his own joke.

“—And I was like, ‘Boom. You lookin’ for this?’”

You think the brown-eyed look of expectancy he gives you is funnier than anything. You smile wide, hiding the sparkling expression behind your palm.

Eddie meets your beam with a boyish pout. He repeats the punchline, more serious this time. “And I was like, ‘Boom’—”

“I heard you, Eds,” you assure with a small chuckle. A mere breath of a laugh.

His frown deepens. “Oh, c’mon!” he exclaims, lifting his hands in protest. They drop back to your ankles a second later. “That was funny! That always kills with Hellfire!”

You nod rapidly, brows raised and eyes wide, like a parent comforting a child. “It was good,” you assure quickly.

“Then why aren’t you laughing?”

“So, what— I have to laugh if I think something’s funny?”

“Well, that’s usually how it works, yeah,” Eddie monotones with a flat face, nodding until his wild curls sway around his jaw. He shrugs lazily a second later and jokes, “If you’re not a psychopath, at least… You’re not a serial killer, are you?”

You meet his narrowed eyes with a more pensive gaze. Your lips purse to the side of your mouth as you jokingly ponder the silly question. “No,” you answer after a few long moments. “Not yet, anyway.”

Eddie nods like he’s relieved. “Nice.”

“There’s still time, though,” you add with a scrunched nose.

He scrunches the bridge of his back. “I’ll take that risk,” he says with a small huff before lifting his weight on his knuckles. The old couch creaks in protest as he leans over to kiss you. 

With a poorly bitten-back grin, you meet him halfway. Your mouths smack together in a fleeting kiss that tastes faintly of frozen pizza.

You settle back on the arm of the couch with Eddie’s socked toes wriggling under your thighs. His thumbs continue tracing shapes on the insides of your calves. He watches you watch the staticky television screen, too wound up about the whole thing to join in on the stupid sitcom.

The subtly overwhelming feeling bubbles in his throat until it spills like vomit from his mouth. “Do you think I’m not funny or something?” he blurts, then goes all shy right after. “Is that why… Is that why you don’t really laugh at my jokes?”

Your breathy scoff only further proves his point. “I laugh at your jokes all the time, Eds.”

He shrugs, unconvinced. “I mean… I guess. You, like, breathe really hard through your nose or whatever, but you don’t… You don’t laugh.”

“I think if you heard me laugh, you’d break up with me,” you joke and don’t think twice about how self-deprecating it is.

Eddie’s face twists at the thought — that he’d ever want to break up with you, or that there’d be a part of you he wouldn’t automatically adore on instinct. “Why would you say that?” 

You shrug with a vague I don’t know type of sound and turn back to the television. “My laugh is just weird, I guess....”

“No one’s laugh is weird!” Eddie insists. “It’s, like, the one sound people make when they’re happiest— It can’t be weird.”

You flash him a deadpan look of silent disagreement.

He caves.

“Okay. Fine. Dustin Henderson’s laugh is weird,” he concludes. “But… that’s just because he’s Dustin, you know?”

You breathe a faint chuckle at that. Almost like you’ve trained yourself to be as quiet in your laughter as you can. 

“My last boyfriend thought my laugh was annoying,” you confess like it’s no big deal. “So eventually I just kinda… stopped.”

Eddie’s soft features harden into a solemn frown. “What a fucking prick…” he grumbles like a storm cloud.

“It’s okay. I got over it. Mostly.”

He squeezes the backs of your calves with a pair of ringed hands, a warm and reassuring touch. “Well, I don’t think anything you do could annoy me,” Eddie tells you, tilting his head to the side until his wild curls bunch at his shoulders. “Just so we’re clear.”

Something in your chest flutters — like there’s a thousand moths trapped behind your ribcage. “Good to know,” you tease in the same sardonic tone.

Eddie rises suddenly, tugging at your ankles until you’re lying flatter on the couch. A squeal sound in your throat as you watch him rise to his knees and lean over you. He digs his fingers gently into the plush of your sides before you can blink. 

“Get off!” you swat at him, laughing loudly at the tickling sensation before you can help it. The golden sound spills from your lips and fills the dim trailer with so many little sunbeams. 

Your face heats at the proud, lopsided smile Eddie gives you.

“Get off,” you repeat, sterner now but still mostly playful. You’re only slightly surprised when Eddie obeys without pouting. You sit up a bit more and tug your shirt down from where it had ridden up. “And stop looking at me like that.”

Eddie fights to purse his beam to the side of his mouth. Your sparkling, unsmiling disposition is impossible not to smile at. “Can’t help it,” the boy shrugs with a stupid grin. “You’re too cute.”

Your face scrunches in disdain of his compliment. You prop your back against the couch and cross your arms over your chest, averting your gaze to the TV once more. “Just drive me home,” you grumble in protest, hardly meaning it.

“No can do, sweet thing,” Eddie says with a sympathetic sigh, dropping a heavy arm around your shoulder to pull you into his chest. You melt begrudgingly into his sloppy embrace. He presses a kiss to your hair and mumbles into your temple. “‘M never letting you go, actually.”

And, despite your very obvious pouting, you pray he never breaks his promise.

[dollwrites]

𝗰𝗼𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝘄𝗮𝗿𝗻𝗶𝗻𝗴𝘀 ∣ smut ( minors dni ), fem!reader, dub con, virginity loss, suggested sex work / trafficking, pantalone is kind of rough, fingering, all characters featured are aged 18+

𝗶𝗺𝗽𝗼𝗿𝘁𝗮𝗻𝘁 ∣ please reblog && leave feedback. not proofread so there’s probably mistakes. thanks for reading < 3

𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗸𝘁𝗼𝗯𝗲𝗿 𝟮𝟬𝟮𝟯 ∣ day nineteen [ pantalone + experience / power dynamic ]

“L-like this?”

you shuddered at the position you found yourself in. not simply because the air in Snezhnaya was chilled. not simply because you were stark naked in a darkened room, lain upon silk and fur bedding you that held no familiar scent, but because you were afraid of the man standing at the foot of the bed. afraid of what he might do once you laid on your stomach like he’d asked. though his voice was softer than most men in Snezhnaya, he sounded all the more wicked because of it. like a devil with a sugar-coated tongue.

“Oh, dear…” he purrs from behind you, but when you feel a warm brush of gloved digits along the small of your back, you flinch. you’re grateful that he can’t see the way you hide, burying your face in the fur beneath you. “Not quite. How am I going to fuck you if you’re flat like this?” a low and daunting chuckle bubbles up from the depths of his chest. “Here, allow me to help you.”

you hadn’t been expecting what happened next.

his hand dipped between your thighs, middle two fingers worming their way into your virgin entrance without warning. you elicit a soft whine of uncertain protest. sliding deep enough to anchor them against your spasming wall, his palm pressed flush against your core, Pantalone pulls your lower half off the bed. you cry out, and bite against the fur blanket, feeling his fingers pushing hard inside you as he positions you by the grip on your cunt alone.

“There we are. You look much prettier with your back arched, and your ass in the air, and even moreso with fingers in your pussy. My fingers” he murmurs, taking a few moments to tease your insides, his digits probe and rub your sensitive, spongy walls, as if gauging how good you feel. “You’re warm. As tight as I expected. Perhaps you are worth an investment, after all.”

“Gentle, please—“ you whine, your hands already grasping for the bedding underneath you, your voice muffled from the blanket between your teeth, and you look over your shoulder and up at him with a pleading gaze. his spectacles hang from their chain around his neck, as if he feared they would fog up from the playtime. but you see his eyes shape into crescents as he simpered wide.

“Do you think you have any say whatsoever in what I do with you, my dear?”

the question catches you off guard, your eyes widen at how direct it is, and you ponder it, dumbfounded.

“I— I—“

Pantalone takes note of the gears working in your head and he chuckles, pulling his fingers from your depths, he uses them to tease the elasticity of your entrance instead, spreading you open until you groan and squirm. a plea for him to stop never makes it past your lips, because he’s already swooning.

“Don’t hurt yourself trying to come up with an answer, dear. It’s all right if you don’t know, I know how hard it must be for you to wrack your simple, little brain. I’ll generously enlighten you. You cost me quite a bit of mora to procure. That means I own you, dear. Now, be a good, little investment.” his voice drops to a low, threatening octave as his free hand presses down hard between your shoulder blades, forcing your upper half back against the fur. it tickles your face, and smells of clean, expensive cologne. “Comply for me, dear. Reach back here and spread those pretty lips, let’s see that eager, virgin hole.”

your face was on fire as he demands this of you, and you didn’t know if you could do such a humiliating act, but your arms move before you’ve fully decided, acting without your consent to reach around. trembling fingertips press against your own folds, spreading them with a soft whimper as the cool air tickles your most vulnerable region once it’s completely open and exposed.

you can no longer see him, and he’s moved away from your body, but you can hear the rustling of heavy furs and fabrics as he sheds his garments. you shudder again, realizing that in a moment he’ll be naked, and even though you’d never done this before, you knew what would follow.

“Very good, put your sweet cunt on display for me. Show me how tight you are, I want to compare this sight to how stretched you’ll be when I’m finished, drooling cum and twitching.”

“G-gentle, please…!” you murmur again, but this time it’s much softer and more hopeless, punctuated by a flustered, little squeak when two warm hands grasp your hips. he’s no longer wearing his gloves, and his willowy digits dig into your supple hips, nails scraping at the outer most layer.

“You make such a beautiful, pathetic parrot, my dear. Always repeating yourself, begging to be treated with care.” Pantalone chuckles and pulls you close, allowing the swollen tip of his dick to prod against your opening. you gasp, wanting to recoil. your fingertips twitch and yearn to push the intruder away, but you manage to stay still, though rather shaky. “But I don’t want you to be a parrot, my pet. Oh no, I want to make you a songbird.”

as he croons his intentions, he forces his cock against your delicate opening, tunneling into untapped innocence with a full thrust, and you cry out with tears in your eyes. your nails bite at your own skin as you try to grasp for something to relieve some of the sting of being stretched for the first time, but Pantalone only chuckles and leans over, dragging his broad chest against your shoulder, his lips against your cheek as he murmurs. “There you go, my naive little bird. I will make you sing louder and louder. Until your throat burns for me, and your body craves my cock above all else.”

[exitpursuedbyavulcan]

What is Broken II (Aemond Targaryen x Pregnant Wife!Reader)

The war, the "Dance of the Dragons," as they have come to call it, is over. And yet, you are not celebrating. You have just learned that your husband, Prince Aemond, spent the last months of the war with another woman in his bed. Not only that, but his mistress is pregnant. Just like you...

Pairing: Aemond Targaryen x fem!reader (third person, no use of Y/N), side Aemond Targaryen x Alys Rivers

Warnings: Angst, pregnancy and related symptoms, infidelity.

Author's Note: So, this did end up getting split in two. It just reached a natural stopping point and it made more sense to add a part IV instead of have an unnaturally long part II.

Taglist is done via reblogs

What is Broken

The next morning, she watched with red-rimmed eyes as the sun emerged over the horizon. As the brightness forced her to look away, she took a moment to thank whichever god had given her the foresight to send Aemond to sleep elsewhere. It had been another horrid night, and to explain it after all that had been said between them would have been far beyond miserable.

He would return soon, she was sure. With new honeyed words and gentle touches. With his beautiful pleading eye and perfect pouting mouth. With the softness of the elusive loving smile he reserved only for her.

Or did he? He had given Alys so many things she thought only they shared. Why wouldn’t he give the whore that smile as well?

The very thought had her stomach lurching again, but she raised herself to sit against the head of the bed and steeled herself against being sick. She took deep, controlled breaths, turned towards the eastern window to feel the fresh air coming off the bay, and set her mind free to wander.

Not entirely free, however. She did not let her thoughts go anywhere near her husband.

Instead, she thought of only nice things. The flowers that would soon bloom in the gardens with the coming of spring. The fresh fruits that would once more grace her table. Weather fine enough that she could ride through the Kingswood on her beloved steed, Litse, once more.

Eventually, the roiling faded, and she looked down to her stomach. “Kōdrȳsi rhinkpa jemo gaomua hae jālosa yno gaoman?” Is that as unpleasant for you as it is for me?

A soft thump near the top of her stomach felt very much like a noncommittal answer.

She laughed a little. “Iā jeme ñuha boteri raqāt daor?” Or do you enjoy making me suffer?

That question received no answer.

Just when she was about to say something more, she heard the door to her chambers creaking open and soft footsteps approaching. Of course, he would come to her so early; he had always slept so little. She clenched the sheets in her fists, preparing to face Aemond once more.

But it was not Aemond who walked through the door.

Instead of a single violet eye, she was met with a warm, brown, tear-filled pair that matched her own, and a helpless cry escaped her lips before desperate sobs overtook her. “Mama!”

Alicent ran to her side, taking her only remaining daughter in her arms and fighting back her tears. One hand rubbed soothing circles on her back while the other gently cupped her chin and lifted it so she could look into her daughter’s eyes. “Oh, my dearest girl…”

She buried her face in her mother’s rich auburn hair, savoring the comforting smell she’d known since infancy. There was no question that Alicent had been told about Aemond’s misdeeds – though whether he told her himself or she heard another way, she could not decide.

“I hate him,” she whispered weakly.

“No, you don’t,” Alicent countered immediately. She pulled away, took her hands, and softened her voice. “You are not capable of hating Aemond, my dear. Nor is he capable of hating you.”

“Then why did he do this to me?”

Alicent sighed, brow furrowing as she pondered her son’s actions. She did not have a good answer, for Aemond had always been the perfect son, save for the death of Lucerys Velaryon, and now, she supposed, this. It was behavior she had anticipated from Aegon, or had in the past. With her eldest son, she knew he acted out of his anger that he could not be the son his father wanted.

But with Aemond…

Aemond loved his wife. He was discontented with many things in his life – his position as the second son, his injury, and his father’s negligence – but never with her. His gaze had never strayed to any other woman, even before their engagement. Once they were betrothed, it was rare to find his gaze anywhere else but on her. He was so happy with her, always. What could have altered his devotion?

“I do not know,” Alicent finally answered. The words did little to soothe her weeping daughter. “Men… they can be wonderful when they truly love you. But even then, they have their weaknesses. Aemond was gone a very long time. Perhaps he was simply lonely?”

She shook her head and ripped her hands from her mother’s. “If he was lonely, he could have come back to me. He was supposed to return to me several times but never did.”

While Aemond was at Harrenhal, she, Aegon, and their grandsire had sent countless ravens asking for his return. Otto and Aegon asked so they could hear the news from the battlefield and try to adjust their plans accordingly. She asked because she missed and needed him. Badly.

He always sent some excuse. The battle was not yet over. Vhagar was too tired to fly. He did not want to leave his stronghold undefended when enemies lurked nearby. She had trusted each excuse like a fool.

“Did you know she’s carrying his child?” she asked, drawing the blankets further up her chest as if she could protect the life inside her from the horrible fact.

Alicent nodded. “I did. He told me.”

She frowned. At least Aemond had the decency to tell their mother himself. “What else did he tell you?”

“He was very upset, my dear.” She tried to suppress the kernel of joy that sparked at her mother’s words. “Not at you, of course, but at himself.”

“As he should be.”

“Yes, he should. But he loves you so much,” Alicent grimaced, setting a hand on her daughter’s belly. “And he loves your family so much. He is inconsolable at the thought that you may never forgive him.”

That kernel of joy went up in flames, and she looked at her mother with unfettered rage. “Why should I forgive him? He has betrayed me and has done nothing to regain my trust beyond his weak, selfish apologies.”

“Yes, but –”

“He lied to me again last night!” she cried. “He said it was only once. He looked me in the eye and lied! And he thought I would be stupid enough to believe him.”

Alicent sighed heavily as she looked away from her daughter. This wasn’t like Aemond – none of it was. Even after hearing his tearful explanation the night before, she was no closer to understanding it. Nor to finding a way to fix it.

“That was wrong of him,” she said at last. “All of it was – is. My dear, I do not know what to say or how to make it better. Your father, for all his faults, never strayed. I cannot begin to imagine the pain you are in. But – ”

“But what?” Her daughter glared at her with narrowed eyes, and her hand clenched into a fist by her side. “I cannot begin to imagine forgiving him, nor how I will ever look at him again without feeling this… this rage. Mother, I cannot be a wife to someone who hurt me so deeply, no matter his supposed remorse.”

She looked down at her stomach, then back to her mother. Though her eyes were red and wet, and her lip trembled, she wore a look of absolute determination. “I want to go. I don’t know where, but I don’t want to be here. I can’t bear to be with him.”

“Oh, my darling,” the queen pulled her daughter to her chest once more, not speaking again until she had calmed. “In any other circumstance, I would arrange for you to leave for Oldtown within the day. But it is not so simple.”

The princess stiffened in her mother’s arms.

“There are so few of us left, and we have already spent so much time apart. We cannot let ourselves become estranged.” Alicent bowed her forehead to rest against her daughter’s. “We cannot appear weak, especially not you and Aemond.”

She was frozen, but at that, she gathered enough strength to lift her eyes to look at her mother. “What do you mean, ‘especially’ not us?”

“There are no more heirs, darling, not of our line. But you,” her hand rested gently on her daughter’s cheek. “You are changing that. In mere weeks, your children – yours and Aemond’s – will become the new heirs to the throne.”

“They might not,” she argued weakly, her voice soft and breathless. “They may be daughters.”

Alicent smiled sadly, placing a hand gently at the top of the girl’s stomach. “This one has given you enough trouble that I would wager the Red Keep itself that he’s a boy.”

She put her hand over her mother’s as she tried and failed to smile. The Maester came to the same conclusion many weeks ago. Then, she had been thrilled at the possibility of giving Aemond an heir. Now, she wished desperately for daughters.

“Why do our heirs matter?” She asked. “Aegon will remarry and have his own soon enough.”

The question was met by a heavy, cloying silence.

“Mother?”

Alicent schooled her face into the careful neutrality that had served her so well as queen, though the tears shining in her dark eyes betrayed her heartbreak and grief. “I am afraid Aegon will not marry nor sire any more heirs. The Maesters… they predict he will leave us by the year’s end.”

Her heart stopped, then sank. “But that means Aemond…”

“Will be king soon,” Alicent confirmed. She again brushed her daughter’s hair behind her ears. “And you will be his queen.”

The implication hung over her like a black cloud: a queen could never leave her king.

-

Aemond knelt in the Royal Sept at the feet of the Father. He had not slept the night before, not after he told his mother what had happened and watched her cry harder than he had ever seen. He’d gone all the way back to his rooms – those he shared with his wife – before remembering the promise he had made.

He could not go back to her. To her arms. To his home.

So, he ended up in the Sept. He didn’t remember walking there, leaving the Holdfast and crossing the upper bailey. He just knew he’d been kneeling there long before the sun crested the horizon. He’d prayed and wept and begged the gods to either reveal to him a path to redemption or strike him down and spare him further torment.

The gods ignored him. He could not blame them for it.

His lamenting was halted by the sound of the carved stone doors opening, followed by a strangle rattling sound Aemond could not identify. He turned and saw his brother and king for the first time in months.

A servant stood behind Aegon to push the wheeled chair in which the kind sat with a blanket over his lap to conceal his crooked, atrophied legs, but was dismissed with a wave of a red, scarred hand. Aegon’s injuries after Rook’s Rest had been so horrific even Aemond struggled to look at him. The scars he now bore were hardly better. The king looked twisted, broken, and weak. It was a miracle little Jaehaera could look at her father without collapsing in terror.

As Aegon wheeled himself down the Sept aisle, Aemond steeled himself against the horrible expression on his brother’s face: empathy, disappointment, and rage.

In their youth, even Aegon had been protective of their youngest sister, to the point that he restrained himself from making too many lewd comments in her presence. And after years of Aemond calling him depraved, perverted, and whorish, he would, of course, delight in the irony that his little brother was just as weak as him.

“I wouldn’t have believed it,” Aegon drawled. His voice was as damaged as his body, weak and rasping. “But then I saw our mother. I always thought I was the only one that could make her look like that. So sad and weepy and disappointed.”

Aemond reminded himself that Aegon was finally the uncontested king and that throttling the life from him was now more than ever considered treason. “I hardly think you are qualified to pass judgment on me,” he growled.

