#struck by the perils of adulthood

[pileofmush]

my dad told me today my voice sounds like an adult’s now bc it’s lost some of its luster ☠️

[theclaymorrigan]

FORGING THE SWORD OF THE GREAT QUEEN 📜 Scroll Three:

Sinder and I showed the encircling figures out open palms. I was calculating which targets would be best to drop in order to break the circle. The Thalmor had built up on my natural archery skills and combined them with stealth. I was able to draw and fire as a continuous act by my parents. The Thalmor had honed this to firing multiple shafts simultaneously and intimate familiarity with vital spots to place them in an opponent's anatomy. If these Forsworn were mortal, I could possibly fell then all before any could reach Sinder and I. But they were not closing in and seemed as perplexed by us as we were of them.

When we had spotted them from the ridge earlier, The Wild Hunt had come to mind. Some of the masculine figures had shillouettes reminiscent of Hircine, resonating with the chord struck when Sinder had asked for my Bosmeri name and I momentarily had recalled my childhood. Hircine was known to lead what was known as a wild hunt. The same term was applied when Wood Elves invoked a final option in times of dire peril and became shifting, nigh-unstoppable beasts. But this band was neither. Sinder's nostrils scanned the breeze.

"Bretons," he whispered to me.

It was the year 145 of the Fourth Era. The politics were beyond field agents such as Sinder and I but, from what I understand, the Empire, spread thin with war against the superior forces of The Aldmeri Dominion, had been expelled from the region of Skyrim known as The Reach. The Reachmen had petitioned The Empire to recognize their sovereignty, but Titus Meade II and his Empire were a bit preoccupied at that moment. To my Thalmor masters, this was a perfect opportunity to gain yet another foothold to strike at The Empire of men from. If this unrest could cut Cyrodill off from their Nord reinforcements and possibly gain for The Dominion this Reach region, so much the better. They were quite willing to parley with the occupiers of Markarth. Cerum Saudalf led my special forces team to intercept an Imperial envoy and its escorts. Having spotted this unknown band during our reconnaissance of the Imperials, we tailed them into ambush. Or had we?

The silence stretched on uncomfortably. Weren't Reachmen of Breton ancestry? Was Forsworn how the rebels of the Reach called themselves? All our briefings had focused on Imperials and their Nordic vassals. Sinder and I were operating blind. This band appeared barbaric by Altmer standards but, again, I was reminded of what had once been home. My conditioning from over a decade of torture and indoctrination began to teeter.

"Is this forseen, Queenspeaker?" asked a burly warrior. They spoke the Tamerelic language but I still didn't understand.

"Perhaps, Bridron," answered the most beautiful female I had yet beheld as she stepped forward.

Perhaps it was the time of year (Summer Solstice) or perhaps the glow lent her in the gloaming. Perhaps Sinder's unintentional prodding of buried memories combined with the wilderness aspects of these Forsworn clad in hide, bone and feathers. Perhaps it was my still young age, burgeoning into adulthood. Make your own choice; all that matters is that I was deeply smitten and any chance I would nock an arrow against her was immediately nonexistent.

"Speak if you were consecrated to The Lord Of The Hunt at birth; to He you would call Hircine," she commanded.

"I was!" I was compelled to answer after a moment's realization that this was precisely the case.

"Then we have come for you," she stated.

"But, Morrigan, er, Queenspeaker," objected the warrior, "This is but a wisp of an elf and his hunting beast!"

"You doubt the prophecy?" She retorted. "The Matron bade us come to this point on the river at this designated time and, no sooner than we arrive, he appears. If it is not who we seek, dispatch and disprove him in the name of The Maiden, The Matron, and The Morrigan."

"With relish," he leered and strode at me. He wore the antlered headdress, bore a facsimile of a sword crafted from wood and bone, and was half again my size. The gathered circle watched impassively. It was to be one on one. All I had was a hunting bow, a quiver of arrows and a dagger.

"In The Names!" He shouted as he swung his weapon. I instinctively parried with my bow as I drew the dagger. I expected to swat his cut aside and end the fight with a dagger stroke at the opening then provided. But the Forsworn Sword belied its primitive appearance and cleaved my bow easily. I was forced to turn the attack aside with the dagger instead. The strength behind his blow was barely turned aside at the cost of the dagger being knocked from my grasp. He raised his arms and readied an overhead strike to cleave me in twain.

Unfortunately for mighty Bridron, I was quicker. My hand flashed to my quiver and I pierced his heart with a handful of arrows. He clutched at the cluster of shafts and fell dead upon the rocky riverbank.

"Behold our new Claymorrigan," the beauty proclaimed. "The new Sword Of The Great Queen."

TO BE CONTINUED…

[seeds-and-sins]

Derange & Desire - Part One

Pairing: Vaas Montenegro x Reader

Rating: M (Language, Violence, Sexual Situations, Drugs)

Description: You are a native. You’d do anything to protect your family, even if that means becoming engaged to the island’s most ruthless pirate lord.

Tagged: @mhiyx

WARNING!! Reader gets drugged in this chapter and there is some non-con.

  When you were a child, you had been quite curious about the world. You took for granted the beautiful landscape you had been born into: with sandy white beaches and luxurious crystal waterfalls wrapped in the warm embrace of jungle vines and skyscraper trees. Your home was a place where the animals roamed free and the air was fresh and flowers bloomed without caution. It was such a fragile destination, easily preyed on by the greed and violence of men. And you took it for granted, just as they did.

    Growing up, there was nothing you wanted more than to jump into the perilous seas, never to return. You would run from one side of the island to the other in the course of a day, to merely catch the rise and fall of the earth's sun. You would lay spread out in the sands, wondering if the stars embraced the freedom that was theirs, until your mother would beckon you home. You envied the birds that floated across the winds, that could easily head toward the mainland if they chose.

  It wasn't until you were a young adult that you had come to praise the island that was your home. Of course, you wondered what the world looked like, what different terrains painted the earth in such brilliant hues. Yet, it was that the will to leave had no longer been appealing once you finally could. Upon reaching adulthood, you had become content with what you had and you enjoyed the various things that made up your lifestyle. It was because even though you didn't know what the earth looked like outside of your island, you knew for certain that there was no place like this. You knew you would regret leaving as soon as you did, and so you chose to never leave.

    The Rook Islands was by no means a heavenly place, but at the very least you had never need complain about your living conditions. The only concerns that anyone ever had on the island were the pirates and then in the south island there was Hoyt. As long as the natives kept to themselves, no one needed to die or be oppressed. The men that littered the island with their sin, did so in a way that it only concerned outsiders. Occasionally, there would be some casualties. The Rakyat were constantly in battle with Hoyt and the pirates, but they attempted desperately to keep those dealings separate from the village and your people.

      Your days were filled with booze drinking and marijuana smoking, partying with your friends and surfing until the sun came down. It was a care free and simple life, where the island provided everything you needed. You simply had to reach out and get it. Of course, there were minor restrictions to ensure safety. The island, as lush as it was with life, was also filled to the brim with death. Survival of the fittest roamed rampant through the minds of its people and its creatures. Everyone knew that respect went nowhere when in the presence of a hungry tiger.

   You were told to stay far from Badtown, so you did. You were told to stay far from the south island, so you did. You were told to stay clear of pirates and their outposts, so you did. You never ventured into the jungle alone and you steered clear of river banks and high tides. It was always a game of survival.

So, why didn't you walk away? When danger struck, why did you just stand there and let it happen?

It was his eyes. Those brilliant green eyes that made your heart throb. That perfect smile, such charm and confident grace. How could something so dangerous be so alluring? So beautiful? You wished you could know, look deep into the processes of the gods in all their creations. You wished you could ask, why him? Why did they create a monster like him? Why did they make him so perfect, despite such imperfections? The scar across his brow, the gun at his hip, the brooding muscles and blood stained red.

"What the hell is he doing here?" You recalled yourself asking one of your friends, Ailani, earlier that day. You didn't want to be anywhere near this man, but it was only a matter of time before he showed up. Carlos, Ailani's boyfriend, worked closely with Vaas. Close enough that they might had even been considered friends.

"Look, you don't have to stay if you don't want to." She spat, rolling her eyes as if you were being somewhat dramatic about partying with a ruthless pirate lord. He was off in the distance, talking with Carlos and the other three friends in your group, when those eyes met yours. Chills ran down your spine and you tried to catch your breath, but you couldn't look away.

"I'll stay. I just-" You cleared your throat, finally shaking your head away from Vaas's locked stare. "I just didn't know."

"Well, let's party then!" You kept your distance, and it was all the more obvious that you were uncomfortable. You didn't drink or smoke, you kept alongside your friends and made sure you were never out of their sight. Vaas didn't seem to pay any mind to you, he much preferred being given the attention more than giving it. You all rode around the island, crammed into his jeep, as he smoked his weed and made his violent jokes.

   You had to admit there was something charming about him, but that didn't excuse the fact that he was a murderer. For the fun of it, he would abduct the people of your village and lay waste to them like their lives meant nothing. Sometimes you didn't understand why you remained friends with Ailani, when she chose to keep such evil company.

  The sun began to fall and instead of driving back to the village, Vaas took you all elsewhere. It should have been sign enough that you had made a mistake, but Ailani was convinced that everything was normal. He drove you out to the farthest side east of the island, to a boat that would take you all to his compound. You weren't having fun. You hadn't been since you found out that he would be cruising around with your crew.

"I think I'll just go. I'll walk back."

"Oh come on, let me drive you." Vaas insisted with that sickeningly sweet smile.

"No really, I'll be fine."

"You'll be lucky if the monsters don't get you first, hermana. Seriously I'll drive you back if you really don't want to go."

"Geez, you're such a buzzkill, (Y/N)." Ailani sassed, then the others started to complain about you too, complaining about how you'd been distant all day. Vaas leaned back against his jeep with that smile on his lips, eyes looking you up and down with a predatory glimmer. It was like he was expecting you to crack under the pressure: you valued your friends, and most especially their company. To what lengths would you go to keep that intact?

"You know what, you guys are right..." Vaas's smile visibly widened into that of a leering grin, he stood up straight and crossed his arms as he drew closer to you. "As long as we don't stay too long, I'll come."

"That's what I'm talking about!" Ailani crowed, and then the lot of you hopped onto the small motor boat, where Vaas steered the way.

That was how you absolutely screwed yourself. You agreed to go to Vaas's private Island, one of the more forbidden island hotspots on your list. That was where you had made your biggest mistake, had broken one of your most important rules.

   The party itself was absolutely wild. The entire compound was filled to the brim with islanders and pirates, dancing to jungle tiesto and snorting coke. Ailani and Carlos flat out ditched everyone in the beginning, then Gee and Luke disappeared, and you were pretty sure Timurra was playing poker somewhere. You wanted to enjoy yourself, but the tension in your shoulders was evident: You were being suffocated. You always preferred more intimate gatherings, nothing like this. That was when Vaas grabbed your wrist and guided you to this giant warehouse at the far back of the compound.

    Inside was a wall of storage containers and neon lights. The place was sparsely decorated; as you rounded the containers, there were two couches, a stripper pole in between, and some tables with stacked crates and papers strewn out on them. The music was muffled as were the cries and laughter echoing from the crowd. It was a surprisingly softer, more relaxed environment, aside from the guns and bullets laying about, complimented by unopened packages of cocaine. You were questioning that perhaps Vaas was not all that you had expected. Perhaps he was kind enough to bring you someplace away from the commotion in realizing your discomfort? Or was he taking you someplace where no one would hear you scream? You wouldn't let your guard down and you wouldn't allow yourself to be comfortable while alone with him.

   It became increasingly awkward when all of his attentions were focused on anything else. You nervously took a seat at one of the couches, not entirely sure what to do other than clench up into a ball and pretend you were invisible. You watched Vaas move around the open space, putting together for himself a blunt and then taking residence at the other couch across from you.

"Can I get you anything, chica?" He asked, smoke billowing up from his laxed form. You shook your head, shifting up to sit straighter.

"No, thanks." He hummed in response, just as his eyes followed the length of a wall up toward the glass window ceiling of the warehouse. It was silent for all of a minute, a minute that felt like five, before Vaas spoke up again.

"These girls, they come from the South. Pretty, but they aren't exactly up to my standards, ya'know?" From the corner of your eye, you saw his head tilt toward you, expecting an answer. You gulped, clearing your throat, now shifting yourself farther into the seat. You hadn't expected the random conversation, assuming that he was referring to the dancers that were scattered about his compound in droves. You couldn't get a read on his intentions by bringing up such a topic, but you figured it wouldn't hurt to bite.

"Why do you bring them here then?" He shrugged, the blunt hanging from the corner of his lips.

"It's entertainment, I guess, especially for the others." You bit your bottom lip and closed your eyes, willing yourself to be in another place, anywhere but here. This was awkward, uncomfortable, nerve-wracking. You were sitting across from one of the most dangerous men on the island, alone. Despite his overall calm, you had heard the stories detailing his unpredictable behavior. "You sure I can't get you something? You seem tense."

"It's okay..." You blinked your eyes open and shook your head. "I'm just tired." You were annoyed, anxious, aggravated even. Your friends said that this would be fun, you should have known better. You hadn't had fun the whole day and it was because of him. Vaas could kill you any second now and not even flinch. And because you were stupid enough to let him drag you here, there would be no chance of escape if he tried.

"I'm a little offended. I don't take kindly to being ignored." His voice was an octave lower, deeper, darker, with the slightest hint of a threat hanging on those words.

"My mother told me to stay away from murderers." You almost gasped at your own audacity, not entirely prepared for yourself to respond swiftly like that, and in such a spiteful way. Vaas chuckled, the smoke wafting from his lips with each cackle.

"Well, your mother doesn't sound very nice, does she, hermana?" He whistled sharply, "The island is filled with murderers, I wonder then who keeps her company." The blunt was wedged between the fingers of his hand as he drew it away and his eyes narrowed on you with that sickening smile. "I'll have to meet her sometime, so I can ask." Your breath caught in your throat, understanding the deeper connotations of his words. Vaas was not a man to back down from his promises. You averted your gaze, not out of submission, but out of dread. You could feel that something bad was about to happen, but you couldn't quite figure out what.

This was bad. Very bad.

"No, no, look back." Your fists clenched in your crossed arms and your head reluctantly tilted back to stare at him. "Don't you have such pretty eyes?" Your cheeks reddened into a dark blush. "Want to know a secret, chica?" You didn't respond and Vaas shrugged, bottom lip curling in before he popped his lips, accepting another drag. You were definitely out of your league, the fear that clenched at the belly of your gut was unmistakable. But then there was something else there, something deeper, that you didn't want to entertain. This warmth stirring at the pit of your stomach, the danger of it all becoming far more enticing, and your logic slipping with each passing second. Vass was as tempting as he was deadly, as attractive on the outside as he was ugly on the inside, with an unparalleled comfort in himself.

