#i mean. i do in a sense that it makes winter more bearable cause at least its not dark and wet all the time

[the-kipsabian]

i do not recall the last time we had this much snow in november and tbh its kinda freaking me out

[cowboylament]

“Did you respect me?” I faltered, asking because I couldn’t bear the other question, the obvious question with the obvious answer. Even if asking this in its own way revealed my hand, revealed the knowledge to him, of the things I couldn’t say. 

“Yes, of course I did. To me,” he said thinking for a long moment his voice wavering a little so he made to clear his throat. “This has always been a risk, it wouldn’t have been worth it to me if there wasn’t. I respected that our inherent bond, the way you witnessed me, gave you power over me and for some reason you never used it. Knowing or not knowing this about you didn’t take that power away. Especially when I know you can wield your words rather effectively when you want to.”

“What could I’ve done?”

“Plenty. Who knows me better than you?”

Or

Lucien makes wanting bearable Part One, Part Two, Part Four, Part Five, Bonus, Ao3

I’d felt old the first time I shared a bed with someone. Maybe by comparison I was, but I’d not made the decision based on any particular ideal or inner conflict. I wanted to and Gawayn, an Illyrian, did also. So without much ceremony or romance we decided to. When I think about it I get the sense that it happened just as perfectly as it should have, that despite the following events I learned something irreplaceable I couldn’t know without doing it as I had. Which is to say, my mother walked in and found us in my bed and that is why I spent one winter in the cabin at the Illyrian village.

It's funny to me, but perhaps not in the way it is to everyone else, because we forget. We forget the things we swore we’d always know, like how hard it was to be old when really you were young. We forget why we wanted to remember and how much you can know even when you’re inexperienced. Mostly though, we forget the mistakes we made, specifically my mother’s, who despite ensuring no one discovered what we’d done, made the error of telling Rhysand. 

I don’t know why or how but she did. When he asked her who’d done it, she pretended not to have seen him. Rhys was too young at the time to manage whatever it was that sent him into the protective rage. He interrogated half the village before recruiting my long-time friend Gawayn to his cause. 

Naturally, he never discovered who it was.

The ordeal mortified me, because despite having taken the right sort of care to guarantee the moment belonged to me, I lost most of the intimacy anyway. I didn’t leave my room for days, not until Gawayn returned and brought with him a new book for me to read and some sweets. 

My mother took one look at us and shook her head. “Well, I guess you at least put some thought into who you wanted it to be.”

It was the first time I laughed since the mortification began. I don’t know if it was pity or sympathy but she offered me an out. She told Rhys I was to stay, as per my ‘punishment,’ in the cabin until after Starfall. Really, I couldn’t bear to face anyone until then anyway so the choice was easy. 

When they tell the story of my winter away from Velaris they hold a small idea of a much larger story. I laugh, because it's the way it is, some things only we can know. In the end, I took comfort in the fact that I remembered, and what I remembered made everything easier. 

I never dated the Illyrian though we returned to each other again and again. We knew how it would end if it were any more serious. Meaning simply, that it would end. That’s why it worked, because we knew we couldn’t, so we didn’t. I might have found it tragic had it not been so comfortably predictable, so easy. I liked the intimacy it offered us, I liked knowing what we’d do and how we’d do it. I learned as I got older that other males were just as happy to cycle through the tragedy once and wipe their hands of it. Not everything needed intimacy, not everyone deserved it. 

So it went on like that, knowing and knowing and knowing. Never again not knowing, never again making the mistake of not knowing, risking mortification, risking loss. You say what I know you’ll say you’ll do what I know you’ll do and if anyone finds out then nothing was on the table to begin with because we didn’t have anything to gain anyway. We never gave over ourselves. Nothing in the world, not even a mate, could have had me give something like that up. 

Lucien was like this too until recently. 

***

Rhys had gotten to Madja first. 

“No, it's quite important. I said as much to your bother when I saw him.” The healer said, when I inquired over these walks I was supposed to take. “Although I didn’t say two hours, just one will do.”

She upheld his lie, even corrected me, so I knew Rhys had found her. She wasn’t just going along with whatever I said, she knew all the details. My cup clinked against the saucer. The house had resumed its usual noisiness, the wraiths in the kitchen, the world outside seeping in with the light through the windows.  

“With my mate?” I asked.

The healer threw her arms up, “I don’t care who it's with.”

The authority she wielded, even as she lied through her teeth, was applaudable. I might even say as much to Rhys if he hadn’t gotten me so badly. Regardless he was absent and I sucked in my cheeks. She knew I knew she was lying but she held little fear, in fact, she grew taller with each lie. I clasped my hands, attempting the grace of a High Lord’s sister. 

“And you didn’t mention it to me because?”

“Because I knew you’d try to get out of it.”

Outside footsteps pushed passed the house growing and receding without a word from either of us. I couldn’t intimidate her, and the silence wasn’t an attempt to. The moment I saw the old fae I understood the odds were against me. Whatever my brother’s cause was, however much he needed Lucien and I to confront our differences so he could move on with his plans for claiming him,  they were indeed more attractive and much more glamorous than mine. Yet it was one thing to find Madja had taken a side, but another to be so predictable that even she knew how I’d react had Rhysand's lie even been true. 

I asked once more if she was sure she didn’t want some tea and after declining again she checked my stitches and left. The edges had singed from the mistake in the garden. The burning within was no work of glamour or imagination, fire had set under the skin and had wanted to get out. She reprimanded me no matter how much I swore it was an accident. Even as she made her way to the door she didn’t so much as hint at a smile, she only reiterated no magic and that in five days she’d be back.

The door shut behind her and I rested my forehead against the cool wood, just as I’d done last night, after Lucien disappeared, and had since remained hidden in the house. The last I’d seen of him was a blush on his face and a bow at my door before he slipped away across the house. I’d waited there, waited for the same thud of the door carving out the new and growing desire to know precisely where he was. 

When I woke there was no way of knowing for certain if he had not gone back, slipped out the front door, and made to see the city himself. This was an old habit, thinking the very worst of him. I would not bring that idea with me, it had grown obsolete. In this world I was brave. He never scared me before. I let out a breath, listening for something, but nothing shifted or turned, no tinkering of trinkets or creaking of floorboards. But he was there, and I was there, and this was much more comforting than it had been the days previous because I knew him. He was waiting for me.  

When, even by lunch, he had not shown up to the library I surrendered to his waiting. I knew he could hear me. He probably was on the other side, in his room, smirking over just how many minutes had passed with me standing outside his door, tracing the whirls of the wood with my eyes. Through an act of insanity or pure stubbornness he’d sat in that room after last night and let a silence settle between us. Absence, once, had been readable between us. Now though, there was very little comfort. I realized that even understanding could not make up the place where nothing was. 

I raised a hand and knocked.

After the dinner, after the hallway, any mood we might find ourselves seemed just as likely as the last. We’d cycled out of any regularity or predictability. The door opened and he was familiar. So to say, he was indifferent to my being there. The bond was empty. 

I swallowed. “Lunch is ready.” Across the townhouse, pots and pans rattled in their places

“Alright.”

Behind Lucien, his room was just barely visible. A chilling air spilled into the hallway, caressing my arm, despite the glowing embers in the hearth. A draft, maybe. From the windows I could see, none were ajar. It might be too cold now for him to do as he liked to at home. Waiting for me had its consequences, Autumn was falling fast this year. Lucien shifted, blocking my view of his belongings, if any there were, and the origin of such coldness remained a mystery. 

“I came to see if you wanted to join me—would join me.” I corrected recalling his desire, his need to mortify me even now, into asking for him instead of after him. I met his eye and almost smiled but refrained when he showed no small mercy himself. “Then we can go see the city.”

Despite our conversation the night previous, he’d returned to the skepticism of his past self, the one he didn’t want to give up so easily. He studied me carefully. So I just stood there and pulled from the past the self I’d been too or part of it. The piece that didn’t care how or when he looked at me. 

“I’ll be there in a minute,” He said and shut the door. 

I don’t know if I wanted to have access to a shield more badly than that moment, knowing the pit of shame was likely traveling through the door toward him, giving me away. All the while I was tormented by no feelings that did not already belong to me. I didn’t wait and let the steady consistent step of my walking away become a kind of shield between us. 

When I sat in my normal spot at the table I placed my feet flat on the ground and straightened my spine. I took long breaths, trying to imagine the calmness pushing up from between the floorboards. The calamity of the days past pushed out of my head, out of the bond, and into the atmosphere, rising up to the rooms above, rising out into the open sky where I hoped they’d disappear and never return. I said I would be brave and so brave I was. There was nothing to be ashamed of, I’d been far braver than him. I risked first. 

I let out another breath.

This is what he told me to do. In the old game, this would have been a loss, but this isn’t the old game anymore. Eventually, I would know the rules. I would not let him mortify me. I would not lose. 

I made my plate, I opened my book, and I waited. 

“Where’s everyone?” Lucien said, appearing in the doorway half an hour later. I didn’t pay him any attention. I compelled myself to care about my book, to keep my eyes on the page, my back to the door, as I had the 30 minutes before. Page after page came into my focus, smothering any contempt from my body and subsequently the bond for his delay. 

“The Illyrian village.”

He walked around the table and sat across from me. I still knew, despite the emptiness between us, that his eyes were on me. They were there the moment he walked in like a brand or a sunbeam. The place between my shoulder blades warmed, my neck, my hands. His steps were slower, contemplative, as he’d rounded the corner and came to a certain finality when he sat. I didn’t know what he’d do anymore, but I got the sense that now some new motive had taken the place of whatever had kept him behind his door so long. 

He piled food onto his plate. “I suppose that's why I’m chaperoning you today. And also why your brother was at my door at dawn.”

“I wouldn’t know. His agenda and my own rarely overlap.”

The tension in the room made it to my eyes. There was a pull now. Not just in this moment but in all of them. I’d noticed it this morning. In the foyer when I walked Madja out my eyes drew to the place the spill of our wine had landed the night before. I stood over it when she’d arrived. Our intimacies became fated themselves with tethers to pull us toward them in some kind of way. It couldn’t be avoided, each time I moved my hands I bumped the place his lips had been. I woke in the morning to my body on the edge of my bed where a chair had once waited all night. There was an almost ineffable weight, dragging me across the world. It was inevitable, like a marble circling a drain. If we’d moved through universes so easily then this one, whether it was the old world or a new one, had hooked into me like a marionette. 

I would mention none of this to him. 

“You can convey to him then that I’m capable of making such decisions.” 

I hummed and kept eating, only turning away from my book to grab my tea and nothing else. Whatever those decisions were I didn’t care to ask and I wouldn’t tell Rhys what he’d said. Whatever had happened between them had given me the upper hand. Lucien was thoroughly annoyed by what had transpired. Too much time in our earnestness had left him with an arrogant streak and Rhys would agree a little annoyance would do him good. I was thankful enough that my brother’s antics didn’t bother me, they couldn’t, or I might go insane. I was busy anyway, trying to learn and remember all at once. I took a sip, then another, then placed the cup down with a clink and swam in Lucien’s attention. I had only just managed to turn the page when the male started again.

“And will you tell him?” He said, voice harsh. Down the bond, a small thread of annoyance wove between a glittering tug of longing. He wanted me to look at him. Despite sitting in his room all morning, waiting behind a door as I ate here alone for lunch, he wanted my attention. He wouldn’t ask for it, no. That was for me to do, he'd said as much himself. It was convenient for him, that in all our mutual waiting, I was the only one who had anything to lose. 

I lifted my gaze at last, “I’m no one’s keeper.” I said.

Surprise wore his face the moment I made to look at him. He wasn’t expecting it, me to give in to his need. He thought I’d make some sly comment too I imagine, but I wasn’t playing into his hand. His mouth, open and at the ready with something cruel, closed and he bowed his head. Then it was I who was surprised, because where I expected an explosive anger, the annoyance, for as light as it had been, disappeared entirely. What was in my chest was replaced. The whole world went soft and he bowed his head. 

“I’m sorry.”

I didn’t let my surprise show as he had. “Are you finished?”

He withdrew his gaze, embarrassed. He’d asked the same of me a thousand times and knew what such a question meant. Are you done with your little tantrum? How annoying it had been those years to sit beside him as he became emotionless, impenetrable, when he would not give in to my taunts. I understood now the power it could give to break the illusion between one person and another. A composure required for the task that asks you to put it all down. 

“Yes,” He said and it was true. His whole body visibly seemed to recede at the edges and at once the powerful male seemed smaller and steeped with that new sincerity. When he’d asked the same of me in the past I’d never done it, let it all go. Whatever Rhys and he had talked about must’ve truly shaken him. 

He peered over the dishes at the center of the table, “what are you reading?”

“It's not interesting,” 

“I don’t mind.”

I flipped absently through the many pages I still had left. “It’s legends of forgotten Gods.”

He reached for a roll and began to lather butter over it, “is that something of interest to you? Folktales and myth.” 

It probably seemed that way from the book he’d found on Velaris myths and likely the many more in the library. A collection we’d had forever that I’m not sure we could attribute it to one singular person's interest but the cumulative need of friends and family. Or maybe it was just nice, to some people, owning precious stories that fell out of popular circulation. 

“Not really.” 

He narrowed his eyes at me, but it was true. 

“Have you thought of what you’d like to see today?” I asked.

Lucien shrugged.

“Nothing in your reading has piqued your interest?” 

He shook his head. 

I sighed. There was one place I knew he’d like, but I couldn’t bring him there. Not yet. She would rip me apart and he would help.

“Do you need anything?” My eyes fell to his shirt, flimsy by comparison to what everyone who passed the window wore. “Perhaps some shops so you don’t freeze.”

“I don’t care where we go, anywhere is fine. Your favorite places.” 

His delivery was soft but there was a quiet enthusiasm to him. It wasn’t so large it couldn’t be contained from the bond, but it wasn’t small enough that his face didn’t hide it, his desire to know me and the city itself. A harsh gust struck the windows behind Lucien and the ensuing draft pushed the wafting scent of him to me. Even just the act of it entering my lungs warmed me substantially. I ran a hand across my chest like I could smother it out of me, or else, warm the cold palm that fell flat at my collarbone.

“You’ll need something warmer.”

“This is all I have.”

I shook my head and rose. Instinctively and too quickly he followed. For someone who’d been scowling at me earlier, he had quite the blush. Apparently, this was what it took, a little moonlight and courtly manners. He followed after me, but I didn’t mention it. A small mercy, and anyway I wanted to see something. 

In the hall closet I pulled from an old box and prayed it wasn’t moth-ridden. At the very bottom, a detail that was perhaps its salvation, a sweater was waiting. I handed it to Lucien. His fists balled the wool, as if feeling for each stitch and seam. His fingertips rolled the material a few times before finally, he looked up at me. 

“This is a bit drab.”

My hands flexed, hidden behind my back. “You can buy whatever gaudy clothes you prefer today.”

“The birdlike fashions of the Autumn court as you’ve called it.” There was a lilt to his voice I recognized, playful but not quite as mean as I was used to.

“Do you remember everything I say? A bit obsessive.” 

He smiled in reply. Yes, he did, but the bank of my memory was just as extensive, just as rich. So I teased him no more.

“I won’t forget you called it drab.” 

“I know.” 

But he did not, not really. 

He threw the sweater over his head and the edges of his shirt lifted up barely to reveal him to me. The edge of his stomach, the waist of his pants. The sweater fell perfectly, and my heart thudded against my ribs from deep in my chest. He must have heard it, mistaking the cause for something else. He looked down, assessing the sweater, but said nothing because he couldn’t. It fit perfectly. 

Outside a howling wind whistled. Lucien stared toward the door. “This is all the protection you offer me then.”

“I’ve nothing else, nothing at least that’s warm.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure,” he smirked. “Give me a kiss and I bet I’ll warm right up.”

I scoffed, “I’m beginning to find it hard to believe you’ve pleasured anyone at all.”

“And how often, before now, did you speculate my proficiency in giving pleasure?” He shifted forward with such satisfaction I realized I had been letting him win far too much. It was becoming pathetic, how this languishing had extinguished the fight I’d once had in me. He added, “and if you really want me to love Velaris you might introduce me to some friends at Rita’s.”

I’m sure he waited for the hollow part of his chest to ring with jealousy but after last night it would take a little more than the threat of a pleasure hall I should think. “None would stoop so low.”

He rolled his eyes, “all this new material from living in the same place and you continuously go for the same old joke. You’re boring me.”

“I surprised you just a few minutes ago.”

“It wasn’t the kind of surprise I wanted.”

“I’ve no interest in being entertaining for you.”

“I very much so doubt that.” He took one more step forward and I took a step back. He didn’t follow. He was stuck there. I blushed, and let my eyes drift down where the sweater that had waited stretched across the broad of his chest. It really did fit perfectly despite how little sense it made. I didn’t care if he saw my stare, I couldn’t help but not care. 

I kept my eyes down, “I see your mood has improved.” 

“It might continue too, depending on what we do today.”

“You’ve given me little help.”

“I think I’ve given a lot.” He said, leaning against the table still set with a bottle from the night before. “And you wouldn’t let yourself be so powerless would you?”

My gaze which had remained on his chest flicked up to his which had a little fire behind it. Those words were still a severe thing to say. I flinched at the question and tried to turn my head like I could convince him it was all one seamless move. For the briefest of moments something in his face fell, like he too had flinched from the aftermath of me. I could tell he’d seen the new tension I’d failed to hide. 

“What are you doing?” I asked. 

He stood upright and smiled. 

“Nothing. Relax,” he seemed to say this with duel meaning. I could feel the sincerity of it, that he wanted me to be at ease with him like we’d done the night before. He wanted a different tension than the life we once had. But I also could hear the humor, so when he followed with his usual taunting I wasn’t surprised. “The spontaneity is good for us. You might learn how to actually surprise me.”

“Maybe,” I cooed, glancing over my shoulder and leaving him in the foyer standing directly over the center of our spill from the night before.

***

The Sidra was unforgiving, just as I liked her to be. The icy winds blew across the water and whipped through the chasm between us. It felt like a chasm, at least. I was keenly aware of the skin across my hand. It was like a wound, my desire and his together. It didn’t hurt but there was no other word. Wanting was a wound. We creased at the cold lashes of the afternoon, folding into ourselves. Lucien wouldn’t say it, but there was a tug of relief and gratitude between us with each pull of the sweater. Fall came that way, in the middle of lasting bits of warmth sudden spells of bitter cold that left little traces of their origin.

“So this is where you truly grew up then?” He asked. 

“We have a cabin in the Illyrian village, but otherwise yes.”

He nodded, “that's good.” He said, looking out on the river as we arced over a hill that inaugurated us into the real thrum and heart of the city. Children laughed and played, people were eating and chatting in restaurants and their hum reverberated off the stone making the whole of the city, not just the people inside it, feel alive. Like the stone itself was pleased, was laughing. 

“It never made sense to me, you growing up in the Hewn City.”

“I think perhaps it made sense, you just didn’t like the idea of it.” I said and Lucien spared a slight glance my way as I skimmed my hand over the icy water of the fountain at the center of the square. Where Prytahin needed a villain, the Night Court always managed to find its step inside their perception. How could it not, what with the Court of Nightmares under our rule. How ruthless we were supposed to be and how ruthless we managed when we needed to. People believed what they wanted, and outside of Velaris we behaved very particularly to expectations. So it did, in fact, make sense that I was from that wretched place. 

“I never liked it, how Beron was your father,” I said. We hadn’t spoken of him since we’d arrived and Lucien stiffened at the sound of his name. “It made sense though, that he was. I saw the traces, but even then, even before, I thought you deserved better. When I saw you and Eris standing there that night I felt betrayed because you’re better than your kin.”

“It's not hard to be.”

“It is, actually.”

He stopped walking and made to look at me, the movement seemed to drag him, like there was a powerful burden resting on his shoulders. At my chest, a growing despair began to climb through the nameless thing between us. From the look on his face, I could tell it was taking great effort not to reveal to me the true intensity of his feelings. “If he saw me, if he suspected anything I’d never have been allowed to participate. The risk—”

“I understand,” I said reaching for him but he backed away, out of my grasp.

“No, you don’t.”

I stood upright, swallowed, and forced myself to see the sadness lining his face. How quickly we moved through an emotion, nomadic, like we couldn’t stand any goodness too long. Perhaps we didn’t deserve it. No, I didn’t, for what I’d done to him. “Alright. I don’t, but I place no fault on you.”

He stared at me for a long time, before he licked his lips and I felt a tug, sharp, on the bond. He didn’t falter from the effect he had on me. “You’re right though, when Eris described the Hewn City I hated the idea that you had to endure that place.”

I smiled, just barely managing it until the weight of his burden shrunk from me. “I’m sorry you wasted your limited sympathies for me on a lie, but I was actually well cared for in Velaris, learning from Cassian how to gamble and causing a general spectacle of myself.”

“I assume that's what they keep referencing, this winter in the cabin was because you made a fool of yourself.” He said, smiling, and it was true again, true enough that something settled. Another piece of worry left my chest, worry for him. What the space would carve out and become I wasn’t sure. He took a step toward me as we began to walk again and our shoulders bumped.

“Something like that.”

“And will you ever tell me or should I ask Cassian?”

“You should wait for me to tell it. Right now I don’t think you’d like my version, or anyone else's for that matter, very much.”

His brow rose, “why?”

I smirked at him but said nothing. It took just a second for him to look away and from the center of my chest, a strong tug of jealousy burned hot and unending. I couldn’t help but throw my head back and laugh as Lucien cursed under his breath and rubbed the skin above his heart. My steps swayed but he didn’t protest when our shoulders collided and remained touching, even as I kept laughing, and we continued on that way in the world's most intimate and hidden of touches.

Entangling Lucien in the city was a process of pulling loose threads of memory until they unraveled themselves. Each time I passed a restaurant we’d been to or a place we frequented I’d tell him a detail, a funny story, and that would only recall finer points, funnier stories, more important details. He laughed, he listened, and we didn’t bicker for the time. He could likely sense it, my desire to really introduce him to this place. We’d lost time, I’d forgotten what I had not known I needed to remember. He tried though, took what I had, and pieced it together. 

“When we go drinking, we’ll probably start at this restaurant. Amren likes the drinks there best,” I said as we sat on a bench just across from the rainbow, outside a tea shop. We’d ended in the art quarter. Lucien had inquired about the shop just as the full hour had passed between us, his official duty ending and something less clear beginning. I didn’t know if he’d stay or go, but he wanted to make the stop, and get something warm to hold onto. 

“Are they any good?” He asked, the cups in our hands, a thin streak of steam rising before our faces. 

“For her particular palette, yes.”

Lucien didn’t inquire further. Call it survival instincts, when it came to Amren even if she weren't around. He did, however, point toward the long alley with which people came joyously out of, bags in their hands. “What’s this?”

“The rainbow.”

When he’d decided not to shield he’d said we’d both be vulnerable to each other, I don’t know if he realized I already was vulnerable to him in a way he could never be with me. Autumn Court lay unknowable across Prythian. There were friends I’d never meet, stories obscured by memory with no one to correct them. I didn’t know what his laugh sounded like there, in a place that had belonged to him. The balance between us could never be righted perfectly. We wouldn’t ever be true equals. I tapped my fingers along the cup and his eyes fell to my hands, caught by the nervous tick.

“It's the artist's quarter. Our best theater resides in this neighborhood, the building with the gold top. You can’t miss it, if you like that kind of thing.”

“I’ve known you to have many faults but none so severe as a dislike for the arts.”

I scoffed, “what makes you say that?”

“you’ve given me a detailed account of every street we’ve passed but suddenly you’ve nothing to say.”

“So?”

“So I saw you fall asleep during a play once. It's fine, at the very least you’re well-read, but I’d like a female with a little more culture.” 

“I prefer the orchestra and if I recall correctly the play we were watching was actually an opera in another language so I can’t be blamed.” 

I’m sure he could feel my annoyance climbing through my chest and down the bond. I could see it in his face, the dual pleasure he got in thinking he’d pinned me down precisely, and the joy it gave him to annoy me. Wouldn’t it have been nice for him to have given that vice up when we arrived. Instead, he gave a cunning smile and leaned back against the bench, his arm stretching along the length of it behind my back. Wretched.

“It was in the old language and I know you know it,” Lucien said, the bond remained quiet of any real feeling. He seemed perfectly at ease with the conclusion he’d drawn. “What is it about the arts that bothers you so, that you can’t charm any with a few cheap words or is it the patience thing you’ve struggled always with?”

I sat forward and turned to face him more fully. “You’re in Velaris for less than a month and suddenly you know me so well,”  the words were sharper, like that which had passed between us when we’d set off that morning. We were right on the edge of returning to our bickering. 

He narrowed his eyes, “I think all my years before coming here are actually what are aiding my knowledge of you now.”

He was no longer complaining that we’d fallen into our usual game of accusations. Suddenly being shocked or surprised was not on his list of things he wanted from me. If I told him now it certainly would shock him, but then wouldn’t I be giving him exactly what he wanted? The reason for which I said so little, the reason why he believed me to be indifferent. 

I stood, after a long beat of silence.“You need clothes.”

“I’d rather—”

“I’d rather you do as I say.” I interrupted, scowling as I turned to leave him. “I won’t take you anywhere while you look so ridiculous.”

Lucien caught up to me, his arm nearly ghostly, and guided me forward with the lightest push on the small of my back as he leaned close to my ear. “You used to love when I made a fool of myself. Have you warmed up to me at last?”

Inside the shops Lucien took on a much more bearable demeanor, his voice kinder and more considerate than I’d ever heard, discussing at length what he liked, what he might need. He asked the elder male who’d approached us when we walked in of the climate, of the winter coming. Though winter had barely arrived he inquired about spring too, then summer. He listened like it was the most interesting thing in the world. I ran my fingers over the fabrics on display, the shirts ready-made, glad that at the very least he might leave here with something.

“What do you think?”

I turned back to the two males, the elder holding out a bound book of cloth. The colors were rich, deep, almost immersive. It was hard to say which color had dragged my attention first, all of them seemed to pull on me and the more I stared the more I saw, the less sure I was of which to pick. Lucien sat idle, waiting for my answer to the question I hadn’t heard. “He says these colors suit me best.”

The older male was the only person Rhys ever went to. He boasted of his expertise and I could see now what he meant. The colors, even just close to Lucien, brought a brightness to his face. I ran my hand along one of the scraps and nodded.

“You wore this color once, at a party, I think it was the best you’ve ever looked. I would trust his recommendation.”

Lucien half raised a brow. We’d already revealed to each other an acknowledgment of beauty. What did it matter if in the past I had been capable of the same, of looking past the distaste to acknowledge an honest truth.

“Then I trust you,” Lucien said to the male and he nodded.

“Put it on my account,” I said as he began to rummage through his bag for tools. Lucien would go in the back and they’d take his measurements, show him styles I knew the deal. It would take another hour before he emerged. I could certainly entertain myself, if I knew what was good for me.

