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queerchoicesblog · 5 years

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Never Play With Fire (ACOR, Lena x MC)

Here’s the full fanfic from my preview! I tried to imagine the tone of the conversation Xanthe had with Lena (mentioned in the last chapter if you ask Lena to comfort you)...because in my head there’s no doubt she was so eager to be the one informing our domina about the match. It seems true to the character.

Surprisingly, writing this fanfic led me to explore Xanthe’s reasons and the roots of her angry attitude. To me, she is still a villain (women can be each other’s best allies but also worst enemies especially when they’re competing over men and I think we all know that), but I hope we would get to know more of her and her story. Hope y’all like it! 😄

Word Count: 1461

Perma Tag: @brightpinkpeppercorn @psychopathdreamer21 @bbaba-yagaa @abunchofbadchoices @silverhawkenzie @bhavf @begging-for-kamilah @melodyofgraves @kennaxval @strangerofbraidwood

Lena x MC series Tag: @korrasamixlover @3pawandme @jellymonster @gayestchoices

(Previous episodes of the Lena series: Your Odyssey, Beautiful Curse, News From The Ludus, Down In The Dungeon & The Gift)

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Lena's scholae still showed the signs of Aquila's violence. The domina was doing her best to remove them and make her scholae a safe haven again. At least she was trying to make it look like it for the sake of the girls. "We will work hard to bring our old walls and paintings back not just because cracked tiles and smeared walls are bad for business but because the Roman, the authority must know that they can't do as they please here. We're a phoenix, sweethearts, and we will rise from the ashes where they meant to bury us and make us feel little and worthless. We're doing this for us because we don't deserve to live like this" she said in the speech she gave to the girls when they came back there. All the courtesans were now doing their part -even little Cirta was somehow helping, avoiding to raid the kitchen at any given opportunity- but there was still so much to be done. It takes time to heal wounds, Lena whispered to herself as she walked down the corridor of the sleeping quarters.

As she passed by, she spotted Xanthe choosing a dress in her room. Lena knocked on the wall to announce her presence and poked her head in.

"Xanthe, it's almost time for you to leave. Please, hurry up and don't make Marc Anthony wait"

The young courtesan nodded: she was almost ready, nothing to worry about "but only the best for my patron". Lena was about to take her leave when she added:

"You made a huge mistake choosing her over me, Lena"

Lena groaned in frustration and pinched her nose.

"Not again, Xanthe. I beg you not to test my patience, we already had this conversation"

"I'm just stating facts, domina." Xanthe commented in her practiced mellifluous voice "Lucilla has a pretty face, sure, she is new...but she hasn't what it takes to get to the top. She just gives her patrons her pathetic puppy dog eyes: I bet she tells them how much she suffered in Gaul...oh look at me, the poor Princess of Gaul! I'm not even sure she has slept with Cassius or any other man since her arrival and you tell me she is your premier courtesan? Rome premier courtesan?"

"What Lucilla does or does not it's none of your business, Xanthe" Lena dismissed her.

The young courtesan's face twisted in anger.

"Oh it is! It is because she took everything from me! My role of premier courtesan, my prestige, your attention, my patrons! Who does she think she is? I was raised to be like this, I don't even know why you bought her! She was like a wild cat, I cannot believe she was a princess once! But oh well, it takes little effort, grace and beauty to be a princess among savages"

"Savages?" Lena blurted out, blinking. "Almighty Gods, do you even listen to yourself?"

"What? Everybody knows that's what they are!"

Lena looked Xanthe from head to toes, still in disbelief of what she just heard. Then she said, about to leave the room.

"Fine, go ahead, but I won't tolerate this conversation any longer"

"What? Can't I speak my mind about-" the courtesan raised her voice but then stopped mid-sentence as a malicious thought crossed her mind.

"Oh I see..." She said crossing her arms and giving the other woman a wicked knowing look. "She plays hard to get with the patrons to drive them mad with the desire while she seduces Syphax and the domina. I give her that, she's cunning and she must have been pretty good in the sh-"

Lena cut her short, slapping her in the face.

"I warned you not to test my patience, Xanthe. You know nothing, girl"

Xanthe raised her head, shooting daggers at her domina.

"Or maybe too much" she hissed, her lips curling into a winning grin.

Lena didn't flinch and stood her ground.

"Your arrogance will be your downfall"

"And Lucilla will be yours if you don't snap out of it! She's plotting against Caesar, maybe you are too..."

Lena welcomed Xanthe's threat with a sarcastic laugh.

"That's how you want to play it? Fine, do you have proof?"

Xanthe cocked her head to the side.