"Not really." Vaas scowled, finally withdrawing those dagger like eyes eyes to consider the empty stripper pole.

"Your friend was trying to play match maker with you and me." You scoffed, bringing his attention straight back to you and you internally scolded yourself for letting your displeasure be known. As if him not staring directly at you was an invitation for safety, a false sense of security to not be pinned beneath those peridot eyes. "Something you want to say?" You bit the inside of your cheek, sneaking a glance at him to find straight annoyance. Your lips parted so that you could utter the words that were burning a path up the pit of your throat.

"She's been trying to hook me up with someone for ages. She thinks I need to get laid." Why tell him, of all others, this information? He didn't need to know anything. He didn't deserve to know it. It was the nerves that made you say it, the faint snort of anxiety that left you after you made your dumbly driven confession. Vaas smirked again and you had nearly breathed in relief if it hadn't had been for his response.

"Hmm, I'd agree." Vaas crossed his legs, his amusement unflinching as he examined you completely without missing a beat. "You've had a stick up your ass all day, chica. We're only trying to look out for you." It took all of your restraint to keep from calling him an asshole, especially by the condescending tone he was taking with you.

"I-I-" You wished you could tell him off, just as you would with anyone else. But Vaas wasn't anyone else, Vaas an extremely powerful man who could mean the difference between life or death for you. In his proximity, it wasn't about defending yourself, it was about surviving.

"Speak freely, I'm not gonna bite." Vaas laughed, choking a bit on the smoke that he was inhaling. "Unless you want me to." He added with that cocky grin, and damn, were you just now realizing how perfect his teeth were?

"I'm-" You took a deep breath, tightening the ferocity in your eyes and targeting him with all you could muster. "I'm not interested, okay?!" You spat, clenching your jaw in the process and narrowing your gaze.

"Oh, I wasn't offering, or anything." Vaas plainly replied, unflinching to your show of false courage, only unearthing the aggravation you had been trying to keep at bay.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"I think you need to get fucked, but I never said that I would fuck you." He shook his head and laughed at you again, mocking you almost. "Damn, chica, you are a piece of work."

"Excuse me?! I'm the piece of work?! Don't get ahead of yourself." You snapped, rolling your eyes. "It's not like I'd want to fuck you anyways, ever."

"Ya’know, I’ve heard that before. Not everybody keeps their word, I guess." It became drop dead silent after that, with you fuming over Vaas's pride and Vaas peacefully smoking on his blunt with that dopey smile. He was certainly a lot more mellow than you remembered others having told you. He hadn't yelled once, killed someone out of turn, or revealed any other sort of erratic behaviors, since you had met him earlier that morning. In fact, part of you could forget his murderous side if you weren't careful enough.

"Not everyone in the world wants to fuck you, Vaas." You didn't know what made you break the silence, but at this point there was no use in holding back your tongue anymore. This whole situation was fucked and like hell were you going to just let it happen. You wanted to go home, you should be able to walk out this compound without feeling like Vaas had a target on your back.

"I know a few that would disagree." He pipped back, adjusting himself so that he was sitting up, instead of slouching.

"What happened to your standards?" You ground out, not having looked his way again since his offhanded remark from before.

"Want some?" He waved the blunt in his hand, an intervening point in the conversation that you once thought was steering more toward small talk and mutual dislike. You eyed the blunt uneasily, nibbling even harder on the inside of your cheek before standing up and crossing the short space to him. You plopped down on the other end of the couch and reached your hand across, putting a decent amount of space between you both but enough to collect the blunt. Once it was free from Vaas's crusty fingers, he eased back into the couch again and sighed. "Truthfully, hermana, I haven't fucked in a while either." You blinked at his admission, then took a generous puff from the blunt he had made. You choked up once at first, but then evened out your breath, holding it back out to him. He accepted it without looking, propping it between his lips once more.

"I find that hard to believe."

"What reason would I have to lie to you?"

"For starters," You dropped your head into the leather couch, chest rising and falling with a deep breath. "There are plenty of women at your disposal, you're a pirate lord after all."

"And then I become as disease infested as half of my men? No, thanks."

"They did invent protection for a reason, ya'know?" The corner of your lips quirked up, partially in disbelief, partially in genuine amusement at your situation. Here you were, having a surprisingly friendly conversation with Vaas Montenegro. About Sex? And what was in that blunt? Were you starting to feel something? After one puff?

"Bare or not, chica, I'm not sinking my dick into sloppy seconds."

"Or thirds, or fourths, or fifths." You teased, shocked at how smoothly the jest had left your growing smile. Vaas chuckled with you, twisting his head so he could stare at you as he held the blunt to you again.

"How 'bout you? You a lesbian, o' something?" You inhaled deeply from the blunt, hoping it would give you the immediate confidence you needed to answer that question, but the effects wouldn't come as quick as you'd like.

"I'm picky."

"Nothing wrong with that." He took the blunt back, then hunched forward to prop it on the edge of the stage for the stripper pole. "You got a type?"

"Yes. Anybody who isn't from my village."

"Ha, you're kidding, hermosa?" You ignored the loose nickname sent your way, the one that made you feel hotter inside, despite how brief. "The men in your village are supposed to be strong and fierce. Isn’t that what you women look for?"

"I'm sure you would know that's not the case. The men in my village are idiots and cowards."

"You seem especially sure about that, any stories to tell?" Yes. You did have one, but it’s best that you kept it to yourself.

"Maybe for another day." Your eyes fluttered shut as you grinned a bit more freely. Not having entirely realized the meaning behind that words that so naturally left your lips. That blunt was definitely stronger than anything you had smoked before, but it felt nice and relaxing. It was just what you needed to be able to sit alongside Vaas like this, to be able to talk to him so openly.

"You changed your tune: A few moments ago I would have thought that you hated me, now you are talking about seeing me again."

"I guess you aren't that bad." Your head limply tilted to come across the sight of Vaas again, mirroring your posture, staring deeply at you with his own soft smile. It was perhaps a fond smile, but you didn’t know what fondness even looked like on a man of his nature. He was too perfect to be so dangerous, too goofy to be so deadly.

"You can come closer if you'd like." His voice was husky, it burned inside the blood that pumped heavier through your pounding eardrums. He had been smoking weed on and off all day. It had accentuated his jovial and eccentric side, as well as the wild and impulsive streak within him. But this? This was reserved for a more intimate setting. His defenses seemed nonexistent, his spirit was free and calm, the monster within him soothed. You weren’t sure how you felt about it and the drugs weren’t aiding your decision-making skills as much as they were stunting them.

"What for?" You whispered, even if there was no need for you to be speaking at such a low volume.

"You'd be closer." In the growing haze at the back of your mind, that felt reasonable. Except you hadn't expected your body to move of its own accord at the fleeting thought. You were no sooner shoved directly into Vaas's side, shoulders smooshed and eyes held together by invisible string. There was a startling intensity in his gaze, despite how calm and neutral his expression was. He could be so deceitful. He could be the best actor in the world in tricking your mind into believe that he wouldn't hurt you, that you were safe here. You needed to tread carefully.

"Ya'know, I don't want to fuck you, but I will admit that you are hot." Holy shit, did that weed hit home! Where did those words even come from?! You internally panicked for all of one second before you relaxed into the fact that the words were already spoken. You didn't doubt that your sudden relief could be a product of the drugs.

"Funny that you say that, because I don't want to fuck you either, but I still think you're sexy as fuck." The quiet returned, but it was much more comfortable than ever before. It was almost jarring how comfortable it was, but you couldn't find it within yourself to care. All you knew was that your limbs had suddenly become numb and that your thoughts were scattered.

"Hmm," Vaas rested his head back to stare at the ceiling again, ears open for whatever was about to leave your filter lacking mouth next. "Why don't we want to fuck eachother?"

"Well, I'm a murderer, you're a prude. Fate doesn't allow opposites to attract, hermosa." There he went again with that stupid nickname, and prude?! You were by no means a prude.

"I'm not a prude."

"Sure, you are, can't even have the slightest bit of fun." He tutted, and you were grateful that you felt like you could hardly move because you wanted to punch him in that moment. If you had, you wouldn't make it out of the compound alive, much less the warehouse.

"You don't see anything wrong with that? I can't imagine anyone being comfortable around a murderous pirate lord. I mean-"

"Okay, I didn't give a shit before, but if you keep mentioning it, we're going to have a problem." He deadpanned sternly, through the fog that the blunt had created in your mind, alarms sounded. You bit your tongue and swallowed down whatever remaining words you were about to speak. Then, so suddenly, Vaas lightly slapped your knee and laughed. He hunched forward as it tightened his abdomen, a bright smile splitting his handsome face. "Ah chica," He sighed in a huff of amusement. "You should have seen the look on your face. I'm just fucking with you." You didn't realize you had been holding your breath, until your cheeks started to turn red and your lunges began to burn. You finally exhaled through your nostrils, lips parted in a slight tremble. "Here, smoke some more. It'll loosen you up some." He bent forward to retrieve the blunt again, holding it back to you. 

You hesitated, confusion rippling through your entire body as you stared at his offer. There was definitely something wrong here, something wasn’t right. What did you feel, right now? How did you feel? Who did you feel?

Somehow the blunt ended up in your fingers again, Vaas plopped back and his arm drew up to encapsulate your shoulders. You were smoking again somehow, everything felt so out of touch. This was the strongest weed you had ever had.

“Vaas?” Was that you talking?

“Yeah, baby?” He sounded so silky, his voice echoing in your right ear, his breath beat down on the skin there. He was so close. How did he get so close again? His nose brushed your cheek and when you turned your head to look at him, the sensation of his warmth and his proximity overwhelming you, your lips nearly touched. 

“What-” You bit your bottom lip. “What is this?”

“It’s the good stuff. I got it from a friend of mine.” He took the blunt from you to smoke some more himself. “You like it?”

“I just-” He had the perfect face. It was so close to yours. His head tilted away, smoke leaving those perfect lips of his. “I lied.” He cleared his throat, leaving your side for a moment so that he could place the blunt down on the stage. He returned, eyes half lidded and his nose nudging yours. His arm curled tightly around your neck and gooseflesh rose up when his fingers began to caress your neck. 

“About what?” You didn’t know how loud you were talking anymore, but it felt like the both of you were whispering, even as the words rattled and echoed in your mind.

“I do want to fuck you.” This made so much sense like this. Where even were you? What even were you? You were a person. You had to be a person.

“Oh...” Vaas was so close. “That so?” You sputtered, your eyes fluttering as you shook your head.

“Am I a person?” Vaas snorted, he was cupping your cheek now as his lips pressed to the corner of your mouth. 

“Yes, I believe you are. One of the prettiest.” Oh, that felt so warm. Words could have feelings too. Those words felt good, exceptionally good.

“You think I am pretty?” You beamed, reaching up and holding the hand he had on your cheek. Vaas drew your forehead to his and he smiled, licking his lips as if he was eyeing up a five star meal.

“Yes, baby, so pretty. You should let me touch you.” You giggled, when did Vaas become so funny?

“But Vaas, you are touching me.” He swiftly reached his other hand down to lift up your legs. As if you weighed nothing, he managed to shift you perfectly into his lap. He was so comfortable, so warm. He smelled strongly of the earth and cheap cologne and fire. Did Vaas smell like fire?  Or did fire smell like Vaas? Was Vaas fire?

“No, baby, you should let me make you feel good.”

“You are making me feel good, silly.” Vaas’s teeth gently scraped along your lips and he chuckled.

“No, baby...” You gasped when his teeth latched onto your earlobe, he tugged just so and then released you before breathing into your ear. “You should let me fuck you.” A pleasant shiver shook your body and your clutched onto his red tank top for dear life. Your eyes slid shut and you bit hard down onto your bottom lip. 

There was no rationality left to save you.

You couldn’t even recall what Vaas did for a living. All you knew was that you hadn’t been with a man in too long and he was there to change that. 

He must not have been expecting what happened next because within the blink of an eye you were then straddling Vaas’s lap with your tongue shoved down his throat. He reacted in kind, tongue meeting yours with the same desire. His palms pressed flush into the arch of your back and he forced you closer, his hips rolling so that you could get a better feel for the lump that was forming there.

“Oh fuck baby,” When Vaas broke from your lips, you still needed him so bad. You kissed along his cheek, then down his throat till he threw his head back to give you more access. “He said the drug would make you easy, but he didn’t mention that it would make you more excited.” You didn’t even understand what he just said. You wanted more! You needed more! 

You rolled your hips and whimpered, fingers tugging his bright red tank top. So many of his colors, you wanted a taste of them all. The tan of his skin, the green of his eyes, the pink of his lips. He tasted so good, but you wanted more. You suckled intensely at the nape of his neck, which he immediately responded with grabbing your hair and yanking you back.

“No, no, no,” He tutted in amusement. “No marks.” Your face wrinkled with another needy whine and you bunched up his tank in your fists.

“Please, Vaas. Please.” His eyebrows lifted and his eyes darkened. 

“Because you said it so nicely.” While he got to lifting his tank top over his head, you began to disrobe yourself of your shirt and bra. By the time his shirt had hit the floor, it was met with your clothes. He was briefly entranced by the sight of your naked torso before he was attacking your lips again with unrelenting force. At the same time, you moved your hips, needing to feel the buzzing in your body intensify. More! More! More!

Then, his mouth was gone. You would have cried if he wasn’t already so close.

Your fingers sunk into his mohawk when he was back again, one of your nipples now caught between the white of his wolf-like teeth. Oh, it felt so delicious. So perfect. Everything felt so right.

“Wait!” You urged, Vaas released your nipple with a painful nip at the bud. His chest heaving, he looked up at you with narrowed eyes, your fingers were still curled into his perfectly gelled mohawk and a thin sheen of sweat forming on both of your bodies.

“What?! What is it now?!” He spat in annoyance, obviously not appreciating your interruption. Your palms smoothed down till you were cupping his face.

“Vaas, I have to tell you something very important.” Vaas paused in confusion for all of one second before he blinked and then nodded for you to continue.

“Well? I’m waiting!” You scoured your mind for this important thing that you needed to tell him. It was so important, how could you have forgotten it so quickly? Oh, but he did feel perfect. So perfect. Through heated breathes you openly took in Vaas’ bare chest. He was muscular, you could tell as much from before by how toned his arms were, veins bulging intermittently across the tough skin. But his pectorals were gorgeous and he was surprisingly hairless, smooth. He must shave his chest. “Hey!” Vaas snapped his fingers at you impatiently. “What do you have to tell me that is so important?” You were really testing him, but you couldn’t understand why. Was everything moving slower for him than it was for you? Your whole world was spinning, but it felt so right.

“I forgot." You admitted, Vaas rolled his. Eyes and then immediately dove back to your chest. His hands kneaded at your ass with enough strength to bruise the flesh beneath your shorts and his legs spread wider to force yours open.