“No,” Lucien began, placing a hand out toward the male. “Put it on mine.”

My forehead creased with my confusion, “you don’t even have one.”

He barely glanced at me. “I do, actually.”

“I assume that's what my brother spoke with you about this morning.”

“You’re free to assume,” he said his voice taking on a sudden severity again. I let a silence fall between us, averted my eyes, and let him think about the tone before I took a breath. He already seemed to be crumbling, softening around the edges especially when I met his eye again. 

“Please,” was all I said and I wanted it to convey my need to do this. If I could not undo, could not give him what he lost at my hand, his title, his home, his freedom, then I could at least take care of him. A heat rose over my body— that was what I wanted really I realized, just to take care of him. We were here because of me. That night he probably had already known which favor he’d call in, he probably had somewhere he wanted to go for safety from his father. But I brought him here. I was pure ego in my thinking that I was his only hope. I couldn’t even blame him if he wanted to leave. His life here, if there were one, would be so different. 

For the briefest of moments, I saw the way this constraint might look on him, emissary for a court he’d been born hating, a court that had long tormented him. It didn’t have to be this way. I saw that now, I could have married Eris. Why was my freedom more important than his own? We could have ushered a new life without the same violence, saved some trouble. I would’ve, knowing all this now, if it meant he got what he wanted. If it meant he got the life he wanted.

Lucien grabbed a hold of me as I made to turn toward the door like he understood this, like he was just as capable of slipping into my mind. He said nothing, instead his fingers ran down my forearm before grabbing a hold of my hand. He held it there between us like it meant something, like there were words I wasn’t seeing in our palms. Only when I looked at his face I understood precisely what he was saying. 

Enough. 

He nodded his head in confirmation, enough . He brought my hands to his lips as he had the night before, satisfying the hunger I’d had all morning, just as he said, and straightened. The private moment over, fading from us, and I didn’t feel much better, but I at least felt full.

“I’ll find you after.”

I nodded and grabbed for the door before he yelled out, characteristically shifting pace on whim like nothing, “be good, and try and find something to like about the arts for my sake won’t you?”

I didn’t spare him a glance back and walked out the door.

“I was beginning to think you died.”

I had barely shaken my jacket off when I looked up to see Egrette, standing behind the counter, a sour mood written on her face. 

“I almost did.”

“Figures.”

I scoffed, hanging the coat where I always did, and walking toward the tiny female. In her later years, she’d seemed to get smaller every time I saw her, though her strength was out of the question. She wasn’t frail, not in the slightest. I sometimes worried she’d wring my neck if I waited too long between visits, and could scarcely persuade Cassian to walk me there. 

“I see you’d have wept at my funeral.”

“For the loss of the free labor,” She said, but as I stared at her until the crease in her anger appeared and she let out a small smile before opening her arms in welcome. I laughed, hugging her back, trying not to wince as she pressed into my stitches.

“What happened? Do I need to write your brother again telling him to keep you out of that business?”

“I like that business you know. And I’m good at it.”

“You’re avoiding the real question.”

I waved her off before lifting my shirt to reveal to her the wound. “I cut myself training. I was messing around and if Rhys hadn’t been away I’m certain he would have finished the job for my stupidity.” 

The fact was, I could not keep her and Lucien apart for very long. Our lives would intersect and they’d be made aware of each other so the less they knew the better before meeting. I could not, in any way, compromise him with more strikes against the Autumn Court, even if it had been him who’d saved me. Some forgiveness is understood only by the people who give it. 

“Well if it was your own stupidity then I should think I’m allowed a complaint or two until I’ve forgiven you for being gone so long.”

I rolled my eyes, “and how have you been?”

“Oh great,” she said her mood shifting toward joy and pleasantries to an almost extreme degree. “You just missed my nephews. I’m starting to think perhaps you are purposefully avoiding them and the prospect of joining my family, but regardless, we’ve had more business this time of year than at solstice last.” 

I smirked as she told me of the interesting projects she’d seen people starting, and how they’d sold out of this and that, things she’d not sold out of in years. She was going on and on I was surprised she even caught my smile, her newspaper coming down on my hands and startling me. 

I withdrew, disarming her as she swatted me again, and pointing the paper back at her. “I’d hate to say I told you so, but I think the nightly workshops have helped. People like doing things with their hands. And might I add your nephews are afraid of me.”

She rolled her eyes, a familiar disdain on their male cowardice, “who cares if you have a mate is what I say.”

Most males, if they knew, wouldn’t interfere with something of that nature for the risk on their life alone and for that reason, most males didn’t know about Lucien. Egrette’s nephews were not to my taste, and so I’d told them inadvertently in the hopes that it would drive a wedge and I’d have some excuse as to why we avoided each other. 

“So, what have you really been up to, injury aside,” the old fae asked.

I lounged back in a chair and closed my eyes. The shop for now was quiet and you could count on someone coming in just when something exciting or revealing was to be said. It was a nuisance and a safety net. 

“I was in Autumn Court, as a sign of good faith or what have you after denying a marriage proposal.”

The old woman mirrored my ease as if the both of us were merely at home rather than in a store where anyone could see or walk in. “Rhys made you do that?” 

“No, it was my choice.”

“You’re lucky the cauldron hasn’t smitted you down yet. You do an awful lot to test its patience.” 

“The cauldron loves me.” I said exaggerating my enthusiasm and it made us both laugh. 

I smiled, “I missed you.”

“And I, you.”

“I’ll be in Velaris for a good while. You’ll probably grow sick of me.”

“Good,” she said. “It's the only way I can ever let your brother have you for his little courtly affairs.”

Lucien and Egrette would get on well. They had something in them made the same. They were both sincere when it was needed, both charming and scathing, loved for the latter adored for the previous. And both seemed to take me into account in my entirety. The same way Lucien could look at me, that kind of look that really was understanding and seeing, Egrette missed nothing. 

“He knows as much. When he sends me to represent Night Court it’s only under dire circumstances.”

“Autumn Court was dire?”

I swallowed and nodded wordlessly. It was never good to make the politics and alliances of another court known in this way. It was better to leave pedestrians unaware, better always to keep this life and the representative separate from one another. Egrette though, she had a way of considering things. I’d told Rhys more than a few times it would have been better if he hired her instead of me for these jobs.

She was the one who’d informed me of the earlier years, the manners and respect most older High Lords would desire. Autumn was particular in how they believed things should be done. Over the years I’d come back and discuss small slights or missteps and she’d helped me get a grasp of what was suspect, what was an issue. 

When Rhys said he didn’t care if we offended Autumn via letter of rejection for the marriage proposal I knew by then that we’d be more at risk his way. He was not thinking as a High Lord, but as a brother. Walking that line, figuring out just how to balance the cruelty and respect had been my job. When I said I’d go to Autumn and deliver the news personally, I’d done so under ‘good faith’ that even if we were rejecting them, Beron would have at least respected the fact we’d done so in person. That was the way of his world. It was what he believed they deserved. 

Why the blessing of the Lares I don’t know. I always had the strange impression the High Lord of Autumn, for all his ancient beliefs, respected me for our game. We had our rules and we played by them, something the Night Court wasn’t known for. When the offer was made, the hand of a future high lord no less, I understood that for all Beron didn’t like me, he at least saw the power I wielded and wanted it for himself. I don’t know what he’d have done if he discovered Lucien was my mate. I didn’t like to think about it. 

“Who was the male you were with?” Egrette said suddenly. She didn’t say where she’d seen us but I knew she had. She knew the boys by name. The only new face was Lucien. 

Our eyes met and she looked unsuspecting, even tranquil. 

“A friend,” I managed to say. 

“He’s Autumn.” 

“Yes.” She’d said it more as a statement than a question. 

“Your mate is Autumn yes?”

A cold sweat began to form along my back, “unfortunately.” 

She narrowed her eyes at me, “what really happened when you went to Autumn?” 

The bell overhead rang and I relaxed so visibly I knew that she’d ask me again if I didn’t make myself busy. She stood, welcoming, her peripheral gaze settled on me as I moved past her to take up my spot behind the counter. She had a better understanding of the inventory than I did and when the customer approached looking for a color match she ushered him to the back. I ran my finger over the big book at the front, checking to see if it was balanced. 

Her voice, enthusiastic as ever, asking for the male’s name gravitated toward me and settled between my ribs with a homely familiar warmth. I turned behind me, looking at the various packages labeled for pick up, and ran my hand over the yarn before I found a parcel with my name on it. I already knew what it was for and turned back as another customer came in looking for help. 

The two of us spent a good hour side by side before I felt a tug along the bond, he was looking for me. The store quieted enough that I could make my leave, least before she started questioning me again. I took the small package and grabbed a bag.

“Thanks for your help,” Egrette said before resuming her space behind the counter. 

“I give where I can,” I smiled. 

“That reminds me.” She crouched and pulled out a box hidden beneath the counter. Within its contents was a colorful array of yarn. I ran my hands over the contents. She watched me carefully, waiting for my reaction. There was too much, more than I had ever taken at least for any task.

“It's rare you’re gone so long I’ve been hoarding a bit more than usual for you.”

I huffed a laugh, “what could I possibly do with all this?”

“Look here,” she said grabbing the cuff of my sweater. “This is far too big on you. You can practice learning proper measurements for yourself. Maybe even deign to find time to knit a gauge and then make a fine knit sweater that actually fits.”

In his own way, Lucien was right. I was far too impatient for the arts, but somehow managed on anyway. For years I’d been knitting and for years I had not done so properly, making sweaters too big, too small, wonky in places that you did not want them wonky, but it endeared me almost to the act of making. Proof that it was truly made by me, that some mortal hand had been part of its conception. 

“You know that's not what I do with this.” 

She shrugged, “well some of it is a solstice gift.”

“You’re giving it too early. In your old age you’ll forget you gave it to me and save me more until you’re bankrupt.”

“With all those classes you gloat about I can give more than I used to,” she said crossing her arms before he body relaxed. She sat at the counter, crossing out inventory in her big book, before looking back at me. “I never truly forget I just like seeing what you make.”

I threw my jacket on and managed to find a bag for all she’d gifted. I slipped a small sum for the yarn in the box when she was turned around and distracted. So in the end I got the last laugh. I wished her well and before I got to the door she looked at me with a sudden seriousness. 

“I hope you know what you’re doing.”

I knew what she meant. I looked back at her, but as I was leaving a customer was coming in and she just as conveniently avoided me as I had her the hour before. She’d seen Lucien and she knew who he was to me. I backed out of the shop and stared at the massive trove of yarn. I had yet to think of a reason to say I had the bag. I couldn’t quickly winnow home to drop it off. Even if Madja wouldn’t find out, that burning from within gnawed at my memory. I’d have to think of something on the way to the shop.

“What’s that?” 

I turned and, coming up the street, Lucien stood in new clothes. Though they were more to his taste, Velaris already had brought upon a fashion I’d not seen on him. I hesitated to think it was his preference and not the matter of the male who made them. A fine vapor curled from his mouth with each breath. He slowed as he got nearer and neither of us said anything as we took each other in, like we were meeting here by impossible chance. My cheeks were already red and cold from the weather which disguised any reveal of how handsome I found him in his version of Night Court clothes. 

Lucien pointed at the store a silent repetition of his question. I adjusted the bag on my shoulder which tucked the bulk of it behind my back and out of reach or glance from him.

“A yarn store.”

He peered in through the window and I saw Egrette helping the new customer, her eye on the scene unfolding before us. I prayed the business would keep her busy enough so that she would not come out into the street, would not demand an introduction. That was for another day, one for when I finally had answers to the questions I had not yet dared to ask.

“What were you in there for?”

I adjusted the weight of my bag and his gaze made to follow the strap. “I used to work there. I like to visit.”

He gave a breathy laugh, “I’m serious.”

“So am I.”

He looked toward the store, then back to me, before glancing over my shoulder. His fingers hooked into the small mouth of the bag still exposed and pulled it open before he peered inside. There was indeed yarn inside the bag if looking through the windows had not made it clear to him that I was telling the truth. The cauldron hadn’t given me a chance to make anything up so perhaps it didn’t want me to. I could believe in that, at least for a moment.

A cruel smile overcame his face and I was ready for his next words. “So wifely are we? I was only joking earlier. There’s no need to pretend you spent your youngling years making mittens and scarves, it won’t make me any more eager to mate you.”

“I’m not lying.” I said flatly, nodding toward his full hands. “Where did you think that sweater came from?”

He opened his mouth but I saw the moment the words struck as those words failed and his face paled. He looked down at the drab piece in his hand. I’d been trying to make it for myself, but it was too big and not in the way I liked. It didn’t fit any of the boys so I’d packed it away years ago where it waited, almost on purpose, for the male I’d unintentionally made it for. Like my hands had always somehow been moving in his direction and were aware of his absence so were trying to make him from nothing. 

Lucien pulled the material between his fingertips to look at it, reaching into the back collar for an embroidered logo, something to prove I was lying, and found none. “Maybe if you tell me what colors you like I can make something less drab.”

“Hey,” he said stepping toward me but I continued.

 “or, perhaps, some mittens. I’ve never made any but I’m up to try.” The element of surprise was, indeed, a fine addition to our little duels. I’d have to use it to my advantage if it made him look this stupid. 

“Wait a minute.”

“And don’t worry,” I said, attempting to be just as cruel with my smile as I turned away. “I’ve no intention of persuading you to mate me.” And left him in the middle of the rainbow, as people walked past laughing.

***

Lucien stood by this duty, like he had in the garden. For one hour each afternoon, we went for our walks and while out we explored various shops I'd come to love and new ones I hadn’t known well that had caught his eye. We did not go back to the rainbow. When the hour was up he would take my hand in his, place a gentle kiss, and we’d part ways. Madja was coming though, to take out the stitches that morning. We’d no longer have any duty, imaginary or real, to spend any time together. 

I hadn’t thought much of it, not until yesterday. After returning from the Illyrian village, everyone carried a density to themselves that had started to seep into the rooms of the house. Even the furniture had begun to bloat with the heaviness they couldn’t put down. I didn’t ask about the visit. Lucien, however, upon arriving back at the townhouse seemed to need little instruction. We shared just one look and his hand came gently down between my shoulder blades as he pushed us toward the room where they’d gathered. Their low voices were just barely able to come up over their slumped shoulders. They didn’t tease, didn’t look at the hand of my mate falling away in encouragement, or the immediate gentleness with which Lucien followed behind me as a silent promise passed between us, a vow, to get them on the mend. 

The hour away from the house was our only reprieve from the stilted conversation over the general lethargy of the court. Life happened as Lucien said it would. Suddenly the problems were forgotten and we tried to fix what had been made aware to us. When either of us entered the room after the other, our eyes would meet in the hopes of finding that knowing nod that said all had been repaired. Only each day, a silent shake of the head passed, and we began the routine all over again. 

No, things were not well. 

“I’ve seen Y/N’s side of the city,” Lucien said looking toward Cassian as he swallowed the last of his drink. “I thought you might have some suggestions too.”

Csasian shrugged, “some.”

“I’m open to any recommendations to try,” Lucien said turning the attention away from the male who had perked up ever so slightly once the weight of conversation had been lifted. Rhys was silent, Azriel too.

“I’ll show you. Tomorrow after Madja leaves.” Mor said. Her voice did not have its characteristic lightness, but it was sincere. She managed to give a smile his way. I tried not to get too excited, I had not seen her smile, had not heard such a long sentence leave her lips in days. And even if she could not totally shake from her being the weight of that world, I believed she really would take him up on the offer. The night then wasn’t a bust.

I knew he felt it, the fondness I had for him as he smiled back at her soft and full of hope. I’d seen it, how he changed at the sign of their despair. His steps were slower, his voice quieter, even the topics of conversation stayed light and easy as he tested between them all who would talk, who wanted to, what topics they liked. He took the same tone he’d taken with me, the same kindness that had once reached across a table, and grabbed a clean cloth from soapy water. 

“I should be getting to bed,” Rhys said throwing his napkin on the table. In near unison, everyone followed with quiet goodnights, up the stairs. All but Mor who’d had plans to see Amren. She was not the kind of female who, even with fine excuses, I’d ever skip plans with. It would probably be good for her. I think they all just needed to be around others for a while, even if at times such socializing could be unbearable.

I looked toward Lucien and just shrugged as I had the nights before, he in agreement shrugged back. We’d done our best, eventually I thought that would mean something. I’d told him the first night what the camps could be like for them. He seemed to understand. He stood from his seat came around the table, and offered me his arm. I smiled and he escorted me to the den.

“Something to drink?” 

Lucien mulled it over, but nodded. “We can toast to your stitches coming out tomorrow.”

The prospect of a drink from Rhysand’s personal supply was the only thing that could rouse me again. I grabbed two fine cups, maybe to impress Lucien, maybe they were just the first I saw, and found my brother's brandy. I heard him fall into the sofa and I looked over my shoulder as I poured. 

He looked like a member of the court, looked as though he belonged here. My hands faltered and his eyes fell shut, a small mercy from the Cauldron so I could stare at him longer. For all that cruelty, the severity he’d had those years, his kindness fit him the most profoundly. It was like he was born for it, all that loyalty with nowhere to go. I liked thinking that he’d saved some, that the world had not made him bitter, and for now, he’d extended it to the very people who’d once despised him. A test of faith maybe. I liked to think one day we’d deserve it.

I turned back and found courage to tip the heavy decanter. The sound of his shifting, getting comfortable, like he’d known all along to keep still for me to watch. 

“I feel it you know,” he said from behind me. “I’ve always felt it. When you were looking at me.”

I hummed, “I can feel you too.” 

“Do you think it’s because we’re mates?” He asked.

“I don’t know if I remember noticing before the bond snapped.”

I began to pour the next glass, all my movements now slow, intentional. Lucien’s attention burned into my back, my arms, my neck which had been exposed thanks to the wraith's help. 

“Sometimes,” I began, “I think you see me better than anyone. Even before.”

When I turned around he’d undone the cuffs on his sleeves, rolling them up the way he had before we’d gone to the house of wind. My breath rose and fell in quicker succession. He could hear it probably, the intake, the need, the speed of a heart that is looking upon something which does not belong to her in the way it would like.

“It isn’t mutual then.”

The small of my back bumped to the table at the statement.“Mutual how?”

“You said the other night that you used to know me. You no longer think that's true?”

I licked my lips, crossing one arm over the other as I held the tops of the glasses in my warming hands. “I think…I think there was a time where we had something between us that was easy and it is no longer easy.”

“Easy how?” He asked.

“I always knew what you’d do with it, with what you found when you saw me.”

“What difference is there, between knowing and not knowing?”

His head lulled to the side and he crossed his arms over his chest. He looked pleasant, vulnerable, and to have anyone's attention the way I had him then would have made you want to be known, to say whatever it was you felt before you couldn’t say. He looked at me with a happiness I seldom saw in our world. That careful in-between, content as they call it, where everything has worked out how you wanted it to. It occurred to me, as his eyes moved side to side in wait, a delicate smile just barely legible, that it was Lucien sitting before me. Sometimes I’d forget, but a kind of possessiveness overcame me. Not because he was mine to have, but because he was mine to know. The one person who couldn’t leave Prythian without my knowledge, without feeling as if the entire continent had shifted toward less mischievous, cunning ends. 

 A girlish blush rose to my cheeks, but I wasn’t afraid. “I’d felt old the first time I shared a bed with someone.” 

My gaze took on that far-away look I recognized in Lucien as I began to tell him of the winter I’d spent away from Velaris. I could tell though, even as I crept far from the present moment, almost to a different world, my mate kept his undivided attention on me. The way he had all week when a corner of the city was becoming known to him as I peeled back the layers of history and meaning. 

He showed no signs of male anguish, no jealousy, but I felt something in him warp and change before at last it settled by the very end. Like I was witness to my own personal transformation, a dimension revealed that didn’t give him a fuller picture of me, but insight, contour, to the ideas he’d already figured out just by being near me all this time. I was his to be known too.

“That’s how it used to be with you too, until recently.”

He said nothing and I approached him, cutting through his quiet while the words hung in the air and the ice began to melt in our glasses. I managed to make it across the room before he’d said anything and even then he just looked up at me. I surprised myself then, stepping just once more so that both knees touched his two as I leaned into him, letting him support me as I extended his glass between us.

“I’m actually insulted you thought I wouldn’t be able to handle such a story. I’ve seen you do far worse.”

It didn’t matter then, who was sleeping or who was awake, I tipped my head back and let out the loudest laugh I think he’d ever managed. I could feel Lucien looking at me, and where once the furniture had seemed to carry with it the weight and despair of the outside world, the air cleared just for the intensity of the joy that had happened close by.

He shook his head, laughing as he grabbed the drink, “you’d think I was some sort of miserable brute of a male.”

“Aren’t you?” I laughed as I fell into the couch next to him.

He didn’t reply. His smile broadened as he brought the glass underneath his nose and smelled it. “You don’t drink brandy.”

“I can start at any time.” 

“Give me that,” he said snatching away my drink and taking nearly the whole of it in his mouth. I might have chided him for such a display, but instead I found myself gasping, as I had seen other respectable females do in his presence, and laughing. He swallowed, “if we’re celebrating you should have a drink you like.” 

I don’t know if we’d ever been so playful before. Maybe the week had called for it, maybe it wasn’t that things wouldn’t be the same forever, but that they couldn’t. It wasn’t the way of the universe, we started life one way and ended it another. And at times, what we could hope for, is that there was change that arrived on something as easy to manage as a clink of a glass, as a laugh between friends. 

I took the cup I’d intended for him out of his grasp and in the same quick motion, had a long sip and swallowed it whole. The warmth filled my stomach and ears and the effects felt rather immediate. He smirked and though at one time it would have meant something menacing, tonight it seemed like an invitation. We pressed our glasses together with shared smiles. 

“To the end of your recovery and the return of your mischief,” Lucien said and we didn’t break eye contact until our next sip was taken. An old Autumn Court superstition. 

We sat back and I leaned against the arm of the sofa, pressing the cool glass to my temple to try and ease the heat. Lucien’s legs lulled open and closed, every so often bumping my own, creating a different warmth I could not chase from myself without his help. So I focused on the coolness near my ear, at the sweat of the glass dripping down my cheek onto my neck. I tried not to think of his arms exposed to the world, exposed to me.

“You’re wrong of course,” Lucien said eventually. “You understand me still.”

I smiled at the thought. He was right, but I wouldn’t say. He knew I knew this and knew I wouldn’t. I relieved myself of the burden of holding up my own head and instead turned my body, tucking my legs under me, so I could rest my cheek against the back of the cushion. Lucien’s head fell to the side to look at me.

“You knew what I meant at the tailors with just a look. I saw the thought arrive and leave,” he added as proof. 

“What thought?”

His mouth formed a flat line and he looked at me with skepticism, the skepticism of someone who knew I remembered and didn’t like me playing dumb.

“The one where you were thinking of everything you’d have done so that I didn’t have to be in Velaris.”

I said nothing and Lucien shifted forward like he had a proposition in mind. Perhaps the alcohol was stronger than I realized because our noses were nearly touching and my body and his seemed to be producing such a heat that between us I thought the fabric would scorch. Sweat formed at the back of my neck and fell beneath my collar. 

“Knowledge such as ours is already a burden. Please, don’t consider marrying someone else, not while I’m nearby and can see.” He said and I felt his words brush along the divot over my mouth. The distance so precarious my own voice rose only loud enough to cross what little space we’d given each other. 

“If it bothers you that much I might not be able to help myself.” He narrowed his eyes and I nodded, “Alright.”

He readjusted, put more distance between us, and I could breathe. His face back to that inquisitive need. “Do you truly believe nothing was at risk between us, that knowing something like what I’d say saved you any trouble?”

I licked my lips, and closed my eyes a moment to help gather my thoughts that in so short a time had scattered to the far ends of my mind. “Yes. What could I lose if I didn’t have anything to gain?”

“But wasn't there something to gain?”

“Was there?”

Lucien shifted, less embarrassed, less afraid of what he meant, “love, I suspect. Respect at least.”

“Did you respect me?” I faltered, asking because I couldn’t bear the other question, the obvious question with the obvious answer. Even if asking this in its own way revealed my hand, revealed the knowledge to him, of the things I couldn’t say. 

“Yes, of course I did. To me,” he said thinking for a long moment his voice wavering a little so he made to clear his throat. “This has always been a risk, it wouldn’t have been worth it to me if there wasn’t. I respected that our inherent bond, the way you witnessed me, gave you power over me and for some reason you never used it. Knowing or not knowing this about you didn’t take that power away. Especially when I know you can wield your words rather effectively when you want to.”

“What could I’ve done?”

“Plenty. Who knows me better than you?”

Lucien was right, to really know someone is burdensome. People don't want to admit it, because on words alone, few would desire to be such a thing. But there is a weight that you are aware of when someone is known to you and you to them. 

It’s like this, I could tell when Gawayn fell asleep. After we had finished I’d hear his breathing deepen, his heart slow. For a long time that had been enough, had meant enough, to make it until morning. To last until the next time I needed him. 

The satisfaction I had with males over the years was seldom ever made from mutual knowing. After long stretches of winter or very early on spring mornings, a desire came about. The craving for weight. Where, at once, the layers of understanding reach through the world to pull you close. It is a particular heaviness that is needed, not just the knowing of names, but the intimacy of two hearts who are familiar enough for the purpose. And strangely it is not so mortifying suddenly. All you want is the burden of knowledge, the weight of someone who has known you all this time and chose you. So I’d call and he would arrive and the heaviness of all we carried in familiarity and expectations would press together and only there I found some relief. 

Yes, I think I understand. To be known, is that not also, a kind of love? Are then, love and burden not the same thing?

There was a deep unsettling feeling forming between my bones, leaking out into my body, my being. The moment of realization that what you’d thought had been protected had, in hindsight, been so dangerously close to peril after all. I was saved by, if only by, the respect of someone good enough to know what was unutterable. The intimacy of never using something you had to begin with. My mouth was dry. I took the last lingering sip of my drink.

Lucien didn’t break the stare, his drink finished. I wasn’t even trying to think of something to say, his insight had obliterated any chance of coherency. My heart rattled against my ribs and I heard it in my ears. Its speed picked up so effectively I saw Lucien’s eyes drop to the thin skin that protected it. 

A wisp of something slid along the wall in my peripheral and then, without ceremony, the lights went out. Azriel. 

“Curfew?”

“Bastards.”

Lucien laughed, his voice so obviously tired now that I heard it in the dark, separated from the alertness of his face. The cushion beside me sunk then lifted. As I had, his knees pressed into my own, and silence unlike that I’d ever heard before, as total as the darkness, as private as the room, stuffed itself into my ears and I was more aware of him than I was of myself. And, all the same, being aware of him, made me aware of myself, because through the darkness a warm hand reached laying itself across my cheek.

Then a thumb over the lips, as the steady hand fell. Moving lower, moving until there was an edge, my jawbone, and running along it. Testing, savoring, and suddenly slower, the hand becoming just two fingers lowering across the valley of my neck. 