“No,” Aegon smirked as he brought his chair to a stop at Aemond’s side. “But I think I am well qualified to gloat, don’t you?”

Suppressing his sneer, Aemond turned to face his brother. “Are you? How many unsuitable women have you bedded? How many bastards have you sired?” He scoffed, but his threadbare feeling of righteousness immediately gave under the lead weight of his desperation. “Why does my wife abhor me when I make this one mistake when Helaena never cared when you did the same over and over again?”

“Because Helaena never loved me, Aemond.” For the first time in their lives, Aegon was the calmer and more rational of the brothers. “She cared for me as a sister, but she never loved me as her husband. Not like our haedus loves you.”

“I love her, too.” Aemond’s face fell into utter regret and despair. “So much.”

“Yet you still broke her heart.”

Aemond turned back to the statue of the Father, bowing his head. “I did not mean to. I didn’t mean to hurt her – I would never intend to hurt her.”

“I know,” Aegon angled his chair and slumped slightly. “But you did. Over and over. I saw it. Not just with your adultery, but every time you did not come home when she asked. Whenever you took Vhagar into battle without warning her – and us. And each day you weren’t here when those babes put her through the seven hells with – ”

Aemond’s heart stopped, and his entire world with it.

“‘Babes?’”

Aegon’s eyes grew wide. “I didn’t say that.”

The same blatant liar he’d been for years.

“You did,” Aemond insisted, his rage at himself now turning on his king, his mother, and everyone else who had kept this secret from him – other than his ābrazȳrītsos. He could still never be angry with her. “Why did you say that?”

After a moment of frustrated silence, Aegon finally answered. “Because the Maesters have determined that your wife is carrying twins. Something you would know if you had come home when we asked.”

“I was fighting your war,” Aemond growled, rising to his feet so his brother could no longer look down at him, “to defend your throne. It was not always possible for me to return.”

“You mean it was ‘never’ possible, right?” In that moment, Aegon truly seemed a king – mature and wise for the first time Aemond had ever seen. He almost resembled their father, as he had been on the few occasions they saw him sit the throne. “You never returned. Not for your duties, and not for your wife.”

“I…”

“If you’d come home immediately after you first fucked whoever-she-is, or any other time we summoned you, perhaps things would be better. But you didn’t, and now you must deal with the consequences of your own stupid mistakes. Again.”

Aemond flinched at the harsh words but could not deny their veracity. The death of Lucerys Velaryon had sparked a war that nearly tore House Targaryen and the realm apart. Now this… this could tear his marriage apart.

His family could be broken beyond repair before their child – their children – were ever born.

A scar-mottled hand grabbed his arm, pulling him away from his despair. “I apologize. I did not come here to make you feel worse than I am sure you already do.”

“Why did you come, then?” Aemond stared at the mangled hand that held him still. He could not bear to look in his brother’s eyes.

Aegon sighed. “I am sending you back to Harrenhal.”

“No.” Aemond ripped his arm away.

“Brother, the peace talks…”

“I said no.” He clenched his fists.

Aegon slammed his hand down on the arm of his chair, the sound echoing through the Sept. “I am your king, and I am giving you an order! You do not get to say ‘no.’”

Aemond froze, his rage roiling, desperate to spill over. But Aegon was his king, and other than his ābrazȳrītsos, his duty to the throne and his family was the thing most dear to him. So, he remained still and silent as he listened without protest.

“Cregan Stark and his army are due to arrive at Harrenhal in mere days,” Aegon explained. “I am in no condition to travel so far, and it would insult Stark and the others who were loyal to Rhaenyra to ask them to travel even further. So, as you are still Prince Regent, you will return to the Riverlands and act as my proxy in the negotiations.”

Absorbed by all that had happened since he’d arrived in King’s Landing, Aemond had entirely forgotten that particular duty. He’d known he had to attend before he left, but how could he go now? What would his wife think if he went back to Harrenhal – where Alys remained – so soon?

“You will take our sister with you.”

“I cannot,” the weak, whispered words escaped him without thought, “I cannot do that to her. You cannot do that to her.”

Somehow, the idea of bringing her with him to Harrenhal was worse than returning there himself. What would happen if she saw Alys? Spoke to her? She was already so hurt, and he did not want her to break entirely. He could not stand it. He would not allow it.

“Aegon, please,” he begged, dignity cast aside in favor of protecting his ābrazȳrītsos. “Do not make her go.”

The king straightened in his chair. “I wish I did not have to. She has already endured so much, and I have no desire to cause her more pain. But I have no other option.”

“Why? What could be more important than keeping her safe?”

Aegon’s face was drawn and filled with regret and grief. “Ensuring the realm sees you as a strong king when I am gone.”

The silence that followed was heavier than the Red Keep itself, and Aemond’s heart grew heavier still when he realized what his brother meant.

“You do not have much time left, do you?”

“Likely only a few months, according to the Maesters. But I’ll be gone by year’s end,” Aegon answered, trying and failing to summon a wry smile. “It’s almost not worth it to un-name you Prince Regent, when the crown will soon be yours once more.”

Silence fell once more.

Aemond wanted to argue. Against going to Harrenhal. Against bringing her with him. Against being king. For if he was king…

“She will be bound to me forever,” he said, not realizing he was saying it aloud, “in a way far stronger than just our shared blood or marriage. She will never be able to leave me.”

Aegon gripped the arm of his chair tighter. “Is that what you want?”

“I…” Yes. No. Aemond fumbled for his words, running a hand down his face as his thoughts raced through his mind like a thousand whirling dragons. “I want her to stay with me, but not at the cost of her happiness.”

Aegon considered the answer, the picture of a king passing judgment. At last, he nodded once. “Even if she decides she hates you, she will not leave. Her sense of duty is nearly as strong as yours, and she would never wish to raise the babes without their father.” He gestured to himself, then Aemond. “She knows well what becomes of children with no true father.”

There came a knock on the Sept door before Aemond could say anything more

Aegon sighed. “It is time for you to leave, I’m afraid. The wheelhouse is waiting.”

“What about – ”

Aegon waved a hand. “Mother went to your rooms this morning to explain the situation to her and help her prepare for the journey.”

“Can we not simply fly?” Aemond did not want for her to have to be stuck with him for the entire journey. The gods forbid that they should be made to share a tent or room at a roadside inn. Though doing so would delight him. He’d missed her so much that he would gladly take any moment he could with her, even when she was so angry with him.

Because she would be angry with him, and spending time with him would do nothing but make her miserable. Her happiness was more important than his. Always.

His brother scoffed as he began wheeling down the aisle toward the door. “Not in her condition.”

Of course. Aemond felt a fool for not realizing it himself. He’d flown Vhagar with Alys, but… she was not as far along as his wife, nor as delicate. A carriage it must be.

He should never have flown with Alys. Not for her sake or that of her child, but because flying atop Vhagar was something he did with his ābrazȳrītsos. It was something sacred they shared, and he had willfully desecrated it.

Gods, he had to get Alys out of his head. He could never become the husband his wife deserved when the witch still haunted his every thought.

Aegon stopped at the threshold of the Sept, again reaching out to grab Aemond’s arm. His eyes glinted with violent promise as he locked eyes with his brother. “If you do anything to hurt her again, intentional or not, I will exile you to Essos, and you will never see her again. I will declare you dead and marry her myself to ensure her children inherit the throne.”

“She deserves a better husband than you,” Aemond spat. It would break him never to see her or their children. But he knew he would deserve it.

The king smiled wickedly, still only a shadow of his former self. “She deserves better than the both of us, brother.”

Aemond bit back his retort and inclined his head to his king as he had at the coronation. “I swear on my life, I will never hurt her again.”

-

Aemond was waiting for her in the courtyard when she finally left the castle, well bundled in a thick, fur-lined cloak. The weather had turned, a final storm of the departing winter. Now, the sky reflected her mood – gray and somber.

At least the explosiveness of her anger had calmed, and she was relatively sure she wouldn’t strangle Aemond along the journey. But to go to Harrenhal with him, to be in the very place where he had betrayed her, to face the woman who carried her husband’s bastard …

She could be brave. She had to be brave. This was her duty, and her duty was sacred.

Aemond had taught her that.

She did not acknowledge him as she kissed her mother and brother farewell, nor as she walked to the steps set at the wheelhouse door.

But then he held out his hand to help her in.

Reluctantly, she took it. The brief touch was marginally more tolerable than the possibility of her stumbling and him having to catch her by the arm or, gods forbid, her waist. That would be far too much of a touch, and she was not sure she was ready for it – if she would ever be ready for it.

He stepped in just behind her, the two of them standing there for a moment, wondering where to sit. In the past, they’d always sat next to each other at the rear of the wheelhouse, with her head on his shoulder and his arm around her waist. But now, the thought of doing so again made her nauseous. So, she turned to the seat in the front.

“Wait,” Aemond grabbed her shoulder, then immediately released it when he saw her wince. He cleared his throat, then motioned to the opposite seat with his hand. “Please, sit here. I don’t want you getting sick riding backward.”

She looked from the seat to his wary smile. Surely he didn’t expect her to still sit with him, did he?

“I’ll sit on the other side,” he added after a prolonged moment of silence.

“Thank you,” she whispered with a nod of her head. But when she began walking to the rear seat, Aemond again stopped her.

“Before you sit, let me…” he trailed off, stepping to the front seat and gathering most of the pillows and cushions that lay atop it into his arms. Then, he deposited them on the other side. He spent several minutes arranging them until they were finally to his liking. “There.”

He reached out his hand again to help her sit. This time, she did not take it. She was more than capable of sitting down on her own, and she was well aware that Aemond knew that, too. He was merely trying to touch her again, and that, she would not allow.

Once she sat, Aemond began fussing again. “Please stop,” she sighed when he started crossing the wheelhouse to fetch even more pillows. “You don’t need to do this.”

“I do need to do this,” he insisted. She could have sworn his eye shone before he turned back to the pillows and blankets. “I want you to be comfortable. You deserve it.”

“A few pillows will not make me forgive you.” For a moment, as Aemond’s shoulders tightened, she almost regretted the words. She had spoken in haste and with cruelty. It was not something she was accustomed to. Somehow, his misdeeds were turning her into a mean and petty woman.

She was just about to apologize when Aemond spoke again, his voice more timid than it had been. “I know that, but I want to do it anyway. I want to show you how much I love you. Please.”

He looked at her pleadingly, desperately. It had been many years since he looked at her like that. When she was a girl, and she fell gravely ill, he stayed by her bedside against the instructions of the Maesters, holding her hand and begging her not to die. She had to look away from him to avoid falling into that memory.

“I am perfectly comfortable,” she said. “So you needn’t do anything more.”

With a sigh, Aemond threw the pillows in his arms carelessly on his seat, except for one – a small round cushion with the Targaryen three-headed dragon embroidered upon it. “Just this one more, please.”

She looked at it suspiciously, some instinct in the back of her mind telling her not to allow it. But his voice was so weak, so desperate. And if it could help her be more comfortable on the long journey, what harm would it do? She nodded. “Very well.”

Aemond beamed and crossed the wheelhouse. With the pillow in hand, he knelt in front of her and brought a hand to hover over her belly. Before he made contact, he looked up to her, a hopeful smile still on his lips.

But that smile was no longer reassuring to her. Instead, it brought on a wave of mistrust and fear. “What are you doing?”

Finally, he laid his hand on her. “I…” His cheeks flushed, and he suddenly could not meet her eye. “This is to cradle your belly while we ride so you are not rattled around so much.”

Her hand flew out and latched onto his wrist, her hold so hard the skin around her hand quickly grew red. She did not want to see him, so she narrowed her eyes until her coming tears blurred her vision. It took several tries for her to speak through her rapid breathing. “Did Alys teach you that, too?”

Aemond looked as if she had just driven a dagger through his heart. “She did, but –”

“I told you never to do that!” She ripped the pillow from his hands and threw it across the wheelhouse with all her strength.

He stayed kneeling, one hand braced on her seat. He had not flinched, only closed his eyes. “Wifey, if it makes you comfortable, if it helps you, then what does it matter how I learned it?”

“Because…” She furiously wiped her tears away, steadfastly looking away from him. “I don’t want you to think about her when you’re touching me.”

“I promise I am not thinking of her,” he insisted. “I could never think of her when I have with me.”

“No, only when I’m hundreds of miles away.”

He closed his eyes and drew in a shaky breath, his hand never leaving her belly. “How long have you known?” Aemond rasped out. “That we are to have two babes?”

Her eyes widened in surprise at the words. How had he known? Who had told him? She did not look at him, did not want him to see the blush of shame that came over her. If either of them should be ashamed, it was him. What he did was far worse than keeping a secret, even one as important as this.

“It was meant to be a surprise,” she whispered. “But you did not come back when you were meant to – you were supposed to return and give Aegon a report on the war. You didn’t.”

Aemond bowed his head, hiding his cheeks – likely just as flushed as hers. He sniffed, as he often did when upset, and shook his head. “If I had known – ”

“It wouldn’t have mattered,” she snapped back. “Your… she was already pregnant by then, wasn’t she?”

For a moment, Aemond looked up at her in pleading before dropping his head again. “Yes,” his voice was thin and utterly defeated, “she was.” He reached to adjust the pillow by her side but decided against it. Then, he returned to the seat across from her, looking at her once before bowing his head and pounding on the roof twice.

Reins snapped, and the wheelhouse lurched forward.

-

The first hours in the wheelhouse passed in silence. Aemond hardly moved, staring at his clasped hands. She thought she felt his eyes on her several times, but whenever she looked at him, he did not look back.

She watched the world pass her by through the windows. She’d never gone north of King’s Landing before, other than a few short flights on Vhagar with Aemond. Then, she was too high to see the little differences, mile by mile. The trees changed and became sparser, as did the shrubs and flowers. The air felt different, as did the ground beneath the wheelhouse, which became softer and less turbulent the farther they went. Even the smell of the air changed. The slight brine she was so used to faded, turning into something green and damp. It was not an unpleasant change.

What was unpleasant was trying to fall asleep within the mountain of pillows and cushions Aemond had made for her. Once, she would have loved the plushness and softness of it. But with the babes in her belly, she had come to prefer more firmness.

She would have moved the pillows herself had she been able to. But between the sheer mass of cushions and her current size, maneuvering enough to do so was impossible. Grand Maester Orwyle had said even two months away from the birth, she was already larger than most mothers just before it. Of course, most mothers only had one babe to carry, not two. So, she was left with only wiggling around as much as she could to try and find a better position.

She didn’t.

With a huff, she looked at Aemond, hoping to silently glare at him and curse him for the stuffed throne he’d made for her. But this time, when she looked at him, he was looking back.

He wore an expression of concern, like he’d been watching her struggle for some time. His eye was wide, and his lips pinched together. She knew that look, and found herself now hating it. It meant he wanted to help, to understand what was wrong.

“I cannot get comfortable,” she explained, not that he deserved an explanation.

A spark of hope entered Aemond’s eye. “Do you…” he licked his lips. “I can hold you, if you’d like.”

“No!” She felt a slight pang of guilt at the hurt painted on his face at her rejection. He did not deserve her guilt, she reminded herself. “No, I’ll be fine.”

Aemond grimaced as if he could sense the lie. He probably could, for how well he knew her. “Are you sure? I can… I can just hold you. It won’t mean anything, I promise.”

Yes, yes, yes, her body seemed to scream. She had always found comfort in his arms, always slept best with him pressed against her. And him holding her would mean he would have to discard many of the ridiculous pillows. If she accepted, she could likely be asleep in moments.

But her heart… her heart would break to be held by him. She wouldn’t be able to stop thinking about if he had held Alys in this same way. If the whore had slept with her head resting on Aemond’s shoulders. If she had kissed his neck as she fell asleep, just as she had loved to do.

She would never be able to stop thinking about Alys. Every time Aemond looked at her, touched her, spoke to her. Alys would be a ghost that would haunt her forever.

A memory of the first time Aemond had taken her to the Dragonpit came to her.

He’d told her she couldn’t come with him, but relented the moment she started crying and dragged her into the carriage with him, Aegon, and Rhaenyra’s eldest sons. Jacaerys was the only one who argued against her accompanying them. He stopped complaining after Aemond shot him a threatening glare and declared that she was braver and more capable than he would ever be. But when they arrived at the Dragonpit, and Sunfyre was led up from the dens, she’d cowered behind Aemond. The sweet little creature - perhaps the size of one of the king’s hounds - she had once watched flit around Aegon wherever he went had somehow quickly turned into a beast larger than anything she’d ever seen, baring sharp teeth the size of her dinner knives. Aegon kneeled in front of her and nudged her cheek with his thumb. “Don’t worry, haedus. He won’t hurt you, I promise.” She still screamed when Aegon stepped within reach of those fangs. And again, when Aemond pulled her from behind his back so she could not hide from the dragon. “Do not be afraid, haedus. Sunfyre is only a dragon, as are you. The blood of the dragon runs true in your veins,” he said as she buried her face in her chest. Something about the words seemed to make Jace angry, but she didn’t know why. “I can’t help it, lēkia,” she whined. “He’s scaring me.” Aemond huffed slightly, petting her head tenderly. “You are afraid because you know very little about dragons. What we do not know can be terrifying.” He turned her to face Sunfyre, who was now perfectly docile while being saddled by Aegon. She squirmed to escape his grasp. “If you watch and listen to the Dragonkeepers, you will learn. The more you learn, the less afraid you will be.”

“Why did you do it?” she asked suddenly.

“My love?” Aemond looked at her as if she’d sprouted horns. But when she held his stare, he whispered gently, “You don’t want to know. Not really.”

“I do,” she declared.Though his answer may shatter her heart completely, she had to know. His childhood voice echoed in her head. ‘The more you learn, the less afraid you will be.’

She swore she could see him remember the same memory she had. His eye darted around the wheelhouse anxiously. “It is not a good reason.”

“Unless she held you at sword point each time, there is not a reason I would call ‘good.’” She hoped it was something like that, that he hadn’t been given the choice to refuse her. It would make everything better, almost fine. But if it had been something like that, he would have already told her.

Aemond was silent for a long while. Long enough for the sun to reach its peak and begin its descent.

“I’d seen only one battle before I arrived at Harrenhal – Rook’s Rest,” he began. “In that battle, one dragon and rider were killed, and Aegon and Sunfyre were permanently wounded.”

“I know,” she whispered. She’d been there when Aemond had brought Aegon, broken, bloody, and burnt, back to the castle. She’d seen what happened to him. Aemond held her hair back as she was sick in the corridor outside the Grand Maester’s rooms.

Aemond nodded. “I was so afraid, ābrazȳrītsos, of what I would see when I truly went to war. And it was just as terrible as I’d feared. Even worse than what happened to Aegon, sometimes.” He waited to continue until she had unscrunched her eyes as she fought away another wave of nausea. “Every time I was scared, raqiarzītsos... And alone. She offered an escape. A chance to not think about the war, for at least a little while.”

“And to not think about me.”

He blanched, moving to stand, but thought better of it and sat back in his seat. “My love, I never wanted to stop thinking about you. I promise. I thought about you every moment of every day. You are what gave me the strength to ride to battle again and again – knowing that once it was all over, I’d be able to return to you.”

She glared at him. “So, you thought about me while you were fucking her?”

“Gods, no!” This time, he did rise, crossing the wheelhouse to fall at her feet. “I… I didn’t think about anything when I was with her. Not about you, or the war, or even her. It was the only way I could empty my mind of all the things that tormented me.”

“… I tormented you?” The idea that she could have done anything to make him want to forget her brought tears to her eyes.

“No. Never.” He tried to reach for her to cup her cheek, but she shrank away from him. “Don’t ever think that you could. What tormented me was that I was so far from you – that I could not be there for you. And the babes.”

He could have been, she knew. He should have been. “You had many opportunities to return. Why didn’t you?” Her voice caught in the back of her throat as a sob tried to escape. “Were you too ashamed of what you’d done?”

“I was and am ashamed,” he declared, and she believed him, “but that is not why I remained at Harrenhal. I knew that if I saw you again, I would never return to the battlefield. It was hard enough to leave you the first time. I could not endure it again.”

There was silence.

She leaned back towards him and allowed him to finally lay his hand across her cheek – an unconscious attempt to soften the blow of her next question. “Is it true that you spared her only because you lusted for her? That you took her to your bed in your first week at that awful place?”

