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satuguro · 1 year

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✧*ೃ࿐ TONGUES & TEETH

[ ACT I: THE GLOW ]

xavier thorpe x valkyrie! reader

#SYNOPSIS— xavier’s attracted to intimidating women, you and wednesday bond over murder methods, and you really need to stop being attracted to trouble.

#CONTAINS— enemies to fwb to lovers, academic rivals, intimidating and flawed reader, gore, blood, death, aged up characters (everyone is 18 except for eugene), sexual content (later on)

#AUTHORSNOTE— spontaneously writing an xavier thorpe fanfic was honestly not on my mind but oh well here it is ! feel free to send me asks/requests about this series or for other wednesday characters

ACT I, ACT II, ACT III, ACT IV, ACT V, ACT VI

a valkyrie was not a mere label. it was a highly respected role, one that was not granted to simply because you were a child of odin. no, the position of a valkyrie was an important one, because every warrior who died in battle, every fighter’s soul, relied on you to bring them to valhalla — no matter what that was for them. heaven, hell, reincarnation — you and your sisters brought them there.

nevermore was seemingly the only available place in which you could reside. you were the youngest of the ten valkyrie sisters, the only one born into the 21st century (as the rest of them were much too old for you to count). odin tried to put his youngest daughter into every school imaginable; public school, private school, boarding school, juvenile detention.

all brought out the same results. you found the material easy and the lack of competition boring, or you were found beating some kid into the ground, your knuckles bloody as adults pried you off of them.

granted, every person you have ever thrown a punch at was deserving of it. but it’s not like the police care about the kid with a broken leg; they care about the person who carelessly broke it with their bare hands.

that was why you found yourself in nevermore, standing awkwardly next to your nine sisters as you loosened your tie around your neck.

the other students didn’t care to hide their stares, their whispers loud and very audible to you as you looked at every single one of them.

“don’t loosen your tie, y/n,” your eldest sister, brunhilde, said with a small look, her arms crossed as she stood towering above the rest of the passing students. “you must look presentable.”

“since when did you ever care about looking presentable?” you replied with a scoff, using one finger to loosen the black tie incompletely. you heard your second youngest sister, gunnr, snicker at that, her laughter quickly hindered by a glare from another one of your sisters.

“ever since father decided to send us to take you here rather than himself,” brunhilde snapped, bitterness evident in her tone as she clenched her jaw. her emerald green eyes flashed in anger; the fact that her father decided not to show up to something like this yet again wasn’t surprising, but it still annoyed her nonetheless.

“he was busy,” eir, the second eldest valkyrie, murmured, coming in yet again as the peacemaker. “besides— this isn’t exactly father’s scene. too many children.”

their conversation melted into the background as your eyes drifted around the courtyard. there seemed to be little cliques within the school — gorgons, vampires, werewolves, sirens, psychics — how cliche. your eyes however, landed on one boy that was painting a raven on the wall, his eyes already set on you far before you noticed him.

his long hair was tied back, his hazel eyes boring into yours as he stopped painting, his hand falling to his side. he was studying you, observing your purposely loosened tie, the sword necklace that hung around your neck, the dagger strapped to your side, and the nine buff women who stood around you. they looked nothing like you, but their energy was strong. powerful. unwavering.

you didn’t break eye contact with him, your eyes narrowing as you challenged him to look away first.

“y/n odinsdottir." a tall woman who practically screamed elegance interrupted your staring contest, forcing you to look away first. her hair was perfectly pinned up, and her cherry red lips curled into a smile as she looked at you. "welcome to nevermore. i assume these are your sisters?" she questioned, looking at your siblings with a warm smile.

"we won't be here long," brunhilde stated, stepping forward. she seemed to be about the same height as the woman, which seemed to please her greatly. she held out a calloused hand. "brunhilde. you're the principal, correct?"

"yes - larissa weems." principal weems' smile never broke as she shook your sister's hand. wordlessly, she began to lead the ten of you to her office. "i have made living arrangements for y/n - i hope she does well with roommates. one of her other roommates is a new student as well."

this new school was, frankly, a lot fancier than most of the schools you had gone to. it looked old, with too many ghosts and history hidden in its walls, but while the school stood out more than the rest, the people seemed to be all the same. prudes with enough money to have the world in their hands. teenagers who have never been told 'no' in their lives. cockiness and pride seemed to ooze from every crevice.

in a way, you found it amusing.

"it was honestly quite a surprise to find all of you here rather than your father," principal weems commented as she opened the door to her office, "i believe that he had told me that he would arrive." she situated herself into her chair behind her desk, placing her hands on the table and clasping them.

you stood in front of the desk, rolling your eyes at her comment. "he likes to lie," you stated bluntly, ignoring the glare eir sent to you as she offered principal an apologetic smile.

