#night harbor publishing

[shigayokagayama]

i think my favorite mob psycho season 3 memory is the fact that, during the semester it was coming out, i was taking a class that had the option of either a monday or wednesday lab, and said lab meant on whatever day i had it i would be on campus 9 am to 5 pm. i was watching mob psycho with my girlfriend at the time, and she only had mondays off, and wouldn't get home until pretty late on wednesday, so i decided to take the wednesday lab so we could spend time together on her day off and then watch mob psycho at like 9 pm on wednesdays when she got home

and then she broke up with me before episode 2 even came out

[reidrum]

all yours if you want me | s.r

pairing: spencer reid x bau!fem!reader

a/n: i think i really like this but if i proofread it one more time im gonna hate it so im just putting it out now lol. this is the full version of the sneak peak i posted last week woohoo ! also this is my first time writing smut so im sorry if it sucks but i hope y'all like it <3

summary: bau's got their first day off in weeks, and you're heading straight to the club to have some fun, you just didn't expect your coworker/crush to also be there while you're trying to forget him.

cw: 18+ minors pls dni, smut, p in v (dont be silly wrap ur willy), munch!spence, lowkey softdom!spence, suggestive dancing in public spaces, minor insecure reader, reader is afab and wears a dress and heels

wc: 4.6k

pls let me know if i forgot anything and let me know your thoughts pleaseee xx

it was the first friday night off you and any of the team members of the bau had in a long time, and you all were determined to spend it well. jj and hotch immediately went home to their families, penelope and emily decided they were going home to get some well needed rest, rossi went to a cigar club, not really sure what derek and spencer ended up doing, but you knew what you were doing tonight.

you’d had a long standing invitation from one of your college friends for a club night, and at first you’d decline because you’d get swept away on a case, and because you were hopelessly pining after your hot nerdy coworker dr. spencer reid.

spencer was smart in many ways, three PhDs, countless published papers, not to mention that eidetic memory of his. there was one thing that spencer was just fucking dumb at, and it was your shameless flirting at him.

like it annoyed you how clueless he was. you’d bring him coffee in the mornings with hearts drawn on it, fall asleep on his shoulder on the jet rides back, even complimenting his outfit or looks which made him flustered, but still nothing. your harbored crush seemed to stay just that, a crush. and while you’d hope he would get the hint he just hasn’t.

so you pull out your phone to text your friend. 

“barry’s at 9?”

“oh my god FINALLY. i’m there i'll pick you up at 8:30.”

you grin to yourself, this was good. you needed to get out and unwind for once.

you drive home quickly to hop in the shower before your friend comes to get you. throwing on a silk slip dress as your outfit of choice, you slipped your heels on and met your friend in the car.

walking into the club, you’re met with the thumping bass of the music playing and the staunch smell of alcohol, sweat, and sex.

it made you think about the last time you got laid, which was a really long time ago. and honestly you wanted to sleep with spencer so bad you hadn’t been making advances elsewhere. but that was going to change tonight, you were determined to have good slutty fun, and hopefully get laid.

your friend grabbed your hand and beelined to the bar, ordering two tequila shots each. once you downed them you moved to the dance floor and started preying for a target. as you’re scanning the room, you notice a familiar looking mop of brown hair standing next to bald headed man. a combo you knew all too well.

-

derek morgan was a player. and before he’s a player, he’s a damn good friend. which was his reasoning for dragging spencer out of his apartment to come out to the club and have fun.

“but i can have fun at home by myself morgan.”

“kid, you need to let loose once in a while. you are young, i’m just helping you take advantage of it.”

-

so now spencer’s at the club (a sentence he still struggles to believe) wearing trousers and navy button down shirt to which morgan had popped the top buttons open because ‘it gives the ladies a sneak peek’. he just rolled his eyes and went with it. he’s nursing a shirley temple at the bar, perusing the environment when he comes across a pair of eyes he knows like the back of his hand.

when you recognize the amber eyes you couldn’t believe your luck. of course, on the one night you’d decided to explore other options he shows up in the least expected place for him to be. so much for getting over him, you think. shyly raising your hand to wave, spencer returns the gesture. morgan takes note, “who are you waving t- oh, pretty girl is here huh pretty boy?” he nudges him.

a blush raises on his face. spencer thought you were attractive, like really attractive. you were a great addition to the bau and he admired your work ethic a lot, the day you walked into the bullpen wearing a fitted pantsuit had his own pants growing real tight. he still remembers when you introduced yourself and he couldn’t even get up without exposing himself. you thankfully didn’t think it was weird, and spencer was relieved when it was finally time to go home. he’d be lying if he said he didn’t have nights where he wished you were the one finishing him off and not his rough hands. he didn’t think you’d like someone like him, and took all of your ‘advances’ as morgan calls them, as acts of kindness.

morgan laughs as he watches spencer’s iq deteriorate to below 50 staring at you, “do you what you gotta do man. but you better be going home with someone tonight okay?”

spencer nods and nurses his drink a bit and looks back to morgan to realize he’s already off dancing with some girls in the corner. damn.

after your distanced encounter with spencer, you decide it’s time to move on and have some fun on your own. you couldn’t be hung up on him anymore, at least not tonight. tonight was for bad decisions.

good thing bad decision walked up to you asking to dance, whatshisname leads you to the dance floor and puts his hands on your hips, swaying to the beats of t-pain and pitbull.

you didn’t know, but spencer was watching every move you made. he watched you get led to the dance floor, the way he placed his hands right on your ass and squeezed, and how he turned you around so you were dancing on his front with your back. he gripped his glass so tight the bartender had to tell him he’d have to pay if it breaks.

he gets it, you’re attractive. this is the kind of thing that happens to people who look like you. who wouldn’t want you? but then he watched it happen a second time. and a third. and a fourth and fifth, till he just stopped counting at nine for his sanity.

spencer was not used to the green monster taking over him, but oh god was he fucking seething with jealousy.

you realized spencer was watching you by whatshisname number five. he hadn’t moved from his spot and he was constantly staring in your direction. deciding to do a little experiment, you played up your dancing a lot more, acting more flirtatious, dragging the guy’s hands further down, and letting out open mouthed moans that you knew spencer couldn’t hear but could definitely see. you watched as his jaw shifted and his knuckles turned white as you danced with each guy, realizing the growing effect that you now had on him.

by whatshisname number nine, you casted your hook. making sure to face spencer and meet his eyes, you watched as they darkened when he realized you were looking right at him. spencer might’ve brushed it off as a coincidence, but then you winked at him. and he realized what you were doing—you were taunting him, and fuck was it working for him. the bulge in his pants grew uncomfortable that he had to stand up to not draw so much attention to it under the bar lights. 

you watched him stand up and adjust himself and you threw your line. when he looked back up at you, you made a come here motion with your index finger and a bite of your lip. spencer’s eyes darkened impossibly more, he paid for his tab and strode over to you.

sinker.

he pulled you from the man behind you, who muttered a ‘what the fuck’ and moved away. spencer pulled you flush to his chest and with a low voice in the crest of your ear he whispered, “what do you think you’re doing?”

“i don’t think i know what you’re talking about dr. reid, could you explain it to me?”

spencer tightens his hold on you and ghosts over your ear once more, “this is a dangerous game you’re playing, sweetheart.”

“a game you joined the second you walked over here.”

he looked at you with a mischievous glint in his eyes, and matched the small smirk on your lips. game on.

the song changed to something with a more sultry beat, and you used the opportunity to wrap your arms around his neck and let his hands guide your hips to the music. while he wasn’t much of a dancer, he could definitely keep a beat. it didn’t prove to be so difficult when your chest was pushing up on his own that he was just waiting for them to spill out. he realized he could feel your hardened nipples through your slip, the nubs rubbing friction through the fabric of their clothes. he moaned internally while he gripped your hips to pull you even closer. it was clear spencer seemed to be getting comfortable with moving your body and holding you close, but you couldn’t let that happen.

before the second chorus you turn around in his arms so your back is pressed up against his front, and you start dancing on him.

spencer’s taken by surprise, something you felt when his hands faltered the confident rhythm it kept up, and while he watched you dance just like this with all those guys it’s like his mind is blank now.

you recognize the song playing, collide by justine skye & tyga, and use the sultry beat to your advantage. you move your ass hard on his front, feeling his length pressed between your cheeks. you gesture for him to lean his head down and he lets out a low groan as you whisper in his ear, “all that for me?”.

a primal instinct starts to take over spencer’s being, and he grips your hips to meet his rutting from behind. spencer was desperate for any friction that could soothe the growing ache in his pants. you grinned as you felt take what he needed from you. it was quickly wiped off your face when you felt his hands inching dangerously close to where you really wanted him.  you place your hands on his with surprise and look at him, “what are you doing?”

“i don’t think i know what you’re talking about, sweetheart,” he threw back at you, “but if there’s something you’d like me to do, i’m all ears.” spencer grazes his fingers under the hem of your dress, toying with the lace band of your panties and slipping his fingers below it to stroke your inner thighs.

fuck. he turned it on you so fast it almost gave you whiplash. the provocative dancing was something you could handle, hell everyone on that dance floor was doing the same thing as you both. what you weren’t sure you could handle was him about to touch you in a public space. but, your body betrayed you as it turned you on to another plane. you look up at him with lust filled eyes and let out a breathy moan of his name. spencer collapses internally and stands his ground, “if you want something, beg me.”

spencer thinks he’s won the upper hand, and he’s feeling so smug behind you. he still thinks he has the upper hand until you reach down and place his middle and index finger in your mouth, circling your tongue around the digits.

“touch me.” you moan out, releasing his fingers.

spencer is dumbfounded how he’s the one about to burst out his pants when he made you beg for him. it should make him feel embarrassed at how close he was, but he couldn’t find it in him to care. not when you in his arms pleading him to do something. you sounded so pretty, and who was he to deny a pretty thing like you?

his fingers continue their journey down, outlining the lace trim resting on your thighs. he hooks his fingers on the fabric to pull it aside and slips into you, going at an aching pace to gather the wetness and groaning out, “jesus, you’re so wet, was this all for me? you needed my attention that bad, baby?”

you whimper and grip his hand even tighter because you’re not sure if your legs are holding out any longer. it’s all so overwhelming—having his hands down your panties in the middle of the dance floor, the lewdity of the noises in your ear, the hard length pressing desperately on your ass. this is all you’ve ever wanted from him, to want you. and now it’s happening, and your brain can’t fire the neurons fast enough to process the moment. instead your body responded with your skin heating up with anticipation, heart beating out as much adrenaline to keep up. the daze is getting foggier by the second as he trails his fingers up and down your slit, spreading the wetness and circling your clit on the way up. and you think you’re about to get accustomed to the pace he’s set, when he delves between your folds and you moan out loud so abruptly that the nearby patrons looked around wondering where it came from.

you can feel spencer’s shit eating grin behind you as he moves his head down to leave love bites on your neck. if he can feel your bluff dissipating, he’s not saying anything. his fingers set a painfully slow rhythm, and you grind down trying to get any more friction to reach your peak. he’s hitting you in all the right spots that make you see the stars and beyond, leaning your head back on his chest as you barrel towards your climax. you feel yourself mere seconds away from reaching, and spencer suddenly pulls his fingers out, making you whine out in protest, “wh- what are you doing?”

spencer grabs your wrist and starts dragging you through the sweaty bodies surrounding you, tightening his grip with a small smirk as he passes a few of the guys you were dancing with earlier. suckers.

he pushes the doors open with a force and while the cool air is attempting to return your body to homeostasis, the anticipation of where he’s going overtakes you, “spence, where are we going wh-“ you cut off your sentence with a gasp as he handles you flush to the door of his car. then it’s just silence for a few moments. no loud bass or weird dudes, just the two of you. the only sound that can be heard are your breaths competing for prominence. you look up at him and focus on the details of his face illuminated by the moonlight, trying to read his expression. his honeyed eyes have fully darkened to a lustful hickory, and suddenly you felt like a gazelle being preyed on by a lion.

he reaches into his pocket and unlocks the car with a soft beep. it’s the focused eyes on you that drive you to open the door, but it’s the subtle silent nod of his head towards the car that makes you move inside waiting for him to join you. he climbs in after you, shutting the door and locking it.

spencer moves to the middle seat and allows his legs to spread open, he taps his thighs and faintly says, “come here.”

you shuffle closer and swing your legs over him, your dress rising up a little as you fully sit on his clothed crotch. and now you realize the corporeality of the moment. it’s like, really real now. all this time pining after the boy genius with no luck and now he’s got you in the backseat of his car and your panties crooked, waiting for you to move. the bravado you wore and so tightly held onto for a majority of the night comes crashing down like a shattered vase, and you’re not sure if you have any more in you to salvage the pieces. you may be a profiler, but try as you might you are not a mind reader, yet you so desperately want to know what he’s thinking. is it too much to ask what this means? will it overwhelm him to say you’ve dreamt about this moment for many nights, and how those dreams went on till the early morning when he’d stay and brush your hair back with a temple kiss. the whispers of sweet nothings sticking to you like honey as you got ready for the day. are these questions you even want to know the answer to?

you may not be a mind reader, but he is dr. spencer reid, who noticed your demeanor change after too long of a silence.

“hey,” he holds your chin delicately to your eyes, “it’s okay if you want to stop, i’m sorry for tak-“

it’s your turn to cut him off, “no! no i, i still want this, i just,” you falter.

“just what, baby?” he coos softly.

it makes tears well up in your eyes, you hope he can’t see them, “i’ve just wanted this for so long, and it’s probably embarrassing that i’m admitting this now of all times, but i don’t know if i can handle this meaning more to me than it does to you.” you confess quietly.

spencer listens to your admission and gingerly resecures his arm behind you, a position he thinks is starting to become second nature. he rubs soft shapes into the small of your back, “what makes you think that?”

“because i basically threw myself at you tonight, and it seems to be the first time you noticed me.” you say halfheartedly. 

“you think i don’t notice you?” he whispers, leaning in to leave soft kisses in the crook of your neck. spencer is dumbfounded, confused at how you reached such a conclusion. but as a man of science, he feels there’s only one way to prove himself. he breathes your name out, “can i show you how much i notice you? please?”

you nod, at least you could commit this moment to memory if it was all you’d have left of him. he presses his lips to yours for the first time that night, your breath faltering as he becomes more feverous with his attacks. slotting his tongue with yours, your hands move up to his silky hair to take purchase in. he lets out a groan as he pulls back from you, “i need to taste you.”

he guides your body to lean back on the center console, the only way his tall figure would be able to accommodate this position. your legs are still split on either side of his legs, using your hands to prop yourself up to watch his movements. he hooks his fingers on the sides of your panties and slowly slides them down, moaning at the way your slick causes resistance as he pulls them off your legs. wrapping his arms under your thighs to lift you up to face level, he places small kisses on your inner thighs as he makes his way to your core. he places a final kiss on your center before licking a long stripe up to your clit. moaning out wantonly, he continues his ministrations and kitten licks all over you, circling back up to your clit after each round.

“spence..” you whine out. he moves his focus to your clit, circling and sucking till you’re squirming in his arms so much has to grip your thighs. your hands are fussing through his hair, gripping and pulling to find something to ground you. spencer then slips his fingers into your core for the second time tonight, and you lose it.

he’s pumping his fingers in and out, that all you can hear is the squelching noises of your cunt. adding another one, you’re unable to stay still anymore, as if you were before.

“oh my fuck, spencer. i’m gonna cu-, cum. please don’t stop, don’t stop, don’t stop.” you moan out filthy.

spencer unlatches his mouth for a moment, “come for me, baby.”

your orgasm crashes down on you like a wave breaking on the shore. it’s all consuming, leaving you shaking and breathless and he lifts his head from between your legs and you see his chin glistening with you in the moonlight. the sight itself is so pornographic, you can’t help but shuffle back onto his lap to crash your lips back to his, tasting yourself on his tongue. he tangles his hands in your hair as you move yours between you both, unzipping his trousers to palm him through his boxers.

he breakily moans in your ear as you slowly pull back the band to take him out. the sight takes you by surprise, you knew he was big, you felt it on your ass while you were dancing. but seeing how it compared to your hand had you bulging your eyes.

“you’re so big,” you whisper. how the hell was that fitting inside of you?

spencer the mind reader places his hand on top of yours as you lazily stroke him, “we’ll go slow, don’t worry.” he can’t help but feel his ego inflate to the skies, he can’t remember the last time he had someone look intimidated by him.

nodding faintly, you gather the spit in your mouth and let it fall between you both to land on the flushed pink tip. you spread it up and down his length, setting a slow pace that had him moaning expletives in your ear.

“oh-, ohhh, fuck baby. you’re so good at that holy shit,” he says trying to hold himself together. you give him a few more pumps before lifting your hips up to guide him inside you. you move his tip to your entrance, rubbing it teasingly before spencer places his hands on your sides to stabilize you, and slowly sink you down onto him.

the second his tip pushes past your folds, you both moan out in harmony. placing your hands on his shoulders you leverage yourself to sink down further inch by inch, until your core is flush with the base of his thighs.

spencer is a man of many words, maybe too many. but right now the only word he can remember is your name as he watched you take his length whole inch by inch slowly losing any restraint he had left. the pressure his cock had inside of you was heavenly. you’d never felt so full, and you could tell he was trying so hard to stay still as you adjusted above him.

when you bottom out spencer throws his head back against the seat, “oh that’s it, good girl,” you clenched around him. “you okay?”

you nod in response, ignoring the way the term of endearment sent flutters to your heart, and attempt an experimental rock of your hips, causing spencer’s head to whip up and meet your lust blown eyes with his own. he adjusts his hands on the sides of your thighs and starts helping you move up and down on his length, setting a brutally slow pace.

you rest your head and moan into the crook of his neck as he continues his movements, “spencer, please, more, i can take it.”

he still can’t believe what’s happening right now, all those days he spent thinking about you in the bullpen, at home, everywhere really, and here you were begging on top of him to fuck you good.

“you still think i don’t notice you?” he says into your ear, “i have dreamt about what you’d look like bouncing on my cock, and you are blowing any idea i had out of the water.”

you whimper as he continues, “and when i’m not thinking about ruining you, i am in awe at how you walk through life. you bring so much joy everywhere you go, it’s a blessing to be able to experience you.” he says through shaky breaths.

the praise goes straight to core, with some traveling to your heart again, and you’re not sure how much longer you can hold on before you unravel physically and emotionally.

his hands are guiding you up and down at a harder pace now, “so,” thrust. “you still think,” thrust, “i don’t notice you?” he thrusts into you once more and holds you down, making sure you’re looking directly at him, “it was never an option to brush past you, you are everything to me. i didn’t know how to show that without overwhelming you. i’m sorry.”

tears well up in your eyes again, spencer notices this time and presses a small kiss on your forehead. all your senses feel like they’re in overdrive, unable to comprehend anything right now. your skin feels like it’s on fire as he rolls your hips faster to meet his ruts.

“spence, i- i’m so close.” you whine desperately. 

he slips his hand between you both to rub your clit, “i know baby, i’ve got you. let go for me.”

his words were enough to break the dam, your second climax of the night hurling towards you. the white hot feeling overtook your whole body, shaking and clenching above him. your grip on him was threateningly vicious, probably leaving deep crescent marks in the nape of his shoulders. you wish the euphoria would last forever if it meant having spencer like this. as you came down from your high, the two of you were still moving together, slowly rocking your hips to meet each other. once you were grounded again, you pushed through the sensitivity in your core to rise up on his length, just barely leaving the tip in before you slid back down fast and hard, now focusing on spencer reaching his peak.

“oh jesus, fuck.” spencer moaned out brokenly.

“come on spence you can do it,” you taunted as you clenched down, “come inside me, make a mess of me please.” a rush of confidence flowed through as you whispered into his ear, and spencer held your hips to help you bounce faster on him.

spencer let out a loud groan as you felt the hot spurts coat your insides, he was leaving matching crescent marks on the sides of your hips as the ones on his shoulders, making sure all of him was left in you. feeling him soften inside, you remained on his lap with him sheathed in you. you both are breathing heavily, leaning back to hopefully give you both some relief from the sex filled air. looking around the car you realize that all the windows are fogged up and let out a tiny giggle.

“what’s so funny?” he looks up at you slightly amused and very out of breath.

“no it’s just, the windows are such a dead giveaway for what we just did in here.” 

“eh, i don’t really care what people think.”

“gasp, dr. reid wants to let the world know he has car sex with random girls?”

he leans in to bite your neck playfully, “random? did nothing i said during all that register for you?”

you yelp and attempt to play dumb, “actually i don’t remember a word, you might have to jog my memory. maybe even recreate the circumstances to help with cementing it. i read about situational memorization where certain scenarios are easily remembered when there’s a big event to anchor it to.”

he swears he could’ve melted on the spot at you explaining a concept you’d read about to him, “careful sweetheart, calling it a big event might inflate my ego a little too high.”

“i mean, i can tell it worked,” you tease as you feel him harden inside of you again, “so tell me genius, how many times does a scenario have to happen for me to remember the information?”

“i guess we’ll have to find out, don’t we?”

[artdcnaldson]

okay but PLEASE elaborate on Olympics!Art AU

TeeHee

Rating: E (18+)

Warnings: SMUT (p in v), feral obsessive behavior, infidelity

A/N: And you would do it too, that’s all I’m saying. Also IMPORTANT note: I love Tashi, she is a mother to many. However this fic has a very obsessive reader who just wants to fuck a married man, at Tashi’s expense

Maybe you were a bad person.

You’d met Art and Tashi Donaldson before— a year back at an event held for Tennis’ rising stars. That was you, some other guys who had done well in the Juniors, a girl from an Ivy League, and more people that fell into the blind spots of your interest..

You must’ve looked so sweet in your formalwear, approaching the couple with shaking hands so you could say just how big of a fan you were. You had no ill intent then, not when you were face to face with two people you’d idolized since you were twelve and watching the Junior US Open. That night you’d taken a deep breath as you stared at the ceiling of your home, feeling like you’d made it.

Sure, Art was handsome, and you’d lived the past decade harboring a massive celebrity crush on him, but he was married, he was untouchable. Art Donaldson oozed that sweet, devoted husband shtick. Anniversary posts, birthday posts, Valentine’s Day posts, Mother’s Day posts. He had a daughter, he posted about how much he loved being a dad.

You were fine accepting that your fantasies of fucking Art Donaldson were strictly fantasies. But that was before you qualified and had to see him every fucking day.

Art Donaldson, who held open doors for you, who talked to you casually, like he might an old friend. Art, who stood in the long line in the food court with you, ate something he probably shouldn’t have, and asked that you don’t tell Tashi.

And you’d smile conspiratorially, and assure him his secret was safe with you. The implication being that you’d keep that secret, and more. As many as he’d ask you to, really.

You’d see him on a practice court, running drills with his wife, and feel the heat of jealousy in the pit of your stomach. You’d turn away, focus on your own game, practice until your hands were aching and sore.

“Where’s Mrs. Donaldson?” You asked one night after you’d been sexiled and had to sit out in the hallway waiting for your roommate to finish up. Art leaned against the wall, standing tall above you, so you had to crane your neck. You liked that point of view, on your knees looking up at him, you wondered if he liked it too.

“Oh, she’s staying in a very nice, very expensive hotel room with our daughter right now,” he said with a grin. “As soon as my events are done, that’s where I’ll be too.”

“Oh,” you said, bringing an easy smile to your lips. “Well, we’re all glad you’re here now.”

“We?” He questioned.

You gave a coy smile, batting your lashes so sweetly. “Maybe just me.”

There was a strange expression on his face for just a moment. Then he laughed like it was nothing. He wished you a goodnight and good luck in your matches the next morning, and disappeared into his own room.

You medaled in women’s doubles. They published photos of you and your partner biting the silver between your teeth. That same day, Art Donaldson took home gold. You were there to see the very end of his last match— every single collision of racket against ball, every step, every grunt of exertion. Your thighs clenched as you watched, fists balled up in the fabric of your skirt.

You wanted him in a needy, desperate sort of way. Like a groupie for a rock band, or a virgin being sacrificed on a mountaintop. You watched him celebrate with a kiss from Tashi and felt that same need like an open wound. Jealousy was festering in you like a rot.

The dive bar wasn’t what you’d expected. Something Art had found with a quick google search and a few minutes with a translation app. He’d knocked on your door to invite you, wearing the beaming smile of someone on top of the world.

“So you’ll come?” He asked after he told you all about it.

“Mhmm,” you said, heart hammering against your ribs. “I’ll come.”

And there you were— in a dress that hardly qualified as such— standing so close to him that you could smell his expensive cologne. His arm would brush yours, he’d glance over and apologize with a warm hand to your arm. You’d clench your thighs together and peer at him through your lashes. It’s fine, don’t worry about it.

A few of the other players disappeared to play darts, or watch the late night coverage of the other sports still competing. You stuck by Art’s side, happily allowing his attention to fall on you completely.

“I saw parts of your doubles final,” he said finally. He was drinking a brand of beer you’d never seen before— something local, you supposed. “You looked beautiful out there.” Your eyes lit up, and then he added. “The way you were playing, I mean— it was phenomenal.”

“Well, I’m no gold medalist,” you said. You let your hand rest on his arm, and looked up at him. The fingers on your other hand toyed with the edge of the medal, warm from where it had been flush against his chest.

He swallowed. You felt his muscles flex beneath your touch, but he didn’t discourage it. Not one fucking bit.

It wasn’t lost on you that Tashi wasn’t there. Not that it was really her type of venue, from what you had gathered. It wasn’t lost on you that Art Donaldson was at a dive bar, drinking random Brazilian beers, instead of celebrating with his wife, with his daughter. Fuck all those posts on his instagram— if he really was a good husband, a faithful one… that’s the only place he’d want to be.

“I saw your match too. I ran right over after my ceremony to watch,” you confessed. It was hard to concentrate on anything else— you were standing so close to him that you were nearly pressed completely into his body.

His lips twitched in interest. “Yeah?”

You nodded. “Mhmm. It was incredible. You were so dominant out there, just taking what was rightfully yours.”