Aemond sobbed, one horrible, wretched sob. His hand dropped, and he lowered his head into her lap, clutching at her dress like a child. The urge to comfort him tingled in her veins, to pet his hair and murmur soft words to him, to gently remove his eyepatch and assure him that all was well.

She did not move an inch.

At last, Aemond lifted his head. The bottom of his eyepatch was just askew enough to allow the tears from his ruined eye to escape. “I spared her because she claimed to be a witch – a seer. The claim was backed by several residents of the keep who had no reason to lie. She offered to lend me her aid in the war, to share her visions with me so I could be prepared when I led my men to battle. I agreed. I wanted to avoid the kind of slaughter I saw at Rook’s Rest. To prevent anyone from going through what happened to our brother. Then…

“I did lie with her in the first week,” he turned away as though he couldn’t say the words while facing her. “On the sixth day. We were to advance on Darry the next morning, to… it doesn’t matter why, just that it was the first time I would lead men to victory of their deaths. I asked Alys to share her vision of what would occur, and she did. She saw how fearful I was and told me that to win the battle, I must go into it without fear. I tried to calm myself, but I couldn’t.”

He swallowed thickly, still avoiding her gaze, and dropped his hand. “Then she offered her… further aid. I will not wound you by detailing what we did. But I will assure you that I did resist.” He licked his lips. “At least at first.”

A small comfort, she supposed.

“When I was with her, all my worries faded to nothing. I thought it was perhaps a spell she put on me, but it was not. My body just needed to find that satisfaction and release. I was hoping it was a spell. For that would mean I did not truly betray you.”

He faced her again. She did not know whether it comforted or saddened her to look into his wet, despairing eye. “But I did. And I continued to do so every time my fear threatened to overwhelm me. Which was, regrettably, often.

“I was weak,” he said with a mirthless laugh, “I was so weak. I should have been braver – better. I should have been the husband you deserve. I will spend every day of my life regretting it and trying to right what I have done wrong. I swear it.” He nodded as if to affirm the oath, yet it brought her no assurance. “I am so sorry, my love.”

He said nothing else.

She still had so many questions, wanted to know so much more. Her fears had barely been quelled. But it was something. And at the very least, the emotions Aemond’s story subjected her to had exhausted her. Enough that she knew she could close her eyes and be asleep within a heartbeat.

“Thank you. For telling me,” she whispered as she moved back in her seat, away from him. “I would like to rest now.”

Aemond bowed his head and retreated to his seat without asking again if he could hold her.

Her traitorous heart almost wished he had.

-

It was raining when she woke. The weather had apparently followed them north. She leaned closer to the window, wanting the wet air to cool her, but stopped when she noticed the wheelhouse wasn’t moving.

“Ser Marston and one of the porters are arranging rooms,” Aemond said softly. She did not reply, nor look at him. A glance out the window informed her that they were in some village she didn’t know, outside a relatively large building whose worn sign, cut in the shape of a stone wall, read simply ‘Inn.’

That question answered, she still didn’t look at Aemond. She knew he’d likely been watching her since they’d arrived… wherever they were. Perhaps longer. Judging by the dusk settling over the horizon, she’d been sleeping quite a while. And yet she hadn’t woken. She wondered if she should start sleeping during the day instead of at night.

“Mother said…” Aemond halted, likely waiting for her to look at him. She didn’t. “We will be sharing a room.”

She whipped her head around to face him, ignoring the slight dizziness that came with the motion. “No.”

Aemond sighed. “Raqiarzītsos, if the innkeeper notices we are apart, he may talk about it. Rumors will start.”

“Can’t we just pay him to remain silent? That’s what Mother did to prevent rumors from spreading about Aegon.”

“And yet rumors spread nevertheless,” his voice was soft and firm, like a parent explaining something to their child. The thought sickened her.

She wanted to say that those rumors spread because their mother could not pay off every woman Aegon had his way with – there had been too many to even know who they all were. But it had been their mother herself who told her that this would happen, that she would have to somehow stomach being in the same room as Aemond at night. That the consequences of not doing so would be worse than those that would come from him being there.

“You will not sleep in the bed,” she ordered, finally facing her husband, “you will sleep on whatever chair or couch is in the room or the floor if there is none.”

Aemond sucked his bottom lip into his mouth. “Very well.”

Curious, she’d expected more of a fight. For him to insist that a servant could see the half-empty bed and raise questions. For him to try and ply her into letting him into the bed with promises of holding her and keeping her warm. For him to try something. But he didn’t.

“Good.”

-

It was not a very nice room.

The paint was chipping off the walls, and the floorboards creaked. The bed linens were faded, the fur blankets patchy. The small table on one side leaned to one side, and an unshaped piece of wood held the couch by the fire level.

At least there was a couch, Aemond supposed. And as it was near the fire, he would not have to sleep in the cold to avoid depriving his wife of blankets.

She crossed the room to the bed, sitting on its edge and looking out the window again. After he’d agreed that he would not try and convince her to let him join her in the bed, she’d spent the rest of their time waiting in the carriage looking out one window, then crossing to the other side of the wheelhouse just before they were called to their room.

Even now, he could see her eyes flitting from one building to another, following the villagers as they milled about and fixating on the livestock that wandered the streets – cows, donkeys, sheep, even a small group of piglets.

He thought it was a distraction at first. But when she continued to watch the inconsequential town for far longer than he ever would, even in a new town, he realized it was something more. When she quirked her head slightly to the right and the ghost of a smile flitted over her lips, he knew what it was.

This was the first village she’d ever been in.

She was born in King’s Landing, and other than their trip to Driftmark for Lady Laena’s funeral… she’d never left the city.

Something in Aemond’s heart cracked. He should have done something, taken her on adventures. He should have brought her on Vhagar and flown her wherever her heart desired.

But he hadn’t. He’d left her in King’s Landing, in the Red Keep. In a cage.

But now… her first trip away from the capital was one she didn’t want to be on. It wasn’t a happy occasion. And their destination was likely the place of her worst nightmares.

He should never have let Aegon order him to bring her to Harrenhal.

Aemond opened his mouth to apologize to her again but said nothing. She had already been forced to be stuck in a wheelhouse with him for most of the day. The kindest thing he could do would be to let her alone for as long as he could.

So, he went towards the door, turning back over his shoulder to look at her for a moment. She was still watching the village. It made him smile a bit. “I’m going to get supper. I’ll be back in a short while.”

She did not say anything back. She only lifted a hand to rest on the window.

-

She’d hardly noticed that Aemond had left. When he told her where he was going, she had just seen a small group of children playing in the muddy road. One of the little girls had spotted her watching from the window and shouted something to her friends. Soon, all the children were staring at her. She lifted a hand to the window to wave at them.

Then, she heard the door closing, and when she turned to look, Aemond was gone.

When she looked back to the children, they had already run off. Her hand drifted to her abdomen. “Nyke urnēbagon jemī tymāt umban daor.” I cannot wait to watch you play.

Before Aemond left for Harrenhal, he had taken her back to the nursery where they’d been raised. The furniture had been covered, as neither Jaehaera nor Rhaenyra’s son Aegon were inclined toward play. Not after what they went through. So, both had moved to their own rooms when they returned to the keep.

But the nursery would not be empty for long.

Aemond had pulled away the sheet covering the toy chest and knelt before it, examining each toy as though it were a priceless jewel. He told stories about them, recalling how they had played with them, and made guesses about which ones their child would prefer and what their choices would foretell about them.

He rediscovered the two wooden dragons they had once painted and named for themselves – Kēlītsos and Balerion. There were too many tales of those little dragons to retell them all, so he told only the one where they imagined the dragons had come alive and had flown them to the ruins of Old Valyria. Aemond would slay whatever beasts had wounded Balerion and killed their great-aunt, Aerea. Then, they would reclaim their ancestral homeland.

He’d kissed her belly then, calling the babe inside the “heir of Old Valyria.”

Now, they were the heir – heirs – to something else entirely.

To a broken family.

To a throne soaked in the blood of their kin.

To the sins of their father.

For a moment, she wished they could simply be like those children, playing without a care.

But they never would be.

They would still be children. They would still play and laugh. They would be mischievous and sneak sweets from the kitchens or stay awake long past the time they were sent to bed. They would still cry for their parents when they scraped a knee or had a nightmare.

But they would also be heirs. They would be taught by the finest scholars in the world how to bear the weight of their responsibilities. They would be trained by mighty warriors on how to defend themselves from the enemies they would have since birth. They would always know that their life was never wholly theirs.

Now, they would also always know that their father had betrayed their mother. She knew that no matter how hard she tried to prevent it, somehow, they would learn of Aemond’s mistress – the mother of their bastard half-sibling.

Part of her hated that child, the small thing that was not even fully formed and yet was the manifestation of all her pain.

Part of her, perhaps a larger part, pitied it.

After all, it was a bastard. The world had never been kind to bastards. After the role bastards had played in the war, she could not imagine it would grow any kinder.

What would the life of the bastard be like? Would it play the same games as her children? Would it have the same favorite toys, or foods, or colors?

While its trueborn siblings were learning to rule the realm and ride dragons, what would it do? Perhaps it would be a servant, like its mother, or become a laborer of some kind.

Would it know who its father was? Would it know the blood of the dragon ran through its veins? Would it ache for a bond with a dragon, as Aemond had? Would it spend its life feeling incomplete, yet never know why?

As she caught sight of the tears shining on her cheeks in her reflection off the window, she decided she did not hate the child. It was not at fault for the sins of its mother, or its father.

She said a brief prayer for it – for its health and happiness. Then one for her own children.

When Aemond came back through the door, carrying a tray laden with steaming food, she wiped her tears away and looked only once more out the window.

The children had gone home.

“Are you hungry, ābrazȳrītsos?” Aemond asked.

No, she wasn’t. But she knew she must eat regardless, for the sake of the babes. So, she crossed the room and sat at the small table.

She did not speak as Aemond served her the meal – fresh, steaming bread, warm stew, and a pot of tea. He did not try and get her to speak. He simply ate his food, watching her carefully.

He faded into the background as her thoughts continued to wander to that poor little child growing in Alys’ womb.

Would it have silver hair? Purple eyes? Or would it inherit its mother’s coloring, whatever it was?

She did not know what Alys looked like. She knew so little about the woman who had shared in Aemond’s sin.

Was she beautiful? Was she intelligent? Was she kind?

It was hard to imagine that she would be kind. That any woman who would lie with a married man would be kind. After all, she was called a witch. Was there such a thing as a kind witch?

Was there even such a thing as a witch?

Aemond said that he spared Alys because she could foretell the future. That the reason he’d first brought her into his bed was because she told him he needed to be calm for the battle ahead if he wished to prevail.

Prevail he did.

Were the visions real, then? Had Aemond only returned from that first battle, the second, the last, because of what Alys had told him?

If Alys were to thank for Aemond surviving the war, should she not be grateful for it? But how could she be grateful for something that had so thoroughly broken her heart?

How was she supposed to feel? How was she supposed to know what to feel? What to do?

“I want to meet her,” she said suddenly. Even her whisper sounded like an echoing shout after so long a silence.

Aemond stared at her. Fear and regret and anger in his gaze. His mouth hung open, and his skin had gone deathly pale.

“Alys,” she clarified. “I want to meet her.”

“My love, please. You don’t.” His voice quavered like a rose in a thunderstorm. “I don’t want you to, it won’t – ”

“I have questions for her. I will ask them.” Tears fell down Aemond’s cheeks, but he did not argue. It almost made her smile. “You may be there if you wish. But I will meet her.”

Aemond nodded. “If that is what you truly want.”

She felt no fear or hesitation. “It is.”

-

After she finished her meal, her exhaustion finally settled upon her. It had only been a day since Aemond returned to the Red Keep. Only a day since both the war and her world ended.

She just wanted to sleep. In that moment, it was all she wanted.

She had Aemond turn away as she undressed and donned her nightgown. He obeyed, staring into the fire and never once looking back until she was beneath the rough-spun blankets on the bed and gave him permission.

He only removed his leather doublet and his boots before settling onto the couch by the fire, its high back blocking them from each other’s view.

The fire crackled.

“Good night, ābrazȳrītsos,” Aemond said. “Sleep well. I love you.”

She did not reply.

She so badly wanted to sleep. But it seemed both her body and the babes in her belly wanted otherwise. No matter how she lay, she could not find comfort. No matter what she thought of, her mind would not calm.

At least she took comfort in that her restlessness was likely preventing Aemond from finding sleep as well.

When she heard his voice again, she stiffened, preparing herself to argue with him again. But Aemond did not speak.

He sang.

“Bantis ropatas Night has fallen

Yn zūgagon daor But do not fear

Sȳndror ilos daor There is no darkness

Kesrio syt drakarys vamiot ilzai. For dragonfire is near.”

It was a lullaby. One he had discovered in an Old Valyrian children’s book he found in the back of the Red Keep’s library. He had sung it to her when she was still in her crib so he could practice their ancestral language.

He stopped singing for some time when his voice settled, adjusting to the new, lower pitch. But when he began again, it was even more beautiful than before. Quiet and soft, but still beautiful.

“Yn ozelēnagon daor And shiver not

Vasīr vēzos hembistas Though the sun has gone

Drakarys kesīr ilzai Dragonfire is here

Aōhi dijaves rāelagon. To keep you warm.”

When was the last time he sang to her? Obviously not in the past six months, but when?

“Aōhi bartos mazilībās Lay down your head

Se aōhī laehossa lēdes And close your eyes

Drakarys avy mīsilza Dragonfire will protect you

Yn sepār kesan. And so too will I.”

Ah, her eyes welled with tears when she finally remembered. It had been the first night after they learned they were to have a babe, and Aemond had bedded her more passionately than he had since their wedding night and more gently than he had ever been.

He sang when they were spent, and she curled into him to sleep. Aemond brushed his fingers in light patterns over her belly and sang. But was that for her or the babe?

The last time he had sung for her and only her… she could not recall. It had been some ordinary day when she did not know she should hold onto that memory and keep it close. She did not know it was a memory she would need when Aemond went to war.

“Dōnī ēdrurī emilās, ñuha raqno Dream sweetly, my love

Bantio rȳ ēdrūs Sleep all through the night

Nyke aōma unna I will be with you

Vapār ōños arlī amāzīlza. Until again there is light.”

She wanted to be angry at him, accuse him of only singing now so he could worm his way back into her heart. But she knew that accusation would be false. After the way he fussed over her today, she knew he was truly worried for her health – and the health of the babes.

Besides, his voice and the familiarity of the song were now truly lulling her to sleep.

She was grateful for it.

“Skorī ñāqes kesīr ilos When morning is here

Se īlvon geron vamiot ilza And our journey is nigh

Īlon henkirī īlvī zaldrīzī kipili We will both mount our dragons

Sepār, sōvīlā.” Then, we will fly.”

Her last thought before her eyes slid closed was that she hoped he had not sung the lullaby – their lullaby – to Alys or her child.

-

Aemond woke to the sound of something crashing. He was immediately awake, throwing off his blanket and bolting to his feet. But he saw no one.

What he did see was an empty bed.

In an instant, his panic had risen to a peak it had reached only once before – the day he’d found out that his half-sister and her husband had taken King’s Landing, and in the aftermath, Aegon was missing and his ābrazȳrītsos was now in the hands of his enemies.

A horrible retching soon alerted him to his wife’s presence on the floor of the room, halfway between the bed and the washbasin against the far wall. But it did not quell his panic.

She was panting between harsh bouts of sickness, her arms trembling as they struggled to hold her up. Aemond moved immediately, kneeling beside her and sweeping her hair away from her face. His words of comfort and concern died instantly when he felt her lean against him.

She was so thin.

Her nightgown was soaked through with sweat, allowing him a clear and horrible view of every knob on her spine and curve of her ribs. The further she pressed into him, the more he could feel the sharp planes of her shoulder blades and the sickening lightness of her form. She was like some of the near-corpses he’d seen in the war – hardly more than skin stretched taut over mere bones.

He had not seen it before. She’d been bundled in robes and gowns and furs. And when she changed into her nightgown earlier this evening, she had not allowed him to look at her until she was buried beneath the blankets.

She knew.

She knew how frail she was. He knew and had not wanted him to know…

Had not wanted him to worry. Not while he was at war.

“Ābrazȳrītsos…”

She sobbed once before she was sick again. He said nothing else until he was relatively certain whatever illness had possessed her passed, and tried not to be too grateful that she didn’t push him away.

“Little darling, please,” he pulled her closer so he could rest against his chest. She did not resist. “What happened?”

She shook her head, reaching to wipe her mouth with the sleeve of her nightgown. Aemond stopped her, set her hand back on her lap, and used his own sleeve instead. She sighed as if the gesture somehow upset her, then slumped slightly. “Nothing happened. Nothing new, at least. This happens nearly every night.”

Every night. No wonder she was so thin.

“Still?” Aemond finally managed to ask in a rasping voice. She had been so sick in those early days – it was what had prompted them to take her to the Maesters, where they discovered she was with child. But it had gotten better in the days before he left for Harrenhal. She had said it was getting better.

She nodded, her eyes shut tight as she turned away from him. Was it from exhaustion or shame? “It…” she swallowed, and Aemond realized how dry her throat must be. He would fetch her something to drink as soon as she could stand. “It never stopped.”

“Oh ābrazȳrītsos…” his voice broke as the realization of how badly she had been suffering sank in. And all the while, he’d been sharing his bed with another woman.

If the Father truly cared for justice, he would have struck Aemond dead the moment he touched that witch.

Aemond held her close, panting with the effort it took to hold back his tears of shame. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

She was silent for a long while. Then, “I’m tired, Aemond.”

“I know.”

A long pause. It took him longer than it should have to realize she was looking at him and longer still to recognize the plea in her eyes. She wanted his help. Or perhaps more accurately, needed his help.

So help her he did, eagerly. He sat her at one of the chairs by the table while he removed her soiled nightgown and dressed her in another. He brought the washbasin to her so he could help her wash her face, then brought her a pitcher of fresh water so she could rinse her mouth. He braided her hair once more and carried her back to bed,

Once he’d pulled the blankets back over her, he reached out to her. When she didn’t flinch away, he softly stroked her cheek. “Is there anything else I can get you, my love?”

She opened her eyes just slightly. “I’m cold.”

He turned on his heel to fetch his blanket from the couch. There was still warmth radiating from the hearth. He could move to the rug.

But when he’d settled that blanket on her as well, she opened her eyes wider and gazed up at him. “Aemond…”

If there was ever proof that the gods could be merciful, that was it.

Still, he had to be certain he wasn’t mistaken. “Are you sure?”

She nodded. Thank all the gods in the world, she nodded.

His veins buzzing with ecstatic joy, he walked to the other side of the bed and climbed in beside her. As he wrapped his arms around her, it almost didn’t matter that he could feel her frailness, that he knew she had only asked this because she truly was cold, or that his touch was tainted by his sins.

Aemond was sharing a bed with his wife. He was holding her. Her, and their children.

When her breathing finally settled, and she drifted off to sleep, Aemond closed his eyes, tucked his face into her hair, and prayed he dreamt of a world where he had slain Alys the moment he first saw her.

[ellavatorz]

Kiss me Plenty || c.b. x reader

summary: you play the “I can’t stop kissing you,” prank on colby.

tags/cw: implied smut, kisses (lots of ‘em), tooth-rotting sweet fluff, established relationship, youtuber(s) relationship.

a/n: there isn’t much for me to say except that I have a very strong yearn for colby to be kissed 24/7. if that man isn’t being kissed at every second of the day like he deserves, then the world is a cruel joke of a place.

and a huge thank you to everyone who enjoyed my last work, you guys are so sweet T.T happy holidays!

- - -

You have the camera set up first thing in the morning. It’s hidden out of visible-sight and is focused on Colby’s usual spot; his desk, where he normally films intros to videos amongst other tasks in respect to his shared channel with Sam.

The plot of your video to be filmed today is explained to your audience. All while a grin is spread on your lips. “Today’s goal is to annoy the shit out of Colby by kissing the hell out of him. I don’t know how he’ll react considering he’s hyper-affectionate as it is… but its also normally something he does rather than me initiating it. So maybe he’ll suspect something right off the bat? Who knows!”