How did you get here again? Did that even matter?

Vaas, that was his name, like a Vase but with an 'Oz' instead of an 'Ass'.

Vaas' head bobbed up and his beautiful, multi-colored eyes narrowed on you. His lips parted, reverberating speech and words that didn't quite meet your ears. You tuned in as hard as you could, maybe he was something important. He felt so good.

"...did you say..." You didn't get everything, he was talking to fast and you could keep up. He was in the middle of speaking with you when you leaned in, you didn't understand a word of what he was saying anyways. Your lips parted over his, sloppily as your tongue slipped between your lips and lapped his tightly closed lips. The world was spinning so wildly now. You weren't moving fast enough or you were moving to fats to slow down, you didn't know which one it was.

You began to laugh, your forehead dropping to Vaas's warm flesh. That was when a rainbow burst behind your vision, the whole world felt like electricity zapping the very tip of your finger and traveling across all of your nerve endings.

There was not a single coherent thought churning through your brain.

You were traveling through a tunnel of beaming light. Your stomach felt like it was floating, or were you floating? Your gripped tightly onto whatever you could as you road the rainbow tunnel to its end, but it just kept going and going. It never took you close enough to the dark hole off in the distance that was its exit.

Then, so abruptly, you came to a screeching halt and the world came to and stilled around you like a photograph. You were in some sort of home, cluttered with books and boxes and crammed together furniture. Light spilled in through the shutters of a nearby window, signaling that it was no longer night. You were resting on something soft and pillowy, hung above you was the face of a baggy old man with narrowed eyes. His accent was foreign to your ears that were still ringing from the instant freeze that came over your sight. Where the hell were you even?! In the background was a familiar man, standing idly off to the side with his arms crossed and a disinterested expression on his face: It was Vase-NO-It was Vaas.

"Hmm, she looks to be awake."

"Last time I'll ever accept fuckin' drugs from you, old man." The man laughed and it was warm and amused. There was no way that anyone had the guts to laugh at Vaas Montenegro, to his face.

"We'll see about that, my boy, we'll see." He tutted shortly and then was off, disappearing down an open entrance leading to what appeared to be a kitchen.

All Vaas needed to do was take one step closer and you were jolting up from the antique couch with your fists in the air. He bounced back, holding his palms up in mock defense.

"Ey, Ey! Calm the fuck down, alright?! Jesus fuck! Give yourself a minute to adjust before you start swinging!" You had a throbbed headache and your bones felt, lighter.

"What the fuck did you do me?!"

"Okay, listen..." He licked his lips and then awkwardly cleared his throat, hands falling to his hips as he squinted at you. "We shared a blunt, you had more than you should have and that is that."

"I don't remember anything!"

"Well," Vaas smirked, his head tilting from side to side with a shrug. "That happens."

"Where the fuck am I? And where are my friends?! What time is it?! What-"

"STOP!" You shrunk back at Vaas's violent growl, his teeth clenched and he panned his forehead. "STOP FUCKING YELLING!" He took a deep breath, the inhale lifting his broad shoulder before he removed his palm to stare back at you. He pointed a threatening finger at you, sending a shiver down your spine. "Okay?" His eyebrows lifted expectantly for your response. You quietly nodded your head, eyelids fluttering from the lack of strength in your body to keep standing. Your limbs shook in resistance and you licked your lips. "Sit." Vaas demanded, you dropped back down onto the couch, not wanting to make him any more aggravated than he already was.

Or perhaps you misinterpreted the aggravated part.

He plopped down beside you, arm resting across the length of the couch to surround you in his precense, far too close for your liking.

"So, I guess by now you know that I've had a bit of a crush on you." He admitted plainly, a soft and dopey expression tugging at his lips. Your jaw dropped, you guessed? That was so far from your mind, it didn't even exist. What the hell was he talking about?! You just met him. "I've been watching you from a distance for a few weeks..." He snorted, shaking his head. "You love to play hard to get, you silly you, but I think I managed well enough, huh?" He held his arms up and gestured around the living room. "Not how I wanted this to go, but I got this far." You gulped, how were you supposed to keep your sanity after this?! What the fuck was happening, right now?! One second you were at a party and now you were here. Everything in between was a brilliant blur, it was all white light and burning heat. How did you end up here? With Vaas confessing his crush on you and his obsessive behavior in having stalked you all these weeks. You got shivers just thinking about, and not the good kind. Vaas released a pleased sigh, pulling his arm tightly around you and hauling your limp form into his side. You were still so stunned that your body had not yet kicked into gear, not that you body was even functioning at a manageable level. You were woozy and tired and sick, followed by anxious, afraid, and confused. "So, what do you say? We stop playing this stupid game and you get to be the luckiest girl on this island?" You blankly stared at him, blinking once and then twice and then three times before you finally reacted.

"Ah, that's..." You feigned a cough and nodded your head in an exaggerated shake. "Interesting and, um, a good one. That's a good joke." Vaas's lips fell into a firm line, his eyebrow lifting in question. "I promise I won't tell anyone." Vaas burst into a deep chuckle, contagious if you didn't find his proximity to be so menacing. He patted your back hard, the thuds of his hand forcing out a choke up from your lunges.

"Still playing hard to get, baby, but don't worry..." He winked at you. "I can be very convincing."

Return to Prompts

[river--glass]

Reylo Fic Recs Long Ass Fics pt 2: Alternate Universe

Someone asked for fic recs 100K or over, so here they are. See Pt. 1 for Canon Verse or Alternate Canon Verse fics. (I haven’t read all of these- my personal comments are in bold)

Equilibrium by AttackoftheDarkCurses & thebuildingsnotonfire. (modern, E, 479K)

When Rey works up the nerve to ask Grand Master Luke Skywalker to train her, she makes friends and finds something deep and wonderful in the martial art known as Taekwondo.

She never thought the choice would change her life.

Alternatively, a (long) story of love, family, and Martial Arts.

The Heartbreak Prince by diasterisms. (Harry Potter, E, WIP) 

I swore I would never read Harry Potter AU’s or Works In Progress, but for this fic I broke both rules. This is, pun not intended, so magical in every way. It has me SHOOK and if somehow you haven’t heard of it yet, do yourself a favor and check it out!

In Living Memory by SpaceWaffleHouseTM. (multiple times, E, 221K)

Ben and Rey are rendered immortal after being struck by lightning at the precise same moment, and keep running into one another as the centuries drag on. Waffle’s stories are all amaaaaazing and you need to read ALL of them.

Hit Me With Your Best Shot by SageMcMae. (modern, E, 214k)

MMA fighter, Kylo Ren is suspended from the league and sentenced to community service at his uncle’s martial arts academy. There he meets Rey Niima, a recent graduate with a natural ability and incredible potential.

Soul Searching by OptimisticBeth. (AU, Modern, E, 205K)

A Soulmates AU in which Ben is horrified to find out he’s soulmates with his 16 year old student, ten years his junior. (no underage shenanigans) This fic fucked me up. The world building is so stunning. The story is rich with love and fluff, but oh the angst. Soooo much angst and emotional anguish and two people who are trying their best but just can't communicate for shit. The overall story is so beautiful and worth every heartbreaking moment. A happy ending WILL come!

Satan Wears a Rolex by AquaWolfGirl. (Modern, E, 205K)A Devil Wears Prada AU. Unfinished, but it’s fascinating and it ends well where it is.

Hiraeth by Ferasha. (1990′s, E, 204K)

An absolute angst and pain train of a historical war fic. This is not a comfort fic. It will fuck you up. But if you’re into that, the way they’ve woven canon plot in with the Yugoslav Wars is a masterpiece. It’s dark and gritty and will make you feel things.

Le Fin Du Fin by QueenOfCarrotFlowers @leofgyth. (Victorian, E, 196K) A Crimson Peak AU!!! This writer has never let me down.

A Proposal by Any Other Name by Lucidlucy. (Modern, E, 188) A Leap Year AU.

Salt in the Blood by Hagen. (9th century, E, 169K) Featuring pre-Norman invasion Ireland, selkies, love of the sea, and mythical creatures.

The Great Big No by dietplainlite. (1990′s, E, 165K)

Kylo Ren is third generation rock royalty, a reigning brat prince starting to feel the burn of the fame he reached for with both hands. Rey is an aspiring singer on the verge of a big break, provided her A&R guy still has a job by the time she reaches LA. Their paths have crossed briefly, disappointingly, before. What happens when they collide?

The Trail Bride by SecretReyloTrash. (AU, Wild West, E, 160K)

Rey Niima finds herself in a perilous situation when her husband dies at the start of their journey West. From the few bachelors on the trail in her party; she attaches herself to the best of her options- mysterious Banker Ben Solo. A really interesting, amazing piece. Lots of introspection, and a heart wrenchingly real look into abuse and recovery. I emotionally digested for days.

The Sacred Texts by Eskayrobot & Poaxath. (Modern, E, 159K)

Doing the Unstuck by slipgoingunder. (Modern, E, 158K) A When Harry Met Sally AU.

The Mating Service by AlbaStarGazer. (Modern A/B/O, E, 146K)

If Rey had known how quickly she would find her biological mate and alpha through the world wide mating service, 'Match,' she might have considered signing up years ago.

Unravel Me by UnderTheCancerMoon. (Modern, E, 145K)

Rey and Ben push and pull their way through their 20's, experiencing the love, success, loss, and challenges that make life rich.

Fire Away by Daisyflo. (Modern, E, 141K)

The Witch in the Wood by HarpiaHarpyja @thisgarbagepicker & Inmyownidiom. (Fantasy, E, 138K)

I cannot say enough good things about this fic. It’s serving you knight Kylo and witch Rey and so so many good feelings. Sure there’s some angst and dark magic and some struggles but mostly this is a lovely Ghibli-esque story about two people living in a treehouse and talking to animals and having a really good life! Everything HarpiaHarpyja writes is magic.

Snow Without Winter by neonheartbeat. (Renaissance, E, 138K) 

If you’re into serious historical fics (this once features catholicism and Rome in 1492) this is for you.

Lemon-hot Summer by IshaRen & pr3tty_g1rl5. (Modern, E, 130K).

In which Ben is the horniest virgin alive and Rey is bored and looking for something (or someone) to do.

Stranger Than Fiction by daxcat79. (Modern, E, 127K). Grumpy writer Ben and sunshine muse Rey.

Like Red But Not Quite by @kylotrashforever. (Modern, E, 126K) KTF is a god-tier reylo writer and you need to do yourself a favor and go read everything they have ever written.

Dark Water by LinearA. (1950′s, E, 125K)

The North Shore by @strawberrycupcakehuckleberrypie. (Modern, E, 125K)

Notting Hill vibes. Actor Ben meets shop owner Rey, and both their lives are changed instantly. It’s mostly about them both being smitten and starting a really good life together!! Lovely!

Stars In My Pockets (Wear Daisies In My Hair) by LostInQueue. (Modern, E, 125K). A Reylogan fic.

we could plant a house, we could build a tree by like_a_dove. (Modern, E, 124K).

An absolute classic. It’s about growing pains and growing feelings - the transition from childhood into adulthood and all the messy bits in between. God, it will hurt you. Badly. But it’ll be so, so worth it.

go i know not whither and fetch i know not what by voicedimplosives. (1990′s, E, 118K)

Russian Mafia AU!! A truly beautiful piece of work. Great plot,great smut, great Bendemption arc. It’s an emotional rollercoaster that’s fully worth the ride.

Souviens-toi de moi by Maniable. (Modern/historical, E, 117K)

Disconnect by Weatherbug02. (Modern, E, 115K) 

Candyleg by 5cents. (1950′s, E, 115K)

The girl was too young, but old enough to have a hustler’s-eye view of her own bleak future. The boys were paying her to do a snow job on a candyleg, but she was beginning to love her work and love Solo, and she decided to stick with him till death did them part...

Baby, It’s Just Biology by polkadotdotdot. (Modern A/B/O, E, 112K)

Only If You Want To by Violetwilson. (Modern, M, 111K)

Personal security expert (and occasional under-the-table hitman) Kylo Ren has a strong feeling about the cute dive bar waitress with the strange bruises and the vicious wit. She's either a victim or the weirdest criminal he's ever met. Possibly both.

Ileenium Manor by WaterlilyRose. (AU, victorian, E, 109K)

Leia’s maid Rey instantly hates Lord Ben when he comes to take over the household. She can’t hate him for too long as he starts to pursue her. If you’re in the mood for a sweet but angsty Lord/Maid fic, this is for you.

Kohelet 3:16 (Call Me A Cab) by LinearA. (Modern, E, 108K)

Ruby Woo Red by HeartSabers. (Modern, E, 107K) Featuring makeup artist Rey and TV star Kylo.

Sixth Year by witheyesclosed. (Harry Potter, M, 107K)

The one where Ravenclaw Rey gets paired with Slytherin Ben in Potions and ohmygod he’s hot now

Lockjaw by bitterbones. (zombie apocalypse, M, 106K)

A Song of Trash and Fire: Ben and Rey Make a Porno by HarpiaHarpyja & sunshineflying. (Modern, E, 106K) 

With the help of rich Unca Wanwo, flagrant misuse of Ben's creative writing degree, and copious amounts of coffee, Ben and Rey put together the porno of the century, starring themselves and their friends . . . with interesting results.

The Hypnotist by Pandora_Spocks. (Modern, E, 104K)

From a galaxy far, far away, soulmates Ben and Rey have been reincarnated on Earth to resolve their karma. Dr. Ben Solo is a charismatic hypnotist to whom present day Reychelle Lumen has been referred to for help with her nightmares.

Score by SpaceWaffleHouseTM. (Modern, E, 104K)

Ben's friends convince him to take the Rice Purity Test, but when he and Rey are revealed to have the highest scores of their friends, they quickly form a pact to beat Poe's out by the end of the semester. I loved this! Its so so sweet and funny and all from Ben’s POV. Sweet, sweet pining Ben.

The World Shifts (And I Am Better Here) by lachesisgrimm. (Fantasy, E, 102K)

Once upon a time there was a beggar girl whose parents sold her to a thief, and she was very unhappy.--In which prophecy is used with malicious intent, and the universe exerts itself to correct the problem.

for @scarletvizhlovers

[shadowruler]

Family

House Vestra, like all high houses of the empire, has always been known to carry a crest, though those outside of their immediate allies don’t tend to know that it is the crest of Macuil, due to some house heads deigning to keep that detail under wraps. The less a potential enemy knows, the better.

As with most nobles, it is preferred for the heir to inherit a crest, regardless of strength. House Vestra was blessed with a child with a major crest of Macuil: Veronica von Vestra. Even better was that she was the eldest child of Barnat and Greta von Vestra, so should they have any future crested children, there would be no worries as to who would inherit the estate.