He swallowed again, gravitating closer. Your tits were practically spilling out of your dress— he probably got the perfect eyeful when he eased you closer with a firm hand on your lower back, when he looked down at you through blown pupils.

“You looked so fucking hot out there, Art,” you said, lips brushing against his jawline. “You can’t even imagine how it felt sitting there, watching you win. How turned on I got… how wet.”

Art exhaled a shuddery breath. “Jesus Christ.”

It must’ve been a while since he had someone want him this bad, you thought. Clearly he needed it— needed a pretty, sweet thing to tell him just how much they wanted him. You could be that. You could do that.

“I’m not wearing panties,” you whispered in his ear. His grip on you tightened and you had to suppress a giddy smile. “You can feel if you want. I won’t tell.”

He swore under his breath and glanced around. Everyone was too occupied or drunk to give a shit about what the two of you were up to.

He grabbed your hand, pulled you away into the bathroom. You looked pretty even then, in the flickering lights, sat up on the edge of the sink eagerly awaiting his attention.

When he wrenched your thighs apart, he was greeted by the pretty sight of your glistening cunt— sticky with arousal and need. His hand fit there perfectly, right where you needed it.

“Fuck,” you gasped. His fingers rubbed through your slit— wet and hot and aching for him. Your head fell back, knocking against the dirty mirror. “Want you to use me— whatever you want, just take it.”

And you meant it too. This was your teenage idol— a man you’d touched yourself to the thought of countless times. He owned your body, your sexuality, as much as you did. It was only fair he took from it whatever he pleased.

You watched with hungry eyes as he fumbled with the button of his pants, then shoved them down just enough to free his dick.

Your mouth fucking watered with the need to feel it on your tongue, nudging against the back of your throat. You weren’t opposed to begging— you nearly started before you got it into your hand.

Warm, thick, pulsing. Precum beaded at his tip, so you smeared it around the sensitive head of his cock with your thumb. He groaned, bucked into your fist once, twice before he moved your hand.

“Spread your legs wider for me,” he said, slapping the inside of your thighs. You obeyed wordlessly, spreading yourself out invitingly. He pressed closer, so you felt him rutting his dick against your pussy, coating it in your arousal. “God, you’re so fucking wet.”

The words came out with equal parts disgust and awe. He probably thought you were a slut with the way you were throwing yourself at him. You wished he’d just call you that, spit it in your face.

Your cunt pulsed with need, aching to be filled up finally. The culmination of years of fantasizing. Art pressed himself against your entrance, sinking himself into you with the slow reverence of a man who liked making love.

He buried himself inside of you and had to stop moving to keep from cumming then and there. He was a perfect image of restraint— the way his fingers dimpled the flesh of your hips in a bruising grip.

Art wanted to be a gentleman— to give you time to adjust to the size of him, to ease you into it and let the pleasure be a slow, soft burn. He pulled out nice and easy, slid himself into your wet, throbbing cunt. That was all fine and good, but you knew it was just pretense. You were laid out and wanting, begging for him to use you as his own personal toy.

“I’m not your wife, Art.” You met his gaze, locked your ankles around his waist. “Fuck me like you mean it.”

The first thrust, the first real one, knocked the air from your lungs. That silence didn’t last long— because you got what you wanted— he was really fucking you, bullying his cock into your pussy with the same need and desperation that you felt.

“Jesus Christ, you’ve— fuck— you’ve got no fucking self respect, huh?” He pounded into you, leveraging his grip to pull you against him, really impale you on his dick.

The moan that escaped you was pornographic. If he kept talking to you like that, if he kept fucking you like that, you’d cum.

“You don’t even care, do you? This fucking pussy’s squeezing me so tight— you fucking love this,” His voice was strained, interrupted by groans and pants.

You moaned, eyes rolling back. “Love this,” you echoed. When you looked down, at the sight of him splitting you open, of the ring of creamy arousal circling the base of his dick, you felt dizzy. Like you were standing on top of a tall building and looking down. Sort of out of body, tethered in the present by brutal thrusts into your pussy and the wet, slapping sounds of your bodies joining.

Your fingers moved between your thighs, rubbing needy and insistent at your clit. So close to finishing that you wanted to cry and just ask to start over again, that you’d savor it more a second time.

“Gonna cum,” he groaned suddenly. You felt him start to pull out, to leave. It wasn’t fucking fair.

Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck— not yet, you didn’t want it to end like that. “I have an IUD,” you lied through your teeth. You used your legs, pulled him closer, deeper. “Just keep going, don’t stop. I’m right there.”

He moaned against your throat— holding you tight, fucking into you with animal need. Your fingers moved against your clit with an insistent need. It didn’t take much to push you over the edge. Your moans so loud that Art had to put his medal between your lips to shut you up.

And you were so pliant— letting him drill into your aching, used cunt, your mouth tasting like metal. You felt his rhythm falter— one, two harsh thrusts that knocked muffled moans from you until he came, painting your insides thick, creamy white.

He stayed buried inside of you for a while— panting, doing his best to catch his breath. You spat out the medal and it fell back against his chest, spit slick and shining. You reached up, ran your fingers along his face, reverently, sweetly. A lock of hair fell into his eyes and you tucked it away with delicate fingers.

When he pulled out, you felt that sinking feeling of loss and jealousy in your chest. He redressed in silence, turned away like he couldn’t stand to look at you, or the mirror. Shame rolled off of him in waves that you wanted to brush away.

It wasn’t bad, you’d assure him. You’re a tennis star, you’re the greatest in the world. You should have whatever you want, whenever you want it.

But you didn’t say that. You just tidied yourself up as best as you could and slipped back out into the bar. If anyone noticed, they said nothing.

[ickie]

♡ ... THE SECRET OF US \ PROLOGUE ...

pairing ... lando norris x leclerc!reader summary ... how did something so beautiful turn into something so terrible ? warnings ... none notes ... just a prologue for my upcoming fic ! first chapter will be published on wednesday, july 15 ! ... masterlist ... next chapter ...

it wasn’t like anyone plans to get their heart broken. it’s not like it was in your winter plans to fall for a boyishly handsome brit who seemed to be everything you had dreamed of since you were a child. how were you supposed to know that a winter trip with your brother and some of his friends would end in one of the worst heartbreaks you’d ever experienced?

the once picturesque setting where laughter echoed through narrow streets dusted with snow had been tarnished, the purity almost seeming too good to be true. alongside the cozy charm of winter festivities, his charming smile had captured your heart, promising a fairy tale amidst the flickering lights and crackling fires. he was the embodiment of every hope and longing you had harbored since childhood.

but then, like a cruel twist of fate, that smile turned. innocent glances turned to ones of uncertainty, and whispers of forever morphed into awkward silences. the promises he had whispered during nights shared beneath the stars now seemed like a distant, bitter echo.

the crisp winter air burned like that of a hot, humid summer day, packed full with unanswered questions and unspoken doubts. every moment replayed in your mind, searching for clues missed, signs overlooked, wondering what you could’ve done differently to make him stay.

as you stared out the window to the snow-covered landscape, the very essence of winter—the purity, the quiet, the promise of new beginnings—now felt tainted by the ache of a heart betrayed. and amidst the chill that seeped into your bones, a single thought persisted: how could something so… pure turn into something so sinister?

[dorkydiaz]

CAN I GO WHERE YOU GO? 920 words | bucktommy | 7x06 coda a/n: look it me! i wrote something :P just a soft little thing that i couldn't stop thinking about <3 idek how long it has been since i published something episode related lol so be kind and gentle if you please<3 title is kinda just what fit best lol, enjoy!

Buck twirls his niece around as music plays quietly over a speaker, barely loud enough to hear over the quiet chatter. He swings her up and deposits her next to her newly-wed parents, and they look perfect. Buck remembers the reception of her first wedding, his cheeks didn’t hurt from smiling then, they do now, and by the looks of it so do Maddie’s. 

“You might want to–” she points toward the chair in the corner that holds his beast of a boyfriend, a bottled water coming dangerously close to slipping from his exhaustion-induced slack grip. 

“I should get him home, the adrenaline has worn off. I love you both so much, and you,” he ruffles Jee’s hair and leans in for a group hug, placing a kiss in his sister's hair. If he thinks too hard about everything he might cry, so he leaves unsaid and squeezes her tight hoping she understands. 

He takes the water bottle from Tommy’s hands and stands between his legs, gently cupping his cheek, “Hey, you are exhausted, let’s get you home. I’ll drive you.” 

And Tommy looks up at him through his eyelashes– how had Buck not noticed those before now? 

“You don’t have to– you should stay here. I’m sure Maddie–” 

“What she wants is for me to get you home safely, and visiting hours are almost over anyway.”

He can see Tommy trying to come up with a rebuttal, his mouth opening and closing as he tries to say something and then gives up.

Buck grabs Tommy’s turnout coat from the back of the chair, folding it over his arm and taking Tommy’s hand in his. 

“Congratulations again you two,” Tommy says as enthusiastically as he can before they turn toward the door.

—

Buck is awkwardly sitting at a table in the common area of Harbor. It feels weird to be in another station without his reason for being there within sight. Tommy had assured him that it was okay for him to sit, and if anyone gave him trouble to tell them that he was there with him. 

“Buckley! What are you doing here?” a familiar voice nearly makes him jump out of his seat. 

“Lu-Lucy! Hi.” 

She stands behind the chair across from him, leaning on her elbows on the top of the chair. And she actually waits for him to answer. 

“I-I’m waiting for Tommy. Had to swing by to drop off his turnouts and get his bag.”

Her brow crinkles a little and she cocks her head, “his shift ended hours ago?” 

“He uhhh, he came to Maddie and Chimney’s wedding. He’s pretty exhausted so I’m driving him home.” 

“He went to a wedding after that fire? In his turnouts?”

“It was at the hospital, wild story really. And I asked him to be there, so he was.” he blushes a little as he watches her do a little math. 

“Donato! Are you bullying Evan?” Buck can hear the smile on Tommy’s lips as he feels his hand land on his shoulder. He looks up at his boyfriend, and Tommy leans down, giving him a light kiss on his cheek. He looks a little brighter after rinsing off in the station showers and changing back into his Henley. 

“I was wondering why you had table privileges,” she smiles. “So, Chim finally got hitched huh, tell him and Maddie congrats for me.”

“Will do,” Buck smiles at her, and she walks away toward what he assumes is the snack cabinet. “Let’s get out of here and you into bed huh?” 

“You read my mind.” 

—

There’s a stillness in the car as they sit in Tommy’s driveway. 

“Evan, come inside. You’ve had a long stressful day too.” 

It’s like Tommy is inside his head, he doesn’t want to be alone tonight, not when he didn’t have to be. 

“And if the texts you sent me last night are any indication, you also did it all while hungover which I’m sure wasn’t all that pleasant. And, besides, you still owe me at least one dance.” 

“You are practically falling asleep sitting up and you want to dance?” 

“It’s what I was promised.” 

TOmmy reaches over the console between them, turning Buck’s face toward him, leans in and kisses him in earnest. Not quite as intense as their greeting earlier and not as gentle as their first. “Just come inside please,” he says just above a whisper against his lips. 

“Okay.” 

—

Buck takes in Tommy’s little house, it’s cozy with some of its years showing. 

“You can move past the entryway Evan. Just take your shoes off.” 

“Oh,” he replies softly, barely having noticed that he was slightly frozen. He toes off his shoes.

“C’mere,” Tommy holds out his hand, a song that Buck doesn’t know the name of softly drifting from the speakers. He lands in his boyfriend’s arms and it feels like it’s exactly where he is supposed to be. One hand on his neck, the other clasped together in Tommy’s, his other hand resting on his waist. It’s mostly quiet as they sway in the middle of the small living room. 

“You know, I never really got the whole hot firefighter thing until I saw you walk through those doors?” 

“You really are adorable.” Tommy smiles.

“Thank you for today. It means a lot that you did really try your damndest and succeeded.” He says earnestly. 

“Of course. It was important to you.” 

And Buck can’t help but kiss him for that, and he does, because he can. 

[jeonzaxs]

amidst chaos ⋟ jjk

SUMMARY; you shouldnt harbor these feelings not amidst chaos.

pairing; jeon jungkook x reader

genre; love at first sight! zombie apocalypse!au

warnings; just two idiots in love. slight against. angst. mention of blood, bruises and death. just too much fluff i think or cliche. lower case intended.

word count; 700+

notes; another repost from my old account!! my second published baby. im pretty proud about this you could say. feedback and reblogs mean so much to me, please dont be shy to. enjoy <3

your eyes drift to the handsome looking man, a few scratches adorning his face and blood leaking from his nose, a gasp leaves your mouth as you turn back to the other who hit him, eyebrows furrowed in anger "fuck- jay, i know we cant trust him yet but you cannot give him a bleeding nose, idiot” you cuss, smacking the red head on his nape as he hisses and steps back without a word.

when your eyes meet the male again, you find yourself breathless. gold shadows the corner of your vision, and jungkook finds the surrounding mute, only your eyes and voice echoing throughout. you look away, clearing your throat, and speaking up "why are you here?” voice cautious as the man replies, "i'm Jungkook, and i was hoping you had some space for another person?" he asks, voice saccharine sweet, and you inspect him, eyes wandering over him as he rolls up his sleeves and bares his neck to show that he’s void of any bites and that he’s not infected. you nod and introduce yourself "i'm _____, i run this group". 

jungkook perks up at your name, he has seen you in class often, you were always within your book and the fact that you're running a group in this apocalypse amuses him, and he can't help but like you even more.

he lends his hand out, a boyish smile playing on his lips. You look up at him, hesitantly shaking his hands, and then your eyes glare at Jay, daring, and he clears his throat. "uh, i'm sorry" he mumbles before stepping backwards, his girlfriend tilting her head as she introduces herself "i'm lily, welcome" a small teasing smile plays on her lips as she looks at you, throwing a playful glance and to that you hiss like a cat.

jungkook wipes his bleeding nose and observes you, he likes the way you hiss, he likes the strands of hair falling to the sides of your face and wishes to push them behind. he repeats your name in his head and thinks that it definitely suits you. the small scratches and the worn out green uniform compliment your figure so much that he finds it hard to just look away. he clears his throat again, attempting conversation "well, uh do we have a schedule or something like that?" you nod to that question, but your eyes shying away from him "yes, we do. we take trips to the canteen to find food, and we also take rounds guarding at night".

he sits down by the chair beside him and asks again, curiosity brimming his head "have you guys had any attacks? any infected?" he hopes you answer again, just to hear your voice, but your friend beats it to him as she replies "yes. we’ve had around two attacks and any infected? none, yet." her face is absent of fear and he notices that all of you look calm in such a situation. 

it's been five days since the whole rupture occurred, so many died and many cried. you and your friends have survived by luck, is what you think. you're grateful that you have found this room to sleep and eat. scars litter all of your faces, most of them have dried up and you now take a look at jungkook and he seems courageous, his doe-eyes warming your heart and giving you some hope. you find some sort of safety in his being.

jeon jungkook is not unknown at all, he is the infamous heartthrob, known to be good at everything. he is disciplined and strong. He is athletic and sweet. jungkook is the one who receives endless letters on valentine's day and has a group of girls always cooing at him, but he is well mannered and does not swell with pride.

you would be lying if you said you hadn't noticed him, the first time you stepped onto campus. he turns heads everywhere he goes, and now, seeing him sitting by that chair. your heart beats faster, breathing labored. you should not be harboring such feelings in the middle of blood and screams. not when you could get bitten anytime. not amidst chaos.

all rights reserved © jeonzaxs. reposting, translating and modifying is not permitted.

[cupidkenji]

Virginia vampire - 1/2

Pairing: Aaron Hotch x vampire!fem!reader Cw: SLOWBURN BRO, descriptions of hunting/blood consumption, angst, fluff, non-descriptive mentions of an abusive dad, cursing, typical criminal minds violence, possible ED trigger (more in disclaimer), idk bro you tell me Summary: You escaped your scientist father when you were 17. When requested by Quantico PD to deal with a stemming serial killer, you realize you recognize the wounds. You used to be the one inflicting them. Disclaimer 1: Reader is chubby! She's not physically described here at all but a fat woman is always the MC. Disclaimer 2: Reader lives strictly on blood. This story discusses themes of intense bloodlust/hunger, UNINTENTIONAL avoidance of blood (food), and physical consequences due to not eating (more so in the next chapter). This is NOT pro-ana or anything like that, and while these themes are explicitly negative, they are still there and may affect those struggling. Please look after yourself, this is all fantasy and is not meant to trigger you. That's all <3 WC: 9.6k - read part 2 here Like I said, please head the disclaimer as I would hate for anyone to feel negatively about this. I personally have struggled with a restrictive ED and would not write/publish anything I felt would trigger/contribute to pro-ED rhetoric. I'm actually rlly proud of this one I think it's cool and neat and I'm excited to share. I also looped eat your young by Hozier while writing this so would recommend as ambiance. Enjoy <33

The Quantico streets seemed to get darker the more you came out. It was late - technically early, as midnight had passed two hours ago - but still a time of pungent heathenism. Nobody out at this hour had good intentions. You knew yours were certainly questionable, discreetly following a man decked in club attire as he stumbled his way down the street. This was the worst part - having to stalk behind them, giving you nothing but time to humanize them in your head. He was probably going home, back to safety. The process of hiding a body is one you could recite with your eyes closed. It’s bitter and metallic, but familiar, and you seemed to project that harbored guilt onto him. It wasn’t as though he’d never see that safety again, you didn’t kill people anymore. Your unusual diet required this type of robbery, but you’d busted your ass for almost three years to figure out the perfect amount. The amount that keeps you just on the cusp of living, closer to death than most but still able to function effectively. The number of times you felt a heart cease it’s beating against your lips because you went too far would strike envy in the evilest of individuals. The amount you took was pure necessity - a full syringe, never a drop more. It would last you about half the week when rationed out. It was livable, doable, only ever being a problem if you couldn’t get more the exact night you needed to. 

You hated preying on drunks, the alcohol in their blood making it taste rancid, but this was the easiest target you could ask for. Beggars can’t be choosers. He took a moment to catch his breath after he nearly toppled over, and you saw your opportunity on a silver platter. Contrary to the movies, stealth was not an inherent trait you get when you live on blood, you’d gained yours from experience. You never liked being so good at this, but as you rendered the man unconscious and silenced his fall to the ground, you relished in the fact that you were. The days of amateur hunting were long over, and the cries of people as the blood rushed from their necks are ones that echo - ones that sit with you. 

You dragged the man to the innards of the closest alley, propping him against the wall and rolling up his jacket sleeve. You took off the bag hanging from your shoulders, removing a syringe and a flashlight. Since you hunted at night, it was impossible to find a vein without lighting. It was something you realized quick when you made the switch from neck to wrist. You turned the thing on, clamping it between your teeth and angling it down at his arm. Growing up with the world’s cruelest biologist as a father, you were well versed in the world of human anatomy per his insistence. You watched the vial fill with liquid, cursing your entire situation for being so despicable. The only way to properly describe your father was Frankenstein, eagerly allowing his only child to grow into the role of his monster. He’d handcrafted your DNA in a petri dish, ensuring that malice was weaved throughout your most instinctual needs. He was a well off man, respectively referred to as the brightest mind in our current age. He’d gained fame after presenting his magnum opus - the invention of literal vampirism. Somehow, something only he knew how to do, he’d made a string of DNA that derived the body’s energy from the nutrients in blood. He started with insects, impregnating beetles with the specific code, making embryos that fed purely on blood of the same species, which manifested into a hostile blood lust once the thing was born. He’d reached rodents and promised he would be ending his tests there, not wanting to breach the topic of morality and push forward with mammals. Unfortunately, your father was as honest as he was kind, so here you were. 

You finished the extraction and pulled the needle from the man’s flesh, apologizing profusely under your breath. You patched him up, a bandaid over the small hole, and hid him amongst some garbage bags. Nobody out at this hour had good intentions, and you weren’t about to offer them a possible victim for whatever desire they may be looking to express. You hated that you had to hurt him at all, no matter how minimally. The least you could do was shield him from the people who truly intended harm. You tossed the now full syringe back into your bag, the flashlight following a second later, and exited the alley. The only thing that kept your feet moving was the few days of peace you would get now that you had food. Your head pounded with the feeling of blood just sitting in your bag, the body full of blood laying defenseless just a few feet away. It was a battle you fought everyday, seeing those closest to you as two separate entities - one was a person you loved, one just a plethora of functioning veins and arteries. Their lifeforce was the closest thing to ambrosia you could imagine. It’d taken you years to get control, though, and you refused to undo that for a couple minutes of gratification. You couldn’t. Losing control would grant your father the victory he ached for, and you would die before letting that happen. You rushed to walk away, choosing to propel yourself with the image of his disappointed face rather than the breathing blood bag leaning on a dumpster. He’d killed your mother before you even got to know her, you refused to be the reason someone didn’t get to know their parent.

–

The BAU was an unwelcome sight when the time was five in the morning instead of your usual seven. You’d been ushered to the building by a sleep deprived JJ, spouting off different remarks of remorse for the early hour but needing the team there immediately. The whole table seemed to share in the disdain, as half of them could barely hold their eyes open and the other half were practically chugging shitty break-room coffee. Aaron was, surprisingly, the last to walk in. Greeting everyone with attempted normalcy while visibly fighting off his own exhaustion. His hair was messy, his torso lacking the coverage of his uniform baggy blazer. The sight of him slightly unkempt from the spontaneity of the gathering caused the air to flee from your lungs. You’d had a bit of a staring problem since you started working here, but his appearance now displayed a casualness that was making you dizzy. The deviation from his standard presentation felt strangely intimate, a more personal version of him. You looked away quickly, you had to. He took his spot next to you, having reserved that place for himself when you were first hired. He greeted you personally once he sat down, something for just the two of you. You had looked at him, about to reciprocate when JJ officially started the meeting. 

“Good morning, everyone. I’m sorry for the early start but we’ve been urgently requested by our local PD. They think we’ve got the start of a serial killer, three bodies were found last night with the same MO.”

“Three bodies?” Morgan’s words were laced with bewilderment. “As in three people were actually killed or three bodies were dumped?” The table knew what he was getting at. Three murders in a single night was quite the task. Especially considering the police had to find the bodies, meaning no pedestrian had seen anything worth reporting.

“They’ve left the crime scenes untouched for us, but they’re betting all of them happened in the same time span.”

As if he could read your mind, Hotch asked the main question that’d been circling your mind. “How are they being killed?”

“That’s why we’ve been asked for.” JJ started distributing files containing the crime scene details. “All the victims so far have the same stab wound in their carotid. Nothing had been stolen, and they were all found in alleyways. For the amount of blood that comes with puncturing an artery, there wasn’t a drop found at the scene.” 

“No signs of torture?” Morgan was looking at the photos as he asked, double checking the information he was reading in the file.

“All of them were basically untouched from the neck down. There weren’t even indications of defense.” JJ shook her head as she spoke. “This guy definitely gets the jump on them.”

“A blitz attacker.” Prentiss concluded, closing her file as she reached the end of it. “Any witnesses?”

“None.” The worst answer JJ could have. “Police found them while on patrol.” 

“Alright.” Hotch stood from his seat. “Prentiss, Morgan, I want you at the first scene.” The agents nodded at the orders, exiting the room to complete the task. He looked towards Spencer, drawing his attention away from the file as he addressed him. “When Rossi gets here I want you guys at the second body.”  The man just uttered a “got it” and looked back down, waiting on Rossi’s presence to start moving. Aaron’s eyes made their way to you. “I want you with me. We’re gonna go meet the officers at the latest discovery.” You couldn’t meet his eyes, feigning preoccupation with closing your folder and simply muttering a noise of agreement before standing. 

“I told the press to keep it quiet. Last thing we need is word of a mini spree leaking to the public.” JJ informed the remaining people of this on her way out, peeking her head back through the door to say it before returning to her office. You watched Rossi finally show up and retrieve Reid from the conference room as you were leaving, heading to the car with Aaron close behind. 

Once you were buckled into the passenger seat, you started talking. “Three bodies in under twelve hours. Haven’t heard those numbers since the Barly Butcher in ‘64.” 

“Let’s hope it doesn’t reach that.” His eyes, although you couldn’t see them, went slightly vacant at the thought. He couldn’t imagine dealing with that level of killer in the modern age - he certainly didn’t want to. “One was too many. God knows we don’t need a Quantico butcher.”

You couldn’t imagine either. “No kidding.” The drive wasn’t shaping up to be a long one, seven minutes went by and you were already approaching the flashing lights of cop cruisers. You got out of the car, the sheriff swiftly coming over to talk. She had thanked you for taking the case, grateful that her precinct wouldn’t be dealing with this one alone. There were CSI already there, but you slid gloves on your hand and headed towards the body regardless. They were respectful, allowing you control of the scene, walking away as you got closer to give you space. 

You turned the woman’s neck slightly to get a better view of the injury, the image shaking the ground beneath your feet and causing the water in your tear ducts to form a haze over your eyes. There were teeth marks around the incision. Such a minor indent that it was no surprise it went over looked. You could see it because you’d once been the cause of such a thing. The closer you examined, the more parallels you drew to your beginner days. The skin around the wound was curling upwards, a sign of applied suction. No wonder they couldn’t find any blood, it’d been sucked out. You nearly fell off your feet from where you were crouching. The unsub clearly knew enough about the human body to inflict such a precise cut, pair that with the obvious motivation to feed and you got the bone-chilling realization currently seeping through you. He’d made another one. You had a sibling, and he was hungry.

–

When the regroup was called back at headquarters, you lead an uninformed and slightly confused Aaron to meet the rest of the team. He’d noticed your determination at the scene, questioning your findings and being eager to get back when you made him wait to hear about it. You wasted no time as you entered the room, pulling up the image on the big screen to properly show them your theory. 