Feeling me swallow, testing for breath, splaying itself out then gripping where breath might be, almost, but with some hesitation. 

My head shifted up, more room for possession, more space for claiming, he noticed, closing tighter, but releasing. A trail of water down the neck is reborn by fingers. Touches that said I know you, remember you. Lowering with the permission of knowledge, feeling the heartbeat at the side of my neck, feeling it calm, feeling it ready. A pressure relieved on one leg, he leans away and returns with his knee between my thighs. I was unflinching, I wanted to wrap around him but didn’t, in case he went further. 

He does.

The distance closed is not enough, but he moves his hand lower, moves places it has never been but somehow still is remembering. 

Tips along the collarbone, a suggestion between breasts—then nothing.  

Two hands clasped, and the warm one pulled. 

A sturdy chest in my cold hands, my breath pushed back against me, he still leaning in. Teeth, in restraint, along my neck. 

Prodding, light, grazing. My name whispered. 

 Then nothing. 

We exchanged what we could, the sounds of our breath—his caught, mine lost, and it said a thousand things that words did not exist for. I wanted to stay, thighs touching, wanted to let my eyes adjust and be sure, see his teeth, and know it had happened but I couldn’t. I walked away first, toward the den doors. His touching, however, wasn’t over yet. He pulled just barely at my skirt, not enough to say don’t go, but like he was holding onto the moment too by its edges willing it in place. He knew what I knew, that once we got out into the hall where the lights were dim he would go and I would go and that great distance would form between our rooms which each night began to feel further and further from each other. I hated it, to the point of tears, the joy that ceased from my not knowing what to do. I didn’t want to be so powerless. 

The knob of the den doors warmed under my hold and Lucien withdrew his hand from my dress. The tension of the fabric faded only to be replaced by the tug of regret pulling from behind my ribs, from between the vertebrae. Why had I left him there in the dark? That I’d thought myself newly brave and could not, even for a flimsy moment, withstand the intensity of having what I really wanted—to stay with him, and for him to stay with me. My stomach turned in frustration. I wanted to the point of sickness. 

In the hall at last I found him still lingering close by. For the first time, I saw it, the respect he had for me. It occurred to me that no one looked at me as he had looked at me. Not just in the way he desired me, males had looked at me with desire, but for that distinctly mated fact. To him, truly, I was his equal cauldron or no.

It made the wanting bearable. Who knew me better than him?

He took my hand in his and I knew what it meant, he would kiss the smooth skin and rush off like he had somewhere to be as he had most of the week. He kept that stare on me and I did not look away. I could feel what he thought of me and it made me feel brave. He made to pull my hand to his lips but this was not the end. I withdrew it, his face creasing in confusion. I wanted him to ask me something, so I would ask first. That was what I had to do, I had to go first and he would always follow. 

He moved away from me, retreating.

“Are you to be my burden?” 

The quiet of our first days back in Velaris returned. As if the walls had solidified, as if even the townhouse had straightened and the whole world was balanced on the point of a needle, unmoving, without breath.

Lucien’s eyes searched, “so that’s how it is?”

“Yes.”

He swallowed, throat bobbing, and thought only a moment, the answer coming quickly to him. “I’d prefer nothing.”

I waited for him to say nothing more , nothing else , but no word followed the vacant choice before it.

“Nothing?” I asked.

“I’d rather be nothing than that.” 

Whatever heat had formed from our moment in the den had been smothered. A heavy cool blanket had been tossed over me and I couldn’t get it off, could not find the hem and relieve myself. Really I had the sense that something terrible had begun and even though we’d only just started to speak again we were already too far ahead in something for us to go back. I got the sense that no matter what I said I could not fix whatever had been broken by the risk I’d made, by the things I’d revealed.

I huffed an uncomfortable laugh, my words out of habit turned sharp, “you didn’t seem to mind a few minutes ago.”

“A few minutes ago?”

“In the den. I thought you wanted to.”

“Well you thought wrong.”

When I didn’t speak Lucien saw the confusion on my face and anger took hold of his words. “Why should I want any part of that?” The bond was alight with it, all he was feeling that seemed only to grow and carve away at any logic, to break it like a bone so we lost any control. 

“Because,” I faltered, my voice becoming small in a way I didn’t like. However, Lucien’s face seemed to soften when he heard it. He waited. There was something he wanted me to say. For a moment I saw a bridge forming between us where we might meet in the middle, where we could put all of this down, all the fear and vague language, and say what we really meant. I stepped forward, “because it’s me.”

I watched the tenderness die, before it had fully arrived, fading slowly away from me until it was entirely out of reach. “Why would that change anything?” 

In my chest the foreign anger grew exponentially, primally, lashing like an injured beast with an overactive maw. Its teeth pierced into me, injured me, and where once a single rage might have been a second formed in its place. 

I steeled, narrowed my eyes, then shielded our bond. Lucien noticed immediately. Flames ignited and extinguished in an instant at his palms. My side burned, a sweat formed at my lower back as I tried to remain unwavering through the pain. Dull and precise it climbed through my side.

“I forgot how cruel you Autumn males can be,” I said finally, looking him once over. “It’s cowardly.”

Lucien narrowed his eyes back and stepped forward, “cowardly?” 

“I know no other reason for someone to abandon what they’d begun.”

“Self-respect.”

Shadows gathered at our ankles and the pain pierced at my ribs. I shook my head, cast a glance over the male, my mate, who had apparently not changed at all. I was still the female in the garden, the one his brother almost sullied himself with. Waves of disgust seemed to push off him, even without the bond between us. His nostrils flared, his lips pulling back. Like he’d forgotten everything, like I was the female everyone knew from the Hewn City.

“What a disappointment you turned out to be.”

He opened his mouth but closed it, sneering as he pushed past me. 

“Where are you going?” I said, my voice echoing through the house and I regretted it immediately. I’d revealed my hand. I care. I care. I care. I care what you think of me. I’d said so in the face of his uncaring. I want you safe, I want you here. In fact, there was to me, no greater fear than what awaited for him if he left. But he wasn’t listening. He had stopped listening. He turned back and, with a new composure of his acceptance of where we’d landed, his voice did not echo as mine had. 

“I’ve no desire to be where I’m not wanted.”

He waited, watching me. He’d realize it. He knew me, he knew what my words meant. He just had to look at them again. Where are you going , it was easy. In any other world, any other time, he’d have teased me about it. He’d say, I’m starting to think you want me around and if it were any other time I’d say, don’t be delusional . But tonight, tonight I’d say I do . He knows this I don’t need to go first. I stared at him waiting for that realization to settle. 

When nothing was said he stepped forward. “But you’re so brave?” 

With his words a ripple of both our powers moved through the house. If whoever had gone to bed wasn’t awake before I knew they were now. I could feel the pain in my throat turning my voice into something pathetic, almost begging. 

“I gave something,”

“You’re a child if you think a few stories, a glimpse at your handwriting meant anything.” He said, the words loud so everyone might hear. They’d probably been listening all along.

“It’s all I have.”

His eyes searched my face. I was not as stony as he. I never had been. He saw the fraying and he didn’t care. He remained unflinching. Then he did something I didn’t expect. “you disappoint me too, how you let the world make you this powerless.”

He used his power over me. 

The front door slammed. Its sound rattled through the whole house, between my bones, my fingers. He thought me weak. And he left. Lucien had gone and I couldn’t do anything about it. I was trapped, standing in the hall, staring where he had only just been. Staring at the space between us, where a spill had used to be. I was caught looking for meaning where there was none. The bump of a hand, a place on the floor, meaningless.

 I slammed my bedroom door in return. It gave no reprieve. Slowly, through the darkness, I undressed waiting for the feeling to settle. Instead, it grew larger until a great mouth seemed to open up and swallow me whole. Stripped, I dropped my shield and went to stretch as I had in the garden to dispel the leftover burn. I placed my palm to my side and found no stitches. I went to the mirror and searched for them through the dark. They were gone. 

They’d burned away. The only thing left was a hint of ash, a long stretch of skin, and a scar.

All of this replayed again, over and over, as Madja prodded my skin while the too-quiet court waited downstairs. If the Cauldron cared even a little for me we’d have one more hour, one more minute, where we would be forced together. There had to be a seam somewhere I could figure out where I’d been mistaken. 

“How does this feel,” the healer said. She pressed into the raised skin around the injury. Her hands were cold. Maybe they weren’t, but by comparison to Lucien, everyone felt cold. 

He hadn’t come home last night. 

I stayed up waiting for that terrible sound to repeat. The slamming of the front door, then footsteps down a hall to a room that no longer felt so far away. He could be a great deal further than just one floor. With each growing distance, the thought of another further destination came behind it. He could winnow to the Illyrian village, to the Hewn City, he could leave Velaris. He might not even be in Velaris anymore. All night I tried to imagine where he’d go instead and the panic had me so sick I had to run to the bathroom before I decided to think of it no longer. I’d know if he’d left. I’d said that. I’d know. 

“It hurts.”

“Probably tender from using your power, but it shouldn’t cause you much grief. If the pain lingers longer than a week let me know,” she said pulling her hands away and moving toward her bag. 

“Thank you.”

She nodded and muttered with a laugh, “good thing you did your exercises.” 

 I cursed under my breath. I’m sure from the outside our predicament was a riot. No one remembered what the cost was. No one ever remembered. I fixed my shirt and made toward the door. Downstairs everyone was waiting. Just as Lucien and I had dropped all pretenses to aid them in their recovery, so too did their various ailments seem to vanish in the space of a sleep. When I’d found everyone at breakfast that morning, between warm smiles, I saw also weary eyes. No one asked where Lucien was. I knew then they’d heard everything. 

Their murmurs climbed up the stairs the stench of alcohol had lingered in the hall. We’d been celebrating and suddenly all that goodness was over, like it hadn’t even happened. I could do everything again, I could shield and winnow and sneak into minds for private mischief, but I couldn’t do anything I really wanted. I couldn’t tell him to come back, couldn’t even return to our old understandings that might have revealed why he’d really changed his mind, and I couldn’t ask him to stay here with me.

“She’s all set,” Madja said, passing through the doors before me. A mass of faces, wide-eyed, nervous, looked in our direction. 

His eyes the only one turned away, stared into oblivion, stared far away. Lucien was on the couch beside Mor in the same clothes he wore last night. Rhysand watched me, his attention undivided and acute. Though his face remained neutral there was an uncertainty between us. He was waiting for me to react to seeing my mate. Lucien’s whole body slumped like it weighed a thousand pounds and he was trying to hold it up. He reeked of a tavern. The stench had been him, stale beer, wine, and something faintly sweet lingered lightly near. Like perfume. 

Every muscle contracted, straining against a heat that was trying to burst through. Barbaric and uncivilized jealousy slammed into me. I tried desperately to remain in control of my body, feeling for my feet flat against the floor, my clenched fists, my slack jaw. I could not after last night reveal such a weakness for him. But one foot vanished from my focus and was stepping forward, then the other. 

“So happy to hear it,” Rhys said maneuvering toward me, carefully putting himself between us. I still didn’t take my eyes off Lucien. “Cassian could you walk Madja out please.”

 “I feel it's important I stay right here.” He said, his hand coming down to clamp on my shoulder with a friendly restraining hold. I didn’t need to look at my brother, didn’t need to tear my eyes away a moment, to know his mouth had pulled into a thin line. 

“Az?”

The shadow singer moved silently through the room toward the old healer who gave a word of goodbye. Their faint sound of footsteps in the hall was privacy enough by Cassian’s standards and so began his teasing.

“Don’t go scaring Lucien away too. He’s barely recovered from sleeping on Mor’s ancient couch.”

“Cassian,” Rhys said.

At whose expense he joked I couldn’t say. Our cousin avoided our eyes, looking around the room. Rhys moved even closer to me. My brother was serious, deathly so, my name falling from him with that command he could wield. It was a kind of remedy, not enough to forgive Lucien, but a logic momentarily denied took root in my spine and I felt any despair vanish. He wasn’t the type, he wasn’t so cruel as to slink off at the first sign of issue and find another female. And if he had he wouldn’t come back. In the time of our agreement for freedom from one another, at no point had I ever found him to be uncaring or cruel to the females he’d pursued. It was another one of the few qualities he’d had that I never deluded myself in snubbing him. No one would respect me had I attempted such an accusation because everyone knew it to be otherwise.

Cassian tugged me into his side as if it had all been playful. “Maybe we could head up to the house of wind, get a little training in, expel some energy. Lucien, you’re free to join us if you can stomach it.”

“I’m going with Mor today,” Lucien said flatly. 

“Where?” I asked.

Mor stood, “I’m showing him my favorite spots in Velaris, will probably need to get him something to cure his hangover, he tried to outdrink me and Amren last night.”

“Another time then,” Rhys said to Cassian before looking my way. “You and I have work to catch up on together now that you’re out of recovery.”

“ What work?” 

He smiled, and all the normalcy in the world seemed to return with his tendency to relish in my suffering. It was a small suffering, but a welcome one, that I wouldn’t be able to languish all day. A wave of gratitude moved through me. My life had been waiting and it was time for me to get back to it. 

“We need to discuss the solstice and a time to see the priestess about Starfall.” I let out a sigh, recalling just how much there would be for us to do then. Rhysand moved past me and with all the casualty in the world threw his hands in his pockets adding, as if he’d just remembered, “oh—and we need to discuss that trip to the Illyrian camps I mentioned this morning.”

I felt nothing at my chest. Just the idea of me and another male days ago had Lucien wincing. I thought… well you thought wrong. 

From behind Rhys, Azriel was waiting in the hall. It was slight, but a wisp of his shadows crept along his shoulder. He was staring at me but whatever it was he wanted to convey was too slight. It was Cassian who, fighting a laugh had turned away from us all and began to leave the room giving away everything to me. Lucien was truly a member of our court then, through the customary ritual of having everyone participate in a campaign plotted against you. Rhys just looked at me in wait.

“I’ll need three days not two, if what you said is true,” I said wanting to test it.

Claws crept along my mind. Cruel. Does he deserve this level of punishment?

Yes. 

“Three it is then. We’ll have to find a good time, likely just before the holiday at the start of the month.”

“Perfect.” 

Glad to see you back on my team.

Rhysand turned away, always have been. Get dressed, there really is work to do.

Mor followed behind my brother, leaving me and my mate half alone once more. Slowly, I turned to face him truly. Even when we’d had the bond his emotions had usually been small. Yet nothing, not a whisper pressed into me of any jealousy. He just stood there narrow-eyed, watching me the way he watched and knowing the way he knows everything. As if the bond itself had whispered my every thought his way, giving over what little leverage I had. 

“Lucien?” Mor said and he didn’t look away.

“Let me change and we can leave.”

“Take your time,” she said but he was done with me. She might know already, she who had watched him last night and took him home. Would he in all his silence confide in her, confide in anyone but himself? Most of what I knew about him was things noticed not shared. 

In silence, we parted. I looked away as he passed, the air off his hand coiling around my fingers with a certain hold. It was no longer warm. It didn’t even seem to belong to him. My eyes settled on the couch, settling on the faraway point Lucien had been staring at when I came downstairs. 

Two cups, their lips together, like a kiss. Like proof that something good here had actually happened. 

“How refreshing it is to see two mates so dedicated to communicating as you,” Rhys said as I entered his office.

“Bastard.”

“Here I was, lying in bed, happy that all my scheming had managed to get you both working together, laughing,” he said throwing his feet on the desk. “Only to listen to the two most stubborn fae I’ve ever met refuse to acknowledge what’s going on between them.”

“I think actually we rather successfully acknowledge what’s going on.”

I fell into the chair across from him. Lucien and Mor had left a half hour ago. I’d laid across my bed waiting for the closing of the front door, trying to settle and become familiar with the sound of him leaving. It took me 15 minutes after they left to crawl back out of bed and come downstairs. 

“And what’s going on?”

“Nothing.”

He flinched, like my pain was his, and I felt our jokes vanish. He quieted his voice, “all that's nothing to you?”

“It could be nothing or something and as of last night it’s nothing.”

There was such pity in his eyes that I could’ve slapped him. I didn’t need the mortification two-fold that not only had they heard him say what he said about me, what he thought, but also they felt bad for me on top of it. As if I could survive the burn of a blade and not the disinterest of a male who, two weeks ago, didn’t care for me to begin with. 

“I don’t think that's true.”

I shifted, turning to look out the window. Despair sat right on the edge of my vision. If I looked away from my anger, if I stopped being in the present I knew it would close in on me the way those shadows had the night we’d arrived. The way it had last night until I fell asleep.

“You thinking so doesn’t mean that it isn’t.” I swallowed and shook away the nerves. A false smile, one I knew he’d see through, spread across my face. “Sorry you won’t win your bet.”

“There’s still time.”

“Wishful thinking,” I said to my brother, who probably really wanted for me to explain how everything had gotten so bad between his trip to this morning instead of what work we had to do. “You should learn from this experience and stay out of my business.”

“Your business is far more entertaining than mine,” he said gesturing toward the pile of paperwork waiting.

“Shall we get started then?”

Rhys let out a small sigh of disappointment. He handed me a pile of pages and I took it from him, looking over the names and businesses that appeared on it.

“Is there anyone first who comes to mind you’d like to make a donation to?” I asked, flipping through what had already been decided.

“Egrette likely for her priceless contribution of keeping you out of my hair.”

I rolled my eyes and found her name circling it, making note of the sum we’d donate. A list of name after name beneath and above hers was accompanied by their own scrawling notes, taken over the last year by Rhys. Passing words, complaints, compliments, anything that was important to their livelihood so that when we came together before solstice we could figure out what was needed, what we could do. 

“Might as well decide what theater gets what too,” I said.

He hummed and we began to rustle through the pages. To sit there with him, half comfortable, it made the whole thing seem rather banal, normal even. Despite what was going on outside the room I could count on him for this, for a moment of reprieve, to sit together like siblings who had spent so many years talking that they need not say anything from time to time. There would come a place for talking again. But for now, that place was up ahead, maybe 50 years, maybe two weeks, when the memory of perfume didn’t linger in my mind. I knew though that he’d be ready when it arrived. He was already there. 

We managed to get a larger chunk done than I expected. Rhys I think continued on so long just to keep me from leaving his office and spiraling. With a headache forming he said we could wrap up for the day. We’d have to talk to the priestess tomorrow anyway. No one had returned to the townhouse.

I sighed, dropping my pages on his desk and he muttered a thanks.

“You’ll need to pass along a message for me when you get the the camp.”

“To who?” I asked, not in any particular rush to speak to most of the males that dwelled there. 

“Gawayn. Let him know the extra work he has is courtesy of the princess of the Night Court. 

Rhys didn’t look up from his desk, jotting notes down in the margins of something and then opening one of his desk drawers. How loud had I been talking? Not too loud I should think. The alcohol we’d shared had made us careless and the laughter had certainly echoed through the house, but was the rest not just a low murmur? 

Rhys put down his pen before he scowled lightly, “he put on a performance, the prick. He had me running around in circles with ideas of where the male from the cabin would be. I’m sure he roared with laughter once he got home.”

I smiled, truly and smugly, “I’m sure he did.” 

He shook his head and began to fidget in his seat with somewhat graceless movements. “I don’t doubt that was humiliating for you. I wish I handled it differently.”

“It’s been a nice laugh over the years and I’ve no interest in carrying grudges. You were forgiven before the snow had melted on Ramiel.” 

“Yes but,” he said rubbing at his face. “I have a terrible feeling I’m to blame in part for whatever’s going on between you two.” 

“Don’t flatter yourself. About 50 years after the fact you lose any claim to such a title.” 

He huffed a laugh and sat back, eyes tired, “what will you do with the rest of your day?” 

“I have my own charity to finish and some letters to answer.”

“Don’t sit inside.”

“Don’t coddle me.”

“I’m not, but I’d rather not risk my life to step between two feuding jealous mates again.”

“You embellish,” I said and when Rhys gave me a questioning look I shrugged. “I couldn’t feel anything—down our bond. He doesn’t care what I do.”

His brows creased but settled. He looked at the cuff of his jacket, fixing it slightly before asking with the false casualty of someone who wanted desperately to know something. “What does it feel like, your bond?”

I thought for a moment, feeling around for the tether and knowing exactly where it was. And yet it wasn’t concrete, not so real, but it had this pull on us we couldn’t stop. Not at least without a far worse pain. 

“Like knowing something for a very long time.”

“Knowing what?”

I thought, “an answer and a question.” 

My brother was quiet and he seemed to toss this idea around in his head. Whatever he thought he settled on keeping it to himself. I heaved myself up and told him I’d see him at dinner. Whether I left the house or not he’d probably be cooped up in here with whatever it was that needed his attention now. My hand had just brushed the door when Rhysand spoke again.

“The night you came home, once Madja had begun to work, we could hear you crying. I thought it would be unbearable for Lucien, it was for the rest of us. But when I looked at him he was even-tempered, agreeable.”

I thought of all those years his body didn’t betray him. His cool exterior in the face of grief, happiness, longing. What he didn’t show. I wouldn’t have expected him to show it. I couldn’t even imagine it. 

“I asked him,” Rhys continued, “how the one person in all of Prythian who should be half feral at such pain could be so calm and he said because you’re you. Like it were the obvious answer, and he was surprised I didn’t know it. So he said, who else had such power, to survive the heat of Autumn?”

Something inside me tensed, like the bond itself was tugging and tugging at something. Pulling him toward me, it was like the cauldron was thrashing, desperate for us to be together. The darkness and despair at my eyes began to close in. You disappoint me. My mouth was dry but I spoke. 

“That doesn’t mean he likes me.” 

“No,” Rhys said. “It doesn’t.” 

***

The following morning I felt worse than the day before. Lucien, again, had not come home. At breakfast when I joined everyone downstairs all I had to do was look at Rhys and he told me.

“He’s with Cassian.”

 And that was that. Each morning it went on that way. If he wasn’t with Cassian then he was with Mor. I didn’t ask them about what they did together, what he revealed. Despite where we’d left things, despite the growing desire to hear his voice and to know how he was doing, if he didn’t want to tell me then that was his business to keep. The truth was I didn’t want to tell him how I was either. It had been over a week since my stitches had come out and the most I got of Lucien was the sound late at night of him coming home, if he did even that, followed by him leaving early in the morning. At times lying in bed I’d feel around for the bond to make sure it was still there, as if its disappearance would be better than what I found. That it was there, and he just didn’t feel much of anything. He had not been encased in any sadness nor did Velaris offer any joy for him to escape into. There was nothing. No reason to stay and perhaps one reason to go. Sometimes at my most desperate I thought, despite how pitiful it was, that the life in me that had been given back was leaving. I had not gotten used to it yet, the sound of a door shutting. 

***

What might have been an idle threat trying to make Lucien jealous had been made real. Two weeks before I was to leave for the Illyrian village we’d wrapped up the details. I’d go there, give my donations to the female I corresponded with, and then spend some time out of the city in the cabin. Though I enjoyed doing this each year, the lifelessness of the days that had passed seemed neither despaired at having to go or relieved to be away. I felt nothing. 

“It will be good for you,” Rhys said as he checked his watch and he didn’t need to say the rest for me to know what he meant. It would be good for me to get away from Lucien, get some space. Space, I didn’t remind him, was now the only thing we had. Every day had started to blur together. Every time I walked into my brother's office he took one look at me and I could see his disappointment. It was one of three checkpoints I’d begun to use to mark time passing. Lucien leaving, Rhysand’s disappointment, Lucien coming home. I tried not to think of it, of a day when there was only one marker that time had passed. 

“Do you have anything you need to get in order before you go?”

I shrugged, “not really. I finished the last of the work last night.”

“What time.”

I hummed feigning thought, “can’t remember.”

“You’re rotting in this house,” he said finally an air of sternness about him. “Why don’t you get some fresh air, sunlight. Egrette is probably looking for you.”

“I’m not there 10 minutes and she tells me her nephews are coming. I’m running out of excuses as to why I have to leave.”

“It’s a big city.”

“Depends on how you look at it.”

“Get out of my office and go outside. Now.” He said, walking around his desk and grabbing me by the arm. It was playful, light. I tried to find where in his words he had also been trying to be playful and teasing but couldn’t. I could find no difference between one thing from the next anymore. He opened the door and Cassian and Lucien were in the foyer, cheeks red, like they’d been out in the cold and had just walked in.

“Oh good,” Rhys said, his practiced nonchalance rather transparent. A sudden cordialness overcame him, “Please, come in I need to talk to you.”

“Why of course,” Cassian said in a mock bow. He’d been spending too much time with Lucien I could see. The Illyrian gave me a sidelong glance as he passed and I heard him stifle a laugh before the door closed behind me. The air from the force with which they shut it brushed my skirts. The well of pity they’d had for me had run dry. I wanted to slip away, to say nothing to him, but just the sight of Lucien after so long pinned me to the wall. I waited for him to sneer, to see the register of disgust, like that he’d had before in this very hall. Instead, he just stared at me before he shifted and his legs began to move. Not further away, like I expected, but closer. 

“What do you want.”

His brows raised in faint amusement. “You’re in a good mood.”

He wasn’t in on my brother’s little game, but what of his own? He seemed happy, glowing even. The separation had looked good on him. He must have been glad to rid himself of such a drain on his happiness. Maybe he drained mine, and the time away, really away, would reveal that. For now, he looked clever and cunning and happy. He looked like how he had all the time I’d known him. He looked like before. 

“You look well,” he said.

“Don’t lie.”

“Fine, you look terrible.”

A familiar tease. I crossed my arms, “so do you.”

“Don’t lie.”

I scoffed, “don’t you have somewhere to be?”

“Why you’ve missed me?” 

At least when he was hungover there was a level of delusion I could employ that our fight had bothered him as it had me, that he suffered from our silence. It seemed that his agonies were absent. He’d recovered almost, if not entirely, to who he’d been before he’d crossed the wards, before the slice had left me powerless. In the face of my own anger his goal, his only desire, seemed to be making it worse. It was so achingly familiar that I had to look away. When I glanced down, however, I realized he was wearing the sweater I made. Something like rage and longing intertwined inside of me. When I met his eye again they didn’t look glad.

“You’re set to leave soon.”

“Two weeks from today.”

He hummed, nodding, “and what will you do there?” 

I raised a brow, “why do you wish to know?”

He shrugged but I could see the thread of tension running through him. A tell of his that would probably always be familiar. Small and delicate, it was a tension easy to miss if you weren’t me. There was something that wasn’t so casual or sincere. In fact, it made him seem even a little sad. Like he was missing something. Nothing between us whispered of that unease. It was as if—

I conceded, “the first day I meet with some women I correspond with. The rest is for me to do as I please. See who I please.”

Nothing. 

Lucien swallowed, his neck tensing, concealed behind his relaxed face. “Anyone you’re planning on meeting?”

A test.

“Gawayn.”

A lick of flames at his hands sputtered but was extinguished. He was shielding from me. The reason it had gone cold and quiet, why he wasn’t feeling anything, why he didn’t seem jealous, was because he was hiding from me. 