That was, until the child took ill. Her decline wasn’t sudden, but even at the age of three, a physician declared her future perilous, and made it clear there was a chance Veronica would never grow to inherit her birthright.

Her parents had already discussed the idea of giving her a younger sibling, but now there was a more practical purpose beyond simply growing a larger family: they needed a backup heir, in case Veronica’s health worsened. That backup would be born a year later, and granted the name Hubert. Only one problem...

He was born crestless.

There were no ill feelings towards the child, but with his sister growing weaker, the issue of an heir was still in question. And whilst Barnat could not fault his son for not being as special as his sister, another line of thought crossed his mind: why did his wife not give birth to another crested child? Was she even capable any more? And the one child she did have with such a thing was too sickly to make it to adulthood.

Slowly, his disdain grew and became more obvious. He began refusing Greta’s company, and some days couldn’t even bare to look at her. At the beginning, he recognised how illogical he was being, but eventually he came to blame her for Hubert’s lack of inheritance. As if she had done it on purpose.

Eventually, Barnat found himself growing closer to the sister of an old friend. He confided in her, and found himself laughing in a way he hadn’t managed since his daughter’s grim diagnosis. One thing led to another and... A month after his seven year old daughter’s death, a second son was born.

Throughout the pregnancy, there was talk of if Barnat would leave his wife for the mother of his third child. With the newborn also not having a crest, the discussion changed to who would raise him. So as to leave less of a stain (supposedly) on his consort’s name, Barnat took the boy in, and the relationship ended.

From there on however, women started to come and go from the estate, leaving Greta to try and think of how to explain it to her son. Why there were more children that became Hubert’s siblings, but not her flesh and blood.

Eventually, such behaviours stopped. Once Ivona von Vestra with her minor crest, the fifth of the children born from such affairs, came into existence, things changed rapidly. The most apparent of which was the re-marriage of the Marquis, to Ivona’s mother...

And the re-location of his first wife.

Greta had been gradually pushed out of the picture for years, a wife in only name. At first she had been allowed to be a mother to her younger child, but slowly his father began taking up more of Hubert’s time, and his to be lifelong relationship with Princess Edelgard had begun. With a new wife, there was no need for Greta: she was sent away, placed in a small but comfortable home near to Nuvelle... The opposite side of the empire to Hresvelg, and thus far from her son and former husband.

Despite his callous treatment of his first wife, Barnat did hold love in his heart for his children, even if his emotional distance suggested otherwise. History will remember his part in the Insurrection of the Seven being motivated by power, but few know of the suggestions that came his way, implying that the three younger children born by this point may find themselves in a tragic accident... That his eldest surviving child may succumb to a similar illness to his full-blooded sister.

Barnat von Vestra was not one for falling to idle threats, but a paranoia struck him at the mention of what could happen to Hubert. His current heir, Ivona not yet being born. He became convinced that Veronica hadn’t been sick naturally, but rather succumbed to a slow developing poison, or deliberately infected. Why else the threat towards her brother?

Years later, once Hubert got his father out of the way and took his position rather than Ivona, he would investigate the idea, having remembered something his mother mentioned about Veronica’s death being unnatural. He never found any evidence of foul play.

[jonathantaylorthomas]

Diary entries, as a rule, don’t constitute art. Songs do.

That’s what drew me in to Taylor Swift and her music upon the release of her 2006 debut album, “Taylor Swift,” and that’s what has kept me closely tracking the remarkable arc of her career since then, up to and including today’s release of her sixth album, “Reputation.”

From the beginning, Swift — then a precocious, uncommonly smart, gifted and ambitious teenager — has written deeply personal songs that often sound like they’re ripped directly from the pages of a diary.

That hallmark of her songwriting has nurtured an especially close bond between Swift and her fans, along with her savvy use of social media from the outset. It’s also given her detractors no shortage of ammunition with which to attack her for everything from a new hairdo to her choices of dates to the logistics of selling tickets to her concerts.

The double-edged sword of success — and the fame and fortune that have accompanied it to stratospheric levels for her — inform many of the songs on “Reputation,” possibly the most anticipated album of the always-intensive fall season.

As one of a small handful of music writers offered an early listen to the new collection, I’ll venture to call it her most focused, most cohesive album yet.

In large part that reflects her dramatic narrowing of collaborators compared with her previous two outings: Nine of the 15 new songs written and produced for the most part by Swift with superstar producers Max Martin and Shellback, the other six in tandem with indie rock band Fun front man Jack Antonoff.

They conjure a sense of foreboding to illuminate her songs of betrayal, heartbreak and disappointment. There also are plenty of bright spots celebrating new love and new maturity in her outlook, most framed in dance-floor-conscious beats and employing inventive sonic textures that expand on or outright defy conventions of contemporary pop-R&B music production.

I’d also say that in many ways “Reputation” echoes one of Bob Dylan’s greatest lines of the last two decades: “I used to care…but things have changed.”

'Reputation' echoes one of Bob Dylan’s greatest lines of the last two decades: 'I used to care…but things have changed.' — -- Randy Lewis I say that based on many hours I’ve spent with her since first traveling to Nashville to interview her early in 2007, not long after her debut album put her on the map in country music circles.

Case in point: “Reputation” is the first album for which she’s given no interviews in advance. (I had sat down with her for extended talks about each of her previous four albums, “1989,” “Red,” “Speak Now” and “Fearless.”)

Additionally, only a small handful of music critics were invited to hear this album in advance (The Times’ pop music critic Mikael Wood was not).

She did once again hold several playback sessions for fans in recent months, as she did when “1989” was being readied for release three years ago. But no reporters were allowed to look in on those as a few did for “1989.”

Things have changed, indeed.

What struck me initially about Swift’s music was the refreshing viewpoint she brought to her songs, which sounded, for a change, like what real teenagers might think, feel and say.

That was a big part of what prompted me to single her out at the end of 2006 as one of the artists most worth watching in the year ahead, and to travel to Nashville a few months later to interview her about her ambitions.

So many other young pop and country acts spent most of their time attempting to pass themselves off as preternaturally mature, often singing of experiences well beyond their years.

That initially sparked my respect for her as a young artist—not just a pretty face and perky personality who’d been handed a batch of songs written by others and instructed by her handlers on what to say, how to dress and where to stand.

Clearly that resonated with a lot of listeners as well, and launched her on a meteoric rise: first in country music, and then to her place today as arguably the biggest pop star on the planet.

Along the way she has held tight to the innate understanding of social media platforms she expressed to me in 2008, shortly before her sophomore album, “Fearless,” was released.

“Blogging has been really fun because I like to let people into my life as much as possible,” she said back when MySpace was still the dominant social media outlet for most musicians, well before Twitter, Facebook and Instagram and, her new favorite outlet, Tumblr, took over. "I think it's important for the people who keep you going and support you and have your back out there in the world to know that you're thinking of them all the time.”

She quickly learned, however, that it’s not a big leap from having someone’s back to stabbing it, a harsh reality Swift has faced through intensely public Twitter feuds in recent years with Katy Perry, Nicki Minaj, Kanye West and Kim Kardashian, among others.

Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and other social media platforms magnify vulnerability and hypersensitivity with snarky comments and images, making adolescence and young adulthood seem more perilous than ever.

She acknowledged the vipers in the room directly on her third album, “Speak Now,” with “Mean,” a song in which she transformed one blogger’s nasty comments about her into a hit song. That’s one tool with which she’s avoided the “Don’t get mad; get even” path of revenge, instead drawing illumination and creative inspiration out of the many barbs tossed her way.

Yet the more famous she’s become, and the more followers she’s cultivated, the more the world at large apparently feels entitled to pass judgment not only on her art but on her life, topics she takes on in several of the new songs on “Reputation.”

That’s a fact of contemporary life Swift recognizes in “This Is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things.” In fact, it may well become an anthem for the Twitter generation, for whom every fleeting thought seems worthy of sharing with the world at large: “Did you think I wouldn’t hear all the things you said about me? And here’s to you… ‘cause forgiveness is a nice thing to do/ (laughter) I can’t even say it with straight face!”

I’ll go as far as to suggest that the whole “Reputation” theme of the album isn’t solely about Taylor Swift and her place in the world, but examines the extent to which most of us now live out our lives in public thanks to the omnipresence of social media, and the multiplicity of ways that plays out.

Indeed, in each of two elaborate 72-page magazines she has created for an exclusive deluxe edition of the album (available in the U.S. at Target stores), she includes an open letter noting, “This is the first generation that will be able to look back on their entire life story documented in pictures on the internet, and together we will all discover the after-effects of that.”

Another facet of Swift’s career that’s impressed me is the way she has respected her place as a role model for young women in general, and other female musicians in particular.

Among the many ways that’s manifested are her personal donation of $500,000 to disaster relief efforts when Nashville, and much of Tennessee, was flooded in 2010 — before she reached her 21st birthday. She ponied up an additional $1 million last year for flood victims in Louisiana after launching her “1989” tour there.

She wielded her industry clout to politely but firmly chastise Apple for initially placing some of the financial burden of a free trial period for its new streaming service in 2015 on songwriters with a plan that would have withheld their royalty payments — an idea the tech giant abandoned in response to her open letter.

Even when she briefly succumbed to the temptation to respond to a perceived diss from Nicki Minaj over yet another VMA Awards show in 2015, Swift quickly apologized and held out an olive branch rather than continuing to ratchet up a war of tweets.

As recently as August, she turned the tables on a lawsuit filed against her by a Denver radio host who claimed he was unfairly dismissed from his job after she complained that he had groped her during a post-concert meet-and-greet. She filed a countersuit in which she asked for, and won, a token $1 jury award after she took to the witness stand to speak out not only in her own defense, but on behalf of other sexual harassment victims.

Yet bloggers galore still seem determined to take her down for any number of issues, lately many of them revolving around the way she has set the stage for today’s release of “Reputation.”

A plan to create an incentive that would give priority for buying concert tickets to fans who most enthusiastically click away to watch her latest videos or place advance orders for the album was blasted as exploitative.

She’s also come under fire for not being vocal enough about alt-right demonstrators who have attempted to co-opt her music into endorsements of their positions, reminiscent of Charles Manson’s bizarre misinterpretation nearly 50 years ago of the Beatles’ “Helter Skelter,” which he insisted was a coded message to him to start a race war.

Then there was the much publicized dissing of her last year from Kanye West in his song “Famous” in which he rapped that she owed him sex because he made her famous by snatching the spotlight from her at the infamous MTV Video Music Awards in 2009 — despite the fact she had scored multiple hit singles and sold millions of albums well before that incident.

She kept a relatively low profile last year when West and his wife, Kim Kardashian, spoke and tweeted ad infinitum that she had given him her consent about the way he portrayed her in “Famous,” offering only a terse denial that that had been the case.

When she released “Look What You Made Me Do” as the leadoff single from “Reputation,” she took flak in many quarters for a perceived belated response and for keeping a feud going long past its natural shelf life.

But based on how I’ve watched her process other life events, what I hear in the song is a woman who recognizes the hurt an ugly life situation has thrust upon her, and who owns the consequences of how it that has played out for her, emotionally and psychologically.

“I don’t trust nobody and nobody trusts me,” is how the sadder-but-wiser Swift portrays herself in this scenario. “Look What You Made Me Do” isn’t an exercise in the blame game; it’s an acknowledgment of loss over defenses one has been forced to erect out of self-preservation.

In a broader sense, the payoff I’m after in “Reputation” has nothing to do with any shade she’s throwing at West and Kardashian, or whether in other songs she’s leaving any clues on her breakups with Tom Hiddleston or Calvin Harris.

Many eyes, of course, also will be focused on whether “Reputation” extends her streak of albums that have sold more than 1 million copies in the first week. She’s the only artist to do so with three consecutive releases.

The only thing that matters in the long run is how she’s evolving as a songwriter, a singer and a record producer.

Will anyone care in 10, 20 or 50 years — heck, in five, even — who the “him” is in “Getaway Car,” when she confesses, “I wanted to leave him / I needed a reason”? What’s much more likely to stand the test of time is the whip-smart form the song’s expression of romantic betrayal delivers: “It was the best of times / The worst of crimes / The ties were black / the lies were white / In shades of gray and candlelight.”

Her commitment to growth as an artist is something I sensed more than a decade ago, when we first met in the bunker-like basement of her then-fledgling record company, Big Machine.

And it’s still why I fully expect to be as interested at what Swift writes at 37 and 47 as what she’s delivered at 27. In my book, that’s the only reputation that matters.

[the-blind-geisha]

Older!Noctis (Hinted Older!Ignis) x Female Reader: The Sylleblossom of Insomnia

A/N: With Eos in need of a new Oracle and the King ascending the throne, the Astrals birth a new Oracle to guide and be beside King Noctis. Though the years seem fruitful, the Oracle’s power and strength begin to wane for unknown reasons, leaving the King of Lucis to hunt for a cure as history threatens to repeat itself…

 {AKA: we don’t accept FF15’s ending, so let’s rewrite it, and here—have some angst. This will be chapter based when I find the time through commissions and the like.}

 Rated: SFW (so far)

 Pairings: Older!Noctis x Reader / hinted Older!Ignis x Reader

 Warnings: None

 ----

 Prologue

 I was told it was dark once—an endless, choking darkness that cloaked the world in fear and peril. Daemons were everywhere and to live in a place that didn’t have a comforting form of light was madness.

 Then, for what felt like eternity, the righteous and true King of Lucis ascended the throne to take back what was his. He fought hard with his companions, whom he saw as his brothers, and the valiant warriors were victorious.

 But light…had yet to return for a time and the people suffered still under the grip of the daemons that killed thousands of innocents. Until, at least, one day the horizon glowed a brilliant hue that had been long since forgotten by the people of Eos. It was as though the mountains were on fire as the radiant daylight spilled over the world and brought peace and calmness back into the lives of those who felt they would be forever in eternal dark.

 As odd as it sounds, I must confess that I don’t remember any of it. Not a single thing.

 The first memory I can recall in my life was waking up in a field of sylleblossom flowers in Tenebrae. Lying as I was, covered in the precious flower to conserve my dignity, I was found by an elderly couple and brought quickly into their home where I lived my life in the coming year as any woman would have under the close watch of their parents.

 It was as though I was struck with amnesia. Everything in my life was just gone. It were as though I was just born into this world but rushed into adulthood to carry out some unforeseen plan the gods had for me.

 How close I was in my past ponderings…

 My dreams were ever prevalent with the sensation of touching and talking with the King of Lucis within the boundaries of, what I can assume to be, Insomnia as his spirit refused to venture to my precious sylleblossom field in Tenebrae to commune with me there. I questioned it not but once as asking such a thing to what, I assumed was a dream, caused his face to falter to anguish. I needed only to see that once to know not to ask again.