By the time Colby has migrated from your shared bed to his desk, you’re just outside the door, anxiously prepared for whatever may come of the situation. Without much of an extravagant entrance, you move toward where he is and stand behind him. His eyes are glued to the screen and you pretend to seem intrigued by whatever it is he’s looking at.

A yawn escapes his mouth as he reaches an arm behind himself, subconsciously searching for any part of you to grasp onto and reel in. “Good morning, baby.” He rasps, last night’s rest still grappling at his body.

“Morning,” you reply, allowing him to pull you closer. You take this as an advantage to wrap your arms around his shoulders from where you now stand beside him. “What are you working on today?”

Colby’s gaze is still caught on the screen when his own arm is snaked around your waist. His eyes flicker from one end to another, clearly focused on whatever he’s reading. “Just emails right now. I have a bit of review and editing tasks to get done on the apparel website too..”

“Ah, I see.” You sigh. Your eyes flash a mischievous glint toward the camera before you begin leaning into his space to plant a soft peck to his cheek. “Do you need anything? Water? Snacks?”

Still enraptured by work, he acknowledges your question half-heartedly. “No, love. Thank you though.”

You feign a frown at his response and begin swaying his chair left to right when the hold on your waist is replaced by the computer’s mouse. He scrolls through several pages, reading what he can manage to as you continue rocking his chair.

“What time do you think you’ll be done?” You question innocently, though you both are aware that his work is capable of enveloping the entirety of his day. He shrugs, too focused to respond. You take this as an opportunity to leave a kiss on the crown of his head, moving behind his chair to loosely circle your arms around his neck. “I think I’m gonna finish my Christmas shopping while you’re still here.”

He hums and it’s evident that he isn’t regarding your presence to the full extent that it’s normally at. You huff and lean over his shoulder to litter butterfly-light kisses along the side of his neck. He unconsciously cranes his neck, providing you with more access to the skin.

“Shouldn’t you come and eat breakfast first? You haven’t eaten anything.” You ponder aloud, and this time, he shakes his head.

“I’m fine, babe.“ he mutters, eyes squinting in the analysis of his emails. Your tongue comes out to swipe at your lips, wetting them before leaning further into his space and kissing him straight on the mouth. At this, he cocks his head to the side, granting you access for more.

You continue to press into him, feeling accomplished when you realize that now he’s fully focused on you. The kiss is languid and feels good enough to praise, but before you can fully enjoy it, Colby is pulling away with a pitiful smile. You don’t even have to question him because he’s apologizing in an instant.

“I’m sorry, petal. I really have to get these things done. I promise as soon as I get this out of the way, I’m all yours.” He says and you can’t help but feel a tug at your heart. God, he really is the cutest. With the way his eyes glimmer at you, you’re confident with the idea that this man could un-alive your childhood pet and get away with it by just looking at you with those damned ocean eyes.

“Just a minute more?” shaking off the thought of ending the video early out of awe for your boyfriend, you continue your antics. You plead instead, batting your lashes tauntingly while returning to his side.

He blinks owlishly at you and ultimately accepts, pulling you into his lap by the hips and allowing you to straddle him comfortably. You grin, wasting no time and diving straight in for a passionate kiss. His hands snake around you to land on your ass, giving a gentle squeeze to which you groan into his lips for.

For a second, you’re convinced that this moment would last for an eternity with the pace that he’s taking. Theres not a doubt that he’d absolutely waste an entire day just to kiss you, and in this case you want this to be one of those days. His kiss is smooth, gentle, yet fierce and meaningful. Your hands move on their own accord; one pressing into the broad of his chest and the other entangling into his hair.

There’s a moan serenading your ears after a few rough tugs to the strands on his head. However, before you know it, he’s giving you one last playful tug to your lip and placing a good space between the two of you. While you’re grateful for this moment to breathe, you also fall clueless as to why the hell he stopped.. until, of course, you remember that you’re filming a video, and he’s working. Hello!

“Do you know how distracting you can be?” Colby chuckles, and you take a few seconds to take in his appearance; hair tussled, eyes dark and dilated, lips swollen with a few teeth indentations caused due to your own accord. You almost want to spend the rest of the video admiring your work, but conclude that the show must go on.

“What ever do you mean, coleslaw?” You quip, pushing against his hands from where they’ve been placed on your shoulders to distance you from him.

He immediately motions for you to get off of him, his hands already shoving at your chest. “Coleslaw? You’re done. Get off of me.”

You laugh and reluctantly remove yourself from his lap only to make an attempt at lifting him up with you. As if knowing exactly what you’re about to do, he drops his weight into his chair. You grunt, tugging on his arms with all your might. He doesn’t budge.

“Baby,” you whine, and add a childish stomp for emphasis. “Can’t you just take today off to spend time with me? Please?”

He falls limp at your words, tossing his head back against the chair’s headrest and huffs in thought. “We already hung out yesterday. The entire day! What do you want to do anyway?”

Pouting, you take advantage of his loose posture to throne his lap once more. Again, circling his neck with your arms and trying to pull him impossibly closer. Though, he does his best to keep a stoic expression and an emotional stiffness to prevent persuasion.

“I miss you,” the words seemingly fall on deaf ears as he remains unfazed, eyes wandering around the room; in other words, anywhere but you. “..just wanted to kiss you today.. but i guess you don’t want my kisses. guess I’ll just find someone else who does—“

His sigh mimics one of defeat. His hold on your tightens in protectiveness, as if afraid you may be taken from him. You begin to feel that bubble of mischief rising to your cheeks, tugging your lips into a smile. Yes! It’s working!

“One more kiss, and i seriously have to get back to work, okay?” He gambles, and suddenly your smile is fading into a frown. He directs his stare back to you, a small quirk at the corner of his mouth. “What, isn’t that what you want? Take it or leave it, baby.”

You bare your teeth in grimace, eyes twinkling with competitiveness before you dive in. Planting your lips on his, you nip and lap at the opening he gives you. Without much hesitance, he’s reciprocating in eagerness. Your tongues dance in the heat of the moment, teeth clashing with force. It’s clear how much you two want each other. And it’s even more evident just how far you’re willing to go for it.

“God, what’s gotten into you?” He manages to slur through the daze you’ve entrapped him in. The intimacy in the kiss exceeds even deeper when you apply pressure against his crotch, gaining a desperate reaction in return. He whimpers against your lips, bringing you impossibly closer to his form as he ruts against you.

“just.. really.. want.. you.” Your voice tapers off into a moan with each breath you take in between. And that’s when you realize. Oh shit. he’s hard.

A probing feeling at your clothed entrance is all it takes for you to pull back and freeze, hands instantly darting for the camera from where it was hidden just a few minutes ago. You focus the rest of the footage toward you, regarding your boyfriend’s lustful daze as a sign to come clean. Placing one hand on his cheek while the other holds the camera, you give a breathy and worried giggle.

“Are you—“ you start, motioning toward the evident tent in his sweats. His eyes waver from your face for a mere second to assess the situation before returning to you. “Colby?”

“Is this is a prank?” He mumbles, cocking his head toward the camera in your hand. You nod, curtaining your smile by placing a palm over your mouth. “Oh,”

“Colby, It’s a prank. I didn’t expect it to go this far!” You admit, and suddenly the giddiness you had been shielding from escaping you throughout the video is released. You laugh in embarrassment. “Oh my gosh. Guys, if you saw anything…. No you didn’t. Haha! But seriously, my poor baby suffered today so if you enjoyed the video, be sure to like and subscribe. Until next time, bye!”

The moment the video comes to an end, Colby is cursing you up and down for the scheme you had hidden from him. However, his scolding shortly concludes with a soft, and admittedly disappointing, “—had me all excited..”

“Oh my poor baby,” you coo, both of you now free from an audience’s presence via camera. Holding his face in your hands, you apply pressure to his cheeks, forcing his lips to pucker when you go in for a gentle kiss. “‘M sorry. The fans really wanted to see what you’d do.”

“Well now they know, so can we please not do that again. you’re very irresistible and convincing you know that?”

You press a gentle peck to his cheek and huff. “Yeah I’ve heard it a few times from my boyfriend.”

“Wow. I feel bad for your boyfriend.” Colby jokes playfully.

“Do you? Hm. Guess I should be a little nicer to him.”

“Maybe.” He pouts his lips toward you, proceeding to lift you from where the two of you sit on his office chair. Your legs wrap around his middle as he travels toward your shared bed. “I think your boyfriend deserves it.”

“I think so too,” you smile. Continuing from where you had left off, you both spend the rest of the morning doing exactly as you begged for; spending the day together. And making out, of course. And maybe a little more than that.

[imaginidol]

Hongjoong: The Dressing Room

!!mentions of NSFW!! 18+!! Please don’t read if you’re not comfortable with smut :) i have no idea why I even wrote this and I hope this is the last time I ever put something out like this into the world again. here’s a hongjoong ver. if you enjoyed the san ver. smut. I’ve also made a yunho ver. smut wooyoung ver. smut and a mingi ver. smut jongho ver. smut here :3

"Hongjoong?" You knock lightly against the door of the KQ artist's dressing room, holding a hot thermos of tea in one hand and turning the doorknob with the other.

"Come in," the boy calls, his eyes fixated on his phone screen as you approached him. He was calmly sitting at one end of the room, patiently awaiting your arrival.

"Here's the tea you asked for," you say, motioning the thermos toward him. "Careful, it's hot."

"That's fine," he shrugs, taking it from your hands. "Thank you."

You meant to leave the room after, but the slight tension made your feet feel like they were glued to the ground.

"Can I help you?" The boy annoyedly looks up from his phone, his eyes furrowing slightly at the sight of you.

"You're upset," you mutter, squinting your eyes at him. "Why?"

"I'm not upset," he says, putting his phone down and hunching over to place his elbows against the chair's arms.

"You can talk to me," you insist, leaning against the edge of a desk behind you. You and Hongjoong had been close friends at the company since you'd started working, and seeing him upset only raised your eyebrows in question.

"Fine," Hongjoong exhales heavily, reaching for his thermos. He takes a slow sip, then rubs his eyes in annoyance as he ponders over the words he wants to say. "I'm too stressed over this upcoming comeback, I found out my now-ex cheated on me, and I haven't been taking care of myself the way I should because of it all. I haven’t slept well in almost two weeks!"

"Damn," you scoff, Hongjoong flashing you a stern glare and wiping the snarky smile off your face.

"I'm sorry I'm being rude," he says, leaning back against his chair, placing a tired forearm over his forehead. "I'm just so fucking stressed."

"That's alright, as long as you don't hold it all in. It's good for you to let it out," you offer your warmest smile.

"Yeah?" He peeks from under his forearm, flashing you a smile. "I could use some of that, honestly."

"Venting?" you ask, nodding your head. "It's real good when you vent your frustrations."

"What? No, I was thinking of... nevermind," he smiles, tiredly closing his eyes and leaning back against the chair.

Your eyes light up and a small gasp escapes your mouth as a horrifying thought crosses your mind.

"What do you mean 'nevermind'? Now you've gotta tell me," you insist, nudging his shoe with your foot.

"You wouldn't be down like that if I did," he mumbled, hoping you wouldn't catch on.

"How would I know if you don't say it?"

He lifts his head and locks his eyes with yours, not saying a word.

"You're not down," he finally mumbles, lowering his arms and bringing them down against the chair's arms again. “So drop the subject.”

Your heart skips several beats as you notice his eyes grow slightly hooded, a deep hunger settling in far beyond his gaze.

You knew for a fact from Mingi that Hongjoong had liked you way before he had started dating his ex, and the only reason he hadn't pursued you was because you had some boyfriend already by the time you both had met. Now, though, your boyfriend was long gone out of your picture, and Hongjoong was, safe to say, back on the market as well.

Your thoughts on Hongjoong had changed slowly since your breakup. You loved the way he lead his group, the way he worked forcefully towards his projects, and the way you felt safe and cared for around him. Needless to say, you found him incredibly attractive and a total catch by all means possible. And now that he was allegedly single again, a few consensual advances wouldn’t hurt, would they?

You smile devilishly as you feel yourself walk up to the boy sitting in front of you, slowly leaning in and wrapping your arms around his neck.

"You're not down, Joong," you dare, feeling yourself pull away from him as you drop the smirk off your face.

Hongjoong stares at you in a moment of disbelief, unable to immediately read the invitation you had just sent.

"Are you gonna say it, or should I clock out for the night?" you sneer, smiling nefariously as you watch the boy's eyes search you and your body for more invitations.

You take a step back and begin unbuttoning one of your blouse buttons, testing to see where he’d follow you next.

In a mere flash, he’s already standing over you with his curious hands around your waist.

“What are you doing?” He whispers, searching your eyes for more signs.

“Fuck around and… find out,” you stick your tongue out playfully at him. He makes no hesitation to shove you backwards, your ass bumping against the edge of the desk where you were leaning on earlier.

He lifts you on top of it, enclosing his mouth around your bottom lip, his hard fingers clenching your jaw as the echoes of several pencil holders and staplers were flung from the desk in the process.

"You don't know what you're in for, if you seriously wanna do this," he breathes hotly into your mouth.

He takes a moment to hold back from doing anything more, searching your face for any signs of possible regret and resign.

"So, you're saying you wouldn't wanna relieve your stresses?" you tease, pulling into his face and smiling into his lips.

"Fuck off," he sneers, tugging at the hem of your blouse and pulling it over your head.

In a few swift motions, your blouse and bra are flung somewhere across the room, followed by the wet echoes of shared, sloppy kisses bouncing off the plaster walls of the dressing room.

From his peripheral vision, Hongjoong turns his attention towards an L-shaped couch sitting at one end of the dressing room. He grabs and carries you by the hips, advancing towards one end he of the couch as he slammed your body into the plump cushions.

He leans over and traces a delicate line of soft pecks from your jaw to your breasts, nibbling gently against your skin as soft moans escaped your lips.

"Hongjoong," you breathe, tugging at the collar of his shirt.

"I'm not fucking you if you can't keep quiet," he sneers, trailing another line of kisses from your chest down to your hips.

He began to unzip your slacks, quickly undressing you fully and bringing your legs to an outward stretch as far as they'd go.

He slowly dives his face in between your legs, and soon enough the gentle pushes of his tongue against your clit begin to set your nerves ablaze.

"Hongjoong, please," you moan as you feel his tongue tracing the outline of your lips, making swift, deep motions before proceeding to eat you out. You clench your jaw and outstretched your neck as far as you’d go, tugging fiercely against the cushions beneath you in a horny and wet despair.

"Fuck, you need to shut it," he growls, diving back into you as your groin dampened with every feel of his touch.

"Fuck you, Joong," you snap, grabbing ahold of his left hand off your waist and tugging at his fingers.“Use these!”

At the very least, the boy was obedient.

He quickly shoved his middle and index finger into his mouth before diving them deep between your legs, stroking back and forth in a steady rhythm inside of you. With each deepening stroke, you felt a wave of heat overtake your body as you so desperately wanted to plead for more. He reached to clasp your jaw with his free hand and clashed his hot mouth against yours, fingering you steadily with each moan you delivered for him.

The kisses could only muffle so much of your loud moaning, and eventually the precious sounds you’d made had gotten the best of him.

"Fuck," he moaned, roughly unzipping his jeans and stepping out of them and his boxers. He revealed a hardened member progressively leaking more and more as he began jacking himself off, eventually giving up after a couple desperate blows before deciding it was best to insert himself inside of you.

He placed his hands around your hips and proceeded to flip you on your stomach, plunging your head into a plump cushion with one hand while thrusting his hot member into your wet groin with the other.

"I told you to... fuck, keep quiet!" He couldn't resist the few moans escaping his own lips as he held onto your outstretched legs on both sides of him, the warm walls of your insides beginning to loosen with each push.

Your back arched farther out with each of his blows pounding deeper inside of you, your moans steadying as you bit desperately into the soft couch cushions beneath you. At this point, all sweat glands of your body had completely dampened every inch of you, and the boy behind you wasn’t far from the same fate, either.

"Hongjoong, Hongjoong," you cried out, the vivid hot tears now streaming down your face as you felt the throbbing sensation of the boy’s pounding member inside of you. At this point, Hongjoong had been concentrating so hard that he hadn’t noticed how far back he’d slid the couch against the wall behind it. With every hard thrust came a loud thump! as one end of the couch slammed repeatedly against the wall behind it.

"Hongjoong," you exhale as your body is set ablaze in hot sweat, irresistible groin pain, and your senses completely hightened. Your fists ball up tighter into the cushions surrounding you as you desperately sink your teeth deeper into the fabric.

I’m about to cum, fuck, I’m about to—

"Shut.. the.. fuck.. up.." Hongjoong breathes in between thrusts, scrunching his face towards the ceiling as he felt himself about to release.

In a quick, sudden instant, a loud, familiar echo erupts through the room as the doorknob turns and the door swings open, inside walking Wooyoung.

"Hongjoong, what's all the noise--SHIT!" the boy's face turns as pale as a ghost, and he immediately slams the door shut, the shadows of his feet under the doorway disappearing back down the hallway.

Your eyes unfocus hazily as you feel your body tightening up in shock, but the only reason Hongjoong didn't immediately stop at the interruption of his younger friend was because was already coming, and he was coming hard.

"Fuck it.. I'll.. I'll.. apologize.. to that.. fucker.. later," he groaned, feeling the final rushes of joy as he finally came inside you.

He defeatedly pulls out, warm fluids seeping all over your lower back. He sighs, looking up towards the ceiling for a short moment to take in the events of the last fifteen minutes. He pulls his black shirt over his neck to take it off, reaching towards a corner end table closest to him to grab an unopened water bottle.

You feel a soft wet cloth wiping you away as you realized Hongjoong had dampened his shirt with the water bottle. Once you were done, you giggled as he helped turn you over and began dressing you again, this time offering you one of his own t-shirts and sweatpants that he thankfully kept in a closet.

Thank fuck we're in my dressing room, he thought.

Once he made sure you were completely comfortable and clothed, he then proceeded to clean and dress himself up, too.

You smiled lazily as your eyes followed the tempered boy across the room, noting the drenched locks of dark wet hair curtaining over his forehead.

He walked back to the couch and plopped himself next to you, wearing a new shirt and sweatpants that he’d also pulled from his closet.

You comfortably reposition your bodies, placing your head warmly against his shoulder. As you crossed your legs, you wince at the raw feeling of Hongjoon’s imprint that still lingered inside you.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, tucking a gentle finger under your chin to turn your face as he placed a gentle kiss against your lips.

"Joong?" you look up from where you leaned against his shoulder, lazily running your fingers through his dampened hair.

"Hmmm?" he groggily looks down, fighting to keep his eyes awake.

"Do you... do you think we'll get in mega-deep trouble for this? And because of Wooyoung?"

Hongjoong scoffs, realizing he would need to have a gentle conversation with his younger friend after.

"That boy won't say a thing, I can promise you that," he whispers, leaning over to plant a soft kiss against your forehead. "Although next time, I'll make sure the door is locked."

"You mean you'd wanna do this again!? Here!?" you look up at him in disbelief, a sly grin threatening to cross your face at the mere thought of Hongjoong’s new method to relieve frustration again.

"I mean, unless you don’t want to end what you've just started, we don't have to," he smiled assuringly.

You frowned. "I didn't say I wouldn't want you all over me like that anymore," you grunt.

"Good," the tired boy grins mischievously, "because believe me, my life never stops stressing me the fuck out."

[ebullientheart]

the nice guy. spencer reid x reader

content — fluff. humour. fem!bau!reader. casual mention of sex. loosely based on season four episode nine. case talk. nondescript injury to reader.

you explain to spence the difference between a nice guy and a ‘nice guy’.

“i don’t understand this.”

morgan spun on his chair, “what’s that, wonder boy?”

the files he was flicking through were baffling him. each of the interview transcripts read the same sort of thing. ‘oh, he was a textbook ‘nice guy’ you know’, or something to that effect.

you were the one conducting that set of witness interviews, and the text before him showed no confusion on your part as you continued your original line of questioning. concluding this meant you understood, spencer ignored derek’s response and instead got up to find you. predictably, in garcia’s office, watching unreleased films, seeing as your paperwork was long completed.