"what y/n means to say is," eir began, absentmindedly toying with one of her long golden braids, "our father is very busy. he has other business to attend to."

"he likes doing business." you continued, "especially on his bed."

one of your older sisters, skuld, hissed a small "y/n," as a warning for your words, making you huff in annoyance.

eir's smile was unwavering and her politeness was undeterred as she laughed lightly, "i apologize for y/n's words. she often.. lacks a filter."

"it's no problem, i assure you." principal weems' smile grew as she looked at you, "she's in very capable hands. later, she will receive a tour from one of her roommates, enid sinclair. she's very approachable; i'm sure they will get along."

that statement made your mask fall for just a second.

friends and lovers were topics that were often unspoken between you and your sisters. to put it frankly, it was hard for valkyries to truly find themselves friends with others or loving another because of something you called 'the glow.' valkyries, being a guide for souls in battle, had the ability to know when someone's death was near. it often appeared as a golden glow around the individual moments before a battle or before a specific moment. to help was to lose your position as a valkyrie. to lose your father's acceptance and appreciation of you. it was the foundation of your position, your one important duty to guide the souls of warriors, but there had been instances where the glow appeared for those you cared for. friends. lovers.

it had happened too many times to your sisters. they had all lost lovers and friends in battle, and had to be the one to guide their souls and leave them for eternity. but there came a moment in time where they all decided to stop caring so much for others. they focused on each other, protecting their own sisters out of fear of caring and losing another.

and when you were born, they warned you of that same fate. they warned you of how hard it was to sense death, to be a symbol of war and death. so to say that you would get along with another and care for them was hard to fathom, because your mind automatically thought of losing them in an instant.

and if you lost them and were not able to guide them, you wouldn't know what to do with yourself.

"i will say that your record is.. only mildly concerning, y/n," principal weems said as she pulled out your folder. she scanned through the pages, licking her finger as she turned and read every offense and crime that ended with you getting kicked out of a school. "you've sent tons of people to the hospital for horrible injuries," she murmured, and you swallowed, mentally preparing yourself to hear the list. "you've broken the limbs of many, gave concussions to many more, and in one instance dropped a teenage boy from a thousand feet above ground."

"all deserved. i hold no remorse for them," you stated, a proud smirk making its way onto your face.

principal weems' brows furrowed as she reached the last page in the folder, the words 'saving grace orphanage' in large letters at the top of the form. "kicked out of nearly 20 homes in the span of 13 years."

your smirk fell, your eyes turning cold as you glared at the principal. next to you, gunnr shifted uncomfortably, her hands clenching and unclenching in the instance she had to hold you back from landing a hand on your principal. "how did you get those?"

"nevermore requires all documents from students," principal weems read down the paper, her look of discontent and worry seemingly growing with every line, "even those that have been terminated." one line specifically caught her eye.

has been found at one location consistently. the owner of the property has claimed that there is no reason for y/n to be there, but she seems to be connected to it. if not found at her foster home, she is most likely found here.

how was it you were only here for a few hours and you now wanted to strangle your principal?

"they have been terminated for a reason," you seethed, "my sisters had them forgotten."

"for very good reasons," brunhilde added, her voice eerily calm as she rolled her shoulders back, fixing her posture. "that's private information only our family knows."

"of course." principal weems shut the folder abruptly, the warm smile (though it was nothing more than plastic to you) returning to her red lips. "shall we bring you to your room?"

"i didn't know that valkyries could be as young as you."

you raised a brow at one of your roommates, wednesday, her deadpan tone doing little to influence you as you shrugged. "i'm the youngest of the ten," you stated, walking alongside her as you followed your other roommate, enid sinclair, around.

"that sounds like torture. of the worst degree," wednesday said, making enid clear her throat to catch your attention.

truthfully, enid was much more extraverted than you would ever be, but you didn't mind. she talked, you and wednesday listened - it was a good system. and she talked a lot. the fact that she was bringing around nevermore's first valkyrie was something she seemed incredibly happy about.

good for her.

"i already gave wednesday the whole rundown!" enid said with a contagiously bright smile. "this is the courtyard. everyone kind of hang out around here between classes or just.. whenever!" she explained, practically bouncing with every step as she brought you around. "there's a lot of cliques here; vampires, werewolves - like me, gorgons," her eyes landed on a few people around the fountain, her smile faltering for just a moment, "sirens, psychics, the usual."

"did you kill someone in your last school?" wednesday asked, making enid gasp.