I blanched at him, and he at me. In our moment of shock there was enough quiet to hear the door shift behind me. The wood pressed forward slightly like there were two males leaning against it to listen. I sent a sheet of darkness to the other side and the sounds of stumbling coughing bodies moving away could be heard. I grabbed Lucien’s arm and brought him to the library, shutting the doors behind us.

“You’re shielding from me!”

He scoffed but apparently didn’t have much to follow with. “You started it.”

“Are you incapable of doing anything that I don’t do first?” I snapped. 

He moved back half a step, the words pushing him further from me in their delivery. Did he know how he followed? Or was what shocked him that I knew so too?

“While you’re gone I suppose I’m free to go to Rita’s?” He said, changing the subject back, averting any blame. A maneuver we’d played before where one of us got the upper hand and the other tried desperately to take their place. Rising to the occasion, trying to make each other equally angry. A frantic and graceless business, but now that he’d revealed his jealousy he wanted to see mine. I knew though, better than he knew of me, that he wouldn’t do such a thing, an empty threat.

I raised a brow, a sudden calm overcoming me. I wouldn’t wallow any longer in inferiority, not when all that nothing had been something. I sighed, “for someone who rejected me you seem to have quite the possessive streak. Don’t tell me suddenly you like me.”

“Reject—” he began, shaking his head, changing course. “I certainly don’t like you.”

“Then this territorial display is poor form unless you’ve changed your mind. Otherwise, as far as I’m concerned, I’m still free to do as I wish,” I said flashing him a grin “and who I wish.”

Lucien seethed, breathing heavily, and something happened. Something like only that which I could compare to the way I’d felt the magic retreat into the land of the Autumn Forest. There was a sense of renewal, a clearing of the mind, and for a moment I felt I’d become wiser to something though to articulate what it was seemed still an impossible feat. The bone was set in place, something righted, I could think again. By the time I’d felt the weight of this knowledge Lucien had calmed himself. 

“Then let's change the terms of our arrangement.”

“Oh?” I said with indifference. 

He smiled, it seemed more in relief to him than a taunt, but his words managed to hold their weight. “How many males do you think you’d bed with my claiming mark on your neck?”

I went still. 

Lucien laughed, moving closer, circling me like a prey. He settled without a word, towering over me. I could feel the heat off his body and the seriousness of his words. He’d do it, he’d bite me right now if I agreed to it. He knew I wouldn’t agree to it.

“You’re not the type,” I said.

Shadows pooled around our ankles, he didn’t even look. Instead, he leaned forward and glanced at the place his teeth had narrowly been. “Didn’t have to be until recently.”

“If you brand me like I’m some prized mare there is no agreement I won’t break. Your immortal life will forever be made miserable by me.”

Lucien’s eyes met mine, bright with his arrogance and amusement.“Promise?”

My eyes bulged and I opened my mouth, half tempted to shove him over the low table at his feet. Before I could, however, the library doors flung open characteristically without thought to who was inside or what they’d been doing. Mor walked in aloof. Across the hall, another door shut. Rhysand. I’d known since Lucien arrived, since that wisps of shadow had shaken the chandelier, that we’d need privacy. True privacy, not just the feigned kind found in the closing of the door. This fight, perhaps, a message from the cauldron that the need was dire. 

“Are you ready?” Mor asked looking at me stretching like she’d been lounging for a long while. I’m sure Cassian put her up to this as a dare. I peered out the door to see if I could find the male clutching his stomach laughing. I suppose, now that I was enjoying the renewed pleasure of annoying Lucien, I could let them too have their laugh. 

“Ready for what?”

She groaned, “you always do this. We’re supposed to go shopping today.”

“When did I say I’d do that?”

“Yesterday at dinner.”

I’d said yes and mhm a thousand times and hadn’t paid attention to a single one. I’d pushed my food around, took bites when necessary, and let their voices all blend together. I thought that, much like the week they were half here, it was understood only small bits of what was said was heard and even less of that was meant.

“Go get a jacket,” she said, smiling widely. Everyone was planning something. That much I could tell, but who was working with who I had suspicion was not so clear. I wouldn’t be able to excuse my way out of it, not when apparently everyone had decided I needed to get out of the house. Without a word, I began to walk away. Lucien, with his long stride, pulled ahead and I pushed into his mind with determination to get the final word. 

What happened to that self-respect you spoke of?

Overrated. He said, throwing up a hand, waving the idea away as if it had been flimsy and small. Like it were nothing. 

Though she’d said she wanted to go shopping Mor bought nothing and seemed, rather contentedly, to be focused on wasting my afternoon. A command at the hand of my brother, if I had to guess private allegiances. He’d wanted me out of the house apparently all day not just an hour or two. Of the four hours she’d dragged us around only one thing had been bought and it had been by me. A flimsy dress, the kind you’d wear to bed in summer when the weather was so hot even cotton felt unbearable. I’d been looking at it and she’d said that, if I got it, we could be done shopping and have a drink right then. So I brought it to the counter. 

Even as I’d been suspicious of her intentions she did not ask after Lucien or why we’d been fighting. She mentioned nothing of what they’d discussed in their time together and didn’t even tell me where they went. I assumed that, eventually, we’d find a store they’d gone to, a place she’d taken him on her guided tour of Velaris, and she’d tell me what he’d thought of it or just that he’d seen it. However, no such admissions came. 

I tried not to be suspicious of her, but no questions seemed far more suspect than a few carefully placed ones. I’d learned a long time ago that what we didn’t say said just as much as what we did, and planned my silence in accordance. 

“So you’ll be staying in the cabin?”

“Yeah, I only really need a couple hours to do what I need to do.”

We meandered through the city, Mor leading. I didn’t care where we went. I just wanted to sit somewhere. The sunlight this close to winter seemed to be fading even as I woke these days. With the solstice lingering close, the longest night of the year on the horizon, I’d tried to use the shopping trip for inspiration for gifts. Yet even as I tried to focus on Azriel or Mor my mind turned to my mate. His gift was already ready, tucked away where truly no one would find it.

“And then what?”

“I’ll probably read.”

“Finish that book that you’ve been on for an age.”

I tucked my mouth under my collar as a harsh wind chapped my face.“It's for research, not pleasure.”

“What are you researching?” She said, a little too fast for me not to notice. 

I answered in time, “Summer Court traditions.”

She hummed, “so Tarquin has invited you then?”

I nodded, lying.  

Mor took a quick right and as soon as I rounded the corner after her I saw them. Rhys, Amren, and Azriel were at a table on the corner of the patio she’d brought us to. Even as their scheming was revealed to me I felt a happiness push through me nearly unending until it reached my face, my eyes. The world pushed into clarity, favored goodness and delight. Everyone’s matching smiles waited, the city beyond them cresting up the hills of the busy streets. The faraway laughter and the mingling of bodies even as it got cold took shape. Through it all too, out of windows and shops, a warm orange glow. Like sun or starlight, it made me feel warm. It made me feel glad. 

Up the street, two figures began walking downhill and even without the wings, I’d have known their relaxed, joyous walk. Cassian and Lucien met us at the threshold of the place, the gate swung open. I peered up at the Illyrian, ignoring my mate who watched me as I looked back at the table of participants. There were just enough glasses for all of us, and they would be finished quickly. 

“Who do we think will break first?” Cassian asked.

“Rhysand.” Mor and I said in unison. 

I could feel, after three glasses, the slowness of my blinks and the delay in my eyes when looking around the room. Everything seemed a bit funnier, more relaxed. It was like going into that universe in which Lucien and I had been allowed to say anything, though I knew that unlike before whatever was said would be remembered tomorrow by at least one person, and they’d not let us forget it so easily. Lucien was next to me and our legs were touching and I didn’t pull away, didn’t scold him down our bond. Though it wasn’t my brother’s collection, the wine they’d selected had settled in my stomach with a heavy warmth after only a sip.

“Lucien,” Mor said. “It's our turn to grab the drinks.”

“So,” Cassian said moving into the seat next to me as they went inside. “You and Lucien seem to have made up.”

I looked toward Azriel with a plea, “can you stop him?”

“I’ve learned it's pointless to try.”

I groaned and folded over the table, letting my forehead meet the wood with a loud thud. If I hadn’t had wine it would have hurt more but I couldn’t manage to react. It had looked like a lot of things between Lucien and me, but what was true seemed to evade any recognition or articulation. I lifted my gaze, resting my whole head’s weight on my hand, and looked at the Illyrian who was beaming with delight waiting for his taunts.

“Your dynamic is so interesting I’m not sure if I want you both to admit your feelings or keep at it,” Cassian said.

“I’d like a little more time to embarrass her before they decide they like each other and are no longer at each other’s throats.” Rhysand said, chiming in.

“Who’s winning the bet then? Am I allowed to know?”

The four remaining table mates looked at each other and smiled coming to an unspoken agreement. “No, but we can tell you who’s losing.” Amren said. 

“Cataclysmically,” Azriel added.

Cassian, Amren, and Azriel raised their hands. I let out a loud laugh, a sense of renewed motivation surging through me in having at least knocked three of them out. Though I’d have preferred to have snubbed Rhys over Az. I took the last sip of my wine and began crossing my arms, “I’m surprised you played Amren, I thought better of you.”

“She bet you’d be mated in a week,” Cassian said.

“You’re all terrible.”

“Not terrible,” Azriel said. “Just perceptive.”

Mor and Lucien returned, and Rhys and I passed out the drinks from the tray carefully. Rhys turned to Cassian and Lucien watching them take their next sip, waiting for them to notice, yet neither did. The two continued to talk about something they’d seen a few days ago in the market, a jewel of some kind. I met my brother’s eye again and we smiled, knowingly.

They’re going to kill you. I said thinking of the discreet words we’d shared with the bartender after we’d gone up to get the second round. Being the High Lord had an unfair advantage sure, but after dinner at the House of Wind, we were sure the two males would indeed pay for the words shared weeks before. We did not forget a promise. Not when it was so terribly easy to get a much stronger wine in their cups without them noticing.

And after they’ll kill you when they discover it was your idea.

Lucien fell beside me, as a debate waged over who lost the last time we’d done something like this. It had been me so I remained silent, laughing over the recounted drama of how we raced home on foot that night which culminated in Cassian pushing Mor into the brush outside the townhouse so he could win.

“There’s no rules so there’s no cheating.” 

Rhys raised his glass, “I’ll be sure to remind you of that.”

Lucien’s leg returned to brush against my own and in taking advantage of the spectacle, he managed to place his arm around the back of my chair. Even with the wine I wasn’t sure if we were alright, but I leaned back and let it for a moment be true that we were. Though to be claimed would be wretched, I liked at times to let him have his subtle possessiveness. I liked to pretend I was not just his to know, but his to have. 

“I have a question,” Cassian said finishing his 6th drink, voice noticeably more slurred than before. “Why didn’t you want people to know she was your mate?”

I hoped Rhysand would say something, push in with those manners of his to tell Cassian to stop, but as I eyed him he seemed just as drunk, if not more. Meanwhile, Lucien was laughing, at ease, barely crossed-eyed. I looked at his glass which had been emptied a while ago and tried to recall in our time across Prythian how much he drank those nights he was hungover at breakfast, but I didn’t pay enough attention back then. 

“If I’m not mistaken this feels like a bit of a trap.”

“And who’s to say it wasn’t me who wanted to keep it hushed,” I said at least draw some of the attention off of him.

“It was a mutual decision,” Lucien added casually. “Though I’d love to hear how you all found out.”

Cassian let out a low whistle and Rhys rolled his eyes. It was Mor who leaned over the table as the streets became nosier, more boisterous. The words fell lazily from her purple lips, “we were out like we were now and Rhys was pestering her about Egrette’s nephews,”

I turned toward Lucien who, despite his relatively short time in Velaris, followed along with the story and its inhabitants seamlessly, like he’d always belonged here. Like he’d happened to be away for 50 years and was learning everything that had happened in his absence. 

Mor continued, “Apparently they were smart and successful and not totally useless.”

“Which wasn’t really her type. Not at that time,” Cassian said.

I slapped his arm and though he tried to pull away the alcohol made him slow. Amren shot a hand out between us.

“And, after a thousand excuses,” Mor finished, “she said their discovering she had a mate made them not very eager suitors.”

“Our High Lord could have leveled the world with the lecture he gave,” Amren said.

Azriel huffed, still annoyed, “and it got us banned from our favorite tavern for years.” 

Lucien’s hand fell over his chest as he tipped his head back and a quiet amusement left his lips in laughter. It was again a moment of domesticity, the kind I’d seen of couples all over the city exhibiting in moments of intimacy where something was revealed and the other was displaying such a fondness. A laugh that wouldn’t have been had for anyone else because what was funny only mattered because of who they were to each other. He laughed a little too long, falling into a kind of dream, the only sign that the wine had any effect on him.

“She spent the summer waking up at 5 in the morning to go train with me. Including the morning after our night out,” Cassian said.

“You’re wretched,” Lucien said turning toward Rhysand

“You sound like her.”

I wobbled up to grab the next round and as I was looking over my shoulder to tell Rhys to follow after me, I bumped into a female who was crossing the patio. She spilled a bit of her drink on the leg of her pants and we both gasped.

“Oh I’m sorry,” I said. “I wasn’t paying attention.”

“It happens,” She said cooly, with little distress. She was a pretty female, her hair fell in long strands around her face. It looked almost golden against the warmth of the city's lights. I opened my mouth to speak, to offer anything, but my brother crept through like a breeze with an easy smile to match hers.

“You’ll have to forgive her.  She’s trying to outdrink a table of six.”

The female seemed to straighten and a brightness came to each of their faces that I thought certainly was enough to make it until morning. We moved toward the bar and he watched her as we walked away. Sometimes I think he joked about the dry spells just because he didn’t want to admit he had no interest in pursuing anyone. I sensed that we shared something unserious between us. Perhaps a mate was somewhere for him too.

When we returned to the table with our drinks everyone grabbed for theirs like animals and I could just barely hear the end of the conversation between everyone which sent my stomach lurching.

“—and suddenly so fond of each other?” Said Amren. 

Lucien removed his hand from behind my chair just as I sat and brought it into his lap, shifting with discomfort. I looked toward him, wondering if he’d give a silent plea, if he’d need me but he didn’t meet my eye.  Cassian picked up the line of questioning with his own suspicion.

“You both seemed rather in the middle of this thing by the time you got here and we know you can keep a secret.”

“I don’t know,” Rhys said, “I had to trip her down the stairs at the house of wind that first week when they were alone just to get them close to each other. Quite a bit of scheming has happened just to get to this point I have to think they were sincere in their dislike.”

I barely managed to process the revelation of his interference at the house of wind before I crossed my legs and drunkenly, put Lucien from his misery.

“We were in the middle of something. When Lucien was running through the woods looking for me and I was half dead hiding in the brush I made a bargain. Some forgotten God waiting to pull me under, I told them they could have me once I got Lucien safe, to our court. Then the darkness withdrew and I found out about his and Eris scheming and I brought him here. I’m probably only alive because Rhys choked Lucien long enough for Madja to make it to the townhouse. So, yes, we were in the middle of a bargain when you all arrived.”

Everyone was silent and I didn’t spare Lucien a glance though I felt the intensity of his attention seeping into my skin, like it was running through my blood, all that blood that had been lost and replaced in the last month. I don’t know if they were all uncomfortable but I smiled.

“I do hope I have such an opportunity to ask questions I shouldn’t ask when your unfortunate partners show up to Velaris.” 

We finished two more drinks with Lucien still looking the best of us all and Rhysand glancing over his shoulder every few minutes at the female who I’d bumped into. They stared at each other, not smiling, but something like it that said a lot without much veiling. I wondered, for a moment, if that was the obviousness that Lucien and I displayed giving cause for such questions to be asked.

“Talk to her.” Mor said.

He shrugged.

“As long as you don’t come back to the townhouse it’s fine,” I joked.

“It's already pretty late.” 

“What do you have to do tomorrow besides torment us?” Lucien asked and I couldn’t fathom the lucidity of his words when the rest of us were stumbling. Whatever they drank in Autumn must have been impossibly strong and I was glad not to know much of it. Rhys didn’t fight him on his words, instead he mulled them truly over. If he left it was his tab to pay and I don’t know if it had ever been this high. Not for lack of trying and certainly not just because Lucien was here. My brother looked around the table, then at Cassian who was still red in the face from whatever female had embarrassed him with a rejection, and stood.

“It’s on me.”

Though the world seemed to be teetering left and right I noticed the visible relief everyone had. We didn’t even bother to finish what was in our glasses. We all stood, Lucien holding his hand out to me, and began to pile out of our corner as my brother crossed the small patio. She had a kind face which made me glad, I’m sure a little kindness was deserved. From across the street, we all looked back, watching them, before we saw her nod. She moved away from her friends with him and with all the obnoxiousness we could muster, we screamed loud ridiculous cheers. Our High Lord glared at us, but it didn’t hold that bite. He was terribly pleased.

“Maybe Rhys and I can teach you a bit about females,” Azriel said throwing an arm over his friend. 

“Bastards.”

We walked along the Sidra passing other equally joyous groups who seemed more put together. Cassian challenged a few of us to a race but when no one would join him he dragged his feet. I jumped up onto the wall of the Sidra and began to walk along it as the icy water flowed below. Frozen shards had begun to float down the river though the first day of winter was still a few weeks away.

“Get down from there,” Lucien said not two steps in. He crossed and I could hear the group of them, or what was left after Amren had disappeared, laugh not so silently to themselves.

“I do this all the time.”

“Drunk?”

“Yeah,” Azriel replied for me. “Ask her about the time she fell in.”

Lucien didn’t hesitate and lifted me off the stone himself and the movement sent my stomach in my throat. I held my hand at my mouth, unable to fight him on the maneuver, and tried not to wretch what had only just managed to go down. The trio of them peeled away, down a different thin street, their laughter echoing off the stone.

“Where are you going!” I yelled, as they took a left down a long street.

“Mor’s ancient couch is waiting,” Cassian yelled. “There's no payment in the whole of Prythian that would force me under one roof with two drunk mates.”

Then time moved strangely. Maybe because I was on the edge of oblivion, but each moment seemed like an island. I was in the bathroom peeling off clothes I remembered but couldn’t picture Lucien handing the new ones against the sink. Then I had them on. I was looking in the mirror, I was splashing water on my face, then I was doubled over. I was retching and falling away from that spinning nothingness. I was falling fastly back to my body and Lucien was kneeling beside me. 

“You alright?”

I nodded, but alright was not the word I’d use. He pulled my hair back after I keeled over again. I sat there until my stomach settled just enough. My eyes closed, the world had stopped spinning at last, but I knew I’d need to sleep or it would begin again. Only I didn’t want to leave the place where Lucien was holding onto me gently. I wanted to wake up to a big house with no one in it and a stomach that wasn’t upset, but a mate who, regardless, was still trying to take care of me. My hair fell from his hands. Maybe he could feel all I wanted and didn’t want my hopes to get too high. Or maybe he was tired too. Either way, I crawled toward the cool tile near the tub and laid my body across it. 

“Lift your head,” Lucien said and I did as I was told. He shoved a pillow under me, though I’d not even known that he left the bathroom and before long a blanket came too. He settled against the tub and his hand came to my hair, pushing it back as he had that night we’d arrived. When the blood and water and tears had pushed it slick against my temple.

“You don’t even look drunk.”

“I’m not.”

I opened my eyes and peered up at him as his warm hand fell again to my forehead. He was smiling, very faintly, like he liked me. He’d said so once, that he didn’t, but I was starting to think he had lied. His eyes were bright, clear, like he knew something all-encompassing that I myself had yet to become aware of. 

“I switched to juice after round 3.”

I gasped, “cheat–”

“You think I don’t know the difference between two wines? I don’t think it's a coincidence that you and your brother went up and suddenly Cassian and I have a notch on our glass with a wine inside I’d not tasted before.”

I groaned, and fell back against the pillow. I didn’t fight him, I still couldn’t manage. My mind was already pulling far away to the look he’d given me and a world where it would happen over and over again. I thought it might be enough to make it until tomorrow, to sleep here on the cool tile, the skin of my bare legs rising at the exposure of it. I looked ridiculous, I’m sure, and was glad that the blanket shielded some of the foolishness. Mostly though, I wanted to sleep before Lucien left and pretend that, like that first time he’d been in my room, he’d wait here all night.

“Do you want me to stay?” 

“Yes.”

“Do you need me to?”

If I were sober maybe I’d know he was teasing but instead, I lifted the blanket and he shifted beside me. His warmth seemed to fall off him in waves, like he were the kind of person made to meet cold things and I suppose for now that cold thing was me. His hand returned to my hair and he twisted it through his fingers as the very tip of my nose was pressed against his chest. For whatever reason, even with the excuse of alcohol at our fingertips, we didn’t get any closer.

“I missed you,” I said knowing I was only brave enough to in such a context, where the consequences felt too far away, like they belonged to someone else who for the time was not me and might never become me.

“I know,” Lucien said. There was a long quiet and I wasn’t really waiting for him to miss me back. It didn’t even occur to me that he did until something inside my chest opened up and a powerful wave of yearning, of somberness, of joy, and missing pushed through my body with a warmth that had become familiar, that was lying just beside me. I let out a sigh of relief. I slept until morning. 

[saviourkingslut]

hot take but just because faerghus' culture thinks about life and death differently from what we do doesn't mean it's toxic.

faerghus is a knight-and-combat oriented country, where the winters are fierce and the food scarce. we know for a fact that this even reaches the nobility, and i wager the people who live there are no strangers to losing sons and daughters to frost and hunger and the general hostility of the lands.

when faerghans praise someone for dying in battle, they do so because this means they died for a cause. they died for something they believed in, for something worth protecting. faerghans praise valour and strength and the glory of a warrior's death not because they don't grieve, but because it makes death meaningful, and the grief more bearable.

and of course this mentality affects different people in various ways! dimitri watched both glenn and his family be brutally murdered while he was still a child, and this makes it impossible for him to feel pride in the face of it. felix lost his brother at a very young age and his father handled his feelings in such a bad way that it made him bitter and estranged. and that's completely relatable, because that's what we would feel if we lost people. their experiences make us think that, yeah, actually, this is a terrible mentality to have toward death!

but if you ask me that's not at all the case. ingrid lost her fiancé while she was just as young as dimitri and felix (she wasn't there to see it, but neither was felix). but for her, glenn dying to protect royalty makes it easier to deal with his loss and bolsters her own dream to become a knight, to fight for the values and people he fought for. rodrigue lost his son, but the knight's-death mentality enables him to look at his death with pride instead of just the sense of loss - and both these feelings can exist at the same time. ingrid still feels sad when thinking of glenn too! but she chooses to let it be a source of strength for her

3h really tries to push the idea that the faerghan mentality is unrealistic or bad, especially because a lot of dimitri's and felix' support conversations involve talking people out of their conceptions of their loved ones' deaths. but i wish they had explored it more, because even though it might be an alien concept of dealing with death for many of us, it is not inherently wrong. just different.

[hecksee]

3 Times The Cubs Struggled Alone, And 1 Time They Had Each Other

This is ficlet number two for the wonderful @kielemarie, means the fucking world to me, and I love her so much. She is the older sister I always wanted. Thank you Marie for always being there, and Happy Birthday! 

The characters, are, as always, from the amazing @lumosinlove. Go give Haz a follow! 

This ficlet is meant to show how mental shit can impact someone’s life and that is okay. People can still thrive with mental shit, and they can still be amazing people.  

Finn 

For the first time since he met Logan, Finn knew he wasn't going to see Logan anytime in the near future. And god he was worried. Worried about Logan, worried about Logan getting hurt, worried about what will happen when he stops repressing his feelings, just worried about Logan in general. And god, that's when he wasn't even thinking about his current season; rookie on Gryffindor Lions, his dream team. 

Finn was playing with some of the greats, Pascal Dumais, Kasey Winters, Sirius Black, and James Potter; to name a few. But the stress could be too much sometimes; the pressure on his shoulders during every game was never lifted. All Finn could think about was how he was some little kid's idol; how they were rooting for him. 

Normally, that was enough for him to get through the day without worrying about Tremz, but today was different; it was one of the days were he woke up on edge, where he was missing Lo so much that it hurt, where the only thing that was keeping him from calling was what had happened before he'd left. 

Practice had ended up making him miss Logan even more; the sound of pucks slapping on sticks reminded him of doing drills with Lo, doing their handshake before they went out onto the ice, all of their memories together came flooding back. 

And god he was even more worried about Lo than he was before. It all was too much, his chest was crushed underneath the weight of his worry; what if Logan slipped on the ice and fell, what if he got into a fight, what if something happened and Finn wasn’t there to stop it. What if he never spoke to Logan again and they ended on bad terms? Logan meant too much to lose him that way. And what if Logan got drafted, but to another team? He’d lose all contact.

 Finn’s head was filled with static, his thoughts were getting louder and faster, his heart was pounding, and his breaths were coming in short pants. In the back of his mind he vaguely registered Dumo skating over, but his mind was in too much distress to care. 

But then, as suddenly as it started,  everything stopped. His mind seemed as though it had been covered in a fog, his thoughts were still there but they were quiet and muted. Everything seemed fake, as if he was in a dream. The world was softer. He was gripping the side of the arena, with no recollection on how he had gotten there. 

Dumo was gripping his arm, waiting for a response to something. When it became evident that Finn didn’t know what was going on he repeated the question. “Harzy are you okay?” Finn knew he wasn’t going to leave without a response so he waved Dumo off with a mumbled ‘I’m fine’. 

Remus was waiting at the side door, opening it when Finn skated closer. “Come on, that looked nasty, let’s check you out.” Finn nodded and Remus ushered him into the PT room. Things were - for Finn at least, still moving slowly, as if he had just woken up but felt like he didn’t sleep at all. “That looked like a nasty panic attack you just had there. You feel fine now yeah?” Remus’ voice jolted Finn out of the slow reality, everything still looked like a dream, but he was less disoriented. 

“Yeah Loops, I’m just tired. Want to go home and take a nap” Finn sat down on a chair near Remus’ desk, waiting to be examined.

Remus nodded. “That’s understandable, panic attacks take a lot out of someone. How about you head home, eat and drink something, and get some rest. You’ll feel better in the morning.”

After a quick thank you and an even quicker cool down, Finn was driving home. On the drive he debated calling Logan, but decided against it. He didn’t even know if Logan wanted to speak with him. Finn knew talking to Lo would make him feel better, but he didn’t want to be a bother. Plus, they had left on bad terms, he didn’t want to make anything worse.

As soon Finn got home he dropped his keys on the kitchen counter and headed  towards the living room. Since calling Logan was out of the question he’d settle down and read. And there was only one book that would help him out of this disconnected state. 

Finn pulled a glossy new copy of The Song of Achilles from the shelf. His battered, annotated copy must have been forgotten at Harvard, even though he distinctly remembers putting it in a box. A part of him wishes that Lo took it out and kept it, to always have a part of Finn with him even when they were apart; like he did with Logan’s favorite snapback, but he knows that’s just wistful thinking. 