 His hand upon my own…it was as though he were truly there. It was warm, inviting and the way his fingers curled upon my hand was of a child needing comfort, and like a flower yearning for the sun’s warmth, I held him close to my body wishing to bask in the fill of his brilliance that gave me life.

 How odd…a man I never truly met giving me a sensation to be strong by mere stories I was told each and every night by either my family or those in Tenebrae.

 But, as fate and the Gods would see to it, my destiny to be this new Oracle in the world of Eos became known when I fretfully fought for a young child to be spared this awful curse wrought by the damned Ifrit…the Starscourage.

 My simple life in Tenebrae became more than that after such a moment was revealed to the prying eyes nearby. I was soon the status of the King of Lucis if not considered higher, and I found myself caged in a glittering castle with only the dreams of the King to keep me company in such a prison when the elected graciously bowed down from the throne.

 I was constantly told where to go, how to dress, and what to do when it came to my new position in power. As caged as I felt, I was more than gracious to the people of Eos and would do anything—everything—in my power to protect them and give them the light they so rightly deserved and needed. Not even the most beautiful of flowers could hold their strength in a realm of eternal night though would fight to find a way just as these many survivors had.

 They deserved their well earned peace and tranquility under their gracious King’s reign.

 However, as selfish as it is to admit in these pages, nothing gave me as much pleasure as those moments with King Noctis of Lucis when I closed my eyes even if for a mere nap there in the sunlight at my writing desk. He knew, and I knew that they were more than dreams (if his arrival of letters to me months later after my announcement of being the new Oracle arrived at his doorstep was any indication). We were meeting one another frequently in the Astral Plane where spirits tend to wander ever close when at peace in restful slumber.

 One dream caused me to awake in awash of tears as I lie there on the desk and felt his hand caress my cheek and cascade the needed warmth upon my skin once more in my astral journey. My fingers tensed and I felt as though I were slowly rising to attend my duties that my officials would ask of me…

 But it was him…smiling down on me there in my Kingdom of Tenebrae with the light from the balcony granting a luminous and holy halo upon his figure.

 “My Lord,” I whispered in befuddlement, my palm to my chest as I felt my heart about to burst with joy, “you are…you are with me here in Tenebrae?”

 His hand extended to ask for mine. “Only in your dream for now, (Y/N),” King Noctis responded, his smile remaining long after I accepted his gesture to stand. “I selfishly stayed away from your homeland for fear of my heart breaking apart once more at what I lost and what I failed to protect years ago.”

 His other palm moved to my cheek to grant that inviting warmth that made me relax to the otherworldly sensation. Eyes closed, I quickly kept his touch there against my features as if worrying I’d wilt without such a welcoming caress that sent a fire through my heart and through every muscle and vein in my body. Tears, even then, cascaded down my skin and ushered the King’s gentle touch to aid me in removing the dampness from making a mess of me.

 “But I cannot be whole again if I keep from the very person who grants me life,” King Noctis’ voice echoed within my mind as he dried my tears.

 To hear such a phrase escape his lips and grace my ears, I thought my tears would never cease, but it mattered not. His hands taking to mine, Noctis hurried backward into the light, which became ever brighter until it engulfed us both. The white brightness soon receded, leaving us in an ever vast field of sylleblossoms, the area raining in their petals as the King playfully guided me through them and, finally in that moment, I saw him genuinely happy.

 The aura of him prior was filled with doubt, pain, and suffering and now there was a light blossoming within him, granting a feverish delight in my space.

 The King of Lucis had turned me towards him when his playful run through the field had ended. In the downpour of sylleblossom petals, we took to a loving embrace with the rhythm of his heart bringing a weakness to my knees as I placed all of me into his arms. “Can my nights and days be filled as this?” I asked, regardless of he and myself aware at this point these dreams were hardly such by now. “Can I soak in the otherworldly love and light that you grant me here in this bed of sylleblossom flowers? May I continue to see your delight and happiness, hear your voice and listen to your laughter echo in the reaches of my mind till it vibrates to my core, sending me into a state of euphoria?”

 I felt him stifle a laugh as his chest tensed and his hand found the back of my head to caress and cradle me so. “Perhaps you will get all of that and more when I come for you soon, (Y/N).”

 My heart felt as though it would halt dead in my chest at those words—not from fear but from delight. But just as I hoped to ask him further, the dream melted away in a form of thick, frigid fog, blotting out my connection to the King and rousing me from my slumber to the cold chill in the air and the very feel of my tears becoming mere crystals on my cheek.

 “Y-Your Majesty…?” I questioned, but as I picked my head up to the world around me, I found my bedroom nearly frozen as the Astral being, Shiva, stood there in the center of my bedchambers. My breath obvious in its take upon the air, I grabbed quickly for my shawl to warm myself and not appeared bothered by her appearance, worried to show disrespect. “I know you…From my dreams…Lady Shiva…!”

The woman of ice smiled a gentle and most welcoming smile. If my body didn’t feel frail underneath her presence, I would have most certainly seen it as motherly. However, I found myself soon upon my knees, the one hand grasping my decorative shawl ever tightly. Her smiled remained as she pitied me.

 “Oh, gracious Oracle,” she spoke in a soothing, motherly tone, “you are still so frail as you are, it seems.” The Divine Shiva glided towards me to where her aura was even more potent and nearly brought me to beg the unthinkable in asking her away.  “You keep your dreams filled with merely the brightness of the King of Lucis and stray from the words and beckoning of the Gods to where you are nearly deaf to us and weak by our presence.”

 With such a damning thing told to me, I looked at her in fright and my eyes stung with pain as tears glossed over my sight, blurring her perfection and bringing a horrid agony at just gazing upon her. I didn’t wish to speak out of turn, but my lips trembled with a pathetic ‘please’ as if to urge her not to depart me from the very man who allowed me breath and company in such harsh and lonely times.

 The Lady knelt before me, her frigid hand threatening to touch upon my features but receding back from the thought as though she were worried she would freeze me in place, a frown chasing away her once prevailing smile. “Perhaps we made you with the King of Lucis too much in mind,” she whispered to me cryptically. Her gentle grin returned, spreading upon her regal features. “But, your King comes for you in the coming days, dear child. Perhaps with his love in focus, you will blossom into the Oracle—and the Queen—you were meant to be.”

 She vanished as quickly as she had appeared and soon the heat returned to my trembling form, tears unlocked from their prison and freely flowing down my cheeks, and my very room, leaving no signs that the Lady Shiva were there as her angelic dust evaporated.

 Perhaps it would have been wise to focus on her warning further and heed her advice, but my King needed me—the people of Eos needed me—and it was soon I found myself in his actual presence and the balmy touch of his embrace when he found himself within Tenebrae and upon her soil once more to come for me as he swore he would.

 The light he emitted was as inviting as I imagined it’d be—the dreams did not fabricate such warmth. The sound of his voice was as soothing and gentle as I often heard when I had not interrupted him upon some vile nightmare he was enduring. The power I felt him emit granted me such protection that I felt the need to stand would be pointless. In the grace of his presence, I fell to my knees no matter how pathetic it would seem for an Oracle to do so and brought the back of his hand upon my forehead.

 “Lady (Y/N)—!” His Lordship tried to speak, but I muttered urgently in a desire to deny him of his wishes to continue forward.

 “My Lord, I offer my services to you willingly; however, I piteously ask of a selfish request in return.”

 I could hear the world grow cold and silent. Merely the hums of whispers echoed about me as worry filled the air.

 My eyes rose to greet the King of Lucis, hand gripping his in need. “Pray that things never change between us. I ask that your light be the one to keep my own strong and to give me the energy I need to continue to give daylight to this world when there was once encroaching darkness. I ask that your love be firm and undying in the most dreadful of storms as I will do my best for you in turn.”

 The King granted me a look that was hard for me to read. It was perhaps of worry and yet curiousness lay heavy upon him as well. His hand urged me to stand, bringing me back to my feet as I stood to face him. “Since when did the Lady (Y/N) ever kneel to me in our dreams?” he asked, a smile flickering upon his lips. “I believe we always saw one another as equals.”

 Knowing I would be taken away from my solitude in Tenebrae and married to the King of Noctis brought me a joy that wouldn’t be feasible to describe on paper alone. I took to my new life and my new journey with acceptance, feeling this is what I was meant to do…this was why I was here…

 Again…How close I was to those very ponderings as I write this very diary entry…

[stephspencer10]

A ghostwritten Memoir about Rena Chynoweth, Ervil LeBaron, and his cult

This Memoir, written around thirty years ago, struck me as the work of an immature apologist and revisionist. Its bias toward Uncle Ervil’s cold-hearted cult hangs like a cobweb over the entire tale authored by none other than my Ex-Aunt, the infamous Rena Chynoweth.

The book is still in the public libraries, et Al; but sadly in need of a rewrite and updates. Recently I had the opportunity to meet one of my Uncle Ervil’s more than fifty children, the brilliant, gifted, and beautiful Gabriela LeBaron; on break from her classes at Cornell University.

She told me Rena had indeed taken in Uncle Ervil’s kids and raised them, chancing her own life and well-being while she helped them get out of Ervil’s cult and become good law-abiding citizens! Hats off to Rena!

This is a long story I hope Gabriela will eventually write. It is a story of great love, sacrifice, dedication, and redemption — especially on the part of Rena, her husband, and others who helped her, including the invaluable “nonprofit” group, “Discovery.” **

( INSERT: October 10, 2017: See, at the bottom of this essay, what I “discovered” about the “Discovery” Organization/Business: Then you be the judge. Some of my cousins vouch for what the “Discovery” group did for them. But it’s common to leave one cult, only to be taken in by another.)

Getting back to my Review of Rena’s Memoir written over thirty years ago, it seemed to me she bragged about and exploited the soldier part she played in this sad, sordid tale about her psychotic, serial-killer husband Ervil’s violent, brainwashed cult. At the same time, however, she ended her book with these positive words:

“I was given a ‘second chance.’ Maybe God wants to use me to reach those kids [Uncle Ervil’s children]. Because I’ve been through years of intensive self-deprogramming myself, I feel I can help them through my own experiences because I understand their very complicated background.

“They should also receive extensive professional help, guidance, and a chance to be around people who really care what happens to them. Simply putting the younger children in foster homes and hoping for the best is not the way to handle the situation.

“They will only run away and return to the lifestyle they always knew, breaking the law and posing a danger to people’s lives. They should not be allowed to grow to adulthood without being given a chance to learn proper values.

“These last remnants of Ervil LeBaron’s flock are still a risk to the rest of society. They are the last ones who may still feel bound by his blood covenant that has claimed so many innocent lives.

“They have grown up around violence and violent teachings, and there is grave danger they will pass these values on to their own children. I want the killing to stop. Only by finding those still out there and getting them the help they need can we stop the bloodshed.

“What John, my mother, and I envision is a ranch –- a place where these young people can live with family who loves them, where they can finally have the chance to go to school and church and be able to receive the counseling and guidance that will help them become assets to society.

“There are a few of us who are willing to do anything we can to give them a chance. If God is willing, and with His help, we shall succeed. If anyone has information that would help us reach out to the LeBaron children please contact … “

* Note: Rena left an address and phone number. But the resource was over thirty years old, so was likely outdated.

Furthermore, I had reservations as to how helpful Rena and her ranch would be to Ervil’s remnants, given the tone of her memoir.

But yesterday, April 5, 2016, I learned from my cousin Gabriela that Rena did indeed do a great service to society, and the remnants of Ervil’s children still left in his cult.

In fact, Gabriela said Rena and her cohorts are largely responsible for having brought to an end the devious and divisive cult Ervil LeBaron started! WOW! I pray that’s the case.

If so, I’m impressed with the present-day Rena. Because this means she not only remade herself: She used her personal awakening to help remake and save other unfortunate cult inductees born and raised in my Uncle Ervil’s bizarre and dangerous mafioso clan.

Rena’s old memoir, however, sounded to me like she had lots of deprogramming and repentance left to do, back then, before she could convince me she was no longer caught up in some of the abusive beliefs of “The Lambs of God” and it’s avenging angels.

 Based on Rena’s memoir, I couldn’t see how it would be helpful to sequester, on a secluded ranch, Uncle Ervil’s warped children who would then have none but Rena and the likes of her as role models.

Besides, her ranch idea sounded like another reclusive cult to me. I felt the best way to civilize warped and abused children was to fully immerse them in a much more healthy environment than the one they came from.

In other words, I didn’t think it would be beneficial for a messed up and confused band of cult and ex-cult members to be living together on a singular ranch with more of their own kind who’d also grown up in their backward, brainwashed, degenerate past.

It seemed to me, the best way to heal “damaged human goods” was to mix and mingle them with normal and better examples — strong people they could emulate and learn from — not some adults who still likely had a lifetime of healing left ahead of them before they fully emerged from their bloody, cult mindset; and the harm it left in its wake.

 To add to my apprehensions, In 2015, as I exited my car, a young man handed me a proselytizing pamphlet. Its doctrine and the image of a sword on the front told me it was material from Ervil’s Lambs of God — or an off-shoot thereof.

 My blood curdled to realize The Book Of Revelations and “avenging angels” literature was still being disseminated — and in my area, no less! It’s scary stuff; and sickening to know the cult of Ervilites still has its leaders … or splinter-groups.

I figure a take-off from Uncle Ervil’s cult was possibly indoctrinating some of Ervil’s progeny and old cult members. Or it was a new group, altogether, but using Ervil’s teachings; and trying to bring converts into its bloody cult under a new self-proclaimed prophet.

I would be very happy if Rena, et Al, did have a hand in ending my Uncle Ervil’s malevolent cult. Let’s pray that’s the case. But that Lit I was handed leaves me worried — though, according to Uncle Ervil LeBaron’s astute and beautiful daughter Gabriela, Ervil’s cult no longer exists!

Gabriela told me it was thanks to Ervil’s ex-wife Rena’s loving and devoted care of her ex-husband Ervil’s kids that she, Gabriela, was brought out of her father’s cult-cesspool she had grown up in.

Since then, Gabriela has become a new person, on her way to doing wonderful service to help make the world a better place! She’s a poet, artist, academic, leader, and more. I’m expecting great things from her in the future — in keeping with the things she is doing now by getting her college degree, etc.

That said, as per Rena’s old memoir “Blood Covenant,” penned over 30 years ago, it’s still a worthwhile read but desperately needs fact-checking! Also, she makes assumptions about a number of serious things that took place in Ervil’s life, as though she were an authority on the subjects. But her assumptions are based on uneducated and wishful thinking.

For example, she claims “Ervil had nothing to do with the JFK murder.” What does she really know about this? She wasn’t around Ervil or the cult in 1963. I was. Furthermore, she was only a small kid at that time.

Continuing with my criticisms, important parts of “The Blood Covenant” history were conveniently omitted. She wrote more about her girlish romantic escapades and her “middle class” self than anything — though  she and her family hardly fit the sociological definition of “middle class.”  “Lower-lower middle class”  or “working-class” was more like it.