"wednesday! i thought we would bring it up later!" enid scolded, frowning as she nudged the dreary girl.

"i was impatient." wednesday's face contorted into one of slight discontent at the nudge, though she (surprisingly) didn't complain.

you however, merely shrugged in response, folding your arms over your chest. "not the one at my last one. i just broke his legs - why?"

"because rumors spread like wildfire at nevermore," enid explained, coming to a stop in the middle of the corridor, much to some students' chagrin "practically everyone's talking about it! i told you that they'd forget about what you did, wednesday," she said pointedly, making wednesday blink, which was frankly a rather large reaction.

you looked at wednesday, eyebrows raising in curiosity. "did you kill someone?"

"two people. not one."

"what was your method?"

"piranhas from my aquarium at home. and you?"

you hummed in appreciation at her method before responding with a curt, "flew up and dropped him from a thousand feet." it made wednesday nod once.

"impressive."

"okay, steering the subject away from death and murder," enid interrupted, awkwardly chuckling as she continued to walk. she came to a stop in front of the boy who had been painting the raven, her smile of relief much too obvious to go unnoticed by you. "xavier! you've made such good progress!"

"thanks, enid." the boy - xavier - turned around, his mouth seemingly going dry when he saw you staring at him. your arms were crossed over your chest, your head tilted up to observe his painting. "you're the one who dropped the guy."

your look of curiosity turned into one of annoyance, your eyebrow raising as your eyes snapped towards him. "what about it?" you challenged, and you heard enid laugh awkwardly yet again.

"nothing. just asking, that's all," a hint of a smirk made its way onto his face, his hand - the one with paint on it - coming out towards you. "xavier thorpe."

"if you think that i'm going to shake your messy hand, you must believe i'm an idiot," you said bluntly, eyes narrowing.

"both an idiot and impolite," xavier responded, and end immediately grabbed you as you tried to take a step towards him, turning you around and briskly walking you the other way.

you didn't want to see him again after your first encounter with him. you didn't like smug people who had nothing to be smug about - the competitiveness in you wasn't cut out for any of that.

it did come in handy however, for academics.

while it wasn’t as fun as war or training was, it gave you enough competition to feel satisfied in victory. public schools were far too easy in your opinion, private schools equally as easy with more prudish people, but nevermore was more interesting. everyone was smarter, weirder, and more witty than any normie— it kept you entertained.

for the past week, you had been dead set on being the best at every class you had. macabre literature, arithmetic, botany, anatomy - you kept yourself busy trying to make a lasting impact on the professors.

you walked into the art class, eyes widening at its size. huge windows allowed for tons of sunlight to shine in, but since it was a gloomy day (or “a wonderful day” by wednesday’s standards), you could only see the condensation and fog on the windows. on one side of the room was sculpture and pottery supplies, while the other had painting and drawing easels set up in a circle with space in the middle for posing.

principal weems wanted you to do something that didn’t include fighting, weapons, or punching, you were going to join wednesday in fencing, but you found yourself here instead.

the class was small and the teacher was as careless as ever, muttering something about how artists must choose their own paths when creating art. but as you walked in and looked at the few faces, your face soured when you realized who you had to sit next to.

“thorpe.” you stated coldly, sitting stiffly in the easel next to him. it was almost funny how out of place you looked, sitting with straight posture on the stool and staring up at the large canvas in front of you.

xavier however, looked as relaxed as ever. he smiled at you lazily as he looked up from his sketchbook. “y/n. how nice of you to grace me with your presence.”

“it wasn’t my choice — weems wanted me to do something.. nonviolent.” you picked up the piece of charcoal in front of you, lips turning down to a slight frown. you hadn’t drawn in forever.

“i heard you tried for fencing,” xavier hummed, watching you pick up art supplies and weigh them in your hand. “you know that fencing doesn't include actual stabbing, right?”

“i do know that, thorpe,” you grumbled, avoiding eye contact as you removed your blazer, leaving only your white button up and messy tie. you rolled up your sleeves, oblivious to the way xavier’s eyes slowly went to your arms.

you were strong.

he had always guessed it — he had gotten stoned with ajax the night prior and they spent the next hour searching up how strong every outcast really was. valkyries, xavier learned, had superhuman strength, agility, stamina, and fighting abilities, so he wasn’t sure why he was so shocked to see your toned arms.

there was a tattoo of a sword on your inner forearm. it was so intricately drawn that he found himself staring at it for a little too long, simply admiring the style. admiring the way it decorated your skin.