“The unsub is drinking their blood.” Looks of defeat and absurdity were present in all of their eyes, but you continued explaining, zooming in so close that the image went slightly blurry. “If you look close enough there are teeth prints around the wound, not bite marks, but the type of print you get from resting your teeth around the wound and applying pressure. The edges of the wound are curling in and up, so it can be assumed some type of suction followed the stabbing.” Most of the team was squinting at the screen, absorbing the details you pointed out and already trying to form a timeline, a motive - something. “That’s why they couldn’t find any blood. It was consumed.”

“So we’re dealing with a vampire?” Morgan sighed, his eyes detailing a reluctant belief. He couldn’t argue with your theory yet, it was the only logical thing they had. “Maybe we should visit your dad, Y/n.” 

You scoffed at the quip, images of the man throughout your early life flashing through your head. “Funny.” You furrowed your brows at him. “You’d have to find him first.” You had slipped from his grasp when you were seventeen. The home you spent your childhood in was vacant a few years later, effectively severing all your remaining knowledge of his life. You’d never had any way to contact him, only the relics of his stories that refused to leave you. The only thing he ever spoke about was himself, and most of his tales were burned into your memory like a branding. If you were honest, you’re surprised he’d never physically branded you, he’d surely thought about it. The dread started to build in your gut. You handled most cases with a healthy distance, some could regard it as a coldness but you preferred the simplicity of your process. This, however, was impossible to deal with impersonally. This threw you headfirst into a situation you had never bothered to prep for. Not only would you be seeing how your team feels about what was essentially an early version of you, but you didn’t want to prosecute this unsub. His path was one you walked for years before acquiring the life you have now. You hadn’t been a villain, there was a high chance he wasn’t either. The bloodlust was controllable, he just needed someone to teach him. Pursuing him with the vigor of a typical unsub would wreck you. You felt protective, almost maternal. Your father had made another monster, but that didn’t have to mean they live a life of his design. You could get him out.

“Can I speak with you?” You hadn’t even noticed the analytical gaze Aaron held, too focused on your own internal spiraling. “Outside?” He motioned his head towards the hallway, instructing you to follow him.

You always felt like a kid in the principal’s office when he called you away from the team. “What’s up?” You hadn’t even waited for him to fully shut the door before you prompted the conversation. You were fully prepared to raise hell and high water to find your unsub, and you needed all the time you could get.

“Is something going on?” He always took extra time to check on your wellbeing. You figured at first it was pity, some type of undermining or an indication he thought you were less equipped for the job than others. He’d never hinted at any of those, always showing genuine concern for you, and eventually you stopped thinking he had ulterior motives. “You’ve been skittish and antsy since you saw the body. You’re speaking faster and can’t look me in the eyes. You’re nervous. Why?”

“Hotch.” You sighed his name, and he tilted his head, leaning in slightly as though pulled in by the sound. “I am nervous. There were three people murdered last night. If this guy is drinking the blood of his victims seconds after he kills, there’s no predicting how long the cool-down will be. He could strike again tonight or he could be gone for weeks. I don’t want more people losing their lives because we waited around too long. I need to figure this out.”

He could tell you were withholding something, you saw it in the way he looked at you. Thankfully, though, he allowed you to keep your secret. Breathing out a sigh of his own and just nodding. “You know where to find me if you want to talk.” 

You held back the look of pure adoration you wanted to send his way, settling for the appropriate neutrality. “I know.”

You both rejoined the team shortly after, ignoring the curious looks of your coworkers and instead inserting yourself into the conversation. Reid went over the typical blood fetishists, along with the multiple philias and phobias associated with blood consumption. All of them falling flat in one way or another. You suggested swabbing the victim’s neck for traces of saliva, Prentiss calling to request the task be performed the second you’d said it. With hours going by and the promise of lab results by tomorrow, you all said your goodbyes. You said a silent prayer under your breath for a body-less night and drove home with a plan. If he was like you, he’d be out again tonight, and you had every intention of finding him.

–

This was the first time in your life you’d ever felt thankful for your knowledge of nightlife. Patrol was amping up, tonight it was one too many cop cars on the street. Tomorrow it could be officers searching the area on foot. With no way to predict the criminal, there was also no way to predict the response, and that was scary as hell. Any attempts they were making to stop him from feeding would affect you just as bad. There hadn’t been a single event since you started hunting more ethically that you’d had to break routine. You wanted to help him, but you also needed to stop him from fucking up your regimen. You were wandering, aimless and anxious. You tried connecting to whatever energetic wavelength you might have with him considering your partial relation, getting nothing but a firm reminder of why that stuff wasn’t considered fact. You ducked away from the second police cruiser of the night, just barely evading the lights before their illumination painted your face red and blue. The alley was a welcoming partner, allowing her shadows to drape over you and create a solitude unique to that darkness. You’d heard the noises a second later - panting, consistent and ragged, followed by a period of silence before resuming. You clicked on your flashlight, shining it maybe ten feet ahead of you and feeling like someone threw sand in your eyes. He was here, dressed in jeans and a black zip-up, hood over the back of his head. You wouldn’t have been able to see him even if his hood was down - he was crouched over a woman, shoulders hunched and mouth greedily stealing what little life she had left to give. He was so small, you physically felt your lips curl in sorrow when you realized he couldn’t be more than fifteen. The woman’s fingers were still flexed, and you assumed she’d died less than a minute ago by her arm placement. They were crooked at the elbow but weirdly resting on the assailant, as though she’d been gripping his shoulders before her strength blew out with the wind. 

You waited, just a moment, stilling to see what move - if any - he would make. He was completely entrenched in his task, but you were surprised your light hadn’t set him off yet. It was only when the river ran dry that he seemed to notice your voyeurism. His head snapped in your direction so fast that you jumped on your feet a little. You thought back to how volatile you’d been in his shoes, deciding the best way to approach him would be that of a rabid animal. You inched closer, seeing him mirror you with a slight back-step. 

“Hey.” You talked quietly, breathily, trying to subdue any dominant undertones you could be carrying. “I need you to listen to me, ok?” You crouched, hoping to put the two of you on the same level. “I know you’re not trying to hurt anyone. You’re hungry, yeah? You’re hungry and I know it fucking hurts. Worse than you ever imagined it could.” You thought back to the days of captivity. Your father made you the absolute pinnacle of gluttony, feeding you even when you finally didn’t want it, engorging you with the only thing you could sustain yourself with. Going from a state of constant overflow to barely a drip-feed was agony, causing fits of hunger so extreme that it was a miracle he hadn’t hit double digits by now. “I can help you, alright? I’ve been there. It doesn’t have to be this way - I promise it’s manageable.” You really should have planned some sort of script for this, you were winging it and from the accusatory look he was wearing, you didn’t think it was working. 

You asked if he knew your father, hoping to establish some reputability in his mind and prove you knew what you were talking about. The name, though, seemed to hit him like a bullet. He took off running and blew past you so fast it knocked you over. You jumped up as quick as you’d been put down and set off after him. The kid was fast, and you knew it wouldn’t be long before you lost him. He had the advantage of being half your height in a city full of narrow shortcuts. You pleaded with him in between breaths to just listen to you, promised you didn’t want to hurt him, all of it was futile. He ducked into a subway and slipped from your grasp before you even knew you had him. Your eyes teared up from frustration, so close to being the saving grace you were desperate to be but just managing to graze it before it leaped away from you. You felt the toll of such a run immediately sodden your legs and weaken your lungs. You didn’t have nearly enough fuel in the tank to give chase, but what were you supposed to do? You’d seen him, almost had him before the acidity of your fathers name melted all the progress you were making. Fitting, you thought. You slipped your phone out of your pocket, you were still an agent who had just found a body. Another victim in a string of serial killings; if you didn’t report it and were traced at all back to the scene you could be fired - or arrested. Hotch’s contact burned a hole straight through your pupils. How the fuck were you gonna explain this? You just happened to be on a classic midnight walk alone as a woman in the city currently housing a vampiric serial killer. You could almost hear the crease of his eyebrows as you told him where you were, requesting the team be awoken and the local PD be sent to you. You’re sure he could hear the ball in your throat as your vision got watery again. He promised he’d be there soon, telling you to hang tight. He was comforting, but there was a determination in his voice that told you he wasn’t letting it go this time. You didn’t know how to prepare for whatever that meant, but you knew some worms would be leaving the can. 

Ten minutes later and you heard the familiar shout of your last name. “What the hell happened?” Morgan seemed worried you’d been attacked, scanning over you to check for any signs of injury. He wouldn’t find anything but your rapidly rising chest.

You watched the EMTs wheel away the woman in a body bag, locking your gaze on Derek when you started to feel nauseous. “I’m fine.” You crossed your arms, rationalizing that maybe a physical security would grant you the strength needed to conceal this mess. “I live right up the road. I go out walking sometimes when I can’t sleep. I just saw the body in the alley, guy was gone by the time I found her.” 

He seemed relieved at your avoidance but also completely floored by the stupidity of walking so late. “Stop walking alone at night.” He was clearly protective. “That's why some of these cases are even possible.” He looked at you, taking your story as truth without a second thought and letting a sense of mourning flood his irises. “I don’t know how I’d cope with having to put you in one of those bags.” How charming. “You get me?”

You looked at him, putting on a face of regretful understanding and simply uttered back a quiet “I got you.” to hopefully dodge all the attention he was giving you. 

He chuckled, looking behind you and gaining a sort of cringe in his smile. “Good luck with that.” He nodded towards whatever was approaching and joined the congregation of other agents and officers, essentially isolating you with the thing you’d been dreading most. Aaron Hotch.

“Aaron-” You turned around to face him but stopped talking when you saw the look he cast at you. Something so curious and pleading for the knowledge you withheld, he seemed to manually dim it with the aspect of his authority. He was your supervisor, but he cared for you as something deeper than that.

“We’re heading back to the BAU. I want you in my office when we get there. We need to talk about this.” He waited a second, letting the unusual professionalism sink into you before seeking confirmation. “Am I clear?” He was gentle in delivery, but the fear you’d betrayed him weighed heavy on you.

“Yes, sir.” You nodded, looking at him. He wasn’t mad, and you didn’t regret the decisions that got you here. Your mind was simply racing with any plausible lie you could tell him to escape this situation unscathed. He knew you better than you were even aware of, you didn’t know if you could get away with lying at all, let alone lying in excess. You just prayed he was feeling particularly forgiving, along with hoping he was especially tired due to the hour. If you lucked out, you might only have to relinquish your integrity instead of the truth.

–

The sound of his door closing felt like the final sign of your demise. He hadn’t slammed it, he’d shut it gently and moved to sit opposite you in his office chair. You couldn’t remember a time he’d been genuinely angry with you. Right now he simply reeked of desperation, of empathy, and it was that notion that kept your eyes from meeting his.

“What’s going on, Y/n?” He was so soft, the tone of his voice combing through your ears like hypnotism. You were so fucking guilty.

You stared at his name card and wondered immaturely how it would feel to share a surname with the man. “I told you what happened.”

He leaned forward, propping his elbows on the desk. “You told them what happened.” You begged him internally to just leave it alone. “Now I’m asking you to talk to me. You can’t even look at me. You seem to think that because you can conceal the standard signs of lying that nobody can tell. You slip past their radar because they don’t know your tells, Y/n.” Your heart sped up, he’d probably known you were keeping something from him before you’d even made the choice to. “The top of your middle finger covers your index when you’re lying or when you’re not telling me something, you know that? Every single time. You haven’t held a conversation in the past week without doing it.” He clasped his hands on the table, readjusting to really focus on you. “What aren’t you telling me?”

Something about him always had a way of wearing you down. You’d been smothering the feelings you held for him for years, so when he showed such devotion to you, he could wring you out like a sponge with just a sentence. You visibly deflated, shoulder slumping forward. “I saw him.”

He straightened, assessing how to tackle a statement like that. “You saw the unsub?” You just nodded. “Do you know how important that information is?” He seemed bewildered, even a little angry at the fact you didn’t tell them. “You know better than most how significant every sighting is. Why would you ever keep something like that from us?” He was speaking slightly faster, confused frustration filling his words as he continued. “It’s a miracle you weren’t hurt, Y/n. This was extremely reckless, I don’t understand how you could-”

“Hotch.” You’d never had to speak over him before. “He’s my family.” The words were coated in bile as they left you - this was a steep slope. You hadn’t anticipated sharing even that piece of information, your family history was far too close to your less than common genetic misfortune to ever be talked about. 

“...What?”

Your eyes teared up. You were going to tell him, and you were also going to cry. “I have to tell you something.” You felt the quiver of your lips, heard the shake of your voice as it circled the air. What the fuck were you thinking? 

“My father - um…lied to the public about his testing. He promised everyone that he would stop at mice, but he didn't plan on actually doing that.” You shook your head in tune with your words, speaking slowly as you thought of how to drop this bomb and cause the least amount of damage. “He kidnapped a woman, my mother. At that point he’d figured out a way to implement the DNA strand he was using on rodents into human sperm, and he managed to get her pregnant with it.”

His face went slack, an emotion reaching far beyond shock, beyond disbelief. “You mean…?”

“It’s not vampirism in the cinematic sense, Aaron. We don’t burn in the sun or have heightened senses or speed. It’s just a cruel mutation. Human blood is the only substance our body can process.”

“You - you keep saying ‘we’.” He was frantic, you didn’t blame him. “Are there more?”

“Just the unsub.” The look in your eyes was begging for acceptance, for empathy and tenderness. You hadn’t even expected him to believe you, but now you feared the possibility of him running for the hills and spilling your secret to anyone he came across. “He’s the only one I know of. I didn’t expect my father to do it again.”

“Jesus Christ.” You concealed a laugh at how expressive the confession was making him. You knew it was the worst possible time, but you’d never seen him so human. “Is this - I mean how do you live, Y/n? Are you killing people?” You understood the accusation, but that didn’t dilute the sting of it as it hit your ears.

“No, Aaron. God, no.” You rushed out a denial before he could think too hard on it. “It took me years to figure out the bare minimum I could live on, ok? It’s two full syringes a week, nobody ever dies. Ever.” He seemed out of it, you didn’t know how to gauge whether this was a good or bad reaction. You’d never told anybody. How did you even proceed in a situation like this? “Look, I know, ok? This is fucking crazy, but you can’t tell the team.” He widened his eyes at you slightly like the thought of not telling them was wilder than anything you just told him. 

“You can’t seriously expect-”

“Aaron.” You were on the brink of losing your breath. “I’m not a threat. I’ve worked here for years. I’ve lived with this my entire life and I have control. We need to focus on finding the boy and that won’t happen if they know.”

“Boy?” He furrowed his eyebrows deeper than you’ve ever seen. “He’s- It’s a kid?”

You thought back to the encounter. You could cup him in your palms. “He has to be. He’s tiny, fourteen or fifteen I’d say.” You nearly broke as you thought of the child he’d never get to be. 

“There’s no protocol for this, Y/n.” This was one of the first times you’d seen him speak with his hands. “I don’t even know how to approach it anymore. It’s hard enough dealing with a child unsub when they’re human. How do you suggest we deal with a vampire?”

“Hotch.” Your eyes held disappointment. He was coping with the situation, and you knew that, but his words still didn’t sit right with you. “He is human. A very scared and lost human boy. My dad overfed me as a kid, wanting to disable the signal that tells you when it’s enough. It’s why he’s killing so many, he must have recently broken out. You get…I don’t know, insatiable. You start and don’t know when to stop, it's just blind instinct. He doesn’t want to be hurting people.”

“You speak from experience.” You didn’t want to tell him he was missing the point, but there certainly wasn’t a mutual focus between the two of you.

“Nobody’s perfect, Aaron.” You spoke with tears lining your eyes, your past was the most shameful thing you carried with you. “I need to find him. I can help him.”

He sighed, baffled and exhausted at the entire situation. He nodded soon after. “I won’t tell them.” You felt the increase in oxygen as you practically gasped in relief.

You stood up, stopping with your hand on the doorknob. Were you running? Yes, most definitely. But he wasn’t speaking and you couldn’t imagine he wanted to stay in your company. “I promise I’m not a monster.” You didn’t quite know if you were trying to convince him of this, or if you were hoping to affirm what he was already thinking, but it was the only thing you could think to say. 

He just stared at you, eyes vacant but clearly attempting to imitate the warmth that would normally reside there. “Goodnight, Y/n.” It was such a familiar phrase that it nearly made you puke from the comfort flooding your body. You scoffed at the casual nature of the remark in the face of such an unusual time, but were still unfathomably thankful for it. 

“Goodnight, Aaron.”

–

Three days later, and you were really feeling the distance. He stopped the routine of checking in - he stopped speaking almost entirely. He spoke of you, giving you orders or assigning your assistance to others but never talking directly to you. He used to pull you aside sometimes just to ask about your day, now he wouldn’t even look at you. The bodies had only been piling, patrol increasing night by night all hell bent on catching the so-called ‘virginia vampire.’ The absolute last thing you needed was a media wave of infamy to drown the boy, but there was no stopping the press once they were off and running. You doubted it made a difference, internet access was fully forbidden within the iron fist that was life with your father. You were hopeful some type of DNA could be pulled from the bodies, as the clean up was nonexistent and some of the necks had still been wet upon police arrival, but you got nothing. Or rather, nothing within the system. Garcia had compared the results of the sample to every database in the country - sometimes branching beyond that - but nothing proved useful. It was foolish to be disappointed, obviously your father wouldn’t have registered the baby of his hostage with the required legal standards. You hadn’t even known what you wanted to find, but the presence of absolutely nothing was crushing.

With the new surveillance demands your local PD wanted to meet, the BAU ended up pitching in to night monitor with them. It wasn’t difficult by any means - just tedious. You sat in turned off cop cars for most hours of the night while trying to ignore the persistent burn of hunger that was lighting up your stomach. You knew it’d been too long since you went out, but you were out of luck. People weren’t on the street hardly at all, and even if there was a small population to prey on, the cops breathing down your neck made it nearly impossible. You’d been paired up with Morgan for the last two nights you’d done this, time moving faster with him there to entertain you. Needless to say, sitting in the dead silence of the Quantico pm with Hotch was not what you were anticipating when you came for your shift tonight. You were only two feet away from him, but you could almost gaze into the sinkhole that sat between you two. Cold and dark, brutally reminding you that you’d volunteered for this abyss when you spilled your guts. You stopped yourself from shifting in your seat as another contraction of hunger pulled at your abdominal muscles. You knew that if someone were looking, they’d be able to notice the decline in your recent performance. You were slower, more zoned out, antsy, irritable. You were good at suppressing those things, confident in your ability to conceal them, but you had a feeling the man beside you could tell. He’d been looking at you all night, analytical and lukewarm, letting the start of a conversation sit just on the tip of his tongue. The silence, though, was taking it’s toll on you. It seemed to morph into a ringing that bounced between your ears like it was determined to slip into your skull and bury itself there. You realized you would take the most awkward conversation over a night of partnered solitude. 

You wrestled with what to say, deciding to stick with your streak of brutal honesty. “Will you ever wanna talk to me again?”

He sniffed, continuing to stare forward like he was expecting the question. “I don’t know what you want from me, Y/n.” You didn’t know either. 

You took a moment to mentally gawk at his words, tripping over them in your attempt to process the answer and decide how to respond appropriately. “Anger?” You felt yourself ramp up slightly, your hands moving as you spoke. “Resentment? Sadness? I mean… you’ve just been cold and I can’t work with that, Aaron.” You looked at him, mouth slightly open as you laid your helplessness out for him to see. “I need something.”

“I just-” He shrugged, shaking his head while figuring out the words he needed to say. “You can’t expect me to adjust to that information in three days. I don’t know how I’m supposed to act around you.” It was deeper than that. You both held a sort of mutual understanding that these lumps weren’t as surface level as confusion. The woman he’d been infatuated with for years had confessed she lived on the blood of her fellow man, how the hell do you act after learning that?

You tried your hardest to be empathetic towards his situation. You’d lived with this arrangement your entire life, so it was hard to put yourself in the shoes of shattered expectation, but you tried. It hurt to hear him refer to you like you were a different entity all of a sudden - but to him, you were. “So ask me. Ask me any question you can think of. If you want to know something, I’ll tell you. I just can’t stand the silence, Aaron.” You put your hand to your forehead as you relaxed into your seat. “I miss you. I’m the same person I was a week ago.” 

You heard him sigh and shift to be leaning forward slightly. “Do you have a…” He trailed off for a second, searching for the way to put it that would ensure you understood his question. “You know, a bloodlust? Do you feel what the kid is feeling?”

The air solidified in your lungs. Yes, you absolutely fucking did. However, you weren’t going to sit there and profess your never ending homicidal urges to a man who was already struggling to accept your bare minimum. You weren’t going to scare the man you cared for more than you already had. “Um…you could call it that, I guess. I do know what he’s feeling right now, but I don’t live in his mindset anymore. It gets less the more you live with it.” You weren’t lying, per say. It truly did get easier to manage, you were simply omitting the follow up of still being a bottomless pit for the substance. Just because you weren’t enslaved to it anymore didn’t mean the constant possibility wasn’t a part of your very being. 

He looked over at you, and in the dim glow of the street light his eyes seemed fuller, pupils rivaling puddles of tar. “What does it feel like?”

Your lips parted to let out your breath as it elevated slightly. The car seemed to humidify in the moments between his last question and now. Was he actually asking that? “It feels like…this-” Jesus Chist how did you even put words to it? “this constant…pulsing…in your gums.” You thought back to the haze it used to cast over your mind. You could barely think clearly when you first got out, focused on stealing the life force from beneath the skin of others. “Your whole body just fucking aches for it.” The eye contact between you and him was searing past your eyes and sinking into your soul itself. It was different than any way you’d looked at him before, so full of remorse and pure want that you’re surprised he didn’t laugh at your patheticism.

You caught quick movement draped in a shadow from your peripheral and were knocked back into your actual purpose. You and him both exited the car, creeping up to the spot previously occupied by the figure. You didn’t see him, simply felt the force of him pelt past you and crash into your shoulder. You, to your surprise, held your footing and were running after him a second later. Hotch was just behind you, both of you sprinting desperately to catch the boy. But, just like the last time you’d walked this path, the nimbleness of his smaller frame won almost effortlessly against the two of you, and you lost him. This time, you’d lost yourself right after. You felt the nonexistent padding of concrete on the sidewalk bruise your body before you even registered you’d fallen over. The world wasn’t fading, you were very awake and very aware of the pain spreading to your entire right side. You determined - rather quickly - that your legs had just given out from lack of proper energy. The embarrassment of doing this in front of Hotch severely trumped the pain of hitting the ground. 

“Jesus.” You heard the concerned mumble come from him as he crouched down to your level. “Are you ok?”

You said you were fine, but oxygen seemed to adopt the weight of a semi-truck and it got harder to accept the necessity into your body. You simply told him to stand up, following his lead and rising from your position with difficulty you hadn’t faced before. Your legs failed you for the second time, though, and you fell back onto your knees with a small sob of exertion being expelled from your chest. He crouched back down, stabilizing himself on his knees and letting you lean against him when you couldn’t hold yourself up.

“Y/n.” The shame of your current situation kept your eyes from his, only looking at him when he forced you to. “When was the last time you ate?”

You just shook your head, weakly trying to free yourself from his hands but failing. “Patrol’s been so high I just couldn’t - “ You sniffed slightly, gasping lightly as breathing became harder to do than the chase you just gave. “I couldn’t get out.” 

He muttered ‘ok’ under his breath a few times, seemingly coming to terms with something, looking around in all directions before rolling up his shirt sleeve. The implication of the action registered instantly and you began squirming away from him. Mumbling words of disagreement that you knew he could hear.

“I can’t, Aaron. I can’t drink straight from the source - I can’t stop.” You felt your lips tremble as you recalled the feeling of impending doom clashing messily against the rush of excitement that coursed through you at the possibility. You hadn’t known that specific cocktail in years, you thought you’d go the rest of your life without feeling it again. “I can’t - please.”

“Well -” He started, pulling up his pant leg in search of the small switchblade he started carrying after being disarmed one too many times. “If we don’t do this, you’ll lose consciousness. That means they’ll take you to the hospital on an IV and you’ll have to explain why none of the nutrients are helping you.” You were so fucked. He was right, a rock and a hard place didn’t even break the surface of your situation. This was hell.

Your vision went blurry as the water in them doubled in quantity. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

“Then don’t.” Bastard. 

“Aaron-”

“You’re practically catatonic, Y/n.” He let energy surge through the response, saying it more as an exclamation than a statement. “I’m not watching you die and I’m not letting you out yourself to some random workers because you’re scared. You need blood.” He positioned the knife away from any major arteries and dug deep, exhaling slightly at the sting. Softening his voice, he looked to you again, and moved his wounded wrist slightly closer to you.“Just let me help you.” You watched it run off his wrist and swore you felt the impact of the drops as they fell like a phantom pressure lighting up your skin. He was breathing heavy, you didn’t know if you were breathing at all; only being able to gauge the depth of your existence by how badly you needed what he was offering. You hadn’t felt yourself accept the invitation, only tasted the poison of it all once it bypassed your lips. You wondered if this was how Eve had felt when she succumbed to the serpent. If so, you didn’t blame her. You would have condemned all of humanity for this feeling too. It hadn’t ever felt this personal, this euphoric. You fed on strangers, never on someone who held as much importance as him. This trampled the idea of simply knowing him, this was a bond you could never backstep. It was done, and it was terrifying. The warmth he always seemed to emanate infested in you from the inside-out, beaming through your entire body and fending off any destruction being done by the famished vines winding around you. He held you against him as it happened, safe and welcoming, and it made a heat line your stomach with such intensity that it teased the idea of burning right through you.