The chronicle of her life as Ervil’s wife appeared to be largely an attempt to be in the limelight and cash in on the notoriety of her Ex-husband, Ervil LeBaron, so as to make money and be a star — albeit a notorious one.

Sadly, we were lucky to get three paragraphs about her cold-blooded murder of Dr. Rulon Allred. And the best apology she could come up with, as to the “Lambs of God” atrocities and murders was, “This did not need to happen.”

Here’s what Scott Anderson had to say: “In 1990, Rena published her autobiography, “The Blood Covenant.” The ghostwritten book is rather bizarre, a rewrite of “Perils of Penelope,” in which Penelope has a gun and knows how to use it.

Interspersed with gratuitous digs at her murdered sister, Lorna, and insistent claims to having been a “victim,” Rena offers long and clinically detailed accounts of her many brushes with oversexed male suitors.

The small matter of Rulon Allred’s murder is dealt with in a few paragraphs. In 1979, the baby-faced, eight-months-pregnant Rena had taken the witness stand to tearfully deny any role in the elderly man’s slaying. In her book, and with all the passion of a financial reporter, she admitted to being the killer.” (Author of “The 4 O’clock Murders”)

Suffice it to say, you may find Rena’s memoir worth a perusal, if only to see how a member of Ervil LeBaron’s self-appointed murder-for-God cult used to think.

But if you want to get a better handle on the real scary-scoop, read from start to finish, “The 4 O’clock Murders” by Scott Anderson. And “Prophet of Blood” by Ben Bradlee, Jr. and Dale Van Atta.

Note: These books may be he found at public libraries, bookstores, Amazon.com, and possibly on Kindle.

Note: Some entries in the above documentaries are not completely right. But hats off to these Author’s for doing as well as they did with a subject that was often next-to-impossible to get “the truth” about.

Since these books were published, there has been great change and progress in Uncle Ervil’s children and families: tales of redemption and examples of what’s possible in the human spirit, against all odds.

As an example, read Uncle Ervil’s daughter’s memoir published in 2017, “The Polygamist’s Daughter;” available in bookstores everywhere. You may also go to the “University” of YouTube to see her interviews; and check her website: AnnaLeBaron.com

Online, there’s much information on anyone or anything I mentioned in this blog. Check YouTube, Wikipedia, and other sites.

The following is an excellent video Documentary on my Uncle Ervil LeBaron and the LeBaron saga.

** 10/17/ 2017 — Look what I just found online regarding the Discovery training group I mentioned above. It’s well worth reading!:

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Dallas Discovery Cult Still Ruining Lives

Posted by: notmuch4games ()

Date: February 20, 2008 03:32AM

Howdy, all you straight shooters out there. There is another thread on this site detailing the creepy and controlling tactics of the Discovery Cult operating in the Dallas area, but a new year deserves a new thread.

I just got an email from a contact asking me if I still have Info on Discovery. I do! For those of you who have not read my previous posts, myself and some other straight shooters with family members swindled by D had quite a heated exchange with certain misguided cult-goers. They went on to easier targets no doubt. But my contact assures me that they have simply tried to slip back under the radar.

This group (cult) has an upsidedown view on family values. Put quite simply if your spouse attends Discovery “training” and you chose not to go, the Facilitators or TAs will tell them that you can’t be trusted with details of the training and that if they can’t convince you to attend then you don’t care about them, you will never understand them, and in the end they will have to break ties with you – But not to worry cause their NEW family cares about them and will fill the void where their family and friends once dwelled.

I’ll tell you the basic jist so you don’t have to be subjected to the verbal abuse and physical conditioning; ie, withholding of water, food, bathroom breaks, and personal space.

They will pressure your husband, wife, son, daughter, ect., to give members of the opposite sex “PEE-PEE to PEE-PEE” hugs (their term, not mine) and to not share with their “old” family the way that the facilitators verbally abuse and degrade each member of the group as their turn comes, breaking their spirit and reducing them to tears in a public setting for all to witness. They basically make them feel worthless for the first two days and then make nice and become their best friend on the last day.

The owner of this cult has no formal training in this dispicable form of therapy, nor any training — ANY therapy. This Cult is operated by a lawyer and a gas station owner. It’s all on the web, if you care to investigate.

If you are considering going to Discovery training of if someone you care about is thinking about going – INVESTIGATE! They will break them down and put their own twisted values back into the shell that once was your loved one.

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Re: Dallas Discovery Cult Still Ruining Lives

Posted by: straightup ()

Date: March 07, 2008 06:36AM

NM4Games- WELL SAID! You hit the nail on the head. You have been fed the same cult crap as the rest of us. I wish I had come here before I went to Discovery. You could have saved me much money and much more trouble.

Looks like you have their number. CREEPS!!! I’m still reeling from my experiance. I have lots of questions and a little insight. I’ll send you a message. Keep up the good work

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Re: Dallas Discovery Cult Still Ruining Lives

Posted by: Enviro_Cop ()

Date: May 27, 2008 09:26AM

Hey Straightup: What made you realize Discovery was a scam? You are lucky to get out with your mind still intact. They are still registered as Discovery Training Ministries LLC with the IRS, although they don’t include that info on their website.

EC

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Re: Dallas Discovery Cult Still Ruining Lives

Posted by: notmuch4games ()

Date: June 03, 2008 12:07AM

I’m still around, guys. As long as Discovery is robbing people of their hard-earned money, I’ll be here to tell what I know about them.

Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 06/03/2008 12:10AM by notmuch4games.

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Re: Dallas Discovery Cult Still Ruining Lives

Posted by: straightup ()

Date: June 03, 2008 05:34AM

EC, I have read your comments and the other comments by the creeps from Discovery. They are all so completely fooled by the mind games and BS being fed to them by Lowder and his ilk! I feel sorry for them. I feel sorry for me 🙂

I wasted a lot of money on that crap and I have more problems now than I did before. Actually, my old problems are probably small compared with the new issues I picked up at Discovery. I am practically broke after completing two “classes.” I was approached about helping to pay for another classmate’s tuition shortly after my first class. I had never seen the mean-spirited money-hungry side of the facilitators until I told them that I could barely afford to go to D2 myself.

They were completely different after they saw that I wasn’t going to sign my life away. I was willing to give everything (spiritually) that I had, but I think the money thing really pissed them off. At D2, they kept making references to selfishness and self-centeredness when I would come around. Now I can see them for what they are. A business! I wish I had seen this thread before I wasted my money. Has anyone ever sued a group like that and recouped their money?

At D2, they kept making references to selfishness and self-centeredness when I would come around. Now, I can see them for what they are. A business! I wish I had seen this thread before I wasted my money. Has anyone ever sued a group like that and recouped their money?

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Re: Dallas Discovery Cult Still Ruining Lives

Posted by: Enviro_Cop ()

Date: June 03, 2008 07:14AM

Notmuch4games, good to see you are still in the fight! I too will remain to educate people just how evil Discovery is.

Straightup, it is crazy how the people become total believers. I refused to contribute to D2 (financially), and it looked like my Ex would stop going but low and behold one of her new “family” came forward and paid for the entire weekend, including gas money! They sent her a lot of emails and cards trying to shame her into signing up for the next training. It was all about sending money to Discovery. But she couldn’t see that.

They sent her a lot of emails and cards trying to shame her into signing up for the next training. It was all about sending money to Discovery. But she couldn’t see that. I am glad you didn’t become one of those zombies!

There is an entity called the Texas State Board of Examiners of Psychologists (http://www.tsbep.state.tx.us.html). Here is their mission statement: “The mission of the Texas State Board of Examiners of Psychologists is to protect the public by ensuring that psychological services are provided to the people of Texas by qualified and competent practitioners who adhere to established professional standards.”

They exist to regulate the practice of psychology in the state of Texas. That also encompasses investigating people or companies practicing psychology without a license. I feel Discovery Training uses methods which could be considered practicing psychology.

A person can file a formal complaint against anyone who they feel is practicing psychology without a license. Maybe if enough people come forward the gas station owner and lawyer might get investigated?

EC

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/03/2008 07:40AM by Enviro_Cop.

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Re: Dallas Discovery Cult Still Ruining Lives

Posted by: notmuch4games ()

Date: June 06, 2008 12:50AM

I filed some paperwork, but I was advised that the lawyer that helps run this scam had all the language just true enough to not be fraudulent. Discovery works very hard at giving a legitimate, even benevolent appearance to the mental, emotional, and even physical abuse administered at the hands of it’s facilitators. Anyone who has had dealings know that this group is anything but legit. They brainwash their members, alienate them, and then squeeze all of the money they can out of them.

Anyone who has had dealings know that this group is anything but legit. They brainwash their members, alienate them, and then squeeze all of the money they can out of them.

I actually called the “Ewing Ranch” of Dallas fame where D holds it’s abuse siminars and spoke to the site manager. He was quite shocked at my claims about the D cult. He seemed unsure of the validity of my Info, so he gave me his email address and I sent him a condensed version of my file on Lowder and his cult.

I noticed that Discovery’s website now has them meeting at the Dallas Doubletree. Hope I did that! 😉 When I have time, I’ll speak to the GM at Doubletree too. I actually stay at that particular hotel when I’m on that side of town.

Straightup, hang in there. Your mind has had bogus and hairbrained ideas inserted into it by invasive methods. You will slowly start to regain the person who went to the brainwashing siminar. All of the old issues will still be there, but they are YOUR issues and YOU are the only with the solution. There is no GAS STATION OWNER, NO LAWYER, and no magic pill that will solve yours mine or anyone else’s problems. Discovery in Dallas is selling magic beans, and people are still buying the crap. STOP DISCOVERY CULT NOW! Keep your loved ones away from cults (LGAT, Discovery, etc.)

All of the old issues will still be there, but they are YOUR issues and YOU are the only with the solution. There is no GAS STATION OWNER, NO LAWYER, and no magic pill that will solve yours mine or anyone else’s problems. Discovery in Dallas is selling magic beans, and people are still buying the crap. STOP DISCOVERY CULT NOW! Keep your loved ones away from cults (LGAT, Discovery, etc.)

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Re: Dallas Discovery Cult Still Ruining Lives

Posted by: notmuch4games ()

Date: August 07, 2008 10:49PM

Hope everybody is staying away from Discovery and other cults out there. Just send me a message if anyone has questions about D. I am happy to tell what I know to anyone with an interest. Keep up the fight, guys. Maybe someday the authorities will “discover” what many of us already know: DISCOVERY IS A CULT AND IT DESTROYS FAMILIES FOR MONITARY GAIN. God bless!

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Re: Dallas Discovery Cult Still Ruining Lives

Posted by: done ()

Date: September 25, 2008 01:57PM

I really wish I had seen this forum before last weekend: My friend made me go.

I am definitely a “changed” woman! I’ve never been more depressed in my life. The sickest thing is, I am NOT one to be swayed by this kind of thing. Or at least I never thought I was….but on Sunday, I was all about this damn thing. Telling my friends to go and everything. It took a long, long discussion with one of my more rational friends to realize what had happened. This whole damn thing is sick, and I’m so angry about it. Is there anything we can do to stop it? I feel so used.

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Re: Dallas Discovery Cult Still Ruining Lives

Posted by: Harley21 ()

Date: October 07, 2008 12:53PM

I do not know anything of this cult but I do feel like giving some advice: Do not blame yourself. Always stay positive and hang out with that rational friend of yours. I believe that we can learn from ALL things good and bad……I bet this will make you a much stronger person in the long run. Be good to yourself and smile always.

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Review of My Aunt Rena Chynoweth’s “The Blood Covenant” This Memoir, written around thirty years ago, struck me as the work of an immature apologist and revisionist.

[alchemisland]

Moors Mutt - II

Prefer Wattpad?

Rising early, if rising it was and not merely stirring from a wakened restive state, I left the tavern in secret and walked a barren stretch. At pale dawn birds like Aztec idols flighted at my stirring. Cold light stained the pasture either side. Sleepshod, the road to Cairn Cottage found me quiet company. Even the tinkers were not yet to the road in their triskeled wagons.

The air was heavy with lavender. A pebbled stretch stirred a reverie of my late father and a codex of heroic tales he had purchased for me, whose chronicles of high adventure stirred me like nothing prior. At six years old, tales of old Arabia appealed most. Kingdoms wrought of sunstones stark against a tangerine haze, swirling tarot star ever-visible, scorpions armoured like chargers; the sheer cloying madness of it all. I visited them in dreams, jumped from the paths of unruly camels, watced the impenetrable waves humbly part in the wake of royal palanquins.

Their heroes were unlike our knights. More often sulky boys preferring quill to falchion. Brooding teenagehood made me relish the stranger entries, tales without lessons existing solely to unnerve, speaking on the bleak lives of Tartarian wizards.

Into adulthood, I came to enjoy Greek tales best of all. The tragedy of Ajax in his lover's plate leaking on the golden sand. Waves, caressing the moored fleet in passing, bursting against the shale where his pyre burned. Always when I hear crunching pebbles, I think of soldiers marching on the strand near Troy.

Before long, a trap could be heard from the middle distance, the first in a network of wagons due to arrive at Cairn Cottage to transport the priceless contents of Lady Sizemore’s library back to Sperrin, where they would be carefully parcelled and carried by train to the Royal Academy Library. I waited astride the ditch until the crude plume atop the horses head appeared like the mantle of some deposed pagan lord. Ixion's disc four times divided had been fixed to bear this chariot. Its heavy trundle ground debris to powder. I hailed the driver, a wind being, every strand of hair or cloth lank enough to lift stood disarrayed. A peak stole his brow but a smile waved me aboard.

The driver never spoke. There was a sense of grim penitence about all I had met thus far. Their lines of deep regret boldened every jowl and furrowed brow. Each bore the weight of his forebears in full. A place without time and silent, where happiness and sadness could last all of forever. So silent were they, matched only by monks in their solemnity, I christened this ham the abbodrice of Sperrin.

Inside chaos reigned. Lady Sizemore's estate was measured first in paper above coin. Hundreds, thousands, of jaundiced sheets all in disorder busied every surface. Before a single penny changed hands, a great many hours I spent hauling boxes, within which were more boxes where spiders large as potatoes spun temporary wonders above the invoices.

I wonder what effect prolonged tedium has. Such thoughts are entertained in avoidance of work as should never be given lucid credence. An entire day dedicated solely to translating letters in incomprehensible cursive, it felt ridiculous. My mind, perhaps reflecting its surroundings, felt dulled, unfocused. So long I stared, when I pried my eyes I found feint margins plastered across reality.

The previous night's visitations I had pondered, ultimately chalking to anxiety. Nothing substantially portentous. Unfortunately, another day I required before I indulged  cryptozooligcal fancies.