Finn quickly grabs a blanket and settles down on the couch, ready to lose himself to the familiar story of Achilles and Patroclus. 

Logan

Logan woke up to the harsh beeping of his morning alarm. It reminded him of Finn - which, to be fair, wasn’t difficult because Logan’s head was always filled with thoughts of the older boy. But the alarm was always a harsh call to reality. If Fish was there, Logan would be awoken by Finn’s soft shuffling as he tried to get ready for practice.

But Finn wasn’t there. He was off in Gryffindor, hundreds of miles away. Finn was off playing for the Lions, probably not thinking about Logan at all. It wouldn’t be fair to distract him from his dream.

Logan missed him so much. It physically hurt to be away from him. Oh how he wished he could just cover Finn in kisses. How he wanted to hold hands. Logan just wanted Finn to hold him and tell him that he was loved.

But Finn didn’t feel the same way; he couldn’t. Logan didn’t know what he would do if Finn felt the same. They’d have to hide their love, and that surely would end in disaster. They’d be kicked off the team, out of the league.

And hell, why would Finn even feel the same. Finn was a golden boy, perfect grades, tall, good at hockey, recruited by the best team in the league. Why would someone that perfect want him. Him, with average grades, who half the time can’t read the words on a page because the letters spun, who represses his feelings, who won’t let himself be happy. Why would Finn ever want someone as flawed as Logan. And even if Finn did want him Logan wouldn’t let him, he wouldn’t let Finn ruin his career over someone as insignificant as himself.

Logan knew he had practice, but he couldn’t bring himself to get out of bed. He didn’t have the energy to move from the warmth underneath his covers, let alone go to practice. He heard John rap on his door, yelling at him to get up for practice, but he didn’t have the strength to respond. He’ll tell the coach he didn’t feel well.

Logan knew that Finn was one of the few things that caused him happiness in this world, and with him gone, nothing seemed to matter. The days all bled together in a pattern of practice, eat, cry, sleep. Occasionally, when it hurt to even think about Finn, Logan would take a bottle of vodka to his room and drink himself silly before crying himself to sleep. He knew that Finn would hate what he’s doing to himself, but it doesn’t matter. Finn wasn’t there with him.

Tears were starting to fog Logan’s eyes as he reached for Finn’s battered copy of The Song of Achilles. He’d taken it to remember Finn by, knowing full well he may never seen Finn again. He opened it up just to see Finn’s handwriting, to remember the late nights they had shared where Finn would read this story aloud.

Logan’s face was wet with tears now, they were flowing freely down his cheeks. Regardless to that fact, Logan pressed his face into the pages of the book. He knew it wouldn’t smell like Finn anymore - it hadn’t in months, but it was worth looking for anyways. When it inevitably didn’t the sobs came. The heart wrenching, aching sobs that came from the bottom of his chest. The sobs that were making his grief known to the world. The sobs that showed just how much pain he was in. He didn’t know when they stopped, or how long they went on for, but after time they turned into small sniffles; and Logan fell into a restless sleep, still curled around Finn’s book.

Leo

There was nothing to do and that was gnawing at his senses. Normally it’s enough to re-tie his skates, tighten his gear, repeatedly drink his water, and turn his gloves in his hands, but today that didn’t seem like enough. The fact that he had nothing to do was making him want to rip his hair out. There was nothing to do and that was bringing his mood down to zero. Everything was not enough but simultaneously was too much.

The lights of the arena were too bright; the sound of the crowd seemed to be grating at his brain. Leo’s foot was moving without control, flicking up and down at high speed, seemingly unaware of the fact he had what essentially was a knife strapped onto his foot.

Leo’s mind was going into overdrive, his thoughts were going too fast for him to comprehend. He needed to get out, but he couldn’t, he had to be there, even if it pained him. He looked up at the scoreboard, but the glowing red numbers hurt his eyes and made the migraine that was already approaching intensify.

Leo closed his eyes and rubbed them with his palms, attempting to make all the light disappear and make the sound a little more bearable. But the noise was still grating at his senses, making his brain feel as though it was melting. The crowd cheering, the announcers commentating, the skates scraping against the ice, the sound of the puck hitting the sticks, and the chatter of his teammates on the bench was becoming too much for him to handle, if another sound was added to the mix he’d have to leave, consequences be damned. Leo squirted some water into his mouth, things always felt worse when he was dehydrated and the odds were he probably was.

But then Coach was calling him in, something about Kasey’s leg acting up again, and Leo knew he’d just have to put up with his senses being in overdrive for the rest of the game.

Together

Things get better after they get together. The bad days don’t disappear, they just become less frequent. Not by much; but by a little. When Finn got stressed about something Leo and Logan were there with words of encouragement and reassurance. How they’d always stay with him, they were going to be okay. When Logan had days where everything seemed hopeless and he didn’t want to get out of bed or when the letters on the page refused to stay still, Finn and Leo were there by his side; whether whispering sweet nothings, giving soft kisses, or just staying by him, reassuring him of their presence. When Leo’s senses were in overdrive and everything was too much Logan and Finn were there, keeping him company and trying to make everything more bearable. The bad days were still there, but now they had each other to lean on. 

[prof-peach]

I...gotta ask but are you well versed in variants in both alolan and kantoian vulpix evolution line? It's a childhood dream to adopt one, maybe an older one who wouldn't mind some lazy days, but I'd like to see which variant might fit my life style best. Thank you professor! Stay safe in 2020😓

I’ve seen hybrids of the two, hybrids being children of two different species, but only the ice and fire variants, they aren’t a Pokemon I focus on in all honesty. I handle just a few fire types for my garden work, and the odd battle, and ice types are my second worst subject behind electric Pokemon, I am only qualified to perform routine checkups and minor first aid on them.

I do however live with a kantonian vulpix, and can at least speak from a little experience.

First and foremost, I will utter this as my dying words if I must, it’s the most important thing: Their personality needs to get on with yours, that’s the one truth to all of your choices on which to go for.

If you’re tied between the two, go out, interact with both, contact local groups who have some around, go to shelters and adoption agencies, from the sounds of it it’s not a choice you’re making because you want a strategic battle team, so forget their typing, just for now. Both can be catered for in a relatively small home, with the right items and care.

One thing I would consider, what do you enjoy the most, the heat of summer, or the fresh cold of winter? Because that’s what it’s like to live with these Pokemon. They can of course control their temperature to a degree, making their effects on the home a lot less obvious, but if you know you struggle with the heat, perhaps the alolan type is better, or vice versa. At least with the fire type you save on heating in the winter. But I suppose if you hate the summer heat, an ice type might just make it all the more bearable. These Pokemon will affect ambient temperature by a minimum of 5-10 degrees when in control (if they get sick or have gland issues, or other medical conditions, it could be much more, to an unbearable point). Mines the fire type, 20+ years old, and I don’t need to ever turn on the central heating because of her, though due to the age she is actually able to act like a thermostat and raise or lower the heat down to 2-3 degrees off of the actual ambient temperature. I have heard this is all equally true for the alolan vulpix, same principals.

Both are strong, both can be trained with precision should they need to be, the kantonian species has ties to psychic types, despite not being classed as one, but the alolan vulpix is closer to fairy typing, even if they don’t evolve. I suppose as a ninetails they get the dual type, but still, it’s information you need to have and collect. Psychic types are more susceptible to nervous dispositions. They can to a degree hear and see things other species cannot, they have a type of overlap interference of other people’s thoughts, pokemons feelings, sounds can seem too loud to them, feelings can be too intense, and generally they can have a tendency to become overstimulated faster than their alolan counterpart. This can be controlled, and doesn’t affect them all the same, some deal we’ll with it, others do not. As for the alolan ones, their fairy typing means they will feel things harder, if they’re sad it’ll be SUPER sad, if they’re happy, everyone in the area will feel that energy. They have a lot of sensitivity to people’s auras or energies, something I know little to nothing about, just don’t deal with them much in day to day work, but they will join in with the rooms atmosphere. If you’re quite a downhearted person, it can bleed into them a bit, and they may become sad too. This is not alwasy the case, some are strong willed and will instead help any low energy people with their upbeat nature.

That you would consider adopting an older Pokemon is a kind choice, a lot of vulpix turn up in bad shape and need a good forever home. They can carry a bit of stigma, people think they’re closely linked to the spirits and can become afraid or nervous around them. At night both can give of an eerie low light, usually caused by them having too much stored energy. Should this come about, just go out and do some more exercise together, battle, run, dance, whatever, they just gotta get that power out, or they can become quite snappy and agitated. If left it can lead to further behavioural issues, so best to just give them the exercise they need from the get go. It’ll be a personlity thing, some love to be spoilt, adored, brushed, cared for, others...not so much. Mine is particularly fussy, not wanting to be held, only doing things she wants, generally a very sassy lady, and I’ve known others like her before, both alolan and kantonian. With eggs you never know what you’ll get, so I’d advise against hatching one. They can come out any which way, and you sound like you need a specific personality around you.

Get to know the Pokemon for who it is, not what it is, the typing doesn’t sound like it matters to you all that much. Patience is key, young or old, whatever is chosen, take your time to find the right fit. If anything you’ll find they’ll come to you if they deem you a good match. They got that freaky 6th sense that just knows.

I went off a bit, but hope this helps you make some rough choice for now.

[thevoilinauttheory]

Winter Sound

[ FFxivWrite2021 Prompt 24: Illustrious ]

[ Content Warnings: None! ]

[  [ Maximiloix learning magic, something something title lol - Earth - Water - Fire - Lightning - Wind - Ice ]

==

They had camped out in the snow, huddled together in their small tent for warmth; all in the comfortable glow of each others’ company. Neither of them were early risers, and so they stayed curled up until the day had reached its warmest part. Or, as warm as winter could get. Then it was shaking out the shivering cold as they packed up their belongings to continue on their journey. Caromont had led them back through a passage to the Western Highlands, to avoid getting comfortable with the city before finishing Maximiloix’s training - though trudging through the deep snow to the northernmost part of the highlands proved difficult, even hazardous. Maximiloix was fairly used to it, and he gave what lessons of his own he could give to survive the harsh climate; this was typical of the winters of Coerthas, and nothing he hadn’t faced with less before. Of course, it was the trek into the Slate Mountains that gave them the most hardships - having barely been prepared for a journey up the steep slopes and rocky climbs (Caromont faced incessant nagging for that one).

It took them another two days to make it to their next destination, but once they were there, it was a sight to see. The skies were clear and free of clouds, offering a pristine view of the snow-draped fields of Coerthas; the sun glittering off of the ice in a rainbow of colors. All they had to do was turn their heads upwards to see the islands of the Sea of Clouds and the wondrous beauty of unknown flora growing upon the emerald grass. “Gods, ain’t this somethin’ else…” “I do not think I could have asked for a better vista than this, it is beautiful up here… if it were not so *swiving* cold, it would be perfect.” Maximiloix snorted - the temperature still bothered him little, though he was beginning to believe it was more than just growing acclimated to it - Caromont rarely cursed, being composed most of the time, though that was how he knew it was *truly* cold out.

“C’mere.” Maximiloix sat himself down on a sturdy rock, then reached his arms out for him; to which Caromont took without hesitation, curled up in a blanket and tucking himself against his husband for more warmth. “Tell me ‘bout th’ice while y’warm up.” “Ice is an Umbral aspected element, making it the closest to the dark element you can get… they tie hand in hand. Though… I have noticed that it ties closely to the light as well, and I believe it is the best balance between the two.” He lifted a finger. “I suppose I should start with… everyone has an innate affinity for certain elements, one more than others. It bolsters the potency of the spells of that element, as well as making it far easier to use with less. You would not think it, but my body has a natural affinity for the wind element - thus, if I *had* to cast a spell without a catalyst, I would attempt keeping my spells to wind-aspected. My body would be able to handle the strain easier and keep me from using too much aether at once, I would drain less for more.” “Mm… what’s that s’posed t’mean fer learnin’?” “Well… you have an affinity for ice.” “Do I?” “Let us start with the fact that you are hardly bothered nor inconvenienced by the cold temperatures - now, most with an affinity for ice would feel it still, but find it bearable. Maybe not *this* much, however. Which brings me to the next point: what you are.”

“...” Maximiloix let a huff out from his nose, pursing his lips and furrowing his brows - he was never a fan of the topic. The fact that it was being brought up so casually made him uncomfortable, to say the least. “A shield from the cold and ice in the form of scales - the fact that you are susceptible to the heat and fire solidifies that you are not Dravanian of origin, as dragon scales are resistant to them.” “Thanks, I guess.” He rolled his eyes. “If ice is a balance between light and dark, it would only make sense that you have an affinity for it. The dark of your scales, and the light of your blessing.” “So instead o’ bein’ heretic, M’full on blasphemous, is what yer sayin’?” Caromont laughed. “I suppose so! That does not mean anything bad, I assure you. Simply that you are different in your own way - it is not what the being is, but how they are; and you are far from a bad person.” “Y’never know!” “Maxie, we have been together for seven years now, and married for one! I think I would know, hm? *Especially* me.” Maximiloix rolled his eyes again, then huffed out a small laugh. “Fine, fine. Guess I gotta believe ya’. So… there’s more t’th’lesson, yeah?”

“Oh! Yes, there is. Ice is used in thaumaturgy to lean the caster’s aether towards an Umbral aspect, allowing them to recover while they are in a passive state - when charged towards an Astral aspect, it can cause just as much destruction as fire can. It shouldn’t be underestimated simply because it is typically used for the recovery of energy.” He pulled himself away from the warmth of his husband’s body, standing up to stretch out, then meandered over to the near completed lance to finish the job with one last crystal. “So. Let us practice.” Maximiloix nodded firmly, doing just the same - he stretched as he stood, then found himself at Caromont’s side to take the lance from him. He smoothed his hand over each one, now imbued with a myriad of colors and emotions, tiny memories stored within his weapon. He smiled at the thought of them. “This time, I *will* let you use your all.” “Heh?” “I wish if I was correct in your affinity, if it truly is as strong as I believe it to be.” “Then I certainly ain’t usin’ it on ya’ this time!” “Oh, hells no. I am not that ignorant nor foolhardy, you will make a target of that rock there, some distance away. Now, stance yourself as if you were to use a fire or lightning spell.” He did as he was told, positioning himself to draw the aether from the crystal itself - then focused from there. What was it that he was supposed to focus on? Destruction was the only thing that came to mind, since his spell was aimed for a target rather than his husband. He focused on that point as if it *were* a person, how the skin would feel, how the ice would cut and burn and blind.

He could feel the chill running through him, it froze his blood in its tracks, choked his breath as it found its way into his lance - as deadly as it should have been, it felt *free*. It felt so free and wild, tamable by only his hands; power was but an understatement. This feeling had nothing on power and force, it was so much *more*. He could feel the cold wind whip his hair about, give frost to the edges of his skin, crawling over the scales that formed on his face. Then there was the pulse, the fabric of his being drawn out by the thread; how the cold made a home in the dark, the air about him thickened with it, stifling the light of the sun. His foot shifted slightly back, bracing himself for the magic that he was about to expel. With a push of his lance, and a hand gripping towards the dark sky above, was that spell released - crushing and shattering the rock in just a blink. Once the ice and darkness had shrunk in on itself, did it implode instead - where there was once the suffocating dark, it was now a brilliant and violent light that blinded them. The force of such a spell - even if it was a distance away - pushed him back, sliding across the slickened pile of snow until he lost his footing completely. He let out a yelp as he found himself tumbling down the rocky slope with his only reflex to cast another spell about him - one that focused on his protection. Ice shattered too easily, and so he was left with the cushion of the perfect mingle between light and dark; it covered him, cradled him, kept him safe until he came to a stop a few yalms down from where he was originally.

“Ughh… ow…” “Maxie!” He could hear Caromont call for him, but his head was still spinning not only from the fall, but the excess of aether he had spent on one spell. He blinked as he tried to look up. “Caro?” “Oh, thank the gods, you are alright; hold on, I will be down in a moment!” Caromont clamored down the mountain side as quickly as he could without slipping up himself, jumping over and across jagged rocks until he reached the bed of snow Maximiloix had flopped down into. The sun was shining again, it reflected oil-stained rainbows off of his scales, and he stared at the sky as if *it* would be his salvation. “Gods! I was glad I had time to prepare, ‘else you would have flung me off the mountain with you! Are you okay?” Caromont knelt down beside him, checking over him for any injuries, and thankful to find none. “Maybe I should be careful of what I ask of you next time, hm?” Laughter bubbled out of Maximiloix’s throat, that same child-like glee as he had when he cast his first spell. “Did ya’ see that! Holy shite! I’d do it ‘gain if I could move!” He continued to laugh, but his body truly would not move no matter how hard he tried. “Love, I don’t think that’s a good idea, regardless of whether or not you could move.” Caromont laughed as well, plopping himself down beside his husband. “That *was* impressive, however. But maybe we should keep the impressiveness to a minimum from now on - I made the mistake of underestimating your all.”

[pollenat]

“Nocturnal silence” | cjs.

➛ ITZY’s Lia. 2012!au.

➛ Word count: 1854.

➛ This short follows the events of “Liquid mirrors”.

The worst part about the overcrowded cabin has to be the snoring woman. The very same one that just a few hours ago complained about the lack of fresh brussels sprouts on a ship - the last ark of humanity after the end of the world. Humankind has gone mostly extinct, and she had the guts to be angry at frozen greens. Looking at her through half-closed lids, you’re itching to throw a pillow at the woman. Nothing can stop her from going on, like an old tractor, choking on its own engine every now and then. The very pillow you’re trying to deafen the noises with, does nothing to your sensitive ears. You’re growing more and more irritated with each passing second.

Others seem to not mind. You look down, at the bunk underneath yours, where a mother with her son are sound asleep. The boy has kicked thin blanket off of his body, as if to prove how much space he can take. His mother is lying on the very edge, somehow calm despite her tragic situation. A man, lying above the snoring woman, has earplugs. Lucky asshole.

Your body thrashes around for an hour or so. At least it feels like it. The duvet is in desperate need of changing, but who cares about laundry during the apocalypse? You’re all sticky from sweat, annoyed by incoming headache and ready to commit a murder, which is just a figure of speech, don’t worry. The fact that nobody else is as affected by the snoring? A perfect way to drive you insane.

At some point you can’t take it anymore - the night feels useless. You miss the rays of sunshine, the sign of life, the reason to stay away from the cabin. Tonight, just like many times before, you jump off of bed, barely avoiding the snoring woman’s husband. He has made himself a sleeping station on the ground. You wonder is he really asleep or just way more patient than you. Either way, you don’t plan on staying around a second longer. As soon as the door closes, you’re welcomed by sweet silence. It’s an odd contrast to the loud snoring. Its lack has you almost creeped out.

The floor is cold under your naked feet. To the point where you can’t touch it for longer than a few seconds. Jumping from one foot to another, you look down the dark hallway. Its only source of light are small windows in the cabins’ doors. Circle-shaped rays fall on walls, like headlights, showing you the way across narrow scene.

Nobody will mind you getting lost in the ship’s hallways, right? You’re just another survivor, struggling to find their place aboard the ark. There are no perspectives. Exploring it seems to be the most compelling thing one could busy themselves with. So you travel down the scene, stepping inside the circles of light and looking inside the cabins as you pass. There’s no other soul up. Everybody is sleeping. It’s sort of weird and you wonder whether it’s just a dream you’re stuck in. How come you’re the only one unable to fall asleep?

Humming some tune you faintly remember makes the night feel more bearable. You’re tired of the crowded spaces, of eyes settling on you, even if they’re just traveling. They’re a tiresome phenomenon that does nothing, but fuel your anxiety. The worst part? Aside from the night, there’s nowhere to escape. All-ocean has made sure of that.

Step by step, you move forward, never putting a foot down for longer than two seconds. You’ve already observed that, but now it reminds you of the past. The tiled floor of your balcony during Winter. Dusting used duvets while cursing at temperature. Welcoming the texture of a carpet with relief. Digging your toes into the fluff. It’s weird to miss carpets in the middle of the night, but you do. Their last reminder is the one snoring woman’s husband uses as his mattress, an object completely out of your reach. What interior designer forgot about additional carpets onboard a luxury ship?

In front of you a door opens. Some silhouettes leave their cabin in hurry. Hushed giggles resonate down the hallway. You can neither make out a sense to their conversation nor put faces to dark shapes. But they do sound familiar. The silhouettes disappear behind a corner in the hallway’s other end.

Heart beating fast, your steps speed up. A thought, string of memories, collection of pictures swims in the back of your head. Common sense is the only thing keeping you from describing them. Number 203 is meaningful, though it’s just a number.

You’re just by the door when it opens again.

“Oh!” Jisoo. Jisoo? Jisoo! “You scared me!” She laughs, eyes morphing into crescent moons. But as soon as her voice raises in volume, Jisoo covers her mouth, worried she will wake up other residents.

“I see there are more night owls around the ship?” You motion at where the two silhouettes, you can now safely identify, disappeared.

The girl looks in the same direction. Her eyes stay there for a longer time, while you watch her profile. Perhaps (you won’t admit it), you should be thanking the snoring woman for a chance to see Jisoo at a different time. Her hair is disheveled, but the little mess is a beautiful one. Eyes glossy, lips dry, t-shirt creased. She’s a painting you enjoy watching. Even when her smile disappears as she returns to facing you.

You grow nervous instantly, because the mood shifts and you slightly prefer the easy-going Jisoo to solemn and serious Jisoo. The easy-going one loves joking, which is much better, as it consists mostly of laughing at yourself and your inability to form proper sentences.

“Uh, yes. I don’t know why Ryujin and Yuna left though. They didn’t tell me. Probably to spy on Yeji.” Pause. “Or something...”

“So, are you going to follow them?” Jisoo seems to consider your question.

Then she steers the conversation to your person.

“I don’t know- Why are you up? Came to spy on Yeji too?”

“As if it has ever bothered me what's Yeji doing at night. I have my own problems, mainly, a snoring roommate.”

Jisoo nods her head in understanding, mouth opened to build on the effect. You’re stuck in nocturnal silence, both scared to break it. Frankly, you don’t even have any idea where to go from here. Maybe you should just return to exploring the ship, but then again, it’s not everyday that you catch Jisoo alone.

“I’ve been walking around, you know, exploring.”

Again, she nods.

“So you’re looking for some place to rest?”

“In a way, yes. Do you happen to know any?” She smiles.

“Actually, I do.”

You’re surprised by her boldness. Jisoo lies down on her bed and you’re watching her with an awkward surprise.

“Don’t make it weird, I’m just sharing a bed with you. Okay, perhaps it does sound weird. But we’re just going to sleep, not- do anything weird? Okay, ignore me. I don’t know what I’m talking about.” To be honest, her joke doesn’t make you feel any better about the situation.

After a defeated sigh, you walk over to the bed, eyes never once meeting hers. Jisoo holds the edge of her duvet. She’s patiently waiting until your stiff posture joins her side. Then she slowly follows your lead.

The first thing you register is the smell - Jisoo’s smell. It’s an overwhelming sensations you’re eager to breathe in after many attempts at small doses. Now that you can experience it in its full form, you can safely say it’s bound to become one of your favorite sensations. It causes you excitement, one that you’re embarrassed to show. Maybe she will call you a creep if you don’t stop yourself from smiling? Suddenly worried, you look for other things to focus on. Like the coldness of her skin against your left hand’s knuckles. Frankly, it’s stuck. The bed is meant for one person and you can’t just sprawl across its surface.

A moment of hesitation passes. Then you turn to lie on your side, facing Jisoo.

At first you’re both stuck in shy silence. Jisoo’s looking down, perhaps thinking over something. But you don’t plan on disturbing her. It’s as if you’ve forgotten your tongue - you can’t even feel it. The darkness is all-consuming and you wish to stay hidden in its embrace, so Jisoo never learns of how hard it is for you to say a word, but also look away.

“So.”

Her eyes, so hesitant to meet yours, finally reach them. She’s surprised to find you staring back.

“How bad is it?”

“Bad?”

“Yeah, how bad is lying next to me on a bed?” Dark eyes pull away to avoid you.

Your brain orders you to be smooth. “It’s not bad.” isn’t the type of smooth you had in mind.

“But not good either? Ah, forget I said anything-” Jisoo laughs nervously through clenched teeth. “I’m just nervous. Because I made you come here with me! That’s why I’m nervous.”

“Jisoo,” The silence returns. “you don’t have to be nervous around me. I know, my magnetic personality and good looks are to die for,” She snickers in disbelief at your words. “but I’d rather you felt comfortable around me. Which doesn’t mean our current bed situation- I mean, I don’t mind it.”

There’s a blunt taste on your tongue. As if you have just finished your entry for a spelling bee and were in dire need of some water. Some actually meaning a lot.

“Do you think your roommates will make fun of us?”

“Definitely.”

“That’s what I thought.”

Silence.

“Um-” She dares a look into your eyes before dropping them again. “Let’s go to bed then, hm?”

You don’t think you’ll be able to fall asleep next to her. At least not with the possibility of seeing her face at the cost of merely opening your eyes. Jisoo seems to have the same idea. Her turning around causes a way too powerful sting somewhere in your abdomen. Before you know it, instead of her soft face structure, you’re looking at void-like black of her hair.

Your left hand sticks to your chest, but what about the right one? Keeping it on your thigh feels tiring. Placing it on Jisoo’s side? Too wonderful and too dangerous. Even if you’re itching to offer yourself, you cannot imagine the amount of courage it would demand from you. Instead, you rest it in the hold of your left hand. That way, perhaps, it will be stopped before any unconscious action takes place.

For a moment, you wonder, would she mind? Still, it’s a question you have no answers for. You also have no idea what will happen in the morning. How will the girls react? What will Jisoo do? How will you feel in the morning and will your left hand let go because of that damn itching...

Perhaps, the snoring woman is weaker than your true enemy - your vivid imagination.

“Goodnight Jisoo.”

“Goodnight.”

➛ pollenat’s list of headcanons

➛ pollenat’s list of shorts

➛ pollenat’s list of scenarios

[nellie-elizabeth]

The Falcon and the Winter Soldier: Truth (1x05)

Well, okay then.

Cons:

I've complained about the uneven time given to Sam and Bucky, and while I appreciate where this episode went with everything, it did shine a further light on how little Sam has had to do all season. How his growth has been happening in the background to other things. I wish the balance could have been changed a little.

I also continue to be less interested in the Flag Smashers than I am in anything else in the show. Not the ideology or how they function politically in this world, but the actual individual characters. Spending time getting to know them makes sense, it humanizes their struggles and what they're willing to sacrifice for their cause. But I just don't find Karli to be a particularly compelling individual, so it makes those scenes a slough to get through.