He wallowed in the feeling for a few minutes, only stopping the exchange when he felt his head become too heavy for his neck to hold. “Enough, enough.” His way of tapping out, the words making you detach immediately with a slight gasp that prompted your panting breath. You realized he was panting too, eyes slightly wide and skull resting uncomfortably against the brick wall that sat behind him as he recovered. You assumed your face was painted with the horror that was flooding your system, but he couldn’t see the extent of the expression in the darkness surrounding you. “Does it always-” He was cut off by the approaching vehicles of your team and other officers. It was time for a shift change, and you felt a small sob intertwine with your exhaling breath and extend to the air around you. With your newly acquired strength, you got up and limped to the closest cop car. You forced away the urge to cry as you asked the officer to take you home, claiming an urgent need to check on your pets. Just add lying to an officer to your list of sins committed in the last 24 hours. You watched your team congregate around the still bleeding Hotch and bit your tongue. His actions had been so instinctual, so automatic in the way he rose to the occasion. He’d given you something nobody ever had, and you weren’t sure you would ever be looking at him again. 

–

In the week that had dragged by since then, bodies were being found significantly less than they were. You’d successfully halted all interaction between your boss and you - which is much easier said than done - and had essentially treated him as though he didn’t exist. It hurt him - visibly - and you despised being the one to instill such a wounded haze to his eyes, but you couldn’t help it. No amount of oral hygiene procedures could singe the taste of him off your tongue. If you let the thoughts linger in your mind too long, you could almost feel the flow of his blood cascading down your throat. It threw you so effortlessly back to your freshly escaped fledgling days that it fucking horrified you how badly you wanted it. You really should have assumed that consuming the blood of someone you treasured would dramatically increase the craving. You weren’t prepared, not even slightly, and that would certainly manifest into some less than work appropriate advances should you acknowledge your boss again. 

The lack of frequent bodies unfortunately didn’t reduce the amount of cops on the street, but you’d managed to slip back into your routine. It was about ten times harder than it used to be to both evade officers and find people outside but you were fed, and that was all you chose to focus on. You had left tonight’s guy under a park platform a couple blocks over, having to resort to unconventional means when hiding them post-theft. You hadn’t stopped your search for the boy, having been out every night since it started. Sometimes on the clock, sometimes off - always trying to think outside of the box. Clearly, that all proved futile, as there was a boy sitting on your front steps practically consumed by the surrounding shadows when you arrived home. You simply continued your trek, stopping maybe five feet away and giving him the space to control the situation. He looked up at you, pulling down his hood and standing to his full height. He was practically gleaming in the dim porch light, his skin seemed to reflect the moon in a way only rivaled by the finest china. 

“What did you mean?” He was as timid as a mouse, looking at the ground as he spoke. “You saw me that night in the alley and you said you knew what was happening. What did you mean?”

You couldn’t say you were surprised your father didn’t inform him of your existence. Knowing the man, he would most likely deny your relation if questioned directly. “I’m like you, buddy.” You slowly let the bag on your back swing forward to a place of accessibility, grabbing the vial of the inky substance and flashing it slightly before returning it to your bag. “I’d offer you some, but I can’t imagine you’re needing it.” You swung it back to rest behind you again, settling the straps comfortably on your shoulders.

He furrowed his eyebrows, confused but apprehensive, as though the motion might upset you. “You live on that?”

You chuckled at his innocence, barely being able to comprehend the pure dichotomy you were talking to. You understood it fully, but such a sweet boy holding such intense homicidal capabilities was an absurd notion. “Took me a while.” You nodded as you confirmed his question. “But yeah, about two of these a week.”

Disbelief quickly befriended the features on his face. “You aren’t…hungry?”

You looked at the boy with undiluted sympathy, you knew the feeling he hinted at well. If you were him right now, you’d have probably lashed out in a jealous rage at such an ability to control consumption. You hadn’t believed it was a livable amount until you’d contained yourself within it’s limits. “A little, I won’t lie to you. But it’s well worth it to avoid killing someone. You get used to it after a while.” He simply looked down, and you realized you might have made him slightly guilty with your wording. In an eager attempt to pivot the conversation, you told him your name, hoping to get a proper introduction from him.  

“I’m Daniel.” You crouched down after he said that, wanting to open him up a little more by shrinking below his height. “You know my dad?”

You smiled at the ignorance, it wasn’t often somebody didn’t know exactly who resided on your family tree. “I do. He’s actually my dad too.” You preyed with everything in you that you were coming off as comforting, docile. You wanted him to trust you. “How old are you, Daniel?”

“Twelve.” Jesus Christ. 

You tried not to let the shock ricochet along your face. You wouldn’t earn his alliance by being wobbly, you needed to be a dependent structure for him to lean on. “You’ve got me beat, kid.” He tilted his head, the meaning of your statement lost on him. “I was seventeen when I got away. Quite an impressive thing for someone your age.” Praise, you hoped, would solidify you as a place he could receive affection. He definitely wasn’t getting it from your father. 

His eyes went wide, lips parted as you saw his head lean forward in response. “You escaped?” His breathing sped up, microscopic, something you wouldn’t have noticed had you worked in a different profession. “How?”

You felt the bottom of your stomach rip and release every ounce of hope you ever carried. Something wasn’t right. “How?” You questioned him rhetorically, mentally pleading that he wasn’t about to confirm your suspicion. “Are you still with him?”

He nodded his head with such casualty it broke your heart. You knew it was all he’d ever known, but seeing him have such peace with his predicament was a sight made of pure devastation. “Yeah.” He sighed out the response. “He says there’s no use in running away. That if I decide to just stay out one night, he knows how to find me.” You notice his averted eyes, a sudden embarrassment becoming evident in his stance. “I’ve…kinda been too scared to see if that’s true or not.”

“Why don’t you come in?” It took all the effort you had to suppress the desperation begging to penetrate the look you were giving him. “I can protect you, Daniel. He’s not as tough as he pretends to be.” In all honesty, you didn’t know if that was true. He’d never sent you out on hunts when you were younger. He gave you any indulgence you wanted, absolutely trampling your hunger cues and making you a nightmare on anyone with a pulse once you finally broke out. You figured it was a fail safe for if you were ever on your own. He couldn’t have you, but you would start piling bodies and would eventually be put down when they traced it back to you. You didn’t understand his game plan here. Why did he suddenly want a high body count? Had he been starving Daniel out just to set him loose like some feral bull? 

He frantically shook his head, stepping away from you slightly and waving you off. “No, I need to go back.” He started tearing up, remembering the true reason he’d stepped foot on your lawn at all. “I need you to help me, Y/n.” He swiped at his nose as he bit back the tears. “You have to get rid of him.”

You felt your own eyes go watery at the ask. “I’m gonna get you out of there.”

He chuckled, light and short, puzzling you for a moment at what he could be finding humor in. “It’s not even about me.” He looked down. “I just wanna stop hurting people.” 

You covered the tremble in your lips in a pathetic attempt to mask the sadness that poured from you at his declaration. “I’m so sorry.”

He returned his head to the safety of his hood, refusing your apology with a shake of it. “It was nice meeting you.”

You stared at him, every instinct you had sparking with the urge to shield him. Absorb him into the atoms that made you up and let live through your screen of security. But you couldn’t, so you just sniffed, reigning in any emotion that slipped from your grasp during the conversation and sealing it back inside. “I’ll see you soon.” And then he was walking away, turning slightly to offer a wave before resuming his role as part of the abyss around you. Only one thought remained in your head - You were gonna kill your dad.

[rin-fukuroi]

𝐋𝐨𝐬𝐭 𝐢𝐧 𝐎𝐛𝐥𝐢𝐯𝐢𝐨𝐧 [𝐁𝐚𝐢𝐳𝐡𝐮]

Please do not translate or publish my works without my permission.

The originals of my works can be read here

Fandom: Genshin Impact

Pairings: yandere!Baizhu x fem!reader

Warnings: !dark content!, Zhongli's cameo, amnesia, references to somnophilia, murder and captivity.

▶• ılıılıılıılıılıılı. UNSECRET, MØØNWATER - Only The Beginning

Note: English is not my native language, so I apologize if there are errors in the text qq

God, i've been writing this for two days, almost without getting up from my chair, and now i feel like a crumbling old grandfather. I am surprised that so far the biggest work in my arsenal has been written about Baizhu, because even though i love him, he's not my favorite man, but… I love him so damn much in the image of yandere. Slippery, cunning, secretive, obsessive Baizhu is so disgustingly beautiful that i'm just not going to say another word and just let you enjoy it on your own.

This work has a more complete NSFW version, but about it… Information will be available later (>ᴗ•)

July 18th

Bright sunlight, marking the beginning of a new day, persistently seeps through heavy eyelids, inevitably squinting when consciousness gradually returns to you after a deep sleep. It stings so unpleasantly, and you turn away from the source of the rays, which cruelly outrages your eyes. The embrace of sleep doesn't lose hope of keeping you at least a moment longer in its warmth, but for some reason the heart in your chest shudders restlessly, forcing you to explode from the soft pillow.

A slight shortness of breath, and the eyes open abruptly. You're clutching the blanket convulsively in your hands.

This place…

Your gaze glides anxiously around the bright, cozy room. The curtains barely move audibly from the breeze of summer, unceremoniously slipping through a small crack in the window. For a second, you look at your own palms, twitching convulsively, as does the frightened muscle in your chest, pumping blood furiously through your veins, before the bedside table comes into your field of vision. Freshly cut qingxin flowers in an exquisite vase, in front of which there is a small mug, to which you curiously but cautiously extend your hand. The liquid has a slight greenish tint and the pungent aroma of herbs instantly cuts into your nostrils.

But there was something else.…

You turn your head anxiously to the bedside table again, now hesitantly picking up a folded piece of paper on which «Read it when you wake up» was carefully written in a beautiful neat handwriting. Whoever left it… It doesn't look like anything threatening, so you slowly unfold the sheet, starting to read a couple of lines written in the same perfect handwriting as the inscription on the outside of the note.

«If you're reading this, then you've already woken up. I'm sorry I couldn't spend the morning with you properly.

You probably have a lot of questions. I'll definitely explain everything in more detail when I get home, but for now, just read the information that you will need to come to your senses.

Your name is Y/N. Unfortunately, by the cruel design of fate, you were destined to be tested by a disease that I, your husband, tirelessly struggle with day by day. Believe me, one day everything will change and I will no longer need to tell you everything that I'll write next, over and over again every morning. But it's not a burden to me, my love, don't worry about it.

As soon as you fall asleep every night, your memories are erased in the morning, so you probably don't remember me or the house you ended up in.

This is our house, Y/N. We have been married for ten wonderful years now, and my love for you will never fade, no matter how many trials life throws at us.

You can warm up your breakfast, I left your portion in the fridge. If you need anything else, I've left hints on all the things you use every day. You can also walk to Liyue Harbor and visit me at work if you wish. I left a map for you in the hallway, with which you can safely get to the city, as you have done more than once. I understand if you don't want to see me before I get home, but I'll be very happy to see you anytime.

Please drink the decoction that you are probably holding in your hand right now. Although this medicine will not help to overcome your illness, it will make it easier to survive the stress of the information you have just read.

You have nothing to fear, Y/N. You're safe in our house.

See you soon, my love.»

The edge of the paper crumples in your hand when you unconsciously clench your fingers into a fist, trying to control the tremor running under your skin. Your gaze moves from the sheet to the mug with the cloudy liquid, and you instantly empty the glass, squinting and writhing from the bitter taste.

After putting the dishes back in place, you tentatively pull back the blanket, noticing that you are wearing a light nightgown, pulled up on your trembling hips, apparently from the way you tossed and turned, not wanting to wake up.

Emptiness. Not a single thought as you slowly lower your feet to the floor, sitting on the edge of the bed. There are too many thoughts, but you can't grasp any of them, being in a kind of trance in which your gaze glides over such a damn familiar, but completely strange house. You notice a lot of things, photos of you and some man, feeling that it all belongs to you, but for some reason… Wrong. This is all wrong.

You squint, pressing your palms to your face in resignation, before finally finding the strength to get up and go to the kitchen. Your legs seem to remember this short road, but your eyes refuse to believe that you've seen this place before. It is bright and spacious. In the middle of the room there is a small table designed for two, as evidenced by two chairs standing side by side. There is a light herbal aroma in the air, which permeates the walls of this house, but it is muffled by the sweet smell of baking. Apparently, that man… Your husband left home not so long ago.

How strange it is to call a husband someone whose name you can't even remember, although it's on your tongue, but all attempts to pronounce it are in vain.

«It's probably… a side effect…»

«You… don't remember me…?»

«It's for the best…»

You grab your head convulsively when other people's words, uttered in a painfully familiar voice, are introduced into your thoughts. The memories aren't as old, but they're not as fresh as you think.

«We will always be together»

Is that… is that your husband's voice?

You freeze for a moment, realizing something even more frightening than the fact that you can't remember anything. If everything that a man you don't know wrote in a letter is true, then how does he live with it? After all, you can barely remember what your face looks like, so now you slowly wander into the bathroom, and he tolerates every day that his loved one does not recognize him? He must really love you if that's the case.

You look uncertainly at your own reflection. Disheveled hair, tired look, lost look, crumpled shirt sliding off one shoulder. Even from the outside, you look like a real madwoman, although inwardly you feel that this is not the case at all.

The pleasant cool water calms down a little the alarming heat raging in your trembling body when you wash your face and then brush your teeth with a brush carefully signed with your name. While you were walking around the house, even out of the corner of your eye it was difficult not to notice how every thing that could potentially be useful to you was also signed with your name, and your heart shrinks in your chest from the mere thought that in the world there could exist a person of such bright and pure kindness of soul who is able to do everything This is for someone who barely even recognizes his face. It's probably the letter he left for you this morning.… He does this every day, right?

And so your whole day went by.

You wandered thoughtlessly around the house, checking every drawer and every corner in a vain attempt to awaken dormant memories in you or at least make your heart skip a beat from something other than an indescribable feeling of guilt. Your clothes, jewelry, dishes, men's things, books, jars of herbs, even a tidy sum of money lying in one of the drawers — nothing seemed familiar enough to you to remember anything.

And you didn't even notice how the sun had long disappeared behind the high mountains of the Geo Archon's lands, and the door of "your" house quietly opened. You were enthusiastically looking at the photos found in one of the many boxes lying in the attic when you heard unhurried footsteps coming from the kitchen before the man stopped at the bedroom door, causing you to turn around in fright.

— Oh, I'm sorry, Y/N, I didn't mean to scare you.

You're clutching a stack of photos so tightly, clutching them to your chest, as if it's the most valuable treasure you didn't even know existed. But now the glossy pieces of paper slip out of your hands as soon as your eyes meet the gaze of the man towering over you.

— Y-you are… — you stutter, looking away in confusion and suddenly stopping at one of the photos now lying on the floor. — My husband?

The man smiles softly. His golden, surprisingly snake-like eyes follow your gaze before he sits down opposite you. You can't help but take a closer look now in person at these long green curls, braided into a braid, probably incredibly soft and smooth to the touch when a man bends down, carefully picking up photos from the floor and collecting them in his hand.

— You always take them out when you're alone, — he smiles, giving you a gentle look from under the half-lowered glasses on the bridge of his nose. — And I'm also very disappointed that you didn't eat your breakfast after all.

— I just… — you mumble softly, but even those clumsy words melt on your tongue when you feel a man's long, elegant fingers wrap around your wrist, lifting your hand and turning your palm with the back of it to your face.

— This is the answer to your question, — the man raises his own hand, and you look at it in confusion, suddenly noticing the ring on your ring finger. And how did you not notice that before? Probably expensive gold and a small emerald, sparkling even in the dark, and on his hand… The same ring, but with a ruby. — I'm sorry, I seem to have forgotten to sign my letter with my name, as I usually do. Huh, maybe I just still have a glimmer of hope that one day you'll wake up and I won't have to get to know you again...

You notice how the man's amber eyes fill with sadness, but the corners of his lips are still stretched in a smile when he suddenly chuckles softly, interlacing the fingers of his free hand with yours, which he still holds in the canopy.

— But it's kind of cute, isn't it? I can meet you again and again, as for the first time, and hope that you will be able to love me again, — you finally feel your heart clench in your chest when he brings your clasped hands to his cheek. But it's not… it's not love. — My name is Baizhu, honey.

— Baizhu… — you repeat, as if deep in thought, but the man suddenly rises from the floor, still not letting go of your hand, slightly pulling you back and forcing you to retreat from another desperate struggle with your own memory.

— Don't overexert yourself, Y/N. You haven't eaten anything, let's go.

You feel like you should just let him take you to the kitchen, which you do, but for some reason you feel so damn uncomfortable around Baizhu. Those photos, his words, his look… Everything says that you probably love this man, since you even married him, but then why are you so worried?

You sit down at the table, carefully watching as an elegant man with perfect posture takes something from the refrigerator and hastily cuts it on a board before sending it to a heated frying pan. It smells delicious… Vegetables and some meat, as you think.

After a few minutes of waiting, a plate of warm snow-white rice appears on the table in front of you and a small portion of pieces of beef, carrots, pepper and sauce, which creates such an appetizing aroma that makes your stomach turn.

— I wanted to cook fish, but I decided that you should eat your favorite dish today.

— Hey! Are you going to pretend that I'm not here?

You scream when an unfamiliar high-pitched voice is heard behind you, and Baizhu just sighs resignedly, placing his palm on top of yours when you almost drop the chopsticks from your hand.

— Changsheng, could you not scare Y/N? — you don't understand with whom your husband is talking to, so you turn around hesitantly, noticing a squinting white snake on a small pillow, looking directly at you. — Y/N, please, don't be scared. This is Changsheng — she's not dangerous. She is… Our friend.

— Since when am I considered a friend of this little girl? I'm just an observer, girl, keep eating your dinner while I'm starving.

— Well, well, hush, — Baizhu suddenly gets up from the table just to get some treats for, it seems, your pet?..

— Why is she talking?! — you still find the strength to get out of your stupor and finally ask the man with his back turned to you.

— Oh, it's a long story, I'm afraid if I start telling it now, we'll go to bed too late, — Baizhu chuckles softly, leaving Changsheng alone with her food before returning to your table.

— Then you could tell me about it… Tomorrow?

«Tomorrow, right?»

You suddenly felt your stomach churn with fear. What's going to happen tomorrow anyway? Will you remember this conversation? Does it even matter what you say or do now if everything starts from scratch tomorrow?

— Of course, — your husband doesn't seem to be at all concerned about how your face is twisted by unpleasant emotions that have flooded into your scattered consciousness. You notice how he calmly starts his dinner, still smiling softly and bringing a piece of meat to his mouth before it disappears between his lips.

— Tell me… Baizhu, how long has this been going on?

You look at your portion, feeling that this food will surely satisfy your hunger, but for some reason your hands flatly refuse to take the chopsticks off the table again.

— Eat, Y/N, — your eyes meet. Baizhu looks at you with unreadable emotion. For sure, this is just a difficult topic for him.

Of course… After all, you'll forget everything that just happened, and he lives with it day by day, falling asleep again and again with the thought that once you wake up, he will be met with a frightened look again. You won't hug him, you won't kiss him, you won't tell him you love him.

You don't know who is he.

You didn't even notice the tears rolling down your cheeks until one of them dripped into your plate of food. It's all so damn unfair. Why do you feel such suffocating guilt, but at the same time you so irresistibly want to escape from here? Why do you want to run away from your own home, from your husband? It's all… too much.

— Oh dear,— Baizhu sighs. It seemed to him that it was not the first time he saw your tears, as if he even knows why you are crying, so he calmly puts down his chopsticks, reaching across a small table to brush a strand of hair from your face behind your ear and touch your reddened cheek. — I know it's hard for you. I promise, everything will change soon.

You look at Baizhu's blurred face in front of your tear-stained eyes, but you can't stop the tears even when you feel the thrill of his thumb caressing your skin.

«Is it hard for me? And you…»

— N-no, I'm sorry… I don't know what came over me, — you sob, trying to calm both yourself and your husband. You wanted to take his hand away from your face, but you let it linger a little longer on your cheek before Baizhu finally pulls away, instead picking up his chopsticks again and pinching a piece of meat from your plate between them.

— Eat, Y/N. You'll feel better, — his honey-colored voice sounds so gentle and affectionate when he speaks to you, bringing a thin slice of meat to your lips.

The smell is so inviting that you unconsciously open your mouth while the man gently puts the meat on your tongue.

— Ha-ha, you're a terrible in cook!

— Really? Then why are you eating my cooking with both cheeks, you rascal?

— Okay, okay, it's really delicious! Maybe it will even become my favorite dish, what do you say?

— Oh, you flatter me...

What kind of voice is that?.. This is not Baizhu.

The homely delicious taste on your tongue suddenly awakened fragments of memories, from which warmth spread in your chest. You remember the male figure so vaguely… his face is blurred, but you feel that your place is next to him. You want so much to grab onto this meager memory, but it slips away from you as quickly as it surfaced in your mind.

Baizhu notices you freeze for a few seconds before finally swallowing your food, and his snake eyes squint at you.

— Is something wrong? Did you remember anything?

— I… — you blunt your gaze down, suddenly feeling awkward. — No, nothing like that. It's just very tasty.

Why did you lie?

✧ ✧ ✧

July 19th

Annoying sunlight, the smell of fresh flowers, an unfamiliar room. And once again, you burst out of bed, clutching the blanket in your fists in fright, before you see the note lying on the bedside table.

«Read it when you wake up»

«If you're reading this, then you've already woken up. I'm sorry that I couldn't spend the morning with you properly again.

You probably have a lot of questions. I will definitely explain everything in more detail when I get home, but for now, just read the information that you will need to come to your senses.

Your name is Y/N. Unfortunately, by the cruel design of fate, you were destined to be tested by a disease that I, your husband, tirelessly struggle with day by day. Believe me, one day everything will change and I will no longer need to tell you everything that I will write next, over and over again every morning. But it's not a burden to me, my love, don't worry about it.

As soon as you fall asleep every night, your memories are erased in the morning, so you probably don't remember me or the house you ended up in.

This is our house, Y/N. We have been married for ten wonderful years now, and my love for you will never fade, no matter how many trials life throws at us.

Please eat the breakfast that I left on the table for you and drink the decoction that you are probably holding in your hand right now. Although this medicine will not help to overcome your illness, it will make it easier to survive the stress of the information you have just read.

You have nothing to fear, Y/N. You're safe in our house.

See you soon, my love.

Your Baizhu.»

When you enter the kitchen uncertainly, there is such a damn familiar smell in the air… meat and vegetables. For some reason, the phantom taste of this dish settles on your tongue and causes an inexplicable feeling of simultaneous calm and anxiety. It's probably what you ate yesterday, but then why are you so uncomfortable?..

Did something happen yesterday, or is it just a figment of your imagination?

Anyway, you notice a plate of pancakes still warm, and you look around the kitchen for a mug to make yourself some tea.

«Baizhu…»

You mentally repeat this name over and over again, trying to get it into your head that this is your husband's name. How could you forget such an important person in your life?

— Delicious… — swallowing the most delicate airy dough, you put down your fork and wrap your arms around your shoulders.

Your gaze turns to the street. The sun is shining brightly over Liyue, which didn't allow you to soak up in bed in blissful ignorance for another couple of hours. Will everything be fine if you go out for a walk? Baizhu… Your husband didn't leave any instructions on this topic. After all, you don't remember anything, but you're quite able to walk, so why are you procrastinating?

Hastily washing the dishes and leaving a clean plate with a mug by the sink, you went in search of clothes. Probably all the women's clothes in the closets of this house belong to you, although you do not remember buying at least one of them. Light dresses, a pair of traditional outfits, several pairs of shoes. There is no hint of what you are doing in this life at all. Do you really just live here and… that's it?

You look at several dresses incredulously, trying to imagine how they will fit you, but then you still choose what is more authentic, and turn to the mirror, taking in your figure with a glance. At least now you look less like a local lunatic than when you woke up in the morning.

When you got to the door, you suddenly noticed a small piece of paper lying on the shelf. The sheet doesn't look new like the one you found by your bed. As if this note has been lying here for a long time and it has already been read more than once.

Unable to overcome your own curiosity, you still sigh and take the folded piece of paper. For just a moment, you're tormented by the thought that this might belong to your husband, and you don't want to violate his personal space, but what the hell?

Unfolding the piece of paper, your eyes widened in surprise for a second before squinting at the drawings on the paper. It looks like a small map with small neat captions that indicated in the drawing, probably the house where you are now, and a certain place called the Bubu Pharmacy, under which it is indicated that your husband works there. Ah, now everything falls into place.

You breathed a sigh of relief.

Baizhu probably left this piece of paper just in case you want to take a walk. How sweet and thoughtful of him to worry about you not getting lost, and yet… It's a little unnerving for some reason.

Anyway, you folded the paper back up and put it in the pocket of the only bag you could find in the closet. Although you're sure you're not out of your mind enough to forget the way back, it's better to be safe, right?

When you emerged, you carefully closed the door with the key that your husband had left in the hallway. Fresh air… You take a deep breath, as if you've been locked up for ages, finally feeling a fleeting taste of freedom. Birds are chirping somewhere in the rustling deciduous branches, the grass tickles the bare skin of your feet peeking out of light sandals, and you were almost ready to just stay here and enjoy how the warmth of the sun warms the skin of your face, how the summer wind blows through the light fabric of the skirt of the dress, caressing your legs.

But from this hill, on which a small cozy house is built, in which you apparently live, there is also a beautiful view of the city below, which beckons you with all its appearance, and you do not even think to resist, so uncertainly, but still start your journey, led by pure curiosity and a desire to distract yourself.

When you get to the city, you are suddenly overcome by fear, which for some reason decided to make itself felt only now, when you are already standing with one foot on the bridge of Liyue Harbor.

What if there are people in the city that you should remember, but…

On the other hand, isn't this a good chance to try to remember something? If you have friends, family, and you are lucky enough to meet them on your way, won't they tell you what your husband might not know? Although it is foolish to believe that a person who cares so much about you would not have tried such a way to restore your memory, but still.

You have to try.

So many unfamiliar faces pass by you, but you look uncertainly at each of them. You might still be mistaken for a local lunatic, but what the hell difference does it make if you forget about everything tomorrow? You also notice local shops, restaurants and snack bars, looking curiously at the counters. It all seems familiar. It feels like you've been here before, but almost everything has changed since your last visit, except… The atmosphere? Yes, perhaps, the atmosphere of bright streets filled with the noise of conversations, muffled music and footsteps of hurrying people is exactly what seems native to you.