"it's stupid how there's no actual stabbing in it," you continued, absentmindedly rolling up your sleeves. you side-eyed xavier, eyes uninterested as you watched the way he stared at your tattoo. "weirdo," you muttered, standing up abruptly and breaking his trance. “i’m going to do sculpting.”

xavier snorted, covering his gawking with his usual confidence as he fixed himself on his stool, spreading his legs just a bit. "since when did you sculpt?" he asked, half disinterested and half curious as he watched you shrug.

"one of my foster parents had a pottery studio." you stared at him blankly, a pause of awkward silence encompassing you before you said a curt, "bye," and left xavier at his easel.

xavier pulled his attention back to his sketchbook, eyes burning holes into his page of a certain pigtailed girl. for an hour he sat there, drawing in his visions on his sketchbook; many of which were of wednesday.

but one page in particular made him stop and stare. in his trance, much too focused on the feeling of his charcoal pencil on paper to care for what he was truly drawing, he had drawn what seemed to be an angel. it flew in the darkness of the page, her arms outstretched and its wingspan wide as she looked up at the top of the page. her hand was holding an invisible hand, but he saw the detail he put into the bandages that adorned her arms and knuckles.

hesitantly, xavier put his hand over the page, watching as the drawing began to move. the angel's arm moved ever so slightly, and his heart thumped loud in his chest when he saw your tattoo on your forearm.

subtly, he looked up through his eyelashes towards where you had been working, his mouth running dry as he watched you start to center your clay on the pottery wheel. you were surrounded by bowls, mugs, and plates of all kinds, being a rather quick worker with a delicate hand for someone who loved to fight. xavier watched you shape the clay in your hands, the substance molding easily as you moved it.

the sight of your eyes snapping up to meet his made him hide his enamor with a lazy smile and an awkward wave, which made you scoff and return to your pottery. but his eyes lingered on you, focused on the way your elbows were on your legs, how you were hunched over and how your arms were messy with clay. how your hair was much messier than when the class started. how your jaw was clenched in concentration, your eyes like a hawk's as you stared at the mug you were creating.

quickly, xavier looked back at his sketched, eyes set on the drawing he had done of you. it was such a specific image; how odd.

on your first friday in nevermore, enid had dragged you along with her to the harvest festival fair, saying something along the lines of "we have to ride every ride there!" that made you reluctantly agree to go. in any other circumstance, you would have opted to stay home and do anything but go out, but enid was enid, and she had no idea when to quit.

thing - wednesday's little hand friend - also contributed to getting you up and ready for the carnival. he was pretty persuasive.

which was how you found yourself awkwardly standing next to a carnival game after enid ran off with ajax, a boy she very obviously liked. it was confusing how people could be so blind to things like that.

the tight black long sleeve you wore was, in your opinion, enough to keep yourself warm as your body generated more body heat than many others. frankly, you looked pretty grumpy standing next to a carnival game you had already won, one of your hands holding a medium sized teddy bear that you (reluctantly) accepted. if it weren't for the fact that all the games were rigged, then you would have gotten the largest one.

"what happened to enid?"

you groaned as you turned towards the voice, finding xavier standing behind you, his hands in his pockets and his hair down. he was dressed in casual clothing, same as you, but you could recognize that subtle smug attitude anywhere. it was as if the smirk he wore could never get run down.

"went off with ajax. probably on a rollercoaster." you looked him up and down with a discontented look. "why are you alone?"

"i came here with ajax and rowan." xavier shrugged, leaning against the carnival table. a toothy grin crept onto his face, his tone teasing as he continued, "are you willing to keep me company?"

"no."

xavier rolled his eyes at your constant grumpiness, shrugging his shoulders as he quickly changed the subject. "i lost them both a while ago. i've just been walking and looking for.." his eyes left you, landing on some people behind you.

you looked back, immediately connecting the dots as you watched wednesday stand next to a guy near a ride, wednesday (surprisingly) contributing to conversation as they paid you and xavier no mind. an amused smile came on your face, and you held back the laugh you were about to let out. "oh my gods, you like wednesday."

xavier frowned, looking at you incredulously. "i don't," he denied. you watched his body movements with a smirk, observing how he fixed his posture and puffed his chest up ever so slightly out of defense.

"i'm not stupid, thorpe. you just gawked at her like a lovesick fool," you snorted, crossing your arms over your chest again.

xavier found himself staring at your arms, the muscles you had worked hard for easily shown off in your black long sleeve.

"if only you weren't so annoying," he muttered under his breath, sighing. "i don't like her," xavier repeated, following your actions and crossing his arms. he looked at you annoyedly, the amusement that danced in your eyes only pissing him off further. "i think she's interesting, that's all."

"denial is always the first step," you sing songed, your smirk turning into a cheshire like grin. "honestly, you should've seen the look on your face."

xavier scoffed. "what look?"