The opening fight scene between Sam, Bucky, and John Walker was good, but it wasn't great. The whole time I was watching it I kept thinking about the Tony/Steve/Bucky fight at the end of Civil War, three men fighting, the shield pinging between them. So much angst and desperation and history and weight to the whole thing. This fight should have been like that, but instead it felt a little more measured. Sam and Bucky are fighting to take the shield away from a dangerous man who has clearly lost control. It almost felt like they were just doing a job. Their connection to the shield was muted during the fight itself, which made that final beat, when Bucky throws the shield down at Sam's side and walks off, hit a little less hard.

And that's one other thing - I loved the Sam and Bucky talk, of course I did. Bucky needed to apologize and it was great to see. But what changed Bucky's mind? We see Sam's journey, but Bucky starts the episode still in that mindset of blaming Sam, and then he comes and helps with the boat, and then he apologizes. What made him realize that he needed to adjust his perspective? I wish I could have understood that a bit more. The only scene we get of him on his own is with Zemo, and that bit of closure seems wholly disconnected to the stuff with the shield.

Pros:

This is a small thing, but I've gotta bring it up: when Bucky is apologizing to Sam, he says "when Steve told me what he was planning"... and when I tell you I screamed... this is literally so important to me. I hate the end of Endgame for Steve. I truly do. The one thing that makes it bearable is the head-canon that he cleared it with Bucky first, that Bucky knew, before Steve left to go return the stones, what he was going to do. And now we have actual canon confirmation that that was the case! I am so incredibly moved by that, I can't even tell you.

But let's talk about that whole scene, shall we? I feel like I could ramble on about it for quite some time, but I'll just say that seeing them throw the shield around like a damn football was so... funny? But also sweet? There's something here about men and how they communicate and how hard it can be to break down the walls and be vulnerable. They manage it because they frame it around a physical activity, with the shared symbol of complicated national loyalties bouncing around between them. Also, the shared symbol of their dead friend Steve. It opens up something between them, allowing Sam to give his "tough love" advice. Allowing Bucky to give a heartfelt apology. It's the stuff they never would have said to each other in that therapy session, but they can say it now, and that's beautiful. The best moment for me, and it was really subtle, was Bucky handing the shield to Sam, saying sorry. Then Sam continues to throw it against the trees and let it bounce back, and he does it specifically so Bucky can catch it again. So there's this almost ceremonial hand-off, and then Sam, magnanimous, lets Bucky know it's still a part of him too.

And Bucky talking about the shield as his family? Yes please. I love it so much. This scene really wrapped up Bucky's arc for me on this show, in a way I hadn't known to expect. Sam tells him that Steve is gone, and that it doesn't matter what Steve thought, or what he meant. Bucky needs to stop defining himself solely by other people. This doesn't mean the struggle is over. Bucky's got a long road ahead. But he understands that road now, and Sam helped him to find his way, which I think is just the loveliest thing.

Another thing about the way these men communicate, is that the apology was necessary, and it was good that it happened, but even before that apology, Bucky showed up and helped with the boat. He fished for an invite to stay, and Sam gave it without question. They joke about being "partners", no, "co-workers," "just two guys who had a mutual friend," but the fact is, they're a part of each other's lives, and they come through for each other. Even with lingering resentments.

I'll talk briefly about Zemo here before we get into the Sam stuff in this episode... I kind of love that he went gently with the Wakandans. It was so different from what I expected, and yet it also followed logically from everything we knew about him from Civil War. It felt like a natural button to his arc on this show. And him telling Bucky that there's no resentment on his end... I mean, on the one hand, I sure as fuck would hope not, given what Zemo tried to do to Bucky. But also that's the point, isn't it? Sam says as much during the tough love speech. Bucky needs to make amends by being of service, by giving closure to the people he hurt as the Winter Solider. Even if they were bad people. Even if they don't "deserve" it.

I still worry about the optics of Sam taking on the shield instead of retiring it permanently. But I was impressed by how far the show was willing to go in explaining the weight of that choice. Isaiah doesn't say some party line like "I love America but these were some bad people." He doesn't say "things were bad then but they're better now." No. He says the truth, which is that America did this to him. It wasn't one bad actor sneaking through an otherwise benevolent system. It was a corrosive, systemic issue that ruined his life, separated him from his loved ones, forced him to hide away and live as a dead man. And he's telling Sam that it's still like that. Oh, sure, things have changed. But not as much as they need to, and not in the ways that really count for a lot, a lot of people.

I respect that the show laid this out, didn't pull its punches in stating this reality. Sam is being positioned as perhaps naïve, overly optimistic, in still wanting to take that pain and make something good from it. Overly optimistic? Willing to jump into situations that are too big for any one man to manage, no matter what? Well, if there's a list of qualifiers for Captain America, I'd say Sam fits the bill just as much, if not more, than Steve did.

And we see that Sam has a community, a history, a deep connection to his sister and his nephews and all the people his parents knew back in the day. I'm a sucker for a good moment like the one we got with the boat, everyone turning up to help. And then Sarah saying that they can't sell it after all... it's just so moving. Sam's fighting the big fights and the small ones, and that makes him worthy of being an exemplar of human excellence. If he wants to fight that fight while holding the shield, I would trust him to try and turn the symbol into something worthy.

Briefly, I want to talk about Lemar. That scene where John went to his parents was really interesting, because it showed that opinions on these very serious issues are by no means shared universally. You've got Isaiah saying that no black man with any self respect would ever take up the shield. Then you've got Lemar's parents saying how proud their son was to be Captain America's partner. It's a lot more complicated than people want to make it. Things would be simpler if we all agreed that America sucks and its history and legacy is negative and racist and therefore let's burn the whole thing to the ground. But there are a lot of people, a lot of black Americans, who like being Americans, who are proud to serve their country. It's not an attitude I know how to understand, but pretending it doesn't exist isn't doing anyone any favors. I like that we saw this aspect of it, too.

A couple last tidbits, moments I really enjoyed.

- Bucky flirting with Sarah.

- Sam's nephews playing with the shield, Bucky waking up and smiling at the sight.

- The super relevant, super hard to hear scene at the end of all the government officials getting ready to round up refugees and march them back across borders... like, damn.

- Bucky forgetting he has a metal arm, but then later using it to save Sam some trouble on the boat.

This was a great episode. Do I have qualms about the arc of the series as a whole? Yes I do. I'll be very curious to see where everything lands in next week's finale. But in all, this one was a winner in my books.

9/10

[missorgana]

how fast the night changes

pairing: alex/willie, background julie/luke

fandom: julie and the phantoms

rating: general

word count: 2244

warning: swearing, referenced homophobia (very brief)

summary: "I think it's brilliant." Reggie tells him. "Brilliant?" Alex deadpans, "You think asking Domino's to send your cutest delivery guy is brilliant?" (an ‘everyone is alive’ AU, seen on this post)

(i am once again late to an event, but here’s my fic for @jatp-week! i really kinda mixed the prompts of day 2 and 3, but nevertheless, i found a cute and hilarious au and had to write it 💖 hope yall enjoy!!)

read on ao3

“I can’t write that, Luke!”

“Yes, you can, dude! Trust me.”

Alex hates his friends. So much.

Okay, no, they’re wonderful and crazy and planned him a birthday party, so maybe he can’t really hate them.

But they’re real close to the limit right now.

Because after much not so civil discussion of pizza toppings, they’re about to order, and suddenly Luke makes a turn back to the topic of Alex’s love life.

Sounds weird, he knows.

But Luke and Reggie, who he’s almost known since birth (well, in spirit, at least), have a minor obsession with setting him up with someone.

He’s always been admittedly socially awkward, so Alex knows the boys are doing it out of love, and they wouldn’t ever make him uncomfortable.

Well, intentionally, anyway. Their insistent wingmen roles suit them, while being perpetually annoying.

And Flynn loves to join in a bit too much for Alex’s liking.

Julie’s more indifferent to this topic of discussion, because she’s an angel. Credit for settling ninety percent of their squabbles goes directly to her, but since her and Luke finally started dating, they’ve been dragging her to their side.

Goddammit.

Alex is currently staring at his best friend in disbelief, and while their advice makes sense most of the time, this is just outrageous.

“I think it’s brilliant,” Reggie tells him from the bean bag, in possession of the tv remote, which he’s been zapping through movies with for an insane amount of time, “and can we order, already? I’m starving.”

Julie’s been an angel, once more, by hosting the surprise party for Alex. And he totally didn’t cry when they revealed themselves. Nope.

The boys hugged him, to the point of them all cuddling on the floor before the girls claimed their own Alex-time, and really, emotions everywhere.

This is also less than a month since Alex came out to them, and to be honest, it was the scariest thing he’s ever done.

That’s why he loves them so much. They’re the first people he’s ever told, not even his parents, and he’s not sure when he’ll do that.

Religion’s always been strict at home, and he’s pretty sure having an openly gay son might give his dad a heart attack.

Alex can’t bear the thought of rejection from his own family. He’s got a family here, though. And this is safety.

“Brilliant?” he deadpans, Reggie clearly not understanding the absolute embarrassment this could only result in, “You think asking Domino’s to send your cutest delivery guy is brilliant?”

His friend only replies with a wild gesture of arms.

“Can’t believe I’m saying this, but I agree.” Flynn speaks up, and Julie shook her head with a smile.

“I wouldn’t call it brilliant,” she adds, just about saving Alex’s heart, until, “but I kinda wanna see who they send.”

“Julie!”

“What?!”

“Forget it, drummer boy! She’s on our side!”

The boys laugh, and my God, they’re the worst. He can’t be mad at these idiots, which is why he simply rubs his temples. No additional notes, then.

“Okay, so, if we forget that and everyone’s happy with that many toppings, then-” and really, Alex is mere seconds from the pay button, till his phone is grabbed from his hands too quickly for him to react.

Luke is the absolute worst.

“Hey! Give it back!” he really tries, really, jumping towards his best friend, who laughs, with Flynn eagerly holding him back, “Don’t you dare, Luke!”

“Dare what?” he replies innocently, and suddenly, his phone is back, and a white screen tells him Thanks for your order.

So not only did his stupid romantic of a friend write exactly the note he protested against, but as if it weren’t enough, he added a winky smiley, too.

Alex is done with wingmen, done with love. Nope, never doing that. Ever.

Except it’s done now, and they all got a smug expression on their faces, except Julie, of course, with her apologetic eyes, and man, he just wants to hide forever.

He’s giving Luke his best stink eye, which he has too much puppy eyes to do, Flynn told him, and his friend rubs his shoulders assuringly, “Alex, what’s the worst that could happen? Either you get the cute guy’s number, or if he’s not cool, you’ll play it off as a prank, or something.”

Alex just shakes his head.

And Reggie’s stopped zapping, landing on The Empire Strikes Back, like he hasn’t seen it about 300 times before.

“I hate you.” he tells them simply.

Reggie grins like an asshole from the beanbag, “You could never.”

It’s especially annoying because he’s sort of right. And really, it’s not like Alex can turn back time now, so even though he’ll definitely get them back for this, somehow, there’s not much else to do than wait.

Fifteen minutes pass by where Luke and Julie hog the couch to themselves, Yoda’s hitting R2D2 with a stick, and Flynn obsesses over just how many different snacks they need.

Reggie decides to abandon the bean bag, too, and rest his head on Alex’s shoulder instead, so maybe it makes it all okay.

And so when twenty minutes have gone by along with throwing popcorn at the television, and Alex intensely quizzing Julie on what kind of birthday cake they got him, the doorbell rings, and the living room bursts into a tantrum.

His friends jump all around him, because of course, they want him to answer the door, which he’s refusing, but they seem too excited to listen when this ridiculous plan of theirs is reaching its peak.

Luke’s holding his shoulders again, “Answer it!”

“I mean, this is technically Julie’s house-” Reggie manages, surprisingly, but Flynn looks at him with disapproval, “Don’t switch sides now, man!”

But Alex is already at the door, suddenly, somehow, in the midst of the discussion.

He doesn’t really see the point in protesting now, anyway, and Julie pinches Luke’s side, redeeming her in his heart. Also, he can’t help touching his hair, cause that’s what happens when he’s nervous.

“I promise, Alex, you’ll be fine!” she looks excited too, but like, secretly.

They all nod in unison, too, dorks.

And so he mentally prepares himself for possibly the most awkward experience in his life. Dramatic, he knows, but seriously, will this exchange be anything other than painful? He doubts it.

Is it too much to hope for, that the delivery guy doesn’t see the notes? Maybe it’s just the boss who handles the orders, yeah, that’s not impossible. Right?

But as much as Alex is prepared for the embarrassing conversation ahead, he’s certainly, in no way prepared, as it turns out, for seeing who’s standing on the other side of the door.

The delivery guy. Well, obviously, stupid brain, but listen.

Alex is met with the cutest guy he’s ever seen. And he’s met a lot of cute guys, albeit they’re all in the same small town, but come on.

In short, let’s say Domino’s delivered more than they asked for.

And uh, yes, Alex realises the irony. Reggie would love that joke, he thinks to himself, hysterically, actually.

So, said delivery guy standing in front of him is a bit shorter, and, of course, he’s wearing uniform, cap and winter jacket, in this god forbidden weather, but he notices the strands of dark hair framing his face immediately.

And the red, dangling earring on his right ear. And his cheekbones, oh my god.

There’s no way he’ll tell his friends any of that once this is over.

Said friends are snickering in the background, by the way, or well, Reggie is, anyway. He prays they’ve moved slightly behind the door, or turned back to the couch, or anywhere out of sight.

“Hey, man!” the shorter boy says, while Alex is suffering an internal breakdown, “It’s, uh, 10 pizzas for ya, right?”

And so he nods tight lipped as an answer, because honestly, he’s not sure he’s capable of forming words right now. As if he wasn’t already embarrassed enough. Super mega cute delivery guy lifts an eyebrow, just enough that it’s noticeable, but he doesn’t voice whatever thoughts passed his mind.

Bless him.

That is, until Alex gets all the cash out (with a tip, hopefully making his shift a bit more bearable, when he has to deal with something like this), and he suddenly asks, “So, am I alright?”

Alex thinks his brain might have an immediate shut down. “What?” he sputters, and his voice totally doesn't squeak, shut up.

Cute delivery guy giggles. That’s just not fair, is it?

“Am I cute enough, I mean.”

That- oh my god. First of all, said boy doesn’t look tired, or annoying, or weirded out, judging by his expression.

Second of all, he looks to the ground for a second, but really, his posture is all confidence. Except he bites his lip, which gives Alex a headache.

“I, uh…” he starts, like he actually knows to finish the sentence, “Sorry, uhm. My friends. They’re ridiculous.”

“Oh.”

Alex expects more, but he doesn’t continue.

Is his mind playing games with him, or does cute delivery guy actually look… disappointed?

No, that can’t be right. He can’t be flattered by a customer note, which, by the way, did the boss decide who to send? Did the Domino’s delivery, or whatever, have a collective vote?

Alex truly doesn’t understand the chaos his friends get him into, sometimes.

He has to admit, it’s not half bad, given that he’s getting food and looking at a cute guy. And actually talking to him. That’s a first.

So, not having much time to weigh his options, he gives the shorter boy the money and tries his hand with damage control, “I mean, uhm, it’s my birthday. Sorry, my friends are obsessed with setting me up with someone, so here we are. I-I’m so sorry, I… and they! Didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”

Super mega cute delivery guy nods along with Alex’s anxious spiel.

And then he smiles, but somehow it looks less like a customer service smile, and more like… a real one? Warmer. He doesn’t really know.

Alex is an absolute wreck, so he’s scared to get his hopes up. Cute guy still thinks he’s a weirdo, probably. More so now.

“Seriously, don’t worry man.” he answers, in what Alex feels is an eternity later, “And happy birthday! Damn, you should’ve put that in the order. We got specials.”

And fuck, he’s so cute. Almost looks genuinely excited, and so he can’t help but giggle. Nervously. It’s the Alex way, as Flynn says.

“Thanks.” he tells him, and he hopes to God he isn’t blushing right now.

The guys will never let him forget this day, he’s sure.

Transaction’s pretty much straightforward then, and his dork friends actually show themselves and help get the pizzas (and three soda sixpacks, seriously, Luke?) into the living room.

Reggie elbows him with a smirk, too, the idiot.

Thing is, that’s out of the way too, and there’s pretty much zero reason for super mega cute delivery guy to be here anymore. His scooter certainly doesn’t look empty of goods just yet.

Yet, he lingers. 

Only for a few seconds, before he catches Alex completely off guard with another question, “So, you don’t want a cute delivery guy?”

There’s no way in hell he isn’t blushing right now, holy shit.

It just makes Alex feel even more like a puddle of goo, because the shorter boy bites his lip again.

And because his mouth is even more stupid than his nerves, “I, uh, I-I mean… Yes. Well, I got one.” blurts out before he can stop it.

This leads to super mega cute delivery guy raising his brows, putting his hands in his pockets, and putting a stupid grin on his face.

Alex is so lost so quick, oh my god.

“You think I’m cute?” he asks, almost sounding surprised, which is possibly the most ridiculous thing tonight, because look at him!

He can’t help looking at his feet, because surely, he must be blushing beyond belief. And the shorter boy tilts his head just a bit, not losing eye contact completely.

Seriously, can he stop being this cute? Alex might just combust soon.

“I mean… obviously.” he tries, shrugging and fixing his hair, “I, well, Domino’s certainly delivered. Oh my god, uh, that��s just terrible. I’m so sorry.”

When Alex finally straightens up again, super mega cute delivery guy smiles at him, exposing his dimples, and that just makes him feel even more things. If that was even possible right now.

“You’re adorable.”

Okay, now, what is actually going on.

He blinks rapidly, like this is a figment of his imagination that’ll disappear in front of him, except the shorter boy grabs the receipt and scribbles something.

And he sticks his tongue out a little bit when writing, like there wasn’t enough cute things about him already, fucking hell.

Next thing Alex knows, he’s handed the slip of paper again, with something at the top that looks quite a lot like a phone number.

Cutest delivery guy, he had signed it off.

Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god.

“Name’s Willie, by the way,” super mega cute delivery tells him, ultimately turning back to the long awaiting red scooter, butnot without a wink that totally didn’t make Alex’s knees wobble.

“See ya, birthday boy!”

[akainekoaika]

Today was a beautiful day, just as it always was around these parts. The sun shone down onto the Earth in tranquil rays, heating things up to a comfortable 75°F. In most every way, it was an ideal summer day in (C/N). The grass was green, the birds were out chirping, and yet you walked to school wearing a heavy coat. To everyone you passed by on your walk, you looked rather ridiculous, but everyone in your classes understood completely. Every single one of your classrooms had been absolutely frigid as of late, and no one could explain why.

You'd talked to each of your teachers about the severe cold, with their classes usually being about 40 to 50°F, but none knew of rhyme nor reason for it. The only lead you had to go off of was the transfer in of a girl from some unknown school overseas. The temperature drops had lined up with the girl's arrival at your school after all. What was more, each of your teachers had told you that the temperature was only different during the class periods in which you in the classroom - at all other times, those classrooms wouldn't be so frigid. But it wasn't just you in there at those periods; this mysterious girl from overseas had somehow ended up with a schedule that was identical to yours, meaning that you were always in the same classes at the same time. But surely such an odd phenomena couldn't be caused by a person, could it?

Those were the words that ran through your mind as you stepped into your first period English class to see that the girl's assigned seat was empty. The classroom was a normal, bearable temperature so you took off your coat as you took your seat. You couldn't help but feel relieved that you weren't going to have to bundle up like it was winter for once, leaning back in your seat with an enthused sigh. Such good fortune would never have lasted however, and mere seconds later the purple-haired girl trudged into the room and instantly the room was plummeted into the cold that you'd become used to at this point. As you tugged your coat back on less than a minute after you'd initially removed it, you couldn't help but ogle at the girl as she took her seat directly behind you. She wore the same outfit everyday - a white sweatshirt with blue sleeves and a tank top underneath, coupled with a light brown checkered skirt, with long dark and light purple striped stockings along with ordinary white shoes and a yellow pendant hanging from a necklace around her neck. Like she always was, she was sucking on a lollipop as she took her seat. This was Mizore Shirayuki, the new kid who had seemed to usher in the cold.

Slowly, the classroom filled up as the other students began filing in and taking their seats, each of them wearing heavy coats much like your own. Class started out as it always did, your teacher taking roll of the students. You mumbled a bored "here" when your name was reached, and began to zone out.

However, you were almost immediately brought back to your senses as you heard your teacher repeatedly call out Mizore's name. You turned to look at her since apparently she wasn't answering the roll call, and found yourself staring directly into her eyes. She was completely motionless and unblinking, laser focused on just one thing: you. A shiver that had nothing to do with the cold ran up your back as you quickly wheeled around to face forward again. Eventually you heard the girl mumble the word "here" in much the same way as you'd said it, same inflexions and everything. It was as if she were trying to say it precisely as you had.

That thought was a little too creepy for you as you began to space out once more, but throughout the entire period you could feel the icy stare from behind you.

The next period, biology class, went much the same way as English had gone. The staring, the strange attempt at copying the exact way in which you'd said here, the whole shebang. In a strange sort of way, you found it to be sort of fascinating; you'd really never had any contact with Mizore - you couldn't even truly say that you knew what her voice sounded like.

As per usual, biology was a slog to get through. As you walked to your third period class, geography, an idea popped into your mind. Why not test out just how much Mizore was copying you? You were so caught up in your own mind that you never noticed the girl who you were thinking about stalking mere feet behind you.

You took your seat in geography class and Mizore took a seat directly behind you, just like always. Roll call began soon, and your idea came into play. The teacher called out your name and you quickly jumped up onto your feet.

"(Y/N) reporting for duty, sir!" You shouted out, raising an arm into a salute before quickly falling back into your seat. Everyone else in the class gave you strange looks - everyone except for Mizore. She continued to give her unblinking stare. You bit your bottom lip in embarrassment, knowing that you had just made yourself look rather foolish in the name of trying to learn more about the foreign girl behind you. Soon after all the buzz had settled down, Mizore's name was called. Sure enough, the girl slowly stood and saluted.

"Mizore reporting for duty, sir." She said, though far less enthused than you had been when you'd said it - this girl was fixated on you for whatever reason. About halfway through the lesson you excused yourself to the restroom, feeling Mizore's eyes on you all the way to the door.

In the restroom you went up to the sink, leaning upon them and looking at yourself in the mirror. Your mind was racing at a million miles a second.

Why was she copying you? Had she always been doing this and you'd just never noticed? What was it about you in particular that she wanted to copy?

You took a deep breath and turned on the sink, splashing your face with cold water as you gently sighed.

That's when the screaming started.

Your head whipped to the side as you became conscious of another temperature drop, this one much more severe than all the others: it couldn't have possibly still been above freezing. The door to the bathroom flung open and in walked Mizore Shirayuki. But she looked different: her hair had turned into large shards of ice, and so had her fingers.

"Mizore," you managed to choke out. "Mizore, what the fuck is going on?"

Mizore's cheeks reddened as you said her name, causing her to look briefly away from you before returning her gaze, staring directly into your eyes.

"You don't have to worry anymore." She said calmly, deaf to the continued screaming coming from up and down the hallways. "Because from this day forth, I swear that I'll protect you."

You took a step backwards away from her as the bathroom door swung shut again, leaving just the two of alone. You shuddered as the temperature continued to plummet and Mizore continued to approach you. Within seconds, her face was hovering naught but inches away from yours.

"Please, tell me what's going on right now." You said weakly, struggling to keep your voice from cracking under the stress. Mizore smiled at you and reached out, taking her hand in yours and pulling you out into the hallway. What you saw could only be described as nightmarish.

The hallways of your high school had turned into an icy hell, completely frozen over. That wouldn't be too horrific, but what actually made you want to vomit was all of the bodies that were impaled on long icicle spikes, staining the ice beneath each body red with blood. No one was moving as far as you could tell, as they each body was almost completely frozen. You could count at least nine in your view, but you had no doubt that if not the whole school, the classroom that you had just left would be the scene of a massacre as well.

"What do you think?" Mizore asked in a tone that was sickeningly sweet given the situation.

"I... I..." You tried to speak, but before any real words could come out, you vomited. You couldn't hold it back any longer, throwing up all over the ice beneath your feet. While you were busy puking your brains out, you felt something cold wrap its way around your neck. On one hand, you wanted to know what it was, but on the other hand you just didn't care. There was so much more than that on your mind at that point in time.

"Do you know why I did this for you?" Mizore said in a cold voice, still squeezing your hand. You remained silent, retching to try and fully vacate the contents of your stomach onto the floor. She took your lack of a response as you wanting her to spell it out for you. "You see, you and I are the same. Neither of us have any friends, we're both outsiders. We both know what's it's like to be different from everyone else. But it doesn't matter anymore, now does it?"

"What..." You sputtered out. "What are you?"

You watched a very menacing grin form across Mizore's face.

"I'm your guardian angel."

(´・ω・`)?

How much time had passed?

You honestly couldn't tell. Your entire life, uprooted and shattered in just a single afternoon. Who could see something of this magnitude coming? You reminisced on the thought you'd had pertaining to the fact that no human could've possibly been affecting the temperature in the way that Mizore had been. Well, as it turned out, you were right. No human could be capable of such a thing. In this case you weren't dealing with a human at all.

You'd passed out in the school shortly after Mizore had proclaimed herself your guardian angel, awakening sometime thereafter on a soft mattress in an unlit room. It took some time for your eyes to adjust, but once they did, all that you could make out was the mattress on which you'd just woke up, a few pillows strewn about the place, and a shut door up a flight of stairs across from you. From what you could tell, you were in some kind of unfinished basement. Every fibre of your body screamed at you to get up, bust down that door if it was locked, and then run away without ever looking back. But of course it would never be just as simple as that. You hadn't even realised how much the pace of your breathing had quickened as you looked down at yourself, finding that you had been stripped down to nothing but your underwear.

Before you had the chance to truly question the strange scenario in which you had found yourself, the air around you suddenly dropped in temperature, causing you to hug yourself tight to try and stay warm. Of course, you knew that this sudden chill could only mean one thing, as up the stairs you heard a lock click and watched as the door to the basement creaked open.

It was Mizore. The girl was wearing the same outfit that she'd been wearing at school, as if not all that much time had passed since you'd lost consciousness. Mizore flicked a light switch as she stepped through the doorway, illuminating the basement fully. Looking around again, you realised that in the darkness of the windowless room, you'd already put together everything that there was to see down there. Mizore shut the door behind her before she walked down the stairs, you know seeing that she carries a space heater with her, something that you're rather overjoyed to see.

As Mizore walked up to you, you reached out to grab the space heater so you could try and stay warm, but Mizore held it out of reach.

"Good morning," she said pleasantly. "You've been out for quite some time."

"M-Mizore," you replied, teeth chattering. "P-please, give me that."

In response, she gave you a warm smile. Unfortunately, that warm smile provided you nothing but shivers.

"I can't let you have this yet." Mizore, pushing you back down onto the mattress as you tried to get up to your feet. "I just need you to be quiet and listen to me for now."