You stop at a jewelry store, mesmerized by the luxurious rings, chains and precious stones neatly laid out in the window. It's so beautiful, but it hardly suits you.

— You should definitely pay attention to this stone, — you flinch when a low, velvety male voice is heard behind you. You turn around and see an elegant, handsome man towering over you, thoughtfully pressing bent fingers in a black glove to his chin. Tall, slender, dressed in expensive fabrics that gleamed gold in the fading sunlight. The brown strands of his bangs barely sway in the light wind, as does the single exquisite earring in his ear. The stranger's amber eyes stare in amazement at the surprised expression on your face when you freeze, just looking up at him. — Ah, you must be… — the man suddenly stammers, clearing his throat before straightening up and smiling softly. — I wanted to say that this stone will suit you, besides, it is rare enough to be honored to be in your jewelry collection.

— Oh… I'm afraid I can't afford that, — you suddenly get embarrassed, nervously scratching the back of your head and looking away.

— I'm sorry for the tactlessness, I hadn't thought of that. It wasn't nice of me.

— No, it's all right!

— You are too kind, but still, as an apology, will you allow me to buy you tea?

You almost let out an exasperated sigh, but still decided to let the situation go. Although you really can't remember a single person you know, this gentleman's politeness is really amazing…

— If you insist, — you kindly agree, and the stranger gives you a soft smile before gesturing you to walk with him to a restaurant table on the opposite side of the street.

It's a little weird, but… this person doesn't seem bad. You watch a man kindly ask the waiter to serve two cups of tea, and thoughts begin to creep into your head that this man clearly has some kind of high position in this city. It is unlikely that ordinary people behave in this way because of a small misunderstanding.

— Ahem, I'm sorry, — you suddenly draw the man's attention to yourself as soon as the waiter hurriedly leaves the two of you. — I just wanted to say that really nothing terrible happened, so I hope you're not seriously worried about all this.

Honey-colored eyes widen as the man intertwines his long fingers on the table.

— Oh, I understand your concern. The thing is, I didn't really look at the price of this stone.

— Huh? — you wanted to be outraged that the first thing you noticed when you entered this store was the sky-high price tags, but then you cut yourself off. Perhaps this man is just so rich that he doesn't need to bother with such topics. — Ah, I get it. Then I suppose you were going to buy it for yourself, since you said it was quite rare?

— I'm afraid not. I can't afford it either.

«Who are you anyway?»

— I see…

The next few minutes passed in silence until two steaming cups of tea finally appeared on your table. The man thanked the waiter before gently wrapping his hand around the mug and bringing it to his lips. The stranger takes a short sip, closing his eyes and seeming to be aware for several seconds of the taste of the intoxicating drink that has fallen on his tongue.

— Perfect, — the man across from you suddenly breathed out before looking at you. — Please help yourself. This is the best tea in all of Liyue, I assure you, you'll not remain indifferent.

— I'm afraid to addicted to such expensive tea by accident, — you giggle nervously before trying your drink.

Well, the stranger really wasn't lying. Although you vaguely remember all the teas that you have ever tasted in your life, you could tell for sure that this one has a rich taste. Subtle fruity notes, slightly sweet, but not cloying… Perhaps it can really be called delicious.

— Oh, what an exquisite taste, — you try to look thoughtful, like him, when you swallow tea, trying to match your companion for today's walk, who, apparently, is even too well versed in what he cannot afford.

— I'm glad you like it.

— Okay, since we're having tea together now, can I at least get the name of the man who's treating me?

— Oh, where are my manners? I apologize. My name is Zhongli.

«Zhongli… Zhongli… something familiar»

— Well, then we'll get to know each other, Mr. Zhongli, — you smile politely, sipping a little more from your cup.

— And you?..

Damn, did you seriously ask his name and forget to do the same in response? Maybe you should have stayed home after all.

— Oh, yes… I… my name is Y/N.

Zhongli notices you stuttering, stumbling over the words before finally saying your name, and his eyes narrow for a moment before relaxing again.

— Perhaps my question may seem tactless to you, but you didn't want to tell me your name? Because it seemed to me that it was very difficult for you, — the man chuckles softly before taking another sip of tea.

— Huh, no… I don't want to burden you with my problems.

— No, it won't be a burden for me. Of course, if that's your wish, — Zhongli suddenly cuts you off.

You're hesitating, fidgeting in your chair. It doesn't look like he really knows you, so… wouldn't it be okay if you told him? He really doesn't look like a bad person, and how can such absurd information about you benefit him? No more than the babble of a stranger he met on the street.

— The thing is, I don't remember my name. I had to strain my memory a little to remember what my husband called me in the note he left me this morning… I don't remember anything and I seem to forget even the day I lived earlier, as soon as I fall asleep. So I suppose even our acquaintance will eventually be forgotten, as sad as it is to admit.

You suddenly become gloomy, plunging back into unpleasant thoughts about what is happening in your life at all… And can it even be considered yours if you don't remember it?

— That's how it is, — Zhongli chuckles, thinking at first, and then his eyebrows rise, as if he remembered something important, and one of his hands reaches into his pocket, from which the man takes out a small notebook. — Then why don't you write it down?

You look at him with undisguised surprise, but his words sound like something taken for granted, but something that you would never have thought of yourself in your life.

— Write it down?..

— Yes. You can write down that you visited a jewelry store today and met me there, and after that we talked and had tea. Then next time, if fate brings us together again, you can find out from your notes that we have met before.

— But I… can write down everything that happens every day… won't that help me remember at least what happened yesterday? — you enthusiastically press your palms against the table, asking this question more to yourself than to Zhongli, but he nods approvingly in response.

— I suppose so.

— Archons… — you feel tears coming to the corners of your eyes, and blink several times, graciously accepting the man's gift. — Thank you very much, Zhongli. I will… take care of that.

The man smiles, feeling a certain relief when he notices that he seems to have helped you solve some problem that was bothering you today.

— Glad to help, — you put the notebook in your pocket when the man finishes his tea and sets the cup aside. — I hope this will improve your condition a little.

You flinch when someone's hand squeezes your shoulder tightly. You turn around, lifting your head to see the man looming over you, whom you seem to have already seen in the photo in your house…

«Ah…»

— Oh, I suppose that's your husband? — Zhongli doesn't seem worried at all as he gets up from the table, slightly bowing to Baizhu standing behind you.

— Mr. Zhongli, what a blessing that you are the one who met my wife. I'm afraid to imagine what could happen to her if she walked around the Harbor alone, — you notice how your husband's eyes close and his lips stretch into a sweetly friendly smile.

— I just gave the young lady tea as an apology for my own tactlessness.

— It's nice that you admit your mistakes, it's very rare nowadays.

Their conversation sounds quite normal, but for some reason you feel your stomach clench with worry and anxiety.

— Like loyalty to the contract, good manners are something that has long been highly valued in Liyue, — Zhongli suddenly turns his gaze to you. — Now, if you'll excuse me. I suppose I can put you in safe hands now and take my leave.

— Y-yes… — you finally squeeze out the quiet words. — Thank you… for the tea.

Zhongli is smiling.

— I hope you won't forget the taste of it and come back here to taste it again.

And the man left.

✧ ✧ ✧

Baizhu didn't say a word as he dragged you up the stairs to a place that seemed to be the very Bubu Pharmacy to which he drew a map for you. It was quite strange to just let a man you didn't really know drag you in a rather possessive manner to a place that you only found out about in the morning, but for some reason you also remain silent, obediently following him.

It's like you have no other choice. Maybe, in fact, it is.

Your «husband» suddenly stops as soon as you overcome the seemingly endless staircase.

— I'm sorry, please. I shouldn't have been so harsh. You must be scared now.…

You notice how Baiazhu's face contorts in remorse as he looks at you with concern, gently squeezing your palms in his.

— It's all right.… I just found this and thought you wouldn't mind if I took a walk, — you pull your hand out of his grip and take out a homemade card from your pocket, which the man immediately snatches from your fingers.

— It doesn't matter. Y/N, I'm just worried about your condition. I don't think you should talk to strangers. Although Mr. Zhongli is a respected person, I don't know how this can affect your condition. Yes, I left this card, but I didn't think you'd be afraid to go anywhere other than my job, so…

— That's enough, — Baizhu freezes, silently opening his mouth when your face takes on an irritated look, and you cut off his endless stream of words. — I can understand your concern, but isn't everything okay? I'm here, I'm fine.…

— Y/N, I know it's pointless to ask you for anything, but just… Believe me, it would be better for you if you just stayed at home or if you came to me. Why didn't you come to me?

— BECAUSE I DON'T KNOW YOU! — you suddenly shout out, causing Baizhu to freeze in shock. Your words are laced with malice and it's so damn disgusting, but you can't help yourself. — I'm sorry, but I don't remember you, you know that yourself! Why should I listen to you at all? I wanted to take a walk, I have the right to do that, don't I?!

— Y/N, you're crossing the line, — you feel your husband's grip tighten on your palm, which was still in his hand. His snake-like eyes seemed to flash with anger, and the soft smile that you saw earlier disappeared from his face, as if it had never been on him.

The very air around the two of you has become heavier, and you feel like you're starting to suffocate. You have to say something, do something.… Apologize? For what?

— Mr. Baizhu… — you both turn around when you hear a small child's voice coming from the entrance of the Hut. Do you suddenly notice a little girl literally plastered from head to toe with… talismans? — I heard a noise.…

— Oh, Qiqi, it's okay, you can wait for me inside, — as if at the snap of his fingers, a kind and gentle smile shines on Baizhu's face again. But the grip on your arm remains just as painful.

— Okay...

The little girl awkwardly squeezes back out the door, and your husband turns back to you. You can feel his fingers slowly relaxing around your palm.

— I have a few more things to settle, and then we can go home. Or do you want to take another walk around the city?

— No, it's not… I'll wait for you here.

Why do you keep groveling in front of him, even though you've just seen what he can be like? It's an inexplicable feeling.… It's like you're being held down by unbreakable chains held by this man. You don't like it.

✧ ✧ ✧

The drive home was stressful, although Baizhu tried his best to defuse the situation by gently holding your hand and asking all sorts of trivial questions. He feels how tense you are, feels that you don't trust him, but he doesn't seem to pay any attention to it on purpose.

The rest of the evening goes the same way. He helps you change, cooks dinner for you, and you eat together, exchanging a few phrases before it's time to go to bed. You feel a certain relief that you will probably forget this chaotic day when you wake up the next morning, but… now you have a way to remember.

Is it worth writing about it? Is Baizhu really not trustworthy?

You don't know.

— Honey, are we going to bed? — your husband gently strokes your head, standing in the doorway of your bedroom until you dare to enter, clutching the hem of your shirt tightly.

— Yes, but I need to… Go to the bathroom.

That smile again.

— Okay, I'll be waiting for you in bed.

✧ ✧ ✧

July 20th

You're having a wonderful dream. You feel so happy, so carelessly free, when your palm rests in the hand of a man who kisses you on the top of your head.

And this image inevitably blurs before your eyes, no matter how hard you try to remember his face. All that you are allowed to take with you from this sweet dream is a feeling of warmth and comfort, woven by the pure feelings that you feel towards this person whom you are punished to forget.

And the last thing you see is a snake sneaking into your cozy nest before it wraps around the silhouette of the man you love, causing him to disappear without a trace. You want to scream, you want to cry, but you just look at how your pencil-drawn life is erased with an eraser, and obsessive images are drawn on top, from which a suffocating lump rises to your throat.

«Wake up, T/I…»

You open your eyes wide. The room, the smell, the warmth enveloping your body — everything is so unfamiliar and causes the anxiety that you experienced in the last moments of your spoiled sleep. You want to pull away from the pillow, but some force holds you motionless before you feel the movements on the other side of the bed.

It's so hard to breathe, and you purse your lips when you look down, noticing a man's hand hugging your body. Maybe it's…

— Good morning, Y/N.

You turn your head and see a sleepy man. His long green hair was carelessly scattered over the blanket, like thousands of threads that, if you blink, will wrap around your limbs. The man smiles softly, looking at you from under heavy eyelids. His amber eyes are like viscous honey, deceptively sweet and alluring.

— W-who are you? — you grab the edges of the blanket with your hands, pulling it higher over your body and fearfully tucking your legs in. A strange feeling of discomfort appears between the closed thighs, and before that only a distant nausea, originating somewhere in your stomach, begins to be felt more clearly.

— Your husband, of course. I'm glad that I have the opportunity to spend the morning with you today. It's not often that I get this opportunity, — a man's palm, resting on your stomach a second ago, now moves to your cheek, and before you even have time to react, his lips are on yours. The kiss is short and gentle, but you don't respond to it, only letting out a dissatisfied moan before the man pulls away, quietly grinning. — I'm sorry, I couldn't resist. You're so cute when you're sulking.

— Why should I believe you? And… — you wipe your lips with the back of a trembling palm. — …don't do that anymore.

The man smiles, resting his chin on his palm.

— In our house, you'll find many confirmations for every word I say. Although you don't remember it, we've been married for ten years and we love each other.

— Then this is… — you look down, squeezing your hips harder, feeling your underwear stick uncomfortably to your skin, before turning your gaze to a naked pale man barely covered with a blanket.

His face contorts in obviously feigned embarrassment.

— Ahem, like I said, we're married. Unfortunately, you forget all the events of the past day, so you probably don't remember what we did last night.

— That's how… — you want to believe his words, but for some reason there is something inexplicable about this man.

Dangerous.

— I think we should take a shower. Will you join me?

— I'm sorry, I… it's so awkward to ask, uh… — you look away, clearing your throat before your «husband» interrupts your mumbling.

— Baizhu. My name is Baizhu, — he smiles again, leaving a short kiss on your forehead before getting out of bed.

Your assumption that he really wasn't wearing clothes turned out to be correct. Baizhu puts on a robe before silently leaving the room. You hurriedly glance around the bedroom, but then glance towards the open door, hearing a quiet noise coming from, it seems, the kitchen. Hesitantly, you reach down, running your fingers under your underwear, almost immediately feeling your fingertips touch a viscous substance that instantly sticks to your skin. You abruptly pull your hand out from under the blanket, noticing how a cloudy milky slime has remained on your fingers.

«Indeed… Either you're my husband, or…»

No, this man doesn't look like a crazy maniac. You examine your arms and the rest of your body for bruises or any other signs of violence, finding no evidence of your frightening theory. Your gaze skims around the room once more, noticing a couple of photos, flowers standing on a table by the window, a woman's robe hanging on the back of a chair that probably belongs to you.

This place really looks like the home of two lovers. Cozy, bright and tidy.

— Here, have a drink, — you startled when Baizhu's voice suddenly rings out in the silence of the room. He's standing over your figure sitting on the bed, holding a small mug in his hand, even though you didn't even hear him come back.

— What is it? — you ask, holding out your hand in disbelief.

— I'm a doctor and I'm trying to cure you. I haven't been successful so far, but it's the least I can do, at least to avoid aggravating your condition.

When you accepted the mug from the man, you immediately felt the characteristic smell of herbs. The liquid is transparent, having a slightly greenish tint. It looks like a harmless decoction. You take a sip, instantly feeling the disgusting bitter taste on your tongue, and choke, almost spitting it all back out.

— Ha-ha, you've never liked taking my medicine, — Baizhu laughs, giving you a warm look before moving away from the bed only to take your robe from the chair and return, spreading it out in front of you while you writhe down the last sips of the decoction. — So you're accepting my invitation?

✧ ✧ ✧

It was so strange to feel the touch of a man you barely knew, who called himself your husband, when he was carefully helping you take a bath. Nothing obscene, but… you felt out of place. Baizhu acts like he's really known you for decades, but you can't return the favor. It's so weird. You didn't feel bad when his hands slid down your stomach, then gently and gently rinsing your crotch from the effects of last night, but it's embarrassing.

For some reason, you feel ashamed that you don't have feelings for this person. On the contrary, you don't even feel comfortable being around him. Of course, you don't remember him, and that's a perfectly normal reaction, but still… This is kind of crazy.

— As much as I'd like to stay with you, I still have patients waiting for me, so… I hope you can manage without me until tonight?

You wipe your hair with a towel, noticing that Baizhu has already managed to get dressed, braid his long hair into a braid and put on glasses. He looked very different than at this morning, but you can't say he looks worse now.

— I've done with this before, haven't I? — you giggle nervously, suddenly thinking about what you do every day.

— That's right, — the man smiles, slowly approaching you. For just a moment, he just stops his gaze on your confused figure before bending down and touching his lips to your cheek. — Then see you tonight, Y/N.

— Y-yes, see you tonight… Baizhu.

The door closes, you hear a loud click from turning the key. He's gone.

You just stand in the middle of the kitchen for a while trying to figure out what to do next, before your gaze stops at one of the drawers, on which it is written in neat handwriting «If you want to have a snack».

You don't feel like eating. Although Bai Zhu mentioned that he always leaves food in the fridge for you while you took a shower together, you hardly feel hungry. To tell you the truth, you don't feel anything. It's so weird, but you're really not standing here because you're thinking or because you need some time alone with yourself. You don't know what you have to do. Although the windows are tightly locked, you can see that the weather is quite pleasant outside, but Bai Zhu took the keys with him. He probably doesn't want you to go out alone.

He probably just cares about you.

You walk over and open the candy drawer, pursing your lips and just staring at the various candies and chocolates that you probably love.

— What am I even doing… — you sigh, about to close the drawer, but as soon as you start to slide it back, your gaze catches on some object lying under the stacks of neatly folded sweets.

You carefully push the chocolates away, noticing a small leather-bound notebook underneath. The first thought that crossed your mind before you unfolded the notebook is that there are probably some recipes written down here, since it is in the kitchen, but even after a cursory scan of the carelessly written lines, you realized that this is not the case.

«I don't know if you will check this place tomorrow, but I know for sure that Baizhu will not look into this box for a few more days…»

«I don't know why I'm hiding this diary, but it seems right to me…»

«July 19th

Today I met a man named Zhongli, who handed me this notebook. He seemed very friendly to me, but I still think that I should be careful with any people with whom I'm connected by fate. Don't you also feel this inexplicable anxiety? It's like everyone knows something you don't. It's so annoying.»

«Baizhu was acting strangely today… When he saw me chatting with Zhongli, they had a very strange conversation. I heard their words, but all the time I had the impression that I did not understand at all what they were talking about. Baizhu is definitely familiar with Zhongli, but does this mean that Zhongli knows me? If so, why didn't he say anything? Why did you pretend that we didn't know each other?»

«I thought about it all the way home while Baizhu tried to pretend that nothing had happened. He's trying to help me, so why didn't he give me a notebook like this before? Wouldn't that help me at least try to remember what happened the day before? It's not enough, I understand, but still… isn't it weird?»

«I feel like he won't let me out of the house anymore. Baizhu was so angry, even though he tried to pretend that he wasn't. He asked me why I didn't come to him…»

«Be careful. I don't know what is really going on, but… all hope is that I will find out in the future, which means I must keep this diary even at the cost of my life. Please move it to another place so that Baizhu will definitely not find it.»

«I'm relying on you. You should know what to do.»

The last lines of the diary, written in obvious haste, began to blur before your eyes. Your head is splitting so much that it feels like it's about to burst, and you wrap your hands around your face, dropping the notebook on the floor, when chaotic images begin to emerge under your closed eyelids.

A man in a suit, the taste of hot sweet tea. Fresh air, the paths of Liyue streets.

«Ah, you must be...»

«I hope you won't forget the taste of it and come back here to taste it again»

«T/I, you're crossing the line»

It's so hard to put the pieces together, like a puzzle with missing parts, but you're desperate to see the whole picture. An obsession that can drive itself crazy, but something forcibly keeps it in check at the cost of lost fragments. You really need to remember this, remember everything, but you run into an impenetrable wall, suddenly opening your eyes.

The kitchen, silence and only a very distant muffled sound of rustling leaves.

— What was that just now?.. — you rub your eyes, just pausing for a second before taking a deep breath and slowly exhaling, opening your eyes again and glancing at the notebook on the floor.

You have to… Continue recording. You have to write down everything that happened today, you have to write down what will happen tonight.

✧ ✧ ✧

July 23rd

— Have a drink.

You're sitting at the kitchen table, staring in surprise at your husband, who is handing you a mug.

— But I already drank it this morning.…

— You need to take this decoction twice a day, honey. I know you don't like the taste of it, but it's for your own good, — Baizhu smiles, leaving the mug on the table and insistently pushing it towards you.

You've been acting weird the last few days. Every morning starts the same as usual, but once Baizhu leaves for work and comes back, you… no, you just can't remember. It's impossible.

The man gently strokes your head, watching intently as you swallow the decoction. Every last drop.

— Good girl.

Baizhu's palm descends lower, gently massaging your neck. You flinch at the unexpected oppressive, but not unpleasant feeling, putting your mug back on the table. The bitter taste lingers on your tongue, forcing you to reluctantly swallow again.

— Baizhu…

The man tilts his head to the side, continuing to stand behind you, now moving his hand to your shoulder.

— Will I ever be able to… live as usual?

Baizhu narrows his eyes. The corners of his lips twitch before stretching into a soft smile.

— I'll do my best for this.

— But this decoction is the only thing I'm taking right now, isn't it? Isn't there… another medicine?

Baizhu's long fingers squeeze your shoulder harder.

— I'll definitely find it, dear.

— What if… — you stammer, suddenly pursing your lips, not sure if it's worth saying what you're going to say.

— If? — the man bends down, and you can feel his breath, from which the stray hairs are slightly waving near your ear.

— If… If I keep a diary?

— A diary? — the tone of Baizhu's voice lowers, and you can almost feel the smile fading from his face. — Where did you get such thoughts?

— Isn't that logical? If I can't remember what happened yesterday…

—No, — your husband cuts you off in mid-sentence. — We've been through this before, honey. Do you really think that I would neglect any way to help you if he was a worker?

— No, I'm not…

— You don't trust me?

You swallow nervously. Under the skin, the purest manifestation of fear that a person can experience seems to snake. This question… There is only one correct answer to it. It's on the tip of your tongue, but for some reason you don't dare say it out loud. Why? Do you really not trust him?

— I… — you take a deep breath before turning to face Baizhu. You're looking straight into cold golden eyes, staring intently at how you're desperately trying to hide the worry appearing on your face. He can feel the blood pumping furiously through your veins, throbbing under his grip on your shoulder. — Of course I trust you.

You gently place your hand over Baizhu's fingers, which are almost painfully pressed into your skin. Baizhu sees your expression soften, and you gently stroke his cool skin with your thumb, bending slightly and leaning your cheek against his hand.

The pulsations under his palm are becoming more and more distinct.

— Don't scare me like that anymore. I'm willing to do anything for you, — the grip on your shoulder loosens, and the fingers of Baizhu's free hand tangle in your hair as he bends even lower. His lips are just an inch from yours. You can feel his steady breathing on the skin of your face. — Anything.

And he kisses you.

So possessive and persistent. He can't help himself. He wants to tear you to pieces. He feels the bitter taste of lies on your lips. The same taste that his own lips have.

You're so unfair.

Isn't Baizhu doing enough for you? Why do you doubt it? It hurts Baizhu so much. He feels his heart oozing with a viscous, stinking black substance — the fruit of his own sin and your disgusting lies, and if he is ready to admit his own inferiority, ready to be punished for his actions, then you… he cannot accept that you can be so cruel to him.

You hesitate, trying to hold back the urge to push Baizhu away as his hand slides down your forearm before settling on your hip. It's not like a normal kiss. His tongue invades your mouth uninvited, long and slippery, almost making you gasp as he pushes insistently towards your throat before wrapping around yours again. You whine when he moves, now standing in front of you and possessively stroking your knee.

You were so sweet when you touched his hand. Baizhu almost believed in the sincerity of your words. He really wants to believe. And that's why he can't stop now until he feels your devotion on his own body. You belong to him. Your smell, your taste, your body and soul are all his.

Finally, the suffocating kiss is broken, and Baizhu's lips come off yours. He slowly pulls away, and the thread of your saliva mixture stretching between you breaks off as he begins to kneel down. You squirm in your chair, fearfully clutching the hem of your skirt as his palms slide up your thighs. The tips of your fingers deliberately touch the inside of your trembling legs, which you squeeze to the last before finally hesitantly spreading apart, feeling that if you don't, Baizhu will force them apart.

— What is it, honey? Don't you like it?

A cloying, such a disgustingly cloying voice. You know that he only expects one answer from you, but Baizhu also knows that you really want to answer. Are you lying again? No. This time he knows you're only lying to yourself. He's sure that if he touches your hot crotch now, he will feel the moisture sticking to the fabric of your panties. Isn't that adorable? Your resistance against the desires of your own body is what Baizhu lacked when he fucked you in your sleep, so pliant and completely surrendered to true desires.

— I-like it… — you whisper so uncertainly that you feel sick of how inept this little lie is.

— Well, of course… After all, I know you better than anyone else, — the tips of his fingers cling to your panties, and you reluctantly slightly lift your hips, allowing him to pull them down your legs and lift up your skirt. — I know what you want… — Baizhu's lips are pressed against the inside of your thigh. — I know that you love… — he inhales the fragrance coming from you, burrowing deeper and deeper between your legs. — I know that you'll never lie to me. Is that right, Y/N? You're only mine, aren't you? — your frightened eyes meet Baizhu's frighteningly cold gaze, and you nervously swallow a heavy lump in your throat before answering softly.

— Yes… only yours.

The amber eyes narrow slightly before Baizhu's lips stretch into his trademark smile.

— Even if you forget again, I'll remind you of it again and again, every minute of my life, if necessary… — you feel the man's hot breath on the sensitive skin of your thighs when he lowers his head lower again. — I'll always remind you of who you belong to.

There's something wrong with him, you shouldn't feel good with him.… But your consciousness is inevitably clouded by the uncontrollable heat localized in the bottom of your stomach. You can try to deceive yourself, but you can never deceive human nature itself. Baizhu knows how to please you, knows how to make you swallow all those brazen lies that came out of your tongue earlier and replace them with sweet moans that he loves to hear so much.