“can i ask you something?” he interjected, causing penelope to throw popcorn at him as a consequence of her surprise.

“can you knock?” she quipped back, but he wasn’t really listening to her. spencer could become pretty single minded when he set his focus on something, especially if it was something he didn’t understand.

you excused yourself and followed him into the hall. the simple window on your right showed nothing but the clouded night sky, meaning only a few people lingered in the office now. spencer turned the light on by reaching past your head to the switch, while you tried to ignore the way your stomach felt upon having him lean over you.

clearing your throat, you addressed him, “what did ya need, spence?”

he showed you what he’d been preoccupied with, “what does this mean? we profiled our unsub as desperate, creepy, and we were right. why did they all describe him as a nice guy?”

you pondered for a moment on how best to explain it to him before you answered.

“they’re kind of being sarcastic. a textbook ‘nice guy’ is a guy who really pities himself, quotes ‘nice guys finish last’, that sort of thing. he thinks he’s so kind, and for that women owe him sex, so when they don’t meet that standard, he just believes women only like jerks. he sees himself as good, but he doesn’t comprehend why women would take offence to his sexual reward system for human decency.”

spencer frowned, “there are enough of them that women have a collective name for this?”

you nodded, “trademarked and everything.”

“really?”

“no, kidding.”

he smiled at you and you returned it, his curiosity fulfilled and his faith in humanity slightly lessened, as it was case by case.

a few days later, you were all jetting off to another police department, examining files and bouncing theories. spencer sat on your left, the only one close enough to hear the low rumble of your stomach. chuckling to himself, he produced a breakfast bar from his satchel and slid it over to you. the overjoyed expression on your face at food, and food in your favourite flavour, prompted him to remember your ‘nice guy’ conversation.

you offered him your thanks and he answered, “you’re welcome. no sex required.”

even though he was half kidding, half sincere, you gave him a whole laugh, easy and unabashed. the smile he donned was satisfied at initiating such glee from you.

as the investigation progressed, the danger became more and more apparent. the team knew someone was going to end up hurt, but it didn’t stop them from flinching as they saw you swinging your legs in the back of an ambulance, taking emergency blood supply. you rolled your eyes at their concern, “really, i’m fine guys. just a scratch.”

they weren’t so quick to dismiss your injury, but they didn’t hover. they had protocol to follow, local cops to brief, and press to alert. the only one who lingered was spencer, awkwardly sitting next to you at your invitation. he thought about wrapping an arm around your bare shoulder as a chill set in the air, but was too afraid to dislodge the tube. you bit the bullet of his worrying and leaned until he was prompted to support you.

“are you alright?” he knew it wasn’t the right thing to ask you, but he wasn’t sure what else to say in that moment, not when you were pressed against him so the warmth from your body bled through his vest to his own skin.

you gave a light shrug, but didn’t comment further, instead saying, “you’re nice, spencer. the real way.”

he hummed, “how’d you know?”

“nice guy trademark would’ve tried to kiss me by now. you’re just holding me.”

he knew what he was about to admit was a risk, but the question burned in his throat, “what if i wanted to? kiss you?”

you looked up at him and his heart skipped a beat. if he tried, he could count every one of your eyelashes, even though a few were clumped together by smudges of mascara that had congealed in your initial reaction to the wound. there was a brightness in your irises that sparked something in his chest. the hand you could move freely came up to his face, which had become flushed. you could feel the heat beneath your palm, but couldn’t make it out visually with his back to the ambulance light.

“i’d think you’re even nicer.”

he didn’t seem all that surprised, “can i?”

“please.”

[wilteddreamsofbaldursgate]

Darling, Mind if I Enjoy Myself?

Astarion x fem!Tav/Reader || ao3 || Masterlist Rating: E Word Count: 2.8k Summary: Astarion walks in on you pleasuring yourself and takes it upon himself to be of utmost assistance to your endeavours. CW: 18+. Smut with fluff. Teasing. Masturbation. Vaginal fingering. Vaginal sex.

“I’m not interrupting anything, am I, darling?”

As a matter of fact—he was, and Astarion knew that very well. He also knew that your pathetic little gasp wasn’t a sign of chased-after relief but surprise. So much surprise, in fact, that your hand had startled into a highly frustrating stillness between your legs; you’d been so close…

All thanks to Astarion’s masterfully quiet feet, you hadn’t heard him re-enter the chamber and his untimely intrusion had your body torn between wanting to freeze and jump out of your skin—and that, too, the bastard knew. The unveiled amusement dripping from his words clearly gave him away.

Embarrassed at the heat rising in your cheeks, you squeezed your eyes shut, at once thankful that you wouldn’t have to see the stupid smirk on his face as he sauntered over to your bed.

“Had you waited half an hour for me to finish my bath, I would’ve been more than happy to assist in your delightful endeavours, my sweet.”

Another matter of fact was that Astarion’s bathing routine did not take half an hour. You hadn’t at all expected to see him again until just before dawn.

Suppressing a scoff, you licked the overripe curse from your lips before replacing it with a lazy smile. You had to play this smart, otherwise Astarion would never let you live this down.

“Enjoying yourself, Astarion?” You purred, slowly opening your eyes in what you hoped was a casual if not playful manner.

His pale face was now close enough for you to touch. He crouched next to the bed, head supported on one hand while he grinned at you. 

“Darling, with you? Always!” 

Astarion’s hair was still wet, you noticed. Wayward drops of water glistered in the pale moonlight, making him look as if he’d been kissed by morning dew. A single water drop caught your attention by running from his temple down his cheekbone before it gathered in the valley of his sensuous cupid’s bow. All you had to do was lean forward and kiss it away, but—

You followed Astarion’s sharp gaze to where your hand vanished under the hem of your nightdress. 

Your fingers still rested heavily against the damp heat of your inner thigh, aching to finish what they’d started in the pleasure of your own company.  

Your smile turned into a grin of your own. Two could play this game.

“Like what you see?” 

“Plenty,” Astarion confirmed without a moment’s hesitation, inching closer to rest his chin atop his hands on the mattress. “You don’t mind me watching, do you?”

Crimson eyes peered up at you through ridiculously long lashes—just like they were wont to do when Astarion put his mouth to very good use on you. By the way his grin widened knowingly, you understood that this particular look was by far no accident.

You cocked your head as if to ponder his question, even though you were already back to stroking your fingers over your slick folds. 

Whatever the damn elf was doing, it surely was working—but he didn't need to know that, yet. 

“Why, only if you don’t mind me thinking of you…?”

Astarion’s movement was too swift for you to follow. 

He’d given a short laugh in one second and the next he was towering over you. The mattress shifted under his weight; a single water drop detached itself from the tip of one of his locks, falling right onto your half-exposed collarbone. In one swift motion, Astarion dove after it. 

Agonisingly slow, his cold tongue gathered up the liquid, leaving a wet kiss in its place before he drew back again. 

His bold attack was over the moment it had begun. 

“I would feel rather insulted if you didn't, pet,” Astarion drawled, slowly settling down next to you.  

His grin had turned impish as he laid on his side, lazily propped up on one elbow as he watched you try and fail to regain your composure. 

You let out a shaky breath, which only earned you another laugh. 

“Oh, go on, now, dear—I see you’re growing…impatient.”

And go on you did.

Astarion’s way of assisting you in your delightful endeavours could range from fucking you senseless to watching you cum on your own fingers and if he wanted a show today, he could have one. You had no idea where tonight might lead, but you were hells-bent on getting your release one way or the other.

You held Astarion’s gaze as you dipped a finger back into the feverish wetness spreading between your legs, another following suit right after. 

A content sigh slipped past your lips as your fingers circled your swollen clit—which Astarion graced readily by draping your leg across his hip. 

Your breath hitched again as the sudden change of position opened up more room for your endeavour, but it was his cold touch upon you that really stroked the fire underneath your skin.

Astarion’s lithe fingers traced along your ankle, your calf, your knee, hiking up your nightdress until it pooled around your waist—laying your desire bare to him. 

You bit your lip in an effort to keep your eyes from fluttering shut. 

“Enjoying yourself, sweet thing?”

Astarion pulled you closer, knowing very well the impact he had on you—he had a front-row seat, after all. 

“With you? Always,” you panted, your movement growing increasingly erratic as your need soared under his teasing touch. 

You couldn’t quite tell if you were more aroused by your own hand dragging you towards release or by Astarion’s thumbs drawing lazy circles across your skin—so at odds with the urgent pace in which you pleasured yourself.  

You had your answer when his hand fanned out on the back of your thigh, only to inch up further to firmly squeeze your ass.

He let out yet another short laugh at the impetuous moan he elicited from you, though this time it was huskier, more reflex than amusement and he leaned over, his breath tickling your ear. 

“You know,” Astarion whispered as if he were about to reveal a grand secret to you. “I've been thinking about that divine ass of yours all day long.” 

Taking in a sharp breath, you wondered if he realised that his fingertips dug almost painfully deep into your flesh, pinning you in place while your hips tried to chase your hand.

“Only good things, I wager?” 

“The very best,” Astarion breathed against the soft spot between your ear and jaw before his lips travelled across your cheek, only stopping when the tip of his nose grazed yours. 

If he were to kiss you now, you wouldn’t last much longer.

But his lips didn’t meet yours. His eyes were far too busy darting to and fro between your flushed face and dripping wet cunt. 

A slight frown settled between Astarion’s eyes—giving away that he was still considering how much of an assistance he wanted to be tonight. 

There was no denying that you wanted Astarion buried deep inside you, to have him ease that insatiable, torturous desire only he could ignite in you. 

But more than that you wanted—needed—him to want it, too.

Giving him time to sort out what he wanted tonight, your hand slowed into a gentler pace, but this only seemed to fully entrance Astarion. 

The grin long gone, he wet his lips, his eyes darkening. You knew that look all too well; he’d beheld you the same way mere hours ago, right before he’d sunken his fangs into your neck. Want. Hunger. Need. 

Lust. 

It only took another moment for Astarion’s lips to finally brush against yours.

“Mind if I join?” He rasped. His hand wandered down your thigh, grabbing the back of your knee to pull you flush against him. 

Through his loose pants, you could feel his hardening cock rub against your inner thigh as he re-adjusted your leg over his hip, riding up his shirt in the process. 

You urged your leg even higher, hooking it around his waist, moaning at the sweet sensation of his cold skin pressed against your burning flesh.

“Please do,” you almost begged. Couldn’t he see how badly you needed him?

But your consent had barely left your lips that Astarion’s hand slid between your legs, his fingers interlacing with your own. He took up your earlier pace caressing your clit, sending shivers down your spine as he guided two of your joined fingers inside you—stroking that delicious spot that always made you see stars.

Tilting your head back, you let out a blissful little cry which Astarion rewarded with a groan of his own as he traced lingering kisses down your throat. 

You arched your back shamelessly against Astarion’s half-exposed chest, getting rapidly close to your climax. As your hand grew useless from pleasure, animated only by the invisible strings Astarion pulled, all you could do was chase your relief. It would only take a few more strokes of Astarion’s finger, another sweet kiss tickling your skin to send you over the edge and—

You could barely suppress the indignant sound of protest rising in your throat when both hands between your legs came to an abrupt halt. 

“Fuck,” Astarion grunted into the crook of your neck before he suddenly withdrew from you, pulling your own hand along—leaving you empty and trembling with scorching need. 

You wanted to cry.

For a frustratingly long moment, you thought Astarion had changed his mind about your endeavours; that he would retreat to his mischievous voyeurism and leave you to your own devices once more. 

But instead of untangling himself from you, he pushed you onto your back, nesting his hips right between your shaking legs.

His arm came down next to your head and from the corner of your eye, you could see his pale hand glister with your arousal. 

Half-dried, dishevelled locks were plastered to his forehead as Astarion looked down at you, pupils blown with lust—no doubt a mirror of your own. 

“Properly,” he said, his free hand tugging at your nightdress. “Let me fuck you properly. You don’t mind, do you?”

If you weren’t half delirious with pent-up need you might’ve laughed at him. 

“Do whatever you want with me, Astarion,” you pressed through clenched teeth, eagerly helping him work the offending garment over your head. “Enjoy yourself.”

Astarion welcomed your breast with his mouth. By the way his tongue circled your oversensitive nipple, it rather seemed like your ass hadn’t been the only thing on his mind. 

You arched into his kiss, hissing when his fangs grazed your tender flesh. 

His shoulders trembled with a silent laugh before he abandoned your breast in favour of your collarbone and neck, your jaw and finally, again, your lips.

You raked your fingers through Astarion’s locks that were made soft and fragrant by the soap and oils he’d used earlier; pulling him closer, you deepened your kiss. Couldn’t he taste how starved you were for him? 

You were desperate when you hooked your other leg around Astarion’s waist, tugging and sucking at his bottom lip. All you could feel was his still outrageously clothed erection rubbing against your stomach, driving you insane—that, and the cursed bastard smirk melting against your mouth. 

Astarion was enjoying himself all right. 

You bit down on his lip.

It only took a second before you could taste iron on your tongue. Astarion pulled away slowly, still smirking as he licked a blossoming bead of blood off his lips. The sight of him was so heady, so obscene, that your mouth hung agape. 

“You vicious, impatient little thing, you,” he chuckled, cupping your hand clawing at his hair, slowly guiding it to his shoulders, his chest, down to the lacing of his trousers. This time, you bit back a moan. 

“But you’ve been so good, always letting me have all this fun when I haven’t even fucked you yet.”

He let out a low hum when he dragged your palm over his taut crotch, undoing the front lacing with the help of your greedy little fingers. 

“But you’ve waited enough, now, haven’t you?” 

Yes! You nodded fervently, his lust-strained voice music to your ears. Yes, you had! 

Astarion let go of your hand to free himself of his trousers, urged on by the way you helped shove them down his thighs. Tears burned in your eyes when you finally caught a glimpse of his beautiful, erect cock. 

For all his teasing, Astarion didn’t waste any time now. 

Grabbing your hip, he aligned you with him, only to tease your throbbing clit with the wet tip of his cock. 

“Astarion…” you whined, arching harder against him—and he was nothing if not a merciful lover. This once, at least.  

By the time he slowly buried himself inside you inch by inch, you no longer cared for whatever noises escaped your mouth. 

For a deliciously long moment, you simply savoured the sensation of your walls stretching around him; Astarion’s hand kneading your hip, his lips back on yours, moaning sweetly into your mouth. 

You wrapped your arms around his neck, tugging at the collar of his shirt to feel your breasts squeeze up against his hard chest. Every inch between your bodies was too much to bear.

Astarion’s long eyelashes fluttered against your cheek as he began to roll his hips against yours.  

He set a slow, if not lazy pace—which was unexpected considering all his teasing, but not at all unwelcome. 

You met his rhythmic thrusts, smiling when he pressed his forehead to yours. It was something he’d only taken up after he’d become more comfortable having sex with you, and the gesture elated you every time. 

“Enjoying yourself, my heart?” You breathed in the rare moment your lips parted from his. 

There was no witty or snide remark rolling off Astarion’s tongue, now. Instead, he could only grunt in reply, his eyebrows knitted in concentration—evidence that it took him everything to focus on his self-imposed arduous pace.

Knowing that it was you who did this to him—that it was your body that had him speechless every time he fucked you—had you clench violently around his cock. 

Groaning, Astarion brought his hand back down to your leg. He blindly untangled it from around his waist before pinning it against the mattress with his knee—opening you up even more for him. 

Clearly unable to restrain himself any longer, his pace sped up. 

With new vigour, Astarion pounded into you, hitting that perfect sweet, sweet spot over and over again; eliciting a whimper from you with every frantic thrust of his hips.

You knew he was close to his release when you felt his cock twitch in anticipation, spurring on your own ecstasy. 

You eventually found yourself dissolving into your own pleasure as Astarion spent himself deep inside you.

Unwilling to miss a second of his undoing, though, you watched him squeeze his eyes shut, deepening his frown as his pace became gentler, but not less effective. The sight of his parted lips, the paper-thin skin of his eyelids made pink by your blood circulating underneath his skin—it was nearly enough to push you over the edge. 

Nearly.

You bucked your hips against him, desperate for more friction, more of him. Once again, you wrapped your leg around his waist, pulling him deeper into you; you could never be close enough to him—never have enough of him. 

As if reading your mind, Astarion’s lips found yours once more. He wound his hand between your bodies, cupping your breast, caressing your lower stomach before he slid his hand down between your legs to mingle with his cock.

Knowing you would never tire of this—of him—you let yourself fall, and Astarion’s perfect nimble fingers assisted you graciously through your climax before he collapsed on top of you.

Together, you waited out the aftershock of your orgasm, his cock slowly softening inside you.

“Darling, I take you enjoyed this… admittedly mediocre performance?” 

Astarion’s voice was still raspy with pleasure and faint traces of unwarranted insecurity. 

You gave him a short laugh. “Mediocre?” 

Astarion only shrugged before he wrapped his arms around your waist, hugging you to him. 

“I’m enjoying whatever you’re willing to give me, Astarion,” you reminded him, pressing your lips to his forehead. “Always.”  

Astarion’s telltale smirk tugged at his lips as he rested his head in the valley of your breasts. “Very good, my sweet, because I want to thoroughly enjoy myself with you again. And again. And again…” 

You chuckled. “Very good, because I would not mind that at all.”

[spdrvyn]

i'll be lonely with you — MIGUEL O'HARA

SUMMARY: with the passage of time and whispers from your acquaintances at the spider society HQ, you've found out that your boss has a habit of sneaking out of his office during the dead hours of night to eat dinner. completely alone.

NOTES: new formatting for fics !!! do you guys like it? :3 i decided to include summaries that way it would be easier for people to understand the general jist of the plot without me spewing nonsense in the notes. anyways enjoy !!!!! thanks for the support on my recent works as well ^_^

You didn't consider yourself the most introverted person.

Even when it came to hundreds of Spider-people, you tried to get to know who you could and become acquainted with as many of them as possible. How could you not?

However, there were few that you knew on a more personal level. People that you'd keep close to your side whenever you visited headquarters. People that you'd enjoy having an exchange of gossip with during lunch in the bustling cafeteria.

Miguel O'Hara wasn't exactly one of those people.

It's not like you didn't want to develop something more than a boss-coworker relationship. Though, conversations with him were always difficult, to the say the least. Most of the time, he's talking about work and anything that goes past that boundary goes unspoken.

Quite literally. You've forgotten the amount of times that you've built up the courage to mention anything about your other (not deceased) relatives or your friends and the amount of times that the room was filled with a silence so awkward that crickets are on the same volume as missile launchers.

Though, you didn't want to lose hope. You sort of understood where he was coming from. People go through grief and mourning in different ways, Miguel's was probably just isolation and a complete avoidance of discussions of personal life.

He was a leader. A good one. A trait of a good leader is to connect with their subordinates, establish relationships. So it really made you think.

How messed up was he that he missed that one quality?

"Hey. Your food's getting cold." There it goes, the sound of your train of thought leaving the station. Sometimes, you were grateful for Jess being there for you. She could snap you back to reality you like nobody else could.

You mutter an apology before stabbing your salad with your fork and taking a bite, Jess rests her head on her palm. Raising a brow at you, "So, did you want to eat lunch with me for fun or are you just using me to get info about Miguel? Again?"

Nervously, you shake your head. "It's nothing like that!" She leans in a little more, waving her other free hand in the air in a circular motion.

"...But if you have anything that you'd like to share then I'm not going to refuse entirely—"

"Oh my god. Fine, fine. What do you want to know?"

With that question, it felt like your mind blanked. You fidgeted with your fork, twirling a leaf of your salad against the plate as you pondered on what question to ask.

Jess responds with a deep sigh, "If you're trying to find a way to talk to him more, he doesn't leave that office of his much unless it's for work. He's in there most of time. Although..."

"Although?"

"Although, I've seen him come here normally somewhere around midnight to get a very late dinner alone. The place is less crowded, most are just in their own universe or sleeping or working."

Your face falls a little upon hearing that. "So I can only catch a non-serious conversation with him... in the middle of the night?"

"Exactly. Besides, there's a good chance he's going to just— continue talking about work with you whether he's in his office or not. You know that, right?"

You drop your utensil in defeat, burying your face shamefully in your hands. "I know..."