"So smart and yet so naive, aren't you Lena? You know that Marc Anthony doesn't need proof, just a little tiny suspect is enough to cause his wrath"

As much as she hated to admit it, Lena knew the girl was right. Xanthe straightened her dress and sauntered back to the mirror. As she added the finishing touches to her makeup, she spoke again.

"Well...at least he's not like you. The most powerful man in Rome didn't get fooled by her. He will give her a taste of her own medicine very soon, exactly what that viper deserves"

Lena's blood ran cold in her veins hearing those ominous words. Marc Anthony was not only the most powerful man in Rome but also the most dangerous and unpredictable.

"What are you talking about?"

Xanthe smiled to her own reflection and continued in a pretended nonchalant tone:

"Haven't you heard that Syphax will fight in the arena tomorrow? Marc Anthony must have taken quite a liking for me as he told me that he set up the match himself. He specifically requested that he will be facing the Conquered King"

Lena's face paled and her shoulders dropped. No, this can't be possible, she thought.

"V-Victus?" she managed to ask.

Xanthe shrugged.

"As if I care to know what the name of that barbarian is! What's matter is that he is the current champion: he never lost, never yielded. I have little sympathy for Gauls but I can already tell that I will cheer for him"

Lena exhaled loudly as a grim expression formed on her face.

"Xanthe, we're all barbarians to them. Live under no illusion to be anything more than some exotic pet for the Roman. You will never be a real gentlewoman"

The girl immediately turned to her.

"I am not barbarian, I am a Roman now. Don't you dare insult me again!" she protested, fury written all over her face.

"You're mistaking, girl...but what about Syphax? He was your bodyguard, aren't you-" the domina said as calmly as she could.

"Yeah, you're right: he was! But she took him away from me too. You took him away from me and gave him to your precious pet. And now I can't wait to see her watch him die!"

Xanthe moved away from where she stood and stopped on the threshold to add:

"Syphax is your friend too, right? Good. May the odds be in the Gallic King's favor, domina"

With her last words, she stormed off the room. Lena was to upset and tired to counter that one: Xanthe wanted to hurt her, she had her reasons for her resentment but even too much pride and stubbornness to understand the precarious situation they all were in. The former courtesan knew that she couldn't let the girl's poison get under her skin but all she had learned over the past few minutes was quite a lot to process. Marc Anthony wanted blood in the arena and her friend was about to face death in a match against her wildflower's father. She still remembered how her love's green eyes gleamed with joy when she told her that Victus, her beloved dad, was in Rome. And now...

She leaned against the wooden wardrobe for support, then slowly took a seat in one of Xanthe's armchairs.

This is a trap. A sick scheme of Marc Anthony for sure: why forcing such a match if not to...

Then the realization hit her. He wants to cash in the favor. He wants to make a deal on his own terms now that he has Lucilla under his thumb.

Lena grabbed her head.

Wildflower, why didn't you listen to me when I warned you about that snake? He will never ask for anything reasonable for his little display of mercy with Syphax, decency is totally foreign to him!

She sighed deeply.

Why, why you didn't come to me, Lucilla? We could have found another way...now there's nothing I can do to prevent him to hurt you because I know for a fact that he will! He chooses the opponents too carefully not to have a plan...he's too smart to challenge you directly and vile enough to use your affections against you as leverage. Gods how much I hate him! And how much I hate being completely powerless and unable to assist you, protect you as you walk in this risky path you choose. Wildflower, Rome is a dangerous place to be...and you should never play with fire.

#acor #a courtesan of rome #acor lena #lena x mc #playchoices #choices stories you play #choices fanfic

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diveronarpg · 5 years

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In fair Verona, our tale begins with MONA CHEN, who is THIRTY-FOUR years old. She is often called QUEEN MAB and works as an ASSOCIATE for the Montagues and Capulets. She uses SHE/HER pronouns.

Hers is not a story that starts with a beautiful little girl wrapped in silks and satins, nor is it one borne from unconditional love or a doting mother’s generosity, but is a tale woven purely as the result of a grave MISTAKE—something Mona’s mother never let her forget. She wasn’t planned, but rather thrust upon a woman who never should have bore a child for there was no room in her heart for anyone but herself. As selfish as she was mean, Caroline Chen was a con-artist who SWINDLED men with deep pockets and even deeper insecurities, swooned with just one bat of her lashes and a quirk of her brow, turned pliable and spineless at a simple graze of her fingertips to their lapel. A few words of praise, maybe even a night to remember if she was feeling particularly generous and they were exceptionally handsome, and it wasn’t long before they were laying money by the thousands at her feet. First it started as some sob story told about her very ill daughter, poured on thick with calculated tears from the supposed damsel cuddling beside whichever unlucky BASTARD thought it wise to trust the pretty woman at the bar last night. And as Mona aged, the lies aged with her. Illness turned to a depressing tale of her father abandoning her and her mother, leaving them with nothing but the clothes on their backs and no place to call home, and with such conviction, Caroline weaved a web thick enough to convince one of her conquests to buy them a house. But what of the little girl who’s life is determined by falsities and half-truths, by a mother who saw her daughter as nothing more than a meal ticket? Deception becomes the only way to survive and SECRETS become sustenance.