Baizhu can give you the love, enjoyment, and happy life you deserve. A life that no one else could give you. Just him.

And this is just the beginning.

«Be patient a little more, Y/N… I'll fix it soon…»

Your body trembles as Baizhu wraps his arms around your hips from below, keeping your legs spread apart. You feel so strange.… The sweet anticipation is so tempting, but it's like something's wrong. The darkness so languidly gives way to the vague outlines of your own legs with Baizhu between them as you blink slowly.

And then you see him.

The image of Baizhu suddenly blurs, replaced by the image of another man. You know him. You should know. Just for a moment you have time to look at his face, remember his soft smile, hear a voice calling your name.

You scream when you see your «husband» in his place again. His wide amber eyes are watching intently as you press your palms to your lips in horror. Your chest is shaking, rising and falling sharply in time with your labored breathing. The shackles of deceptive pleasure seem to have evaporated, now replaced by pure panic and anxiety, which penetrate deep into your skin, sending a chill down your spine.

— You… — you're not blinking. It seemed like you even stopped breathing. — Who are you?

✧ ✧ ✧

July 21st

«He refused to let me out on the street. When I asked him if I could at least go to work with him, his face suddenly darkened, but he was still smiling. As always.

Whatever he's trying to hide from me, sooner or later I'll get to the truth...»

«Why does he keep giving me this decoction? As soon as I asked what was in it and what it was for, Baizhu didn't answer anything and just changed the subject. It's so weird…»

July 22nd

«What if I had asked him about the diary? I really don't understand what he wants.… I know that Baizhu wants to help, I know that I should appreciate what he does for me, but think about it. Have you ever seen him do anything for you? Why does he never talk about my past life? Why does he just say that he is my husband and nothing else?»

«You have to find Zhongli… He definitely knows something. It's very risky, but why don't you try to escape through the window when he's not at home?»

July 23rd

«I met with Zhongli, but to no avail. No matter what I asked, his answers were so vague…»

«He said he couldn't tell me the whole truth. He said: «Why don't you ask your husband about it?». Should I even do this? The more I dig into it, the more I realize that he can't be trusted…»

«I have to ask him. Otherwise, it will never stop. I'm starting to remember… I'm starting to remember very vaguely the person I shouldn't have forgotten. Who is he? Baizhu should know him. But I can't ask about it directly.… I think he might get angry if I ask about another man.»

July 25th

— How sweet, — Baizhu smiles, gently closing the small notebook. — And how ugly it is for the God of Contracts to violate his own terms, although … — the man grins, slightly throwing his head back. — …but I should thank him, because don't trials make our ties stronger?

Baizhu turns to you.

— Oh, yes, yes, you can't answer me, — the tips of your fingers run over the tape tightly glued to your lips. — I'm sorry that I had to go to extreme measures. The last few days have been as hard for me as for you… I had to work overtime, leave you alone in this state. There wasn't a second that I didn't think about you, I swear.

He's stroking your cheek.

— Tomorrow will be our last first meeting, I promise. I'll make you forget about everything that worries you so much.… It's the least I can do to help you.

You mumble incoherently, fidgeting in your chair.

— Oh, I know what you want to say. I'm sick of having to do this to you myself. I really wanted it to be different, but your memories started coming back too soon.… This is my mistake. I'll fix it.

For a moment, Baizhu's face is distorted with mock sadness.

— I'm really sorry that I had to get rid of your former husband, — the man sighs. — I wanted you to forget about him, but even my skill is not perfect, it took a little time to refine the «medicine». I'm sorry you had to go through all this.

You gasp for air, about to scream as soon as Baizhu tears the tape off your face, but his fingers instantly press into your jaw, tilting your head back and forcing your mouth wide open.

— I have to give you credit. Although the idea of the diary seemed innocent to me at first, when you had already kept it before, this time you surpassed yourself. I knew that sooner or later you would start digging into things that you don't need to dig into, — Baizhu clicks his tongue. — You should have just trusted me. I have to be the only one who will carry this load.

You take a deep breath and immediately choke when he forcibly pours a disgusting-tasting liquid into your mouth, which you try to spit out, but it inevitably flows down your throat anyway.

— You don't need this.

The room suddenly starts spinning before your eyes. The tinnitus drowns out the sound of your coughing and vomiting.

— See you in our new life, Y/N.

✧ ✧ ✧

July 26th

Bright sunlight, marking the beginning of a new day, persistently seeps through heavy eyelids, inevitably squinting when consciousness gradually returns to you after a deep sleep. It stings so unpleasantly, and you turn away from the source of the rays, which cruelly outrages your eyes. The embrace of sleep doesn't lose hope of keeping you at least a moment longer in its warmth, but for some reason the heart in your chest shudders restlessly, forcing you to explode from the soft pillow.

A slight shortness of breath, and the eyes open abruptly. You're clutching the blanket convulsively in your hands.

Your eyes are frantically running around an unfamiliar room, you feel a drop of cold sweat trickling down your temple. Fragments of a painful nightmare pop up in my mind. There is still a bitter taste on the tongue, causing nausea.

— Are you awake yet, honey? — you turn your head sharply in the direction from which the velvety gentle voice is coming.

There's a man you don't know standing in the doorway. His eyes are closed behind the glasses resting on the bridge of his nose, and his lips are stretched in a smile while he holds two steaming mugs in his hand, from which a subtle coffee aroma emanates. You scan the soft features of his friendly face with your gaze, and suddenly your eyes widen when they notice a white snake wrapped around his neck.

— Hey, Baizhu! You already left me for a few days with Qiqi, and now you're forcing me to inhale this disgusting smell. Get it away from me, — the snake suddenly spoke in a haughty tone, making you completely numb from shock.

— Okay, okay, — the green-haired man grins, leaving the mugs on your bedside table before sitting on the corner of the bed next to you. — How are you feeling, Y/N?

You tear your stunned gaze away from the pouting and averted snake and turn your attention to the man who is carefully wrapping his arms around one of your palms.

— I… don't know… I'm sorry, but who are you?

The man's fingers tremble on your palm. His smile widens a little.

— Don't worry, my love, I'll tell you everything now.

✧ ✧ ✧

August 5th

Baizhu sips tea from his cup, sighing contentedly. He turns his head to the side where the sound of your ringing laughter is coming from. You carefully place a homemade wreath of flowers that you have managed to collect around your house on Qiqi's head, with a doomed look allowing you to play with yourself like with a charming doll. The little girl looks at you in a puzzled way, probing with her hands what turned out to be on her head, and you smugly straighten up, resting your fists on your hips, glancing at Baizhu, sitting at a table in the garden not far from the two of you. You wave at him and smile radiantly, making the man's heart clench in his chest for a moment.

So carefree and happy.

— I see that she's fine now, — Zhongli says, covering his golden eyes before taking a sip of his hot drink.

— Was there any problem? — Baizhu smiles, interlacing his fingers on the table.

The man opposite chuckles, returning his cup back to the small saucer.

— I'm sick of watching them not detach from each other for the last few days, — Changsheng snorts in displeasure, curling a tighter ring around Baizhu's neck.

— What a nice tea,— Zhongli glances at the empty cup. — Thank you for the invitation. I think I should go now.

Baizhu smiles softly, getting up from the table after the guest.

— I hope you'll find some more time to visit my wife and me someday. You were so kind to help her last time, and this is the least I could do to express my gratitude.

Zhongli nods briefly.

— I'm always happy to help.

— Oh, and by the way… — Baizhu takes out a small notebook from his pocket, handing it to the Consultant. — It was so kind of you to give my wife such a lovely gift, but I'm afraid she can't accept it.

Zhongli's eyes widen slightly when he recognizes the object in Baizhu's hand as the notebook he gave you at your last meeting before taking it back.

— It's a pity, but I guess it did her a favor after all.

— More than that, — the Doctor smiles, squinting slightly. — I hope you know what to do with it. Although I follow all the laws of Liyue, but this time I can forgive some mistake that you allowed yourself to make by violating the terms of our contract. It would be a shame if you were careless enough to look for loopholes in it again, Mr. Zhongli.

— I could say that I hope for future fruitful cooperation, but I wouldn't like to accidentally meet you again at night on the Wuwang Hill.

Baizhu chuckles softly.

— Fair point, — the Doctor turns around again, noticing how you worriedly pull out the wreath that Qiqi was trying to eat from her hands. — It would be extremely awkward to meet again under such circumstances.

[astralnymphh]

𝒔𝒆𝒂𝒍 𝒐𝒇 𝒕𝒘𝒊𝒍𝒊𝒈𝒉𝒕☽◯☾

𖤐ྀ࿐-ˊˎepilogue!ellie x afab!reader

WC: 5.8k+

designated song: red flags and long nights - she wants revenge 𖤐ྀ an: first fic i ever published so idk what im doing but im doing it! i kinda just farted out an idea and then it blossomed into a fic over the course of a couple days so hopefully it lives up to its full power cause i fr inhaled this thing 6+ hours a day and totally not with a thesaurus at hand im definitely a natural wordsmith (i like my sht detaileddd) pls lmk what you think cuz i will be writing more stuff cuz i am so done with character DAWT ai fr.

⋆࿔･ cw: NSFW 18+, MDNI! >> friends to lovers, takes place after tlou2 ending, detailed but tried to be as natural as possible, proofread enough, ellie loves to joke around, hella cursing, fingering (receiving + giving), oral (receiving), stimulation of nipples, lots of foreplay, petnames (babe, pretty girl), slight overstimulation. ✧༺♥༻∞ synopsis: you met ellie a week after she sent farewells to jackson and her farmhouse, locking away the love she embodied for dina and set forth a journey towards a fresh horizon. furthermore, you joined her on this trip after running into her in an abandoned hospital, which at first things weren't so friendly and rather condemned you to gun-point but regardless it resolved eventually. the original plans she had her mind latched on were demolished since you mentioned your living situation. you live in a community not bound to FEDRA or any other titled organizations, only an ankle-straining expedition away from wyoming. one of these nights weeks after you met, you're sunken into a makeshift bed in the cruel wilderness underneath the ivory moon, it's lunar lights absorbing into the exposed skin on your arms. moonbathing, essentially. ellie's present too, but if she engages in a chat, where might it lead you? ⊱ ───────────────── {.⋅ 𖤐 ⋅.} ──────────────── ⊰

𖤐ྀ࿐-ˊˎ

Mind oscillating on a path through notions not tended to at daylight, imagination running amok, fueling a creative craving that often returns at moonrise when most dangers, mostly most, are kept at bay and you at harbor and reeling you back into your delusions. Well, scenarios just happen to spark out of the void in your cranium, especially when there's a woody auburn head to your right. Ellie's back lined by the cut of her tank top is giving your eyes a warm greeting, a film of drying sweat cloaking the skin on her shoulders fortunately so the celestial body above reflects its light perfectly off it. Her back flexes slightly as her hands are occupied with the doodles and entries beckoning to go from head to paper. She wrote quite often on your trip, whether it be graffiti, a landmark, personal thoughts or just some notes contingent on the route and journey ahead. The faint noise of non-stop scribbling had your mind tilting towards the fact that it was probably some emotional dumping or intense art session, so you'd rather not bother her. You both had a tight and steadfast bond regardless if the initial meeting was at best a month ago. Why was it taking an age to reach home? If it wasn't for the fury of infected hordes on a fucking crusade through the country and bandits seeking trouble constantly, you'd be there. 

Brushing all these thoughts off, you pushed your back into the cold tree trunk behind you, molding into the space between your shoulder blades nicely and tucking your knees up to your chest. You pulled a fine-tip Sharpie from your supply bag's netted pocket and just tugged the cap off immediately. The tip surged with a night black ink, seeping into the flesh of your knee as you scratched in a little art piece. Imagination caught you at the right time. 

The noise of a book wafting closed perks your eyes over to Ellie spinning on her knee in a circle to face you. You glanced back and forth at your knee and her approaching you. Her hair illuminated a bronze auburn in the inferno of the campfire.

"Still not asleep?" Ellie questions in a low throaty tone, a voice that settles itself in your ears and invites a smile to your lips unintentionally. 

You mused at her until she claimed a spot on the foliaged earth surrounding the brink of the tree you call your natural headboard, blinking your sights forward on your knees again and speaking, "Sleep is barely possible in this world," a remark that slips past the threshold of your lips often, "Dunno if you noticed, but I'm never asleep before sunrise." you add.

Ellie rebounds with a chuckle and raises her brows, "Good point," she tilts her head idly. "What's that on your knee?" She nudges the air with her chin, referring to the ink doodle gracing your knee.

"Oh, boredom." You reply vaguely with a smile, returning your sight onto her and observing her freckled face longingly.

Ellie sucks her lips inwards, running her tongue from one corner to the other while nodding ponderously. Her teeth pinned down her bottom lip, akin to poking a soft cushion and curling into a smirk. "Well," Her lips parted. "Got an extra pen?"

Her asking enticed a smile on your face, cheeks jerked up by a thread, "A-huh" You hum with your mouth ajar, fingers pursuing the bigger pocket of your bag to scrounge up another pen. Eventually, you slide another Sharpie out between your fingers, holding it like a blunt to Ellie.

She grasps it gently, biting the cap off and settles it between her pretty pink lips before blowing it off into the patch of grass.

"Uh, You better not lose that cap!" You reacted swiftly, furrowing your brows in a playful sourness.

She draws the air through her teeth, "Too late." 

You purse and wiggle your own lips but eventually a smirk flexes back and replaces it.

Ellie merely synchronizes a smirk back prior to inching her face near your thigh, poking the pens tip on your plush skin. Her large palm conceals whatever the hell she's sketching.

Suddenly, the pen moves in a certain pattern and a hint illuminates in your head, "I swear if it's-" You are cut off by Ellie's hand moving to reveal just what it is and your assumptions redeem truth. "Boobs.." Your eyelids peel back, staring at a pair of cartoony breasts plastered on your skin.

"Whaaat? Not appreciative of my artwork?" She curved her words, embarking on a playful tone.

"That's kinda gay." You spat back, jabbing your index finger into the firmness of her bicep which made her balance waver sideways.

Ellie played along with an offended visage, "Uhh, I know you're not talking!" She indeed bites back.

"Uhh, well I am talking!" You counter and shimmy your tongue a bit and lodged it between your lips as you taunted her.

Ellie just laughs you off and immediately starts drawing again, learning your lesson you tug your thigh away from her usage. You jeer, "Nuh uh! You're gonna draw a dick or something!"

Her tone recedes and reduces down to a calm one, that familiarly husky one sweetening the space and thrumming into your eardrums, "I won't, I promise." 

A quiet brow teeters on your skin, expressing your doubt but nonetheless you lend your thigh again as her canvas and slyly relax it against her leg.

Ellie smoothly returns pen in hand, her other hand snaking over your thigh and resting her three fingers on the squishy padding of your inner thigh. She honed in on this sketch, laser focused as the pen glides over your skin.

This rockets your fragile coolness into the forest of stars above and dilated blood blooming across your cheeks. Ellie may have appeared a tinge bit flirty this past week, but not this quickly did the aura embracing both of them turn so love infested. The pads of her fingertips were coarse yet melded with your skin warmly. The way your mind delved into thought from this plain touching electrified your heart, igniting something abdominal and a fluttering ache in your hips.

"And.. there." Ellie mumbles from her throat, voice a bit hoarse and stuffy. Her dominant hand retreats without the one clasping your thigh gently, twining it gently with pressure to reveal her sketch. It was a moth, unlike the ones etched into her journal time and time again. Details were revived in it and just looked so lovely on your bare thigh. 

"Wow, another moth?" You tease her with a shoulder bump to which she reels back onto the scaly tree and smiles widely cheek to cheek fashioning those signature dimples to peek. You swore a color akin to red jasper trickled across her midface.

"Shut up.." Ellie sheepishly pushes her lips together in attempts to halt a smirk but her cheeks falter and perk up, a cute sight to you and humiliation to herself.

You patch up her embarrassment with an excuse, "It's nice, though. Like.. tattoo-worthy." 

Ellie chuckles in response and relaxes her eyes onto your visage momentarily, darting a glimpse repetitively at her left hand that laid solemnly against the crevice of your thigh and hip. She stutters, "S-Shit, shit, sorry." a calm tone masked the nervous lump in her throat and she swiped her hand away.

You couldn't help but feel that tension in your neck mutually, clogging your chance of saying 'it's fine' so you simply descend your head and giggle behind closed lips.

Sweat coated her forehead thinly, invoking an attractive amber glow on it brought by the flame crackling in front of you.

Ellie's husky voice sauntered to your ears, "So, does that mean.. you'd get that tattooed?" She resumes the statement you added earlier.

You blow raspberries, "Yeah, not gonna lie. You're fuckin' talented." You firmly assure her.

Her eyes perk up and so do the corners of her lips, irises painted with a color akin to the wings of a lunar moth casting onto yours, noticing luminous rings of orange light wrapping her pupils.

At that moment, you wish you could just admit 'and you're really pretty' but your stomachs sunken in on itself, reeling your heart and throat along with it. The assumption that pouring your heart out might result in Ellie fleeing this trip, rotting your body with the pestilence of rejection and would be too poisonous to bear. 

"Wish I could still play guitar right now," Ellie soothes the silence, craning her neck and hangs her head low huddled to her chest. "Y'know?" Her head oscillates to gaze at you.

"I would've loved to hear that." you reply, a comforting hand advancing to the back of Ellie's neck.

"One day- I wanna at least try singing."

"What's stopping you now?"

Ellie raises her palm upwards in defense, "There's no instrumental backing it though!" her voice raises in a falsetto.

"Guess the sounds of wind and fire sparking isn't ideal." You get her point, "Ey' I'll just.. beat this stick on a rock," a stray branch enlightens you. "Nature's drum."

"Tch-" Ellie spits air from her teeth. "You're silly." 

"You're silly." You emphasize.

"Right, I am, wanna hear a joke?" Her body tosses onto her hip to face you, twisting one leg more open and the other bearing against the tree root lump under her.

"What's with the jokes this week, Ellie?" you reminisce on the flurry of puns Ellie just had the itch to entertain you with this week specifically.

"Okay fine then, I'll part with the jokes!" 

"That's not what I meant, I just bear some curiosity." you plea your context. "You seem more open compared to our first week together. You swore you wouldn't trust a stranger."

Ellie huffed out a hefty lot of wind, "Umm…" She became fiddly and lingered her pause, "I just found.. comfort, in your presence." the aura clouded in her eyes shifts to a darker one, "You're literally the only person I can be with after months of fucking isolation, the one person that I haven't.." Her rambling stumbles into a halt.

Wind rustles the branches above and around you, only a faint noise filling the lack of words.

"You don't have to explain-"

"Hurt." Ellie concludes.

You explore her void expression, eyes duller than the seconds before delving into this conversation. She's been bottling shit within, clearly. "I understand," you nod, the hand you laid upon the warm skin of her back returning and caressing a circle. "Do you wanna talk about it?" you offer.

"Nah, uh- don't wanna spend my time.. remembering, right now." Ellie reverts to sitting on her bottom.

You respectfully let her words settle in open space for a moment before speaking, "Still wanna tell me that joke?"

Ellie lightens up instantly, dimples convex in her cheeks as a smile is puppeteered on her luscious pink lips and baring teeth. She swipes her tongue between them before indulging, "What's the downside to eating a clock?" Her cheeky smile remains. 

"Mmm… what?" you hum curiously.

"It's time consuming." 

You compressed your lips tightly, a rumbling chortle bubbling within your esophagus. 

"Yeah, yeah- I'm hilarious." Ellie humbles herself in tone.

"Uhuh, totally." You forced some air through lips locked tighter than a top-secret chamber causing an intense vibrating buzz to rattle your skull.

"Don't lie, you love it." Ellie tilts her head, the auburn bang like a crest to the side of her face now hanging just where it tickled the apex of her nose.

Your right index finger, bearing a will of its own, swoops in to hook this bang behind the conch of her ear, tucking it away from her eyes with the pad of your fingertip.

Ellie pores her sight over the structure of your face, exposing you like an open book. The way her green rings enveloped you felt different, like she was contemplating a daring decision. Her eyes falter only once but capture contact again, such a gaze soft and charming is born upon her eyelids.

"Ellie?" you utter softly.

The subtle touch of Ellie's fingertips cradling your head were the only thing you registered before a pillowy flesh was aligned upon your lips, suckling at your supple bottom lip and challenging the balance of your neck with the way she smashed into you. Her hand advanced to your cheeks, cupping them tenderly yet palms pushing down with friction, lips smoothing over yours multiple times and reluctant to separate as they felt practically welded and magnetically attracted. 

"Mmph.." Her peachy cheeks graced yours and passed along a radiating heat. Catharsis possessed the ebb and flow of passion bursting at the seams of your swelling heart and that same infernal ache of your pelvis siphoning off your hidden lust.

"Fuck," Ellie utters a curse below her breath, shambling away from your space only to be interrupted by your eager fingers clawing into her collar and jerking her closer.

"That wasn't a mistake." You assure her in a promising tone, a solace hand cusping the concave valley under her jaw and fingertips converging with the groove behind her earlobes.

Ellie's expression lush with turmoil slowly contorts into a smirk, nasal lines and dimples beautifully indenting around her wide smile. A husky mumble, "Should I stop?" thrumms into your ears. Her eyes scan you for an answer.

"No." your breath hitches.

Ellie's hand takes harbor on the small of your back, nudging you towards the tarp tent a few feet before you. 

Your body senses the hint and takes you beneath this dense blue tarp where Ellie attempts to slumber, but now its intended purpose has fizzled away beneath this lust-drunk haze. Your back sinks into the foliaged bedding with a few flannel blankets splayed across it. Ellie scales above your body and casts a shadow of her own that cascades over you. Her fern green irises fixate on yours, embers of excitement caper within the midst of your midriff, plucking and tugging at your heartstrings.

Ellie's raspy voice slithers into your ears, "I thought you wouldn't want this." Her pupils dart around to every edge of your face nervously.

"But, I do." your hand is an assurance on her shoulder, but the calf ascending over her lower back and dangling off her butt implies an abysmal desire.

Her eyes examine the situation with your leg for a split second, "What're you doing?" She mutters amid a crescent smirk pursing her coral lips.

You glance away promptly for a wink, "I said-" 

Ellie's lips hush yours and sever them apart, tongue tipping the threshold and beckoning for yours to surface. 

You indulge in the lovers tango with your tongues, lips smacking together as the air is siphoned from you. She suckles and bites down hungrily as seconds trickle past, feeling her fingernails etch their stamp on the flesh of your mid-back. She is so fucking enamored with you.

"I fuckin' need you.." you breathily grunt into the enclosed space betwixt you both, searing foreheads melding together and nose tips drifting over one another.

Ellie's eyes twitched half-closed, midface boiling red, mouth ajar and spilling out hot air, "Shit.." she moaned, fingering the fly of her jeans and fiddling with the zinc alloy rivet.

"What are you rushing for?" you tease in a coo.

"Shhh-shut up." She hushes onto your cupid's bow, pecking it with a tiny smack prior to elevating her torso upwards.

You ogle her toned slender bod as she slips off the ribbed white tank dabbled in sweat and crimson splotches, chucking it mindlessly against the overhead tarp causing a loud crinkle to thunder.

You panic with a laugh, "Oh m'god- shh!" and clasp her wrists to steady her arms, "That was so loud! Don't attract the clickers!" you nag at Ellie playfully.

"I wasn't!" She pleads.

"If clickers come charging up here cause of your-"

"Guns' in here babe." Ellie replied hoarsely.

"Oh, I'm your babe now?" you fakely bumble, slyly lurking a keen hand to her stoutly toned abdomen, eyes just now comprehending the reality that she was bra-clad to her upper body, damp humidity sticking to her beaten skin so perfectly you sensed yourself melting at the existence of it like there's goo in your skull instead of a brain.

Ellie affirms low and honeyed, "Yeah, a hundred percent m'babe." Her face creases into a slanted brazen smile.

Heeding her affirmation, your fingers advance down to the hem of your shirt, pulling it over your head leisurely and disclosing your skin openly for her. Your shyness had fractured and dissipated completely and was yearning for the mingling of her body with yours.

Ellie's jaw suspended slightly open and lip caving over her bottom teeth as she puffed a breathy chuckle. She was unarguably turned on by the notion of you bound by bareness.

"Fuck me." She utters breathless.

You regard her words before harshly hauling her torso back down, capturing your barren lips in a sloppy entanglement which only glosses over the true pleasure you ache for. 

Ellie's hand detects that desire and traverses the map of your body before flattening on the destination of your inner-thigh just below the crevice of your crotch. She asks, "Can I?" softly against your neck, because consent is sexy.

"Mhm." You nod your head eagerly and straighten at the knees comfortably.

Her left hand pulls your fly back over the button, popping your jeans open with a smidge of panty fabric peeking already. Ellie teases the zippers tab with her fingernail and sluggishly separates the zippers teeth. She inclines back slightly to absorb the sight of both hands tucking into your jeans, rolling them down at a pace that tickles the microscopic hair on your thigh.

You wiggled your legs as she heaved them upwards, tugging your bunched up jeans bulking at your ankles, unintentionally your socks caught on and slipped off your toes.

"Don't toss them recklessly this time." you demand of her jokingly and chafe your thighs wantingly.

"Wasn't planning on it."

You watch her politely cast the fabrics aside, lunging carefully with both arms cradling your head as she swooped in to steal a quick kiss before dragging her lips across your chin, stranding a dozen pecks in her path until she craned over behind your ear and leaving a fresh trail of kisses along your neck. 

Ellie's lips were defiant on departing anytime soon, she was pious to your body and had to worship it with the offering of lust. She only paused to carve a love-bite with her teeth and peppering up a dark mauve bruise.

"Did you just give me a hickey?" 

"Uhuh~" her voice vibrates with a laugh. She perks up from your neck and gives you a once-over, "But that's not the only place I'll be sucking.." 