You quickly wrap up your lunch with Jess, as she shares bits and pieces about him. You had really wondered how she was able to learn all of these things about him anyway but before you had the opportunity to ask her, she told you to not.

Respecting her wishes, you keep your mouth shut. Respecting her even further, you decide to pack up both of your plates and wave her a goodbye before picking up those thoughts that you were left a while ago.

Admittedly, you didn't know why you were so persistent for something like this, for someone like him.

Determination was a strength of yours but that didn't mean that you didn't know where your limits rested and you would back off when you needed to.

There was just something. A swirling feeling in your gut that was telling you to keep going.

That it would be worth it.

So, you follow everything that Jess told you. Around midnight, he'd be alone, in the cafeteria, and looking for an empanada to snack on before heading back into his office. A very small fraction of his time left for personal conversation if you tried hard enough!

This most likely wasn't a good idea. You didn't sleep at all through the day but the thrill kept you alive and thriving. You confidently stride up to the counters of the cafeteria, picking out a small bag of chips for yourself and the last empanada for your soon-to-be snack companion.

Now, you wait.

You surveyed your surroundings and as you were doing that, you realize why he particularly emerges during these kinds of hours to eat. There was a significantly less amount of people.

Whenever you came here during the day, it was a miracle to be able to find completely empty seats. At times, you were forced to sit with a group of people.

You weren't entirely ungrateful for that though, you've made a lot of friends that way. Sure, it was awkward at first but the more you were forced to interact with people that way, the more you adapted to making small talk.

Even then, there were a lot of tables that were taken here save for one completely empty one at the far end.

Then, you finally see that navy and red suit.

Deciding to observe him just a little bit more, you watch him curse under his breath seeing the display case for the empanadas empty. Before he walks away any further, you tap him on the shoulder.

His mask was on, his eyes widen a little bit before you hand him the small box. "I saved the last one for you."

With a soft huff, you see the muscles in his shoulders and back grow loose once more, he hestitantly takes the container from your hands. Looking at it then looking back at you, "Thanks."

You two share a few seconds of awkward silence, you felt a little exposed. You decided to unmask for this because you wanted him to feel more comfortable talking to you rather than who you were as a Spider-person yet there's still that same awkwardness in the air.

Clearly without nothing to do and no idea on how to makem something better out of this, Miguel's about to walk off before you stop him once more.

"W— wait," A little piece of yourself dies inside as you hear yourself stutter but nevertheless, you keep going. "Uh, there aren't any other spots so is it alright if I sit you? I don't know any of the people here."

The way that you see the eyes through his masks narrow ever so slightly once the question escapes your throat makes your heart quiver like crazy.

You wanted to get to know him but damn, if you said that he didn't scare you sometimes then you would be lying.

You cry on the inside with sweet victory as he says...

"Fine."

That was it. That was all you got but you gladly take it! You have to catch up to him though because once you're done mentally celebrating, he's already a little bit far from you.

You try your hardest to keep your head straight but you can't help but look up and spare him one glance, the fact that you even had to look up at him really only emphasized your height difference with him.

Another factor that made you just a little bit more intimidated by him, his physique. You considered yourself to be of average height, you weren't the tallest person in the room but you were never the shortest as well. Just average.

The way he practically towered over you, his hand nearly being the size of your head. It made you feel something.

The moment that both of you have a seat, you take your opportunity.

"So, is there anything that you plan on doing after this?"

You get a little distracted once his mask comes off, he raises an eyebrow at you, crimson eyes that feel like they're looking straight into your soul. Though, side-tracked as he bites into the dough and meaty goodness of his empanada, with a shrug— he replies,

"Not really. Unless there's an anomaly I haven't heard of yet then I have no plans. Why do you ask?"

"Oh, nothing. Was just curious is all." Why was this so hard?!

The conversation goes as what you expected. You'd ask a question every moment or so and he'd give you a short response before going back to his food. He wouldn't ask you anything back, wouldn't add any 'unnecessary' comments. Just bask in the silence.

You simply couldn't take it anymore, you didn't know how to express your interest in him without asking him more questions about himself which he seems to avoid trying to answer.

You couldn't ask him about his hobbies because he'll most likely say that he's too busy working to actually spend time gaining and branching out to different interests.

Dejectedly, you sigh. "I'm sorry for imposing— on your alone time, I mean." It was like everything that you wanted to say just kept spilling out of your mouth.

"I didn't want to eat with you at this hour because I pity you or— or I found you lonely or whatever. I just thought that whenever you weren't talking about work, we'd be able to get along."

You stand up from your seat, eyes mindlessly darting arounf the labels of the bag of 'Spider-O's' in your clutches.

"I'll, uhm, let you eat in peace now. Once again, I'm—"

"Wait."

Which ever brain cells died from that interaction certainly reignited now. "Sit back down," It comes off an order. An order you certainly obey.

"I wouldn't have actually said yes to you if I didn't want to talk." He starts. "I know a lot of people but it's not in the same way that you do. I know their names, their faces, their canon events. You know their feelings, their mindscapes, and their troubles—"

"—And those are the exact kinds of things that I can't comprehend most of the time. We understand people differently, is what I'm saying. I still have no idea why exactly you sought out me of all people but I will... try to gain this new perspective of things."

You want to tamp down the smile that creeps up on your lips as you hear those words but you can't. What he said, it all made sense now. You couldn't see the full picture still, but you were willing to find it—

"I understand. It's fine."

"So? Do you have plans after this?"

Together.

[ayaboba]

DAY 5: KEEP THINKING OF ME ❅⋆⍋

summary: when you ‘forget’ to kiss him goodbye.

characters: alhaitham, lyney, neuvillette, xiao.

notes: i have this weird thing of progressively making the paragraphs longer than the previous, wanted to try a different format, gn! reader. wc: 160 - 200 per character.

⋆⁺₊❅⋆ dreamy december event masterlist

alhaitham

Let’s be honest, he’d remind you.

Alhaitham is attentive to detail, fairly organised when it comes to routine, and certainly notices when something that ties his hasty mornings together is forgotten. He likes to say the work of a scribe is so endlessly dreary that he should be at least deserving of some reward. Preferably, though not outwardly stated, affection in the form of a tender kiss of your silken lips, brisk, energetic or longing, he’s not fussy.

Alhaitham believes that your affection is one of the only divine cures that could possibly be the remedy to the multitude of poisons inflicting his sanity. You find it a little funny; who knew the Akedemiya’s renowned scribe and former Acting Grand Sage could be so dramatic?

So, when you do forget to kiss him before he exits the door, he makes sure to mention it, makes sure that you won’t forget the next morning, because otherwise, the Akedemiya would have to deal with a missing employee.

lyney

The thing with Lyney is…he probably had more than plenty before he even reached this dilemma.

Throughout the day, from the first sunbeams to the final streaks of moonlight, he was quite bold when it came to the showers of love he craved most frequently. In truth, Lyney considers a day terribly incomplete if he hasn’t been exposed to the warm feelings of your beloved affection. He sincerely promises you that the simple regret doesn’t leave his mind, despite all the distractions he hopes to divert his thoughts revolving madly around you. Something that beautiful should never go overlooked.

Depending on the cruciality of the situation, he’d turn back and come knocking on your door with such a solemn expression that you’d assume that someone had died. The question would arise, his voice uncertain and curious, “Did you forget something important this morning?”

The best option would be to just give him that precious kiss. You don’t want him to do anything too extreme for it, do you?

neuvillette

Did he upset you the night before?

Neuvillette’s knowledge of the complexities of human emotions and responses was, in comparison to anyone else, a little rusty, he admits. That, of course, does not stop him from trying. The often ‘lost in his thoughts’ face the people of Fontaine regularly noticed about him was merely Neuvillette grasping in the elements of human nature, for to deeply understand them was essential if he ever planned on living alongside them.

The lighthearted experiment was just to see how he would react—a small prank, you convince yourself—but perhaps, just maybe, the chief justice had sincerely thought you were mad at him.

You haven’t seen him all day.

Neuvillette seems to have abandoned the customary meeting spots you’d typically bump into him, and that’s when you know.

The idea of putting the blame on himself, making up some complicated scenario that was certainly not true, elicits a newfound determination to make it up to him, to apologise with the compensation of the truth.

That evening, you wait for the door to open, and when it does, you ensure the person entering is gifted the sincere caress of your lips—a few more than what he expects.

xiao

Xiao would continue on with his day. He’s fine, thank you for asking. So what if you forgot to kiss him goodbye?

However, it would be a downright lie to assume that he was 100% veritably unaffected. Xiao was never particularly good at masking emotions, but rather more skilled at intensifying them.

He’ll ponder and wonder; the same question answered with the same reply, repeating like a lament, carving into the inconsolable space of his mind. In other words, Xiao is sulking and in brutal denial of it.

You observe him from the distance, standing on the tip of a faraway mountain, and there’s a strong feeling that he’s gazing at you, too.

Call out my name, he almost begs, a foolish excuse to inexplicably confront you.

The sound of your voice summons him instantly; it breaks him out of his trance, and what you say next cuts through all the tragic thoughts he ever contemplated beforehand.

“I forgot to kiss you this morning,” you smile, playfully apologetic. “Did you realise?”

Xiao doesn’t say anything, there’s nothing to be said, but his actions prove all that needs to be said—how the corners of his lips tug just the bit upwards as he leans into you.

[devildomditzy]

Wincing, you continue to wrap the mess of bandages around your damaged hand. Sure, you weren’t new to teleportation, and you can't even begin to count the times where Solomon failed to remind you to “stick the landing”, but you’re not sure if teleportation through time played by the same rules.

You’re lucky. Mammon caught you before you could hit the ground, because of course he does. Hell, just last week he caught you before you could trip your clumsy ass down the stairs in the hallway. Even in non threatening situations, his intuition to protect you over all else shone through his tough guy façade.

You instantly clung to him, because well, it’s him. Once you both landed, you leaned into his embrace. Though by now you were used to random cases of danger invading your daily life in the Devildom, plummeting from the sky unexpectedly is still enough to shake you up.

You let out a stuttering breath.

“Thanks, Mammon. I have absolutely no idea how I teleported up there. Maybe I don’t have as good a grip on my sorcery as I thought.”

You look up at him with a small smile, the one you know drives him crazy.

He returns it with a blank stare.

“How’d ya know my name?”

Something was clearly wrong.

“Not to be facetious, but I could heal that for you, you know. You could heal that for you.”

You glare up from your spot on the bed to make eye contact with Solomon.

“Gee, thanks for the reminder.”

His lips purse together in a thin line in a valiant attempt to hold back his laughter as he steps closer to you.

“You’ve got to admit, though unexpected, this turn of events is quite humorous, don’t you think?”

“Yeah, sure. I’m thousands of years in the past, my friends and boyfriend don’t recognize me, and I’ve only got you to keep me company. Hilarious.”

His lips upturn in a devious smirk. You hate that smirk.

“Aw, is it so bad to have to live with me? We’ve got all of Cocytus Hall to ourselves. I could wake up everyday and cook breakfast-"

“Please don’t.”

“We can divide up the chores, it’ll be like we’re newlyweds.”

Your wrapping halts so that you could look up at the pain in your ass. You need to ensure he sees the way you scrunch up your face in disgust.

“If I wasn’t in so much pain I’d slap you, but I won’t, consider it a favor.”

You continue wrapping the roll around your palm tightly, just like Mammon had taught you, as he did once before, right after you’d just met. A moment you remembered fondly, one of the first times that he hinted that he might see you as more than a friend. Even if he had a weird way of showing it. The thought makes you smile.

“Well, can we consider it a favor that I followed you all the way out here to ensure your wellbeing?”

You roll your eyes so hard he could probably hear them moving in your skull.

“Oh please, it’s you we’re talking about. There has to be some ulterior motive.”

He seems to pretend to ponder for a bit before tilting his head to the side.

“Ah, was I really that obvious?”

“Of course you were. 'Solomon the Wise' is anything but subtle,” you say, jeering his silly little nickname in a mocking tone.

A small chuckle shakes his head. “Well, I do really want to keep you safe, and return us back to our time with minimal temporal damage, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t interested to see what this time period had in store.”

You stop once again to give him a confused side eye. “Didn’t you already live this time period?”

His eyes seem to look a little far off, as they typically do when he’s lost in thought. “It was so long ago, I truly don’t remember much of it.”

“Hmm,” you hum finishing up the last of the wrapping and securing it in place. You attempt to flex your hand to the best of your ability. You swear you heard a pop. Your eyes begin to well up.

“Why aren’t you letting either of us heal you again?”, he questions after seeing your pained expression.

“I told you," you frown looking down at your sorry excuse for first aid. "I need a reminder that this isn’t some convoluted dream, or one of Levi’s weird games.”

“The fact that the brothers don’t remember you isn’t reminder enough?”

You know he’s joking, but Solomon always finds a way to get right under your skin in the worst way.

The tears that once threatened to bubble over begin to fall silently, streaking your face as you purposefully avoid eye contact.

“Ah, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean anything by it, truly.”

You’re both quite for a moment. Surprisingly, the air in the room isn't awkward. It's just... solemn.

He breaks the silence first.

“I know how hard this must be for you, considering how close you all are. To be honest, I'm kind of jealous. So many people care for you so fiercely across all realms.”

You sniffle, wiping your face with the back of your hand.

“You didn’t see the way he looked at me, Sol. It was like I was nothing to him. He didn't even look at me like that the day I met him. ”

He sits down beside you on the bed, pulling an arm around you, allowing you to collapse into him.

“He only looked at you like that because here he doesn’t know you yet. In case you've forgotten, you weren’t exactly born yet,” he teases.

He gets a small chuckle out of you with that one.

As you calm down, you begin to really reflect on what you know, and what he’s told you so far.

“Wait, you mentioned temporal damage before. What did you mean by that?”

“That’s a tricky one. to explain. But I guess to put it in layman's terms; You cannot, no matter what happens, tell anyone that you and I are from the future. Doing so could have dire consequences.”

“Like, it could change how things happened in our time?”

“Precisely.”

“And doing so would cause-”

“Temporal damage, yes.”

You give a dejected sigh. “Doesn’t even matter if I tell them anyway, they’d never believe me.”

“On the off chance that any of them do, or you convince them of the fact, our original timeline could fall apart.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning you might never get to go back to the brothers you know today.”

You can’t hide the worry that flashes on your face, even if it was just for a second. You’re the two most powerful sorcerers the world has seen for a very long time, and yet you feel so powerless.

“I-I can’t really feel them anymore. Their pacts, I mean. They’re so faint. B-But, it worked on Satan! So they have to still be in tact, right?”

Solomon smiles at the little glimmer of hope lighting up your face.

“Yes, it’s true that you haven’t formed your pacts yet in this time period, but you’re still the same you from the present. The invisible bonds you share between yourself and the brothers are still connected.”

“How is that even possible?”

“MC," he sighs, trying to figure out the best way to explain. " You didn’t die in our timeline. You didn’t leave, you didn’t cast any spells or trigger any curse. You were just gone. There only thing I could trace was this slight time distortion, so I went off the only lead I had. I’m glad I did.”

“I’m glad too, or I’m afraid I would be dead by now.”

“If I didn’t go after you, I’d be dead by now too”, he laughs, “The brothers aren’t too forgiving when it comes to you.”

The notion fills you stomach with a warm feeling. A warm, thick, bittersweet feeling.

You still have the boys, but they don’t know you yet.

You still have your magic, but not nearly as strong.

You’re not alone, but neither of you have any inkling on how to get back.

Meanwhile in a place in time thousands of years from where you sit now, seven panicked demons are tearing their realm apart high and low to try to find any trace of you.

[daizymax]

a little pampering | lfl (m)

summary: your kind, attentive boyfriend helps you unwind after a long day with a massage and a little more.

pairing: felix x fem reader

genre: fluff, smut

word count: 5.6k

rating: mature (18+)

warnings & features: established (but new) relationship; profanity; mentions of food; graphic sexual content; clit play & vaginal fingering; some breast & nipple play; a tiny bit of spit play & finger sucking; dirty talk; oral (m receiving); penetrative piv sex with condom use

author’s note: re-written, re-titled and re-uploaded from my old blog. hope you enjoy!

( click here to read on AO3 instead )

---

Technically he has good timing, but as you set your things down and kick off your shoes, you aren’t sure if you’re really in the mood to answer his call. Not after the day you’ve had. But it’s Felix, and the relationship is still new, so you answer anyway.

“Hey.”

“Uh oh, what’s wrong?”

Normally you don’t mind how observant he is; that’s one of the things you have come to admire about him. But you don’t want to unpack your hard day on him, so you feign ignorance.

“Hm? Nothing’s wrong, I’m fine,” you say, then promptly change the subject. “I just got home. How was your day?”

“It was alright,” Felix answers pleasantly. His smooth, deep voice is always soothing. Just a few words from him and you’re already feeling your mood lift a little. “I was just calling to see how your day was. When you didn’t answer my last text, I figured it turned into a rough one towards the end.”

You ignore his correct suspicion for the time being to quickly check your messages. There it is, the missed text from a few hours ago asking if the two of you could meet up for dinner tonight.

“Shit, I’m just now seeing it,” you say. “You’re right, work was rough and I was just crazy busy this afternoon, I’m sorry.”

“No worries! Does dinner sound alright, though? We can go anywhere you want.” When you make a noise somewhere between a ponderous hum and a non-committal grunt, Felix laughs knowingly. “Okay, that’s fine.”

His easy acceptance of your hesitation doesn’t make you feel better. If anything, it only makes you feel guilty.

“I’m sorry,” you sigh, “I just don’t really feel up to going out tonight. I’m tired and my neck is killing me. I kind of just want to stand under a hot shower for, like, half an hour, then pass out in bed.”

“Ah, poor thing. Can I at least bring you dinner, if I promise not to overstay my welcome? I’d still love to see you tonight, even for just a little while?”

His offer is sweet, but you don’t exactly like the way he’s pressing to see you tonight. Even when worded as questions, even with his assurance that he won’t stay too long, it comes off as kind of pushy to you. But to be fair, Felix has been nothing but respectful and understanding and kind to you in the couple months you’ve been dating him. Is a well-intentioned offer really something to refuse? Or something worth getting into an argument over?

You blame your sour thoughts on your terrible day and decide you probably would feel a little better if you let him dote on you with a simple meal and some company, so you accept his offer on the condition that he bring enough food for himself as well.

---

Felix arrives at your door with two bags of food and a smile.

Even after his own long day of work, he looks fresh and pretty. His blond hair is parted, freckles on full display against his honey skin. He smells good, too. Something clean and floral wafts into your nostrils, even through the smell of the food.

“Hey you,” you say. “Thanks again for bringing dinner, you really didn’t have to.”

“Hey you,” he echoes, stepping inside when you allow him by. “It’s my pleasure, really. Thanks for letting me come over. I hope you don’t mind, I brought dessert, too. Nothing special, just some ice cream. If we don’t eat it tonight, you can just keep it and save it for another time.”

You thank him again for the thoughtful gesture, and he wastes no time helping you put dessert into the freezer before dispensing the rest of the food onto some plates.

By the time the two of you settle across the table from each other, you feel silly for your negative thoughts earlier, even if they were brief. Maybe one day you will decline his company, but right now, this feels exactly like what you need: a nice meal and your boyfriend’s comforting presence.

“This is really great, Felix.”

He beams. “Dig in, babe.”

You expect him to ask for the details of your stressful day, but he doesn’t bring it up. Instead, he talks of his own day, and you learn a few new tidbits of information about him as he talks — the way he likes his coffee (extremely sweet), the time of day he showers (in the mornings, though he thinks nights would be better actually), the amount of time it takes for him to commute to and from work (about 20 minutes each way). It’s odd how mundane things like that are always fascinating at the start of a relationship.

Partway through the conversation, you stretch your stiff neck, and Felix notices your discomfort. He lumps his mouthful of food into one cheek and asks, “So what did you do to your neck?”

“I don’t even know,” you mutter. “It’s been a few days now. I don’t know if I slept on it wrong or what.”

“Poor thing,” he tuts again. “You’re probably ready for that shower. I’m just about done here, I can go ahead and show myself out and leave you to your rest.”

“No, stay,” you blurt. “I mean, I do really want to shower, but maybe we can watch a movie or a show or something when I’m done, if you want?”