Darkness in ravenfeather arrived premature. I ran to the track where the last impatient husbandman sat in stasis. 'Bound for Sperrin?' I called, already halfway inside.

I arrived at Lar's fiercely humoured. Tired, thirsty and caked in mud golemlike, my gladness at journey's end was quickly consumed by the fury of indignity, having endured the return trip atop a sewagesucker's swine van. Lar tended bar. I wondered had he stirred in my absence. Anticipating a thirst, two mugs were set.

I dropped my satchel and enjoyed relief akin to weightlessness by contrast. We drained tankards like soon-to-war Saxons, spoke of weather, I asked had anyone noteworthy visited, mostly from politeness. When asked had the room served, I replied it had done so more than adequately. Again, politeness.

Not wishing to appear overeager, I spared him details of my dream. If the tale was relayed to me, I should say how convenient the very man hoping to find the beast would experience a vision. Besides, in the unlikely event we found a mangy badger after I'd described a prehistoric horror.. perish the thought.

'Do we depart tomorrow?' Lar grunted as he pretended to dust.

'Short delay as it happens. I'd have said from the door, only for the ale calling. Alas, labour remains. My charges lust for satisfaction. They are at Rome's gates! Distant cousins write in droves. By air, land and sea their letters come, squeezing through grates, shimmying down chimneys. Forget the beast, if they find me I'm dead.' I said, picking at a heel of bread.

'We sank tankards enough last night. I've seen plenty pale on the dizzy morning after the night before. If this delay is to spite me, let me allay concerns, I'm the man for this job. We're the men for this job.' Lar shot a glance at Fergus. A pale lance cleft his brow through the slitted shutters.

I looked to my empty cup then longingly at his selection. Lar fingered a bottle, but reached further back and took another instead.

'My god, man. Boil a pot and toss it down your trousers. No such notions occurred to me. We're expedition mates! I didn't make a dent in the work, really.' I raised a silencing finger to hear the ale splash. 'There you have it. Mystery solved. If the mystery of the beast is this easy, we're laughing.' I inhaled its aroma. 'Listen, chap. There's something else I wanted to talk about before we go. I mean to publish an expedition diary. A chronicle of our adventures. Part scientific tome, part roaring adventure book. Your pub will be the busiest spot in the weald after this. Would you object to such?'

Lar's measured tone returned. Careful as a tiptoeing sinner, he asked 'You good?'

I smiled. 'Only Ben Adhem saw the book, ask him.'

Lar stove the ashen helm crowning his cigarette, plunging the embers into the cold bronze bowl. 'At writing.'

'You should say! I tease, I tease. To answer your question, yes. Humbly, in my hand the pen is like the master mason's chisel, from whence grand cathedrals spring forth from their less divine constituent parts.' Lar was fumbling for his tobacco already and I thought what small use that vice would be in peril.

'I'm convinced.' Lar spoke quickly, stumbling over the words to get them out. I took no offence at his zeal to change the subject. 'Do you have a manuscript at hand?' he asked.

'Not with me, unfortunately.' He stifled a sigh of relief. 'Upon returning home one story heavier, I'll ensure you receive signed copies of every one. I'll sing them My favourite tub of Lar. Yours literately, Beastman. That way you'll know it's me.'

Lar's ale, a home brew, was a swift agent, promising to travel from your mouth to the toilet's in twenty minutes. I joked he might patent it for a medicine. Call it the Midas touch. Everything it touched turns to gold: toilet seat, floor, shoes if you weren't careful.

I spied Fergus. His thumb led a blunt edge across the ribbed bark of a sprig, from which he had carved two lidded eyes and a pursed mouth.

Lar lit a cigarette from the flared end of another, then discarded it on the ashen pyre.

Lar had to raise the hatch for me, which spoiled any hope of a dramatic exit. 'Departure two days hence, on the strict proviso no unpleasant libel suit comes once my story hits print. Rest assured, I'll include nothing untoward, but I reserve the right to artistic licence. Print the myth.'

'Libel is a city crime.' Anticipating my desire, Lar walked while he spoke. I mirrored and slipped through the open portcullis to sleep, perchance to scream.

*

Lying in bed, I wondered what to include in my chronicle; exciting details only, or every charged exchange? Nobody asked how the shipwright felt constructing thousands of ships without prior notice. They only wanted Achilles. The reader will concede, I have included much of the mundane.

Well-oiled, I slept easily. Set like a star I saw things from the blind past, dark present and murky future, useless without chronology, stifling their prophetic nature. The beast came again, shaking the ground where it trod.

*

Lar, blackbird that he was, rose early. He emerged from the fugue state that best pleased his constitution and stretched, his wingspan filling the alcove. He found me in my linen cell, bewhaled as Jonah.

'Terrible day.' He drew the shutters. Groggily, I pulled the sheets down over my face to the sight of Lar's stocky silhouette in the dirty light. Tapping a cigarette loose on the sill, he plonked one cheek on the ledge and struck a match. 'Anything you want from town? I'm going to get supplies. I should be away most of the day. There won't be a return trip before we go. Speak now or forever hold your peace.'

'Ambulo in pace.' I tapped my journal, 'I have everything.'

'Do you have a mac?' he asked. The rain beat down harder.

'No, we're English, some Irish. Although I heard tell that a distant branch traded their roses for thistle stalks.' I smirked.

Lar shuddered, ill-humoured before midday despite protestations he needed no proper rest. 'I mean a waterproof.'

'Oh give me credit. That's humour.'

'We in the smiling countryside call it idiocy. There's a time for revels. Unless you've been up all night, dawn isn't it.' he said somewhat angrily.

'I don't have one and I'd like a loan if that's what you're asking, thank you. I didn't sleep well now you mention it' I tossed my feet onto the cold ground and felt for a sock.

Lar watched the rain spilling in romantic sheets. 'You'll need an ark to get back. It's like a bog when it rains. No one will be able to get you. Not me, not the constabulary, nor anyone else. If the weather worsens, make sure you get back in time. Otherwise, everything will be closed until further boatice.'

'Boatice?' I said.

'Now that is humour. Rain, boats, further notice. Get it?' Lar left, more spritely than when he entered.

[jesusvasser]

An Epiphany in a Maserati GranTurismo Convertible Sport

In my career, while behind the steering wheels of automobiles of every type and color, I have experienced moments of joy too numerous to count. Usually I am alone, free to focus on the charisma of the machine and the splendor of the passing landscape as I think to myself, “This is why I love cars.”

There was the time I piloted a Lamborghini Aventador Roadster, roof off and cockpit open to the cobalt sky above, up Going-to-the-Sun Road in Montana’s Glacier National Park, the narrow two-lane wriggling against a perilous drop-off, snow-dusted mountains rising nearby and beyond, the V-12 behind me purring with muted power and primed—at the slightest touch of my right foot—to explode in mechanized fury. The week I spent driving a Dodge Challenger R/T through the American Southwest, just me and the Hemi V-8 and the rush of warm desert air as we discovered land-locked saltwater seas, endless dunes of pure white sand, and Trinity, the delivery room of the world’s first atomic bomb. The afternoon on California’s Highway 1 at the helm of Reeves Callaway’s open-cockpit C16 Speedster, fresh from its Concept Lawn debut at the 2007 Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance, me the first outsider to don one of the car’s two paint-matched Stand 21 helmets and take the 700-horsepower supercharged beast out for a romp, no windshield to filter the view, no motorist immune to the shock of spying the silver UFO with the exposed, helmeted alien fast approaching in the opposite lane.

All of those and more were joyous experiences, yes, but a slow burn, the kind of happiness you feel on a perfect afternoon at the beach or during an afternoon barbecue with friends and family, the steaks rare and the beers cold and the conversation warm-hearted.

But recently I drove a 2018 Maserati GranTurismo Convertible Sport. Although I cannot be certain why, I felt a shock of emotion I have felt on only a handful of occasions in my life, all of them 40 years ago. Call it what you will—bliss, rapture, an epiphany. One afternoon in the Maser, seemingly from out of nowhere, it struck me. It changed me, too.

The last time I experienced anything like it was back in college. During my sophomore year at the University of Michigan, I lived alone in a small top-floor dorm room overlooking one of the school’s sports fields with the main campus buildings beyond. I had a routine. With classes done for the day, I’d hit the dorm’s dining hall early, the better to avoid the dinner crowds and, more important, to catch the evening’s special lasagna before it congealed too much. Afterward, back in my room, I’d grind some fresh coffee beans (before the Starbucks invasion, only a few specialty stores in Ann Arbor sold them) and brew up a small carafe in my little Krups machine. Suitably energized, I’d don gloves and a down parka (it was always dark and always cold) and head back to campus for a walk in the crisp winter twilight. And on a few nights, whether it was the caffeine or the orange and ice-blue of the dusky sky or the etch of a crescent moon above or just being young and having everything in front of me, I’d feel, as I walked through the chill of the coming night, a wave of elation. Absolute peace. A contentment where I had no worries and noticed beauty all around me. I felt hard-wired to the earth, as if things were suddenly clear to me. It couldn’t last, of course, not with papers to write and exams to take and the responsibilities of adulthood soon to shoulder. But in those few precious moments on those rare winter evenings, I felt … bliss.

The car is as “digital” as an anvil. That is not a criticism. the GranTurismo’s analog essence comes through to your fingertips unfiltered and unapologetic.

the Fiat Chrysler-sourced 8.4-inch color touchscreen). The 4.7-liter naturally aspirated V-8, making 454 horsepower at 7,000 rpm, is based on the engine used in the Ferrari 360 Modena—from 1999! The gearbox is not a cutting-edge dual-clutch design but rather a gentrified six-speed automatic (it does have shift paddles, though). As if to drive home the “timelessness” of this $165,000 ragtop, to start the engine you actually have to twist a key in the ignition. To anyone who has grown up believing smartphones have always existed, the GranTurismo will seem as primordial as a Tyrannosaurus rex.

Dated, perhaps, but this sensuous Maserati is expressive and thrilling in ways that far faster, far more modern sporting automobiles simply aren’t. The car is as “digital” as an anvil. That is not a criticism. Instead, the GranTurismo’s analog essence comes through to your fingertips unfiltered and unapologetic. (The steering isn’t even electronically boosted.) The V-8, unmuted by turbos, simply howls with passion and power. Just listening to the Ferrari-sourced powerhouse for a half-hour could lift the pall from the worst of bad days.

I spent a memorable afternoon hurling the GranTurismo around my favorite mountain two-lanes in Malibu, the top folded away, the exhaust playing a 32-valve aria as I flipped the shift paddles up and down through the gearbox. For an old chassis, the GranTurismo proved remarkably solid and quiver-free—especially given the lack of a roof structure. It even sticks well, charging hard through corners despite its touring nature and 4,300 pounds. This is sports car driving the way it used to be, with no sense that computers are doing much of the work for you, the connection between you and the machine palpable and enchanting.

And then it happened. I was driving home along Pacific Coast Highway, the sun warm on my face, the ocean to my right sparkling green and blue and breaking gently on the shore. The Maserati’s V-8 was alive with the chorus of whirling valves and cams and rods, the radio playing one perfect tune after the other—Springsteen, Seger, the Stones, Warren Zevon. I expected nothing more than to savor my good fortune at being able to drive this car in the here and now. But suddenly, as if a spigot had opened inside me, I felt flooded by a euphoria I hadn’t felt since those long-ago moments out amid the Michigan winter dusk. Briefly, intensely, everything was right and at peace and I had not a care in the world. I had no thoughts of bills or deadlines or the world’s injustices or all the things I’d done wrong up to now. Once again I felt that accord with the earth, as if I understood without knowing what or why. I was so overcome I almost pulled over, but instead I kept driving, hoping the feeling would continue. It did.

When I got home, before I’d uttered a word, my wife and daughter said almost in unison, “You look different.” They could see it, and I was. In a beautiful car, I’d felt that elusive bliss I’d thought lost to a moment in time. And now I could hope that someday, if I were lucky, it might come again.

IFTTT

[jonathanbelloblog]

An Epiphany in a Maserati GranTurismo Convertible Sport

In my career, while behind the steering wheels of automobiles of every type and color, I have experienced moments of joy too numerous to count. Usually I am alone, free to focus on the charisma of the machine and the splendor of the passing landscape as I think to myself, “This is why I love cars.”

There was the time I piloted a Lamborghini Aventador Roadster, roof off and cockpit open to the cobalt sky above, up Going-to-the-Sun Road in Montana’s Glacier National Park, the narrow two-lane wriggling against a perilous drop-off, snow-dusted mountains rising nearby and beyond, the V-12 behind me purring with muted power and primed—at the slightest touch of my right foot—to explode in mechanized fury. The week I spent driving a Dodge Challenger R/T through the American Southwest, just me and the Hemi V-8 and the rush of warm desert air as we discovered land-locked saltwater seas, endless dunes of pure white sand, and Trinity, the delivery room of the world’s first atomic bomb. The afternoon on California’s Highway 1 at the helm of Reeves Callaway’s open-cockpit C16 Speedster, fresh from its Concept Lawn debut at the 2007 Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance, me the first outsider to don one of the car’s two paint-matched Stand 21 helmets and take the 700-horsepower supercharged beast out for a romp, no windshield to filter the view, no motorist immune to the shock of spying the silver UFO with the exposed, helmeted alien fast approaching in the opposite lane.

All of those and more were joyous experiences, yes, but a slow burn, the kind of happiness you feel on a perfect afternoon at the beach or during an afternoon barbecue with friends and family, the steaks rare and the beers cold and the conversation warm-hearted.

But recently I drove a 2018 Maserati GranTurismo Convertible Sport. Although I cannot be certain why, I felt a shock of emotion I have felt on only a handful of occasions in my life, all of them 40 years ago. Call it what you will—bliss, rapture, an epiphany. One afternoon in the Maser, seemingly from out of nowhere, it struck me. It changed me, too.

The last time I experienced anything like it was back in college. During my sophomore year at the University of Michigan, I lived alone in a small top-floor dorm room overlooking one of the school’s sports fields with the main campus buildings beyond. I had a routine. With classes done for the day, I’d hit the dorm’s dining hall early, the better to avoid the dinner crowds and, more important, to catch the evening’s special lasagna before it congealed too much. Afterward, back in my room, I’d grind some fresh coffee beans (before the Starbucks invasion, only a few specialty stores in Ann Arbor sold them) and brew up a small carafe in my little Krups machine. Suitably energized, I’d don gloves and a down parka (it was always dark and always cold) and head back to campus for a walk in the crisp winter twilight. And on a few nights, whether it was the caffeine or the orange and ice-blue of the dusky sky or the etch of a crescent moon above or just being young and having everything in front of me, I’d feel, as I walked through the chill of the coming night, a wave of elation. Absolute peace. A contentment where I had no worries and noticed beauty all around me. I felt hard-wired to the earth, as if things were suddenly clear to me. It couldn’t last, of course, not with papers to write and exams to take and the responsibilities of adulthood soon to shoulder. But in those few precious moments on those rare winter evenings, I felt … bliss.