"the look you always have when wednesday walks by." you were laughing now, your careless teasing and prodding making his presence all the more tolerable in your opinion. "like a lovesick puppy. it's kind of pathetic, honestly - like, haven't you barely talked to her.." your words died out as your eyes caught sight of something you didn't expect to see within your first week in nevermore.

the glow.

you saw the shining gold before you saw who it surrounded. it was blindingly bright particles that floated and emitted a bright light that only you could see. all your senses were honed in on him, far too focused on the soul you had to guide to notice that he was following wednesday, who had trailed off moments prior.

your eyes widened when you saw rowan walk by, the golden glow surrounding him making your eyes cloud over in white. your irises and pupils disappeared into nothing, leaving your eyes a milky white. you felt that familiar tug in your chest, the one that brought nothing but dread and danger, and the immediate pain of loss. the glow that surrounded him was shining horribly bright; his death was really close.

"y/n? hello?" xavier followed your view, a snicker leaving his lips. "oh, i see." he watched as rowan's walk turned into a run into the nearby woods; right after wednesday. "i didn't know your eyes did that when you saw someone you like, y/n -"

"can you shut up, thorpe?" you snapped, shoving the bear towards him before turning around and walking away. your walk turned into a run as you followed rowan, knowing fully well that your agility would make you easily catch up with him. but as with the glow, your mind was only focused on him. nothing else mattered in that moment except for the fact that rowan laslow was going to die.

the sound of a roar made your hold your hand out, your tattoo of a sword glowing and making your sword materialize. on your back, hidden under the confines of your shirt, your tattoo of wings began to glow. that too, began to materialize, your wings writhing and stretching as it ripped through your shirt and spread out around you. pure white feathers flapped a few times, accustoming itself to the space, before you began to lift off the ground.

you flew towards the sound of the roaring, dodging trees and bushes before you saw a large monster over rowan, its claws digging into his chest. wednesday hunched over, catching her breath not too far away, and with no hesitation you flew faster and kicked the monster away from rowan. it let out another screech, one of pain this time, but you couldn't have cared less for its ugly form, for you were too focused on the dying boy on the ground.

the glow never lied. you saw his soul appear next to his body, merely a blue transparent silhouette in your eyes. you swallowed thickly, the pain of such a young soul being lost weighing heavy in your heart as you held your free hand out.

wordlessly, he accepted it. his hand was ice cold against your live one, and with that, you flew. you flew up thousands of feet, moving fast as your wings forced you up higher, higher, higher.

you broke through the clouds, breath heaving as you looked at the silhouette of rowan. the one that used to be alive, with a beating heart and living thoughts.

"there's a light," rowan murmured, his eyes set on the blinding light only he could see. but you saw nothing but the stars and the moon.

you only smiled sadly. "that will take you to where you need to go."

your job was a hard one. you brought them to the entrance of their death and allowed them to go there themselves and be there for eternity. there was no satisfaction from it, other than the fact that they weren't lost. they knew where they had to be.

you felt his silhouette disappear, the hand you were once holding now disappearing into nothing. your eyes reverted back to normal, and you looked around you at the emptiness around you. you were left with only the pain of losing another human.

you let out a sharp exhale, forcing yourself to think of anything but the soul you had just guided to the heavens, before flying back down to the woods. that was one of the hardest parts of your job; you felt the pain of them leaving. you understood that they would be missed, that they had an entire family and friends that would continue to miss them. you felt that pain from the moment you held his hand to fly him to the heavens, to the second he left.

the sound of flapping wings made wednesday look up from where she stood. she had been staring at the drawing rowan had kept in his pocket before your arrival, in which she quickly pocketed it and turned to you. your chest was heaving slightly, your arm bleeding from a twig that had seemingly gotten in your way during your flight between the trees. your wings folded behind you, and you opted to keep them out for as long as possible; it was hard to have them confined for long periods of time.

"did you guide him to valhalla?" wednesday asked, her tone as dead pan as ever, as if the fact that you had huge angel wings was the least of her troubles (which, in that moment, probably was). she was out of breath as well, her once perfect pigtails now a frizzy mess upon her head.

"i guided him to the entrance of whatever he believes in," you replied, looking down at his body and swallowing thickly. to change your focus, you glanced at wednesday, "your lack of response to a near death experience is admirable," you stated, making her nod curtly.

"truthfully, it was the most fun i have had all week," wednesday replied.

ACT II, ACT III, ACT IV, ACT V, ACT VI

#AUTHORSNOTE— that was the first part of my new series! feel free to send me asks about it and ask to be on the taglist! thank you sm for reading :)

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