He looks a little surprised at your suggestion. “Uh, yeah, sure. I mean, if you’re sure I won’t be overstaying my welcome? I really don’t mind if you want to kick me out now so you can get on with your evening. You don’t have to—”

You reach over the table to brush your fingertips over his knuckles, and he promptly shuts his mouth. “Felix, it’s okay. I want you to say, if you want to stay.”

He smiles and relaxes. “Alright, cool.”

After the table is cleared, you insist he make himself comfortable in the living room and find something for the two of you to watch when you return.

The pressure of the hot water and the encapsulating steam is everything you’ve been dreaming of all afternoon. And even though you have lovely company waiting, you decide to take your time and savor the water pelting your aching muscles until it turns lukewarm and you drag yourself back out to dry off and put on some comfortable clothes.

Felix certainly looks comfortable perched on your couch. He smiles brightly again when he sees you. “Feeling better, sweetheart?”

You stretch your neck experimentally. “Physically? Not really. Mentally? So much better.”

“Well that’s something, at least.” He fluffs open the blanket on his lap and says, “Come here.”

The scene is too tempting to resist. You cozy up beside him and wrap your arms around his middle as he does the same with you.

Felix sighs, then you hear him inhale softly. “You smell good.”

“So do you,” you say, sniffing his sleeve.

“Thanks.” He shifts one arm to reach for the remote on the table beside him. “Is Sci-Fi okay?”

You nod and lay your cheek against his shoulder. “Sounds good.”

“Cool.”

Half an hour into the show, your neck twinges in protest over your otherwise comfortable position, and you groan quietly as you pull yourself up to sit up straight. You’d been so content to cuddle with your warm, pretty boyfriend.

Felix pauses the show and looks over at you. “You okay?”

Before you can answer him, you bump your fingers into his hand when he reaches for the back of your neck first. His fingers are soft, and you can’t help but sigh at the tender pressure he puts on the sore tendons.

“You do feel tight. Tense,” he says, gazing at your skin in concern while he rubs gentle little circles into it with his thumb. “I might be able to help a little more than the shower did, if you want.”

You quirk an eyebrow. “You do massages?”

He shrugs. “I’ve been told once or twice that I’m decent at it. Think it’s worth a shot?”

You shrug back. “Yeah, sure, why not. Thanks, baby.”

Once you’ve situated yourself so that your back is facing him, Felix places his hand at the junction between your neck and shoulder.

“Right here, isn’t it? Down into your shoulder, too,” he says, measuring the damage with delicate prods of his fingertips.

“Y-yeah,” you mutter, then clear your throat. “Yeah, like all along there.”

With that confirmation, he takes a firmer grasp of your knotted muscles to try and smooth them out. You hiss at the sensation, a mixture of pain and pleasure.

Felix hums knowingly. “Sorry. Try to relax, but tell me if it hurts too much.”

He takes hold of your opposite shoulder just to steady you as he works the pained one. He rolls his fingers along the column of your neck, pressing his thumb at the base of your skull with a calculated pressure, then pinches the muscle of your shoulder.

“Feel okay?” he checks when you let out an indecipherable sound.

“It does hurt a bit,” you admit, “but it feels good, too.”

“Good.”

He repeats his motions over and over until he’s built up a nice rhythm of gentle squeezes up and down your neck and firmer, longer squeezes along your shoulder. You start to feel weightless, boneless, and you lean into his chest at the lulling ministrations.

At one point he sweetly kisses the side of your head without pausing his work, and it occurs to you then that you haven’t kissed him in days.

To remedy that, you start by turning your head towards him. Felix smiles when he meets your eyes, and you lean closer to kiss his lips. He doesn’t have time to react outside of a tiny, surprised grunt before you’re pulling away with a pleased grin.

He grins back wider. “Another,” he says, puckering his plump lips into a cute, inviting pout.

You giggle and oblige, this time holding the position longer. He kisses you back with the smallest movement of his jaw. Greedily, you decide it isn’t enough, so you reach to hold the back of his head and part your lips further to coax him into doing the same.

A sigh through his nose breaks across your cheek at the same time the tip of his tongue dips between your lips. You meet it softly, deepening the motion by tilting your head even more so there can be no gap between you.

The quiet sounds of your lips breaking and reconnecting fills your ears soothingly. His fingers have stopped massaging you in favor of simply holding you close to him, but you don’t mind. In fact, you’re already thinking of a better place for him to put them right now.

When you start to guide his hand down to your chest, Felix whispers your name against your lips. He doesn’t elaborate, and you’re not sure what he thinks he’s trying to say, but you don’t comment back.

Instead, you cup your hand over his and squeeze so he’ll take the hint. He doesn’t say anything more, just fondles your breast as requested by your body language. You arch into his touch and moan into his mouth, partly for sexy effect to keep him going, but mostly because it’s exciting to have him touch you like this for the first time.

Your moan encourages him, just as you suspected it might, and he adjusts his hold on your breast to run his thumb across the nipple starting to poke through your thin shirt. He doesn’t mention the lack of a bra, but you can tell he finds the easy access exciting by the way he hums again. He switches to your other breast to pay it some equal attention, rolling your stiff nipple between his thumb and forefinger gingerly, then pinching it just to hear you react with a light gasp.

“I’m really glad you let me come over tonight, Y/N,” Felix takes the time to mention, as though this makeout and groping session is the highlight of his whole day. The thought makes you want to take things even further.

“Me too.” You twist your torso to face him even more, and his hand slips from your breast to your lap. “Felix? I want you, baby.”

He licks his already wet lips, dark eyes shimmering as he glances between each of yours. “You mean… have sex? Right now?”

You nod silently, and there is a split second of hesitation on Felix’s part where you can almost see the gears turning in his head before he swears under his breath and surges forward into another kiss, feverish with new intent this time.

He returns his hand to your clothed chest without guidance this time, but you think of something even better, so you bring his hand up through the bottom of your shirt instead. You’re sure your own body temperature is rising with your desire, but his palm is nearly searing on your bare skin.

He starts to lose focus on kissing while he’s feeling you up, and so do you. Every roll and tweak and squeeze sends a pulse of arousal between your legs. It gets to the point that you start rubbing your thighs together needily, and Felix — being the kind, thoughtful, observant person he is — takes notice.

“Fuck, babe,” he swears. His hand smooths down your warm stomach to the band of your leggings and stops there. “Getting kind of horny?”

You giggle because he sounds kind of precious saying it aloud. It’s already been established that you want to have sex with him — of course you’re horny.

“More like a lot,” you say, nipping his bottom lip with your teeth.

Felix smirks deviously. “Hm. I see. Let me help you with that, sweetheart.”

He doesn’t push his fingers into your pants right away. Instead, he cups your pussy over your clothing with a confidence that both surprises and delights you. Then he starts to drag his fingers up and down, back and forth. Your toes curl and loosen depending on the pressure of his moving fingers and how often he brushes across your swelling clit. You’re barely kissing him at all at this point; more like hovering right against his lips, which are still smirking ever so slightly.

“Feel good?” he murmurs.

“Y-yeah.” You spread your legs a little wider, and Felix uses the extra space to grind the heel of his palm over your clit now. “Oh fuck,” you gasp over the new, rougher sensation.

Unlike with the massage he was giving you, he does not build up a steady, diligent rhythm of repetitive motions. He alternates without pattern between the grinding of his palm and the tickling of his fingers along your covered slit. It feels unbelievably, surprisingly good, but you’re getting frustrated by both the teasing and the barriers separating your burning skin from his.

“Felix,” you whimper. “I need more, please...”

“I know, I’ve got you.” He finally dives his hand into your pants, but he still only touches you over your underwear. “Mm, this does feel good, doesn’t it?” he says, alluding to how damp and sticky you’ve become. He traps your swollen clit between his index and middle finger and gives it a vibrating shake, and your thighs automatically clamp together on his hand, which makes him chuckle. “You still seem tense, Y/N. Relax for me. I’m taking care of you. Gonna make you come just like this.”

The whine you let out is pitiful even to your own ears. How easily he’s turned you to putty in his capable hands.

He wraps one arm across your stomach while the other flexes beneath the blanket at your crotch. You can’t see anything he’s doing down there, but you can sure as hell feel it all.

He keeps two fingers focused on your clit with tight, firm circles and increases his pace. Your soon-to-be-ruined panties not only add to the friction he is creating but also keep his fingers from slipping around too wildly. The concentrated pleasure races through your veins as fast as he can rub at the stiff, sensitive bundle of nerves.

The edge he’s been dragging you toward looms— “Right there! F-Felix… Please, j-just like that, please…”

“You don’t have to beg, sweetheart. Just let go,” he says. His voice is pitched lower than you’ve ever heard it, which very well could be what launches you straight into your body-tingling climax.

You gasp when it hits and clutch his forearm tightly — not to stop him, just to let him know, as if he couldn’t already tell you’re coming from the way you’re stuttering mindless expletives and desperately humping against his hand.

Felix almost moves his fingers away too soon, but you whimper and hold him in place for a little while longer to wring that last bit of ecstasy out. He coos something apologetic that you can’t quite make out through the static in your ears and continues drawing dwindling circles into your clit.

After a few more, he hooks his middle finger through the side of your panties and slowly glides it through your bare folds for the first time, from the bottom of your soaked opening, up between your puffy lips, all the way to your clit still pulsing at the top. You twitch weakly at the onset of sensitivity, but he doesn’t linger or torment you with overstimulation; his finger is gone almost as quickly as it came.

You slump against him, and Felix presses a sweet kiss to the first part of you he can reach, which is your sweaty temple.

“You’re amazing, Y/N. Feeling alright?”

In the midst of calming down and catching your breath, you have to laugh at his compliment when he was the one who did all the work.

“Yeah, I feel great. That was so good.”

“Good. There’s more orgasms where that came from, if you’re up for it.” He plants another quick peck on the crown of your head and gives your pussy one last pat through your panties with a flat, open palm before finally withdrawing from the cramped, humid space of your pants.

You turn to look at him over your shoulder again and give his lips a quick kiss. “I think it’s your turn for some pampering now.”

Felix doesn’t protest, only shifts with you as you transition from sitting between his legs on the couch to kneeling between his legs on the floor.

“Is this okay?” you ask, rubbing one of his knees.

Your pretty boyfriend nods. “Yeah, definitely.”

You start to run your hand up his thigh towards the enticing bulge between his legs, but he puts a hand over yours to stop you. You give him a concerned look because you thought he was good with this; he just said so.

“Listen, I’m not, like… impressive, okay?” he says.

Oh. That’s what he’s worried about? The size of his dick? The thought of him being self-conscious about it saddens you, honestly.

You give his thigh a squeeze. It feels firm and warm to your touch. “I’m not the kind of person to rate your dick based on size, baby. I promise you.”

Felix smiles shyly, face flushed pink. “I know, I know. I know it’s about how I use it. I guess I just wanted to, I don’t know, warn you? Not warn you but, like, prepare you, or something?”

He’s nervous, which in and of itself is completely understandable. This is the first time you’ll be seeing his dick. He wants to make a good first impression, and his size is one of the first things you’ll notice. You don’t want him to worry about it, though, so you go back to reaching for the zipper on his pants, and he lets go of your hand.

“Trust me, I’m more than prepared to suck you off, baby,” you say with a grin.

“What about your neck?” he asks.

“I’ll be alright.” A little soreness in your neck is not going to stop you from doing this. No way.

Felix lets out a breathy laugh at your determination and lifts his hips to help you get his pants down. His dick twitches beneath his boxers when you reach for them next.

As soon as you remove them, you think you can see what he was talking about. There are certainly longer and thicker cocks out there, and maybe he is slightly smaller than what could be considered ‘average,’ but by god, you’re not sure you’ve ever seen a prettier cock in your life. It’s rock solid, wrapped in a plump vein, and the tip is blushing a darker shade of pink than his face. You’re already more than pleased with it.

“Baby, your dick is perfect,” you say, reaching for it. He’ll probably think you’re exaggerating for the sake of his confidence, so you elaborate, “Perfect for me to swallow whole, and more than enough to fill me up. It’ll feel amazing to have you fuck me hard from behind, or with my legs on your shoulders in missionary, you know? You’d hit me just deep enough to hurt a little bit but not too much. You even fit perfectly in my hand. See?”

You swear you feel his cock pulse harder in your hold. The skin is so warm and smooth, silky yet stiff. You cannot wait to get your mouth on it, or have him stuff it in your pussy.

Felix breathes a short laugh; he sounds a little winded all of a sudden. “Fuck, I can’t wait to do all of that with you,” he says. His head falls back against the couch, and you’re glad to see him relaxing.

You nod. “Me either, baby. Can I start by swallowing you whole?”

Another twitch of his cock, which is clearly in agreement of its own, but you wait for his words.

“Yes, please,” he says, so politely.

You scoot a little closer on your knees, then bend forward to take his leaking tip into your mouth. Felix gasps as soon as you seal your lips around him, and he practically shivers when you lick at his slit. You love how sensitive and responsive he is. You can already see yourself worshiping his cock for hours. Maybe not tonight, but hopefully some time in the very near future.

It’s fun hearing his voice go from high-pitched and whiny to deep and almost tortured sounding, depending on whether you’re tracing the vein on his cock with your tongue or hollowing your cheeks around the flared mushroom head. He fits in your mouth so perfectly, just as you told him he would. His cock stretches your lips, but not enough to make your jaw sore; his length extends into your throat, but it’s not terribly troublesome to deep-throat him. It seems he especially loves breaching your throat and feeling the tight muscle flexing around his tip. Those sounds — the desperate little gasps — are quickly becoming your favorite.

Just when you’ve really gotten into a rhythm, however, he hisses “Wait wait wait,” and reaches out for your shoulder to gently ease your face away from his cock. It drops with a wet little plop against his lower stomach, glistening in your spit now.

“I’m gonna come if you keep going like that,” he says to your confused look, chuckling a little. “You’re actually about to suck my soul out.”

You laugh and rub his thighs. “I’m just taking care of you like you did for me.”

“I think I need to eat you out for ten minutes to even the score now.”

“There’s no score,” you say, still laughing, “but if you’d rather move on to something else, I have condoms in the bedroom.”

Felix sits up. “Lead the way.”

He leaves his pants and underwear behind on the living room floor, and you take his hand to bring him into your bedroom.

He’s been in here a couple times before already, but he’s never taken you by the hips and pulled you into a steamy kiss in here before. He’s never watched you strip your clothes for him in here before, or stripped his clothes for you in here before.

He’s never lowered you onto your mattress and followed on top of you before.

The feeling of his weight on yours is nice. His skin is so smooth and muscular; he’s been hiding those abs under his baggy clothes all this time. You kind of want to take more time to admire his body, but you’re not about to interrupt the feeling of his lips on your neck and throat; he’s found a sensitive spot, and it’s winding you up tighter to finally be fucked.

“Where’s the condoms, sweetheart?” Felix asks, as though he can hear your screaming thoughts. He scatters kisses along the tops of your breasts.

“In here,” you say, reaching for the drawer on your nightstand.

Felix reaches too, fingers bumping into yours as he finds one of the packets. He may have been nervous and self-conscious about his dick size, but he’s confident when he tears open the foil and tugs the latex over his erection. As soon as he’s ready to go, he asks, “So, did you want me to fuck you hard from behind, or missionary with your legs over my shoulders?”

God, he’s perfect.

“Doesn’t matter to me,” you say.

He smirks again. It looks extra devious on his angelic face. “Alright, well, at the risk of being cheesy, I think I want to see your face when you come this time, so legs up it is.”

You giggle. “So cheesy, baby. But that’s fine with me.”

Felix helps you into position, practically pulling your legs up for you to get the backs of your knees hooked over his shoulders. The tip of his covered cock bumps against your inner thigh, then the entrance of your pussy. You can feel how wet you still are — and how hard he still is — just from that minimal contact. He brings a hand down to better line himself up, and you can’t help but whimper when he presses a little harder on your hole. So close, but still not close enough.

“Ready?” he asks.

“Ready,” you say.

He pushes in, slowly but all in one go. The angle is perfect for him to hit just the right spot inside your walls, just like you knew he would.

Felix’s eyes roll back in his head in pure bliss, and he hugs your thighs to help balance you and to brace himself against all this pleasure.

“Oh my god,” he whispers. He leans a little more of his weight forward, unintentionally testing the flexibility in your legs. His core strength is impressive. “Is this okay, babe? You good?”

You bring your hands up to cup his face and purposely clench your walls tighter around him. “I’m fantastic. You can move whenever you want.”

He does just that, retracting the tip of his cock to the edge of your entrance before sliding in deep again, nice and slow. His movements are even and firm, tip to base, over and over again as he acquaints your pussy with his cock and vice versa.

“Oh f-fuck,” you breathe. “That’s so f-fucking good, Felix, so fucking deep.”

He groans and drops his hands from your thighs to plant his fists in the mattress instead. He fucks you faster, harder, battering that sweet spot inside you and driving you into the mattress. You can feel his balls slapping against your ass with every powerful push, and you can feel that your arousal has already leaked onto them, too. There’s going to be a hell of a wet spot on your sheets later, but you couldn’t care less.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” Felix chants under his breath in time with his thrusts. His eyes have been closed since he started moving faster, but he opens them again now. You meet his gaze and bite your lip, and he leans in to kiss you, pulling your bottom lip between his own teeth. His lips graze across your cheek and down your neck.

“You feel amazing inside me,” you tell him, fingers twisting into his hair at the back of his head.

Felix brings his hands around to your backside to take your ass in his hands and hold you even closer to him. “Got me so fucking close already, Y/N,” he grunts into your mouth.

“Then come for me.”

He shakes his head; long, blond bangs sweeping the freckles on his cheeks. His thrusts stutter before evening out again. “Not before you. Will you touch yourself for me?”

You smile and nod, bringing two fingers up between your lips and accidentally bumping Felix’s lips in the process. He surprises you by catching them in his mouth immediately after you’ve wet them with your own.

“Jesus, baby,” you whisper, heavy gaze on the way he sucks your fingers so well, if only for a quick second or two.

His brown eyes are smoldering, burning into yours, and you nearly forget what he just asked you. He watches you bring your wet fingers down between your rocking bodies to finger your clit. Your walls instantly clench tighter around his cock, and he groans straight into your ear.

“So fucking t-tight, babe. Your pussy fits s-so perfectly around me, fuck.”

Felix takes your free hand and presses it into the mattress beside your head, leaning more of his weight into you again. Your legs are aching from maintaining this position, but it’s worth it to have him hitting your g-spot over and over again at this angle, and your orgasm is so fucking close now.

It’s clear Felix is close, too. His forehead and upper lip are dotted with sweat, his hips are getting more and more erratic, his breath is stuttering. He rakes his eyes from yours, down to your jiggling breasts, down to where your fingers are playing with your clit, and repeat.

“So gorgeous,” he whispers with a sweet peck to your lips. Far too sweet for the way he’s plowing you up the mattress, which somehow only pushes you closer to the edge.

“Fuck, gonna come,” you moan, squeezing his hand tighter.

Felix squeezes back and goes in even faster, determined in his thrusts. “Do it, sweetheart. Come on my cock.”

It doesn’t take much longer for you to do so. A few more perfect pushes against that sweet spot inside you and a few more flicks of your fingers and your orgasm quakes through you, hot and molten from your core all the way down — up — to your curled toes. You can’t help but tug Felix’s body even closer with your legs as you tremble through your high.

“God damn,” Felix swears as he watches you come; he couldn’t see it this well on the couch earlier. Your eyes are shut, mouth fallen open, body squirming under him from all the pleasure he’s helped bring you.

And your pussy, fuck. You can’t seem to stop clenching, and it draws out his own climax. He can barely get the words out to tell you. “Shit, c-coming, babe— ungh!”

He lodges his cock as deep as it can go and finally unloads his cum into the condom with a low grunt. You peek your eyes open in time to witness his own mouth dropped open in bliss. He gives a few more firm thrusts to finish off his orgasm, then gently eases your legs down. You wince a little as you become more aware of the muscles you’ve been straining, and Felix gently kneads your hips with his fingers.

“You okay, sweetheart?”

“Can’t feel my legs,” you pant, smiling up at him, “but in a good way. That was amazing. You okay?”