You give her a baffled visual with brow lines furrowing until her thumb swipes repetitively over your clothed nipple and eliciting a voiceless moan from your strained throat.

"You're a freak, you're freaky." you jest.

"Maybe, but you love it." 

"I do, I do.." you assure softly and smirk up at her, your hands soaring up to pull your bra over your head willingly.

"Well~" Ellie's pupils gawked at your bare breasts. "Excuse me madame!" She impersonates shock in a playful manner, but really, she was witnessing your chest in all present dimensions. Guess you could sum it up to her really liking your boobs.

"I didn't discard my bra for you to just ogle them." you point out.

"You're just needy." Her toothy smile appears while her slender fingers stream your sultry skin up to your chest, cupping the soft skin like a crescent moon and whispering, "But I like that."

"You like me."

"I do… I do." she repeated your phrase from earlier and crooked her pearly smile.

From here, her hair bore a radiance of honey color, the fires illumination outlining that handsome mullet you always deemed so attractive on her. Speckled skin that dotted her face and chest that appealed to you, a heavenly set of juniper eyes that read you like a poem. Every detail pertaining to her existence was the sole reason you felt attached to her like a magnet.

"Guess it's my turn?" Ellie's voice snapped you out of your lustful trance.

Mind fumbling, you furrow your brows and observe her hand movements. She crosses one arm over the other and tucks her fingers in the elastic band securing her bra, snaking it off her head to expose her chest.

"Ohh, and she plays fair?" You stifle a chuckle behind a spirited grin, curving your tone chromatically.

"What? Thought I'd leave you hanging?" She snorts in emphasis, an evidently immature joke about your boobs.

You release that chuckle, chest jittering as you force the air through a gritty laugh.

Ellie gives a satisfying once-over before ambling her face downwards towards your chest, etching a favored kiss into the plender gap of your neck, sewing a seam of nibbles and pecks along your sternum.

A rush of heat plasters your face, reddening your cheeks and undoubtedly lingering upon your spine. Wetness forms itself and drips beyond the crevice of your core and onto your panties.

"Mhh.. Ellie.." you purr barely past your lips.

She continues kissing the base of your sternum before her mouth takes a detour to your nipple, teasing a ring around it with the velvety skin of her lip. Her lips tenderly latch around the perky mound, suckling and lapping with her ticklish tongue.

You sample a whimper that entrances Ellie to intensify the ministrations upon your sensitive bud, and so she does, causing an extension of these whines to stumble from your throat.

"Need my fingers, pretty girl?" Ellie mumbles, hot breath soaking a humid film around the nipple her mouth played with and sloping her head sideways to gaze at you. Her tatted arm bends to place a gentle palm against your aching clothed slit.

Your clit stung of a fiery pleasure at the mere pressure her hand brought, jutting your pelvis against it unintentionally. You shudder, "N-Now.." and choke out, "yes…" wantingly.

Ellie obeys your word and tugs your panties down in a flash, gripping them tightly and pulling them off your legs without hesitation in sight. Her head partakes in burying itself in the crook of your neck, inscribing keen bites that narrowly distracted you from her two fingers rounding the perimeter of your slit, the perfect introduction.

You croak, "I've been thinking about this momen-" 

"Shut up." Ellie hushes you verbally and with her fingers languidly pressing onto your clit, letting the sensitive bud wiggle between her fingertips and sparks a glimmer of pleasure through your pelvis.

"Fuck.." a subtle winded groan expels out of your very being.

Ellie's fingers began a circular motion, swirling the wetness around her fingertips and deliciously flexing her forearm slightly at each flick of her wrist.

You weave your fingers in her feathery auburn locks, poking your nose at the apex of her head that still positions itself at your neck as you gaze down to witness her handicraft, her literal handy-craft.

"I wonder.." Her voice inaudible, felt like a puff of air taunting your blazing skin as she guides her mouth back to your nipple, teething at it sensually to arouse you further beyond stability.

"Uhhnn.. fuckkk." You entangle the soundwaves stirring around you with your gratifying moan, inadvertently tensing your fluttery legs around Ellie's hips, to which she clasps your thigh with her unbound hand and pushes it down against the ticklish cloth.

"Stay open for me, hm- babe?" She asks in a honeyed manner, assuming you'll adhere to her words.

You open your legs further for her, absolutely enchanted by her being in control yet simultaneously so gentle with her words, only furthering the strikes of bliss corroding your senses when she quickens the roll of her digits, like she's fucking the literal sense out of you.

"Attagirl." Ellie's magnetic hum haunts your ears, dawdling in an echo inside your foggy brain. Her hasty touch lingers in tight circles against your clit for a diminutive moment until her willowy fingers cruise through your damp folds and dive into your sulking pussy, stretching you slightly and easily thanks to your wetness.

"Ohh my fuckin…" your elongated moan snags in your throat, choked up by the prompt filling of your core and spluttering of your speech, "god, Ellie.."

Without a hesitative hurdle in sight, Ellie idly pumps her fingers against your clenching walls, the slickness crowning around the base of her knuckles beautifully and enticing her ears to an arousing sound.

"Mhmm.." she vibrates against your neck prior to elevating her head to meet your puffy eyes, "S'wet for me, hmm?" her words slurred.

Your tongue couldn't articulate the words swimming through your sex-rot brain, the mere gauge of your opening was enough to hit right where you wanted and mist your brain up nicely.

The autumn bang dangling from her hairline tickled your forehead as she withers the space between your huddled faces, the tip of her nose wrinkling and bending as it pushes against your cheek as lips meet timely, fondling and smacking together in sloppy affection.

Ellie's fingers curve into you like a hook, searching for that delicate spot that'll render your faculties fried and abdomen throbbing for release. She prods it like a button, propelling numerous surges of ecstasy through your bottom.

A moan interrupts, "Just like tha- dn'stop.. dun.." you battle the knot in your throat and your pelvis, your entire body shuddering along with Ellie's aggressive pumping that rocked you.

"Don't worry babe, I'm not stopping." Her breath catches and quickens, beckoning that knot to snap in your core as her pace practically defies laws of motion.

"It feels… so-"

"I know, I know.." Ellie's voice buzzes in your ear.

Your walls tightened and convulsed around her, feeling every ridge of her fingers slip and slide inside of you.

"I'm c-cumm.." your voice altered into a strained, grit one, locking away your endless string of moans.

"Cum for me, babe, cum…" Ellie bit harshly on her lip in an attempt to contain the heaving of her breaths, bewitched by your state and keeping her forehead glued to yours.

Registering the green light Ellie gave you, your aching hips gave into the delightful knot and released a flurry of pleasure through your essence, igniting your skin and throbbing cunt. Your walls entrapped her digits inside, slowing her pace a bit as she didn't waver and carried on with her ministrations. Her fingers coated in that silky mess of you, dripping down your bottom from how much she had stuffed her fingers in and your pussy has brimmed past its limit.

"Good girl."

Ellie browsed your barren neck with her lenient kisses, the fingers inside you just now sliding out after a few moments of prolonged pleasure.

"Was I good?" Her husky voice crows out, curled smirk tickling the succulent flesh of your shoulder.

"So.. so.." your voice trickled through exhaustion, "fucking good." you chuckled.

Ellie syncs a laugh with you, shimmying away slowly from your body and licking her fingers clean of you, "Let me clean you up."

Your eyes condense on the tarp above you as Ellie slipped out of your linear sight, shuffling towards your pelvis that still ached from release. The stillness in the air is all your mind renders before you feel a shaggy presence between your legs, grasping the fact that her head has found a home between your thighs and the tip of her tongue swipes between your tumid folds.

"Ahh! El-elele..Ellie.." Your tongue sputters at the roof of your mouth, fingers grasping her dull tawny locks out of oversensitivity.

Ellie continues lapping hungrily at your soaked core, apex of her nose prodding at your clit lightly. Her arms wrap around your thighs and let her calloused hands dangle over them, leaving a delicious sight for you to see. Before you displayed the crown of her head nuzzled into your crotch, flushed skin and beads of sweat plummeting on her forehead. She suckled so gently on your clit a few times, strawberry lips smacking and puckering around the pampered bud like a lollipop.

"E-Ellie.." you giggled lightly, followed by a string of short whimpers.

She moved away from your heat, smirking. "There." she put firmly in a murmur, shutting your thighs and towering over your body, "You taste nice." she utters between a chuckle.

"Not sure if I needed to know that." you quip.

"Too bad." she replies and swoops in to present a kiss onto your lips.

Tension arises from this plain kiss and you push yourself onto your jello knees until you both are kneeling before each other.

"What're you doing babe?" Ellie's hoarse mumble traces your chin and entices a mischievous giggle from you.

Your fingers fumble with her halfway-open fly and inch the zipper of her jeans open. It peels open and allows your hand inside, lurking towards her clothed entrance.

"Oh, fuck.." Her eyes flicker in a blur, jaw left ajar, panting a humid veil onto your lips and inquiring, "You gonna do this?" 

Her toughened hand glides across your upper arm, gripping your wrist loosely.

"I wanna do this, for you, babe." your saccharine tone sweetens her ears and excites her lower region in ways she never detected before.

"Well, I did say fuck me.." Ellie recalls her words from earlier, indulging a partly suppressed chuckle and beaming smile.

You both entwine lips whilst kneeling against each other's warm bodies, her hand pinning your chin between her thumb and index to angle your head perfectly for her. Your unoccupied hand slithers to the rim of her jeans and struggles to pull them down.

"Use both hands, dummy." she twits with a smug look.

"I didn't wanna move my other hand.." you reply with an eye roll, moving your hand out of her pants to remove them properly.

She shifts them off her ankles and resumes her focus onto you, sealing your lips once more with hers and slipping some playful tongue.

Your hand finds purchase on her stomach, plunging into her panties and flicking her clit with the tip of your finger to tempt her further.

"Oh God, don't tease me.." Ellie begs with a following whimper, circling her hips into your palm in dire lack of stimulation.

"I wasn't going to.." your words halt at an edge while your actions suture her desires, three fingers usher beyond her delicate folds and stuff her instantly.

"Fuck, babe.. fuhhck." Ellie groans out and feels her body falter, fumbling onto her butt and keeping herself at an angle with her elbows to the blanket.

You tucked your knees in and settled between her spread legs, hand still tucked into her panties which now peeled back slightly from the angle of your wrist. A sly thumb from your vacant hand brushes over her clit and rests there, drawing long circles whilst your idle fingers begin thrusting in and out.

Ellie's cheeks summon a rosy shade, those lovely eyes rotating to the back of her head in pure bliss as you pump your hand graciously.

"Your hand is ten times better than my own." she praises, dangling her head backwards to expose her neck just coaxing you to leave a love bite.

"Mhm?" you hum into her headspace before latching your mouth onto her warm neck, suckling like a vampire out for blood.

"Shit.. god damn.." Ellie heaved a hefty breath, embracing your body with her legs cloaking your hips.

You felt her claws dig into your back, infusing her lust with each grip and grinding her swollen pussy against your hand. Your fingers curl up and explore that spongy area she so desperately whined for.

"Nghh!" she pins her lip between her teeth harshly, face scrunching up in raw paradise and pleasure. 

Your focal point is her g-spot, bouncing off of it practically faster than light itself. Her every expression was like an art piece to you, peppering it with sweet kisses regardless if your hands were sinister.

"Don't fuckin' stop, dont.. fuckin'.." she demands, letting her self loose in your hands.

Both your hands were coated with her stickiness, yielding it tricky to keep your fingers steady on her clit, but you managed, rushing her towards an explosive climax steadily approaching.

Soon enough, Ellie's jaw unhinged and released a mountain of moans, body shuddering vigorously as her orgasm lit an inferno of stimulation in her core. She clutched her chest close to yours as she rode this out and pulled you down with her. Her voice shatters the barrier of your ears, even surprising you a bit.

"How was that?" you ask sweetly, searching for clarity.

"I hope nobody heard that.." she jests, gazing up at you with weary eyes.

"I really heard that." 

"Shh!" she jabs your bicep with a balled fist, embarrassed at your smart-assed-ness and flaring her nostrils.

You smack her arm back immaturely causing her to capture you in a tight bear hug, rolling around in the disheveled blankets as she tackled you with numerous kisses across your face and neck.

"I love you." she declares earnestly, finally wishing to hear you assert your feelings too.

Not a speck of doubt haunts your mind, "I love you too."

Ellie adorns a grin wider than any before, creasing her skin and denting those adorable cheeky dimples that made you fall head over heels for that smile. Her arm extends to cusp your face, admiring every blemish that painted your skin, even the ones you didn't like.

Your eyes brimmed with tears like a cup as you yawned, announcing your acute fatigue loudly.

"Oof, your breath." Ellie mimes a face of disgust, waving her hand in front of her nose.

"So not funny." you roll your eyes sarcastically and tumble out of the cuddle, sitting upright to grab your panties and other garments.

"Wait," Ellie shoots upright as well, bracing her palm around your wrist, "you'll sleep with me, right, babe?" She deciphers your reaction for confirmation.

Your solace hand assures her, "Yes, I just don't want to freeze to death by morning time."

"Well then, don't leave me waiting." She wriggled her roguish brows seductively at you and huddled over your shoulder, gaining a frisky shove from you so you could get dressed for goodness sake.

Ellie eyeballs you sliding your undergarments on, tracing every curve and roll of your captivating body, enthralling her completely in your mere existence and cleansing her very being.

"I know you're staring."

"I know that you know that I'm staring." she plays it off.

You stick your tongue out as you crawl into her barren arms, whooshing a shrouded blanket over your conjoined bodies. "So much better.." you sigh.

"Are my arms not enough for you?" Ellie's voice strolls to your dulling ears, dwindling inside your twilight sealed mind as your eyes flutter tiredly.

"Shut up." 𖤐ྀ࿐-ˊˎ

[miaajaade]

The Line Between Love and Hate - Prologue

Aemond Targaryen X Targaryen!F!OC (Rhaenyra and Daemon’s Daughter)

A/N: Here is the first installment please no hate I’ve never published before 🫶🏻 also note that some years and ages are changed to fit with my story thank you!

Summary: When Daemon Targaryen asked his older brother the King for his niece, Rhaenyra’s, hand in return for defeating the crab feeder King Viserys I surprised the realm when he agreed. Years later, when Alicent Hightower puts her son on the throne usurping the rightful heir Rhaenyra Targaryen, two childhood companions Aemond Targaryen and Visenya Targaryen reunite through hatred.

Series warnings: Age gap (both characters are of age), incest (Targaryen), death, future smut, slow burn.

No minors below cut

In the years following Alicent Hightower’s marriage to the king, Viserys I, his daughter Rhaenyra harbored negative feelings towards her, once, childhood companion. What her dear friend had done to convince her father of a marriage that was not advantageous for the kingdom alluded her. In the years that passed, Alicent bore the king two children Aegon and Helaena as well as a boy, Aemond, on the way. Though love was still harbored between Rhaenyra and Alicent, the former knew that her position in Westeros was in question now that Alicent had bore Viserys a son.

Rhaenyra’s uncle, Daemon, had not been seen in court since he was derived of the position of Commander of the City Watch. Said to be fighting in the Stepstones against the crab feeder along side Corlys Valaryon and his son Leanor Valaryon. Without word, Daemon returned to court when he had won the war and was crowned king of the Narrow Sea in 109 AC. In return for the Narrow Sea, king Viserys granted him anything he wanted.

“Rhaenyra, I want Rhaenyra, wed her to me.”

Daemon’s own lady wife had since passed in a “riding accident” . At his proclamation, King Viserys shocked the realm by adhering to this wish and betrothing his heir and daughter to his brother. They would be married according to Valyrian custom.

The following year, 110 AC, Alicent gave birth to Aemond Targaryen.

In 114 AC Daerion was born to Rhaenyra and Daemon and Daeron born to Alicent and Viserys. This would be Alicent’s last child.

In 115 AC Viserys is born to Rhaenyra and Daemon

In 117 AC Visenya is born to Rhaenyra and Daemon, this would be their only daughter

These would be the last of the children born to Rhaenyra at kings Landing The rest of Rhaenyra’s children would be born on Dragonstone before the Dance of the Dragons begun.

Alicent and Rhaenyra’s children, growing up together, were quite close. They studied, fought, and dined together creating a bond painful to tear apart. The closest knit however would be Aemond and his niece Visenya. Seven years her senior, Aemond would often visit her in her nursery as a place of solace from the cruel jokes played on him by his brother and younger cousins. As Visenya grew older, she saw the pranks played on him and would go to him to give comfort when Aemond had retreated for the day.

“Aemond?” Visenya knocked on the door to his chambers in the dusk of night after dinner. He called for her to enter. She found him sitting on the floor staring at the vast array of dragon toys leftover from when he was her age. At the age of fourteen he deemed himself to much of a man for such things. Visenya at the wise of age of seven decided that Aemond took pleasure away from himself in trying to prove himself worthy to those around him.

“What did the boys do this time?” Visenya asked seeing the soot and ash still apparent in the stark white hair of her uncle.

“They gave me a pig” he stared down at the ground knocking one the dragon figurines onto its side. “They told me they had found me a dragon and they instead gave me a pig!” He was angry, but not only that he was sad. He had longed for the approval of his older brother and the respect from his young nephews. This was something he never got.

“I don’t have a dragon yet either” Visenya placed a comforting touch on his shoulder and she kneeled down next to him, “My mother says not all eggs hatch and that I must prove myself by claiming my own dragon in time. That claiming a dragon shows the power of your character more than one simply being born to you.” He looked at her for a quick second, envious of her for having a mother who consoled her rather than placed blame.

“You are lucky to have a mother such as yours.”

Moments like this were precious to Visenya. She often felt unseen by her brothers because she was a girl and unable to participate in the yard swinging swords and training with Ser Criston. She spent most of her day with her aunt Helaena wishing to talk to Aemond, as Helaena more often than not was rambling and rats and spiders. This bond she had with Aemond was not only important to her but to him as well. He felt he had someone to confide in, a family member he truly felt that he could trust.

When a raven sent word that her mother’s cousin Leana had died, Visenya and the entirety of house Targaryen traveled to Driftmark for her funeral. There Leana’s widower, the sea lord of Bravoss was met with warm condolences at the death of not only his wife but the babe she carried in her. Throughout their time there, Visenya’s mother spent most of her time with her dear friend Leanor Valaryon comforting him against the death of his beloved sister. While Visenya felt an ache in her chest at the death of kin, she also realized that Leana Valaryon rode Vhagar. A fearsome dragon which if she claimed would prove her worth as a dragon rider outright. She searched for her Aemond as quick as she could to tell him her plan.

She found him near the cliffs on the beach throwing rocks into the ocean. She quickly ran up to him giddy with excitement, “Kēpus!” Aemond turned at the sound of her voice with a smile on his face.

“What is it?” He took her under his shoulder to shield her from the harsh winds. “ I plan to claim Vhagar, on the morrow before we leave for kings landing. It will surely prove that I should be a dragon rider don’t you think?” Aemond regretted at that moment that it was not his own idea to claim the dragon, but he would not betray his only friend, when there were still unclaimed dragons in the pit and more being born each year.

“Kessa, I do believe you shall greatly prove your worth with that mighty dragon.” He smiled down at her as she hugged his side and stared into the abyss of the sea.

Later that night as the maesters were treating his father for the lost fingers from sitting the throne, Aemond stumbled upon his brother Aegon pleasuring himself in his cups, drunk as ever.

“You’re really going to let that little girl claim a dragon like Vhagar?” Aemond was shocked at his words not knowing anyone was around during their conversation. “Are you afraid a little girl may be more deserving? Do you want to know why we gave you a pig dear brother? Because a pig is the only dragon you could ever be worthy of.” With that Aegond stumbled away wine splashing out his cup as he made his way to his chambers. Anger took hold of Aemond and without thinking of the consequences he began to search for the warrior beast of a dragon. He found Vhagar sleeping and tried to mount the beast. Awoken from her slumber she gnashed her teeth at the boy. Aemond was not deterred. Determined as ever he did not stop until he was mounted on Vhagar and sailing above the clouds.

Visenya awoken from the roar of Vhagar’s wings ran to her window, seeing a rider atop what she saw as her dragon caused tears to fill her eyes. She rushed to her brother Daerions room to tell him what had transpired. She, Daerion and Viserys make their way outside only to find Aemond walking back in.

“It’s you?” Visenya cried “ that was my dragon! You knew I was going to claim her!”

“Yes it’s me” Aemond snapped back “ if you were going to claim her you should have when you had the chance, I guess I was just more worthy.” Visenya had no idea what caused Aemond to behave so cruelly. She ran up to him beating on his chest in anger, he pushed her off him. Pushed her too hard, harder than he had meant. He sent her flying to the ground scraping her hands and knees and the rocks and sand beneath them. Her brothers quickly retaliated and soon a brawl had begun. Aemond had Viserys on the ground with a rock in his hand ready to hit him when Daerion took out a knife. They continued to fight. Somehow Viserys got hold of the knife and in a split second Aemond’s scram echoed. Kingsguards rushed towards the children.

That night lines were drawn. The bonds that were there between the children now broken due to blood shed. The bond between Rhaenyra and Alicent broken out of anger for their own children’s safety. When they returned to kings landing Visenya and her family announced to her grandfather the king that they would be going to Dragonstone to put distance between then and Alicnet’s children. Aemond and Visenya wouldn’t see each other again for near 15 years, when the Dance of the Dragons begins.

Next part: I

Translations:

Kēpus - Uncle

Kessa - yes

[calderacitylovers]

Wholesome Zutara Short Stories

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Tales of Tenderness by emicha | Published: 2021-04-06 | 3,068 words

Toph, Iroh, Sokka, Gran Gran, Aang, and Azula observe how the relationship between Zuko and Katara unfolds over the years. “This is the picture of two souls that have seen too much bad already, who’ve grieved and hurt more than one single lifetime should permit; the picture of two people who still have it in them to hold a person so different from oneself this close.”

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After Sokka and Suki’s wedding, Katara wakes up with the worst hangover of her life, with the best friend she has been harboring feelings in secret for the last few years laying next to her, no clothes at all on either of their bodies. Oh, and she had no idea how they ended up in that predicament.

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The Brave Man Only Once by ifyouwereamelody | Published: 2021-02-19 | 2,2K Words

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Til Kingdom Come by bluenebulae | Published: 2020-07-26 | Words: 6,2K

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After the Last Agni Kai Zuko and Katara are waiting for the news from the GAang and get to explore their friendship and growing connection. A tender and beautiful story. “Tears are gathering in her eyes, and a new tightness pulls at Zuko’s chest. Though he still isn’t used to the casual way his new friends touch one another, this is not the first time he has felt the instinct to reach for Katara, in particular—to lay a comforting hand on her shoulder or arm. But wiping tears from her face is something new, and Katara watches him with wide eyes as his hand rises to her cheek.”

happiness (that's all rolled up in you) by soopsiedaisies | Published: 2024-01-17 | 3,8K words

A first kiss story. Zuko and Katara are cooking dinner for the Gaang on the Ember Island. Sweet, thrilling, and beautiful. "She reckons that she likes a lot of things about Zuko. She likes his face, for starters: his nose, his eyes, his mouth. She likes his scar and the way he dresses. She likes how he picks up the slack left by the others like those tasks were his anyway and she likes his smile. She likes the way he kisses and she really likes his hair."

For the Fire Nation | 2019-11-25 | 2,8K words

He falls in love with her for his country before he falls in love with her for himself. A short and beautiful AU story that explores how love and duty aren’t always mutually exclusive.

[juniorig0327]

Wrote this in like two hours how do y'all feel about this?

Percy can’t believe it went wrong so quickly.

He was enjoying his well deserved retirement from the demigod life, hell he was getting to a point where he almost believed he deserved it. That’s when he heard his mom call his name.

“-Percy! Hurry come quick!” Sally called out and he came rushing into the other room, clutching his pen.

“Mom? What’s wrong..?”

The only thing she did was point to the radio and turn up the volume.

“…This is KTU in Honolulu, Hawaii. I am speaking from the roof of the Advertiser Publishing Company Building. We have witnessed this morning the distant view a brief full battle of Pearl Harbor and the severe bombing of Pearl Harbor by enemy planes, undoubtedly Japanese. The city of Honolulu has also been attacked and considerable damage done. This battle has been going on for nearly three hours. One of the bombs dropped within fifty feet of KTU tower. It is no joke. It is a real war–”

His hands began to tremble. War? Oh no, oh hell no. He’d had enough war in lifetime. First with Kronos and then with Gaea. He was not going to fight in another war, he wanted no part in it, especially a war against mortals. Killing insane Titans and Primordial beings was one thing, but humans? Humans who bled red? Humans in which the only difference between them is that their ambition wasn’t golden? Not humans. He’d avoided directly killing demigods, people with flesh and blood like him – maybe not like him, he felt more god than human these days, those people were more human than he was weren’t they? – before, but he had a feeling. This might not be something he could escape from. He clenched his fists as they began to tremble and the talking continued.

“The, uh…public of Honolulu has been advised to keep in their homes and away– uh from the Army and Navy. There has been serious fighting going on in the air and on the sea. The heavy shooting seems to be…”

Fuck. Was it just his mind or did everything seem to be closing in on him? It got way harder to breathe, like it was a struggle to inhale and exhale. He could feel shaking at the balls of his feet but he didn’t know where it was coming from. All he could hear was static in his ears. Was he dying? Was this the part where his life would flash before his eyes? Would he open his eyes (he doesn’t remember closing them) and be in Charon’s boat? 

“--Percy!”

Something cut through the static. It sounded familiar, the voice (not like the voices in his head– something real). He heard the voice again, calling for someone. Percy? Who was Percy? Was that him? He didn’t know. 

“Percy. You’re in New York right now and I need you to calm down sunshine.’

Annabeth? That sounded like Annabeth. But Annabeth wasn’t here, was she? (Suddenly it got a lot easier to breathe.)

“Sunshine, I need you to open your eyes.”