It doesn’t take a genius to trace back Mona Chen’s roots, the barely-there strings that tie her back to a woman now rotting away in PRISON and the one-night stand that cultivated her existence. It takes her six months to track him down, to get the full story on how he met her mother in a seedy bar, took her back to his hotel room, far too deep into his cup to even realize she’d lifted his wallet and his keys, and never heard from her or his Mercedes again. He had no idea he even fathered a child, and in fact, married three years later and started a family of his own. I have siblings? She’d asked, somewhat wide-eyed but never dumb enough to be truly HOPEFUL. Like a man suddenly aware he revealed too much information, all he did was nod. Took a sip of his side-of-the-road diner coffee and looked out the glass window to his right. They sat there in silence for a bit. Mona took in his visage from beneath her thick, mascara donned lashes, memorized the details of his face, his eyes, his nose, everything that looked like something he’d given her, and then she left. It can’t be said she never gave him a second thought because there are often times when she does exactly that. Think of him. He floats into the edges of her mind as she graduates college, a hard-earned degree in business paid for through less hard work and more STOLEN checks from dalliances too focused on her petal-pink lips and plunging neckline to notice her hand slipping into their breast pocket. Mona walks across the stage, accepts her diploma with a handshake, and distantly wonders if her father would be PROUD. He recedes from her memory as she starts her career, an intern at a financial firm in downtown Verona, clouded by the stress of starting her adult life, but her best-laid plans of shedding her mother’s tangled roots crumble when she’s released from prison, showing up on her daughter’s doorstep looking for a place to stay. A couple weeks, she’d said. Just until I get back on my feet.

Her mother stayed four days and ROBBED Mona blind, taking everything from the few designer dresses she’d managed to afford on her minimal salary down to the silverware. Anything that could be pawned, she took; anything that could be worn, she stole. And perhaps what hurt the most wasn’t that if only her mother had just asked, she would have helped, however begrudgingly it might have been—no, it was that Mona was clearly no better than her FATHER. A source of income, a thing to be used until there was nothing more, left behind once her value had been diminished. Credit cards maxed out and bank account emptied, she lost her apartment the following month. Repossessed by the very banker she’d overtly flirted with to get the lowest rated mortgage, and with such a pompous smile. Like he knew she bit off more than she could chew and proven him right in less than six weeks. Fast and all at once, Mona found herself back on the STREETS with nothing but the clothes on her back to her name. Those, and her wiles at least. The one good thing her mother had ever done for her: taught her all the ways to survive. Her father moves into view those first few nights, the ones she spent on park benches or huddled inside bus terminals to fight off the cold. It took him three years to get his life together after meeting Caroline, after she CONNED him for all he was worth. It takes Mona six months to do the same, and in record time if she does say so herself. She spends her nights at the Emelia first, catering to older men who love to look but never touch. They just want someone to listen, and listen she does. With ears perked up and brows knitted in a perfected feigned sympathy to their first-world blights and white man problems, all while she dips her fingers into their very deep pockets. Her time and attention, she quickly learned, was worth a pretty penny, and it wasn’t long before Mona built herself a clientele, dreams of an EMPIRE slowly coming into view upon the horizon.

She was never a girl built for the white collar life, spending her days catering to the wants and whims of men who thought it funny to slip their palm against her derriere at the copy machine. It was a life she tried, a life she told herself she wanted time and time again; anything to not become exactly like her mother. But like her mother does with all things, she took, she stole that dream, pried it right out of her daughter’s fingers and forced her back down into the dirt from whence she came. Not unlike a PHOENIX, though, Mona rose from the ashes of her mother’s relentless destruction and became anew with many a lesson learned. Never again would she be made into a thing of value for someone else. Nor would she settle for anything less than all the control. And if there’s anything her clients love more than drinking, it’s spouting off at the mouth about all their supposed POWER. One name found its way into her whispers over and over, like a broken record, the man who changed it all, blessed the poor and turned them rich: CAPULET. She went to him with an offer, a business plan to turn his subpar front of a casino into something worth remembering. And what would you give me? He asked, smoke curling out from the sides of his mouth. She answered him with one word and one word only. Access. The deal was simple. Mona passes along whatever whispers are pertinent to the mob’s success and Cosimo garners forty percent of the profits. And thus THE DARK LADY was born. It took little effort to convince her clients to follow her, offering them VIP entry to the newly remodeled den of sin as compensation for their loyalty. Within two years, Mona adds to her ranks, donning her little birds Sparrows and sets them off to gather more whispers, encouraging them to always listen and never stifle the words their clients offer up. Intimacy is never a must, but trust is paramount.