"I-I'm going to get frostbite!" You loudly protested, once more hugging yourself and just looking up at this psychopath. Her smile turned to a nasty grimace in an instant, as if an internal mood switch had been hit.

"I'm sorry, did you not hear what I just said?" Mizore asked bluntly. "I told you to be quiet, did I not?"

You quickly nodded and averted your eyes downwards, not wanting to anger this girl who had already showed that she was capable of and willing to commit great violence. A few tense seconds passed before Mizore exhaled deeply and began to orate.

"Listen, (Y/N). You probably don't understand what exactly is happening right now, so allow me to explain it to you. You are now my property, and you will be until we're both pushing up daisies."

You started to say something but you quickly cut yourself off.

"I know that right now, you don't love me." She said, reaching down and gently caressing your cheek. "But you will in time. It's not like I'm going to give you much of a choice on the matter."

You slowly nodded in fearful understanding, not pulling away from her hand.

"You're going to be down here for a long time, my love." She said, causing you to flinch in response to the bluntness and the gravity of her words. "Perhaps I'll let you go upstairs in a few months," she mused. "But only if you behave yourself."

You could do nothing but look down in response, feeling tears form and run down your face, pooling and eventually freezing on the ground beneath you. Finally, Mizore gave you the space heater, though she had a begrudging look upon her face.

"You should try to get used to the cold." She chidded before wheeling about and walking back up the stairs, shutting the door behind her. Soon after, you heard the click of a lock.

As you turned on the heater, you had just one bitterly simple thought.

Who knew that Hell would be so cold?

[collecting-stories]

Enchanted - Crutchie Morris

A/N: canon-era newsies fic. Based on AKB’s Crutchie cause he’s too cute. 

///

There was no denying that Crutchie, with his strawberry-blond hair and effervescent smile, was a sight to behold. The last bit of light illuminating a room through a window and warming anyone who stood in its path. Perhaps a little blinding at first glance but nevertheless beautiful and welcomed amidst the gloom of everyday life in New York. A vast and overpowering city, it was want to make you miss the farm you’d worked on before this but Crutchie made it a little more bearable, even if you only saw him briefly as you grabbed the paper and groceries for your employers.  

“I really am starting to get used to the market,” you mentioned, bright and early as you skimmed the front page of the paper you were sure to purchase.  

“I can’t believe theys don’t have ‘em up north.” Crutchie replied, sparing a smile for a lady that was passing. She slowed and he waved a paper in her direction, seeming to reel her in with it the way one might reel in a fish.  

“I’m sure they do but there’s no need for them where I lived, didn’t make a lick of sense to be selling eggs to people who can already buy eggs. Not even milk delivery came ‘round.” You confided as you finally pulled a nickel from your coin purse.  

“That’s too much,” Crutchie insisted, as he always did.  

In truth it did cut into your income to pay him a full nickel or dime instead of the penny it cost for the paper but you weren’t bother led by it. The family you were in service to now boarded you in their home and you had no one to send your income to so it was solely yours.  

“It’s a tip,” you insisted right back, “your smile is like the sun on a winter day Crutchie.”  

Crutchie flushed a red so deep it looked threatened to match the beets in your basket. It dusted his ears and his freckles disappeared completely.  

“Yous got a way wit words.”  

“I’ll see you tomorrow Crutchie.” You promised,  tucking the paper under your arm and heading in the direction of your house.  

You looked nice enough, plain of dress but he didn’t think anything of it. You had never said you were in service to the household where you lived only that you lived on Poplar street and Crutchie knew it to be richer folk. Not the Katherine Pulitzers of the world, surely, but richer than Davey’s family by leaps and bounds. All you had told him was that you had moved here from up north. You regaled him with tales of the white winters and the beautiful summers in the farming community. The woods and the vast amounts of green pastures everywhere. It sounded like a fairytale, a place too good to be true, like Jack’s Santa Fe. Why should anyone trade such an ideal for the overcrowded streets of New York? He was want to ask but it knew it wasn’t his place. He didn’t know you like that.  

Crutchie has met you the first time you’d gone to the market, walking home frustrated and completely lost, you’d flagged the newsie and asked directions. He’d been hooked ever since. Jack told him that he gave too much of himself to others and that he ought to be careful.  

“Tread lightly.” Were his exact words.  

But Crutchie couldn’t be bothered listening. He was sitting up late at night scrubbing stains out of his vest that had been there since it was sewn. There was no convincing him to go about things slowly.  

“Extra! Extra! Gold found in New York!” Crutchie shouted, waving his arm as he held the paper up. Down the street he could hear Racetrack shouting about a baby born with two heads. Impossible but Racetrack was just sure enough of himself to convince a person it might be true.  

“Least gold makes sense, all those folks moving to the gold towns out west.” Crutchie had joked earlier that morning as he split a stale bagel with his housemate.  

“Theys ain’t stupid, New York ain’t got nothing but rats and garbage.”

“But theys supposed ta believe a baby wit two heads?”  

“I can’t argue wit the people Crutch. They like crazy stories.” Racetrack replied, stuffing the rest of the bagel in his mouth and swallowing it down with water.  

“Just don’t go spreading ya stories on my corner. I’ll have ta soak ya.” Crutchie teased, pretending to whack his friend with his crutch.  

Race was far enough away that he wasn’t pulling any business from Crutchie but he could still hear the over-sensationalised story being advertised to the folks of New York. Both boys would age of the lodge, and of newsie work, soon and they’d been talking about splitting rent with Finch and Mush somewhere near by. There were more than a couple tenement buildings around and Finch had already gotten a second job running machines at a factory near the Hudson. But before Crutchie threw in the towel on being a newsie he wanted to see where his chances sat with you. If he wasn’t hawking papers every morning you’d have no reason to see him, unless you wanted to.  

That was the thing that Jack was warning caution with. Asking you out, confessing his feelings, it was all nice in theory but you had better prospects than a homeless newsie, especially one depended on a crutch.  

“Crutchie!”  

He sold off another paper and pocketed the penny before spinning himself to see you walking his way, waving as you got closer. You waved the way people waved ships out of the harbour, excited and joyful.  

“Here for the pape?” He asked, already pulling one out.  

“I am, I heard a story about a baby born with two heads but I suspect he was lying.” You announced, “what’s yours say?”  

“I’s got gold in New York,” Crutchie offered, handing over the paper that did indeed speak of gold-fever outside the city.  

“Golds tricky business. If it’s there it’s good but if it’s not...” you trailed off, your usual smile faltering just a bit as you took the paper from him.  

“Ya ever seen any?”  

“No, can’t say I have.” You perused the paper as usual, reading through the front page as Crutchie continued to sell.  

“Before ya head off,” Crutchie began to say, drawing your attention away from the paper. “I’s wondered if I could escort ya home sometime?”

“I would love that,” you couldn’t help the smile that spread on your face. You’d been stopping to chat up Crutchie for a while now because you liked the newsboy. He was cute and charming and funny and while you were sure he flirted with everyone you liked when he smiled at you and flirted with you. “You could uh, walk me back today?” You offered.  

You had been in the city long enough that you knew both the longest and the quickest route to get home. You took Crutchie the long way back, walking slowly as you did. All the rules about flirting you had learned from the kids at your last service. The shy looks, the accidental brush of a hand or a trip over air only to hold his hand, a sweet smile and laugh at everything he said. You disregarded all of those rules though, instead taking Crutchie’s free arm and walking with him along the street.  

“Do ya like the city so far?” Crutchie asked.  

“It’s nice...it’s always busy. I do like that this house has less kids, and less land.” You replied, “walking to get some eggs at market is a lot easier than wrestling with a bunch of chickens every morning. Or milking a cow!”  

“Oh,” Crutchie said, “I thought yous lived on Poplar.” He was surprised to hear you say that you were in service. But more than that he felt a little more hopeful.  

“I do, but I live in the servants’ rooms, off the kitchen.” You explained, “it’s a pretty nice job, all things considered.”

“I’m sure it beats being a newsie.” He replied.  

“For me certainly, I’d be a lousy newsie...no one would ever buy a pape from me.”  

“I would.”

“You’re too sweet to me Crutchie.”

“I mean it, nothing sells a paper faster than a beautiful face.” He replied, blush staining his cheeks.  

“That’s why you sell so many,” you teased, leaning over quickly and kissing his cheek. You pulled away just as fast, watching the smile that took over his face.  

The two of you walked the rest of the way back in silence, stealing quick glances at each other. When you arrived at your employer’s house on Poplar you led him to the side entrance, in the alley. The kitchen door was open and a few of the other workers were inside, pretending not to look at the two of you but glancing over curiously.  

“Thanks for escorting me home Crutchie, I really enjoyed walking with you.”  

“Maybe I could walk you tomorrow too?” He offered, holding your hand.  

“I would really like that.” You said, kissing his cheek once more, “I’ll see you tomorrow then?”

“See you tomorrow.”  

Crutchie took the quick way home, heading straight for Racetrack’s corner to tell his friend that he owed him a dime. Racetrack had bet Crutchie that she would be too upper-class for him but two kisses and the promise to walk together tomorrow told Crutchie otherwise. He had won, more than just the dime he was already planning on using to buy you a bouquet of flowers for tomorrow.  

-

More newsies. 

[fericita-s]

First Born

This is the next installment of “When All is Lost” that @the-spastic-fantastic and I are working on to tell the story of Young Iduna and Young Agnarr.  This story takes place after they are married while they are expecting their first child. All thanks and glory and honor to @the-spastic-fantastic for helping me get this to where I wanted it!

Links to the other stories: When All is Lost

Iduna  wanted to give him a child right away.  She knew it was important to the kingdom, but even more she knew it was important to Agnarr. The monarchs of Arendelle had a tradition of dying young, more often than not as the only child of an only child.  Some in the village whispered that it was a curse placed on the royal line after the trolls were run up into the mountains. Iduna didn’t hold with that, and not just because it would mean she had a short and grim future.  Trolls were tricksters, sometimes able to interpret or see magic that others could not. Occasionally, some of the most powerful ones were able to use small magic if the old tales were to be believed. There were even Northuldra stories of trolls making a man lose a cargo of mushrooms from his sled or enchanting a man into marrying a stranger, but never ones about cursing a kingdom.  Iduna was certain a good midwife would help her more than trolls could harm her.  She had already dealt with trolls and their impossible command to leave her homeland. What more could they do to her?

She could tell Agnarr was worried by the way he smiled in a thin line, no teeth showing, no dimples. He ordered Midwife Jora to take up residence in the castle during the pregnancy before it was even clear to others that she was carrying. Iduna knew his mother had died during childbirth and did what she could to calm his fears.  “I’m strong, love - healthy.  My mother had four children, all easy births.”

Speaking of her mother, thinking of her mother, and missing her mother were daily chores.  She counted on the repetition to help the overwhelming grief of it seem bearable.  She had mourned her mother as lost to her years before, but becoming a mother herself made the loss fresh again. Would the baby have her mother’s blue eyes? Her father’s height? Would she be able to remember the lullabies of her youth? Who would teach her how to nurse and how to swaddle?

Midwife Jora saw her tears and patted her arm. “It’s to be expected, many women cry and fuss over nothing and everything during this time.”

One thing was not as expected. Iduna felt cold the entire pregnancy.  "Most people feel hotter while expecting," Gerda said as she rang the bell for more tea for the queen. Agnarr took over tending the fire in their room, hoping to keep a closer eye on her and to help his wife stop shivering. But the fire didn’t want to behave, leaping in tall bursts and then sputtering down to embers whenever Iduna so much as shifted in its direction.  It left her uneasy, and she wished she could remember more about curses and magic and what her people knew so much about.

At night he rubbed her arms until she fell asleep and slept with her pressed against him. He wore thicker clothes to keep himself warm and worried about what this might mean for her health and that of the babe.  In the seventh month, Midwife Jora felt the queen’s stomach and announced the baby a healthy size and weight. "Carrying can do all sorts to a woman. I've seen feet get larger and stay that way, mothers-to-be who felt itchy the whole time, some who could no longer stand the taste of potatoes. I'm sure you'll be right as rain when the baby comes. You're growing a whole person in there, your majesty."

Iduna wasn't worried about feeling cold; Arendelle on the whole was a much warmer place than the home of her youth. But she worried for the baby, and worried that this unexplainable cold was a portent of magic. Could that be why even in the steaming hot bath, she felt a pull and a push in the water? Or why even the wind felt more like a kindred spirit than it had since she left Northuldra? She wished for her mother and for the knowledge of magic the Nothuldra had. Something about this baby felt magical, and she wanted assurances it was good magic.

When she was so large that Agnarr fastened  her shoes on for her each morning, he gave her a gift that was so precious, she cried.

“It’s a shawl.  For the baby to have as a blanket.  I had the weaver make the same symbol as the one on yours,” he grinned, shyly, as if they were once more young teenagers. “The same as the ones I had put on my coat.”

Iduna wept, holding the shawl to her chest, her tears falling down on it and soaking into the beautifully woven fabric.  “It’s perfect.”

Agnarr smiled, pleased he had not gifted her with something terrible. He wasn’t sure he’d ever be able to remember his gift to her on her sixteenth birthday without embarrassment. A golden mortar and pestle had seemed like such a thoughtful gift at the time. He hadn’t known that gold was so malleable, but Iduna had told him, laughing, pleased that he would give her a gift to celebrate her new position at Old Man Visser’s Apothecary after she left the orphanage.

“I remember you saying Northuldra children receive one at birth,” he murmured as he kissed her cheek. “I know this isn’t the same, I know it’s not as treasured as your own mother or grandmother making it, but we can treasure it together.”

Iduna wrapped herself in the shawl, thinking about how her mother had wrapped her in a new shawl at birth, again longing to talk to her about this new life growing in her, the coldness she felt, the strangeness of the elements around her. It was a lonely feeling.

***

Cradling Elsa, she studied her daughter’s translucent fingers and pale hair, her impossibly small ears and large blue eyes. Iduna stroked her cheek and hummed, starting a lullaby she had not thought of in years. It was an old song that her mother had sung to her in another life. Agnarr put one of his large fingers into Elsa's hand; it opened and closed around him like a morning glory, unfurling and then closing the splendor of its petals.

Where the north wind meets the sea

There's a river full of memory

Sleep, my darling, safe and sound

For in this river all is found

In her waters, deep and true

Lie the answers and a path for you

Dive down deep into her sound

But not too far, or you'll be drowned

Yes, she will sing to those who hear

And in her song all magic flows

But can you brave what you most fear

Can you face what the river knows

Where the north wind meets the sea

A coldness, settles deep in me

Come, my darling, homeward bound

When all is lost, then all is found

Elsa did not seem sleepy hearing the song; she merely blinked and continued to open and close her hands.  Agnarr looked down at the baby’s hand in his and saw a single, perfect snowflake.  

***

Elsa cooed and smiled and sometimes made icicles grow on the ends of her fingers and toes.  She started to crawl and the ground beneath her would occasionally turn to ice. To Iduna’s surprise, Agnarr was delighted. “Most people think their babies are a miracle, but our Elsa really is! Look what she can do!”

Iduna started to form an idea that gave her a hope she had given up the day Agnarr proposed to her. “I think the spirits have gifted us with a magical child. I think Ahtohallan is telling us that the mist is open, and Northuldra is safe.”

Agnarr thought of a lot of reponses: Was Northuldra ever safe? Was a talking river of memory a good thing to listen to? Would an opening in the mist mean the end of peace for Arendelle? But he saw the hope in her eyes, knew she longed for her mother, and knew he would do anything to give her a new moment with her family.

He would do anything for another moment with his father, to ask him if he wore the crown well, or to know what his mother’s voice sounded like and what it would feel like to have her ruffle his hair. Traveling to the mist and seeing if the forest was open was something he could do for his wife, for their family, and the good of the kingdom would have to come in second place.  They could go without royal insignia and soldiers, just alone, as a family of three.

***

It had been hard to convince Gerda and Midwife Jora that an outing in winter without the palace guard made sense, but King Agnarr claimed it was a royal tradition to pay homage to the trolls and no more questions were asked. When they came to the place, no trolls were present, and the hill that had been Flemmy was now completely a part of the landscape.

She saw the stones and shivered. The mist was still there.

Agnarr walked up to it carefully, but was pushed back after reaching a hand out to make contact. Iduna passed Elsa, wrapped in the newly woven shawl, to Agnarr before she walked closer.

“Perhaps it has to be me.  A Northuldra.” Iduna touched the mist, but was pushed back with a stronger jolt, and she fell to the ground.

Agnarr rushed to her and helped her stand. “Do you think Elsa needs to touch the mist?”

Iduna drew a shaky breath, taking Elsa back.  She could too easily imagine her daughter being hurt by the force of the blow.  “ I won't risk it.”

She checked Elsa’s blankets to be sure she was warm and covered, though the cold never seemed to bother her.

"It’s alright." Iduna swallowed and kept her voice steady. It's alright.” Agnarr drew close, seeing how her shoulders caved in and her hold on Elsa grew tighter.  "It was just an idea. It's fine if it won’t open.” She tried, and failed, to smile.  “I'd rather not cause a war or have Ahtohallan claim our baby.”

Agnarr took Elsa from Iduna and cradled her in one arm as he wrapped the other around Iduna, drawing her close. “No one will harm our baby.” He sighed and stared at the shifting mists.  He had heard her crying in her sleep during the pregnancy.  Heard the names she had entrusted him with spill from her lips as she stirred.    “And I would give anything for you to see your family again.”

“I don't even know if they're in there,” She said softly. “Or alive.  Or traitors.”  Her voice broke. “Or if they would kill me on sight for wearing Arendellian clothing, or if they murdered your father, or if they would murder you.”  She let out a sob.  “Or our daughter.”

Agnarr’s gripped tightened and he rested his head on the top of hers.  “Your family, whatever else they may have done, always loved you.  You know they loved you. They love you still. And we will tell Elsa about them, so she will be ready to love them when the mist does open.”

"No, please,” she shook her head and wiped her eyes “Please we musn't tell her. I don't want her to know your father was likely killed by my people. I don’t want her to know that a river of memory might drown her if she looks for answers about her magic. She will be happy with the ice and snow she makes.”

“If you think that’s best, that’s what we’ll do.” Agnarr watched her face, and saw that the tears had ceased.  

Iduna nodded, relieved at his words. “ She doesn’t need to be burdened with stories of elemental spirits in a forest she can’t visit.  She does not need to know her mother’s family is punished, cursed and trapped in the woods.”

The ride back to the castle was slow and cold, and they stopped several times for Iduna to nurse. Iduna stroked Elsa’s nose and sang an Arendellian lullaby about a snowman. Agnarr sat with his body around Iduna, shielding her from the wind, and so she would not see his grief at her sadness.  She had enough to bear already.

Iduna and Agnarr never came back to the mist.

[kaisoo-catalogue-beta-blog]

Hello ~ wish you the best with your blog. I'm craving for some wolfau. Thank you

Hello there, i really feel you dear, like during the winter break, i’ve been craving for ginger bread and gained 4 pounds. When i returned to the college, nothing is fitting anymore, and now i’m stuck to leggings and long sweaters, and i’m not referring to the pinterest version, no, the grandma version.

Now back to your ask!

I’ve been reading a lot of wolfau fic last year, and what i noticed was that most of them were written back in 2013, “it has something to the with exo comebacks, i guess”. So, what i’ll do is to share with you the latest fics i read and then the ones that had marked me.

p.s. some of the descriptions you’ll be reading are mine and have nothing to do with the descriptions the authors put on their fics “They’re classy folks, i’m the crazy bia*ch”

Latest wolfau fics:

Omega Nini: This is the latest fic i’ve read two days ago, and i can say that Jongin reminds me of my little sister. Hear me out: the wolf is a bully and pushy and makes you wanna punch his cute face, in the outside, but in the inside he’s just so fluffy, a mall of fluffiness “if that makes any sense”, and Kyugsoo was able to see that and not be fooled by the book’s title. I don’t want to give any further spoiler and urge you to go and read it.

BITE: So Kyungsoo is not really a wolf but is a vampire who was living the quite discrete life until he met wolf Jongin, you read that, i know you did, now the cherry on top is that the fic is based on the twilight saga…no more spoiler guys go and read.

Golden: Kyungsoo is a vampire again, “i’m just so in love with supernatural sh*t”, and he was always lonely “you guys know how dramatic vampires can be” so Baekhyun “my hero in this story” kept pushing him into meeting people, and i guess you have an idea who he met, but how? you folk have to read the story.

Neighbour Omega: you know the saying “plot what plot?”, you don’t? then go and read this human Jongin x Omega Kyungsoo au.

The Alpha: This made me so emotional, i literally cried reading it because, it’s about being selfless. So Jongin is an alpha who has responsibilities, and has to make a choice: Be with his lover or be with his pack.

Bye Bye Sadness (Hello My Love): So kaisoo is an established couple who are seeking for happiness, “like who isn’t, really”

In the Morning: So Kyungoo is an old-times-life-coach and Jongin is an alpha who just fell in love from first sight, and who didn’t guys like seriously who didn’t fell in love with Kyungsoo from first sight.

A Promise: Omega Kyungsoo is forced to marry alpha Jongin to save his family and kingdom. The story is slightly …really slightly based on game of thrones.

Our Season : A love abo story, as simple and sweet as any love story could be where Kyungsoo is an omega who’s soulmate is the mot perfect alpha who ever sit foot on alternative universe earth. 

Your Love, My Moonshine: Kyungsoo is on a looking-for-a-soulmate journey.

Something In The Mist: So Jongin went to visit his granny and there he heard about the local scary story evolving around the mystical mist that cover the island at nightfall, and he might and might not have met some wolf there. Have to read the story to find out.

Hybrid Hyperbole: The history of the wolf hybrids is one of desolation and anguish, but which side is to blame? A headstrong Omega is out to make that very clear, causing repercussions that he might not be able to deal with and attracting attention that causes his world, heart and values to change. 

Without Measure: Baekhyun “my hero again” is making sure that everything is perfect for Jongin’s birthday surprise this year, by having Kyungsoo, his best friend, plan it with him. Coincidentally, Kyungsoo and Jongin have a long, messy history, but Baekhyun just wants the two Alphas to be happy again. 

The Knot Box® : This is pure crack, and the smut is insane. I’ll just copy past the description because there’s nothing else to add “go and check” Kyungsoo is an alpha delivery guy for The Knot Box®. Jongin unhappily discovers that he’s an omega just before opening the door for a delivery. The meet, meet again, and years later find themselves working together for Wolf Pack, an a/b/o care package start-up.   

If It Wasn’t For You (I’d Be On My Own) :Humans and wolves had found ways to coexist in peace for centuries, but that’s all it was. Coexisting. Their worlds weren’t supposed to collide any further than maybe working in the same office building or being cordial neighbors. But when Kyungsoo discovers that his mate seems to be an improbable link between humans and wolves, him and his pack, EXO, find themselves in the very epicenter of a species war 20 years in the making. 

Anosmia: omega Kyungsoo saw his heat triggered when a new pack came to town, and of course everyone freaked out, because hello! It’s kyungsoo we’re talking about ;)

Old stories i loved:

Actually, i loved all the stories i listed above because i don’t rec a fic i didn't read. The only difference is that the ones listed bellow are really old “some of them are 6 years old from when exo has debuted”, some of them must be really popular to the fandom but since i’m new, i only heard about them like last year.

Alpha Male: Jongin a human high school student, living his life daydreaming “i mean who didn’t daydream during high school, it’s what made that hell bearable”  and then mysterious Kyungsoo got into his life, did some hocus pocus things with his mind, they became rivals, Kyungsoo got even physical like “you don’t know me, you don’t know my mama, you don’t know my papa, stay away” and this is where the story started.

It Has To Be You “A Wolf Boy Chronicles:  Human, again, Jongin “lucky b*stard” is living his life peacefully, one day Kyungsoo came and called him “love” and Jongin freaked out, “like i understand why Jongin freaked out, me in his shoes i would kick Kyungsoo on the balls. No just kidding, kyungsoo before me= die happily”. Sh*t went down when Jongin found out that he’s a wolf and a bitter Chanyeol got into the picture. The story is still on-going since 2015 BUT last time i checked the author is still alive, so we still have chance folks…hopefully. 

(Before The Night Is Over) Come See Me : This one is just so fluffy, hear me out, Kyungsoo is a vampire who’s wife has died because of humans so he went into a long sleep until one day he woke up and boom, Jongin, a wolf kid, is his soulmate who ate his chicken and messed with his palace garden.

Moonlight Love : Well Kyungsoo is a vampire who hates werewolves and Jongin is just a sweet cinnamon roll pup who’s longing for some attention.  While reading the story you can’t but smile and frown in the same time.

Better Than Good :Plot what plot in a good way tho. 

That’s it folks, hope you’ll like this rec and see you soon.

[deepweboutlxws]

October Prompts - Day 15 : Sweater Weather (Lucas and Ernst)

// For @dxllmaking ;3

With every passing day, the air grew colder and crisper. The wind picked up and brought with it a bitter chill that nipped at the nose, the cheeks, and the fingers. It was bearable in the sunshine, the warm rays staving off the bitter winds and making them feel more like a welcome breeze to those spending the dwindling season still outside working. It felt like Fall had just begun not even a few days ago, and yet winter would soon be here. Lucas could feel the excitement of it in his bones, his favorite season just on the horizon, yet still so far away. He couldn't wait to go out and run through the snow, catch snowflakes on his tongue, build snowmen and have snowball fights, curl up by a fireplace with a warm drink in hand and watch movies. Ah— but that was still some time away. He still had quite a wait ahead of him before there was any winter wonderland prancing to be done. Still, the weather’s shift was something to be addressed and it seemed Lucas knew just the way to go about it.

Pressing his nose into the fabric on the oversized collar of the shirt, he inhaled deeply and sighed with a smile. The comforting familiarity of the scent that clung to the threads was something remarkable to him and he purred as he sank into a turtleneck that was much too big for him to be wearing. He flopped onto his side on the couch, face halfway burrowed into the article of clothing and a cheeky grin overtaking his face. Banal gratitudes rumbled in Polish and Spanish rolled off his tongue in smoky tones, praising the man he’d stolen the clothing from as he took another breath of the scent still on the fibers. It was faintly sweet beneath the pungency of disinfectants. Something vintage and almost nostalgic. A feeling of safety, a feeling of home.

“Ah, there you are, pfirsiche. I was wondering where that jumper went.” The Dollmaker had grown rather accustomed to the thieving hands of his partner. The collection of sweaters in his closet had begun to dwindle over time and he was certain that it was not because of his own increased use of such articles. It only took a few different sightings of Lucas in wear that was ridiculously large for his small, short self for Ernst to make the connection— though truthfully it was hardly necessary. Lucas was the only other person in the house and to his knowledge, none of his dogs knew how to steal clothes (and thankfully so, otherwise the German was certain his wardrobe would have been even smaller than it already was).