Well, if it was Annabeth, he could trust her. He opened his eyes hesitantly to see an IM of Annabeth in front of him. “Annabeth..” He let out a sigh, looking up at her. “... I– we’re going to have to fight. Again. Against mortals.” 

“Percy you can’t think like that.”

“Yeah, you’re right I guess.”

-

“Yesterday the Japanese Government also launched an attack against Malaya. Last night Japanese forces attacked Hong Kong: Last night Japanese forces attacked Guam. Last night Japanese forces attacked the Philippine Islands. Last night the Japanese attacked Wake Island. And this morning the Japanese attacked Midway Island.

Japan has, therefore, undertaken a surprise offensive extending throughout the Pacific area. The facts of yesterday and today speak for themselves. The people of the United States have already formed their opinions and well understand the implications to the very life and safety of our Nation.

As Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy I have directed that all measures be taken for our defense.”

Percy began packing his bags, staring at the sheet of paper on his desk. He felt a surge of rage and bitterness thinking about it. He was supposed to be done with fighting, all of this. But no, now he has to go fight for a country he’s not even sure he wants to fight for. But he has to fight, he has to fight against another evil, an evil that's not something of the godly world, but someone (thing) so terribly human it disgusts him.

“But always will our whole Nation remember the character of the onslaught against us.

No matter how long it may take us to overcome this premeditated invasion, the American people in their righteous might will win through to absolute victory.

I believe that I interpret the will of the Congress and of the people when I assert that we will not only defend ourselves to the uttermost but will make it very certain that this form of treachery shall never again endanger us.

Hostilities exist. There is no blinking at the fact that our people, our territory, and our interests are in grave danger.”

He slung the bag over his shoulder with the letter in his pocket, taking – possibly – one last look at his room before closing the door. He stepped out to see his mom and Annabeth standing beside each other. He couldn’t help but smile a little as he stepped forward to kiss his mom on the cheek. “I’m gonna miss you both. Ma, don’t get all lonely without me. Don’t forget I’m an IM– or a letter – away, don’t hesitate to reach out.” He couldn’t help but be upset. Paul was at Pearl Harbor and died (in water, in his domain, in his dad’s domain. He can’t forgive himself for that) and now he was being drafted. His mom would be all alone (because of him the voice in head head helpfully supplies).

“With confidence in our armed forces with the unbounding determination of our people we will gain the inevitable triumph so help us God.”

He turned to Annabeth and cupped her face, leaning in for a passionate kiss. He could taste the coffee on her tongue as he brushed his thumb over her cheek. After kissing way too long for being in front of his mother he pulled away. “I’ll be back. I promise. Never Again remember?” He said, his voice shaky, as if he was trying to convince himself more than her. 

“Yeah.” She said back, her voice just as shaky as they pushed their foreheads together for a brief moment. Annabeth was the first one to pull back. “Go.”

“I ask that the Congress declare that since the unprovoked and dastardly attack by Japan on Sunday, December 7, 1941, a state of war has existed between the United States and the Japanese Empire.”

 February 5, 1942 Percy Jackson left for war.

[mins-fins]

two slow dancers.

&&. watching you paint has become a state of relaxation for renjun, you realize how much more vocal he is about his love for you than you thought.

pairing: huang renjun x m!reader

genre: fluffy like clouds, gay preple 😢

warnings: none!

word count: 0.8k

notes: renjun 🙁…….renjun 😖……..renjun 😢….. my wife i love him sm 💔 um anyway so last night i had a DREAM about renjun and i realized how good of a plot it ended up being despite how jumbled up it was 😞 i remember all of the good parts and that's what matters! um anyways take this writing from the corners of my mind

this was published so xiao dejun doesn't murder user @junjiie 😊

"shouldn't they be flying then?"

"well they don't actually have to flying, the wings are there for symbolism".

renjun eyes somehow un-blur themselves, and he stares for a long time trying to figure out what you mean by symbolism. now— renjun's not an idiot (he's actually very smart if he does say so himself!), it usually takes him a good few minutes to get what your talking about when your referring to symbolism, but in five minutes he ends up getting it.

he enjoys watching you paint, just watching the whole process intrigues him. before this, before you, renjun wasn't necessarily a fan of art museums, but ever since you've come into his life, with your stupid puns and your paintings full of symbolism, your shared apartment has pretty much become an art museum in itself.

the creativity you harbor shows no bounds, you paint practically everything of interest to you, thoughts you had at three in the morning with a long lecture ahead of you in a few hours, things you'd seen outside that were just too out of this world to not remember, or your reminiscing about moments in your life that will only happen once.

renjun thinks your mind must be the most interesting place in the world, your just thinking all the time, brainstorming. even when you aren't physically painting, your drawing up ideas in your head of what to put on your canvas.

and somehow, all of them just connect to you, all your paintings just contain something special that scream you, renjun can't fathom how you do it.

sometimes he describes it as a "superpower" you have, and you always manage to laugh at the wording of his sentence when he says so.

renjun just has this way of describing things, you have to give him credit on how incredible he is.

"the wings aren't meant to be taken literally.." you mutter, finishing up the final touches for your painting, somehow, you seem to still be full of energy, despite the fact that you've currently been up for a good 17 hours (renjun counted for you), and haven't touched your bed once today since you crawled out of it first thing in the morning. "they represent purity, innocence, it's truly associated with white birds so—"

you pause in the middle of your sentence, worried that your boring your boyfriend, but when you glance over at renjun, his full attention is on you, he's completely focused on what your talking about. "and? continue!"

his interest surprises you, most people you know roll their eyes when you begin explaining the meanings of your paintings. you don't mean to annoy anyone, so you've become accustomed to giving short and easy answers when people ask about the meanings behind your paintings, you often feel like your doing too much if you give such a long and thorough explanation.

renjun doesn't care though, everything you say is of importance to him. he isn't looking around the room, he isn't zoning out, he isn't focusing on a random part of the couch and zooming in on it, his attention is all on you.

he cares about what your saying.

you snap out of your mind, though glad about the whole revelation you just made, you forgot you were in the middle of a sentence. "that's why i chose them, this painting is meant to represent childhood innocence, and white birds, innocence".

you almost feel like you sound stupid in a way, but as renjun glances back at the painting, the one he'd sat and watched as you created with your own two hands for the past two and a half hours, he smiles, his eyes light up.

admiration is the obvious answer, you know the look because you can't count how many times you stared at renjun with the same exact stare. he laughs at a thought he has, and then turns to you, completely unaware of how you were looking at him so lovingly. "it's beautiful, i love it" he tells you, staring at you the same way he admired the painting beforehand.

you can't stop the way your face heats up, and your sure renjun can tell how red you are. if he can he doesn't say anything about it, just smiles at you, and you swear your face is practically burning at this point, it's a little funny to you that your getting so flustered over words your literal boyfriend is saying, you assumed after the two of you started dating you'd be less like this.

but no, renjun just has this power over you, you'll always be flustered by his compliments no matter how much you try to resist his crazy charm.

somehow, after minutes of getting flustered over a compliment and pretty chinese man's smile, you find your voice. "thank you".

renjun snickers, noticing the flush on your cheeks.

"your so cute".

"i don't think you should be talking".

renjun smiles.

he loves you, loves you so much.

[life-at-hogwarts]

In the Shadow of Love (Ominis x GN!reader)

Pairing: Ominis x GN!reader

Warning: pure fluff

Wordcount: 1.7k

Summary: You decide to finally take the next step and ask Ominis for a date.

A/n: This once I'll let them be happy. No trauma. Just fluff.

Had this chapter lying around finished for a couple of months and for some reason never thought it was ready to be published. Now I thought I'll just put it out anyway.

(This is part four of Dark Legacy - House of Gaunt but can be read as a oneshot)

Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3

The library was filled with the sounds of quills scratching on parchment and rustling pages. It was late afternoon and soft golden light trickled through the tall windows when you made your way to one of the desks in the corner, where Ominis was fast asleep. His face rested on the book he had been reading, with one arm covering his eyes, while the other one was outstretched, still holding on to his wand. You dropped your books on the table with a loud bang, causing him to shoot up from his book. “Studying hard, eh?” you teased and sat down opposite him. Ominis yawned and rubbed his eyes. “I was taking a break. My eyes get tired when I have to concentrate for an extended period of time.” There was an awkward pause and you quickly opened one of your books to diffuse the tension. This was the first time the two of you were alone since you had returned from the Gaunt estate late last night. Sebastian had come back from Feldcroft in the morning, just in time for breakfast. The three of you had had a busy day, and now it was time to catch up with the classwork you had missed while you were gone.

“Where’s Sebastian?” you asked, searching the room for the freckled brunette.

“He’s not coming. I think he’s in the Undercroft researching Slytherin’s spell book,” Ominis murmured, unable to hide the concern in his voice. You knew how he felt about Sebastian’s research and thought about Anne’s warning. Still, you felt torn, not wanting to take away his hope. If anyone could find a cure for Anne, it would be Sebastian. You had seen how much it pained him to see his twin suffer – he needed her. Instead of answering you got out your quill and quietly started working.

 You had been working in silence for about half an hour when Ominis sighed deeply and put away his spelled quill. “How could we have missed this much in just one day? I swear Sharp is doing this to punish us because he couldn’t the other day when he caught us in the common room.”

You closed your book too, deciding to finish the rest some other time and asked, “Have you ever been to the Underground Harbor?”

“Hmm I think so? I guess in my first year they took us somewhere by boat, but I can’t quite remember.”

“It’s by the Viaduct courtyard. I’ve discovered it on one of my nightly prowls around the castle. I don’t think people really go there, but it’s beautiful, really.” You took a deep breath. “Do you want to join me tonight?”

A cheeky smile spread across Ominis’ face. “Are you asking me on a date?”

“Well, I suppose you could call it that. It’s time we had a proper date don’t you think? Don’t get me wrong I didn’t mind our night in the common room and back at your house, but it does not really qualify as courting, does it?” No one was more surprised by the sudden burst of confidence and cockiness than you were. Immediately after the words had left your mouth you started blushing, but Ominis’ smile only widened. “In that case, I would love to go on a date with you.”

-----------

Your heart was pounding when you snuck out of your common room and made your way to the dungeons to pick up Ominis. Usually, he had no problem navigating around the castle, but he wasn’t exactly stealthy, and you didn’t want him to get caught on the way to your first date. The tall blonde was already waiting in front of the Slytherin common room. “No need to be nervous, darling. I could hear your heart beating from the other corridor,” he chuckled and brushed a lose strand of hair from your face. The sound of his voice calmed you and made your stomach flutter at the same time.

The Viaduct courtyard was on the other end of the castle, but to your luck you reached it without running into anyone, thanks to your excellent knowledge of the castle’s secret passages and corridors. Even though these nightly excursions were almost part of your daily routine by now, you still felt the adrenaline coursing through your veins when the doors of the ornate elevator closed behind the two of you. “Now I know why Sebastian is so fond of you. Based on the ease you navigate around with without getting caught I reckon you do this quite a lot. You must break even more school rules than he does.” The elevator rumbled and you moved closer to Ominis. “This is worth breaking a few rules for.”

You followed Ominis into the dimly lit room giving him a moment to take it all in, before you headed towards the docks. The blind boy walked behind you, carefully putting one foot in front of the other.

“Why did you pick this location?” he asked when you climbed into one of the rowboats and offered him your hand.

“It’s my favorite place here in Hogwarts. Whenever I need a minute of peace and quiet, I come here and sit on the docks. I thought you might like it too,” you answered while you waited for him to sit down. He seemed a bit uncomfortable, and you wondered if this had been a bad idea.

“I find the sound of the water quite calming, and I like the fresh smell of the lake,” he assured you and you could feel him slowly starting to relax next to you. Moonlight fell through the vines of the lake entrance and made Ominis’ eyes glow like pure silver. You swallowed loudly, your mouth feeling dry all of a sudden. Merlin, how you longed to finally feel his lips on yours again. He lifted his long slender fingers to your face, and you shuddered under his touch, raising your head in anticipation but the kiss didn’t come. “Tell me something about you no one knows,” Ominis demanded instead. “You’ve seen so much of my life, yet I barely know anything about yours.”

“It’s not that interesting, really,” you breathed, his sweet scent driving you insane. The blonde pulled his hand away and left you starving for his touch. You hated the effect he had on you. You weren’t usually this needy. All of a sudden, he cupped your face in his hands roughly and pressed his lips onto yours. “Believe me I want nothing more than do this all night. But I also want to show you that my attraction to you is more than merely physical. Even a blind man can tell you’re beautiful. I want to see the parts of you you don’t show anyone else.”

Hours passed in effortless conversation, and you only realized how long you had been talking when the moonlight, that had been seeping through the vines of the overgrown entrance, slowly faded. Ominis too noticed the subtle change of lighting. “Let’s watch the sunrise,” he murmured sleepily and reached for his wand. He navigated the boat safely out of the cave, stopped in the middle of the lake and raised his head to the sky which had started to change from a blueish grey into a soft orange as the sun was slowly creeping up behind the mountaintops.

An idea started to form in your head, and you gave Ominis a mischievous smile. “Do you trust me?” Before he could answer you had already summoned your broom which quickly made its way into your outstretched hand.  Ignoring Ominis’ confused expression, you mounted your broom and waited for him to climb up behind you. Knowing full well how much Ominis disliked flying you took off very gently, enjoying the warmth of his body pressed against yours, his hands resting on your waist. You flew a few slow circles around the lake to make sure he was comfortable before speeding up and flying close to the water that was glowing with the light of the sunrise.

Ominis let out a surprised laugh and you turned around to see his flushed face smiling back at you. This only fueled you on more, making you push your broom to its limits, shooting up into the sky and circling the towers of Hogwarts with delicate maneuvers until you felt Ominis anxiously digging his fingers into your hips. The sun had fully risen when you headed back to the lake and manage to land in the boat. Even though you tried your best to make the landing as gentle as possible the small rowboat shook violently, causing you to topple over taking Ominis with you. You gasped when his weight forced the air out of your lungs for a moment. The next thing you knew his lips were pressed firmly onto yours, once again taking your breath away. He stopped for a moment to let you catch your breath, but you quickly pulled him back down again. He took his time, planting gentle kisses all over your face and neck, driving you wild before giving you another taste.

“Well, that was quite the date. I am going to have to try hard to give you an even better one,” Ominis mumbled breathlessly as he untangled himself from you.

“I’d like to see you try,” you grinned, feeling quite pleased with yourself.

“I take that as a challenge. I for one would love to finally have a date during the day. As much as I love spending every night with you it’s quite exhausting and I already have a tendency to fall asleep during class, so this is not going to bode well for me.”

“You’d love to spend every night with me? Is that a promise?” you asked jokingly. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” Ominis grinned and placed another quick kiss on your lips.

[webanglikethat]

How can he be guilty as sin? (A Wyatt one shot)

Published: 08/06/24 Words: 1,767 Summary: Wyatt, a member of the royal guard, struggles with forbidden feelings for Princess Ellaire, knowing that his duty demands unwavering loyalty, not love. as he battles his heart's desires, he begins questioning whether his deep devotion is a sin or the truest expression of his allegiance. Ao3: read here and please leave a comment!! Note: I haven’t finished HoT yet so don’t spoil anything !! and this is for my best friend Agrima 💙

Wyatt knew it was wrong. he had always known that harboring feelings towards the princess, the future Queen of his homeland, was a mistrial in the temple of his feelings. he shouldn’t be feeling this way because no other emotion other than interminable loyalty should flow through the veins connected to his heart. or at least that’s what he kept repeating himself as she walked past him, gifting him one of those secret smiles of hers that she kept just for him, like an oath only they knew the words to. he knew, deep down, that harboring such feelings for the princess was not only forbidden but also fundamentally wrong. as a member of the royal guard, his allegiance was first and foremost to the crown, to serve and protect without question or hesitation. anything beyond that — especially feelings of affection or longing — was a transgression and transaction he could ill afford.

and yet, each time her eyes met his, Wyatt felt a pull stronger than his sense of duty, tempting him to forget his role and forget it all, as long as he didn’t forget her. her smile, delicate and sweet, stirred something deep within him, a longing he had no right to feel, a longing that didn’t belong to him, a longing he couldn’t spare. after all, he was but a mere queensguard and he had been one since the age of two, when he was elected for this specific role, thanks not only to his skills but in part to the legacy his father was building. but that didn’t mean Wyatt had the right to feel what he felt, for he was a mere civilian, and she the Queen to be. how could he even dare to think of her like that? how could he dare envision his lips tracing doodles on her body, immortalizing it as a piece of art? sometimes he could swear he felt her warm hand squeezing his, and differentiating wishful thinking from reality had become his newest enemy, one he couldn’t escape or reach. how cruel fate was, to play such games with his mind, holding his heart hostage, squeezing it until it confessed the emotion’s name his lips didn’t dare to utter. 

so he clenched his fists, trying to force the inappropriate emotions back into the recesses of his mind where they belonged, like a dirty secret he couldn’t risk being brought to life. for some people, the skeleton in their closet was an actual corpse, but to him, it was his own traitorous heart. so loyalty, he reminded himself. honor. duty. a legacy to uphold. he repeated these four terms in his mind until they all swirled into one, but being warned by God didn’t stop Eve from biting the apple and therefore, forcing himself to not feel anything didn’t stop the emotions from threatening to overflow. not even the shackles of fate can hold back a lover’s desire. 

as she drifted further down the corridor, her laughter ringing softly in his ears, a melody he couldn’t stop replaying in the secrecy of his room at night, Wyatt couldn't help but wonder if she sensed his turmoil. did she know the effect she had on him? did she feel the same forbidden spark? did she feel the same pull, forcing her to linger by his door sometimes, just to hear his breath and know he was alright? did she too keep these longings locked inside? was he too more than just a friend to him? the questions gnawed at him, the way a monster would play with his victim to elongate the pain, threatening to unravel the tight control he prided himself on. he shouldn’t think of this, for he didn’t know what was worse — the not knowing, or the knowing — in a scenario where her answer was a refusal.  and perhaps that would’ve been better, he told himself. a clear no, a distinct refusal and maybe he could turn off his heart, an organ he didn’t - couldn’t - claim as his own anymore. or perhaps he should stay in his own bubble, drown in memories where holograms of her were the only actress starring unendingly in every moment of his existence. perhaps having her there, a place no one else could get into, was more than he should already be grateful for. 

it was especially in the quiet hours of the night, as the world around him slipped into slumber and he eluded the sleep fairy that his thoughts invariably turn to Ellaire. night seemed to always unfailingly be the time his mind's inner thoughts gravitated to her. he wouldn't be surprised if, in the undoing of the grand tapestry of his existence, all else faded but her memory. it was in those moments, bathed in the gentle glow of moonlight, that he would find himself consumed by a most exquisite and excruciating tenderness for her. he had known her for his whole life, had begun caring for her before he could even learn how to draw a sword since he was raised to protect and care for her, so truly, who could condemn him for his affection love? she had been the foundation of his existence, and he’d do anything to keep hers intact. 

to him, she was akin to the moon, for she was the only glow in his longest nights, a light he could always count on to guide him home. she was a star, one of those important ones that you never get tired of contemplating — the one you run to look for as soon as the sun goes down and a golden light begins to twinkle behind the clouds. she held that same light that guides lost fools in a storm’s disaster, which makes you fall in love with the night and makes you plead to remove your own eyes, so you could bask in it eternally. at last, Wyatt understood why kingdoms would lose their minds over love, why rulers would forsake their crowns for just one kiss from the woman they adored. he understood it all, trapped in the same desire.

and he .. well, what was Wyatt? there were so many small stars in this vastness called universe so how could he expect to be important to her? he was just one doodle among many more, another black shade in this sky, a planet out of human sight. even if he dared to imagine himself next to her, he knew it could never be the way he painted it in his mind. there would be no great dark ink depicting their story, no grandiose declaration of devotion etched into the annals of history, and he would remain a footnote in the story of her existence, a forgotten annotation in the manuscript of her grandeur. but as long as she was the name on its cover, he didn’t mind being nothing more than a spectator. for as long as she shone brightly, he could drown in the darkest shadows and he’d laugh with the utmost joy. 

but even as he belittled himself, Wyatt knew that his loyalty and devotion were unmatched. he knew that wherever Ellaire went, he would follow. should she ask him to close his eyes and lead her to inferno itself, he wouldn’t deny her request. together, they would face the unknown, and he would protect her, as he had always sworn to do. for Wyatt, the thought of denying her anything, of refusing her even the most perilous of requests, was inconceivable. he would risk his life if it meant she got to exist in his stead. he’d give her his heart if she’d only ask him and he’d unstitch every vein to give her the prettiest part, deign of a Queen. he’d bleed himself dry to keep her warm with the tepidity of his vital claret if she was cold. he would’ve done anything for her — unraveling his sanity to preserve hers and giving up all knew for her; for who was he, if she wasn’t there? he’d grown up knowing her, and so he would die. 

in her, he found his purpose to exist. she was the embodiment of everything he held dear, the light that illuminated his darkest corners. and though he may never be more than a shadow in her radiance, he would stand by her side, hanging onto every ray of light she shone, akin to a drunken man holding onto the lips of their lover knowing their doom. in her luminescence, he discovered a solace that outweighed anything he had ever seen or felt before, willing him to face any fate as long as he could remain even as a fading phantom in her orbit. 

as the echoes of her laughter faded into the distance, Wyatt found himself enveloped in the stillness of the night again, his thoughts consumed by the woman who held his heart in her hands. and maybe, giving up something so vital was freedom in itself. and for a moment, Wyatt dared to entertain the possibility that his love for Ellaire was not a sin to be condemned but a sacred calling to be embraced. what if, he thought to himself, the way he felt was not a betrayal of his allegiance but the truest expression of his devotion? what if the way he held her was the holiest subject of his faith? what if the words slipping from her lips were a religion he had woven into his soul? what if his lingering touch, so wrong yet so right, was the prayer he whispered in the quiet of his heart? 

so truly, how could he be guilty as sin, when love is the first virtue a person learns? was it not love that led Eve to take that fateful bite, trusting in the bond she shared with Adam? and if love was the foundation upon which humanity was built, how could he be faulted for following its lead? love, the most primal and pure of all virtues, surely could not be a sin. if Eve’s love for Adam sparked the beginning of life, then how could he be condemned for allowing love to guide his actions?

so he wondered, how could his protection, his love be a sin, when it was the foundation of his existence and of humanity’s history?

so may them condemn him all they want, he thought to himself, for he now knew that love was the longest-standing temple of humanity, the only divinity to be revered.

and he’d die fighting for his religion, his love, his Ellaire. 

love, above all, was the truest form of sanctity, and he’d rather die a sinner for her, than a nonbeliever. 

⨯ . ⁺ ✦ ⊹ ꙳ ⁺ ‧ ⨯. ⁺ ✦ ⊹ . * ꙳ ✦ ⊹⨯ . ⁺ ✦ ⊹ ꙳ ⁺ ‧ ⨯. ⁺ ✦ ⊹ . * ꙳

taglist: @annn-starrr, @pawaki17luna, @goddessofwonderland, @liykaii💙

[kthynes]

tête-à-tête

18+

authors note: surprise! I’m here and decided to publish this chess piece. So enjoy this little ficlet about Lloyd and how he’s a complete opportunist. Fake husband comes with all the underhanded motives.

Lloyd was a two word conversationalist. He didn’t have the patience or willfulness to side with small talk yet here he was, remanded and entertaining a trying (and tiring) affiliate.

“That your girl?” Court Gentry spots you tyranting amongst a cesspool of inebriated patrons. His eye thin out, coyly humored by your state while Lloyd remains untrained, swirling his liquor and anger, both hand in hand.

“She’s someone.” Lloyd glares at his drink, longing for an out.

“Someone important or someone better off.” Fucking Court.

“Neither.” You wanted a night out. Lloyd insisted on chaperoning not truly realizing how demoralizing it was for him to babysit you.

“And does her father appreciate having you around?”

“We’re doing business actually.” Lloyd bores while slowly fixing his posture, stretching his limbs out to the sides. “A small trade off…”

“Should’ve known.” Court patronizes him, thumping fist to counter.

“He offered her hand in marriage just so I wouldn’t go under.” Lloyd shamefully admits, casting a downward gaze.

“So you’re struggling…”

“I’m surfing high tides.” Lloyd then corrects him. “I have to get my assets in order and a few shipments cleared in exchange for all of this and mostly her.”

“That’s really suss, Hansen.” Court scoffs, slamming his glass down after polishing his drink.

“I think it’s abominable.” Lloyd winces.

“Yeah, fucked if you ask me.” The blonde nark winces. “So what’s gonna happen when she finds out?”

“She won’t.”

“Actually what’s gonna happen when I go over there and take my chances.”

“You won’t.”

“I can try.”

“If you dare…” Lloyd grunts. No one touches you but him.

“I like how you like her.” Court surmises, almost reading his enemies thoughts and premonitions. “I didn’t think you had it in you.”

“I’m not trying to eat where I shit.”

“Is that so?”

“What is your deal, Gentry?”

“Now we’re talking.” Court jostles and leans closer. “I need you to pull out of the Majorca deal. That’s my deal.”

“Not a chance.” Lloyd had won that merger, a billion dollar ammunition deal with zero compromises. Not even from weaselling old Court Gentry.

“Oh c’mon, brother. At least think it through.” Court smugly adds, feigning his defeat while stretching his limbs. “I’m sure little miss tipsy toes would agree.”

“Her opinions are a little baited.”

“How ‘bout you tell her daddy what’s good and maybe that way you won’t have to run around with your tail caught in between your legs. Hm?”

Lloyd’s jaw ticks. “Name your price.”

“I’ll see you down at the harbor ya?” The harbour. Where the most chaotic mergers are met.

“We’ll see about that.”

“I’ll always be onto you Hansen.” Court addles before swiftly exiting the pub. Lloyd sifts, mulling over the mess he was in. He owed your father. You were on borrowed time. But Lloyd didn’t find himself wanting to let go of you.

There’s going to be a fight and then there’s going to be a battle.