The car is as “digital” as an anvil. That is not a criticism. the GranTurismo’s analog essence comes through to your fingertips unfiltered and unapologetic.

the Fiat Chrysler-sourced 8.4-inch color touchscreen). The 4.7-liter naturally aspirated V-8, making 454 horsepower at 7,000 rpm, is based on the engine used in the Ferrari 360 Modena—from 1999! The gearbox is not a cutting-edge dual-clutch design but rather a gentrified six-speed automatic (it does have shift paddles, though). As if to drive home the “timelessness” of this $165,000 ragtop, to start the engine you actually have to twist a key in the ignition. To anyone who has grown up believing smartphones have always existed, the GranTurismo will seem as primordial as a Tyrannosaurus rex.

Dated, perhaps, but this sensuous Maserati is expressive and thrilling in ways that far faster, far more modern sporting automobiles simply aren’t. The car is as “digital” as an anvil. That is not a criticism. Instead, the GranTurismo’s analog essence comes through to your fingertips unfiltered and unapologetic. (The steering isn’t even electronically boosted.) The V-8, unmuted by turbos, simply howls with passion and power. Just listening to the Ferrari-sourced powerhouse for a half-hour could lift the pall from the worst of bad days.

I spent a memorable afternoon hurling the GranTurismo around my favorite mountain two-lanes in Malibu, the top folded away, the exhaust playing a 32-valve aria as I flipped the shift paddles up and down through the gearbox. For an old chassis, the GranTurismo proved remarkably solid and quiver-free—especially given the lack of a roof structure. It even sticks well, charging hard through corners despite its touring nature and 4,300 pounds. This is sports car driving the way it used to be, with no sense that computers are doing much of the work for you, the connection between you and the machine palpable and enchanting.

And then it happened. I was driving home along Pacific Coast Highway, the sun warm on my face, the ocean to my right sparkling green and blue and breaking gently on the shore. The Maserati’s V-8 was alive with the chorus of whirling valves and cams and rods, the radio playing one perfect tune after the other—Springsteen, Seger, the Stones, Warren Zevon. I expected nothing more than to savor my good fortune at being able to drive this car in the here and now. But suddenly, as if a spigot had opened inside me, I felt flooded by a euphoria I hadn’t felt since those long-ago moments out amid the Michigan winter dusk. Briefly, intensely, everything was right and at peace and I had not a care in the world. I had no thoughts of bills or deadlines or the world’s injustices or all the things I’d done wrong up to now. Once again I felt that accord with the earth, as if I understood without knowing what or why. I was so overcome I almost pulled over, but instead I kept driving, hoping the feeling would continue. It did.

When I got home, before I’d uttered a word, my wife and daughter said almost in unison, “You look different.” They could see it, and I was. In a beautiful car, I’d felt that elusive bliss I’d thought lost to a moment in time. And now I could hope that someday, if I were lucky, it might come again.

IFTTT

[eddiejpoplar]

An Epiphany in a Maserati GranTurismo Convertible Sport

In my career, while behind the steering wheels of automobiles of every type and color, I have experienced moments of joy too numerous to count. Usually I am alone, free to focus on the charisma of the machine and the splendor of the passing landscape as I think to myself, “This is why I love cars.”

There was the time I piloted a Lamborghini Aventador Roadster, roof off and cockpit open to the cobalt sky above, up Going-to-the-Sun Road in Montana’s Glacier National Park, the narrow two-lane wriggling against a perilous drop-off, snow-dusted mountains rising nearby and beyond, the V-12 behind me purring with muted power and primed—at the slightest touch of my right foot—to explode in mechanized fury. The week I spent driving a Dodge Challenger R/T through the American Southwest, just me and the Hemi V-8 and the rush of warm desert air as we discovered land-locked saltwater seas, endless dunes of pure white sand, and Trinity, the delivery room of the world’s first atomic bomb. The afternoon on California’s Highway 1 at the helm of Reeves Callaway’s open-cockpit C16 Speedster, fresh from its Concept Lawn debut at the 2007 Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance, me the first outsider to don one of the car’s two paint-matched Stand 21 helmets and take the 700-horsepower supercharged beast out for a romp, no windshield to filter the view, no motorist immune to the shock of spying the silver UFO with the exposed, helmeted alien fast approaching in the opposite lane.

All of those and more were joyous experiences, yes, but a slow burn, the kind of happiness you feel on a perfect afternoon at the beach or during an afternoon barbecue with friends and family, the steaks rare and the beers cold and the conversation warm-hearted.

But recently I drove a 2018 Maserati GranTurismo Convertible Sport. Although I cannot be certain why, I felt a shock of emotion I have felt on only a handful of occasions in my life, all of them 40 years ago. Call it what you will—bliss, rapture, an epiphany. One afternoon in the Maser, seemingly from out of nowhere, it struck me. It changed me, too.

The last time I experienced anything like it was back in college. During my sophomore year at the University of Michigan, I lived alone in a small top-floor dorm room overlooking one of the school’s sports fields with the main campus buildings beyond. I had a routine. With classes done for the day, I’d hit the dorm’s dining hall early, the better to avoid the dinner crowds and, more important, to catch the evening’s special lasagna before it congealed too much. Afterward, back in my room, I’d grind some fresh coffee beans (before the Starbucks invasion, only a few specialty stores in Ann Arbor sold them) and brew up a small carafe in my little Krups machine. Suitably energized, I’d don gloves and a down parka (it was always dark and always cold) and head back to campus for a walk in the crisp winter twilight. And on a few nights, whether it was the caffeine or the orange and ice-blue of the dusky sky or the etch of a crescent moon above or just being young and having everything in front of me, I’d feel, as I walked through the chill of the coming night, a wave of elation. Absolute peace. A contentment where I had no worries and noticed beauty all around me. I felt hard-wired to the earth, as if things were suddenly clear to me. It couldn’t last, of course, not with papers to write and exams to take and the responsibilities of adulthood soon to shoulder. But in those few precious moments on those rare winter evenings, I felt … bliss.

The car is as “digital” as an anvil. That is not a criticism. the GranTurismo’s analog essence comes through to your fingertips unfiltered and unapologetic.

the Fiat Chrysler-sourced 8.4-inch color touchscreen). The 4.7-liter naturally aspirated V-8, making 454 horsepower at 7,000 rpm, is based on the engine used in the Ferrari 360 Modena—from 1999! The gearbox is not a cutting-edge dual-clutch design but rather a gentrified six-speed automatic (it does have shift paddles, though). As if to drive home the “timelessness” of this $165,000 ragtop, to start the engine you actually have to twist a key in the ignition. To anyone who has grown up believing smartphones have always existed, the GranTurismo will seem as primordial as a Tyrannosaurus rex.

Dated, perhaps, but this sensuous Maserati is expressive and thrilling in ways that far faster, far more modern sporting automobiles simply aren’t. The car is as “digital” as an anvil. That is not a criticism. Instead, the GranTurismo’s analog essence comes through to your fingertips unfiltered and unapologetic. (The steering isn’t even electronically boosted.) The V-8, unmuted by turbos, simply howls with passion and power. Just listening to the Ferrari-sourced powerhouse for a half-hour could lift the pall from the worst of bad days.

I spent a memorable afternoon hurling the GranTurismo around my favorite mountain two-lanes in Malibu, the top folded away, the exhaust playing a 32-valve aria as I flipped the shift paddles up and down through the gearbox. For an old chassis, the GranTurismo proved remarkably solid and quiver-free—especially given the lack of a roof structure. It even sticks well, charging hard through corners despite its touring nature and 4,300 pounds. This is sports car driving the way it used to be, with no sense that computers are doing much of the work for you, the connection between you and the machine palpable and enchanting.

And then it happened. I was driving home along Pacific Coast Highway, the sun warm on my face, the ocean to my right sparkling green and blue and breaking gently on the shore. The Maserati’s V-8 was alive with the chorus of whirling valves and cams and rods, the radio playing one perfect tune after the other—Springsteen, Seger, the Stones, Warren Zevon. I expected nothing more than to savor my good fortune at being able to drive this car in the here and now. But suddenly, as if a spigot had opened inside me, I felt flooded by a euphoria I hadn’t felt since those long-ago moments out amid the Michigan winter dusk. Briefly, intensely, everything was right and at peace and I had not a care in the world. I had no thoughts of bills or deadlines or the world’s injustices or all the things I’d done wrong up to now. Once again I felt that accord with the earth, as if I understood without knowing what or why. I was so overcome I almost pulled over, but instead I kept driving, hoping the feeling would continue. It did.

When I got home, before I’d uttered a word, my wife and daughter said almost in unison, “You look different.” They could see it, and I was. In a beautiful car, I’d felt that elusive bliss I’d thought lost to a moment in time. And now I could hope that someday, if I were lucky, it might come again.

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[jonathanbelloblog]

An Epiphany in a Maserati GranTurismo Convertible Sport

In my career, while behind the steering wheels of automobiles of every type and color, I have experienced moments of joy too numerous to count. Usually I am alone, free to focus on the charisma of the machine and the splendor of the passing landscape as I think to myself, “This is why I love cars.”

There was the time I piloted a Lamborghini Aventador Roadster, roof off and cockpit open to the cobalt sky above, up Going-to-the-Sun Road in Montana’s Glacier National Park, the narrow two-lane wriggling against a perilous drop-off, snow-dusted mountains rising nearby and beyond, the V-12 behind me purring with muted power and primed—at the slightest touch of my right foot—to explode in mechanized fury. The week I spent driving a Dodge Challenger R/T through the American Southwest, just me and the Hemi V-8 and the rush of warm desert air as we discovered land-locked saltwater seas, endless dunes of pure white sand, and Trinity, the delivery room of the world’s first atomic bomb. The afternoon on California’s Highway 1 at the helm of Reeves Callaway’s open-cockpit C16 Speedster, fresh from its Concept Lawn debut at the 2007 Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance, me the first outsider to don one of the car’s two paint-matched Stand 21 helmets and take the 700-horsepower supercharged beast out for a romp, no windshield to filter the view, no motorist immune to the shock of spying the silver UFO with the exposed, helmeted alien fast approaching in the opposite lane.

All of those and more were joyous experiences, yes, but a slow burn, the kind of happiness you feel on a perfect afternoon at the beach or during an afternoon barbecue with friends and family, the steaks rare and the beers cold and the conversation warm-hearted.

But recently I drove a 2018 Maserati GranTurismo Convertible Sport. Although I cannot be certain why, I felt a shock of emotion I have felt on only a handful of occasions in my life, all of them 40 years ago. Call it what you will—bliss, rapture, an epiphany. One afternoon in the Maser, seemingly from out of nowhere, it struck me. It changed me, too.

The last time I experienced anything like it was back in college. During my sophomore year at the University of Michigan, I lived alone in a small top-floor dorm room overlooking one of the school’s sports fields with the main campus buildings beyond. I had a routine. With classes done for the day, I’d hit the dorm’s dining hall early, the better to avoid the dinner crowds and, more important, to catch the evening’s special lasagna before it congealed too much. Afterward, back in my room, I’d grind some fresh coffee beans (before the Starbucks invasion, only a few specialty stores in Ann Arbor sold them) and brew up a small carafe in my little Krups machine. Suitably energized, I’d don gloves and a down parka (it was always dark and always cold) and head back to campus for a walk in the crisp winter twilight. And on a few nights, whether it was the caffeine or the orange and ice-blue of the dusky sky or the etch of a crescent moon above or just being young and having everything in front of me, I’d feel, as I walked through the chill of the coming night, a wave of elation. Absolute peace. A contentment where I had no worries and noticed beauty all around me. I felt hard-wired to the earth, as if things were suddenly clear to me. It couldn’t last, of course, not with papers to write and exams to take and the responsibilities of adulthood soon to shoulder. But in those few precious moments on those rare winter evenings, I felt … bliss.

The car is as “digital” as an anvil. That is not a criticism. the GranTurismo’s analog essence comes through to your fingertips unfiltered and unapologetic.

the Fiat Chrysler-sourced 8.4-inch color touchscreen). The 4.7-liter naturally aspirated V-8, making 454 horsepower at 7,000 rpm, is based on the engine used in the Ferrari 360 Modena—from 1999! The gearbox is not a cutting-edge dual-clutch design but rather a gentrified six-speed automatic (it does have shift paddles, though). As if to drive home the “timelessness” of this $165,000 ragtop, to start the engine you actually have to twist a key in the ignition. To anyone who has grown up believing smartphones have always existed, the GranTurismo will seem as primordial as a Tyrannosaurus rex.

Dated, perhaps, but this sensuous Maserati is expressive and thrilling in ways that far faster, far more modern sporting automobiles simply aren’t. The car is as “digital” as an anvil. That is not a criticism. Instead, the GranTurismo’s analog essence comes through to your fingertips unfiltered and unapologetic. (The steering isn’t even electronically boosted.) The V-8, unmuted by turbos, simply howls with passion and power. Just listening to the Ferrari-sourced powerhouse for a half-hour could lift the pall from the worst of bad days.

I spent a memorable afternoon hurling the GranTurismo around my favorite mountain two-lanes in Malibu, the top folded away, the exhaust playing a 32-valve aria as I flipped the shift paddles up and down through the gearbox. For an old chassis, the GranTurismo proved remarkably solid and quiver-free—especially given the lack of a roof structure. It even sticks well, charging hard through corners despite its touring nature and 4,300 pounds. This is sports car driving the way it used to be, with no sense that computers are doing much of the work for you, the connection between you and the machine palpable and enchanting.

And then it happened. I was driving home along Pacific Coast Highway, the sun warm on my face, the ocean to my right sparkling green and blue and breaking gently on the shore. The Maserati’s V-8 was alive with the chorus of whirling valves and cams and rods, the radio playing one perfect tune after the other—Springsteen, Seger, the Stones, Warren Zevon. I expected nothing more than to savor my good fortune at being able to drive this car in the here and now. But suddenly, as if a spigot had opened inside me, I felt flooded by a euphoria I hadn’t felt since those long-ago moments out amid the Michigan winter dusk. Briefly, intensely, everything was right and at peace and I had not a care in the world. I had no thoughts of bills or deadlines or the world’s injustices or all the things I’d done wrong up to now. Once again I felt that accord with the earth, as if I understood without knowing what or why. I was so overcome I almost pulled over, but instead I kept driving, hoping the feeling would continue. It did.

When I got home, before I’d uttered a word, my wife and daughter said almost in unison, “You look different.” They could see it, and I was. In a beautiful car, I’d felt that elusive bliss I’d thought lost to a moment in time. And now I could hope that someday, if I were lucky, it might come again.

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