Felix is trying to catch his own breath, but he still giggles. “I’m great!” He runs his hands up your legs from ankles to hips, then gives the sides of your ass a couple pats. “Be right back.”

He hops off the bed with a surprising amount of energy and dashes into the bathroom to trash the condom. When he returns, he has a towel in hand.

“Is it okay to clean up with this?” he asks.

You give him a tired thumbs up, and he smiles as he helps clean up the lingering wetness between your legs. He tries to do something about the wet spot on the sheets, too, but you tell him not to worry about it; you’ll just change them in a bit.

For now, you reach out to bring him back into bed and into your arms, and he easily obliges.

“Just lie with me for a bit, please?” you murmur, halfway to sleep as you play with his hair.

Felix snuggles tighter against you and hums. “Of course.”

“Might pass out any second,” you warn him.

He kisses your throat. “That’s alright, sweetheart. Rest.”

You yawn. “Want you to stay with me.”

His body is so warm and solid. His voice is deep and honeyed. “I’m here. Right here.” A few beats of silence go by, then he adds, “I’m really glad you let me come over tonight, Y/N.”

You hum, “Me too,” just before drifting off.

---

if you enjoyed, please consider re-blogging and/or leaving me some feedback. take care! ♡

copyright © 2023 by daizymax. all rights reserved. back to masterlist

[roseykat]

KINKTOBER DAY 2 - CHANGBIN

Title: These hands were made for you

PAIRING: Changbin x reader

SUMMARY: Changbin agrees for you to give him a massage to relieve some of his back pain, but isn’t prepared for the physical reaction he has to your touch. For context, the reader is part of the management team!

WARNING: minors DNI with this post or my blog. I create NSFW SKZ related content and I know I won't be able to regulate/monitor every single potential interaction with these posts so please do not engage with my work and page whatsoever. 

TAGS: hands-free orgasm, massages, swearing, hint of body worshipping if you squint.

KINK: erotic massage

KINKTOBER - MASTERLIST

Thinking Changbin was awake happened to be a mistaken thought, especially after you had been standing at the door of his hotel room for the past few minutes, knocking at it. Even calling and texting him didn’t help. In saying that, it was late and you had to give him the benefit of the doubt; he had played a show not too long ago, had been complaining of muscle pain, and was most likely really tired. 

But so were you.

Having waited over an hour at the airport trying to track some of Changbin’s lost luggage during their performance. A while after that, both of his items had been located and it was your task to return them to him. 

For a few spare seconds, you thought it would be wise to just wait until the morning since you were convinced that he was asleep. But it wasn’t until you heard some rustling and footsteps behind the door right before it opened.

“Oh,” Changbin rubs his drowsy eyes. “Sorry, I swear I was up and then I closed my eyes and drifted off.” 

It was easy to tell by his bed hair, the way that his natural curls were starting to peek through, “no it’s okay, you must be tired.”

“You have no idea,” he replies and looks at both bags of his luggage that you had been rolling with you since you got back. “Thank you, thank you, thank you! Where were they?”

He takes one off of you while you roll the other one into his room, “they were at a different luggage pick-up. But we already rang the airport to say that they were missing and then it took them an hour to track them. Anyway, did you go to see the physio in the meantime?"

About a few hours ago after the concert had finished, Changbin was complaining about how sore he was after the gym. It’s common for him to feel that way since he practically lives in that space. Only this time around, he might’ve pushed himself a bit too hard - that and during the concert. 

“Nah,” he brushes it off as the door closes behind you both. “I can’t see any of them until tomorrow.” 

“Do you think you’re injured maybe?” You ask concernedly. 

Changbin huffs, “I’m not injured! I’m only sore and my muscles hurt like hell. Plus I always warmup and cool down properly.” 

“Okay then, where are you sore?” You question again. 

“Mainly my back,” he answers and goes to sit down on the edge of the bed. 

“Upper or lower?” 

“My upper,” Changbin confirms and tilts his head, looking at you. “I didn’t realise you were so concerned about me.” 

Your eyes narrow at him, “not in the way that you might think.”

“Sure, sure,” he chuckles lightheartedly. “Anyway, if you’re going to ask me so many questions about my injury, you wouldn’t happen to be a physiotherapist right?” 

“So you are injured.”

“That’s not what I meant,” he corrects. “I'm just sore, and I need a good night's sleep.” 

“Well, if you want me to I suppose,” you say, ignoring his tone of voice. 

“Wait...” He asks in disbelief. “Really?” 

“I did a year in physio at college so I know a few things,” you answer, placing your own bag on the lowered counter where luggage is usually stored in the room. “I’m not a licensed one though.”

Changbin ponders; he has no way of getting in to see their physio at this point in time. Even just a massage would be some relief to him. 

Whilst you aren’t professional in either of those fields, you didn’t study it for nothing. You know the functions of the body and muscles inside out. You know what happens to them when they’re under stress, torn, or strained. But also the remedies which can help repair them. 

“Okay then, if you’re able to,” Changbin agrees. “Where do you want me?”

“The bed, so take your shirt off and lie on your stomach,” you instruct. 

Changbin side-eyes you, “a date would be nice first,” he says even though he’s taking his shirt off in a rush.

You roll your eyes and take a small kit out of your bag. It’s stocked with the essentials; plasters, KT tape, scissors, cold spray - usually for Minho if his shoulder is playing up - nail clippers, all of which you have just in case.

These boys are constantly on the go and are prone to getting injured. So even though it’s not your job, you still keep things handy when there aren’t any left. But also because they end up asking you anyway whenever you're around. Spontaneous massages aren’t on that list though, but there's always a first for everything.

By that point, Changbin had stripped himself of his t-shirt, placed it to his side and lay face down on the bed. There were a couple of silent seconds of you preparing what you needed but also admiring Changbin’s body. 

His back and shoulders are broad but especially taut, you’ve seen them before when he walks around the dressing room with his top half stripped of any fabric. But you’ve never seen nor felt it - not that you would in that type of way. 

In saying that, you start by taking the small tub of deep heat, unscrewing the cap, and scooping some of the product onto your hand and setting the tub aside. Your first point of contact with Changbin’s back makes him jolt. 

“Sorry,” he mutters, turning his head on the pillow.

“It’s fine. I’m gonna start now okay?” 

“Got it,” he says. 

You dollop a little bit more of the deep heat onto Changbin before spreading it and working it in until his skin absorbs it. He’s smooth to the touch. Your hands glide over every glorious muscle.

It doesn’t really sink in that you’re doing this until Changbin hums, sounding like he’s in relief. Within a few moments, he feels like his back is pressed up against a heater. His skin is hot and burning slightly, but that’s the whole purpose of the deep heat. It’s to soften the bunched muscles in his back, making it easier to knead and roll them out like dough.

However, given the state this part of his body is in, you can already make an observation on how tense his muscles are under your hands. 

“You’re tight,” you feel as he rubs into a spot just above his right shoulder blade. “When did you say was the last time you went to physio?”

Changbin’s face flushes, he can feel the heat rising to his cheeks as if you put the deep heat on his face. 

“I-I didn’t,” he responds, trying to relax. “But I haven’t been at all so far.”

You pause, “we have three physios and a sports massage therapist for a reason. You can’t tell me that you haven’t been to see one of them so far.”

“Some of the others are seeing them shortly and I didn’t wanna wait that long,” he argues. You use the thumb and the pad of your index finger to dig and narrowly drag down Changbin’s spine, making him contort to the left slightly.

“I’ve still been able to take care of myself after shows and whatnot. Ice baths and stuff like that, so I haven’t had any injuries so far," he adds.

“You don’t just take ice baths though, do you?” You ask, digging for more information to see if he really has been taking care of himself. 

“Yeah, cold showers too,” he adds to his list. 

“Heat is also good for your muscles, you know that right?”

“Not as good as cold techniques,” he says. “Right?” 

“Depends on when you need it,” You point out. “You're a gym rat. I thought you already knew all of this information about taking care of your body-"

“Ah-” 

Your hands still for a second from his reaction, “hurts?” 

Changbin nods before his eyes flash open when you press your thumb deeper into the same spot. He lets out a yelp, his arms coming up to the sides of his shoulders, getting ready to prop himself up. 

“Yeah - yes, that really hurts, fuck,” he groans. 

“If it hurts, it’s working,” you use the flat of your hand to push Changbin back down into the mattress. 

“That’s a very outdated saying,” he strains, trying to absorb the soreness before it eventually becomes bearable. 

It takes him a few moments to melt against your touch now that his back is slightly more relaxed and warmed up. He’s now more susceptible to sensitivity which for him, heightens your contact on him. He doesn’t exactly know why it feels good - strangely good. But Changbin doesn’t complain. 

“Y/N…” he breathes out involunintarily.

You freeze on the spot, wondering if your ears deceived you for a second. Surely Changbin didn’t just moan out your name. All you’re doing is unravelling knots in his back. But even so, you were curious for a split second and when curiosity takes shape, there’s nothing you can do about it. So to test your theory, you take a little bit more deep heat, rubbing it between your fingers and massaging it slowly over the area. 

Changbin’s hands grip the sheets in response. He can’t control any of his reactions to the way your hands smooth over his back, or when the heel of your palm digs and drags nicely down his back. He doesn’t even want to think about where else good he feels.

“How does it feel now?” You test. 

His response is a strange, high pitched hum, but he does give a small nod. You try not to smirk even though it’s not like he’s able to see it. 

“I’m sorry,” Changbin swallows, almost panting. “It's just...you touching me.”

“Do you want me to stop?” You ask him.

“No!” he exclaims too quickly. “I mean, only if you want to. I’m okay with it, just…tender.” 

You’re thankful that Changbin can’t see you blushing with embarrassment. You don’t know why you reacted that way but the more you massage his back, the more you forget about the moment. Changbin on the other hand begins to panic when he recognises that he’s actually horny. 

Over the minutes gone by, his cock starts slowly filling out between his legs. It’s an awkward position to be hard and lie down at the same time. Either way, nothing is stopping it from happening and certainly not your hands. The heat, the cream, your touch, the wet, sticky sounds that it’s making, makes him think things that have crossed the border of ‘appropriate’. 

“Are you okay? You seem like you’re struggling a bit,” you witness his shoulder blades start to cinch together.

“Fine,” Changbin turns his face into the pillow. “It’s sore but…it feels good.”

You look down at his hands and see him gripping the sheets again. From any physiotherapist’s point of view, Changbin might just be expressing that this hurts. That you’re really relieving the stress and tension built up in his back. 

“Fuck, Y/N,” he mumbles. 

But from your point of view, you can tell that he’s actually enjoying this more than he should be. You mentally scold yourself for jumping to that conclusion, because in what world does someone get off from having their back rubbed? It might be this world because when you realise that Changbin is making small, almost unnoticeable thrusts with his hips, he can’t help but want to speak his mind.

Usually, massages, erotic ones at least, are accompanied by other forms of actions, at least that's what you thought before Changbin started to become visibly flustered

“Changbin,” you say as he takes his tone as a warning.

His eyes flash open, knowing what he’s just done, what he couldn’t help but do, “fuck. S-Sorry, I didn’t expect…”

Didn’t expect what? Changbin doesn’t even know what the rest of his unfinished question means and he obviously doesn’t know the answer. Flustered as hell, he cannot seem to rack his brain for a lie. Even if he did, you would be able to see right through it. 

“Again, it’s just someone touching me...” he mutters aloud what he's feeling.

You pause, “are you sure you don't want me to stop? If not, I’d like to get these last few knots out of your back.”

Changbin knows that this situation could go one of three ways. If he lets you continue to massage him, he will definitely cum. The bonus there is that his back will feel better and also his dick.

But if he asks you to stop, it'll be awkward as hell having to deal with the fact that he’s fully hard. The downside is that there are still knots in his back, and he won’t get to sleep, which ultimately means he'll be in a terrible mood.

The other way is that there is an unlikely small chance that he won't cum. His body might be overly excited right now, but it could pass. There's a 99% chance that he might have time to get soft. But with the way that you're both going, he knows it probably won't happen.

“I…I don’t know,” Changbin replies, clearly confused. “It’s been a while since…someone touched me-“

“That’s okay,” you dismiss his babbling. “It’s not unusual.”

He swallows, bewildered, “it’s not?”

“No,” you assure him. 

At this point, you would stop but for some...fucked up reason, you want to keep going. You really want to see how this ends. You’ve never been someone who half asses things, so how is this any different? Plus it’s technically your fault after making Changbin unintentionally horny. At least that’s the state he’s currently in to your knowledge. 

But you’re okay with that if he is. 

“Wanting contact with other human beings isn’t abnormal Binnie. You’re obviously just a bit touch-deprived.”

“T-That’s a thing?” He asks, turning his head to try and look at you. But you smooth your palm up his spine, massaging into the divots until he reaches the base of his neck so that he can relax and not focus so much on you. 

“There’s this theory that we all need human contact. Not sexually per se, but mundane things like hugs, holding hands and all that,” you start explaining. 

“I guess that makes sense,” Changbin responds, then tries to suppress a grunt when you start gliding lower to his tailbone again.

You’re working the area just under his shoulder blade which at the moment seems to be the most sensitive. That and his dick - indirectly. Changbin is too embarrassed to think about the fact that you can read him far too easily. Either that or he’s just being extremely obvious, which he is. 

“Even just social interaction at times. Studies show that there’s a link between loneliness and touch deprivation,” you add.

He can’t even believe he’s having this conversation with you. At the very most, he can’t believe that your hands are on him and making him feel certain things that are beyond his control. 

“R-Really?” Changbin jolts when you begin kneading his back again, like every cell in his body is on edge. 

“With these interactions, it can release a neurochemical in the brain called oxytocin which is responsible for good feelings…”

Neurochemical...oxytocin….Changbin appreciates the science talk and in fact, it’s strangely hot to hear it come out of your mouth. But he cannot focus on what he’s saying at all, because his dick is achingly hard and there’s nothing he can do about it.

“Fuck…” Changbin swallows harshly. “Touch me, please.”

“I believe I am touching you,” you respond coldly. 

He doesn’t even know if your words were teasing or not. He just wants to relieve the throbbing ache in his dick when all he can do is make small thrusting movements. It’s not until you use the pads of his thumbs to press into a few points in his tailbone. It feels good in terms of the pain he had in his back, but now he can’t thrust against the mattress anymore. Not yet at least. 

Changbin whines when you slowly release the pressure of his touch.

“You have a nice back,” you comment, then gently scratch down it with your fingernails, not enough to hurt him, but it definitely makes the deep heat feel hotter. 

“Oh my god m’gonna cum,” Changbin exclaims out in a choked, rushed voice. His words instantly confirm your thoughts, so you continue to slowly rub down his back to his tailbone again. “Please..."

“It’s okay, you can come,” with the heel of your palm once more, you knead just under his shoulder blade, enough to make Changbin keen to the side. 

His eyes snap shut before he’s dipped into pleasure. He goes silent for a few seconds, still making tiny movements, almost as if he were trying to fuck someone into the mattress. For him, it’s an odd sensation because his cock had been completely untouched and neglected. 

Breathing heavily, Changbin slowly opens his eyes when the realisation dawns on him. He spends the first ten seconds of his comedown trying to figure out where he is. Your soothing hands slowly and gently rubbing up his back reorients him. The heat that the cream provided is now turning into a cooling sensation, added in with your touch. It feels good, and even better now that his muscles are at ease. 

“Feel better?”

“H-Heaps,” he swallows, now feeling like someone tipped a bucket of ice water on top of his head.  

“Good,” you smile to yourself, content with that outcome. “You should probably clean yourself up then.” 

-

A/N: thank you everyone for your patience. The last half of this week was so busy for me, so I’m back writing and catching up the works x

TAGLIST: @kbitties @luneskies @mal-lunar-28 @kibs-and-bits @aaasia111 @fairy-lixie @dreamingaboutjisung @lizzekat 🩷🩷🩷 (if I’ve forgotten anyone again, please let me know 🙃)

[lemony-snickers]

i am sorry but tummy touches are an underrated form of intimacy. like, even just the barest brush of fingertips beneath the hem of a shirt, you know? it's such a vulnerable part of the body - so many delicate organs, no bones to protect them. a part so many are self-conscious of. and whether made of firm muscle or soft tissue, it is delicate. easy to destroy.

and i imagine a shinobi is even more hyper aware of this. imagine kakashi gently redirecting your hands the first time you try to slip yours beneath his shirt as you cuddle on the couch early in your relationship. he's reading, probably, while you half-doze on top of him, listening to the reassuring rhythm of his steady heart against your ear, the gentle movement of his chest as it expands and then contracts, lulling you like the ocean tide.

you barely recognize the change in the tempo of his heartbeat, the way it skips and races a second before resettling. he threads his fingers with yours as he pulls your hand away, so you hardly notice what's happened, especially half-asleep.

but then it happens again. and again. and eventually when you walk up behind him in the kitchen and try to sneak your hands beneath his shirt as he washes your dinner dishes, you can't keep your curiosity at bay any longer and you ask, "is there a reason you don't want me to touch you there?"

and kakashi doesn't really know how to answer, exactly. technically, there's no reason for you not to. honestly, he doesn't even know why it makes him feel so squiggly inside. uncomfortable.

vulnerable.

so he just answers, "no," with a little bit more of a question mark than he meant to tack on the end and you stare at him a little, pondering the best way to proceed.

you decide on boldly, and step close, maintaining slightly too intense eye contact as you roughly shove your hand beneath his uniform shirt...

only to be met by chainmail, which snags against one of your fingers until you pull back with a slight yelp.

kakashi pales, eyes wide as he steps forward to cradle your hand. "sorry, shit, sorry, i forgot."

you frown, maybe pout a little. "you forgot you were wearing battle armor in the kitchen?" you ask, only half-skeptical. kakashi is a strange man, one with many habits ingrained from his time as the copy ninja of konoha. you don't pretend to understand all the things he does - hiding weapons scrolls in your couch cushions, keeping a spare pair of sandals on the window sill in his bedroom, always sitting with his back to the wall and never the window - but you don't question them. you know it's just part of who he is.

still. the chainmail is a little unexpected.

"isn't it heavy?"

kakashi has many laughs, and you've been lucky enough to hear almost all of them, now. this time, he offers that soft huff that puffs his mask out a little in front of his mouth. "old habits never die, it seems."

you chuckle, leaning up to kiss his cloth-covered cheek. "next time i try to be assertive, i'll be sure to ask if you've changed out of it first."

"probably a good idea."

kakashi wraps your finger in the bathroom, "just a precaution," he says when you protest. you let him even though you know it isn't necessary because you understand it's important to him to take care of you.

you thank him with another kiss, this time without his mask in the way, before he heads home.

the next time the two of you snuggle on the couch together, you don't try to reach beneath his shirt. as much as you want to - as much as you crave knowing what his body feels like beneath the thick, reinforced fabric of his uniform, you satisfy yourself with running your fingers over his clothed chest, tracing concentric circles while you daydream and kakashi reads.

the snap of his book closing draws your attention and you twist yourself to look at him. "are you hungr--"

you never finish your sentence because, faster than you can ask the question, kakashi has grabbed your hand and guided it beneath the hem of his shirt with swift purpose.

he isn't wearing chainmail this time, and all your palm is met with is warm, soft skin, broken in place by what you assume are scars you haven't yet seen. you flex your fingers, drag your fingertips over his abdomen until he shivers.

"ticklish, huh?" you tease, "good to know."

kakashi only hums.

you can feel his own fingers dancing across your hip, sliding from your upper thigh to your ribs and back again like he's trying to decide what to do.

you gasp very gently when his hand slips beneath, goosebumps springing to life across your skin in the wake of his calloused touch. you sigh, nuzzle your face into his chest as you both relax into the embrace - so similar to your usual cuddling position, and yet suddenly more intimate.

a step forward, something which often comes so painfully slow in your relationship with the stoic and reserved kakashi hatake.

you listen closely to his heart this time, relishing the way it sometimes speeds when you let your hand drift higher, toward his clavicle - or lower, toward his waistband - knowing your own heart hammers just the same as kakashi's hand dances over your belly, grazes your hip bone; your nerves all alight, blood racing.

you're ready for more, and hopefully he will be soon, too. for now, though, you're content to map with your fingers all the scars you plan to lavish wish kisses when the time comes.