Taking a seat next to the hitman curled into a ball on the sofa, the elder smiled at the sight of his clothing hanging so heavily and so loosely off of the other man’s frame. Frankly, he found it rather adorable how tangled Lucas could become in the fabric. The way it hung down and dangled far beyond his arms, covering his wrists. When he tried rolling them up, they’d roll right back down and obscure his gentle little fingers. The way he pulled up the collar over his nose and left only those sweet brown eyes visible, staring up at Ernst with a type of soft fondness he’d never seen anyone regard him with before. Despite all that he knew about Lucas and his profession, it was difficult to see the assassin as anything but an adorable, sweet little thing at times. A chuckle reverberated within his chest at the prospect and he reached over, gathering the half-Cuban in his strong arms and effectively cradling him. The man didn’t resist, he only wriggled a slight to make it a bit easier and giggled gleefully in response.

“You are quite the little thief now, aren’t you, pfirsiche?” The large man leaned in, nuzzling his nose against his partner’s covered one before frowning and tugging the material down. Lucas playfully scoffed and turned away.

“Me? A thief? Where would you ever get such an idea?” He cocked his head back, grinning. The elder spared him a coy look and took a gentle hold on the man’s collar, tugging him closer again.

“You aren’t exactly the best at hiding the evidence.” He released the shirt only when the other man finally relented and rested his forehead against his own. The Pole pouted a bit at the statement.

“I thought you liked seeing the evidence,” he teased, tugging down the shirt collar just enough to reveal several reddish brown marks tinged with purple left on his collarbone from the Dollmaker’s teeth. The display caused a devilish smirk to cross Ernst’s face as he admired his handiwork. The remains of some other night they’d spent together to celebrate one or the other’s completion of a job well done.

“It is rather a good look for you—“ The defense caused the smaller man to chuckle once more as he rolled the collar back up and rested his arms over his partner’s shoulders, making himself comfortable in Ernst’s lap and tucking his head under the giant’s chin. There were no complaints from the other at his actions. “I suppose I could let it slide.”

“You’ve been letting it slide for a while then.” The hitman purred, taking a grip on the shirt his lover currently had on and sniffing at it. Ernst must not have started working on any new projects yet. It didn’t offend his sense of smell like some of his other “work outfits” did.

“Believe me, peaches, I’m well aware. My wardrobe can only get so small before I begin to notice things are out of place. Or missing, in this case.” He craned his neck to spy at the little man tucked against him, raising a finger to lightly tap the unsuspecting male on the nose. In response, Lucas wrinkled his nose a bit, drawing back a bit with a soft noise and shaking his head. A light scratch under his chin settled him back down against the surgeon’s chest once more.

“Damn, and I thought I was doing such a good job at covering that up at the very least.” He mumbled, growing drowsy from the immense warmth that surrounded him when Ernst wrapped his arms around his tiny man.

“Oh, but you were. I probably wouldn’t have noticed up until very recently, but it seems you’ve had this effect on me that makes me a bit more attentive towards the finer details. Outside of work I mean.” A soft huff. “I suppose it’s become a necessary adaptation so that you can’t get away with your reckless behavior, hmm?”

“I wouldn’t say that, Ernie.” The assassin finally reared back from where he was laying comfortably against the gentle giant and smirked. “After all, just because you noticed me stealing the sweaters doesn’t mean you did anything to stop me.”

“Oh, well, of course!” The German abruptly leaned forward, stealing a kiss from his partner’s lips and the smirk from Lucas’ quickly reddening face. “I don’t see any harm in the occasional nicked fleece. I quite encourage it actually. I quite like the way you look in my clothing.”

He raised his head proudly as Lucas sank back, embarrassed and flustered. “How humble.”

The comment, as well as Lucas’ appearance, drew the Dollmaker back a bit from his ego. He leaned down to nuzzle the peach fuzz of his man’s cheek, warbling in his ear. “And anyhow, I wouldn’t want you to be cold. This time of year always does call for sweater weather.”

Knowing Ernst cared seemed to warm the Pole up a bit inside and draw him out of the collar once more for a gratuitous kiss. That answered seemed to satisfy him a lot more.

[likeanemployee]

Nightmares

White turned to red as the figure before her scattered on the breeze like flower petals. She reached out but the petals seemed to flee from her reach. When the figure had completely dissolved she collapsed in despair and the petals turned on her. They rushed her violently, filling her vision. Though she could see nothing but the red of petals the sound of wind rushed in her ears and she had a sense of the world moving, spinning, and flipping upside down. She shut her eyes tightly hoping she could make it all just go away and for a moment everything went perfectly pitch black. There was no sound, no sense of movement, nothing just a perfect empty void and then a light slowly grew and dawn arrived over the edge of a cliff. She found herself seemingly floating staring down at another figure just like the first but with a red cape instead of white. The figure kneeled over an open casket. As she watched she realized the figure was crying except they were no ordinary tears they were a deep blood red and they fell onto the body in the casket leaving bright stains in a beautiful perfectly white dress. Looking up from the stains she could just make out hair as white and pure as the dress. The dress and the hair seemed familiar but they were far away and indistinct a corner of her mind itched she knew that person but she couldn't tell who they were. The world seemed to zoom in focusing on the face slowly it gained detail a mouth, nose, eyes, a scar over one of those eyes. "Weiss!" She cried out and suddenly the whole world jerked Weiss lurched up reaching out toward her and seeming to cry out something but she couldn't hear it she was being launched away and suddenly the whole world disappeared into a tiny far way dot and Ruby jerked awake.

She sat up feeling a cold sweat covering her body and breathed deeply trying to calm herself. She had become fairly adept at dealing with nightmares she had them more regularly then anyone, even Weiss or Yang, knew but this one was particularly bad or at least unusual. The beginning was fairly familiar those images or ones like them had gone through her head on many nights and while they were still very painful repetition had made them, mostly, bearable. She could even sleep through them at least some of the time. The end though that was new and deeply unsettling. 

Ruby had seen her fair share of nightmare material in her life and while she loved her mother and would never discount her importance a part of her had always wondered why her mother's death troubled her so much more then the destroy villages, the burned, mutilated and discarded bodies or the million other atrocities she had witness as a huntress. The human mind could be fickle though and there was no denying the loss of her mother had been a tragedy that defined much of her adolescence so it was hardly surprising it might cause the occasional or even frequent nightmare. Weiss though that was new and seemingly unwarranted

She looked down at her partner sleeping next to her. They had been together for years and in that time they had faced death both together and separately. It was part of their jobs as Huntresses and while Ruby would be lying if she said it didn't bother her it was something both had come to terms with and she had never had nightmares about Weiss before. It wasn't even like they had had any particularly close calls recently so why... she laid one hand gently on Weiss's arm as she thought taking confront from feeling that Weiss was there and safe. Weiss rolled over and looked up at Ruby as she felt her touch

"Oh I'm so sorry Weiss go back to sleep I didn't mean to wake you!" Ruby said as gently as she could when Weiss stirred trying not to disturb her and hoping she could quickly fall back asleep easily. Weiss just rolled all the way over and smiled a light comforting smile back at Ruby "you didn't wake me, or at least not by touching me. I don't sleep through nearly as many of your nightmares as you think" her tone was gentle and loving and that light smile remained but her eyes had an undeniable sadness behind them as she spoke. Ruby stared back speechless and a little confused after a moment Weiss explained "I know you don't want me to know about them, I'm not sure if that's because you don't want me to worry or because you think its something to be ashamed of or even just because its something you think you can handle yourself and don't want to bother me. To be fair, to some extent you do seem to handle them fairly well yourself and I try to let you have it your way because, well as ridiculous as it sounds, I didn't want you worrying about me worrying about you, but I do. I worry a lot and I want to help but I don't really know how to do that either. I’m here though and I want to help so, I don’t know, do you want to talk about it? It might help at least some.” as she spoke Weiss had sat up next to Ruby, leaned Ruby’s head against her shoulder and wrapped her arms around her. 

Ruby sank into that embrace and for a while she simply sat there leaning against Weiss. She was still fairly shaken from the nightmare Weiss could tell and so she just sat and waited.... and waited holding her partner and best friend tight as she tried to process and deal with whatever it was she was dealing with. Finally, Ruby spoke quietly and without moving, still hiding deep within Weiss’s arms. “You were there.” she said simply. Weiss cocked her head slightly to get a better look at Ruby she moved slowly and deliberately trying not to disturb her nestled partner at all. She responded calmly trying not to react too much to anything so she didn’t scare Ruby away. “Is that unusual?” she asked and Ruby only nodded in response. “what happened?” she asked cautiously a little unsure if she should be encouraging Ruby to remember the events of the nightmare. “You were dead” Ruby cried and buried her face into Weiss’s chest. Weiss moved one hand to cradle Ruby’s head and held her as tightly as she could with the other, rocking slowly and whispering comfortingly “sshh shh it’s ok I’m here, I’m fine, I’m right here with you, everything is ok.” Ruby lean back just enough to see Weiss’s face and shook her head trying to smile but with tears in her eyes it only made her look even more pitiful. “I know” she choked out trying desperately to at least slow the tears “I know and I know I shouldn’t be crying, I shouldn’t feel this way. Normally I’m so good at controlling it but this time... It was you and you reached out but I couldn’t reach back and then you were gone, everything was gone and I just, I don’t know why. Why was it different? Why was it you?!?” she burst into tears falling back onto Weiss’s chest.

Weiss resumed her rocking whispering the occasional word of comfort while she tried to make sense of what Ruby had said. She had to figure out what she could do to help, what she could say, besides all these damn worthless platitudes, that would make Ruby feel better. She just felt so useless she had no Idea how to help the person she loved most in all the world. She would never leave Ruby she couldn’t think of a single thing which could stop her from being there for her in a time like this and that was something but it wasn’t enough. Every reassuring touch every comforting word felt as effective as forbidding the Atlisian winter from arriving. She’d do it, she’d tell all four seasons to shove off and demand the waves settle down too, just for good measure, if it was all she could do to help Ruby but she hated how useless she felt while she was doing it. She wanted for all the world to be able to wish Ruby’s nightmares away to take all that pain away from her. After all the good Ruby had done in her life surely she deserved at least that much but Weiss couldn’t all she could do was sit here hold Ruby and try to reassure her. 

In time Ruby’s tears came to a stop, she sniffled one last time, and drew herself away from Weiss with a long cleansing breath “Thank you” she said with a smile that actually looked genuine and kissed Weiss “I love you so much.” she added laying back down “I love you too.” Weiss replied “but are you sure you’re ok? you don’t want to talk about it anymore?” Ruby smiled at her and kissed her again before drawing the blankets around her “it’s late, we need to sleep maybe in the morning” Ruby replied she sounded as though she didn’t really want to talk about it in the morning either, Weiss thought, she wasn’t sure how to feel about that. Weiss wasn’t sure how ignoring it could help but she wasn’t sure talking about was really the right solution either, maybe that would just force Ruby to relive the experience, make things worse. She wasn’t sure, maybe Yang would have some idea or maybe there was someone else she could ask. Someone on Remnant had to know something about nightmares there were certainly enough things out there to keep people up at night. In any case Ruby was right it was late and they did need to sleep so if Ruby thought it could wait Weiss supposed it could probably wait, she had been dealing with this sort of thing for years after all, but Weiss resolved herself to find out more to figure out what she could do to help the girl she loved.

[rocketpowerreg]

winter’s coming, soon after summer → rc cola

TAGGING → @rocketpowerreg​ @nicoladerocha​ TIME → Saturday, 9/7 Mid-afternoon LOCATION → Reagan’s floral shop NOTES → The one where Nicola and Reggie try to be civil with each other only for Nicola to accidentally reveal to Reggie that her closeted ex from North Carolina was a homophobic, cheating bully  AUTHOR’S NOTES → Remember when Nicola yelled at Reggie last summer? This is worse and she wasn’t even trying to hurt Reggie this time 

REGGIE CLIFFTON

"Mom, I'm good. Really. Promise-- don't worry about me." Reggie muttered into her phone, walking the streets of New York City with a skateboard under arm rather than under her feet, "Yeah, yeah, I know you still will, but don't. Love you, too." And with that, the call ended. While Reggie had had a rough couple of days in her head, she had thought going out and wandering the streets would help. It hadn’t , so the conversation had been a welcome distraction as Reggie aimlessly wandered sidewalk to sidewalk. Though now that she was off the phone, she was taking in the surroundings and recognizing she was by Raegan's flower shop. Rather than just go home she decided it was better to find another distraction. Her first instinct was to go to the shop and see if Rae needed an extra set of hands. But then she remembered the cook book they had talked about Raegan mentioned her shop sold and figured now was as good a time as any to thumb through it. Cooking had become a bigger escape for Reggie as of late. While she couldn't get herself past the mental blockade to get herself to be as physically active as before, at least her culinary skills were getting honed in on. With the anniversary of her injury recently passing, Reg was trying to have her mind be focused on doing something nice for her old soccer team rather than think about the day that completely ended her soccer career. That also had to be a good sign... right? 

"Hey, anybody home? Paying customer coming in, so if you're fucking in the back it's time to come out." Reggie announced, expecting to see the usual suspect of Raegan behind the counter, and potentially Matt coming from under it.

NICOLA DE ROCHA

While working in Reagan’s flower shop wasn’t exactly the job Nicola envisioned herself having post grad, she was so incredibly thankful for it.  April offered her a spot behind the counter at ACup, but Nicola didn’t dare tell her even the espresso machine looked intimidating.  Sure, she wasn’t exactly built for customer service, but she really shone when she was free to arrange the flowers.  What could she say?  Aesthetics were her thing.

As soon as she heard another voice never the shop, Nicola dropped her phone, as if she wasn’t just scrolling through Instagram and made herself look busy.  Her brows knit together as it was Reggie who entered the shop instead of Reagan, “Ew, don’t be vile, Cliffton... the rumored ‘brothel’ is the next block over,” Nicola teased as she occupied herself cutting ribbon like she was supposed to be doing in the first place.

“What are you doing he— “What brings you in today?”  She asked giving herself a major pat on the back for those seamless customer service skills.

REGGIE CLIFFTON

The moment there was a note for Reggie to be less... well, herself, she knew she wasn't running into the redhead she was thinking would be there. Instead, it was the brunette with a bite and a constant thorn in her side Nicola De Rocha. While unexpected, the amused smirk on her face showed it wasn't unwelcomed to see her. Especially in a rubber apron and with dirt potentially under her nails. It was satisfying, albeit, strange, "Nice save, De Rocha," Reggie teased, approaching the counter and turning on her heel to rest her back against it, "if I hadn't grown up knowing what neighborhood you lived in, I might have just figure this was your first job, not your first time living upon the working class." While Reggie didn't know all the details of what happened, she had come by Raegan's shop enough to of known the financial situation of Nicola had changed. Reggie wasn't the type to judge things like that, especially because in truth, she thought pretty fondly of Nicola. They came from different parts of the same state, and had been background players in each other's and Spencer's lives. Having that relationship change into something more of its own entity was also welcomed by Reggie. Her attention scanned over the shop, taking in all the various flowers, gardening supplies, and products that were currently on sale.

"I wanted to check out this cook book Raegan said she had in stock. It looks like things have gotten a little rearranged since the last time I was here," her head turned and eyes landed on Nicola with a knowing smiling, "I'm gonna take a wild guess you had a hand in making that happen, didn't you? When you can't change outfits as much, you might as well change shop." Laying it on thick was practically Regina's specialty, but she liked to think the both of them had thick enough skin and a complicated enough history that all the teasing was assumed to be from a good place. Usually.

NICOLA DE ROCHA

Nicola served an exaggerated eye roll as Reggie spoke next, but chose not to reply.  Maybe this was some sort of karmic revenge on Nicola.  She was known for making biting remarks concerning the neighborhood Reggie grew up in back In North Carolina after all.  Even before Nicola’s financial situation changed her eyes were peeled open to her born privilege.  It wasn’t lost on her that even now as she needed to work for a paycheck at a day job, her parents would bail her out it it really came down to it.  Being cut off started a point of contention between Nicola and Emilio de Rocha, and Nicola wanted to prove she didn’t need Daddy’s credit cards to make it in New York.

“Yes, I did have a hand in this, in fact I did it just to annoy you,” Nicola teased as she made her way from behind the counter.  As much as she wanted to leave Reggie to find the item herself, she figured she might as well make herself useful.  While potentially earn back some karmic points from all the times she made digs at Reggie’s expense.

“I believe you’ll find what you’re looking for in the newly reorganized kitchen goods section,” she offered doing her best Vanna White impression as she showed off the section of books.

REGGIE CLIFFTON

There was no denying that Nicola had a personality to her. Even when she was having to adjust to a world she used to look down on people for being part of, Reggie couldn't help but notice she kept her sharp wit and graceful elegance as if nothing changed at all. It was impressive as hell, but mostly, it was entertaining to lay witness to, "Oh ho ho, how fancy this place has become," Reggie pointed out playful exaggeration, pushing off the counter to make her way towards the designated section and bowing her head in polite thanks as she neared Nicola, "I'd say I'd like to buy a vowel, or maybe a book, but Lane seems to insist on having a 'people don't actually pay for things' policy." Reggie joked, knowing there was a a glimmer of truth to the statement. 

 Her eyes darted to the shelf, skimming cover to cover until they landed on the book in question. Or the one she assumed it was-- there would at least be some recipe she could use most likely, "It must be weird working for someone who's loaded. And someone like Raegan-- she's kind of like the nice version of the people from Wilmington. Which it makes sense that people like her weren't actually in it. The place might’ve been too bearable that way." Reggie glanced up and winked at Nicola. Sure, she did mostly mean the statement, but it wasn't meant to be a dig at the girl herself. In the past it might have been, but not anymore. Somehow, Reggie was sure she knew what she meant now that Nicola's horizons had broadened beyond that of their county lines and parents bank accounts.

NICOLA DE ROCHA

Not even Nicola could pretend like she could take any credit for Reagan’s shop being as elegant as it was.  She was simply given the creative space to make adjustments if it suited the aesthetic.  The changes could potentially catch fresh eyes and draw in new customers, maybe those business classes would be a total waste after all!  “I have noticed she runs her business like a Salvation Army, but it’s kind of sweet,” Nicola shrugged before adjusting one of the nearby bouquets.  “I mean it’s a terrible business model, but something tells me Reagan isn’t in this for the money.” 

 Nicola wanted to take offense to the comment made about the people from her hometown, but Reggie was kind of right.  Most of the people back in Wilmington were at best snobs and she chose not to think about what they were like at their worst.  “I want to argue with you but I’m constantly reminded that Spencer’s parents are Wilmington’s exception not the rule.  You should see what my old social circle is up to,” she added with an eye roll, this one surprisingly not in Reggie’s direction.  “They are all collectively turning into the worst kind of people."

REGGIE CLIFFTON

Grabbing the book off the shelf, Reggie let her focus be on thumbing through the pages of the recipes inside. If she was actually cooking, holding a conversation wouldn't be something she would want to continue. However, she was having a pleasant conversation with Nicola and that warranted to be enjoyed. The two didn't have a lot in common, and not in the cute way like Nicola and Spencer had. It was in a way where if they managed to not just stand awkwardly around each other, that was a feat. Maybe the two of them had changed in NYC more than it seemed. At least now they could poke fun at the people from back home together. 

 "Sorry, did you just say your old social circle? 'cause damn, they must really be some pieces of work if you're not even wanting to call them 'friends.'" Reggie playfully pointed out, looking back up at Nicola as she shifted her weight to lean on the display case, "But I believe it. No offense on anything, but I always hated whenever I went to your guy's school. You could just feel the judgement in the hallways. I don't know how you or Porter dealt with it daily."

NICOLA DE ROCHA

“They were hardly friends when I was in high school,” Nicola offered with a shrug.  Of course that realization had only come with the luxury of time, back then she was loyal to all they represented— being popular and more importantly being accepted.  They accepted her but that was because she stifled the parts of herself they wouldn’t have.  Nicola’s eyes darted to the book in Reggie’s hands at the mention of Spencer, considering she was the one who had to deal with the brunt of it all.  “None taken.  Considering I actively contributed to the culture… I really have no room to take offense.” 

 A thought occurred to Nicola as she remembered the atrocious group photo that had just popped up in her Facebook memories this morning.  Nicola pulled her phone out of the apron pocket, “Want to see a photo?  A throwback Thursday as the youths say,” she chuckled as she held up her phone.  “Bonus points if you can point out my beard."

REGGIE CLIFFTON

While Reggie was having no trouble scanning through the recipes and listening to Nicola, truthfully, Reggie had zoned out near the end. It wasn't Nicola's fault, or even Reggie's, it was just habit from having to learn drown Matt out since they had become roommates. So for a few seconds, Nicola's phone didn't get Reggie's attention and just remained suspended near her face. It was the few seconds of silence that made Reggie glance back up from the pages she was analyzing to be faced with a picture. One she had never seen before, but it had more than one familiar face.

"Jesus, what the fu-" Reggie started, her surprise quickly getting replaced with undivided attention. She stood straight up, hand reaching out to steady Nicola's phone and get a complete look of the photo. Her brow knitted together, eyes zeroed in on one face and one face only. A girl with dark hair, deep green eyes, and a smile Reggie knew all to well. Yet she could not even begin to understand what her ex-girlfriend was doing in a picture with Nicola DeRocha. Or any of what she called her social circle. Reggie desperately needed to know more, "Who is that? The chick between you and that guy? What's her deal?" Reggie had to stop herself from asking 'why is she there' as that was one she wasn't sure she would get, or want, an answer to .

NICOLA DE ROCHA

Honestly Nicola thought she was being playful and self deprecating by showing Reggie this photo.  It was the closest she’d ever had to an awkward phase, “Reggie, I have braces in this photo and I”m desperately hanging off a boy’s shoulder… this is prime roast material!”  Nicola’s eyes glanced back to the photo, and out of all eight teenagers posed, she couldn’t for the life of her understand why she’d focus in on Jinny Edwards of all people.

Foremost Nicola answered Reggie’s question with an eyeball, but maybe enough time had passed since high school where Nicola could find the humor in this situation.  “Jenna Edwards.  I don’t know what she’s up to these days because she blocked me everywhere, but at least she gave me an excuse to break up with my beard by making out with him a bunch junior year.  Still a total bitch move though, ya know?"

REGGIE CLIFFTON

Jenna Edwards 

 So it was was her. 

She blocked me everywhere 

Her Jinny had done that too. It absolutely was her. 

... making out with him a bunch junior year 

No. No. It couldn't of been her. 

Reggie felt a lump in her throat and looked at Nicola with eyes a little too dark to fully express how lost she felt hearing these things. Reggie and Jenna had been together for months by the time she transferred schools. Going to different schools didn't matter, her being in the closet didn't matter, her parents barely liking Reggie even as a friend didn't matter. It had made things harder, but they had never broken up before college. Not until after Reggie’s accident and certainly well after junior year of fucking high school. To say Reggie's mind was racing was putting it lightly, and it wasn’t helping her throat was closing up. It was getting hard to speak-- to say anything.

 "She... what?" Bewildered, that was her tone. She was at a loss, "He cheated on you with her? That's not... you're kidding right? You sure you're talking about the chick with the freckles?" On one hand, Reggie was pretty composed for someone who was feeling sick to her stomach. On another, it probably just seemed like she was surprised someone cheated on Nicola. Two things could be true, but she was much more focused on getting the truth on who Nicola knew Jinny Edwards to be and who Reggie had been perhaps too blind to see all along. 

NICOLA DE ROCHA

“I know, right?”  Fell a little too quickly from Nicola’s lips when Reggie seemed to be in disbelief that Nicola got cheated on.  At least that’s what it sounded like to her ears, and while she deemed Reggie’s doubt warranted… it wasn’t like Nicola had been a faithful girlfriend either, but least she had the good sense to trade up!  Nicola zoomed in on the photo, so it was cropped upon her ex and the girl in question, “Don’t let the freckles fool you, she was an obnoxious bully,” Nicola recalled with a shake of her head.  It wasn’t like the rest of her friends were much better, but as snobby as they were they never tore Nicola down.  At least now directly to her face.  “She called me d*ke-cola once— to moderate laughter, when I left a party early to hang out with Spencer.  I refuse to believe she clocked me by the way!  She was just being a bitch."

REGGIE CLIFFTON

A misunderstanding was all Reggie was hoping for at this point, but the moment Nicola had the picture zeroed in on Jinny there was no possible way this was. Nicola was a woman of many things, being this cruel wasn't one of them-- it was clear she had no idea who Jinny really was.  Or more like she didn't know Jinny's role in Reggie's life.  That part didn't surprise Reggie considering all the lengths she had gone through to keep them a secret. Hanging out in public was almost always met with a No, her going to Reggie's soccer games happened only before Jinny transferred, meeting any of her new friends from her new school was completely out of the question since Jinny said she "didn't have any," and the possibility of being together to the world wouldn't be allowed until they were in college-- far, far away from North Carolina. During the course of their relationship it had become frustrating keeping up with the rules, but Regina loved her. Jinny loved Reggie. And the world had told Reggie for years that love made everything worth it in the end... 

 It was now making sense why the couple winded up where they did. 

Throughout all the years since their break up, Regina had lamented herself for becoming a spiteful, awful person after her accident, especially to Jinny. For years Regina had seen Jinny as someone good in the world she had completely broke the heart and soul of from their constant fights near the end. She had never considered Jinny to be someone keeping secrets from her... especially ones of her bullying others with homophobia. The lips Regina had kissed and loved had also went around the school hallways saying slurs as jokes. It was sickening. It was infuriating. And god it was heartbreaking.

"I- uh, yeah. Sure. Maybe." was all Reggie managed to get out to Nicola after far too long of a silence. It was hardly answer but it was all she had after staring far too long at the photo again. Though, to be fair, Reggie wasn't exactly feeling the most present at the moment due to how much of her past just got shattered. She was beginning to feel herself questioning everything and it was getting to be heavy- too heavy. Reggie was starting to feel the weight of Nicola's words and the past actions of Jinny crushing her bit by bit. She felt like she was going to faint, or that the ground would swallow her up. For a moment, Reggie wished it would, because she couldn't stay where she was any longer. She needed to leave. She needed to stop looking at this picture. She needed to do fucking something. 

"Look, I... I gotta go, De Rocha, I can't fucking be here anymore," Reggie quickly tossed out, shoving the phone back towards Nicola as she could no longer keep looking at the picture. She didn't mean to have such a bite to her words, but currently Reggie's emotions were a little on the edge. Yet she didn't want Nicola to ask questions either, "I just... I feel sick or something so I'm... I'm gonna go. Thanks. I-I mean, sorry-- whatever. Fuck it. Who cares?" She muttered, looking for her skateboard so she could leave. The tone of Reggie's voice ranged all over: sincere, to unsure, to seemingly pissed. She could have explained herself better, but Reggie was in no place to. All she wanted was to get the hell out of Reagan's flower shop. She had no plans besides that. Given the entirety of what she thought to be true of her past was now in shambles, thinking beyond the current moment was impossible. Much like how her finding a way to get past this felt.