Once upon a time it was an empire Mona wanted, a kingdom forged in her own image, something that was hers and hers alone, but as the years have gone by, she has realized it is within the DARKNESS she shines. When will you join our ranks, tesoro? Cosimo still asks, still begs the question and waits with bated breath for her answer, hoping for her to utter a long-awaited ‘now.’ Why would I do that? She asks back, a quirk to her brow, lips twisted up in a knowing smirk. Here, I’m the QUEEN.

LUCREZIA FALCO & CALINA SOKOLOVA: Emissaries. Where there is a will, there is a way, and Mona Chen’s will is by far the greatest. She is an expert in bending those around her to her will, and if there was anyone strong enough to gently caress the ego of Lucrezia Falco without falling prey to her piercing onyx gaze, it was the Dark Lady herself. The same cannot be said for the Montague, a girl who’s mind and motives Mona cannot seem to pierce or probe despite her best efforts. Calina is not so easily read, nor so easily wooed for her ego is not what matters most to her like the Capulet. It is by a leash the two emissaries think they have the Queen of Whispers, pulled taught around her throat so as to keep her in line and keep the interests of their Dons at the top of her list. Little do they know Mona fastened the collar to her neck by choice; hold your allies close, your adversaries closer.

YAMAMOTO OMI: Favorite. Of all her Sparrows, her exquisite collection of rare beauties, Omi is by far her best and without a doubt her most cherished. It is with an uncharacteristic compassion Mona handles Omi, with soft touches and forehead kisses, offering up words of wisdom at every turn to better the little bird. To further her ability to dissect secrets from the toughest of subjects and show her how to hold on tight to those whispers, for they are the only true currency worth a damn in this city drenched with sin. And to be rich in this respect is of the utmost importance, a necessity to survival. More than anything Mona wishes to see her succeed, and while there’s pleasure to be had in the taking, the real joy comes from wielding such power. There’s no use for a Sparrow on which these teachings falls flat, and Mona has not spent years training Omi to be her best asset if she didn’t think they were capable of greatness—together.

RONAN IVARSSON: Indenture. He is weak, and that is, perhaps, Mona’s favorite thing about him. Privileged in every sense of the term, he glides through life as if this world was made for him, taking whatever he wants and using those he deems as having talents worth his time, but ultimately he is selfish. He uses people like they’re his playthings, and while the same argument could possibly be made against the Dark Lady, she knows how to cover her tracks. But even more so Mona knows how to actually care for people, how to let her walls down and offer entry into her heart, however guarded it may be. It takes strength after the luck, or rather the lack thereof, the universe handed her. For now, he is a slave to his desires, as most men are, and it is a fact that elates Mona for it means he has secrets, and it is those little whispers he thinks he can keep to himself that she is after. Watch yourself, Ronan. Mona Chen sees all; hears all. And how bad it would be if she took your exploits to that little group you’ve pledged yourself to across the bridge.

HARRIET D’ANGELO: Closest friend. There are few people in this city—on this Earth entirely—that she trusts, but Harriet has become one of them. Enigmatic and exceedingly intriguing, Mona was drawn to the woman from the moment the two first met haphazardly at the Tempest. Harriet with nothing more than a regal air of solitude weighing the space she occupied alone, and Mona with a few Sparrows-in-training by her side, the two exchanged pleasantries in line for the bathroom, and as hackneyed as it may be, the rest was history. From their first meeting, there has been a bond, a certain kind of kinship Mona has been deprived of most her life. Someone to share her soul with, not a lover but a love between almost sisters. The madame is quite protective of the D’Angelo woman, especially as her path begins to collide with the seedy underbelly of Verona. And make no mistake, anyone who dares to cross Harriet D’Angelo will have the Dark Lady to answer to.

Mona is portrayed by GEMMA CHAN and was written by SIDNEY. She is currently OPEN.

#mafia rp #bio rpg #lsrp #lsrpg #gemma chan fc #mona chen #ow #w #o #neu

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